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Ep. 3: Rosie Mullender on Self Harming as a Teenager
164 Plays5 years ago
*Trigger warning: this podcast episode features a discussion around Rosie's experience of self-harm as a teenager*
Rosie Mullender had a long career as Content Editor at Cosmopolitan magazine before she went freelance as a journalist in 2018. You might think that nailing her dream job on a glossy mag would mean that she had a straightforward path to success, but nothing could be further from the truth.
As a young girl, Rosie struggled to fit in at school, and she began to self-harm at the age of 14.
I had an incredibly frank - and very moving chat - with Rosie. I found her stories of alienation at school heartbreaking, and her description of how she transformed her life to what it is today hugely inspiring.
Now a successful journalist, with a fab fiancé, and the most fantastic flat (listen to our chat to find out more about the amazing space she's created!) Rosie couldn't be more of a role model for teenagers everywhere.
If you are self-harming and want to get help, Rosie's key advice is to talk. Although that may feel scary, she said that once the first sentence is out, it gets much easier.
You can also find advice to help you stop self-harming on the following websites:
- NHS https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/self-harm/
- Harmless http://www.harmless.org.uk/
- Young Minds https://youngminds.org.uk/find-help/feelings-and-symptoms/self-harm/
If you're considering self-harm or suicide, talk to someone as soon as possible. The Samaritans is a good place to start if you can't face telling someone you know.
Parents - if you're worried about your child you can also talk to your GP, or use any of the resources on the OLLIE website.
You can find Rosie's fun Tat Museum account on Instagram, and check out her journalism on her website.
Thank you so much for listening! Subscribe now to the Teenage Kicks podcast to hear all my new episodes. I'll be talking to some fabulous guests about difficult things that happened to them as teenagers - including losing a parent, becoming disabled, and being hospitalised with mental health problems - and how they overcame things to move on with their lives.
I'd love it if you'd rate and review the podcast on iTunes too - it would really help other people to find it. You can also find more from me on parenting teenagers on my blog Actually Mummy, and on Instagram and Twitter @iamhelenwills.
This episode is sponsored by Blue Microphones, who gave me the brilliant Yeticaster for the recording of the podcast.
For information on your data privacy please visit Podcast.co. Please note that I am not a medical expert, and nothing in the podcast should be taken as medical advice.
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Transcript
Introduction to Teenage Kicks Podcast
00:00:06
Speaker
Welcome to the Teenage Kicks podcast where we take the fear out of parenting or becoming a teenager. I'm Helen Wills and every week I talked to someone who had a difficult experience in their teens but came out the other side in a good place and went on to make a real success of their life.
00:00:30
Speaker
Today I'm with Rosie, a brilliant journalist who's had an amazing career and was the content editor of Cosmopolitan magazine before going freelance.
Rosie's Teenage Challenges & Self-Harm
00:00:40
Speaker
Now I need to insert a trigger warning here because my conversation with Rosie deals with her experiences of self-harming when she was a teenager.
00:00:52
Speaker
It was always about self-hatred, it was always when I felt like I'd been stupid or I'd said something wrong at a party or I'd messed up in some way. Unfortunately, I think that this is something that quite a few kids will relate to. But what's brilliant about this chat is Rosie's take on life, how she dealt with her problems and what happened afterwards.
00:01:21
Speaker
absolutely is locked at the end of any tunnel, no matter how dark that tunnel is. I just want to take a moment before we dive in to thank Blue Microphones for sponsoring this series of the Teenage Kicks podcast by gifting me the Yeti Caster which is a fantastic looking contraption that's made recording all these podcast episodes super simple for a novice like me and made sure that I got it right.
Life at Rosie's Flat
00:01:49
Speaker
Okay so Rosie welcome to the podcast it's so nice to meet you and thank you for inviting me to this fantastic flat. I can't actually describe it you all have to visit actually it's just
00:02:04
Speaker
so quirky Rosie's got a ton of fascinating everywhere I look I want to I want to talk about things we could be here all day so oh you've got millions over you've got retro sweets everywhere as well my daughter would be in heaven in here
00:02:20
Speaker
Tell me about all this. Why are you into all this stuff? I've got a really real big passion for tat. So one wall of my living room is covered in what we call the tat museum, which is just a whole wall of shelves just filled with knickknacks and objects. The trend tends to be kitsch and creepy. So it's sort of, you know, cupidole lamps and
00:02:46
Speaker
cactus vases and things like that. Is that a stormtrooper helmet? No, I think that's from Game Destiny. So my fiance is addicted to Destiny, a computer game on the PS4. So the Tap Museum is a combination of my kitsch stuff and his... So you two are really well matched.
00:03:04
Speaker
Yes, his Destiny stuff and Star Wars bits and pieces. Have you always collected little bits of stuff? Yes, absolutely. I don't want to say tat because it sounds derogatory but since you're calling it tat. Most of it is his storage to be honest. This is a tiny fraction of the tat museum we pay.
00:03:20
Speaker
We have to pay for a storage unit because we've conglomerated, when we moved in together, we've conglomerated two types of stuff. That's lovely. We've both got a lot of tat in storage still as well. So it's the goal for a really big house one then. You took a big tat room. Absolutely. He's going to have a games room with all his gaming tat and I'm going to get all of mine. I've got a massive tin toy collection.
00:03:41
Speaker
vintage tin toys, so I'm going to get all of those out. I'm looking forward to moving out of London and getting a bigger place. Yeah, you need a bigger place. My son is obsessed with Lego and he's got the Death Star and he saves up for these things and buys them himself. And he is having a room, he says, where he can hang the Lego Death Star. I thought, you're going to need steel beams. I love all that. So when you were a teenager, did you have a room that was chaotic and messy and no one was allowed in?
00:04:10
Speaker
Actually, relevantly as well, I was very obsessively neat and tidy when I was young, obsessively so and my sort of hobby on a Saturday was tidying my room and dusting each. I had sort of plastic gold stars scattered so it was kind of an ethereal look with sort of chandelier candelabras and things and
00:04:33
Speaker
and a sort of chandelier type light and muslin hanging off the ceiling like a cloud and there were gold stars everywhere and I would painstakingly dust each star because that sense of control was something that I really really made me feel safe so I was actually really massively tidy and minimalist when I was younger and then as I've got older and more confident it's kind of exploded into the opposite. Well I mean I have to say it's not untidy there's
00:05:00
Speaker
You've got proper storage units for all these bits of talent. I was looking for hope because my daughter collects and hoards, you know, rubbish, Pringles cans that are empty. She won't throw them away. I'm looking for hope. Light at the end of the bedroom devastation tunnel. I'm afraid I've always been quite neat. I use the, I use the philosophy, Chanel's philosophy of get dressed and then remove one thing before you leave the house. So each shelf I filled with stuff and then I removed things strategically to make it look
00:05:28
Speaker
not too cluttered. It does look amazing. I just love it. There's method behind the madness. I love the colour, I love it.
00:05:39
Speaker
I think that tells us a bit about you anyway but tell me about your, tell us about your life now, who you are, what you do.
Career Journey from Cosmopolitan to Freelance
00:05:47
Speaker
So I'm a freelance journalist now. I was a journalist for 60, I've been a journalist for 16 years. Along that journey I was, features a content director at Cosmopolitan magazine where I worked for nine years. I was editor of Culp Food magazine which is the magazine you get free in the Culp and then
00:06:07
Speaker
Two years ago I decided to go freelance just so I could be my own boss and not have to boss other people around. And yes, I've been freelancing ever since. I write for Lifestyle Magazines, like Roxy a stylist, Mary Claire and I do copywriting for mainly hospitality brands.
00:06:25
Speaker
I mean, I was working with some absolutely incredible women. My boss for the majority of the time I was there, Louise Court, was the editor of the magazine and she was just unbelievably inspiring. And I just found it to be incredibly supportive.
00:06:40
Speaker
atmosphere and it'd also been my ambition from a very young age from my teens to work for Cosmopolitan magazine it was kind of on my wish list and I sort of drove myself to achieve that so to me it was an absolute genuine dream come true to work there so I was grateful every day for that.
Dealing with Teenage Struggles and Bullying
00:06:58
Speaker
Let's talk about that because that I'm really interested in people who've struggled in their teenage years but still being able to
00:07:08
Speaker
achieve the things they wanted to achieve in spite of all of that. So we'll talk about how you made that happen. I think that's important. Obviously, we're here to talk about the fact that you as a teenager self-harmed. I'm interested to know what built up to that and just what your journey was before you got to the point of actually harming yourself.
00:07:39
Speaker
And I'm really sorry if I say things that are inappropriate. No, I'm absolutely fine. I'm tactless. It's not something that I've got any concept of in my head. It's not somewhere I would ever go. And yet I know that there are so many young girls and boys actually and adults who do this.
00:07:59
Speaker
I was very, when I was at junior school, I was very, I was quite outgoing and loud and my family life was very stable. So I was, you know, parents were together, very loving, I had a brother that I adored, you know, my mum in particular was incredibly supportive of me.
00:08:21
Speaker
but I absolutely hated school so this is where my sort of problems stemmed from so even from primary school I really didn't like it I would fall out with my friends and feel excluded by them so I had I had a best friend that would sort of she moved house without telling me
00:08:41
Speaker
which really upset me. I had another friend who did that thing where you're a little kid and you swear allegiance to each other for life and then she went off with a group of popular girls and started making fun of me. So I was bullied a little bit at junior school and my teacher in the fourth year of primary school, so the last year of primary school,
00:09:07
Speaker
I was moving to another town so I was moving to a senior school where I didn't know anybody and he told me that because I was so loud and outgoing nobody would like me in my new school. He said if you don't tone things down you're going to be really unpopular and no one will be your friend when you go to senior school.
00:09:25
Speaker
What is it with teachers? I've had this again and again that something has stuck in, someone that I'm talking to for the podcast, something's stuck in their head that a teacher's told them and it's really altered how they viewed their abilities going forward. What?
00:09:43
Speaker
I mean it's different now, I mean at one point he got the class to throw me out of the window because I was being so annoying so yeah he got the class to throw me out the window and then when I came back to the classroom he'd got them everyone to stand in front of the door so I couldn't get into the classroom because he said I was getting on his nerves so I think that's obviously very extreme and that wouldn't happen these days. My mum went to the school to have a word with him and
00:10:07
Speaker
he said the next day you only told your parents because you were a show off and you were looking for attention again so that was quite you know that was quite a fraught year of my school days so my friends were sort of bullying me but I also felt a little bit bullied by that teacher. Did you feel confident at school before that or did you always hate school? I think I was quite confident but I think I always had trouble with friendships so I don't think I ever enjoyed it. I remember being incredibly like school plays
00:10:34
Speaker
made me incredibly nervous. I would have sleepless nights. I hated PE, you know, like sports days when people talk fondly about sports days. I don't understand it at all. I hated it, you know, so there was a lot of things I remember really disliking about school, being very nervous and anxious all the time.
00:10:52
Speaker
you know sleepless nights before school plays and things like that so and then that was exacerbated by the fact that I had some tricky relationships with friends so by the time I went to senior school where I didn't know anybody I think I was quite vulnerable to not fitting in and I just didn't really fit into my new school so I found that quite hard to deal with and I found it very hard to make friends because I had in the back of my mind this thought that I wasn't
00:11:21
Speaker
easy to make friends with because I'd been warned that by my teacher. And that move to secondary school is such a huge transition anyway. I've been through it twice with my kids and each time it's shocked me as a parent how big of a deal that is. It's such a shift and if you're going there without friends
00:11:42
Speaker
and not even having any confidence in your own ability to make friends. That must be horrifying. It was, it was very, it was quite scary. And I remember sort of going up to people directly and saying, sort of, will you be my friend? You know, in the way that you just, it's in appealing to, you know, Essex, 11 year olds. And I did make, I made a sort of best friend on my first day. The school arranged a,
00:12:08
Speaker
day for people who were coming from other schools so they wouldn't know people from the area and on that day I met a girl who became my best friend so I did have someone who was a bit of a confidant but we had a bit of a relationship very ups and downs through the time we were at school as well I think that's really common I think girls do
00:12:28
Speaker
I think they do, I think they do. I remember it as, I think it's an age-old thing with adolescent girls. Definitely, and I just think, I just felt like I didn't, we were kind of misfits, we'd spend our lunch times in the library, you know, the other girls would be watching the boys playing football. The popular girls. The popular girls, yeah. They were lovely, you know, to be fair, they were, there were a few bullies here and there, as there always are, you know,
00:12:54
Speaker
But I think more, it wasn't the bullying that upset me so much as the rejection of the girls I wanted to be friends with. So, you know, they just thought... It's not overt. No, exactly. It was just insidious. Yes. I mean, it was a bit verbal bullying, nothing physical at all. No. Just a bit of like, I was the weirdo that... Yeah, yeah. I was the twat. I was the twat to the knees. I get it, yeah.
00:13:18
Speaker
Absolutely. Spending time in the library, didn't fancy boys, socks pulled up to the knee, like real goody-goody. So I did get a bit of bullying, but the main thing that I think really hurt me was finding out about parties I hadn't been invited to and things like that. And that really, for me, was that feeling of unpopularity, which triggered everything.
00:13:44
Speaker
Even though at home, you know, my mum would do everything she could when I came home. She'd, you know, make things really cosy and ask all about my day and, you know, make really lovely dinners and, you know, you could tell her anything. But... So everything at home was good? Everything at home was absolutely brilliant, you know. How good was that? Everything was very... Yeah, no, it was. It was like a haven. Yeah. So my brother hated school as well and, you know, so we both sort of treated home as a bit of a haven. Yeah. And had a lot of support there.
00:14:15
Speaker
Which really did help, obviously without that. I think that would have been much, much worse. But to feel that sort of rejection from your peers every day is just really hard. It just wore me down in the end, I think. I think there are probably quite a lot of kids feeling that.
00:14:34
Speaker
even if actually they are popular, I think that it's so stressful figuring out where you fit in such a big group of different personalities. It's like that high school musical thing where there's the skateboard geeks and the computer science geeks and the very cool kids and you try to figure out where you fit, especially if you're not part of a big group of friends that are all perceived well. I think it's hard
00:15:03
Speaker
Do you know, I think there must be a ton of kids feeling a little bit that way. I think absolutely. It's quite intense. And like you say, I think even if you are one of the popular kids, you've got a whole different set of problems to be dealing with. How much vodka can you tank? You know, have you got a boyfriend and what have you done with him? Absolutely. It's all so strange. I think our teenagers have got such an immense amount. I mean, they always have had it. I do think it's
00:15:30
Speaker
I'm only 53 so I don't know what's coming, but to now I would say that's been the hardest part of my life. Absolutely, yeah. I think it's difficult for everybody. So that was the sort of scenario from where it started really. Yeah, yeah. So tell us about...
00:15:48
Speaker
When did you start first? When did you come aware that self-harming was a thing, that it was an option?
Personal Experiences with Self-Harm
00:15:54
Speaker
Well, I didn't actually know about it. So I think it's a bit different now because obviously there's social media and you can read about these things, which you couldn't in those days. But I think it's actually quite interesting that it wasn't something I'd actually heard of or read about or was aware of at all. You didn't know anyone else that was doing it? No, I didn't know anyone else that was doing it. I just had an urge to do it. So I do feel like, you know, although these people
00:16:16
Speaker
talk about these things being fueled by social media or you know their friends and peer pressure and things like that leading by example for me it was it was a spontaneous urge. Just came from you. Just came from me yeah I just felt really I remember one day I just felt really
00:16:33
Speaker
i think it was a situation again where someone had had a party i wasn't invited to or something like that or someone said something at school um so because i would try very hard to fit in but for example i've got bought a pencil case i thought oh everyone you know it would be the same as the cool kids
00:16:49
Speaker
And then one of the cool kids said like, I've got the same pencil case as Rosie, I'm going to throw it in the bin now. You know, it's just even my biggest attempt to fit in. Think about what they're saying, do they? No, I mean, you know, I was trying so hard to fit in. And I think it was one of those scenarios, it was like, there's nothing I'm going to be able to do to ever fit in. And I remember just feeling this sort of real, just such anger and rage.
00:17:12
Speaker
about myself for not being able to do that. You know, I just was so angry with myself, like, why can't you fit in? Like, whatever you do, you can't fit in. So in your mind, it was your fault that it wasn't anything to anybody else's prejudice. Absolutely. You know, so it was completely my fault that I couldn't fit in. My best efforts failed again and again and again. Whatever I did, I wasn't popular. And I just thought it's obviously something about me, you know. And it was nothing that my parents could say to me to make me not feel that because
00:17:41
Speaker
Of course you love me because you're my parents, biologically. Yeah, I get that. You've got to say that. You have to love me. You have to love me. You made me. Of course you love me. But I just wanted the respect of my friends or the people who wanted to be my friends. So I just remember going into the bathroom and there was a hair slide.
00:18:05
Speaker
like just the Kirby grips. And I took the ends, the plastic ends off the Kirby grip and just sort of dragged it across my arm as hard as I could, just because I was so angry. Was this at school? No, no, it was at home. So I was 14 at the time. And I just, as hard as I could, just dragged it into my arm, just to sort of release, you know, and to give me something else to think about.
00:18:29
Speaker
And that to me was the absolute key thing about self-harm was when I couldn't bear the thoughts in my head about myself It was a way of sort of punishing myself, but of distracting myself for a literal physical release I'm thinking now about how much my arm hurts not about how awful I am, you know, it was real and it really you know, it worked it sounds awful to say yeah, but you know for me it was you know, I
00:18:54
Speaker
14 year old equivalent of getting drunk, you know, when you've had a really hard day at work and you can't stop thinking about it and you've got loads of stresses and pressures and you think, oh, do you know what? I'll have a glass of wine and watch them telly and it'll adjust my mindset. You know, the way you have a drink to relax and it just sort of changes your mood a little bit. If you've cut yourself, your mood has changed because you're thinking about, I've got to hide this and there's blood and I've got to sort this out and it hurts. You're thinking about something else.
00:19:21
Speaker
So you've distracted yourself quite a bit. I know this is going to sound super cliched and people listening are going to roll their eyes and go, hello, you're not woke at all. Where have you been? People know this already, but I didn't. And you've just switched to light bulb on for me. As you were saying that the pain and the fact of doing this distracted you from the kind of emotional turmoil that you were dealing with.
00:19:47
Speaker
presumably 24-7, I'm thinking, yeah, that's what I do when I've had a really bad day or the kids are acting up or I've had a row with my husband or the place is a tip and I haven't got time to clean it up. I pour a glass of wine.
00:20:01
Speaker
And that's my equivalent. I just want to numb that stress that's going around in my head and make it settle down and go away for a bit. You just break the cycle. You break that, you know, if you can't sleep, you know, when you've got insomnia because things are going over and over and over in your head, it's the same thing. It's just, I just want to think about something else for a bit. And that was really, you know, that makes total sense. So the very first time I did it, it was a bit of a self punishment thing, but it quickly, I learned,
00:20:33
Speaker
coping technique to distract me. And did it make you feel better in your mind? It did, it really did, which sounds awful. It's not a recommendation to do something like that. It's absolutely not something that, if you've got, this is a very recurring theme actually in all these interviews that I'm doing that it doesn't really matter what you're doing that isn't right, it's
00:20:51
Speaker
straight away. It was actually a
00:21:03
Speaker
It's coming from somewhere that needs attention and dealing with it. It's not the physical harming yourself that needs the attention. It's the what's going on inside that's driving you to do that. And that's the same with all of these situations where people have made choices that are difficult or had experiences that are difficult.
00:21:23
Speaker
If I told my parents about it, or if they found out, then they would have got me help straight away. I know they would. Did you not? So as you were describing that, as a mother, I had this ball of anxiety whirring around in my stomach and I'm going, oh my God, as your mum, your mum must have been going demented worrying about you and almost feeling that pain because you do feel your children's pain as well as your own.
00:21:51
Speaker
But she didn't know? She didn't know. I hid it. She found out when I was 20. And I hid it. I wore cardigans all summer. I never wore short sleeves. Did she not notice that? Did she not ask? No, I think not. I was also very sweaty when I was a teenager. So I would keep my blazer on at school all day anyway.
00:22:14
Speaker
So this thought of me covering up wasn't, and also I was very self-conscious about my body generally, I was really self-conscious about having hairy arms, so the covering up, I was already sort of quite self-conscious and covered up and you know, long sleeves all the time and never showing my legs, never showing my arms anyway, so it wasn't a difficult thing. I do remember sitting in the garden with my cardigan off except on one arm.
00:22:39
Speaker
sort of because I was so hot and then just when my mum came out just slipping my arm back in the other sleeve so she wouldn't notice something was off. And was that almost an extra stress, the need to deal with what you were doing in terms of other people's reactions and expectations?
00:22:58
Speaker
Definitely. I think I was really really embarrassed. I was really embarrassed and as the sort of years went by I think a few years later when we were sort of later teens I know some friends used to sort of quite openly self harm people that one girl used to play noughts and crosses on her arm with a razor in the classroom, you know, and it was quite demonstrative and open and I didn't understand that I was sort of quite
00:23:23
Speaker
that really shook me and horrified me that people would do that and I was really really keen not to let anybody know about it I was really worried about people finding out and then a teacher saw some cuts that I'd done and he spoke to my best friend and he said tell her she can talk to me if she wants to so
00:23:46
Speaker
I was kind of really embarrassed that he'd seen but then also he didn't talk to me himself so that was kind of maybe an opportunity missed a little bit because I might have... Do you think it might have helped? How old were you at that point?
00:23:59
Speaker
I think he was around 16 at that point. So I think so, yeah. I think if he talked to me, I would have talked to him about it. But it wasn't a kind of demonstrative thing. I wasn't doing it as a cry of help. I was doing it to relieve my own stress. So I didn't particularly want anyone to find out, but I think had he
00:24:17
Speaker
talk to me about it, then I would have said something. But I was very, very good at hiding it. I think my mum, when she found out, she was devastated and she just felt so guilty. But I remember being amazing. I remember just had sleeves over my hands.
00:24:36
Speaker
all the time. And the teacher saw some cuts because I'd done some on my wrist, on the back of my wrist rather than at the top of my arm. So that's why he saw and I sort of like never to do that again. Right. And then, you know, it sort of, it also that need to hide it almost made it worse because I found out that razors don't scar. So I moved on from sort of blunt, using blunt things like the razor, the sharpener, I'd undo pencil sharpeners and use the
00:25:06
Speaker
Blade in a pencil sharpener or a necklace clasp or things like that, but they lift quite bad scars, right? Um, but then I found out that I can't remember how I found out now seems like a weird thing to find out I think I just I used a razor one day and it healed really quickly and didn't leave a scar So it was like oh, wow now I've got this way of doing it that right I can hide really easily um
00:25:30
Speaker
So yeah, it was it was a no one really knew about it No, if they did they did my friends found out eventually but I was gonna say did you tell friends? Did you confide in anybody at all? Um, I did so my best friend knew about it and and then My I think some eventually, you know friends who I hung out with a lot, you know did see see them and they were sort of
00:25:56
Speaker
I remember one friend saying don't ever do that again and getting really cross and crying and things like that. So as I got older, I had sort of integrated a bit more. So as I was sort of 16, 17, 18, I actually did have more friends. I was more sociable, but then I was sort of struggling with boys and you know. There's always something. Exactly. I wasn't kissed until I was 18. So I was really stressed about relationships. I failed my driving test.
00:26:25
Speaker
I was desperate to get into Cambridge and there was always something to be worried about. Absolutely. And it comes in quick succession in those teenage years because there's so many things going on that changes. Absolutely. And by then I'd learnt how to deal with it. I'd found my own way. So you kept going. So I just kept going, yeah.
00:26:44
Speaker
And were any friends helpful? Because I can imagine someone just being cross with you. That's almost counterproductive. That just makes it even worse about yourself that you've upset a friend by doing this thing. You might feel as a friend that that's helpful. You tell someone not to tell. I really care about you and I don't want this to happen. But it's maybe counterproductive. Did anybody actually let you talk about why you were doing it? Not really. I think people...
00:27:14
Speaker
You know, I mean, thinking back, it does feel a bit weird because, you know, I had boyfriends in that time and, you know, it just didn't... No one really sort of talked about it seriously with me. Did boyfriends know? Yes. Yeah, boyfriends knew. And didn't talk about it, didn't ask you about it. No, not of a call, I think.
00:27:33
Speaker
Um, I'm trying, I mean, so I didn't get, I didn't go, I didn't socialize. So my big ambition was getting to Cambridge. And then when I was rejected, I went to the pub for the first time. So I hadn't really been to a pub till I was 18. So I went to the pub, got my first boyfriend, started drinking. And then it kind of got much worse because when you're drunk, you, everything's absolutely elevated.
00:27:55
Speaker
beyond reason and you're drunk and things don't hurt as much, which sounds weird. So it got a little worse when I hit my late teens. But no, I mean, I remember once, I think I was cutting myself at a party or something, someone had said something to upset me and a boy from banging on the door, bathroom door saying, I know what you're doing in there, come out sort of thing. But it wasn't really sort of discussed in terms of
00:28:21
Speaker
you need to get help or anything like that it was just more of a trying to stop me doing it and I think there's work when you're you know if you're 18 and you really don't get a party and once someone's over there crying and someone's in the bedroom having sex you know I'm in the bathroom cutting myself you know I think it was just kind of like
00:28:38
Speaker
part of the teenage show. Part of the male strong. You know, it wasn't really particularly considered this sort of, you know, giant... Something that is just a thing, it's just one of those things that happens. Yeah, just the melee of emotion going on at that age. I don't think it was particularly considered, you know, a big, huge deal. I think, you know, they worried about it, but I don't remember ever having any serious conversations about it. Did that bother you, that people... did you feel judged that people were trying to stop you doing it?
00:29:05
Speaker
I don't think so. I really think my main concern was my parents not finding out. I think the whole time that was really my main concern because I knew they would be absolutely devastated and I really was worried about them feeling like they'd let me down because I knew it was nothing to do with them. I knew I was getting all the support that I needed at home. It was so unrelated to that that I
00:29:28
Speaker
I just really didn't want them to find out. And also I kind of, I knew it would be like, oh, you know, you need to go to counseling. You didn't want to do all of that. I didn't want to do, I really, really didn't want to talk about it. You know, I really, I'm like now, you know, I didn't want to talk about it. It was the last thing on earth I wanted to talk about. I felt very embarrassing and didn't want to talk about it. So I didn't want to be put in a situation where I'd have to get help really. Yeah. So this went on, you said for 10 years.
00:29:59
Speaker
What made you think about stopping? Did life just get better? How did you, because you don't do it anymore? No, no, no, I don't do it anymore. I think, so the last four years I did it very, very regularly because my mum found out, like I say, my mum found out when I was 20 and I swore that I wouldn't do it again. And although I had a few lapses over the next four years,
00:30:26
Speaker
Basically I found a boyfriend that you know my first true love and we were together for eight years and really from the time when we met he bolstered my self-confidence. It's always about self-hatred, it was always when I felt like I'd been stupid or you know I'd said something wrong at a party or you know I'd messed up in some way.
00:30:49
Speaker
And I remember the very last time I ever did it was just after I'd met this guy and he, it was Halloween and I was dressed up for Halloween and I thought I looked really good when I left the house. And then I got drunk in the pub and looked in the mirror and I thought I looked an absolute state. I thought I looked, you know, classic size eight, 20 year old. Oh, I'm so fat and ugly. I can't believe, and the whole, the emotion was, I can't believe I was so arrogant as to think I looked good when I looked so awful.
00:31:19
Speaker
Horrible. Yeah, I remember just feeling so disgusted that I thought I looked great and I'd been confident and it was like my punishment for having the confidence. And so I cut myself in the pub. And that was the last time I ever did it. And after that, you know, my strong relationship, my confidence gradually grew.
00:31:39
Speaker
to the extent that I just didn't need to do it at all anymore. So, but the main turning point really was my mum finding out, which was kind of, you know, I'd always known that if she found out that would, I would kind of have to stop. So it was, um, so yeah, that was a responsibility to someone else and feeling comfortable in your own skin effectively because of the people you had in your life. Absolutely. Yeah.
00:32:01
Speaker
Just gaining that confidence really, like confidence with age and with experience and caring less about what people thought of me and things like that. I feel like this is something, as you were saying, it's a thing you do to distract from the stresses of life, or you did, as many of us will pour a glass of wine or smoke a cigarette or whatever it is that our particular thing is. Is it something that is
00:32:28
Speaker
that you deal with all of your life? Is it something that you ever worry you might do again or is it something you can compartmentalise and say that was part of that and quite clearly I will never go there again? You know is it like an eating disorder almost? I'm sorry to draw comparisons but I feel like you know like struggles with alcohol and all the modern problems that loads of us have
00:32:53
Speaker
we're all constantly thinking, well actually I won't have a glass of wine today because I had too many yesterday. I do wonder actually because I have something I've written about so I'm happy to talk about but I did until recently
Transition in Coping Mechanisms
00:33:08
Speaker
I was drinking a bottle of wine a day. I was drinking a lot of alcohol. So after I broke up with the man who... The big love. Yeah. And that's always a hideous time, isn't it? Yes. The first heartbreak is horrific. Exactly. And that was after we'd been together for eight years and we broke up because I don't want children. So it was a big, it was a big, you know, it was a big wrench. And I just started drinking really heavily because I'd stopped self-harming.
00:33:33
Speaker
long time before that and I remember there was a moment when I fell out with a best friend and I overheard her talking about me at a party I was in the Lou's the classic classic movie scenario where she was basically complaining about me to her new best friend and I remember sitting there going like
00:33:52
Speaker
really desperate self-harm and thinking I'm not going to do it I'm not going to I'm not I don't do that anymore I don't do it anymore so instead I went and confronted her I confronted her and actually you know so you know whereas before I sort of internalized the people saying things to me
00:34:09
Speaker
and decided it was my fault. I was like, no, I'm going to say something. It's not right that she's saying that about me. So I kind of grown in confidence enough to be able to think, no, I'm not going to do that. So I think that for me was a bit of a turning point to know that I didn't have to resort to that. I could cope with things another way and be strong enough not to do it. Same matters, really.
00:34:30
Speaker
as you draw that parallel as well, it's the same as alcoholism or something where it's a real addiction, you feel a massive, massive drive. If I do this, I'll feel differently. And it's true. I remember just thinking all I want to do is cut myself and I didn't and I was really proud of myself.
00:34:49
Speaker
and it showed that I could get through things without that crutch but then the next time I was going through a really hard time I started drinking really heavily and until about two years ago I was drinking a bottle of wine a day so even when I met my now fiance who's incredibly supportive, fantastic for my self-confidence
00:35:08
Speaker
I had learnt that instead of dealing with my feelings to turn to something else. And then that was alcohol. And I was at one point on antidepressants as well.
00:35:23
Speaker
Which is really great and you know what I think one of the reasons I was reluctant for anybody to know about what was happening was because of this, oh I don't want to have counselling, I don't want to go on antidepressants, I had this real massive eye stigmatised antidepressants hugely. Well they used to be a stigma. I don't think there is any more. I hope not because I do have friends who I think
00:35:50
Speaker
you know, who I know have had to use antidepressants and sort of feel really weird about it and they don't tell anyone about my antidepressants. So I still think there is a bit of that around. But I so wish, I so wish I'd gone on antidepressants when I was 14. Yes. You know, I really, really, I think it would have, you know, I don't think I would have self harmed if I had that. Just helped you cope. Absolutely. I mean, I think they're just a useful, they're there for a reason and so many people are on them because they work.
00:36:15
Speaker
I've had periods of time, postnatal depression I've had periods of time on antidepressants and it's just something that helps you get through to a point where you're more able to cope without them and I think that's fine but my mum being of a different generation, my mum
Stigma and Benefits of Antidepressants
00:36:31
Speaker
You know, she's had, she's had troubles in her life and I've said to her in the past, mum, go see the doctor and ask for it. And she's like, pull myself together and cheer up. You know, it's a generational thing, but I do think it's getting better. I think there's this feeling that it dulls your emotions.
00:36:51
Speaker
whereas I saw it as a cloud lifting. I think it's completely different to how I expected because everyone says, you know, I won't be me, I'll be a different person, my brain will be changed by chemicals. I feel it's just melodrama. When I actually went on them, I was like, it's completely, it's like I've been hidden under a rug and I've lifted the rug off my head. Like, you know, it's completely the other way around. I just felt like, oh my God, I feel like me again. So, so, you know, antidepressants.
00:37:15
Speaker
are the best way of coping, minus the alcohol I think. If you need them, I think they're great. But then I was drinking very heavily for quite a long time as well. Just another coping factor. Just another coping, that mood changing thing. So now I try to drink when I'm in a good mood rather than when I'm in a bad mood. I've heard people say that before. That's really good advice. That's
00:37:38
Speaker
Adults, kids should not be drinking alcohol. Go for the antidepressants and not the vodka. Yes, absolutely. But that's a really good point. Because then it stops you using it as a crutch and as a way of changing your life. And I still do sometimes do that. If I've had a really bad day, I'd be like, you know, sorry, I'm going to have a glass of wine. I think that's really common and people talk about that. I mean, this is not a podcast about alcoholism. We probably need to do that on another occasion.
00:38:03
Speaker
with someone that has been alcoholic, but it's really socially acceptable, especially among women, I think, to say, I've had a crap day, I'm having alcohol. And that is, when you think about it, that is awful, because really, it's in the same camp as the self-driving or the drug taking. It is a way of numbing and escaping. And changing your mood, isn't it? The things that you're dealing with today.
00:38:32
Speaker
Okay, so given that teenagers are really stressful and lots of kids probably struggle with where they fit at times, I think it's a massively common issue. What would you say if you had a young girl here, or boy, anyone, if you had a young person here today who was thinking about doing this, or who maybe had done it for the first time and was a bit scared,
Advice on Addressing Self-Harm Urges
00:38:59
Speaker
I mean actually did it feel scary the first time you did it? It wasn't scary the first time so much. It was more scary when I started using raisins and things like that to be honest because it was more physically more blood and more scary and more I think
00:39:20
Speaker
I think one of the big things for me is that I used to read a lot of magazines and I imagine it's similar on social media. I have seen this on social media and people
00:39:32
Speaker
There would always be these articles about people who'd ended up in A&E because they'd cut themselves and it was so bad and they'd lost points of blood and it was really dreadful and they had these massive snaking scars and I thought I haven't got a problem because I'm not like that. So I would say to a young person sitting here if you've done it even a tiny bit or you've got the urge to do that
00:39:54
Speaker
that is the time to start talking. It never cut myself seriously enough to be seriously injured, I never needed to go to A&E, I never had any physical problems, but in my head that meant it wasn't a problem.
00:40:09
Speaker
it was just it was a little thing but ended up dogging me for years so you know obviously i wish i'd been able to cope in another way i really wish now i'd spoken to somebody you know those fears i had of talking you know telling my parents
00:40:25
Speaker
sort of people in authority finding out about it were really unfounded. I think it would have been, I should have taken it a lot more seriously, I should have taken my feelings more seriously. I think part of it, obviously if you're self-harming because you don't feel worthwhile, you don't think you're worth helping. So that is a bit of a catch to it too. So I would say of course you're worth helping, you're really worth helping.
00:40:48
Speaker
and people who care about you would want you to get that help and once you start talking about it, it gets a lot easier to talk about. So, you know, opening up is terrifying but once you've started it gets a lot easier and there are ways of getting help.
00:41:06
Speaker
because also like things like drinking and taking drugs, it can start small, but it can really escalate. It's like anything, you do it a little bit and then you have to do it to get the same feeling. You have to do it more and more and worse and worse and worse. So from that first sort of time, I cut myself with a little Kirby grip, it ended up quite bad. So I think,
00:41:31
Speaker
don't ignore beginnings of something like that. If you feel like that way then get help as soon as you can and just try and be brave. If you're brave enough to cope with the pain of self-harm, you're brave enough to get that help and there are people there that can help you and talking just really helps.
00:41:48
Speaker
I think really what I needed to do was talk to someone, an adult basically. Yes, not because you don't want to tell your friends. In case they think, oh god that's really weird and then it makes the whole situation worse. Well totally, I mean yeah, they thought I was really weird. People would sort of back away looking at me like I was really old and they didn't know to talk about it. It's not something another 14 year old should be burdened with really, if your friend is
00:42:15
Speaker
is harming themselves, that's not something that... No, they can't provide help. No, exactly, like a fellow teenager shouldn't, you know, it's difficult for someone, obviously you've got a friend who can be supportive, that's really nice, but really you need to be talking to someone who can get you proper practical help. So a teacher or another relative or, you know, if I'd been less good at hiding it, I think, you know, or if the teacher who saw had actually spoken to me directly. Yes, then that might have propelled you to talk a bit more and get some proper help.
00:42:42
Speaker
Because I think, I remember when I heard that the teacher had found out about it, I kind of almost felt a little sense of relief. You know, I'd been so scared about someone finding out about it. I thought he was going to talk to me. And so I felt a bit of relief that I couldn't talk to someone about it now. And, you know, when he didn't, I didn't get that opportunity. I wasn't about to approach him about it. So, um,
00:43:04
Speaker
I definitely would have, you know, I didn't expect to feel that relief that an adult would have found out about it, but I really did. So I think anyone really, any adult that you feel comfortable talking to that, you know, that you find supportive. That actually the telling a responsible person, it might even just be a teacher that you really like or that, you know, rates you. That first sentence might feel really scary, but would you say that once that's out of the way,
00:43:34
Speaker
generally people's reactions are positive and supportive and then it gets easier. Absolutely, absolutely. I think it's so easy to imagine people's reactions. I think as well when you're a teenager or a young person, things seem so much worse than they are. Everything seems so much worse than it is. Everything is terrible. Things can seem like the absolute end of the world. And it is in that moment.
00:44:02
Speaker
Well of course it is and I was telling you it's not that big a deal. It's so annoying. I don't care what you think. Even if it's a big spot on the end of your nose. If you're 14 and that is the biggest thing happening in your life right now. It could be a lot more.
00:44:20
Speaker
horrified every time I got a nasty break out. I'd get up in the morning and I'd be like, oh my god, I don't want to go down to breakfast because I know what's going to happen. My dad's going to point it out. My dad was horrific at that. He would just be like, oh, that's a nasty spot. He didn't mean anything by it and he probably would have tried to help me if he could have.
00:44:39
Speaker
I just didn't want people to point it out. Because if he was pointing it out, then I was going to go to school and everyone else was going to see it. And that's all I think about all day. But you think about it all day. Exactly. You panic about it. And I think so that there is that idea that you think if you, you know, you blow things up so much in your mind, such an active imagination as a teenager, you know, you think you imagine. I really remember, for example, when I was younger, telling the lollipop lady that my cousin had lay in the road
00:45:08
Speaker
as a joke and I spent the whole day thinking and the police were going to come to school and arrest me because I told the lollipop lady about my cousin going in a road. Now of course that wasn't going to happen but in my head that's definitely going to happen. Yeah, yeah, yeah and you almost love that melodrama as well. I remember that whole thing of kids phoning random numbers to see who they get because it's just a bit daring and a bit scary but you sort of caught that when you're young. I remember phoning random numbers and then someone would answer and go
00:45:37
Speaker
I'm ringing doorbells and running away. Exactly. It's early. It's about testing boundaries and things. Yes, I guess it is. It really is. So you might imagine that if you tell somebody it's going to be this massive, big, scary drama and there's going to be 10,000 adults crowding around making you talk about things you don't want to.
00:45:59
Speaker
Actually, opening up is less scary than you think it's going to be. And people know how to deal with these things. They'll look at you like you're a weirdo. They're not going to think, you know, like back away gasping. They're going to be concerned and really want to help you and they know how to help you. And it's less of a big deal now. Schools are very aware of it and there are so many. In fact, I'll do some research and stick some links in the show notes.
00:46:28
Speaker
There's so many places you can go for help and teachers know all of this and parents have access to it and I think that's one of the really good things about social media and the internet is that that awareness is there and the stigma around it isn't so great as it used to be and so people can open up and talk about how they're feeling
Reflection on Seeking Help and Achieving Goals
00:46:48
Speaker
and what they're doing and find support there. I think that there's an awareness that it's okay to talk about these things so once you do open up
00:46:58
Speaker
it's going to get easier. Absolutely. And if you don't do anything about it, it's not going to get easier. You're not overnight and not going to feel like that anymore necessarily. It takes work and you need help for that. And I think looking back,
00:47:13
Speaker
If I'd said something then, I could have saved myself 10 years of being really unhappy, which is a real shame. It's a real shame that I thought I had to deal with that on my own. I really, really wish I'd told somebody, because I know now that having since had counseling, having since been on antidepressants, these things that I was so dreading,
00:47:35
Speaker
knowing they're as scary as I thought and really helpful. Did you find external support when you eventually decided to stop? Or did you just do it cold turkey by yourself? I just did it, basically for me it was as my confidence grew. So I used it as a little bit of a, I used my experiences as a bit of a motivator.
00:47:57
Speaker
through my life. So I set myself sort of personal goals when I was in my teens that I desperately wanted to sort of achieve. And I focused on those and sort of trying to achieve those aims as a kind of almost, okay, so I wasn't very popular at school, but I'm gonna really work hard to make life as an adult better, to make up for it. That's really interesting.
00:48:22
Speaker
it kind of spurred you on to achieve things that you might maybe wouldn't have if you'd been one of the popular accepted people. Well I definitely wouldn't have, I mean a wrote list on that list was working for Cosmopolitan magazine and getting my name on a film poster as a reviewer and writing a novel you know these were quite sort of unusual things so Cosmopolitan because
00:48:45
Speaker
I always loved the magazine but I didn't really understand it. I never had a boyfriend and I didn't understand like they'd go on about the Cosmo girl and I didn't really get it. I thought I'm not that person, these glossy girls, their cool jobs and their boyfriends and smoothies or whatever the equivalent was back then. And I felt like I'm never going to fit in like that. So first my ambition was sort of to
00:49:07
Speaker
to be a Cosmo, to understand it and maybe to get a cool job and some friends and a boyfriend. And they might not achieve those things. I thought, well, maybe I could actually work for Cosmo. Maybe I could turn things around so vastly that I go from someone who feels like a complete outsider to someone who's working with this magazine that I saw as this sort of pinnacle of glossiness. And I eventually got my job there. Amazing. Did that feel incredible? Oh, it felt absolutely incredible. How did you start?
00:49:36
Speaker
What was your first job? How did you get to it in the door? I did an English degree so I didn't get into Cambridge which is another thing that I let make me feel really bad about myself. So I did an English degree and then I decided I did a publishing postgraduate certificate and while I was there we had a lecture from someone who worked on a magazine
00:49:59
Speaker
And I thought that really sounds like what I want to do. And obviously I'd always had this sort of cosmopolitan dream in the back of my mind. So after I did finish my certificate, I did three years working in a petrol station.
00:50:14
Speaker
and doing a work experience in London. So I was working evenings and weekends in the petrol station and in a pub to pay for the travel. And I paid my parents rent to go to London to do work experience in the day. So I spent three years doing work experience.
00:50:30
Speaker
and they got a job in Bristol at a news agency so that was my first journalism job and then I worked my way up from there so I was on weekly magazines, gossip magazines, real life magazines for a few years and then I got my job at Cosmo so it was very exciting.
00:50:49
Speaker
I told the editor, I told Louise Caught about the fact that I used to put Cosmo in the drawer of my bedside table like you might be the horror novel because I'd get so frustrated that I didn't understand what it was talking about and I said you know this would really be a big dream for me. What was her take on that?
00:51:11
Speaker
I was genuinely passionate about it and I did say this is such a turnaround for me that I've gone from this
00:51:21
Speaker
14-year-old that had no confidence whatsoever and just didn't fit in and just felt like such an outsider to be working for a glossy magazine in London. The idea of this is just such a massive thing for me because it represents a lot to me and I'm really, really passionate about it. And then when I got there, they said, do you want to review? I review TV books, films. I was like, films? And then I got my name on a film poster as a reviewer. Fantastic. Every step I've taken in my life and my career
00:51:50
Speaker
I've always had that 14-year-old in my mind. I've done it, so this flat, which, you know, I really love my little flat, it's like a converted warehouse, and it's very small, but I said to my fiancé when we looked at it, I said, 14-year-old me would kill to live in a converted warehouse in London, so can we buy it? You know, it just was like, it sounds silly, but I just, I felt such a,
00:52:16
Speaker
I do a lot of things for her because she was so unhappy. And she deserves that. And she deserves those things. And I just do things thinking, how would I feel? How would I have felt then if I could tell her? So I do things now that I could tell that girl. That was one of my questions, actually, if you could sit down with her yourself when you were that age. What would you say to her about her life? I just I really just say, hang on in there. I just really I think I'll get a bit emotional. You know, I think
00:52:45
Speaker
It felt so hopeless and I never thought it would get better. And, you know, I just really, I just never thought, I thought I'm never going to get, I just want to be popular. I want a boyfriend, I want some friends.
00:53:01
Speaker
a good job. I don't want anything too out there, but I'm never going to have those things. I'm never going to be popular. I'm never going to have friends. I was always convinced I'll never have friends. And now I've got some fantastic friends. I've got loads of fantastic friends. I've got wonderful fiance. I'm living in the flat that my 14 year old self would adore. I do my dream job.
00:53:24
Speaker
And, you know, I wouldn't believe it. I would not believe that was even possible when I felt so bad about myself and so awful about life and how fair life felt at that time. I would never have dreamed that that could happen. So.
00:53:38
Speaker
It's just anyone feeling like that. I'm just saying that it absolutely is like the end of any tunnel. I mean, how dark that tunnel is. And as we always said on Cosmo, snow always melts. That's what we always said. You're never in the same state forever. Things change constantly. My life is so completely different now as to how it was when I was 14, when I was 20, when I was 30.
00:54:00
Speaker
you know it's it life constantly changes and no matter how dark things feel when you're a teenager especially when you don't have as much control over your life yes you know one day you will be 18 you'll be 20 you'll have a lot more control over your life over the decisions made for you things will not stay the same you will grow growing confidence you will get the things that you want you know it's no matter how bad you feel it doesn't mean things won't get better
00:54:27
Speaker
I love that. Thank you for sharing that. I think that will resonate with a lot of people. Thank you. Is there anything else that you would like anyone listening to know? I don't think so.
Conclusion and Support for Listeners
00:54:43
Speaker
I think the key thing is that love at the end of the tunnel.
00:54:46
Speaker
I just think it feels so impossible, so long. Yeah, it does, it does. Rosie, thank you so much. I've really enjoyed this chat and I think it will be helpful for a lot of people. Where can people find you if they want to? And you're on Twitter. What would you like to... I'm kind of... I want to...
00:55:07
Speaker
I almost want to promote the TAT Museum now. Is that Instagram? Yes, I think it's at TAT Underschool Museum, the TAT Museum. I'm just going to go and follow you now. You can see my cupidole lamp and weird bits and pieces. I love it. Anywhere else that you'd like to direct people if they wanted to find you? I've got a website rosymelinda.co.uk where I've got some of my writing on there, so you can see proof. Yeah, absolutely. I actually did it. Yeah.
00:55:37
Speaker
Lovely. Thank you so much. It was a brilliant chatting to you. You're welcome. Thank you. I absolutely loved that chat. Rosie really, she really shed a light on something for me because I just did not get self harm. It made no sense to me whatsoever. But her explaining it as a way to distract herself from the turmoil that was going on in her head.
00:56:02
Speaker
made total sense to me and more than anything it just makes me think as Rosie said the important thing is not to solve the symptom of what's going on but to really get to the bottom of why it's happening in the first place and help that young person to to feel better about themselves and their situation in life.
00:56:25
Speaker
I really hope that's helped anyone who might be going through this at the moment. Come back next week for another brilliant guest and go subscribe if you've enjoyed this episode. I'd also love it if you would rate and review the podcast that really helps other people get to hear about it and yeah really look forward to having you back next week.