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- [00:00]
A
If someone said to me, you need to lose a limb and if you do, you will never have depression again, I would have offered both arms like that. To be honest, I still would. I don't know the person that I was. Now that I'm 13 years sober, I'm 67 years old, and I'm driving along thinking, my God, I'm driving. I've actually passed my test.
- [00:22]
B
Hello and welcome to how to Fail. This is the podcast that believes that most failure can teach us something meaningful if we let it. And before we get into this episode and this conversation, I I would love it if you could follow and subscribe to the show because it really, really does help. So just tap that button now and I will be forever grateful.
- [00:43]
C
It's Jonathan Van Ness from Getting Better. With Jonathan Van Ness, it's easy to feel hopeless, but we don't have to stay there. I'm all about finding places where we can turn that energy into hope and into action. One of those places is Americans United for Separation of Church and State. Americans United or AU is this quote unquote quiet but mighty force working every day to preserve freedom without favor and equality without exception. I am so obsessed with that tagline. And let me tell you something, honey, that wall between church and state, paper thin. It's got a leak, honey. It's one of the last safeguards protecting so many of our rights. So right now, from bodily autonomy to LGBTQ + rights to the future of public schools, to me, this is about creating a world where everyone gets to live as themselves. As long as you're not harming anyone else. Now is not the time to curl up and hide. It's the time to link arms and stand together for a better future. Join Americans United for Separation of Church and State and their growing movement because church, state separation protects us all. Learn more and join the fight@au.org better. Let's go. Americans United this episode is brought to.
- [01:48]
A
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- [02:09]
B
Denise Welsh grew up in Whitley Bay in a family of confectioners. As a child, her habit of turning up to birthday parties with large bags of mixed toffees made her a popular guest. The popularity has lasted and grown into her adulthood, even if the sweets haven't. After years as a successful and Award winning actor appearing in long running soaps such as Coronation street and Waterloo Road, as well as in acclaimed theatrical productions. Welsh became a regular panelist on ITV's flagship panel chat show, Loose Women. She won Celebrity Big Brother in 2012 and after speaking openly about her own experiences with depression and addiction, is also open a mental health ambassador. She's been married three times, has two sons, one of whom is Mattie Healy, the frontman of the 1975, and is now with the contemporary artist Lincoln Townley, whom she credits with helping her get sober. But this potted biography can only go so far because there's something else about Denise too, something more intangible. It's a warmth and an ability to voice what many of us are thinking, combined with a sense of having seen it all before but never having lost her joy or sparkle. It's the knowledge that she's lived through hard times but kept her fabulousness intact. It is, in short, that she's a total Hun, as one interviewer put it, the grande dame of Hun culture. Some people won't be outspoken about something because they're so terrified. Welsh says if I think I'm right about something, I don't care what people think of me. Denise Welsh, welcome to how to Fail. Thank you.
- [03:58]
A
You are so good at those introductions. You're the queen of the introduction. Thank you.
- [04:03]
B
Thank you for being here. I wanted to ask if you have always been like that. You've always been someone who, if you think what you're saying is right, you don't mind what other people think of you.
- [04:14]
A
It's funny, Elizabeth, because I'm actually the world's worst people pleaser.
- [04:19]
B
Okay.
- [04:20]
A
In my real everyday life, but on television with the forum like Loose Women, I am not scared of cancel culture. Yeah. If I am really committed to what I think, you know, on a panel of women who say to throw an example in the air is my sort of Harry and Meghan fervor. You know, I've always flown the flag for them. Pretty much exclusively me on that panel. I don't care what Doris from Darlington on X thinks. They are my beliefs and how I feel and I'm not bothered about being in the minority.
- [04:56]
B
Talk to me about being a Hun because when I was trying to describe it in the introduction, it's hard, isn't it? It is very, very hard to do. It is this esoteric quality. Do you like being called a Hun?
- [05:07]
A
I do. I embrace it. I have to. Because when you are featured on the Instagram page, love of Huns iconic and Katy Perry likes it. Who doesn't even know you. You think? Right. Okay. This is quite cool to be a Hun. Recently I'm jumping ahead, but recently I was overjoyed to be at Charli XCX and Georgia's wedding. And that elevates your Hun status through the absolute loose. Yes.
- [05:35]
B
She's the supreme leader of Hans in many ways.
- [05:37]
A
Charlie XX supreme leader. And of course it was hilarious at the wedding because I was, you know, taking photos with lots of the guests and things and then, you know, when we were allowed, I'd put them on Instagram and people are going, oh my God, have you seen who she's in the photo with? And I didn't have an absolute clue with these young people.
- [05:57]
B
Was it an amazing wedding?
- [05:58]
A
It was one of the nicest weddings that I've ever been to. It was in Sicily. And considering that everywhere my husband Lincoln and I have gone this year we've taken the left the heat wave here and taken the abroad. It was a beautiful three day event in a gorgeous place. And considering there was the cool of coolness of people there, it was the most unpretentious, lovely wedding. But then that's kind of down to Charlie and George. You know, I've known George since he was 12. Cause he's Mattie's best friend.
- [06:30]
B
I read this thing that you said about the 1975 that they used to rehearse in your house and you couldn't wait to be rid of them. To be rid of them. And now you crave them coming back.
- [06:40]
A
Well, that's it. I mean they. Mattie started the band at high school. He was at Wilmslow High School, which is in Cheshire. And so we'd moved down from the northeast. I used to live in London. We moved back to the northeast when I was pregnant. Then everything went tits up. That which I'm sure we'll. We'll cover and. And then Coronation street took me to Cheshire. And so when they were about 12, Mattie started the band and we had these kind of garages and sort of outbuildings and they were. So for years we had. I'd wake up in the morning and I'd be stepping over bodies and Matt would go, oh Mum, this is. This is Airship. Who were another band, you know. So I'd step over Airship to go to work. This is you and me at 6 or something. And I'd step over you and me at 6. And they started there, they would eat there. What was lovely was that because that was the hub of their band rehearsals, even though it was years before anything happened, they would. All the girlfriends came there, whereas often with boys, the boys go to the girlfriend's house and without having a daughter, it was quite nice. And then, of course, Louis, there's 12 years between my boys, same dad, 12 years in between. And then, of course, they've got this little toddler who's trying to knock on and standing longingly outside the rehearsal room, wanting to be in the band. And then when they were about 22, 23, chocolate, one of their signature songs and one of the first songs Mattie and George wrote, took off and there was no, oh, you're going to university. You know, we know a year in advance what's going to happen. They were just gone. And they were gone internationally. And then that was tough. Obviously, I had. I had a little one as well, so that kind of filled the gap, but it was. It was hard because I knew that life would never be the same. They're not going to come back at weekends and have their washing done. Well, it wouldn't have got done, but in principle, they would have brought it back.
- [08:50]
B
Is it emotional when you see him on stage? Yeah, I can't even imagine as a mother.
- [08:54]
A
No, it is like. It's very emotional and obviously I'm hugely proud. It comes, Elizabeth, with, if I'm perfectly honest, along with the emotion. It comes with a lot of Gls, I call it, which is guest list stress. So I always am the person responsible for the guest list, even though I try not to be. And you go somewhere like the O2 and you're trying to just, you know, you're in the box or the area, wherever you are, and you're just looking forward to it. And then somebody, several people call, Hello, Yeah, hi, We're at the O2. Where do we park? I don't run. Am I allowed to swear on this?
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B
Yes, you are.
- [09:37]
A
I don't own O2, you know. Hi, we're at door B, but they're saying door A and Sue's got the gold band, but I've only got the. I've only got the silver. There is that. But, yes, of course, it's very emotional. And Sometimes when there's 20,000 people again at the O2, for example, I want to scream, you're all here because of me. Yes. 42 hours of labor pushing him out. Thank you. Yeah, thank you.
- [10:10]
B
It's the adulation you deserve.
- [10:12]
A
Absolutely. It's incredible. I mean, I used to scream at them to shut up with the songs. And now when they sing them, I'm thinking, that's my pension. Yeah. Sing out, Louise.
- [10:27]
B
Your first failure. I've kind of switched around the order a bit. So, Denise, you did this incredibly generous thing. You gave me four where you were only required to give me three, but they're all brilliant, so I'm going to do them all. Your first failure is that you failed to become a domestic goddess. Did you want to be a domestic goddess?
- [10:44]
A
My probably level of what is a domestic goddess is probably just maybe cleaning the kitchen and wiping the benches down. But seriously, I look at some people who are the same age as me, younger than me, similar sort of lifestyle, and they'll show what they've done for a dinner party. And they've got the napkins and they've got the center thing down the middle of the table, and they've got the lighting and they've gone and got the plant and the flowers and the cutlery and everything. I just can't do it, Elizabeth. I just don't feel like I've grown up enough to have that kind of dinner party.
- [11:21]
B
Yeah.
- [11:22]
A
Like, I still sometimes am driving along and I want to go, God, I've actually passed my driving test and I'm driving.
- [11:29]
B
I've never heard anything so relatable. When I have people in the car with me, I'm like, I can't believe that I'm being someone who's responsible.
- [11:37]
A
I know I'm 67 years old and I'm driving along thinking, my God, I'm driving. I've actually passed my test. And I get that with the sort of domestic goddessness. I am busy in my work, but. But naturally, I'm incredibly lazy. I'm what Lincoln calls a sloth. So my blanket that I have on me on the sofa is my sloth blanket. Cause he said I look like. Remember that, Neil? The sloth from those furniture adverts?
- [12:04]
C
Yeah.
- [12:05]
A
I can sloth out for nine hours at a time and possibly not even go to the toilet. And if I had a bedpan, I probably wouldn't go for another nine hours.
- [12:16]
B
Never say never.
- [12:17]
A
Yeah, never say never. But I just feel I. I failed at. I failed at the cooking dinners. I did cook for my children because they're alive. But how people do chicken wrapped in something stuffed with this. And it's just. It might be adhd. I don't know what it is.
- [12:36]
B
I find this so interesting, given your age. You're 67. Is that right?
- [12:43]
A
Yeah.
- [12:43]
B
You look fabulous.
- [12:44]
A
Thank you.
- [12:45]
B
For an entire breakdown of the skincare regime.
- [12:47]
C
But.
- [12:47]
B
But there's something very interesting about that age group and when you grew up, the kind of socially conditioned role that women were allowed to have and maybe your mum had and the pressure of that. And I think there's something quite radical about your refusal to do that.
- [13:08]
A
Well, my mum, she wasn't the best cook in the world, but she didn't really do guilt to my mum if she felt she was right about something. Wow. Whereas I have been plagued with it all of my life.
- [13:20]
B
And in spite of her Irish Catholic background.
- [13:23]
A
No, she didn't. No, she didn't conform to any. She didn't conform to any of that. She was quite a rebel, my mum, really.
- [13:28]
B
Yeah. So you had this sort of strong female role model.
- [13:31]
A
Yeah, absolutely.
- [13:32]
B
I'm interested in how much this domestic goddessry, or lack of, played into your relationships and your marriages. I read this beautiful thing that you said, and I could not agree more, that you and Tim, Matty and Louis.
- [13:48]
A
Dad. Yeah, that I'm still friends with.
- [13:49]
B
That you're still friends with. You don't regard your marriage as a failure because you had 20 plus years of a married life and these two wonderful sons. So just because it ends doesn't make it a failure.
- [13:59]
A
Yeah, I kind of refuse to think of it as a failure because it would have been an obvious one to. I had a first marriage, which was. It was a first marriage and it didn't work out and thankfully there were no children around. And, you know, my marriage to Tim, as you just said, was 24 years. Should we have possibly split up earlier? Maybe. But we did what we thought was best. Like people, do you stay for the kids? Da ba da ba da. And I refuse to think of it as a failure because we have two wonderful children that came out of that. He was a wonderful man in many ways, especially with living with someone with mental illness like I've had for 36 years. I think that's another reason why people who are poorly stay, because you think maybe no one else will ever understand your illness. And we have maintained a friendship. Of course, there was a. When it ends. There was a lot of bumps in the road. We didn't go straight from ending a marriage to being really good friends. But we are now. You know, Tim and his wife Jo, myself and Lincoln, we. We all Christmas together, you know, even though the kids are grown. I remember once, a few years ago, I think probably Lincoln had said to Louis, oh, make your mum something nice for her birthday. And Louis had kind of done this notepad and put some Photos in and whatever. And he'd put a picture of me and dad, his dad. And he put. Oh, catches me. That he put, thank you for still loving this man. Wow. And I just realized that the fact that I do still means such a lot to my children, even though they're grown and asking them, they probably think, yeah, we're glad that you are both happy now in marriages that suit you. More now.
- [15:49]
B
Beautiful. I want to talk more about Lincoln later on, but before we move on to your second failure, because it's a big one and I want to give it the respect of enough time. Talk to us about your adhd, because you mentioned it in passing there, but it's quite a recent diagnosis.
- [16:04]
A
It is. It's only about. It's about three and a half years, I would say something like that. And the diagnosis came about because Nadia Sawala, one of my friends and colleagues on Loose Women, suspected that she was very ADHD and that her daughters were. So she spoke to our producer, Sally, whose husband, Henry Shelford, is very high up in the ADHD world. I'm thinking of being tested. Sally said, if we get you tested, would you be happy to be filmed and we'll use it as a piece? Yes, absolutely. Whatever the result. When they mentioned this to ADHD360, this company, and said, you know, we have about 20 loose women altogether. Some work on the show more than others, but across the board, probably about 20. And one of our girls suspects that she has ADHD. And they said, is it Denise Welsh? And I said, what the. And the other women went, oh, come on, Den. Oh, come on. Like that.
- [17:05]
B
Is it Denise Welsh?
- [17:06]
A
So I thought, well, okay, you're offering me a test, I might as well have one. But to me, depression had always been my illness. I'd never considered that anything else was there. And I thought, well, if it's just that I interrupt a lot sometimes, girls, that's cause you're boring me. You know, I'm not gonna have tablets because I interrupt a lot. Or maybe I sort of go off on a tangent thinking that that's be what it was. So I did the. The whole thing. And needless to say, I was diagnosed adhd. And it's only now on my second attempt at medication, which came after a breakdown last year, first in five years, that I've realized how I had completely underestimated the impact of ADHD on me, running parallel with my depression. And if maybe I had shown signs before I had Matthew, if maybe there was more money spent on women's health they would find a huge link between ADHD and postnatal depression, severe postnatal depression. So I can't be resentful about it, thinking, oh my God, do you think there is medication that I could have had? But all I know now is that. And again I keep jumping the gun cause it all sort of merges into one life. But my cocaine dependency was not till my late 30s. Now I always think if I was going to be a person that was into dabbling in drugs, I would have done it in my 20s when everybody else was doing it, I was vehemently against it. I had no desire to have anything more than have a drink on a Friday, Saturday night with my friends. That was me. But my desperation to lift this immovable depression led me to what will do it. That will right when I've been depressed subsequently in the last four years and I have taken my ADHD tablet, it has the same effect, but not the I'm going to drink and smoke effect.
- [19:23]
B
I so appreciate the way in which you speak about this with such honesty and openness and generosity because people listening to this will feel so seen and held in your words. It is incredibly powerful. And I don't for one minute underestimate how much that takes. And so I just want to thank you for that.
- [19:41]
A
Thank you. I can't really honestly talk about my history of depression and trying to get well without mentioning that that was a part of. Well, it was a part of me thinking it was going to help my recovery and then me on a dark road. Ford BlueCruise Hands Free highway driving takes the work out of being behind the wheel, allowing you to relax and reconnect while also staying in control. Enjoy the drive in blue Cruise enabled vehicles like the F150 Explorer and Mustang Mach E Available feature on equipped vehicles. Terms apply. Does not replace safe driving. See Ford.com BlueCruise for more details. This episode is brought to you by State Farm. Listening to this podcast Smart move. Being financially savvy Smart move. Another smart move having State Farm help you create a competitive price when you choose to bundle home and auto bundling. Just another way to save with a personal price plan like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Prices are based on rating plans that vary by state. Coverage options are selected by the customer. Availability, amount of discounts and savings and eligibility vary by state.
- [20:58]
B
It leads us onto your second self stated failure, which is that you say you failed at getting sober for your kids.
- [21:05]
A
Earlier my kids would say to me but you're sober now, mum. And have been for 13 years. And I am so grateful that I found the strength and found my husband, Lincoln, and we did it together. Cause we were both in a very dark place for different reasons. And Also, we were 15 years apart. I'm 15 years older than him, you know, so I was in my late 30s when I was doing Coronation Street. And it was an incredible job. You've got to remember, it was the job that everybody wanted. And I was very lucky to be there in the iconic days, you know, when Vera and Jack were still there. I just bumped into Bill Roach the other day and Mike Baldwin and Barbara Knox and Betty Driver and Phyllis. You know, it was the proper Corrie era. But it was incredible, incredibly hard work. And I think coping with an intermittent illness, coping with a job that you couldn't just ring up and say, I can't come in. I mean, I was used to that in theater. But in Coronation street, you're working seven in the morning till seven at night. And bearing in mind in those days there was 21 million people watching an episode. You couldn't go anywhere. You were more famous than anybody. You could put any American movie star in the same supermarket as you and you'd be the one that was mobbed. That's a third of the country watching you four times a week. And you're making the equivalent of two movies, you know, in a week. Because you know how long a movie takes. And it was very hard work. And now having an actual, what we used to call a nervous breakdown, I would have been kinder to myself, but I didn't. And you think, well, if I'd had a horrendous kidney condition, if I'd had a horrendous heart condition, I would have been removed and nobody would have died. But because then, and I hope that I've played a role in changing the landscape of how we talk about it. I was one of the few people talking about it. And remember, we only had four television channels. There was, you know, there was no. I think sky was just starting. We had no social media and all of this type of way. And I would go on Lorraine. And I remember doing Lorraine from down the line at Coronation street on the cobbles, and talking about the horror of hospitalized postnatal depression. And I remember Lorraine, who I see on a weekly basis now, saying to me, we've never had as much response in any of the get up and give appeals that we've done over the years, which is always about a physical condition than we have had with you talking about mental Illness, because it was still a stigma. In some areas it still is, which is ridiculous. And I remember being sort of berated because I'd said once, I wish that. Well, they'd taken the nub of the quote and not continued it. I said, I wish that everybody in the world could experience clinical depression for 15 seconds. 15 seconds, and then it would go and never darken their door again. So that nobody would ever say, well, what have you got to be depressed about? You know, the difference between the illness and how we all. It's like we use ocd. Oh, I'm so ocd. No, you're not. People go, I know I had postnatal depression for a week after. No, you didn't. You had the baby blues. And that's all. That's all also horrible. I'm not taking that away. But with someone like me, it started after Mattie. And never. When people say, how long did your postnatal depression last? I say, well, 30, 36 years.
- [25:04]
B
Can you tell us a little bit about that experience of postpartum psychosis?
- [25:10]
A
I can. I was on the verge of postnatal depression and postpartum psychosis, so I was in and out of lucidity. I had a wonderful pregnancy. I'll try and pray to you this. So I had an incredible pregnancy. Those ones where people say, the blooming woman in pregnancy. My skin was fabulous, my hair was great. I loved being pregnant. I loved every day of being pregnant. I had a husband, we had some money in the bank. We weren't worrying about the financial aspect of having a kid. My husband was a successful actor. I knew I was in a position that if I wanted to continue work as an actress, I could. We were having a much wanted child and skippity do. And even when I was overdue, I still was thinking, oh, I love being pregnant, love being pregnant. So I was the little. Anybody ever mentioned about postnatal depression? Didn't cross my mind. So I had my baby privately. Tim was a bit of a, I say this with love, a champagne socialist. So he was a bit begrudging. But the hospital I was allocated, National Health, was just. It was a disaster. And I had him in, what I didn't know at the time was a natural childbirth hospital. I'd just gone because someone said, it's a great private hospital. So I went there and in one of the classes, they were talking about this natural childbirth. And I remember saying, yeah, obviously, if it's agony, you will give us some pain relief, won't you? And they said, oh, Mrs. Healy as I was then, Mrs. Healy. It's not the Victorian times, of course, of course. We will fast forward to Hit me over the head with a spiked fucking mallet. No pain relief. So. And Matthew, true to form, was, you know, in there listening to the radio, having a fag, thinking, I'm not hurrying, there's no rush on here. 42 hours later, natural childbirth. Not gas and air, nothing. Out he came. It was wonderful. It was just wonderful. He was the first boy. My dad was so thrown because he thought he'd have a girl, I'd have a girl. And it was all fantastic. And they said I was the most unanxious mum in the hospital. There's only probably about six other moms in there. I didn't pull the anxiety cord, nothing. Feeding him, wanted to try breastfeeding, wasn't fixated on it. My mum had been amazing. If it doesn't work, love, don't let them pressure you, you know, bottle fed, babies will be fine. So she was fantastic and got him home. And this was on the Wednesday, so I had him on the Saturday, got him home on the Wednesday, and I opened all the cards that had arrived and I dissolved into this emotional state of hormonal chaos. And I was aware that I had the baby blues, so it didn't frighten me, it was just. I couldn't open a card without crying and looking at this child and feeling this wave of huge responsibility. But I was all right, right? Two days later, my mum and dad arrived from the Northeast. And it was a moment that I had dreamt of for years. I can remember feeling devoid of feeling something I'd never felt before. Not depression, just a very void feeling that when my mum was saying, oh, my God, you know, I knew I'd love my grandchild, but I was unprepared for this overwhelming love I feel for him. I couldn't cry, I couldn't feel anything. And I went to bed that night and I had the first panic attack that I'd ever had. I wasn't thinking panic, I wasn't anxious. I just woke with the only thing I can. The sort of analogy is that you're driving along in your car and a lorry cuts you up and you think you're gonna die and. And you pull over to the lay by and you stop and your heart is racing like it's going to come out your chest, but the danger passes and eventually you calm down. It was like that, but never the danger passing. And I'd gone to bed with huge breastfeeding Bazookas. And after the panic attack, so I'm talking just hours, I had no milk and I had spaniel's ears, boobs, to put no finer point on it. I'd lost all the milk. And this community midwife came round who I'd never had before, and she was bloody awful, Elizabeth, if I'm honest with you, and I'm a huge respecter of the NHS and wonderful people in that organization. And I said. And she went, oh, that is not normal. She said that. Really. I've only ever seen that happen if a spouse dies or a parent dies, or indeed if the child dies. You're gonna have to go out and get some bottles. That's really not it now. Now, the flag that would be waving in front of them would be hormonal. This is a hormonal disaster. Something has gone seriously wrong in this woman's hormones. Obviously, there is a chemical chaos, you know, when your hormones are righting themselves. But nobody knew anything. Tim went out and they got the bottles and they brought them back. And there was the Milton with the bottles in at the top. And we had this long kitchen. And to this day, if I smell the perfume that my mum wore, because she came down for three days and had to take leave of work as a psychiatric nurse, she had to take leave of work to look after me. And if I smell the perfume that she was wearing, which was Yvoir de Balmain, it will. Or if I smell Milton in someone's house. So that was maybe the Thursday, Friday. On the Saturday, Mum said, let's take him out for a walk. And I wasn't depressed, I just was odd. And we went for a walk in Crouch End in London, and I'd lived there for 10 years, so it was somewhere I knew very, very well. And on the way back from this coffee, we went into a corner shop to get some milk. And on the radio it was announcing the horrible Hillsborough disaster, April 15, 1989. And I came out the shop and I remember saying to Mum, there's been this awful disaster. 96 people have been crushed and died. It's terrible. And we got half a mile home and Mum asked me a question about it, and I remember saying, that was a dream. And she said, no, no, sweetheart, you just told. And I said, oh, my God, why are you trying to make me go mad? That was a dream. I dreamt it. And my mum thought, oh, okay, this is not good. We got in the house and my mum said that she walked out of the bedroom and I was on the Windowsill, trying to open the window. Now, the press picked that up, as if I was trying to take my own life. I wasn't. I didn't know where I was or what I was doing. So there was no conscious decision to do that. And I then just spent three months pretty much in the corner of a sofa wanting someone to give me an injection. And my mum was so brilliant and she knew that keeping the contact with my child was really important. So every four hours she would make me walk to the bottles, make the bottle, which was like she'd said, go and climb Everest. And I would make the bottle and I would feed him. And I had no bad feelings towards this child. I just had, why have I got this child? And then the blackness started and it was like it started from my feet and rolled up like a blanket. And it meant that the depression was so thick, it was, it was so thick that I couldn't move my hands or my mouth. And so when you then have an illness where people say, you've got to snap out of it, you know, you've got a beautiful baby who's healthy, you've got an amazing family, people have got no idea, you know. So all I've tried to do in my kind of mental health advocacy role, unelected, but, you know, that's what I felt I should do, is just try and explain to people that this is an illness which is as serious as any other illness. You just can't, you just can't see it. And there's not enough, there's not enough help for women who are going through that because not everybody is lucky enough to have the family that I had. So when I read a headline about someone who has recently had children and they've taken their own life, I completely understand it. And these headlines are, how selfish, how utterly selfish. No, it's not fucking selfish, it's desperate because you think that you are just a drain on everybody else's life is how you feel. And that, of course, led to the rocky road of self medication, which when you are so desperate, you would do anything. If someone said to me, and again, you'll get the flak going, that's so disrespectful to people who've had to have that done. If someone said to me, you need to lose a limb, and if you do, you will never have depression again, I would have offered both arms like that, to be honest, I still would. You would never say to a person, so say, for example, when my mum had cancer, she lived so brilliantly and courageously with cancer for 20 years. And most of that time she didn't look poorly. You wouldn't say to my mum, annie, we know you've got cancer, but you've been in bed for what, a month now. Get up, get some trainers on, show everybody that you've got a bit more about you and get on with you. Wouldn't say that to somebody, but I would have that said to me every single week of life, you know, but. But I will add that living with a mental illness, the times in between and how I've managed it with help, I still consider that I've had a wonderful, a wonderful life and I still do have huge lengths of time of great joy. Great joy for me is feeling normal. It's not being frightened of the mornings. Because with a depressive, you are frightened of the mornings a lot of the time because you have no idea what the morning's gonna bring. So when I wake up and it's about 11 o' clock before I think, oh, I'm all right, that's a really good day.
- [36:10]
B
I'm so moved by how you've expressed all of that and I'm so in awe of your courage.
- [36:17]
A
Aww.
- [36:18]
B
I really am. Thank you so much for sharing that and for me.
- [36:22]
A
Well, I wanted to do this show, to do it.
- [36:27]
B
I'm deeply honored. Thank you.
- [36:32]
A
Every story you love, every invention that moves you, every idea you wished was yours. All began as nothing. Just a blank page with a blinking cursor asking a simple question. What do you see? Great ideas. Start on Mac. Find out more on apple.com Mac when did making plans get this complicated? It's time to streamline with WhatsApp, the secure messaging app that brings the whole group together. Use polls to settle dinner plans, send event invites and pin messages so no one forgets mom's 60th. And never miss a meme or milestone. All protected with end to end encryption. It's time for WhatsApp message privately with everyone.
- [37:28]
B
Learn more@WhatsApp.com I wonder if I could ask you about one of my favorite songs from the 1975.
- [37:38]
A
Yeah.
- [37:39]
B
Called she lays Down.
- [37:40]
A
Yes.
- [37:41]
B
Which Mattie wrote about this period of your life.
- [37:45]
A
Yeah.
- [37:46]
B
And there are some lyrics in that song that take your breath away every time you hear them. But I wonder what it's like for you listening to it. So, lyrics like she'd like to love her child. Lyrics like she's appalled by not loving me at all. She wears a frown and dressing gown when she lays down. And in the End she chose cocaine, but it couldn't fix her brain. How does that feel, listening to that song?
- [38:12]
A
I. He didn't tell me that he was writing it. And because he probably knows that I would have said, what you gonna say? What are you gonna say? Why did you say that? You know, because when you've got a child who's a as well, I would be like this outside his door when he was playing guitar in his teens, thinking, oh, my God, is he going to sing about his scarred childhood? Let me have a listen. And it wasn't until it came out. And in fact, the first time I heard it, I saw. I rely on social media to know sometimes where my children are, you know, like, where, where is he now when he's on tour or he's in Denver. And I remember my. My Twitter feed going wild at some point. It said that Mattie had burst into tears on stage and found it hard to continue. So of course my heart goes like that. And it was. He'd sang she lays down about my depression. So the she lays down is because when he was old enough, obviously when they were children, when he was a child, Mummy would just be in bed, not well, and Daddy would protect them from that. They didn't need to, didn't want to understand mental illness as much as they did when they were older. But when both of them subsequently were at an age when they could understand, I would explain to Matthew that I would lie down next to him and pray to be able to love my child with the love that I had felt when I had him. Cause it wasn't that I wished any harm on him or had any negative feelings towards him like some poor women do. I just couldn't feel anything. And I think the thing with depression is that people don't understand. It's always described so wrongly in everything I read about it as extreme sadness. It couldn't be further from the truth. Elizabeth Extreme sadness is what I felt when my mom and dad died. It's what you feel when something makes you extremely sad. Depression is the inability to feel extreme sadness. You can't feel happiness, sadness, nothing. It depresses everything about your life. So if someone knocked at the door and said, you've won 18 million on the lottery or whatever, or your whole family have been wiped out in an aircraft disaster, nothing. And that's when you read the tragic headlines. And so I said, I used to lie down. And he said, and I told him again years later, when he was a grown up, when he was a tot, like eight one year to 18 months. His dad was doing a series in Australia called Boys from the Bush and I felt so awful, so I flew to Australia and surprised Tim. And I got so poorly the night before I went. And I remember thinking on the plane, I just wish it would go down. When these quotes are taken out of context, you can see how I've been plagued with, you know, press that have taken stuff out of context. It's because you will do anything to stop the pain. And you think if it's taken out of my hands because I won't be able to be, you know, all of this. But, you know, Mattie has had his own. I don't really try not to talk too much about my kids because apart from that, I love them and I'm so proud of them because it's not fair. But I think I can say, you know, Matthew has had his own dealings with the. With a tendency to the dark side. And if you listen to the lyrics of his songs, you can hear that. So that is his version of what I told him when he was older.
- [41:46]
B
I wanted to ask you because we started off talking about.
- [41:50]
A
I was gonna say about the failing to get sober quicker. I think my drinking and using. Not so much with Louis, because Louis was nine when Lincoln and I got sober. He's never ever seen Lincoln have a drink. He doesn't remember Mum having a drink. And I'd also like to point out to the viewers and listeners that I wasn't the kind of alcoholic that woke up in the morning and pretended to get the fruit juice out and was doing this with a vodka bottle from under the sofa. If I drank in the morning, that was because I was still drinking from the night before and I was still holding down a job. I don't believe there is such a thing as a functioning alcoholic, because you physically going to work, but you're functioning on about 10% of your capability. But was I staggering around the West End during the day, living on the streets? No, I wasn't. I was also going home and bringing up, you know, two children. But I wish that I could have found the strength to not rely on those things earlier, but I couldn't. And it was like I was living two separate lives. I was at home in the Northeast at this point, where the family home was, and then I would be in London and I'd be away, and obviously I'd always made sure that everything was sorted and looked after. But then many years later, when. When Mattie would tell me something that had impacted him from my Drinking days. I would get incredibly defensive and it would be like, oh, you know, oh, yes, what a terrible childhood. Oh, yes. We just let you all be in the garage. We paid for everything. We bought you the first van, da, da da defense because I couldn't bear it. And then I had to have a real. In an irreligious, come to Jesus talk with myself. And to think my behaviors did impact on him. Of course they fucking did. So grow up and accept that you're not, you know, there's no way ever that either of my children have ever done the old, you know, we're scarred because of you or whatever. But obviously, if your mum is. And the household was crazy, what Matthew's also said before is, but if you hadn't been a bit rock and roll, I wouldn't be the person that I was. So there is balance to that, to the, you know, what Louis might say, considerably boring household, you know, with the most exciting thing was having, you know, two crumpets as opposed to one, which is how my nighttimes are now.
- [44:41]
B
That is pretty exciting.
- [44:42]
A
It is pretty exciting. Especially with loads of butterns.
- [44:45]
B
Delicious thick slices. Agenda.
- [44:47]
A
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Whenever I have shame. Shame and guilt are very different. I think guilt is something that we nearly all suffer. And as a mum, Mum, guilt comes with the package. Shame is something that you really, really. That I really struggle with. I will get a wave of something, a memory of something, because it's like I don't know the person that I was now that I'm 13 years sober. The things that I would have done differently, the decisions I've made, but what people say and what my kids. But, Mum, you have given us the ability to fly because you are sober now and we know that you are safe and we know that you and Lincoln are safe together. So I do have to stop beating myself up about it. But I can't help but say I still wish that, that, that I had. But then again, if I had, it wouldn't have been because of Lincoln and I wouldn't have met the person that is maybe the happiest I've ever been.
- [45:44]
B
Let's talk about Lincoln. Because it is extraordinary how the two of you met at a certain point in each other's lives and got sober for each other.
- [45:54]
C
Yeah.
- [45:55]
B
What was the moment where you thought, oh, I have to do this now?
- [45:59]
A
Well, him first. I gave him an ultimatum first. So we'd got together at a nightclub. We were both. We didn't go, hi, I'm Denise, I'm an alcoholic. It didn't start like that. I was a party animal. He was a party animal. Lincoln is now an internationally successful contemporary artist, as you kindly said in the introduction. But when I met him, he was the PR and marketing manager of Stringfellows. So he was living an incredible nocturnal life. And so we. My marriage was over. Tim and I had both decided that it was mutually. But the press didn't know that it was. I was hacked for many, many, many years in quite a well known hacking case where they put bugs in my hotel room as well as just hac. I was really, really targeted. And at the time, when you don't know, you don't trust anybody because you had no idea that you were being hacked. And so it was a very, very hard time for me that every single thing I did was out there in the papers. So when the press discovered we'd broken up, I was kind of forced, not by Loose Women, but by my hand, was forced to announce publicly that we'd broken up when I wasn't ready to really. And of course I was the flippity jibbet and I was the one having the affair and everything. Cause that's the narrative they wanted and. And I just had to suck it up, I suppose. And then we realized that we were getting very, very fond of each other. And the one time that we argued that was ruining everything was when we drank. And I saw a side of him one night that I didn't like. Not a physical side or anything, but a side that I didn't like. And I gave him an ultimatum and he gave up drinking the next day. He was so frightened of losing me. And I was doing a tour of Steel Magnolias, the wonderful play with Sherry Lungi and Isla Blair. And I didn't think therefore that I had as much of a problem because I could only have a couple of beers after the show and blah, blah, blah. Anyway, fast forward to this one night and I woke up the next morning and I had no recollection of the night before. I was on the front of the Evening Standard, screaming and shouting in the street. And Lincoln said, I'm going to come and pick you up from work tonight and I don't want you to say anything, I just want to talk. Let me do the talking. And he picked me up at Richmond Theatre, drove me all the way back to his little diddy flat in Kensington he had at the time. And basically he said, it's going to be so hard for me because I don't know who you're going to be when you Walk in the door. And I just thought, I can't do that to him. I'm going to lose him. And that was April 18, 13 years ago. Not very good at maths and I've never had a drink since.
- [48:59]
B
That's not a sherry trifle, you know. I'm so proud of you. Congratulations.
- [49:04]
A
Thank you.
- [49:05]
B
One of the extra failures you gave me was a failure to have any spirituality or belief in higher power. And my understanding of the AA 12 STEP program is absolutely that you have to have that belief.
- [49:17]
A
That's why it wasn't for me, but it is for lots of people.
- [49:20]
B
And that's what's so interesting to me. So you didn't. You just got yourselves through it?
- [49:24]
A
Yeah. And apparently, according to a therapist, and I've been in and out of therapy, it's not a great staple of of mine. I'll pick it up when I need it, but if I've got my meds right, I'm okay. But apparently we are in about 3% of the world that as a couple have managed to do what we did. Because what you need is to maintain sobriety as an anchor. And to a lot of people, AA is a wonderful, necessary, important anchor to us. Each other is our anchorage. And also a higher power is very important to a lot of people. And I'm very respectful of that. To me, no. Higher power stopped me drinking. Willpower stopped me drinking.
- [50:07]
B
Is there anything that you miss about it?
- [50:10]
A
About drinking?
- [50:11]
B
Yeah.
- [50:11]
A
Not one thing. Because I know where it takes me. Do I wish that I was the kind of person that could have two or three glasses of champagne and get a bit giddy with my girlfriends on a Friday night? Yes. But I couldn't, not in a million years could I do that. And to be honest, there's a few people who say to me I've stepped off the wagon and I can have. Doesn't usually last very long. And that's not saying that some people can't. But to me, nothing is worth it. Nothing is worth it because what we have in our marriage is so incredible. I am. My marriage is the bedrock of my life. If my marriage is good, everything else works for me. Giving up alcohol didn't cure my depression, but it stopped compounding it. So that's what I would do. I would drink and use to momentarily, for a few hours, take the pain away, block out, behave immorally. You know, cocaine is the worst drug you can take. It lies to you. It's the most vile, disgusting thing that you can ever do. But it used to Lift me out of a depression temporarily, you know, crazy. I would not be having what I like to call. I'm pinching. What Pamela Anderson said on here or what you said about her second act as an actress. Now I'm having. I'm creating a second act for myself. And none of that would have happened were it not for my sobriety. Your teen adjective used to describe an individual whose spirit is unyielding, unconstrained. One who navigates life on their own terms, effortlessly. They do not always show up on time, but when they arrive, you notice an individual confident in their contradictions. They know the rules, but behave, behave as if they do not exist. The new fragrance by Miu Miu, defined by you.
- [52:22]
C
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- [52:48]
A
At the Home Depot.
- [52:52]
B
I'm so glad that you found each other and that you found each other's sobriety.
- [52:57]
A
Yeah.
- [52:58]
B
And I'm so thrilled about your second act as an actor. Which brings us onto your final failure because you said to me that you failed to play a lead role in a bonnet drama. But I. So I want to get back to that. But we've just heard that you are returning to Waterloo Road, which is very exciting.
- [53:18]
A
Well, it's 15 years ago since I did Waterloo Road and the creator. Yes.
- [53:23]
B
It's gonna be the first time that you're doing it, so.
- [53:25]
A
Yes.
- [53:25]
B
That's amazing.
- [53:26]
A
Yes, yes. I mean, God, I have to say, you know, the young kids in it now. Cause Jason Merrills is back as well. And the young kids in it now. Go tell us what it was like when you were in it. And we say no, it was just very different. It was very, very different. You know, even those who didn't have an alcohol problem. We were a party. Things have changed in this world, haven't they? We were a party crowd. But I loved the character of Steph and I helped create her because I was there, you know, from the very beginning. And so when they did ask me to go back, and this was just last year, they asked me to go back initially to do one. And I will say to Cameron, the wonderful exec producer who's had, you know, brought the show back. And it's amazing only if Stephen can maintain the DNA of Steph, because we now live in a world where Steph could not get away on the BBC with doing some of the things she did 15 years ago. But at the same time, I don't want to dilute her down. And then people lose the memory of the iconic character that she was. They pushed the boundaries a little bit. Cause I wanted her to be a sexually active woman in her 60s. Not that you have to see that, but I wanted it registered that because she wasn't still married, that don't worry about Steph, everybody. She might be in her mid-60s, but she's still cracking on and having a good time. And I've just done a fabulous episode of Russell T. Davis new series Tiptoe with Alan Cumming and David Morrissey. I'm doing an episode of Death in Benidorm, this new sort of crime drama out in Benidorm. And I'm just loving a return to my acting world and what I do, what I do best. I love Loose Women. There will always be a place for me there. But I just now want to remind people that I'm a bloody good actress. Elizabeth. Ah, Denise. It's the one thing I say that I'm good at. Yeah.
- [55:28]
B
And actually the bonnet drama of it all. Do you think that you have been historically underestimated for various reasons?
- [55:36]
A
Because I think I do. And I think that I didn't help derailing in derailing it, but I had a very unfair disadvantage of the way that I was targeted. So it derailed my reputation in the public, I think, as well. I also had people who were meant to be looking after my career who were actually derailing it themselves. I thought that they were spotting the metaphorical car crash, rescuing me from it in a crisis management way and making money from it. Only many years later did I discover that the people had been creating the car crash in a horrible management situation. Selling stories on.
- [56:15]
B
That's so awful. How do you trust anyone?
- [56:18]
A
Well, that was a very, you know, difficult time. But this is why now. I think, okay, I'm just going to. It's not like the script bus comes along and chucks scripts under my door. You know, I'm gonna decide that I'm doing this, but my agent and I worked on a strategy and it's proving, you know, that there are still people that want me to work as an actress. I'm glad that I'm having my turn again.
- [56:48]
B
We are too. You belong there.
- [56:49]
A
Thank you.
- [56:50]
B
My final question. It's a very, very, very serious one. We started off talking about the Sweet Factory.
- [56:55]
A
Yes. Welsh's toffees.
- [56:56]
B
Welsh's toffees.
- [56:57]
A
Okay.
- [56:58]
B
If you were a suite, it can be any suite in the world. It doesn't have to be one made by Welsh's. What suite do you think you.
- [57:06]
A
Oh, my God.
- [57:07]
B
Soaked off, Sorry.
- [57:09]
A
I think I would be an Opal Fruit, which is now, to the young people, called a Starburst, because the old thing used to be made to make your mouth water. And I think I can still make some mouths water, even in my old dotage. Denise, what a fabulous note to end on.
- [57:29]
B
You make my mouth water. I love that we get a shout out to Opal Fruit, because I also think they tasted better. I know.
- [57:37]
A
Made to make your mouth water.
- [57:38]
B
I so remember that.
- [57:39]
A
Fresh with the tang of citrus for refreshing fruit flavors.
- [57:44]
B
Do you remember Marathon before it became Snickers?
- [57:47]
A
Why?
- [57:48]
B
Why would you change it?
- [57:49]
A
You know, my dad, the toffee manufacturer, of course, was also a drag act, Was also Raquel. So, I mean, how that plays into your life as well.
- [57:57]
B
Your dad was a drag act?
- [57:59]
A
He was. And because our surname is Welsh, my dad went out as Raquel again. I say that to young people now, and they go, who? And I go, raquel Welch. No idea. No conception. But obviously back in the day. So he was. So when I was at drama school in the late 70s and the other kids were being taken to McDonald's, you know, their parents would come down. We were all 18. Their parents would come down and take them to McDonald's, which had just come over from the States. I was taken to the Black Cap at Camden Town to watch the drag reviews. He was a heterosexual drag art. And he took Jane McDonald and I to a place in Phil Beach Gardens. And dad was wearing, because he'd been on Loose Women, a short Lycra green miniskirt and an off the shoulder blouse. And we walked in and I swear. And you ask Jane, we walked in and we heard. Look at those two who've come as Denise Welsh and Jane McDonald. They're shit.
- [58:55]
C
Oh, my gosh.
- [58:56]
B
I don't want this conversation to end.
- [58:58]
A
Well, I'll have to come back. How is that just like a tiny.
- [59:00]
B
Little anecdote that you slipped in the end there? That could be a whole episode in and of itself. Please come back to these.
- [59:06]
A
Absolutely.
- [59:07]
B
I'm obsessed with you. My obsession has reached ever newer heights during the course of this. Oh, my God.
- [59:12]
A
Thank you. I've loved it. I honestly feel like I'VE been in therapy.
- [59:15]
B
Thank you. It's a huge compliment. Thank you. I'm so grateful you came on how to Fail.
- [59:19]
A
Thank you.
- [59:21]
B
Please do follow how to Fail to get new episodes as they land on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever.
- [59:28]
A
You get your podcasts.
- [59:29]
B
Please tell all your friends this is an Elizabeth Day and Sony Music Entertainment original podcast. Thank you so much for listening.