You Keep Me Sane
For 10 years, Aileen and Julie have been each other's sounding board from opposite sides of the globe – Aileen in London and Julie in Melbourne.
They have navigated everything – motherhood, relationships, menopause, health, grief, and everything in between – through daily voice messages. These exchanges often became lifelines, and now they share that space with their listeners.
In You Keep Me Sane, Aileen and Julie hold honest conversations on life's challenges, growth, and connection. They lend an ear and share heartfelt insights, creating a space that allows both them, and you, to be human.
Listeners are encouraged to write in with their own experiences and topics, becoming part of the conversation that feels like a chat with close friends.
Episodes
124 episodes
Rejection Sensitivity: When Rejection Feels Like Proof You’re Not Enough
Episode OverviewWhy can a delayed reply, a critical comment or a relationship ending feel so emotionally overwhelming?In this episode, we talk about rejection sensitivity — the tendency to strongly react to real or perceive...
Optimisation Culture : Why We Never Feel Enough
Every scroll tells us there is something else to improve - our body, sleep, health, productivity, appearance or mindset.In this episode, we talk about how self-improvement can quietly become another form of pressure, especially in midlif...
The Difference Between Who You Are and How You React Under Stress
Episode OverviewHave you ever caught yourself snapping, shutting down, feeling flat, or reacting in a way that doesn’t feel like you?In this episode, we talk about how stress can make us feel like we’ve become a different pers...
Outgrowing Who You Were: The Midlife Identity Shift No One Talks About
Episode OverviewIn this episode, we read a listener letter from Sarah, who describes something many women feel but rarely say out loud - the quiet sense of being “in between” versions of themselves.Life looks good on paper....
Menopause, Self-Worth and the Moment You Stop Feeling Like Yourself
Episode OverviewIn this episode, we’re joined by menopause practitioner Laura Lambe for a clear, reassuring conversation about what really happens to women during perimenopause, menopause and post-menopause.We talk about why s...
Joy Isn’t Gone - It’s Buried: How We Start Letting It Back In
Episode OverviewWhy does joy feel harder to access in midlife - even when nothing is technically “wrong”? In this episode, we unpack that quiet heaviness so many of us carry and explore why joy can feel distant during this stage of l...
Imposter Syndrome in Midlife: The Confidence Gap No One Talks About
Episode OverviewThis week, we’re returning to something we haven’t done in a while - reading a listener letter. And this one stopped us in our tracks.Elsa writes about something so many of us quietly carry: doing well on pa...
Cortisol: The Hidden Driver Behind How You Feel in Midlife
Episode OverviewIn this episode, we explore something that’s been sitting underneath so many of our conversations lately… cortisol.What started as disrupted sleep and feeling constantly “on” quickly became something deeper....
The Day You Realise You Don't Need To Be Chosen Anymore
Episode OverviewThis week, we explore the need to be chosen — at work, in friendships, in love, and in family roles. For years, being picked can feel like proof of worth… and not being picked can quietly unravel us. We unpack how mid...
Quiet Wealth : Why Peace Is The New Status Symbol
Episode OverviewThis week, we explore a quiet but powerful shift happening in midlife: the move from chasing traditional success to craving something far less flashy - peace.For years, achievement meant striving. Building. ...
The Negative Jar: Why One Comment Can Ruin Your Day
This episode grew from a simple image we shared in a recent Sanity Check: two jars.One jar is full — kind words, encouragement, praise, moments where someone saw you and appreciated you.The other jar holds just one negative commen...
Losing Our Voice - When Midlife Asks Us 'Who Am I?'
Episode OverviewThere’s a moment many women reach - often in midlife - where we stop and quietly think, Who am I actually?It doesn’t arrive with drama. It doesn’t happen overnight. It’s usually the result of years spe...
Always On: The Hidden Cortisol Cost of a Busy Life
Episode overviewIn this episode, we explore what it really means to live in an always-on world — and how that constant state of availability quietly keeps our stress response switched on.Cortisol has become a bit of a...
Wintering: Honouring Your Energy Through the Seasons
Episode OverviewIn this episode, we explore the idea of wintering - not as a trend or aesthetic, but as a very real biological and emotional experience.Recording from opposite sides of the world - one of us in a UK wi...
Heartbreak and Self-Worth: Who Are You When the Relationship Ends?
Episode OverviewWhen a relationship ends, it can feel completely disorientating - like the ground has shifted beneath you and nothing quite makes sense anymore. In this episode, we talk honestly about heartbreak, obsession, reject...
Trying To Figure It Out: Identity, Self-Worth, and the “Voice” We Lose
Episode overviewA line from Jon Bon Jovi that genuinely stopped Aileen in her tracks: “We’re all just here trying to figure it out.” Coming from someone who looks like he’s “made it”, it lands differently - like an equaliser and a...
Boundaries Vs Belonging : When Self-Worth Shapes Our Relationships
Episode OverviewIn this episode, we explore a tension many of us feel deeply — the pull between wanting space and craving connection. When does protecting our peace start to feel like shutting people out? And why can setting boundari...
Playing it Small: Why We Dim Ourselves (And How To Stop)
Episode overviewIn this episode, we unpack why so many of us learn to play it small — not because we lack confidence or ambition, but because at some point it felt safer to do so. Following the huge response to our Don’t Hide You...
You Don't Need A New You
Episode OverviewNew Year’s Eve often sits in a strange in-between space - part reflection, part expectation. In this conversation, we gently unpack why this moment can feel heavy with pressure, and how New Year’s resolutions so often...
Connection at Christmas: It Isn't About The Table
Episode OverviewIt’s Christmas Eve, and today we’re sitting with one word that has shown up again and again this year: connection.Not the glossy, picture-perfect kind we see in adverts, but the quiet, truthful kind that groun...
Sitting with the Shift: We’ll Know Them Longer as Adults Than as Children
Episode overviewIn this episode, we pause on one simple line that stopped us in our tracks:“We’ll know our children as adults far longer than we’ll know them as children.”We take a trip down memory lane talk ab...
Quiet Doesn’t Mean Weak: Redefining Strength, Self-Worth & Self-Confidence
Episode overviewIn this episode, we explore a sneaky belief many of us absorbed young: that the loudest person in the room is the strongest one - and that being quieter, reflective or sensitive somehow makes you weaker.We talk...
From Small To Seen : Owning Your Worth
Episode OverviewThis week we’re joined by Monica Maldonado - the voice behind @thepowerofgoodenough - for a raw, hopeful conversation about how low self-worth can quietly shape our lives even when we’ve had a “stable” upbringing...
Always On: Reclaiming Your Attention in a World That Never Sleeps
Episode OverviewWe talk about the “always on” culture - phones, pings, and pressure to reply instantly - and how it hijacks presence, deep focus, and self-worth. From family group chats and school apps to work Slack and late-nig...
Emotional Vampires: When Caring Becomes Carrying
Episode OverviewWe dive into that sticky space between empathy and exhaustion—the moment a caring friend becomes the “emotional sponge” (hello, emotional vampires 👀). We talk about invisible emotional labour, midlife capacity, Cathol...
