Diary of a Working Woman
Passionate, hard-working, fearless Educationalist, Psychologist and mother, Johnette Barrett talks to a selection of working women who have gone through many challenging experiences, often having to undergo many conflicting roles. Johnette unravels the secrets of being a successful woman in today’s world.
Diary of a Working Woman
Overcoming Body Changes with Expertise and Care: Insights from Melina Healy
What if you could embrace aging with grace and confidence? Join us in this enlightening episode of Diary of a Working Woman as we sit down with the remarkable Melina Healy, a senior lecturer at St Mary's University in London. Melina opens up about her diverse career in teaching, sports therapy, and biomedical sciences, sharing her journey from a science-loving child to a respected educator and mentor. She also delves into her roles in Race Equality initiatives and menopause support networks, highlighting her dedication to education and health.
Ever wondered about the real impact of aging and body changes? Melina shares her personal experiences with post-pregnancy transformations and the profound hormonal shifts that accompany them. We discuss setting realistic goals, seeking expert advice, and using resources to maintain a healthy lifestyle. Plus, we tackle the often-taboo topic of menopause, emphasizing the importance of awareness and preparation for better mental health and self-esteem. This candid conversation offers practical advice and encouragement for women at every life stage, from their 20s through menopause.
Self-care isn't just a buzzword; it's a necessity. Melina shares invaluable tips on tracking health patterns, recognizing food intolerances, and prioritizing mental health. We explore daily routines that contribute to feeling youthful, from exercise and meditation to skincare and diet. Melina also provides insights into maintaining physical intimacy, understanding vaginal health, and enhancing sexual pleasure. Celebrate Melina’s incredible achievements and gain inspiration from her story of balancing doctoral studies with family life. This episode is packed with wisdom, practical tips, and heartfelt moments that will resonate with listeners of all ages.
A new podcast in which Johnette Barrett, educational psychologist, seeks out inspirational working women who have transformed their lives and that of others through their courageousness and compassion.
The conversations that follow are sometimes eye-opening, sometimes heart- breaking and sometimes humourous.
Diary of a Working Woman (DOAWW) is hosted by Buzzsprouts .com.
Email: diaryofaworkingwoman@yahoo.com
Instagram: doaww podcast
Website: https://www.buzzsprout.com/2227789
Hello, my name is Jonette Barrett and you're tuning in to Diary of a Working Woman, or DOA, d-o-a-w-w. I'm here today with my dear friend, melina Healy. Melina and I are really passionate about learning. She's been in teaching and lecturing for over 18 years and has worked across all sectors schools, further education and higher education. She is a senior lecturer at St Mary's University in London in the Learning and Development Division, and I'm so proud of you, mel. Mel has been promoted to the chair of the Race Equality Charter, which is amazing. And I know that you're also the co-chair of the Race Equality. Yes, I'm the chair of the Race Equity Network, equity Network right, I'm the co-chair of the Race Equality Charter.
Speaker 2:And not only that. I mean she's beautiful, she's a bias bias, I am biased. She's an author. I am, yes, yeah, and a claimed co-author, and which is amazing as well. And she bakes. Yes, she looks after her grandchildren.
Speaker 2:Yeah, she's a amazing uh companion uh to many women. She is an expert um in the field of menopause and runs a regular uh network supporting women going through the menopause. She works with big burly men as a sports therapist. She does so much with her background in the sciences. So, but you know I'm going to be quiet for a little bit because I'd really like Mel just to sum up, because it's really hard, because she does so many things. She's remarkable, mel say hi to my listeners and just tell them a little bit more about what you do. So hello first of all, and thank you, jeanette, for having me here with you today. It's my absolute pleasure. It's a pleasure.
Speaker 2:So I am a in the first instance. I guess my background is biomedical sciences, so I'm a science background, followed on then closely by my sports therapy. I'm an ex-athlete, always had a love for the body, the love for movement, love for how we move. But also I'm a geek, so I was a sporty geek. So I love science, I love, I love the way the mind works, I love how we learn, I love how those things collaborate and come together. That then led me into teaching. So I did my teaching qualification while teaching.
Speaker 2:So you know the in-situ qualification that you do teaching your work and you're teaching on the job yeah which was amazing so I did my teaching degree in that way um and incidentally that was then my second degree, so I already had one um and a postgraduate thing for my school so you just love learning?
Speaker 1:I do.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you're a lifelong learner, I do she is the epitome of what all teachers want. They want children to become lifelong learners, and this is what you are yeah, it's amazing. Obviously, learning is doing amazing things for your skin, uh, for your mental, your physical and emotional well-being.
Speaker 1:So that's amazing.
Speaker 2:So, mel, you know it is a pleasure having you on and because you're you're multi-talented, I think you could have spoken on lots of different topics today. You know, really it was really hard. Do we talk about menopause? Okay, a little bit might come in. Uh, do talk about sports science and sports therapy.
Speaker 2:But, you know, diary of the Working Woman is all about celebrating women who are, you know, just doing great things in their field, so that, you know, you can share your knowledge and expertise and inspire other women out there, and maybe men too, and in a process that we can learn something from one another.
Speaker 2:So I'm sure there are going to be lots of nuggets on here today that you are going to take away from you.
Speaker 2:So, mel, can you share with our listeners what you're going to be talking about today? Okay, so I'm going to talk about ageing, and we're not going to, as Jeanette said, we could have put it in the box of the menopause, but we all age, so we didn't really want to restrict it to that. I'm going to be talking about how to take control of the aging process and how to, rather than fear it, how to love it and enjoy that, that the new experiences that we're, that we're now open to as we get older, but also learning from what's happened in the past and how all of that is kind of making us better for now, and also none of us look our age anyway, so I don't really know what all the fuss is about, to be honest, because you know, johnette sat here next to me. No, I think what it is, mel. I think there are women out there who have always taken care of themselves and always prioritized their health and their well-being and their fitness.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and then there were women out there who'd be thinking well, you know, I wish I had done so, you know, 10 years ago or 15 years ago. So what is it in you when you were younger made you think that you wanted to go down this route, the scientific route, you know? The sporting route? Were you a sporty child?
Speaker 1:Did you love science. What were you?
Speaker 2:like as a child, very sporty. So a little, a little tiny little story. My, when I was small, my parents lived. I grew up in South London. My, when I was small, my parents lived, I grew up in south london, so my parents lived in um a not, it wasn't a big, wasn't like a tall high rise, but it was you know.
Speaker 2:They lived on like a low rise and um, I must have been, I don't know, maybe two or three. So every time my mum brought me downstairs to go anywhere, I would just run off. Literally I would run from the minute that I could walk. I was running and she had to put reins on me because she couldn't catch me. And my dad? My dad heard something, so I I was the key, it was dragging her and dreading here they come, that poor woman with that child that's erasing yeah, so that was always me, yeah.
Speaker 1:I always I had a lot of energy, yeah, always and my dad was very sporty.
Speaker 2:Um, and I literally almost lived in my dad's pocket. I adored my mum. Um. So, god, I worship my mum. She was amazing and my dad was like my um like almost sort of hero.
Speaker 2:It changes as you grow, obviously, because you know they do stuff and yeah, but but you know he was my hero and he particularly sports, because that was his thing. He was cricket, he thought it was cricket. He could run fast. He used to race me. We used to, you know, there was, there was a lot of play, yeah, a lot of fun yeah, I was very blessed and I was also very inquisitive, right.
Speaker 2:So I always wanted to know how things worked. But not things, not like mechanical things but the body, the body, the body.
Speaker 2:So how does our hair grow? How can you imagine, mom, why do women brush their hair at night? What's the point in them brushing their hair at night? Because isn't it going to get messy when they're sleeping. And then I decided that it was mum. Why do women brush their hair at night? What's the point in them brushing their hair at night? Because isn't it going to get messy when they're sleeping? And then I decided that it was because, if anything happened in the night, they looked beautiful. I must have been about six when I decided that. Um, but it was things like that. Why do we? Why do we, moisturize our skin? Yeah, why? Why does water fall off of our skin and not go into it? All of those things were questions that my mother was faced with from a very early age, so you were naturally curious.
Speaker 2:And were you that curious at school, and how did your teachers find you with that level of curiosity?
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's interesting.
Speaker 2:So that wasn't always very welcome. I can imagine, yeah, because I'm also chatty, as you will tell Chatty Mary. No, they didn't find it very, they didn't embrace it. Not really, because I went to my primary school was different, my primary school. But I think if you're lucky and you happen to be in a primary school where they are innovative thinkers and they embrace differences, yeah I went to primary school in a, very in a.
Speaker 2:It was a church primary school, but it was a very diverse primary school and they all of our quirks were embraced, yeah, so primary school was, was an amazing amount of fun. I loved my primary school and I had a shock when I got to secondary school because I went to an all-girls grammar school. I was one of three other black children in our whole cohort in our whole cohort of 120. There were three of us and there were five or six in the school yeah so we there weren't very many.
Speaker 2:So a little inquisitive black girl asking a million questions and honestly asking questions because if I, if you don't give me an answer, you're gonna probe, I'm gonna keep going because I don't give me an answer yeah, you're going to probe.
Speaker 1:I'm going to keep probing because I don't get it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah. That doesn't make sense to me. Those and I, I think, eventually learn after I got thrown out of geography. Learn to curb a little bit of that, of that inquisitive nature, yeah, and it's a shame, isn't it really? Really that you've had to suppress a part and certain parts of your personality you know, just to fit in with what you expected to be like as a child, as a student going to a secondary school which is a little bit sad but anyway, let's fast forward.
Speaker 2:So you always have that natural curiosity and science and the body and the mind and all the rest of it. At what stage do you think that you were going to? Um, go to uni and study and and um, yeah, just study, okay because, obviously there's not. You know I'm not quite sure the percentage. You know what the percentage is of um children and black girls back then who were going to university.
Speaker 1:You know, yeah, yeah, we weren't that many.
Speaker 2:No, I can't imagine that. You know, you were and, um, I suppose, my biology teacher. So if we go back a step, yeah, when I was 10 I decided that I wanted to be a gynecologist. So I know it's ridiculous, which is a if anyone doesn't know, not presuming everyone even knows what a gynaecologist is. But it's a female. They specialise in women's issue, particularly the womb. You know all of that sort of thing, yeah, not necessarily pregnancy but some, but all female-related medical issues.
Speaker 2:in that sense and don't ask me why that was I think my mom took me with her to one of her appointments and that particular doctor was really nice yeah, and very friendly and answered all my questions, and that inspired me um, and then when I was at school I was demotivated from doing that by my headmistress and sadly sort of listened.
Speaker 2:But I had a brilliant biology teacher and she gave me a love of the microscope, right and what was going on inside the body. So that kind of brought that back. And then I looked at biomedical sciences. Yeah, so for those who don't know what biomedical science entails, could you just say a little bit about what it is? Yeah, so for those who don't know what biomedical science entails, could you just say a little bit about what it is? Yeah, so it's the science of everything, essentially everything that goes on inside the body and it's in cellular form. So it's separated into biochemistry, microbiology and haematology. So if you've ever been to the hospital, ever had a blood test, the people that do all of the assessed testing of the blood in the lab are biomedical sciences. So anything anything to do with any kind of pathology yeah, the underlying tests that are happening in the laboratory, that that's what.
Speaker 1:That's what you do right, wow.
Speaker 2:So you know, we are going to be talking about the aging process and, um, and looking back over maybe the decades for both of us, um, and just thinking you know how our bodies have changed that well, I think it might be changed, and you know, and, and how we feel about that, I guess. So, I think for me, um, I didn't really. I felt like I started to age around mid-30s mid to late 30s? I've not, was it mid to late 30s?
Speaker 1:it could have been early 40s?
Speaker 2:no, because I had. I had my children quite late, um, and I was maybe early 40s. After pregnancy, the post-pregnancy body, right, that was the first thing. I had dreadful pregnancies, both times around lovely kids I really do, but I had bad pregnancies carrying you, um. But, um, I remember the post-body, just not what I wanted, because pre-pregnancy I'd always been a gym freak. Uh, growing up through the ages child, I've always danced, you know, always very active, like yourself. So I prided myself on having this body that was proud of. And then I had the babies. And then, all of a sudden, it was like, oh, a bit of a sag here, a bit of a sag there and a bit of a wrinkle here, a bit of a droop there. I thought, oh, my goodness, but I was determined. I thought, you know, that's just the state of my body following pregnancy and.
Speaker 2:I can work to, you know, to get it back-ish into what it was pre-pregnancy. So what would you say to women who you know? Obviously, most women who get pregnant, most women are happy about that and go on to have beautiful children, but there are some women who really struggle with identifying with their post-pregnancy bodies.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's. I suppose the first thing is to um realize that pregnancy, giving birth to another human being, is huge. There are enormous changes that are happening in your body. First of all, all it's a miracle You're carrying another human being into the world, so you are their protection. They are literally growing in you and using your body for their nutrients. So that means that in order for you to carry them, in order for you to give them nutrition, in order for your body to be nurtured strong enough for you to do all of those things, your hormone balance changes. Yeah, and with those hormone balance changes, there's always a isn't there or some sort of always. Then there's, there are changes that. So you don't just put weight on. It would be lovely if you just put weight on around you know the womb and the stomach in order to protect the baby, because that's what's happening your breasts enlarge because they're getting ready to feed.
Speaker 2:But also, if we think in a sense, if we go back and think prehistorically, think cave dwellers, before we had these lovely houses and our lovely cars and our lovely everything, that we would have to be protectors of those children. Yeah, you're not a very good protector if you're stick thin and you don't have any meat on your bones in order to be able to fight and lift and nudge and do all of those things. So you're putting weight on because you're nourishing. That's. That's why that starts, because you need. You need extra because you're giving. Half of what you're taking in is going to the child. So that's, that's the weight game. So it's. I suppose the reason why I'm saying it like this is because it helps to understand why something is happening to then be able to embrace it on the other side, because
Speaker 2:all of these changes, while they are, can be frustrated. It's horrible to sort of watch your ankles and your you know your wrists and everything's swelling up and some women do get fluid retention and all of those things. I'm not saying by any means that it's always an easy road, but the reasons why those things are happening is because your body's trying to nurture the growing child. Once you've had the baby, I think being able to take control as much as you can over your birth plan, over the birth to come I mean, I had preeclampsia when I had my son.
Speaker 1:That's quite a serious condition, isn't it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so that's where your blood pressure goes through the roof. It's serious for both you and the baby. Women have died with preeclampsia and the kidneys start not working. It's a sort of a shutdown thing. So he was born at seven months. So he was born prematurely and you can imagine that means that everything was quite traumatic around it. I ended up having to have an emergency C-section. I had an epidural, it was all you know and then I was out of it for four days. Afterwards I was in ITU and he was in special care and his dad my ex-hushusband now, but still my very good friend um was torn between the two.
Speaker 2:So it was all a really traumatic time, um, and my body wasn't ready, no to give, to give birth. So I identify with this whole. I was very fit beforehand and then afterwards I've got this c-section. I, you know, I'm like bent over walking trying to get myself upright and I think, maybe, maybe, because I had a really strong network. My mum was amazing, my dad was amazing. It makes all the difference. It does. It does. I had a very strong family around me that meant that I had help, so I had time to heal and to do.
Speaker 1:You know what I mean come to terms with, and I think that that's a massive thing, because the body will heal itself it will heal itself, because it's a natural process. You have to rest, don't you?
Speaker 2:those of us who are high energy need to need to sit down, exactly slow down, and stop. So that's a little bit about maybe. You know a lot of women get pregnant in their 20s and their 30s and, and noticing the changes to um their bodies, um what, what sort of advice would you give to any woman who has had a baby and it's been like maybe 10 or 15 years on and they've not lost the baby weight?
Speaker 2:you know, you know they've not lost the baby weight or that little jiggle at the bottom of your tummy that I've still got, because I had two emergency sections myself and no matter how many sit-ups I do, no matter what I do in the gym, it remains yeah, yeah, it does yeah it does, isn't it?
Speaker 2:I know I'm, I'm, I'm with you there. I think there comes a point when we so, and I'm going to get all woo woo now on you. So apologies, apologies, but not apologies. I don't know what means, but we'll see, right, okay. So there comes a point when, in order for you to be able to have the body you think you need and I say you think you need that you have to come to terms with the body that you have, yeah. So in order.
Speaker 2:You can't, if you keep going around saying I'm fat, I'm fat. What you're going to see is I'm fat, yeah, and your body is going to respond with I'm fat. You're going to see is I'm fat, and your body is going to respond with yeah, I'm fat. And that sounds ridiculous. But keep bear with me for a second. We have to. You have to have a sensible starting point for you. So I will. I can't look like Johnette, johnette can't look like Jonette, jonette can't look like me. We're totally different people. So I can't put my aspirations for how my body should be on what someone else has done. And we look at a lot of stars on TikTok and all of this. They've had a baby yesterday and today they look amazing. Well, first of all, probably they don't, and there's a lot of you do know, but there's a lot of kind of little, what what they're called the um profile things.
Speaker 2:The filters yes that you can use to make everything look amazing. Plus, they can afford to have a personal trainer and and nutrition list and all of these things that we people can't yeah so the first thing is to make peace with your body.
Speaker 2:So really take time, slowly to. Some people don't even look at their body in the mirror to know what their body looks like, and we need to start doing that, and at first it's difficult. So it might be that you get out of the shower or the bath and you spend 30 seconds just looking at the naked you in the mirror 30 seconds or 10 seconds if that's as much as you can handle. But you keep building it up on a daily basis, and the reason why I'm saying that is because you need to get to know your body once you can stand in front of the mirror for long enough that you can actually see yourself. So let's say a minute. I then want you not to don't look at what is not okay, what you don't want. We all none of us like our tummy. I've known very few women that have had children that can say I love my tummy, yeah. So let's not look at our tummies. To start with, what part do you love?
Speaker 2:we've all got one part, even if it's your toe, we've all got one part that we, that we're happy with yeah, I like my legs yeah, and I like my shoulders, you've got so I, I love my legs, yeah, yeah so I start by looking at my legs and talking about all the things that I love about my legs the shape and you know the curve here and the curve there and my hamstrings and my this and my that. Look at that part spend some time appreciating what you do exactly.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, those those parts, and do that on a daily basis and then move a hundred percent, move from one place to the other. By the time you finish talking about all the bits that you love and there will be more. Once you start, yeah, you'll find that. There might be your eyes, it might be your nose, whatever it is. Yeah, you'll see things. That's what you're going to be looking in the mirror at. I'm not saying that magically, your tummy will go away yeah, it won't suddenly just go it won't disappear, but I should show you't disappear.
Speaker 2:That's a shame, mel. I know it's rubbish, right, but you're now at a starting point to be able to go okay, what do I realistically would like to change? What realistically can I do? So if you've got a favorite dress or something that you used to wear, yeah, but now does be. Now, listen, I'm not saying if you are a size 16 that we're aiming to be a size 6, because that's you'll be really bonkers, yeah, but you, we are thinking that we all inadvertently might have gone up a dress size. It's very realistic to think actually, I'd quite like to get back into that that I was in last year, that would be, and use that as your aim, so that now what you're doing is you've got a focus to work towards.
Speaker 2:That's the first thing, or an event that you want to go to.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you think right, I want to be able to wear this dress, or? This suit at this event in three months time giving yourself a really strict time scale and then work towards it.
Speaker 2:I think, you're absolutely right and get experts, don't try to do it yourself don't try to think, oh, I'm going to go to the gym and just aimlessly wander around, get a personal trainer, if you can afford to get a personal trainer. There are lots of online free apps that you can get for exercise, lots of online free apps that you can get for nutrition. I you know everyone sort of says is there, there's no magic? It's, there is no magic.
Speaker 2:You take in less than you expend, so you eat less and the energy you burn but it's so hard it just rolls with the tongue, doesn't it just rolls with the tongue eat less and move more you eat less, you move more and stay the yeah, but look, we're going to stop for a quick break at that point.
Speaker 2:So we've sort of looked at, you know, 20s and 30s, pregnancy bodies, um, growing to love the body that you have, appreciate the good things about your body, maybe having a goal in mind if you'd like to lose a bit of weight or you want to get into a particular dress or you want to be in your best possible body state for an event that you've got. So, yeah, what's that? Nothing, but anyway. So we will be right back, we'll be right back. So we're back again.
Speaker 2:I'm here with melina healy, and melina is talking about aging and aging for women and how we can embrace aging and learn to love the body that we're in and make changes in the areas that we'd like to. Um, so I think we said before, mel, we were talking about, you know, our 20s and 30s and those women who choose to have children, have gone on to have children Just how the body can change after pregnancy and how you can take control when you have a goal in mind. And Mel was talking about getting expert help. If you need help dieticians, personal trainers we're using social media apps out there which are free, so we want to just move on a little bit, don't we Mel and talk about the N-word, the N-word.
Speaker 2:You know people, you know women do experience menopause in lots of different ways. Some people go through it and don't even realise they've're through it, you know, and then others really, really suffer. So, um, you know, I think it'd be really good to touch on just just how the body changes, you know, from mid-30s through to, I don't know, 55, upwards, I don't know and how that can affect a woman's self-esteem and her mental health and everything else.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay, so the n-word that we all don't want to talk about but actually should be talking about more, because if we spoke about it more, it wouldn't be such a taboo, we would be a lot, we'd go through it a lot better yeah so, um, some of the changes that can happen, and if you're listening to this and you're like 25 and you think, oh, I'll switch off at this point, please don't, because you understanding what will happen to your body, what can happen to your body, the changes that can happen to your body, means that you're going to be prepared, it won't be a shock number one and you'll be able to go through the menopause in a better way than people, than some people that didn't know what was going on with them, started thinking they were going mad, because that causes issues. So keep listening, please.
Speaker 1:Um, you heard it here yeah, mostly I'm such a don't mess with mal, yeah exactly.
Speaker 2:Most people start going through the menopause somewhere around like 35 ish. Yeah, okay, um, but it's, it's. There are two. It's perimenopause and anamenopause. So perimenopause speaks to the changes that are happening throughout the body while our oestrogen level is slowly dropping off yeah and the menopause is when our oestrogen has more or less bottomed out right, um and the. The differences between the two, or how they work out the differences between the two, is a. Obviously you're not producing any more oestrogen, but the big one is, your periods go yeah, yeah um, and that is most of you probably out there going.
Speaker 2:Well, that's a great thing, isn't it? It is. It is in and of itself, but it's not because of all the other stuff that goes on, and you start learning very quickly that estrogen is responsible for so much stuff. It is involved in everything. It's a proper busy body.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah everything, everything, there's nothing there's nothing, there's no hormonal, um kind of chemical equation, chemical anything can? I'm trying to trying to think of the word myself like um see that's, that's the symptom, menopause, right there where you can see the word, but you can't get the word out.
Speaker 1:Brain fog, exactly, yeah so for chemical processes.
Speaker 2:There's very few chemical processes, particularly in a woman, that happen without estrogen being somewhere in the mix. It's it's quite frustrating. So there is the brain fog, there's the old lady eyes, as I like to call them, where you think that you need reading glasses.
Speaker 2:And you go to the optician and they say to you there's nothing wrong with your eyes and it's the eye muscles getting tired. There's the fatigue, oh the tiredness. All the time tired, sleeping all the hours but getting up tired, ridiculous. There is the itchy, dry skin. Yeah, that was the first symptom for me. Just, my moisturiser stopped to have an effect, it just wasn't working anymore. No matter how much moisturiser. I applied my skin was dry and itchy and I had to switch brand at that stage.
Speaker 1:I remember that really well. That's the increase in cortisol.
Speaker 2:So one of the things that happens with oestrogen is that you get an increase in some of the other things that are happening. So cortisol is one of them, serotonin is another, inflammatory response is another. So you start getting aches and pains all over everywhere. That are ridiculous because you get up and suddenly your right knee's hurting.
Speaker 1:you sit down, then it's your left knee hurting you turn your head, yeah, and then all of a sudden you've pulled something in your neck yeah, this is like when you get up and you're back.
Speaker 2:I mean, what is this now? Oh, oh, oh. You turn your head and you, yeah, what the hell.
Speaker 1:What is this why?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so that's. Oxytocin is a hormone that we release every month with our periods, and its job ordinarily is to make sure that our pelvic passage is open for you to give birth, right, so your ligaments get lax around the joints. The annoying thing with all of this stuff is it's not like if it would just be to the part. So can't you just go to the bit that you're meant to work on and not all the bits around the body? So your body has an increase in oxytocin, which makes all of your joints lax. And when you're pregnant, um, some women, when they are pregnant, start start talking about joint aches. That's a similar thing, right when you are going for this when you're going through the menopause?
Speaker 2:yeah, and if you did suffer with lots of joint aches when you were pregnant, if you know you became pregnant. That was the case. That's going to be mapped again. When you because that's one of the so estrogen levels are low when you're with your menopause, because that's one of the so estrogen levels are low when you're pregnant, obviously, but that's one of the so the symptoms that you're experiencing. Then you kind of mirror later on.
Speaker 2:It gives you a clue yes when you're going through your periods, you're mirroring some of those symptoms. That's why it's important to listen now, young ladies in your 20s, because if you think about what, how you feel going into your periods now, so if you do get premenstrual tension, if you get really bad headaches, if you um have really painful breaths or really painful periods, that mirrors itself when you start getting your symptoms for the menopause. Yeah, so perimenopausal, you might get erratic periods, but they are very heavy, very painful. You start getting period headaches, period migraines that come on indiscriminately. Those things kind of ramp up a bit when you start going through the menopause. So you can use your if you're right, that were before yeah to give you a bit of a clue as to how you're going to be later.
Speaker 1:You're going to be later on also I'm just thinking about.
Speaker 2:You know, um, a certain amount of how you're going to go through the menopause is based on how your mother went through that's right, yeah, I remember thinking you know, have I gone through it, am I going through it?
Speaker 2:I had no clue, no ideas to when my mother went through it yes, and you know um, I'm, you know my mum, love her dearly, but is not one for talking um very much about personal matters. So, um, you know, I did. I dared go and say a mum, you know how old were you when you went through menopause? You're probably probably look and think I've not been through it. Thank you very much. I'm still young, I don't know what you're trying to say. But, joking aside, but yeah, I think we need to talk to our mothers a lot more.
Speaker 1:We do, Don't we? We do yeah.
Speaker 2:But it's a conversation that the older generation didn't really, because I I mean, my mum's passed now, but I half remember when she was going through it because she had the flushes really quite badly, um, but I don't really know anything else about it. I remember my aunts and my godmother both had to have hysterectomies because their periods became so heavy that I mean they were both of them had been found on the bathroom floor just in floods. So and incidentally, at one point hysterectomy was the answer yeah you're going for the menopause, you've got a problem.
Speaker 2:Let's just take it out. You don't need it. That's not the answer. That just plunges you faster and deeper into it.
Speaker 1:If.
Speaker 2:I can just say just move us on a little bit in that you know you've spoken about some of the physical symptoms like the eyes deteriorating, the joint and muscular pains, the dryness of the skin. You know they're dropping the oestrogen levels, but I've been. I remember when I was younger and been in the workplace when there's been menopausal women and you know it can. The menopause can play havoc on your mental health absolutely.
Speaker 2:You know something really cranky, yeah, uh, just lacking in patience, irritable the whole time and I felt really bad and I thought, my goodness, you know I'm not looking forward to going through that. I know we all age differently, but you know how can it affect your mental health going through all of this? How does it? It's anxiety, so the less you know about what's happening, yeah, knowledge is power, right.
Speaker 2:So the more you know about what's happening, you understand why it's happening. That's halfway. That's 50% to helping you deal with it. You can't deal with something that you can't name. No, that's right. So if you think about some of the women that would have been struggling with anxiety and being snappy, think about a teenager that doesn't know anything about puberty and is going through puberty With the hormones going up and down. Where you're emotionally, one day you're happy, the next day, one minute, you're happy, the next minute you're not happy.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you're low, but you don't understand why that is. So now you start thinking what's wrong with me? I don't know how I can't trust myself in this situation. And then you start getting people calling in sick. Yes, not wanting to get out of bed and it really, it really can affect your confidence in your body that you once knew so well yeah now it's kind of like tripping you up every five minutes yeah you know you're in the middle of a big meeting, giving a presentation and you can't think of the words to say right or there's
Speaker 2:sweat pouring off you Embarrassing I remember a friend years ago said to me as well that she was you know. She got very nervous about going out in public because all of a sudden she kept noticing a sort of fishy odour, Fishy smell, yes. So what's this fishy odour? Yes, yes, Thank the Lord, it hasn't happened to me. So what's the speciality of that? Thank the Lord, it hasn't happened to me, Thank goodness. What is that, Fanny? Why is that happening? Change of body hormones Right, that's literally. And the change of the. So it's almost. We're going to talk about the V word now. So we're on the end.
Speaker 1:She's talking about vagina, we're talking about the V. Let's just say it.
Speaker 2:Let's get it out there. Let's get it out there vagina, vagina, vagina. So there we are. We said it. Now we're happy. So yes, so it's, it's vaginal health right as well yeah so, and also the, the pores. So some people, you know it's. I don't want to say that for some people their sweat is really strong. Yeah, but it's a change in the yes, and a change in that chemical balance is what right is that?
Speaker 2:is what there's course in the odor um, vaginal health is really important and we don't talk about it enough. But the same way that your skin on your hands or your face gets um itchy and dry, the vaginal lining of the vaginal wall becomes itchy and dry. The vaginal lining of the vagina wall becomes itchy and dry and that almost shedding or scratching or whatever of that will bring about odors, of course it will.
Speaker 1:Yeah, if we.
Speaker 2:I'm not saying I'm not saying that we should be. I know the americans are very introducing and it's not something that we particularly talk about doing over here, because the vaginal um, the chemical balance, is very delicate, but we do need to moisturize it with vagina moisturizers, not ponds cold cream.
Speaker 2:All right, now talk to us about the vagina moisturizers, so yeah, there's um, there's, they're all different types, they're plant-based, but it's simply about putting a little drop on your finger and then inserting it in daily, daily, twice, a day, twice a day, twice a day so what that's doing is moisturizing your, the inside of your, of your vagina, moisturizing the on the inside, keeping it supple, keeping it hydrated so it doesn't become dry. Women complain of painful sex and sometimes they almost feel like their vagina's being ripped out, because it is it's friction.
Speaker 1:It is, it's friction.
Speaker 2:If the skin's dry and you're rubbing on it, it's going to flake and break down. So by using a vagina moisturizer twice a day, morning and evening you're moisturizing. You're improving the health of your vagina. Also, during sex. As much as we all like to think that, yeah, here we go. When we're having sex and we're having intercourse women class we count how turned on we are, how into intercourse we are, by how wet we are vaginally.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:By the amount of secretions that we're, but that doesn't always follow so much when we're um going through the menopause because, I've just said, the skin's dry, so you can't right it can't be dry, and it's great, it's not.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so is that?
Speaker 2:why I mean there's, you know, women of a certain age. There are a lot of women out there who say sex, I don't do that anymore. You know intercourse, you know not sex. Maybe intercourse don't do that anymore, no need for it. Got the children. It's messy, it's painful. Why am I doing it right? And then the poor men who they're with um, because, you know, I think men can go on their 80s, 90s don't they?
Speaker 1:a lot of them are still running around still proving they're manly and experiencing that sexual pleasure.
Speaker 2:But you know, what would you say to a man in a relationship with his partner, his wife or his girlfriend or what have you, and she's not so into the intercourse, she's not initiating she. You know, there's an excuse when he wants to, you know, be intimate with her. How could you know, how could we help educate the man to? Understand what the woman's actually going through, or maybe going through Right. So it's about talking, it's about communication, it's about taking it away from yourself as a man, in the sense of less ego, right?
Speaker 2:less it's not. It's not. She doesn't. She's not into you. Yeah, it's not. She doesn't love you. It's not any of those things. It's maybe having a conversation with. Have you been doing the same thing, the same way for?
Speaker 1:the last 20, 30 years Exactly.
Speaker 2:Change it up Right. What does she need? What would work for her? We still, even though for some women going through the menopause the libido drops. Yeah, it does, but that's because the body's on high alert. So high alert doesn't mean that sex is important. Yeah, high alert means you're trying to prevent your body from going through whatever danger your body thinks it's going through, which is what it's fighting with the menopause. So it's like it thinks it's having a fight. It's fighting. It's enemy is the menopause.
Speaker 2:So it's a high alert the penis is the enemy. Well, I'm joking, no, but it might feel like that exactly, it's really dry and itchy exactly, exactly.
Speaker 2:You've got this visitor right, so the things that the woman can do is about moisturizing, because that will help. The things that the men can do is about talking. What does your woman need? Does she need not like 25 years ago when you know you could just grab her, and but does she need you to be more playful? What about doing things that? No foreplay for a week? Why not?
Speaker 2:why not just being at the gentle, loving you know the strokes as she walks past the confidence, because I love everything that you're saying, but I'm a woman, like you are, and that's a, that's a feminine brain talking and of course it's a feminine brain talking, because men, would you know, a lot of men would say well, that little softly, softly, gently, gently, let's talk about it I just want to it leads to, but it leads to it and someone will say actually it's your duty to give yourself to me, it's your duty, it's part of being in a relationship an intimate relationship and if they're not getting that and they're missing that level of physical intimacy, then that can cause problems it can and it can cause marriages to break down, or extramarital affairs, because they're not looking for women, can cause problems, can't?
Speaker 2:it can and it can.
Speaker 1:It can cause um marriages to break down as they or extra marriage, or extra marriage because they're looking for women exactly and, and you know so, you haven't got dry pussies but in my carry on, yeah that.
Speaker 2:And you know, and you know what's really sad about all this is that in a lot of cases the woman knows that the man is going elsewhere and they feel almost like it's a burden lifted because they haven't got to worry about that anymore. And I think that's really sad because we don't have to be. None of that has to be happening. You can make it more fun and more playful by. I'm not saying you've got to like really do it, for I mean, if you want to do it for a week, that's fine but you know just be, just have the conversation.
Speaker 2:Does this still work for you? Does it still work? What about changing position? Yeah, what about? Do you know what I mean? I mean? Yeah, I mean I'll just say personal anecdotes. You know, we've been together for quite a while and we do try to be novel with our intimacy and where we have the energy and you know, we'll have date nights for example, we have cards. We play these lovely games with cards where you know you deal a card and it'll give you a position it might go outside somewhere.
Speaker 2:I'm sorry if you're a bit prudish and you don't want to hear this, but you know, it's about keeping it fresh yes and keeping it current and keeping that level of excitement going isn't it.
Speaker 2:So I know not all women are comfortable with that, but anyway, that's a little bit about sex. So we need our vaginal moisturisers, yeah, and while we're on that, vaginal lubricants during sex as well will help too. And last word on the whole sex thing if you are having problems vaginally and I know we're joking about it as well, but if, if you are having problems, vaginally, and I know we sort of you know we're joking about it as well, but if you really are, if you really are having problems, you can be referred to um a women's health physiotherapist that are out there for your gp.
Speaker 2:Asked to be referred. It's your right to be referred. Look up where they are based. I live in Sussex and I'm lucky that they're part of our Sussex um uh, musculoskeletal healthcare the team we've got, but that's not everywhere, but you can be referred so you could travel to one. It's worth it. Ask to be referred. They will talk to you about your vaginal health, about the painful during sex. All of those things's not normal. It happened, but it's not normal to have pain during sex.
Speaker 2:It's not normal. Therefore, accepting it yes, it happens, because we know why it happens, but it's not. I just have to put up with it because that's not the case. You don't. So would they give the vaginal physio? Would they give you exercises vaginal physio Would they give you exercises to do.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they talk to you about how to strengthen your. So how many women, how many of us as women, even know what we look like down there? That's the start of the thing. Have you held a mirror? Have you looked? Because you should. You should know what it looks like normally so that if anything is wrong, same as your breasts, you can recognise it. It's so important. It's not. It doesn't belong to anyone else. You should be friends with it. I have friends that give their names. I haven't named my girl, but she is my girl so she's got a name and I know her well.
Speaker 2:I you need to know. They will teach you how to put two fingers inside and squeeze, how to feel around the vagina, the vulva, the whole thing, because it's a vulva really how to feel around it, how to know where your sensitive spots are, all of those things.
Speaker 2:How to squeeze and hold, all of those things. How to squeeze and hold, because we're getting older, things get a little bit lax. We know that it's a muscle down there like anything else, so we need to think about pulling in and pulling up, not just because we don't want to wet ourselves when we go to the toilet and doing our pelvic floor muscles, but also because it increases the enjoyment of sex. Yeah, yeah, you know it does. Yeah, and just that note about you know, not being able to hold your wee as long as you used to.
Speaker 2:I mean, that can be really embarrassing, can't you? You're out there and then you're caught, and I've seen women you know, I've done it myself a few times who are absolutely desperate and I must go now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, so that's all that, so you need to. It's all about the vaginal muscles, yeah the pelvic floor muscles.
Speaker 2:So a simple exercise is go to the toilet. When you're in the toilet, practice stopping it. Try and make it stop. Yeah, keep practicing it. If the first time you do it, nothing happens. Just keep going, keep going, keep going, pulling up yourself from weaning that's what it is. You will eventually be able to stop it. That's when you know that those muscles are strengthening and then you won't be struggling and rushing to a toilet. You shouldn't be living like that no, no during sex.
Speaker 2:It is amazing to be able to literally pull in during intercourse. That increases your pleasure as well, and his but it increases it more likely to sort of um bring on an orgasm yeah, yeah, yeah for you, yeah, yeah for.
Speaker 2:You yeah, yeah, and. And the clitoris, it doesn't just. It's not just the two little flaps on the outside, it's right inside as well. So you know there's a lot of joy there, ladies, that we're missing out on. And we're older. So, as older women, we need to be embracing all of this knowledge that we now have because we're older and actually we don't mind talking about our vaginas and sex. We're not, we're not. We're not trying to impress anybody else.
Speaker 2:Well, we've moved on, we've moved on, yeah, yeah so that knowledge is out there and yeah, more comfortable exactly so just you know, because the time is racing, just thinking about you know that, what are the main symptoms? You've mentioned about hot flushes, which some people get, some people don't, um, in various degrees. You've talked about the, the, the joint and the pains.
Speaker 2:You've talked about eye muscles weakening and not being able to see as well and blurry vision, which I think sometimes. We talked about body odor and you know um changes in the hormones and inducing a stronger body odour. We talked about skin dryness on the face, on the complexion, on the body, but also about how the menopause and the drop in oestrogen levels can affect the makeup. The chemistry is it the chemistry?
Speaker 2:Whatever it is the chemical makeup of your, the vagina and the vagina lining and the, the dryness that that create can create and the impact that that can have on you. Know your, your sexual pleasures and feel the feelings of being a woman and feelings of being a woman being absolutely because we join this anymore.
Speaker 1:This is painful, yes I'm not.
Speaker 2:I'm not giving my partner what he wants and the guilt that I guess right exactly about not being able to do that and that then leads to the feelings of feeling inadequate about, yes, being a woman, yeah, within a relationship, being unable to please your, your man is, and it sounds so caveman, doesn't it, to say like that? But actually it is an innate part of of what we've grown up understand, knowing that part of being a woman, part of that femininity, is our sexuality. We, we link those men and things yes yes, it's matter to them.
Speaker 2:Yes, matters how you look yes, you know so, but you know, um, if you've been with your partner for a long time, they see change in your body. They'll be going through changes in their bodies as well so hopefully they'll embrace your changes and encourage you to be at the body that you want to, rather than trying to put pressure on you. That's right, but you also talked about anxiety, and there are lots of women who experience anxiety and depression when they're going through this critical stage of, you know, of their lives, and that feeling of hopelessness.
Speaker 2:And you talked about hormone treatments and hysterectomies, but is there anything else that you would recommend? Maybe? Good old rounders, I know you're the vitamin queen, you know supplement queen, I should say, and you know a lot of, you've got a lot of knowledge about alternative approaches to just you know, having just being in the right place with your, if your, um, what do?
Speaker 1:I want to say yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:I the the first thing. I suppose there's so much to say, but some gems would be keep a journal, start, start a journal, buy yourself a lovely book with a lovely pen, not just any old bit of nonsense, so that it will encourage you to write. And what you're going to write about is how you feel, because that's really important. Um, and I'm not being woo woo, I'm not being, like you know, fluffy, I'm being practical as well, because I'm always, I'm always fluffy, but I'm being practical as well. Write down what you eat that's really important. Write down what you drink that's really important. Write down how much sleep you have that's really important. And write down your mood. Now you don't have to write essays, bullet points.
Speaker 2:Some people I've um had clients that just do faces, so they've just put you know food and then they've got smiley faces or sad faces or whatever, as to how they've, how they've felt, and that's, and the reason I'm telling you to do that is because certain foods will affect us, our bodies, our bodies are chemical you know, made up chemically.
Speaker 2:So the foods that we take in we all know can affect us. People have food allergies and all sorts of things. Things change as you get older and the hormone balance change. What what was once okay for you now is no longer the case. So you need to work that out and there'll be certain foods you're eating that your, your body's like yeah, what are you doing cause? Bloating. You'll eat and you'll just feel your stomach looks like a huge football right, like you know exactly.
Speaker 2:Um, dairy does lots of people. I struggle with dairy. Um, in fact, I haven't had dairy now for oh my goodness, I don't know maybe 20 years or so. Um, mine started a bit before, before my menopause and into perimenopause. That was the very first thing that was. My issue was that I started struggling long before my period stopped. I even thought about it. I started struggling with dairy and I just thought that was because I'd eaten my weight in cheese. So that's what I put that down to. So in my 30s I couldn't eat dairy at all, so I stopped. And then, when I tried to reintroduce it because I like cheese in my sort of early 40s, realised actually, if I eat this, it felt like I was going to die so knowing what you knowing, knowing what your body can tolerate and not right.
Speaker 2:It's so important changes to your diet yeah, so map what you're doing, make time for yourself. That's really important. Yeah, um, and I say this all the time and people are like Mel, but, but you know how? By being intentional. So you need to. Everyone has a diary, everyone has a calendar. Put your time in the calendar, literally put it in and guard it. Now, when you first begin, it isn't that easy You'll start putting things in because you'll see that as an empty space. But if you put it into two or three different places not just one day, two or three different places maya angelou used to talk about um taking a day away once a month right and you go away and you don't take your phone tell all your loved ones where you're going.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you just take yourself off just today to do whatever you like, whether it's wandering around in nature, whether it's me time, yeah, sitting in the bath all day, whatever it is.
Speaker 2:You won't do a whole day to start with, but you will take snippets of time, yeah, so take, find a space. That realistically, even if it's only half an hour, that's all you've got. That's all you've got. Go and sit in a car, lock yourself in the bathroom, whatever you need, whatever've got. Go and sit in a car, lock yourself in the bathroom, whatever you need, whatever you need to do, sit in a cupboard, it doesn't matter. But take that time, that time for your mental health. We need to recharge.
Speaker 2:You wouldn't keep using, you can't use your phone if the battery is low absolutely so how do you think you can keep going with your batteries low, because more even more so in the menopause we need our batteries to be fully charged because our body is already working almost 100% all of the time, so that's really important. Yeah, I'm just looking at the time. We almost out, we're nearly an hour and we gone on, but it's been so really good, it's been fantastic. And I think, just to hone in on some of those challenges that we as women face, you know and this is all just outside of the day job, isn't it?
Speaker 2:We're busy doing doctorates and baking and all those grandchildren and working Spending time with friends, it is really hard work, but I suppose I'm just going to ask you just to end perhaps with um you, melina, looking beautiful and looking very youthful. What things and we've got about two minutes what things do you use as your daily care routine? What do you do in a typical week that has made you the beautiful woman that you are today? Right? I'm gonna have a minute because you are so beautiful.
Speaker 2:I exercise on a daily basis. I am I am exercise slightly obsessed. It's always been part of my life. It's part of my mental health. It keeps me balanced, right, whether it's it's not always going to the gym. I do go to the gym at least three or four times in a week, but it might just be yoga or doing some abdominal circuits, or I do that. I do not get out of bed every morning until I have meditated and spent 20 minutes with myself. Yeah, every day. I can't, I can't. I've got to the point now that I cannot.
Speaker 1:I can't yeah without doing. That, doesn't matter what's going on.
Speaker 2:I set the alarm so that I can wake up. With that space, 20 minutes to half an hour is is man, that's a lot of time. Yeah, but I've made it part of my routine and I can't get out of bed without doing it. It just has to happen and everyone's different. It might be 10 minutes, but allow yourself a chance to be thankful for the day and then move into the day. That's the inside stuff that happens the outside stuff. Like everyone else, I moisturise, I get up, I moisturise, I've moisturized all my life.
Speaker 1:My mum from from birth, my mum's been slacking cream on us.
Speaker 2:Yeah so I use natural skincare. I don't use any chemicals at all. Right? When you say natural skincare, is that a product? I use a product called tropic tropic skincare. It's a Surrey-based company, right? All natural products. Yeah, that's what I use on my face, on my body, I use baby oils. I get out of the shower. Her skin always feels silky smooth. I'm always complimenting her. Here we go. Why is your skin so soft? I loofah as well. I do loofah.
Speaker 1:I loofah every day.
Speaker 2:Have done for years. Yeah, um, and I use whatever moisturizer. That's not true. I use um sanctuary or I use um safe and glory, but a moisture because I like the smells, I like the way it feels. Yeah, just a luxurious, I think of my body yeah as uh, and this sounds vain, and I'm not vain, I'm the least vain person but I love my body. Yeah, I love. I love what my body feels like and I, I love massaging my legs and massaging my arms and I like that feeling of appreciation, isn't it?
Speaker 1:yeah, self-love, yeah, yeah, and I love it.
Speaker 2:I give myself that every day and I try and eat. Well, I'm pescetarian. I don't eat meat, I eat fish and vegetables probably more vegetables than fish. Fish sort of comes in every now and again when I feel like I just fancy it. So does that mean you don't have any convenience food at all? Oh god, don't be ridiculous oh god, you're human, don't be ridiculous.
Speaker 1:I try really bad, so I can eat what I like. Yeah, yeah exactly, exactly.
Speaker 2:I think that's it, that's it yeah what about you? Okay, very quick, because we are out of time, but just in a nutshell.
Speaker 2:So I guess my regime as I've hit, that that phase that we've been talking about in life is first and foremost, is my mindset. So I do try to be positive and have a positive spin on everything and if the things that are going on in my life that aren't so positive, I reframe them. I reframe them and I just look for the positive in every negative, and I know that's a bit nauseating for some people you know, but that is me and that's what gets me through life.
Speaker 2:Um, like Mel, I like to be active. I wouldn't say I necessarily work out every day, um, because of my work schedule and everything, but I do enjoy going to the gym and enjoy doing exercise at home, going for a walk, maybe a little jog and it clears my mind and sets me up for my day, so I love to exercise first thing in the morning, if I can, before I do anything, before I have breakfast, before I do anything, same, um, I think, food wise, I've yo-yo, yo-yo dieting.
Speaker 2:I'm fixing with that, I'm afraid, on and off over the years, where things have worked. Some things work, some things don't. But I do know that diets don't work long term and they're always so, you know, always looking for that lifetime, um, that lifestyle change, which is hard. At the moment. I've just decided I didn't eat much, um, I only ate chicken breast to begin with, but I've decided I'm not going to eat any chicken, I don't eat red meat anyway, and I'm going to really try not to eat fish at all and just try to have vegetables as much as I can. But I'm really bad guys, I'm really bad If it's cold outside. I want some creature comfort food, like a little bit of rice pudding or something. But anyway, you know, I'm so a bit of what you want, in moderation, I suppose, absolutely so, okay, and you know communication, I like to talk when I'm in that mood to talk. I have my friends, I have my partner, I've got support of my loved ones. Um and um, yeah, I, I just think, just be positive and embracing life.
Speaker 2:Embracing life and just just yeah, and that's it. Yeah, and I think that's what keeps me the way. And obviously a good moisturizer keels amazing for your skin well, for my skin anyway, I love a keel, and on the body I use a v-note. I don't use a vagina moisturizers, yet oh well, I use silk.
Speaker 1:Silk, it's called silk s-y-l-k-e s-y-L-K-E, but I'm going to have to add that to my list.
Speaker 2:That'd be really really good, and that's it oh and yes, lubricant, yes, lubricant, if you know full, and that's it. So, mel, it's been absolutely amazing. I don't know where the time has gone. I'm hoping that you will come and share your experience and your knowledge. Um on something else, maybe a bit of menopause later on, but really I'd love to hear about how your doctorate's coming on um, just everything else it'd be really lovely to hear it's I.
Speaker 2:I champion any man or woman who ventures into that. You know, um, that's that field. You know you've got your degree, your second degree's, master's, and then you go on and you get a doctorate. That's amazing. I know that. You know you do that whilst giving your time freely to your friends, and you know you've been a fantastic grandmother to your, to your two lovely grandchildren, and a wonderful mother to your son. So so you are a superwoman. This is Mel Healy. She is a superwoman.
Speaker 1:Next time you can bring me One to no one she bakes.
Speaker 2:Can you bring cake next?
Speaker 1:time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, bring cake, bring cake, or aren't I allowed? No, I've got to be good, no you're allowed cake.
Speaker 1:No, I don't know.
Speaker 2:No, no, no, we're in moderation indeed, so it's been amazing. Thank you so much. I always ask at the end if there is a funny story that my guests would like to share, a relationship story, with um valentine's coming up, or if you've got a favorite book that you're reading at the moment or a piece of music that you're listening to, that um that you would like to just share. Oh lord, so the book, funny story about your relationship, or a piece of music that's inspiring you at the moment? Actually, music-wise, because I have been getting up at stupid o'clock in the morning and working on my doctorate. I have been. I went through this whole thing trying to find music to music to stimulate the brain at five o'clock in the morning and actually, and classical keeps coming up, and then I suddenly thought, oh, I love bridgerton, which is going to be coming back soon. So I've been.
Speaker 2:I've been listening to the bridgerton soundtrack yeah which is lovely because it's all not all but half modern songs, yeah, but really done classically with the violins and it's beautiful. So I've been having that wash over me yeah, yeah so the bridgerton the bridgerton soundtrack. You heard it, melanie. Thank melina. It's emily melina. Thank you, you've been amazing. Love you, darling, okay you too, hon bye wow, oh my god, we, we talked, we talked. It really Gosh, thank you.