From Anxiety to Authorship: Carrie's Journey Through Words

Heather Masters: 00:00:01

Hello and welcome to the Choosing Happy podcast.

Heather Masters: 00:00:04

I'm Heather Masters, your host, and this week I had an amazing conversation with Carrie McGovern, who is an author and who spends her days writing contemporary fiction novels.

Heather Masters: 00:00:18

We touched on much more than this.

Heather Masters: 00:00:20

We touched on a lot of mindset and mental wellness issue that may have affected many people over the last few years.

Heather Masters: 00:00:31

It was a really powerful conversation.

Heather Masters: 00:00:34

And if you have suffered from mental health issues or stress over the last few years and you're interested in how writing could potentially help you, then stay tuned for this week's Choosing Happy podcast.

Heather Masters: 00:01:04

Hello and welcome to the Choosing Happy podcast.

Heather Masters: 00:01:07

Today I'm having a chat with the amazing Carrie McGovern, and she's an author who spends her days writing contemporary romance novels about strong women and men who fall first.

Heather Masters: 00:01:20

She has three published novels, with a fourth being released very soon.

Heather Masters: 00:01:24

Welcome, Carrie.

Heather Masters: 00:01:26

Lovely to see you.

Carrie McGovern: 00:01:28

Hi.

Carrie McGovern: 00:01:28

Thank you for having me.

Heather Masters: 00:01:31

Can you begin by telling us a bit about yourself and your journey, please?

Carrie McGovern: 00:01:37

Okay, so, as you said, I am a contemporary romance novelist, but I wasn't always.

Carrie McGovern: 00:01:44

It's kind of been a quite a recent thing, I would say.

Carrie McGovern: 00:01:49

My first book turned one last month, so it is pretty new.

Carrie McGovern: 00:01:56

But the whole writing thing isn't particularly new to me, the way I started.

Carrie McGovern: 00:02:03

I mean, it's funny the way that your life kind of turns out, isn't it?

Carrie McGovern: 00:02:07

So you're going away, you're trundling along this road, happy as anything, and then you come to a couple of bumps and that's kind of what happened to me.

Carrie McGovern: 00:02:16

So maybe about three years ago, you know, it was the kind of the post Covid, my kids were at that age where they were going back to school, back to primary and secondary school, and they were really struggling, especially one.

Carrie McGovern: 00:02:30

And we had a lot of kind of issues around undiagnosed autism and the struggles with being out of the school situation for so long with such a scare behind you as well, because the kids were terrified that they were going to catch something and pass it on to the grandparents or the parents or whatever.

Carrie McGovern: 00:02:52

So it was, I think we forget how hard that time was, especially for some of these kids who were coming into adolescence at the time.

Carrie McGovern: 00:03:01

So I had a lot of issues with kind of school refusal and stress and anger, and I basically shut down.

Carrie McGovern: 00:03:11

And my anxiety was just, was just too much.

Carrie McGovern: 00:03:15

I wasn't living my life.

Carrie McGovern: 00:03:17

I was completely and utterly focused on how my child was going to have, how his day was going to go to school, when the phone was going to ring for the school to pick him up when, you know, what kind of mood he was in when he came home, when he woke up, whether he had a good night's sleep, whether I had a good night's sleep.

Carrie McGovern: 00:03:36

So I'd completely shut down.

Carrie McGovern: 00:03:37

I couldn't work my business out.

Carrie McGovern: 00:03:39

I was the same just at the time.

Carrie McGovern: 00:03:40

I made a home decor stuff and I just couldn't focus.

Carrie McGovern: 00:03:46

My brain had completely shut down and it was taking over my life.

Carrie McGovern: 00:03:51

And it got to a point where I thought, I need to do something now because I can't go on the way I am because it's making me really, really ill.

Carrie McGovern: 00:04:01

And I don't know how to kind of change my brain so that it will kind of like.

Carrie McGovern: 00:04:07

Because, you know, I mean, how do you get away from anxiety?

Carrie McGovern: 00:04:12

It's not a question you can actually answer.

Carrie McGovern: 00:04:15

There's no way.

Carrie McGovern: 00:04:16

It's different for everybody.

Carrie McGovern: 00:04:17

And where do you start when you're in that shut down position?

Carrie McGovern: 00:04:20

So the first thing I did kind of was I started reading.

Carrie McGovern: 00:04:25

And before that, I was kind of.

Carrie McGovern: 00:04:28

I struggled a little bit with reading, to be honest.

Carrie McGovern: 00:04:32

And I think that's kind of looking back, I think it may be a bit of.

Carrie McGovern: 00:04:35

Kind of the neurodivergence kind of side of me.

Carrie McGovern: 00:04:40

I need to be captured from that very first sentence.

Carrie McGovern: 00:04:44

And you get put off by reading and books because they're big and they're scary and are you gonna like them?

Carrie McGovern: 00:04:52

Are you not gonna like them?

Carrie McGovern: 00:04:53

I struggle with unfamiliar things.

Carrie McGovern: 00:04:55

So I decided, and I was only kind of.

Carrie McGovern: 00:04:59

I was only reading kind of like, you know, when you go on holiday and you take two books.

Carrie McGovern: 00:05:03

I was reading two books on holiday at the very most and no other time because, I mean, life, I didn't have time to do stuff.

Carrie McGovern: 00:05:11

I had kids, I had a job.

Carrie McGovern: 00:05:13

I had to, you know, so all those things kind of were in the way.

Carrie McGovern: 00:05:17

And this was, at this time, this was the only thing I could do.

Carrie McGovern: 00:05:20

The only thing I could do was read a book because I had so shut down.

Carrie McGovern: 00:05:25

I didn't do the shopping, I didn't do the cooking, I didn't do the cleaning, because my brain could not cope.

Carrie McGovern: 00:05:31

So I sat down and I read books.

Carrie McGovern: 00:05:35

My husband, I read a couple of, like, paperback books.

Carrie McGovern: 00:05:38

I struggle with paperbacks, though.

Carrie McGovern: 00:05:41

And there was a couple of other.

Carrie McGovern: 00:05:44

There was books that were only available on Kindle.

Carrie McGovern: 00:05:46

So I downloaded those, started reading them off my phone.

Carrie McGovern: 00:05:49

But, you know, you're still waiting for your phone to ring, aren't you, if you're watching your phone.

Carrie McGovern: 00:05:52

So my husband bought me a Kindle, and I've really never looked back.

Carrie McGovern: 00:05:58

And in that first nine months of reading, I read 130 books.

Carrie McGovern: 00:06:03

So I was well invested in reading.

Carrie McGovern: 00:06:07

And it's, it's generally all romance because this is what, that's what I like.

Carrie McGovern: 00:06:12

And that started to open up my brain again.

Carrie McGovern: 00:06:16

So it kind of developed new pathways, I suppose.

Carrie McGovern: 00:06:20

So I started being able to communicate better.

Carrie McGovern: 00:06:23

I started to be able to feel things.

Carrie McGovern: 00:06:25

I'd not felt things for ages.

Carrie McGovern: 00:06:27

I'd not felt anger, I'd not felt sadness.

Carrie McGovern: 00:06:29

I'd nothing felt anything because I've just completely shut down.

Carrie McGovern: 00:06:32

And it kind of, it brought me back to life again.

Carrie McGovern: 00:06:37

So, you know, I'm very thankful for those authors that I read at the time.

Carrie McGovern: 00:06:44

And it was, it was one of those things, but I knew I was still in anxiety basis, so I knew there was still something there.

Carrie McGovern: 00:06:51

I couldn't just stop reading because that wasn't, you know, that wasn't going to help.

Carrie McGovern: 00:06:55

So I thought, well, what's another way to distract my brain?

Carrie McGovern: 00:06:59

And I actually used to be, I trained, well trained.

Carrie McGovern: 00:07:04

I went to university in the communication studies, which was specializing in journalism so many, many years ago.

Carrie McGovern: 00:07:11

So you finished university, and then you kind of go for a job, and then you get knocked back so many times, and then you get a job, like, down the road, and then you think, yeah, but this will just be a stopgap.

Carrie McGovern: 00:07:20

And I, that kind of thing.

Carrie McGovern: 00:07:22

And then you get married and you have a family, and it all kind of falls by the wayside.

Carrie McGovern: 00:07:26

And then I remembered at, how old was I, 45, that I actually did used to write quite a lot.

Carrie McGovern: 00:07:33

So I thought, oh, well, I'm really bad at finishing projects for myself.

Carrie McGovern: 00:07:37

Anybody else?

Carrie McGovern: 00:07:38

I'm fine, but I can't finish a project.

Carrie McGovern: 00:07:41

I've got so many projects around this house that are like half finished chairs that I've dismantled all kinds of stuff.

Carrie McGovern: 00:07:49

So I'm like, I am never gonna write a book.

Carrie McGovern: 00:07:51

I mean, who writes a book?

Carrie McGovern: 00:07:52

I mean, who.

Carrie McGovern: 00:07:53

I mean, come on.

Carrie McGovern: 00:07:55

So I decided instead of writing it, I would plan it, I think, well, you know, there's no pressure.

Carrie McGovern: 00:08:02

There's no pressure there.

Carrie McGovern: 00:08:03

I'll just plan this book.

Carrie McGovern: 00:08:05

So I started, I got, you know how you do.

Carrie McGovern: 00:08:07

You get yourself some new pens in a notebook, obviously.

Carrie McGovern: 00:08:11

And I started to plan the kind of book that I'd been reading.

Carrie McGovern: 00:08:15

So it was a younger woman, generally, slightly older man, maybe, that kind of thing.

Carrie McGovern: 00:08:22

And I was like, I can't write this.

Carrie McGovern: 00:08:26

I don't know what a 20 odd year old woman does now.

Carrie McGovern: 00:08:30

It was not the same as when I was 20.

Carrie McGovern: 00:08:32

It's a whole different world.

Carrie McGovern: 00:08:34

So I was like, no.

Carrie McGovern: 00:08:37

So I scrapped that idea and thought, what am I going to do?

Carrie McGovern: 00:08:40

And I just started.

Carrie McGovern: 00:08:42

I just started writing.

Carrie McGovern: 00:08:43

I just.

Carrie McGovern: 00:08:44

That was it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:08:45

It just kind of, like, came out, and I had lots of different kind of, like, situations.

Carrie McGovern: 00:08:50

The way I explain the way a book is, comes to me is it's different scenes played like a movie.

Carrie McGovern: 00:08:58

And then I type up the script for the movie, if you know, I mean, yeah, so all of these little scenes started coming out, and I started writing them, and then I thought, oh, hang on, I could put these together.

Carrie McGovern: 00:09:14

And then I was like, oh, put it together.

Carrie McGovern: 00:09:16

That's like a book and stuff.

Carrie McGovern: 00:09:17

So I started, and I predominantly wrote the majority of my first book not knowing what I was going to do.

Carrie McGovern: 00:09:28

And then I kind of went, oh, God, I'm going to have to do something about this.

Carrie McGovern: 00:09:31

I'm going to.

Carrie McGovern: 00:09:32

I'm actually going to maybe have to publish this book.

Carrie McGovern: 00:09:35

And it was more kind of like a.

Carrie McGovern: 00:09:37

It was.

Carrie McGovern: 00:09:39

I always say I felt like it was a bit of a vanity project at the beginning.

Carrie McGovern: 00:09:43

It was just a book I had to write.

Carrie McGovern: 00:09:45

It was a book about a woman my age who completely lost herself and had to find herself again.

Carrie McGovern: 00:09:52

So that's how it started.

Carrie McGovern: 00:09:55

And it was quite funny, because when I actually physically wrote the first chapter, which is probably not the first bit I wrote, but when I wrote the first chapter, I wrote the scene where Emma was at work, and she was, like, going down a normal daily business, and the school rings, and it's the same conversation every single day that she has with the school.

Carrie McGovern: 00:10:17

She should be best friends with a receptionist.

Carrie McGovern: 00:10:19

They know each other by first name, that kind of thing.

Carrie McGovern: 00:10:22

And an hour later, the school rang me, and it was just like the same conversation.

Carrie McGovern: 00:10:27

I could have played out the scene in real life.

Carrie McGovern: 00:10:30

It was.

Carrie McGovern: 00:10:31

It was just.

Carrie McGovern: 00:10:32

And I suppose the rest, they say, is history, but it's kind of been an evolving thing for a long time.

Carrie McGovern: 00:10:40

I mean, I self publish my books, so I've not only had to write a book, I've had to learn how to publish a book and learn how to promote a book and those kind of things and learn how to develop my writing, because my writing is quite.

Carrie McGovern: 00:10:57

It's choppy.

Carrie McGovern: 00:10:58

It's very.

Carrie McGovern: 00:10:59

It's quite fast paced, but it's very.

Carrie McGovern: 00:11:02

It's very like my brain to the point.

Carrie McGovern: 00:11:04

And I suppose that's the way that I always go back to, like, my journalism training, because I needed to have a concise account of something in the small, shortest amount of words effectively.

Carrie McGovern: 00:11:15

So, I mean, my books aren't particularly long, but they're all, you know, full stories.

Carrie McGovern: 00:11:21

And, yeah, they're quite fast paced.

Carrie McGovern: 00:11:24

I get a lot of people saying that they don't usually read, but they were hooked on it and they could.

Carrie McGovern: 00:11:30

They read the book in two days kind of thing.

Carrie McGovern: 00:11:32

So that's nice to hear.

Carrie McGovern: 00:11:35

Yeah.

Heather Masters: 00:11:35

Good.

Heather Masters: 00:11:35

Great.

Heather Masters: 00:11:37

So coming back a little bit, if I can, to the.

Heather Masters: 00:11:43

To the shutting down, because I know from my own personal experience, kind of had a lot of losses over the years and got to a point where I felt quite detached, you know, not feeling things and just going through the motions and what I uncovered, it wasn't so much anxiety as I had anxiety, but it was really, like you said, the amount of trauma that was kind of inflicted at that time that people really don't know how to deal with or move through.

Heather Masters: 00:12:24

I mean, one of the things that I found was semantic healing, and that's based around the fact that animals deal with trauma in an immediate way.

Heather Masters: 00:12:38

They actually physically shake off the trauma.

Heather Masters: 00:12:41

That's how they come out of trauma and move on.

Heather Masters: 00:12:44

But because we're thinkers, we don't allow that to happen.

Heather Masters: 00:12:48

And often there aren't.

Heather Masters: 00:12:51

For instance, with COVID and the ongoing fear, there isn't kind of one opportunity to just let go of that trauma.

Heather Masters: 00:12:59

So was there anything else that you did other than.

Heather Masters: 00:13:04

I mean, obviously the reading helped.

Heather Masters: 00:13:06

And I know, you know, I became a massive reader, not like you, but I read every night before I go to bed.

Heather Masters: 00:13:13

And that's.

Heather Masters: 00:13:13

That's really helped me as well.

Heather Masters: 00:13:15

And we're only on 50 books a year, not 100, but.

Heather Masters: 00:13:20

So I can completely relate to that.

Heather Masters: 00:13:23

But was there anything else as well that maybe you did that could help other people?

Carrie McGovern: 00:13:28

I think it's about acknowledging it more than anything.

Carrie McGovern: 00:13:33

I think that's.

Carrie McGovern: 00:13:34

That has to be your first step.

Carrie McGovern: 00:13:35

You have to acknowledge what's happening to you.

Carrie McGovern: 00:13:38

And that's the hardest bit, I find the hardest bit, acknowledging it and then taking that first step.

Carrie McGovern: 00:13:43

And I think the other thing to do is about communication, about telling the people around you what's happening and why you think it's happening kind of thing.

Carrie McGovern: 00:13:55

I think a lot of people, when they go through this kind of, and you've got to as well think about, I started going through perimenopause at the same time, which wasn't the best thing to happen.

Carrie McGovern: 00:14:06

So it's about communication with the people around you and not keeping it to yourself, especially my children, because my children needed to know that I was struggling, because they need to know it's all right to struggle.

Carrie McGovern: 00:14:19

And the other thing I think is the issue is that the way that society looks at mental health, I mean, it is getting better.

Carrie McGovern: 00:14:29

But for my age, it was always that kind of thing that was always brushed under the carpet.

Carrie McGovern: 00:14:35

We didn't talk about it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:14:39

And I quite happily stand in the middle of a room and say, I struggle.

Carrie McGovern: 00:14:43

I am struggling right now.

Carrie McGovern: 00:14:44

I struggle.

Carrie McGovern: 00:14:46

So I think definitely the communication with my husband, because that could have gone one of two ways that could have quite easily had me going down divorce routes.

Carrie McGovern: 00:14:56

Because if I had a husband who didn't understand and didn't want to listen to what was going on, it could have been a completely different story.

Carrie McGovern: 00:15:05

But instead, what we did was we talked it through.

Carrie McGovern: 00:15:10

He then understood how it was more as well, about understanding the way that my brain works and the way that my children's brains work as well, because we're quite similar and then doing things for us.

Carrie McGovern: 00:15:24

Because I think also you get.

Carrie McGovern: 00:15:26

I was at that time in life when my kids were doing things by themselves and they didn't need mum or dad there as much.

Carrie McGovern: 00:15:35

I mean, they still do and they will do forever.

Carrie McGovern: 00:15:37

But it was that point where we said, we need to build our relationship back up from being just parents and from being a couple, you know, two people who, you know, are, like, in love with each other and will go out and do stuff together.

Carrie McGovern: 00:15:55

So we did do a lot of.

Carrie McGovern: 00:15:57

We made a point because there was so much going on in term time.

Carrie McGovern: 00:16:02

We made a point to go away every half term and just have two days away, just me and him and my parents would come and stay at our house and look after the kids.

Carrie McGovern: 00:16:14

Cause I've generally, until recently, I've not had any kind of support with, like, family because I live in the north east of England.

Carrie McGovern: 00:16:24

I don't come from the north east of England.

Carrie McGovern: 00:16:26

Neither does my husband.

Carrie McGovern: 00:16:28

And my parents were living abroad at the time.

Carrie McGovern: 00:16:30

So they came back over and they've taken on some of the kind of not looking after duties because my kids are teenagers, but that kind of.

Carrie McGovern: 00:16:40

That responsible adult being around and that I.

Carrie McGovern: 00:16:44

And that my mum will step in and she will make sure that I don't have to think about things.

Carrie McGovern: 00:16:50

And it's not the big things.

Carrie McGovern: 00:16:52

It's never the big things.

Carrie McGovern: 00:16:53

It's the little things.

Carrie McGovern: 00:16:54

It's the.

Carrie McGovern: 00:16:55

There's not enough ketchup in the house, what we're going to have for tea.

Carrie McGovern: 00:16:59

That is my biggest nightmare ever.

Carrie McGovern: 00:17:02

Just all the time.

Carrie McGovern: 00:17:03

What's for tea?

Carrie McGovern: 00:17:04

Because you have to cater for four different people.

Carrie McGovern: 00:17:06

Do you know what I mean?

Carrie McGovern: 00:17:07

There's only four of us in the house and the cat, but there's four different meals going nearly every night.

Carrie McGovern: 00:17:12

So it's about identifying it and then not.

Carrie McGovern: 00:17:17

People say, don't sweat the small stuff, but that's not how it works.

Carrie McGovern: 00:17:21

It's all the little small things that join together and make you break.

Carrie McGovern: 00:17:26

So, you know, people say, and people say to me all the time, oh, you don't seem like you've got anxiety.

Carrie McGovern: 00:17:34

You don't seem like you're not confident.

Carrie McGovern: 00:17:37

You don't seem.

Carrie McGovern: 00:17:38

I'm like, well, yeah, because that's a mask.

Carrie McGovern: 00:17:41

And that's the whole fake it till you make it kind of thing.

Carrie McGovern: 00:17:44

Because social constructs have you doing that and you can't move.

Carrie McGovern: 00:17:51

The problem is it's a.

Carrie McGovern: 00:17:52

It's a no win situation because you can't move forward until you do that.

Carrie McGovern: 00:17:56

And you put on that brave face, you pull your big girl pants up and you step out of the door, and that's just what you need to do.

Carrie McGovern: 00:18:04

But it definitely is identifying it and communicating it with people.

Heather Masters: 00:18:09

I think that's a really powerful point that, as you say, people miss.

Heather Masters: 00:18:15

It tends to be the small stuff.

Heather Masters: 00:18:18

I know I was like, as you say, at work, I was doing absolutely fine, but it was at home, the small stuff that I really struggled with, especially after my partner died.

Heather Masters: 00:18:30

You know, the house was a complete tip and I just couldn't, because I couldn't face it.

Heather Masters: 00:18:35

But the big stuff I could handle.

Heather Masters: 00:18:38

And I found that really quite bizarre, that I could still, you know, overcome mountains, but I couldn't cope with them.

Heather Masters: 00:18:45

All hill type things.

Carrie McGovern: 00:18:48

I think, as well, people expect that you can't cope with the big things.

Heather Masters: 00:18:53

Yeah.

Carrie McGovern: 00:18:54

And I think people are more willing to not help.

Carrie McGovern: 00:18:57

I don't mean help.

Carrie McGovern: 00:18:59

I mean kind of give you that leeway to make your own way through it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:04

Whereas the small stuff, they don't.

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:06

Not at all.

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:07

Well, why can't you.

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:08

Why isn't your house tidy?

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:10

Why.

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:10

Why haven't you got the kids tea on the table?

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:13

Why do you.

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:14

Why are you just sitting reading a book?

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:16

Well, and they don't see the little things.

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:19

Also with.

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:20

I found that I'm probably neurodiverse in some way and I struggle with my brain that if there's too much going on, I just shut down.

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:32

So I mean, my son's the same as well.

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:34

And this was the issue.

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:35

If, you know, you look around the house and you say, I've got this, do this to do this to do this to do.

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:39

And then my brain starts going, yeah, but you need to do that before that and that before that, and you need to do that afterwards.

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:44

And then it just goes, nope, can't do it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:47

That's it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:47

Nope.

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:48

And just, like, stamps its feet and goes, nah, we don't do this anymore.

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:52

We're just gonna sit and turn the tally on.

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:55

And it looks like being lazy.

Carrie McGovern: 00:19:57

And it's not being lazy, it's just being overwhelmed.

Heather Masters: 00:20:01

Yeah.

Heather Masters: 00:20:05

Just coming back to something else you said earlier about pulling your big girl pants on and getting out of the door.

Heather Masters: 00:20:16

Was there something, a trigger or a catalyst that got you there?

Carrie McGovern: 00:20:22

I think as we're both in the northern last lounge, I think I refer to my, I've got a little, my little story about the group.

Carrie McGovern: 00:20:33

So I joined it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:20:37

I joined the group a while ago, like, I mean, years ago, and I was a proper lurker in the background.

Carrie McGovern: 00:20:42

Didn't get involved, didn't really need to ask a few questions.

Carrie McGovern: 00:20:46

And then when I realized that I was going to be writing this book, and I thought, oh, God, I'm going to have to make people buy it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:20:53

I'm going to, what am I going to do?

Carrie McGovern: 00:20:56

I mean, I can't just, like, publish it and then go, tada.

Carrie McGovern: 00:20:59

Kind of thing, and expect everything to happen.

Carrie McGovern: 00:21:01

So the first thing was an awards event, and it was publicized.

Carrie McGovern: 00:21:08

It was last year's awards.

Carrie McGovern: 00:21:11

And I kind of went, okay, I'm gonna go to this because I need to be mixing with people, because I found that it's really weird.

Carrie McGovern: 00:21:19

I can't even describe it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:21:20

I'm quite a solitary person.

Carrie McGovern: 00:21:22

I don't like going out that much, but I need people.

Carrie McGovern: 00:21:24

I need people in equal amounts of needing to be on my own.

Carrie McGovern: 00:21:28

But I seem to, I seem to, I don't know, my brain just seems to go, yay, people, my people, people go, yay, my people.

Carrie McGovern: 00:21:36

So, you know, that's where I get my happy dopamine fix from being with friends.

Carrie McGovern: 00:21:42

So I didn't really know anybody particularly.

Carrie McGovern: 00:21:47

And so I bought my ticket and went, right, you have to do this, because I knew if I bought my ticket, I would definitely go.

Carrie McGovern: 00:21:54

But I also knew that I would talk myself in and out of it several times because I would do the, oh, I don't feel too well.

Carrie McGovern: 00:22:01

Got nothing to wear.

Carrie McGovern: 00:22:03

Oh, I don't know anybody you know?

Carrie McGovern: 00:22:05

So I actually messaged someone I knew from before, knew her in the last lounge, and said to her, I bought my ticket.

Carrie McGovern: 00:22:13

I'm coming.

Carrie McGovern: 00:22:14

But I'm probably gonna kind of flip flop about going and not going.

Carrie McGovern: 00:22:19

So just so you know.

Carrie McGovern: 00:22:21

So I told someone, and because I told someone, that was out of my little kind of my household, then she was like, okay, then you're going, and I'm going to come and pick you up.

Carrie McGovern: 00:22:32

And it was like, oh, okay, then.

Carrie McGovern: 00:22:34

So she was like, right, okay, so you're definitely coming, because I'm gonna have you in the car, and we're gonna walk in there together.

Carrie McGovern: 00:22:40

I was like, okay.

Carrie McGovern: 00:22:41

And in the meantime, one of my other friends I'd known outside of the last lounge, she messaged me and said, oh, you're going to this thing?

Carrie McGovern: 00:22:49

And I'm like, yeah, yeah, I'm going this thing.

Carrie McGovern: 00:22:51

And she was like, can I sit with you?

Carrie McGovern: 00:22:53

And I was like, oh, my God, yes.

Carrie McGovern: 00:22:55

And it was just like, oh, yeah, yeah, gosh.

Carrie McGovern: 00:22:58

Can I sit with me?

Carrie McGovern: 00:22:58

I don't mind.

Carrie McGovern: 00:22:59

It was like, oh, my God.

Carrie McGovern: 00:22:59

Thank you.

Carrie McGovern: 00:23:00

Thank you.

Carrie McGovern: 00:23:01

So I sat with her for kind of like, because I had someone to be with, and that was the safety net that I needed, because I found that the way that my social anxiety works is I'm really good at walking into somewhere and going to have lunch or a coffee or a meal or whatever with someone I have never met before.

Carrie McGovern: 00:23:24

I am quite happy walking in there, because there's no one kind of knows, if you know what I mean, but walking into a room where you're not sure whether people know you or they don't know you, I really struggle with.

Carrie McGovern: 00:23:37

I struggle with the fact that I might say to someone, oh, who are you?

Carrie McGovern: 00:23:40

And they go, well, you know who I am, because I was speaking to you, like, like, 20 minutes ago online, and I'm like, do you know what I mean?

Carrie McGovern: 00:23:48

So I struggle with that side.

Carrie McGovern: 00:23:49

So it was nice having someone there that I did know.

Carrie McGovern: 00:23:53

Then people then came up to me, and I was able to kind of.

Carrie McGovern: 00:23:58

And because I'd had help with the book as well, from people in lounge, I was able to identify people who I'd never met before, but I'd worked with.

Carrie McGovern: 00:24:06

So people who had done my printing for different things.

Carrie McGovern: 00:24:08

I had Lauren, who was the illustrator for my book covers and that kind of thing.

Carrie McGovern: 00:24:13

So it kind of.

Carrie McGovern: 00:24:15

And it kind of escalated from there.

Carrie McGovern: 00:24:17

I kind of.

Carrie McGovern: 00:24:18

I had the confidence, even the littlest tiny bit of confidence, to go to another event.

Carrie McGovern: 00:24:25

And then I started.

Carrie McGovern: 00:24:27

I started.

Carrie McGovern: 00:24:27

It's all about conversation and communication.

Carrie McGovern: 00:24:30

I started talking to people.

Carrie McGovern: 00:24:32

I started getting involved.

Carrie McGovern: 00:24:33

And that way I knew that I'd feel better and it would help my book as well, because the more people knew me, the more people knew I had a book, the more people would tell someone that I had a book.

Carrie McGovern: 00:24:47

And then it kind of worked onto the fact that I then, in fact, joined the northern Las lamb team.

Carrie McGovern: 00:24:52

And I'm now admin for them.

Carrie McGovern: 00:24:53

So I do a lot of things for them now as well.

Carrie McGovern: 00:24:56

So that's just been.

Carrie McGovern: 00:24:59

It's been a funny year, let's put it that way.

Carrie McGovern: 00:25:03

I didn't think, maybe not this time.

Carrie McGovern: 00:25:06

18 months ago, I was in a completely different place.

Carrie McGovern: 00:25:09

Completely different place.

Carrie McGovern: 00:25:12

And I think it's the support from other people.

Carrie McGovern: 00:25:16

And I don't just mean support.

Carrie McGovern: 00:25:17

I mean, I don't even know how to put it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:25:20

It's that unconditional love.

Carrie McGovern: 00:25:22

That's all the way I can kind of describe it, where someone wants to know you and will, like, big you up to someone, and they've hardly ever met you.

Carrie McGovern: 00:25:34

They just kind of know you, if you know what I mean.

Carrie McGovern: 00:25:37

It's a funny sensation, and I've never known it in a group of women before that are so behind each other that it's crazy.

Carrie McGovern: 00:25:45

And I've made so many new friends, and there's so many, you know, people, and everybody kind of, like, knows me.

Carrie McGovern: 00:25:50

I'm still, like, kind of.

Carrie McGovern: 00:25:52

I don't know half these people, but people always know me because of being kind of, like, posting constantly.

Carrie McGovern: 00:25:58

So.

Carrie McGovern: 00:25:59

So, yeah, that was the.

Carrie McGovern: 00:26:01

That was definitely the marker catalyst of me being the old me and the new me at the same time.

Carrie McGovern: 00:26:10

The not anxious Harry, the kind of the filth peddler, as the girls call me.

Carrie McGovern: 00:26:18

So that's my nickname in the lounge.

Carrie McGovern: 00:26:21

So, yeah, so that kind of came right the way around, like, a 180, and I don't even recognize the person I was three years ago.

Heather Masters: 00:26:32

Totally different person, I mean, from the lounge.

Heather Masters: 00:26:37

I love that your playful side and your sense of humor always comes out, and obviously that comes out in your books as well.

Heather Masters: 00:26:45

And I think that's really attractive as well.

Heather Masters: 00:26:49

And your willingness to be vulnerable, I think that's such courage and strength to do that as well.

Carrie McGovern: 00:26:56

I think everybody helps each other out as well, and I've never known group, so, as well.

Carrie McGovern: 00:27:04

I think as well, it helps that there's a lot of neurodiverse women in there as well, because they kind of understand I was in a situation recently.

Carrie McGovern: 00:27:15

And I laughed it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:27:16

You know, it could have gone one or two ways, but I did really laugh at it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:27:19

I was going to an event, actually.

Carrie McGovern: 00:27:22

What happened?

Carrie McGovern: 00:27:22

It was.

Carrie McGovern: 00:27:23

It was more like my anxiety was, like, full blown and I didn't know why.

Carrie McGovern: 00:27:28

I think a lot of it was my HRT was failing, right.

Carrie McGovern: 00:27:31

So that was one of the things.

Carrie McGovern: 00:27:33

But there was lots of little things that were happening, like back to school and I had an event to go to that was a complicated event.

Carrie McGovern: 00:27:42

You know, it was like different floors, different times, different people.

Carrie McGovern: 00:27:45

So I was really struggling.

Carrie McGovern: 00:27:47

And I said to someone, you know, oh, my anxiety is like, proper high level at the minute.

Carrie McGovern: 00:27:52

And she went, why?

Carrie McGovern: 00:27:54

And I was like, what do you mean, why?

Carrie McGovern: 00:27:57

I'm like.

Carrie McGovern: 00:27:57

She was like, but why?

Carrie McGovern: 00:27:58

Why do you get anxious about it?

Carrie McGovern: 00:28:00

Why don't you just not be anxious?

Carrie McGovern: 00:28:02

And I was like, I wouldn't have thought that.

Carrie McGovern: 00:28:05

I said, the reason that I'm anxious is because I'm so good at it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:28:09

I'm really good at it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:28:10

I excel at it, so therefore I'm going to roll with it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:28:12

And she was like, oh.

Carrie McGovern: 00:28:13

And it was just.

Carrie McGovern: 00:28:14

It was.

Carrie McGovern: 00:28:14

Made me laugh because I'd not come across anybody like that, like, in the last two years or so, because the girls are so.

Carrie McGovern: 00:28:24

They so understand when you say something like, you know, I'm really anxious.

Carrie McGovern: 00:28:29

They don't say, well, why?

Carrie McGovern: 00:28:30

What's going on?

Carrie McGovern: 00:28:31

They go, what we gonna do about it?

Carrie McGovern: 00:28:33

And, you know, what?

Carrie McGovern: 00:28:34

What would help you not, well, why?

Carrie McGovern: 00:28:38

Surely you should just stop being anxious.

Carrie McGovern: 00:28:41

And I forgot those people like that in the world, you know, I mean, that didn't come from that kind of background and didn't kind of understand the stresses of, like.

Carrie McGovern: 00:28:51

Like my brain.

Heather Masters: 00:28:55

Yeah.

Heather Masters: 00:28:58

Just coming back to, you're saying where you are now is completely different from even 18 months ago.

Heather Masters: 00:29:09

Are you a lot happier?

Heather Masters: 00:29:10

Are you kind of.

Heather Masters: 00:29:11

I know this is a strange question sometimes.

Heather Masters: 00:29:15

This is just a personal belief.

Heather Masters: 00:29:17

I find that the things that we go through shape us for a reason and, you know, we become stronger and sometimes we get happier.

Heather Masters: 00:29:29

But I think it depends on how we manage to deal with it.

Heather Masters: 00:29:33

Where are you on that?

Carrie McGovern: 00:29:37

I think if you ask anybody if they're happy, it's a.

Carrie McGovern: 00:29:41

It's a hard question, isn't it?

Carrie McGovern: 00:29:42

And I think looking back at where I was.

Carrie McGovern: 00:29:45

Yeah, absolutely, I am happy.

Carrie McGovern: 00:29:47

And I think I'm more happy because I'm just.

Carrie McGovern: 00:29:50

I like the simple things as well.

Carrie McGovern: 00:29:52

You know, I'm not.

Carrie McGovern: 00:29:53

I'm not someone who's caught up with stuff.

Carrie McGovern: 00:29:58

So my, like, you know, my happy is sitting in front of the telly with my husband.

Carrie McGovern: 00:30:04

That's my happy.

Carrie McGovern: 00:30:05

Someone making me tea.

Carrie McGovern: 00:30:06

That's my happy.

Carrie McGovern: 00:30:07

So, yeah, I'm happy.

Carrie McGovern: 00:30:08

I'm a lot happier.

Carrie McGovern: 00:30:10

You know, would I like things to be a little bit better, differently?

Carrie McGovern: 00:30:13

Would I like my books to sell better?

Carrie McGovern: 00:30:15

Yeah, absolutely.

Carrie McGovern: 00:30:16

Would I be happier?

Carrie McGovern: 00:30:18

I'm not sure.

Carrie McGovern: 00:30:19

I think I'd be probably a little bit happier for that moment in time, but generally, and I mean, as well, you know, my kids are happy for the first.

Carrie McGovern: 00:30:29

Not for the first time, but it feels like for the first time in a long time, my children are actually happy.

Carrie McGovern: 00:30:37

And we're actually kind of.

Carrie McGovern: 00:30:39

We're letting things flow.

Carrie McGovern: 00:30:40

We're not forcing things.

Carrie McGovern: 00:30:42

And it just.

Carrie McGovern: 00:30:43

Everything's just a bit chill.

Carrie McGovern: 00:30:45

So, yeah, I'm definitely happy.

Heather Masters: 00:30:49

Good.

Heather Masters: 00:30:49

Good.

Heather Masters: 00:30:50

You just said you're letting things flow.

Heather Masters: 00:30:53

Because my next question was, do you have a place that you want to go with your books?

Heather Masters: 00:30:59

And with the promotion and if they took off and perhaps the way you want it to, would that change anything?

Carrie McGovern: 00:31:10

Hmm.

Carrie McGovern: 00:31:11

Would it change?

Carrie McGovern: 00:31:12

I don't think it would change much.

Carrie McGovern: 00:31:15

Really?

Carrie McGovern: 00:31:15

Yeah.

Carrie McGovern: 00:31:16

I do want to be successful.

Carrie McGovern: 00:31:18

I want to be at the stage where I don't have to worry about money.

Carrie McGovern: 00:31:21

I don't really worry about money, but you know what I mean?

Carrie McGovern: 00:31:24

You want to be comfortable about it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:31:26

And, I mean, if anybody's wanting to write a book because they think they're going to make money, I mean, don't bother.

Carrie McGovern: 00:31:32

That's not how it is.

Carrie McGovern: 00:31:34

I always publish these books because I had a story inside that I needed to get out.

Carrie McGovern: 00:31:38

And the thing that makes me the happiest about doing what I do is when people read my books and people get in touch with me, I mean, I get messages from people saying, oh, my God, I've just read your book.

Carrie McGovern: 00:31:52

And I could not believe, or even part of the way through the books and go, I can't believe he just did that.

Carrie McGovern: 00:32:00

I can't believe she's.

Carrie McGovern: 00:32:01

I hate this person.

Carrie McGovern: 00:32:02

I love this person.

Carrie McGovern: 00:32:04

And that is what makes it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:32:06

That's what makes it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:32:07

And do I wish.

Carrie McGovern: 00:32:08

I mean, I'm not really one for the limelight, really, but would I like to be like El James and have three houses?

Carrie McGovern: 00:32:20

Yeah, I probably would.

Carrie McGovern: 00:32:22

But would I change my life?

Carrie McGovern: 00:32:24

Not.

Carrie McGovern: 00:32:25

Not really, no, I don't think I would.

Carrie McGovern: 00:32:28

I mean, I'm currently.

Carrie McGovern: 00:32:31

Well, I'm currently going to publish fourth book, but it's an.

Carrie McGovern: 00:32:34

It's a novella.

Carrie McGovern: 00:32:35

It's in the same series that I'm writing, and then I'm going to take maybe a year is my thoughts, and I'm going to, instead of writing and publishing, which is what I do, I write a book, then I publish it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:32:49

Then I write the next book and then publish it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:32:50

I'm going to try.

Carrie McGovern: 00:32:51

I always say this with a laughter because my husband always laughs at me when I say it, and my author friends laugh as well because they go, haha.

Carrie McGovern: 00:32:59

Yes.

Carrie McGovern: 00:32:59

If I'm going to try and write the majority of three books in a series and have nearly the whole series finished before I publish the first one.

Carrie McGovern: 00:33:11

But whether that happens, you know, I'm very much a kind of like, I don't know, see if your pants kind of write.

Carrie McGovern: 00:33:21

I just, I don't spend a lot of time writing or perfecting.

Carrie McGovern: 00:33:28

It just comes out like word vomit.

Carrie McGovern: 00:33:31

So it just, and it's there.

Carrie McGovern: 00:33:35

So I don't know whether I can, and I can't keep a secret as well.

Carrie McGovern: 00:33:40

I can't keep my own secret.

Carrie McGovern: 00:33:41

I keep anybody else's.

Carrie McGovern: 00:33:42

I can't keep my own.

Carrie McGovern: 00:33:43

So whether I can keep three books under wraps, I don't know.

Carrie McGovern: 00:33:50

I don't know whether that's possible for me.

Heather Masters: 00:33:54

Now you say it comes out like word vomit and it's something that you're kind of compelled to write.

Heather Masters: 00:34:00

So there are a lot of you in, in those books.

Carrie McGovern: 00:34:05

Is there?

Carrie McGovern: 00:34:05

A lot of what?

Heather Masters: 00:34:06

Sorry, you yourself, your personality, your story.

Carrie McGovern: 00:34:10

Oh, yeah.

Carrie McGovern: 00:34:11

Like a hundred percent.

Carrie McGovern: 00:34:12

And people seem.

Carrie McGovern: 00:34:13

The question I always get asked is, who are the characters based on?

Carrie McGovern: 00:34:18

Anybody?

Carrie McGovern: 00:34:19

And I always say, well, the series is a group of friends, effectively, and the friends kind of, the friendship group changes and morphs throughout the series.

Carrie McGovern: 00:34:32

But the first book, who were the books based on?

Carrie McGovern: 00:34:36

They were all different parts of me, really.

Carrie McGovern: 00:34:41

So the, when you first read hello, happiness, the bit about Emma, if any of my friends, whenever any of my friends read the first chapter, they went, that's you.

Carrie McGovern: 00:34:53

But they also went, and that's me as well.

Carrie McGovern: 00:34:55

So a lot of my friends go, you've written about me kind of thing.

Carrie McGovern: 00:34:59

So my best friend, who is called Emma, funnily, I didn't set that up.

Carrie McGovern: 00:35:04

And she's also my better reader.

Carrie McGovern: 00:35:06

So the first person ever gets to read the book, she, she thinks that that book is entirely about her.

Carrie McGovern: 00:35:13

Apart from the nice man at the end, it isn't.

Carrie McGovern: 00:35:19

And I think people, people, I think it's not based on anybody, but people see bits of themselves in characters.

Carrie McGovern: 00:35:29

And when I had my book launch for the third book, hello, handsome.

Carrie McGovern: 00:35:33

We did a little game where you kind of chose who you were.

Carrie McGovern: 00:35:39

Which one of the friends were you, which one of the friends were, because we've got, you know, different, all different characters, you know, the downtrodden mum was Emma, the kind of.

Carrie McGovern: 00:35:49

Lizzie was the one who kind of.

Carrie McGovern: 00:35:51

No nonsense, if you want to be told directly what they thought, you went straight to Lizzie.

Carrie McGovern: 00:35:58

And then there was, like.

Carrie McGovern: 00:35:59

There was Megan, who was a bit ditzy, and she was the younger one, and she was kind of, you know, she wasn't quite in control of life.

Carrie McGovern: 00:36:07

And then there was Beth.

Carrie McGovern: 00:36:08

And Beth was the one who had little kids and she was kind of this feisty little thing as the series went on.

Carrie McGovern: 00:36:18

As the series went on.

Carrie McGovern: 00:36:19

And I've said this to a few people, the things in the book that are from personal experience always happen to one character, and I always put these things that have happened in my life as her, and that's Beth, and she doesn't have her own book, she's happily married.

Carrie McGovern: 00:36:39

But Beth and Steve, if there's anything that my husband has annoyed me about, it happens to Beth and Steve, and Beth always rants about Steve to the girls and you.

Carrie McGovern: 00:36:50

I would say probably nine times out of ten, when Beth's had a rant, it's actually happened to me.

Carrie McGovern: 00:36:58

Yes, there's definitely bits of me there.

Carrie McGovern: 00:37:01

And also, I have to.

Carrie McGovern: 00:37:02

In social situations, I have to remind my friends that anything they do say may be taken down and put in a novel.

Heather Masters: 00:37:12

Very good.

Heather Masters: 00:37:14

So has doing that been really cathartic as well, that really helped you move forward?

Carrie McGovern: 00:37:20

It has as well, and it's kind of like, I'm really lucky.

Carrie McGovern: 00:37:24

I have a really supportive partner and husband and a supportive family, really.

Carrie McGovern: 00:37:32

But I know people don't, and I think I'm one of these people who feels for everybody else.

Carrie McGovern: 00:37:39

So I see my friends going through things and I always say, why are you accepting this behaviour from this person?

Carrie McGovern: 00:37:46

I don't understand it because I've not lived it, but I've seen it through other people.

Carrie McGovern: 00:37:51

So it was quite nice writing about that kind of thing for me to just kind of say to people, it's not acceptable, this is not the way that we should be treated.

Carrie McGovern: 00:38:03

And I think that was the cathartic bit of it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:38:06

I mean, it's nice to have a rant about your husband and ingest and talk about how you want to build another patio, which we often do in the books when the men annoy us, but I think it was more cathartic.

Carrie McGovern: 00:38:20

For my feelings towards my friends who have experienced, like, domestic abuse, you know, kind of, you know, coercive control and behavior and the people in my periphery that I see who get talked down to constantly.

Carrie McGovern: 00:38:40

And the way that as women, we are seen as, I don't know, we're still seen.

Carrie McGovern: 00:38:48

We're still talked down to, and it really irritates us.

Carrie McGovern: 00:38:52

And that's why, I mean, I know on the outside, people who are not in the romance genre kind of do the whole, oh, well, it's romance.

Carrie McGovern: 00:39:02

She falls in love with a bloke and, you know, he.

Carrie McGovern: 00:39:05

It's not like that.

Carrie McGovern: 00:39:07

The romance genre is not like that at all.

Heather Masters: 00:39:10

It deals with some real issues.

Carrie McGovern: 00:39:13

Strong women and men always fall first, and a man never, ever saves a woman, ever.

Carrie McGovern: 00:39:19

And that's.

Carrie McGovern: 00:39:20

That was my main kind of aim.

Carrie McGovern: 00:39:24

I will never be putting that kind, you know, the opposite of that in a book.

Carrie McGovern: 00:39:28

It's always going to be strong women.

Carrie McGovern: 00:39:30

It's always going to be strong women who don't even realize they're strong until they have to be, that kind of thing.

Carrie McGovern: 00:39:37

So it wasn't cathartic so much for myself, but for what I was seeing around me.

Carrie McGovern: 00:39:43

And it really.

Carrie McGovern: 00:39:45

It winds us up.

Carrie McGovern: 00:39:46

It winds us up the way women are made to expect certain behaviors.

Carrie McGovern: 00:39:52

And no, we're not gonna.

Heather Masters: 00:39:55

Yeah, it's weird because what's.

Heather Masters: 00:39:57

What pops into my head, which I'd forgotten about.

Heather Masters: 00:39:59

And this is actually a man thing.

Heather Masters: 00:40:02

I don't know if you've heard of Jeff Thomas.

Heather Masters: 00:40:03

He wrote, he's a martial artist filmmaker, but he also wrote a few books, and one of them really had an impact on me way back when called Shapeshifter.

Heather Masters: 00:40:16

And I got to interview him: 2010

Heather Masters: 00:40:32

And it just.

Heather Masters: 00:40:34

Yeah, I mean, that was, like, really quite amazing for me on his determination to write that book as well.

Heather Masters: 00:40:42

So, yeah, it just came up when you were seeing that sort of relationship and not having to put up with it and how.

Heather Masters: 00:40:50

How restrictive it can be, but how we can overcome it by recognizing it as well, I think.

Heather Masters: 00:40:56

As well.

Heather Masters: 00:40:58

Yeah.

Carrie McGovern: 00:40:58

Yeah.

Carrie McGovern: 00:40:58

And I think as well, the things that I like to put, especially in the books and in real life, is it's not the big things.

Carrie McGovern: 00:41:06

It's not the big things that make the difference.

Carrie McGovern: 00:41:09

It's the little things.

Carrie McGovern: 00:41:11

And my friends, one of the things that kind of was a catalyst for one of the stories, I think probably.

Carrie McGovern: 00:41:19

Hello Mister Beckett.

Carrie McGovern: 00:41:21

Some of hello Mister Beckett was the fact that she said she'd been married for so long and her husband still didn't know how she took her to coffee.

Carrie McGovern: 00:41:28

And that makes me so sad.

Carrie McGovern: 00:41:31

But it's, it's the small things, do you know what I mean?

Carrie McGovern: 00:41:34

It's the little things, it's, it's the, you know, buying your favorite drink and bringing it home because, just because, do you know what I mean?

Carrie McGovern: 00:41:44

It's that kind of thing.

Carrie McGovern: 00:41:45

It's about doing things that don't matter, but really, actually massively do.

Carrie McGovern: 00:41:52

It's been thought about.

Carrie McGovern: 00:41:53

That's, you know, that that's what love is, that's what love is.

Carrie McGovern: 00:41:58

And that's what happiness is in effect.

Carrie McGovern: 00:42:00

It's knowing that people think about you when they do things, do you know what I mean?

Carrie McGovern: 00:42:06

And that you are, you are something.

Carrie McGovern: 00:42:09

And especially in book one, because I mean, I've seen so many of my friends have relationships with men who just didn't care.

Carrie McGovern: 00:42:18

They didn't.

Carrie McGovern: 00:42:18

It was obvious that they lived their life the same as they had always lived their life.

Carrie McGovern: 00:42:24

And that sometimes that is the way sometimes the male brain is set up, but it's exaggerated in some men, and they will go to work, they will not think about what happens at home, or their children, or their wife or whatever.

Carrie McGovern: 00:42:38

They'll come home, they'll expect everything to be done.

Carrie McGovern: 00:42:41

And it's still like that now?

Carrie McGovern: 00:42:43

It's still like that.

Carrie McGovern: 00:42:44

And they expect everything to be done.

Carrie McGovern: 00:42:46

Being involved with school is not their job.

Carrie McGovern: 00:42:49

Babysitting the kids.

Carrie McGovern: 00:42:50

Why would I babysit the kids?

Carrie McGovern: 00:42:51

Not babysitting it, you're just parenting.

Carrie McGovern: 00:42:53

So that kind of thing, really kind of, that's what sparked the kind of the feelings that I got for Emma, where she just.

Carrie McGovern: 00:43:02

When someone doesn't care about you, you don't care about yourself anymore.

Carrie McGovern: 00:43:07

And that's, that's just awful, you know, and that's something I like to put out in these books, is that, you know, we're worth more.

Carrie McGovern: 00:43:17

We're worth more.

Carrie McGovern: 00:43:19

We're not just mum.

Carrie McGovern: 00:43:20

And it's not just, it's not just men, it's society, it's everything.

Carrie McGovern: 00:43:24

I mean, when my kids were growing up, still growing up, obviously, but when you went to the doctors, when you went to school, when you went to see any professional, you were mum.

Carrie McGovern: 00:43:35

You never ever had a name, you were just Mumdha.

Carrie McGovern: 00:43:38

And you know, we've got.

Carrie McGovern: 00:43:41

Yeah, that's part of our job, but it's only part of our job.

Carrie McGovern: 00:43:45

It's not who we are.

Carrie McGovern: 00:43:46

I don't feel like being a parent is who I am as a person, you know, it's part of my job and my lifestyle and whatever, but it's not all that I am, you know, I've got other traits as well.

Carrie McGovern: 00:44:01

I am seen outside of having children as well, so that's a big thing for me as well.

Carrie McGovern: 00:44:07

Being seen, yes.

Heather Masters: 00:44:10

Yeah and I think that's such a big thing.

Heather Masters: 00:44:14

I was actually just putting together a coaching program and one of the things that I was looking at is how a lot of people have kind of been forced to go remote, if you like, and be on their own.

Heather Masters: 00:44:30

There are a lot of people on their own, I think, more so now than ever before and not having that contact and that support and that friendship anymore.

Heather Masters: 00:44:41

So it's kind of something that I'm really looking at are people who have cut themselves off and not necessarily cut themselves off, but found themselves in a situation where they really don't have that level of support anymore.

Heather Masters: 00:44:55

And I think it's quite sad that have gone that way.

Carrie McGovern: 00:44:57

It is and I think as a society as well, I think we've been so busy with having work as the only thing you do where you make friends and you converse with people.

Carrie McGovern: 00:45:15

So in Covid, when that was taken away from everybody, people really struggled.

Carrie McGovern: 00:45:20

Now I work from home already so I didn't struggle.

Carrie McGovern: 00:45:23

But the problem is, because we've been in this situation where it has been work based and we've seen that by like government policy, you know, get everybody back to the office.

Carrie McGovern: 00:45:33

Why?

Carrie McGovern: 00:45:34

Why do we need to go back to the office?

Carrie McGovern: 00:45:36

We don't need to go back to work to socialise.

Carrie McGovern: 00:45:39

We need some kind of structure in our lives.

Carrie McGovern: 00:45:42

The community that we've lost, we need that back in place.

Carrie McGovern: 00:45:47

We don't need everybody to go out to work.

Carrie McGovern: 00:45:50

We need people to get together and communicate with each other and help each other and have that mental stimulation from having a conversation with someone else.

Carrie McGovern: 00:46:02

And it doesn't matter if you don't agree with them.

Carrie McGovern: 00:46:04

I love having conversations with people I don't agree with because I mean I'm one of these people who can see kind of like both sides of the, the coin kind of.

Carrie McGovern: 00:46:16

So having discussions with people I think is fascinating because I don't suggest that they're wrong, but they have a different point of view to me and that's healthy.

Carrie McGovern: 00:46:27

Really healthy.

Heather Masters: 00:46:28

Absolutely.

Carrie McGovern: 00:46:28

So I think also the problem we've got at the minute with society is that people aren't mixing the way that they used to mix before.

Carrie McGovern: 00:46:40

So people with different opinions aren't mixing with each other, so people with the same opinions are mixing with each other and fueling each other.

Carrie McGovern: 00:46:50

And I think that's what.

Carrie McGovern: 00:46:51

Where we get into the point of kind of like, not quite extremism, but like, people are, like, single visioned on certain things.

Carrie McGovern: 00:47:01

And I think if we had more of the kind of, I don't know, more kind of cohesion between different groups of people in social situations, in community situations, I don't think that would be as much of a problem.

Carrie McGovern: 00:47:21

But we've had that taken away from us, we've had funding taken away, and that's the real shame, I think, definitely with the way things are going.

Carrie McGovern: 00:47:31

But it will all be pointed back to the fact that we work from home, and that's not the issue.

Carrie McGovern: 00:47:37

The issue is not working from home.

Carrie McGovern: 00:47:38

It's about not having anything outside of work for people.

Heather Masters: 00:47:44

No, there's a definite move towards separation rather than collaboration in a lot of places, which is a bit of a shame.

Heather Masters: 00:47:50

So, yeah, I mean, I'm kind of focusing on collaboration, communication and companionship.

Heather Masters: 00:47:58

I think that's really kind of the three c's, if you like.

Heather Masters: 00:48:02

So, yeah.

Carrie McGovern: 00:48:04

And I mean, having a.

Carrie McGovern: 00:48:06

Having a group of.

Carrie McGovern: 00:48:06

I mean, this comes back to the books as well.

Carrie McGovern: 00:48:08

Having a group of friends and going out with a group of friends is like a therapy session.

Heather Masters: 00:48:14

Yeah.

Carrie McGovern: 00:48:15

Because you're able to talk through things and you'll either have people who will.

Carrie McGovern: 00:48:21

I mean, we were laughing.

Carrie McGovern: 00:48:22

I was laughing with some of my friends the other day because I'm one of these people who say, look, I'm annoyed with something, just let me feel the feels and let me get it out.

Carrie McGovern: 00:48:33

Because if I get it out now, it'll be over with and I'll have got past it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:48:37

If you kind of, like, dull it down and make me fester on it, it'll be two and three weeks and I'll still be ranting on about it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:48:42

Just let me have my feels.

Carrie McGovern: 00:48:43

You don't need to fix me.

Carrie McGovern: 00:48:45

And I think that's it as well.

Carrie McGovern: 00:48:46

You'll have people in your group who will be the people who, if you need fit, if you need help fixing, they'll fix it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:48:53

If you just need someone to rant to and go, yeah, that was really bad situation.

Carrie McGovern: 00:48:57

I feel for you.

Carrie McGovern: 00:48:58

That's what you need.

Carrie McGovern: 00:48:59

You need that.

Carrie McGovern: 00:49:00

Group therapy is what I call it.

Heather Masters: 00:49:03

Yeah.

Heather Masters: 00:49:04

Yeah.

Heather Masters: 00:49:05

Sometimes you just need to be told that it's all going to work out one way or the other.

Carrie McGovern: 00:49:10

Yeah.

Heather Masters: 00:49:11

Yeah.

Carrie McGovern: 00:49:11

Oh, on the other hand, you also need to be told it's okay to feel like that.

Heather Masters: 00:49:16

Yeah.

Carrie McGovern: 00:49:17

It's okay to feel all the feels.

Carrie McGovern: 00:49:20

Feel all the feels and get it all out and, you know, would then we move on.

Carrie McGovern: 00:49:25

Just don't fester in it.

Heather Masters: 00:49:26

Yep.

Heather Masters: 00:49:27

Absolutely.

Heather Masters: 00:49:28

Absolutely.

Heather Masters: 00:49:30

So it's been lovely talking to you.

Heather Masters: 00:49:31

If there was one thing that you wanted to share that maybe you haven't shared yet, what would that be?

Carrie McGovern: 00:49:41

I think going back to the reading thing, I'm quite an advocate on reading for mental health as adults.

Carrie McGovern: 00:49:52

I mean, all the way through school, children are encouraged, forced sometimes, but encouraged to read.

Carrie McGovern: 00:50:03

And they're encouraged to read until they get to, like, 18, and then no one encourages them anymore.

Carrie McGovern: 00:50:10

And I think it's a real shame.

Carrie McGovern: 00:50:12

And I think there's a lot of barriers to reading.

Carrie McGovern: 00:50:15

Like I said before, I mean, the.

Carrie McGovern: 00:50:17

But one thing I.

Carrie McGovern: 00:50:19

If you don't have time to read or to do something that will make your life better and your mental health better, what's the point?

Carrie McGovern: 00:50:31

Make time.

Carrie McGovern: 00:50:32

Make time to do it.

Carrie McGovern: 00:50:33

I still.

Carrie McGovern: 00:50:34

I mean, I don't read as much as I do because sometimes I can't read while writing because it pollutes the brain.

Carrie McGovern: 00:50:40

Yeah.

Carrie McGovern: 00:50:41

But generally, I usually try and find something a bit different to what I'm writing.

Carrie McGovern: 00:50:46

But, you know, it doesn't matter what you read because reading is so, so good for your mental health.

Carrie McGovern: 00:50:54

There's been studies done about dementia and that reading helps, just doesn't stop dementia, but it slows the.

Carrie McGovern: 00:51:04

Slows dementia down.

Carrie McGovern: 00:51:07

So it doesn't, you know, so it's not formed as highly because of the way that your brain is reacting to what you're reading.

Carrie McGovern: 00:51:13

And it's that time, whether it's a magazine, whether it's a comic, whether it's a.

Carrie McGovern: 00:51:19

Whether you're in your sixties and seventies and you're reading a young adult novel.

Carrie McGovern: 00:51:23

It doesn't matter.

Carrie McGovern: 00:51:24

It doesn't matter what it is.

Carrie McGovern: 00:51:26

The only thing that matters is that you are enjoying it and you are being taken away on that journey in that book and you are in that story.

Carrie McGovern: 00:51:34

And that's it.

Heather Masters: 00:51:36

Brilliant.

Heather Masters: 00:51:37

Brilliant.

Heather Masters: 00:51:38

Well, thank you.

Heather Masters: 00:51:39

It's been a fabulous conversation and, yeah, let's maybe do it again sometime soon.

Heather Masters: 00:51:45

Thank you.

Carrie McGovern: 00:51:46

Yeah, definitely.

Carrie McGovern: 00:51:47

Thanks for having me.

Heather Masters: 00:51:48

Thank you.

Heather Masters: 00:51:50

Thank you so much for taking the time to listen to this week's episode.

Heather Masters: 00:51:54

If you enjoyed it or think it would be valuable to others, please do share.

Heather Masters: 00:51:59

And if you really enjoyed it, please leave me a review.

Heather Masters: 00:52:01

It really helps the podcast.

Heather Masters: 00:52:04

All of the links are in the show notes and I look forward to seeing you next week on the choosing Happy podcast.