In this compelling episode of Judymay Is Listening, host Judy Mae Murphy tackles a question from listener Beatrice about navigating a relationship where her boyfriend constantly undermines her new ideas and goals. Judy Mae uses this as a jumping-off point to explore the deeper patterns at play: suppressed emotions, power imbalances, and the importance of knowing yourself before sharing your dreams with others.
Judy Mae emphasizes that Beatrice has the right to feel excited about her ideas and to have New Year’s resolutions, regardless of her boyfriend’s dismissive attitude. She encourages listeners to get crystal clear on their own values and desires first, so when someone pushes back, you won’t second-guess yourself. The conversation explores what ‘realistic’ really means and whether pessimism is actually helpful or just dream-killing.
Ultimately, Judy Mae addresses the red flags in Beatrice’s relationship: the constant criticism, the lack of support, and the emotional suppression she’s experiencing. She challenges women to recognize when they’re playing a supporting role in someone else’s life story rather than starring in their own, and asks the crucial question—is this behavior particular to this relationship, or a pattern you’ve learned to accept everywhere?
Main Topics
You have the right to feel what you're feeling—don't suppress your emotions or excitement about your ideas, even if others dismiss them
Get clear on who you are to yourself first through journaling and self-reflection, so you have a solid foundation when others push back against your desires
Question whether 'being realistic' is actually useful or just a way to kill dreams before they develop; usefulness depends on timing and intention
Recognize power imbalances in relationships where one person constantly needs to lead and insists the other person align with their beliefs and version of success
Different definitions of 'working' exist—yours might be learning and joy, while his might be financial gain; understanding these differences is crucial
Living in constant compromise isn't sustainable; there needs to be enough core compatibility for a relationship to thrive long-term
Notice if you're more unhappy than your partner and if you're over-compromising—women often stay in these positions longer than necessary
Full TranscriptWelcome to Judy Mayer's Listening. This is the show where you tell me what's happening in your life and I listen and tog...▼
Welcome to Judy Mayer's Listening. This is the show where you tell me what's happening in your life and I listen and together we transform everything. Welcome back. This is Judy Mae Murphy. Here you are listening to WRS women's radio station supporting women's well being. And today I have a really gorgeous guest for you to meet. Someone who I really love talking to. I've known her for a great many years. You're going to be meeting her in a little while. And also as well as Orla Dermody, we have Elspeth Proudlock in the house as usual, our wonderful associate producer. And Elspeth's doing really well being in here today because she had a really fancy big party last night and she showed up on time, smiling with her. It looks kind of like a turmeric drink. Yes. A mango juice from Pret. Well done. That is just, you know, we said she gets all the medals for that just for being here. And if you're having a kind of day where you feel like you deserve all the medals just for being here, you get medals too. Because you know what? Sometimes it's not as easy as it could be and sometimes we're in slightly better form and we're able to do a little bit more. And what we need to do is to make sure that at all times we're being the best we can be. Whatever that is, whatever that is. Not to say, oh, I'm going to just take it easy today, because I feel like taking it easy, but saying instead, how can I get myself to a place where I feel on fire for everything that I need to do? How can I make my dream come true today? How can I have a really enjoyable day and also have some kind of urgency around it? Just an extra couple of phone calls can really make a difference. And there was one call. If those of you who are listening last week or who have listened to the replay during the week, you remember, there was one call that we didn't get to, one question that we didn't get to last week from one of you guys. Who was that? Elspeth. And what was it that they were saying? So this is from Beatrice and she said every time I try something new or even say I'm going to try something new, my boyfriend points out why it won't work. He says he's being realistic, but it hurts when I'm excited about something. He just takes all the joy out of it. What really annoys me is that sometimes he's right. I stop sharing my ideas even Having new ideas. I heard him yesterday boasting to someone about how the two of us did don't set New Year's resolutions. And I had to go off to another room. And as I started to cry, I came back into the room pretending everything was fine, but it's not. Oh, my goodness. And that's from Beatrice. Beatrice. So, Beatrice, the thing that I love about that is that there are so many lessons within that for all of us. And the first one is this idea that somehow you don't get to feel what you're feeling. So even before we're looking at the rights and the wrongs, the goods and the bad of being realistic, being pessimistic, being optimistic, before we delve into that, just look at the fact that you have the right to feel the way you feel, and that is something that you are suppressing. Now, I don't know whether that is because this man is particularly not open to your reality. And he sounds like he really needs to lead first with his reality and to then say that you're part of that, just, I guess, just because you're with him. But first of all, just getting clear for yourself on, well, what is my reality? And really journal, what do I want? What am I excited about? And then having conversations from that place, from a place of. Hold on a second. I do want to have New Year's resolutions, or I have set New Year's resolutions. So first of all, get clear on who you are to you. And then when you get out there, it won't be so fuzzy. So when someone pushes back against that reality, against your wishes, against your desires, you won't be saying, oh, yeah, maybe it's that, because you will already have become crystal clear on who it is that you are and where it is that you're going. So becoming clear on that first. And then secondly, asking yourself, why is it that you are not comfortable sharing that reality with people? Because it could be that it's just that he has sent you messages of that's not okay. Perhaps he has shouted you down, sulked, you know, not being so available, done all number of things when you are not totally in agreement with him. And if that is the case, that is a pretty toxic relationship. That is a relationship that cannot be fixed. That is not misunderstandings. That is an imbalance. It's a power imbalance where one person feels more entitled. They feel that their version of things needs to lead. Perhaps they feel that they are in some way superior when it comes to doing life. And as women, we very often Numb down that information as we get it and we turn it into something else. Such as, well, he just had a bad childhood, or if he understood or he's just very, very ambitious. I've done that one myself for many years. Well, he's just so ambitious. He's just got so much to do. That. That's why, you know, he wants. He's got a high standard, and he knows that I can reach that high standard. So I want to raise to that standard as well. Whatever it is that you're doing, I would suggest just for a while, don't do that. Don't do that. Instead, say, you know, this is not okay. It's not okay that I don't get to be completely me. That the kind of relationship we all deserve is a relationship where we believe something. And then somebody says, tell me more about that. And somebody tries it on and someone, you know, steps into our experience, that they have that empathy, that they have that way of saying, you know, let's. Let's make sure that we. That I'm understanding you correctly. But it sounds as if perhaps you're sort of playing a role in his. In his movie, and that you've been sort of cast as leading lady in his movie and that your movie isn't really getting a look in. So that's. Beatrice, the first thing that I'd have a look at and also ask yourself, is this something that's particular to him, or is this something that you have learned to do with everyone? Have you ever been able to sing out loud, cry out loud, and not worry about the reaction of the people around you? The next scene then was this idea of boasting that you guys don't set New Year's resolutions and fancying himself as being realistic. Well, I've always had a big problem with this word realistic, because there's so many different versions of what can happen. So when we're talking about the future, you can either take it as completely unrealistic or completely realistic to make up whatever kind of future that you want. It's not decided yet. You can say to yourself, well, what's likely to happen? What's more unlikely to happen? But I haven't found that useful. What I always do with a phrase, with any kind of belief, a belief about what will happen, a belief about what will not happen, a belief about what you're capable of right now, a belief about what you're capable of making possible later, learning, doing, connecting with other people. The best question around that is, is this useful? Is this idea Useful now sometimes having someone push back and go, these are all the things that can go wrong. Sometimes that can be useful, especially when you've got a complete Pollyanna kind of head on you. Like I tend to do that. You have someone that says, okay, Julie Mae, you're going to go and you're going to do this, you know, 10 city tour of the USA and you're going to do it in five weeks. That means you're going to be on a plane every such and such number of days and you're going to be, you know, TV shows and radio shows and talks on the stage. Do you not think that maybe if you do five, you might do a better job and in fact reach more people by doing a great job with five cities in that time? And that's really useful to me because I can kind of go possibly. I just loved the idea of going back to Speak in South Carolina because I had such a great time there the last time and I wanted to go to Savannah again. And they go, well, how about having Savannah as your vacation after the tour? So you can see how someone pushing back can be useful sometimes. But when it's done at a time where your dream is just developing and the ideas are just coming out, then that can just kill the dream, that can just squish it dead. And so at that time it's not useful. It's particularly not useful when he's just doing that. So he's just sending the message of, I don't think you're capable. I don't think that life can be awesome and magic. Whereas, you know, if it was that, he was often saying, yeah, you know what, go for it. I believe in you. Take a chance. And you know what, if it doesn't work out for you, I'm here for you. We'll go and we'll, you know, we'll go and we'll have something great to eat and we'll go for a walk and we'll talk about it. So that, that again is a concern. The fact that he seems to be, at least from your version of what you've told us about him, he seems to be quite one note, one color, like one shade of a color. And that is, you know, I am this, this is how I do life. She is like this, like, she is like me. And that, that is a concern to me. What was the very first sentence Elspeth that Beatrice shared with us? She said, every time I try something new or even say I'm going to try something new, my boyfriend points out why it won't work, why it won't work. Like he is. Like he's got a crystal ball. Like he knows it won't work because. But also remember that your version of working and his version of working might be quite different. So for me, something works if you've learned something from it, or you've enjoyed it, or you've someone, it really is that simple. And so most things that we try work, if that's your definition of it working. Now, if your definition of it working is that like my dad's definition of things working is pretty much, did you get paid for it? So, you know, I can do something extraordinary. I can say, oh my goodness, I was, you know, on this new TV show and there was, you know, half a million people listening and we got really great feedback and I helped all these people. And the first question my dad will ask is, did they pay you? And so that's that. Because that's his version of it working. So perhaps you could find out what. What is his version of, of things working, and you can share with him what your version is. Now, if he stays stuck and he keeps insisting that you always align with him, you always align with his beliefs, you always align with his version of it, then that is problematic moving forward. Because we need to be able to grow in relationships. We need to be able to grow as an individual, we need to be able to grow as a couple. We need to be able to support each other through that growth. So it's not like you are misbehaving. You are not being the person that I thought you were when you auditioned in the first couple of dates. And so therefore, goodbye forever. That just isn't helpful. It's not happy. It ends up in power struggles. And the thing I'd point out right now is it seems as if you are more unhappy than he is. And as women, we will often take that position and we will often live in that position for a lot longer than we need to. We will often over compromise and we will just do too much. We will stay there for too long. So how about just seeing, is he able to compromise too? Is he able to change? But even if he is able to compromise, living in constant compromise isn't great. So if you've got a couple and one person loves going out dancing all the time, another person just loves staying in, reading all the time. Yeah, for a while, the reader will be able to go out and dance and the dancer will be able to stay in and read. But really, in order for it to sustain over time. There needs to be enough that you're compatible with. So we've got more after these. Welcome back. Welcome back and this new year is going to be so awesome. Welcome to Women's Radio Station. Hello and welcome to future Classic Women Awards with me, Stefania Passamonte on Women's Radio Station. Hello and welcome to Julie Mae is listening. Hi, this is Anna Kennedy and we're at Women's Radio Station supporting women's well being and we're talking all things autism women. The possibilities are endless. That's what makes us different. Hi, I'm Nicole Goodman. And I'm Lauren Mishkon and this is the Self Care Club podcast. The advice for self care today is endless and can feel like yet another overwhelming job for women. The Self Care Club is part social experiment, part reality show. Every episode we trial a different self care practice, live it to the letter for a week and report back to you on the results. Will it actually improve your well being or will it be another waste of your time? We test out self care so you don't have to. Welcome to the Self Care Club. My name is Ingrid Marsh and I host the Radical Wellbeing show supporting women's well being. On my show I bring you ordinary women like me and you who are sharing their unique stories. Women who have refused to be defined by their pains to be silenced by stigma or crushed by stereotypes and who are taking back their power. And together our mission is a simple one. And that's to inspire you to kick away the roadblocks too. To don your wings and be the person that you were born to be. Do you want to be a doula? Would you like to support families through pregnancy, birth in the postnatal period? Do you have qualities of compassion, listening, caring and empowering? At Nurturing Birth we offer approved doula training courses across the UK which are facilitated by an award winning doula. Here you will learn more about the support you can offer, explore the doula role and think about how to set up your business. No need for previous qualifications. Find out more at nurturingbirth.co.uk. hi, I'm Hazel Butterfield, a blogger, book lover and mental health advocate and you can listen to my show get booked here at Women's Revolution radio station daily at 5am and 5pm throughout my shows we'll talk about the books I've read, new releases, chapter authors, publishers and book enthusiasts, all with a theme and aim of supporting women's emotional well being. If you have a book to tell us about, get in touch@presentersomensradiostation.com join me on my show and share my love of books and writing. You're listening to women's radio stations supporting women's well being. Women's Radio Station is creating a global network for the empowerment of women and we want you to be involved. Join us on Instagram and Twitter womensradio station, that's Women's Radio Stn or Facebook Women's Radio Station to keep up to date with all our exciting programs. Welcome back to Judy Mae's Listening. This is Judy Mae Murphy. I am all about making sure that your dream comes true. And the way that we do that is we change the in in order to change the out. The thing that we have absolute control over is what we think and how we react. And that includes things like the things that we feel. We can change an idea that we have about something, we can change an idea that we have about ourself. Ourself as well. And throughout all that, though, the one thing that I love that remains consistent in people is I find that people, when they have great characters, that sustains over time when someone is just a good person. So when you've known someone for a very long time and they are just good people, it's always a joy to meet up with them again. And I've had this experience this weekend when our guest today and I got to meet up again. We hung out together 30 years ago in the 80s on Grafton Street. We were in the same school but a year apart and different classes. But it's just so lovely to have all of Dermody here in studio and to be able to introduce her to you all are welcome. Thanks very much. Judy Mae. It's an absolute pleasure to be here. I'm so excited. I'm so excited to see you again. I'm just very, very excited to be in London again. This is my first time in London in, wow, 25 years. Really? I didn't know that. It's. Yeah. Because living in the States, I would travel back to Ireland basically with my limited vacation time and then back off. Very limited vacation time working in Seattle. Right. And you'd fly all that way and then you'd come back. And what do you find to be the most interesting thing about being the age we are now? Because when you're younger, everything's ahead of you and sometimes you're kind of protected by the fact that you don't have any major disappointments, but kind of getting your mojo back and getting excited again after a few life Disappointments. It's a different job, really, isn't it? Very much so. I mean, I think that, you know, the lessons we learn over that span of time are so valuable. They really are. And just touching on a few points that you made earlier, since we're in London, I thought I would start off with a little Shakespeare of To thine own self be true. So essentially, that is the key. I mean, it's written hundreds of years ago, but it's so valuable. And I think that's what you learn over time as a woman. You just become more integrated. Yeah. Centered in yourself. Exactly. And you just. You just. And I think living in the States also helped me sort of find my voice as well, because I think in a lot of cases, you have to very much be your own advocate for everything. So I think, you know, self doubt, I think, is something that we all struggle with quite a lot. And maybe the aging experience, I think it doesn't necessarily take it away, but it makes you see it under a different light. So you can kind of question, oh, is this the right thing to do? Or, you know, but. But the experience of all those years helps you. It does. I guess that's what we call wisdom. Yeah. You know, maybe not with a capital W, but definitely wisdom of sorts. Do you remember a time where you weren't your own best advocate? Do you remember a time in your life where you really didn't speak up, where you weren't true to yourself, where you were kind of playing a role? Oh, absolutely. And I think, again, it goes back to being quite young. I was involved in a relationship that was quite destructive in a lot of ways. And it happened very, very slowly and very, very gradually. But, you know, slowly but surely my voice was sort of diminished to the point where I was really just living for my partner, kind of serving him, or almost. Yeah. Like, it got to the point where he would almost decide who my friends were, who I talked to. You know, it was a little bit crazy. So you were probably relating to Beatrice thinking, well, that was me at the beginning. Absolutely, absolutely. Absolutely. And I know. I've done that, too. Yeah. And it's. But why it's so insidious. Like, how does it creep up? How does it happen? It seems to happen slowly because it's like, you know, the things you're putting up with a year, two years into the relationship are things that if it happened a week or two into the relationship, you'd have been like, ah, here, I'm out of here. Exactly. I suppose it's like the concept of a, you know, the frog in the. In the cold water that's about to. That's slowly brought. Brought to the boil and it stays. It stays in the water, it's slowly brought to the boil, but if you put it in boiling water, it just jumps out. Exactly. And it is that concept. So I think. What would I say about how you would spot that? I think maybe just referring to the previous, you know, caller. And your answer about that is essentially, you know, finding your voice and trying to spot whether, you know, is it really. Are you being sort of. What's the word? Sort of diminished? Yeah. Are you being put down? Yeah. So what do you wish someone had said to you when you were in that situation? Do you wish someone had said to you something like, you know, here's what he's doing, or here's what I believe? Or would you have rebelled against that? Would it have been more useful if someone said to you or like, go away for a week and think, you know, it's. It's quite interesting because again, it goes back to the youth thing and not having life experience. And I think all experiences, like you said, are valuable, whether, you know, trying new ideas, et cetera. If they don't work out, you still learned something. So I think it would have been difficult to. I may not have listened 100%, but I think maybe a timeout or a conversation with somebody who was outside of the relationship, you know, way outside, not a friend group, but just to get a clear, crystal clear perspective might have helped. Maybe that would have just opened a little crack of light to come in, and then over time it wouldn't. Maybe you would have stayed quite so long. Exactly what was. What would you say without, you know, asking you to share something that's too personal? But what would you say was a low point in that where you really lost yourself? Where. Because I remember I had a relationship where. And a lot of people would be amazed if they knew this. It was. It was over a decade ago, but I was in a relationship where the guy said that he needed the apartment to himself in the mornings for his workout routine and to meditate. And so I wasn't. So at first he just said that and I said, oh, it's fine. I used to get up at 6. I said, it's fine, I'll get up at 7. So already I'm compromising myself. And then he said, no, there'd be loads of times I'd start getting up at 7, and he'd be like, I'm not ready yet wait until I come and get you. So eventually it ended up with me in the bedroom waiting while I was awake for him and come to come and tell me that I could start my day and be wandering around the apartment. Wow. Yeah. And that was insane. And then one day I really needed to go to the bathroom. So at about 6:30, I snuck past the living room and I saw him with headphones watching TV and he wasn't even working out. I mean, it shouldn't have mattered. But the point was that I had such low self esteem that I felt like, you know, I didn't even have the right to say, well, if you want to meditate in complete quiet, you know, why don't you stay in the bedroom or why don't you go on the rooftop or why don't you go into a park? I really felt like it was my job to make myself small enough that somebody else would be happy. Do you remember a time like that when you. Oh, definitely. I mean, I think. And again, it goes back to a very gradual, you know, sort of manipulation of the relationship where, you know, at the final point, I basically, you know, had to almost leave the country essentially to get away from that relationship. What was he doing? Was he, was he kind of phoning, phoning you at work to see if you were where you said you would be? Yeah, I was quite controlling. And you know, also, I mean, as it turned out, he was seeing somebody else. Oh my goodness. I'm so sorry. Oh my gosh. And he actually called my bluff at one point and handed me his phone and said, I've stopped seeing her. You can call her and even check that. And so he called my bluff. At the time, I was silly enough to not actually call his bluff and just go, okay, let me check that. But as it turned out, he had continued to see her and it wasn't. And the relationship wasn't over at all. So there was, it was just a lot of damaging sort of, you know, toxicity in that relationship. And you know, I think that was maybe the turning point where I had to kind of wake up myself and just realize I'm, you know, I think all along there was a thread in the back of my mind that was telling me, this is not right, this is not right. You know, it's really not right. This is not who you actually are. You're not this person. You know, you're a person with a voice and opinions and everything else. But we think we've got to, we've got to kill that little voice in order to be that somehow that killing that little voice, killing our own idea about what's right and wrong, we feel that that's necessary in order. That that's like the price we've got to pay to be in a relationship, because we're told that that is the best thing for a woman, like, particularly, you know, women of our vintage, and we were being fed all the time. That that was the best thing that could happen in your life was to be in a love relationship. Exactly. Yeah. And as you said, we're willing to diminish that little voice in order to be in that relationship. And you know, the excitement that went along with it, because obviously, if you're in a relationship with somebody like that, they're very manipulative, they're very good communicators. They're very good at, you know, sort of selling you a lie. And so that's why it is so difficult to kind of extract yourself because you've. You're so tied in with that view, you know, that relationship, that it's hard to extract yourself because they've been so successful at integrating you. And also at that point, there's so little pure. You left. Exactly. That you're, you're, you're so weakened. So you're trying to leave in a weakened state. And that's kind of why they do it as well. They do it so you can't leave. They bring you down so low. So that it's kind of impossible for you to leave. Exactly. To pick yourself back up again. Yeah, absolutely. And did it take a while for you to recover from that? Oh, totally, definitely. So the next person that I went out with was the exact opposite in that I absolutely insisted. Well, I, you know, I had a gap of, you know, quite some time to try and work it out and work on myself. Who am I? What do I want? But the next relationship was with somebody who literally wouldn't tell a lie. So that was. That was quite funny in itself. George Washington. Was it? Somewhat. No. He was doing this, actually this experiment where he would not lie to anybody about anything. And that's kind of a bit weird, too, because that. Because there are kind of like times, socially, where, you know, you do want to choose, well, which truth am I going to go with? Am I going to go with the bigger truth of I love this person, I think she looks great, or am I going to go with the bigger truth of, yes, it makes your ass look big? We're going to continue this right after the break. We are here at WRS Women's Radio Station Supporting Women's well being. Talk to you very soon. Welcome to the Women's Radio Station Supporting Women's well Being Women's Radio Station is all about diversity from opinions, career, ethnicity, education and most importantly, women's well being. We aim to celebrate the individuality of every woman everywhere, providing opportunities and the platform for your voice. Visit our website womensradiostation.com for more information. I'm Tamina Zaman, founder of Empower and Enrich when it comes to money, do you clam up or get confused? Do you wish you could save more money or are you hoping you have enough for retirement? You are not alone. Many women want to be smarter with their cash but just don't know where to start. @empowerandenrich.org you will find a host of options to help you take charge of your finances and learn how to put your money to work for you in an easy, affordable way. Get in touch with me@empowerandenrich.org and let's change your future together. Do you want to be a doula? Would you like to support families through pregnancy, birth and the postnatal period? Do you have qualities of compassion, listening, caring and empowering? At Nurturing Birth we offer approved doula training courses across the UK which are facilitated by an award winning doula. Here you will learn more about the support you can offer, explore the doula role and think about how to set up your business. No need for previous qualifications. Find out more@nurturingbirth.co.uk hi, I'm Carolyn Van Beers. Please join me for a brand new show here on women's radio station. It's Mother's Hour. If, like me, you're a mum juggling far too many balls and dropping most of them, this is definitely the show for you. We'll examine the highs and lows of motherhood and make sure you laugh out loud as we take on this challenging role together with spoonfuls of advice. Incredible stories. It will be refreshing, honest and funny. Look at being a mum. Are you struggling with money? Turn to us as a national charity helping people struggling to make ends meet. Job loss, illness or bereavement can cause a real financial crisis. We give practical help to get people back on track. Whether you're thinking of having a baby, trying to get out of an unhappy relationship or just unsure what benefits you may be entitled to, we can help. Visit turntous.org.uk welcome to the women's radio station supporting women's well being. Women's radio station can give voice to your brand. With a wide range of sponsorship opportunities, including individual programs, we can tailor your experience for you. For more information on how you can sponsor a Show, go to womensradiostation.com Women's radio station supporting women's wellbeing. Welcome to Judy Mayer's Listening. This is the show where you tell me what's happening in your life, and I listen, and together we transform everything. Welcome back. And today we have all of Dermody here in studio, as well as our lovely associate producer, Elspeth. And Elspeth, her eyes were just like, absolutely sources. When Orla was talking about this guy who she dated after, the very controlling guy, the next guy was the opposite in that he wouldn't tell a lie. But that's kind of just like, how did that work? Were you ever just offended by the truth? Because everybody knows you tell white lies. Did he ever say white lies, or was it all just pure? Well, he was trying this thought experiment where he would tell the absolute truth about everything. Now, I'm not certain that he accomplished that 100%, but, I mean, it was comforting to know that he would tell me the truth, you know, and it took me a while to actually trust that, you know, given my previous experience. But I did discover, I did find out, you know, after a while, he absolutely was 100% telling the truth. Now, he wasn't offensive, you know, like, if it was a case of, you know, you know, yes, your bum looks fat and that or whatever, you know, he. He just wouldn't say it, if you know what I mean? Like, it's not that he wouldn't. That he would tell a lie. It's just he wouldn't comment at all, like, on. On different. If he got questions, you know, that would be the answer, potentially would be offensive. I think he kind of avoided questions like that. But, yeah, he was. He was a very good guy, a very talented musician, you know, singer, songwriter. But I think, interestingly enough, it was kind of the flip side of my previous relationship where alongside not telling lies, it was also giving me full control of everything. But that's. That doesn't work either, because then you're the. You're the person who's making all the decisions. And that can be really tough when you've got a stressful job and, you know, you're coming home absolutely exhausted. Let's go eat dinner. What restaurant? Or what should we eat? You know, Italian, Chinese, whatever. And he just wouldn't make a decision. So everything got left to me, and it was Too much. It was just a lot of a burden to be supporting the entire relationship for both of us. So that's really interesting that, you know, I imagine for the first while, it must have been a wonderful novelty, kind of going, what you mean I get to choose? And you won't sulk for an hour. Wow, Christmas. And then. But then after a while, as you say, you start to see the downside of it. I think it's that thing that a lot of women feel when men kind of offer to be supportive in the home, like around the housework, and they say, what would you like me to do? And it sounds very supportive, but it's not, because it's saying, the burden is yours. The thinking, the planning, you know, making sure that this works. That's on you. I'll just kind of be the butler. And I often feel like a lot of men will congratulate themselves on not being controlling, but at the same time, then they are kind of being the butler in their own relationship because they're saying, now, love, what would you like me to do? So many men will go off and do a task, and they will phrase it to others and to themselves that they're doing it for their wife. And it's kind of like, oh, do you not eat food? So you're not. You're not doing the shopping for your wife. You're not doing what she told you. Because I think men can kind of cast themselves as kids in that way. And then they wonder why the sexual attraction goes, well, if you're showing up as a kid, your wife is not going to be sexually attracted to you, or if you're showing up as completely passive, she's not. Your woman's not going to be sexually attracted. So I think a lot of men sort of miss that part of it. Yeah, I think definitely you become their mother in some ways. And it's like, I didn't sign up for that, you know. Yes, it was like you said, it was like Christmas getting to decide everything at the beginning. But then I realized slowly again that, you know, all the decision making was being put on my shoulders, and that just isn't, you know, viable for a relationship of equals, which. Which actually is another way of controlling you. The first guy controlled you by, you know, taking away your choices, and the second guy controlled you by, you know, giving you all the choices, giving you that job of everything. And so. But I love the fact that, like, with myself, that we didn't stay in those relationships, because my heart really goes out for women who feel that because they have kids or because there's a certain amount of money involved, either an excess of money or not enough money, they feel that they have to stay in these relationships that really aren't serving them. And there are some women who are just staying in them because of this cultural idea that somehow it's better to be in a relationship than not. That somehow it has to have crossed all kinds of boundaries and it has to be really hideous and you have to be beaten up nightly before you walk out the door. Do you think that that's the case? And if it is, is it changing? That is an interesting question. I do think women are starting to find their voice more, and they are starting to realize that it's okay to leave. It is okay to leave. It is okay to be a single person. It is okay, you know, to try to try and follow your own path. You know, now I understand. You know, I was. Had no kids or we had no kids, so it was a different situation. I think it is more difficult to, you know, leave when you. When you are. When you do have the mortgage and children, etc. So. But. But then again, is it better for you to live your life fully, your full self, and a better example for the kids as well? Right? Exactly. Exactly. So, yeah, this is. This is how to be someone who's a full person, rather than this is how to live as a compromised person. So I guess if I had kids, I mean. I mean, you know, again, we can only imagine. But I imagine if I had kids, that I would much prefer that they were. That there was maybe some less money and that maybe I was busier and that maybe I was a little more stressed, but that I was living life on my terms. That I had sent out a very strong signal of it's not okay to treat me like this or I insist on being able to live my dream, not live according to someone else's version of what I should be dreaming of or what I should be wishing for myself. So when you say that, you know, that we're getting better at having a voice, what does that look like? Because I know that a lot of women I really admire are on Twitter and they're giving it socks. I mean, they are just not, you know, they're not caring. They are just saying it exactly like it is, and they're going in their heart, and they're not playing nice, and they're not trying to make anyone feel okay about themselves. They're just really being angry, but being marvelously angry. So those are women who I see as finding their voice, but I guess it shows up in all kinds of different ways. Exactly. And, you know, I was just having this conversation with a friend of mine last night, and we were just chatting about, you know, exactly that. Women's voices and women finding their voice. And I think, you know, one of the things we were talking about is female. Female aggression and, you know, angry. Being angry and getting angry, and it's okay to be angry. You know, so the things that we would accept in the past, you know, like a brush past your breast or like a touch on the. You know, basically men feeling the right to kind of touch, feel or cop a feel. Exactly. Women are getting much, much better at actually standing up and saying, no, no, that can't be done. You know, you cannot do that. And. But I think women maybe need to tap into that a little bit more. I think that we. We do let things slide quite a bit rather than be confrontational. And I think that we do need to tap into finding our. Finding our anger, maybe. Yes. Yeah. And just saying, yeah, this is not okay. Because I think that younger people, younger women would be amazed at the kind of nonsense that we had to put up with. Like, as, you know, schoolgirls in our green uniforms in the 1980s, there were a lot of flashers around our school. Yes. Like, you know, just there were flashers. There were. I remember my walk home from school, there was an old man who would, you know, walk with me and often put his arm around me under the guise of, you know, putting an umbrella over my head, even if it was just barely raining and want to go, like, you know, want to go off somewhere with me. I was. I was 12. And I didn't occur to me to report it to anybody. It didn't occur to me, me to say anything. And of course, you know, so many things that were. That were said back then, you know, would just be appalled about now. I mean, Elspeth, what would you say about that? Do you. Do you see that there's a difference between what we kind of put up with and what, 100%. My. My mum, she told me of stories when she was younger that would generally shock me. I mean, there was a teacher at her school who used to walk with them. They used to have a walking club and he used to go in the nude, like, really bad. But nobody thought of saying anything because to them they were all so young and it was just weirdly normal. Yeah, exactly. But it's so wrong. And she looks back at me and she goes, that was Completely wrong, completely wrong. And I remember her telling me this and being generally shocked because I've never had anything like that ever. And the thing is that, you know, but when we do say that as women, we do say, this isn't acceptable to me, it very often just gets squashed. And this is what I love about, particularly these women that I follow. People like M raz, it's E M R A Z Z do, check her out and many other people like her that they're just saying immediately and loudly, seriously, not okay. And when someone comes back with a weak excuse like, oh, well, you know, men are like that. Men need to be able to do. And men are different. And everyone's getting too PC now and they will argue back really, really hard and go, no, no, we're not buying that anymore. We're not allowing you to say that. If we say something isn't working for us, we say that this is hurting us. We're not allowing you to say, well, you don't get to decide that. We're not allowing you to say you're too sensitive. We're not allowing you to say, you know, you're seeing it wrong, that there's somehow something wrong with you in wanting things to be different. We're not allowing them to say things like, well, you know, I get to decide that, you know, you don't get to be offensive, you don't get to transgress other people's boundaries. You don't get to do just what you want to do just because of your gender, you know, and you certainly don't get to then turn it around and say, well, women do it all the time. Here's the thing, here's what toxic femininity is and here's what happened to a woman. I know, but we're going to have a lot more. We're going to get very angry very soon. Welcome to women's radio station. Hello and welcome to future classic Women awards with me, Stefania Passamonte on women's radio station. Hello and welcome to Julie Mae is listening. Hi, this is Anna Kennedy and we're at women's radio station supporting women's well being and we're talking all things autism women. The possibilities are endless. That's what makes us different. Hi, I'm Nicole Goodman. And I'm Lauren Mishkon and this is the Self Care Club podcast. The advice for self care today is endless and can feel like yet another overwhelming job for women. The Self Care Club is part social experiment, part reality show. Every episode we trial a different self care practice, live it to the letter for a week and report back to you on the results. Will it actually improve your well being or will it be another waste of your time? We test out self care so you don't have to welcome to the Self Care Club. My name is Ingrid Marsh and I host the Radical Wellbeing show supporting women's well being. On my show I bring you ordinary women like me and you who are sharing their unique stories. Women who have refused to be defined by their pains to be silenced by stigma or crushed by stereotypes and who are taken back their power. 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Find out more@nurturingbirth.co.uk hi, I'm Hazel Butterfield, a blogger, book lover and mental health advocate and you can listen to my show get booked here at Women's Radio Station daily at 5am and 5pm throughout my shows we'll talk about the books I've read, new releases, chapter authors, publishers and book enthusiasts, all with a theme and aim of supporting women's emotional well being. If you have a book to tell us about, get in touch@presentersomensradiostation.com join me on my show and share my love of books and writing. You're listening to Women's Radio stations supporting women's well being. Women's Radio Station is creating a global network for the empowerment of women and we want you to be involved. Join us on Instagram and Twitter womensradiostation, that's womensradio Stn or Facebook Women's Radio Station to keep up to date with all our exciting programs. So today here on WRS Women's Radio Station where we are supporting women's well being. We're talking now about anger. We've kind of gone from just having some kind of visibility, having some kind of idea of you existing within a relationship and within a space to a place of when that doesn't happen and when that's not listened to how do we push back with anger? I'm Judy Mae Murphy. I'm your host here on wrs on Judy May is listening. So, you know, there's clues in the title, as we say. And also here in studio, I have Orla Dermody and our associate producer, who you know very well because she's here every week. Elspeth Proud Luck. And myself and Orla, being of the older generation, were just kind of amazing. Melis. And Elspeth Melis, by the way, is our technical producer and we're so happy to have her back with us. And we were just kind of amazing them with stories of things that have happened to us simply because there were certain things that used to be. Used to be acceptable. And Orla, you started off the sentence, since I was on a bus one time, you have to finish that one for us. So, yeah, I mean, it's just horrendous, the type of things that we. I mean, it wasn't that we accepted it. Sometimes they were scary and you just froze. But these days, you know, if somebody had done what they did on the bus, I would turn around and either slap them or shout at them or something. I would have reacted. But. But. So you would have known that your reaction was supported. I imagine now, whereas back then we didn't have any idea, A, what would a reaction look like because no one was reacting. Exactly. And B, we had no references for that reaction being supported. We always thought we would be in trouble because we were the kids. So, yeah, I was sitting on a bus. It was winter. I had a scarf wrapped around my neck and my hair inside my coat. So this guy gets up out of his seat behind me and he walks up and removes my hair from under my scarf. And that's all he did. I mean, it was super weird, creepy and wrong. Extremely weird and creepy and, you know, whatever, that somehow your body was his to make a decision about whether your hair was inside your scarf or out of. And I think that sometimes some men do that, that they will. They will test something that they think they might be able to get away with, and then they will kind of do more and do more. So they might kind of say something nicely. They might have a, you know, a polite criticism. Do you mind if I just say that? You know, I think your hair would look a bit better if it was like this. And then that is something that escalates. I still to this day don't know what that was about. How old was he? He was an older man. Maybe in his. I was probably about 19, 20. He was probably about 40. But it was just. I just froze. I froze in place. I mean, I don't think I even looked around until I was getting off the bus. That's how, you know, sort of we reacted back in the day. Or I probably, you know, would have reacted back in the day. And these days, oh, my goodness, it would be very. He would not want to do that. So how do you feel then about the narrative that's out there saying that, you know, by our reacting to those things, that, A, we're overreacting, B, that we are emasculating men, that men should be allowed to, you know, do certain things, that somehow we should be. If a guy does that, that somehow we're supposed to be flattered by it. This idea that, you know, he's making it look nicer, he thinks he's helping and that. See that we are somehow less feminine, therefore less attractive, therefore less valuable as people by standing up for ourselves. Because every time I hear it, I just. I see red. And I. And I talk red. I'll just go out and just give someone an earful on that. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's. It's. You know, I think that these days, you know, there's a lot. A lot of stuff has moved on that we are finding our anger. And do you find that you dream differently, that your. Your idea for yourself and your life has changed? Because I certainly find that, you know, the dream early on, like, even 20 years ago, the dream was, you know, having the ideal husband and the ideal kid. And. And now, you know, my dream is. Is mostly around the kind of things I was even doing back then, that I was already living that dream, that I was, you know, doing a lot of media all around the world that I was traveling. I was meeting amazing people. I was creating at a very high level. So it was. I kind of feel that there was this ideal dream that was sold to me and that that wasn't where I really ever wanted to go. Yeah, I mean, probably that was the path, you know, that we were sort of shown that this is the way that you go. But I think that, you know, I've definitely found happiness in the traveling that I've done, in the locations that I've lived. And I feel like I've really found who I am through myself, basically. And yes, relationships that have been mistakes or whatever, but they're all valuable lessons in the end, and they do contribute to who you are as a person. And as you said, when we get a little bit Older and we look back on our younger selves. Is that the life we planned for ourselves and how far have we strayed from that? And I like to think I've. I kind of, in a lot of ways, followed my own desires and whatever because I saw, you know, my mom wasn't necessarily happy with four kids and, you know, having to give up her job, which is another thing that women had to do way back. The previous generation. Right. Yeah, the previous generation in the marriage ban. Yeah. If you. If you. If you go. If you got married, you'd have to leave your job. Exactly. Which boggles the mind, I think, of most. Most young people. You know, young women these days, they wouldn't even for a second, you know, consider that. Consider the thing. Yeah. The fact that it was in law, that that was like what you had to do. That's not that long ago, we know. So true. And how do you feel when you meet women who have gone down a different path? So I know that there's this very odd moment when I'm speaking to a woman who has, you know, she met her husband when they were both in college or straight out of high school, and they got married and they had kids. And then now the kids are starting to have kids, which really is a little bit freaky, and they have a very different life. Because I know that 20 years ago I'd be having a conversation with a woman who was my age and who was. Had been married and have a kid, and I really felt that I had to myself. I felt pitied, I felt frustrated. I felt like I was way behind on my life plans. And now I find it's kind of switched now. I find that, in fact, they are saying, you know what? I wish I'd done more of what you did. And saying things like, well, I didn't necessarily. Looking back, I didn't necessarily make a choice. I just sort of fell into what was expected of me. Do you find that, or do you find we're all in a place now where. Where it's just like, oh, I don't know what's going on. No, absolutely. I think that, you know, there are losses and gains on both sides, if you know what I mean. I never went the marriage and kids route, and most of my friends did, but I think that I've always. I'm not sure I've ever felt like they pitied me or that they envied me. I think that. And likewise myself with them. I knew that that's not really what I wanted. But I do think now that we've, you know, aged or whatever, we have come to this kind of recognition that, you know, it is important to develop yourself. And yes, I think some people who've gone through the marriage and kids thing maybe do feel regrets that they didn't sort of travel more or see more of the world or work on themselves, develop themselves and actually kind of, you know, do a lot of self reflection. Because I think when you're alone and, you know, you are living a solitary life, so to speak, you get a lot of time to sort of work on your mental health and reflect on your choices and figure out your wants and needs and desires. But I think maybe some women come to that much later in life because they have been preoccupied with, with their family and the mortgage and et cetera, all of that, and the husband. So what are you really looking forward to in the next, say, 10 years? Is there something that you sort of say, you know what? I don't know if it's definitely gonna happen, but I'd like more of this. Do you have a dream ahead of you? I think I really want to travel more. Definitely. I do think that I still want to work on. So my resolution for this year, for 2020 is to see old friends, so. And reconnect with relationships that I haven't sort of worked on, you know, or really that have been sort of more superficial over Facebook, etc. When in actual fact, seeing people in the flesh is so, so different and it's so wonderful. So reconnecting with old friends is definitely what, you know, what I want to do in the short term, long term, I'm not 100% sure yet. The future is open and it's bright. So that is so fantastic to hear. That is really, really great. Elspeth, what are your 2020 goals? I didn't ask you this last year, last week. Mine are just very boring. The kind of the usual, get more confident and be happy. I just want to be sad. Self confident. It's more what I want to do. I want to become more self confident. Self confident. So we're have to find out a few different sets that will. Oh my goodness, you're the sassiest young woman I've ever met. I love it. I absolutely love it. Yeah, it's really cool. But isn't it interesting how we are quite quickly learning that when we just do what it is that feels good to us, that, well, we're so blessed to live in a part of the world where as women we are allowed to do that and just noticing very quickly how good that feels because you've shared this, Elizabeth, before, how when you didn't want to go down the university route at first you got a lot of pushback from people, a lot of people saying, really? And now what you're doing is you're saying to yourself that you're ready for something else, that you're, you know, you have to be able to do it in your way. And this is what I am looking for for everyone that's listening right now. Orla Dermody, thank you so much for being in studio today. Elspeth, as always, thank you. Thank you. Thank you too. Thank you to Melis. And just to leave you on this idea that whatever it is that is inside you, whatever it is that it is that you want, that is not wrong. As women, we often feel that we should be looking to somebody else to find out what is the best thing to be done in the moment, that we should somehow be serving others before we serve ourselves. So let's just have a little go a little commitment that we all make here on Judy May's listening that we are going to really listen to ourselves and that once we've worked out something that we will share that we will just do it not because we want to manipulate a situation, but just, just because we have the right to take up space, we have the right to make noise and we do have the right to be angry. Welcome to the women's radio station supporting women's well being. Women's radio station is all about diversity from opinions, career, ethnicity, education and most importantly, women's well being. We aim to celebrate the individuality of every, every woman everywhere, providing opportunities and the platform for your voice. Visit our website womensradiostation.com for more information. 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