Episode 160: Genevieve Turley

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0:38You put your phone down instead of firing off that text. You say what you actually mean instead of what would hurt someone else the most. Nobody applauds those moments, but they quietly change your life. That's what growing feels like. And that's exactly what Grow Therapy is here for. Grow is therapy that works, covered by insurance. Sessions average$21 with insurance and some pay as little as$0 depending on their plan. There are no subscriptions, no long-term commitments. You just pay per session. Grow connects you with thousands of high-quality licensed therapists across the U.S. offering both virtual and in-person sessions nights and weekends.

1:18You can search by what matters, like insurance, specialty, identity, or availability. And you can book a therapy session in minutes and begin in as little as two days, not the national 48-day average. See if you could pay as little as$0 for therapy in seconds at growtherapy.com slash ACAST. That's growtherapy.com slash ACAST. growtherapy.com slash ACAST. Availability and coverage vary by state and insurance plan.

1:54Hello, I'm Sophia Lisbexter and welcome to Spinning Plates, the podcast where I speak to busy working women who also happen to be mothers about how they make it work. I'm a singer and I've released seven albums in between having my five sons aged 16 months to 16 years, so I spin a few plates myself. Being a mother can be the most amazing thing, but it can also be hard to find time for yourself and your own ambitions. I want to be a bit nosy and see how other people balance everything. Welcome to Spinning Plates. Hey, hey. Greetings from a, God, incredibly muggy Sunday. I'm in my garden. I woke up this morning in Amsterdam.

2:35And I was so deeply asleep, I couldn't remember where on earth I was. But I was there because yesterday I did a festival with Nile Rodgers in the Netherlands, in a place called Tilburg, Spore Park Live. And it was lovely, actually. Great crowd. we come back to yeah hot london took the kids to see how to train your dragon and just had a nice supper together i've got all five at home in the moment so sweet um and yeah i'm just feeling excited about the summer holidays i don't know about how you guys are doing with your small people if you have small people in your life but i've had one finish for the summer.

3:17One finishes on Friday and I think I've got another two weeks for the little two. Can't wait, actually. I'm in the mood for summer holiday. I think it's because we've been having so many heat waves in London. Blimey. Yeah, what else has been happening? I went away last week with Richard, just the two of us, for our wedding anniversary. It was our 20th wedding anniversary. So I think that deserves a bit of something special. And it was lovely, actually. So nice. And now I'm not flying anywhere or going anywhere or anywhere overnight for a few weeks. And I'm really glad because I love, I've been having so many adventures, but I just was pining to have some time at home now, which is what's happening.

3:58And yeah, this is the last episode of this podcast series flown by as 10 weeks. It really whizzes sometimes. And I've had a lovely time recording it. And I'm just starting to think about the next one because it gets a bit tricky over the summer because everybody's away for August, including me, doing bits and bobs. So, yeah, I will make sure when I come back, which will realistically be September now, I will have everything ready for you. Lovely people. And some of you have been messaging me with suggestions for guests. Honestly, I adore it. Thank you so much. It really helps. Anyway, this week's guest is...

4:42she's a makeup artist called Genevieve Turley. And maybe you know her, maybe you follow her. I think she's really funny online because she does sort of, she like pokes fun gently at other makeup tutorials. And she does it really well. And it's sort of warm hearted. And yeah, I've just always enjoyed watching her. And another one of those people really where you feel like you know them before you meet. and so I've been following her for a while and the more I learned about her the more I thought oh this is an interesting journey she's had actually because she was in the RAF she was a nurse in the RAF and then went towards makeup which was actually her passion her love so that's intriguing she and her partner husband Richard are also doing a renovation project at the moment they've got two kids age six and seven and she has her online work and also she does a lot of bridal makeup so we talked about loads of things excuse me nursing makeup ivf renovations and um yeah it's a lovely warm fun chat to end this series on so thanks to genevieve and i'm going to leave you with it and i'll see you on the other side.

6:07See you in a minute. Enjoy.

6:17Genevieve, it's really lovely to meet you today. So nice to be here. As often happens when people arrive here, I feel like I have already got a bit of a relationship with you and then we launch straight into so many conversations before we press record. So I'm thinking, where should we start? I think a good place to start is often the here and now so what is going on in your life at the moment what's going on in your life professionally why don't we start with that so look it's it's all a bit chaotic at the moment if I'm being honest I'm sort of where just in lots of different areas and it's all really exciting um I'm just trying to catch up with everything so at the moment I am in the middle of bridal season so I have got my brides to look after um I've also just finished filming uh with Katie Piper for ITV so that was really exciting and um I've been approached about writing a book so I need to really pull my finger out and write the proposal for that it's all in my head as everything is um and then you know trying to do the social media and the content which I feel because of filming I wasn't able to do as much of as I would normally like doing so um this last week I was like right I'm gonna do I'm gonna do a bit more of that but what's really nice I'm doing a podcast with you today and I've got a podcast tomorrow and I like these these are really lovely because it's lovely to to chat with people and I love listening to podcasts as well so it's always nice to I do as well come and have a chinwag yeah and that is exactly it it's just a conversation which I feel like for me has given me so much I always feel so much better for having an uninterrupted chat it's nice um and you've also got your renovation i'm guessing as well with all the yeah i've forgotten about yeah yeah yeah pretty major also building your home building a home yeah i mean i will say my husband very much has taken the reins on that i turn up every so often and just kind of go what are we doing there and when's that happen sounds like my kind of renovating to be fair yeah he's um occasionally he'll just ask me my opinion on skirting boards of which I couldn't care less about.

8:22I know. The board, I'm just like, you can decide that. And he's like, okay. Yeah. And then he was like, shall I just, and I said, no, you don't get to decide everything. You can decide the skirting boards without me having to choose anything. But he's brilliant. He just goes in and cracks on. He's a real hard work. He's a real grafter. So he has taken the reins on that a lot. So I can just, you know, do silly content online. Sounds like the perfect relationship. And come here and have a lovely chat and have a cup of tea and he can work hard on the house perfect I wonder what he's doing right now covered in dust sorry rich some kind of heavy machinery but having a great time because this is this is his what he loves doing you know he loves renovating he loves um using his brain and making decisions and things so he although it can be stressful and it can be difficult and when it was winter and he was in this house freezing cold you know I can imagine that was pretty miserable he'd come back as an ice block um but he does enjoy this is what he really wanted to do so I'm yeah I am really grateful to him that he does so much of it but I do know that he does enjoy it as well yeah and also you know you're building the home there's the practical side of it but it's also about all the emotions of what home is and I know this is a relationship you've had with this house for a few years now building up to this bit yeah where you're actually you know you're still not living there but you're creating all the little pictures you have in your head of yeah what you want and and that involves the kids and how they'll interact with the house and you know how you as a family how it will evolve for us as a family is it growing yeah absolutely i mean not a growing family i don't intend to have any more children but um how it will grow for us and and you know when you're making decisions like the kitchen you know well whilst they're young we'll probably have them here but as they get older they'll probably use this space like this and um and so that's really nice and as you say creating a home and because this has been such a long bloody project so for those of you who may not be aware we had the offer accepted years ago like over three years ago and we've been living with my sister with my mom living in rental accommodation so we haven't had a sense of a home for a really long time and actually that has affected us both because the house just like cooking we've got no joy cooking in that kitchen it's just joyless there's stuff everywhere because we've never actually put shelves up we haven't got any lampshades because we thought we'd be there for six months so it's not a home at all in fact we don't enjoy being there it's cold it's got no personality it's just not nice so we're so excited to finally have a home again I mean first world problems we have a house to live in and you know all of that and we're very lucky but that sense of a home where we want to invite people over you know because we like to host and we love to do things like that so I've missed that sitting in a nice garden yeah and also the way you make decisions in a home I totally get that because this was the first house that I knew we weren't going to leave anytime soon and it meant that you know you could say I'm going to paint the wall that color or I'm going to do that wallpaper or I'm going to do those things because I'm going to have the time to enjoy it afterwards rather than thinking whoever moves in next is going to have it for longer than me.

11:37Claire, I can see what you're doing and I'm going to set it for you. Because that's just not going to work. I don't think she does it again. I think I tracked her. I'm not good here. Yeah. What is the look? There's two in here. They're so naughty. These are my kittens and they are so fucking naughty. Oh yeah, because one of your cats, you had a litter, didn't you? Yes. So this cat that I'm trying to get out from underneath here, she's supposed to go to... She's supposed to go to my biggest boy and he's just kind of gone off the idea. This is his cat. This one's ours. So funny. I'm going to your uncle.

12:17How many cats do you have? So I used to have one and then I got brother and sister while Richard's gone to her thinking, this will be jolly. And then one of them got pregnant and had cats. We ended up keeping one. I'm actually going to put this in front of her as well. Okay. I think they push and open the door. you might be trapped in by logo I'm so sorry don't be silly at least you weren't in the middle of a very serious conversation that could have been like horrific I think I could easily talk to you the whole time just about house stuff anyway because I'm quite into all that stuff too you are and your house is stunning and as soon as I walked in I was like I'll show you all I'm going to have to have more of a tour and I'll be like your house is like a Pinterest board it's incredible it's incredible yeah I don't even know what's going on with half of it at the moment I mean I'd hate to dust the sides you know what I say to that just don't bother yeah I'm with you I'm with you yeah but the other thing I really love is makeup so can I talk to you about you've no idea but I really do how many screenshots of your face are on my phone really honestly eyeshadow colours and I've talked a lot about you I was talking about you to Trini really yeah Yeah, I was saying how you just, your makeup is always so creative.

13:39Like I always say to people, there are no rules, just wear what makes you happy. And I always say, you are the epitome of that. You wear the sparkles, you wear colors that technically you shouldn't wear to, you know, they shouldn't work, but you clearly enjoy it and you wear it well and you wear it with confidence. So it works. But you've always done that for a long time. Yeah, I think my relationship with makeup, and this might resonate with you, started when I was really little and the first time I sort of started experimenting and realised that really there's not that many rules anyway. You can try different things in different places.

14:13If a product says it's for one thing, you can try it somewhere else. There was one time when I got this close to putting nail varnish on my eyelid. I'm really glad I stopped that. I was like, this is a great colour. FYI, my mouth is wide open. It was probably an audible gasp. I was like, this is a great colour, nail varnish. And I literally got the brush up to like a couple of centimetres. This might not be a good idea. I think this might be too much.

14:43But I remember I had like a really sparkly lipstick and I would put that near my eyes and things like that. And I think there's so much fun to be had. But what about you? Because I'm guessing from what I've heard you speak about with your relationship with makeup that even though we will talk about it a bit, you've had other careers. makeup has been a quite essential part of yeah so i remember going into my my mom had this well my parents had this beautiful ensuite and the they had the mirror you know the mirror with the light bulbs around uh and it was this amazing space with vanity it was beautiful and my mom isn't a big makeup wearer she was never big on makeup she she always goes i don't know where your obsession from lotions and potions came from because it wasn't for me but she did have a few bits and bobs and I used to go in and just not do makeup looks I used to sort of do like tribal stuff because I was just like oh this is you know really young oh this is cool and then I remember asking for like my sixth birthday for a makeup table with makeup and I got this plastic set and I was frantically trying to drag this lipstick across my lips and I was like damn it why is there no colour on it and of course it's plastic and everything was plastic and I was like oh no I don't want plastic I want real and my friend Alice is a real uh she's always been a real tomboy and when we were like seven she always laughs about this she'd always want to play football she'd always be in her goalkeeper kit and want to play football and I'd always be like can we do makeovers she's like no let's go and play football I was like let's do makeovers so I was always that friend and on a night out I was always the friend who did your makeup oh perfect um always loved it just uh you know I remember Urban Decay had a color called like acid rain you'd have loved it it was a lime I had that did you do you mean the eyeshadow yeah yeah I had that it's a great color I've probably still got it you probably see yeah I've it's long gone but urban decay if you still make it so let's let's bring it back um and yeah I loved I loved makeup and then I always thought I would go off and be a makeup artist that was the plan uh and then I always wanted to go traveling as well so I went traveling thinking I'll come back and then go to London and do makeup yeah but then I kept traveling and then after three years my parents were like I think at some point you need to make a plan yeah and my sister was a doctor at this point and I'd always done care work yeah to get money together so I worked people with learning difficulties or dementia and is your sister older than you yeah she's three years older than me and I've got a brother who's six years older than me got it um he's not medical at all and she said look Jen you really love the care side of things you love looking after people and caring for them and she said you love travel so why don't you be a nurse and then you can travel the world but get paid so yeah right do that so went off and did nursing and then my dad had wanted to be in the air force but didn't didn't pass exams to be a pilot and he said why don't you think about joining the air force you love sport you want to travel you want to you know you're not afraid of I suppose knows what what you could face so whether that's war or humanitarian aid which is more what I was thinking you know because obviously a lot of people think military they always think war but actually they do a huge amount of humanitarian aid as well so I was like you're all right I'll do that then just do it you know so then I spent a year trying to get into the forces and then you know this is the thing then before you know it I'm just trundling down this road and then there was a burns card that came up and I always like uh wounds uh so I know I know I know when you say I always like wounds do you mean the someone says I hurt myself and that you are you one of the people go show me a picture weirdly no how do I explain it so no I my husband's toenail fell off the other day and he was like can you help me and I was like no he was like no I can't look at it and I was like don't even tell me about it it's making me crazy toenails are not my thing and eyeballs no I don't it's really weird I can't but if you were like Jen I've hurt myself yeah as in like there's a wound on my arm I'd be like okay let me help it I'm weird I don't know I'm just trying to get my head around that because like when you said not many people say I like wounds and then when you say that I actually um you do well I'm not squeamish my grandma was a I feel like I could have possibly got involved with that like you I like being around people and the nurture but look I'm talking in a casual passing thought, what I'm hearing from you is you have all these different it's not a casual thing to find yourself a military nurse working in a burn how did we get here?

19:48and so you had this thinking about makeup but you also thought about travel so I'm hearing that you're obviously like not at all work shy you know it's not like something you can just sort of go yeah okay I'll give it a go you've got to do training and oh god no I mean how long was the how long did it get from the idea of it to actually finding yourself doing it so obviously nursing is three-year degree then to get into the military you've got to pass you know your fitness or your exams you've got to do presentations it's quite a big thing to get through and then you've got to pass basic training because a lot of people don't realize that nurses have to do basic training the same as every other soldier so the military would say you're a soldier first and then a nurse wow so you know you have to do all your weapons handling you have to be out in the field and things like that so you do all of the same training as everybody else granddad was furious that i joined the force at the air force because he was a colonel in the army so why have you joined the air force and then he was like and why are you not an officer So I was like, well, granted, I'm going in the ranks.

20:51That's what I'm doing. So he was utterly like, and then he kept saying, she's in the army. I was like, well, I'm not. He was like, she's in the army. Okay. Well, I guess, I mean, it is part of the forces. Yeah, everyone always goes off. Yeah, it's all part of the forces. But if you said that to someone in the forces, they're like, no, it's all different. There's always hierarchies. Absolutely, yeah. And lingo. Oh, yeah. From my point of view, it's all the same sort of thing. Well, it's all wildly impressive as well. it sounds a lot more impressive than it actually the reality of what my situation was was very different to what I thought it was going to be it's so not what I thought it was going to be sadly uh but once I got in and jumped through all those hoops I then you do a rotation for a year um so you can't be deployed anywhere in that year and that's when Afghanistan was starting to wind down a bit so I then they then put out a burns card saying we need burns specialist nurses and I was like oh do you know what that is me I definitely want to do that so then I went back to university and specialized in burns so again not deployable and then I and then I met rich around that time as well and then there just weren't opportunities to particularly go anywhere like um I was needed on the wards a lot was this sorry where were you sort of stationed then so at this point I'm down at East Grinstead okay in Surrey and were you always I stayed there once Yeah.

22:12So I was in the Air Force for seven, eight years and I never went on an aircraft. Oh. Yeah. That's not how I would imagine that working. No, it was not what I imagined. I put myself forward for loads of things. And unfortunately, without going into too much detail, you are at the mercy of your line manager. And if you have someone in the hierarchy who is not great, which is me putting it incredibly lightly, they can make your life as miserable as they want and unfortunately yeah my life was made pretty miserable I'm sorry to hear that yeah and and the thing that's frustrating is I am somebody who if I have issue with somebody I think it's good to sit down and be like right let's hash this out because I'm a bit I'm you know there's issues here you can't do that you can't do it because Is it some hierarchy?

23:07You can't, you just, they're an officer, you're in the ranks. It's just a difficult thing. And because we were so small where we were, my NHS colleagues, beautiful, absolutely love them. I love the hospital. I love my job. I loved all of those things. And I was, yeah, I was having a tough time. I was going through IVF. And this one person in particular just made my life a living hell. And I remember being on shift and I was in the middle of my IVF treatment. and it was going really really wrong and I was an hour away from the hospital where I was having treatment so to get there for appointments was a nightmare and this boss text me she was kind of harassing me and I was in the wound the room with all the wound stuff and I was getting all my bits and I read the text and it was basically just like you're taking too much of your your working days for IVF appointments so you need to you owe us time oh my god and I was obviously not in a good place and so I just but I just burst that cry I think I was actually having a bit of a panic attack and then the the ward manager came in and I was like hyperventilating stuff and she'd had IVF so she was like I'm I'm taking I'm taking you home and I was like no no if she finds out I've gone home it won't be worth my life like I can't she said she can deal with me I'm not having this she was just like this is horrific what's going on with you right now anyway so things like that were going on luckily my IVF was successful uh so was that you just was it was maybe too personal was it something that took a long time with a lot of rounds or is it we were so lucky first round it worked but it went very wrong in terms of um I don't know if you've had much experience with IVF or I'm sure you've had friends yeah yeah absolutely so uh you know it's dependent how many eggs you've got and then where you are in your hormone levels as to how much medication you need at certain times so often they say the first round they're sort of working out how your body adjusts so it's very often that the first round doesn't always work because then they learn so much about your body um it's really i mean it showed how much women we don't know our own bodies at all i mean i was like a nurse and i was absolutely amazed by what i didn't know and essentially I was expected to have loads of eggs and I had four or five and they said we're taking you to surgery and then those they all fertilized and then each morning you have to call up and find out if they're still there and they're still okay so you call up each day and every morning right we're down to four right we're down to three and then it was the weekend and they said come in for transfer on the Monday morning early so we're on the way and on the Friday I had two left and I said to my husband the way in there you understand that we might get there and they say none have survived and he said well why would they let us come in I said because they won't give you bad news on the phone so we might have to just get there and know that nothing's going to happen and we got there and we walked in the consultant was like you've got one and I was like okay he just went one is all we ever wanted one is all we need and so yep and that that was our daughter yeah so we were incredibly lucky um and one is all we need one is all we need one is all we need one is all it takes and we're so lucky and I honestly you know felt we were obviously going to try for another one we were saving for IVF because once you've had it on the end we were very lucky we had on the NHS once you've had a baby on the uh IVF first round you obviously pay to have more and it's super expensive you're looking at five to eight grand depending on your medications and so on so we were already saving money uh towards it and actively trying straight away um and i remember just people saying to me how do you feel about it and i said i feel like i've we've got everything we ever wanted you know if if this is all that we get then we are the luckiest people in the world because you you get that feeling of uh you've lived with it for so long that this might never happen for us having our own you know biological child we always knew that we would want to be parents somehow so whether that was adoption but we were just like you know to actually have our own biological child was amazing and then um when she was 10 months got pregnant naturally and then that was our son so we were so lucky that's pretty wild, isn't it?

27:37But I mean, it's one thing to have a baby in front of having another one 10 months in on its own, regardless of the path that you've taken.

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28:25You bite your tongue instead of escalating. You put your phone down instead of firing off that text. You say what you actually mean instead of what would hurt someone else the most. Nobody applauds those moments, but they quietly change your life. That's what growing feels like, and that's exactly what Grow Therapy is here for. Grow is therapy that works, covered by insurance. Sessions average$21 with insurance, and some pay as little as$0, depending on their plan. There are no subscriptions, no long-term commitments. You just pay per session. Grow connects you with thousands of high-quality, licensed therapists across the U.S., offering both virtual and in-person sessions, nights and weekends.

29:06You can search by what matters, like insurance, specialty, identity, or availability. And you can book a therapy session in minutes and begin in as little as two days, not the national 48-day average. See if you could pay as little as$0 for therapy in seconds at growtherapy.com slash ACAST. That's growtherapy.com slash ACAST. Growtherapy.com slash ACAST. availability and coverage vary by state and insurance plan

29:39but i feel we've got to go a little bit into that tiny window of time that 10 months yeah because so that time you're still working in the military but you already handed in your so in the military you have to give a year's notice okay a year yeah that's i don't know if they've changed it this is what 2017 I think yeah because our daughter was born in 2017 so yeah you have to give a year's notice so I had six months full mat leave then you have to go back and sort of pay back and service your mat leave so I I tried to do it as cleverly as I could um with working all out so I tried to do it that I didn't have to go back to work full time for too long I did it with like my annual leave you know I used up annual leave and I used up stuff like that to try and put that into that year's notice yeah as well as my mat leave so I didn't have to go back for too long um and then the military give you well they did back then three months I think full pay so that you can essentially set your give you time to find employment and set yourself up and things but I had made the decision that I didn't want to be a nurse in the NHS for several reasons the military you are on more money because effectively you are owned by the MOD and you have to do exactly what they say which is why my life was made pretty miserable and I'm not saying that's everyone's experience that was my experience um and you know you because I was a specialist nurse I got a specialist pay in the NHS if I'd have gone and become a specialist nurse my pay wouldn't change so that you know my pay would have dropped dramatically uh and I just I I just looked at it and I and I know this sounds awful and I apologize to people who are still doing it and I took my hand off to you I just saw it as like a black hole of just like I don't want to do it I don't want to do that for the next 30, 40 years.

31:43It's such a hard job. It's such a hard job. And I know that people who haven't done it like to go, oh yeah, it's really hard. Oh God, it is so tough out there. And that is pre-pandemic I'm talking about. I haven't been on wards during or since, but I have a lot of friends still nursing and they still are haunted by what happened during COVID. and I don't think general society will ever know the depths of what some of these medical people and I'm not just talking nurses or doctors I'm talking everyone who was a part of it so so hard so incredibly hard and I am glad to be out I do miss the rapport I had with my patients I miss the morale I miss the working with incredible people who are just so damn good at their job so good you know you watch them and you're like in awe of them just phenomenal like I would trust trust you to look after my mum my sister you know just incredible people it was a real honour to work alongside some of those people but I didn't want that to be what I always did and I just decided to revisit makeup and I thought well why not now you know I just I've always said you don't have to do one career your whole life if there's other things you want to do and you want to go for you know just try and work out a way to make it happen for some people it would be easier than others it wasn't easy for me but what I did have is support and I and you know when I remember saying to my dad my parents are divorced but I remember saying I remember being a bit nervous about telling my dad and my mum which is weird because they've never been anything other than supportive but I think you know I just what I was giving up was a safety net and I just become a mum so when I told my dad I was like I'm gonna give all that up and I'm gonna go self-employed and he just went well you've always wanted to do that so good for you you'll make it happen you know and like when I told my mum my mum because she went she was a essentially she did work a bit when we were growing up but she was essentially a stay-at-home mum and when my parents got divorced I remember her always saying to my sister and I, I'm so glad you two have careers because she had to sort of work things out when she was 58.

34:02Um, and she said, I'm so glad you've got careers. You know, that makes me feel really safe. I was like, you know, you've always said, you're really glad I've got a career. And while I'm giving that up and I'm going to go self employed and be totally reliant financially on my husband for a bit, you know? Um, but she, she was like, I'm going to buy your first set of makeup brushes. And you know, my mum's always, is when I my mum lives locally to me and she's always I'm so proud of you she'll listening to this she listens she watches everything I do she listens to everything I do so hi mum you're a rock star and I love you um she's always you know I'm so proud of you and actually I bumped into a one of my mum's friend's sons and he was like oh your mum was around my parents the other day and she was like oh Genevieve's doing this and she's like she's so chuffed for everything that you've done things it's really nice so I think that's how I was so lucky I had not a lot financially to go on we'd done a big renovation like you know two babies it was really hard but what I did have in abundance was people going yeah you can totally do that and not and that's the key thing yeah well I think especially knowing what I know about makeup artists uh that support counts for so much not just because of the the immediate you know you're giving up the career path to do something with lots of ifs buts and mays around it um but also because what is quite significant about the dynamic of being a makeup artist with a client is you have to walk in there and basically make them feel reassured that you've got this so all your insecurities and vulnerabilities about that are still there but you can't convey any of it in the job you are basically effectively on aren't you you know you set it up you put out your kit and you turn to them and you go you don't worry you're in safe hands with me so your your parents and your friends and your siblings going yes is about more than just you going okay i'm gonna just go over it but also walking into that that very intimate space where someone sat there with nothing on their face feeling like and saying like i've already got this so i think that's wonderful and also it makes me think that it's interesting that your parenting continues long into your kids being adult because you're going to see them and saying i'm going to do this and i'm going great and buying the makeup brushes and everything it's just what great parents oh i honestly when people say to me and and people say this who don't personally know me they go oh you've been so lucky and I kind of go yeah I have been really lucky because I was born in England which is a pretty safe country and I was born to parents who really wanted me and love me and have protected me and I was really lucky I was given private education and great opportunity and I was really lucky to have great peers in my classroom who have gone on to be dear friends for the last three decades that is all luck but my parents did not do my basic training my parents did not do my degree my parents did not you know do gruelling hours of juggling two babies with no child care and trying to set up this and doing the next I did that I did that there wasn't luck that was hard work and graft and I remember sitting on the sofa I just not long had our son and my daughter was like rolling around on the floor somewhere because she could barely walk and I was trying to book all these trials in but I anytime I booked a trial in I had to give one my mum one of the kids my mother and all another one because it was too much for one of them to have both of them and that was a huge palaver so I'd be trying to book in this simple trial but the logistics of it were huge and then I got I went to bloody soft play and got this raging eye infection lovely places aren't they soft play oh my god and i had this horrific eye infection and so i'd had to put like postpone all these trials which was awful but the eye infection just wouldn't clear up like three weeks was awful and just wanted to like rip my eye out and i remember sitting on the sofa with my mum and she sat there with her diary open and i was like right mum we've got to try and do this all again and then I just suddenly went do you know what it's too hard I can't do it I can't do this mum like I am I am covered in psoriasis I am so ill my eyeball is horrific look at that it was like look at me look at me and I've got a screaming baby on me here you know daughter just rolling around the floor and I was like this is madness I can't do it and she I just remember she went okay and just closed the diary and put it on her lap and just her doing that I just was like no open your diary I'm doing it I can totally do it she was like okay but I remember that moment of just this is mental what am I doing why am I doing this and of course it was so brutally hard and I think I always had this ridiculous faith that I would make it all work out.

39:15It would all be worth it. And of course it has all been worth it. And I am able to say that now, you know, we're five years down the line. But if you're listening to this and you're in those, and I will say the depths when you've got two babies and you are trying to work it all out and make it work between, you know, that's a huge pressure on your marriage at that point. It's a huge pressure on your work if you're trying to have a career. It's a huge pressure as you anyway for just trying to juggle the whole mum situation that's a lot going on when you've got really small kids um and so yeah it's all about being surrounded by the right people and just really going where do I want to be in five years because it I've got to just push through this really hard bit and then I will it'll all be worth it wow you're good at the long-term thinking with that I've always got a five-year plan wow I like that was it smart goals you know you know they're always like smart goals I can't remember what they are specific measured something reasonable I can't remember smart have you heard that no I just thought you meant a good choice smart goals I mean I agree with you good goals no they're these that's that's how you do them like smart measurable I can't remember um and I was always like you have your six-month plan annual year plan, your five-year plan.

40:35And how did that work when you found yourself taking the leap of faith? I mean, obviously, I understand you're picturing the five-year time, but the bit where you're saying, I can't do it, and you've got these much long-for babies, but then you're also putting yourself out there and taking on the jobs and trying to build your roster. And I mean, how did you give yourself? Oh, and then COVID. Oh, yes. But when you got this much long for baby and then you find out there's going to be another baby is there a bit where you're thinking how can I make sure I'm also enjoying this thing I've wanted so much for so long these these this family life how do you how did you triple that in or did you just have not even time to really I don't think I had time to work that out I remember sitting at the top of the stairs heavily pregnant our daughter she was always just rolling around why is my image of her always just rolling around?

41:36I did pick her up. She wasn't just on the floor all the time. She still rolls to school. La, la, la.

41:48And I remember my husband opening the door, and like our front door then, you could see straight to the top of the stairs. And I was just sat there, and he was like, oh, my God, are you okay? And I just looked at him, and I'm like, what the hell are we going to do? He said, what do you mean? And I said, what the hell are we going to do? we've got I'm not making any money this we've got we haven't got a kit we don't have kitchen we haven't got a kitchen what we're gonna do we haven't got we were trying to wake out work out if we were going to be accepted for finance in a car because our car had broken down what and he's like just go for a walk just walk to the shop which was like 200 yards away and just to have some fresh air or something and he was like we'll work it out and I and then I as we were walking back I got the ding your finance has been accepted and I was like oh okay I've got a car so that's great.

42:34I just there was too much going on that I couldn't think about the mum bit I suppose. I was just trying to work out how we just get through this bit and then I did feel that our son's first year I was like I haven't enjoyed this and that's me being really honest. Of course I enjoyed moments of it but it was. No I appreciate your honesty because I think that's something that I can definitely relate to that I think we it's so much of the motherhood things about talking about when they're little but actually as we just said about your parents it's there's so many chapters thing and I got to really enjoy our daughter as a as a baby you know that I had six full months where I was paid full pay how many people get that you know that's one perk of the military they've probably taken it away now but and I used to I remember just being in an absolute bubble this is amazing I love this I enjoyed that I look back at that so fondly and I remember just taking to motherhood like a duck to water really and I remember meeting up with other mums who were clearly struggling and I they'd be like oh are you finding this as well And I used to just lie and say, oh, yeah, it's awful.

43:57But that's not really how I felt at all. But I didn't want them to feel they were doing it was them. It was just that she was really straightforward. And I didn't have colical reflux to deal with. And I didn't have some awful post-traumatic disorder, physical, mental, anything. So I used to just lie. And then when our son was born, I didn't really get to enjoy our daughter as a toddler because I was just trying to juggle so much and I didn't get to enjoy him particularly as a newborn but when our daughter did go to school I got to enjoy him at that age so what I tell myself is you've got to really enjoy one of them in that small bit and you've got to really enjoy the other one in that bit and neither of them are going to fucking remember anyway so why are you giving yourself a hard bloody time over it because they won't know they won't know they'll just know that they were really super loved and you were trying really hard to create something so that you could um really what I've tried to design is a life that I really wanted for my family which is that I can be there for pickups and drop-offs and be my own boss so I can make sports day and uh do the nice trip that's what I wanted and that's what I think I have created um so the the age is that the kids will remember is sort of really for and onwards isn't it yeah and I think that they'll be like oh no mum was around and you know probably shouting a lot now well actually I was thinking one thing as well that we haven't really introduced into all this but there's also clearly been a sense of humor that's accompanied you with everything you do as well which probably helps with weaving it into the stresses I was wondering as well I wonder if this is why bridal makeup because you have to walk into situations they're very high emotion be this calm force what is it you like about that's when nursing comes into it yeah tell me more about that so a lot of people say to me the transition from nursing to makeup that's a really crazy jump but it's funny lots of the nurses are like oh there's loads of transferable skills there because you have to walk into a room and you have to be able to read the room really quickly what does this person need me to be do they need me to be a really calm person and set that tone do they need me to be quite tactile towards them do they need me to um get rid of you know sometimes bridesmaids are really excitable aren't they and you can see that your bride is really terrified so you have to try and calm everything down um sometimes you'll have a challenging mum of the bride sometimes all these different things I once had a bride who was going through something really you know sometimes parents aren't there on their wedding day whether that's through you know a family bereavement or it's because there's been a break somewhere in the family uh so you try and delicately manage that and that is definitely where nursing comes into it yeah 100 and don't get me wrong i have had to do some first aid and i've also had to use my textiles gcse several times always have a sewing kit please oh my god amazing and basically unless the bride's toenails fall off your yeah i'm good

47:13so yes there are transferable scars but the biggest thing is I you know burns are horrendous wounds they are a split second of someone going about their everyday life it doesn't matter how big or small they are they're bloody painful and it doesn't matter if you've got a small scar for the rest of your life on your hand or whether you've got you know you've got facial scars a scar is a scar and that's hard for everyone in different ways and so I've been around these incredible people who have gone through uh such hard changes being in so much pain uh and then we would have to be the first people to put a mirror to them you know you've gone through you've maybe someone's been wearing a sari and their sari catches light you can imagine the burns for that and so showing someone their image for the first time you have to really hold their hand through that and then you've got people sitting in your makeup chair who have no idea how lovely they are and instead of you sort of say what kind of thing do you want they go can you cover this I don't like this I don't like that what I've realized is that women have such a broken relationship with their reflection and for some it's really bad and for some it's not as bad and I suppose my experience in burns and plastics because that was my specialty is I've seen women go through really horrific things and so for me whenever I have a negative thought about myself whether that's like body image or you know the way I look I think of those women and so that's where I get my sort of like oh doesn't matter that I go you know I get asked a lot about how I'm so sort of comfortable with aging I'm just like oh if you saw what I saw you wouldn't care you wouldn't care I'm so grateful for what my body does every day because not everyone gets that I was talking to a friend the other day and she was saying oh I really want to run the marathon but I'm going to do it when I'm 16 she's 55 and I said just do it now like do it why are you waiting she said I just think 60 sounds like quite an achievement I was like mate you don't know you're getting to tomorrow do it now and I didn't mean that to be in a really morbid way and she was like oh my god you're right and I said we don't have the we don't know we've got tomorrow so sort of seize the day go for it we don't know how able we're going to be in a few years time you know we always like to think we're invisible but we're not and nursing shows that so I've seen women just really have a bad relationship with themselves so I really try and communicate with women to sort of not be like no you'll love you know that sort of no you're not but just to try and sort of go you know you're do you not realize that you've got beautiful eyes and you might not like your whatever but let's really focus on your eyes and bring them forward and I really want them to see that when they look in the mirror that they just go my god my eyes do look really beautiful and that's not vain it's really important that you like yourself oh absolutely Well, I was thinking, firstly, I love hearing all the layers you've got to what you do, because I realise that's what I enjoy about when I've been following you online, is that you've got that generosity and that empathy.

50:38So I'm imagining when you're talking to the camera, you're picturing all of these women the other side of it. Yeah, absolutely. But also I'm thinking what lovely parenting that must lead to as well, because it's all the truth, but it's all backed up with your life experience. You've actually gone into these very extreme situations. And I can't imagine how it must feel to go into someone in a hospital ward and show them their reflection after they've had something life-changing like that. That's a very poignant moment in their life, one that they'll never forget. And you've got to be right there with them.

51:12So this all comes from really quite extreme, not everyday occurrences, but you've now filtered into wanting to spread good stuff and good relationships. and I think that must be what form is like the backbone of what's going on with with what you do and I suppose when you were asking about comedy before I think I make light of things because it's all it can be a bit serious I suppose you know and and definitely you know you've got a love of makeup and I'm sure you follow lots of makeup accounts or whatever there's quite a sort of serious tone to it now you know this is how we do our makeup and there's rules and don't do it like this but do it like this and and I was watching all of this going oh fuck off yeah because I don't follow that many for that reason I do yeah because I've always I think it's playful I think if you yes it should be like playing and what's the worst that can happen you put something on and go and then you wipe it off because you don't exactly and and people you know will say to me I'd love to wear a red lip but I'm so scared that people would look at me and laugh and I think if someone stopped and laughed at a woman who's wearing lipstick then that woman is a dick You know?

52:22So the chances are either no one would notice because it's a red lip and it's not the big, it's not you're wearing like blue lipstick. Yeah. And the other thing is more likely you'll walk past a woman who'll go, God, she looks great. Exactly. That is the likelihood of the situation. So I suppose the comedy side sort of accidentally came forward because I was just like, let's just lighten this up a bit because it's all gotten a bit intense and ridiculous and clickbaity and it's confusing us millennials who are going, what are we meant to be doing? I'm so confused. What's going on? And do we have to do all these steps?

53:02And do we need all these products? So I'm sort of there going, because I know these women, I've had them in front of me. I've looked after them. And I think, no, most women are not after this content. They want to know the basics and they want some honesty. you know they they want to understand what do they you know if they enjoy makeup and they want to feel good because makeup is about feeling good isn't it it's not just about looking good I mean I don't know how you feel but I I'm comfortable being makeup free I couldn't care less I walked down the street couldn't care less but I love nothing more when there's an opportunity to sort of go right you know I'm gonna have some fun with my makeup this evening you know and then it's playful and fun so I want women to sort of well and men whoever to find the joy in it again enjoy wearing makeup I mean there's that five minute face that you kind of do really quick in the morning and then there's the shall I shall I shall I try a smoky eye shall I do it shall I do a bold lip yes and then just go for it and I think I've had women messaging me going I have been nervous of makeup for ages but you've made me sort of step back in it again and enjoy the process uh or me sort of going you don't have to contour so many people are like I thought I had to contour no I don't even really like contouring I don't either I'd get very if I do it's very subtle and if I was doing it it'd be because I'm wearing a very sort of uh bronzy sort of look and that's the emphasis of the look I can see that it can look incredible I my my makeup artist friend Lisa will do it sometimes when we're doing shoots but me personally yeah I don't go there so do you do when you do shoots do you do much of your own makeup I do all my makeup for gigs so all my stage stuff is always me it's part of what gets me in the right headspace yes and i love it and i'll get all my makeup out and i'll spread it all out and i'm like what today i've got my bag of glitters and all my colors and i'm i try to do a different look every single night different color so i might do i might have like a different color glitter for every yeah every city on the tour for example but it just gets me in the right headspace have a look muck about i'll think about things it'll give me a little bit of yeah time to think about show and what i want to talk about and i guess it is about about playing really and about joy um i'm not always brilliant at it but i just like the process of it but if i'm doing a shoot or a tv or something then no that's not really it's quite unusual if i do that it kind of it's a yeah it's a bit next level for me that stuff it's just a bit more layers isn't it i suppose maybe sometimes and i'm awful at doing my hair like spectacular oh my gosh my husband's always like why do you why where's your hair brush I'm like oh I just can't do hair I've turned up for weddings before and like a hairstylist hasn't turned up and they go don't and I've heard don't worry Genevieve's here and I've gone what no I don't I can I can brush your hair like I can't do anything god no I can't even curl hair with GHDs no one look at me right now I'm like Don't do it.

56:07Yeah, I would love to raid your makeup bag. Oh, we can do that. Jeez, I bet it is so fun. I'll show you stuff. Do any of your brides go for colours or does it turn?

56:20What about you? What did you do? For my wedding day, red lip. Cool, me too. Red lip. God, we're so aligned. Red lip was, so red lip was my thing. And then I had kids. And then, of course, they grab your face all the time. so I just stopped wearing red lips and I will occasionally wear a red lip but it's I've gone quite neutral on my lips now to be honest with you I've been like that too yeah red lip is quite unusual for me now it used to be a regular yeah and now as well if I'm made up it means I'm going out every day it's just not very much at all no I am quite minimalist day to day but I like that though because then when you do go to something it's nice to go I'm gonna have some fun I couldn't and and I don't want it to be a ball and chain I remember like turning it to nursing shift and if you forgot to put makeup you run out of time to put that little bit of makeup on that you did people like oh my god are you okay you're all right like yes I'm fine Sandra I just didn't put any mascara on this morning okay I'm fine um so there is that thing I always think if you do wear makeup every day you've kind of got to commit to it otherwise everyone is going to be like oh my god is she all right I don't know if you're going to work if you're not if the school run i mean i love watching people do it on the tube when people do their eyeliner on the tube i know and it's like it's jolting um i think makeup is so much fun and i do i do think it's like yeah it's always been my friend really experimenting as well but i think with the bridal stuff especially i like the idea of you stepping into these places and having to like navigate and make the space calm and create what's needed there and sometimes i i have to fill a void of you know people don't really know what to do of course so then i do end up getting louder and louder and i'm definitely not bringing the calm i'm bringing the chaos but but yeah a lot of my brides i very much specialize in natural makeup so a lot of my brides are not makeup wearers and are wanting something yeah um so definitely not going for you know green sparkly eyes or something i don't think i've ever had anything particularly well i've had the odd you know bold lip and things um but it's more i've had people for an evening event where they want something a bit more fun or they're or they're just quite open to whatever i want to do color wise that's nice isn't it it's really nice it's quite unusual isn't it being given free room do whatever you want yeah go go wild yeah do you get have you had because obviously you've always done bold makeup because my your to me your most iconic one was mode on the dance floor that look yeah the black tick the red lips I mean the green sparkly eyeshadow that for me was like one of the most iconic makeup looks ever oh so who came up with did you no it's Louise Constad uh so when I first started um making solo videos I met Lisa Lauder and Louise Constad they were at least doing my hair Louise doing my makeup and they are like lifelong girlfriends of mine now like over 20 years of friendship loads of adventures they're my third boys godmothers oh and um um i adore them and louise has taught me so much everything i'd the way i do my face has been learned from her and lisa learned with her so now lisa will do my hair makeup for things and louise just works when she wants to because she's in a nice bit where she's picking and choosing the work but just absolutely louise is good for like an experiment and the glitter was just so inspired and looks so beautiful on screen and then from that yeah i've got so many glitters and i'll do the same technique and so did you wear glitters before that not really actually i've always been i've always loved what makeup can do but i don't think glitter makeup was even so much of a thing like to get the stuff we were using back then it was mac makeup had these pots of these glitters whereas now it's absolutely but now it's everywhere isn't every range has got something twinkly or chroma it's become a lot more have you got a brand that you stick to or you just drawn to colors i don't i'm not like snooty i've got like a really big range but there's a few things which i think are really really good for stage um i've got a few tricks and things i can do very quickly as well because sometimes i'll turn up at a festival and yeah you've got 20 minutes before you're on stage or something um yeah i definitely think there are some brands who are great for base products but another brand is better for eyeshadows and the longevity and things like that yeah so no it's good fun but urban decay yeah they're still good they do some fun palettes they do i'm gonna go and find my acid rain yeah we're gonna we're gonna know i'm gonna nosedive straight so feel as bex's makeup draw but um before we do that i want to thank you because i think there's so many wonderful aspects to where you found yourself not least the message of sending out to all those people who feel maybe the rug has been pulled under them they're there with the baby here the other one doing the rolling and always rolling um and that feeling of what have I done I don't know if I can do this I just keep wanting to sort of picturing you like reaching back to you five years ago and saying like we did it yeah I did I did think that the other day because I was saying to a friend who um we ran the marathon the same day she did Manchester I did London and she is a marathon runner and she was running for a sub four hour a marathon because she's crazy and it was a really hot day and she didn't get it and I she's and I knew she was going to be really disheartened because obviously she trained so hard and I said to her just think if you could go back to you five years ago and say by the way mate you're a marathon runner now that's what you do she'd be floored by you and also what that's brought to her but the confidence that's brought she's like changed parts of her career and I said if you could go back and just go and talk to her now and say this is what you do now and this is where you work she wouldn't recognize you so like that's what you need to focus on today not the time but where you are now where you've got to and I think that that's really important that where exactly like you said right now you might be really in the depths of where you're at but it's not forever it's not forever you might just have to survive for a bit and it's not I wouldn't want to say like survive for the next few years because that makes it sound like it's just going to be awful there's obviously there was loads of joy in those couple of years years but it was really really hard and I'm not afraid of saying that and I'm not afraid of saying parenthood can be really brutal and it can be really tough on your relationship and finances and everything because there are people out there who think that they're alone feeling like that so you're not alone and it's not forever and you will you will find you will find yourself again for sure well I think also the significance of having good people around you absolutely don't they?

1:03:04That's vital, isn't it? I'm thinking of your mum listening out there somewhere. Fifi. Fifi massive. She'll be delighted. She'll be sat there like this. Big beam. She'll be like, I wasn't. You didn't get Jo mentioned. She'll tell Bridge Club.

1:03:26So funny. After Genevieve left the house, I went upstairs and looked in all my makeup and I still had so many old bits of makeup after we've been talking about makeup. I still have like Urban Decay, Acid Rain and all these other makeups we've been talking about. I would have loved to have had a go at being a makeup artist, but I think I might lack the precision because when Genevieve's doing makeup, I can see that she's good at just taking her time and making it perfect for someone, especially on their wedding day. I mean, what a pressure. For me, I think I'm just too, too quick to slapdash, like, you know.

1:04:05But then maybe you learn when it's other people. Anyway, shared passion for sure. And also how fascinating to hear about Genevieve's experience working as an RAF nurse and, yeah, just how full on that was. So thank you so much to her. And, look, thank you to you. This is episode, well, my 160th guest now. and that's crazy to me all spread out over five years but I probably should have celebrated the fifth birthday podcast a little bit it's all right I can wait for the 10th maybe but um yeah what an amazing thing so happy I think I refer either out loud or just in my head to wisdom I have found with these conversations daily daily they've been that influential to me and especially with my album Perry Menopop I don't think I would have made it without doing this podcast it's funny how all the things link up and lead together when you don't expect it but yeah thank you to Genevieve thank you to all my guests for this series it's been a joyful turn and please do keep your suggestions coming and also everybody when they message me and tell me that they've enjoyed the podcast I read all the messages and I always really appreciate it it's funny I've got so many things I get up to if someone comes up to me in the street and says i love your podcast it almost means more to me than anything else i think because i pour so much of myself in here it's definitely a boulder i push all by myself in that regard like i have you know amazing support with richard um doing the editing with ella may for the artwork i'm with claire jones for the production but um i kind of the actual initial sort of motivation and momentum comes from my own my own desire to keep it going so everybody that enjoys it thank you so much you definitely put fuel on the fire and I appreciate it anyway I'm rambling a little I can see inside the kids are all watching a little bit of Glastonbury on catch up together with their dad I um I must admit I've had pretty bad fame I never get fame I'm not a famo kind of gal but this year Glastonbury looks so good so many good acts and I've had so many happy times there.

1:06:20But I have been there for the last two years and it's very unusual to perform two summers back-to-back, let alone three. So I have to just be at peace with that. And I didn't want to go if I wasn't performing because that would just feel sad too, even though I know I'd have seen some good stuff. Anyway, it's fine. I'll get over it. Other fun things have happened. And, you know, I wouldn't have been able to see How to Train Your Dragon live action today if I'd been at Glastonbury. So, you know, these are the wins, right? All right, listen, have a great summer. whatever you're getting up to and i will be back let's put a marker on the diary for september and i will see you then with more glorious guests to uh entertain and inspire i hope lots and lots of love thanks to everybody who works in the podcast with me um claire has been with me since the beginning doing production um richard he has been an amazing support we're doing the editing week after week and Ella Mae I know you've had a few weeks off because of your new baby but he's beautiful and you do beautiful artwork and you'll be back for the next series so lots of love to all my beautiful listeners and their beautiful ears and all my gorgeous guests and I will see you on the other side lots of love thank you so much

1:07:46We'll be right back.

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