For those of you who know me well, you’ll know I’m a traveler. It’s one of the things that makes my soul come alive. It’s one of the reasons I started The ALiVE Retreat – I wanted to share my passion and I always get great insights and experiences that change me when I travel and I hope the attendees on the retreats get a taster of this. So off I went to Peru, not quite with a backpack but some light luggage, an open mind and ready for adventure. I did lots of great stuff in Peru – met Incas, went to villages, hung out with an alpaca, but the real reason people come to Peru is to go to Machu Picchu, and I’m no different. For those of you unfamiliar with it, Machu Picchu is an ancient city that was only uncovered in 1911 and has been preserved in its original condition. It’s one of the new 7 wonders of the world. So I was pretty excited and hoped to not only see it, but get some cool photos for Instagram.  I really fancied one of me looking out to the city looking wistful and poetic. You know the one I mean. If you don’t, it’s this one. So I wasn’t too thrilled when I arrived and this was my view…yes it was raining too! So what was the plan? A common theme in my life and I’m sure many others is how to cope with reality over expectation. I have high expectations for myself and the people I surround myself with. Part of it comes from wanting them and myself to be the best we can be. I’m a girl from the Welsh Valleys and I now run my medical practice in Knightsbridge in London. It didn’t happen overnight but I worked hard and didn’t lose my vision despite numerous ups and very very low downs. But I also expected to be married with kids and a size 10 and that hasn’t happened. And it’s hard for me to admit, but I spend a lot of energy wondering why my expectation isn’t my reality. So whilst up Machu Picchu, in the rain, in the fog and in that oh-so-sexy plastic poncho, I came up with the following steps for accepting reality. Step 1:   Real is better than fake . I like people who are authentic and honest and aren’t perfect and I’m sure you do too. It’s nice to know people don’t need to be perfect to do well. Is it better to have a real experience rather than an airbrushed, Instagram-filtered one? Is it better to actually feel something rather than portray an image that doesn’t fit? Cognitive dissonance is when our actions and words don’t fit in with our values and true beliefs. It can lead to emotional stress which can lead to physical health issues. Step 2:   Higher Power If you believe in a higher power or God then you will believe you’re always being guided to something or someone good for you. Or as Dorris Day would say, Que Sera Sera, whatever will be will be. Step 3: Gratitude If you’re biggest problem in life is not being able to see Machu Picchu because it’s foggy then you need to get a life! I’m alive, I’m relatively healthy, I have a good home, friends and family and a job I love. I’m not homeless, I don’t live in poverty, I’m loved. Did you know, even if you’re in the poorest 1% in the UK, you’re still in the richest 10% in the world. Puts things in perspective right? We all have a moment from time to time but just need to get a grip. Even if we’re ill we have access to health care. There’s always a way. Step 4: Self Actualisation I know who I am and what I’m capable of. I know my strengths and weaknesses. I also know  what my greater purpose is. So I have to be grateful for what I have as my body and mind allows me to travel, to see amazing things, to help other people, to listen, to laugh, to move, to dance, to teach, to feel, to help, to be. So instead of berating myself I have to embrace all I am. So, it was rainy and foggy so I went with my new pals to get a coffee and a Twix, and we had a really great chat and laughed. It turns out as soon as you accept where you are, it seems the universe collaborates to move things. So we decided to go back in and the fog lifted. I got my photo, it wasn’t that one I imagined, it was one that’s all me.

Recently I feel like my health has been failing me. I’ve always prided myself on having a robust immune system, I’ve been quite lucky that I can shake off colds and viruses in a couple of days, and I hardly ever need to take time off work due to ill health. Yes, I am one of those people who are always on the go but I usually have good energy and get up and go, and rarely have had to not do things due to feeling ill. However something has changed in the last few months and I’ve been ill on almost a monthly basis – to the point where it’s affecting what I can and can’t do. It’s also kind of ironic as I’ve recently just started at an intensive workout program, being more mindful of my diet, and I’m taking supplements on a regular basis. I decided to really embody the whole “practice what you preach” thing and yet my health seems to be worse for it. Maybe this is what happens when you hit your mid-30s!! So here I am, alone on the Saturday night of the bank holiday weekend, because I can’t attend one of my best friends’ 40th birthday party because I’m too ill. This sucks. And this also ends here. So I’m going to tell you what I’ve tried to do so far to monitor and modify my health and I’m going to keep you posted on my progress every month. You can hold me accountable! Genomics Testing DNA (genomic) tests are all the rage now, but are they any good? I decided to try them out and see. I’m not that into the tests that tell you your percentage risk of getting dementia – I’m not sure how empowering that knowledge is for me. So I decided to have a full spectrum of tests done that look more at processes in the body; to look at my hormone metabolism, the processes of detoxification and methylation in the body, and DNA diet and sports tests to guide me on what to eat and how to exercise. The tests are really easy to carry out, using a cotton bud-type swab to rub on the inside of your cheek. You post it off and get the results in 3-4 weeks.  The test looks at Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms, or SNPs. SNPs are a variation in a single nucleotide that occur at a specific position in the genome. SNPs underlie differences in our susceptibility to diseases. The point of the test is to identify specific SNPs that can lead to diseases, and then use this information to take certain supplements, nutritional and lifestyle changes that help support the body’s pathways. Helpful, personalized and empowering information. The results were definitely interesting. Firstly, I am not that great at  methylating.  What does that mean in English? Methylation is essentially the process of converting folate in food or folic acid in to methylated folate. This is essential for many processes in the body such as balancing hormones, detoxification, it can also effect mood, sleep and even vitamin D absorption. It can also put your risk up for heart inflammation. The main reason I wanted this test done is because of the profound effect it can have on your mood. I have real issues managing my stress and mood, and it has always felt a little out of my control. As soon as I heard about how methylation can effect this I instinctively knew I had this, as the way I react to things is often more extreme than I  would like it to be. So it was almost a relief to see that any issues I have with stress and mood aren’t entirely due to my inability to deal with things, and taking a supplement will help. Now that I know I don’t methylate well, I am taking a supplement of methylated folate and B vitamins which I will probably have to take forever. I am fine with this, as it is better than taking medication forever plus it is going to cut down my future risk of health issues. Detoxification  My body is pretty good at detoxification and my liver works pretty well.  The most important antioxidant in the body is called glutathione and my body can make it pretty well – phew! But I have a SNP on the receptor for glutathione so my body is going to be less able to use my glutathione. Therefore taking extra glutathione, or the building blocks that help to make glutathione, will be useful for boosting my immune system and will support my body’s detoxification.   Oestrogen Metabolism Bad news, my body doesn’t metabolise my oestrogens as well as it should do. But not to worry, I am going to improve my methylation and take certain supplements that will help me with this. Who’s ever heard of a hormone doctor who can’t deal with her own hormones?! 😉 DNA diet   and sport The best diet for me is a Mediterranean one according to my genetics. This makes sense as my oestrogen test said having no carbs at all would not be good for my oestrogen metabolism. There’s always lots of talk about high protein and high fat diets, but based on my genetics, only moderate fats are good for me, even the ‘good fats’.  The DNA test also looks at the number of MET hours I need to do to stay healthy and fit and maintain my weight. MET stands for  Metabolic Equivalent Tasks  and are a way to measure how much energy you burn up during an activity. Every activity has a MET score, from watching TV to going to a run. The more vigorous the activity and higher the MET value. Unfortunately to manage my weight and stay healthy I need to have a high level of MET hours, 24 a week! This is the equivalent of hitting my 10,000 steps 5 times a week and doing about 3x 1 hour vigorous gym sessions.  So it’s great to know what I have to aim for. So I think this sort of information is really empowering and I am so happy I had my tests done. I have been able to change my supplements to what my body actually needs based on my genetics, and can now make well-informed decisions about my diet and how I manage my exercise. For the women I see taking hormones, I think the hormone balance genomics testing is a game changer. Women often worry about taking hormones, and this could help put their mind at ease. But it is also great to see how the liver is working, check methylation and build your nutrition and fitness program around what you actually need, and take all the guess work out of it. I want to stay healthy and happy for a very long time, and a lot of it can be out of our control, or even luck, but lots of it isn’t, and this sort of information can help us achieve our goals.

I recently watched the BBC documentary  ‘An Insider’s Guide to the Menopause’ . I thought I would share my thoughts about it. I thought that the documentary was extremely well presented, and was a great overview of the different symptoms and stories that menopausal and perimenopausal women can experience and the way they can be left feeling. I am in the privileged position of hearing these stories on a regular basis and understand how devastating it can be to suddenly be thrown in to mood swings, hot flushes, poor sleep and low libido. To all of a sudden lose your confidence and not know who you are anymore. I am glad that this is at last being talked about publicly and I hope it will help take away some of the stigma of this process that all women go through. I felt the documentary was well balanced about the benefits of taking hormone replacement therapy and emphasizing individualized treatments. It was also great that they talked about the importance of lifestyle, such as weight management, nutrition, exercise and psychological interventions like CBT (Cognitive Behaviour Therapy). This is something I look at with my patients, as well as supplementation. My job is often part doctor, part life coach, part therapist and part nutritionist and lifestyle coach – and I love it! The reason I spend a lot of my time working with menopausal women is because I feel that women are really valuable members of society. A woman in her 50’s is probably more valuable than a woman in her 20’s, due to her life experience and wisdom. Yet society continues to judge women mainly on their looks and weight in a way that doesn’t seem to happen to men. We need to break down the barriers around menopause and stop seeing women as ‘washed up’ as they age. I will never forget a powerful woman in her 50’s who works in the City of London in Finance telling me about having to give a big presentation in front of her colleagues and feeling the sweat drip down her face and going red as she had a flush, and seeing her male colleagues in their 20’s sniggering at her. Hearing about this degrading and humiliating experience from a brilliant and bright woman who is being judged by her age and hormonal state made me vow to help as many strong, powerful, wise women as possible to not have similar experiences. Some women feel they have to just suffer at this time of life, or see taking hormones as a failure. Studies are now showing taking hormones at the start of the menopause benefit a woman not only in terms of symptoms, but in terms of cardiovascular health, bone density and neurological health. Hormones should not be feared, but you do need to see an expert who understands all the evidence and can help you weigh up the pros and cons. This BBC show went a long way to help break down these barriers, to show women help is out there and to help women understand that they don’t have to suffer in silence.

I spent some time this week looking at my core values and planning for what I want to achieve in this coming year.  This led me to spend some time thinking about why I do the work that I do. As you probably know, I am a GP and used to do that full time for the NHS for some time. I started to become disillusioned as I felt I wasn’t helping people in the way I wanted to. I want to help empower people and tap into what’s going on with them and evaluate what is important to them and how they can improve their lives. I truly believe that if you feel happy and are living life on your terms, you will feel better, stronger and able to make better health choices, or cope with ill health and improve their condition. After studying integrative medicine, and realising the importance of nutrition and lifestyle changes, I then started learning about hormone balance. I see hormones as the foundation of health – if you have shaky foundations, you can have the best bricks in the world (nutrition and exercise) but they won’t build you a stable house. I’m by no means perfect in my health, but I do believe in taking control of your health and life. If there’s something you’re not happy with, change it.  I can struggle with my own nutrition and motivation to exercise, but I try my best and try to do something good every day for myself. I believe that if you want to improve your health, you can use nutrition, exercise, stress management and other lifestyle changes to help. I do believe that conventional medicine is very important at treating illness, but there is a lot we can do before to try and prevent the illness from happening in the first place.  But I also believe in balance. I’m not an ‘All or nothing gal’, I believe a little bit of what you fancy does you good, and a nothing is too naughty if done in moderation. I often tell people there’s a difference between ‘happy eating’ and ‘sad eating’, and this can apply to food, drink, and other vices.  If done in joy, it will have a less negative effect on your body psychologically and hopefully physically too. So my main values are authenticity, fun and meaningful interactions, and I hope I bring them to the work and consultations I do! I hope you can spend some time looking at your values and bring them to your work and life too.

A patient sent me the following blog asking my opinion, so I thought I would write a blog to address this for everyone who may have similar questions or queries. The blog in question is by the well-respected Dr Heather Currie, read it  here . Dr Currie is an experienced doctor and also runs a site called Menopause Matters. She’s an active member of the British Menopause Society too. A lot of what has been written in this blog I definitely agree with but I do have a slightly different view point on a couple of points. I do agree that the term bio-identical refers to the structure of the hormones used, and does not mean custom made all compounded. Dr Currie says that there are bio-identical hormone preparations available that are licensed, such as Estrogel, Oestradiol tablets, Utrogestan , and this is true. Where ever possible I would prefer to use these medications as my first choice. However, one of my main problems when prescribing for women is due to testosterone. I find testosterone to be a very important hormone for women. It is important for libido, motivation, muscle mass, preventing osteoporosis, focus and concentration and memory. At present, no drug company makes a testosterone dosage for a woman. There are testosterone preparations available but they are in doses that are made for men, such as 50mg a day, where commonly I would prescribe 1mg a day for women. I know certain doctors tell women to “guesstimate” the dose when they give them a preparation made for men, but this isn’t something that I feel comfortable with, so I get my testosterone manufactured in a low dose for women. Other medications can be manufactured in special doses when needed. For example, if a patient needs specific forms, strengths, or a medication that needs to be change from a tablet form to a liquid form or intravenous form, I use a pharmacy that does this for 250 hospitals in the UK. They are not a compounding pharmacy but rather a specials manufacturing pharmacy that can make special doses of medication when needed. They have a strict quality assurance process that tests the medications and quality. Sometimes a patient will have a negative effect due to the medication that has been  prescribed, and therefore I might want to have a lower dose made for them to see if this suits their body better. This is another reason for having hormones manufactured for a patient, as is that it may be their choice or for financial reasons. I do ask my patients to have blood testing of their hormones done from time to time. I have this done at a specific time after they’ve used the hormones, to make sure the levels are not getting too high which might excessively stimulate breast, ovarian, and endometrial tissue. If this is the case I can lower the dosage, and if the patient is having side-effects it is also useful for me to take a blood test to see exactly why this is happening. I also advise my patients to have a pelvic ultrasound scan yearly and regular breast screening and smears. This is because I do not want the hormones to cause overstimulation in these areas. For me, the two most important aspects is not doing harm and being of service to the patients I see and listening to their needs. I try and provide them with options so I can help their symptoms and give them a say in how they are treated. For me, one size doesn’t always fit all. I am also aware that some women feel fantastic on conventional HRT and I have no problem with that either. The key is to look at the person in front of me, listen to them, and treat them holistically, taking into account their preferences and lifestyle.

When your adrenal glands are producing too much cortisol it can make you feel tired, stressed out, fat, irritable and wound up. You can spend your life feeling exhausted all day, and then wide awake at night when you should be sleeping. Your memory and concentration can be impaired and can feel like you have ‘brain fog’.  You may find that you are keeping yourself going all day on caffeine and sugar, and then using wine or sedative medication to unwind. Having a high level of cortisol not only makes you feel bad, but affects your body physiologically. It puts you more at risk for insulin resistance, obesity, high blood pressure, increased cholesterol, and affects your digestive functioning. For most of us it is not possible to LOWER the stress in our lives, instead we have to learn how to MANAGE the stress in a better way. There are ways to manage your stress lower your cortisol that will make you feel more energized and healthier.   Nadi Shodhan (alternate nostril breathing) Nadi Shodhana, or “alternate nostril breathing,” is a simple yet powerful technique that settles the mind, body, and emotions. You can use it to quiet your mind before beginning a meditation practice, and it is particularly helpful to ease racing thoughts if you are experiencing anxiety, stress, or having trouble falling asleep. Take a comfortable and tall seat, making sure your spine is straight and your heart is open. Relax your left palm comfortably into your lap and bring your right hand just in front of your face. With your right hand, bring your pointer finger and middle finger to rest between your eyebrows, lightly using them as an anchor. The fingers we’ll be actively using are the thumb and ring finger. Close your eyes and take a deep breath in and out through your nose. Close your right nostril with your right thumb. Inhale through the left nostril slowly and steadily. Close the left nostril with your ring finger so both nostrils are held closed; retain your breath at the top of the inhale for a brief pause. Open your right nostril and release the breath slowly through the right side; pause briefly at the bottom of the exhale. Inhale through the right side slowly. Hold both nostrils closed (with ring finger and thumb). Open your left nostril and release breath slowly through the left side. Pause briefly at the bottom. Repeat 5-10 cycles, allowing your mind to follow your inhales and exhales. Steps 5-9 represent one complete cycle of alternate nostril breathing. If you’re moving through the sequence slowly, one cycle should take you about 30-40 seconds. Move through 5-10 cycles when you’re feeling stressed, anxious, or in need of a reset button. Cut sugar out of your life Sugar causes spikes in insulin which in turn spikes cortisol and adrenaline. Cutting out sugar from your diet will massively improve this and help to keep cortisol steady. Having a diet rich in vegetables, whole grains, and protein with every meal will also help steady your blood sugars. Laugh more We cannot always do anything to reduce the stress in our lives, but often increasing the pleasure in life can counteract this. Laugh often, watch your favourite comedy TV show (I particularly like Modern Family and you can never beat re-runs of Friends), see actual friends, take long walks and bubble baths….whatever makes you happy. Take supplements Ashwarganda and chamomile, magnesium and B vitamins are all important for healthy adrenal glands. Camomile is relaxing and best taken at night. Gratitude to reduce cortisol Feelings of gratitude reduce feelings of fear and stress. It is important to have a gratitude practice and I have found it so helpful in managing my emotions. Tony Robbins says we should start with something small to be grateful for like a good cup of tea, the roof over our heads, because if we are always looking for something big to appreciate like holidays, or bonuses, we will lose perspective of the other little things that are good for us too. 3 things morning and evening are a good start, either written down or just noted to yourself or said out loud.

Tonight is Friday night, and for the first time in aaaaages, I am staying in . I am wearing a onesie, writing, and watching TFI Friday and eating leftovers. I did have plans to see some friends, who I really love and it would have been so fun, but I couldn’t do it tonight. After a long week at work, I needed some ‘me’ time to recuperate. FOMO is a new trendy acronym that ‘the kids’ are using, which stands for ‘Fear Of Missing Out’. I have lived a lot of my life feeling FOMO. But every time you do something because of FOMO (what if I miss that totally hip party, what if everyone is then talking about it in work for weeks and I wasn’t there?!) you are missing out on something else that you perhaps need more. Perhaps something your body needs, like a rest, or a gym session, or a good night’s sleep. Is putting your needs first and looking after yourself boring? Yes, maybe. But it sure is healthier and good for your spirit in the long term. It keeps you focused on your bigger goals and sets boundaries, which is a healthy thing. So try saying ‘no’ to something over the next week, and in turn say ‘yes’ to yourself. Have a great weekend!

My gorgeous friend Marnee was visiting London from California so I asked her what she wanted to do while she was in town. She was really keen to go to the Churchill War Rooms and I had never been so was happy to do try something new. The Churchill War Rooms are the underground rooms where Winston Churchill held office away from the dangers of The Blitz. It was fascinating to see these rooms preserved, holding so much history. What was even more fascinating was the life lessons I learned from the museum about Mr Churchill’s life. I thought I would share them with you here: Winston Churchill was 65 years old when he was made Prime Minister. We all often remember him for his role in WW2 but he had lived a whole life before that. He continued to work until he was 89, and only stopped due to ill health. Lesson: you are never too old to achieve what you want in life or to start again. When you love your work, it is not work, it is who you are. Before becoming Prime Minister, he had worked as a soldier, a journalist, he was the highest selling book author in 1900, won a Nobel Prize or his writing in 1953 and was a politician. When he was a war correspondent, he was kidnapped and made an escape and reached celebrity status. He used this celebrity to launch his political career. Lesson: Just because you are known for doing one thing there’s no reason why you can’t try something else, and be a success at it. He had many talents and hobbies – he enjoyed landscaping, bricklaying and painting. Lesson: it’s good to have a variety of different interests away from work to unwind. He had a lot of self confidence. One quote I love of his is “we are all worms, but I do believe that I am a glowworm”. Lesson: confidence in one’s worth and talents is not necessarily arrogance if it is backed up. Unless you are confident in what you do, it can be hard to be successful and fulfill your potential.  He was a troubled child. He was sent to boarding school and missed his parents so often ‘acted out’ and got low grades. Lesson: what you achieve in school doesn’t have to be an indicator of what you will achieve in life.   He was married and devoted to his wife and children. In his first letter to her after their first date, he wrote that it was lovely to meet a woman who was strong and had intellect. She is often sited to being his rock and confidant and advised him on many political matters including the handling of WW2. Lesson: strong men admire and need strong women.  He was apparently extremely difficult to work for. He needed silence at certain times of the day, and he could be difficult to his staff. Yet they all said that it was a pleasure to work for such a great man. Lesson: it is important to be respected for what you do and who you are.   He changed political parties, from what would have been conservative back then to labour. Lesson: a man of conviction and honour, he wasn’t afraid to change parties, he would rather follow what is right than what was conventional.  He had a strong personality. He could be short with people, had a sharp tongue was very witty and also had a style – he was known for his cigars and bow ties. Lesson: having a strong personality and an individual style is important. Not everyone might like you but everyone will remember you. Churchill suffered with depression, which he referred to his ‘black dog’. Lesson: mental health issues are not a weakness or a flaw, some of the greatest people suffer with depression. He is responsible for some amazing quotes: “Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.” “If you’re going through hell, keep going.” “Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak. Courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen.” “You have enemies? Good. That means you’ve stood up for something, sometime in your life.” “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.” “We make a living by what we get. We make a life by what we give.” Lesson: an inspiring man we can all learn from, who’s life and ethos is still relevant today as it was in the 1940s.

It’s been a year since my book ‘The Tiredness Cure’ came out. Most people would think that this is a cause for celebration….after all it’s been selling relatively well, I get emails from people who’ve read it and feedback from patients coming to see me who say they’ve found it inspirational and its generated some good publicity about holistic health and about my work. However if I’m being completely honest, over the last year the book has felt like a noose around my neck. I haven’t felt proud, I’ve felt ashamed and a fraud and I haven’t been able to enjoy the achievement of writing a book at all, I would flinch whenever anyone asked if I’m writing a second book, and I’ve tried to run away from it as much as possible. I wrote my book with the desire to help people, the same reason why I became a doctor. There wasn’t anything else like it around for the British public and I had a desire to share my knowledge and just try and make things better for people struggling with their health and not living their best life. I felt it was a great little book, written in my ‘easy to understand’ style, full of practical tips and covering everything from nutrition to meditation to supplements to hormones to exercise. Of course to be truthful I also hoped it would generate some good publicity for me too and establish me as an authority and my aid my career. It would be dishonest to say I wasn’t hoping for a bit of praise for my amazing concept and a little bit of ego-stroking. I didn’t expect Oprah to call me with congratulations, but I did expect….something big. Even a year on I feel a slight sense of shame because of the backlash from the dairy community. I made a mistake and became ‘Most Hated’ with the UK dairy farmers who were positive I was launching an all-out war to put them out of business. I misquoted a reference I found and had wholeheartedly believed, as it is so widely reported in the nutrition community, about ‘pus cells’ and hormones in milk. However it turns out it’s an American stat not a British/European one. And I am not American, nor is my book published there. When writing my book, there were key areas that I thought might offend people, and had prepared what to do about a backlash for them, but the milk thing caught me totally off-guard! It’s really hard to make a mistake, but to make it so publicly via The Daily Mail is really painful. A tiny quote had been magnified completely and put my credibility at risk. If the book was read as a whole, people would have seen one of the key messages is to buy from local farmers, and to not completely cut out any type of food if you don’t have a problem with it. But that wasn’t made clear and obviously I took responsibility for the mishap. It was a dark time for me where articles were written about me in the Farmer’s Guardian, I received constant hate mail via social media and I stopped taking care of myself (doing pretty much the opposite of everything in the book!), I cancelled my book launch party, completely stopped writing and turned down a load of speaking events. I would never intentionally try to hurt anyone or try and victimise a certain group of people. Most doctors don’t try and hurt people that way. I was trying to be authentic and got it wrong. I’m trying to be the most authentic person I can be and that includes admitting when I am wrong, scared or unhappy and saying sorry, as well as sharing my skills and being proud of all that I am – good and not as good. I did a lot of ‘letting go’ of past baggage recently (but we’ll save that for another blog post!) and I’m finally willing to let this go too. I’m the author of The Tiredness Cure and I’m proud I’ve written a book which is good and I tried to contribute to the world and help people. If you haven’t read it you really should! Here’s what I’ve learned over this last year: 1) People will be far more vicious to you over the internet than they ever would to your face (I assume) because they forget you are a person with feelings and insecurities, just like them. 2) If you want to go out and do anything in this world you’ll probably make some mistakes. A good friend of mine said at the time ‘at least you’re out there trying to contribute to the world ‘. That kept me going during tough times. 3) When being given a lot of different advice from different groups of people, it’s probably best to follow what feels most authentic and in keeping with your values, not the best “PR” line. Ultimately I was responsible so I had to step up and trust myself to get through it. 4) If you want to do anything in life, you have to get used to being embarrassed. I hope you’ll never be publicly embarrassed via a national newspaper and farming forums, leading to everyone you’ve ever known hearing about it, but still, it’s a good idea to get used to dealing with humiliation. Once you’re over it, nothing will ever phase you again and you’ll be out there taking risks and living life on a whole different level. 5) Don’t hide your light, the world will move on with or without you…..and you’ll wake up old (if you are lucky enough to make it to old age) and wonder where your life went and why you didn’t take more chances. 6) The hardest thing is to say you are sorry and admit a mistake, but it will liberate you to do so. 7) If you know you’re coming from a good place, then fear not, you will find a way around things to make it right again. 8) You know who your friends are when the sh*t hits the fan. 9) There’s no such thing as ‘you only get one chance’, you make chances in this life. If you feel you’ve blown a chance, work hard to create another. 10) My darling father – the only man so far in my life who has always been there for me and my hero – listened to me sob and panic down the phone one day about what’s going to happen if I get struck off and lose my career, and he calmly and patiently said, ‘when it happens, then we deal with it, until then let’s not worry about it’. That’s just good advice for everything in life. He should write a book, he’s also far better at attention to detail than I am….. 😉

Today is A Level results day in the UK and it brings up a lot of memories for me. It is the day where you see if your hard work has come to fruition and if you’ve gotten in to university. Here’s some things you may not know about me. I didn’t get good enough grades to get my place at Cardiff University to do medicine. So although I had what most people would consider good grades, I went home after picking up my results from school sad and disappointed. However obviously you know that isn’t how the story ends, as about 3 weeks later (after I’d made a plan to resit a couple of my A-Levels) I got a phone call from Southampton University offering me a place for medicine in their clearing scheme. Before that call I’d been very blue indeed as I had failed my driving test that day. I was very upset but, hey, here I am now, a full qualified (and very good, may I add!) driver. Here’s something else you might not know about me. I failed my first year of medical school and had to do summer re-sits. I got confused and thought university was just for partying and forgot about the studying bit!! Why am I telling all these things? The point I am trying to make is that I was devastated when my A-Level grades weren’t good enough, but it all worked out fine. I thought it was the end of the world when I failed my driving test, but it’s no big deal now. I was gutted when I failed my first year of uni, but it’s hardly hindered my future success. The things we feel are a big deal at the time, often have no impact later on. Failure makes us more resilient. My friend Helen told me she asked her gran who was in her 80s for some advice in life, and gran said ‘I wish I’d worried less’. Because in the end, I guess everything works out just as it should do, and worrying just spoils the ride. Start to see the positive side of failure.

So I was at a wedding on the weekend of one of my dearest university girlfriends. She’s finally met the love of her life and there was one hell of a celebration! I was really really happy for her. But also a bit nervous. I was seeing girlfriends I hadn’t seen for years, and was worried about how I would come across, how I would look, have I done well enough in life, would there be the inevitable questions about why I don’t have an ‘other half’ yet? So after choosing the dress and making sure my hair and make up was good, I arrived at the wedding and had a huge realisation. No one really cared that much! It wasn’t about me, we were hear to celebrate Lauren’s day and have a good time. Here’s something else I realised. Lauren is lovely and so are her girlfriends. These women knew me when I was a girl (but thought I was a grown up!) and we have seen each other’s mistakes and successes and will take each other’s secrets to the grave (I hope!!) and there’s nothing better than being around people who knew you before you were the ‘you’ you are today. Life can be so hectic, I found myself dancing to S Club 7’s Don’t Stop Moving and wishing for the days when I was a young and carefree student again. We all have worries and insecurities but most of the time they are bigger in our heads than they really are to the outside world. Most people don’t have time to be analysing everything you do or say so cut yourself, and them, some slack. I was reminded on the weekend of all the wonderful strong women I have in my life, even if I don’t see them often enough. We have a past and friendships together that we’ll always share and I hope we’ll be there to celebrate the triumphs and carry each other through not so good times in our future. So I implore you seek out the people in your life that you love and say hi and reconnect. There’s nothing more important than human connections, and I’m very glad I got to spend the weekend reconnecting with some of mine.

I regret that pages 86-92 of my book The Tiredness Cure includes some inaccurate information about dairy, wheat and meat. My publishers will include the new, corrected material in future reprints of the book. You can view or download the corrected pages by clicking the link below: The Tiredness Cure – (Corrected Pages 86-92)