Woman's Hour - Women's Prize winners, Weight, T20 World Cup, Mental healthcare

Episode Date: June 12, 2026

Last night, two debut authors received the Women’s Prize for Fiction and Non-Fiction, each worth £30,000, respectively. Anita Rani speaks to the two winners, novelist Virginia Evans and Lyse Doucet, known to listeners as the BBC’s Chief International Correspondent.Last week, Hannah Murray, who played Gilly in Game of Thrones, told Anita that during the final season of the show, the papers wrote she was pregnant - when she wasn't. Hannah said that maybe this was the only acceptable way for a woman in the public eye to gain weight. Following a strong listener response to that item we discuss if there is a right way to talk about women’s weight. Anita is joined by Alex Light, a body confidence activist and author and Dr Dolly Van Tulleken, food policy researcher, policy consultant and visiting researcher at the MRC epidemiologist unit in Cambridge University. England is hosting the 2026 T20 Women's World Cup this summer, and England and Sri Lanka launch the competition with their match at Edgbaston today. This is the first time that 12 teams will competing for the World Cup trophy – an increase on previous years. Anita talks to Melissa Story, a cricket player for Gloucestershire and a commentator for BBC’s Test Match Special, about how the tournament works, the players to watch - and the matches we can’t miss.This week the Royal College of Psychiatrists launched its first ever Women’s Mental Health Strategy. It was instigated by Dr Lade Smith, president of the Royal College of Psychiatrists who chose women’s mental health as a key focus when she took up her post three years ago. As Lade steps down from that role, she joins Anita to talk about why she thinks that the women’s mental healthcare is in crisis and her vision for improvements.When bride-to-be Kayley Stead was left alone at the altar on her wedding day in 2022, she did what few would think to do - she let the wedding continue. Kayley's photos of enjoying her wedding alone, including the speeches, the first dance and cutting the cake, went viral. Other women congratulated her for celebrating herself and still enjoying the day. Four years on, she's found love again - she's engaged! - and she says she wants her wedding to be "a big party." She joins Anita. Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Rebecca Myatt

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. The Signal Awards recognise the podcast that define culture and being honored by the Signal Awards sets your production team apart with recognition from the industry's top experts and access proof that your work is a standard bearer for podcasting worldwide. By entering, your work is heard by the Signal Awards Judging Academy, an invitation-only body of podcast professionals from acclaimed organizations which include the BBC. Grow your audience, celebrate your team and stand out.

The final entry deadline to submit is the 26th of June. Enter your podcast at signalaward.com for consideration. Hello, I'm Anita Rani and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Good morning and welcome to the program. Lise de Sette and Virginia Evans. Both winners of the Women's Prize 2026 announced last night, both here post-party, to share their joy. The Royal College of Psychiatrists has launched its first ever

women's mental health strategy this week. We'll be discussing what they're suggesting with the president of the college. Women's cricket. The T20 Women's World Cup, to be more specific, is being hosted by England and begins today in Edgebaston. There may be googly chat in the program, later. What would you do if you were jilted at the altar? Well, Kaylee Stead carried on regardless and had a solo wedding and party because why waste a great spread and cake? Well, she's found

love and has got engaged. We'll be catching up with the bride to be. And Hannah Murray, who played Gilly and Game of Thrones. Some of you may remember, she was on the program last week talking about her memoir. Well, a clip of her talking about weight really struck a chord with a lot of you on our social media. She basically said that the only acceptable way to gain weight in the public eye is to be pregnant. So we're picking up the discussion on the program today. How do you feel about weight and the scrutiny on women's bodies?

Share your stories. Have you been on a diet for most of your life? Do you look in the mirror and love or hate what you see? And if you don't like it, why do you think that is? And how does it impact your life? Please be as frank and honest as you like as usual. And remember, you can remain anonymous. get in touch in the usual way.

The text number is 84844. You can email the program by going to our website or WhatsAppers on 0300-100-444. The text number once again is 84844. And social media, we are at BBC Woman's Hour. But first, the Women's Prize for Fiction was founded 31 years ago by the novelist Kate Moss after a major literary prize

released a short list of books that contained no female authors at all. The non-fiction award was added three years. years ago after the Women's Prize Trust found that nonfiction books by women are less likely to be reviewed and less likely to be shortlisted or win prizes than books by male authors in the same space. Their research also found that the gender pay gap has increased in the past five years for women writing nonfiction. Well, last night at an elegant, if slightly inclement, garden party in London's literary heartland of Bloomsbury, two debut authors received the

Women's Prize for Fiction and Nonfiction, each worth £30,000, respectively. The winner of the 2026 Women's Prize for Fiction is Virginia Evans for the Forest Furnberg. And the winner is the finest hotel in Kabul by Lee's due set. Well, that's the chair of judges, Fangham, Debenar, Labour Pier and CEO of the UK Opera Association, and Julia Giddard, former Prime Minister of Australia. Australia there. Well, I was also there on the slightly damp lawn with heels stuck in the grass to applaud them both. And I'm pleased to say that the two winners, novelist Virginia Evans and

Leastisdissette, known to our listeners as the BBC's chief international correspondent, are here with me now in the Women's Hour studio. Congratulations to both of you. How do you feel? You first? Oh, no, you're coming into my homes. Virginia, how do you feel? I feel like it will take me a long time to absorb the feeling, but primarily I just feel so thankful to the judges who took the time to read all of those books and to see what I wrote and to see the value in it. And, you know, I just feel overwhelmed. I just feel overwhelmed with gratitude, I think. At least, congratulations. The energy in that room and the women in that room, Electric. How are you feeling?

From start to finish, the women's prize has been one big hug. Thrill to be on the long list. stunned to be on the short list. And I was telling some of our co-conspirators last night, just not minutes before. No, no, no, no, no. I'm on, it's great a gift to be on the short list. There are literary giants on my list. So for me, it was just a wonderful, wonderful hug

from this great community of writers, but also of readers. And unlike Virginia, I always, I feel overwhelmed by it. and touched that the judges saw something about a book, about a place that seems so far away in every way. And as you know, Anita had slipped from our headlines. Women's hours still does stories about Afghanistan, particularly the plight of women and girls, but that the judges found in it something more universal,

something which had meaning and joy and something that they felt was worth reading. Well, let's talk about the books and what the judges had to say. Because, Lisa, your book, The Finest Hotel in Kabul, was described by one of the judges as an epic tale of life throughout the rise and fall and rise of the Taliban, cleverly told through the lens of the staff of the infamous Hotel Intercontinental. I found it incredibly human and readable.

So tell us why you made that particular hotel the focal point of the book. In our news business, there is this phrase now about news avoidance that we find the news so grim and glum. I find I turn away from, dare I say it on Radio 4, turning away from Radio 4 in the World Service to listening to Radio 3. classical music. Oh, relax. But of course, we're citizens and we do need, we want to know what's happening in the world around us because what's happening so far away is not far away at all. So I wanted to explore a different kind of storytelling. And when I first began traveling many, many, actually decades ago, I had found myself turning to novels, turning to narrative nonfiction to immerse myself in a place and time where history literally comes alive on the page. I was, I was, I I read Freedom at midnight when I was living in Pakistan during the partition of the Indian subcontinent. And some people in this book, which was written like a novel, although it was real history, they were my friends in Pakistan.

And I thought, this is living history. And so it was a risk. It's a risk. And I say to all authors, would be authors, want to be authors, about to be authors out there. And Virginia certainly knows this story. And I wanted to see if I could, I had to learn how to write in a different way. And I had, so I tried to use a familiar prism, a hotel. Let's be honest. I'm sure even women's hours listeners love a luxury hotel. Never mind it, it became the worst hotel.

A familiar prism to tell what can be for many an unfamiliar story. And the hotel has never closed its doors despite the decades of conflict. It's an extraordinary. The hotel itself is a person in my book because I think all of us, you know, buildings carry history within their walls. They become to epitomize certain places and times their memory palaces. And it was, I was struck. So in a country, where hospitality is hardwired. I thought the home of hospitality, the first international luxury hotel, a hotel which was my first home in Kabul for nearly a year

when I first went there in the depths of the Cold War and the harshest winter in Kabul in decades. And that for all of the buildings which came crashing down were gutted and ravaged by one war after the other, the Intercontinental Hotel is still standing proud on that hill, on the western verge of Kabul. And, you know, it's balconies, 200 balconies like eyes, looking out over the city, bearing witness and then becoming a victim of the war. The book is subtitled to People's History of Afghanistan.

And one of those people whose stories you tell is Abida, who became the first female chef at the hotel. Would you read a little to introduce us to her? Abida has no formal education. She has no, she can't read, she can barely write. But her superpower is in her hands. Wow, she can cook. Oh, she tells her stories in the traditional embroidery of Kandahar in southern Afghanistan, where illiterate women have always told their stories through their embroidery.

Abada Nazeri, chef, seamstress, widow, mother of eight children, had been the first woman to sign up for a job at one of the government-owned hotels. She had dazzled the Intercon's new foreign managers with her mouth-watering Afghan dumplings. They had never tasted Montu and Ashak before, had never even heard of them. They gushed over the plump pockets of pasta, stuffed with onion-a-afghan leaks, and finely chopped meat and onions, smothered in a velvety, garlicky yogurt sauce. She was hired on the spot. Last week, the day she was sacked had been another of her darkest days.

Abada had never imagined it would happen. to her, not in a hotel where they respectfully called her Madarjan, dear mother. Feels incredibly poignant, given what we know, about the restrictions placed on women. I mean, it's only five years ago. Unbelievable.

The Taliban... You must have done stories at that time. So many. And women have been erased from public life. They feel forgotten. And in many ways they are for... It slipped from our news. It briefly makes an appearance when something terrible happens and sadly all too many terrible things happen and that's the world in which we lived and

I hope this book can draw more people. Do we know what's happened? What has happened to Abida? Yeah, Abida is still there. She didn't get her job. She was actually sacked before the Taliban came to power on August 15, 2021 because the hotel was losing money and they had to do cost cutting. So I stay in touch with her. She's, you know, she sadly lost one of her daughters to sickness that that plagued her for all of her life. And Abada suffers from many aches and ailments, but she still maintains her optimistic and full of spirit. So we stay in touch.

She's not physically well, but she tries to find that everyday courage to keep going. Well, from the non-fiction book of a foreign correspondent to the fictional book, The Correspondent. I love the title of the book. It's a great title, of course. It can move in many ways. It's sort of mysterious.

It's been called a sleeper hit because it came out last year climbed to the top of the New York's bestseller list. One of the judges said that your novel was immediately original, incredibly compelling, and has real emotional heft. It's structured as a series of letters

written and received by an elderly former lawyer named Sybil Van Antwerp. A great name. Why did you want to tell the story through letters and through her eyes? I started with the thought that I wanted to tell a story in letters because I had read 84 Charing Cross Road by Helene Hanf.

And that book is a memoir and it's letters from this academic, you know, intelligent reader in New York City. And she's looking for these very obscure books. And she can only find them at this bookshop on Charing Cross Road. And so she develops this, you know, this relationship with a bookstore, basically. You know, it's it feels like it's relationships between people, but it's this relationship that starts with her looking for these books. And the book is very short. It's very beloved and it's very quick to get through. And I finished the book and I thought, you know, I was at the moment where I was ready to write something new. I had a book out on submission and it wasn't selling. And so I got that book and I finished it and I thought, okay, I would like that to be longer. I wished it had never ended. I thought the book was perfect. So then I thought, how big of a story could you tell in letters? Could you really tell? a sprawling story. Could you tell a story that crosses the world? Could you tell a story that is a whole life? And so that was part of it. And then this character, this woman, Sybil, sort of came to me.

And she was fully herself and I knew her and I knew exactly what she thought and I knew exactly what she would say. I also knew what she was haunted by. I knew and I knew that her life felt closed, but that I wanted it to open as she was aging. And so I started with the first letter and it's still the first letter of the book. And it was it was really organically written. I wrote it kind of letter to letter and, you know, the exercise of trying to keep the narrative tight and keep the, you know, keep the story tight, but also let it sprawl in some way. And so it did feel like a dance to kind of keep it tight, but let it breathe. Shall we hear some A Taste of Sybil's correspondence?

So this is a rare email. that's Sybil, so Sybil's 73, and she's sent to a former colleague on the subject of their co-workers' funeral. That's right. This is a good one. Dear James, were you invited to the funeral? They're finally getting around to it six months later, and by invitation, as if it's the royal wedding. He must be ashes by now. Doubt they've kept the old shell on ice for half a year. It's uncouth. It bothers me. It honestly does. Makes me think I need to have a conversation with my own children. Anyway, it gets worse. Liz asked me to speak at the service. Speak, dear God, the horrors never cease, as if getting there wasn't enough of a task, so do let me know if you'll attend, if you were invited. If you were not invited, perhaps you could come along as my plus one.

I'd rather not drive out to Frederick alone is what I'm getting at, James, and Bruce is taking his children on a skiing trip to Colorado, and it would be good of you to pick me up. Do get back to me, warm regards, Sybil. Well, Sybil sounds like a character. Where did she come from? she, you know, she came sort of out of the organic matter of women I have known and, you know, women close to me and my aunts and women I have worked with. And then I met a woman. We were hoping to buy her house. And this woman brought us to her house and she took us on a tour through the house.

And she was very like Sybil in that she was at a certain age and she was living alone and her children were grown. and, you know, meeting her, I just had this kind of spark of a thought of, you know, you see someone, let's just say at their front door and you, and this is the way we encounter most people. You have one snap moment to meet someone and have your opinion fully formed. But when you go inside someone's house, and I mean this literally in this case, but also figuratively, you know, you go inside someone's house and you look around and you take. take time and you start to see the things on the walls and hear the stories and see the photographs, it opens up, you know, what has been and what a whole life looks like. And so I met this woman,

her name's Anne, and she took us through her house. And it was, it was marvelous. You know, she's walking us through the house and saying, you know, this painting was from when we lived in this country and this book was signed by Seamus Haney because he, you know, came to my house, you know, all these different things. And I left. that day and I thought that's that's it there's something in that you know this desire to take take take go through the very narrow door of the snap and then go inside the house and open it up and reveal yeah which is what you've both done in your books um how significance is the prize in the national year of reading for both of you for your own work and for women's writing more broadly lease the women's prize is very special

And there are people who say, why should there be a women's prize? And you listed in your introduction some of the reasons why. But Virginia and I are not here because we're women. We're here because we're writers and first published writers. And that's how we first want to be known. But the women's prize is a great excuse for women to come together to celebrate that I don't have a gendered view of reporting, that women report differently for men.

And I don't know Virginia's smiling and nodding and a gendered view. but I always see as part of who we are and journalism is defined and I think writing is defined by the kind of questions we ask and literally what we see in a room and what we don't see. And sometimes we see things differently

and I think it's a huge honor and for me and what I said last night when they first asked for my response I hope it sends a signal to all those wannabe writers out of there because writing is a solitary business and you're left alone with your doubts. In my case it was

can I write a book? Well, I like writing a book. I loved writing a book. Love words. And you can't write. And can I write in this kind of way? Can I finish the book? You know, I'm very busy, as we all do, busy daytime job in a world turning upside down every year. And most importantly, what will the readers say when they reach the book? So may we both stand as a testament, especially you Virginia, your story is just draw dropping. Your determination. You knew you would do it one day. that just keep going, just keep going. And I really enjoyed what you said in your acceptance speech, Virginia, about your love of reading. Yeah, yeah. And the importance of books in your life and always being in another world. Yes.

Yeah, and that's, I mean, that's sort of the beauty of this. It's that reading and writing go hand in hand. And it's coming into, you know, into the women's prize and just coming into the world of authors and stories and kind of, I said this, last night, but having a seat at the table, it just, it just is so tremendous, especially, you know, you grow up reading and reading and reading and you, it feels like authors sort of sit in this position, which maybe we shouldn't think that, but, you know, you sort of think, but the authors and then

to kind of feel that the gate is opened and you also get to come in and get to, you know, come into the room. And, yeah, I agree with what you were saying. And I think it's just the more opportunities we have to celebrate fiction and nonfiction and writing and thinking and women. It's the more the better, you know, the more the better. And just to be a part of, you know, this, the women's prize specifically, it's just tremendous. And to do it with you. And both of your individual stories as it is your first time being published as authors. And there you go.

So what a way to start. What a way to start. And it's real lovely to be with the lead story on women. Oh, yeah. You made it. In a great program. I was listening as a BBC person. Wow, what a great program.

I'd be listening in my kitchen if I wasn't here. Well, yeah, lots coming up. I want to congratulate you both once again. Virginia Evans' book, The Correspondent and Leicester's book, The Finest Hotel in Kabul, a People's History of Afghanistan, are both available now. Congratulations. Thank you. 8444 is the text number.

Now, last week on the program, I spoke to Hannah Murray, the actor who played Gilly in Game of Thrones. Hannah told us that while she was doing the media rounds for the final season of the show, the papers speculated that she was pregnant, but she wasn't. When I was doing the press tour for the final series of Game of Thrones, there were a lot of stories speculating that I was pregnant. And I remember thinking, oh, that's the only acceptable way you can gain weight as a woman in the public eye, is to be pregnant.

And I wasn't pregnant. and I also didn't feel like they should be allowed to comment on my body in that way. So, yeah, that was a big, I think that was a big turning point, actually. That was kind of around the time when I decided, I think I need to step back from this industry. I think I want to take a break. But that break has never stopped. It's still ongoing. Well, after that, our Instagram account was flooded with responses from you about this.

So it got us thinking seven years on from what happened to Hannah, why are we still scrutinizing women when it comes to wait? have we developed appropriate language to talk about women's weight? Should we even be talking about it at all? Well, joining me to discuss this is Alex Light, a body of confidence activist and author, and Dr Dolly Van Toulican, a food policy researcher, policy consultant,

and visiting researcher at the Medical Research Council, epidemiologist unit in Cambridge University. So Alex and Dolly, welcome to the programme. I'm going to start with you first, Alex. What do you make of what Hannah said? Oh, I just, well, thank you for having me firstly, but I just, I feel so sad for her that she felt, she really, she felt pushed out of this industry that she had to take a break and that she wasn't able to continue because of the scrutiny around her appearance and specifically her weight. And I just, I think it's just so sad that this is something that women have to contend with, especially when they're in the public eye. But for women that aren't in the public eye as well, it's also an issue and it's just incredibly sad. I want to quote, we've got such a huge reaction, as I said, on our Instagram, and I want to quote the comedian and actor Jade Adams,

who said, the greatest threat to the patriarchy are fat women because we've eaten our way out of the male gaze. Who's setting the standard for how we look? Well, I mean, the social commentary about weight and our bodies, particularly women, is so deeply embedded in our culture. And the association between being thin and healthy and being thin and valued is deeply embedded and it's partly because we can see weight.

And it's a really interesting perspective from my work I concentrate on public health and what we can do to improve public health. It's largely driven by our food system and the food that we eat. And because in the UK, we live in this sort of horrendous situation where we're absolutely surrounded by unhealthy ultra-processed food,

which now makes up 60% of what we eat on average, at the same time as how we eat, having this social commentary that's completely obsessed with our weight and we and that association with health, even though the majority of health problems related to ultra-processed food are essentially invisible. So we think that weight is the greatest sort of metric or marker of someone's health. But actually, when you look at what ultra-process food consumption drives, it's type two diabetes, cardiovascular disease, depression, cancer, these things are really hard to see. And to the point that if you value weight more than

those actual really concerning health problems, you can actually drive people to put their own health at risk in order to achieve an aesthetic assumption about what makes us healthy. Right. And I think most people listening, and we'll be listening to you, nodding along, going, yep, she's right, she's right. But why are we still here? Why are we still looking at ourselves in the mirror and hating what we see? I think because there's such a deep narrative about what weight says about us and our personality and our capability. And in the public health space, we are sort of on a mission to try and move away from that

because the associations between weight and being strong-willed and not being lazy and being able to kind of fight the odds, I find it incredibly depressing that we actually celebrate the exception. We celebrate when people have broken the norm and, you know, whether it's a big weight loss story or whatever, we celebrate that continuously, even though for me, that is the most nightmarish position to put people in to say, yeah, we're going to put you in this really unhealthy food environment,

surrounded by ultra-processed food, that's literally designed to make you addicted and to have an unhealthy relationship with food at the same time as going, oh, but we also expect you to be thin, rather than creating the conditions that enable everyone to live a healthy life, kind of without having to think about it, and to be able to enjoy that.

And you have examples of food companies that literally play into that, like Pringles, you know, once you pop, you just can't stop, or all of the narratives around go on you deserve it. These cereals called Crave, we're literally being driven to have this unhealthy relationship with food, which we know with ultra-process food, which drives all sorts of health problems, not just weight gain, but other thing. And at the same time as going, you should fight that.

Yeah, you've got the sort of ultra-processed at one end, and then you've got the kind of real restriction of kind of eliminating food at the other end, which we'll come to. But Alex, I want to bring you back in, Because we had so many messages, women saying various different things. But another listener told us that she was at her slimest when she was suffering domestic abuse and her husband was throwing out all the food. And at the time, she was told how great she looked.

Why does some find it hard to see thinness as anything other than an achievement? And we had a few messages like that where people were congratulated about their weight loss. Yeah. I mean, unfortunately, for a woman in this society, our currency is our appearance and specifically tied to how thin we are. And so thinness is seen as the greatest moral achievement. And so when someone achieves it, we don't really care how they've done it. It might be grief. It might be sickness.

It might be, as you said, in a dangerous environment. We actually, a lot of the time when we complement weight loss, we have no idea how it has. happened yet we shower praise on the person for being thin and for achieving thinness and it's it's you know it's it's it's it's seen as a compliment and it's seen as a sort of like a passing compliment oh wow you you look you look you look you look amazing but there is so much it's so dangerous that compliment and I think it's something that we need to look at and assess how we how we speak about people's weight and specifically women's weight I mean, Irish singer CMAX

By the way, I must say, Dolly, that some food companies may say that they are not the problem and that it's a much broader issue. But Irish singer CMAX shared her deep sadness about body shaming comments that she received online after a performance at the Radio One's big weekend a few weeks ago. She said she'd love to stop talking about it but can't because it keeps happening at an accelerating and worsening pace as I become more famous. Can we talk about the body positive movement?

Alex. Can you explain what that was and what's happened to it? Of course. So the body positivity movement sort of peaked at the in the late 2010's early 2020s. And it was this real cultural moment where we were expanding the definition of beauty and seeing bodies that we've never seen represented in the media before. and it was an amazing opportunity for women to see themselves represented in a space where previously only very thin bodies, you know, had been visible. So it was a really exciting time and there were a lot of ad campaigns and marketing campaigns featured in really diverse body sizes and types. But unfortunately, we saw that movement die off and it happened quite quickly, actually. I really, I did, I was naive and I was.

I thought that it was here to stay. We were all a bit naive, I think. Right. Right. I thought that we had expanded the definition of beauty for good, but as it turns out, we hadn't. And we slipped straight back into thinness. And now we've kind of, we've really gone the other way to sort of celebrating ultra thinness.

And of course, that's coincided with the rise of JLP ones, which is kind of, you know, the phenomenon that's gone stratospheric. And so, yeah, we've seen the demise of the body. positivity movement and it's been really, really gutting because I think it meant a lot to a lot of women. Yeah, and one of our listeners commented again on Instagram, but it's not acceptable to be large in the age of GLP ones. GLP ones, they're the injected medicines that help people feel fuller. Dolly, what do policymakers make of this sudden uptick in the use of GLP ones for weight loss? Well, I mean, it's absolutely being a kind of focus point in terms of government policy

on tackling sort of health and food and weight, which is historically embedded. I would say that what's really interesting about what Alex was saying in terms of the fact that we still hold weight as this absolute high moral position to be in is true of people within the food and health policy space

and campaign and academic space as well. And I was sort of struck thinking about this discussion by how many conversations I'm in regularly where people who are academics in the food and health space, who are policymakers in the food and health space, who are campaigning on this, will comment about weight, whether it's a reflection of their own weight or other people,

to the point where we're now holding it as a requirement or even a qualification for being fit for being an academic or a policymaker in this space. And I think of even, I remember doing these interviews for a report about politicians tackling obesity as a policy area over the last 30 years.

And in 1993, there was a comment in Parliament to the health secretary at the time, who was Virginia Bottomley, saying one need only look at her to see that she is fit and healthy and responsible for the nation's health. The idea that your weight and your physical appearance allows you and qualifies you to be fit for office. And someone very recently reached out to me about RFK, who's the health secretary in America, going, isn't it great that he's at the gym and he's such an image of good health? And that's what qualifies him. And I'm there thinking, what about actual qualifications that are about, you know, what you studied, what you know, what you bring your ideas? And I think women, any women out there can relate to that, that our value is still so much on our appearance and our weight rather than our ideas and what we have to offer in terms of our skills and talents. Apart from today, spending your time worrying, today, let's all just have a day off. Dolly and Alex, we've just barely scratched the surface,

but I want to thank you both for joining me to talk about that, Alex Light and Dr. Dolly Van Tulican. Thank you. I'm going to read out a couple of your messages. I am a 27-year-old woman. I have a muscular physique, and I'm a size 10-12, but I have cellulite and hip dips and absolutely hate it. My weight has fluctuated over the past few years,

and I've started running and dipped into some diets. I've lost a stone now, and everyone says I look better, which makes me feel embarrassed about how I felt before, or that being thinner is. better. And another one here saying, I'm in my late 50s and despairing that even at this age, most of the women I know have tortured, have a tortured relationship with their bodies. And regardless of the reality of their body size or attractiveness, hate their bodies in some way. Many have what I would term eating disorders, restricting their diets, eating the bare minimum, developing intolerances

and becoming a reason, which become a reason to eat less to stay skinny. Now that so many people are on weight loss drugs, the norm is becoming even more unattainable. I am so tired of women feeling self-loathing and misery over our bodies. When will this all end? I'm sure we will be coming back to that. Maybe today. Today we take a break. 84844 is the text number.

The Signal Awards recognize the podcast that define culture and being honored by the Signal Awards sets your production team apart with recognition from the industry's top experts and access proof that your work is a standard bearer for podcasting worldwide. By entering, your work is heard by the Signal Awards Judging Academy, an invitation-only body of podcast professionals from acclaimed organizations which include the BBC. Grow your audience, celebrate your team, and stand out. The final entry deadline to submit is the 26th of June.

enter your podcast at signalaward.com for consideration. Now, you may think there's only one World Cup going on at the moment, but that's not the case. England is hosting the 2026 T20 Women's World Cup this summer, and England and Sri Lanka will launch the competition today with a match at Edgebaston. Fixtures will be held in grounds across England throughout June and July, and this is the first time that 12 teams will compete for the World Cup trophy, joining me to profile the tournament and the matches we can't miss

is Melissa's story. She's a commentator for BBC's test match special as well as a cricket player herself. Melissa, welcome to Woman's Hour. Thank you very much. You play for Gloucestershire. Tell us about the significance of this World Cup as a sportsperson and a spectator.

Why should we be excited? Well, you mentioned there that the 12 teams taking part. This is the biggest women's T20 World Cup ever, which is a major milestone for the growth of the women's game globally. It's also the first time England and Wales have hosted the tournament since the inaugural 2009 event, which England did go on to win.

So those 12 teams, they're going to be divided into two groups of six. Each team plays every other team in the group in a round robin format. And excitingly, England, Scotland and Ireland are all in group B. And at the end of the group stage, there'll be knockouts and then going on to the final at Lords, the home of cricket on the 5th of July. which is the best stadium to play in? I mean, Edgebaston, which is hosting the opening game tonight,

it's a party atmosphere there. Fancy dress is very much encouraged. And when you're in the crowd, you're almost immersed in this volume of noise. But I think for the players, it will be Lords because getting to that home, well, getting to that World Cup final at the home of cricket, it's a very historic ground.

And until recently, Lord's didn't host much women's cricket. So it speaks volumes for how far the women's game has come. T20, notoriously fun games to watch. I absolutely love a bit of T20, but there might be some people have no idea what it is. Can you tell us a bit more about how it works? And I actually think this is a really great way to get into cricket

for people who don't think it's for them. I think T20 is the perfect gateway. It is. It's one of the shortest formats of cricket. It's 120 balls each side. And the premise is quite simple. One side will bat first, try and score as many runs as possible. And then in the second innings, the next side will go in and also have a go at scoring those runs.

So it's more straightforward to follow than perhaps the longer formats, but it's also accompanied by plenty of entertainment and music and pyrotechnics. And it certainly, I would say, is the gateway for new cricket fans and families to get immersed in the sport. And what's the preparation being like for this summer of sport? because England is hosting the competition. Yeah, I mean, there's been warm-up games taking place all across the country, and it feels like there's a real sense of build up to this World Cup, because you know, you mentioned the men's football World Cup on as well.

Wimbledon later this summer, there's a festival feel towards what is going to be a celebration of the women's game. And, you know, I think at the heart of that on here on the BBC, there's going to be coverage analysis across radio online of every single, game. And so people can get stuck in, get into those narratives across the competition. And beyond this, there's going to be, I mean, some really exciting specials. There's a special bargain hunt episodes between cricket versus tennis. There's also going to be blue pizza features and even a CBB's bedtime story tie. And so there's something that for everyone all ages. Let's talk about the England side. It'll be the first women's world cup in the UK since England famously

won the 50 over title in 2017. So how are their odds looking this year? I mean, a lot better than they have the last few additions. To be entirely frank, England have had a tumultuous 18 months in the last few global tournaments. But in the build-up to this World Cup, they defeated New Zealand, who are the current reigning champions, and also defeated India. And that was a really big statement because India, they're one of the strongest sides in the world. England outplayed them in the key moments and really when the pressure was on. And I think this England side, you can't speak about them now

about mentioning their new head coach, former England player, Charlotte Edwards, and her influence on the domestic game is completely reshaped the talent pipeline. And you can see this new clarity and aggression in the way England are playing under their leadership. England, they're yet to lose a home world cup. So they'll know there's that pressure and expectation,

but I think it's really going to help this team perform. And what are your expectations of this year's final and the future of the women's game in general? The final, I mean, there's, the women's game is probably the most open. It's been for a while because of the differences and disparities in funding historically. You've seen teams like Australia who have six titles in this T20 World Cup dominate, but you've got an Indian side who won the most recent 50 over World Cup. I mentioned New Zealand are the reigning champions.

Africa, they've been contending and getting into these knockout stages consistently. So actually, it's really open about who can get into those knockout stages. And I think excitingly as well, having teams like Scotland and Ireland in this World Cup is indicative of the growth of the women's game globally, because for them to be able to perform on this global stage and have that backing behind them as well is really huge. Absolutely. Exciting stuff. Lots of look forward to Melissa, thank you so much for speaking to us. And if you want to keep up with the Women's T20 World Cup coverage, every match will be broadcast live on BBC Radio 5 Live and across the BBC Sport website and app from today, the 12th of June. 84844 is the text number. I'm going

to read out another message here. During both my pregnancy, as I was met with many comments on my body, well-meaning compliments about the small size of my bump, and that I barely looked pregnant. It may be very anxious about gaining any weight as it seemed that only a slim pregnant body was acceptable, even when pregnant our weight is policed. And another one here is saying, I've always been surrounded by female family and friends worrying about their weight. I never did it. But as I hit 44, my body changed. I put two to three stone on and now I feel like I'm a failure. I work in a corporate job, but a lot of people are on weight loss drugs, even young people that weren't overweight and I feel like if I stay the weight I am I look like I'm not trying or looking to

succeed. I'm also single and with all this looks maxing guff I feel like I'm done for. Goodness me. We are so much haven't we just like I said we've just barely scratched the surface of this. I will maybe bring it into the conversation with my next guest because on Monday the Royal College of Psychiatrists launched its first ever women's mental health strategy. It was instigated by Dr. Larde Smith, president of the Royal College of Psychiatrists who chose women's mental health. That's a key focus when she took up her post three years ago. Next week marks the end of Dr. Larde's time as president. And she joins me now.

Thank you for coming in to speak to us. Thank you for having me. Where did the idea come from? Why did you want to look into this? So it's really clear. Mental health problems are really common. Yeah. One in five of the population across the world and mental health problems are growing.

But the fact is that the commonest condition, a health condition that a woman's going to suffer from, is actually a mental illness. And it's getting worse. So women are disproportionately affected by mental health problems. You know, common mental disorders like anxiety and depression, which are eminently treatable are much more common in women than they are in men. 24% of women will suffer from a common mental disorder compared to 15% of men. And when it comes to young people, young women, the prevalence rates are significantly increasing. This area is so huge. Let's break it down. Give us some of the headlines. You've given us some stats there. But I mean, even just listening to some of those comments coming in about how we scrutinise that just that anxiety of just looking in the mirror.

So what are some of the top lines that have come out of this report? So the main things we know are this, that we now understand so much more. we understand what drives women's mental health problems. So there are key transition points in our lives. Sexual, reproductive, hormone, our hormone health is really important. So puberty, pregnancy, post-natal period, the menopause, older age, really important, crucial times that are life-changing, but also there are biological aspects.

Gender-based violence and the trauma that women suffer. 85% of women who come into contact with mental health services have actually suffered some kind of trauma in their lives. And that drives a lot of the problems that we see. And then also there are these long-standing structural inequities, you know, historical inequities. Leicester SEP was talking earlier about women not being able to be educated or even work in Afghanistan.

That's happening now. That's something that has a significant impact on women's health outcomes. and this has driven a lot of the lack of a failure to attend to women's mental health. You say that women's mental health policy has been in effect overlooked when it comes to national policy strategy and service planning. In what way? Well, you know, for historical reasons, it's just been an afterthought. I think there's this kind of idea that, well, that's what happens with women, isn't it?

You know, women are just, you know, a little bit flaky, a little bit. emotional, you know, and it's not, I don't think it's been taken seriously. And increasingly, I started to think, you know, this, this lack of attention to mental health problems and mental illnesses, maybe it's because they predominantly affect women. And we're actually seeing a kind of a conflation of two things. It's women's issues, no one's bothered. And so we haven't paid attention to it. It's always an afterthought. Yeah, where's treating the former Secretary of State for Health and Social Care said that the launch of the renewed women's health strategy for England in April this year,

that the NHS has a problem with basic everyday sexism and an appalling culture of medical misogyny. So the governments acknowledge that there's a problem with some aspects of women's healthcare. Have they responded to your report? So not yet, but then it's only just come out. And my hope is that they will actually view this as a very positive step forward

because we're not just admiring the problem anymore. We're saying, look, we actually, you know what works. We know what the solutions are. What we need you to do is to act on it. Yeah. What would you like to see from the government? So we'd like to see that the initiatives that we know work are implemented on a national scale. We would like them to acknowledge and respond to the fact that gender-based violence is a, it's a public health issue. And it just needs to be acknowledged as that and responded to is that? How would you like to see that violence against women and girls, because you've said it's a major driver for mental illness. How would you like it treated at

service level? So the basic things, for example, no matter every single woman who is seen in any kind of service, whether it's a gyne service, whether it's A&E, ask about trauma. Are you experiencing any trauma? It's a small question and actually it might allow that woman to open up. We have to make sure that the staff are trained and, you know, able to know what to do to be able to signpost people to appropriate services. We need to have trauma-informed services across the board. And we also need to make sure that if a woman has a severe mental illness and that, you know, she gets access to good physical health care, good trauma-informed services as well. There have been some positive trials like the Community Mental Health Framework in Cambridge.

What have you seen that you feel works? So the Community Mental Health Framework is something that was developed by a cast of thousands. it can work. It's a bit like a neighbourhood model and it brings people in from the voluntary and community sector to work with statutory, you know, secondary health services

and primary health services. And so it's like a one-stop shop and everything that you need is there. So if you need actual, you know, psychiatric care, you can get that. But all too often, people will also need support with their housing and with their debt and with, you know, support with their children.

children actually and and you know we can do all that at once it works in Cambridge and Peterborough it works it's worked in Somerset it's worked in Hartleypool we need that to be that's a holistic a holistic approach yeah and there's also a crisis houses like Drayton Park in Islington again this is a this is an initiative that's been going for years a women's service for women by women it you know with women it works incredibly well and I'm to and believe the women when they come in I mean you know We don't have to constantly go in and advocate for ourselves. And only those of us who know how to do that can do it in the first place.

Exactly. We've talked about it so much on the program. What about bringing care coordinators? Tell us about that, who don't need to be clinical. Well, you can bring it, well, you know, we can have key workers. People have key workers and care navigators. Yeah. And actually, we have a massive workforce shortage in clinical care.

We've got 20% shortage of nurses, one in six consultants, psychiatrists, vacancies. And so, and we know that a lot of the problems that women have are driven by the socio-economic environment that they exist in. And if we can do something about that, if we can get people who are care navigators or, you know, connectors in the community to help them with their housing problems, to help them with their debt problems, then they're less likely to need and require the services of someone like me. Mental health is a very broad spectrum. Are certain types of mental health treatment fairing better for women when it comes to diagnosis? Well, one of the main problems we have is that less than a third of people are actually able to access treatment. So, and it's just awful, actually. I mean, women are often quite good at presenting themselves to services.

But even if you present, you don't necessarily get the treatment that you need because we've got such, you know, so chronically under-resourced that the threshold that the thresholds that the thresholds to get into services are so high. So unfortunately, at the moment, it's very, very difficult to get the care that people need. And we're at a crossroads, really. We really are. We have to decide as a country, as a government,

do we want things to continue as they are with the significant economic impact of that? Because, of course, women are the main carers. Women are the, you know, people who have to work force. you know, if we're ill with the problem that could be treated and it doesn't get treated, then that has an economic impact. And it's estimated to cost up to £300 billion a year. So we're at a crossroads.

The government and the country can decide we're going to continue doing what we've been doing, which means that people will continue to get iller and iller, which is what we're seeing. It doesn't get better by itself. Or we can decide to invest in good mental health care. We can decide to invest in a government. cross-government strategy that takes into account all of the social factors that drive the problems. We can invest in a public health approach to gender-based violence.

And also just having spoken to women on the program, like we're less, we're not, we're not the first to say we need help. We will just try and cope and get through it. It's almost feeling that there is a place for you to go to get the help that you need. Yeah. Well, I mean, that's the problem. It's this historical idea that women are just going to put up and get on with it. Yeah. When in fact, what happens is a gradual deterioration in a woman's functioning until she eventually gets so unwell that she ends up needing to come into hospital.

And at that point, that's when she's at the biggest risk to herself and others. I feel like we need to make a bit of a positive point. I don't know if it is that positive, but you do point out that just 40 years ago there was the legacy of the mental health asylum system that still existed. So progress has been made. Progress has definitely been made. There's no doubt at all. I mean, you know, we now can deliver care in people's homes, we can deliver care in the community.

People are talking about mental health in the way they haven't ever done before. And so people are much more open about it. We just need to be able to invest in services, in particular in women. If we invest in women, things will be so much better. This is your last week in the position as of President. How would you like to see the NHS change in terms of delivering women's centred care? So what I say is every single, every single practitioner, whenever you, see a woman, ask her about trauma. Ask her about her periods. Leslie Regan would say,

ask her about her periods as well. And that woman, the answer to that question will make all the difference to that woman and all the difference to the way in which we start to develop the services that women need. Yeah, I had my over 40s health check a year, a couple of years ago, and I was not asked about anything to do with the hormones. I was so surprised, and it's changed now, but at the time, it was just blood pressure, off you go. So what should women do when they experience an issue with their mental health? So women should still obviously go to your GP. You can phone 1-1-1-2.

You can go on to various websites and, you know, the Mind website, Rethink website, the Royal College of Psychiatrists would be able to get ideas from, you know, leaflets from there. But you can get support in your local community. I would urge everyone, everyone, the Department of Health, NHS England, individual women, have a look at our women's mental health strategy. You go to the Royal College of Psychiatrist's website. You can download the strategy and that will tell you what you need. We know what the answers are.

We just need to implement, you know, the action now. And a Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson did tell us we're committed to ensuring every woman gets the mental health support they need as early as possible. That's why we're investing a record 16.1 billion pounds in mental health services this year and we've hit our target of 8,000 extra mental health workers. We will also push a new mental health strategy this year so everyone, including women, can get help closer to home. Dr Lade Smith, thank you for coming in to speak to us this morning.

Thank you. 84844 is the text number. Now, when Kaylee's stead was left alone at the altar on her wedding day in 2022, she did what few would think to do. She let the wedding continue. Kaylee's photos of her enjoying her wedding alone, including the speeches, the first dance and cutting the cake went viral. Other women congratulated her for celebrating herself and still enjoying the day.

Four years on, she's found love again. She's engaged and she says she wants her wedding to be a big party. Morning, Kaylee, and congratulations on your engagement. Morning and thank you, yeah. Over the moon, as you can probably expect with the engagement. Completely surprised, but over the moon. nonetheless. So let's go back to, I mean, I don't want to kind of touch on a nerve, but, you know, let's take you back. I'm an open buck. It went viral. You're deciding to continue your wedding alone, although your friends and family, with everyone beside you. Your fiancé never showed up. Why did you decide in that moment that you needed to have the day, regardless?

I think I've always been somebody that everyone can go to for advice. And my advice has been for my nieces, especially at like a young, impressionable age. It's always. been don't let the person who you're with define you. How you overcome that is how you should define yourself and you should fight for that. And in that moment, I had to lead by example on what I was preaching to them. And I did that. And I wanted to celebrate me

and all the work that I had done up to that day, I had worked overtime. I had sacrificed a lot of things. I was looking forward to spending time my friends and family. I was looking forward to my natural bar, if I'm honest as well. I'd constantly gone on and on and on about that. The natcho bar.

Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. You are my hero, I have to say it. Yeah, I wanted to enjoy that. And I didn't want him leaving me to also take away that. Yeah. What did you learn about yourself in that moment? And I really think, I mean, how lucky are your nieces to have you as an auntie to be instilling such, like, positive messages?

but yeah, and your level of resilience. So I've been a young carer since a very young age of five. So my mum was disabled all of my life. So she's always taught me that you've got to rise up to any occasion, no matter what. And I think that was kind of my time to kind of go thank you to her as well for what she's taught me. And she was there by my side the whole time. She was so proud of me. And I think at the time, of course, I was devastated at a point.

But I just learned that I've got so much love other than just romantic love. Yeah. And that, to me, was just overpowered anything else. And you thanked your bridesmaids? Absolutely. And the groomsmen. So all his groomsmen stayed. And I couldn't thank them enough. They were by my side as much as my friends who have known for over decades.

These are men. I'd only known since being with my ex at the time, who had known for a couple of years. But they were by my side throughout it thick and thin, and they stayed there for me. And you met your now fiancé, because he saw articles of you being jilted at the altar. That's quite the butterfly effect.

Can you tell us how that happened? Yeah, of course. So I've known my partner for actually over a decade. So we met in universities. So we were in uni together. He actually asked me out in first year and I said, no. I asked him out in third year.

and he said no. This is so romantic. Honestly, it is insane. And then 10 years later, we were a bit like, we kind of rekindled a bit of a conversation. Neither us wanted to drop it. He was like, we're going on a date. I'm not going to ask you, like, this is something we both wanted to do,

let's throw caution to the wind. And it was the best decision he and I have ever made. And, yeah, we're now living together. And, yeah, planning our wedding. You know, yesterday's, on yesterday's, program we were talking about once in a lifetime synchronicity when something happens where you think you know how on earth well there you go jilt because you were jilted at the altar you've now met your fiancee incredible and i can't thank him enough well he's lucky yeah what do you have

planned for the wedding day this time so we um he's actually outnumbered me on the guest list which was completely different the last time so we want to just have a day where we can celebrate us really and this time it's about us to rather than others having the influence on it that's where I've learned from the last time and we just want to have fun because we're very fun people we enjoy the chaos and we're excited to just have a day of just us too but I'll be bringing it back the nato bar I was going to please this is what I needed to hear the nacho bar will be there I think you just going to make the nacho bar a thing.

I want to wish you all the best of luck. What a joyful story to hear on a Friday, Kay Leastead. Thank you so much. I'm going to end the program with a few of your messages coming in. We've been talking lots about various things, all sort of related to mental health, really, but we had a discussion about weight and the scrutiny that women are under and that we put ourselves under. I've been overweight all my life, says someone on an email. I'm sure I didn't get certain jobs because of my weight.

However, as I've got older, I've become more confident in saying to myself and close friends, this is who I am. If you don't like it, then it's your loss, not mine. And Chrissy in Dorset says, as a size 10 to 12, women with muscle to keep me strong into my later years, I say to anyone listening, this is a good one, strong, not skinny, here, here. That's it from me tomorrow on Weekend Woman's Hour, Claire Connor, the woman who transformed cricket in England and Wales, as she leaves the role after 18 years. as after the T20 Women's World Cup.

That's all for today's Women's Hour. Join us again next time. Hi there, I'm Dillie Carter, and this is everything you need to know about my new podcast. Sort your life out, unpacked. I interview a different celebrity every episode. They bring me in three items from their home

that reveal them most about them, and we unpack the stories behind those items. And I give you a few tips and tricks along the way. Some of the guests that I'm going to be interviewing are TV presenters like Lorraine Kelly, reality stars like Kerry Cotona, podcast royalty like Elizabeth Day, and of course our very own Stacey Solomon. Oh, and let's not forget some incredibly funny comedians like Phil Wang and Eddie Caddy. I think, as with everything to sort your life out based,

you are going to get so much motivation, inspiration and ideas for your own home. Sort Your Life Out unpacked presented by me, Diddy Carter. You can watch us on EyePlayer and listen on BBC Sounds. Signal Awards recognize the podcast that define culture, and being honored by the Signal Awards sets your production team apart with recognition from the industry's top experts and access proof that your work is a standard bearer for podcasting worldwide. By entering, your work is heard by the Signal Awards Judging Academy, an invitation-only body of podcast professionals from acclaimed organizations which include the BBC. Grow your audience.

celebrate your team and stand out. The final entry deadline to submit is the 26th of June. Enter your podcast at signalaward.com for consideration.