The Boss Mums Circle

Sheila's Story Part 2 - The Con, the Camera & the Comeback

• Carly Raynsford • Season 2 • Episode 5

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The Con, the Camera & the Comeback – Sheila’s Story (Part 2)

Life might throw the curveballs… but what you do next is where the real story begins.

In Part 2 of this conversation, Carly continues her chat with Sheila Kronfeld — and this is where things start to shift.

After opening up about her upbringing, self-doubt, and the unexpected scam that knocked her confidence, Sheila now shares what it actually looks like to rebuild.

Because the comeback isn’t just a moment — it’s a decision you make over and over again.

From finding the courage to keep showing up, to trusting her instincts and leaning into creativity, Sheila talks honestly about pushing forward when it would be easier to step back.

There’s something powerful about this stage of the journey — the part where you stop waiting for permission and start backing yourself.

And with her brand new Saturday lunchtime show, The Sheila Show, launching on a new radio station, Sheila is doing exactly that — stepping fully into her voice, her space, and her next chapter.

This is the part of the story where resilience turns into momentum.

Expect honesty, self-reflection, and a reminder that setbacks don’t get the final say — you do.

In Part 2, we cover:

  •  Rebuilding confidence after setbacks 
  •  Learning to trust your instincts again 
  •  The reality of “starting again” (and why it’s not really starting over) 
  •  Showing up even when self-doubt is loud 
  •  Stepping into new opportunities with confidence 
  •  What’s next for Sheila and The Sheila Show

Follow Sheila’s journey:
Instagram: @sheila.s_nature_alchemy

If this episode resonates, share it with another mum who needs to hear Sheila's story. Don’t forget to follow, subscribe, and leave a review — it helps more Boss Mums find the support they deserve.


Join the Boss Mums Circle

If you loved this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review the podcast. Share it with another mum who might need to hear this story today.

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The Boss Mums Circle Podcast is produced by Your Voice Here. Visit www.yourvoicehere.co.uk to find out how they simplify podcasting and make it easy for you to get your voice heard.

SPEAKER_02

Welcome back to the Boss Mum Circle podcast. I'm Carly, and this is part two of Sheila's story: The Con, the Camera, and the Comeback. If you haven't listened to part one, go and do that first. Trust me, it's worth it. Sheila's upbringing is unlike anything you'd expect, and you need the full picture before we get into this. Part two is where things get really interesting. Sheila starts a family, makes a move to America, finds her way into Radio Presenting, and then ends up working for a station. But as it turns out, it was not a station at all. Nobody paid, nobody explained why, and nobody really worked out since. It is a lot, and Sheila tells it brilliantly.

SPEAKER_00

Do you remember the adverts for De Montfort University with the big whale?

SPEAKER_02

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Which everyone made fun of.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

That was where I ended up. So I went there and did design management, which was a sort of compromise. It was like business studies with design, where you'd study every kind of design. So you'd do a bit of architecture, interior design, textile design, graphic design, and business studies. So it was a real jack of all trades, master of none. First every year it was done, wasn't recognised by anyone when I came out, and was, I mean, I had the most brilliant, brilliant time.

SPEAKER_02

Did you feel, did you feel though, that your essentially your dream had been taken away from you? And did you how did you feel towards your your dad about that?

SPEAKER_00

I was I think I was really, I was really, really upset and really hurt and felt as well that they didn't have belief in me. Um but I think my whole childhood was so governed by my parents' decision that I sort of just accepted that this is what I'm allowed to do, this is what I'm not allowed to do. So I just went I had to go along with it. There was never any kickback. Obviously, there were tears, and please, please, please. No, we haven't paid for this. And I would had to have done a foundation course with this, with I don't know whether it's this university or anyone doing a fine art degree, but you need a foundation course from your A levels to be up to standard to start the degree course, and so he would have had to pay for it. So when my father was saying, I'm not paying for it, you're not doing that. That's not a proper course.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

That's not, you know, that's not what I've invested in you to do. My elder sister had done French at London University, my other sister scraped through doing occupational therapy, and my parents had really frowned on it. But again, she had she was left on her own, really. She didn't know what to do. She sort of just got into somewhere she could doing something she could.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

So we'd all I think we all sort of felt a bit abandoned. And yet when it came to decisions, that's when my father certainly would come in with heavy and put his foot down. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah. What do you think happened to so you're 18, you can't go to fine art school. So what do you think happened to uh you, your like your creative side? What where did where did she have to go?

SPEAKER_00

I think it really was quite crushed, and I think I felt as if, well, obviously that's something I can't do. That's not realistic, that's not something that I will ever be able to achieve, which absolutely has shaped I think uh my life going forward. I've always felt that I'm not quite dreams aren't necessarily the dreams are dreams, they're not necessarily things you should try to achieve because they're not in touch and distance.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, yeah. So you had to go, you went down a corporate road.

SPEAKER_00

Well, it was a sort of Mickey Mouse dream, really. You know, it wasn't one or the other, it was business and design, but not full business and not full design. So I came out, couldn't really get a job doing, you know, I couldn't be a graphic designer and I wasn't a business studies graduate. So then I did a secretarial course and got a job as a PA. And I thought, you what? You're asking me to do this and this and this. That no, I don't want I did it for a while, but it was just no. So then I went into sales and got into recruitment, and that moved me even further away from what I really loved. And even now I've got a big easel, I've got a big pad, and I've got lots of paintings that I did from years ago, but I can't I sort of can't. It's as if there's a block. I don't want to start it again because what if I'm crap?

SPEAKER_02

Because I think if you're being told the whole time, no, that's not for you, no, you can't do that, you sort of get a bit of an inner, well, I'm cra it's like well it's like you don't want to open Pandora's box because you're not sure what the reaction will be or how you'll feel about it, or what you're meant to, I guess, do with that emotion that you got told no.

SPEAKER_00

And if I try it again and I'm told again, yeah, that's not great.

SPEAKER_02

Well, it's not your you're yeah, it's almost like you're not willing to find out yet.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, it sort of makes you like just withdraw.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, retract inwardly and inwards.

SPEAKER_00

Inwardly, and I think I come across as so confident people, and I can laugh at myself, and but it's all to mask this actually inside. I don't feel that I'm good enough because I've been told along the way, don't do that. And whether it's for protective reasons or not, it's still the same.

SPEAKER_02

You come out with the same still shaped your character today.

SPEAKER_00

Yes, definitely.

SPEAKER_02

So after you went into obviously a different career path that you didn't intend on or wanting to go down, yeah, you then had a family, you you got married, yeah, um, had children, and then stopped.

SPEAKER_00

And then yes, so then after I got married, I worked for in a headhunters, then I went to work for the mail on Sunday doing sales for them, which was absolutely brilliant fun. Um, not for the job was fine, but the extracurricular things were brilliant. And um then I worked for a film company. Um, so I think I was sort of trying to edge my way back into creative things. Um, and then I got married and um I met my husband online in when there was no online dating, it was a new thing.

SPEAKER_02

And one of the first.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. I was a pioneer of and I and I remember I was at home, I was looking for a new flat mate on loot, um, which I don't know if you remember, trying to put my ad on loot, sitting at home at my mother's house. And I had a boyfriend at the time and everything, but I kept on getting, and my children do say, Oh, you're such a boomer, but I um I kept on getting these pop-ups saying, Um, well, I was trying, I was obviously putting too many words in to my ad. And so it wouldn't accept my thing, and I kept on getting these pop-ups saying, Snog London, meet singles in your area, and I thought, oh, sorry, I'm I this is so annoying. I'll click onto it. And I put on something like I was a four-foot Eskimo, and just the most random things, because I thought, I don't want anyone to know it's me, but I want to have a nose of what's there. And so it went through, and a few people messaged straight away, bloody perverts, thinking I was a four-foot Eskimo, and um and I might just be their thing. Yeah, exactly. Everyone had the thing, surely. Quite a lot of them, as you can imagine. Yeah, and I think it was about midnight, so it was lots of people that had come in from you know, drinking sessions. I was just at my mother's for the weekend at midnight trying to put this thing on for a new flatmate, and um and then I saw a picture of my now husband and thought, oh, he looks quite nice. And so messaged him and then we started chatting again. Pervert. Why is he talking about the and um so we started messaging back and forth? That was quite funny, and I didn't know the etiquette. Obviously, there was no online dating. So I was giving my number out, and I still have my brick mobile phone at my mother's house, and my phone was going off at three in the morning with these weird foreigner people saying, Hello, Cia. So you know that they're because I've given my number to everyone. Anyway, still thought this is a load of nonsense, carried on, had my nice boyfriend, and but had carried on messaging my husband, and then we met up, and you know, that that was it. Then we we got married. The rest is history. He got a job in America soon after when my eldest daughter was so I carried on working until I had my daughter, yeah, and then when she was five months old, he got a job in America that took us to America. And I remember being devastated, you know, first baby, my whole family's here. I think I'm quite clingy to people because of moving around.

SPEAKER_02

I think your childhood, you want because you got taken away so many all of your you and your siblings separated, brought back together and live in individually with parents. Yeah, it's almost like that's what you want now, you want everyone to be together and close and not. And with friends as well.

SPEAKER_00

So my friends have been my support throughout wherever I've gone. Yeah. We've made really, really good friends and clung on to them.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

And so being told we're moving to America, I thought, oh, I don't want to go, I don't want to go. Anyway, moved out there and uh absolutely loved it. I remember my we went out there thinking, oh, it'll be so romantic going out for Christmas. And it was awful, none of our furniture turned up. We were there on our own, jet lagged with a tiny baby, not knowing anyone. There was snow, it was just what seemed like a romantic, lovely idea was actually hellish. And I thought, this is awful. And then New Year's Eve, I my husband was still jet lagged and tired, and just thought, oh, you know, if this isn't what it was cracked up to be, and went to bed, and I remember drinking a whole bottle of champagne on my own, thinking, oh no, I just want to be at home. And um, and then I found out I was pregnant again. I thought I did think the hangover was pretty severe. Yeah. And anyway, so stayed out there for for years, and I'm trying to remember why in New Jersey.

SPEAKER_02

Oh wow.

SPEAKER_00

So in a really, really lovely place. New New Jersey's got a terrible um reputation, but I uh I we happened to be in a gorgeous, gorgeous place, and it was the best time. Absolutely loved it, but I didn't have a work visa, so I couldn't do anything apart from have babies. So I had my second daughter very soon, they're not even 14 months apart.

SPEAKER_02

That was born there or one.

SPEAKER_00

No, so my eld my eldest was born here, she was about five months old when we moved there. Okay, um, and I remember feeling uh not quite right and doing a pregnancy test at the airport when we were waiting to fly out because we hadn't overnight we had to stay at the airport, and it came out as clear, so I thought, oh well, I'm obviously not pregnant. So carried on drinking away, bringing the champagne, yeah, and actually discovered I was pregnant and had my second daughter out there, and then a couple of years later we were there for three years, I think, and discovered I was pregnant with my twin boys.

SPEAKER_02

Oh gosh, so you've got two girls and then twin boys.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. Wow. Um, so I was having babies and just it was amazing. I made amazing, amazing friends. Bizarrely, when I first got there when I was really miserable, I sent out an email to everyone I knew in England, an SOS email saying, um, I'm so low, Lou, don't know anyone here. Does anyone know anyone in New Jersey? And one of my friends wrote back to me saying, Don't suppose you you were anywhere near a place called Far Hills, which happened to be about five miles away, they turned out to be the most sociable people that were lovely, that were English but had lived in America for 20 years, and just knew everyone. Oh nice, introduced us to everyone. So quite quickly, we had great, great friends, and it was it was the time of my life.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Um, and then when I came back to, I think in the end, my husband just felt as if if we don't leave now, we're never gonna go back. My parents are getting older, we're too comfortable here.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, blah, blah, blah. So would you have happily stayed?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

I really I loved it.

SPEAKER_02

You feel like you'd made a life for yourself somewhere rather than moving around constantly.

SPEAKER_00

It's like this is where I feel I think wherever I go, I feel as if I never want to leave.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

And when you make great friends, to me, that's that's my support, that's my hold on to. Um, and so when I was there, I felt as if I I just I'm so happy. I'm so good. And it's hard work making friends. I don't have masses of friends, but the ones I do, I want to see. I can't be bothered with superficial.

SPEAKER_02

No, I I then they say you should count your best friends on one hand. Yeah, I believe that. That's your that's your people, yeah. Definitely. You've moved back now to the UK. Yes, tell me how did you because you got into radio.

SPEAKER_00

Yes.

SPEAKER_02

So how did that happen?

SPEAKER_00

So I um really I think at the beginning of lockdown, I thought I was gonna blow my brains out with home learning. Yes. And I obviously had four children at home who were trying to do online learning. One of my sons um is neurodiverse. Um, so he was especially tricky to try to help. And he they're obviously twins. Yeah, so it's really hard to try and give two children the same age who are doing similar work, but at a different, he was at a specialist school. Yeah. So it was quite different, but still trying to help two children, and then having two daughters who are also close in age to each other and to the boys, trying to help them all. I thought, oh, and my husband is um a doctor, he doesn't work as he's not a practicing doctor now, but he trained as a doctor, worked as a doctor before. So he decided he was going to go out and help um vaccinating people.

SPEAKER_01

Okay.

SPEAKER_00

And I thought, I'm going a bit mad, yeah, just being stuck with the children. And again, I think that was where my comfort eating came back with a vengeance. And I just thought, I'm gonna go mad, I need some other release. And I also feel somewhere that's just to do with you as well. Yes, yeah, and I thought I need something for me, and my children are amazing, I adore them. But having four really young children at home non-stop who all want your help, all feel as if you're not helping them enough, and you're trying to help. And I don't, I don't know. I don't I don't know what you know, and also I'm not a teacher, yeah. So, you know, I can help you paint. I'd love to help you paint pictures and bake cookies, and but I don't know half this science stuff, and I know I'm a grown-up, but anyway, so that was how I and I saw my husband going out, so he could go out of the house, and he was helping people, and I thought I'm useless. I'm just I feel like I'm useless with the children because I'm not able to give any of them enough time. Their schools were good, but it's it was just an impossible time, as you know. And um, I just saw a tiny ad on Facebook for could you help with a new local community station that's starting?

SPEAKER_01

Okay.

SPEAKER_00

Um, and I thought I could try that. I, you know, I'll give it back to it. Yeah, and so I did, and fortunately, it I turned out to be the first person to join. I got on with the person that was running it so well. He was an ex, he's worked all over the place. BBC, so really quite professional, really lovely, great taste in music, and just a great person. And he took me on and also said, You can you can do what you want, really. Just just what with your own show, yeah.

SPEAKER_02

You yeah, creative.

SPEAKER_00

This is how you use the software, yeah. You could do it from home. I remember being in an upstairs, almost covered with loads of blankets around me and my little computer and my thing, and I'd sit there and just do it for a couple of I know I it took me quite a while. At first, I'd be staying up really late doing it to try and master what I was doing because I was doing a three-hour show that went out every day, Monday to Friday. That's a lot, which was a lot, but I found it such a brilliant release and was getting nice feedback, and the person that was running it, Simon, was so lovely and so supportive that it was a real boost and it made the days easier because I thought I'm gonna go and do this. And my husband wasn't really around because he was going off vaccinating every night, so I had time to do it. Yeah, so it was brilliant. So that was how I got into it, and then I thought I quite want to do more than just my local station, so I applied to do I can't I've worked on so many. I I applied to do another local station as well, which I won't name, but was not the success story, wasn't supportive, it was very old school network, I was being told off a lot for things, and I thought I'm doing this for free, and I'm giving you my time, and you're making me feel rubbish, and you're criticizing me for things that I think I'm just trying to brighten people's day. That's all I'm trying to do. Obviously, I get something out of it, yeah, but uh it's just fun. There's I'm not saying anything offensive to anyone. I might give an opinion of a program I've watched, but it ties in with the music, it's all a bit cheesy and it's meant to be just a bit of fun. So you've been told off, yeah. Constantly being told off, and that was the only feedback I ever got. Whereas Simon from the other place was if he got a complaint, uh, I remember talking about Gwynneth Paltrow's candles, which got a very rude name, yeah, and he found it hilarious. And I wouldn't ever say the name, but I just say it rhymes with angina or something like that. And sometimes people would complain, and he'd be straight on the phone saying, This is brilliant! It means people are listening, and how funny. I found it hilarious. I was laughing at that, which is really nice, and to get no feedback whatsoever, apart from a message saying, You mustn't do that, I thought, well, this is disheartening. So I left there, and then I found uh a radio competition as well as starting and met um some lovely people doing it. But it it was helpful ish, it was quite fun to do, but I think the idea of this can propel you to possibly getting a paid job was false, false advertising. And so, and also some of the advice I was giving. I remember you had to do a video part of it, and I showed everyone this is what I'm putting forward. And they said, Yeah, yeah, yeah, we love it. We think it's great. And then they said, No, we don't, we don't think that'll work. We don't think that'll work. You should change it. And then so what I changed it, did what they wanted me to do. And then the feedback I got was it wasn't creative enough. And I think, uh, this you know, so it was a bit frustrating, but it was fun to do, interesting to do, met some brilliant people, and um it was you know, it was it was great, but I knew that I had the radio bug, and I thought this it was something I tried, and I thought this is just fun. You like it was like sit sitting here talking to you now. This is just fun. You're gonna find me everywhere. Who needs a podcast person? Because I because you know it's just good, yeah. And so then I went to another station which was free therapy, I think. It's today's sessions. Today is, I know, I'm so sorry. Um, and um, then I went to another radio station, which was national. I thought, oh, this is good, and it was an internet station, but anyone could hear it. And the people running it seemed to have ideas above their station. They wanted to be one of the major players. Okay. And they're not, they're they were one of thousands of internet stations. And it became not fun with some of the some of the comments I was getting. And what internally? From the people running it.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, okay.

SPEAKER_00

So the the other people that were doing it were also getting the same feedback. So we were in touch with each other, thinking he's not a very nice man. That's not and and then we thought, actually, we are doing this for free, giving up our time, really putting an effort in, researching what we're going to talk about, making sure it's in line with the you know, it wasn't just sitting down and pressing a button. You know, thought goes into it because you want to be good, because that a lot of prep work goes into the radio, yeah. Um, and did that for months and months and months, is and felt as if my confidence is being crushed a bit, and I'm actually giving up time with my family to do this because I was also working as well.

SPEAKER_01

Okay.

SPEAKER_00

Um, so I'm doing this after hours as a fun thing, and I'm not feeling very happy. This is this is not nice. Um, so once again, went to a different national station where I saw an advert on LinkedIn and on radio today. So both places that are quite established, quite respective. Yes. And they said we will pay you X amount of money to be on this. So this was gonna be your first. This was gonna be my first commercial paid thing.

SPEAKER_02

Um, and so obviously this is when you feel like, oh cool, I've I'm kind of making this here. Yes, you know, I'm moving forward in the radio world.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, I thought this is what I've wanted. This is probably a bit like the art thing. If if anyone ever bought a painting undone, I'd feel like this is the beginning, I've made it. I felt like that, oh wow, I've been doing this now for years. Yeah, and finally it's being recognised. And as much as I really enjoy doing radio, the validation you get from being paid to do something makes you feel as if I'm doing it properly. This is, you know, this is great. So I was so, so excited, told everyone, told all my friends, all my family, made everyone tune in. This is brilliant. The people I was doing it with as well, the other people that were on the station as well, the presenters had done shows on Heart and Global and were established radio presenters. Yeah. And I thought I I feel like a bit of a fraud because I'm not really. But they've heard my VT, they want to take me on, so brilliant! So it was lots of back and forth, and then they sent through a contract, I signed a contract, that went back, and again it was a daily show, and I was still working. My husband was saying because I was going to be earning more by doing the radio because I was I was just doing a little part-time job that kept me going, so I've got a bit of my own independence money, which I think is really important to have. Um, and my husband's saying, Look, it's taking so much time because you're still doing this other job, and now you're doing this. It's taking so much up of your time. And I was saying, I know, I just want to wait till my first paycheck before I handed my notice. Thank goodness. I worked every single day doing this show. I think again it was a three-hour show with other people, and it was all through Monday to Friday, yeah, every day. Yeah. All through everything was done through Discord. They kept on changing the method of how we could contact this man. Um, had interviews with him. He seemed very well well, I say he seemed very professional. My first interview with him, he looked as if he was in bed. And I was thinking, what's going on here? This he was in the dark and looked as if he was sort of in pajamas with covers on him. And I thought, what's going on here? But, you know, the horses for courses, I don't care as long as he he seemed to really know what he was doing. He said, I will need you to get professional photos done because we're doing billboards around Durham. And um my daughter's actually a really good photographer. She said, I'll take photos of you. But so we did we did this because luckily I didn't pay for you have to pay for the photos. We were meant to, okay. But my my daughter managed to take some photos, which were great.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Um, so did all of that. We had to prepare jingles, we were it a lot went into it, and we started working. The funny thing was he kept on um changing the methods that we could message him through, and we could never message any of the other uh presenters at all. None of us, there was no WhatsApp group, there was nothing, there was no screen.

SPEAKER_02

So you're not even allowed to know who the other people were.

SPEAKER_00

No, we knew who they were because you could see on the website who they were, but we just didn't have each other's contact details. And I could hear everyone else's show, and I could see their bio to see how professional, you know, where what backgrounds they'd come from. And I again, you know, felt a little bit of impostery syndrome of, oh, they're proper radio people, and I'm just I'm just me. Um, but I thought this is great. And he was sending through figures. Um, we would have to send our invoices through, obviously. And I remember that there were on my first invoice, there was a mistake or something. He said, No, you've got to do it through this. Um, then he said, then it was actually there's a change of email, how you send your invoice. Um, so then I sent it through that. No, you haven't done it properly. But anyway, it turned out that I sent my invoice about two weeks late. And um his partner who was setting it up with him sent me a vicious message about how how could why do you think you'll be paid? Uh why do you think you should still be paid at the same time as everyone else? Blah blah blah blah blah. And I said, Oh, I'm so sorry, so apologetic, obviously. I can wait till the next round, but blah, blah, blah. Anyway, every time, all of us were working really hard, all of the presenters, every time it came to invoice day. Oh, actually, we've just changed our finance company. You now have to send it through that to this. And then you still kept your other job because you were waiting, weren't you? Thankfully, my husband was saying, honestly, just give up, give up the other one. You've got this coming. You've signed a contract, they have to pay you. You're gonna earn more. We're never seeing you because you're doing your other job, and now this is taking up so much time. And I was literally stopping and starting, it was still VTing, so I could stop and start, go make supper, you know. But I wasn't eating with my family, going back to record everything else, making sure it was perfect, making sure all the links worked, all the you know, all the beds were right, everything was perfect because I still had this. Oh my goodness, it's going out nationally, and I'm being paid. I cannot afford to mess about with this. Yeah, um, so I did take it so I still had fun, but it was different to my local one. Yeah, and then, but I wasn't seeing my family. But luckily, I don't know what it was, maybe it was Sixth Sense that said, I'm not going to give up the other one until I've been paid.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

I worked for them to cut a really long story short. There was always a reason why we couldn't, why I couldn't be paid. I looked up the finance company, it was a genuine finance company. I looked up the other people that were working with me. They were genuine people. I could hear them on the radio and I could see who they were. Eventually, after five months of doing this, day in, day out, working in this way, giving up my family time, working really hard, loving it, but putting my all into it. I contacted one of them through LinkedIn and said, I don't suppose you've got a phone number. Can I message you? And he replied, saying, funnily enough, I'm in touch with blah blah and blah blah. Um, yeah, I'd be really interested in talking to you. And then soon I started this WhatsApp group, and soon everyone was being added to it because they some people, all the other presenters, so we were all on this chat, and we realized that none of us had been paid, and none of us were uh, you know, everyone was just being struggled. Someone said that we were getting messages from this person that ran it. The billboards look great. You all look great. I keep on getting compliments about it. None of us were in Durham, so none of us knew that this wasn't true. You're on the sides of buses, blah blah blah. He even sent photos. This is your billboard, don't you look good? This is you on the side of the bus, because he obviously mocked up these things. So we believed it. These are your listening figures, really high figures, that I thought, wow, I'm just telling my family, it's so many people are here listening to me, blah, blah, blah. Um, and really excited about it. And then we realised that none of us were. There was a at the beginning, who would like to interview Tate McRae? So not many people seemed to reply. So I replied, yeah, I would uh my children say, You've got to, you've got to do it, Bum. Um, so I said, Yeah, I'd love to do it. And there were a couple of other big names that he had set up. This is gonna go out. Who would like to do it? Um, so the only one I put myself forward for was Tate McRae, and he said, I'm really sorry, someone else picked you to the post. And I thought, oh, I did, I did take a few days to respond to that message, so fair enough. Um, when we were finally all on the group chat, everyone was saying, I haven't been paid, I haven't been paid. And someone was saying, I looked up this finance group. They're real though. Yeah, um, this is their real email address. I don't understand. And then someone said, Don't you realise there's a dot? So it was blah blah blah dot blah blah blah dot something. There's a dot in the one he's been given us. But it wasn't bouncing back to us. So he had set up these fake email addresses that we were sending our details to. He had our to sign on, he had our national insurance, he had a copy of my passport. We thought it and all of us had sent all of our details, our name, address, birth dates, copy of your passport, uh everything. Everything. And we all suddenly thought, oh, what's happening?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, I mean, the effort gone to into such a scam is and to keep it going for months and months and months.

SPEAKER_00

And it was going out on air because we could all listen to it.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

And mocking up these fake photos of us on billboards, photos of us on buses, coming up with figures, and uh making up fake finance things that were similar to real finance companies.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

He was receiving all of this information. I don't know. None of us understood what it was about. For months, I thought.

SPEAKER_02

So did you all approach approach this person at the same time?

SPEAKER_00

I joint um, yes, we all started email. So at first we were messaging them individually, and some people were getting really cross saying, look, this doesn't make sense. Your he had sent a group message, but we couldn't see each other's details.

SPEAKER_03

Okay.

SPEAKER_00

You know, so it was blind copied group message. I'm afraid a couple of you um had a typo in your um invoice that you sent. So none of us knew, well, oh, that must be me, because I haven't been paid. So, and all of us thought that, yeah, thinking, oh, well, everyone else has been paid. So there were things like that, and there was something every month. Um, in the end, we sent a group message saying, unless we are paid by the whatever date it was, sometime in April, uh, by the end of play on this date, we all said we all worked out how much each of us were being paid, what the listening figures were. He was just plucking numbers from the from the sky. So I was being paid this much. One girl had left her job. She was working, she was quite a younger girl, she was working in radio for I think Asda as their in-house radio. Great job, you know. If you want to get into radio, she was being paid to do it, she was on her path to get a proper commercial job. Yeah, and she had phoned him saying, I haven't been paid, I don't know what to do, and I can't do this as well as that job. It's giving me, you know, I've got um it's affecting my mental health. I don't know what to do. She had a long conversation with him and he had said, I really feel for you. Give up the other job.

SPEAKER_02

Wow.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

It's brutal, isn't it, when you actually look at the length people will go to scam people. Yeah. Like there's just no emotion connected at all.

SPEAKER_00

Absolutely mad to say to someone, give this up, knowing full well you had no intention of paying her, and she's got rent to pay. And she and yeah, so she left her job, and we all eventually found out she, you know, when we were all in touch, she put this on the message. There were all sorts of stories.

SPEAKER_02

Do you still keep in touch with the people?

SPEAKER_00

Any of the people we're on the same occasionally we arrange to meet, but none of us have ever met. One person have never met before. So it's quite hard when you're all in different locations to actually do it. And ever and life starts getting on.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

And I was contacted by someone about doing a podcast on this. Um, but they wanted everyone else to do it as well. And everyone said, No, I don't want my name being evil.

SPEAKER_02

I think as well, it's almost like you said, you told so many people, your friends, your family. So a lot of people would have either been embarrassed or mortified that they'd been drawn into the situation that you're like, I just want to leave it there now. Yeah, yeah. It's like lesson for I want to move on. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

That's how these romance scammers get get away with getting all of these scammers. People are too embarrassed to say, someone's taking me for a ride.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

And so everyone, at first, one of them said, Yeah, I'm definitely on for it. Then everyone else is saying, No, I don't want my name associated with this. And then that one person said, Actually, I've thought about it, I don't want it. They didn't want it professionally, getting out that this had happened, and they didn't want the shame of everyone knowing beyond the people that Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

So, what what did you do next? Do you you also do you found photography?

SPEAKER_00

So, no, I've always done photography, really, and it just as a hobby. I I love it, and I love editing photos, so that's been an ongoing, an ongoing thing, and I've created calendars that I've sold. You've sold out of calendars, haven't you? So, yeah. Yeah, which was which was yeah. Yeah, no, it was great. Well, it was it was uh yeah, it was annoying. So I printed these calendars. I wasn't happy with the quality of the paper. I thought it was a bit too thin and flimsy, and I thought people are paying money for this. So I ordered a whole lot of new calendars in thicker paper that I thought that's something that I'd be proud for people to have. Yeah, so I did sell out of all the calendars, but I made zero money because I'd effectively done two runs of calendars. But but yeah, no, I loved it. I love nature photography. I I feel like a bit of a hippie fogey because I think if I'm feeling down, there is nothing better than taking my dogs out and going for a really big power walk and listening to a podcast. Like I've listened to loads of your podcasts through power walking, you know, moving your body, getting proper fresh air, yeah, and getting out and taking photos. And I my it drives my children mad. They don't want to go for walks with me because it's always like every two seconds I'll be saying, oh, what a beautiful, beautiful piece of grass. Let me just take a photo. Yeah, so I I love nature. So they're all nature photos, yeah. And um generally, and so yeah, I've always done that, and that's not part of this. But after this, I didn't realise, I don't think, how much it affected me. This being taken advantage of. I think having had a couple of radio stations before that had knocked my confidence a lot. Um I've always had the original one I worked for who's bolstered me and been lovely. So that's been really nice. But I think being being made to feel that someone's taken advantage of you and made a fool of crushes your confidence. And I haven't done any radio until now. I've just signed up literally to start at the end of this month with another. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

So who who is Sheila today? Who are you now? I know you're gonna do your radio, but who are you today? So I think to be honest, I think after After your extraordinary life, I I'm just I think I am still trying to work it out, which seems ridiculous.

SPEAKER_00

I'm in my 50s, I still don't don't really know.

SPEAKER_02

I think you need to take a minute and actually realise everything you've done and been through because there's so much that you've done and been through, and and I think that yes, a lot of it may have knocked your confidence, and a lot of times you've been told to keep quiet or no, but I I feel like your time is now, as in, I feel like this is where you as a person are probably gonna be like, no, this is what I'm gonna do next. That's what that's what I get from you. As in, I feel everything that's led you to this moment now has taught you what you need to do go going forward, I guess. I hope so.

SPEAKER_00

I hope so. I think I I don't know if anyone feels as if this is where I'm meant to be, but it would be a lovely feeling. I've started writing a book. Okay. Um which I think because I lost my uh the other job I had, which kept me going through the whole thing, I lost it in December.

SPEAKER_02

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_00

So I lost that job, and I Also, my constant radio, my local one, which I've always kept on on and off, but we've always kept in touch. My local radio station, I have always gone back to him, and he's always welcomed me with open arms, which is lovely. So I've I was with him. I went back to him after this, and it helped, but that shut down. Unfortunately, his mother became ill, so he shut down the station again in December. So I lost both of those stabilizers in December. So it felt now feels like I it's partly a bit scary because I've got no anchor. I'm focusing more on my children and enjoy, I I adore them so much. They're hilarious. And I think, wow, I've got more time to be a little bit of a better mother. That's that's quite nice. I feel as if I've got more time to actually talk through things with you and help you, um, which is a lovely feeling. Um, but also I'm gonna start doing this radio station. I've started to write a book, and I do feel as if, even though I don't really know what I'm doing, I'm so excited. I feel positive, I definitely feel positive, and I think there are lots of times in my life where I've felt so low that it felt as if I didn't necessarily want to be here. And it's horrible to admit, but and I know that uh my parents would be devastated if they realised that uh possibly some of the decisions they've made made me feel as if uh I was so worthless and so useless that I didn't want to uh be carry on going, I didn't want to be here anymore, and so I know what it's like to suffer mentally, I know what it's like to bolster yourself out of that. I also know now what has when I say going for dog walks, and honestly, if I didn't do that, I think it would I I'd be a basket case. I I would be a very sad, unhappy person, and I want to be as happy as I can, not just for me, but for my children. Um so yeah, I think it is exciting now to to be able to do the things that I potentially can, and if I hadn't lived those things, I probably wouldn't be where I am now trying to make it happen. Whether I do make it happen or not, who knows?

SPEAKER_02

But but yeah. Um, okay, my last question to you is um I want you to finish the sentence. I want to be remembered for.

SPEAKER_00

I would like to be remembered for being the loveliest mother that my children can always come to me, no matter what, and their friends, but not as much as they can. Um and really fun. I'd like to be remembered as a ray of sunshine that I brought fun to people, fun and happiness, and can boost people and can empathize. So when they're low, I could listen to them and help them. Yeah, and when they're happy, I can make it even happier. Yeah. Um, but I think, yeah, I I just think a ray of sunshine would if anyone described me as that, I would think I'll die happy.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah. Thank you so much, and thank you for sharing your story. And yeah, don't ever tell anyone again that you've got nothing interesting to share.

SPEAKER_00

Oh, thank you so much. Thank you, really. Has been like therapy.

SPEAKER_02

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