123 - The Menopause Revolution with Carolyn Harris MP

The Dr Louise Newson Podcast

Dr Louise Newson

Health & Fitness, Mental Health, Medicine

4.8 • 798 Ratings

🗓️ 26 October 2021

⏱️ 32 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Carolyn Harris MP left school at 16, had two children at a young age and worked as a barmaid. Her young son, Martin, was tragically killed in a road accident in 1989 and this changed her life forever. She sank into a black hole for the next few years but turned things around when at 34 she became the first person in her family to go to university. Carolyn never dreamt that 20 years later she would be the MP for her community, Swansea East, and although she continues to experience imposter syndrome regularly, once she has decided to fight for change, she does not give up. Carolyn has campaigned on topics such as child funerals and gambling. She did not realise her collection of health problems were related to the menopause at first, but when she joined the dots and learnt more about the effects of the menopause, especially in the workplace, she set up an All Party Parliamentary Group on menopause and was successful in changing the law in Wales in removing the prescription fee for HRT. Carolyn’s advice to women: Be part of the menopause revolution. Find us on social media, there’s a template letter on the APPG website so you can write to your local MP, and contact my office or on Twitter if you’d like to get involved. Join us in London in Parliament Square for the Menopause Support Bill on the 29th Dreams can come true. Don’t think you can’t achieve something. You are brilliant and strong. You can be what you want to be, you just need to be brave. We are using our platforms to call for change, but you can go into your place of work, talk about your own experience, ask others about theirs, say ‘do you think this could be the menopause?’ Carolyn Harris MP details: Website: www.carolynharris.org.uk Twitter @carolynharris24 and @AppgMenopause Email: [email protected]

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Hello, I'm Dr. Louise Newsome and welcome to my podcast. I'm a GP and menopause specialist and I run the Newsome Health Menopause and Wellbeing Centre here in Stratford-Bron-Avon. I'm also the founder of the Menopause charity and the Menopause support app called Balance.
0:29.9	On the podcast, I will be joined each week by an exciting guest to help provide evidence-based
0:36.5	information and advice about both the perimenopause and the
0:40.9	menopause. So today I'm very, very excited because I have with me, Carolyn Harris, who's very
0:49.1	kindly given up her time on a Sunday morning to talk to me about the menopause. So thank you very much,
0:54.9	Carolyn. My pleasure, Louise. So I've been aware of your work for a while and like a lot of people,
1:00.1	I just end up stalking them. And I don't know how I managed to do it, but I managed to get in touch
1:04.7	with them and then have the most amazing conversation. And Carolyn is one of the most inspirational
1:09.6	women that I've ever met and spoken to because
1:12.1	she's very determined, which I like in women. She doesn't take no for an answer and things
1:17.8	haven't been easy for her. And I think it's very easy when you see people who are at the sort
1:22.4	of peak of their career, I think how easy life has been. We've all got stories and a lot of
1:27.0	them we don't share, but some of them we do. And I think that makes us has been. We've all got stories and a lot of them we don't share,
1:27.9	but some of them we do. And I think that makes us more determined actually as women. If we've had
1:32.3	easy backgrounds, then we sit and rest on our laurels a bit and most of us haven't had
1:36.6	easy backgrounds. And neither is Carolyn. So thank you for coming today. Pleasure. So just let's set
1:42.0	the scene really because when your name is in the media, it's
1:45.2	equaled with free prescriptions, menopause. But it's not always been like that, has it? So just can
1:50.2	you talk us through sort of what your career's been like and how you've got to where you are?
1:55.1	Okay, left school at 16 at my first child by the time I was 20, my second child when I was 25, during this time I was a barmate.
2:04.5	Right. And then in 1989, worst possible thing in the world happened. Then my first child,
2:10.7	Martin, was run over and killed. And I just went like for three years in a black hole, didn't take any kind of antidepressants, fought it off, but you never fight it off.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Dr Louise Newson, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Dr Louise Newson and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.