Woman's Hour - Weekend Woman's Hour: Toni Collette, Adults regressing, The Archers special

Episode Date: January 3, 2026

Since her big break in Muriel’s Wedding 30 years ago, actor Toni Collette has graced our screens in a huge list of standout roles from The Sixth Sense to Hereditary, Little Miss Sunshine to Mickey 17. She joined Kylie Pentelow to discuss her latest film, Goodbye June. The emotional directorial debut from Kate Winslet tackles themes of love, loss and Christmas as a fractious family come together to sit vigil for the family matriarch, played by Helen Mirren.From the very beginning of the NHS in 1948, Irish women were actively recruited to staff British hospitals. By the 1960s, there were around 30,000 Irish-born nurses - making up roughly one in eight of all nurses – yet their contribution has often gone unrecognised. A new book aims to change that. Based on dozens of interviews, it tells the story of Irish nurses in their own words. We hear from co-author of Irish Nurses in the NHS: An Oral History, Professor Louise Ryan, who spent years researching Irish migration and from Ethel Corduff, who came to England to train as a nurse, a career she spent 40 years in.Relative Energy Deficiency in Sport, or RED-S as it's known, was once framed as a concern only for elite athletes. But as running culture intensifies alongside weight-loss jabs and healthy eating trends, RED-S has become more widespread. It's often hard to spot, but the long-term consequences can be devastating, impacting immune function, growth and fertility. Sports dietitian Renee McGregor and Jodie Pearlman, who experienced the condition first hand, joined Kylie to talk about the condition.Why can adults seem to regress to childhood or teenage behaviours at Christmas? We discuss family dynamics and the kinds of behaviour that can re-surface with everyone under the same roof again. Guardian columnist Elle Hunt shares her own experience alongside Woman's Hour listeners, and psychotherapist Julia Samuel offers advice.It's 75 years since The Archers first launched. Woman's Hour broadcast from Ambridge to celebrate the female characters who have helped this programme tackle some of the most challenging, contentious and sensitive issues affecting women. Nuala McGovern joined Felicity Finch, who plays Ruth Archer, for a behind-the-scenes tour, along with Technical Producer Vanessa Nuttall.Presenter: Kylie Pentelow Producer: Annette Wells

Hello, this is Kylie Pentelow, and you're listening to The Woman's Hour podcast. Hello and welcome to the programme. Coming up, actor Tony Collette on her new emotional film about the death of a parent, Good by June, directed by Kate Winslet. Also, a new book documenting Irish nurses in the NHS. Plus, welcoming your adult children home during the holidays. Was it happy families, or did you or they return to those family dynamics of childhood and teenagers? years. And we mark 75 years of The Archers by celebrating its female characters who've helped tackle some of its most challenging, contentious and sensitive storylines. Lots to get through, so let's get started. Now, since her big break in Muriel's wedding, now three decades ago, the actor Tony Collette

has become a familiar face in many standout films and TV roles, from The Sixth Sense and Hereditary to Little Miss Sunshine and more recently, Mickey's 17. If you found time to watch a festive film or two over the last couple of weeks, you may have come across Tony's latest project, Goodbye June, the star-studded, an emotional directorial debut from Kate Winslet. It was written by Kate's son, Joe Anders, and inspired by the death of Kate's mum, his grandmother.

The film tackles themes of love, loss and Christmas, as a fractious family come together to sit vigil for the family matriarch, played by Helen Mirren. Tony plays one of her children, the spiritual sister Helen, who rushes home from abroad with crystals in her bra and affirmations in her headphones. As the family descend to put their differences aside and give their mum a fitting send-off. Her siblings are played by Andrea Reisborough, Johnny Flynn and Kate Winslet, alongside Timothy Spall as their dad. Well, I got to speak to Taney recently

about her experience of making good by June. And we started with how she feels about putting such a tearjerker out into the world at this time of year. There's so much pressure on Christmas to be this joyous family time. And it is. It actually is still that in the film.

But I can understand that people would potentially slightly balk at the idea because some of it's intense. It's heavy. It's about loss. It is about grief. But it is so life-affirming and so uplifting and heartwarming. And it's about family coming back together after being fragmented

and those connections strengthening. And I think it's quite a healthy kind of healing film and kind of like an ideal way of saying goodbye to someone to celebrate their life, to give them the most, you know, Helen Mirren's character, Helen plays our mum June. And she loves Christmas. And she's sent off in the most beautiful. way. It's got a pretty dysfunctional family at the centre of it. Beautifully chaotic, yeah.

Four siblings. I'm one of four so I can very much identify with some of the themes. How is that for you working as one of those siblings and Kate Winslet being another? It was a total gift and the experience kind of felt magical. Look, they're all, yeah, adult children coming back together, their lives are kind of fragmented, they're disjointed and disconnected and have some petty issues with each other, some larger issues with each other, and mum, before she leaves, very cleverly helps them kind of come back to really seeing things clearly and gets them to kind of build a bridge and mend things so that it truly is like a time of peace and not full of all these grievances and disgruntled crap. And I guess when someone's dying, your priorities get sorted out pretty

quickly. It's the great kind of equalizer or neutraliser. It just kind of puts things in their place and they're able to move beyond things they've been holding on to for years. And Kate Winslet directed it and she said that she assembled her dream cast for this film. You mentioned Hallamirin, Timothy Spall, who is amazing in this as your parents. He really is. They both are amazing. Everyone's amazing. Andrea Reisbrough and Johnny Flynn play the other siblings. And obviously Kate, oh, look, I was blown away when she asked me. to do it. I was on a holiday in Italy. I was in a public place eating and I got a call from

her saying, I mean, I've talked about it for so long about wanting to work with Kate. She was really at the top of my list. So when I got this call, not only about working with her as an actor, but as it's such a big deal to make your directorial debut and then to be chosen to be a part of that, I put a napkin over my face and cried because I was so overwhelmed with joy. usually meetings take, they can take up to a month to get on the phone with someone or Zoom somebody. I spoke to her two days later and I always just felt like I kind of knew her. And weirdly, when we did work together and get to know each other, we do feel very sisterly. It just felt immediate.

She's so articulate and obviously had such a handle on the story. Her son Jo wrote this when he was 19 as an exercise for a screenwriting. So she said, you should read it first because I was like, I don't even care, I'll do it. I want to just be, I'd be a flying a wall. I don't care about it. But when I did read the script, I couldn't wait to do it. What did you make of your character then? Because Helen is kind of a bit woo-woo, isn't she?

A bit spiritual. She kind of brings a little element of fun to it, doesn't she? She's got her crystals, her drum. Did you enjoy bringing that character to life? It looked like you did. Absolutely. My character is the eldest child. And I think there's that thing as the eldest child when other kids start popping out.

The focus shifts, right? So your parents are obviously still there. for you, but there's a kind of sense of being jilted, like a little bit of an abandonment issue going on. And I think her life has just been this kind of, she's one of those journeying people constantly seeking to kind of fix herself or better herself or connect with something where she feels safe. And so I think her gravitation towards that alternative kind of lifestyle stems from that, looking to find some wholeness in her life. However, what Kate didn't know, I'm into all that stuff.

So at first I was like, why is everyone laughing at me? And then I realised, oh, I'm the comic relief. And they're making fun of the stuff that really matters to me. But I get to be the kind of life raft. There are some really heavy moments. And then as an audience member, you need to kind of land somewhere and breathe for a minute before you continue. And it's kind of an honour to be in that position.

When we meet your character, she's pregnant, and the film really cleverly explores how often those themes of birth and death seem to go together in life. there are some really poignant moments when your character and your mother kind of realise that she won't get to meet her grandchild it's really upsetting there were really key

kind of emotional moments to that film that so many people can relate to I think it affects all of us I remember when I had my kids I had this really profound understanding of being part of nature and the cycle of existence it was really like it came

to me, and some things I think you have to go through in order to really understand them. You can talk to somebody, you can read about it, you can do all the research you want, but it's actually something that you have to experience. And maybe part of the joy of the movie is about the kids, and the fact that my character has a baby coming somehow provides a lot of hope and distills that idea of the entrance in the exit and the cycle of what we experience here on our beautiful planet. Yeah, the scenes with Eleanor.

incredible. There's some moments in the film where she's on her own. They break my heart. Yeah. Because she holds it together. She's so stoic and she so loves her family. She has poured her entire life into her family. And the moments where she's completely still,

mostly kind of lying on her side in her bed in a hospital ward, looking out the window and you see what it's really doing to her and what she's facing. It's totally heartbreaking. When I watched it, I probably spent about an hour afterwards crying. because, you know, like so many people I've experienced the loss of a parent and interestingly I was watching it with my husband and he was crying as well

and it did make us kind of connect in that moment and think about what we've both been through but the film kind of does come with a bit of a warning that it does really hit home in a big way, yeah. Definitely have a hanky or tissues at the premiere we all had a hanky on our seat. I'm in the movie. I know what's happening. I've seen it before.

There was not one dry bit of the hanky at the end. I was kind of convulsing with like trying to hold the emotion in. There's this notion of certain emotions not being acceptable or that they're bad. Emotions are energy helping you understand what works and what doesn't and how to process your existence. It's okay to have those feelings. I haven't lost a parent yet and I dread it. I have obviously experienced grief of people who are very, very important to me, who I love very much. It's part. of life, and I think the sooner we can embrace it rather than ignore it, the more we can enjoy what we have, rather than it being tainted by the shadow side of it.

Lots of our listeners will have first seen you in Muriel's Wedding. I cannot believe that came out three decades ago. Yeah, it was crazy. It still means a lot, doesn't it, that film to so many people. How do you feel about it? It means a lot to me. It completely changed my life. I mean, I didn't think I'd have a career. I'd done one film before that, and I'd done some theatre, I went to drama school. Sometimes you can tell when something's going to have, you know, a certain kind of response. I can anyway. It's only happened a handful of times. I didn't know then because I didn't even know myself really well. I was probably more like Muriel than you would understand,

well, that I could understand. But yeah, it changed, not to change my life, it kind of created a whole new life for me. So I will be forever indebted and forever very, very grateful for that beautiful story as well. You know, it's an incredible story. A girl escaping an abusive life and changing her family story because she's the one brave enough to face it. That was Tony Collette there and her new film Goodbye June is available to watch on Netflix now. Now from the very beginning of the NHS in 1948, Irish women were actively recruited to staff British hospitals By the 1960s, around 30,000 Irish-born nurses were working across the service, making up roughly one in eight of all nurses. Many left home in their teens, trained here, worked long hours on the wards and built lives in Britain, yet their contribution has often gone unrecognised.

Well, a new book aims to change that. Based on dozens of interviews, it tells the story of Irish nurses in their own words. from the discipline of hospital training to life outside work, dance halls, friendships, homesickness and making a new life in England. Claire was joined by Professor Louise Ryan, who has spent years researching Irish migration and co-authored the book, and Ethel Cauduff, who grew up in Tralee before coming to England to train as a nurse, a career she spent 40 years in.

She began by asking Louise how the nurses were recruited in the first place. It was a very targeted campaign because there was an urgent need to staff hospitals. So the NHS was placing advertisements in newspapers, not just national newspapers, but provincial papers throughout the length and breadth of the country. And members of staff were travelling over to Ireland to conduct interviews, often in hotels, in towns across the country. And this was a way of really reaching out into rural Ireland to recover. recruit tens of thousands of teenagers, and so they were not qualified nurses. They were school

leavers who were coming here to train as nurses, so they were coming as student nurses. And it was the beginning of a wonderful career for many of them. Ethel, how did you first come upon the idea of being a nurse over here? I had left school at 15, and I had worked as a shop assistant in about four different jobs in Dublin, in Trilly, in Killarney. And the last job I was in, I was going to ask for an extra pound a week. And did they give it to you? No. Okay.

He wouldn't give it. Even though he said I'd increased his business by 50%. So that made you think. It made me think. It was like a light bulb moment, really. And how did you make the connection with, did you see an advert? What happened? Well, everybody I knew was going nursing.

at that time. So I went out, it was just an overnight decision, went out in both the universe, and there were two advertisements in it. And one was for Stoke-on-Trent and the other one was for Eastburn. And I thought,

whoever replies to me first, I will go. And who won? And it was Stoke-on-Trent. Not a bad place, the pottery is very... Well, it was, but it was very industrial. Yes. I mean, this is a common theme, isn't it, the book. And also, just to go back, Louise, to why the pull of the NHS was so attractive,

if you wanted to train to be a nurse in Ireland, it wasn't that straightforward and it would cost you, wouldn't it? Yes, that's right. So it was completely oversubscribed in Ireland. There just weren't enough places for the demand of students wanting to train as nurses. And you also had to pay. You had to buy your own uniform. So it was expensive. Whereas the NHS offer was very enticing. They not only paid you while you trained. They provided uniforms, but you also had the fantastic lure of accommodation in the nurse's homes. And for many Irish families who were letting their teenage daughters, sometimes not quite 18 years of age, leave home and head off to this unknown adventure, the guarantee of accommodation was tremendously reassuring because it was

really run almost like a boarding school so you felt that your teenage daughter would be well looked after and as an extra bonus the NHS also paid your travel to come over so it was a very enticing offer a safe environment tell me about the breakfast in bed well I think that was

a story that Ethel has yes once a week we had breakfast in bed and it was a cook breakfast bought to our room by the maid in the nurse's home that's a nice extra yeah it was a nice extra

Was it an environment you felt safe in when you came over? Yes. I mean, to be honest, I was quite homesick first, you know, even though I was 22 because I was quite mature compared to some of the girls, you know. But I think it was just been in a different environment, in a different country, you know, and also in a very industrial area,

which was totally unfamiliar to me, you know. Yeah, and a very brave thing to do because the first time you've left your home country, Tell us about the matrons. They kind of ruled with a rod of iron, didn't they? There were expectations on nurses about going to mass, about maybe not going to certain dance halls. Yes, it depended on the matron.

I mean, a lot of the matrons were Irish. And our matrim was Matron Brown, who was a cousin of the Bishop of Galway at that time, and she was very, very religious. And she went to mass every morning, and she would see if any nurses were there or if you weren't there. So you couldn't have fib about that.

You couldn't say, yes, I went. That's right. And also, we had to go to Mass in the hospital chapel, at least once a week at 7 a.m. before going to work. And how about the dance halls? They didn't really approve of that kind of carry on, did they? No. I mean, we didn't have, in Stoke and Trench, you know,

there weren't many Irish people, you know. So there weren't any Irish dance halls, which was quite different to London, you know. That's another point you make in the book, isn't it, about the integration of where the Irish nurses came to. Because I guess in London, and there's a big Irish community and you could end up socialising with other Irish people.

That's not always the best way to integrate, though, is it? The experiences of nurses in other parts of the country, such as Ethel in Stoke-on-Trent, were very, very different. So in the book, we have nurses who were in Liverpool, who were in Leeds, in Scotland, around the Glasgow area, in Wales, and some of them were in small towns in quite remote areas. And I think it's important just to maybe some of your younger listeners won't be aware. But in those early days, even very small towns had their own hospitals.

There were cottage hospitals all over the country, many of which now no longer exist. So a lot of these nurses were in quite small towns. As Ethel has described, maybe they were in a place where they had really no idea where it was and didn't know anybody there. So they were really starting to build their lives from scratch. And of course, Ethel, as we moved through the sort of 60s and 70s in England, given what was going on in Northern Ireland, there was a certain amount of prejudice that certain Irish nurses encountered.

Did you ever encounter them? Never, no. I never did. No. That's good. But in that book, Louise, you say that certain people would, you know, when a nurse had an Irish accent, they would say, I don't want this nurse to treat me. Yes. So particularly around the time of the troubles,

when bombs were going off and there were some horrific bombing incidents. And for Irish nurses, many of them spoke very powerfully and very emotionally about how that impacted on them where you would even have victims of the bombings coming into a hospital, having Irish nurses treating them and where they would experience quite a lot of antagonism and negativity.

But even in situations where people were not directly involved in a bombing incident, there were several stories in the book about nurses who were, for example, healthcare nurses or community workers who were out on the district and they would be going into patients' homes and maybe in the immediate aftermath of a bombing incident which had gotten a lot of media attention,

patients would turn around and say, I don't want the Irish nurse coming to me today. So for these nurses who were wearing their uniforms, doing a job, being professional, providing health care, essential care, they were being rejected on the basis of being Irish and therefore somehow being guilty by association. Ethel, you made a career, I think I'm right,

over 40 years in the end of, NHS and you've stayed in the UK and had a family. At what point, or maybe it doesn't even feel like that now, but does this feel like home to you now? Oh, yes. It's actually felt like home for quite a long time, you know. And you married here and you had your children here? Yes, married here.

Yeah. And now we do it. I'm sorry to hear that. And brought up a family here as well. Yeah. And quite happy. And what would you say to other people now? because obviously it's a profession that we need more people in wherever they come from.

What have you got out of nursing down the years? Well, I think I've got friendship. Patients have been very appreciative. And, you know, it's actually been a very rewarding career. Yeah, fantastic. For anyone. And of all the people, you know, alongside this wonderful woman here you've spoken to, is that what they say to you?

You know, it's such a detailed and fantastic book. And there's a lot of negatives, and there's a lot of homesickness and prejudice and all of that. But what is the overriding message you got from this oral history of these women? There's an overwhelming sense of pride, I think, that they felt tremendous pride in their nursing career. And I think one of the really key things about nursing, particularly in the 50s and 60s and through to the 70s, is that it allowed women to continue working after they got married and had children, which was almost impossible in many other careers because of lack of child care. lack of nurseries and creches, which we kind of take for granted now, albeit very expensive.

But in those days, that wasn't an option for many married women. They had to give up their jobs. But nurses were able to continue because of shift work. So many of our nurses had this long career like Ethel, 40 years, many of them longer than 40 years, because they were able to work around their family commitments as well. So there's a tremendous sense that they gave a lot to nursing, but nursing also rewarded them. That was Professor Louise Ryan. Ethel Corduff there. An Irish nurses and oral history is available to buy now. As the new year begins, you might be thinking about getting more exercise into your life. If so, this is something that might interest you. Relative energy deficiency in sport,

or Red S, as it's known, was once framed as a concern only for elite athletes. But as running culture intensifies alongside weight loss jabs and healthy eating trends, red S has become more widespread. It's often hard to spot, but the long-term consequences can be devastating impacting immune function, growth and fertility. Leading sports dietician Rini McGregor and Jodie Palmer, who experienced the condition firsthand, joined me and I began by asking Rini to explain the condition. So Reds or Red S, as we say, is relative energy deficiency in sport, although I think really the terminology is just relative energy deficiency. And so it says what it is on the tin, which is basically there's not enough energy in the body to support both

kind of movement and that movement can be every sort of all movement we do, but obviously things like exercise and training as well, as well as biological function, which is, you know, the energy we need to be human, basically for our brain, for our hearts, for our lungs, for, you know, for our bone density, for our fertility. Like, we need a lot of energy just to be human. And what often happens is, is that energy is always prioritised for movement. And so if we don't quite give our bodies enough energy, then we end up, the energy that we do have is used for movement. And a bit like when your phone is on sort of low battery mode, our body starts to shut down. So it's not an instant thing. It's not something that happens immediately. But it is something that

happens over a course of time. And the longer you're in this kind of deficit, the more your body starts to downregulate and protect and preserve you, because that's what it's trying to do, fundamentally, is keep you alive. But one of the things that I want to kind of just clarify is that we often talk about this condition with only thinking about the kind of energy aspect in terms of the fueling. But actually, we also know now that it also includes not resting enough. And I guess that's something that's quite important and probably why we're seeing it more and more in the recreational individual as well because, you know, those of us that are recreational, we are also, you know, have families, we have lives, we have jobs and sometimes we're trying to train like an athlete

and also do all those other things. And we may over train to a certain degree in the sense we just don't give our bodies enough rest. So actually what we've come to know is that Reds is more than just an energy. It's actually about the overall stress that we place on our bodies. And and it's the way, it's the body's way of trying to protect itself. And you've said that you're seeing up to 10 new cases a week. Yeah. I mean, we're, we're getting a lot of, um, a lot of inquiries about, about red s and, you know, the symptoms that can occur vary so much. And I think that's the other thing, is that Red S itself is it's a presentation. So it is a condition, but it is a presentation. And the presentation can be that an individual is presenting with

recurrent injuries and niggles and particularly like bone stress injuries or connective tissue injuries. And it's just a recurrent thing that they're not recovering from. It can be more complicated in that if it starts to affect the endocrine system, then of course both men and women can be affected from a fertility point of view, but we often see it in women much earlier because the female body is so sensitive to any sort of stress or any sort of threat to the endocrine function. So what might show up is changes in menstrual cycle, in the cycle length can get shorter, flow can get lighter, and also in the worst case, it stops completely. And of course these things should not be ignored.

And other symptoms can also be non sort of physical. You can also start to notice things like changes to your sleep, changes to your mood. And in the worst case, it can be much more widespread in that you can have issues with your nerves, with your cardiac function. So it's a really complicated condition. And we're still learning so much more about it. Jody, can I bring you in here? So you experience Red Earths. Can you take us back to when you first realize that there might be something wrong?

Yeah, so I think the first sign for me was around my menstrual cycle. So it was kind of when I went to university and my periods kind of gradually stopped. I think at the time I was probably, I've always done exercise kind of throughout my whole life, but I think I probably did slightly more at uni. I also kind of, you get into sort of cooking for yourself, kind of just a change in routine. and so my kind of loss of periods was the first sign for me. And what happened? Did you go to seek help from a GP? I did. I initially went to a GP and they, I think probably throughout the kind of four or five years I had symptoms.

I saw kind of a couple of different GPs and specialist gynecologists and kind of the result was always kind of go on the pill, the contraceptive pill. They initially ruled out anything serious. So I did have checks and scans to make sure there was nothing else going on. But kind of following that, they didn't find anything and they prescribed the pill. As their advice was kind of you need to have periods, we can't really see another issue. The pill will make you have periods. And what then happened because he started to get more severe symptoms, didn't you? So I think during that kind of four or five years, with hindsight, I think I did have other symptoms.

symptoms. At the time, I didn't really notice anything else. So kind of at that time, I'd say it was quite constant in what I experienced. And I think I wasn't, I think I wasn't technically underweight. And I think that's important in thinking about kind of GP doctor response in that. We can't see kind of an eating sport issue go on the pill. And so I think it was only after those four or five years, I could have looked into it more. But it was only kind of later on when actually I managed to get my periods back where I got a couple of stress fractures from running and I found out my bone density was quite low. So I guess, yeah, kind of I did have other things going on that I was kind of completely unaware about during that period of time.

Rina, can you just reflect on that? Is that something that you are hearing to from patients that they may be misdiagnosed and also the longer term impacts that you can have from Reddust. Yeah, no, I mean, it is a real problem. I think, as Joe said, one of the biggest issues is you don't actually lose weight with Reddance. So even though there's this kind of energy deficiency, because the body is in down regulation mode, you know, you don't, you don't lose weight. So your body's actually preserving energy. It's trying to protect you. And I think, you know, we do live in a very crazy societal era where the focus is on image and fitness and health, which are all important, not the image side, but the fitness and health side of things.

But I think it's taken to an absolute extreme level. And actually, we're not looking at what does health actually mean and what level of fitness do we actually need to have. And so I think when you go and see a doctor and you don't look on well, and that's one of the key things about red S is you don't ever look on well, unless, of course, Red S is associated with an eating disorder, and that's kind of a slightly different presentation. But in general, people who are participating in physical activity at quite a high level

and end up with Red S, they will not physically look that different. However, their performances, their body, everything else will start to become impacted. And the consequences, as Jodi has said, is, you know, they are really problematic. The bone health is one of the key things. like we've said, you know, your menstrual cycle and your endocrine function generally. So this is the same for men as well, is that if you don't produce your sex hormones, estrogen and testosterone, it starts to have a negative effect on your bone health. And that's quite early on.

That's within three months. And so the longer this goes on, the more detrimental impact it's having on your bone health. And I do get very frustrated. We get a lot of people, not young people. We get a lot of people coming into clinic who have been told, okay, yeah, there's nothing wrong with you. We've done all the gynecological tests. We're just going to put you on the pill. And the pill just seems to be this kind of very easy answer. And all the pill does is disguise what's really going on. And actually, it's not the appropriate action for somebody who has red S.

It's not the appropriate action for somebody who has lost their menstrual cycle. Because if you think about what the pill is, it's a contraception. So actually, it suppresses ovulation. It's never going to reboot your menstrual cycle, which is what is often suggested. And we'll We also know now that the synthetic component of estrogen in the contraceptive pill is not protective of bone health. So one of the key things that doctors kind of tend to say is, if we put you on the pill, we're going to protect your bone health. But actually you're not protecting bone health.

And the gold standard now is actually using hormone replacement therapy. So even if someone is not in those perimenopausal or menopausal years, if they're young, they've shown that their bone health has been affected by red S, they are not having a menstrual cycle while we're working with them to try and restore their energy availability, restore their hormonal health, if we know they've already presented with one stress fracture as well and we're quite far off because, again, there's a lot of mindset involved in why you're doing what you're doing. There's a lot of behaviours that kind of keep you stuck in where you're at. And so it takes time. In those situations, we would actually be, you know, asking the GP to

put the individual on hormone replacement therapy for a short period of time. Well, just to say that we contacted NHS England and they've sent us this statement from Professor Victoria Sautzu Brown, who is the chair of the Royal College of GP, saying GPs are highly trained to have sensitive conversations with our patients, taking into account all factors that could be affecting their health in order to arrive at the right diagnosis. They're going to say the RCGP recognises that Redis is a serious condition that can have significant impact on patients' health and the knowledge and skills related to Redis fall under several specific topics within the GP curriculum. frameworks. Jodi, just from you, I just wonder if there's anyone listening who is concerned about this and maybe recognising some of those symptoms. What would you say to them? I would say definitely don't wait. At the time, I thought I actually felt fine. And that's why I think I kind of just got on with it and dismissed it for so long. I think kind of stress fractures can happen really late down the line. And I think even kind of disruptions to your menstrual cycle can be

slightly delayed. So for me now, it really helps to kind of tune into the symptoms I get like quite immediately if I think I've had even like a couple of days of not eating enough, which can be anything from kind of fatigue, nighttime hunger is really common, kind of changes to digestion. And I think we also have to be aware of the fact that like we know hormonal contraception and being on the pill doesn't help and it can make it really tricky because it masks what's going on with your mental cycle. But I think it's also the reality that a lot of people are on hormonal contraception.

So I think especially kind of tuning into those other symptoms is really important. Rini McGregor and Jodie Palmer there. If you've been impacted by any of that discussion, you can visit the BBC Action Line or contact your local GP for further support. Still to come on the programme, we mark 75 years of the archers

going behind the scenes into one of the most hallowed spaces in Ambridge. kitchen at Brookfield. And a reminder, you can enjoy Women's Hour any hour of the day if you can't join us live at 10 a.m. during the week. Just subscribe to the daily podcast for free via BBC Sounds. Now, did you go home for Christmas, or perhaps you hosted your adult children? What kind of behaviour or family dynamics surfaced with everyone under that one roof again? Well, one phenomenon that occurs with everyone home is the adult children in the family reverting to their child, or teenage behaviours.

Regressing in this way is a very common occurrence, but why does it happen? Why do otherwise socially cohesive adults unleash their most basic selves upon their family during the holidays? To discuss this, Claire was joined by Guardian columnist El Hunt and psychotherapist Julia Samuel. Elle wrote about this for The Guardian,

confessing to being prone to regressing when she returned home. And Claire asked her how this manifested itself. I think in the ways that it manifests for a lot of people, I sort of veer between petulance and behaving as though I was 14 or 15, not cleaning up after myself, as you described, just being irritable and snappy with sort of any kind of imposition put on me by my parents, or the other way of being a sort of performative adult, sort of declaring I have stacked the dishwasher and are waiting for my thanks

or offering to cook them a meal and saying, Look at how functioning I am. I am no longer 14, 15, or I'm very mature for my age. And I was reassured that this is not just me. Apparently, a lot of people do it. Why, have you analysed yourself? What is motivating you into this behaviour? Well, I'm in an unusual situation where my parents live in New Zealand,

so I only see them every two years. And I think that makes it especially pronounced because we have a short period of time together and the regression is so quick. It's almost as though when I cross the threshold of the family. home. And it's not even a home I grew up in. It's a new space. It's just that family dynamic of I am that eldest daughter and I will behave this way and they behave that way. And I suppose we're both responsible for creating that where my parents obviously still think of me as younger than I am, whereas I'm living on the other side of the world and think of myself as a

competent adult kind of handling things. And then we messed, you know, that all gets brought up around the table and then I don't do it again for another two years. It's a really interesting combination because in one sense it sounds like you're freeing yourself to be that child again, but on the other sense you're saying, look, I'm a functioning adult. You're showing them all of your sides, aren't you, when you go home? I guess the childhood one is there, just that exists with them. So it kind of, you know, for one of a better word, is triggered by the presence of my parents. And then there's the adult side where it's wanting to impress upon them.

I'm not a child anymore. Like, I have this life and I am this adult. And talking to my friends about their experiences over Christmas, it seemed that was the sort of common theme among the adult children where it's this desire to impress upon our parents. Like, we're not how you remember us. We actually have these lives. And we don't necessarily express them in the most positive way.

Let's bring in Julius Samuel now. I heard you kind of humming in agreement. Yes. through Elle's retelling of her life back at home. It sounds very familiar. I know you've got four children. We'll get on to that. But how do you reflect on what Elle's just described there?

Well, it's just so interesting. I mean, I think Christmas is a particularly emotionally loaded time. You know, and it's freighted with memory and tradition and rituals. And that gets, as she talked about, triggered or ignited by our senses that work, Zoom is back. They work a million times faster than our thinking. and they're ignited by our senses, sight, sound, touch, smell and taste.

So as she said, the minute she walked through the door, it's like time travel going back to her teenage self or even her eight-year-old self. So there's the embodied body memory sense, but also there's, we know, we're pattern-making beings. And so the old family network dynamics, those patterns get created the minute that all of us are in the room. So her parents become the kind of parent that they were when she was 14,

even though she's living a very independent life across the world. And she becomes her 14-year-old self who expects everyone to clear up and sucks if she's asked to do anything. I'm not sure you did that, but you know what I mean? Oh, I did, Julia, yes. And see how I've loaded the dishwasher. So the thing is, in some ways, though, Julia, is this not kind of freeing for adults to sort of go back to their childhood selves and in much simpler times. I'm not saying that's great because it causes conflict.

But there's something quite comforting of that, isn't there? I think there's something, you know, we like the safety of familiarity. And I think that's what you're kind of recognising is that we feel safe with our family of origin and those patterns. And there's a kind of connected, embodied sense of who we are through our ages that we really enjoy.

I think, as you're saying, What's difficult is when it's the back and forth of our adult version of ourselves that comes into conflict with the younger version of a sibling and then you can have a big rupture or, you know, you can play the roles that you always played. And there can be fights. And if you add lots of food and alcohol and expectation into that, then that can create too much intensity that isn't comforting but is actually quite discombobulating and upsetting.

Listen, I want to read lots of women's hour listeners getting in touch with the program. So I'm going to run some of them by you, Julia. Family Dynamics reared their head with vengeance. I'm the oldest child and the expectation is that I will care for everyone and put my needs aside. My dad was his usual bullish self and my mum was her usual indecisive anxious self. My younger sister, 49, played her role of irresponsible but allowed to get away with it because that's just how she is. I could ramble on about it, but won't bore you. It was awful.

I can't wait to get back to my home from Wendy. And these are people in middle age now. What would you say to Wendy, Julia? Well, I'd say to Wendy that, first of all, awareness is the first step, that when we kind of just keep doing it without noticing what we're doing, we'll fall back into it.

So awareness is really important. And then her naming her pattern, that she was the one that was meant to look after everybody, then name what she feels that really helps because that allows you to kind of slightly disengage from falling into it. And I think, you know, there's things that you can do before Christmas. So don't have text messages with family members about what you'd like or what you need. But you could have a preparation zoo, maybe with her sister or possibly with her parents as well,

where you kind of look at what's likely to go wrong and maybe ways that you can kind of do something different. In some families that's possible, in other families it isn't, in which case for her it would be having her own tools that she carries of sort of circuit breakers. It could be breathing in for four, a night for six, or you can feel your body, the jaws music as it kind of loads in your system and your shoulders are up to your years. And you can just feel yourself explode just before that moment, stand up, go outside, take a glass of water, walk around and then come back, slow down, to sort of to your adult self. And I think that helps you from exploding. Or just keep going. Just keep going.

Walk out and keep walking. Elle, there's lots of other texts. I'm going to throw at you, Julia. Walk home. Or just walk home. Elle, you came, I think you came up with the idea of potentially a buffer guest. Is this correct in your article? Well, I mean, this is actually from my own experience where because my parents live so far away,

I often spend Christmases with my friends' families. And it's such an interesting experience where obviously I don't get triggered by the same family patterns because they're new to me. But I get to see my wonderful, mature, sensible, you know, wonderful friends regress in front of my eyes where I'm just the happy guest, happy to be there and so great for the meal and the hosting. And, you know, very interested in their parents and aunt's stories. And meanwhile, my friend is sort of slouched halfway beneath the table, arms folded, kind of about to, you know, it blow up in that way that Julia described. And I think as the buffer guest, it means that those family dynamics are kept a little bit lowered or people are keeping an eye on them because, you know, there's a stranger at the table. And I think everyone should have one now.

And I'm very available to be at your next Christmas dinner. Yes, please. Buffer guest for hire. Julia, here is another one. I'm Ben, a 42-year-old man. Yesterday had an argument with my 48-year-old sister whilst I was visiting for Christmas. I was so incensed that I stormed out of her house

after shouting, driving from the Midlands back to home in London, a whole day earlier than planned. It was definitely about our sibling relationship rather than the actual matrim in hand. I haven't contacted her yet and my older father doesn't want to be caught in the middle of his very grown-up but somehow very childish children rowing. So I guess you would say to Ben that maybe

knowing that what was coming, that there was, he's recognising, Ben is recognising which is good, that this is something that is from their past, but what could he have done differently, do you think? Or maybe he could do now? I think, I mean, I think often conflict is sometimes inevitable.

And the big thing about the conflict is him recognising it as he does and it's repairing after the fight. It isn't the rupture. Once he's calmed down and he's not wrong, you know, not furious anymore, more. And he can see it really wasn't about who stacked the dishwasher this way or that way, but about some old power dynamic with his sibling, that he can kind of, I would video call

his sister and talk about what was really going on and repair and maybe make an arrangement to meet up and go for a walk together and reconnect. Because if you just sit in your righteous ignitination that she's wrong on your right, then the next time you meet the fight is still in your bodies and you just will play it out again. simmering away. I'm interested to know, Elle, you recognise what happens in yourself. What are your techniques? I know New Zealand is a long way to go home and there must be an awful lot of pressure when you do go home. But do you have any techniques that you employ? Because you know that there are certain things that are going to trigger you.

I think not going home before Christmas actually does alleviate a lot of that pressure because it is just, I witness it, you know, on the streets around me. The level of anxiety and frantic stress that everyone's operating at and this great sort of key moment of the meal and the preparations, presence, so forth, that just exacerbate anything that might be going on to the surface or historically. And also sort of going for a long enough period. And I guess, you know, there's one option of going for just being able to spend time with your family for shorter periods and then leave when you want to and before it kind of compounds. But also the opposite is going for longer periods where you do get into that day-to-day rhythm.

And I do find that any kind of frustrations do sort of either, like you find a kind of workable level with it. And also just kind of getting to know my parents better as an adult and then getting to know me better as an adult and sort of changing the relationship away from, you know, you are our child and we can parent you still. I've really enjoyed that. And on my last visit back to New Zealand,

it was a noticeable improvement on my previous visit, where I did regress. And the last one, there was that sense of, no, we're all adults in the room here and we don't have to fall into the eldest daughter or the first child dynamic. So it is possible to change, but both sides have to be willing to see each other differently,

I think, and behave differently. El Hunt and Julia Samuel there. Now the explosion at Grey Gables, Nigel Parditer falling off the roof, the epic floods of 2015. Just some of them. moments that were created for the ears of Archer's listeners. But as any one of them will tell you, the Archer's is as much about everyday life as it is about

high drama. To think more about that idea and also to get a bit of a look behind the scenes, we were invited into one of the most hallowed spaces in Ambridge, the kitchen at Brookfield, the original Archer's family farm, where Nula caught up with Felicity Finch, who plays Ruth Archer. This is a place that you have lived in, worked, acted in for decades. We've just stepped over the threshold, if we'll call it that. How does it feel? That's my kitchen.

It's my home. It's where I've played out so many scenes with the members of my family, you know, my other family. Yeah, yeah. And it also holds in its walls in everything about it. history as well. The years gone by. Describe what we're looking at. Okay, it's quite an intimate space compared to the rest of the studio. It's got wood panels around it as well as all the kitchen equipment in it, etc. And a table at the centre of it. Let's go and have a look. Well, we've got a fridge here and we've got a sink and running water and a teapot and a kettle. Yeah, yeah. Tea, they're all important cups of tea. But over the other side is the aga. Now, this is a central piece. It absolutely is.

I'd say this is the piece of the kitchen that is at the heart of everything, of what it means to be in the Brookfield kitchen. It comes into its own at Christmas time. Of course. Because we're trying to make a million dishes like a few else, you know, in different parts of the kitchen. And somebody might have brought something in from somewhere else

and it'll be warmed in there. But looking at the auger, it is kind of making me hungry. Well, it just happens, Nula, that I've been. baked a carrot cake, especially for you coming today. I mean, I love carrot cake, but I'll be honest. I kind of expected lemon drizzle. No, no, no, no. That's Jill, my mother-in-law's territory.

I could never even attempt a lemon drizzle cake. Well, let's go and sit down and have a little bit of cake. Okay, I'm sitting at the table here in the Brookfield kitchen. Felicity is making the tea. If you think about how many cups of tea must have been drunk in this kitchen. Yes, since 1950. Oh, my goodness. So, Felicity slash Ruth is taking a seat beside me.

But, you know, you talk about all the cups of tea. And there you go. Oh, thank you very much. That really signifies that this is the headquarters of a family and a business. Talk to me a little about the way Ruth runs both of those. She's still absolutely there, helping with the milking of her herd, maintaining the herd maintenance on the farm

you know there's so much to do all the paperwork connected to a farm so Ruth is doing all of that but she's also being a mum like all great characters there is tensions within Ruth's identity not just between work and motherhood we talk there about them being inseparable

as you see it she's not from a farming background this is a space then that she's sought to take possession of it hasn't always been easy we're going to hear a clip now from 2022. Chelsea Horriban has decided to have an abortion after a one-night stand with your son, Ruth's son, Ben. Ruth's mother-in-law, Jill, who you've mentioned, has given

Ben a piece of her mind about the whole episode and let's just say that things escalate. Is my grandson? Yes, and he needed you. Instead, you crushed him. Why couldn't you think of my kids before your own selfish backwards opinions? You're being up. I'm fair. I'm not. From the moment I arrived here, it was clear I wasn't an archer, turning your nose upon me wanting to work on the farm, thinking you know everything about what a woman should and shouldn't be. That's not true. Perfect, a drill, archer helping out, hopeless Ruth. Me and David, are not you and Phil. And you judged me for that. You've been judging me ever since, and I am not going to let you do that to my children. How dare you say that you're ashamed of him.

He should have fought for the baby. So says Patricia Green, who plays Jill, and of course Felicity Finch, who's sitting here beside me, playing Ruth Archer. This table has hosted so many showdowns. That one is up there. How was the scene staged? How did you approach it?

Do you remember? It's one of those scenes that somehow encapsulates years and years and years of a relationship, of a history. And when you're talking about Jill, who is the matriarch of Brookfield and what some people would say of, you know, of the archers. And then you've got Ruth, who no matter how much she is integrated into Ambridge, is an incomer.

Which doesn't mean she's not accepted, but it means, you know, there are moments in life, and this is one of those moments where everything kind of blows up. And when you do that scene, if you can remember, I know it's a few years ago, are you sitting down doing it? No, I wouldn't have been sitting down. It's kind of one of those scenes where you think about everything that the scene is about and prepare as much as you can for that. And then you just go.

And actually, it was really interesting what Paddy Green, who plays Jill, chose to because she was very quiet and controlled. So that was a really interesting dynamic that I think is the reason that Ruth cannot believe that she's just sitting there. And in the end, what matters is Ben's future.

And so it kind of opens a fault line, I guess we could say, in Ruth's family life. And to think, it all happened here while I nibble on some very lovely carrot cake. Very lovely carrot cake. I'm forgetting to eat. It is delicious, of course. Tell me a little bit about Ruth's relationship to cooking.

Some might say it's a bit misunderstood. Well, if you want to rile me, Nula, just say Ruth's a bad cook. I'm not going to say that. Because when that's trundled out sometimes, I immediately, well, I would, wouldn't I, sort of confront it, saying, well, you know, in the beginning, when she first arrived at Brookfield, she was not a great cook and even managed to burn pizza, I think. But gradually over the years, Ruth did learn to cook, but Ruth will never be the cook that Jill is.

But I think there's something underlying, I would imagine, in most women's, is in me and it is in Ruth, that you still want to be able to do it when you can. You know, you still want to be that provider of food as well. But it is, yeah, it's a conflict without a doubt. Speaking of food, I have to make a confession to the listeners. There is no carrot cake There is no tea

I'm here eating some sliced banana having some water We also have Vanessa Nuttall here as well Ness as you also go by Longstanding Archer's technical producer I feel I should give you a round of applause

Ness what have you been doing So whilst the actors are speaking I'm doing the action behind them creeping around them, doing various things. I've been making tea for the action to take place in the scene. So I was opening a cupboard, taking the mugs out. So often I'm doing several things

for several different actors in the one scene. But Felicity, what's it like for you, like the relationship with Ness? They kind of need to be in your head, be like a second pair of hands. I think of it as being like shadow and I think the magical thing is that you know, 80, 90% of the time

you're not really aware of her because she's so integrated, so empathic really as well. The moments that stick in my mind because it's when you really notice the person is when I remember once there was a muntjac deer, a fawn, their mother had been killed. And the muntjac was in the kitchen, staying warm. I just remember when the spot person had to be the muntjac. And I think there's spot effects as well. That was a new term for me. This is people that go around making some of these sounds.

as you are working. So they're sort of pitter-pattering a little bit and moving around. Playing little animals is part of the spot person's 40. Dog sheep dogs and all sorts of terriers. Live lambs were put in the auger to keep them warm after birth, nests. Can you please explain what happened there?

This thing. I hear I have. Okay, we've got a sheepskin rug. Yes. Rapture. log for a little bit of weight. Okay, quite a big log. Because it has the sound of something.

Okay, so this is about the size of a small lamb. Yeah, it's quite large for a newborn, I would say. Yes. But again, and also, it's important to say that my colleagues behind the glass are also playing in recorded sound effects. So if we need any bleating from the muntjac deer, for example, or the lamb, they're playing that in as well. Because we're painting the picture through people's ears.

Yes. And it's lots of different audio signals. So I would go to the Arga here. it'd be the bottom of them and we'd leave the door open obviously but... Then you think a life man has just been put in the aga to be kept warm because its mother had rejected it

many people will remember times that it has happened on the story as well when you think back about all the scenes from lamb, deer fights, cooking, frozen pizza why do you think it is such an important or central part of the drama of the archers. I think because it creates a hub where people come together.

So many characters over the years have sat here and drunk cups of tea. And I always say the scenes where people just have a nice chat are just as important with the scenes where the archers deals with really important social issues as well. And it's that juxtaposition that I think is part of what makes the programme work. Thank you to Felicity Finch, who plays Ruth Archer, and a technical producer Vanessa Nuttall. And you can hear the full programme by going to BBC Sounds

and search for Women's Hour on Thursday the 1st of January. Now on Monday's programme we begin our series Going It Alone, where we are hearing from three women about their experiences of having a child without a partner. Statistics show that more women than ever in the UK are choosing to become solo mums by choice. On Monday, Lucy tells us her story and we also hear a discussion about the legal and the practical implications of this rising trend.

Join Nula at 10 a.m. on Monday. But from me, for now, thank you very much for listening. That's all for today's Women's Hour. Join us again next time.