Frost meets Harley St At Home – The nuts and bolts of how Harley St at Home can help by Alex Bannard Wellness and Wellbeing Editor

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After a couple of days of back story, we finally get to the juicy bit…

What help can Harley St at Home offer?

HSAH is a private & free menopause community which was launched at the beginning of the the first lockdown on Facebook & has grown from 300 to 13,200 members.

Nigel gathered specialists like Dr Naomi Potter, a menopause doctor, as well as a variety of wellbeing specialists in a beautifully safe, supportive & caring community, full of advise & information to support women.

Eventually, the natural evolution was for HSAH to become a bespoke website with a huge amount of information & resources to support women during this life changing transition.

Nigel is acutely aware that a lot of women struggling with the menopause have never put themselves first. They have never thought they were deserving of prioritising self-care for themselves. Many women think that wellbeing & things like yoga & meditation are for rich women or celebrities, without thinking it can be for them too. HSAH is making all this & much more readily available to all women.

HSAH offers such a wide variety of self-care options to women to try so that they can work out what their own individual self-care toolkit looks like at an extremely affordable price (less than 70p per day). Essentially, it is a menopause wellness centre on line.

Why Harley St at Home?

I chose HSAH simply because the quality of all the classes, courses, advice & support is so high but it’s in your own home. Which makes it extraordinarily accessible. There is nothing exclusive about this community except the  quality of the content available to women.

Nigel is keen for women to understand that they have a choice here. Menopause (& peri-menopause) is more than just a hormonal change. It affects mind, body & soul &  there is an affordable approach to tackling all elements of the menopause in a safe & supportive space enabling women to put themselves first.

Nigel’s aim is to encourage women who are not used to prioritising themselves to have the choice to create their own self-care toolkits & a life in which they can thrive. Self-care is not selfish, it is essential. Self-care is important at every time of life but more than ever during the peri-menopause & menopause. And let’s face it, we  are  worth it.

How does it work?

There are 2 options available: the free option to help you decipher what actually is going on with access to a menopause symptom tracker & menopause survival pages including a blog.

Paid membership gives access to a schedule that is packed with over 40 different classes each week from strength, aerobic, yoga, meditation & mindfulness, face yoga, nutrition, medical classes from the Dr’s & it’s only £19/month.

And Nigel has kindly offered Frost readers 20% off membership for life. So it’s less than 50p per day. Just type in FROST20 when you go to the website to sign up & let technology do the rest.

On any given day there are 5-6 menopause specific exercises classes, information sessions, self-care workshops from real women who understand menopause because they are going through it themselves.

Join me tomorrow to hear Nigel’s advise for those who are suffering with peri & meno symptoms.

For 20% off membership for life type in FROST20

To find out more about Nigel & Harley St at Home check out these websites.

IG: menopause_dietician

nigel@nigeldenby.co.uk

Facebook group: Harley St at Home : Menopause

www.harleystathome.com

If you would like to practice yoga with Alex her YouTube channel offers free short classes for everyone & is available here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQlKZJ7MeyYc6lqkv6seISw

Alternatively all of her classes are streamed on live on Zoom, for more information message her at alex@alexbannard.com

Free resources are also available on her Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/AlexBannardYogaMindfulness

And her website is www.alexbannard.com

Alex is based on the edge of the stunning Cotswolds & has been sharing her love for all things yoga & mindfulness for almost a decade, not just in the UK but also around the world. Her mission is to help everyone discover a more mindful way of living & to encourage them to embrace regular self-care practices for a happier & healthier way of being.

Hot Tools Hair Styling Products – Perfect For Christmas

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The most perfect Christmas present? Why, perfect hair of course. With the festive party season on the horizon combined with the hunt for the perfect gift  Hot Tools (two of which are on offer throughout November) – the award winning US hair styling brand which has launched this summer across the UK and Europe. Inspired by professionals and with more than 30 years of salon experience, the brand’s new Pro Signature range of styling tools has been created especially for a consumer audience.

 We love the The New Pro Signature Detachable Blow-Dry and Volumiser – Combining fast drying in up to half the time (versus drying and styling separately) with exceptional volumising for salon blow-dries and styling on-the-go in one easy-to-use tool with an exclusive detachable design. Currently £79.99 – on promotion with Argos 01/11-30/11 with £20 off. This fantastic brush really works. It is also super stylish. An easy shortcut to fab hair, what more could you want?

 

 

The New Pro Signature Digital Straightener – Featuring unique gold titanium floating plates and exclusive Pulse Technology® for ultra-sleek, long-lasting styles, time and time again. Automatic dual voltage also makes it the ideal travelling companion. Currently £59.99 – on promotion with Argos 01/11-30/11 with £20 off.
 
 

Hot Tools® Pro Signature Gold Curling Irons – The new Pro Signature collection includes a trio of Gold Curling Irons featuring iconic gold plating in multiple barrel sizes, delivering long-lasting, effortlessly beautiful curls, waves with reduced frizz and added shine. Currently £59.99:

Multiple Barrel Sizes for Different Styles:
25mm – Create bouncy, classic curls and waves
32mm – Perfect for creating polished curls or soft beachy waves
38mm – Create large soft curls and volume
Other great products in the range include:

“I would wet myself in fear”: Mum reveals terrifying abusive childhood and vows to ‘end shouting’

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Shouting is still controversial, but recent studies show the impact of shouting at children can be ‘just as harmful as hitting them’
abusive, childhood, shouting, www.LETSTOPSHOUTING.com, , anxiety, end shouting, shouting

After becoming a parent, qualified therapist Yasmin Shaheen-Jaffar decided it was finally time to break the “historical pattern” of abuse she had suffered as a child, rendering her “anxiety-ridden” in adulthood.

“Shouting can trigger violence. I was shouted at a lot as a child and it often turned into physical abuse. This made me grow up into quite a nervous adult, and also avoidant of conflict which has brought a whole host of issues I’ve had to overcome”.

Children suffering from verbal and physical abuse often develop a low self-esteem and self-image, and a negative worldview. But the consequences aren’t all psychological.

“This is really embarrassing to admit, but when I was shouted at as a child I would be so frightened that I would wet myself. This just caused me even more shame and made me feel like I couldn’t tell anyone. The fear paralysed me”.

When Yasmin became a parent herself, she felt it was important to stop shouting and instead foster a “healthy communicative relationship” with her child so that the pattern would never be repeated again. This decision was reinforced further when she suffered a personal loss.

“Someone very close to me committed suicide a few years ago. It made me realise within all that shouting that so often happens in everyday life – the real issues get buried. I think quite often the shouting ends up being a distraction”.

After committing herself to ending shouting and encouraging “healthy ways to have difficult conversations”, Yasmin launched World Let’s Stop Shouting Day in an effort to share her experience with parents on the effects shouting can have on their children.

“Children model their behaviour on the people around them. It’s not always easy, but if you don’t want your child to turn to shouting as a way of communicating, and everything that comes with it, you need to change your own behaviour first. It can feel impossible at times, but with some work it can be done”.

ABOUT WORLD LET’S STOP SHOUTING DAY

The World Let’s Stop Shouting awareness day’s focus is to open the conversation about the impact of aggressive and angry communication on our relationships and physical and mental health. Shouting, as a form of verbal abuse, can often be a trigger for more violent crimes and there should be greater encouragement for healthy debate.

More info here: www.LETSTOPSHOUTING.com

Frost meets Harley St At Home – what’s happening during the menopause by Alex Bannard Wellness and Wellbeing Editor

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Yesterday we met Nigel Denby, founder of Harley St at Home & in my eyes a pro-aging revolutionary. HSAH helped me so much, I want to share all I learned with you over the next few days. So today I explore what is the life changing transition that is the peri-menopause & menopause.

So what is happening during the menopause?

During the menopause oestrogen levels in a woman’s body are plummeting.  During peri-menopause these hormones are roller coasting & symptoms can appear for a woman from the top of her head to the tip of her toes.

A woman’s entire identity is controlled by oestrogen as it affects every cell & every system in her body. It affects her hair, her skin, the shape of her body, how her brain is operating, her emotions, her muscles density & bone strength. Oestrogen protects her heart, digestive system, vagina & urinary tract. Oestrogen also impacts the brain.

This completely resonates with me. I felt like I was going mad when my menopause symptoms were at their worst. The menopause literally changes women’s lives & in some cases it is destroying women’s lives.

There are  about 13m women,  apparently, experiencing peri & meno symptoms in the UK & 10% of them may well end up leaving or loosing their jobs or cutting their hours – all that amazing experience & expertise being lost because women just cannot cope with what these symptoms are doing to their lives.

Many women find t their personal relationships crumbling as their body & vagina change & libido drops off a cliff.

On average 75% of women gain 10kgs when they start their peri-menopause..

In short, oestrogen enables women to multi-task & juggle family, relationships, jobs so when this hormone takes a nose-dive it impacts every spect of a woman’s life.

Some other symptoms include: disruption in sleep; migraines & headaches; muscles pains & aches & restless legs; increase in urinary tract infections; IBS & digestive problems; dry eyes or drying of nasal passages; changes in the skin & hair including hair loss & itchy scalp; hot flushes & night sweats; gaining weight; brain fog, forgetfulness, apathy & lack of concentration; mental health issues; low mood, irritability & mood swings; muscle aches & pains; lack of energy …  on and on until we reach over 50 symptoms.

Do try your doctor, of course, but if you then feel that you need more  help  or support you could do as I did and explore further avenues – HSAH is the perfect place to start to build that all essential self-care toolkit which is such an integral part of navigating peri-meno, menopause and beyond.

Join me tomorrow to find out what is Harley St at Home & how it can help you or someone you love.

For 20% off membership for life type in FROST20

To find out more about Nigel & Harley St at Home check out these websites.

IG: menopause_dietician

nigel@nigeldenby.co.uk

Facebook group: Harley St at Home : Menopause

www.harleystathome.com

If you would like to practice yoga with Alex her YouTube channel offers free short classes for everyone & is available here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQlKZJ7MeyYc6lqkv6seISw

Alternatively all of her classes are streamed on live on Zoom, for more information message her at alex@alexbannard.com

Free resources are also available on her Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/AlexBannardYogaMindfulness

And her website is www.alexbannard.com

Alex is based on the edge of the stunning Cotswolds & has been sharing her love for all things yoga & mindfulness for almost a decade, not just in the UK but also around the world. Her mission is to help everyone discover a more mindful way of living & to encourage them to embrace regular self-care practices for a happier & healthier way of being.

Women reveal secret affairs, re-discovered martial bliss, falling out of love and more salacious secrets in viral postcard project

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Earlier this year, designer and shop owner Eleanor Tattersfield – who runs Marby & Elm, a print workshop and stationery store on Exmouth Market, London – put out a call on Instagram: ‘I’ll send you a postcard, you send me a secret’. What transpired was a feeling of togetherness and community between women from all backgrounds.

Postcards poured in, some beautifully decorated, some simply handwritten, but each one anonymously sharing a very personal confession. They came from people of all ages and all walks of life, including some celebrities from Jamie Oliver to Cath Kidston and Grayson Perry.

All human life is here: furtive infidelities, bad behaviour in the local bakery, sneaking off for baths during a busy home-schooling schedule, and secret abortions. Eleanor’s postcard is featured in a new collection called Lockdown Secrets out now by Pavilion Books

LOCKDOWN SECRETS

ELEANOR TATTERSFIELD

A compelling collection of anonymous postcards sent during lockdown, revealing hilarious, salacious, relatable and sometimes heart-breaking secret confessions.

 

In the thick of the 2021 coronavirus lockdown, designer and shop owner Eleanor Tattersfield put out a call on Instagram: ‘I’ll send you a postcard, you send me a secret’. Lockdown Secrets is an astonishing record of what happened next.

 

Postcards poured in, some beautifully decorated, some simply handwritten, but each one anonymously sharing a very personal confession. They came from people of all ages and all walks of life, including some celebrities. Prominent themes began to emerge: relationships, sex, masturbation, food, rebellion, loneliness and, surprisingly, a lot of love for lockdown itself. Eleanor’s project caught media attention from all over the world, including pieces on BBC and Channel 4 News in the UK and 9 News Sydney in Australia.

 

This beautiful book brings together the best of the postcards Eleanor received, including 100 previously unseen secrets. All human life is here: furtive infidelities, bad behaviour in the local bakery, sneaking off for baths during a busy home-schooling schedule, rediscovered marital bliss, and, occasionally, poignant moments of sadness and despair.

 

We’ve all been through the lockdown experience, and every reader will find something to relate to in this fascinating collection, a perfect snapshot of an extraordinary time.

 

About the Author

Eleanor Tattersfield is the proprietor of Marby & Elm, a print workshop and stationery store on Exmouth Market, London, where she designs and hand-makes cards, letterheads, calendars, labels and posters. The shop started in her garden shed and grew into a family business, and her products are now stocked in Liberty London. In 2021 she began her hugely successful lockdown secrets postcard project. She lives in London and is available for interview.

 

Follow Eleanor and Lockdown Secrets on Instagram:

 

@marbyandelm | #LOCKDOWNSECRETS

 

Perfect For Christmas Go Nuts For Cambrook Foods

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If you’re after a last minute stocking filler, or you need something for the person who has everything, then Cambrook‘s gift sets are sure to be a hit.

With two gift sets available, these are perfect for foodie-lovers and nut-lovers alike, in addition to being ideal stocking fillers, gifts for grandparents or as part of a Christmas hamper!

The two jar set includes the Hickory Smoke Seasoned Almonds & Cashews with a real hickory hit, together with a jar of Baked Truffle Nuts with almonds, cashews, macadamias and pecans, all baked and seasoned with a distinctive aromatic black truffle and sea salt.

cambrook nuts, nuts, christmas,
The set of 3 gift box includes Cocktail Mix No.2 – a jar of expertly baked & salted traditional mix of nuts, (served at some of London’s best-known cocktail bars!) and Cocktail Mix No.6, which brings together a unique and fantastic mix of flavours, combining salted cashews and macadamias, chilli battered peanuts, smoke seasoned almonds and caramelised sesame peanuts – a guaranteed taste sensation! The final jar is the Baked Cashews & Peanuts with Chilli & Lime, giving your Christmas a zest and spice to savour.

Baked in small batches for big flavours, these gift sets will excite even the most discerning of taste buds and provide the perfect unwrapping for a foodie-lover this Christmas.

The 3 Jar Gift Set is available via the Cambrook Foods website or in Wholefoods, Chatsworth House, Yumbles, NOTHS, All Things Brighton Beautiful, Borough Box, RRP £18.50.
The 2 Jar Gift Set is available via the Cambrook Foods website, Lakeland, Chatsworth House, Yumbles, NOTHS, All Things Brighton Beautiful, Borough Box, RRP £14.00.

Joffe Books is thrilled to let us know the news… The Night Thief by Joy Ellis is Book of the Week.

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What a treat: Joffe Books is proud and delighted to bring us their Book of the Week:THE NIGHT THIEF — the stunning new crime thriller by #1 bestselling author Joy Ellis.  Such good news for all crime readers.

This addictive new mystery is sure to have  all of you turning the pages late into the night until you reach the shocking conclusion… Nope, not telling you … but read on:  when everyone is sleeping, he comes into their houses. He takes one thing. A photo of their child.  A thief on a power trip or something even darker and more sinister?  Arghh.   No wonder Joy Ellis has sold over two million books globally. A snip at   99p / 99C

                                                       

Now, on to see what else is on offer this week. A cornucopia, and here are two of them:

The Dead Hand of History by Sally Spencer. Two severed hands. One newly promoted detective with her hands full.   Monika Paniatowski can’t wait to land her first case as detective chief inspector. And, as it turns out, she won’t have to. On her first day, a woman’s severed hand is found in a leafy park.

Sally Spencer’s The Dead Hand of History: “Belongs in the same league with Rebus, Resnick, Harpur and Iles, Morse et al.” Booklist ONLY 99P / 99C

Now for a huge VALUE FOR MONEY box set: Paul Bennett’s Nick Shannon Thriller Box Set 1-5

Nick Shannon is a convicted killer   But don’t let that put you off. He had his reasons. And nope again – not going to tell you…

Joffe Books feels that this is just perfect for fans  of Mark Dawson, Frederick Forsyth, David Baldacci, J.B. Turner, Rob Sinclair, Lee Child, Vince Flynn and Robert Ludlum –  FIVE page-turners for only 99p/99c

TIME TO MEET ANOTHER OF THE jOFFE BOOKS TEAM: SASHA ALSBERG
SOCIAL MEDIA MANAGER

WHAT I DO
My job revolves around book promotion/awareness on social media. I create content featuring our books through video and photo formats for TikTok and Instagram. Alongside this, I work with the marketing team to brainstorm and execute new ideas that can help drive Joffe Books’ online profile to new audiences and digital mediums.

WHAT I’M LOOKING FORWARD TO IN 2022
I am so excited for all the incredible books we have coming up and the fun ideas I have to help make them bestsellers.

FAVOURITE BOOKS
My favorite book of all time is Outlander by Diana Gabaldon. It is a historical romance novel where a nurse named Claire (who is from the 1940s) accidentally touches standing stones that teleport her back in time to Scotland in the 1700s.

Also if you want a great thriller — Verity by Colleen Hoover is addictive! It’s about a ghostwriter who is hired to finish a series by an author who had a life-altering accident. But things take an unexpected turn when she discovers a grizzly confession within the pages of the writer’s notebook… I highly recommend.

To find out all that Joffe Books has to offer: Joffe Books

ELAINE SPIRES: TURNING A NOVEL INTO A STAGE PLAY

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In her second article Elaine Spires turns a novel into a stage play

In my previous article – Turning a Stage Play into a Novel – I shared my experiences of turning two of my plays into novels and of the relative ease with which this was done. Writing a play from a book (Singles’ Holiday) proved much harder.

Photo credit: Danann Breathnach

Originally I wanted to write a screenplay but knew the probabilities of getting it in front of anyone that mattered were slightly less than winning the Euromillions next Friday. And although I know lots of actors, writers and directors, I unfortunately don’t know anyone with the financial means to make such a film or TV series. Producing Singles’ Holiday for the stage, however, was much more feasible.

The book has a fairly large cast of characters, and I wanted them all to appear in the play.  This was impossible.  As interesting as their backstories were and of importance in explaining how this totally diverse group of people come to holiday together in Antigua, it couldn’t be told in two hours.  So the culling of characters began.  It felt like I was murdering my own children.

To start, I took a red pen to all the minor characters.  Then I concentrated on those remaining to move the story along and produce my first draft. I’ve always preferred writing dialogue, but writing only dialogue proved a challenge resulting in lengthy stage directions.

The draft was four hundred and two pages: totally unrealistic as it would mean a six-hour show.  Actor Nick Campbell who knew the book well, had encouraged me to write the script and wanted to produce the play sat down with me and after much foot-stamping on my part persuaded me to cut two more characters but this meant we lost a huge plot twist.

I feared this would diminish the story but I could see that he was right; it was better to concentrate on writing a play that worked rather than a faithful rehash of the book that didn’t.  There’s nothing worse than theatre that doesn’t entertain.

It turned out to be sound advice.  I realised that Singles’ Holidays is, in fact, almost three books in one and by carefully plotting the story arc and concentrating on a smaller cast it could work well.

Once the second draft was ready I got a group of actors together for a table read.  This is a vital part of the playwriting process as it’s the first time a writer sees her characters come to life and hears them speak, outside her own head, of course.  It also shows what works theatrically and what doesn’t. As this draft was over two hundred pages I already knew further editing would be necessary.  I made copious notes and worked on the script again. Cutting out two further characters and their dialogue brought us to one hundred and sixty pages.

And it was time for another table read.  A fabulous director friend Jane Gull came along and was brutally honest with me, asking,

“Whose story is it, Elaine?”

This one question (answer – Eve the tour manager’s) showed me what I needed to do: cut out anything superfluous to developing her story.

Finally, I had a one-hundred-and-thirty-page play script. Another table reading showed it worked!

And in October 2014, Singles’ Holiday had a hugely successful week’s run at the Brentwood Theatre, courtesy of Melabeau Productions.

Singles’ Holiday is now the first in the six-book Singles’ Series. The others are set in worldwide tourism destinations and continue Eve’s story.  I still think they would make great TV.  Does anyone know someone at Netflix?

 

www.elainespires.co.uk