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Welcome to season 2 of the podcast - Why didn’t anyone tell me this? This podcast is about health education with an emphasis on reproductive health. We do not cover these topics enough in school or beyond. Joyce Harper and her guests want to give you the tools to empower you to live a healthy, happy and fulfilled life. And on the way, we will debunk some of the myths around our health. This podcast will include a wide range of amazing guests, discussing topics such as nutrition, exercise, sleep, mental health, happiness, cancer, periods, fertility, infertility, fertility treatment, preconception health, pregnancy, miscarriage, PCOS, endometriosis, menopause and much more. Joyce is a cold-water swimmer so expect some episodes about swimming! They will tell you about their work and life journey, what are the key messages they want you to know, their motivation, what makes them happy and their advice to their younger self. Joyce Harper is an award-winning author, educator, academic, and scientist with over 30 years’ experience in reproductive health. She is Professor of Reproductive Science at the Institute for Women’s Health at University College London where she heads the Reproductive Science and Society group. Her latest book, Your Fertile Years, is published by Sheldon Press, 2021. She is chair of the International Reproductive Health Education Collaboration (www.eshre.eu/IRHEC) and co-chair of the UK Fertility Education Initiative. She is founder of Reproductive Health at Work. Further information at www.joyceharper.com.
Hi. I'm Joyce Harper, professor of reproductive science at the Institute For Women's Health at University College London. Welcome to season 3 of my podcast, why didn't anyone tell me this? This season, we'll be diving into topics that explore how to achieve good health and happiness. I'll be speaking with leading experts who will provide evidence based advice and debunk some of the many myths around our health.
Speaker 1:Additionally, I'll be having conversations with individuals who bring unique perspectives through their lived experiences. In season 3, we'll cover a diverse range of topics including reproductive anatomy, inspiring female icons, chronic health conditions, factors that influence our well-being, and global women's health issues. I really hope you enjoy season 3 of why didn't anyone tell me this? Welcome to the first episode of season 3 of my podcast. This is the 1st podcast of the year and has has now become tradition.
Speaker 1:The first podcast is just with me with no guests. So apologies. There's just me. But what I aim to do at the 1st podcast of every year is to tell you what I've been up to in the previous year and what's happening in the coming year. And I've called this edition of my podcast, Nurturing Your Good Health and Happiness, as this is what I want everyone to achieve in 2025.
Speaker 1:And good health and happiness was one of my mother's sayings, and I think it's such an important message. And I can't believe we're on season 3 of my podcast just over 2 years now that I've been doing them, and I've done over 50 podcasts. And you can catch up with them all, all the previous podcasts, on any pod podcast platform or also via my website, joyceharper.com. And if you want to see the interviews, we have laughter, cry crying, and everything in between. The videos are all on my YouTube channel, joyceharper.
Speaker 1:And it's been really exciting that my podcast is now listened to in over 90 countries, including Saint Lucia, Papua New Guinea, Norfolk Island, and Dominion Republic. And those are all countries that I haven't been to, but people have been listening to me. So that's great. When I started the podcast, I was being a bit random in how I chose to guess. I just thought about topics I was really interested in, and sometimes there were just people I knew that were really interesting.
Speaker 1:And they were all about health, and there was a focus on reproductive health. But in the middle of 2024, I thought about rearranging the podcast into miniseries. So I have done a lot in the past. If you look at the previous ones, we've done a lot of menopause. We've done a lot about exercise, and fertility and infertility.
Speaker 1:But the first official miniseries was on motherhood, and then I moved on to embracing life postmenopause. I'm gonna come back to that because that's what I've been working on for my book. And the final series for 2024 was on beyond the bleed exploring menstrual health. And I'm gonna continue with those miniseries for 2025. But before I talk about the podcast for this year, I hope you enjoyed the music that you heard at the beginning of this podcast, and I'd like to thank my dear, dear friend, Dave Crisco.
Speaker 1:He's been one of my best friends for, oh my god, Dave, I think about 40 years. And he makes loads of great music, so I asked him to make some music for the beginning and the end of my podcast. So let's look at the podcast I've got lined up for 2025. I've got some really amazing guests. As you heard in the introduction, they are either experts or those with a lived experience, And I'm going to continue with the miniseries idea, and I'm gonna kick off with reproductive anatomy.
Speaker 1:So we are going to talk about the vagina and the vulva, the clitoris, the breasts, the womb, fallopian tubes, and ovaries. And I have not forgot about men, so we are going to do the penis and the testicles. So I'm really excited to start recording these in the next few weeks. I've got brilliant people who have agreed to come on. So very, very exciting to talk to you about the anatomy of those organs, what can go wrong, and some of the weird things that we do nowadays such as surgery and things to, play around with those organs, which I don't think we should be doing.
Speaker 1:Then I'm gonna move on to female icons. So many years ago, almost almost 10 years ago, I set up a women's group in my town, Safran Malden, and I called it the purple tent. And I called it the purple tent because we have a red tent for people that menstruate. There's a red tent movement, which I think is brilliant to get women together at this time of their lives. I think being with other women and women's circles are so important.
Speaker 1:But I decided to call my, group the purple tent because I was mainly wanting to talk to women who were, around perimenopause and postmenopause. And one of the first things we talked about at the very first meeting was about female role models and that we don't promote females enough and have good role models for us to look up to. And I've really been trying to do that on my, social media, and I'll be doing that a lot more because so many of the women I interviewed for my book are really amazing role models. And I think if we fill up our social media following these amazing women who are doing great things, I think it's so motivating and so positive. So really looking forward to doing that more in 2025.
Speaker 1:And the podcasts are going to be about really inspiring female role models. So we're going to talk about the 1st woman to swim the English Channel, the UK's first female doctor, and also women that have had major contributions during the World Wars and some other topics. Really excited. Got some great people who've already agreed to be on, but I'm not gonna tell you about any of my guests yet. I'm going to wait and advertise that near the time when the mini series come out.
Speaker 1:But really brilliant people, and I'm gonna be so excited to talk to them. Then we're going to get onto some real deep health topics. So we're going to start by looking at some chronic health conditions. So, again, long overdue to talk about heart disease, diabetes, dementia, cancer, obesity, and osteoporosis. So I will be talking to some of the world leaders in these topics about these, and really debunking some of the many myths that social media really perpetuates.
Speaker 1:And then we're going to look at some of the problems that unhealthy practices, should we say, that can perpetuate these chronic health conditions. So we're going to talk about alcohol, ultra processed food, smoking and vaping, and also gambling. I've been really aware recently about the growing problem of gambling for everybody, but including women, and how this can really affect our health. So we're gonna talk about those topics. And it's also over 10 years now that I set up a website, trying to bring together community to talk about global women's health issues, and I called it Global Women Connected.
Speaker 1:And if you go to my website, my blogs are, they live under the title of Global Women Connected because all of my blogs I'm writing are about these issues that affect women globally. So, again, a miniseries that's long overdue. We're going to talk about some of these global women's health issues. We're going to talk about female genital mutilation, abortion, menstrual stigma and period poverty, pregnancy and maternal morbidity, and also human trafficking, forced marriages, and child brides. So, again, some brilliant guests lined up to do that.
Speaker 1:So that's actually gonna take me to the end of the year. That's the full year of podcast for 2025 already scheduled in. So if there are any but but if there are any other topics that you'd like me to include, please let me know. And let me know what you think about the topics I've chosen for 2025. So on my podcast, right from the very beginning, I've asked people about what what's made them happy and where's their happy place, and that's going to be absolutely feeding into my book that I'm writing.
Speaker 1:I'll tell you about it in a moment. But I've also asked people their very last question is what advice they would give their younger self. And in January 2023, when I did my first podcast, my advice to my younger self was two points, to sort out my sugar addiction, which I've had my whole life, and also to be more still. So I am very excited to say that I have not eaten any processed sugar in the form of chocolate, cakes, sweets, biscuits, and pastries since August 20th 2024. Woo hoo.
Speaker 1:You know, I said this in the podcast in 2023, and it took me another, year and a half to actually start this journey, but I've done it. And on 15th November, I've put these dates in stone. I've added Crisp to the list. I really understand how toxic sugar is to our health, and I hope you do too. I've written a blog about this.
Speaker 1:You can find it on my website under Global Women Connected. And I'm really pleased that finally, today, we have the conversation about ultra processed food has really been highlighted. And I I do have a pretty healthy diet. I cook almost everything from scratch. But the sugar and, you know, most of those things that I meant all of all of those things that I mentioned, chocolate sweets, which are ultra processed, has really been my downfall.
Speaker 1:And, many years ago, there was a film out called Embrace about embracing our bodies and body image, which I think was a great film. But afterwards, I did a couple of q and a's. And in one of them, I talked about how there are unhealthy foods. And 1 woman argued with me and said, no. There's no such food as unhealthy food.
Speaker 1:All food is great for us. And I didn't agree with her then. And I as I said, I'm so glad that this conversation at ultra processed food has really come to the forefront, with help from people like Chris Van Tuleeken, and others. And I think, you know, now now we're taking it on board that there are foods that are causing ill health, and we shouldn't be eating them or should really try and cut down. But it it's very hard.
Speaker 1:As Chris says, it's really hard in today's society. We are all bombarded by marketing, great marketing around these products. So let's talk about, being still. So, this is certainly a work in progress for me. I I am quite a manic person.
Speaker 1:People say I'm like a hurricane. I sort of whiz in the room and then sort of whiz out of the room. I talk a lot. I talk too much. I've been really working on listening more to people and just being quiet and listening, which, I've had to train myself at.
Speaker 1:And so what I've been doing in 2024 is try to have a few days where they were silent days or quiet days. And, it was quite strange. I I had quite a negative response from lots of people, lots of laughter, people thinking I'm being crazy and why. Why was a big question. And people not really not understanding why I wanted to have quiet time.
Speaker 1:And I think that's a bit worrying. So I tried to find other words to describe what I was trying to do. Digital detox, I think, is really, a a phrase that that's important, but also just shutting down communication. So that and and that links really in with digital detox. You know, we're our phones are are crazy.
Speaker 1:And, again, through the purple tent, many years ago, one of my friends, Anna Wierzing, said to me that she's turned off all the notifications on her phone so her phone doesn't buzz anymore. And I said, wow. I'm going to do that. And she didn't believe me. She didn't believe that I could do it.
Speaker 1:I did. I did it that day that she said it, and I've never had any pings, on my phone since then. I and I think I I do think I have read that as soon as we get that ping, we get a release of cortisol and, like, the stress response. Oh, we've got to answer. We've got to answer it.
Speaker 1:And then my phone my kids said, well, what do we do if there's an emergency? If there's an emergency, phone me. Don't text me or WhatsApp me. Phone me. Call me if there's an emergency.
Speaker 1:So I think that's a great thing to do, but I really wanted to take this further. And then one of the women I interviewed with my book, she said that in today's society, it's like we've got all these tabs open. Now look at your Chrome now. Have you got 10, 20 different tabs open? Look at your phone.
Speaker 1:How many apps have you got open at any one time on your phone? And I think that's what our brains are like now. We've just got all this different stuff going on. And I'm I am a bit of a multitasker, and my job is such that, you know, I do so many different projects, and it's it does get a bit manic. And I think in today's society, if we want to keep control of that, we do need a digital and communication detox every now and then.
Speaker 1:So so I tried a couple of days last year. They were both, I I would say, a bit of a failure. I was trying not to touch my phone, and I did. And I did some WhatsApps both of those days. The first day, I thought I'm gonna go to my normal fitness classes.
Speaker 1:Because if you go in a silent retreat, you normally do a yoga class. So I thought, okay. That's okay. And that was a bit of a disaster. Even things like when I walked in, holding the door open for someone or someone hold the door open for me, and I couldn't say thank you.
Speaker 1:And so that seemed really wrong. And then when I went went to the class, I did 2 classes that day, and I did tell everyone before that I was gonna have a digital detox and silence and not speak. And, there was a lot of jibing. So lots of people laughing and saying, oh, Joyce is gonna be quiet. And then the teacher said, oh, it's like Christmas has come early.
Speaker 1:Joyce is gonna be quiet. And, yeah, that that that wasn't really that good for me. So the next time, I decided not to go to a class, and I exercise at home. But, yeah, I I didn't I'm still sending emails both days. I mean, really, can I not have a day without sending an email?
Speaker 1:The my phone doesn't ring that much, so I wasn't worried about not picking up the phone and the link goes to answer phone. Yeah. But I've I've I really want to do more work on this. So I do I'm gonna schedule days in, maybe once a month. One day and I know lots of people have days where they don't talk to people.
Speaker 1:If you live alone, you might not talk to people, and you might want to go the other way. You might want to have more days where you do talk to people. But for me personally, and I think for a lot of people that have very busy lives and they have kids, you know, I live with my eldest son. So to have a day where we just shut down a bit. So the next one, I'm going to go off.
Speaker 1:I I've got a camper van. Got a camper van last year, and it's now set up as an office. So I think I just need to go. I need to go somewhere, be on my own, be in my own headspace. And my lovely friend, Siobhan Daniels, who is the retirement rebel, wrote a brilliant book.
Speaker 1:Please, everyone, read her book. You know, she realized that she hadn't been processing lots of emotions, such as some of the death of some of her family members, etcetera. And she was finally in a place alone by a lake, and she just screamed. And that's really been at the back of my head that we don't give each give anyone the space to really process our thoughts and emotions. So, yeah, I'm gonna go off.
Speaker 1:Gonna set my date. I haven't set my dates yet. We set some dates for January, February, March. And go off my camper van and just try and, shut down, for a day and not talk and just reset and have some space to write and to meditate and to have some silence and communication shut down. So I have a reboot of my brain.
Speaker 1:So I did in series 2, I didn't give advice to my younger self, but I did say I was going to try to look for love. Probably too much information for for the podcast, but I do think love's important. I think it's something we need to talk about. I've been single for 12 years because I felt that I couldn't juggle everything. I don't think we can juggle everything all at once.
Speaker 1:I think sometimes we we need to compartmentalize what we can do at certain times of our life. And for me, for the last 12 years, love, took a really, was at the bottom of my pile. I did not have the energy with my kids and work and and my own social life. I I put those as a priority for that time. So 2025, I I I have dabbled with dating apps.
Speaker 1:I find them really, really painful, but I know that's the way so many people do it. But I don't know. I don't know. I'm just going to keep that door a little bit open this year in 2025. But advice I would give myself now, now I seem to be certainly working on the sugar and the stillness and love is money.
Speaker 1:I've been bringing up 3 kids on one salary. I am broke. To to uni now, Eleanor Mills, who I had on my podcast, and we spoke about money. And I've also interviewed for her for my book, and there will be some information about money in my book and finances. I've really taken on board some of the things that she said and how important it is, especially for women to sort this out.
Speaker 1:I do have a great pension, so that's that's good. And then I said that's so important. I know some women are not in that situation. But I will never pay off my mortgage. I first took a mortgage out when I was 25.
Speaker 1:Thought I was gonna pay that off way before now, but it's just and I was doing really, really well until I became single, and and then it's really taken a hit. So it's actually got more over the each few years rather than less. And so that is, yeah, I I realized I'll have to downsize and move somewhere that's a bit cheaper to live. So but I am manifesting money for 2025, and I've always felt uncomfortable with that. I think that comes from my mum.
Speaker 1:My mum, always said that money didn't buy us happiness, and I it it doesn't. But I do think we need to take it into account, and, and we shouldn't be getting in debt. And I feel I feel that that with that mortgage, it is something when I know so many people who have paid off their mortgage at my age, and I I'm I am jealous. But money has always I felt a little bit uncomfortable talking about money. I've I've always felt it's a little bit, sort of not the right attitude to have to think about wanting money, and I've got to get over that.
Speaker 1:I think it's just that's a bit of a stupid way of thinking about things if you're going to get in debt and not be able to do things. I I'd like to to go off on more holidays. I go off on great trips with work, but there are lots of places that I'd like to go that I wouldn't go to with work. So, yeah, there are things I want to do if I had more money. So I'm manifesting money for 2025.
Speaker 1:Money money and love. Maybe they'll go together. Right. I want to move on now to talk about my book. So it's been absolutely wonderful in 2024 that I interviewed 50 well, 51 amazing women for the research for my next book.
Speaker 1:And it did start off being called good health and happiness over 50 because I've interviewed women over 50 to talk about how their lives have changed. Because for me, certainly, postmenopause has been amazing and has been a really empowering time of my life. And up until recently, I would have said my best time of my life was when I was at university. But now I am not the only person to say that the best time of my life is right now. And so I set out to interview 50 women over 50.
Speaker 1:But then the amazing Liz O'Rorydon, who wasn't 50 when I had finished the interviews, she had her birthday, and she said, please, can you interview me? And Liz has so many wise words. She's so full of wisdom that, and there's so she we've now I've I'm now interviewing 51 women, and, actually, there's a few more who want to be interviewed. So it might be a few more than 50. But over 50 women over 50 to share their wisdom and their experience.
Speaker 1:And, I had finished all the interviews when I went to spend a week with my wonderful literary agent, went to York. Wendy lives in the most beautiful setting in the south of France. It is such a nurturing and nourishing environment, and she runs, book, retreats, writing retreats. And it was so brilliant to be there after I'd done the interviews. And I'd had had actually drafted the first chapter.
Speaker 1:The first chapter I I interestingly chose to do was about sex. It was obviously on my mind. So, yeah, it was so amazing to be with Wendy and the other people at the retreat and to take on board thoughts about how I could write the book. Because when I went there, I realized that how I'd written the chapter about 6 was it was huge. It was 17,000 words, which anyone who writes a book knows that's way too much for a chapter.
Speaker 1:So during that retreat, it gave me the space to think about how I want to to write it. So I've got 3 chapters that are finished. Wendy's happy with, with the ones that she's read so far. I've done sex. I've done menopause, and I've done exercise and and how health how important that is to our health.
Speaker 1:And I'm now working on the chapter on, hobbies and creativity. So, I really hope to find the time to finish that book. I, in my head, I wanted to finish it by the end of March. And on the retreat with Wendy, I realized that the way I should organize this book is have one section about health. So under health, the pillars of health for me that I've always talked about are nutrition, exercise, sleep, mental health, and friendships and community.
Speaker 1:And I talked about all of those in my last book in your fertile years. I did used to talk about just 4 pillars of health. I didn't add in friendships and community in in your your fertile years, but I have added those that section in. I think it's absolutely essential. And most people that I know talk about health say that those 5 pillars are really essential for our health.
Speaker 1:But the second section is going to be about happiness. As I said, I've I've asked all of my guests on on my podcast about what makes them happy and their happy place. And I asked the women I interviewed about many questions about their happiness and what makes them happy. And I've set these into 5 sections. So as I mentioned, hobbies and creativity, also time in nature, our sex lives and love, stillness and quality time alone, and sense of purpose and career.
Speaker 1:So from those 5 health pillars and 5 happiness pillars, I've made a wheel of health and happiness, which I'll be doing lots of work on in 2025. It's you can already find this wheel of health and happiness on my social media, and I've done a a, a blog about, manifesting our intentions for 2025, and it's in there. And I'm just about to publish a blog about treating yourself to a retreat, and the wheel of health and happiness is also going to be in there. I want people to lead their most authentic lives. And that's a word that came up with the women that I interviewed that they they were now living their authentic lives.
Speaker 1:Many of them stated that they were now living their happiest lives ever. So that that that wheel of health and happiness has really come out of those interviews and really been solidified from what they've told me. So I will talk about the retreats in a moment. I just want to go a little bit more deeper into some of the other work work that I've been doing. So 2 of my big projects that I've been doing for for many years have been reproductive health education, which I started really working on 10 years ago in, 2015 when we set up the UK fertility education initiative.
Speaker 1:And then in 2019, I set up the international group to work with the many brilliant people who were doing fantastic work who are doing fantastic work on fertility and reproductive health education. So we we call ourselves the International Reproductive Health Education Collaboration. Really long name. Bit of a rubbish name. Sorry.
Speaker 1:But, it does we are doing what it says on the tin. And I was so pleased in 2024 that a number of the resources that we'd been working on, including a teacher's resource for teachers to teach reproductive health in schools, also twelve information leaflets that we co designed with focus groups I ran with ran with young people. And we also did some focus groups about a fertility education poster that we first made in 2019, but we updated it, aiming it now at young people. And we did focus groups with young people to talk about the poster. And it's got 9 points you should know if you want to have kids in the future.
Speaker 1:So it was great to work with them and make sure the language was correct for them, and they they were really achieving something from reading that post or learning something, became more informed. So those are the three main resources from the from the iREC. And we're gonna do lots more work with the brilliant group of people that I work with. My dear friend, Maria, has now taken over from me as chair of this group. And my colleague, Bola, is going to she's she's chair elect.
Speaker 1:So they're I'm gonna continue working on this project as past chair of the IREC for the next 2 years, but then Maria and Bola will be taking over. So we're we're doing a lot on social media about this. You can follow the IREC, the the our hashtag oh, sorry. Not hashtag. Our handle is at eseshre, which is Eshera, the European Society of Human Reproductive and Embryology.
Speaker 1:So Eshera, _irec, I r h e c. But you can find it on my social media as well. And we want to use those resources to make sure everyone becomes aware of all reproductive health such as PCOS, endometriosis, fertility, miscarriage, menopause, everything from puberty to menopause, all of reproductive health. So please follow us if you're interested in any of that. And, yeah, that work will be continuing.
Speaker 1:And I'm really, really proud of what we've achieved. And my other big project, which is a newer project, we've been working together for a year and a a bit now, year and a half. And that's our menopause education project. And my brilliant team with Sheema, Nikki, Polly, and Florrie. And Sheema came up with a brilliant name for this, last year.
Speaker 1:We she said we should call it in tune so that women are in tune with their menopause, in tune with their body, and in tune with each other, which is fantastic. I should have got Shima to sort that, the name for the eye wreck. Anyway, we did lots in the last year. We set up in a brilliant advisory committee. We did 2 fantastic workshops.
Speaker 1:We've done a number of focus groups. We've still got a few more to do with the focus groups with really diverse people. We did those, we've done the LGBT community. We've done those with breast cancer, those with early menopause, those with surgical menopause, different cultures. And we've got some more to do such as those with disabilities, those with, neurodivergent, and and a few more.
Speaker 1:So we're trying to talk to as many people as possible because what we want to do is provide a co designed inclusive menopause education program for everybody, hopefully free for everyone in the UK. And we've got 2 from listening to everyone, we've got 2 products, if you like. 2 programs that we've developed or and are still developing. The first is called be prepared for menopause, which I am testing out in various places in the next few months. And we have got brilliant experts in menopause to tell us about what menopause is, what the symptoms are, how you diagnose it, what the treatments are, and what life is like postmenopause.
Speaker 1:So we've made little videos of by these brilliant experts to tell you about these different topics. And after each video, we have a discussion with the group to see what they think about it. And, at the moment, we've just developed it overall, but then we will have to adapt it for different groups of people, such as neurodivergent, different disabilities, etcetera. And we we want to offer this online and in person depending what people how people want to do it. And we, hope I hope this year, what our aim is is set set up a website so we can start putting these, products online so that people can start accessing them.
Speaker 1:But we are still developing it. So it's still being tested out to see if it's fit for purpose. And then our really big project is that we hope be prepared for menopause helps women understand when they're starting the, perimenopause symptoms because for mine and and Shima's and many others research, we know that women don't know that. They don't know that they're in the perimenopause. And that's what's one stage that's really important.
Speaker 1:So we wanted to be educate to be able be able to educate women about that. So be prepared for menopause should help that. And then the main intervention will be, from what everyone's told us, probably 6 weeks, again, face to face and online. And in this, women who are experiencing or those experiencing perimenopause symptoms, we want them to come and share their experiences and have and have peer support with other people who are going through the same, symptoms and experience that they are, and at the same time for them to learn a little bit more about what they're going into and what help there can be for that and what it would be like when they've, got through the the perimenopause and into postmenopause. So we're very, very excited.
Speaker 1:We do need to generate funding. As I said, we need a website. So many people are on board with this project. It's very much a community project. It's not our project.
Speaker 1:We're we're just facilitating it, but we want everyone to be on board. So we're very, very excited about what this next few years will bring us with Intune. So that's, where the main two topics I'm doing at work. But we I've also done a some obviously, I'm doing menopause research and continuing continuing that. And and last year, it was mainly about postmenopause for the interviews for the book.
Speaker 1:I also completed 4 sets of focus groups with women at different life stages to talk about their periods. We've got the study on perimenopause women has been published. And in the next few months, hopefully, the one with the one we did with 15 year old girls, in 4 different schools will be published. And also the other different age groups in between that. So the 18 to 40 year olds.
Speaker 1:So very, very exciting work, but very upsetting to hear how women felt they really didn't understand enough about their period. So we're going to do lots more work now to make sure that we deliver proper evidence based teaching in schools because the women told us at the most they had 2 lessons in schools, 1 at primary school and one at their high school. And everyone agreed that that wasn't enough. And educating males is really terrible. They also get no education at all.
Speaker 1:And then, you know, it was so interesting to listen to the women who said, well, my partner or my husband doesn't understand. And I said, they're not going to understand. They probably never learned anything about it. So, you know, we've we've got to sort this out. And I'm so pleased that I have now become an ambassador for Well-being of Women.
Speaker 1:And they have done some absolutely fantastic work around menstrual health education and education on so many different women's health issues. And I'm really looking forward to diving into work with Well-being of Women and really hoping to make a difference around education about all these topics. So that's that's almost everything that I've done in the last year, But I want to move on to 2025. And one of the things I really am excited, about already working on some projects, and I really want to expand this, is to work on retreats. So there's a blog coming out soon called treat yourself to a retreat.
Speaker 1:And this is a totally new project for me, and I'm just so excited. I just think a retreat is a brilliant way to reset and pause. Remember what I said earlier in this podcast about being still and having quiet time and closing all those tabs in our brain. And I absolutely always practice what I preach. So this is so important to me.
Speaker 1:I went to a few retreats over the last few years. I felt so nourished, so motivated, so reset. And I really want everyone to be able to do this. So, for health and happiness, as I've said, I've got this wheel of well-being and happiness that I've drawn on. And for me, these retreats, it it they are for women of all ages.
Speaker 1:So the retreats that I'm involved with, I want people to bring along their mothers, their grandmothers, their daughters, their friends. This is not I know lots of people associate me with menopause work, but my work you know, my book my last book, Your Fertile Years was, as I said, from puberty to menopause. So all of everything I do is for women of all stages of their life, all stages of their reproductive life course. So I'm kicking this off with a one day retreat in Brighton on Saturday, 5th April. And I love working with the team.
Speaker 1:And 2 brilliant people who live in Brighton are Karen Newby and Petra Coveney. They have already both run retreats themselves. We're also by the sea. So we're really looking forward. We're gonna talk about health in the morning.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna start off by talking about women's health. The the retreat is titled hormones, health, and happiness. So we're gonna talk about women's health to start, and then we're gonna talk about our pillars of health, as I've mentioned before, and then our pillars of happiness. And, Petra's a yoga teacher, so we're we're gonna get some nice meditations and some nice yoga movement. We've got someone providing delicious lunch.
Speaker 1:And a retreat for me needs to be in a great location with lovely food, bit of education, giving you also space to think about what you're learning and to also reflect on it afterwards. And we are really ticking all of those boxes. So when you read my blog about treat yourself to retreat, you'll see that in this retreat in Brighton, we will be ticking all of those boxes. And I've already mentioned Wendy York, my wonderful literary agent. So when I went to her, beautiful home for the retreat, writers retreat, last year in 2024, and I had so much inspiration.
Speaker 1:It I literally I I got out of the car and I just went, wow. Wow. And every minute of the time I was there, it is such a beautiful setting. So such a pleasure that Wendy suggested that we set up a wild swimming and yoga retreat, and we're going to be doing this in May. Please come and join us.
Speaker 1:There's a few places left. Over half the places have gone. We're only taking 11 people. You will feel so nourished. There's going to be a wonderful chef providing great food.
Speaker 1:The location is amazing. Wendy has picked out beautiful places for us to visit. So lakes and rivers and, the sea. And you can dip or you can swim. It'll be, I think, the perfect temperature in May.
Speaker 1:Everything is included once you're in France. All your travel, all your food, all your accommodation, all your entertainment. The only thing we haven't included is wine, and you can have some extra massages. But the yoga, swimming, food, everything else is included. You just need to get your flight.
Speaker 1:There's a great cheap flight, Ryanair flight, to Carcassonne. And then myself and Wendy will drive everyone to Wendy's wonderful house. So please come and join us if you if you want to. And I hope that we'll be doing that annually. So and I hope also the retreat one day retreat I'm doing in Brighton that we'll do some in London later in the year if it's a success.
Speaker 1:So please come and join us at those 2 retreats. But also, it's a great pleasure that I'm going to be performing at the big retreat festival at the end of May, which is in Wales. And, Amber Lort Phillips, set set this up quite a few years ago, and she's done such a brilliant job. It's I haven't been yet, but I've been following the big retreat festival. And it and I've heard many people have been and said it's just amazing.
Speaker 1:So please come and join us. Again, in my blog, I've put information about the retreat festival, but you can just Google big retreat festival, and you'll come up. And there, will be a link on my website to, get tickets or get them directly. So I'll be doing some great events there. There's people like, Ruby Wax who loves it.
Speaker 1:I know she's appeared a few times. Siobhan Daniels, again, will be there. And, Gotguan is DJing. So we're gonna do some dancing. And we're gonna do you know, all of those things that I said are important to our happiness.
Speaker 1:Amber has got them all in there in the big retreat festival. So, please come and join. It's gonna be such an a great event. So I hope to see some of you at these events this year. And so just just on a a personal note, I think I've already mentioned that my kids, my eldest graduated and back home, but my twins flew off to uni, 1 to New York, and one to York.
Speaker 1:And I, again, I wrote a blog about it. I wrote a blog about, kids flying the the nest. And I know many women that are nervous about it and, have been very sad about their kids going. And, yes, it is sad, but it's time for them to fly. I really, really believe that.
Speaker 1:And I think it's time for women to get their own life journey back. So we've been if if we've had kids, we've been mothers for for decades and been nurturing. And I think it's just great to get that our lives back on and start doing all the things that you enjoy doing. I did a number of radio interviews about the blog I wrote, and on one of them, there was a guy that said that he was suicidal when his kids left. And, wow.
Speaker 1:I you know, let's get our life back. Let's start thinking about self. And that's really where my next book comes in because that is hopefully going to give everyone the the thoughts about how they can reset, refine themselves, rediscover themselves, reinvent themselves, and start leading their best best lives ever. And if, you know, if we've had kids, they're gonna be there. They'll come and visit.
Speaker 1:We'll they'll probably come home after uni like mine has. But, yeah, time time to time to do those things. And so I I love doing vision boards. I I've done vision boards for many years. Again, I've got a blog about how to do your vision boards manifestation manifesting your intentions for 2025.
Speaker 1:You know, spend spend January thinking about what can I do to make 2025 the best year yet? And I found this really, really works great for me. Some years actually, the very first one I did was really manic, and I do 2. I do one for home and one for work, but they are really starting to merge. Work life balance sort of does merge.
Speaker 1:So, think about for you. It's very individual. What will make you happy is what makes you happy, not what makes anyone else happy. So don't think about anyone else. Just think about you and think about what do I what could I do that will make me really happy?
Speaker 1:So something that's appeared on many of my vision boards over the years has been a camper van. And, again, reading Siobhan Daniel's book really inspired me. And last year, I bought a car. After reading Siobhan's book, I bought a car that I could sleep in. But the camper van I got the camper van.
Speaker 1:1 of my friends, actually, a couple of years ago, I've had the car now. But last year, I bought the camper van. One of my dear friends, Trudy, was selling her camper van, who she had named Fanny, which was highly appropriate for me and has caused many jokes. So, yes, Fanny, my camper van has been amazing. As well as just that sense of freedom, I have now as I said, it's my office, and I go off for the day and sit there working in it, looking at some beautiful scenery, normally some water, and get inspiration to, write.
Speaker 1:And I also will will read and just chill out and have some time. So but do what's right for you. Do whatever you not everyone needs to buy a camper van. Do what's right for you. I am still doing lots of dancing.
Speaker 1:I'm going to lots of my day raves. I've done many, many more in 2024 than ever before. And I'm doing lots of my wild swim, which which I've been doing many years of wild swimming. But very excited that one of the projects we set up in 2024 was a group called swim her. So we published 3 papers on wild swim or cold water swimming and women's health.
Speaker 1:And SwimHER is a group that is going to be taking this forward. And I'm working with brilliant people like Jill Shaw, Heather Massey, Mike Tipton, Malika, and Mark Harper. And, yeah, very excited that our group are getting together in February to have a 3 day meeting to talk more about where SwimHer can go forward with looking at cold water swimming and women's health. So very excited about that. And I on my vision boards as well, my work vision board, I want to do more public speaking.
Speaker 1:I do a lot of public speaking at conferences, but want to do more want to do more media work. Highlight for me was that, I 2 highlights was that I was on the Infinite Monkey Cage, with Brian Cox and, and Robin. And, yeah, it was it was brilliant. And we talked about making babies. And then with Filomena Kunk, I was on her Christmas special about kunk on life, talking about sex.
Speaker 1:I wasn't in it very much. We we did some brilliant recording. I obviously do know about the format of the program. And I think with most of the academics, they want them to look a bit shocked, and I obviously didn't look shocked. So even though we had some great conversations, I'm not on it for much.
Speaker 1:I'm just a little bit talking about explaining sex to her and then a couple of bits in the outtakes at the end. But, also, another highlight for me was with my dear friend, Lucy Vandervelde. We did a show, in Amsterdam in the brilliant club Paradiso about understanding your reproductive health. And we loved it. Lots of people found it very funny.
Speaker 1:I flew out through into the audience my knitted clitoris that my dear friend, one of my dear friends had made for me, Madeleine. And, unfortunately, it didn't come back. I threw it out. I threw the a womb out and a knitted sperm. They came back, but the knitted crochet clitoris that Madeleine made didn't come back.
Speaker 1:She has made me another one, and I hope to learn how to do that in 2025 so that I have been learning some crochet, but not not yet at the level to make a crochet clitoris, but that is one of my aims. So I hope to do more of those things. They were really such fun. So, yeah, think about what's going to make you happy. I'm gonna have lots about retreats on my vision boards as well, and I'll probably have something about love.
Speaker 1:And so the last couple of things I want to finish this podcast talking about, my blog, I've mentioned a few times. They're they're on my website under Global Women Connected. And, Sam Chandler, who works on my website, has been nagging me to write a monthly blog or he wants me to write more than more than monthly, but I've been doing them, Sam. I have been doing them now. So I'm gonna try and write more blogs, in 2025.
Speaker 1:And I when I first set up Global Women Connected, we used to run a newsletter. Was quite a lot of work, and I abandoned it quite a few years ago. But newsletters seem to be back, so I am writing my first newsletter now. So it'll be out in January. I'll do aiming for 1 a month at the beginning, but we'll see how it goes.
Speaker 1:So if you want to keep up with what I'm doing and, the other blogs that I'm doing and the podcast, etcetera, please sign up for my newsletter. You can, do this via my website, joyceharbour.com, and also follow me on social media, to check out my adventures and what I'm up to. It's at professor joyceharper on Instagram and Twitter. I still can't call it x, and also on TikTok. So you can see the videos on TikTok.
Speaker 1:And so I don't use Facebook my own personal Facebook for work things. I've been trying to keep that for private things, but it does get a bit muddled. But if you want if you're on Facebook, if that's your preferred, medium and you want to follow what I'm doing, please join Global Women Connected Facebook group, and you'll find everything there. So, wow, that's me for this year. I hope you've enjoyed hearing about what I've been doing.
Speaker 1:I hope to meet more of you in 2025. I hope that through the work I'm doing with the many amazing women that we have some inspiration for people to lead their best life ever. So I hope that happens for you in 2025, and I wish you all good health and happiness. Thank you.