Why Sophie Ellis-Bextor refuses to "wind down" after 5 kids

0:00Before we start, a massive shout out to our sponsor Jet2 Holidays for making family holidays actually achievable without taking out a second mortgage. Flights, hotels, transfers, 22kg baggage and 10kg hand luggage all bundled in. It's like someone finally read parents' minds. VIP vibes without the VIP price. Coming up, the iconic Sophie Ellis-Bexter. Welcome. In fact, you have five kids. Hold my beer. Yeah. It's five boys. Go. It was a lot. I remember when I had one, it felt like a lot. I think I've skipped some bits of learning for the smaller ones. I know for a while they were really bad at identifying quite basic farmyard animals.

0:41Like, Mummy, look at a seagull. I'm like, that's a goose. I think for the beginning bit of having Sunny, it felt completely overwhelming. And no, I wasn't ready to even think about having another for quite a while, actually, because I just wasn't really in that frame of mind. It was such a massive life change. Don't cry, Louise, because I feel like I could literally start crying.

1:10So how's your week been? Mental? Mental. Yeah. I feel like it's always mental at the minute. And is that because I have three kids or is that because I choose for my life to be mental? I don't know i feel like we survive yeah on chaos yeah we're in that hamster yeah ring of fire whatever it is what is it called the hamster wheel yeah yeah and if it stops i literally just fall off yeah and then i'm and then it's almost like i like well i need to do something i'm not if i'm sitting still i kind of get a bit like yeah need to do something it was interesting my mother-in-law said something the other day um in the nicest possible way because I do love her um but she did say something and it really resonated with me because um so I I got in from a show um at like one o 'clock in the morning quarter to two Annabelle wakes up so I'm awake sorting her out and then go back to sleep again then Bradley my eldest had a nightmare and he came into our room at like quarter to five oh crikey so I was chatting to my mother-in-law and um I said oh god you know I had like not very much sleep last night and she just says yeah but you're a mum you can function for a night with broken sleep that's what we do we are superheroes and you know all of a sudden it's like if I was chatting to my friends or especially if I was chatting to my dad my dad would be like Hannah you really need to rest because you're gonna get ill the problem is you don't sleep you get run down you get ill yeah and you've got all this mental load going on in your head um and uh it's interesting how like my mother-in-law's perspective is like yeah you're a mom crack on with it that's what we do what would she say if her son had said i've only had three hours interesting you say that louise because he's got a little man cold and i actually i actually i actually watched him go up to his mom and he was like just but you know when you can put on that you've got a blocked nose i could be like this no yeah so he it was a bit like and then he went up to his mom and says oh god i'm not feeling very well and he they gave each other a hug and you know when you look and you're like you are just walking away from your parenting duty yes like I see you yes you know when you're so sleep deprived when you've just had a baby and you have like oh she's got a newborn she's got a newborn nobody talks about the toddler sleep deprivation because at least with a baby you could be like you know give it some more milk or just get your boob out and feed it whereas with a toddler they wake up they have no concept of night and day but that sleep deprivation it's is another level isn't it and actually weirdly this happened to me at the weekend and my daughter's six and so this doesn't usually happen and I guess this goes into my parenting fail even though it wasn't my fault it never is you do you do you do always say that you do you do say it was not my fault um so my my son my my middle child um wasn't feeling very well so he came in my bed um and then so then my daughter was got a bit jealous but then for whatever reason she woke up at one o 'clock in the morning um thinking it was the morning she just woke up oh god and went downstairs and you know what it's like as a mother you're just alert i'm never in like a proper proper deep sleep yeah i'm always alert i can hear what's going on and so she so i hear her go downstairs and i think it's my husband she goes downstairs and then I hear herself pouring cereal and then Alexa goes on and I'm like, oh my God.

4:36Ringing you while you're upstairs. You know, and I'm getting more and more angry because I'm like, it's one o 'clock in the morning. Yeah, yeah. She's hidden somewhere in the kitchen and I'm going, Alexa, stop. Alexa, stop. My daughter has somehow managed to change the wake name. So her name's not Alexa anymore. What? Yeah. What's she called? Ziggy. I have found though with with the kids coming into bed like my eldest now just doesn't do it like even trying to get a hug out of him is like trying to get blood out of a stone it really scares me at the thought of uh of that happening I really hope that my kids want to ring me for just to chat like I can make like small decisions like what should I cook for dinner what should I'll always ring my dad and say oh what should I do for this I bet they sat there with a gin and tonic but thinking I've been there done that it's all a phase now go away yeah get on with it stop I did it in the 80s without the internet yeah or that when he sat down or ipads it's so hard for you I do wonder though like what's harder as in when our parents were looking after us when we were smaller yeah in the 80s like my mum's work finished yeah at half past five six six o 'clock it was done yeah there was no one to bother you after that time there was no whatsapps There was no social media.

5:56There was literally nothing. Can you imagine now finishing work at six and having no screen time, nothing? How nice. How lovely. I feel like a spa. But we're constantly bombarded with WhatsApps, emails. Even if you finish work, you'll still get emails at 10 o 'clock at night. And you still look at them. And it's like a concern on my phone today was Sophie's lost one of her shoes. like I've got 20 ,000 tabs open in my head. Sophie's shoes are irrelevant to me. Like label them. But do your WhatsApp chats, if someone says, oh, we've lost Sophie's shoe, do you get messages going, I don't have it, nor do I.

6:37Have you tried there? Look, lots of pretty. All the way that has to go to, ping, ping, ping, ping. You're like, oh my God. And it's like when you see Sophie's mum at school gates, it's like, I'm so compelled to be like, did you find it? Did she? Did she get the shoe back? Please tell me because it really took my whole Monday morning thinking about so-biz-no. Such a drama. I know. That was unlabeled. Yep. Right, well, let's get on with our win of the week. Oh, I love these. Oh, here we go. We're still on our mission to find the sunny side of parenting this year with Jet2 Holidays, and that means celebrating our wins of the week.

7:13Whether they are big or small, we want to shout them out. So this one comes in from Claire. Okay, are you ready? Ready. My win is that I've now told my kids the iPad has updated and now it only works after they've tidied their toys and that Alexa is watching to activate the iPad when they've finished. I just turned the Wi-Fi off until they're done. That's genius. I don't know how to turn my Wi-Fi off. How do you do that? I don't know. Who's this, Claire? Claire. Claire. Come on, Claire. Give us more deets. How do you turn that? That's actually genius. What a great idea. Today we are joined by a pop star mum of five boys and she first invited us to murder on the dance floor back in 2001 when she got everyone through lockdown with her kitchen discos.

8:01But over 20 years later, thanks to the cult film Saltburn, she's having a pop resurgence and we are here for it. Please welcome the iconic Sophie Ellis-Bexter. Welcome. I feel like I had to look elsewhere. I didn't want to interrupt your flow. I know, I can't believe I actually got that right in one go. thank you so much for being here that's the bit where people normally are a bit like ah silly surname really thank you yeah that's a great i've had so many variations on that really i mean you are literally we have you are so iconic like we've grown up with you yes you know like with your music and just your style and the fact you have five kids we're always like oh we've got three kids each and it's like you've got five five boys yeah have that hold my beer yeah five boys go yeah I remember when I had one it felt like loads I mean it's you know whoever you're raising it's a lot it is a lot can I just I just want to go straight in and just say what it was like because I saw you got an email so on your Instagram we got an email in 2022 saying can we use your music in saltburn like did you have any idea the impact that was going to have no I mean so much that I sort of forgot to tell anybody um I mean I was happy with the email because it's always a treat when someone wants to use any of my music yeah for anything so I was already really flattered and I could see that it was Emerald Fennell was the director of the film and I thought oh that's lovely she seems like a lovely director and I'd enjoyed her last film so I was I was yeah I was flattered but and then when you watched it were you aware that Barry Keegan was going to be like lobbing his third arm round to your song the iconic song it did have the synopsis yes so I did know that there was nudity and I knew it had someone dancing naked but that could have been in any which way.

9:45I wasn't expecting this sort of, you know, malevolent triumph of this. Yeah, but also how dark it is. It's like this bit after he turned so devious. Yes. So I didn't know it had this dark heart to it. So when it all blew up again, how did you take that all in? And how were your boys, like seeing you again in the press everywhere? From where I was standing, post-kitchen discos, we'd been having, Richard and I, I had been out touring a lot with that. So we'd already had this gorgeous community come out of the kitchen discos and our focus was on that. And that had really in some ways affected the kids quite a lot more at the time because we were doing these discos and that had poured in a lot of new energy around what I was up to, but also felt very soul satisfying because all the people that were coming around during lockdown to our ridiculous, strange Instagram lives.

10:43Brilliant. Well, they were fun, but they were really, I don't know what they were, mad. So at the time, I think when things started bubbling up with Salt Burner, Murder, it didn't really get the full impact until probably like halfway through the next year. And it caused me to really look back over 20 years of all these people I still work with, all the things I've learned, the highs, the lows, and just pour all of that into what the album Perimenopop became. So I wouldn't have made the album I did without that. but I also completely what a name for an album Peri Menopole I mean massive relate I think you and I are similar ages I think we are you born in 1980 I'm actually 79 I'm spring okay so yeah and you're touring soon you're going off Australia soon yeah so I go yeah a couple of weeks off to Australia and New Zealand where it's warm which will be nice and who's going to look after the kids while you're away like how do you juggle like this is my biggest question like how do you look like this and you have five kids not just five kids but five boys they are a different like territory altogether aren't they but what what was it like this morning for you getting ready to come out the door with five boys there's a lot of questions there I'm trying to think where I start yeah there's so many child care yeah like I mean I have um child care at any working parent that's how we work it people will say to me if it's not you is it your mum um well actually my mum's quite she has her own things going on as well uh so she lives nearby but no we have brilliant I have brilliant support and I've really worked hard you know for my kids their dad and I we've always done what we do so my eldest is now approaching 22 I can't believe that honestly I think it's quite fun like honestly looking at you I'm like you're so cool yeah like you're so cool you've got a 22 year old but I do love it I love having an actual adult son yeah does he help with childcare he can do actually he has done a couple of babysitting nights but I think he is the most brilliant I mean he's great with the little ones but actually the teenage two that's where I think it's a really wonderful dynamic because if you know the 13 year old he will open up to Sonny in a way that he might not to anyone else and that's I'm sure you'd agree like when I had my first baby and then I could see Sonny having a relationship with my brother with my mom or with his granddad and that feeling of like stepping back and being like well I might be the person who introduced him to the world but now they've got their own relationship and it's sort of nothing to do with me.

13:05Totally. And I've always really loved that feeling. Yeah, that's lovely. I find it very fulfilling. February is sneaky. It's short, but somehow it still feels endless. But the thing that snaps me out of the midwinter gloom, getting a summer holiday in the diary. Oh, 100%. And that's why we're so excited to have Jet 2 Holidays on board because nothing beats knowing that you've secured this summer's sunshine now. Exactly. You pop down a low deposit, pick your perfect spot and boom, Instant mood lift, future sun sorted, and present you gets to feel just a tiny bit smug. Any parenting fails? No, nothing.

13:41Oh my God, literally. I was like, thank God you laughed after that. Because honestly, we've had some people come on and they're like... No, I've managed to get everything just right. Five kids on and it's so good. Nothing to say. I mean, you could start the hour again with this for me. Yes, of course. Bucket loads. I think probably my biggest... Some of them are inherited. my mum and I both have this, I don't know why we do it, sort of cautionary tales that we'll then warn our kids about and then they'll be very far flung. So it'd be like my brother and I were talking the other day because he's like, whenever you get a cut, are you always expecting to see a line coming out of it and it's sepsis?

14:21I was like, yeah, because my mum was always like, mine for sepsis, you know, if you see a line and I've realised that's actually quite unusual, you know, and anyway, I've obviously inherited that. So that's definitely not something I meant to make them. I mean, at least they're kind of relaxed about it. They could be like, oh, worried about everything. And I think sometimes as well, especially with my eldest, trying to inform him of things actually probably wasn't quite, you know, when you think you're going to be like, it's fine, we're going to talk about everything, it's going to be super cool.

14:50But actually, I was probably telling him about stuff he didn't really need to know. So when he was, I mean, he must have been in reception, he started asking like a few questions about how babies are made. I thought, right, I'm going to, I don't want any myths. I don't want any mystery. So I found a picture book and it's all about how this little community of sperm, they live in the testicles and you can see them. They've got like a little cinema and a cafe. It's all like really sweet little illustrations. The community of sperm. I love it. And one of them happens to win a swimming race, wins the prize, you know, gets to the egg, makes the baby.

15:25But obviously even that was confusing for him. So on the way to school, quite loudly he said am I gonna have a fun fair am I bum for all the sperm when I'm big I thought yeah that's really not landed as I intended oh so innocent and so cute I just thought I was being like helpful yeah maybe not yeah and so that was with your first yes so with your fifth you were like you have sex there's a baby doesn't last long well oh no another parenting fail uh some I think I've skipped some bits of learning for the smaller ones right because you get to the point where you can't especially when you have your fourth and fifth and not necessarily they sort of skip a few stages because they've got older toys hanging around they've got older kids in the house so i feel like there's definitely a phase and you know jesse and mickey aren't here to defend themselves and they would say no we're really good at all that now but i know for a while they were really bad identifying quite basic farmyard animals okay

16:24oh that's brilliant yeah london kids you know just went to like a city farm and like mommy look at that seagull i'm like that's a goose do you know the difference between a cow and a pig i hope so i mean we've probably got to go over some stuff but it's just you think you think you've done things and then i'll be like oh gosh i haven't taken you to that museum or this thing because i did it so much with like the older ones And I've just got visions of you in your head with like two, three kids sitting down and you're like, you know, breastfeeding a baby, writing a song and like just juggling everything.

16:56A lot of that. A lot of that. But it's like cow, pig, whatever. Yeah, exactly. It was the big stuff in life. But also, I think there's something in all of that I've always really loved. I like that feeling and I like the fact it probably suits something in my head because I like the fact I can go home from work. And even if I've been doing something quite high pressured, none of it matters when I get in through the door because it's all about what they're up to and how was your day? And for them, you know, all the stuff that they're going through and their own, you know, the cultures in their classroom and conversation that comes in bigger than anything we are dealing with in our working lives.

17:33And I really like that switch. I totally agree. if I'm having a bad day like a really stressful day and everyone's annoying me which happens a lot being perimenopausal when I pick my kids up from school as soon as I get that hug I actually feel I can breathe like oh definitely everything's fine everything else falls away everything falls away and then they grab my bag and ask for a snack and I go for crying out loud but I feel so much more at ease and calm when they are when you first see them and obviously then they drive me mad when I take them home and they don't like the food that I've cooked them, but they give me that feeling of calm.

18:10They want you and they need you, but equally we need them as well. Yeah, I think it's nice to recognize when you're in it with the little people because that is really special. But also I think that it's really nice the next bit as well. And I suppose, you know, I remember when my youngest had his last day at nursery and I was like, I know for some people and that's absolutely, I get it if you do feel a tug. But for me, I've always been so excited about the next bit as well. And, you know, I suppose I know that with my dad, he found it quite hard when I was growing up. When I was a teenager, he'd be a bit like, you know, you as a little person I got.

18:50And now it was like, and I just really never really wanted. I always want to completely see them for where they're at right now. So I've never wanted them. You don't want them to feel like, oh, I'm sorry I grew out of that stage. I'm sorry I'm not that little person anymore. yeah so I think it's nice to let that what's your favorite stage I mean I love I did I think three objectively is a really fun age yeah because they they got like a little bit more common sense but it's like they're really unpredictable and funny yeah they're so cute yeah cute I always find that a cute stage but uh I actually quite unusually maybe I really like them when they get sort of teenage and double figures because I just I find my teenagers quite adorable they're like big dogs that still think they're small dogs and I quite enjoy them sort of like the slightly bumbly like oh they're just still very very sweet I find.

19:39And because your kids are all your eldest is in their 20s and your youngest is six right? He's just turned seven last week. Like parenting over the years I guess when Sonny was younger there weren't screens as much or was there like is it different now? I think things always change and evolve they don't know and actually one of the biggest shifts I noticed is that well firstly I have two different generations which the kids talk about quite a lot. Yeah. So the youngest ones are Gen Alpha and the older ones are whatever one comes before, which I've forgotten about. And so they'll talk to each other about that, which I always find quite funny.

20:14That's fascinating, actually. You've got two generations in your whole... Yeah, so they'll talk about that. And then the other thing is when Sunny was born, so, you know, obviously going back nearly 22 years, it was all about the naughty step and it was, you know, the age of sort of super nanny. and now we're much more into I see you're angry yeah but it's interesting how that evolves and I was sort of the back end of things like uh contented baby books you're sort of timed feeding and it's funny how you don't realize how much you're as a parent part of whatever the current vogue is the culture of parenting as well yeah so there's all those sorts of things that I've noticed because of that span because yeah there's nearly 15 years from top to bottom and you've kind of seen the involvement of like school whatsapp groups i mean i'm on so many whatsapps yeah um i quite enjoy it when it kicks off because i then can tell people about it i love screenshots send it to your friends yeah yeah everyone does it though everyone does it's funny yeah and ridiculous and some things that are in the messages you're like wow yeah i can't believe You've just written that.

21:26Definitely. Screenshot send. Pink, pink, pink, pink. What in f***? Like Sam's mummies. And then you see the next day it's called, hi. Yeah, oh God. Awkward. Yeah, everybody is. Yeah, it's a lot of noise, isn't it? And I think, I don't know about you guys, but whenever I'm feeling overwhelmed, I think that because we have, we live in a time when everybody is expected to be on sort of 24-hour call a little bit. So if you message someone and then we go back to you now, you're thinking, something terrible might have happened or why are they ignoring me? Oh my God, I always think that with my own mother.

21:55Yeah. She doesn't reply to me. I'm like, are you actually dead? That's what my mum does to me. She thinks we're, she always thinks we're texting. But you've blue ticked it. You've blue ticked it. Yeah, exactly. I love the blue ticks. Oh, yeah. So when I'm feeling like, oh, I feel like the WhatsApp level, everything comes in and block capital and I can't differentiate between something important on that and something important on email because everything's just coming in at the same pitch. Yeah. You must be so organized though to keep on top of everything. I think I, I think sometimes I've done myself a bit of a disservice by talking about family chaos because there's just always something happening and I think anyone that's from a big family or living within it now will know what that feels like.

22:34And that exhaustion though for like that fatigue as a parent if you've got one child that has a bug and you don't sleep much if you know you've got a gig the next night how do you cope with that? I am quite good at getting on with not much sleep which I didn't really mean to experiment on myself in that way. Do you want to be a guinea pig for that one? And I think also there are definitely times when I feel like, wow, I feel like I walk into a room and a child will see me and think, what can I ask her to do? Just like immediately. Oh, there's that woman. A snack maybe. Oh, I've left something somewhere.

23:05I can't find. How much of parenting is just knowing where stuff is? God, that's constant. And also I've unwittingly made myself the queen of that. Third shelf down on the left-hand side. You know, you just start. Yeah, it's standard. But why? Come on. Everybody could do it if they tried. I know they can, but they don't. They come to us. They come to us. My son's doing this thing now where he'll just say my name and then continue with nothing. He just goes, Mummy. And I'm there going, yeah. Yeah. Nothing. It's almost like he's trying to think of what can I ask her to do. So where's that snack gone?

23:36Can you put that please? I love the story of your journey with Richard because you met and then you kind of got together quite quickly and you were, didn't you move in two weeks before Sonny was born? Well, yeah, that's what we, we didn't know that when he moved in because I was supposed to be pregnant for a little bit longer, but yes. Fine. So we'd met and already done a couple of tours together. So we'd only took about a year and a half by the time we started. We had our first date. Yeah. But after six weeks, I realized I was pregnant. So then we had to... So the first date was really good then, wasn't it?

24:06Yeah. I had to quickly friend all my friends and be like, you remember Richard, the bass player? Yeah. So we're going out and then they'd be like, and I go, yeah, and I'm actually having a baby because it was quite a lot going on at once. And then as it turned out, I also got something called preeclampsia, which meant that Sonny was born two months early. So when Sonny was born, we'd been a couple for eight months at that time. And you met his parents pregnant. That's a lot to take on. Yeah, that was great. And then did you always know that you wanted a big family? I think for the beginning bit of having Sonny, it felt completely overwhelming.

24:39And I wasn't ready to even think about having another for quite a while, actually, which is quite a big gap, nearly five years between my first two. Because I just wasn't really in that frame of mind. It was such a massive life change. Yeah. And also, if your baby's in two months early, I'm guessing there was lots of, I'm guessing you stayed in hospital for a bit. Yeah, it's definitely quite a medicalized early years bit, really. I suppose the first maybe up to two years is quite affected. You have their corrected age. You have a little bit more medical support in terms of checking their milestones.

25:13he was in hospital for nearly two months um and they're quite prone to because their lungs are like the last things to develop so they're quite prone to some breathing so if they get a cough or a cold it can quite easily go into their lungs and sometimes you find yourself back in hospital for a night but it was only all we knew so I didn't really I didn't really feel too too overwhelmed by that because I didn't know any different but I do remember even amongst all of that the day I had Sonny I had this feeling of I could have 12 and never be sated of this feeling of how good it feels to have a baby.

25:53Yeah I just felt really I don't know how to describe it I just thought I could never have enough of this feeling I'll never be too much. Do you ever feel any pressure to look a certain way because I know that Nellie Pitato got absolutely slated recently um well at first i thought nally looked amazing she looked amazing she looked absolutely incredible and she's so incredible i've always really had a soft spot for nally for today um i suppose look babies or no babies you know you you evolve and you change and i think it's so important to walk in step with yourself insofar as feeling the best you can for where you're at and and sort of recognizing what's changed and be at peace with that, but also doing the things that make you feel good about where you're at.

26:46So I think for me, I've always enjoyed dressing up and, you know, whether that be just to go and meet a friend for lunch or if it be on stage. And I love the way that clothes and makeup can set the tone for the occasion. But that being said, I'm also not too wrapped up. For me, it's more like a play fun thing rather than keeping up with some sort of appearance kind of thing. I like it as a tool for punctuation. So, you know, when I leave the house and all I'm doing is staying close to home and it's a school day, school run, and I've got a couple of things to run, I can dress really down. I probably won't bother with much makeup if I'm going to work.

27:22I love the fact that the punctuation of like, oh, I'm going to do my tick and choose a nice glitter and do the lipstick. That means I'm going to work. So it's more about what it symbolizes rather than something I feel like I need because someone expects it of me. I actually enjoy it like dressing up, I suppose. Going back to like childhood or something. But no, I'm in quite good terms with my body because my mom, she never had scales in the house. She was never on a diet. We weren't allowed to even use that word. It was all about healthy eating and feeling capable and strong. And for me, I'm more interested in being able to always like run quickly up the stairs to grab something, walk around the place jump on the trampoline with my little one that kind of thing that is more where my head's at I want to keep myself in good step for that I want to keep my stamina for my work I'm on stage for an hour and a half I love some very weird dance choices I don't know why but I like jumping around and this strange make-kicky thing I've known I was just saying when you said a trampoline me and Louise were like so you're not **** yourself Serafine do you know what I mean I think I've touched wood I hear it can change at any point so I don't know I feel like if it was going to change You would have been up to five kids.

28:33No, you'd go by now. I'm so, because I really like my jumping on stage. I'm quite into that. I love your jumping on stage. Please don't stop. It's amazing. I don't think it's cooler, I think, but it just seems to be where I'm at at the moment. Especially having, you know, five kids. Do they look at you and think that you're cool? Like, do they understand the magnitude of like, you know, how everybody knows who you are? Like, my generation. I'll definitely bring it up at supper time. Do you know? The woman's seven is, I'm a legend. We're going to talk about me. We're going to go around the table.

29:03Who thinks I'm cool? Do you understand what I've achieved? There's a snack relying on this kid, so think about it. But their friends at school must say like, oh my God, your mum's Sophie Alice Baxter. You know, and I mean it hand on heart. If that happens, I don't ask them about it. I think I grew up with my mum in the public eye and she was really good at making my school life about what was going on with me. yeah and I yeah it would be it'd be worse than our six seven discussion if I start asking them how they feel about me I hope that as the years go by and they get older like my eldest um probably about a year and a half ago now he did a month of travel on his own in Japan and I was like that made me feel so good because there's been so many times I've gone away for work and I've felt so guilty and so torn and I'm like you know such a taboo isn't it for as a mum oh you're going oh oh who's gonna look after the kids yeah you know and um and I thought actually it's such a long game parenting and if he's seen me and his dad go off for work and come home with the stories and you know keeping in touch and knowing what he's up to at school and what's going on home life and then I'm back again and we keep moving forward maybe that's given him the confidence to travel now and I think you know you've got to I actually was reading an interview the other day with a an astronaut she went to the international space station when her little boy was three and she was there for five months wow and I was like whoa that is huge isn't it you know nearly half a year of your very small son's life and yet she said I'd worked my whole life before he was born working up to that kind of opportunity how would I feel if he knew when he was older that firstly I turned it down I had the opportunity I turned it down and secondly it was because of him I thought what a wonderful way yeah yeah to reframe yeah these things so some you know it's a long it's a long game yeah that is interesting and the conversations that can surround it I mean my mum was away lots when I was small but that's not how I I'm very close to her and that's not how I think of things I don't think oh yeah that that ballet recital when I was five you know I remember lots of other stuff and I'm like she jumped out of planes and did really cool stuff she's very cool stuff yeah very very cool stuff do you see um because your mom was in the public eye you're now in the public eye do you see anything in your children that might make them want to be in the public eye um actually I don't know if they do actually I know I think the first one I was very much like what would he be and trying to guess all the time and now I'm just like now you've had five you're like do what you want bring yourself up there's a house key and a phone sell yourself I think the big thing for me is leave school with an employable skill.

31:47Be open to things. Don't complain. Just get out there. Have some momentum. You don't have to know the bigger picture, but have an idea where your foot's going to fall next, and that'll see you right. I don't know. It's hard. I think they're more freaked out by AI and what jobs will be there for them. Oh, God, I'm freaked out by AI. Can I ask you a question? I saw an interview you did on Happy Baby podcast with G. brilliant podcast um that when you were pregnant with your fifth and you saw someone at the hospital and they openly said do you want to be sterilized or you should be sterilized afterwards yeah that suggested it yeah quite shocking do you know what i've thought about that as well because i was reading through some of the comments because it got quite a lot of interaction um that which was actually really uh really really lovely because i you know it happens in those little consulting rooms doesn't it so to have it sort of taken out of that and and share it with people firstly a lot of people like you know they were they were shocked as well but secondly there were a lot of people said that they'd had similar conversations and actually why shouldn't it be an option but i think for me it was all about nuance i'm so big on this and how things are communicated because there's so many ways of saying the exact same thing but one thing will make you feel good and one thing won't yeah and so if this person who i'd never met before as well by the way this this consultant i had that day was not my usual doctor so we'd never met before uh there was a student in the room so we had this slightly unusual dynamic of being observed in an exchange so we're both kind of being slightly on you know slightly on you know more like alert behavior I guess but I just think if if she'd said to me I appreciate it's a sensitive topic and by all means go away and have a think about this but there is actually an option if you would like for us to make it so that you can you you will no longer be able to get pregnant after this if that suits you but it's more that she was first of all freaking me out with right let me have a look, fifth child and you're 39, you do realize you're more at risk of everything.

33:42The risk of hemorrhage grows up, your risk of organ damage. So I was already thinking, this is happening. I'm having this child. So I guess I just, what, fingers crossed. I don't know. All the best. Yeah. And secondly, then she said, and would you like to be sterilized when you're having your C-section? And for me, it was just a bit, a bit much. It's a bit. I just wasn't ready. I wasn't expecting it and I wasn't ready for it. No. But because of this third party effort, I had to go, no, thank you. And I don't know. I just kind of walked out feeling a bit, was that just for me? My benefit, was that because of my age?

34:17Is that because of how many children I've had? Is that because she thinks I've been irresponsible? I suppose she'd already introduced the idea that she thought it was not a brilliant idea that I was having a baby in the first place because of all these risks I'd subjected myself to. But my usual very nice consultant had never said any of that to you. It would be quite thumbs up. But you're right. Like it's not what you say, it's how you say it. There was a nice way to say that. I remember getting a scan with my second pregnancy and that pregnancy unfortunately didn't happen. But the sonographer, whilst you're there and you're heartbroken, she said, yeah, sorry, there's no heartbeat.

34:57And then she said, you'll probably find it really difficult to feel pregnant again. What? For real. And I'm lying there going, You poor thing. Okay, you just killed me twice. But because of that comment, it was then in my head. So then when we started trying for another baby, it was constantly like, this isn't going to happen. Because that medical profession has told me that I can't get pregnant again. I once had a miscarriage. This is a while back. And I had a scan. And when I came out of the room, I went to the desk and the lady said, do you want any photos? Are you printing any photos? Oh, my gosh.

35:31So obviously you had no idea what happened in the room. Oh, my gosh. and you know you have these little daggers and you have to go now okay thanks just walk out like oh the little the little sword is just just there isn't it invisible dagger okay I'll just have that lodged there until I'm so sorry I can tend to that wound later on in privacy in my own home made my stomach turn and I thought of you coming out of there I remember once um when I went for a scan and it was like my husband couldn't come in and um that was like my second miscarriage and I got to I think I was 13 or 14 weeks and I'd had a private scan a few days before and I'd got it on video and I'd sent it to everybody like all the family and they were going oh my god this baby's so wriggly it's bouncing all over the place went for the NHS scan the baby looked as it should as it did a few days before and I was like oh god it must be like it's just asleep not moving and they were just like oh sorry there's no heartbeat the pregnancy's not going to progress so um yeah sorry about that so you'll go into another room and then we'll just talk about the next steps when I was about to go and have my dnc the the doctor said to me right um you know we're going to go now and get rid of the debris oh god don't call my baby debris it's it's oh I can't it's hard though isn't it and the thing is the statistics are you know one in four women go through it but people don't talk about it i feel don't cry louise because i feel like i could literally start crying