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In this first episode, which was recorded in March 2022 I talk to Lynne Booker. Lynne has been working as a counsellor/therapist since 2004 in all sorts of different contexts, through the NHS, with a hospice, and more recently with the Refugee Council working with refugees and asylum seekers. Lynne initially trained at the University of East Anglia, doing a masters in Person Centred Counselling and wrote a dissertation on complicated grief. Lynne has a Jewish background and became Christian when she was 19. She was born in London but grew up in Reading and now resides in Lincolnshire with her husband. She also enjoys life drawing, being a mother (although the kids have flown the nest) and fairly recently become a grandmother. 

We talked about a lot in this first episode and therefore it’s an unnaturally long. We started off talking about Lynne’s training in Person Centred Counselling, why she wanted to become a therapist and her own personal journey which includes a break up with a partner she was very much in love with and the loss of her parents, which triggered a reevaluation of her relationship with them.

We also talked about the importance of meaningful tradition around grief, a loss of family ties and sense of community, refugees feeling war including PTSD, the different stages of your children growing up and a sense of loss of the person they were as we celebrate who they become and surprisingly we talked about football grief and masculinity plus Lord of The Rings! A trigger warning that there is lengthy conversation about child loss, miscarriage and still birth.

The episode include much more besides. Please do leave a comment if you have any feedback at all.

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This episode I’m talking to Anita Nayyar about her experiences with miscarriage.

Anita is a social psychologist originally from Croydon, South London and now resides in Peterborough, Cambridgeshire. Her job has two halves to it, one half looks at hate speech and its effects and how to counter hateful narratives, the other half is one to one work which includes mentoring and counselling (Anita is also trained in psychodynamic counselling) and works with people who are leaving gangs. Anita is of mixed heritage, her father was Indian and her mother is English. In her spare time she enjoys writing poetry (occasionally performing it as well), cycling, swimming, kayaking and attending cultural events.

This is an important one, well, hopefully all the topics we cover in the podcast are, but this one specifically that perhaps don’t understand how deeply affecting a miscarriage can be and how society at large can pretend that it’s insignificant. 

There is some lightness to the start of this conversation even though it’s a heavy subject and Anita I talk in a very matter of fact way. It’s worth saying that we have been friends for a while now so we talk to each other in a very relaxed manner. 

Subjects covered include complications of grief surrounding miscarriage (the shame and taboo surrounding it), a lot of this episode concentrates on the difficulty but necessity of embracing your pain, Anita talks about the book “Unattended Sorrow”and what happens when you try to ignore pain and try to get on with things and how transformative it can be if you do engage with it, the mixed care and understanding from pretty much everyone, garden burial for the foetus, the sensitive and care given by the hospital chaplin, we briefly talk about the loss of her father at an early age and the appreciation of having such a good dad. Listen out for the microphone punch just after this bit, nonverbal expression through crying and the shame around it and support from friends and support and advice she has given to others going through a similar experience. We also question is any walks of society deal with grief better than ourselves? From a Muslim perspective but also what’s happening in a secular society.

If you or anyone else is affected by this subject, Anita has suggested two support groups:

https://www.tommys.org/baby-loss-support/miscarriage-information-and-support/support-after-miscarriage

https://www.miscarriageassociation.org.uk

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