I'm Absolutely Fine! by The Midult: Recent Episodes

The Midult

Do you feel like a fully-functional human person? Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan of The Midult look at all the glamour and indignity of being a grown-up, while rummaging through the handbags, emotional knicker drawers and lives of some extraordinary people.

Sometimes we need reminding that we aren’t failing. The entire fucking system is against us. We have interviewed three brilliant American women who have dedicated their careers to looking at the patriarchy: Ada Calhoun with her Generation X defining book, Why We Can’t Sleep: Women’s New Midlife Crisis. Eve Rodsky’s manifest for female creativity: Find Your Unicorn Space. Elise Loehnen’s primal roar that is On Our Best Behaviour. Presumably you are already angry. Have a listen, get angrier and feel better. We could say empowered but we can’t quite bear it. Remember that you are not alone. After all, if we’re not in it together we’re not in it at all….Note: these are highlight, not new recordings Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hopefully you are fully engaged in a wonderful holiday, spending joyous time immersed in the glorious slipstream of your family dynamics. If so GOOD FOR YOU. If, however, you feel that you are on the brink, near the overwhelm or just unbelievably tired, have we got an episode to you… We’ve gathered together some self-preserving thoughts from therapy titans, Julia Samuel, Mandy Saligari and Sam Akbar, to talk you down off the emotional cliff. Note: these are highlights, not new recordings. PS: For further inspiration you might want to take a look at Julia Samuel’s Every Family Has A Story, MandySaligari.com and Sam Akbar’s Stressilient. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Here at I’m Absolutely Fine we have gathered the finest beauty minds for a Beauty 101. Nadine Baggott brought us her Skincare SOS kit: she decodes the ingredients to look out for and keeps budget front of mind. Sali Hughes, who has launched her wildly successful skincare range with Revolution (Emilie is a devotee of her Daily Exfoliant), opened up her make-up bag, uncovering treasure, and Annabel rifled through her bathroom to share her summer sensations…NOTE: These are highlights not new recordings… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Summer is here. Maybe you are leaping into August with the enthusiasm of a newborn deer or maybe you feel as if you are about to be culled and mounted on the living room wall. We are veering wildly from wanting to scamper and scurry the streets, eating snacks and generally channelling rat girl energy; and spending so long in the bath that we turn ourselves into broths. Either way we will not be replying to emails in a hurry: Sorry for the delayed response but….I’m Absolutely Fine podcast is taking a break (having a break-down). However we will be sending out some greatest hits to keep you company. See you in September…. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Happy Friday! Just slipping into your feed to let you know that the week is nearly over, and there’s only one more week to go before you have to get through the next week. Oh God. So this week we asked you the question: You’re a burglar…but you can only steal things that MILDLY INCONVENIENCE your victims. What are you taking? 700 of you responded with mildly inconveniencing horrors…Long story short, we are not the bigger person... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Our guest this week is Anna Richardson - host of Channel 4’s Naked Attraction and the recently-launched podcast It Can’t Just Be Me: a sex and relationships podcast where she answers all kinds of problems about anything from ‘Can you be friend with an ex?’ to ‘how do I cope partner’s depression?’. Anna has seen more naked people than anyone else we know, so we ask her about the dynamics of attraction and what she’s learned about bodies from looking at so many of them. She’s also making a documentary about Ozempic, the so-called skinny drug so we dive into that…is it a horror story or a fairy tale? Have a listen... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Just slipping into your feed to let you know that the week is nearly over, and there’s only one more week to go before you have to get through the next week. Oh God. This week we talk about JULY WEIRDNESS. July is the waiting room of summer, and waiting rooms are weird: you don’t know your life is about to change for the good or for the bad. As a result we find ourselves thinking the same thing over and over… ‘Disappointed, but not surprised’. And we have also discovered a good catch-all for when you don’t feel like explaining yourself…. Because, sometimes, it’s just none of their business. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to a Podcast From The Edge - I’m Absolutely Fine but…mini! Five-ish minutes, broadcast live from The Edge…The Brink… The Overwhelm…The Vortex - that slips into your feed every Friday. Not ‘That Friday Feeling' but, rather, all the fucking feelings. Just to let you know that the week is nearly over, and there’s only one more week to go before you have to get through the next week. Oh God. Here we go: This week we’ve chewed over some of the DANGEROUS ACTIVITIES FOR MIDULTS. Like... looking in the mirror - you never know what you may find. Which leads us on to this week’s burning question: Is a cheek hair worse than a chin hair? Discuss… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Our guest this week is novelist and all-round treasure Daisy Buchanan - who is no stranger to this podcast because now and again we ask her to come on and tell us what we need to be reading. She hosts the literary You’re Booked podcast and has just written another great novel - Limelight - which is about women and bodies and bodies and shame and sex and bodies and how we take up space in the world. We talk about how we are trained to look at ourselves and why things like sex and photographs are so complicated because sometimes we are not sure who we are doing it for...Plus brilliant book recommendations to help you get through Summer...

BUCHANAN'S BOOKS: Lucy Vine's Seven Exes Hema Sukumar's Minor Disturbances at Grand Life Apartments Balli Kaur Jaswal’s Now You See Us Lauren Bravo’s Preloved And Limelight by the lady herself…from all good independent bookshops Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to a Podcast From The Edge - I’m Absolutely Fine but…mini! Five-ish minutes, broadcast live from The Edge…The Brink… The Overwhelm…The Vortex - that slips into your feed every Friday. Not ‘That Friday Feeling' but, rather, all the fucking feelings. Just to let you know that the week is nearly over, and there’s only one more week to go before you have to get through the next week. Oh God. Here we go: All the ways we’ve been undignified this week - revolving door panic, dribble (both ways), torch incontinence and why, if you see a cross-looking woman carrying a fan through the streets with the plug dragging behind her…it’s probably Annabel. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We used to get on planes as though they were buses but, these days, that feels a bit more complicated, expensive and wrong. So what do you do if you long for adventure? Pine for discovery? But you feel grounded - and not in the good way? Well, we have our friend Melinda Stevens on the podcast this week – she’s about as expert as travel experts get. She edited Conde Nast Traveller UK and US for years and she’s just launched Loupe - a new initiative entirely designed to give us a new way to look at the UK. Perhaps there really is a whole world on our doorstep: new openings, rich regions, hotels, shops, villages, oh my. Anything interesting happening on this sceptred isle? She’s in the loop. Loupe on Instagram Loupe Website

LINKS TO ADVENTURE... Bard Rhug The Green Cafe in Ludlow Bayley & Sage Settle Unyolked Cowley Manor Experimental Aynhoe House Hungerford Bookshop Angela Knight Lingerie Wylding The Fife Arms Florence Knight at Sessions Arts Club Boath House Three Horseshoes in Batcombe Tillingham in Rye Pollyanna Johnson Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Envy, Gluttony, Anger, Greed, Sloth, Pride, Lust… Elise Loehnen has written On Our Best Behaviour: What Happens When We Stop Trying To Be Good? It’s about the way women have been caged by the patriarchy, by fake morality, by the seven deadly sins and by our feeling that if we are obedient enough, we will be protected. It is a fascinating, overwhelming read and she’s our sensational guest this week. Is it an uncomfortable truth that the more we try to be to the world, the less we can be there for ourselves? Are we denying ourselves a full existence? Buckle up, guys... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Everything in the world is making us want to retreat to our beds with a book right now. But what to read? Enter our guest this week, Daisy Buchanan. Daisy is a writer of naughty books and heartwarming books and books that can help us to look at ourselves with more generosity – from her hot novel Insatiable to the most recent Careering. She also has a mini-book out with The Pound Project called Burn Before Reading which is full of books to hold on to when you are in the emotional quicksand. We talk about how to read our way out of the slow-release burnout that so many of us are suffering from. It’s a heavenly listen as Dr Daisy prescribes books for all sorts of emotional ailments….

Here are Daisy’s literary prescriptions… A book to make you feel like you’re 13 again High Wages by Dorothy Whipple A book to give you hope for 2023 When The Dust Settles by Lucy Easthope A book for heartbreak A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara The book that changed my year – that celebrates vulnerability We Are The Luckiest by Laura McKowen A book to heal from dealings with a narcissist The Exhibitionist by Charlotte Mendleson A book for anyone grieving a complicated friendship One Day I Shall Astonish The World by Nina Stibbe A book for when you feel like no-one understands you Fight Night by Miriam Toews A book for grey days Sunny by Sukh Ojla You can also find Daisy interviewing writers on her brilliant podcast You’re Booked.... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Bay Garnett is the woman who turned second hand into vintage. She is the person to talk to right now, when money is tight, fashion feels oppressive and we want to stop contributing to the fast fashion phenomenon that just feeds our greed for new…more…now. In this episode, the Queen Of Thrift talks to us about how to plug into the thrift circuit, how shopping can also be activism and why secondhand clothes can help us tell our own style stories. Rather than the ones that are just…sold to us. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We all kind of agree that (despite the amazing skin elasticity and ability to metabolise alcohol) our 20s were the fucking trenches. So here we are in our 30s, 40s, 50s trying to decide which bits of our personalities to hold on to and which bits to let go of. Who to be, basically. Well maybe we could start with who we’d like to be in a very micro way. This week we start a campaign to be the people who…. organise 6:30pm dinners and no longer compliment people on losing weight. Tiny steps to world peace. But don’t worry we haven’t gone soft. There are also lot of things that we would sue, like printers, the patriarchy and Bryan Adam. We’re going to build a Midultverse where the lighting is fantastic, phone charge is infinite and sizing is universal. Come join us…. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If you are anything like us, you will have been driven half mad tracking the chaos - the sheer wildness - of the last few months in politics. So have we got a treat for you. This week our guest is the sensational Hugo Rifkind, Times star columnist and radio presenter - his Saturday morning show on Times Radio is a must-listen. He unpacks his red box of weirdness for us as we talk about the maddest things that have happened in this Autumn term of politics. Given we are in fast moving times, Gavin Williamson (his dickishness is one of Hugo’s talk points) has resigned, since the recording of this podcast. Bye then Gavin. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Here we all are, wrestling with the shifting sands of our identity. Who are we? What are we doing? Is this what we wanted? And alongside these panickings, there are times when our physical selves change and challenge us in ways that can make us feel desperate. Today’s guest opened the floodgates for people to take about their experience of hair loss when she started documenting her own situation. And the solutions she sought. Because Jo Jones is a woman of action – she co-founded Beauty Banks, an incredible charity and initiative that supports people living in hygiene poverty. She also co-hosts Instagram's Beauty Hags series. We talk about why hair is everything, Jo gives us her best beauty buys and tells us how we can help with the cost-of-clean crisis… Links... Beauty Banks Instagram My Instagram DropPoint P2Bus Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Do you have a happy vagina? Do you even know what would make it happy? Content? Perhaps equal pay and a health industry that prioritises its well-being? This is why activist and advocate Mika Simmons wrote her book, The Happy Vagina, to empower us to talk openly about health, relationships and pleasure. In this episode we talk to her about why vulvas need a rebrand, medical gaslighting, the stupid term ‘hysteria’ and get a bit fucking furious and a tiny bit hopeful. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

So last week we posted a Gemma Collins meme about those motivational slogans - printed and framed - that are somehow too much to bear. You lot shared all of your love-to-hate motivational sayings and now we’ve done a podcast about it. As well as Emilie’s most recent undignified moment, how late-onset rudeness has crept on us and why you should never EVER look in a lift mirror. Also we chat to the fabulous founder of Blink Brow Bar, Vanita Parti, about why brows are everything... PS: This podcast was bravely brought to you by Blink Brow Bar and their new supercharging Brow Boost serum. This is practically a public service announcement. Get your hands on Blink's Brow Boost Serum. Because it’s all about the brows, people. And you know it. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Are you scared of mascara? Bruised by blusher? Disconcerted by dark circles? Do you want to look like you know what you’re doing with makeup? Or maybe you’ve set the bar lower, and you just want to look a little less corpse-like as Winter beds in. This week we called in our friend and general sensation, Nadine Baggott, to talk all things make up. Because Nadine – who seamlessly transitioned from veteran health and beauty journalist to YouTuber with 23 million views - is a proper expert. We talk about CBA (Can’t Be Arsed) Make-up, and why we all need a magnifying mirror. Oh God. PS: This podcast was bravely brought to you by Blink Brow Bar and their new supercharging Brow Boost serum. This is practically a public service announcement. Get your hands on Blink's Brow Boost Serum. Because it’s all about the brows, people. And you know it. PPS: Here is a list of all the products discussed... Olay Whips moisturisers L'Oreal Paris True Match Foundation Laura Mercier Tinted Moisturiser Chantecaille Future Skin Beauty Pie One Powder Wonder Charlotte Tilbury Airbrush Flawless Finish Nars Radiant Creamy Concealer Nars Pure Radiance Tinted Moisturiser Clarins Everlasting Compact Foundation Blink Brow Bar Josh Wood Colour Mac Powder Blusher in Peaches Ciate Dewy Stix Highlighter Westman Atelier Lit Up Highlight Stick Perricone MD Face Finishing & Firming Tinted Moisturiser Chanel Les Beiges Bronzing Cream Nars Laguna Bronzing Cream Revolution Cream Bronzer MAC eyeliner pencil soft brown Bobbi Brown eyeshadow Max Factor 2000 Calorie Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Most of us live in a constant state of despair around how to get dressed. Office clothes now feel like fancy dress. Trying to look a little bit swishy for a night out feels like a Sisyphian struggle. We want to look together but casual at the weekends but mostly we look like pile of old laundry. So the question is: how to look relevant and comfortable - and even a little bit dangerous - when you’ve slightly lost your way? This week we’ve brought in some heavy hitters. Ex-Vogue fashion editors and celebrated stylists who set up a website, Collagerie, to solve exactly this problem: finding one thing over every thing. We talk to Lucinda Chambers and Serena Hood about where to find the best boots, jeans, shirts, coats, earrings and the rest. They style Annabel in a pink mohair jumper. Beware, listening could be a bit perilous for your wallet… collagerie.com jigsaw-online.com/collagerie PS: This episode is bravely brought to you by Readly – your one-stop shop for thousands of magazines and newspapers, from Grazia and New York Magazine to The Guardian and World of Interiors. Readly are offering I’m Absolutely Fine listeners a free two-month trial at gb.readly.com/midult. Read it all. With Readly. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Is your social battery dead? The Social Battery is the latest excuse-slash-label-slash-diagnosis for why we are so tired and can hardly bear to see anyone, do anything. So this week we discuss all the different batteries we could use and what would happen if we actually became fully-charged human women. WHAT THE HELL THEN? We also offer some translations for every day sayings like "I’ve had a bit of day" (I have just had the most intensely terrible experience of my life) and "Have you seen the news?” (I don’t want to tell you what is in the news in case you are too fragile. But another terrible thing has happened). Because have you seen the news? Oof. Link in bio. PS: This episode is bravely brought to you by Readly – your one-stop shop for thousands of magazines and newspapers, from Grazia and New York Magazine to The Guardian and World of Interiors. Readly are offering I’m Absolutely Fine listeners a free two-month trial at gb.readly.com/midult. Read it all. With Readly. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Paralysing grief, collective dread, crushing anxiety, acute self-loathing, debilitating panic - are you feeling it all right now? Well, we have an authority on the podcast this week. Donna Lancaster is a therapist, facilitator and healer. She has 30 years of experience in her back pocket: she was head of teaching at the Hoffman Institute and is a co-creator of the Bridge Retreat, a six-day personal development experience where you can overcome grief and loss and step into wholehearted living. Now she’s a written a book, The Bridge, which is a gift for people seeking peace. A guide to help us to return to the person we were before our hearts were broken one too many times. Oof. PS: This episode is bravely brought to you by Readly – your one-stop shop for thousands of magazines and newspapers, from Grazia and New York Magazine to The Guardian and World of Interiors. Readly are offering I’m Absolutely Fine listeners a free two-month trial at gb.readly.com/midult. Read it all. With Readly. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

How do you feel about your body? Can you celebrate its wondrous function? Do you high five yourself every time you tie your shoelaces or carry a heavy thing? Do you admire your favourite bits and embrace your other bits? Are you happy with your size and shape or do you often see yourself as a …before picture "If only I were thinner, more toned, had bigger/smaller/perkier boobs?” We have run the daily gamut of diet culture for years, a happiness-threatening - hell, life-threatening - obsession with thinness and food. It’s exhausting, isn’t it? But help is at hand. Alex Light is dedicated to helping people separate reality from the air-brushed, patriarchal diet pressure that makes so many of us hate ourselves. She promotes body confidence and self-acceptance by talking about her own eating disorder struggles and pointing out the dangerous hypocrisies and downright lies in the media and fashion world surrounding women’s bodies. She co-hosts the number one podcast called Should I Delete That? and now she’s written a book, You are Not A Before Picture, and frankly we are little bit obsessed with her. We talk about all of this and more. Plus there’s a bolt-on with Abbie Miranda, the co-founder of Beija London, the sensational lingerie brand that has bravely sponsored this week’s episode. PS: Visit www.beija.london for a look at their beautiful modern classics, from a AA up to a 36H. They also offer a free 20-minute online bra fitting if you are unsure about your size. Beija London are giving I’m Absolutely Fine listeners a 15% discount – just enter ‘themidult' at checkout… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We’re back. And we’re fine laughs for days. So fine. This new term does not have that hopeful September flavour, does it? What with The Great Exhaustion, raw sewage in our seas, Truss & Trump, energy bills, war, floods and all the other global horror. The unnamed dread we’ve been pointlessly carrying around for years has now become very much named dread. Oof. Anyway, to celebrate our return, we have made a desperate attempt to put some good energy into the world to combat the collective dread and found some small reasons to be happy that it’s Autumn. We also talk about things we are just going to have to accept (politicians are awful and no matter how much sleep we get we are still going to be tired) and why maybe it’s time to dive into a gentle Midult crisis….another piercing, anyone? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Maybe we should just refer to this period in history as "The Circumstances". Because, let’s face it, we have been around the block a few times (!) and we have never experienced a time when there have been so many “circumstances”. Doesn’t seem much point in listing all the things – personal, financial, ecological, socio-economic, cultural, political. Doesn’t seem much point in breaking them all down and having to absorb the horror and understand the nuances and process the feelings. Maybe we should just sleepwalk through the next year or so, occasionally muttering about The Circumstances. Anyway, on the podcast this week we talk about all the things that seem like a good idea for 20 seconds; why we were always destined to be adults with anxiety and brilliant ways to turn down invitations. With a little help from @lettersofnote. We’re off for a little break,…due to the circumstances. See you on the other side. Love, A&E x Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Maybe you love your job. Or maybe you spend an alarming amount of time crying in the loo/working in the evenings to meet deadlines/feeling under-appreciated and trapped/hoping meditation will sort it all out. If you are constantly teetering on the brink or staring into the overwhelm – well we have a guest for you. Anniki Sommerville is an author and journalist, podcaster and woman familiar with… the edge. She ditched her toxic work environment, set about finding that elusive life-work balance and has written a book, The Big Quit, to help us all do the same. We talk about how to tame your inner arsehole, why ‘dream jobs’ might not exist and the perils of anti-chafing pants... Click Here for The Big Quit Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Listen, it's all pretty hideous/hopeless out there. But buying beauty bits can be properly feel good. Annabel rifles through her drawers to find her current beauty stars - some are new, some are classics. Some are budget, others are treats. All will blur, blend and burnish where we need them to. Head to TheMidult.com for all the shoppable links, but we discuss:

Botanico Vida Omega Oil

Kopari Deodorant

Oskia Renaissance Mask

Naked Sundays Collagen Glow 100% Mineral Sunscreen

Rose Inc. Blush Divine Radiant Lip and Cheek Colour

Guerlain Terracotta Matter Powder

Maybelline Lash Sensational Sky High Mascara

Charlotte Tilbury Airbrush Flawless Setting Spray

Sol De Janeiro Coco Cabana Cream

Nars Pure Radiance Tinted Moisturiser

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We all feel stressed, right? We feel dread-full. We’ve done Pilates and lit a candle and had a bath and, in Annabel’s case, fallen asleep in it. But still. The panic. WE NEED SOLUTIONS. So this week we’re thrilled to have Dr Sam Akbar on the podcast. She's at the frontline of serious, heart-breaking stress; a clinical psychologist who treats refugees and survivors of torture with post-traumatic stress disorder. Now Sam is applying those hard-won skills to our everyday flavours of stress with her excellent new book, Stressilient. We talk about how to be psychologically prosperous, how to stop being afraid of our feelings and why mindfulness should sack its PR team - plus there are lots of exercises to give us all a little of bit of space…have a listen and feel a bit better. We did. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Are you worried about the wreckage that is your face? We are. This week we have one of the country’s foremost beauty experts on the podcast…. whether it's writing her unmissable Guardian beauty columns, building the charitable initiative Beauty Banks or breaking the internet with her decision to go fully grey, Sali Hughes is honest and outspoken about beauty standards and how the beauty industry makes us feel about ourselves. She’s just launched her own brand in partnership with Revolution which keeps selling out. We talk about how things have changed since we were teenagers, the terror of trolling... and of course we delved inside her make-up bag, uncovering treasure which include… Tinted Moisturiser - budget and brilliant L'Oreal Paris Tinted Serum Rimmel Kind and Free Cream Blush Elf Planet Revolution Hourglass Cle de Peau Bobbi Brown Highlighter - of sorts... Charlotte Tillbury Hollywood Flawless Filter Bronzer Hourglass Fenty Chanel Milk Eye Shadow Crayon - idiot-proof Bobbi Brown Nars Elf Beauty Pie Tubing Mascara - for those prone to the smudge Clinique Estee L'Oreal Paris Trish McEvoy Kevin Aucoin Mascara Maybelline L'Oreal Rimmel Face Powder Mac Mineralise Skinfinish Natural Powder Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Regular listeners of the podcast will know how totally demotivating we find motivational quotes – however there is one exception to this rule… Veronica Dearly, whose whole-hearted warmth and empathy is at the cornerstone of her illustrations. Veronica's funny blend of stress and self-awareness is a lovely corner of the internet - she stares into the abyss and finds a little bit of hope there. Her new book How to Do Hard Things is out now: an illustrated guide to embracing change and challenging self-limiting beliefs. We talk Anxiety! Panic! Procrastination! Sometimes all at once... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Are you so bored of cooking that you’d quite happily throw all the utensils out of the window? Have you abandoned any attempt at culinary imagination? Are you worried about how to feed everybody, let alone with any kind of flair, without going insane and bankrupting yourself? Well, we are delighted to welcome the delicious Thomasina Miers to the podcast. She won Masterchef (FFS!) before founding Wahaca and her latest book, Meat-Free Mexican is an absolute goldmine. We talk about anxiety, cooking as meditation and how to spice up your lunch…cheaply. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We are slightly awestruck by our guest this week – she’s a BAFTA and Emmy award-winning screenwriter of such magnificences as The Hour, The Split, Iron Lady and Suffragette. But she’s soon to be famous for her bestseller This is Not A Pity Memoir. Ok, so we should warn you that this is a book about a series of heart-breaking events: her husband had a catastrophic reaction to MS drugs; he woke up from a six months’ long coma and she was the only person he didn’t recognise. Then, while caring for him and supporting the family, she got breast cancer. This is an incredible conversation with an incredible woman about life, love, death - all the big guns - and how you survive the unimaginable... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Recently someone said to us – as they do – just go with the flow. Our first thought – obviously – was…’Have you ever met us?’ Swiftly followed by, ‘What time does the flow start?’ And ‘What do we wear?' We have never knowingly or unknowingly gone with the flow. Anyway, we are unlikely to tell anyone to go with the flow, but there are a lot of things we are currently saying to people who have annoyed us like, ‘I’m just going to leave that with you’ and ‘Wow, you have given that a lot of thought.’ We also talk about ways to punch up a social situation (‘Who do you hate here?’) and all the childhood fantasies that turn out to be adult nightmares….like making decisions and taking responsibility and being able to watch whatever we like. Plus Emilie’s improbably intense relationship with her soft-closing drawers and, stay tuned for a ten-minute chat with Symprove's founder, the brilliant Barry Smith...

PS: This podcast was bravely brought to you by Symprove. You can sign up for a 12-week introductory programme – and here’s your code for a 15% discount MIDULT15 at symprove.com. Follow your gut feelings... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Recently someone said to us – as they do – just go with the flow. Our first thought – obviously – was…’Have you ever met us?’ Swiftly followed by, ‘What time does the flow start?’ And ‘What do we wear?' We have never knowingly or unknowingly gone with the flow. Anyway, we are unlikely to tell anyone to go with the flow, but there are a lot of things we are currently saying to people who have annoyed us like, ‘I’m just going to leave that with you’ and ‘Wow, you have given that a lot of thought.’ We also talk about ways to punch up a social situation (‘Who do you hate here?’) and all the childhood fantasies that turn out to be adult nightmares….like making decisions and taking responsibility and being able to watch whatever we like. Plus Emilie’s improbably intense relationship with her soft-closing drawers and, stay tuned for a ten-minute chat with Symprove's founder, the brilliant Barry Smith... PS: This podcast was bravely brought to you by Symprove. You can sign up for a 12-week introductory programme – and here’s your code for a 15% discount MIDULT15 at symprove.com. Follow your gut feelings... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we’ve got a veritable powerhouse of a guest. Maybe you started needlepointing during lockdown? Or baked a dodgy sourdough loaf or two? But if you’re Steph McGovern, you started a whole television show…. from your front room. In fact, Steph’s Packed Lunch, was just nominated for a BAFTA. We talk about our dire knicker situation, dealing with IBS and what it’s like to be a northerner who doesn't like tea. PS: This podcast was bravely brought to you by Symprove. You can sign up for a 12-week introductory programme – and here’s your code for a 15% discount MIDULT15 at symprove.com. Follow your gut feelings... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If you are ever depressed about the chilly perfection of Instagram then we have the antidote…. Em Clarkson, who uses this platform to call out the constant cultural undermining of women and to smash our own internalised misogyny one awkward-yet-joyful post at a time. We talk about the power of changing your mind, what will happen if we just keep letting ourselves be coated in shame and judgement, and why we shouldn’t try to be liked by everyone. Warning: Contains ranting. Link in bio. PS: This podcast was bravely brought to you by Symprove. You can sign up for a 12-week introductory programme – and here’s your code for a 15% discount MIDULT15 at symprove.com. Follow your gut feelings... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We have a question: at what point does your ‘manner’ become your horrible personality? Because – somewhere – we all have a horrible personality. Even Emilie. This week we discuss why we need to own our anger, and why all our inner people - Inner Warrior, Child and Diva - are malfunctioning at the moment. Plus lots of ways to get Midult high AND ways to say no without saying no - because we are, after all, only here to help…tune in for Big Midult Energy…. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Has there ever been a better time to talk about sex education? Girls, women and their bodies are under siege. Supposed protectors of laws and rights are watching porn in the Commons. Young people are deluged with mixed messages about what they should and shouldn’t expect. There’s an orgasm gap, along with all the other gaps FFS. It’s enough to make you want to start burning everything down. So this week we are thrilled to welcome journalist Sophia Smith Galer to the podcast to talk about her new book, Losing, which proposes a new template for sex education for the 21st Century - starting with the absurd mythologising of virginity. It will make you angry about the sexual untruths peddled at girls and boys for generations. It’s time for a sex reset... PS: This podcast is bravely brought to you by sex-positive start-up, HANX. They are offering listeners a HANX Free Set, which includes two of their best-selling, vegan, biodegradable condoms and two samples of their water-based, toy and condom friendly, gentle lube. Plus a discount for their next order at HANX – you just need to pay £3.50 for P&P. Just go to hanxofficial.com/midult and get it on… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What’s the word for when you’re very clever but can’t remember anything and know literally nothing…? Because that’s where we live now. This week on the podcast we talk about why we need entire essay prompts to remember anything; all the stuff we shall never understand (like why does watching documentaries about serial killers help us to relax); and why we are low-level suspicious of anyone who looks forward to a long weekend. Plus there’s a chat with Doctor Seaweed himself… PS: This episode is bravely brought to you by Doctor Seaweed. Discover the wonder of seaweed with 20% off using the code midult20 at checkout as well as an additional 15% off if you subscribe and save. Cancel and pause anytime free of charge! Doctor Seaweed is so confident you’ll notice a difference that there is also a 30-day money back guarantee. www.doctorseaweed.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sometimes it’s hard to even feel like ourselves. Pressure. Confusion. Exhaustion. And then we wonder about menopause and how we are going to handle the storms ahead… so this week we asked Karen Arthur to join us, to talk to us about those choppy waters. Karen was a teacher until menopause floored her, robbed her of her sense of self and led her down a path of anxiety and depression. She left her job, her relationship and, after a ton of therapy, found her new life - as a speaker, podcaster, model and fashion designer as well as an advocate for women and menopause. We talk about what happens when you tumble down the hole - and why there can be so much joy once you climb out…. PS: This episode is bravely brought to you by Doctor Seaweed. Discover the wonder of seaweed with 20% off using the code midult20 at checkout as well as an additional 15% off if you subscribe and save. Cancel and pause anytime free of charge! Doctor Seaweed is so confident you’ll notice a difference that there is also a 30-day money back guarantee. www.doctorseaweed.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

All this 'going out’ business…well, we are sorely out of practice and in danger of falling at the first hurdle: what to wear. Half of the exhaustion of 'going out' is the bit before. The getting ready. shudders So we are delighted that our old friend Kat Farmer has written Get Changed, a book about how to leave the house without leaving your sanity. We talk about bags, belts, budgets and if you are feeling lost, where to begin. Spoiler alert - never start with going shopping…. PS: This episode is bravely brought to you by Doctor Seaweed. Discover the wonder of seaweed with 20% off using the code midult20 at checkout as well as an additional 15% off if you subscribe and save. Cancel and pause anytime free of charge! Doctor Seaweed is so confident you’ll notice a difference that there is also a 30-day money back guarantee. www.doctorseaweed.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If someone asked you what you did for fun, would you have a full body panic? Are you living at the intersection where overwhelm meets boredom? Well, LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE PODCAST with writer and revolutionary, Eve Rodsky. With her latest book, Find Your Unicorn Space, Eve is helping us reclaim time, reclaim energy and reconnect with our creativity. No small task. But this is a woman undaunted by such things. We talk about daily flourishing, martyr syndrome, why chasing happiness all the time is a trap and why the concept of multi-tasking is a conspiracy by the patriarchy to keep us doing it all. Enough? Let’s all go find our unicorn spaces... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week’s podcast is all about how and why money makes us crazy. Rising costs are crunching us and we know that financial planning is sensible, so why are we resistant? Can’t afford to do the roof and yet still addicted to athleisurewear that will never witness any athleticism. We talk about money regret: waxing, the futile hunt for the perfect capsule wardrobe, highlights. And, at the end, there is a 10 minute chat with Pension Bee’s Clare Reilly about how to…get started. PS: This podcast is bravely sponsored by PensionBee – pension planning without the panic. Head to Pensionbee.com for more information. Capital is at risk. PPS: Thanks to recording this financial mini-series, Emilie has finally got herself a pension. With PensionBee. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We don’t think anyone was prepared for the idea that 2022 might be worse than all the rest put together. So, seeing as so many of us are feeling terrible and guilty and frightened, we are thrilled (and a little relieved ) to welcome Julia Samuel back to the podcast. Julia is a psychotherapist specialising in bereavement and a bestselling author. Her warmth and wisdom has helped thousands. Her latest book, Every Family Has a Story, is an examination - built around case studies - into how families work, or don’t. PS: This podcast is bravely sponsored by PensionBee – pension planning without the panic. Head to Pensionbee.com for more information. Capital is at risk. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

One of the areas where we feel we could be more grown-up is... money. Some people are unemotional, practical and organised when it comes to money. Not us. So we are delighted that our guest this week is a money grown-up. Georgie Frost is an award-winning financial journalist and she’s here to tell us how to initiate a financial MOT…and maybe help us calm the money madness in our minds. We talk about pensions, savings and how the best thing to do is just get started. Gulp. PS: This podcast is bravely sponsored by PensionBee – pension planning without the pain. Head to Pensionbee.com for more information. Capital is at risk. Instagram - @pensionbee Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Listen, all things considered, we weren’t sure whether to record a podcast this week. But we did…so APOLOGIES IN ADVANCE for all the weirdness. We talk about Spider Ma’am and other reluctant superheroes who might not actually be prepared to pull on the spandex. We talk about all the flare-ups - from emotional incontinence to accessorising. And we wonder what the fuck Meatloaf wouldn’t do for love... Who knows? Who knows anything anymore? It’s all very frightening, so go easy… xxx Click Here for a list of charities to donate to, and other ways you can aid Ukraine. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we are delighted to welcome a true voyager to the podcast – Clover Stroud travels to the very sharpest edges of human emotion in her writing, taking us with her through the dark woods of grief, loss and what it means to love. You are going to be hearing so much about her book, The Red of My Blood (which is about the death of her sister - out on March 10th) because it is brilliant, truthful, unflinching and devastating – the sort of writing that is sparklingly easy to read and very hard to think about. Today’s podcast is a tearful conversation about some of the things that make us human. PS: This episode is bravely sponsored by Leapfrog Immune. If you don’t have time to get ill, get Leapfrog…and there’s 15% off for listeners with the code MIDULT15 at leapfrogremedies.com. Stay tuned after our conversation with Clover for a chat with Leapfrog’s founder Stephanie Drax… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Our guest this week is the sensational Daisy Buchanan; novelist, journalist. podcaster and an authority on both books and sex. She writes brilliantly sexy books and her latest is called Careering about magazines, millennials and masturbation. Sometimes at once. But today she’s Doctor Daisy – giving us her book prescriptions for all our emotional ailments. Because, wow, do we need them… A book for when you need to be soothed, unravelled and made sense of - These Precious Days by Ann Patchett Books for when you’d love to spend time with friends but don’t have the energy for your actual friends - Asking For A Friend by Andi Osho and Everything I Know About Love by Dolly Alderton A book for when you need love in your life - Here Again Now by Okechukwu Nzelu A book for when you’re suffering from career envy - The Other Side Of The Story by Marian Keyes A book for when you have no time to read - 4000 Hours by Oliver Burkeman A book for when the world is going to hell in a handcart – The Movement by Ayisha Malik A book to break a reading drought - Dear Reader by Cathy Rentzenbrink Pre-order Daisy’s book Careering https://www.waterstones.com/book/careering/daisy-buchanan/9781408725931 PS: This podcast was calmly brought to you by OTO CBD Sleep Drops. Give yourself the best chance of a good night – and there’s 20% off for listeners with the code Midult20 https://bit.ly/3r25v50 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If you’ve ever been heartbroken you will remember the agony. It can be enough to stop you from embarking on new relationships. ‘Can I survive that again?’ you wonder. We very much hope that no one listening to the podcast is going through this right now, but if you are, there is a resource. Our guests this week are psychologist Alice Haddon and writer Ruth Field who founded The Heartbreak Hotel, a retreat where you can go and put yourself back together. We talk about power, possibility and a few little tricks to get the heartbroken on the road to recovery. PS: This podcast was calmly brought to you by OTO CBD Sleep Drops. Give yourself the best chance of a good night – and there’s 20% off for listeners with the code Midult20 OTO CBD Sleep Drops: https://bit.ly/3r25v50 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We’re not being dramatic but… we're under threat from… The Panic Variant. This week we talk about how we are navigating the panicdemic; essential conversations we have with our friends (burial or cremation? Big knickers or bigger knickers?) and whether we are meant to feel bad because Downing Street has hosted more parties in the last two years than we have been to in our entire lives… plus the Midult Eighties Kitchen Disco Playlist, designed to take you from empty, to euphoric. PS: This podcast was bravely brought to you by OTO CBD Power Drops. They are offering listeners a 20% discount with the code MIDULT20 – https://bit.ly/3o0hBtn. Discover the power of your inner calm with OTO PPS: THE MIDULT EIGHTIES KITCHEN DISCO PLAYLIST Let’s Dance by David Bowie I Wanna Dance With Somebody by Whitney Houston Faith by George Michael (I’ve had) The Time of My Life by Bill Medley & Jennifer Warnes Push It by Salt-N-Pepa Theme from S’Express by S’Express Footloose by Kenny Loggins Buffalo Stance by Neneh Cherry Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If anyone can shake us out of our January torpor it’s our guest this week. Is there anything that Helena Morrissey can’t do? She runs banks, advocates for women in business, writes books, and has nine children. She’s also a Dame and only 55. Maybe you need a lie down now? Anyway, Helena talks movingly about how the menopause ambushed her and rocked her confidence; how to ask for a pay-rise and why fitting-in doesn’t matter but finding allies does… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Not sure we know a Midult who isn’t currently experiencing that heady mix of exhaustion and panic - what will this year look like? Can I be bothered to care? Am I up to it? Do I look good in high-waisted jeans? Have I turned the gas off? Have I? So this podcast is about all the myriad Januarys we are having and why adulthood is currently not recommended. Yes we’re capable grown-ups (coughs) but sometimes even putting your phone down so you can focus on the telly feels like a major win. Getting anything done when you feel the way everyone feels at the moment should be a source of great pride. So we’re giving you all a medal xxx PS: This podcast was bravely sponsored by LYMA, but Annabel has been taking it for two years and asked them to come on board because she’s a genuine fan… PPS: Is your face falling off? We hate to cast aspersions but, if you are looking less than peachy, why not enter our lovely LYMA competition to win a facial with world-renowned facialist Nichola Joss? Click Here. T&Cs apply. LYMA's Website LYMA's Instagram Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What happens if you are on the floor, dreaming of a padded cell, a noise-cancelled life and as little interaction with the world as possible? Well, you can consult an expert on how to feel human again. This magical creature does actually have a human form, her name is Lucy Goff and she is the founder of super supplement LYMA. She came on the podcast to tell us where to spend and where to scrimp, what works and what doesn’t….Also we are hosting an Insta live with Lucy next Monday (the 17th) at 6pm so she can deal with all your confusions and questions about which supplements work, which don't, the ingredients to look out for and how not to get ripped off. So please DM us with your questions…. PS: This podcast was bravely sponsored by LYMA, but Annabel has been taking it for two years and asked them to come on board because she’s a genuine fan…. PPS: Why not enter our lovely competition in association with LYMA? Win a facial with world-renowned facialist Nichola Joss? Click Here To Enter T&Cs apply LYMA's Instagram LYMA's Website Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We can’t think of a better way to start the year than with a dose of sunshine in the form of telly’s Cherry Healey. She presents Inside the Factory, makes everyone cry on 10 Years Younger and is on a mission to help us all get our heart’s desire with her straight-talking manifesting course: Manifest That Shit, created with Instagram sensation @StyleMeSunday aka Natalie Lee. We talk about finding out what we really want, quietening all the interference and how manifesting changed Cherry’s life... PS: Why not enter our lovely competition in association with LYMA? Win a facial with world-renowned facialist Nichola Joss? Click Here To Enter T&Cs apply LYMA's Website Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Maybe you feel like the human equivalent of tangled fairy lights? If only we paused for thought as much as we pause for cheese. This week we talk about acts of selfishness transforming into acts of service: if I eat all the biscuits I am saying to everyone else in the house: "I love you. I alone am taking the sugar hit." Plus how raging in the car is our civic duty, to keep sleepy drivers safe and alert. Then there are all the different flavours of headache plus a few Midult mantras to chew on. In case you’re bored of cheese. #never This podcast was bravely brought to you by To Better Days - because life doesn’t have to be such a pain. To Better Days are offering I’m Absolutely Fine listeners a 10% discount and free shipping until the end of January with the code BOXING DAY at tobetterdays.co.uk Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sure, we’re supposed to be happy, shiny, excited, horny at this time of year. But what if we’re actually tired, angry, lonely, psychotic? Christmas is like a box of chocolates - you never know which feeling you are going to get. We talk about aggressive carols (Deck The Halls? Too bossy - stop telling us what to do); why we may never forgive Alan Rickman for breaking Emma Thompson’s heart in Love Actually AND why, when it comes to Christmas invitations, everyone needs a ‘soft no’ in their arsenal. PS: This podcast was bravely brought to you by Hairstory – go to hairstory.com if you want a better life for your hair… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Maybe you’re super well-informed, when it comes to all the political action. Or maybe you’ve been too tired holding the world up and haven’t got a clue any more. So, we called an old friend with a brilliant brain to come and tell his favourite news stories of the year. Hugo Rifkind is the hugely popular Times columnist and he takes us through his 2021 highlights including Dylan Johnson’s balls and Rishi Sunak’s tendresse for Mexican Coke. It’s Mock The Year 2021... PS: Here’s Rishi’s Mexican moment https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nO_fXajyzek Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We should probably apologise in advance because this podcast might make you a bit angry. But maybe that’s a good thing. Last week was Equal Pay Day - which marks the day in the year where women stop earning relative to men - because of the gender pay gap. Yes, we are all mostly working for free until the end of the year, on top of every other thing. So we asked Gill Whitty Collins, career coach and author of ‘Why Men Win At Work’ to come and coach the hell out of us all. We talk about confidence, culture and why women should sometimes just walk away….PS: another apology for the quality of the audio in places…not blaming the patriarchy but... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Life is a journey, right? Trust the process, ok? Resilience is everything, apparently. This week we talk about why the current self-help buzzwords make us feel like we’re failing. So we decide to add injury to insult and set a series of challenges for grown-ups - introducing Squidult Games. We also discuss why we are constantly vacillating between frenzied hyperworkmode and a near-catatonic state of existential dread and avoidance. Oh, and we interview the delightful Simon Gaisford, Professor of Pharmaceutics at UCL about bacteria and why we need to look after our gut - so that it will look after us. This podcast was bravely brought to you by Symprove - the water-based supplement that carries live and active bacteria to your gut in order to start to multiply and produce food for the bugs we already have. Be gut to yourself…You can sign up for a 12-week introductory programme – and here’s your code for 15% discount: MIDULT15 at symprove.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

OUR FACES. WTAF!?! So we had an emergency meeting with the incomparable Nadine Baggott. Now Nadine has been a titan among beauty editors for many years, but in 2016 she launched a YouTube channel with the specific intention of talking to grown-up women about beauty…. beauty with no bull, no facetune and no filters. Five years in she’s got hundreds of thousands of devoted followers who have entrusted her with all their beauty decisions. Because what Nadine doesn’t know about skin and make-up isn’t worth knowing. We talk about the creep of the crepe, decode the ingredients to look out for and look at our beauty budgets. This podcast was bravely brought to you by Symprove - the water-based supplement that carries live and active bacteria to your gut in order to start to multiply and produce food for the bugs we already have. Be gut to yourself…You can sign up for a 12-week introductory programme – and here’s your code for 15% discount: MIDULT15 at symprove.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

So. The hormones. The horror. The havoc. The what the hell is going on? Well this week we are thrilled to welcome broadcaster and general sensation Lisa Snowdon on the podcast to walk us through the fuckery of our forties - from peri-menopausal symptoms to imposter syndrome and everything in between…We talk about how Lisa found love second time around, why Emilie is having night panics and why you should always head to the doctor armed with a list of symptoms and a bucketload of research. Ok ladies, let’s get busy… This podcast was bravely brought to you by Symprove - the water-based supplement that carries live and active bacteria to your gut in order to start to multiply and produce food for the bugs we already have. Be gut to yourself…You can sign up for a 12-week introductory programme – and here’s your code for 15% discount: MIDULT15 at symprove.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Obviously we’re all absolutely fine…but…isn’t everything a bit nuts right now? This week we imagine a Midult House of Horrors where we are assaulted by voice notes and chin hairs. Apps that we actually need – like ones that warn us we are about to be the arsehole or let us know when an ex-boyfriend is going to appear. And we wonder if it’s nearly time to switch from our regular anxiety to our shiny Christmas anxiety…. Oh God. P.S. This week’s podcast is bravely sponsored by carbon neutral jewellery sensation @AnaLuisa. Go to https://shop.analuisa.com/absolutelyfine and use the code ABSOLUTELYFINE for a 10% discount. It doesn’t cost the earth… or the planet. #analuisany Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We don’t normally talk about babies or children on the podcast. But what happens when things get interesting? When you get to 37 and you're single, and being a mother is the only thing you’ve ever really wanted to be? Our guest this week is Liv Thorne who made the increasingly popular and brave decision to go it alone. She bought some Danish sperm and off she went. Simple? Not really. Liv has charted her journey to motherhood in her brilliant book, Liv’s Alone. We talk everything you’ve always wanted to know about solo parenting but were afraid to ask… P.S. This week’s podcast is bravely sponsored by carbon neutral jewellery sensation @AnaLuisa. Go to https://shop.analuisa.com/absolutelyfine and use the code ABSOLUTELYFINE for a 10% discount. It doesn’t cost the earth… or the planet. #analuisany Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We’ve shamelessly stolen the title of this week's podcast from our guest, writer and columnist Lucy Mangan whose book Are We Having Fun Yet? is out today. You will have read her TV column in The Guardian, you will have nodded in vehement recognition at her columns in Weekend and Stylist, and now here’s her first novel, a frank and fizzy look at family life – it’s funny, heartfelt writing with sharp corners that you bump into and go ouch, yes! That’s me! We talk about the female load, feminism, all the FFSs…we had fun and got furious…just the way we like it. PLUS There’s some bonus pelvic floor wisdom from psychologist Dr Meg Aroll PS: This podcast was bravely brought to you by pelvic floor trainer Innovo. They are offering listeners £55 off the full kit using the code MIDULT55. Time to give ‘Inner Strength’ a whole new meaning.... https://www.myinnovo.com/uk/the-midults/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Since we started recording this podcast we have always zoned in on the little worries. No tiny worry stone has gone unturned. But, just as there is a difference between being Big Tired and Little Tired, there is a difference, isn't there, between Big Worried and Little Worried? And isn’t there a fuck-load to worry about? So, this week, in our 99th episode, we worry about peeing. And women. And life. We talk about Halloween costumes for 2021, which turned out to be a rich seam to plunder. Because almost everything is HORRIFYING… PS: This podcast was bravely brought to you by pelvic floor trainer Innovo. They are offering listeners £55 off the full kit using the code MIDULT55. Time to give ‘Inner Strength’ a whole new meaning.... https://www.myinnovo.com/uk/the-midults/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Are you getting enough sex? What even is enough sex? Are you having good sex? How good is good enough? Are you intimidated by sex? Do you want more sex? Less sex? Any sex? Sex, sex, sex. This week we get down to business with Suzi Godson, one of the country’s best-loved sex columnists and talk about how to spice up your sex life or even just raise it from the dead….Plus some bonus wisdom from pelvic floor expert Dr Ruth Maher. PS: This podcast was bravely brought to you by pelvic floor trainer Innovo. They are offering listeners £55 off the full kit using the code MIDULT55. Time to give ‘Inner Strength’ a whole new meaning....https://www.myinnovo.com/uk/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode, we're 90% panicking, About energy: mental energy, emotional energy, physical energy. Will we ever have any again? About temperature. About everything breaking. About the new rhythm of life and we're meant to be dancing to the beat of what drum exactly? cue Darth Vader theme tune P.S. This week’s podcast is bravely sponsored by carbon neutral jewellery sensation @AnaLuisa. Go to https://shop.analuisa.com/absolutelyfine and use the code ABSOLUTELYFINE for a 10% discount. It doesn’t cost the earth… or the planet. #analuisany Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week it’s all about stuff to make life feel a little…easier. How about that? Annabel rifles around in her beauty drawers to talk about what might give you that bit of up, up and away as we step (stagger?) into Autumn...featuring: Hairstory Living Proof Advanced Clean Batiste Dry Shampoo and Volume Klorane Dry Shampoo Kristen Ess Working Texture and Loose Styling Powder Saltee Daily Protection Formula SPF 50 La Roche Posay Anthelios Age Correct Amanda Harrington The Face Set Oskia Adaptive Tan Mist Clarins Radiance Plus Golden Glow Booster Jones Road Miracle Balm Charlotte Tilbury Nudegasm Drunk Elephant O-Bloos Rosi Drops! Christian Dior Forever Cushion Powder Shiseido Micro Liner Ink Charlotte Tilbury Bigger, Brighter Supermodel Eyes Liner Duo Hourglass Curator Palette Nars Soft Matte Tinted Lip Balm in ‘Brief Encounter’ P.S. This week’s podcast is bravely sponsored by carbon neutral jewellery sensation @AnaLuisa. Go to https://shop.analuisa.com/absolutelyfine and use the code ABSOLUTELYFINE for a 10% discount. It doesn’t cost the earth… or the planet. #analuisany Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome back to your life. Oh God. This week we talk about what we need in our Back to Life pencil cases (a rubber to erase all the times you were a dick?), the weird ways we receive compliments (This old thing? I found it in the skip) and the little domestic fantasies that keep us going. We take our thrills where we can find them... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We are going on holiday. We think. But as we prepare to leave the building/consciousness we wonder if we are grown-ups? Or teenagers? About the little lies we tell every day and our own, personal pingdemic. This episode is so mad that our delightful producer @chesleyxmoore emailed us to asked if we were OK. Who knows? See you in September you lovely lot… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Everyone we talk to is exhausted - desperate for a holiday/a break/a month lying down in a darkened room. And we are all sick of looking at our faces: newly etched and grey from all the WFH: Worrying from Home. So we are delighted that the renowned make-up artist Hannah Martin came on the podcast with a ton of tips and tricks for make-up to make us look like we’re having a break. Not a break down. PS: She’s developed the perfect lip oil for My Beauty Brand - and there’s 30% all her products on My Beauty Brand with the code HANNAHMARTIN HANNAH'S SUMMER SAVERS Superdrug Control Papers Shiseido Oil-Control Blotting Paper Beauty Pie Sheer Tinted Oil Free SPF 20 (we have a code, MIDULTSENTME) Tarte Shape Tape L’Oreal Infallible Iconic London Sheer Bronze Nars Tinted Moisturiser By Terry Hyaluronic Hydra Powder Charlotte Tilbury Hollywood Flawless Westmann Atelier Peau de Peche Bobbi Brown Shimmer Brick Tata Harper Cream Blush Jillian Dempsey Cheek Tint Ciaté London Glow-To Illuminating Blush in Baby Doll Trish McEvoy Cream Eyeshadow Bobbi Brown Cream Shadow stick in Golden Bronze Victoria Beckham Future Lash Trish McEvoy High Volume Tubular Mascara Urban Decay 24-7 Eyeliner in Tiger Eye Max Factor Kohl Pencil Victoria Beckham Satin Kajal Liner Hannah Martin x My Beauty Brand Perfect Pink Lip oil Charlotte Tilbury Red Carpet Red Mac in Ruby Woo or Lady Danger Max Factor Infinity Huda Beauty Liquid Matte Lip Kylie Jenner Lip Kit Urban Decay All-Nighter Hourglass Veil Setting Spray Charlotte Tilbury Setting Spray Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dating apps. Minefield or smorgasbord? Necessary evil or delicious distraction? Our guest today is writer Phoebe Luckhurst, a seasoned dater with her fingers on the swipe button. We tell tales from the dating frontline, ask whether punctuation is a deal breaker and why digital connection can end up meaning personal disconnection. Phoebe’s first novel The Lock In is out next week. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Some resets you plan, some ambush you. What happens when you are 47, you get divorced, you lose your house, you lose your dog and you get an unexpected diagnosis? Maybe you spend the next few years in a darkened room. Or if are our guest this week, fashion editor and columnist Stacey Duguid, you look life right in the eye and decide you want to embrace the second half with, as she puts it, "the kind of high-level enthusiasm you might find on centre court during the finals.” And that includes dating, a lot of dating. But you also spend a hell of the time in that darkened room. In this episode we talk about how she coped when the universe decided to reset almost every area of her life. It’s a tough one... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Is anyone else finding that doing the things we used to do feels 1000 times more exhausting than before the pandemic? How is that possible? This week, on the podcast, we wonder if we are doing anything right and why sometimes it feels as if our lives are at the mercy of some evil writers who keep shouting PLOT TWIST…. Plus all the ways we feel 90 years-old: Annabel’s head torch makes a comeback and Emilie embraces the sturdy (orthopaedic) shoe. #rockstars

This podcast is bravely brought to you by @readly. Heard about Readly? It’s a digital subscription service for magazines and newspapers, a kind of Spotify for thousands of national and international titles available at a touch on your smartphone or tablet. Readly is offering you lovely lot 2 months free if you sign up today using our link readly.com/themidult. Then it's £7.99 a month for over 5000 titles and you can cancel anytime. Remember staggering around, weighed down with three tonnes of mags that cost a million pounds? Not any more. It couldn’t be simpler and… boom? Suddenly the world is at your fingertips. It’s a joy actually. We’re really into it. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Everyone in the world had a bit of a shocker in March 2020. But few more so than our guest, Helen Thorn whose marriage suddenly ended 3 weeks before lockdown. So, what happens when you find that you’ve fallen out of marriage and fallen in love with being single via dating, drinking, lawyers, video sexting, single parenting, wanking and female friendship? Not all at the same time. She’s one half of the brilliant Scummy Mummies comedy duo and her book Get Divorced, Be Happy is out next month - a testament to the fact that there can sometimes be treasure in the horror.

This podcast is bravely brought to you by @readly. Heard about Readly? It’s a digital subscription service for magazines and newspapers, a kind of Spotify for thousands of national and international titles available at a touch on your smartphone or tablet. Readly is offering you lovely lot 2 months free if you sign up today using our link readly.com/themidult. Then it's £7.99 a month for over 5000 titles and you can cancel anytime. Remember staggering around, weighed down with three tonnes of mags that cost a million pounds? Not any more. It couldn’t be simpler and…boom? Suddenly the world is at your fingertips. It’s a joy actually. We’re really into it. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Are you out in the world, attacking the day or do you just want to lie in bed staring at the wall? Well, the brilliant Esther Coren is here this week, armed with a book list to get through this languishing low. She’s a writer, podcaster and voracious reader who has an arsenal of brilliant books for our every wild and crazy thought… of which there are MANY...

This podcast is bravely brought to you by @readly. Heard about Readly? It’s a digital subscription service for magazines and newspapers, a kind of Spotify for thousands of national and international titles available at a touch on your smartphone or tablet. Readly is offering you lovely lot 2 months free if you sign up today using our link readly.com/themidult. Then it's £7.99 a month for over 5000 titles and you can cancel anytime. Remember staggering around, weighed down with three tonnes of mags that cost a million pounds? Not any more. It couldn’t be simpler and… boom? Suddenly the world is at your fingertips. It’s a joy actually. We’re really into it.

Esther recommends….

Wintering by Katharine May

How to Talk so Kids Will Listen and Listen so Kids Will Talk by Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish

Sorrow and Bliss by Meg Mason

Wow No Thank You by Samantha Irby

Early Morning Riser by Katherine Heiny

Cobble Hill by Cecily Von Ziegsar

A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles

A Bit of a Stretch by Chris Atkins Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Don’t know about you, but we are trying to find some even footing in a year where we’ve alternated between stagnation and panic - sometimes both at the same time. And now we are expected to deal with more change - to rise to meet the re-opening of the world. But we are still…stuck. So this week we asked our old friend Julia Samuel to come and talk to us because she wrote the book on change - literally. She’s a bereavement psychotherapist whose book, This Too Shall Pass, is out in paperback. She is also launching an app, http://www.griefworks.app/, to support people through grief - helping to navigate that most devastating emotion. We talk about living losses, the fear of the unlocking and why small steps might mean big leaps - eventually... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week things are meant to be near-normal. laughs hysterically Not this end. We talk about how we no longer understand diaries; the things you shouldn’t say when you are finally exposed to fellow humans - and we ask you: are you languishing? Because we sure as hell are... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Haven’t you found that, over the past year or so, your old tricks have stopped working? Your trusted emotional fallbacks have fallen short. You have become a stranger to yourself and to others. Yes… it's been heavy. And many of us are wondering if it might be time to… go another way. So this week we are delighted to welcome a little light into the studio. Estelle Bingham has been described as ‘The Heart Whisperer’ and she has been helping people find love, purpose and connection for over 20 years. Her flavour of energetic and psychic healing is all about embracing the joy and potential in our lives - and welcoming in all the possibility. Are you listening? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Are you suffering from an acute case of doubt? Then, according to this week’s guest, it’s time to wash your hair. Anya Hindmarch is the poster girl for kindness in an industry not renowned for its compassion. A leader in her field and a few others - Anya is brilliance in human form: creative, generous, innovative, organised. She has written a book called If In Doubt, Wash Your Hair, a guide to being kind to yourself and living a little more boldly. And who doesn’t need a dose of that? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we’re broadcasting from the edge… the brink… the overwhelm. Sometimes when you are feeling truly weird, a bit of a beauty tip can help. So Annabel has a rummage around in her drawers again to help you face the world. All products listed below…

Cinema Secrets Professional Make Up Brush Cleaner, 473ml, £21.99

CeraVe Hydrating Cleanser for Normal to Dry Skin, 473ml, £15.00

CeraVe Moisturising Cream, 177ml, £9.00

Beauty Pie Super Healthy Skin Deep Purifying Cleanser, 100ml, £7.97 (we have a code MIDULTSENTME)

Bliss That's Incredi-peel Glycolic Acid Pads (15pk), £21.99

Dr Dennis Gross Skincare Alpha Beta Universal Daily Peel (30pk), £89.00

SkinCeuticals Ultra Facial UV Defense SPF50, 30ml, £41.00

Ren Ready Steady Glow Daily AHA Tonic, 100ml, £15.00

Frank Body Caffeinated Scalp Scrub, 125ml, £13.95

Wildsmith Toning Body Serum, 150ml, £65.00

This Works Perfect Legs Skin Miracle, 120ml, £38.00

Braun Silk-épil 5 5-820 Epilator for Women for Gentle Hair Removal, £109.99

Boots Exfoliating Gloves, £1.50

NARS Pure Radiant Tinted Moisturiser SPF30, 50ml, £33.00

Laura Mercier Pure Canvas Primer Perfecting, 50ml, £34.00

Sensai Silky Bronze Natural Veil Compact, £45.00

Clarins Everlasting Compact Foundation SPF9, £32.00

Trinny London Just a Touch Foundation-Concealer, £28.00

Ciaté London Dewy Blush Glossy Cheek Tint, 10ml, £19.00

Elizabeth Arden Eight Hour Cream Skin Protectant, 50ml, £27.99

Laura Mercier Blush Colour Infusion Blusher, £24.00

Chanel Les Beiges Healthy Glow Luminous Colour, £43.00

Guerlain Terracotta The Bronzing Powder, £39.00

Marc Jacobs Beauty O!Mega X Three Powder Blush-Bronze-Highlight Palette, £42.00

Bambrows Organic Caster Oil, 10ml, £12.00

Charlotte Tilbury Brow Cheat, £22.00

Glossier Boy Brow, £14.00

Trinny London Eye2Eye, £18.00

NYX Professional Makeup Epic Wear Long Lasting Liner Stick, £7.00

Maybelline Lash Sensational Sky High Mascara, £9.99

L'Oreal Paris X Elie Saab Bridal Collection Limited Edition Paradise Mascara, £12.99

Chanel Rouge Coco Bloom Hydrating and Plumping Lipstick, £33.00

Victoria Beckham Bitten Lip Tint, £32.00

Charlotte Tilbury Tinted Love, £25.00

Morphe Luminous Setting Spray, 125g, £16

Johnson’s Baby Lotion, 500ml, £1.50 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

These are turbulent times, aren’t they? We have bent ourselves in all sorts of shapes over the last year and not in a fun way. Now that we are slowly blinking in the sunlight we are not sure who we are anymore and - in particular - who we are in relation to everyone else. Thankfully our guest this week is Emma Reed Turrell, a psychotherapist who has written the definitive book on people pleasing, called Please Yourself, which is out now. Are you a people pleaser? There are few different types you know - even some bolshy ones. So whether you have fallen down a people pleasing hole in lockdown, to whether you suspect that you’ve held yourself hostage to other people’s feelings, this is for you… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hasn’t this been a huge week? Have we finally lost it? Will we ever get off the emotional Coronacoaster? Now that we are expected to put on our human suits and go out into the world again, we talk about the weird behaviours, the paranoias and the terrible conversational habits we’ve picked up… Are we ready? Doesn’t look like it… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Anyone else forgotten how to get dressed? Having spent a year in elasticated waists, we felt the need to call our friend Kat Farmer, also known as Does My Bum Look 40, an authority on wearable, affordable clothes. We talk about why this is not the time to reinvent ourselves and find that there is a halfway house between troll who hasn’t left the house for a year and fully functioning fashion-aware female.

This podcast was bravely sponsored by Meg&Bee - beautiful bags for all the women that you are. The bags are classic, affordable and fantastic quality as well as being designed by an all-women team - and it takes a woman to know how to handle a handbag. You can change up the straps and play with tassels and charms depending on how you’re feeling. Annabel is wearing the navy suede classic with the disco strap, Emilie is wearing the suede classic with the camo strap. Meg & Bee are offering Midults a 15% discount until the end of April using the code MIDULT15 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

At the tail end of lockdown, we’ve never been so grimly aware of the dust, dirt and clutter in our homes. So we are thrilled that our guest this week is Lynsey Crombie, also known as Lynsey Queen of Clean. We get filthy about cleaning and why it both drives us mad and keeps us sane. Lynsey’s latest book The 15 Minute Clean is out today… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

After a year of panicking about lockdown, we are now deranged with panic about post-lockdown. I mean who even are we anymore and what on earth happens next…

AD This podcast was brought to you by Diet Coke. They have teamed up with magazine app Readly to give you two months FREE subscription to lots of amazing magazines! Pick up a Diet Coke and unlock your free two-month Readly subscription code via the ring pull… Grab #YourDietCokeBreak…@dietcokegb @readly

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Anyone else eating the same thing every night? We can’t remember a time when we’ve been more obsessed yet exhausted by food - so thank goodness our guest this week is the sensational chef and restaurateur Skye Gyngell. We beg for her help… Warning: may cause hunger. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we talk about the panic/excitement/panic around the return to our old lives: Eye contact? Packing? Restaurants? Oh my... We think about the mood-loop of the past year and how it’s messed with our sense of identity. Who even are we? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Are we slowly grinding to a halt? This week we talk about all the terrible conversations we’ve been having (favourite pasta shapes, the state of our feet); why you must never overthink a loo brush; all the lockdown phases we’ve been through and why we might just be a week away from doing something dramatic to our hair and/or never getting out of bed again... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we are thrilled to have Sophie Williams on the podcast. Sophie is a leading anti-racism advocate, activist and the author of Anti-Racist Ally and the upcoming Millennial Black (out in April). We talk to her about what we can do to be authentic allies and how perfection isn’t the aim, but progress is... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It’s amazing how little we know about our vaginas. We may have had sex, we may have had babies, we may have had scares, but there remains a kind of insidious ignorance and confusion about our own anatomy. This week we thought we’d take a deep dive with our guest, the fearless Dr Hedieh Asadi. What she doesn’t know about female bits and pieces is not worth knowing so we tackle vulva myths, how to look after vaginal health, to lube or not to lube and why a happy vagina means a happy woman.

This podcast is sponsored by DeoDoc, beautiful products for beautiful bits. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we talk about the tiny things threatening to tip us over the edge, virtual micro-aggressions and why Sunday carbs and Thursday vodka don't count… They just don’t. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we talk about box sets in the bath (party for one), Zoom panic and spiralling social anxiety. On the plus side, we haven’t had to deal with a missed delivery slip for months… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Anyone else feeling full-on feral? This week we talk about bed jumpers; run through the technicolour spectrum of walks we are taking and roll around in the ways we’ve aged since March 2020. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This time last year, we recorded a podcast with phenomenal therapist Mandy Saligari about self-esteem and how we can meet the demands that life throws at us without constantly running on empty. Little did we bloody know! Anyway now that we have nothing left to give - and yet more and more is asked of us - we thought we’d bring Mandy back. Because she’s a badass who helps people untangle their demons. We talk about how to feel your feelings, conquer that insidious personal isolation and why this is yet another f***ing growth opportunity... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As we enter the perineum of the year, we talk about all the things we’ve learned in 2020, ineffective stress busters and why we are all still rockstars on the inside - despite the 9pm bedtimes….

Thank you for all your wonderfulness this year… see you on the other side.

P.S. This episode is bravely sponsored by Skin + Me - personalised skincare, prescribed just for you, delivered to your door. Skin + Me are offering listeners their first month for free using the code MIDULT1220 (minus a £3.50 prescription charge). Check it out... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It’s beginning to look a lot like… Stressmas and we are acting out in all sorts of strange and uninteresting ways. So Annabel has rifled through her drawers (oh yes she has) to unearth some bath, skin and make-up discoveries to brighten up the most ruthless time of year.

Finds include…

Chanel No.5 Le Deodorant Soaper Duper Nourishing Coconut Body Wash Aroma Active Laboratories Muscle Recovery Soak Neighbourhood Botanicals Face Off Cleanser Facial Oil Dr Dennis Gross All-in-One Cleanser with Toner Beauty Pie Dr Glycolic Pore Purifying Glow Toner (we have a Beauty Pie code MIDULTSENTME) Laura Mercier Blurring Pure Canvas Primer Vieve The Essential Eye Palette and Modern Matte Lipstick in Treasure Charlotte Tilbury Lip Cheat Lip Liner Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we have the glorious Daisy Buchanan with us - a woman we trust with everything but most particularly books. Daisy is a wonderful author and host of the hugely popular literary podcast You're Booked and is a bit of an expert of the high brow and the low brow and the everything in between brow. And, right now, what do we need more than little, affordable portals of escape? A book - the most joyful way to think outside of yourself. Even when you’re stuck inside contemplating the end of the world as we know it. P.S. Her shockingly sexy book Insatiable is out in February

For when you have misplaced all hope - The Girl with the Louding Voice by Abi Dare

For any kind of grief – The Consequences Of Love by Gavanndra Hodge

For all your party needs - Eve’s Hollywood by Eve Babitz

For when you’re on the brink of joining a cult – Untamed by Glennon Doyle

For missing friends – Happy All The Time by Laurie Colwin

For when you have forgotten how to get dressed – Fabulous Nobodies by Lee Tulloch/How To Be Yourself by Simon Doonan

For romance to warm your cynical heart – Good Riddance by Elinor Lipman

For when all you need is love – Leonard and Hungry Paul by Roman Hession Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this week’s episode of I’m Absolutely Fine!, we talk guilt, girlfriends and gravy with the incomparable Claudia Winkleman. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we get personal about the panic. Our guest is the magnificent Andrea McLean, Loose Woman, award-winning broadcaster and writer of bestsellers. She talks to us with shattering honesty about the very dark place she went to last year and why it led her to write her book, This Girl Is On Fire. If anyone listening to this episode is experiencing any of the feelings discussed please reach out and get help. You are not alone and you are worth it. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week our guest is the extraordinary entrepreneur Marcia Kilgore, founder of beauty brand after beauty brand. Her most recent incarnation is Beauty Pie, the disruptive buyer’s club that changed the way we think about beauty shopping. We talk self-doubt, skin and why this might actually be the best time to unleash your creativity…

P.S. Beauty Pie is offering you lovely lot your first month's membership free. Your code is MIDULTSENTME*

*T&Cs apply Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we are going to have a little light lockdown therapy: our guest Anna Mathur is a psychotherapist, bestselling author and podcaster. We talk about all the fucking feelings, micro needs, big anxiety and small panics and why it is so hard to wade through it all at the moment. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week it’s the superb Scummy Mummies - and it's chaos! We had them round Annabel’s kitchen table one evening - back when such things were allowed - to talk terrible sex injuries and why we’re all feeling so insane. They are properly funny stand-ups, properly famous podcasters and properly brilliant human beings: we love Helen Thorn and Ellie Gibson so excuse the swearing, the snorting and the general mayhem of this recording. It was just bliss to do. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On the podcast this week we have a guest with a unique perspective on the horrors of getting dressed in the morning. It’s hard enough when you only have yourself to answer to. Imagine, if you can bear it, knowing that the eyes of the world will be on you, poised to criticise your figure and your fashion choices. Well, Samantha Cameron had years of those terrifying camera flashes and, since then, she has amalgamated her experience and channelled it into her own label, Cefinn, renowned for its solution-oriented elegance. So if anyone can give us some tricks to get out the door looking like a fully functional human woman even when our minds and bodies are betraying us, it's her.

P.S. We’re very happy that this podcast is brought to you by Label/Mix. They’ve collaborated with new, exciting brands and designers to bring you hot fashion at slightly more accessible prices. Have a look... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today we are delighted to have a real fashion authority with us. Anna Murphy is Fashion Director of The Times and renowned for her stylish, real life approach to getting dressed; drawing our attention to wearable, relevant clothes as well as new and interesting brands with all sorts of creative, sustainable, ethical and fantastical stories to tell. Thanks to her we might all find it a little less traumatic to get dressed this winter…

P.S. We’re very happy that this podcast is brought to you by Label/Mix. They’ve collaborated with new, exciting brands and designers to bring you hot fashion at slightly more accessible prices. In fact, this podcast includes a little chat with the force behind Label/Mix, the sensational Gemma Metheringham. Have a listen... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In these strange times, when we are so unsure, it’s reassuring to talk to experts. So, taking a break from weeping into our wardrobes, we talked to the peerless Caroline Issa: fashion super force, publisher of Tank magazine, consultant for beautiful brand after beautiful brand, street-style queen, on every best dressed list for ever. Because if anyone can navigate us through these choppy wardrobe waters it is this lady.

P.S. We’re very happy that this podcast is brought to you by Label/Mix. They’ve collaborated with new, exciting brands and designers to bring you hot fashion at slightly more accessible prices. Have a look... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Way back in the mists of time - 2018 - the authors of the bestselling Slay in Your Lane: The Black Girl’s Bible, came on our podcast. It opened our eyes. So, as soon as there was a whisper of a new book, we booked them in. So yes, Yomi Adegoke and Elizabeth Uviebinene are back with Loud Black Girls, an anthology of 20 black British women writers asking what’s next… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Do you suspect that you may have aged 1000 years in the last six months? Well you probably have…. stress + environment + everything = skinpocalypse. So we talked to one of London’s leading cosmetic doctors Dr Suha Kersh about life, lines and how to get your face back on track. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today's guest is the sensational Sophia Money-Coutts who is an actual person and a writer, not a made-up character. She is the author of best-selling, sexy novels; a journalist and now the host of a new podcast about freezing her eggs called Freezing Time. We probed her on every single detail - legs in stirrups please. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We’re back! Are we though? Oh God. Everything is so crazy. So... to counter the moaning, the madness, the uncertainty, the sheer precariousness of everything, Annabel takes us for a romp around her bathroom cupboard. This week we are all about September Beauty Heroes from a soothing cleanser to a sensational new mascara via the best bath oil and glowy skin stuff...

@drunkelephant @oskiaskincare @katesomervilleskincare @afrohairandskinco @weledauk @skinceuticals_uki @malinandgoetz @suqqu_europe @ctilburymakeup @narsissist @olverum @colorwowhair Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Are you a bit miserable? Do you feel as though you’re failing? As though you’ve missed the life you could have had. Because most grown-up women are finding themselves living in a total shit show. But – as we always say – if we’re not in it together, we’re not in it at all. So, it’s very exciting that just before we fully surrender to our nervous breakdowns, we have a real authority on the line. Ada Calhoun has written the definitive analysis about why Generation X women feel so close to the abyss: In Why We Can’t Sleep – Women’s New Midlife Crisis she looked at housing costs, employment trends, debt, divorce, perimenopause and at every turn she saw a pattern – Gen X women were in crisis. See? It’s never just you… P.S. The podcast is taking a break, see you in September. Love, A&E x Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week our guest is sunshine in man form. Jules Von Hep has worked in the tanning industry for over 10 years, bronzing up Hollywood’s finest, getting models golden backstage at fashion week, always on and off TV sets, including Strictly and The X Factor – you name it, he’s seen them naked and at their most vulnerable. So it’s no surprise that he is also obsessed with body positivity, inclusivity and making people feel really good about themselves… ENJOY Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We all have a super weird relationship with food, don’t we? Well, this week we’ve got a rosé-drinking, no-nonsense nutritional therapist, the wonderful Eve Kalinik on the line. With her realistic approach to gut health and food fads, she talks sugar, gluten, caffeine - all the big guns - and what the perfect poo should look like. It’s a gut ‘un… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we talk to the brilliant columnist, satirist and broadcaster Hugo Rifkind about the rubbish new normal - from the threat of 'space weather' to Donald Trump sex dreams, via our old friend Brexit (remember him?) and our even older friend impostor syndrome.

P.S. This week’s episode is sponsored by the fun-fact-filled magazine, The Week Junior. You know how when you are a kid you think, 'I can’t wait to be an adult and then I will know everything'? Obviously, that didn’t pan out, but The Week Junior can help the young people in your life make sense of the world. The Week Junior is the current affairs magazine for 8-14 year olds. Its pages are packed with the latest news, animals, nature, science, books, sport, technology, films, recipes and puzzles to stimulate and inform those curious minds. It might even give you some help working out what the hell is going on! I’m Absolutely Fine! listeners can visit theweekjunior.co.uk/themidult to try their first 6 issues of The Week Junior absolutely FREE, with home delivery included. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we have a real, live female film director here. The magnificent Coky Giedroyc is known as the queen of costume drama: she’s made Wuthering Heights, Oliver Twist, The Virgin Queen, all with Tom Hardy coughs. Also Harlots and The Hour to name but a few… Her latest film is How to Build A Girl, an adaptation of Caitlin Moran’s book, which lands on Amazon Prime on the 24th July. In lockdown she’s also been Zooming with Take That because she’s making Greatest Days, a film about their fans. We talk corsets, heartthrobs and dealing with so many men in a male dominated industry - gripping. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we talk to a proper beauty expert, the delightful Emma Guns, about everything from our terrible toes to our terrible hair, via stretch marks and beards. P.S. This was recorded remotely so please forgive us if it’s a bit rough and mad. Here are all her top tip products...

Boots Foot File https://bit.ly/3euumWD

Philips Lumea https://amzn.to/318ewgd

Braun Silk-Epil https://amzn.to/2V80vva

Body Brush https://bit.ly/383HyiD

No7 Hydration Masks https://bit.ly/2B55wxW

Kate Somerville ExfoliKate https://bit.ly/2YysLtn

Kate Somerville DeliKate https://bit.ly/2YysLtn

Parissa Hot Wax https://amzn.to/2BuTMEM

Brain over Binge by Kathryn Hansen https://amzn.to/37Y7e0f Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brain over Binge: Why I Was Bulimic, Why Conventional Therapy Didn't Work, and How I Recovered for Good

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None

HOT (Hard) Wax Strip-Free (120g), Parissa Salon Style Hair removal waxing Kit for bikini, brazilian, face, upper lip, Eyebrow With after care Azulene oil

This week we talk about quicksand, office a***holes and daily malpractices - from Manifestering to adopting a Positively Mental Attitude... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

From suspender belts to knee supports, this week’s episode of I’m Absolutely Fine! is all about the multiple personalities of our knicker drawers. Bravely sponsored by Stripe & Stare - who are offering all of you 20% off with the code FINE10 (until 31st July) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we discuss living in The Overwhelm, on The Brink, in Denial, deckchair panic and how we've forgotten how to be civilised members of society. P.S. All these episodes are recorded remotely so please forgive us if they are a bit rough and mad. Love A&E x Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we talk about what would happen if Midults did Love Island, Locktail hour, and all the therapy we are going to need when this madness is over. P.S. All these episodes are recorded remotely so please forgive us if they are a bit rough and mad. Love, A&E x Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we are deranged with joy to welcome our very dear friend Gavanndra Hodge to the podcast. Her new book, The Consequences of Love, is about love, addiction, trauma, parties, grief and the eventual understanding that, if we are brave enough to look at long ago loss, we can change our lives. Listen to her. Then read the book. Trust us x Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we’re back on the Corona-coaster talking about all the different flavours of panic, insomnia and some of the times we disgraced ourselves… P.S. All these episodes are recorded remotely so please forgive us if they are a bit rough and mad Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week Annabel and Emilie talk about The Tiredness, micro horror stories and games you can play to keep the madness at bay. Sort of… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week Annabel and Emilie comb through the remnants of their former lives, from past-their-sell-by-date condoms to hair balls to secret copies of The Rules... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It’s Episode 3 from reality 2020. This week we discuss the erosion of our sense of self and how our fantasy life is getting out of control - in all directions Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We’re absolutely fine but… we’ve gone lockdown loco. It’s our second dispatch from the new normal. We talk about the magimix of feelings, the terrible sex dreams and how it’s possible to feel lonely and claustrophobic AT THE SAME TIME. Love A&E x Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We’re absolutely fine but…. we’re in lockdown. This is our first episode from Reality 2.0. Join us as we share some of our wildest thoughts in these strange times… P.S. This was recorded remotely, on our phones - which are now actually fused to our hands - so forgive the glitches… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mandy Saligari is complete badass: an addictions therapist whose TedTalk is titled 'Handle feelings before they handle you'. She is a multi-hyphenate who has helped thousands untangle their demons in order to learn to live a fuller life. She looks at self-esteem, the frightening areas of vulnerability, fear and how we can meet the demands that life throws at us without constantly running on empty. Sound familiar? She is wisdom in motion… this is an important 40 minutes. P.S. This podcast was recorded before life turned upside down. Love A&E x Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If you haven’t heard of @DoesMyBumLook40 then you’re about to. For years she’s been a badly-kept fashion secret: doling out tips and tricks on Instagram. She combs through the tat and shares the treasures. Now she is leaping from your iPhone screen to your TV screen in BBC1’s Prime Time show You Are What You Wear next Thursday. We are so grateful to you Kat Farmer, for helping us get dressed in the most human way. P.S. This episode was recorded two weeks ago when the world was a little different. Stay safe everyone ❤ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week Annabel and Emilie are dazzled by Kate Silverton. One of our most popular and versatile journalists, this woman is BRAVE. So versatile that she has been a war reporter, competed in 2018’s Strictly Come Dancing and tackled some of the UK’s most perilous rivers by kayak. She’s clearly a maniac. But she also looks inwards and her Panorama about childhood trauma and toxic stress is out later this month. Warning: this podcast made us cry. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week’s guest is Julia Samuel, one of Britain’s leading psychotherapists - she is also one those people who changes the temperature of the room, who makes it a kinder, safer space. Her speciality is grief - can you imagine the things she has seen and heard? The feelings she has witnessed? The pain that she has had to process? Known for her whole-heartedness, she helped to launch the remarkable charity, Child Bereavement UK and has worked both with the NHS and in private practice for over thirty years. Her first book, Grief Works, came out in 2017 and her latest book - This Too Shall Pass - is out now. She is pearls of wisdom bound together by kindness and we are honoured to have her on the podcast… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hormones. Hormones. Hormones. The horror. The magic. The conspiracy of silence. The almost institutionalised ignorance. Lady chemicals. It’s time to take back some hormonal power. This week on I’m Absolutely Fine!, Annabel and Emilie chat to Doctor Martin Galy - the renowned hormones specialist. Women who have been treated by him call him The Magician. He has helped thousands of women to take back control of their bodies And if anyone can blow away some of the myth and mystery - and downright terror - that often infuses our thinking around hormones, it’s Martin. So listen on and listen hard, because when rogue hormones are the boss, life can feel pretty rough. But, as ever, knowledge is power. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week Annabel and Emilie get naked with Grace Woodward. The former Britain’s Next Top Model judge and X-Factor stylist talks about the toxic fashion world and how it nearly broke her. But she staged a comeback to ask the question: why as women do we feel so terrible about ourselves? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I’m Absolutely Fine!, are now here weekly. Happy Galentine’s Day - this week Annabel and Emilie get romantic about friendship, tears, identity and all the different kinds of Midult porn. From property porn to cancel porn: cancel me, cancel me, cancel me harder! Oh God, that’s good…. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I’m Absolutely Fine!, are now here weekly. This week we hop into Josh Wood’s chair. We talk to the world’s most famous hair colourist about how women feel when they look in the mirror and cope with the ever-evolving creature that looks back at them. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I’m Absolutely Fine!, are now here weekly. This week we meet a bit of a super hero… Because not all heroes wear capes. Sometimes they wear very short skirts. They get cancer and instead of hiding away they film and photograph themselves at all their lowest, most brutally intimate moments. They show the world how you can live, love, dance, cry, suffer and survive. Thank goodness for Deborah James… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I’m Absolutely Fine!, are now here weekly. This week we are on the frontline of solo parenting with writer Sophie Heawood. talking about what it feels like to exist outside the nuclear narrative… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I’m Absolutely Fine!, are now here weekly. This week we’ve made an appointment with the book doctor. We talk to writer, podcaster and professional bookworm Daisy Buchanan about her literary prescriptions for heartbreak, trauma, envy, loneliness and money panic.

P.S. Here are all the books we talked about…

ENVY Adults by Emma Jane Unsworth Crazy Salad & Scribble Scribble by Nora Ephron Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

GRUMPINESS The whole of Adrian Mole by Sue Townsend Diary Of A Nobody by George Grossmith

HEARTBREAK Imogen by Jilly Cooper Wedding Toasts I’ll Never Give by Ada Calhoun

LONELINESS The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter Carson McCullers

MONEY WORRIES The Secret Dreamworld of a Shopaholic by Sophie Kinsella Ballet Shoes by Noel Streatfeild

OPTIMISM Almost Everything: Notes On Hope by Anne Lamott Rachel’s Holiday by Marian Keyes

TRAUMA The Lark by E Nesbit Man At The Helm by Nina Stibbe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I’m Absolutely Fine!, are now here weekly. This week we are rifling through the emotional knicker drawer and talking house moves, growing businesses and seizing every napportunity with Steph Douglas, founder of Don't Buy Her Flowers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I’m Absolutely Fine!, are now here weekly. This week we are rifling through the emotional knicker drawer and getting lubed up with the brilliant Anna Whitehouse a.k.a Mother Pukka. This podcast is bravely sponsored by Habito, on a mission to make mortgages easier. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to the perineum of the year. Join Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I’m Absolutely Fine!, in bed. This podcast is bravely sponsored by Habito, on a mission to make mortgages easier. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I’m Absolutely Fine!, are now here weekly. This episode they are joined by the sensational satirist Hugo Rifkind, talking about the personal and political chaos of the last week. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I’m Absolutely Fine!, are now here weekly! This week they are not talking about the election. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I’m Absolutely Fine!, are back with a mini series about marriage, divorce and all the mess in between! Join them for the final episode where they talk to Clemmie Telford about how she brought her marriage back from the brink... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I’m Absolutely Fine!, are back with a mini series about marriage, divorce and all the mess in between! Join them for the second episode where they do a deep, dirty dive into divorce with the legendary lawyer, Mishcon de Reya’s Sandra Davis. Notebooks at the ready! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I’m Absolutely Fine!, are back with a mini series about marriage, divorce and all the mess in between! Join them for the first episode where they rifle through the lively marriage of Giles and Esther Coren… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I'm Absolutely Fine!, are back with a second series. Join them for the final episode of Season 2 where they rifle through the brain and handbag of the heroic Deborah Frances-White, the woman behind the game-changing Guilty Feminist podcast. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I'm Absolutely Fine!, are back with a second series. Join them for episode seven where they rifle through the emotional knicker drawer and handbag of midwife, author and mother of all influencers, Clemmie Hooper, a.k.a Mother of Daughters. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I'm Absolutely Fine!, are back with a second series. Join them for episode six where they rifle through the emotional knicker drawer and handbag of the ultimate multi-hyphenate Emma Gannon. Plus how we get dressed, with the Creative Director of Hush. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I'm Absolutely Fine!, are back with a second series. Join them for episode five where they rifle through the emotional knicker drawer and handbag of interiors sorceress Rita Konig. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I'm Absolutely Fine!, are back with a second series. Join them for episode four where they rifle through the emotional knicker drawer and handbags of Yomi Adegoke and Elizabeth Uviebinené, the game-changing authors of Slay In Your Line: The Black Girl Bible. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I'm Absolutely Fine!, are back with a second series. Join them for episode three where they rifle through the emotional knicker drawer and handbag of Masterchef winner, restaurateur and all-round sensation Thomasina Miers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I'm Absolutely Fine!, are back with a second series. Join them for episode two where they rifle through the emotional knicker drawer and handbag of television presenter and wonderwoman Cherry Healey. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I'm Absolutely Fine!, are back with a second series. Join them for episode one where they rifle through their emotional knicker drawers, their handbags and their murky pasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this Boxing Day Special we talk to Bryony Gordon about addiction, the trouble with huge boobs and the never-ending chaos in our heads. Plus all the things we didn't get for Christmas... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

For the last episode of this series, we talk to the amazing badass Lauren Mahon a.k.a influencer Girl Stole London. On her podcast, You, Me & The Big C, Lauren and her co-hosts turned a cancer diagnosis into a game-changing conversation. We also talk about sex, mothers and make-up. So there. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Not all heroes wear capes. Some are never without false eyelashes. In episode 7 of our podcast we meet the utterly inspirational Martha Lane Fox to talk CONFIDENCE. Because we could all learn a thing or two from her... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I'm Absolutely Fine but is social media ruining my life? Hmmmm. On this week's podcast we talk to the whipsmart Katherine Ormerod about this thorny issue - because she wrote the actual book. Plus some useful beauty tips - because who DOESN'T need those? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Do you ever feel perfection is being pedalled at you from every platform? This week, Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan of The Midult sit down with diversity and body confidence champion Natalie Lee, a.k.a the influencer Style Me Sunday. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ever feel as though dry shampoo and concealer are the only things making you feel like a fully-functioning human woman? Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan look at all the glamour and indignity of being a grown-up. In this episode, they talk to the designer Bella Freud about mood, identity and gratitude. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Things get real when Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan of The Midult get down and dirty with comedians Ellie Gibson and Helen Thorn (a.k.a. the Scummy Mummies). You don't have to be crazy to listen, but it helps. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan of The Midult talk to designer Anya Hindmarch about how she grew into her face and body: the triumphs, the disasters and how she got organised. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan, authors of the best-selling book I'm Absolutely Fine!, rifle through their emotional knicker drawers, their make-up bags and their murky pasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Do you feel like a fully-functional human woman? Annabel Rivkin and Emilie McMeekan of The Midult look at all the glamour and indignity of being a grown-up. With glorious guests talking about how they grew into their faces, their bodies and their lives. Plus some properly useful beauty tips. Because who doesn’t need those? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices