Reframing Resilience with Dr. Poppy Gibson

We continue reframing resilience with Dr. Poppy Gibson, a lecturer in education whose key interests involve children’s psychological development and mental health, and wellbeing in education. Nat had actually previously met Poppy when writing for a journal that she edits, and after doing some digging found out some really significant similarities! We talk about how both Nat and Poppy almost died, and Poppy’s children’s book about how to talk about death with kids. All kinds of trauma are navigated here, but somehow we ended up laughing a lot — and briefly crying!

Links:
When They Died by Poppy Gibson & Alfred Russo
For more from Poppy, follow her on Instagram and Twitter

We love hearing from our listeners! Leave us a voice message, write to the show email, or send us a DM on any of our socials.

If our conversations support you in your own reframing practice, please consider a donation on our Patreon, where you can also hear bonus episodes, or tipping us on Ko-fi. Subscribe to the Reframeables Newsletter. Follow us on TikTok, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube too.

Chapters

• 0:00 This week's episode
• 2:09 Surviving sepsis
• 9:03 Being different
• 13:02 Revisiting grief
• 18:29 Poppy's book
• 24:27 Teaching resilience
• 30:20 Inspiring reads
• 35:22 Balancing acceptance and striving
• 37:54 Something surprising

Transcript

Natalie
Hey, it’s Nat. 

Rebecca
And Bec — two very different sisters who come together to reframe some of life’s big and small problems. We’re moms, writers. 

Natalie
We have soft boundaries. We see the world differently, but we both lean into vulnerability together and with our guests, because we like deep dives. So come with us — let’s reframe something. 

Rebecca
Hey, Nat. 

Natalie
Hey, Bec. 

Rebecca
So, remember when I wooed you out of teaching to start a podcast and make movies? 

Natalie
Yes I do, and the irony is not lost on me that you have now been wooed by George Brown College to teach in their film program. 

Rebecca
Touché. 

Natalie
Rebecca, the script has been flipped. It was inevitable that I’d reel you in, and today’s Reframeables episode is also connected to teaching. 

Rebecca
And learning. 

Natalie
Yup. As we continue our reframing resilience series with Dr. Poppy Gibson. 

Rebecca
A lecturer in education whose key interests involve children’s psychological development and mental health, and wellbeing in education. 

Natalie
I actually met her when I was writing for a journal that she edits, and then after doing some digging I found out that she and I had some really significant similarities. 

Rebecca
We’ll talk about how both of you almost died, and her children’s book about how to talk about death with kids. 

Natalie
And then we navigate trauma — I mean, somehow at the end of this interview we still laughed a lot. 

Rebecca
You also cry. 

Natalie
Ok, briefly. But then we walk away feeling a little bit lighter. 

Rebecca
Well, let’s get into it: reframing resilience with Dr. Poppy Gibson. 

Natalie
This is so much more fun for me to connect with a person who technically fits for me when I wear one hat as an educator, but then actually has so many other links — to life together. 

Poppy
Cool, I think this will be fun. 

Natalie
Good. Well, thank you for being here with us, Dr. Poppy Gibson. 

Poppy
My pleasure. 

Natalie
In terms of kind of an opening, we are doing a series on resilience. And I was struck when I read in your bio on one of your many platforms that you are a sepsis survivor. And I was like, “Oh my goodness, I’m a sepsis survivor.” 

Poppy
What! 

Natalie
And I didn’t realize that was going to be a thing that would connect us. 

Poppy
Wow. 

Natalie
And I think what’s so fascinating for me about the sepsis story is that I literally didn’t even know that was a word. I didn’t know it was a condition. Speaks to potentially my privilege as just always assuming I was going to be healthy until I wasn’t. So I remember the moment, being in the hospital with the doctors running around me like crazy and me going, “Can I just get back to work? Like, I really have things to do.” And the one doctor going, “You have no idea how serious this was.” 

Poppy
Wow. 

Natalie
Yeah — and I really didn’t. I had no idea. 

Poppy
And they knew it was sepsis at that point, or it took some time? 

Natalie
No, they knew. And it had been an overnight issue of them having assumed I was healthy enough, I was in the emerge, but they took me off of the machine and put it on somebody who seemed to need it more. And by doing that, my body reacted. So it was technically their fault — you know, if we’re going to put it like that. But medicine is a crazy thing. But that made me go, “Ok, so I didn’t know,” — and then I’m being told later that I almost died. And I’m like, “How do I reconcile that experience?” 

Poppy
How long ago? 

Natalie
This would have been now… 11 years. 

Poppy
Wow, so mine’s 10. Is it still raw for you? 

Natalie
Well, see, that’s the thing — I don’t know that it’s raw because I’m still sort of grabbing for the language. So that’s why I wanted to learn from you. 

Poppy
Oh. 

Natalie
Tell us about your experience, because I know you just posted recently that it’s, like, the 10-year anniversary and you’re navigating this. So please share with us about you. 

Poppy
Yeah — also, thank you for opening up about your recovery journey because I think that’s really interesting, with you with 11 years under your belt that you’re still unpacking it. I feel like 10 years after having sepsis, I’m still unpacking it, but something happened actually last week that I’d love to talk about — I’ve not spoken about yet. I did one post — again, I wasn’t even sure. Do I want to talk about it more? But this is great timing to come and talk to you both, because I’ve never looked back at my medical notes of that time and you will know from having sepsis that your mind would be very clouded — like, a lot of things may be difficult to remember. I misremember a lot of things. And when I talk about them now, everyone’s like, “That didn’t happen.” I’m like, “Remember when we sat in the corridor?” And they’re like, “You were never sat in a corridor.” So a lot of it’s misremembered. 

And I spoke at a sepsis conference earlier this year, and one of the delegates said, “Have you ever gone back and looked at your medical notes?” So I never thought of doing that. And so I think it was last month I actually reached out to the hospital that helped me recover and asked if I can view my notes. And last week they finally got back to me and said, “You can come this week. You can come, you can have an hour slot. There’s too many for us to scan and send. Normally we’d scan and send.” So I was like, “Yeah, let’s do it.” 

And I think this is the thing why everyone’s journey is so different because it also depends who’s around you, it depends on you. And some people around me were like, “Definitely. Go read the notes, go process it.” And some people were like, “Why would you want to go and read your notes?” And some people were like, “How are you still talking about this after 10 years?” And I think for most people you think, “I’m glad that you don’t understand that journey.” So that’s the part, Nat — I just read my notes. 

I did a tactical thing. So I would also say this for anyone who’s done that kind of mental health recovery, because as you know, the physical recovery is really quick. Like, after being in ICU and intensive care, having the blood transfusions, having the blast of antibiotics, I was recovered from sepsis. But honestly, 10 years later, I’m still healing from the mental challenge. So tactically, I took my mom, who is the least emotional person. A lot of people are surprised because I’m very open about emotions and things — my mom is like a clam. So I was like, “I’m going to take my mom. I love my mom, but she’s not an emotional person. I think I just need a body in the room.” That sounds a disservice to my mom. “I need someone that I love in the room, but who’s not…” — you know, my mom never asked me about sepsis. She doesn’t really talk about emotions. She’s the kind of person that says ‘fine’ when you ask how she is — it’s always ‘fine.’ 

So she came along. It was a good strategy in that I just got to work through the notes. The lady was amazing. So she said here in the UK, we keep notes 26 years after someone is born, because I had maternal sepsis after I gave birth. So she said, they’ll keep these notes until he’s 26 — so plenty of time yet, he’s only 10 (obviously, his 10-year anniversary). But she said, “Just work through and then any you want, I’ll photocopy for free. You can just take those notes.” But my mom just kind of sat there and she didn’t really say anything or do anything. At one point I cried because the women went, “You must have been really poorly.” And I was like, “Oh my gosh, I was.” 

And when you look back at the notes, you remember fragments, but my mom’s kind of not a huggy person. So, like, I cried in the car all the way home on my own after I dropped my mom off. I think another big thing that I’ve learned through recovery, and I don’t know if you’re the same or anyone listening is the same: you have to just take care of yourself. It’s kind of selfish to put your expectations on other people. Like, even with when I was going to see my notes, I told a few friends, “I’m going to go look at my notes.” And then on the day, a couple text me and they were like, “Good luck today.” And then a couple didn’t, and I was like, “I can’t believe they’re not saying ‘good luck.’” And I’m like, “Let that go.” Like, honestly, it could have triggered something in them. They could have just forgotten because you’re not the center of their world. 

And so a big part of recovery for me has just been: do you know what? Rebuild yourself, protect your energy, connect with those people who want to. Don’t think for everyone it’s as big as it is for you. And maybe it’s the same for you, but certainly for me right now, I keep coming back to it and it’s still big. I’m just learning to take care of me and not expect everyone else to understand. I guess what I said is: it’s good everyone doesn’t understand. 

Natalie
Yeah. 

Rebecca
But is that what’s particular (or one of the things that’s particular) about sepsis — is that people don’t understand it? So is that part of both of our journeys — is that you’re always trying to almost defend that you went through something life-threatening and you’re here, but people don’t get it? Is that true? 

Poppy
That’s a good question. Did you feel that? Well, you said you didn’t even know the word yourself, so I guess… How about people in your network? Did they understand, or…? 

Natalie
Well, it’s a thoughtful question because I think my journey with disability has been long, because what started in terms of a sepsis experience for me turned into what actually was going on in my body in a larger sense, which was blood clots. And so those blood clots and the impact on my right leg and all these various kinds of components, I think have been so lonely. So I think I would say that the people the closest to me, you know what I mean — like, my family, Rebecca, my sister, my husband, who, you know, became my husband out of this whole journey. Like, I mean, lots of really good people, but finding the language to talk about something I think for me health-wise has been kind of lonely and isolating because you are feeling like you need to almost defend, to yourself even, that this thing has happened and you’re now different. 

Being different — and then, like, not knowing how to necessarily relate to somebody who loves you, but maybe loves the version of you that was before you were sick and now you’re different. And we’re both trying to figure out the language for who Natalie is now. And I don’t know if I would ever say that I lost anybody because of it, but I definitely resonate with you saying, like, you have to sort of protect your energy and figure out who’s with you for this new ride — because it’s different. 

Poppy
It is different. It is different. And you are changed, right? When someone tells you, “Prepare for death,” you change because you actually think it’s the end of your life. And so one thing that I often say when I speak about sepsis at conferences (and this is the worst bit of it all for me) was I’d just had my baby, and so he was nine days old when I went into septic shock. So I couldn’t see him — when you’re in intensive care, you obviously can’t have visitors, especially a baby. And so I didn’t see him for nine days. My milk supply dried up. I know as an educator how important attachment is. I was like, “Oh my God — like, the attachment is gone. Everything’s ruined.” But you know, they said, “Please,” — like, you know, “Spend some time. We’re going to let your husband come visit.” 

And I thought, you know, “Time to just, like, make peace with everything.” And I just remember saying to my husband — like, he was sitting there and he did not know what to say, and I didn’t know what to say. And I just said, “Take care of our boys for me.” And we looked at each other, and it hurt so badly because you’re so vulnerable. You’re in a bed, you know, attached as you were to machines, and you can’t do anything. You can’t hug them goodbye. And you know in movies they get to hug people goodbye and you’re like, “This isn’t how it’s meant to be.” 

And then a day later, things change and the amazing NHS here in England, you know, saved my life. And then, oh, now you’re getting better. And now you go home — but especially as a mother who’s had maternal sepsis, you go home and then you can’t wallow in being a victim because you’ve got this baby that needs you. And then because of the attachment thing, I was like, “Must work hard, must work hard.” And I bought an electric breast pump because normally I was going to breastfeed. He’s now got bottles that my husband had to buy from the supermarket and try making up powder. Like my whole family did amazing work while I wasn’t there. But equally now I’m into this crazy situation trying to care for him and me, and… Yeah, so when I saw you doing podcasts about resilience, I was like, “Maybe that is what it was.” Yeah, maybe that’s what gets you through. 

Natalie
Wow. 

Rebecca
I’m kind of obsessed with… I just think about grief all the time. My story is that (or parts of my story is that) my daughter had open heart surgery at six months. 

Poppy
Oh my… 

Rebecca
That was something we discovered probably at our three month ultrasound. She did well, and we’re on the other side of it mostly, but it’s sort of an ongoing experience for me that I expected that sort of grief to leave and be over. And it’s just something that stays — like, it comes up again once in a while. So I guess I was curious, as we talk about resilience, once in a while do you still grieve that you didn’t get to have a normal birth — or have you been able to successfully turn it into, “I overcame and there’s mostly positive emotions with it now”? I mean, I guess you were saying it’s not as simple as that — it’s a complicated journey. 

Poppy
Yeah — and firstly, so sorry for everything that happened with you and your daughter. And I think you probably already know my answer to the question. 

Rebecca
Yeah, I guess I do. 

Poppy
Because I imagine — here’s a question for you, like, to come back at you: how many people ever ask you about that time? Do many people ask you about the open heart surgery and your feelings? 

Rebecca
No, I really think people think it happened and it’s over and clearly you have a beautiful daughter now and life has moved on. To be honest, even my husband feels that way, I think — which has been mysterious for me as a mother is that it’s so enduring, and for him, it’s like, “What’s the problem?” I mean, he wouldn’t be as callous as that, but in a way that’s his experience. Sort of maybe like when you’re talking about your mom — that she’s able to bracket maybe better. That he could bracket and be like, “We got through it.” So it’s interesting for me. And maybe it’s women, I don’t know. I mean, certainly it’s a mothering thing, but yours was tied into being a mother… 

Poppy
That’s interesting. I don’t know, and I think part of it is maybe their coping strategy, that they don’t want to revisit it. But equally then yes, every day I think, “You should just be grateful because they survived.” But then my son who was the one that was born when I had sepsis, Griffin is his name — like, I love him so much. He’s my middle child. He loves space. He loves philosophy. He’s 10. He’s incredible — like, he talks about existentialism and he’s like this real old soul. But sometimes he’ll become very emotional and I think, “Oh my gosh, it’s because of his trauma at birth.” And then I’m like, “No — like, but is it?” 

Then, you know, the more I read around neurodiversity, acquired neurodivergence of birth from traumatic birth — because obviously I had the sepsis for three weeks before he was induced early. So while I was ill for three weeks before he was born I’m, like, thinking of the cortisol, thinking of the stress — like, has that had an impact 10 years later? And the hard thing is you’ll never really know how they were impacted, and you’re still learning how you were impacted as a mother. I’m going through that, and so it is so complex, but I think part of why I love that you’re talking about this on your podcast, part of the reason it’s difficult is because a lot of people don’t know how to have that conversation, and they might not realize that it’s on your mind so much. I would say I think about ICU every day, I think about sepsis every day. You may think about your daughter very frequently and that awful time, I can’t even imagine what that was like. 

But if I tell you how many times people ask me about it, it’s, like, zero — like, very rare. And sometimes I just want to talk about it. And then again, it’s remembering that’s not on them. They’re not quite ready. They don’t have the tools. Then maybe they’re not ready to open the can of worms, as people tell me I’m doing every time. Like, “Why are you opening that can of worms again, Poppy?” But for me, that works for me, but I guess for everyone, that’s not the tool for them, right? 

Rebecca
Sometimes people ask us if we make money doing this podcast. The answer is we don’t. In fact, every hour we spend on Reframables is time not spent at a paying gig. And the steps to making a podcast are actually many. Finding the guests, booking the guests, reading the books, planning the questions, editing the interview, uploading it into the podcast world, making the artwork. So if you value this podcast, please consider supporting it with a financial contribution. Memberships start at $6 a month on Patreon and include a monthly extra where we record our five things in a week. In this world we have to support what we love, and with that support an energy comes back to us — so thanks for going to patreon.com/reframables and becoming a supporter. It doesn’t really make a lot of sense to be making a podcast, but here we are, three years later, still doing it with your help. So go to patreon.com/reframables — now, on to the show. 

I don’t know if either of you have watched the Martha doc — the Martha Stewart Doc. I just find this so interesting. Martha Stewart has gone through a lot of trauma. Like, her family was really challenging, blah, blah, blah. But at one point in the doc, she just turns to the interviewer and she’s like, “Can we talk about something happier now?” And I found that so interesting. Like, it’s the world, right? Can we talk about something happier now? 

Poppy
Yeah. 

Natalie
It’s true. 

Rebecca
Well, sometimes we can’t, but people want us to apparently. Is success in our society associated with moving on quickly? Like, “Get over it.” Like, get back to more important things — which is success and money. 

Natalie
Like, I mean, the fact that you’ve written a kid’s book. So Poppy, I’ve just pressed order on my kid’s book, and I’m so excited for it. But it’s funny — like, basically I’m saying to the world, “I’m really excited about this kid’s book about death.” 

Poppy
Exactly. 

Natalie
Right? I mean, like, that’s what it is. Your beautiful book, When They Died, is all about talking to kids about death. And so obviously the ongoingness of your own journey. I’m making a link, maybe this isn’t the link, but I’m making a link here that you think that, “Ok, so if the world isn’t going to let me sort of have my conversations, I’m going to count on the kids, because only the children are going to make us well.” But, like, that idea that, I mean, maybe these conversations are so important to start fostering with the next generation now. And maybe some families are better at this than others, but I certainly know that a book like this would be really helpful. So maybe you can just sort of tell us in response to Becca’s question a little bit about your book in that way. 

Poppy
Yeah. And thank you also — again, a lot of people don’t want to ask me about that book so I love how brave you are, and I love your take on it as well. And actually that’s interesting you’ve made that link. It did not in my mind seem any fit towards the sepsis, but where it came up for me: you may be aware a couple of years ago, our queen died. Her majesty died in England after, like, the longest reign. We’d had her Platinum Jubilee. You know, everyone was thinking about the queen, how much we loved her, Queen Elizabeth II. And then she tragically died. 

And I was contacted by quite a lot of people — by schools, by her teachers, by friends saying, “How do I talk to my child about death?” They’re asking loads of questions about the dead queen. “What do I do?” And I got contacted by BBC, that’s a company here in UK. Go on the radio to talk about it. And my main thing was: talk about it — like, don’t be afraid to talk about it. So this was a couple of years ago. And again, I was aware of people in my network that when their bunny died, they would go to the pet shop, find a similar looking bunny and replace the bunny and tell the children it was the same bunny. Someone I know told me that their pet actually went on holiday. You know, or that it’s gone to sleep for a long time. 

And things that I’ve noticed personally from being a teacher for so long is that we’re actually doing children a disservice if we try wrapping up some of these. And again, it does depend on the child. It does need to be age appropriate. But sadly, death is that one thing that will come to all of us. And we will all, as we grow, learn more about it. We’ll know more people that die, just generally as we’re longer in the world. And so luckily I found this amazing illustrator. I wrote a very simple children’s book and it’s, like, a child asking questions. Things like, “What happens to our body after we die?” Or, “Where does our soul go?” Or, you know… 

Natalie
“What is a soul?” 

Poppy
“What is a soul?” Yeah. We’ll write book two together. 

Natalie
Yeah, yeah. 

Poppy
And so we wrote this book and these kinds of responses that are not scientific I’d say, but transparent and honest. And even if you don’t agree with the answer in the book — for example, souls, we do not have time to go into souls. It’s so big. Some people believe it or don’t. So it gives an answer, and then even if you don’t agree with the answer, it gives you space as the parent reading it or the teacher reading it to then question. “But what do you think?” And it’s basically a tool for reflection. 

But I’ll tell you a funny story about the book. So whenever I go to a conference and present, it’s normally great because I have so many amazing friends in my networks. You know, in these parallel sessions, that kind of U-level conference — like, when you have parallel sessions and people sign up, normally whenever I go into my room to speak, my audience is full and I love it. I’m like, “Thanks everyone for picking me. Welcome, welcome.” And normally my room’s full and I feel so blessed. I went to a conference last year to speak about the death book, and I was like, “I can’t wait to speak about my children’s book about death and grief.” And then when my audience came in, there were eight. I wasn’t even double digits — like, eight. And I think there were about 400 people at this conference. 

And I spoke to the eight and it was really interesting. A lot of them stayed behind. One went on to tell me that her dad had just been diagnosed with cancer, someone else went on to tell me that his wife was ill and his school wasn’t supporting him. And I was like, “Wow,” — like, you maybe didn’t even come here to talk about the book. You’ve come here because no one’s giving you the space you need to talk about those things in your life. So… 

Natalie
Yeah, wow. Academic conferences are the best and worst in that way. I’ve told Rebecca, I spoke in one where the room was just filled with the people who were also speaking in that room, so we all just kind of had, like, a round table. 

Poppy
Quality over quantity, clearly. 

Natalie
Well, and that’s totally what it was. And it was a very lovely conversation and it was very smart. Anyway… but that’s very interesting that people just needed the space to come and talk about themselves. 

Rebecca
So how do you speak about resilience with your kids? Is that something that comes up in your household? 

Poppy
Yeah. 

Rebecca
This came up for me yesterday. I’ll just say my daughter did a piano performance and it didn’t go that well for her. She had trouble getting through the song. She didn’t have her music. She was trying to do it without the music and just… she wasn’t happy with it, so she kind of got off stage and just burst into tears. 

Poppy
Were you there? 

Rebecca
Yes, I was there, yeah. But so then we spent a lot of time afterwards trying to talk about failure, or is it failure? I was trying to use it as: failure is great — although now I realize she was very much wanting me not to call it failure. I don’t know, I was trying to go at it from different ways. You know, “How did you want to experience that? It seems like that wasn’t the experience you wanted, so what could you do to have an experience next time?” I felt like I was really fumbling and trying to figure out how to help her be honest about what happened. Like, she’ll say, “Everyone actually told me it was great,” you know what I mean? And then she’ll just go, “Oh, it was great,” when in fact she did forget. I might be sounding really confused, but I was like, I didn’t even know how to address it, but yet I want to embrace the idea of failure. And Nat and I were talking about how as a society we talk a lot about how it’s great to fail and that makes you resilient, but we don’t know how to do that with kids. Anyway, big question, Poppy. 

Poppy
I love it. I love it. And do you know what’s really interesting hearing your recount of it, because I think what you need to take away is: number one, you were there, and number two, you made space to talk about it afterwards. So please don’t feel like you fumbled or that you were confused because just by being there and just by making space, we never will know all the right things to say because our brains are so complex. But you 100% were a supermom in that moment — so I just wanted to say that. 

Rebecca
Aw, that’s really nice. 

Poppy
We’ll never know what to say. 

Rebecca
Yeah — like, what do you talk about with your kids? Do you have an example of a moment when you’re trying to inspire resilience? 

Poppy
I mean, every day. And I want to say by no account am I supermom — like, I’m the same. 

Rebecca
Yeah? 

Poppy
Every conversation you have, you go away and you think, “Should I have said it differently? Was that the right way to handle it?” But the one thing that we enjoy, or that I’m hoping my children enjoy, one tool we love is the “I wonder” tool. So out of my three children, one is adopted. And I think going through that process, we learned a lot around how to kind of therapeutically parent. And so a big part of that is about, you know, listening and wondering. So for example, I spoke about Griff, my little trauma baby (or not). He can find it really hard to verbalize how he feels, especially when he’s upset. So I’ll do a lot of, you know, “I wonder if you’re feeling upset because of this,” or, “I wonder if you might feel better if you do this.” 

So always try and show that you’re never giving advice to move on and get stronger, but just making space for wondering and sometimes trying to give them the words, remembering they’re so young. And really interesting what you were saying, Natalie — like, you’re still trying to find vocab as an adult for stuff that’s happened to you. And sometimes our kids as well are trying to find that vocab, so sometimes I’ll try and do wondering a lot. 

And I would say, honestly, it was only about five or so years ago that I let my kids see me really upset. I used to definitely shield that a lot from them — you know, wait till they’re in bed, and then my husband would just take the brunt of me, like, wailing and ugly crying. And now, I can’t remember what happened, but something really upset me about five years ago, and I just burst out crying in the kitchen, and my oldest son, Otto, like, came up and he just hugged me. And I was like, “I’m sorry if you see me like this.” And then I explained what was upsetting me. And I was like, “Actually, that’s what they need to see — is that it’s ok.” And then I said, “Do you know what I’m going to do? I’m going to get a hot shower, I’m going to get my favorite pajamas on,” and, like, also showing them: how do you find the things that make you feel better in those moments? So I try and do a lot of role-modeling, but again, we’re all so different in the ways we seek comfort, aren’t we? I mean, how did your daughter seek comfort after yesterday? Did she dive into another activity? Did she want to sit on the sofa? What was her kind of coping? 

Rebecca
Well, she wanted to hug me a lot. She needed to cry and sort of articulate that: “I suck.” She needed to sort of get that out, and then we talked about it and, “That was the worst.” And then a bit more crying and, “It’s always going to be like that.” So I felt like we kind of went through that. And then she would just stand there and then go for another hug. So it seemed to be a lot of time — like, she needs time. And then eventually she just went and jumped back into an activity. 

Poppy
I love that. That’s beautiful. Like, you should give yourself a gold star because that is really beautiful. 

Rebecca
Poppy, you need to be in my life. 

Poppy
I’m always here. I’m always floating around. 

Rebecca
I think I don’t give myself enough gold stars, so that’s a really nice way to say that the idea that just being there is… 

Poppy
Yeah. 

Rebecca
Like, just, giving space for something. 

Poppy
And you were there for those hugs, right? She clearly needed that physical touch and you were there for that. And you know, the fact that you said she kept coming back for hugs again, you made yourself physically and emotionally available. That is 100% the best you can give to anyone. 

Natalie
We’ve been wondering — I mean, as you have just given some advice (or some thoughts, right) as you share around how we have navigated mental health and wellbeing for us, for our kids, whatever, how are you doing it for yourself in terms of the types of people that you are supporting yourself with? In my writing, I will call it ‘relational reading,’ and I’m thinking about it as, like, “Who are some of the thinkers that help to support my way forward,” right? So my colleagues, my collegial reading, who I’m never going to meet — like, philosophers who are dead, but they are my colleagues because they help me forward in terms of the way that I read the world. Who are yours? Who are some influencers or thinkers that you’re spending time with who help you to feel your most resilient? 

Poppy
Ooh — I have to say, I’m just going to be really, really honest: I need to read more. Because, I mean, I’m just reading academic papers. I need to read more stuff. I don’t engage well with podcasts. Obviously, love your podcast, but generally I find it really hard to listen, because you know you’re just so busy and switch off — audio books, apart from if it’s, like, a really gory thriller, I can’t do it. So I do need to get better at that. But interesting you said you love some, like, golden favorites. I love Bessel van der Kolk, talking about Body Keeps the Score, one of the best books I’ve ever read. Things like that I go back to all the time. So when my children, you know, are struggling, when I’m struggling, I go back to a seminal book like that, remind myself how there is such a bond between our physical and mental health. Reminding us not to be hard on ourselves. 

A really amazing book, I don’t know if you’ve read The Primal Wound by Nancy Verrier — I love that book as well. Another book, again, that’s just out in my house to dip into. This is a really interesting one because my adopted daughter’s been going through, like, a lot lately and I have to remind myself: this is because of trauma she doesn’t even know how to talk about yet. She’s so young, and we do talk about adoption, but I don’t think she quite gets it. 

So looking at books like that, I think, remind me how big some of these things are and how big these feelings are how it’s not anything I’m doing, hopefully, but these are things bigger than ourselves. So anything like that reminds me of, I guess, the enormousness of emotion. So books like that always make me feel good. Although they’re tough to read, I think they remind you about what being human is and how, even in our lifetimes, we’ll still have no answers, but the best thing we can do is have podcasts like yours where you’re making space to share some ideas, to reflect on what you’re doing, how we can continue to improve and support each other. That’s, like, the best we can do, right? 

Rebecca
But I think that’s important that you say they are tough to read, because I do have The Body Keeps The Score, and I… 

Poppy
Love it or hate it? 

Rebecca
I think it’s really important. But then when I think about what you were saying about when you were pregnant and you had cortisol rushing, or those weeks — you basically went into sepsis in the last few weeks of your pregnancy? Is that what you said? 

Poppy
Yeah — I was being treated, yeah, for pneumonia for three weeks, but it was actually a kidney abscess. 

Rebecca
Wow. 

Poppy
That was undetected, yeah. 

Rebecca
Ok, so basically you have these things rushing and you’re wondering: did it affect your son? And I have exactly those feelings about my daughter — all the stress of finding out so early, that cortisol rushing through her. Ok, so basically I’m saying: if the body keeps the score, it’s so frightening because there’s so much in all of us, but I guess the point is you can’t deny it. So we think maybe if we don’t read those books, it’s not true, or we don’t inform ourselves. 

Poppy
Yeah. 

Rebecca
And I think that’s a temptation: to think, “If I just don’t learn about it, it’s not applicable to me.” And I think that’s another place we sort of need to face the world, or face feelings, face truths. 

Natalie
With tools. I mean, like, that’s the whole thing about a book like that, though, right? Isn’t it a reframing tool at some level to help one to feel a little bit of… “control”’s maybe too strong, because you can’t control the things that are happening inside you, but you can give yourself knowledge and then you can talk about it with people because of, like, a book being almost like a shared experience. Like, now the two of you have the same thing on the same bookshelf — there’s something about the way you connect. 

Poppy
Yeah. Back to your very opening point of this podcast, you know, around how 11 years ago you were so ill and it’s a big part of your journey, but maybe people around you still don’t know how to talk about it, about your daughter, it’s a massive part of your journey, people don’t know how to talk about it — this is it, right? So anything we read that helps us just understand a tiny bit more about how we’re feeling — you don’t have to read the whole book. I’ve not read either of those books in their entirety, but if you can just read those nuggets and it helps you make a little bit more sense of something, like, that’s the best we can do, isn’t it? 

Rebecca
Yeah. I feel like maybe the best thing, Poppy, just hearing you say we’re not trying to have a low bar for life, but we’re trying to have a reasonable bar. Would you say? Like, maybe this is the last question — like, how do you balance acceptance and striving? Like, you strive for health, you strive for the best life for you, your kids, but then there’s also acceptance. Do you think about that balance? 

Poppy
Sorry. 

Rebecca
You probably do. 

Natalie
Hi. 

Rebecca
Hello. 

Poppy
Hi. 

Rebecca
This might be an example of a moment right now. Poppy’s… one of her children is popping in. 

Poppy
Yeah, so definitely as a parent, one thing that I’ve learned is: you know when you go out for a meal the first time with your baby and they’re crying and they’re screaming and you feel like, “Everyone’s staring, I’m ruining it for everybody.” When you go out to a restaurant and it’s someone else’s baby screaming, I don’t know about you, but it doesn’t even touch me, it doesn’t even touch the sides, and I think it’s about taking pressure off yourself and remembering you’re only doing what you can do. Often we think people are thinking worse of us than they are. But all you can do is manage your own expectation. Definitely have high expectations of yourself at all times, but just low expectations of others, I think, is the best way — and then they might surprise you. 

It comes back to what you were kind of saying about connecting with people, connecting with the right people. Letting some people go as you grow, I think, as well. Knowing that sometimes those friends we get older in life are the ones that we connect to better than those we try and hang on to from childhood as well, I think. So connecting people for the right reasons… Sorry. They were digging pirate treasure out of things. She’s showing me her treasure. Sorry. 

Natalie
Aww. 

Rebecca
That’s a perfect answer. 

Natalie
And very important. 

Poppy
I’ll be five minutes. Go take it in the house. I’ll be five minutes. Sorry. 

Natalie
It feels like it’s very you too. You are very able as an educator, parent, you know, human in the world to be holistically, I think, yourself. 

Poppy
Aww. That’s all we can do, you know? 

Natalie
Yeah. 

Poppy
That’s all we can do — just be ourselves, and just be unashamedly ourselves. And that’s how you know you’re with the right people. Like, the fact that she even came on your podcast — like, thank you for not judging me. 

Natalie
Love it. 

Poppy
I think that’s when you know you’re with the right people: when you’re being yourself. So that shows you’re making good progress. 

Rebecca
Poppy, last question: is there something very surprising about yourself or something that you love that might surprise our listeners that you could share? 

Poppy
Something that might surprise… 

Rebecca
That might be totally unserious or un-... 

Natalie
Mental health, un-anything. 

Poppy
I’ll tell you something that a lot of people are surprised when they meet me in real life: that actually I’m very antisocial. I’m the most antisocial person I know. I probably have, like, three friends in the inner circle — maybe two, one’s on the edge. And I think a lot of people always say to me, “Oh, you know, you must have huge groups of friends.” And I don’t, but that’s why I love social media, because you can have these huge tribes. You can choose when you connect. Like, I love social media. My PhD was on social media. I love it. I love connecting with you guys in Toronto. Like, I’m here in England, you’re over there. This I love. But in real life, I’d be quite happy if, like, I saw no one for a week. That’s my secret: secretly very antisocial. 

Natalie
That’s a great share. 

Rebecca
And surprising. 

Poppy
It’s also about being content with who you are. And I think when I was younger I felt I had to be surrounded by people all the time to be happy. I felt like, you know, you had to spend time with other people. But now as I get older, I feel like I’m more content with just being with myself. You know, I’ll go out to eat by myself, I go for walks by myself and with my dog. I’m quite happy. I go for Christmas shopping by myself. I think when you make peace with yourself, when you start to know who you truly are, that’s the biggest self-actualization that we can have. 

Rebecca
And, like, you love that now about yourself — like you accept that, yeah. 

Poppy
Yeah. I mean, I’m still really annoying. I annoy myself. But I think, yeah, I’ve learned just accept you for you and be happy with who you are. This is your one time in this body. Whatever you believe happens after this life, this is your one time in this shell. Like, I used to hate looking in the mirror, seeing my stretch marks and scars. And now I’m like, “Thank goodness I pulled through. Thank goodness I’m here. Thank goodness I’m me.” 

And so just having that everyday gratitude, I guess. And that makes a difference. Like, don’t think, “I wish I looked like that.” One of my friends has got these incredible eyelashes and every day I’ve just got, like, my little stubs and I think, “Wait a minute.” Like, just be glad, you know, that you’re you, don’t judge yourself based on everyone. The downside of social media, you know, the very filtered images of amazement, but just be glad you’re you and for what you have. And I think that’s a game changer. And you two are both amazing, that’s my final word. 

Natalie
Poppy, you just made me cry. 

Poppy
Don’t — you’ll make me cry. No! 

Natalie
I know — I just put my eyes on. They’re really good today. 

Poppy
They look great. 

Natalie
That’s a really beautiful way to close it — like, it’s our one shot. Poppy. Yeah. It’s our one shot. Enjoy the ride. 

Natalie
Yeah. Thank you for spending this time with us. 

Rebecca
Oh, yes. 

Poppy
Thank you — thank you both. You’re amazing. Keep doing great work. 

Natalie
Take good care. Go look at your treasure. 

Poppy
I will. 

Natalie
I’ll see you online. 

Poppy
Yeah, talk to you soon. 

Natalie
Ok, bye. 

Poppy
Bye.