Katie Piper on Life After Trauma, Parenting & Perspective | No Parental Guidance

0:00Coming up, the incredible Katie Piper. Woo! She's here! So we have been doing everything really badly. We're just keeping it real today. So I was that person that was like, my kids will not be having phones, will not be having social media. Then we got to year seven and I was like, okay, how is she going to have any friends and talk to anybody? So my daughter wants to like go out

0:19Katie Piper:and like hang around town already. So I go at one end of the high street with the dog and like a coffee and just sit there like a spy. And then she walks around using her phone with no silver card that's got nothing on it, taking pictures of things. Yeah, they are noticing boys, they chat to boys, and I'm just there spontaneously combusting.

0:46Spring is here, and the shopping list is long. Time to make a Lowe's run. Buy three bags, get three free of Stay Green one cubic foot garden soil. Plus, right now, members can earn four times the points on an eligible purchase. Start spring off strong with these deals and more. Our best lineup is here at Lowe's. Ballot through 325. While supplies last. Soil offer excludes Alaska and Hawaii. Loyalty program subject to terms and conditions. See lowes.com slash terms for details. Subject to change. Point boosters subject to exclusions and more terms apply. One time only offer. Zootopia 2 has come home to Disney+.

1:16Let's go! Get ready for a new case. We're the greatest partners of all time. New friends. Kelly the snake. And your last name? The snake. Dream team. New habitats. Zootopia has a secret reptile population. You can watch the record-breaking phenomenon at home. Zootopia 2, now available on Disney Plus Rated PG. And right now you can get Disney Plus and Hulu for just$4.99 a month for three months with a special limited time offer ends March 24th. After three months, plan auto-renews at$12.99 a month. Terms apply. This episode is brought to you by Peloton. Break through the busiest time of year with the brand new Peloton Cross Training Tread Plus.

1:51Powered by Peloton IQ. With real-time guidance and endless ways to move, you can personalize your workouts and train with confidence, helping you reach your goals in less time. Let yourself run, lift, sculpt, push and go. Explore the new Peloton Cross Training Tread Plus at OnePeloton.com. Good morning, Hannah. That's very official, though. Good morning. Good morning. Yeah, I've had like about two hours sleep. Not going to lie. Well, you need. Have you got the video of Jesse snoring? I feel like you need to play that to get the context of why you didn't sleep do you know what I'm I am going to do this play the audio because you sent me a message this morning to say listen I've had no sleep last night and I was like oh my god was it the kids and you were like no no it was the husband check this out guys this is why I'm not sleeping

2:48are you kidding me was it the kids Louise I am I come I feel like when am I going to get to a point in my life where I can just sleep yeah that would be great I've gone through the kids like my kids sleep through now it's wonderful I've passed the waking up in the night the feeding the changing nappies I'm sorry I'm sorry it will come it will come but now I have not only do I have the perimenopause waking up in the middle of the night needing a wee hot whatever angry uh aggressive you can see why i'm angry when you've got to listen to that yeah i'm so excited that is so loud yeah yeah yes it is so what do you do because if when if if if when andy snores it's like a it's that breathing where I'm like, if he just tilted his neck slightly, open the airways to the side.

3:45If you just put a pillow over their head. And got out of the bedroom. I actually contemplated it. Did you think about it? In the middle of the night. I was like, what if I just smother him? I could say it was a sexual act with my breasts. Because I'm for manslaughter. I wanted to do Rudy's, honestly, sheriff. Yeah, so that's why I'm really tired today. Oh, God. But a few times I've woken Andy and like or I'll pretend to like hold his hand and like squeeze it a bit tight and then he's like and he'll go stop it like why are you waking me up and I'm like I was just trying to hold your hand you just turn to the side like breathe face that way so it doesn't disturb me but that is like you can't get back to sleep when you've been woken up oh no no I'm awake and then it could create anger so I give him the nudge and I'm like shut up roll over and then the audacity You've just woken me up.

4:37And I'm like, oh, I'm sorry to disrupt your slumber. Like to a point where separate bedrooms appeal to me more than ever. Well, sometimes if the kids wake up, I'm quite happy to get out of our marital bed and share a bed with my quiet sleeping child. Oh, 100%. And you think, oh, they wanted me. And it's like, actually, I willingly was like, oh, a mouse farted. Maybe it's a kid. Get my pillow. Off I go into the other bedroom. and my kids have got those bunk beds you know where they're like a double-decker bus bed yes i've got like a steering wheel and a like right on my bottom and i don't care because it's quiet sleep and i can i'm a bit uncomfortable but i can actually sleep but so many of my friends have separate bedrooms because their husbands snore and i totally get it i mean yeah you heard that right like yeah i mean maybe a great idea just had a thought there when we move into our house that we've been refurbishing for like a year and a half um I might get the kids like double beds yeah because then I have options don't I I could go oh Andy's snoring never mind and then just go and sleep and have like a space yeah what a great idea you could just build another house for yourself or put him in the shed exactly the man cave that they all that is so need yeah take it that is so that is so much it's hard that I wonder what other women have done you know when your partners have been snoring and you're like what tactics have other people got that they could share with us well i did actually send that clip to him um what did he say and i literally was like sort it out it's been 16 years um and he did say yeah that's sorry because you can get strips cut you across the nose yeah i'm gonna try those um i do have like wax earplugs but i get really paranoid that they're gonna get stuck oh I won't be able to take them out I thought you're gonna say that you can't hear the kids if they're waking the night no that's fine he's not gonna hear them anyway is he no Jesus I know anyway any um any fails I can I can enlighten you with mine go on go so do you remember I had a bit of a rant about kids birthday parties you don't get invited to some and it was really quite heartbreaking well we were invited to a birthday party but it was in our um it was in our whatsapp chat for the whole class for your daughter for my daughter and the invite and i've never had this before and it totally makes sense because you know it's saves money and time and effort but it was just a poll in the whatsapp chat saying can you make this birthday party and that was the invite that was it just a poll there's no picture No, no, no.

7:14No Canva kind of design. No, no. So it was just so-and-so's birthday party, this date, can you make it? Yes, no, in a poll. I wrote, yes, I can, because I could. It was my fault. Admittedly, I forgot to put it in the diary. Oh. But the invite was like six weeks before the actual party. And genuinely thought nothing of it. then yesterday I see photographs come through in the whatsapp chat and it's of the birthday party and I completely forgot and the whole living class is there and this is a year group chat yeah so it wasn't like a separate no it was the whole class and I felt awful oh god like awful where were you at the time I was having a jolly oh were you yeah oh were you drinking wine and having fun oh that's even worse oh god louise i know how do you feel awful yeah like genuinely awful but i don't know if you do this whenever i send out an invite for a birthday party i'll always do a reminder like well yeah and say can't wait to see everyone this weekend in other words don't forget yeah it's my kids party and i've brought you all party bags everyone asks that any allergies no none of that well do you know my uh my fail is probably similar to a kid it's on a kids party theme so we have um actually on the way here today um there was no reminder on the train all right okay fine that is a bit odd isn't it um on the train on the way here i went to reply to a whatsapp that was a party invitation that happened on saturday missed it oh god so i replied and said i hope oscar had a great party so sorry i didn't see it but i thought because i didn't reply she wouldn't have put me down as like because some women invoice don't they for kids parties and stuff.

9:03What? I've seen that. Yeah, I've seen that in the paper before. Hang on, what? Some people invoice birthday parties? Yes. What do you mean? The cost for invites for parties. I've seen a woman did it in London. So you'll get invited to a party? Yeah, and then the mum invoiced people. I think that was if they didn't attend the party. What the hell's going on at the party? I don't know. I mean, who've we got? Beyonce performing. Pass the parcel. Yeah. I mean, it's still no excuse. If you invite someone to a party, you've got to expect that some kids won't be able to come. Well, yeah, people get sick or you forget, clearly.

9:31Well, parents can't be a**sed. Parents haven't been over. But there's a weekend coming up and there's three kids parties that weekend. And my husband hates kids parties. Now he has to think, does he want to stay at home with two of our children while I take one kid to the party? Or does he want to have to go to the party and make small talk? He doesn't want to do either, Louise, right? Andy was like, no, we're not going to any of them. Just tell them all we're busy. He was like, if we actually were busy, it wouldn't matter. No. But he was like... Eczema is unpredictable, but you can flare less with Epglyss, a once-monthly treatment for moderate to severe eczema.

10:12After an initial four-month or longer dosing phase, about four in ten people taking Epglyss achieved itch relief and clear or almost clear skin at 16 weeks. And most of those people maintain skin that's still more clear at one year with monthly dosing. Epglyss, LibriKizumab, LBKZ, a 250 milligram per two milliliter injection is a prescription medicine used to treat adults and children 12 years of age and older who weigh at least 88 pounds or 40 kilograms with moderate to severe eczema. Also called atopic dermatitis that is not well controlled with prescription therapies used on the skin or topicals or who cannot use topical therapies.

10:41EBCLIS can be used with or without topical corticosteroids. Don't use if you're allergic to EBCLIS. Allergic reactions can occur that can be severe. Eye problems can occur. Tell your doctor if you have new or worsening eye problems. You should not receive a live vaccine when treated with EBCLIS. Before starting EBCLIS, tell your doctor if you have a parasitic infection. Ask your doctor about EBCLIS and visit ebglis.lily.com or call 1-800-LILY-RX or 1-800-545-5979. We all have that dream trip we've been wishing we could go on, but too often life, or usually price, gets in the way. That's why Priceline is here to help you turn your dream trip into reality.

11:16With up to 60 % off hotels and up to 50 % off flights, you can book everything you need for your next adventure. Don't just dream about that next trip. Book it with Priceline. Download the Priceline app or visit Priceline.com and book your next trip today.

11:34Protein is now at Starbucks and it's never tasted so good. You can add protein cold foam to your favorite drink or try one of our new protein lattes or matcha. Try it today at Starbucks.

11:49we cannot like people please and go to and i'm like yeah but for your kids it's like those happy core memories where you go to the parties with your friends and it's fun and stuff like that but actually andy was like no we're just not gonna go just leave it leave the kids did you tell the kids that they i just said unfortunately we have something else on that day and you know when i sent it i was like it just took all that pressure away no i totally get that i've lowered my standards the last six months of my parenting because because we started the podcast and I was like I'm getting so worked up I need to be more Louise our guest today is a woman who honestly needs no introduction but I'm going to give her one anyway because her CV is frankly exhausting she's a best-selling author an award-winning presenter an activist honoured with an OBE a mum of two and a literal powerhouse of resilience we are talking about the incredible katie piper she's here good morning i was feeling useless today you need louise to say that to you every morning i'm here for you every morning we can just like send that as a voice note every day if you like ego boost love it yeah how you've been darling i'm good i'm really good i'm excited to be here because i feel like this is quite a uh not just a safe space but a fun space it was nice because you kind of said you know there's there's a lot of podcasts out there and the reason you were happy to come on here was because we are just keeping it real and talking about we we want to know about your parenting style how chaotic it is because you've got two girls yes and you're how old are they um so the youngest

13:24Katie Piper:p um she turned eight at christmas and then my eldest bell is um going to be 12 in like two weeks time so like that towards the teenagers but what tell me tell the listeners what you'd said that your daughter was like criticizing what you're wearing about your makeup yeah because it's really weird like when I was 11 I had like a lego haircut um yeah hadn't even pudding bowl fringe yeah I hadn't even started shoplifting by then like yeah I was like totally totally I was a child yeah yeah and Belle is five foot four with a size eight shoe um and yeah and she's just like um what did you know your mascara's all flaky down here and I'm like yeah thanks Belle she does like really good makeup and yeah so she is I guess they call it tween yeah yeah yeah and is she year seven now then she's at secondary school yeah that all happened in September she moved up to secondary school um was that weird for you it was and um it's it's strange because lots of people online come to me for advice about like bringing up robust confident girls and I was like i'm just going to be so good at this because this is what i do all the time and no i'm not at all and she doesn't want to hear any advice is she in a whatsapp group uh no so we have been doing everything really badly where i signed up to this i signed up we're just keeping it real today so i was that person that was like my kids will not be having phones will not be having social media then we got to year seven and i was like okay how is she gonna have any friends and talk to anybody so then we got her a nokia and she was just like please and i was like you know this honestly you can play snake all day on that thing it's amazing connected and then i've like text i like why don't you text back she's like mum take this phone and try and text on it and i was like no you're right you can't text so now she has my old iphone with no sim card so she's in i message group chats she can i message email film herself make videos um but doesn't have a phone number and whatsapp okay that's smart all right that's okay but really who am i kidding because what's the difference between an i message group chat and a whatsapp group chat well i mean my my kids year nine yeah and i find that the kids these days are on snapchat to use that as communicating like to put no social media yeah i had to download snapchat just so my son would answer my calls.

15:53And here lies the issue because you can like have all this like holier than now and all these restrictions. And then like she wants to go like round town and walk around doing circuits and eating chips. And then I'm like, well, I can't track her or contact her if I don't give her an iPhone. So you kind of have to embrace some stuff. That's the thing. I put one of the trackers, what do you call them? the yeah the air tag yeah so i put one in my son's uh bag when he went on a school trip and they told us not to yeah the school don't like it because well the reason the year before um they lots of parents had done it and one of them the battery had died and stopped working and then they didn't know where their kid was so it's a panic so the teachers are obviously doing it for like your own well-being but then everyone was like where are they nobody's communicated from the school like they should be back they should have been back an hour ago and i didn't want to be like well actually i know i'm tracking them and i got in trouble for that yeah i was in trouble but i like the idea of the watches where yeah yeah like keep track and you can phone them can't you yeah the watch is great actually we've got a watch for my 10 year old um he only wears it if he's going firstly you know to his grandparents or something yeah um and i do like that actually because you can track them you can still call them they can there's no social media so both

17:11Katie Piper:kids have they both have little um garmin bounces which is like the kids version but what it does mean is we've become this weird family that have like step competitions i like that that's good i remember my mum was doing this step competition with my auntie and it was like who could get the most in a day and i remember i came home from work and my mum was watching my kids and my four-year-old at the time was running around the garden like really fast and my mum was sat there with a hobnob and a cup of tea and i said oh you're not getting many steps in and she looked and she went I am look at your son out the window and she'd attached it she'd attached it to Bradley's hand and he's running around the garden she absolutely smashed her step I was gonna say you'll never beat the kids because they've had like double swimming yeah you'll never beat that you'll never beat that and am I right in saying before you um had your first child you were worried that you might not be able to have children because of all the operations and everything so I honestly it's it's it's so funny I don't know if people are gonna think this is funny maybe it's not this is clipped it's not funny so I I had um I had a had transplant right I had a donor tissue from a deceased donor for my cornea um and one of the things you have to do is take rejection drugs like psychosporine it's a really strong rejection drug um loads of side effects and one of the side effects is infertility and I had to take it for like a couple of years right and anyway like when you have extreme trauma or you've been in a coma like your menstrual cycle sometimes you lose it um and then I had like problems with like nutrition and stuff like so you you have like all these problems that mean you don't really menstruate for like a long time anyway so I was just kind of like it's more important for me to have my transplant than to worry about fertility and I was early 20s I feel like you don't worry about fertility in your early 20s because you like you say you think it's like god-given right anyway um so I just never like had periods for a long time so when I met Richie we're 27 and uh we were at View Cinema together and went to Spaghetti House for a drink in like Westfield and I said oh yeah by the way um just before we go in to see Borat that's what we were going to see I was like I'm yeah it was so good I was like I'm I'm infertile so oh you actually said I'm infertile oh I said I don't think I can have children because I don't have like periods or anything yeah and he was like oh right babe yeah and I was like so you know it's probably like if you want to have children i would just tell you that and like typical bloke is like nah not really bothered and i just think like men maybe he's just thinking in that moment of like he doesn't want one now whilst he's going to see borat you know and we left it at that and then we moved in together sometime later and i went to tanzania i was volunteering with like a nhs burn unit that go out to like kilimanjaro where you get like um people from rural villages to burn injuries they walk to the nearest hospital to come for burn treatment so they take like nhs burn surgeons physios and i was doing like talks with people around um like taboo and stigma around what burns and disfigurement mean and whilst i was out there i was drinking like tanzanian beer in the evenings like eating with locals and like we were staying in that hostel kind of accommodation right bucket shower everything yeah it's like never felt so unwell I was like just feel so ill every day god even vomiting like we're just gonna carry on drinking in the evenings because it was like really stressful days seeing like really bad burns and stuff so like wanting to like escape and then when I came home I just like never got rid of that illness and I was just like I need to go to the GP because I think I've got dysentery from Tanzania and they were like no you're like really far gone pregnant oh my gosh how far gone like like past the six week pee on the sticks thing oh my gosh and I was just like okay so kind of like obviously haven't been trying for a baby and I told Richard couldn't have children and you hadn't had a period no oh my god yeah so I was oh my gosh right okay and I had like really bad anxiety about it and kept going for all these like unnecessary private scans in the back of mother care because I was just like so worried about the fact that I had just been not living like a pregnant person and everything was fine and she was totally healthy and it was a really I don't want to say easy pregnancy and I'm always so mindful the way I talk about parenting because it's and like birth and things like that because like my birth story to me was easy but maybe it wouldn't be to somebody else and then after that when I decided to have a second child I just was like I want them to be two years apart so now I'm going to start trying took me four years to get pregnant the second time it's funny how it works like that isn't it yeah it's really bizarre Do you feel because of what happened to you with your attack, do you find because you have daughters, do you feel like you're overprotective of them?

21:55Katie Piper:Yes and no. So I try really hard not to be that person that lives my life through my kids and punishes them for anything I may feel went wrong in my life. Because I think it doesn't matter who you are and what's happened to you. You see so many people having their kind of their mental scars and sort of putting them onto their kids, you know, and it's like, you know, what what happened for you or how life was like for you doesn't necessarily mean that's going to be your kids experiences. So my whole past is sort of really out there. It's a bit like, right, you know, if you adopted a child and they always know they're adopted.

22:32Katie Piper:Yeah, that's my relationship with my children and my past because it's so Google. My actual first books in the national curriculum. so you know is it really how embarrassing for them right and that's what i am just that's wonderful i mean i always worried about them googling me uh because obviously in school there's so many filters of you know they can't look at adult content porn violence but i don't make the filter so all my stuff's on there so i did ask them when they started googling things or have you seen me on online and stuff and they're like yeah and we don't know why you ever had a fringe oh I was like really that out of everything oh I love that yeah she's like never never dye your hair brown again mom oh okay and then that's just how it is because I think if something's always been that way and always existed for you that is your normal yeah um so and I've done little things like gone into careers days and got and done stuff at their school that I wouldn't do around the world at schools but I do it for them to kind of break the ice a little bit you know um I think I think that's a really healthy way to explain it.

23:33It's exactly what you said. Like they've always known and it's not like it's like something new and something that you tell them when they get a phone. Yeah, like the apprehension of waiting for that conversation to talk about it.

23:43Katie Piper:And they have other things. Like, you know, my husband is half Jamaican. So they have other things where we live in quite a white area and they're a minority for that reason. That's probably a bigger thing in their mind than actually me. Like, you know, your kids don't think about you at all. They don't. You're just like an annoying embarrassment. Yeah. Yeah, it's just mum who can't put mascara on properly by the sounds of it. Like, fucking hell, come on, mum. She didn't have a fringe, apparently. Brown hair, God. It's amazing what they take. How do you think you'll feel, you know, when they start having boyfriends and partners and stuff?

24:14Well, do you feel any apprehension around that and the boyfriend's behaviour and things towards him? So my daughter wants to, like, go out and, like, hang around town already. So we do this really fun, weird thing where we'll go to, like, this small area that's got, like, a high street.

24:29Katie Piper:and I go at one end of the high street with the dog and like a coffee and just sit there like a spy and then she walks around buying like KFC and like using her phone with no sim card that's got nothing on it taking pictures of things it's great um and then I have I've instructed to like if I see her and her friend pretend we don't know each other if I want to start walking I need to go anti-clockwise because she's going clockwise and yeah they are noticing boys they chat to boys and I'm just there spontaneously combusting my street yeah love it and is she into makeup a little bit yeah I mean she's got like great skin like dark brows dark lashes um she loves Caroline um Hirons I did it doesn't yeah she's amazing because when we started she's like oh I want this like 80 pound cream I'm like absolutely not like when I was younger we just used spit so you can you can do that yeah we just use water and phlegm actually actually there is something i know i know we laugh about this but actually um i was told and i don't know if this is completely true but if you get a spot especially if you're a teen if you just lick your finger and put your spit on your spot it's actually really healing listen thanks to caroline herons all my little remedies are being poo-pooed because i'm like just put toothpaste on it she's like no in caroline's book it says you can't do that yeah does she talk about spit and she doesn't talk about spit but that could be a chapter she could add in the paperbacks it's crazy when you think about i actually remember going to school and we would go to like super drug and put all the testers on our faces oh yeah and body shop body shop oh yeah like i was going to be a teamy version of the spice girls yeah but there was definitely no skincare at all we must have all looked like dried out flip-flops there was no there was clearasil to dry you out yes oh god yeah i remember that yeah there was no oils or moisturize i think you just i think you just you didn't even drink water anyway hydration was not i didn't know i didn't go to school with a water bottle yeah a bit of a thing e45 oh yeah okay a bit of aqueous cream have you have you ever embarrassed your kids i mean i had this weird when we were in tenerife this half term i had this weird thing where i'd be like to be like It's like buffet breakfast, right?

26:44Katie Piper:So all the families are there that you'll see around the pool at the breakfast. And it was Shrove Tuesday. I was like, Val, look, they've got sprinkles. And she was like, stop it. I was like, what? And then when I got back to the table, she was like, do not talk to me about sprinkles at the buffet breakfast. I was like, sorry. And then just as a joke, when we went back up to get more food, I got the sprinkles and threw them. And it just didn't go down very well. How did that affect the day? Yeah, I just like, let's just say humor wise, we're not on the same page yet. Yes. Have you got any parenting fails or anything that's happened where you look back and think, oh my God, I was in the trenches of parenting at that point.

27:25Yeah. I mean, there's definitely like been lots of different things that you look back and think probably wouldn't do that again. So you do know the second child's had a better upbringing. um we we're not really like a camping family um you know I like a sterile environment for my eye drops and a straightener to plug in you don't strike me as the camping environment kind of gal to be honest I've tried it and I won't be doing it again I did glamping right so we did like it was like a family uh festival it's called feastable right so it's amazing love feastable and we were clamp uh glamping is that what you call it yeah I was gonna say clamping I think that's something hornish glamping in a yurt right and I took along like our normal potty the kids

28:10Katie Piper:were a little bit younger but they weren't using a potty anymore but my my theory was I don't want to go out to the port-a-loos in the middle of the night no nothing worse after some like margaritas and stuff so um I had to get up in the night with pee because she had like woken me up to tell me that the sleeping bag was zipped too high so I'm like again you know one eye bandit like trying to forage around this year to find her to unzip um and I stand in the potty right and I'm like oh and I do have an acrylic overlay on my toenails so I've got like a French pedicure and I stand in the potty and you sort of think well that's not too bad potty stuck to your foot maybe like a little bit weird whatever wasn't we it was the other thing you're doing a potty went all under my like toenails oh god and honestly like we'd been at a festival day drinking all day I wasn't even sober and and richie was asleep after like margaritas so he was like deep sleep so i was like richie richie and in the end i was just like had to stop because if i woke him up it was going to be even worse then my kid just like went straight back to sleep snoring and there i was on your foot oh yeah yeah and you're like i don't want to be here tipsy and blind with poo under my acrylic nail no it's not the best situation you know when we were trying to get pregnant this wasn't the thing in the baby books that I read about what do you find the hardest part about being a mum um it changes all the time and I do think parenting is is seasons and I think obviously I probably have a unique um experience to other women because you know I mean on paper technically I live with a disability so I think the hardest thing for me would be with my vision right um so I lost my left eye and wear a prosthetic eye um and it's interesting because like the brain takes I think it's like two or three years to adapt um so things do like improve in that sense but you always um struggle with depth distance uh like in crowded spaces like if you don't have peripheral vision you can feel slightly more vulnerable but there's so many positive things like you know you see everyone panicking about AI and I'm over here in a full-on relationship with JackGBT so I'm not panicking no one talks to me like Claude good old Claude but there's so many positive things like in the medical world in in surgery in theater with AI and actually there's so many apps and things that can help you with your independence so one of the things that I use is something called NaviLens which once I tell you about it you will realize it's everywhere it's not new it's established like you'll see them everywhere um at like train station platforms in museums and it looks like a QR code it's like this little colorful square but where it's now starting to appear for the very first time is on things in supermarkets so fruit shoe are the first other children's um drink brand to put it on their packaging so it you think of it like a QR code but you know the QR code you need good vision because you need to line up that you know when you're like in doing the menu in the restaurant you're like oh I can't press the thing can't see it nabby lens works on like 20 30 meters oh wow yeah so I would be in the supermarket right if I'm in the supermarket on my own it's like I'm rushing to a job or I've finished a job and I need to rush to the school so I'm rushing if I'm in the supermarket with my kids I've got that like can I have this can I have that yeah and I'm just like either way it's a high pressure situation for me and then I've got that lack of vision right so it might be that I can't find the aisle because I can't see the sign or it might be when I get close up and somebody's decided to make like bright red packaging with yellow writing on it like why does somebody do that and I'm doing this whole thing and in layman's terms Navi Lens will turn any packaging into audio for me on my phone oh that's genius oh my god that's incredible so it's super quick so neurodivergent children like it as well and adults people that get overstimulated but also I just feel like anybody should like it if you like a voice note so hopefully because a big brand like Fruitshoot are doing it hopefully it will just become normal and it'll just be on everything and make your life so much easier it's an independence thing I don't want to ask other people to help me I'm I want to be like dignified and independent and I would like to think that that can be the same way for our our kids and our children and it's it's not an other thing it's a normal thing across the board so i think in that sense it's quite exciting i think it's brilliant and very exciting and actually i didn't even know that that existed so and i think our listeners will love to know that as well yeah you've got guys gotta give it a go in the supermarket now well can you do it on wine this one will make you feel lovely and relaxed they have it on shampoo so you think yeah i thought you didn't say champagne i was like oh what do they do listen i'll be back in a month to talk yeah my way yeah right but i guess it is something that probably should be on more products yeah i think we'll see it widening out beyond visual impairment i just think it will be a thing that because we're very instant society and we want things to be easy yeah like voice notes you know i just think it will be happening all the time i hope anyway yeah i'm terrible with voice notes that's all i do i just think in the car quickly press six the thought of just sitting and typing a message for me i'm like i haven't got like those two minutes i could be getting in the car because I've got to do the pickup.

33:30Exactly. So in the car, I just voice note everybody back.

33:33Katie Piper:I agree with it for logistics, but it annoys me in a friendship when someone heavily is constantly, because I'm like, well, we're not ringing each other. Oh, I know what you mean. I think I prefer it. She's disconnecting from the world. I don't know. I think it's nice to just, like, I like, when I get voice notes from my friends, if it's like a good six minutes, I'm like, all right, let's tuck in. Put us a podcast. It is a podcast. And I didn't sign up and subscribe to it. That's true. like and subscribe this one um although yesterday um i did have an actual phone call and the the guy i was talking to was a work call and i'm not panic though when people ring yes yeah yeah and it was a work call and he was talking a lot um and it i got to a point where i was like i actually thought it was a voice note yeah so then i did a burp oh god thinking and then i was like oh my god And then, you know, and then I was like, oh, God, no, this is an actual real phone call.

34:27But, you know, there's a thing about that where we've lost the art of listening because like because a voice note, right? Not no shade thrown. It's people say it's an element of narcissism where it's like, I want to deliver this message to you. I don't want your opinion. I want my voice heard. I want my voice heard. I don't want you to interject. This isn't two way.

34:44Katie Piper:And I'm imposing what I'm saying on you. And that's it. So now when people ring us, they communicate in that way. Yeah. Like I've got these Meta glasses and you can have phone calls through them. I was going to get them. Should I get them? Yes. I'm desperate to get them. Because I've got ones where you can have a phone call, you can listen to music. I think actually also if you look at something like a foreign language, you can say, hey, Meta. Translate. Translate. Yeah. You can get your nails done and you can get translations. Hear them slagging you off. Yes. Yeah, I don't know. No. Yes. Yeah.

35:14I'd love to know what they say. That's why my nails are always perfect. Oh, what are you saying now? so did she just call me a b**** I think she did but have you had it when you've seen other people filming you with them because I've had that I've seen people go like that have you yeah oh because a light comes off yeah a light comes off so you know

35:32Katie Piper:when if you know the glasses you just know when they go like that on the edge as well but it's a weird thing because you're like okay it's kind of good for women's safety if something feels off and you want to start filming it but then I don't know about the consent thing of being filmed yeah well there is that as well yeah the thought of I like if you can get a map on the I just know that I'll be walking around like turn left and then I'm like we're basically we're in body cams aren't we we're basically the police yeah yeah we are we're detectives yeah there was actually this really awkward adjustment period of um the one eye where because you can't judge depth or distance you don't want everyone to think you're drunk so like people would come around for like family barbecues and you imagine if you can't judge depth or distance you go to get that glass you often knock it over yeah because you're kind of you're always like a few inches out or you go to put it down and you're having a mild normal chat and it ends up being like bang because you slam it down because you don't know where the table is so what's like two years of letting everyone know I I am sober okay it's midday at a family barbecue when you're all one drink in I wasn't drinking nine before before you got here um and you do just constantly like bang into things and smash things usually at like this levels you get like little bruises on your forehead and my husband's a carpenter so he was just like you're just smashing into like open cupboards and like pulling things off hinges and he was like it's like it's just like living with somebody that's like trashing the house but yeah but you know he fixes it all for free i was gonna say yeah i mean that's actually the way i married you back listen i'm giving you loads of before and afters for your work social media can you make cabinets with rounded corners then to help yeah do you know what he doesn't he's not a good carpenter no that's so horrible i didn't mean not good in skill i meant he's like the floorboard kind i thought you're gonna say is that the teamu version of well it's just like the boring version i i i want like shoe racks yeah yeah yeah he's like doors fair play yeah and does he do loads of stuff at the house he does do loads of stuff at the house he's really good do you know what our marriage and our roles are constantly evolving and i'm always really careful when people ask me for like advice of like having it all and I'm like no I think your roles change um depending on who's earning what who's more exhausted how the kids are um so yeah I think we have like seasons where every five or six years things change yeah I think that makes sense yeah because isn't it true that every seven years we shed our skin and we become a new person yeah apparently hence the seven-year itch yeah yeah I think I definitely think it's true and I think that's why you either like do grow together or end up just um you know having separate rooms and hating each other yeah and how did you meet each other oh uh bbm do you remember bbm no no oh you must remember blackberries oh my god messenger give me your code give me your pin give me your black okay i missed out on that yeah blackberry messenger and then we were like bbming and it was like mutual friends where my friend was like casually dating his friend so we were in this sort of group where we go to like pub beer gardens and sort of see each other um but we weren't like we didn't connect anything beyond friends then uh he asked my friend for my pin and i was oh my god i totally forgot i missed out on this again i feel like this is tea and toast all over again i completely missed out on this single in the blackberry era yeah yeah so he asked he asked what the hell he asked through a friend of a friend for the pin and i was like him huh he's always in those beer gardens doesn't talk to me no at then an hour later i remember a friend i was like well I mean you could get past the pin on if you want I suppose it won't hurt uh and then we started BBMing all the time and then I went away to I was working in like America Minnesota of all places on a stem cell documentary about eye soap yeah and I had no kids single so I actually went away for like a month so we had one of those like 90s relationships even though it was like 2012 where we'd fall asleep on the phone oh my god would I even miss those and then you wake up and the the phones there and you're like oh my god we were just talking a load of rubbish oh my god have I got any credit left and it's like I'm cleaning my teeth I'll take the phone to the bathroom with me and we had that for like a month so it really was just friendship and he was he was really good looking and I felt like I wasn't so I did say you're really good looking so if you do meet people just like go off with them don't wait for me and he was like no no I think we really get on and I was like oh do you think so oh sometimes I find you a bit boring but okay and then yeah I came back to the UK and then it just carried on and it was blockbuster love film era and then we'd meet up Fridays and stay because we lived quite far away from each other and we'd stay at each other's flats alternate weekends watching blockbuster I do miss the good old days of blockbuster yeah the deal with the Doritos and the popcorn oh god those were the days it really was like that was that was the night out just choosing a movie and you got to know each other properly yeah and like I've had quality time not distracted by phones or messages or whatsapps or anything and it's how funny when you said about the bbm messaging it's like do you remember like myspace bebo msn messenger yes I remember that yeah it's like oh those days how did you visualize you know from being a young girl thinking oh when I'm older because I said I'd love to have four boys when I'm older like what things did you used to like hope for when you were a little girl I was definitely always maternal because I come I'm like the middle child three three of us and my mum made lots of sacrifices to be a parent um you know she had a career as a teacher and she became a supply teacher so she could parent us I remember her working in the in a supermarket evenings and weekends and then opening up our house to be a child minder to make extra money so she she embraced being a mum she was brilliant like she taught us how to read at home before we went to school like she was really focused on our education and hobbies like so that was an amazing experience so I was like I'm going to be a mom and I'm going to be brilliant and I'm definitely not as brilliant as my mom and it's definitely a different world you know like my dad was the one that earned the money um so I always thought I'd have that I draw the picture at school with like a fence a dog a cat like and I always thought I'd have three children just because that's what my mom and dad had yeah and I did try like for a long time to have a third child and it just never happened and it became really unsexy with like apps and like you need to come home because it's this window and yeah and then I need to do a headstand afterwards apparently and then I was just like all these weird things and it just like never happened and I did not want another medical journey in my life so i stopped at trying naturally and then got really paranoid about right now we've like stopped i bet it's gonna happen and i now feel too old and too tired um so now we have to be like really careful because we don't want uh to be 19 and give birth isn't it hard you go through that for like having a baby you spend all your years like trying not to get pregnant when you're at school and then you try and get pregnant and for not everybody actually works or happens and some people have to have fertility treatment or you know miscarriage and have awful experiences and then it hinders the journey after that and then it's like you like you say you get the apps and you check in all the time and you're ovulating then you decide actually maybe we'll just leave it now and then it's like right we need to be really careful then yeah it's like god you just it's like a constant like yeah there's definitely something missing yeah in education at school like i know it's important to tell you how to prevent and how to use contraception but there's definitely a whole lesson missing around that absolutely oh there's so much missing I started trying for my third child when I was 40 yeah and I actually think it was that thing of um oh okay this is last chance saloon like if we gonna if we're gonna do it we'll do it now um and I thought it would happen uh within a year or two because also I consider myself like apart from the obvious I consider myself like really healthy you know I'm really like physically fit I'm really active I don't really drink a lot um and then when it didn't it was like creeping into like I'm now 41 42 and then I was like how can I like I get up in the mornings just angry as a standard now so like I don't know how I'm gonna get up for like uh you know middle of the night feeds and stuff like that and then like Belle starts going through puberty and she's having all these raging hormones and I'm realizing my hormones are depleting and like am I becoming like perimenopausal and I had like fertility tests and I wasn't I didn't have fertility problems so I just I don't know like I am a big believer in like just listening to nature and like a higher power of knowing it probably wasn't meant for me and I also think it was that thing of like life was getting easier parenting because they were getting more independent so you have had this weird thing where you're like it's too easy let's throw some let's throw a bomb into the mix I always think that I thought that last last week and then I quickly changed my mind well you know what we did we got a puppy because our life that's I think I might get a fairy baby instead.

44:36Katie Piper:Yeah. So our life was becoming too civilized and nice. So we were like, oh, let's bring someone else in who can shit on the floor and not listen to shit in a potty and you can step in it. Have another one. And a puppy is really hard. It's actually harder than a baby, I think. Okay. Scrap that idea then. Yeah. Don't do that. Because they wake in the night and everything. You have to like fully tread. And shit everywhere. Yeah. And the communication isn't as easy as a baby. So I think also that's why I stopped because I was like, my kids are healthy and that's a privilege in itself. At my charity, we're a burns charity.

45:08Katie Piper:We support people with traumatic scarring and burn injuries. And that's the reason charities are needed for burn survivors because there is no end point. It's not like, say, having a disease where there's a treatment and there's an end point. It's ongoing care. And that's something that a lot of people can't work. So financially, it's really difficult for people. So charities fill that gap where most people just wouldn't be able to. Where can, if our listeners want to find the charity, what's it called and where can we find it? It's called the Katie Piper Foundation. So you can find like, we've got websites, we've got social media.

45:44Katie Piper:And we don't just support the survivor, we support the family as well, because obviously it affects your whole network. And there's no eligibility where you have to have been burnt recently. like it might be historical childhood burn and you now want to re-engage with services and there's again there's no end point to our support like we'll be in our life for as long as you need us and only when you don't need us in a way that's the sort of sign of success it's particularly like psychologically but things change for people all the time yeah but it's my favorite scar my c-section I love that oh yeah and um how did it feel getting an OBE oh mixed feelings I mean it was incredible yeah uh first thought was what am I gonna wear yeah of course literally and also it was like super awkward because it was post-covid and usually you're allowed to take like your whole family to the palace but post-covid it was one person so it was like oh this is awkward who am I gonna offend uh I took my mom yeah which was fun my husband was really like gracious about it um and it was amazing because my OBE was services to charity so in like a British way I kind of felt a bit like embarrassed and bad because obviously like the charity carries my name but it's definitely not just me like there's a whole board of trustees there's volunteers there's staff the survivors there's so many people that make it what it is so I also just felt like really embarrassed oh no it's really well deserved yeah I think uh what my like charity OBE my story like everything for me shows right is particularly on social we think oh it's such a cruel world it's a hateful world and it's just so dark at the moment and I'm like no it's really not right you know that cliche saying of like look for the helpers they're always there like what everything around me illustrates for me is that we are really good in the time of crisis and we do rally around we do send solidarity and my foundation has never received government funding like it's literally from people selling cakes running marathons getting their corporate companies to make us their charity of the year and we've been running over a decade and we've we've created a rehab center we've got in we have a residential facility where people sleep and stay like imagine just doing that off the back of people being decent yeah that's actually kindness yeah yeah that's incredible but thanks so so much for coming on the podcast thank you so much yeah thank you thank you so much if you loved this episode as much as we did please hit that subscribe button and leave us a review

48:32This episode is brought to you by Athletic Brewing Company. No matter how you do game day, on the couch, in the crowd, or manning the snack table, Athletic Brewing fits right in. With a full lineup of non-alcoholic beer styles, you can enjoy bold flavors all game long. No hangovers, no buzz, no subbing out for water in the second half. Stock the fridge for tip-off with a variety of non-alcoholic craft styles available at your local grocery store or online at athleticbrewing.com. Near beer, fit for all times.