Vicky Pattison - ‘You don't become old and wise if you haven't been young and daft’

0:00This bonus episode of How To Fail is brought to you by Arla Lacto Free. Delicious dairy dairy with all of the taste, none of the lactose.

0:16welcome to how to fail the podcast that redefines failure as data acquisition there is no such thing as a mistake if there's a lesson wrapped up in it you don't become old and wise if you haven't been young and daft i was a mess at 30 i'm 37 and i'm still not there i've got to the point where I've shared so much. Like, I just don't know where that line is. Vicky Patterson was 22 when her life changed and producers cast her in a reality TV programme called Geordie Shaw. She was on the show for nine seasons between 2011 and 2014, during which time the cameras followed her falling in love, becoming engaged, then breaking up with her then-fiancée.

1:00Patterson was an instant hit with the viewers, becoming known for her humour, her sometimes chaotic personal life, and her vocabulary. Her catchphrase, Tash On, became a new entry in the Collins Dictionary. But this was just one part of her TV career. Now 37, Patterson, who studied drama at Liverpool John Moores University, has rarely been off our screens. Whether it's getting rave reviews for her caramelised apples as a finalist on Celebrity MasterChef, or winning I'm a Celebrity in 2015, Patterson has become a beloved figure in our national culture. Along the way, she's also published best-selling memoirs and novels, built up an Instagram following of over 5 million, and campaigned for wider recognition of women's health issues.

1:48She's now a radio presenter on The Heart Network, and is about to front a new Channel 4 dating show called The Honesty Box, and a new podcast, Get a Grip with Angela Scanlon. I'm not kidding when I say I always wanted to be famous she wrote in her 2014 memoir nothing but the truth I come from a family of attention seekers when we get the karaoke system out on Christmas day it's like the Hunger Games Vicky Patterson welcome to How to Fail I learned something about myself in that little intro yeah I thought I was tell everyone I did 10 series of Geordie Shore, but it was just the nine. Oh, well, there you go.

2:27I'm sorry. I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news. You've outed us. The impact felt like 10. God, it felt like 20. Still does feel like 20. You put a little body. Does it? How did it feel? Actually, I was aware when I was reading out that introduction in front of you that I started off with something that you have worked really hard to become more than. Yeah. And I hope that was okay. No, please. I don't feel any type of way. It is still one of the things that I get recognised for the most Geordie Shore. And ultimately, that does make sense. Like, I spent five years of my life doing it, you know.

3:03It's a show that's still repeated, that's still doing the rounds. and I've been really honest about my conflicted feelings about my time spent on Geordie Shore you know they were my formative years like who hasn't made mistakes and done silly things that they probably wish they hadn't in their 20s mine were just all televised and I still maintain that I probably didn't have the skills as a young lass in her early 20s to navigate everything that was going on so I'd like to think I've done a lot since then I've changed I've grown up I've worked on myself but do I mind when people like quote bits back to us and stuff like no it was still a part of my life and let's be real mate I wouldn't be where I was without Geordie Shaw you know I've got to recognize that and I'm very grateful to everything that that show that opportunity MTV gave to us and I think I mean I would find it so difficult if my 20s would play down screen oh mate actually like I was still just a kid like figuring it out you know um and I thought I would really mourn the loss of my 20s I think like most women I have a fear of getting older this amazing thing happened when I hit my 30s I just loved them like I loved them like I stressed less about what everyone thought still habitual people pleaser don't get us wrong but it was alleviated slightly.

4:25I learned to accept myself for everything I was and everything I wasn't. I just, I don't know, felt a sense of liberation and comfort and acceptance came with me 30s. I never had with me 20s. It's almost made me less terrified about the impending 40s. Let me tell you, if you think your 30s are good, your 40s are amazing. Mum says things like this all the time. Yes. Bring it on. Now, does it help being married to someone who understands reality TV? Because your husband was in The Only Way as Essex. Yeah. I mean, I think that's a common misconception. Like, Irk, bless his heart, was in TOWIE for five minutes.

5:02Like, blink and you would have missed him. That was a real bone of contention for him. But I always think he was too nice for reality TV. And that is not me being judgmental or in any way disparaging about people who are successful within reality TV, because I myself was one of them. but he is just the kindest guy and I don't think that was a bad thing I don't think that was his journey what Erkan is is just incredibly kind and supportive and thoughtful and patient and all the things actually that I probably wish I was more of oh so um Vicky what a beautiful thing to say no I always get a little bit upset when I talk about Erkan because I waited a long time for him for somebody who was all those things all the things that actually I didn't know I needed and probably in my teens or my 20s would have dismissed you know oh he's too nice for me or I'll chew him up and spit him out like you know but actually he's been the best thing that's ever happened to us so you know he he's just kind for loads of other reasons and understanding for loads of other reasons he didn't have to be in reality tv i think kindness is the most important quality and like you i think it took me a long time to put that at the top of the list for a romantic partner there are tissues just yeah i think i'm wrong there i was just say you did say i'm going to cry i was really hoping oh gosh no ruining the place i was really hoping i would have um a little bit further in before the war fine you're fine and tell me a bit about that thing that you wrote in your memoir about always wanting to be famous.

6:42So where did you get your idea of fame from? Was it watching TV as a kid? Yeah, I think my family are all the same. And actually, I think more than anything, less about the fame. I just wanted to be successful. I didn't matter. It didn't matter to me how I got there, whether it was, you know, reality TV or the radio or the TV or writing books or any sort of thing. I just wanted to be successful. Let's get on to your first failure because your failures are so good. And I know that a lot of the things that we've touched on in the introduction, we're also going to get deeper on in the failures. Your first failure is your failure to drive.

7:20Crap. So you've never passed your test? Never. I've never even taken a proper test. Okay, tell me more. Why? So it will surprise absolutely no one to know who's familiar with my previous work that when I was younger and everyone else was like learning to drive and stuff, I was just quite drunk all the time. I was from about 16, 17, going out all the time, working in bars and nightclubs. And it just wasn't a priority of mine to learn to drive at all. My priority was always just having a good time. And then at 18, moved to Liverpool to go to uni, lived in the city centre. everything was walking distance again so much fun to be had like getting me provisional license was just not top of the agenda you know it was like three Jager bombs for a fiver and dropping on bars you know kissing Scouse boys I loved it all it was exciting and then um left uni and then I I really was under the impression I think I've probably watched too many rom-coms but I thought you left uni and like as you are standing afterwards with your cap and gown somebody walked up to you and was like i'm from so and so company we we can't wait to hire you do you know what i mean one of those and you moved off to a city and got a high-flying job and started a complicated relationship with a gorgeous mysterious man across the across the way played by harrison ford done um and it wasn't like that there was 300 000 graduates my year for 30 000 graduate jobs so the vast majority of we were just rendered a little bit redundant um so me and me pal were like right we are gonna have six months of fun before we get our heads down and join the rat race and be grown-ups and we moved to Ibiza and we lived the best time like we were on the bones of our ass mate but we just had so much fun and like oh used to blabber we and all the great nights and I just loved it came home and within a couple of weeks had got found for Geordie Shaw it just feels like I've been on this real like conveyor belt this like super fast hamster wheel whatever you want to call it and driving has never really been a priority of mine um and then a couple years ago I say a couple years ago it's probably 10 now I don't know where the time goes but I did a driving show with E4 called Celebrity Driving School don't pander to and say you watched it.

9:44Nobody fucking did. I saw the trailers. I did see the trailers. Oh, yeah. It was a bit of a swing and a miss, that one. So, yeah. They're going to all be hits. But, yeah. So, I remember making that. In my head, I'm making a TV show, you know. But in the instructor's head, I was learning to drive. And we had very different ideas about what we were doing. And out of, like, 16 celebs or something, I was the only one that they wouldn't let sit their driving test. They wouldn't even let you sit it? No, they would not. he called my driving style get on this highly unpredictable and very dangerous he said I was not only a hazard of myself but others and that I would never pass my driving oh my gosh if you hadn't already written your memoir I'd say like a hazard to yourself and others would be a great title that's savage there's plenty time yet but did you feel when you were behind the wheel of the car did you feel out of control so the thing is like i'm i'm probably i'm probably undiagnosed adhd in fairness um it would just it would explain a lot um uh and i subsequently am either like hyper focused or completely disinterested and i can get distracted very easily as well um and so subsequently like i'd be driving and i would be really trying at first to listen to him and watch the cars and be observant and all those things that are necessary to be a good and safe driver.

11:08And then there'd be a dog. And I'd just be, oh, there's a dog. And I'd be like, oh, yeah, sorry. So I, and like, he wasn't a bad guy. He was doing his best. And he probably said what he said out of complete frustration, but it's never left us. It's never left us. And I've tried a couple of times since, you know, to like do an intensive course or get a driving instructor locally. and it's just always ended in not I think disaster is hyperbolic but close it's so interesting what you say about that phrase or those phrases never having left you yeah because I think there is something for women who have grown up in a certain culture in a certain decade when they've come of age where social conditioning wasn't often that friendly towards women having their own agency and so we become people pleasers as you mentioned and then someone can say something that to them they won't even think twice about it.

12:03Very cavalier and thrall. Yes but we internalize it so deeply. Yeah. Is that can you recognize that in yourself? I hold on to everything absolutely everything and like even even going back to when I was on Geordie Shore and I was a very divisive and you know quite outrageous character a caricature of myself if you will um the things that people would write about me or say about me whether it be comments online or the press I still remember them and in like my deepest darkest moments you know that three o 'clock in the morning when you can't sleep like I get treated to a highlight reel of that you know had this one really horrible ex-boyfriend who used to say to me you that's unfair we were just we were toxic together but he used to say you think you're Vicky from the jungle but I know you're Vicky from Geordie Shore and I think it was his way of of reminding me of what people potentially saw me as and just basically honing in on me deepest darkest fear and really giving that a platform so yeah I do think I do think sometimes we are where we're harshest critics aren't we that is so obsessing Vicky and I'm so sorry you had to bear the brunt of that because for me that speaks of someone who is so insecure in themselves that they have to lash out at someone else who they perceive to be more successful and powerful than them and I'm sorry that you had to hear that oh thank you honestly it was it was a bit of it was a it was doomed to fail that one and I probably wasn't great either and we can recognise all of that now do you know what I mean hindsight's a really nice thing but yeah you don't let go of stuff like that in a hurry like I say I dwell on it yes we were chatting beforehand about the fact that we're both Scorpios November Scorpios and we will bear lifelong grudges oh never forgive or forget yeah I'm like Arya Stark in Game of Thrones I just have a list of names I still remember them Can we talk a little bit about the drinking years?

14:15Because you've spoken about them so openly and so movingly in the past, particularly as it pertains to your dad and the documentary. Yeah, the tissues are there on the left. Just look at my tissues there, Elizabeth. This incredibly powerful documentary you did with your dad. Yeah. Examining his alcoholism. And I know that we started off talking about a failure around a driving test. but I was so intrigued that you explained that by saying there were these kind of lost years for me how is your relationship with alcohol now um I think for a long time I genuinely believed that I had this like predetermined destiny this future that was completely outside of my control and ultimately because my dad was an addict um and I was his daughter and I was always told when I was growing up you're your dad's daughter you're your dad's daughter and again people probably didn't understand how I was internalizing that and taking it you know but um I just believed I was ultimately going to become an alcoholic like my dad and I do have a very addictive personality you know so it was for me a foregone conclusion and um I wrestled with that for years and a lot and you see a lot of that on Geordie Shore um but now through years of like therapy counseling life coaching personal training working on myself distancing myself changing my lifestyle changing the people that I spend time with everything um I would describe my relationship with alcohol is healthy um but it's taken us the best part of like 20 years to get there and there's still a part of me that is afraid that old habits will die hard um and I will end up like me dad but I think that fear that recognition is the thing that will stop me at least I hope it is that's when my dad told us himself he said when we're making the documentary he went you're so worried and so scared of ending up like me and he says but you've got one thing that I never had and he says I was never afraid of this he says you are and you don't want to be like me and even though that's heartbreaking because I want so much more for my dad it is the truth and it is his reality so yeah i would say i'm in a good place now but um i think when you've had when you've been exposed to what i have as a child and as a young adult and as even as an adult when you have a an alcoholic parent you potentially live in fear of becoming the same because you've seen what it can do to a person in a family and also like the pull is i feel like for me you know when you've had a hard day or someone you know there's a bad article or you're feeling overwhelmed or exhausted or overstimulated my go-to was always alcohol it's always like a medicinal thing an emotional thing but i've had to work hard to remove that but yeah it does still scare us man you're so strong and so eloquent in your pain and I really want to thank you hugely for sharing that oh honestly it it's taken us like yeah it's taken us years to understand my dad's illness and that itself like honestly if I can implore any child of an alcoholic any child of an addict who is struggling to understand who is has a complicated or strained relationship with a parent like I would implore you to work hard to try and understand it I for years was so mad at me dad so mad at me dad that he and asked myself these questions all the time like why doesn't he just love us enough to stop but it's bigger than that and it's not that and I think once you take the time to understand the illness then you do feel a sense of you give them grace you give them grace but you also can't enable them you've got to hold them accountable it's finding the right balance isn't it I feel really grateful that me and my dad were able to do the documentary and I was able to understand my relationship with alcohol and also understand his because it brought work fundamentally so much closer.

19:05It allowed me to exercise some compassion, mate. And realise, potentially, I had been enabling them, you know. I feel like there's a vulnerability to addicts that sometimes gets overlooked in people's rush to have them condemned. You start to realise there's a person behind it. And there was probably a... it's probably something significant that sparked it you know nobody wants to be an addict and I think like once you sort of understand that there is a real potential to enable oh it's you've had a drink it's fine don't worry dad I understand god I would have done the same you're only human and these things even though you think you're helping them you're not well especially as a child yeah you want to normalize your parents behavior as well so that's it must have been so difficult and it must continue to be how is your dad doing oh and i see my dad's so good he's actually on the train down now to come and see us okay my relationship is great now it used to be very strained but it's brilliant he um he is he just he sees himself he says he'll always be an alcoholic sometimes he's in recovery and he is beating the illness and sometimes sometimes he's not it's not a linear thing can i ask you a really big question not that these ones haven't been big don't worry it's actually yeah it's it's something that i am really passionate about and you have been so open about and i've really respected that which is the journey to being a parent potentially so I'm someone I've had loads of unsuccessful fertility treatment basically and I'm not a parent I'm at peace with it but I also went through egg freezing I just don't have enough tissues for the day oh my darling are they already left oh no I'm so sorry I love you you shared your egg freezing journey online and I was so grateful to you for doing that because people don't understand how invasive and emotional that is and it's offered as this kind of cure for people who might not be sure about when they want to have a baby and feeling like the timing isn't right and actually there's just lots of complexity to it and I just wondered given everything that you have so beautifully shared about you and your dad and parenting and children how much this plays in your mind oh mate it's like right at the start of the documentary i say i think i was about 32 when i did the doc i'm 37 now i say i know i haven't had children or even entertained the idea of having children because i was so terrified believing that becoming an alcoholic for me was a foregone conclusion.

22:21And there was a huge genetic element to it, which I still believe there is, that I was just going to have, I was just going to give birth to children who are fundamentally broken like me. Oh, but you're not broken. I won't have you thinking that. Don't be sorry. I won't have you thinking that. You're so perfect. You are such a radiant, shining being. and you are perfect in being the person that you are that's so upsetting i'm so sorry no and like please don't please don't apologize like i had to work through an awful lot

23:06my house like my mom and dad are the best and i just absolutely have to have that as a precursor to whatever i'm going to say next and i had a really nice childhood with a happy home and a gorgeous family who loved me but it was very different to what a lot of other children and families experience as their norm do you know what i mean yeah i grew up in a house where like was loud sometimes and it was scary sometimes i don't know what type of parent i'm going to be Elizabeth no I know no one does but um I have fears about the type of parent I could have been if I was still on the trajectory I was on from say 10 years ago and that is in my opinion not someone who was fit to be a parent I wasn't fit to be a parent and um it's took years of like work on myself um to get myself to a place where I do believe I could actually be a nice mom yeah and the heartbreaking thing about that it's like twofold one is that's why I get so upset when people remind me of who I used to be because I think if you knew why I'd worked so hard to get away from that you'd maybe give us a little bit of grace but secondly is after doing all this work putting in everything you get to the point where your body is gonna find it hard to give you a baby do you know what I mean yeah and I just think it's really unfair on women like we're just expected to have it all figured out by the age of 30 yeah like fuck me I was a mess at 30 I'm 37 and I'm still not there like you know and I just think the odds are totally stacked against her to be able to be everything we want to be and I thought by freezing me eggs and sharing me journey I was potentially doing something responsible I was giving women this alternative to fucking rushing and having a kid with the wrong bloke because you felt like this biological body clock was ticking and I remained steadfast in that belief but what I wasn't prepared for was the backlash that came with it that shocked me too I it's the amount of people with no skin in our game who have opinions about what we should do with our bodies is shocking to me I know and like I know this whole like no uterus, no opinion is like gaining some traction quite rightly so again at the moment.

25:58And I believe that. But you know, the hardest thing, and you'll get this, is when these opinions came from women. Yeah. And I don't know why it hurts us more when women are disparaging about us, but it just does. For what it's worth, Vicky, there are two things I want to say to you one is I found it very moving when you said I just wasn't convinced I'd be a good mother and I think I had my time of thinking that too because it wasn't happening for me so then if you believe in the universe and things working out as they should there was part of me that was like why isn't this working out is it telling me something about how I'm not worthy of this.

26:40And the thing that helped me through that, and I know you have two beloved dogs and I have a beloved cat and I realized how I was with my cat. And I know that that sounds trivial or stupid, but honestly, I mean it really sincerely. I see how you are with your dogs. That to me is the biggest sign that you are going to be an amazing parent. And I just want you to know that. And the other thing that I want you to know is that if for whatever reason, it doesn't happen for you, there's this amazing piece on the other side of it that I never believed existed but I'm here now and I'm here to tell you that it is and there are different ways of being a parent and but I I just I firmly believe in both of those things for you that's really reassuring and this is why I think we need more like like fertility needs more sunlight totally I love the way you put that candor it needs more brilliant brave women speaking about their alternative experiences but the thing is when you have these really loud judgmental voices you understand why people don't share and it's because of stigma it's because of fear of judgment it's because actually it is such a hard emotionally difficult thing to go through you're so exhausted just by that output like to share it with anyone else feels impossible but ultimately we need to get past that we need to push past it otherwise we're never going to get to a place where people understand it where people understand these different routes to being a mother whether that be surrogacy whether that be like egg freezing or adoption or actually choosing to not have kids like all these things are okay and they're beautiful but people are scared to talk about them because of others reactions and it's this cycle isn't it

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29:35So your second failure is your failure to be still, which is actually quite funny because you just got up to go to the loop. But wait, it's deeper than that in that you thrive off being busy as you said yeah and you find it hard to switch off yeah it's in every in every sort of sense of the word I find it hard to relax so my husband and I haven't actually had a honeymoon um I left the wedding after two days to fly to Cyprus to make um my new tv show that's coming out the honesty box um so like we never did the traditional tin cans on the back of the car riding up into the sunset thing which I really wanted and then since then there's just been no time we I made the dock I got my job at heart it's just been a bit of a roller coaster so we are trying to find somewhere for a honeymoon and his idea of like honeymoon heaven is just like me and him on a beach with like a cocktail and a coconut and like the sand in between my toes and I can do that for about 45 minutes okay it's a long foot and flight for 45 minutes like I just I feel like once I'm I just feel like I get so I feel trapped and I feel stressed and I feel stagnant very fast I need to know like I need to be working I need to be doing and a lot of it is I think a lot of it is to I honestly feel like unless I'm busy unless I'm proving myself I feel like somebody else is going to come along and do what I do what better and everyone's going to forget about me yes and I have that desperate belief but also as well I'm just really neurotic yeah like just just yeah and just a bit unhinged essentially where do you think that comes from that belief that someone's going to come and make everyone forget you I think I think for an awful long time um when I was on like Geordie Shore and stuff like that I knew from I knew from like series one that I wasn't happy it didn't matter to me how much of a success the show was become want to become how much of a cult following it was going to have I knew that it wasn't serving me as a person and even in those formative years being quite young and just really inexperienced I knew I wasn't happy mentally there I used to threaten to leave every series this is it I'm done I'm gonna go I'm not happy I want a nice normal boyfriend I want to buy my own house I want a normal I wanted I wanted to get away from it you know and I would be always told whether it be by people at MTV or agents or whatever like don't bite the hand that feeds you there's nothing else for you out here you've got it good like you should know where your bread's butters what you're going to do outside of this just no one had any belief that there was anything else for me and I say now I was probably just surrounded by the wrong people people who are trying to keep us small I was benefiting them probably I wasn't it wasn't easy for them just to collect that 10 20 % off my jewelry show paycheck and you know keep me feeling little um and ultimately like I made the decision to leave series nine as I now know um and it was really scary because I did it without the support of anyone really apart from my mom my mom and my pals they absolutely really believed there would be something else for me the people around you at the time wanting to keep you small your lack of self-belief served their needs and it takes a long time to unpack that yeah I think it takes as long to unpack as you were in the situation oh in a way so somebody said to me once like however long you were in a relationship it takes twice as long to get over it and I believe it's a similar yeah it's a similar like dynamic with that I spent so long being kept small because that's where I was useful and pliable and manageable for people.

33:53How does this impact your wellness more generally? What does wellness mean to you? So I've always had this thing. Wellness to me is waking up before your alarm in the morning. And that sounds so silly, right? But like, I know I'm firing on all cylinders and I'm well and I'm healthy and I'm ticking all the boxes. When I wake up before my alarm and I go, now I'm ready for a day yes and this may be like a really ignorant innocent like romanticized version of health but it's my it's my version because when I'm eating everything I should and I'm nailing me jobs and I'm being kind to people and I'm going all the right places saying the right things going to Pilates you know doing the things I need to do I go to bed when I need to go and that horrible voice that keeps me awake at night is quieter you know and I wake up before me alarm and I'm like right I'm ready for a day but when certain things are slipping and I'm neglecting my health and I'm neglecting the wellness and all the rest of it the alarm goes off and I feel like it's the middle of the night and there must have been a mistake why would I set me alarm for 4am this can't be right and I look and it's not seven and that's just not how I like to start my day with that like dialogue that inner monologue I like to be like ready yeah and every day you're never gonna it's not gonna be every day and do you think there are more of those days now the good days or the bad days the good days yeah ultimately honestly mate like I for I got to the point when I was younger I couldn't even look at myself in the mirror because I hated who I was becoming but now no like I'm surrounded by great people I nurture those relationships I'm thoughtful I walk the dogs I get fresh air I eat what's right and I've got a lovely partner, great family.

35:46I know I am moving more and more towards being the person that I want to be. So yeah, sleep does come easier and ultimately waking up is easier. There's still some slip-ups here and there. I've had a Red Bull too late or potentially haven't been the perfect way I should have been to a colleague or whatever. Do you know what I mean? But ultimately, no, I'm definitely finding wellness I'm on the right track yes and I love that you include kindness in your wellness map that idea that if you're not being as kind as you would have wanted to be on a perfect day quote unquote then that is a signal maybe that you need to take more care of yourself yeah like it's I don't know I think it you can tell when a person is well and happy you can just tell because they are patient and nice and don't get me wrong I'm not talking about all the time we all have down days we've all got so much that we're dealing with in in this day and age especially women that I'm not suggesting for one single second that we're all fucking perfect all the time because I'm not but you know when you just know someone's gone to pilates or somebody's done sunrise yoga or somebody's had their green juice or somebody's like done the hit class or had the walk with the dog and you know because it's in the way they treat people and it's in the way they treat themselves and I wonder if for you it's almost like for many years maybe you didn't think you were worth taking care of in this way and you're getting to the point gradually where on some days you do feel you're worth taking care of and that will just get more and more Ricky like it will get more and more as you understand that you are fundamentally lovable exactly as you are yeah I really hope that I think it's all um I think it's definitely how you treat yourself sorry don't ever apologize for showing beautiful emotion honestly tried so hard to hold them in but sadly I leak um it is like how you treat yourself is all wrapped up and how you say yourself it's your self-worth isn't it and um I think for me that is the final puzzle piece that's missing the last bit is how I see myself yes and um it's just gonna take time mate well you are amazing this is the first time we've met but doesn't feel like that it doesn't feel like that at all and your final failure is your failure to be private and this pertains specifically to the fact that you grew up essentially on a reality TV program and as you put it to me I have had to work twice as hard to prove myself yeah so like you know when you're in your early 20s and stuff and your teens and things like that like you're just trying to work out who you are in fact your whole 20s is that a complete decade of self-exploration and growth and you know for the best part none of us have got the tools to navigate it it's all a bit trial and error there's absolutely no rule book but I think it's when you it's when habits are formed it's when you learn about yourself it's when you you make routines and things and um subsequently most of my formative years those years were played out in front of millions and um now as an adult I have a real warped opinion of what is appropriate to share yes like I remember um being so desperate to leave reality tv in its most traditional sense you know um and saying to my team I just want to be a tv presenter I want to be a broadcaster I want um the only thing that people know about me to be like what color dress I had on that day or how I did at my job don't want them to know everything about my personal life anymore because when you give so much of yourself like that people do feel like they know you and they feel like they've got every right to judge you this way to Sunday and that is quite exhausting emotionally to have to explain yourself to millions of people all the time when you're just trying to figure it out yourself when you're just a kid so I remember saying that and then being like yep this is the journey for you this is what we're going to do we're going to take you away from reality tv we're going to you know we're just going to rebrand and I wanted that I wanted it so much and actually i just found a way to fucking overshare myself anyway i just went on social media and was like i'm over today or got me period today or gotta be like shit today or i'm so angry or this or that and this you know this juggernaut that is social media sort of was rising as i was making this decision to dip out of of reality tv and it just replaced that in my life for giving everybody this huge access to me.

41:03And I think because that's how I lived my early 20s, I don't really know how to be anything else other than a habitual oversharer. I've gotten to the point where I've shared so much, I just don't know where that line is. Do you think that you struggle confusing privacy with secrecy? So the idea that you might want to keep something to yourself is there part of you that feels like oh that would be dishonest though if I didn't share it that would be dishonest I wouldn't be being authentic I've made me living on being a transparent person yes being this nice normal lass who's just managed to get somewhere and is really proud of that and I know I wouldn't be here

41:50I know I wouldn't be here if people hadn't bought for us to win the jungle people didn't buy me books and follow us on instagram and invest in me and subsequently i feel like i owe people so much and so i give so much yeah i give everything like i've got i really do and um i always say like whenever i'm out and people go oh does it bother you when people ask for pictures and i'm like are you fucking joking me does it bother us when someone comes up and recognizes me no it's the biggest honor in my life because the minute people stop asking for pictures or the minute people stop going oh you're that bird from x y and z i'll be back at me call center and i did i was very bad i was not good at that job like i was rubbish i was trying to sell sky and i couldn't i was crap i feel beholden yeah to the people who've put me here and i feel this real sense of responsibility to continue to share everything the highs and the lows of my life yeah so that be getting married to urcan this love of my life i've waited 15 years to find go on let's lash it on the telly because people who were there for me when i had my heart broken and talked me through how they had their heart broken deserve to know that there can be light at the end of the tunnel like i found yes That's what I think.

43:19And like, whether it's me PMDD, me periods, me hangovers, me gym sessions, me dogs, whatever. I just think everybody deserves to know because they're invested in us. But it is exhausting. And I don't know if I'm doing the right thing. Am I boring people with me life? No. Should I be keeping some more back? I don't know anymore. It's such an interesting question. It's such an interesting question. And really fascinating hearing you talk about it. as someone who is in the belly of the beast. And I want you to know that I don't think you need to feel beholden to us. We are so invested in you and want to see you thrive and you can keep on sharing, but you don't have to share immediately.

44:04I think that would be, if it ever feels exhausting, you could always take some time and be like, let me work out how I feel about this thing and then I'll post about it and that can be so powerful because it comes from this position of wisdom yeah I think as I've got a bit older I am getting a bit better like I used to be so impulsive it used to be like this has just happened to me right now so obviously I need to share it with everybody yes because that's what I'd grown up doing and I am getting slightly better i think me pmdd it makes us quite introspective and i don't know if what i'm feeling is rational all the time so i i sit on i try and sit on my feelings a little bit before i share the lines are still blurred for us mate so pmdd is premenstrual dysphoric dysphoric disorder and i had never heard of it until you started talking about it and then a contestant on married at first sight started talking about it she did christina yes love christina yes we love her gorgeous little bunny um and it is like a very very aggressive form of when you explain what it is i'm gonna hitting the nail on the head honestly so pmdd premenstrual dysphoric disorder is um essentially often described as an aggressive form of pms the best way i ever heard it described and something that has stayed with me is like imagine building a sandcastle of good habits you eat healthy you nurture your relationships you practice self-care and then once a month a wave comes along and it completely destroys your castle and in place of all these good habits and and just is utter destruction and despair for some people it manifests itself as anxiety and insomnia and exhaustion and crippling self-doubt.

46:04In extreme cases, you have such dark thoughts. You're suicidal, right? And every month I have to watch this quite strong, quite confident, ambitious woman turn into a terrified little girl who doesn't want to post on social media, who doesn't want to go outside, who can barely articulate yourself I I lose all sense of myself and it's like a terrifying place to be because in some of the darkest moments I genuinely believe the world would be a better place without us in it and I have to fight that I have to fight that feeling and and reiterate that it's just temporary and you've been here before and you know this isn't you and you're going to be okay but it's killing women for five years I went back and forth to the doctor telling them you know I don't think I'm well something happens to me seven to ten days before me period and I'm unrecognisable I don't know what I'm capable of you know and it was from a real place of despair and fear that I went to speak to somebody I got told have you tried losing weight?

47:32which of course when you get told by a medical professional you go away and do so I lost weight I think maybe it's the time you came off your birth control you've been on it a long time so I came off my birth control that didn't help do you know that periods just get worse as you get older do you know that every other woman is going through what you're going through and they're managing to be okay are these mostly male doctors yes absolutely and like let's not make a sweeping generalization I think fair's fair there was definitely some women who marginalized how I was feeling who dismissed me feelings and made me feel ashamed you know but ultimately it was men and that is because there is a huge bias within medicine medical misogyny is rampant and I just like so many other women absorbed it scolded it for years believed I was the problem believed I was weak and I couldn't cope with periods like all of them could and you know it was only Elizabeth through going on social media and this is why I have that complicated relationship with my privacy because if I hadn't gone on there and gone I am really struggling our women reached out in their droves mate and they said um Vicky this is a normal regardless of what doctors are saying to you it sounds to me that you've got PMDD so I went away and I researched it myself I kept a feelings journal which honestly for as a girl from Wall's End is not so like I thought I was gonna look at you've ever had i went to see a doctor i went private in the end which again irks me so much because i love the nhs but they're just so oh they're just so stretched so anyway so i went and i sat there all guns blazing ready to have like a row about it and just be dismissed again and i eventually got through my spiel which must have been so muddled and just emotional not anyway she just went take a breath she says it sounds to me like you've got pmdd and i just burst into tears honestly mate i felt for the first time in my life like at least for the last 10 years i felt seen i felt liberated yes i felt like i wasn't just descending into madness yes and it's just so much more common than you think and is there treatment for it it's frustratingly enough not a one size fits all pill um it's kind of you have to work out what works for you and there's loads of different routes you can take a lot of the time a lot of the time it is antidepressants for a certain period of the month personally I'm reluctant to do that I'm not depressed I have PMDD it's very different and you should be able to treat that rather than treat me as if I'm a depressed person and birth control works for some people um cognitive therapy works for others um supplements I'm still not where I'd like to be the thought of being a mother as I am now is again a terrifying reality I'm facing has Erkin been helpful yes and no yeah because he's a man and I hate to again make a sweeping generalization but they don't understand yeah they don't understand and they can't possibly hope to be empathetic they can be sympathetic sympathetic but it's taken so same i think it's maybe three four years ago i got my diagnosis it's three um and we've both had to learn to live with this because it absolutely kills me that for a quarter of our life, I am not the person that he fell in love with and not the person that he thought he was marrying.

51:19Because that is the reality. I'm not myself. I'm not recognisable at all. I could be screaming one second and sobbing the next, then completely disassociating, unable to be social, lost, afraid, whatever it is, however it's manifesting itself that week you know he's had to he's had to learn to love that version of me as well and that is really difficult and that is not something I would ask of my worst enemy let alone the man I love more than anything else in the world you know it is a true testament to him and his character that he's learned to understand it because not every man does I found the one thing that helps is communication so saying to him we have a little I gotta say it's coming into PIMD week he goes oh no PIMD and I say yeah PIMD and he goes that's okay like we'll just take it so and he knows that some days I will have to come in from work and just go straight to bed and I can't even speak to him because I'm so done in from pretending to be the person that I am normally with other people that I've got nothing left to give him or the dogs he is so understanding considering so I think what I'm trying to say is if any women are listening and they've got PMDD or they think they've got PMDD and the husband or partner just can't understand it please don't think that makes him a bad person or it makes him fundamentally not the right person for you don't go down a rabbit hole with it they're not they're not made to understand initially you have to help them with it you have to help each other and I think the very fact that you have found the words to communicate something so difficult within your partnership is such an amazing foundation for a future relationship.

53:10Communication is totally key. So the fact that you can navigate this very, very challenging thing for me just makes you as a unit stronger. So I want to commend you for that. Thank you. Final question. If you could still have done Geordie Shaw and be where you are and who you are, but you could erase all of the tapes in existence and it would never be seen by anyone again. Would you do it? Oh, I don't know. No, because that's a coward. It's cowardly. You don't become old and wise if you haven't been young and daft. I would not be on the trajectory I'm on now, Elizabeth, you know, to being somebody who is worthy of the things I want.

53:58If I hadn't had certain things happen to me and if I hadn't been a specific type of person, if I hadn't done some stuff to myself, oh well, let's hold my hands up with a bit of accountability. I was my own worst enemy, sabotaged myself all the time and I'm constantly reminded of who I used to be and that pushes me forward stops me doing those things because i don't want to be that person again and maybe as if those tapes weren't out there and i didn't get the odd comment from people still being you are just the slag off the telly i wouldn't be so committed to being better oh that's made me that's made me cry what an amazing note to end on you can't be old and wise unless you were young and daft we've all got past me and we just need to own it unapologetically and use it as fuel to go forward.

54:52Vicky Patterson, I can't wait to see what you do next. You are such a powerful and worthy woman. Thank you so much coming on How To Fail. Thank you so much for having us. I hope everyone's got sick of seeing me cry like a big photo. I'm not going to get up and give you another big hug. I want a hug. This episode has been brought to you by Arla Lacto Free. Delicious dairy with all the taste, none of the lactos. please do follow how to fail to get new episodes as they land on apple podcast spotify amazon music or wherever you get your podcasts please tell all your friends this is an elizabeth day and sony music entertainment original podcast thank you so much for listening