Dr Annette Greenwood 191222

Hello and welcome to this week's edition of Free Your Mind, Let's Talk About It with LKJ at www.womensradiostation.com, the radio station supporting women's mental health. Today we are going to talk with a wonderful lady that I met at WOHA WHA, which stands for the Women of the Hearts Awards, and her empowering speech across that room when she received her award stopped me in my tracks with her voice. Her voice is for the voices and her work is outstanding. Annette Greenwood is a Golden Door Ambassador. She's an award-winning author and recently received a doctorate in humanitarian services. Fondly known as Straight Talking Yorkshire Woman with a Warm Heart. Annette works globally empowering women, helping them find purpose, passion, and lasting fulfillment. Annette is hugely passionate about triumph over adversity and self-belief. Her own journey with severe depression and anxiety led to practice derived from Far Eastern psychology and philosophy, especially in traditional Japanese Zen Buddhist practice, which transformed her life. Annette has helped a wide range of women at all stages of life, whatever their backgrounds, and specialized in coaching in a women's prison. A regular guest on podcast interviews giving tips and advice, including Expert TV— the Expert Channel TV, my apologies— Hollywood Digest, Brilliance Business TV show Hit Talks. Annette has featured in magazines and newspapers, The Telegraph Women's Own, Northern Echo Women, Kindred Spirit, and More to Life. So as we all see, a very, very impressive bio there on her. So we're, um, holding no haste in bringing her in today. Hi Annette, how are you? Hi, I'm very well and thank you for that lovely warm welcome. It makes me sound like I've done so many things in such a short space of time. Well, it's very empowering what you've done, you know, and receiving a doctorate in humanitarian service is wonderful. I— for people who don't understand that, it's one of the highest accolades that can be given to you. Myself being awarded one in the USA for the Business School of Entrepreneurship for Mental Health and Humanitarian Services myself, um, and it's such a wonderful recognition. Again, with any award that's given, it's not the title of the crown that we wear, it's recognition of our work that when you're humble but alert, that you actually are recognized for Doing something you're passionate about. You, like myself, we've walked in adversity with mental health, and I am a great believer that when you truly walk in it, you truly understand the experience. Not putting aside any doctors or any mental health experts out there, but it's— for me, having walked it, I feel it, I sense it. And I know the actual reason and what happens to our brain. And in my own studying and trying to find out why I suffered, because I wanted answers like yourself, you know. And then once you've walked that path, you know, when you see people hurting from this pain, you want to help. So my first question is, I always like my audience get to know the guests, where they're from, background, etc. So can we just start? I need to take you back to your childhood so that the listener can understand where you grew up, how many— did you have any brothers or sisters, school life, how was home life up until the age of 16? So I'd like you to cover all that, if you may, to interact with our listeners. To say, where did this empowerment come from? Where did you, um, where was you born? You know, where, where did you come from? Okay, um, I was born in the city of York, um, with my, my parents who were working class. My, my dad was a milkman and a window cleaner. My mum was a, you know, she cleaned offices. So my dreams and visions as a young girl were squashed because of the the background because they didn't have the money to— for me to pursue my dreams of— I wanted to be an actress, I wanted to be a model, and all those things, um, that you want to do as a child. Um, and I would sit outside and I would fantasize about being a writer and an actor because that was my dream. And I'd sit outside in the middle of winter imagining I was this person on the TV and all those kind of things. And that's kind probably what got me through my childhood. And we moved about quite a lot, to be honest. My mum was a bit of a, a flitter, and we moved from different houses and different locations. I went to different schools, and I just got settled in one, then we'd move again. We moved to the Midlands, to where my father was from. Then we moved back to Yorkshire again, and I picked up my old school friends, but by this time I probably slipped behind, you know, in, in my education from being moved around so much. I'm not saying that was a bad thing, that my parents did what they thought was right, to be honest, okay, Jay. But they— we got moved around and I slipped behind, and then I became where I, I just hated school. I, I don't want people to think that school's a bad thing because it's not, but I hated it with a passion because I just didn't understand Maths wasn't my strong point. I was more interested in drama classes and games and being outside in nature. And, um, it just kind of went from there. When we got into our, you know, secondary years, I was doing my exams, and again my dreams came back about being an actress or going to university to do something amazing. And my parents just didn't have the money. It was, you know, this is, this is the path, you're going to have to get a job. Um, so I, I got a job working for the, the local Yorkshire Evening Press as a bookbinder. At 15, I left school, um, which was quite a young age now actually when you think about it, isn't it? You're not, you're not grown up properly, you don't know what you want to do. So, um, off I went to this job and everything. And I foolishly met and married very young, probably just because I wanted to leave home, because I thought, you know, I'm being controlled, I, I can't do what I want. Most things that most young girls or, or young guys want to do these days, you know, they want to be out and do their own thing. So unfortunately, I got in with the wrong crowd. And I met and married this guy, um, and it turned out to be a domestic violent relationship. And I didn't know it at the time, but that would be the thing that formed my passion for, for working with women in my older years. I didn't know it at the time. All I could see was I was in a situation a bit like in the film Educating Rita She was striving to do better in her life and getting nowhere because he wanted her to have children, and she was hiding her pills under the, under the carpet or under the floorboards. And I was doing a similar thing. I was hiding my birth control pills because I didn't want to become pregnant at 17 years old, just kind of 10 days before my 18th birthday. That just wasn't on my horizon. We were completely a complete mismatch, really, when I look back at it, but Sadly, the relationship turned violent very quickly, and I'd not experienced anything like this at all. And, um, I couldn't understand how I'd got myself into that kind of a situation. His family had said to him, you know, you've made your bed, now you lie on it. My mother and father, you know, even though they had challenges and difficulties as parents, there was never any, any kind of violence. And I just I just wasn't used to it, and neither should I have been, really. But I would go to work with bruising. I would go to see my GP with bruising, who asked me how I'd done it, and I made all the excuses that most women make. I've fallen off a ladder, I've bumped my head, all those kind of things. I would leave him, then I'd go back. I'd leave him, then I'd go back. And I guess at that point my mental health can't have been very good. I'm, you know, I'm 16, 17 years old here, you know, getting on for 18. I'm in a relationship that is destructive by every stretch of the imagination, and I'm not sure which way to turn with this. And then one particular day, after a real bad bout of— he'd come home from a nightclub and he'd been drinking. And he tried to make me jealous by saying about all these women and things that he'd been dancing with. And it ended up where he sat on me and he started to punch me. Um, he was punching me in the face. Um, so I grabbed the only thing I could find, uh, which I'm not proud of, which was the alarm clock with bells on it, and I whacked him over the head with it to get him off. And then I I ran. I ran in my nightie through the streets to where my parents lived around the corner, um, and they took me off to the hospital because I was in shock. And my mum was— my mum was worried sick, my dad was worried sick, and they took me to the hospital. And I was laid on the stretcher waiting to see the doctor, and this male nurse— he was probably a gift from heaven, you know, now when I think about it. He lent into my ear and he knew, he knew that I'd been hit by my partner or my husband. He knew that I hadn't just fallen and he just lent into my ear and said, 'Leave him, you're worth better, he's not worth it.' And something must have really resonated with me because after I'd been patched up, the following day I went home and I just sort of sat and something, something inside me, there was a fire in my belly and I thought, do you know what, I'm getting out of this. I deserve better. And this was only when I was about— I was about 19 at this point, something like that, 19 or 20 even. So up I got, got my bags, and I left. I left him and I never went back. Um, and I filed for divorce, and we went through the divorce and all the rest of it. And it took me some while to be able to forgive for what he'd done and for what I put myself through, and forgive myself for actually allowing that situation to, to continue. But when you're in it, you can't see a way out. There was nothing like domestic violence charities supporting women then. I think there was one, and that was about it. And it was shameful to be in a relationship where you you would be knocked about. It just wasn't talked about the way it is now. So as I say, I didn't know at the time that this was going to, to change my life and form the work that I do now. And at this point, I'm 20, 21 years old, and all I want to do is to get the hell out now and have a bit of fun, which is what I did for a few years. I just went out with my girlfriends, I went on holiday to Spain, I didn't have any heavy relationships. But, uh, the scars, um, the scars still remained for, for some considerable time, for many years in fact. And I was very cautious and not trusting of men at all because I just didn't want to be put in that position again. So I just allowed— didn't allow my heart to love anybody in the same way I'd done then, even though it really wasn't real love at that age. I know it wasn't now. It wasn't a real sincere deep love. It was just of, this is a way out, and a way out that I took that probably in hindsight wasn't the best thing. But you know what, if that hadn't have happened, I wouldn't be sat here talking to you now. So how can I, how can I hold my past to ransom for something that's led me into such a beautiful place now? Absolutely. You know, when I was sitting there taking all that in, you know, from the young age, you know, um, from school, you said Yorkshire, your dad, you know, milkman, you know, your mum cleaning, etc. So a very northern life because, you know, the difference between north and south, there is a divide and we know that, how the divide is in cost of living, work, raising, and how people find in their social times to do it. I mean, my brother lives up the north And when I visit up there, you know, you go around to the pubs, they're massive pubs, but do these amazing offers, you know, for dinner, 2 can eat for under £10 and everything, you know. This sociable side where it was a lot of clubs, bingo, people do a lot of that, where down the south it's very, very different. And I will be humbly corrected and apologise if anyone wants to come and say no, it's different, but it is different. It's very different up the north, as I call it. I, and I do believe as well with that in the northern sector, like you're saying, people tend to settle down quicker up north than South, generally, because of the way the smaller villages where you come from, what it's like. You generally tend to be somebody that you know in your town, and I believe in a lot of people that I know from that and who I've interviewed, you know, will show that side. They get young, very, you know, married very early in that the mother knows the grandmother or somebody, you know, knows that family and going in. But, and like you were saying, the expression you used, "You've made your bed, now lie in it," is that's when you go forward. It, you know, excuse me, trying to put on an Orland accent here, but 'You know, my girl, you know, you've done this now, you've gone off, you're a married woman now, you're no longer single, you've done this, off you go, you're a wife and a mother now.' You know, to go in, in that expression. But it wasn't so easy, you know. And you do feel— and I think a lot of us, even myself when I was 16, felt older in my mind than what actually— I'm thinking Yes, I could cook. Yes, I could be a homekeeper, but actually at your age to become a wife and running this home, doing the challenges that come in there. And you do believe you are in love. You know, you get the love and the first love, sweet 16, going into 17, thinking we can do that, I'm grown up, because it's an awful age actually. Where it should be a beautiful age. Because at that age, it's all because you're too young to go into a public house to have a drink, wasn't you? You were, but you was classed as an adult if you wanted to buy your bus ticket or you wanted entry in somewhere, you are an adult. But a lot of places you wasn't seen as one. You could get married at the age of 16. To get married at the age of 16, your parents could say because you couldn't do it unless you're 18 yourself. And obviously you had those challenges going in, but then reality hits as you're growing up. And we do see a lot of people now, you know, as they get on in their second trimester of their life, is that where you're looking, thinking, that's when they get bored. I haven't done that, or 'Some people are going out and living on their own.' I haven't done that because we felt we were old enough at 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, that whole adolescent age. We think we're growing up, but we're still dealing with adolescence. But you have to deal with domestic violence at the same time. And I said, 'How can you not hold that trance?' Because you won't be here speaking to myself. Had those experiences. Life is a lesson and a journey, and when we do— no, we don't want to be hit, we don't want to have this pain, or for our childhood gone. We want to live a life that's peaceful, kind, and which we find as we get older, we look more for that than the holidays, the glamour, the glitz. To have happiness, to have peace, and live a simple life is more rewarding than to have materialistic things, you know, this whole power that somebody can have hold of you. It's just, you know, have peace in your mindset. And for yourself, that's why when I saw in that room in your speech how you go on and you empower people with this, and your recognition from, as the listener will hear, in what you have done. And then you went to, you know, yourself having walked in the adversity that is coming forward, to then you took it even further. You started helping people, women in prisons, didn't you? Because like myself, you believe in rehabilitation. I do. And that That in itself, that whole journey came about as a result of us moving over here to where we live now in the Yorkshire Dales, and my really sliding down a really bad, a bad hill. I don't know the right way to describe it. I slid down really badly into, into depression and anxiety, and I didn't know what it was at the time. I actually had a nervous breakdown, but but I, I didn't know that's what was happening. I just knew I was very scared. I was going into the menopause at the same time. I just moved out of York and left my family. Everything happened together, and I just couldn't deal with it all at once. And I'd been to see a, um, a psychotherapist. I'd tried counseling, and none of it worked. It was a very short-term thing for me. And I had, um, a desire to work with people. I'd always wanted to work with people, um, but I just wasn't in the right place. I really wasn't. My mental health was really bad, and I'd gone to a really dark place, and I felt suicidal, um, at one point. I was driving down this— down the road, and I just— I nearly drove myself off, off the side of the road. But there was, again, there was that something in me, that fire in my belly that said, no, don't you dare do this, don't you do this. And I pulled the car off the road, sort of swerved it off and pulled it to a standstill. And I thought, no, I'm going to get help, I've got to get the right help. But it was the, the help that I needed, but it had to be the right thing for me. Everybody's got, you know, their own path. And this, this help came in the form of, um, the Zen Buddhism that you're talking about earlier. You know, it really transformed my life and As part of that transformation, I began doing training in coaching and wanting to work with women, and I set a project up for a charity, a local charity over here, and people heard about my work and rang me and said, would I be interested in working in, in a prison as a coach coaching women? And I thought about it for about 5 seconds and I was over there like a shot because I just knew again it was that wasn't a thought process. That was starting to come from my heart. I was making that journey at that point, which I'd been talking about at the Wu Har Awards, and that journey was taking me into my heart. And I went and I, I coached in this prison for, for over 2 years, and I worked with women who'd been street walkers, you know, drug, drug pushers that committed murder, all sorts of crimes, but The, the one thing that they all had in common— this is what I found— is that they had no self-belief and their confidence was low. They'd been in domestic violent relationships and all the things that I could resonate with from my own life. And I was fascinated by, by their stories and how— what I could do to help them turn their life around. Maybe not in prison, but outside. So if I could coach them mentally from where they are at that point to where they wanted to be, surely that was a way forward and a better way than actually going out of prison and then coming back in again, if that makes sense. Yes, because what happens is they become institutionalised by installments. If you do not rehabilitate, then the pattern will repeat itself and will repeat itself again. They will come out with some of the working at personal officers coming out from there free on the streets, and now get on with this, take what you've done. And within 6 weeks, you're there. And actually, the prison officers and the wardens know who will be back. Yeah, because they don't know how to cope outside when they're in prison. There is no mask. You know who exactly everybody is, who you are sleeping with in your dorms, whatever, wherever you are, and when you eat, whatever, in that you know exactly who you are. Well, on the street we all wear masks. So many people wear masks to disguise what's going on. People like myself, as you know, I have hidden disabilities, and one of my radio shows that I've done that hasn't aired yet, I could have rerun and re-recorded it, but I chose to play it because I suffer with narcolepsy, one of my hidden disabilities. I'm interviewing in it and I fell asleep, but it was a trigger that sent me to sleep. When we, you know, I replayed it looking at— because the lady, you know, she would strip off and run through the streets. It was something she did. She just didn't want clothes on her. She felt dirty, mentally unclean, you know, when you're going through that. So she spent most of 3 years in a psychiatric ward coming out. But she'd lost her daughter, but I'd lost my brother. And she was talking about brother and the car accident, the whole thing in dangerous driving like that. Something triggered in my mind because when we replayed it, I just went straight out and I came back. So it was about 6-7 minutes missing of this episode that's playing as we're recording, going out where the viewers are going to think what went on it. So My decision was— and she's like, hello? And she said she was even here, but I know she made a cup of tea. She sat herself down, thought, well, okay, Jamie. But she was going, hello, are you there? In the end, because you don't hear anything, you just completely go. I was like, oh my God, you know, like, oh, straight on the, on the live thing. It wasn't recorded because I was right in the middle of conversation, which is my brain shuts straight down. Oh gosh. Like yourself, when you have had a mental health breakdown, there's certain triggers or stuff. Even when we are interviewing and we are talking amongst, you know, each other, and for our listeners, always believe that the listeners are all in the same room as us and they're just invisible. But I know behind it they're there because they're engaging and listening to it, and the listening is very important to our voice because we are the voice to help, that we are hearing what they're going through, we're hearing, you know, it goes through like I said with these ladies, you know, that need to get, you know, change, need to change in and break the pattern, break the mould, because this institutional repeat, repeat, because they don't know it's okay to walk the other side of the road, because it feels unsafe to them and unnatural. Like for people in domestic violence, like you made excuses to that doctor when you sat with the doctor. 'Oh, this is how I did that,' or 'I did it like this.' This lady, another lady I spoke to, the doctor thought she had leukemia because she had that many bruises on her. Oh gosh. In the end, it was domestic violence being done to her, till eventually he tied her to the chair beat her with a broom. Oh, but she chose to be with that violent partner because she wanted to inflict pain on herself. She used to cut herself too because the pain was so bad it was releasing. So as she cut, did it release? Or she ran naked with a It's a trauma, and you know, and losing her child, but she was suffering with mental health issues before. But that's why I always ask, like yourself and the listeners, there is no shame in saying I suffered with mental health. It was very taboo to speak about it. If somebody said, oh, you know, she's got mental health issues, and they would joke. It was bullying. They caused and inflicted more mental health pressure on you. When you had your breakdown, I was like, what? You just can't cope. Depression, you're not understanding. Scared to speak out. And with mental health, people being scared. And I still believe to this day, as much as we talk freely, there is still a stigma And we must remove the labels because when actually you sit and you— we sit together even through these airwaves, is that we have to stand, we have to look at our reflection and say, I'm enough, I am enough, I'm not worthless. As much as your mindset and those dark demons are saying to it. You have to stand up. And if you stand, you think, "Oh, it's like..." Jump! And jump! And jump again! Because then you get your balance on to balance and align your body to come on. Like when you took that steering wheel from the side of the road and went, "No!" "No!" Because you was enough. You could turn this around, and by God have you turned it around in what you've done. And like with all your voice, because you went into that prison, yes, you knew who they were, you knew their crimes, but your job was to explain no matter what, there has been some reason why you did this, of course. But there are other reasons why you took that act. Like when you took the clock and smacked it on the head to free yourself, to run in your nightie to your parents— self-defense. But some people in violence, and you know themselves when they're doing that, We had it recently, I think it was last year, where she called the police and said, "I've killed my husband. I hope he's dead." Right? And they come and said, "I hope he's not breathing." They all looked at her and said, "Have you gone mad?" No, she hasn't gone mad. No. She suffered years and years and years and years of abuse and push to, in the end, she done it. So yes, the judge gave her a 2-year order. No, life for life doesn't. But sometimes you're pushed and pushed and pushed and you have to say no. And you have to— people have to understand. Dr. Rhonda Wood, a great friend of mine, always says, "Your no has to have value and your yes has to have reason." So in your work, and when you met Dr. Rhonda Wood and Dr. Teresa, Women of the Hearts Awards. Dr. Shabnam Moosie got the Peace Award. They were Americans come over. Yeah. So for your work that you're doing, was like you stood up and went, no, no, and you will understand when I say no, it has value. So then your yes had reason. So your life became your reason. Your reason now is the empowerment that you bring to the table, because you own the table. The table is yours, and you can sit on that table, and you can enjoy who you place around that table, because the table is yours. And that table knows that you're enough, and it will carry you, carry your weight, carry whatever you want to do. You want to dance, it will know you, because you, you know each other in that alignment. What's she going on with her philosophical words here? Around that table where you place people, When I looked at your bio and how— what you've done, and around that table with you in the middle as a centerpiece on there, like your trophy in the center of that table. Looking at your bio and you put in the chair each of what you've done and coming around, what a fabulous table, what a fabulous dinner party with the people that you've helped. Bringing each person in, what you've helped and what you've done in the empowerment. When you say about Buddhism that it took you through your depression and, you know, then to help you to be able to coach other women, just for the listeners, Zen aims at the perfection of personhood. You sit in meditation called a zazen, which is employed as a foundational method of practice across different schools of this Buddha way, which is not ideologically but by a way of living. This is most distinguished feature of the school of the Buddha way. When it's a contention, is wisdom accompanied by compassion is expressed in the everyday life world when associated with oneself, other feature, and nature. The everyday life world for most people Zen is an avancée, transforming stage in which life is consumed, philosophically speaking, by either or egological dualistic paradigm of thinking with its attendant psychological states such as stress and anxiety. So couldn't you, you know, when— that's just something I read out of the internet for the people to know what it says about Zen. Explain Zen in your word rather than a computer word. Well, for me, when I went to see my teacher— so he's a British doctor, he's, he's not practicing as a doctor now, but he, um, he worked in hospitals in London, and he was a psychiatrist, and he'd done all the, the, the normal kind of trainings that you do, but he also had studied in, um, Zen Buddhism and philosophy and all that kind of thing, and When I saw the, the information about him in, I think it was The Times I saw it in back then, back in the day, I thought, this is it, this is what I'm searching for. And I rang him and he asked me to go and see him. He was in Cam— it was either Cambridge or Oxford at the time, and I got the train through to see him. And I thought he'd be doing similarly to what counselors and other things had you know, people had done, and they'd be asking me about everything about my past, and I'd be crying again all over this stuff again, this old story that I was having to go through. And he didn't— he did not do any of that. And when I started to cry, gave me a tissue, but he was very matter-of-fact, um, but empathetic, and asked me to write out a timetable for getting up and going to bed. I thought, what's this? What is this? And he said, well, just do it. Until you just do it, you'll never find out. It's not for me to tell you, you have to learn. I thought, this is serious. So I went home and I, I did what he said, and I did it. He says, do this wholeheartedly and your life will change. So I threw myself into it, and about a month into doing this I started to see colors again. I started to see light. My mood lifted. I felt lighter. I felt happier. And this was just because I was working to this routine where I was going to bed, getting up. And it sounds quite indoctrinated to people, but it's not. It's about disciplining the body and disciplining over the emotions that had been controlling me for so long. I was now able to continue with my life without being controlled by how I felt. So if I felt depressed or stressed or anxious, it wouldn't stop me getting on with my life, which is what it had been doing all those years. And once I'd seen the way within that month, I knew this was the path that I was going to go down. Now, I'm not saying it was easy, and that there have— there are times where it's been so challenging, but I've never given up. Never given up because it transformed how I felt, how I lived, how I deal with things, how I live, you know, my relationships. That journey with the coaching training I've done as well, from the head to the heart, became much more, much more understanding on why I was doing it. And in fact, I spoke to him today. I've been working with him over 20 years now. So he's still my teacher in that sense, and I still work, and he still gives me things to do. So it's a continuous journey, and I never— I, despite all the other trainings that I do, I never ever give up on this because I know it is the way for me. So the daily meditation, the living in the moment, the acceptance of the now, the acceptance of my emotions, the acceptance of how life is It doesn't mean I'm a doormat, or you become a doormat, which is one of the fears when I first began. It's more about I can accept things as they are and I can make changes, but I can do them in a much more structured and focused way rather than reacting to the emotions that have been controlling me for so long. It was like the wild horse was now starting to be tamed, and rather than me screaming and shouting in anger. I could do it from a place of, um, perspective and calm and much more rational way of dealing with things. And I just— I would not, not have this in my life. That will— this will be how I live until the day I die, which sounds really maybe harsh to people, but it's not, because your life just changes as a result of that. Having had things like beta blockers and antidepressants and all that kind of stuff that I had back then. I just didn't want to go down that road, and so this was another option. This was a choice that I made. Not for everybody, I totally get that, but I've been able to incorporate my buddy's teachings that are, you know, 21st century. I'm not walking around in a red robe or anything. With the coaching techniques and work with these people and the women in prison. The, the project I set up as an afterwards, because I knew when they came out of prison they would be struggling. So I set a project up that's still successfully running, and it's run by volunteers. And I worked in, you know, a man's prison as well. I worked in probation services. So I took what I'd learned and adapted it for people who are really at the hard end of society. And if I may, if it's all right to do so, can I share something with you that one of the people I worked with sent me just recently? Yes, of course. Right, so she says to me, you know I love you. You made such a difference to my life. You helped me when I was incapable of helping myself. I can only thank you because you led me and taught me to be a better person, and now I can help others. And if I don't know how to do it, I can find someone else who will. I've learned to ask for help. I haven't been arrested in years, so completely different from 156 arrests in a year. I'm off 36 medic— meds a day thanks to your help. I've lost huge amounts of weight and I'm never going back. You deserve every recognition you get, Annette. You totally deserve it. You saved my life and I cannot thank you enough. Wow. That still fills me. That still makes me tearful even now, just to read that. And this was only a few weeks ago. And she went on to say, I found my voice and strength in you. So for me, 'You are the most powerful inspirational person,' a British mayor, Angela. Now, I'd never heard of— I don't even have pronounced that right— and Angela, and I had to Google it, and she was a civil rights activist. Now, for her, this woman is in the absolute pits and depths in her life, and she's been, you know, arrested so many times, but the influence and the impact that my work has had on her has made such a change. You can't, you can't buy that. You can't, you couldn't pay me a million pounds and it have the same impact. And I know that by doing what I've done, if this works for her, it can work for anybody. Absolutely. I mean, and it is the empowering, um, recognition, as I was speaking to you about Oh, you know, when you're in the room and you come up and the humbleness, but you are alert, always got to be alert around you, but always stay humble. But in your passion, it's— you're a natural leader of the Voice because your inner self, your persona, and what you expel out to others fills that room for myself. You know, when I come out, please may I sit next to you? I was like, wow, I need to, you know, find out more. I think for the listeners, we need you to find out and show from that award, from the Women of the Hearts Awards, that those awards are given out for a reason. And to have people like yourself join us on the show for mental health and what you've been through is a testimony for the show, for the people at home. When you tune in to womensradiostation.com and on my show Free Your Mind, we do free that mind. We're very open. Like yourself, they see Dr. Annette Greenwood, they're like, ooh, ooh. But hearing your voice, knowing what you are, and as you say, Against the Current. It's wonderful to receive the awards in recognition for what you do, like that letter you've received. It's great to have that, but even without the rewards, that you would do that and would challenge yourself to continue to help another person, because like myself, you are humanitarian where you do believe the welfare and well-being of another person, and you believe the same rehabilitation, you believe in helping these people achieve their goal and understand they're enough, like yourself. When I said you're enough, when, you know, I come home and I'm going to, you know, my hair rushing through, doing shopping, doing everything, say, trying to get to do this interview that we had, you know, with the ladies, different things that you need to come in to do it. But we finally got there to do it, which I'm so chuffed to bring that, and it'll be one of many, one of many input, and it comes out before Christmas. Annette, touching on the work that you do and empowering people, can I ask, because obviously you're in this interview will be aired on the 12th of December for a whole week, so the listeners can tune in Monday through to Sunday at www.womensradiostation.com at 8 AM and 8 PM, twice a day for a whole hour. So even if you're busy, you've got to shut the door, tune back in and hear. But I'm gonna ask, you know, and through your own personal life and challenges and stuff, you know, we have Christmas approaching. How do you see Christmas and the effects on mental health? It can be a time of great joy for some people, and it can be a, a great time of stress for others. So I firmly believe in the most simple approach to it that we can have, because especially this year with the cost of living. People, parents in particular, feel pressured to, to buy things for the children. They don't want the children to go without. There's some people who won't be able to buy things for the children. So my approach is, is very simple, is to keep it as simple as possible. Now that might sound very, um, esoteric because I'm sat here saying this to you. But I know through personal experience that when we lost everything, and I mean everything, we had no money and we had about £20 for Christmas. So we split this £10 between the pair of us, and the challenge was to go and buy things from charity shops or markets and feed ourselves and buy some gifts. On this amount of money. And we did it. We did it. Now, I'm not saying we ate fantastically well. We didn't have any champagne or anything like that, but we ate. I kept it as simple as I could, and I actually was transparent with my friends and family and said, look, this year we can't do it. I might make things. I might even just write a card on a bit of paper, but that will be what we have to do. And rather than feel the pressure from other people I stood up and was honest about it. And for anybody who turns around and says, oh well, if you're not going to buy me anything, well then I'm not your friend. Do you really need a friend like that? It's, it's all about, isn't it, togetherness? And whether you've got £5 to scratch your backside on or a penny, if you've got a friend or a family member or somebody that you can share it with and you can make it special do that. It doesn't have to be about as much as you can spend, not in my world anyway. I don't know about you. No, I'm very much saying that. I feel like I'm in this materialistic world in decorating, because that's the thing that gets me, is the goddamn decorations they put in. I don't care about presents, the decorations, because I look at the ornaments like the little things, and I'm obsessed with them, with decorations. I saw these little round ones to go, "Oh, they look lovely on the tree," the little drums and the other— "Manta the little drummer boy," or the berries, or, you know, the oranges and the apples, and, you know, creating that tree, how it represents. And I always find You know, by doing the decorating, on comes the music. Let's, you know, and I like old-fashioned music, the old-fashioned tunes, you know, Dean Martin at Christmas, stuff like that. You know, that was music. I'm not saying no disrespect to people doing crazy music, LKJ, what you want to know, but for me, Bing Crosby, White Christmas, you know, when I'm out there and decorating, like when I decorated you know, the outside, you know, I had help with that too. But for people to walk by, to uplift them, to say, you know, the twinkles, the lights, you know, to go on there, to feel good, even if for a couple of seconds it's made them feel good. That's what I believe in. Again, on that, and I just saw these two massive reindeer and I was like, to come in to go out, you know, outside on it. And more like Hall of Beauty, I mean, lots of people having that. But once you've got your stock, you've got your stock, you know, that's it, it's going out years after. And it's the first time this year because I gave all my decorations away when I lost my mum, and she died on the 15th of January, so She was diagnosed with bowel cancer on the 19th of December, so all through Christmas, New Year, she died. And she eventually died in my arms, you know, on the 15th of January. So where I always had a passion for Christmas, I hated it. It was the worst time of year. My mental health was heightened. My daughter died on the 17th of October. I usually hate these months. Hate them. 17th of October, my daughter died. I buried her on the 20th of November. My brother then, leaving the— after, you know, we buried her, was killed by a drink driver. And then my grandmother died on Christmas Day, and then my mum took over. So, you know, I wanted— and I always had the big tree, always enjoyed that because Christmas is very special. My grandparents were half Welsh, my father's side, and the other side were from up north, so So that's how I know as well, you know, very different. Mill workers, you know, like that to my father's side, being a different type of community, as I would say, and very different to the northern life in that, you know, for Mum. And so, yeah, I didn't want it. It meant mentally These cause me more triggers every month, right? My mental health, I have to watch it more carefully. I'm more reactive to the— as a human reacting to that. And when Mum went, I couldn't bear it. I could not bear, you know, when everyone's going, "Happy New Year!" What's going to be happy about it? You know, the anger, the rage as I laid with my Mum holding her hand. And passing the tears thinking, am I going to get through this, you know, with the challenges. You never forget that, but I've learned with it. So I demolished Christmas, you know, that bridge of Christmas was gone. So I got rid of it, you know, it all went to charity and to help people and to have stuff there. But this year I said, I cannot, in my own voice and being the voice for Joyce, is to say, you have to overcome this. So I've been shopping. Oh my goodness, the prices of it have all gone up, everything. But I've become fascinated by all the stuff and the memes. There's angel wings and there's so much out there. I mean, I've had myself for 23 years since go out and do it. So I have also, but I still kept it very traditional. And, you know, like I wrote a post on LinkedIn, you know, about the bow and everything has to have meaning. So I took the challenge and with the mental health to go through and look what I was placing up, what did it mean? So it wasn't a trigger. And that's what we have to watch out is the trigger, isn't it? I mean, you have, you know, I've had everything. From almost being attacked by the hammer, everything. It's been a roller coaster through it, so staying in and just doing decorations, you know, and, you know, the good old Amazon man as well, you know, comes along. I've got to give a shout out to Amazon, you know, this time of year. But like yourself, we are having a— I'm going to be doing a event in January where I'm going to bring people like yourself together to sit around a table to see what we can do to help people through those January, February, and March months. They're going to be tough months. Yeah. And as with Dr. Rhonda, myself, there's other, you know, Dr. Jerry and stuff out there, other people, just to come down, you know, where we will crash out some ideas and putting a helpline out to reach out, you know, to people to do it. It's something I want to do. Like you, you know, when you go out, the passion is there to say, I will give this time, what can we do in our postings, what we do I mean, you know, travelling like that, we can have our board meeting virtually or we can have a day together, you know, over coffee, you know, and stuff and cake. Gotta have some cake in there. Not walnut. You know, coffee and walnut, please. Or Victoria sponge, you know. They're my two favourite, coffee and walnut or Victoria sponge. But to help, and that's what you want to do. And you're speaking when you've got the Women of the Hearts Award, uh, from that. But other than that, what is your next vision? So my next vision is, um, I would like to launch a podcast or a radio show where I am sharing tips and I'm giving insights and maybe having a little bit of fun as well with it, and perhaps interviewing some people that I've worked with whose, whose lives have changed. Doing that from a place of insight rather than a place of, um, oh, I'm trying to sell something. It's not about that. It's how people's lives have changed since I've met them and seen them. I feel it's a bit like Grand Designs, you know, 5 years later. Where they were putting down the foundations, and then you've seen the roof go on 5 years later, and wow, look at that house. And I can stand back, and that message from that, that lady was one of those things where I stood back and go, wow, why? You know, also, I've just finished some more, um, qualifications in something called Life Force Coaching, and that is very much about helping people with their energy levels So you— there's techniques and processes that I've got that I can help people with, whether you are a, you know, a high level in your business or you're somebody who sweeps streets for a living. It doesn't really matter. It's about, about the quality of life that you live. So I'm going to be focusing in on that. I also have a very strong spiritual side as well, so I love to connect in with, with that side. And talk about things from a spiritual perspective as well. So all that, I think, coming together, um, meeting you, um, has been an absolute godsend. I do believe that. I just feel we'll be doing more together. I just feel that in my gut. I can just tell that. And giving, giving my voice to the unspoken still, as well as following my own path. That's probably a big answer for a quick question. I'm sorry, I rattled on a bit there. No, no, no, but that's true because you've become the angels of the voice. Our voice is impactful and how we deal with that and how we unite and we— you are connected, you meet people for a reason. I believe in the quantum uplift of our mindset. I'm also— I do believe in all religions, um, and that we're equal under one rainbow. You know that, everybody knows that about myself. However, I am fascinated by the spiritual world because, like you, our minds are always studying. Like you said, you just but another word, always looking to feed my brain with why. Where are they? Are they all watching? When you get on an aeroplane, I look out at them clouds and think, are they sitting on them clouds? Because you know when you're down here and you look up and you think, wow, they're watching the sky. When you're in the sky, you think, where are you? Where are you? I can't see you, you know. And different feelings. And different things I've had happen. When I wrote the book, "The Girl in the Red Shoes," the house was haunted. I'm telling you, it was haunted, that convent. Stuff that went on that was there. And sometimes, you know, I speak out to my brother, my grandparents, and I'll say, "Oh, come on, Mum, can you do me a favor? Help me out here." and something happens. So how did that, you know? So for me, that spiritual side, and like you said, there's something we're going to go on. We will be bringing you back in the new year because it'd be great for everyone to see how Annette got on over Christmas. Any advice, as we say, we're going to be pulling together this board meeting of, I call them my transformational angels, and myself, because we are there to help. We are the invisible hand. And like Annette, she's the voice of voices in her work, who's the most wonderful person that was in that, amongst other women in that room. But wow. But thank you. We're coming to the end of the show. It's gone by so quickly. Thank you for tuning in. We will see you next week on our next one, and we look forward to bringing Annette back. Thank you, Annette, and goodbye from LKJ. Thank you.