October 13, 2024 • 48 mins
From ‘Playing it Straight’ to straight talking on the airwaves, broadcaster and presenter, Zoe Hardman, joins the Mile fly Club to bare all… quite literally.
From boobs out in Ibiza, to sex-less wedding nights and the struggles of step parenting, she’s spilling all the tea with no turbulence. Get ready to take off with an episode crazier than an Ibiza closing party.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Ten hot guys. I know some of them were gay.
(00:02):
Originally rising to fame, playing it straight on reality TV.
I thought you were kissing me as a straight man.
When I said, I've chosen you, he went, I'm gay, darling.
And I was like, what?
Hard work had to make it to the top.
She's carved out a career as a broadcaster, hosting an array of television and radio shows.
She's also a mother and a fellow podcaster.
(00:26):
I spent half my summer spray-painted blue, wearing a rubber wig, with my boobies out.
Penetrative sex.
Penetrative sex.
I'm going to drop that there again.
And this may sound like the wankiest thing anyone's ever said on your podcast, but...
I was in Ibiza and I was like, where's my mum?
And my mate went, look up there, and she's on f***ing stage, like, woohoo!
And I was like, how is this happening?
(00:46):
I didn't even get to sleep in my marital bed.
You didn't even have sex on your wedding night?
No! My friend slept in it and he puked everywhere.
You never had a proper honeymoon?
No, I have not.
Why not? F***ing question!
Do you know what happened at our wedding?
No, tell me.
Oh God, I've never told this story.
I was 22 years old right at the time.
And it was just like, oh God, I can't believe they chose her.
She's fat.
(01:06):
What would they see in her anyway?
And it was just trolling after trolling after trolling.
I had like 10 missed calls from my sister and I was like, this is weird.
And she was like, Zoe, you need to come back now.
How long have I got?
And she was like, just try and get on the flight.
30 minutes later, phone rings.
He died.
I couldn't get my head around it.
How could I have been so happy and so ecstatic?
And then, devastation.
(01:28):
Welcome to the Mile Fly Club, your VIP lane to first class travel tips,
tell old tales and turbulent life tales.
Think the Mile High Club only with more clothes, but no less revealing.
Each week, I'll be inviting high flying, globe trotting guests to bear all in my club.
So if you're searching for some tantalizing travel tidbits and a good old gossip,
(01:50):
you've arrived at the right destination.
Now sit back, relax and get ready to join me in the Mile Fly Club.
Ladies and gentlemen, we've now reached our cruising altitude.
I'll go ahead and turn off the seatbelt sign.
So sit back, relax and enjoy the flight.
Have you ever wondered why some reality show contestants managed to carve out a career in TV where others fail?
(02:15):
Well, my next guest's broadcast career has gone from strength to strength.
After appearing on Playing It Straight back in 2005, she's forged a 20 year career in the business
and shows no signs of slowing down.
Joining the Mile Fly Club this week is Zoe Hardman.
Oh, I love it. And I love the purple. Isn't that the colour of sexual frustration?
(02:37):
Well, yeah, it is.
Well, sexually frustrated, seeming you're not a member of the Mile High Club.
That's what I really want to know.
I'm not. I'm most disappointed.
No one says yes.
Oh, they do.
Some of our guests have said yes.
Prove it.
That's what I will say to people when they're like, oh, yeah, no, we shagged on a plane.
(02:58):
I'm like, what in those disgusting loos?
Why does it have to be in the toilet?
Where would it be?
Well, I think you need to listen to some other episode of the podcast, Zoe,
and then you will find out who is a member of the Mile High Club.
I just... There are people out there.
Well, no one does it in the seats, though, right?
So no.
I suppose if you were in first class, there would be like areas.
(03:19):
There would be better areas.
What about the crew areas?
Ever thought about that?
I haven't, but I will now spend a lot of time putting some shape on that and come back to you.
Do some research.
Zoe, it is really amazing to have you here.
So thank you so much.
Now, not many people will realise that you started in the industry over 20 years ago.
I know.
It's amazing.
(03:40):
Which is amazing because the way I look, isn't it? It's incredible.
You always look so trendy and I want to be you.
And I see your post on fashion.
I'm like, oh, wow, she looks hot.
She looks good. Thank you.
So you were the love interest in playing it straight in Mexico.
It's so funny.
Well, it was amazing because back then that really was when reality TV was just breaking,
(04:02):
like the time of Big Brother, Jade Goody, and you were part of that.
And you went into that.
So tell me about that experience.
It was so funny.
It's still my favourite job that I've ever done in my life.
You can imagine being 21 years old and I just got back from a big trip around the world.
So I've been away for 10 months by myself.
I went backpacking.
I ended up in Mexico weirdly and I just got home and my mum was just, you know,
(04:26):
when you get back home, I didn't go to university.
So I'd like brought all my bags back, you know, stinking rucksack hadn't washed for a while.
Like had some sort of weird braid in my hair.
I was like, you know, I'm just traveling man.
My mum was like, what the fuck are you going to do with your life?
I was like, there's a plan.
I just haven't formulated it yet.
And she said, well, look, I went onto the channel for website today and they're looking for a girl to be part of a dating show.
(04:47):
And I said, absolutely not.
I don't want to do anything like that.
I'm not, you know, reality TV.
No, thanks.
And she was like, look, for goodness sakes, just go to these auditions.
Anyway, so I rung them up and lion productions.
They were making it and I spoke to someone at line and they said, look, actually, you're a bit late because we chose the girl.
I haven't told her yet, but we've chosen the girl and we were going to tell her tomorrow.
(05:08):
And I could sense something in his voice.
They weren't necessarily that happy, you know, and just get a vibe.
And I said, look, I'm coming to London tomorrow.
I'm just going to sit in the reception.
You're a ballsy as that.
I'm coming. I love that.
That's so cool.
So I sat there and I said, I'll be there for an hour.
Anyway, I sat and sat and sat and about 50 minutes.
I thought they're not coming.
Although this is actually the building.
(05:30):
Yeah, but I just sat there.
I said I had a meeting.
Anyway, I sat down.
This was like 20 or 20 years ago.
And then like 52 minutes, someone came down and said, well done for wasting nearly an hour.
Actually, we're not that happy with the girl that we've picked.
Would you come up and do a screen test?
And I was like, yes.
So went upstairs, did the screen test.
They said, thanks very much.
We'll give you a call.
(05:50):
I stepped out the building.
The phone rang.
They said you need to go down to Channel 4 now.
They want to meet you.
So I went down.
They said we call you tomorrow.
I was on the treadmill in my local gym at the leisure center thinking I've really fucked that up.
And then the phone rang and that was it.
And I was off back to Mexico again for six weeks.
And I was in the gym and playing it straight and it was just the most bonkers, brilliant, amazing experience of my life.
(06:12):
It was so 21 years old, 10 hot guys.
I know some of them were gay, but you know, they were all just a dreamy to look at.
And the premise of the series because it was kind of like met with a little bit of Christism.
Not at the time.
Was it not at the time?
Not at the time.
I mean, it was so tongue in cheek.
It was the most beautiful.
(06:33):
I mean, you couldn't make the show now.
And I understand that.
You know, times have changed.
People have grown up, you know, a hundred percent.
I look back on it and there were parts of it where I cringed, but it was so hard.
Did you cringe?
Oh, me and June looking around some of the boys rooms and being like, oh, he's got a pink shirt.
He must be gay. It's like what an awful thing to say.
But it was all done tongue in cheek at the time.
(06:54):
And and there was no offense meant by it at all.
And actually it wasn't, you know, hunt the gay guy.
It was like, you know, you shouldn't judge people, you know, by the way that they look away that they act.
That actually, you know, it's their heart that counts.
And that was the heart.
It was it was about love and friendship and adventure.
And it was fun.
I just loved every second of it.
And the guy that you ended up picking.
(07:16):
My friend Ben, who I was convinced was straight because, you know, guess what?
I was 21 and hadn't really met a gay person before.
He was a builder from Essex.
And when I said, it's you, Ben, I've chosen you.
He went, I'm gay, darling.
And I was like, what?
I couldn't believe it.
I remember.
I remember watching it.
(07:36):
And didn't he feel terrible as well?
Because it was like a cash prize up for grabs and he got to keep the money.
But I feel like I remember him saying, I can't do this.
I need to give you half or something.
He gave me all the cash.
And then I said, have half back.
Right.
But we weren't romantically involved.
We'd formed a really tight friendship.
And you still really trusted him.
(07:58):
I haven't spoken to him for a while, but he sometimes we sometimes reach out to each other on social media, but essentially, no.
Oh, that feels like a shame there.
After going through that experience.
I know.
So you're not not in touch.
No.
Have you been back to Mexico since?
I haven't.
Why not?
I don't know.
I don't know.
Some friends are going this year and I would love to go.
(08:19):
I'd love to take the kids because I had the best time there.
And but then there's so many more places that I want to explore.
Like when you were there filming that show, did you actually get to see like much of Mexico itself?
Or were you really?
Because so many people ask that question.
When you're away filming, do you actually get to see a destination?
It's like, yeah, we do, because we're traveling around.
But did you get to see much of Mexico?
No, but remember, I'd only just got back from six weeks there.
(08:41):
Yeah, you knew it well already.
Well, Guadalajara was amazing.
Puerto Escondido.
I basically went from Tijuana at the border and then just traveled all the way to Acapulco, Puerto Escondido and then went into Mexico City.
And then we went out to Cancun and Isla Mujeres.
And like I just I love how you remember all these towns and these names.
Look at me, I'm still living on to my 20 year old youth.
(09:03):
That's amazing.
So your life changed in a big, big way.
Did you ever expect that to happen after your mum finding that little advert on the Channel 4 website?
And what took her there in the first place?
Because she was always trying to find me because I wanted to be a presenter since I was seven years old.
Right. That was that was no there was no coincidence that I did a show like that because I had tried kind of a couple of years previous.
(09:27):
I'd got my show real together.
I was you know, I really, really loved the industry and I love chatting to people and interviewing people is like something that sets me on fire.
So I'd worked on the reception of a TV production company, which was FlexTech, which it was like, yeah, bravo.
Tems, talk back, Tems or something that ended up becoming FlexTech.
I don't know. I don't know what it is now, but it was like the Bravo days and I was next to Radio 1.
(09:51):
Actually, there's another story behind that too.
In a minute. And I've worked on the reception and every person that came in, I was like, hi.
I want to be a presenter and they were like, just come for our 10 o'clock meeting.
And I was like, all right, OK, but when you finished, if you're really important, can you try and get me on the telly?
But you have to ask.
You don't ask, you don't get and look where it got you.
(10:12):
So it was just it was just wonderful coming out of it because everybody watched it.
What happened after immediately after coming?
Well, yes, there was a bit of a wait, you know what it's like while they're turning around the edit and then it TX in the April.
And then I joined Davina's agent because Davina McCall is the reason that I'm a presenter.
I grew up watching her on Street Mate. I just loved her as a person.
(10:32):
And I actually only just had my Davina moment about three months ago at heart.
So I've been in the industry for 20 years and she co-hosted Jamie and she was in the office and she came sprinting down and was like,
so and I was like, she fucking knows my name.
She's lovely. Isn't she amazing?
Yeah. Well, I did the jump with Davina.
And I just had Rocco, my son, who's 11 in a couple of months time, and he'd been born by a caesarian section.
(11:00):
So everyone thought I was nuts because I was going on this ski jumping show and I was a reserve.
I was actually a reserve on the show initially.
And I ended up replacing Tara Palmer Tomkinson, the late Tara Palmer Tomkinson.
But I've got a photo of Davina and Rocco in a car seat on a flight when Rocco was three weeks old,
traveling to Austria to do the jump.
(11:22):
It's crazy, but she's such a lovely, lovely lady.
I can't believe you did that.
Although knowing you actually, I can't believe it.
You're like that. Yeah.
Yeah. Anything scary?
I mean, bit crazy, but no, Davina's lovely.
But so you did, you obviously did the show and then positive positives came out of it, but some negatives.
Yeah. Tell me.
Is it, am I right in saying that off the back of that show, you ended up getting an eating disorder?
(11:47):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
So what triggered that, do you think?
So you've got to think this was like 2006 and it was before the days of social media.
So they had all these horrible forums, which I'm sure they still have now,
and where people basically go there to just troll you.
And I just remember getting increasingly more anxious about waiting for the show to come out and not really realizing,
(12:11):
you know, there was part of me that was, well, I was concerned.
I've always been quite aware of what people think of me because I want to be friends with people.
And I, you know, if anyone thought that I had been, you know, rude or like I just wanted to come out.
Okay. And that meant a lot to me.
And so I was waiting and waiting, waiting.
And then when the show aired, you know, we got good figures.
(12:31):
But then I started sort of diving into these forums.
I was so young. I was 22 years old right at the time.
And it was just like, oh God, I can't believe they chose her.
She's fat. You know, she's so ugly.
What would they see in her anyway? And it was just inside trolling after trolling after trolling.
And I kept looking at them and I wasn't talking to anyone about it.
And the pressure just got way too much.
(12:51):
And literally within, I'd say three months, I was in quite a bad state.
I had just essentially stopped eating.
I was really over training like twice a day.
I became quite alone and isolated, which was weird because it was this big moment in my life that I thought would be really happy.
And it was the flip side of that. It was quite dark.
(13:12):
You felt dead for such a long time.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah. Just numb, I think is the word.
But eating disorders can do that to you.
You know, you can go from being absolutely fine to feeling like you will never get out of it.
You know, it takes quite an evil grasp of you and it can happen really fast.
And actually, 22 is quite late for a woman to get an eating disorder.
(13:34):
But it was really bad.
How did your mum feel seeing that happen to you?
Because she'd almost pushed you into doing this show.
And I know you've got a very, very close relationship with your mum.
But how did that make her feel like seeing you go through that?
Well, it's interesting that you say that because my mum, our relationship, and I'm sure you say the same,
(13:54):
you know, it's not always as close as you'd like it to be.
My mum and dad, it also coincided with my mum and dad leaving the UK and moving back to Africa.
So my support system had completely gone.
So you've got to think I was living in London by myself.
You know, I didn't have many friends in London at the time.
And my mum and dad weren't around.
So I think that impacted in terms of how it made her feel.
(14:18):
Anorexia is a direct link between the relationship that you have with your mother growing up.
So it's all about searching for attention, searching for love, looking for that person to put their eyes on to you
and almost reverting back to your prepubescent self.
Lots of people don't know that, but that is essentially what it is at the beginning.
And my mum wasn't around for that part.
(14:41):
So it was hard.
Wow. It was hard.
And it did not know that that's where it all comes from.
How are you now? You're all good?
Yeah, it took a lot of therapy. It took a lot of therapy and understanding.
But I think the light switch moment for me was when I hadn't had periods for such a long time.
And I know that lots of people listening to this, if you've had an eating disorder, that will be, that's triggering.
(15:01):
But that is that's what happens.
And then your fertility essentially could be damaged long term.
I wanted to have a family.
And so I had this amazing partner at the time, Ryan.
Shout out to Ryan, who was really kind and got around me because it was hard to have relationships as well.
Right. Because you're so concentrated on being as thin as you can and controlling everything.
And he was like, we've got to get a hold of this.
(15:23):
So he got me into OA.
I went to some meetings. I saw a therapist.
I started to understand what was happening to my body.
And then you slowly, slowly come out of it.
But it took three years probably to come out of the fog.
Wow. What a thing to go through.
Yeah.
Prior to being in Playing It Straight, you spent a lot of time and you did mention it just there.
Your parents went back to Kenya.
(15:43):
So is that where they were originally from or where you're from?
Or what's the connection to Kenya?
Well, I just love Africa full stop.
My dad worked in Nigeria for a long time in the 70s and him and my mum just fell in love with Kenya.
And so when we were kids, we were there a lot, you know, not full time.
But kind of three months of the year we were there.
How did that work with schooling then?
Just back and forth like month to Easter, month to Christmas, month, six weeks in the summer type thing.
(16:08):
And it's just the most incredible country.
And the people are amazing and the beaches and the rawness and the smells.
And I just love it all. And of course, the wildlife.
You know, I grew up on Spharia. Essentially, they're my first memories.
So they were there when we were young and then they came back to UK.
And then they went back when I was 21 to live there permanently.
(16:29):
And how did that feel like seeing them both go, right, see you.
We're off, especially when you were going through what you were going through.
Yeah, it was a weird one because I was 21.
So I was an adult, but they were a bit like, this is our time.
Let's go and live it. And I was like, OK, don't forget about me.
But, you know, your parents have to do that.
They needed to do it for their relationship.
So and is it just you and an only child?
(16:49):
No, I've got an older sister, Catherine. So she went as well.
So she ended up being there and being a tour leader across Africa.
And she was there for seven years.
I want to say she just bought a house there. So she's going to be going back
and forth with her partner as well now. Wow.
So what was it then? You know, you say the people are amazing.
But what was it specifically about?
What is it about Africa that you love? My dad was born in South Africa as well.
Oh, my God. So you get it. Yeah.
(17:11):
Well, he's never been back.
So my dad's parents both died when he was four years old and he got adopted
to a family in the UK.
He can't go back there because at four years old,
you know, the things that happened that he went through that
they just couldn't deal with.
And so crazy as a four year old, you think, well, how could you remember?
He just he's never been back.
I've been back there to film A Place in the Sun, actually, many, many years ago.
(17:35):
And I loved it. And I said, I don't know what you're doing.
Why are you not going back? It's so incredible.
But what is it specifically about Africa?
That's interesting.
So if you think that everything here for me, aside from being very
natural at home and, you know, loving the outdoors and spending lots of time
in my gym kit and running, running around in like the forest.
(17:55):
And we go biking and stuff.
But my other side of my life is really quite polished.
And it's all kind of, you know, you have to be on all the time,
performing and lots of interviews and whatever it is.
I sometimes feel that it's it's it's a lot.
Whereas Africa, I can just strip back its nature, its beaches, its animals.
It's no makeup. I don't wear shoes. I barely wear clothes.
(18:18):
I eat from the sea.
You know, we we we feed the monkeys every morning.
You know, we it's it's everything that my life here isn't.
And even though nature is a big part of our life here, it's like
it's like nature on steroids.
And I love nature so much.
And your mum's still there.
Yeah. My dad, when my dad died, I thought she'd come back.
(18:39):
But actually, she met someone else and and he didn't really have
anything keeping him here. So he moved back with her.
So it's like, so your dad, your dad died quite.
Yeah, it was it was all of a sudden, wasn't it?
Yeah. Three years ago.
No, no, no. Eleven years ago. It was 11 years ago.
Yeah. 2013, he died.
She was obviously devastating.
(18:59):
But my mum really took it and just ran with it.
Met someone, fell in love again.
How quickly did your mum meet someone else?
It's actually quite a sad story.
So I'll keep it brief because I don't want people to feel sad.
But she met somebody and he was South African and they lived together in Kenya.
And then 15 months later, he died.
So she lost two people within the space of 18 months.
(19:23):
But my mum is very pragmatic and she loves life and she loves love.
And she doesn't she wants to share her life with somebody.
So four months after her second partner died, she met someone else.
And he's still alive.
The last time we checked.
And she lives with him.
He moved into my parents house.
(19:43):
You were close to your dad.
Yeah. Oh my God.
And so how did he's deaf? How did that affect you like 11 years ago?
It's a big question really.
But essentially it kind of...
Grief is such a strange emotion because people think you need to grieve in a certain way.
(20:07):
And for me, it was so highs and lows as in it was like a roller coming for me,
like a big wave.
You know, I was completely floored at periods and then I felt oh, I'm okay now.
But then a couple of years later,
loads of other stuff came out when I really started to delve into therapy again,
because I felt like I needed it.
You know, I needed to try and process.
It's a shock.
(20:29):
And I don't know, did you talk about death in your family when you were growing up?
We did talk about death because obviously my dad was adopted.
And so his parents both died when he was four.
And that's why he was adopted.
So we did speak about that and knew how that happened.
But I never lost anybody in my life really until I was 13.
(20:50):
And that was my dad's adopted mum.
Right.
And so we did talk about it, but I don't feel like I was as close to her.
I don't know why, even though she was my gran.
Yeah.
It was for an adopted connection.
So just yeah.
And then I think really for me, the people that I've lost closest to me were my mum's mum and dad,
(21:11):
my nan and pops.
Yeah.
My pops died.
He died in COVID.
Not of COVID, but he died in COVID.
And then my nan died two years ago.
And I'm 42 now.
So to get that far and actually they're the two people that have closest to me.
And it's such a strange thing because I understand about life.
(21:31):
I get that there is a beginning, a middle and an end.
You know, I really do get that.
And I had a loss in my when I was in my teenage years, somebody very close to my cousin's husband, who was like a brother.
So I experienced grief at that point.
But I think it's because I was in my happiest place ever.
I was in Ibiza with my mum.
She had just had this incredible experience on stage with Luciano, one of our favorite DJs.
(21:54):
I lost my mum, O'Shwyer, and I was like, where's my mum?
And my mate went, look up there.
And she's on fucking stage with Luciano, like woohoo!
And I was like, how is this happening?
This was just the most incredible moment.
And then she goes to the after party.
She's calling me, I've left your wristbands on.
I was like, how have you left me wristbands?
This is my island, bitch.
(22:15):
So we're having this incredible night.
And then we she's like, we're going to space.
And I was like, you are not coming to space.
And she was like, I am.
Anyway, I sent her home.
I should have taken her with me, but I just thought she was a bit tired.
And that's what we're saying.
And then so we I get back at like seven o'clock in the morning from dancing all night, having the night of my life.
And then I put my mum on a plane.
(22:36):
And when she got picked up from the airport by my dad, he said, I'm not feeling very well.
I've got I've had this headache for a couple of days since she'd been with Zoe and Ibiza.
And as he left the airport, he collapsed and hit his head on the curb.
But essentially he was rushed to hospital.
I get the phone call.
Phone had been ringing in my room and I was sitting out with friends.
I was staying at a friend's house.
So I go back and I had like 10 missed calls from my sister.
(22:58):
And I said, this is weird.
And she was like, Zoe, you need to come back now.
And I said, what's going on?
And she said, well, dad's had a full but they're worried about him.
And I said, is he dead?
And she was like, he's not dead.
He's not dead.
And I was like, OK, fine.
How long have I got?
And she was like, just try and get on the flight.
Anyway, 30 minutes later, phone rings.
He died just like that.
(23:21):
And I think I couldn't get a flight.
I couldn't get off the island.
And it was just I just the shock of what happened just really ripped my my world apart.
You know, it was just I couldn't get my head around it.
How could I have been so happy and so ecstatic and then devastation?
It was tough.
Yeah, really tough.
Really tough.
(23:41):
And how long I mean, they say that grief you never truly, truly get over.
How long did it really take you to sort of get back to OK, I can pull myself together
and I can get out to work and I can be there for my mom.
And because I guess not that long ago, it hit you again, right?
When your close friend, Caroline Flack.
(24:02):
Yeah, yeah, she died.
Yeah, she died.
But, you know, the it's been I think the older I get, the more understanding I have around death.
And I try to speak to my children about it as much as they want to.
Like, for example, Grandpa Peter is all around the house and Luna has a photograph of him next to her bed.
(24:25):
They're very curious as to how he died.
And I'm not shy away from those conversations because I think we all need to be prepared for it.
You know, I'm not going into detail with them, but because they're only little.
But I don't want to be like, oh, don't worry.
You know, no one's going to die.
And it's absolutely fine because people do die.
Yeah.
And so and so, yes, it's devastating when it happens.
(24:46):
But I think because I was so unprepared for it with my dad, I don't want to make that same mistake with them.
So it's about educating them in the right way around it.
Does that make sense?
Absolutely.
I'm a massive advocate for being open and honest and talking to my children about, you know, everything.
Are you?
Yeah.
I mean, one of the questions my nine-year-old daughter asked me just a couple of weeks ago is,
(25:07):
Mommy, what's masturbating?
Oh, wow. Okay.
And I was like, okay, how do I answer this question?
I'm going to tell her what it is.
The next question, so do you do it, Mommy?
I like what you're saying.
I've got me open and on it.
But, you know, like, you can't, I just feel like, you know, to have conversations with your children,
I'd rather talk about death, talk about it is important.
(25:29):
There's a really great book that my friend Dr. Zoe Williams wrote called You Grow Girl.
I don't know if you've got it, but if you've got teenage girls or tween girls listening to this,
then you should definitely get it for them because it covers everything.
I wish I'd had this book when I was eight, nine, ten years old,
because it just covers everything from periods to sex to weed to boys to girls, whatever it is, you know, it's just there.
(25:51):
And I was me and my...
What's it called?
You Grow Girl.
You Grow Girl.
And me and my eldest were chatting about it the other night and Luna doesn't have a copy, she's seven,
but Isla has one, she's 11, so we sent it to her.
And me and Isla were chatting, like under our breath whispering,
and I could just hear Luna going, I know about sex!
And I was like, shut up, you're seven, we're not having this discussion now.
She was like, I'm reading that book when Isla goes back to her mom's because she's my stepdaughter.
(26:13):
And I was like, okay, so we're all reading it now, are we?
But, you know, it's done in such a brilliantly educational way.
And it's better they have the conversation with you than anyone else.
Yeah, that's my thoughts on it.
I just want to very quickly before we move on talking about the children,
because you obviously, you've got a blended family.
We've spoken about that before actually when we've been at events and stuff.
(26:36):
But I would love to talk about Caroline.
Caroline Flack, you were friends.
Where did you meet Caroline?
So I met her on my first ever proper screen test.
We were screen testing for...
Were you asked to do the same job?
Yeah, she got it.
Of course she did. It's Caroline Flack.
Do you remember that show on BBC One called TM?
Was it TM?
It was Mark and Sam and Mark, wasn't it?
(26:57):
Didn't they do it? Three of them?
Yeah.
So we were at John Noll together.
Flacky was there.
I hadn't met her at this point, but obviously I knew who she was.
And I remember doing my screen test, coming out and she...
Us just saying hello to each other in the corridor.
Hearing her laugh first, I think, you know, that Caroline laugh, which was just so famous for.
And then her just...
And I was like, oh, hi, I'm Zoe.
(27:18):
And she was like, hi, I'm Caroline.
And then she flung her arms around and she went, how did you do?
And I said, oh, I don't think I did well.
She goes, don't worry, there'll be others.
Gave me a massive hug.
She walked in cackling as she went in.
And then, yeah, 20 years of friendship.
But I just, I love that moment so much because, and I've spoken about this before,
I think in a world where women are pitted against each other and there's so much competition
(27:40):
and we're supposed to all hate each other because we're in the same industry and we're going for the same jobs.
There was just none of that between us and there never was.
That's what it's about. So that's lovely that you had that friendship early on.
Yeah. And then just for like the next 20 odd years, you know, we were always in each other's lives.
She was so special.
She was so wonderful.
I mean, everybody felt like they knew her.
People that didn't even meet her.
(28:01):
People that watched her on the telly.
She was everyone's best friend, everyone's sister.
She was, she was fab.
This is your captain speaking.
I hope you're enjoying the flight.
If you like what you're hearing, you can catch up with the rest of the series on our YouTube channel.
All major audio streaming platforms or check out some clips on our socials.
And don't forget to like and subscribe if you're enjoying traveling with the MyFly Club.
(28:23):
Now sit back, relax and enjoy your flight.
So look, let's come back to the kids.
You've got three children.
Yeah.
But you're a blended family and I remember asking you, not that long ago actually, when we were at an event,
how does that work?
Yeah.
Because, you know, I want to know, like if I meet somebody, how does the blended situation work?
(28:43):
What's the best way of managing it?
Oh my gosh.
What did I say?
I, you actually told me that it's, it's your Isla is your stepdaughter.
Yeah, my stepdaughter.
Don't want to call her your stepdaughter because she's not, she's your daughter.
So she's got, you know, you're her second mum, let's say that.
Because you've known her since she was three.
No, so she was about 15 months when I met her.
(29:06):
And I think that was what you'd said to me, that it really helped knowing her from being a baby.
Yeah.
It's almost harder when they're older.
I get a lot of questions about this on my Instagram and on the podcast and stuff.
I just don't.
What do people ask you?
How do you make it work?
What's the secret?
How do I do it?
You know, it's such a minefield.
The step-parenting role is the best relationship, essentially, that I've got because it's the most challenging.
(29:33):
Because for me, I have to love a child like I birthed her, but she has a mother who did.
So if you think that that questions your own love and you think, well, I love her.
I love her the same as my own children unconditionally, but there will always be another person that she will go to before me.
(29:54):
Now, that's taken me a long time to get my head around because I just, I felt her unreasonably, like only inside.
But I'll share that with you today.
And that's something that I don't really ever talk about.
But you do you go through these big emotions of, you know, teaching them to potty train, you know, being there, bathing them, feeding them, tucking them up at night, cuddling them when they have nightmares.
(30:16):
You are their parent, but they have another parent.
And so it has been difficult and challenging in part.
But she is the most wonderful girl.
Like what we've all done, the three of us together is quite remarkable.
And I do feel that now there is a beautiful relationship between me, her mom.
When you say what you've all done, do you mean like the relationship you've you formed or what you've done in terms of where you've been and explored and stuff?
(30:43):
No, like the relationship that we formed, you know, me, me, her mom and her dad.
We work as a three really well now and we really do co-parent in the most beautiful way.
And it is all about Isla. And it's not it's not easy.
Some days are really tricky.
And some days I sit in the car and go, I think, oh, like what we're doing, am I doing it right?
(31:03):
I question it all the time because I think with my biological children, if I tell them off, I'm like, oh, they're just being little shits and I can tell them off.
But if I tell Isla off, there is an element of me thinking, will she love me less now?
Because I've told her off because she's it's really weird.
I can't hopefully I'm articulating it right.
Yeah, I mean, if I'm not in that situation, but I always think, oh, what happens in the future?
(31:26):
If I end up in that situation where you end up having a blended family, but who knows what will happen?
We know my number. You can call me.
I will do. But you let's go back to Ibiza.
Yeah, Ibiza recently as a family, all five of you.
Yeah. So I've been six times this year and we're recording this in September.
(31:46):
Why have you not bought a balloon property there?
We're trying. We're trying. That's what we're trying to do.
We've got a little property.
You haven't called me. I could have given you some advice.
Well, we haven't done it yet. We're saving because, you know, it's bloody expensive.
Ibiza is quite cheap, isn't it?
So what was it about Ibiza then that, you know, I've done two seasons there.
Do you know this? No. Oh my God.
(32:07):
Some of the funniest, most wildest moments of my life went basically, I went there on holiday
with my Ibiza friend, Claire, who just she she ended up coming to our school.
Claire and Tom twins.
Then when Claire arrived, we were like, oh my gosh, so cool smokes.
She lives in Ibiza. She got a moped.
She's like, she's really cool. And so we became really great mates.
And they were like, let's go come and stay with us in Ibiza.
(32:28):
So there was five of us that went out there, got let the apartment in San Antonio.
That was when I was 15 or 16.
And then when I was 17, I went back there for a two week holiday, just for two weeks.
Year 11. So I hadn't even done my A levels yet.
No, not year 11. Sorry. 12. Year 12.
So A level. Level six.
And so I was only supposed to be going for two weeks.
(32:48):
I remember phoning my dad. My dad was like, I'm so excited to pick you up from the airport tomorrow.
And I was like, yeah, no, about that.
I'm actually not coming back.
And he was like, yes, you are. And I was like, no, I'm not.
I've got a job. I'm working in a bar.
I'm just going to stay for the rest of summer.
And he was like, well, can I say no?
And I was like, well, I'm 17. So you probably could.
But please don't, because I'm really happy. I've got a little apartment.
Everything's great. And he was like, OK.
(33:10):
So they just left. They there I was at 17. Did my first season.
That was hysterical. I worked.
What happened? Just like too much stuff.
PRing for various clubs.
Manumission was open. Obviously, DC 10 was an illegal rave then.
I like spent half my summer spray painted blue wearing a rubber wig with my top with my boobies out in blue.
(33:33):
I can't believe you haven't joined the Mile High Club.
You were in Ibiza, spray blue with your boobies out.
Running around promoting various different nights.
I mean, it was wild. Wow.
It was really. And then I went back the following year to do.
I bet you did. Of course I did.
From a blue spray paint. And then you've been going back ever since.
And your mum loves it too. Mum loves it too.
(33:55):
And this may sound like the wankish thing that anyone's ever going to say on your podcast,
but that feeling of being on the dance floor is freedom for me.
Doesn't matter how busy it is. If the tunes are great and my mates are around me,
I'm just like this. That is that is my happy place.
Are there any other destinations in the world that you've traveled to that even come close to Ibiza?
(34:15):
There is nowhere else in the world.
Where else do you go on holiday?
You've cycled Cambodia, Vietnam. Yeah, she's done her research.
Nothing comes close to Ibiza.
I really love Thailand. I loved Thailand.
And I loved the full moon party at Copenhagen, but too much sand.
(34:37):
So you're looking to buy in Ibiza. Do you think you'll relocate there ever?
Yeah, you would. That's what we want to do.
Do you? Yeah, we really want to do that. But that's the 10 year plan.
So you're married to Paul? Does lad. Yeah, does er.
Does er? Does er, yeah. Rugby player?
Ex rugby player, but he's still got the short shorts.
(34:58):
He loves Ibiza too? He loves it. I would not have married him.
Genuinely, if he said he didn't like Ibiza, that would have been a deal breaker for me.
So had he been much before he met you or did you? No.
You got him into it. Have you ever painted him blue and make him get it fully out?
We do it every Friday night. Do you?
I've still got the rubber wig. I swear I can't believe you haven't joined the Marhive.
(35:20):
Oh, you stop saying it. I don't believe. I don't have sex on a plane.
I do not believe it. I do not believe it. I've not.
You've never had a proper honeymoon? No, I have not.
Why not? Fucking good question.
Get him to take you on a honeymoon. Do you know what happened?
Do you know what happened at our wedding? No, tell me.
Oh God, I've never told this story. Oh, good. I love an exclusive.
Obviously, we got married in Ibiza and our friend's villa,
(35:44):
they had turned the Hamman spa into the space closing party.
And so it's like a cave, rave in a cave, essentially.
And it's like our kids are there.
So I'd had Luna at this point, obviously, Isla was there as well.
But our lovely babysitter had taken them back to the villa with grandma and a few other people.
(36:07):
Anyway, seven o'clock in the morning and the party still going in full swing.
And the phone rings and I was like, Oh God, I'd like tucked it down,
down the side of my wedding dress like that, just for emergencies.
I was like, don't call me unless it's emergency. Yeah.
Anyway, phone rings, phone rings. I don't pick it up. I'm like trying to ignore it.
I was like, yes, amazing. What a great night.
And then I was like, hello. And the babysitter is like, you have to come back.
(36:28):
And I was like, Oh God, what's happened? Are the kids OK?
I was like, what's wrong with me? Are the kids OK?
The kids are fine. But it's really sad. This is a sad bit.
So you can do sad face. But one of her relatives had had, he was in, he'd been rushed to hospital.
So she was like, my mum's booked me a flight. I've got to go.
So I was like, are you joking? And I was like, she was like, I'm like, obviously,
(36:49):
I said, I'm really sorry for you first. But then I said, yeah, you're really bad, right?
You're in a cave. But I said, do you have to do you have to go?
And she said, yeah, I've got to go to the airport now.
And I was like, Oh my God. I looked at Dozer and I was like,
this is the worst news that you're ever going to have.
We have to go back and look after our children.
I've done like 500 tequila shots at this point. I could barely walk.
(37:09):
I was it was so fun that that moment and then it went for the worst moment.
So we went back to the villa. Nobody would help us.
No friends, no family, nobody. Nobody helped us.
So I spent I didn't even get to sleep in my marital bed, by the way.
No shag. I was a sexy didn't even have sex on your wedding night.
No, my friend slept in it and he puked everywhere.
Oh, you deaf. Oh, man.
(37:30):
So then I got to my beach party where I was supposed to like waft in
in some gorgeous like linen gown, smelling of hemp.
And I just collapsed on the sun lounger and went like this.
I hadn't even had a shower because I'd been up the whole day
looking after our children.
Damn children.
So it went from the best day of my life to one of the worst.
Wow. So no honeymoon for us.
And that's no one's that you've never told that story to anyone.
(37:52):
Why not?
I thought people might judge me.
There's no judging here.
Literally, you say what you like, we don't judge.
Okay. So now then, do you not think it's important for you as a couple
to get away as a couple without the kids?
Yeah. So we've got this trip to Mauritius.
Have you been to Mauritius? Yeah, I have.
To Beachcomber. Yeah.
Yeah. I love it. We won it in a raffle.
(38:14):
Did you? I say won it, does a bought it.
But is that something?
Well, that doesn't really count as winning it in a raffle.
Peter Jones's Golf Day. Right.
Does a bid.
Trying to be a bit billy big balls, but thank God.
And then we've got it.
And so but that's for five nights.
And I've never done five nights away from my kids.
Have you not? No.
(38:36):
I think I think I think I just don't know if I can do it.
I think doing a trip away.
You know what? You're not sure if you're going to do it or not.
I just think we should bring them, but then it won't be a honeymoon.
I want them there. I love them.
They're so fun.
Listen, I think it's amazing to travel with the kids.
I've traveled with my two since they were three weeks old.
They've traveled around the world.
And but I also have time, especially now, as I co-parent my children
(38:56):
with their dad, that they're with their dad for a week
and they're with me for a week.
And it's brilliant because I get to meet them.
Oh my God, is it amazing?
And actually, how do you reconnect when there's a couple with the children?
Always there if you never have.
You've heard of a kitchen rave, right?
No, I haven't heard of a kitchen rave.
Come on, tell me about it.
Every Friday night, Dusla and I get the kids to bed.
(39:19):
Yeah.
And then we just stay up.
Just the two of you or do you invite other couples?
No, it's not swinging parts.
It's not a pineapple outside the front door.
Well, I won't put it past you though.
I don't know what you get up to.
We just stay up till like one or two and we just dance and drink and chat
and do other stuff.
It's just not like as in we just connect basically.
(39:41):
And we just, yeah, we just love it.
That's brilliant.
And it's not every Friday because it gets a bit negative, it was.
But twice a month, we'll have our little kitchen rave, play music.
Your mates.
You love it.
You love your kitchen rave.
We just love it, but we don't.
But what you're right is we don't.
When we do go away together, we'll go to Ibiza for three days and go dancing.
And that's probably not that restorative either.
(40:02):
So we absolutely do need to do it.
He would be totally fine with us going away for five, seven nights without the kids.
It's me.
I find it hard to let go of them for that long.
I find it really hard.
I think you'll love me, but you might not love it.
You might find it interesting to talk to you after you've.
But then I tucked my tuner up in bed last night and she was like, oh, can we read the worry book?
And I was like, oh, what? You don't have any. What?
(40:24):
You got worries? What's going on?
And she went, it's only the thought of you leaving me.
And then she stared right at me and I was like, she's got that instinct.
Digging the knife in.
Do they know that you're going away?
No, no, because we might add them on to the holiday.
Are you telling me not to?
I just I just think go try it and see.
I mean, you might you might not like it and then you have to do it again.
(40:46):
Or you might think, well, this is brilliant.
You might have a little Mauritian way rave.
A Mauritian kitchen rave. Yeah, a Mauritian kitchen rave.
You said before that marriage isn't easy and it's something you have to to work at.
Yeah.
What what? I know you're renovating your house at the moment with your husband.
But what issues have you had that you've really had to like work out and dig deep and think, no, we want to stay together.
(41:12):
Some some of us don't.
Yeah. Oh, God, no. But that might be the easiest thing.
Doing what you do.
No, I'm joking now because we'll get through your renovation and then we'll see if you make out the other side.
We have worked.
We've worked really hard at our relationship, but it has been incredibly challenging.
And I think any couple that say their marriage is easy breezy is lying out their asses.
(41:37):
You know, I'm not the easiest person.
I'm quite defensive.
I'm very passionate.
I'm very emotional and he gets he's you know, he can get a bit angry sometimes and he retired from rugby.
And so he lost his sense of identity.
And so it was a perfect storm.
Me losing my identity, having the children, him retiring from rugby, you know, financial situation, stepdaughter stuff like it was like.
(42:04):
But we really, really, really love each other.
And we just jumped headfirst into therapy.
Anybody who is at crisis point, you need to go and see a therapist.
Our one saved our marriage.
No questions asked.
And the things that he taught us, we were in therapy for two years.
In fact, we only came out of therapy last year.
And I really recommend I always give his details out to anybody that needs it because he's just a special, special human.
(42:28):
But even little things down to me getting something in my head, marching over straight to dozer and being like that and him going, this is not a good moment.
And then I'd be like, why you don't prioritize me?
And suddenly there's a big row.
Whereas now, if I want to talk to you about something, I say, is this a good moment?
And he says either not right now, but I hold it.
Give me five minutes and I'll come back to you.
(42:50):
Or he'll say, yes, let's find a space for it.
Amazing. Yeah, I didn't even know that was a thing.
I was just marching over on my terms, wanting everything to happen at that moment.
And, you know, now we just do our Sunday check ins.
They're fun. Right.
What's the Sunday check in?
So Sunday check in is get a good before or after the kitchen.
Oh, no, that's the Friday kitchen rave.
This finishes the weekend off nicely where we jump into bed.
(43:15):
Obviously, get ready for bed, brush teeth, shower, get into bed, jump in.
And then we do the check in.
The check in is thing you have to tell the person that you're with why you appreciate them.
So what have they done during the week?
It's not like, you know, thanks for picking up the bananas and the milk from the shop.
It's more like, you know, when you heard me when I was trying to explain about my vulnerabilities around my boobs.
(43:36):
Or when you when you told me that you were feeling like you look knackered and you heard it and you didn't say you didn't rubbish it.
I really appreciated you.
And then we just check in, check in, talk for five minutes.
We have to share.
It normally leads to sex.
Which is always great.
OK, that's the next question that I want to lead to.
I'm taking all these tips on board.
I'm loving this because normally when I get into bed after my jam packed day of bang, bang, bang, doing this stuff, my head hits the pin.
(44:02):
I'm like, I'm out.
You got someone there next to you, though.
She doesn't like a question.
But I don't know, does she?
Who is it?
I'm not revealing those secrets.
You talk about going through the menopause.
Yeah.
How sexy is that?
No, but so like I'm intrigued by that because they say that, you know, you go through menopause and then you lose interest in sex.
(44:27):
Clearly you haven't.
Well, you do for a while.
You definitely do for a while.
But you get it back again.
Yeah, libido.
But I don't think you have to even go through the menopause to have a drop in libido.
I mean, people's libido.
You just got to put your head on the pillow and just be asleep.
Yeah, exactly.
I think it's I think that's a misconception of menopausal women is that they obviously lose it and never it never returns.
(44:51):
So, you know, remember when our mothers went through the menopause and we would just see, you know, Vera in the corner with her floral blouse sweating profusely with a high waisted skirt saying, oh, I just feel awful.
I've got to sit down.
It annoys me when I hear that because I think, yes, it is really tough.
But you can feel amazing again.
And it's like my body is a machine.
(45:14):
Like it needs to be oiled.
I needed to have estrogen.
The drop in estrogen was really bad for my moods, and I felt like absolute dog shit for a long time.
You know, with the brain fog and the night sweats and stuff.
And yes, my sex drive did disappear.
But Dozer was amazing at holding that.
And he understood that it will happen.
And if it happens now, I just say to him, look, I've got to be honest with you.
I've had a plummet in it.
Just bear with me.
(45:35):
It will settle out.
But people don't want to discuss sex.
Isn't it weird?
Like you're living with your partner, raising children, but you can't say to them, I'm not afraid tonight.
Or how can we make some time for it?
Or maybe I don't want to have penitentiary sex, but I want you to rub my feet or give me a back massage or run a bath for me.
All these really intimate things that we forget to do in a marriage.
(45:56):
I love it.
Penitentiary sex.
Penitentiary sex.
I'm going to drop that there again.
If you like that word.
Look, there's so much more.
I feel like, Zoe, honestly, I could chat to you.
Chat to you. Chat to you.
It's brilliant.
But I know you've got to go.
She's got to, you know, chug all the kids.
School run.
Got it.
But you are on heart.
I love listening to you on heart.
You do heart breakfast sometimes.
I do.
You're a working mum.
(46:17):
Like you're literally juggling it all.
You're such a fun time, amazing energy, positive person.
Thank you.
You've got your tattoo, your palm tree tattoo.
Is that related to travel?
Yeah.
Just tell me quickly where.
Before we wrap up, where that comes from, because I want to know.
It's the Kenyan in the Ibiza and Palms.
That's when I look out of my room in Kenya, that's what I see.
Palm trees everywhere.
(46:38):
And obviously Ibiza is just palm trees, palm trees, palm trees.
But if you turn it that way, it looks like a bog brush.
Luna goes, why have you got it tattooed on that way?
And I'm like, because you could see it like that.
She goes, you know, you can't.
You're looking at a lube brush the whole time.
And I was like, great.
She's like, when does it come off?
It doesn't.
(46:59):
It doesn't, babe.
No, it's my Ibiza palm.
And I love it.
So where are you off to next?
Oh my God.
Ibiza.
Guess what?
We're going to Ibiza for closing parties.
Where are we going to next?
We're going to go skiing.
We'll go to Kenya at Christmas.
And then we're going skiing in February half-term.
We're going to go back to Morzine.
We love skiing as a family.
Yeah, it's great.
I just can't wait.
(47:20):
But there will be a sneaky two nights to go and close the dance floor for another year.
Oh, Zoe.
See you there.
I've only ever been to Ibiza once.
Book your flights.
I'm sending them to you.
Oh, I can't wait.
I'm drawing you on your next trip there.
Don't you have any ideas about this mile high club going to Ibiza?
The flight is way too short.
You don't need that long, do you?
(47:41):
So do you win?
So thank you so much.
It's been incredible to chat to you.
So lovely to chat to you.
You have been brilliant.
You are officially a member of the Mile Fly Club.
Yay!
Yay!
And thanks to all the listeners out there.
We love having you all as members of the Mile Fly Club.
Stay tuned for more fantastic episodes coming soon.
Ten hot guys. I know some of them were gay.
(00:02):
Originally rising to fame, playing it straight on reality TV.
I thought you were kissing me as a straight man.
When I said, I've chosen you, he went, I'm gay, darling.
And I was like, what?
Hard work had to make it to the top.
She's carved out a career as a broadcaster, hosting an array of television and radio shows.
She's also a mother and a fellow podcaster.
(00:26):
I spent half my summer spray-painted blue, wearing a rubber wig, with my boobies out.
Penetrative sex.
Penetrative sex.
I'm going to drop that there again.
And this may sound like the wankiest thing anyone's ever said on your podcast, but...
I was in Ibiza and I was like, where's my mum?
And my mate went, look up there, and she's on f***ing stage, like, woohoo!
And I was like, how is this happening?
(00:46):
I didn't even get to sleep in my marital bed.
You didn't even have sex on your wedding night?
No! My friend slept in it and he puked everywhere.
You never had a proper honeymoon?
No, I have not.
Why not? F***ing question!
Do you know what happened at our wedding?
No, tell me.
Oh God, I've never told this story.
I was 22 years old right at the time.
And it was just like, oh God, I can't believe they chose her.
She's fat.
(01:06):
What would they see in her anyway?
And it was just trolling after trolling after trolling.
I had like 10 missed calls from my sister and I was like, this is weird.
And she was like, Zoe, you need to come back now.
How long have I got?
And she was like, just try and get on the flight.
30 minutes later, phone rings.
He died.
I couldn't get my head around it.
How could I have been so happy and so ecstatic?
And then, devastation.
(01:28):
Welcome to the Mile Fly Club, your VIP lane to first class travel tips,
tell old tales and turbulent life tales.
Think the Mile High Club only with more clothes, but no less revealing.
Each week, I'll be inviting high flying, globe trotting guests to bear all in my club.
So if you're searching for some tantalizing travel tidbits and a good old gossip,
(01:50):
you've arrived at the right destination.
Now sit back, relax and get ready to join me in the Mile Fly Club.
Ladies and gentlemen, we've now reached our cruising altitude.
I'll go ahead and turn off the seatbelt sign.
So sit back, relax and enjoy the flight.
Have you ever wondered why some reality show contestants managed to carve out a career in TV where others fail?
(02:15):
Well, my next guest's broadcast career has gone from strength to strength.
After appearing on Playing It Straight back in 2005, she's forged a 20 year career in the business
and shows no signs of slowing down.
Joining the Mile Fly Club this week is Zoe Hardman.
Oh, I love it. And I love the purple. Isn't that the colour of sexual frustration?
(02:37):
Well, yeah, it is.
Well, sexually frustrated, seeming you're not a member of the Mile High Club.
That's what I really want to know.
I'm not. I'm most disappointed.
No one says yes.
Oh, they do.
Some of our guests have said yes.
Prove it.
That's what I will say to people when they're like, oh, yeah, no, we shagged on a plane.
(02:58):
I'm like, what in those disgusting loos?
Why does it have to be in the toilet?
Where would it be?
Well, I think you need to listen to some other episode of the podcast, Zoe,
and then you will find out who is a member of the Mile High Club.
I just... There are people out there.
Well, no one does it in the seats, though, right?
So no.
I suppose if you were in first class, there would be like areas.
(03:19):
There would be better areas.
What about the crew areas?
Ever thought about that?
I haven't, but I will now spend a lot of time putting some shape on that and come back to you.
Do some research.
Zoe, it is really amazing to have you here.
So thank you so much.
Now, not many people will realise that you started in the industry over 20 years ago.
I know.
It's amazing.
(03:40):
Which is amazing because the way I look, isn't it? It's incredible.
You always look so trendy and I want to be you.
And I see your post on fashion.
I'm like, oh, wow, she looks hot.
She looks good. Thank you.
So you were the love interest in playing it straight in Mexico.
It's so funny.
Well, it was amazing because back then that really was when reality TV was just breaking,
(04:02):
like the time of Big Brother, Jade Goody, and you were part of that.
And you went into that.
So tell me about that experience.
It was so funny.
It's still my favourite job that I've ever done in my life.
You can imagine being 21 years old and I just got back from a big trip around the world.
So I've been away for 10 months by myself.
I went backpacking.
I ended up in Mexico weirdly and I just got home and my mum was just, you know,
(04:26):
when you get back home, I didn't go to university.
So I'd like brought all my bags back, you know, stinking rucksack hadn't washed for a while.
Like had some sort of weird braid in my hair.
I was like, you know, I'm just traveling man.
My mum was like, what the fuck are you going to do with your life?
I was like, there's a plan.
I just haven't formulated it yet.
And she said, well, look, I went onto the channel for website today and they're looking for a girl to be part of a dating show.
(04:47):
And I said, absolutely not.
I don't want to do anything like that.
I'm not, you know, reality TV.
No, thanks.
And she was like, look, for goodness sakes, just go to these auditions.
Anyway, so I rung them up and lion productions.
They were making it and I spoke to someone at line and they said, look, actually, you're a bit late because we chose the girl.
I haven't told her yet, but we've chosen the girl and we were going to tell her tomorrow.
(05:08):
And I could sense something in his voice.
They weren't necessarily that happy, you know, and just get a vibe.
And I said, look, I'm coming to London tomorrow.
I'm just going to sit in the reception.
You're a ballsy as that.
I'm coming. I love that.
That's so cool.
So I sat there and I said, I'll be there for an hour.
Anyway, I sat and sat and sat and about 50 minutes.
I thought they're not coming.
Although this is actually the building.
(05:30):
Yeah, but I just sat there.
I said I had a meeting.
Anyway, I sat down.
This was like 20 or 20 years ago.
And then like 52 minutes, someone came down and said, well done for wasting nearly an hour.
Actually, we're not that happy with the girl that we've picked.
Would you come up and do a screen test?
And I was like, yes.
So went upstairs, did the screen test.
They said, thanks very much.
We'll give you a call.
(05:50):
I stepped out the building.
The phone rang.
They said you need to go down to Channel 4 now.
They want to meet you.
So I went down.
They said we call you tomorrow.
I was on the treadmill in my local gym at the leisure center thinking I've really fucked that up.
And then the phone rang and that was it.
And I was off back to Mexico again for six weeks.
And I was in the gym and playing it straight and it was just the most bonkers, brilliant, amazing experience of my life.
(06:12):
It was so 21 years old, 10 hot guys.
I know some of them were gay, but you know, they were all just a dreamy to look at.
And the premise of the series because it was kind of like met with a little bit of Christism.
Not at the time.
Was it not at the time?
Not at the time.
I mean, it was so tongue in cheek.
It was the most beautiful.
(06:33):
I mean, you couldn't make the show now.
And I understand that.
You know, times have changed.
People have grown up, you know, a hundred percent.
I look back on it and there were parts of it where I cringed, but it was so hard.
Did you cringe?
Oh, me and June looking around some of the boys rooms and being like, oh, he's got a pink shirt.
He must be gay. It's like what an awful thing to say.
But it was all done tongue in cheek at the time.
(06:54):
And and there was no offense meant by it at all.
And actually it wasn't, you know, hunt the gay guy.
It was like, you know, you shouldn't judge people, you know, by the way that they look away that they act.
That actually, you know, it's their heart that counts.
And that was the heart.
It was it was about love and friendship and adventure.
And it was fun.
I just loved every second of it.
And the guy that you ended up picking.
(07:16):
My friend Ben, who I was convinced was straight because, you know, guess what?
I was 21 and hadn't really met a gay person before.
He was a builder from Essex.
And when I said, it's you, Ben, I've chosen you.
He went, I'm gay, darling.
And I was like, what?
I couldn't believe it.
I remember.
I remember watching it.
(07:36):
And didn't he feel terrible as well?
Because it was like a cash prize up for grabs and he got to keep the money.
But I feel like I remember him saying, I can't do this.
I need to give you half or something.
He gave me all the cash.
And then I said, have half back.
Right.
But we weren't romantically involved.
We'd formed a really tight friendship.
And you still really trusted him.
(07:58):
I haven't spoken to him for a while, but he sometimes we sometimes reach out to each other on social media, but essentially, no.
Oh, that feels like a shame there.
After going through that experience.
I know.
So you're not not in touch.
No.
Have you been back to Mexico since?
I haven't.
Why not?
I don't know.
I don't know.
Some friends are going this year and I would love to go.
(08:19):
I'd love to take the kids because I had the best time there.
And but then there's so many more places that I want to explore.
Like when you were there filming that show, did you actually get to see like much of Mexico itself?
Or were you really?
Because so many people ask that question.
When you're away filming, do you actually get to see a destination?
It's like, yeah, we do, because we're traveling around.
But did you get to see much of Mexico?
No, but remember, I'd only just got back from six weeks there.
(08:41):
Yeah, you knew it well already.
Well, Guadalajara was amazing.
Puerto Escondido.
I basically went from Tijuana at the border and then just traveled all the way to Acapulco, Puerto Escondido and then went into Mexico City.
And then we went out to Cancun and Isla Mujeres.
And like I just I love how you remember all these towns and these names.
Look at me, I'm still living on to my 20 year old youth.
(09:03):
That's amazing.
So your life changed in a big, big way.
Did you ever expect that to happen after your mum finding that little advert on the Channel 4 website?
And what took her there in the first place?
Because she was always trying to find me because I wanted to be a presenter since I was seven years old.
Right. That was that was no there was no coincidence that I did a show like that because I had tried kind of a couple of years previous.
(09:27):
I'd got my show real together.
I was you know, I really, really loved the industry and I love chatting to people and interviewing people is like something that sets me on fire.
So I'd worked on the reception of a TV production company, which was FlexTech, which it was like, yeah, bravo.
Tems, talk back, Tems or something that ended up becoming FlexTech.
I don't know. I don't know what it is now, but it was like the Bravo days and I was next to Radio 1.
(09:51):
Actually, there's another story behind that too.
In a minute. And I've worked on the reception and every person that came in, I was like, hi.
I want to be a presenter and they were like, just come for our 10 o'clock meeting.
And I was like, all right, OK, but when you finished, if you're really important, can you try and get me on the telly?
But you have to ask.
You don't ask, you don't get and look where it got you.
(10:12):
So it was just it was just wonderful coming out of it because everybody watched it.
What happened after immediately after coming?
Well, yes, there was a bit of a wait, you know what it's like while they're turning around the edit and then it TX in the April.
And then I joined Davina's agent because Davina McCall is the reason that I'm a presenter.
I grew up watching her on Street Mate. I just loved her as a person.
(10:32):
And I actually only just had my Davina moment about three months ago at heart.
So I've been in the industry for 20 years and she co-hosted Jamie and she was in the office and she came sprinting down and was like,
so and I was like, she fucking knows my name.
She's lovely. Isn't she amazing?
Yeah. Well, I did the jump with Davina.
And I just had Rocco, my son, who's 11 in a couple of months time, and he'd been born by a caesarian section.
(11:00):
So everyone thought I was nuts because I was going on this ski jumping show and I was a reserve.
I was actually a reserve on the show initially.
And I ended up replacing Tara Palmer Tomkinson, the late Tara Palmer Tomkinson.
But I've got a photo of Davina and Rocco in a car seat on a flight when Rocco was three weeks old,
traveling to Austria to do the jump.
(11:22):
It's crazy, but she's such a lovely, lovely lady.
I can't believe you did that.
Although knowing you actually, I can't believe it.
You're like that. Yeah.
Yeah. Anything scary?
I mean, bit crazy, but no, Davina's lovely.
But so you did, you obviously did the show and then positive positives came out of it, but some negatives.
Yeah. Tell me.
Is it, am I right in saying that off the back of that show, you ended up getting an eating disorder?
(11:47):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
So what triggered that, do you think?
So you've got to think this was like 2006 and it was before the days of social media.
So they had all these horrible forums, which I'm sure they still have now,
and where people basically go there to just troll you.
And I just remember getting increasingly more anxious about waiting for the show to come out and not really realizing,
(12:11):
you know, there was part of me that was, well, I was concerned.
I've always been quite aware of what people think of me because I want to be friends with people.
And I, you know, if anyone thought that I had been, you know, rude or like I just wanted to come out.
Okay. And that meant a lot to me.
And so I was waiting and waiting, waiting.
And then when the show aired, you know, we got good figures.
(12:31):
But then I started sort of diving into these forums.
I was so young. I was 22 years old right at the time.
And it was just like, oh God, I can't believe they chose her.
She's fat. You know, she's so ugly.
What would they see in her anyway? And it was just inside trolling after trolling after trolling.
And I kept looking at them and I wasn't talking to anyone about it.
And the pressure just got way too much.
(12:51):
And literally within, I'd say three months, I was in quite a bad state.
I had just essentially stopped eating.
I was really over training like twice a day.
I became quite alone and isolated, which was weird because it was this big moment in my life that I thought would be really happy.
And it was the flip side of that. It was quite dark.
(13:12):
You felt dead for such a long time.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah. Just numb, I think is the word.
But eating disorders can do that to you.
You know, you can go from being absolutely fine to feeling like you will never get out of it.
You know, it takes quite an evil grasp of you and it can happen really fast.
And actually, 22 is quite late for a woman to get an eating disorder.
(13:34):
But it was really bad.
How did your mum feel seeing that happen to you?
Because she'd almost pushed you into doing this show.
And I know you've got a very, very close relationship with your mum.
But how did that make her feel like seeing you go through that?
Well, it's interesting that you say that because my mum, our relationship, and I'm sure you say the same,
(13:54):
you know, it's not always as close as you'd like it to be.
My mum and dad, it also coincided with my mum and dad leaving the UK and moving back to Africa.
So my support system had completely gone.
So you've got to think I was living in London by myself.
You know, I didn't have many friends in London at the time.
And my mum and dad weren't around.
So I think that impacted in terms of how it made her feel.
(14:18):
Anorexia is a direct link between the relationship that you have with your mother growing up.
So it's all about searching for attention, searching for love, looking for that person to put their eyes on to you
and almost reverting back to your prepubescent self.
Lots of people don't know that, but that is essentially what it is at the beginning.
And my mum wasn't around for that part.
(14:41):
So it was hard.
Wow. It was hard.
And it did not know that that's where it all comes from.
How are you now? You're all good?
Yeah, it took a lot of therapy. It took a lot of therapy and understanding.
But I think the light switch moment for me was when I hadn't had periods for such a long time.
And I know that lots of people listening to this, if you've had an eating disorder, that will be, that's triggering.
(15:01):
But that is that's what happens.
And then your fertility essentially could be damaged long term.
I wanted to have a family.
And so I had this amazing partner at the time, Ryan.
Shout out to Ryan, who was really kind and got around me because it was hard to have relationships as well.
Right. Because you're so concentrated on being as thin as you can and controlling everything.
And he was like, we've got to get a hold of this.
(15:23):
So he got me into OA.
I went to some meetings. I saw a therapist.
I started to understand what was happening to my body.
And then you slowly, slowly come out of it.
But it took three years probably to come out of the fog.
Wow. What a thing to go through.
Yeah.
Prior to being in Playing It Straight, you spent a lot of time and you did mention it just there.
Your parents went back to Kenya.
(15:43):
So is that where they were originally from or where you're from?
Or what's the connection to Kenya?
Well, I just love Africa full stop.
My dad worked in Nigeria for a long time in the 70s and him and my mum just fell in love with Kenya.
And so when we were kids, we were there a lot, you know, not full time.
But kind of three months of the year we were there.
How did that work with schooling then?
Just back and forth like month to Easter, month to Christmas, month, six weeks in the summer type thing.
(16:08):
And it's just the most incredible country.
And the people are amazing and the beaches and the rawness and the smells.
And I just love it all. And of course, the wildlife.
You know, I grew up on Spharia. Essentially, they're my first memories.
So they were there when we were young and then they came back to UK.
And then they went back when I was 21 to live there permanently.
(16:29):
And how did that feel like seeing them both go, right, see you.
We're off, especially when you were going through what you were going through.
Yeah, it was a weird one because I was 21.
So I was an adult, but they were a bit like, this is our time.
Let's go and live it. And I was like, OK, don't forget about me.
But, you know, your parents have to do that.
They needed to do it for their relationship.
So and is it just you and an only child?
(16:49):
No, I've got an older sister, Catherine. So she went as well.
So she ended up being there and being a tour leader across Africa.
And she was there for seven years.
I want to say she just bought a house there. So she's going to be going back
and forth with her partner as well now. Wow.
So what was it then? You know, you say the people are amazing.
But what was it specifically about?
What is it about Africa that you love? My dad was born in South Africa as well.
Oh, my God. So you get it. Yeah.
(17:11):
Well, he's never been back.
So my dad's parents both died when he was four years old and he got adopted
to a family in the UK.
He can't go back there because at four years old,
you know, the things that happened that he went through that
they just couldn't deal with.
And so crazy as a four year old, you think, well, how could you remember?
He just he's never been back.
I've been back there to film A Place in the Sun, actually, many, many years ago.
(17:35):
And I loved it. And I said, I don't know what you're doing.
Why are you not going back? It's so incredible.
But what is it specifically about Africa?
That's interesting.
So if you think that everything here for me, aside from being very
natural at home and, you know, loving the outdoors and spending lots of time
in my gym kit and running, running around in like the forest.
(17:55):
And we go biking and stuff.
But my other side of my life is really quite polished.
And it's all kind of, you know, you have to be on all the time,
performing and lots of interviews and whatever it is.
I sometimes feel that it's it's it's a lot.
Whereas Africa, I can just strip back its nature, its beaches, its animals.
It's no makeup. I don't wear shoes. I barely wear clothes.
(18:18):
I eat from the sea.
You know, we we we feed the monkeys every morning.
You know, we it's it's everything that my life here isn't.
And even though nature is a big part of our life here, it's like
it's like nature on steroids.
And I love nature so much.
And your mum's still there.
Yeah. My dad, when my dad died, I thought she'd come back.
(18:39):
But actually, she met someone else and and he didn't really have
anything keeping him here. So he moved back with her.
So it's like, so your dad, your dad died quite.
Yeah, it was it was all of a sudden, wasn't it?
Yeah. Three years ago.
No, no, no. Eleven years ago. It was 11 years ago.
Yeah. 2013, he died.
She was obviously devastating.
(18:59):
But my mum really took it and just ran with it.
Met someone, fell in love again.
How quickly did your mum meet someone else?
It's actually quite a sad story.
So I'll keep it brief because I don't want people to feel sad.
But she met somebody and he was South African and they lived together in Kenya.
And then 15 months later, he died.
So she lost two people within the space of 18 months.
(19:23):
But my mum is very pragmatic and she loves life and she loves love.
And she doesn't she wants to share her life with somebody.
So four months after her second partner died, she met someone else.
And he's still alive.
The last time we checked.
And she lives with him.
He moved into my parents house.
(19:43):
You were close to your dad.
Yeah. Oh my God.
And so how did he's deaf? How did that affect you like 11 years ago?
It's a big question really.
But essentially it kind of...
Grief is such a strange emotion because people think you need to grieve in a certain way.
(20:07):
And for me, it was so highs and lows as in it was like a roller coming for me,
like a big wave.
You know, I was completely floored at periods and then I felt oh, I'm okay now.
But then a couple of years later,
loads of other stuff came out when I really started to delve into therapy again,
because I felt like I needed it.
You know, I needed to try and process.
It's a shock.
(20:29):
And I don't know, did you talk about death in your family when you were growing up?
We did talk about death because obviously my dad was adopted.
And so his parents both died when he was four.
And that's why he was adopted.
So we did speak about that and knew how that happened.
But I never lost anybody in my life really until I was 13.
(20:50):
And that was my dad's adopted mum.
Right.
And so we did talk about it, but I don't feel like I was as close to her.
I don't know why, even though she was my gran.
Yeah.
It was for an adopted connection.
So just yeah.
And then I think really for me, the people that I've lost closest to me were my mum's mum and dad,
(21:11):
my nan and pops.
Yeah.
My pops died.
He died in COVID.
Not of COVID, but he died in COVID.
And then my nan died two years ago.
And I'm 42 now.
So to get that far and actually they're the two people that have closest to me.
And it's such a strange thing because I understand about life.
(21:31):
I get that there is a beginning, a middle and an end.
You know, I really do get that.
And I had a loss in my when I was in my teenage years, somebody very close to my cousin's husband, who was like a brother.
So I experienced grief at that point.
But I think it's because I was in my happiest place ever.
I was in Ibiza with my mum.
She had just had this incredible experience on stage with Luciano, one of our favorite DJs.
(21:54):
I lost my mum, O'Shwyer, and I was like, where's my mum?
And my mate went, look up there.
And she's on fucking stage with Luciano, like woohoo!
And I was like, how is this happening?
This was just the most incredible moment.
And then she goes to the after party.
She's calling me, I've left your wristbands on.
I was like, how have you left me wristbands?
This is my island, bitch.
(22:15):
So we're having this incredible night.
And then we she's like, we're going to space.
And I was like, you are not coming to space.
And she was like, I am.
Anyway, I sent her home.
I should have taken her with me, but I just thought she was a bit tired.
And that's what we're saying.
And then so we I get back at like seven o'clock in the morning from dancing all night, having the night of my life.
And then I put my mum on a plane.
(22:36):
And when she got picked up from the airport by my dad, he said, I'm not feeling very well.
I've got I've had this headache for a couple of days since she'd been with Zoe and Ibiza.
And as he left the airport, he collapsed and hit his head on the curb.
But essentially he was rushed to hospital.
I get the phone call.
Phone had been ringing in my room and I was sitting out with friends.
I was staying at a friend's house.
So I go back and I had like 10 missed calls from my sister.
(22:58):
And I said, this is weird.
And she was like, Zoe, you need to come back now.
And I said, what's going on?
And she said, well, dad's had a full but they're worried about him.
And I said, is he dead?
And she was like, he's not dead.
He's not dead.
And I was like, OK, fine.
How long have I got?
And she was like, just try and get on the flight.
Anyway, 30 minutes later, phone rings.
He died just like that.
(23:21):
And I think I couldn't get a flight.
I couldn't get off the island.
And it was just I just the shock of what happened just really ripped my my world apart.
You know, it was just I couldn't get my head around it.
How could I have been so happy and so ecstatic and then devastation?
It was tough.
Yeah, really tough.
Really tough.
(23:41):
And how long I mean, they say that grief you never truly, truly get over.
How long did it really take you to sort of get back to OK, I can pull myself together
and I can get out to work and I can be there for my mom.
And because I guess not that long ago, it hit you again, right?
When your close friend, Caroline Flack.
(24:02):
Yeah, yeah, she died.
Yeah, she died.
But, you know, the it's been I think the older I get, the more understanding I have around death.
And I try to speak to my children about it as much as they want to.
Like, for example, Grandpa Peter is all around the house and Luna has a photograph of him next to her bed.
(24:25):
They're very curious as to how he died.
And I'm not shy away from those conversations because I think we all need to be prepared for it.
You know, I'm not going into detail with them, but because they're only little.
But I don't want to be like, oh, don't worry.
You know, no one's going to die.
And it's absolutely fine because people do die.
Yeah.
And so and so, yes, it's devastating when it happens.
(24:46):
But I think because I was so unprepared for it with my dad, I don't want to make that same mistake with them.
So it's about educating them in the right way around it.
Does that make sense?
Absolutely.
I'm a massive advocate for being open and honest and talking to my children about, you know, everything.
Are you?
Yeah.
I mean, one of the questions my nine-year-old daughter asked me just a couple of weeks ago is,
(25:07):
Mommy, what's masturbating?
Oh, wow. Okay.
And I was like, okay, how do I answer this question?
I'm going to tell her what it is.
The next question, so do you do it, Mommy?
I like what you're saying.
I've got me open and on it.
But, you know, like, you can't, I just feel like, you know, to have conversations with your children,
I'd rather talk about death, talk about it is important.
(25:29):
There's a really great book that my friend Dr. Zoe Williams wrote called You Grow Girl.
I don't know if you've got it, but if you've got teenage girls or tween girls listening to this,
then you should definitely get it for them because it covers everything.
I wish I'd had this book when I was eight, nine, ten years old,
because it just covers everything from periods to sex to weed to boys to girls, whatever it is, you know, it's just there.
(25:51):
And I was me and my...
What's it called?
You Grow Girl.
You Grow Girl.
And me and my eldest were chatting about it the other night and Luna doesn't have a copy, she's seven,
but Isla has one, she's 11, so we sent it to her.
And me and Isla were chatting, like under our breath whispering,
and I could just hear Luna going, I know about sex!
And I was like, shut up, you're seven, we're not having this discussion now.
She was like, I'm reading that book when Isla goes back to her mom's because she's my stepdaughter.
(26:13):
And I was like, okay, so we're all reading it now, are we?
But, you know, it's done in such a brilliantly educational way.
And it's better they have the conversation with you than anyone else.
Yeah, that's my thoughts on it.
I just want to very quickly before we move on talking about the children,
because you obviously, you've got a blended family.
We've spoken about that before actually when we've been at events and stuff.
(26:36):
But I would love to talk about Caroline.
Caroline Flack, you were friends.
Where did you meet Caroline?
So I met her on my first ever proper screen test.
We were screen testing for...
Were you asked to do the same job?
Yeah, she got it.
Of course she did. It's Caroline Flack.
Do you remember that show on BBC One called TM?
Was it TM?
It was Mark and Sam and Mark, wasn't it?
(26:57):
Didn't they do it? Three of them?
Yeah.
So we were at John Noll together.
Flacky was there.
I hadn't met her at this point, but obviously I knew who she was.
And I remember doing my screen test, coming out and she...
Us just saying hello to each other in the corridor.
Hearing her laugh first, I think, you know, that Caroline laugh, which was just so famous for.
And then her just...
And I was like, oh, hi, I'm Zoe.
(27:18):
And she was like, hi, I'm Caroline.
And then she flung her arms around and she went, how did you do?
And I said, oh, I don't think I did well.
She goes, don't worry, there'll be others.
Gave me a massive hug.
She walked in cackling as she went in.
And then, yeah, 20 years of friendship.
But I just, I love that moment so much because, and I've spoken about this before,
I think in a world where women are pitted against each other and there's so much competition
(27:40):
and we're supposed to all hate each other because we're in the same industry and we're going for the same jobs.
There was just none of that between us and there never was.
That's what it's about. So that's lovely that you had that friendship early on.
Yeah. And then just for like the next 20 odd years, you know, we were always in each other's lives.
She was so special.
She was so wonderful.
I mean, everybody felt like they knew her.
People that didn't even meet her.
(28:01):
People that watched her on the telly.
She was everyone's best friend, everyone's sister.
She was, she was fab.
This is your captain speaking.
I hope you're enjoying the flight.
If you like what you're hearing, you can catch up with the rest of the series on our YouTube channel.
All major audio streaming platforms or check out some clips on our socials.
And don't forget to like and subscribe if you're enjoying traveling with the MyFly Club.
(28:23):
Now sit back, relax and enjoy your flight.
So look, let's come back to the kids.
You've got three children.
Yeah.
But you're a blended family and I remember asking you, not that long ago actually, when we were at an event,
how does that work?
Yeah.
Because, you know, I want to know, like if I meet somebody, how does the blended situation work?
(28:43):
What's the best way of managing it?
Oh my gosh.
What did I say?
I, you actually told me that it's, it's your Isla is your stepdaughter.
Yeah, my stepdaughter.
Don't want to call her your stepdaughter because she's not, she's your daughter.
So she's got, you know, you're her second mum, let's say that.
Because you've known her since she was three.
No, so she was about 15 months when I met her.
(29:06):
And I think that was what you'd said to me, that it really helped knowing her from being a baby.
Yeah.
It's almost harder when they're older.
I get a lot of questions about this on my Instagram and on the podcast and stuff.
I just don't.
What do people ask you?
How do you make it work?
What's the secret?
How do I do it?
You know, it's such a minefield.
The step-parenting role is the best relationship, essentially, that I've got because it's the most challenging.
(29:33):
Because for me, I have to love a child like I birthed her, but she has a mother who did.
So if you think that that questions your own love and you think, well, I love her.
I love her the same as my own children unconditionally, but there will always be another person that she will go to before me.
(29:54):
Now, that's taken me a long time to get my head around because I just, I felt her unreasonably, like only inside.
But I'll share that with you today.
And that's something that I don't really ever talk about.
But you do you go through these big emotions of, you know, teaching them to potty train, you know, being there, bathing them, feeding them, tucking them up at night, cuddling them when they have nightmares.
(30:16):
You are their parent, but they have another parent.
And so it has been difficult and challenging in part.
But she is the most wonderful girl.
Like what we've all done, the three of us together is quite remarkable.
And I do feel that now there is a beautiful relationship between me, her mom.
When you say what you've all done, do you mean like the relationship you've you formed or what you've done in terms of where you've been and explored and stuff?
(30:43):
No, like the relationship that we formed, you know, me, me, her mom and her dad.
We work as a three really well now and we really do co-parent in the most beautiful way.
And it is all about Isla. And it's not it's not easy.
Some days are really tricky.
And some days I sit in the car and go, I think, oh, like what we're doing, am I doing it right?
(31:03):
I question it all the time because I think with my biological children, if I tell them off, I'm like, oh, they're just being little shits and I can tell them off.
But if I tell Isla off, there is an element of me thinking, will she love me less now?
Because I've told her off because she's it's really weird.
I can't hopefully I'm articulating it right.
Yeah, I mean, if I'm not in that situation, but I always think, oh, what happens in the future?
(31:26):
If I end up in that situation where you end up having a blended family, but who knows what will happen?
We know my number. You can call me.
I will do. But you let's go back to Ibiza.
Yeah, Ibiza recently as a family, all five of you.
Yeah. So I've been six times this year and we're recording this in September.
(31:46):
Why have you not bought a balloon property there?
We're trying. We're trying. That's what we're trying to do.
We've got a little property.
You haven't called me. I could have given you some advice.
Well, we haven't done it yet. We're saving because, you know, it's bloody expensive.
Ibiza is quite cheap, isn't it?
So what was it about Ibiza then that, you know, I've done two seasons there.
Do you know this? No. Oh my God.
(32:07):
Some of the funniest, most wildest moments of my life went basically, I went there on holiday
with my Ibiza friend, Claire, who just she she ended up coming to our school.
Claire and Tom twins.
Then when Claire arrived, we were like, oh my gosh, so cool smokes.
She lives in Ibiza. She got a moped.
She's like, she's really cool. And so we became really great mates.
And they were like, let's go come and stay with us in Ibiza.
(32:28):
So there was five of us that went out there, got let the apartment in San Antonio.
That was when I was 15 or 16.
And then when I was 17, I went back there for a two week holiday, just for two weeks.
Year 11. So I hadn't even done my A levels yet.
No, not year 11. Sorry. 12. Year 12.
So A level. Level six.
And so I was only supposed to be going for two weeks.
(32:48):
I remember phoning my dad. My dad was like, I'm so excited to pick you up from the airport tomorrow.
And I was like, yeah, no, about that.
I'm actually not coming back.
And he was like, yes, you are. And I was like, no, I'm not.
I've got a job. I'm working in a bar.
I'm just going to stay for the rest of summer.
And he was like, well, can I say no?
And I was like, well, I'm 17. So you probably could.
But please don't, because I'm really happy. I've got a little apartment.
Everything's great. And he was like, OK.
(33:10):
So they just left. They there I was at 17. Did my first season.
That was hysterical. I worked.
What happened? Just like too much stuff.
PRing for various clubs.
Manumission was open. Obviously, DC 10 was an illegal rave then.
I like spent half my summer spray painted blue wearing a rubber wig with my top with my boobies out in blue.
(33:33):
I can't believe you haven't joined the Mile High Club.
You were in Ibiza, spray blue with your boobies out.
Running around promoting various different nights.
I mean, it was wild. Wow.
It was really. And then I went back the following year to do.
I bet you did. Of course I did.
From a blue spray paint. And then you've been going back ever since.
And your mum loves it too. Mum loves it too.
(33:55):
And this may sound like the wankish thing that anyone's ever going to say on your podcast,
but that feeling of being on the dance floor is freedom for me.
Doesn't matter how busy it is. If the tunes are great and my mates are around me,
I'm just like this. That is that is my happy place.
Are there any other destinations in the world that you've traveled to that even come close to Ibiza?
(34:15):
There is nowhere else in the world.
Where else do you go on holiday?
You've cycled Cambodia, Vietnam. Yeah, she's done her research.
Nothing comes close to Ibiza.
I really love Thailand. I loved Thailand.
And I loved the full moon party at Copenhagen, but too much sand.
(34:37):
So you're looking to buy in Ibiza. Do you think you'll relocate there ever?
Yeah, you would. That's what we want to do.
Do you? Yeah, we really want to do that. But that's the 10 year plan.
So you're married to Paul? Does lad. Yeah, does er.
Does er? Does er, yeah. Rugby player?
Ex rugby player, but he's still got the short shorts.
(34:58):
He loves Ibiza too? He loves it. I would not have married him.
Genuinely, if he said he didn't like Ibiza, that would have been a deal breaker for me.
So had he been much before he met you or did you? No.
You got him into it. Have you ever painted him blue and make him get it fully out?
We do it every Friday night. Do you?
I've still got the rubber wig. I swear I can't believe you haven't joined the Marhive.
(35:20):
Oh, you stop saying it. I don't believe. I don't have sex on a plane.
I do not believe it. I do not believe it. I've not.
You've never had a proper honeymoon? No, I have not.
Why not? Fucking good question.
Get him to take you on a honeymoon. Do you know what happened?
Do you know what happened at our wedding? No, tell me.
Oh God, I've never told this story. Oh, good. I love an exclusive.
Obviously, we got married in Ibiza and our friend's villa,
(35:44):
they had turned the Hamman spa into the space closing party.
And so it's like a cave, rave in a cave, essentially.
And it's like our kids are there.
So I'd had Luna at this point, obviously, Isla was there as well.
But our lovely babysitter had taken them back to the villa with grandma and a few other people.
(36:07):
Anyway, seven o'clock in the morning and the party still going in full swing.
And the phone rings and I was like, Oh God, I'd like tucked it down,
down the side of my wedding dress like that, just for emergencies.
I was like, don't call me unless it's emergency. Yeah.
Anyway, phone rings, phone rings. I don't pick it up. I'm like trying to ignore it.
I was like, yes, amazing. What a great night.
And then I was like, hello. And the babysitter is like, you have to come back.
(36:28):
And I was like, Oh God, what's happened? Are the kids OK?
I was like, what's wrong with me? Are the kids OK?
The kids are fine. But it's really sad. This is a sad bit.
So you can do sad face. But one of her relatives had had, he was in, he'd been rushed to hospital.
So she was like, my mum's booked me a flight. I've got to go.
So I was like, are you joking? And I was like, she was like, I'm like, obviously,
(36:49):
I said, I'm really sorry for you first. But then I said, yeah, you're really bad, right?
You're in a cave. But I said, do you have to do you have to go?
And she said, yeah, I've got to go to the airport now.
And I was like, Oh my God. I looked at Dozer and I was like,
this is the worst news that you're ever going to have.
We have to go back and look after our children.
I've done like 500 tequila shots at this point. I could barely walk.
(37:09):
I was it was so fun that that moment and then it went for the worst moment.
So we went back to the villa. Nobody would help us.
No friends, no family, nobody. Nobody helped us.
So I spent I didn't even get to sleep in my marital bed, by the way.
No shag. I was a sexy didn't even have sex on your wedding night.
No, my friend slept in it and he puked everywhere.
Oh, you deaf. Oh, man.
(37:30):
So then I got to my beach party where I was supposed to like waft in
in some gorgeous like linen gown, smelling of hemp.
And I just collapsed on the sun lounger and went like this.
I hadn't even had a shower because I'd been up the whole day
looking after our children.
Damn children.
So it went from the best day of my life to one of the worst.
Wow. So no honeymoon for us.
And that's no one's that you've never told that story to anyone.
(37:52):
Why not?
I thought people might judge me.
There's no judging here.
Literally, you say what you like, we don't judge.
Okay. So now then, do you not think it's important for you as a couple
to get away as a couple without the kids?
Yeah. So we've got this trip to Mauritius.
Have you been to Mauritius? Yeah, I have.
To Beachcomber. Yeah.
Yeah. I love it. We won it in a raffle.
(38:14):
Did you? I say won it, does a bought it.
But is that something?
Well, that doesn't really count as winning it in a raffle.
Peter Jones's Golf Day. Right.
Does a bid.
Trying to be a bit billy big balls, but thank God.
And then we've got it.
And so but that's for five nights.
And I've never done five nights away from my kids.
Have you not? No.
(38:36):
I think I think I think I just don't know if I can do it.
I think doing a trip away.
You know what? You're not sure if you're going to do it or not.
I just think we should bring them, but then it won't be a honeymoon.
I want them there. I love them.
They're so fun.
Listen, I think it's amazing to travel with the kids.
I've traveled with my two since they were three weeks old.
They've traveled around the world.
And but I also have time, especially now, as I co-parent my children
(38:56):
with their dad, that they're with their dad for a week
and they're with me for a week.
And it's brilliant because I get to meet them.
Oh my God, is it amazing?
And actually, how do you reconnect when there's a couple with the children?
Always there if you never have.
You've heard of a kitchen rave, right?
No, I haven't heard of a kitchen rave.
Come on, tell me about it.
Every Friday night, Dusla and I get the kids to bed.
(39:19):
Yeah.
And then we just stay up.
Just the two of you or do you invite other couples?
No, it's not swinging parts.
It's not a pineapple outside the front door.
Well, I won't put it past you though.
I don't know what you get up to.
We just stay up till like one or two and we just dance and drink and chat
and do other stuff.
It's just not like as in we just connect basically.
(39:41):
And we just, yeah, we just love it.
That's brilliant.
And it's not every Friday because it gets a bit negative, it was.
But twice a month, we'll have our little kitchen rave, play music.
Your mates.
You love it.
You love your kitchen rave.
We just love it, but we don't.
But what you're right is we don't.
When we do go away together, we'll go to Ibiza for three days and go dancing.
And that's probably not that restorative either.
(40:02):
So we absolutely do need to do it.
He would be totally fine with us going away for five, seven nights without the kids.
It's me.
I find it hard to let go of them for that long.
I find it really hard.
I think you'll love me, but you might not love it.
You might find it interesting to talk to you after you've.
But then I tucked my tuner up in bed last night and she was like, oh, can we read the worry book?
And I was like, oh, what? You don't have any. What?
(40:24):
You got worries? What's going on?
And she went, it's only the thought of you leaving me.
And then she stared right at me and I was like, she's got that instinct.
Digging the knife in.
Do they know that you're going away?
No, no, because we might add them on to the holiday.
Are you telling me not to?
I just I just think go try it and see.
I mean, you might you might not like it and then you have to do it again.
(40:46):
Or you might think, well, this is brilliant.
You might have a little Mauritian way rave.
A Mauritian kitchen rave. Yeah, a Mauritian kitchen rave.
You said before that marriage isn't easy and it's something you have to to work at.
Yeah.
What what? I know you're renovating your house at the moment with your husband.
But what issues have you had that you've really had to like work out and dig deep and think, no, we want to stay together.
(41:12):
Some some of us don't.
Yeah. Oh, God, no. But that might be the easiest thing.
Doing what you do.
No, I'm joking now because we'll get through your renovation and then we'll see if you make out the other side.
We have worked.
We've worked really hard at our relationship, but it has been incredibly challenging.
And I think any couple that say their marriage is easy breezy is lying out their asses.
(41:37):
You know, I'm not the easiest person.
I'm quite defensive.
I'm very passionate.
I'm very emotional and he gets he's you know, he can get a bit angry sometimes and he retired from rugby.
And so he lost his sense of identity.
And so it was a perfect storm.
Me losing my identity, having the children, him retiring from rugby, you know, financial situation, stepdaughter stuff like it was like.
(42:04):
But we really, really, really love each other.
And we just jumped headfirst into therapy.
Anybody who is at crisis point, you need to go and see a therapist.
Our one saved our marriage.
No questions asked.
And the things that he taught us, we were in therapy for two years.
In fact, we only came out of therapy last year.
And I really recommend I always give his details out to anybody that needs it because he's just a special, special human.
(42:28):
But even little things down to me getting something in my head, marching over straight to dozer and being like that and him going, this is not a good moment.
And then I'd be like, why you don't prioritize me?
And suddenly there's a big row.
Whereas now, if I want to talk to you about something, I say, is this a good moment?
And he says either not right now, but I hold it.
Give me five minutes and I'll come back to you.
(42:50):
Or he'll say, yes, let's find a space for it.
Amazing. Yeah, I didn't even know that was a thing.
I was just marching over on my terms, wanting everything to happen at that moment.
And, you know, now we just do our Sunday check ins.
They're fun. Right.
What's the Sunday check in?
So Sunday check in is get a good before or after the kitchen.
Oh, no, that's the Friday kitchen rave.
This finishes the weekend off nicely where we jump into bed.
(43:15):
Obviously, get ready for bed, brush teeth, shower, get into bed, jump in.
And then we do the check in.
The check in is thing you have to tell the person that you're with why you appreciate them.
So what have they done during the week?
It's not like, you know, thanks for picking up the bananas and the milk from the shop.
It's more like, you know, when you heard me when I was trying to explain about my vulnerabilities around my boobs.
(43:36):
Or when you when you told me that you were feeling like you look knackered and you heard it and you didn't say you didn't rubbish it.
I really appreciated you.
And then we just check in, check in, talk for five minutes.
We have to share.
It normally leads to sex.
Which is always great.
OK, that's the next question that I want to lead to.
I'm taking all these tips on board.
I'm loving this because normally when I get into bed after my jam packed day of bang, bang, bang, doing this stuff, my head hits the pin.
(44:02):
I'm like, I'm out.
You got someone there next to you, though.
She doesn't like a question.
But I don't know, does she?
Who is it?
I'm not revealing those secrets.
You talk about going through the menopause.
Yeah.
How sexy is that?
No, but so like I'm intrigued by that because they say that, you know, you go through menopause and then you lose interest in sex.
(44:27):
Clearly you haven't.
Well, you do for a while.
You definitely do for a while.
But you get it back again.
Yeah, libido.
But I don't think you have to even go through the menopause to have a drop in libido.
I mean, people's libido.
You just got to put your head on the pillow and just be asleep.
Yeah, exactly.
I think it's I think that's a misconception of menopausal women is that they obviously lose it and never it never returns.
(44:51):
So, you know, remember when our mothers went through the menopause and we would just see, you know, Vera in the corner with her floral blouse sweating profusely with a high waisted skirt saying, oh, I just feel awful.
I've got to sit down.
It annoys me when I hear that because I think, yes, it is really tough.
But you can feel amazing again.
And it's like my body is a machine.
(45:14):
Like it needs to be oiled.
I needed to have estrogen.
The drop in estrogen was really bad for my moods, and I felt like absolute dog shit for a long time.
You know, with the brain fog and the night sweats and stuff.
And yes, my sex drive did disappear.
But Dozer was amazing at holding that.
And he understood that it will happen.
And if it happens now, I just say to him, look, I've got to be honest with you.
I've had a plummet in it.
Just bear with me.
(45:35):
It will settle out.
But people don't want to discuss sex.
Isn't it weird?
Like you're living with your partner, raising children, but you can't say to them, I'm not afraid tonight.
Or how can we make some time for it?
Or maybe I don't want to have penitentiary sex, but I want you to rub my feet or give me a back massage or run a bath for me.
All these really intimate things that we forget to do in a marriage.
(45:56):
I love it.
Penitentiary sex.
Penitentiary sex.
I'm going to drop that there again.
If you like that word.
Look, there's so much more.
I feel like, Zoe, honestly, I could chat to you.
Chat to you. Chat to you.
It's brilliant.
But I know you've got to go.
She's got to, you know, chug all the kids.
School run.
Got it.
But you are on heart.
I love listening to you on heart.
You do heart breakfast sometimes.
I do.
You're a working mum.
(46:17):
Like you're literally juggling it all.
You're such a fun time, amazing energy, positive person.
Thank you.
You've got your tattoo, your palm tree tattoo.
Is that related to travel?
Yeah.
Just tell me quickly where.
Before we wrap up, where that comes from, because I want to know.
It's the Kenyan in the Ibiza and Palms.
That's when I look out of my room in Kenya, that's what I see.
Palm trees everywhere.
(46:38):
And obviously Ibiza is just palm trees, palm trees, palm trees.
But if you turn it that way, it looks like a bog brush.
Luna goes, why have you got it tattooed on that way?
And I'm like, because you could see it like that.
She goes, you know, you can't.
You're looking at a lube brush the whole time.
And I was like, great.
She's like, when does it come off?
It doesn't.
(46:59):
It doesn't, babe.
No, it's my Ibiza palm.
And I love it.
So where are you off to next?
Oh my God.
Ibiza.
Guess what?
We're going to Ibiza for closing parties.
Where are we going to next?
We're going to go skiing.
We'll go to Kenya at Christmas.
And then we're going skiing in February half-term.
We're going to go back to Morzine.
We love skiing as a family.
Yeah, it's great.
I just can't wait.
(47:20):
But there will be a sneaky two nights to go and close the dance floor for another year.
Oh, Zoe.
See you there.
I've only ever been to Ibiza once.
Book your flights.
I'm sending them to you.
Oh, I can't wait.
I'm drawing you on your next trip there.
Don't you have any ideas about this mile high club going to Ibiza?
The flight is way too short.
You don't need that long, do you?
(47:41):
So do you win?
So thank you so much.
It's been incredible to chat to you.
So lovely to chat to you.
You have been brilliant.
You are officially a member of the Mile Fly Club.
Yay!
Yay!
And thanks to all the listeners out there.
We love having you all as members of the Mile Fly Club.
Stay tuned for more fantastic episodes coming soon.
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