Martha Keith has run her stationery business ‘Martha Brook’ for over a decade, and started the Business Secrets Club two years ago, to help small business owners with things she wishes she’d known when she started out.

Martha told me about her 10 year fertility journey and her two IVF daughters aged 8 and 3.

We also talked about how she’d had a late diagnosis of endometriosis, a very difficult birth with her first daughter and how she’d lost her beloved Dad Philip just before she became pregnant for the second time.

I really valued Martha sharing all those things, and her takeaway advice for listeners is so valuable: 1. never assume what you see on social media is real 2. ask for help if you need it and 3. don’t neglect your health. If you’re in pain that’s a sign that something is wrong.

Spinning Plates is presented by Sophie Ellis-Bextor, produced by Claire Jones and post-production by Richard Jones.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Catherine Anne Davies is better known by her stage name The Anchoress.

She is a musician, producer and a former academic, which results in her providing a fascinating reading list with her art pop albums, of poems and other writing that inspired her.

After many losses, Catherine had a successful 7th pregnancy and her daughter is now 5 years old.

She told me how becoming a mum radicalised her, and also how she kept her new motherhood a secret for two and a half years.

Catherine told me how work offers became less when people knew she had a child, inspiring one of her new album’s tracks to be called ‘I Had a Baby, Not a Lobotomy’!

Spinning Plates is presented by Sophie Ellis-Bextor, produced by Claire Jones and post-production by Richard Jones.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Honey Spencer is a wine expert who has two little boys aged 6 and 1.

She and her husband Charlie run a neighbourhood restaurant called ‘Sune’ in Hackney in East London, which she describes as feeling ‘wholesome and right’.

Honey told me that Georgia is the birthplace of wine, and how she is a fan of ‘skin contact’ wine. She also described how vineyards are like the ‘canary in the coal mine’ of climate change.

Honey has written a book about natural (organic) wines and is the wine director of Eurostar. She told me how pregnancy gave her a superhero palate, and we debated the wisdom of eating ginger biscuits during wine tasting… Listen to the podcast to come to your own conclusion!

Spinning Plates is presented by Sophie Ellis-Bextor, produced by Claire Jones and post-production by Richard Jones.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.