A lover of adventure: climbing, hiking, camping and fun, Frankie started biking in lock down and with very little experience took her second hand bike on a squiggly loop of the UK to interview 51outdoorsy folx older than her about how they kept the adventure alive, and showing that you don’t have to “do it whilst you’re young”. These stories were recorded and the conversations shared via the Extraordinary Ordinary Womxn Podcast* *Extraordinary Ordinary Womxn – has had a rebrand and has changed its name to Extraordinary Ordinary You – this transition is taking place now. The reason for the name change will be discussed during this episode. Listen to Frankie now on the Tough Girl Podcast! You can listen on itunes, Soundcloud, Stitcher, Spotify & iheartradio. New episodes go live every Tuesday and Thursday at 7am UK time – Make sure to hit the subscribe button so you don’t miss out! The Tough Girl Podcast is sponsorship and ad free thanks to the monthly financial support of patrons. To find out more about supporting your favourite podcast and becoming a patron please visit www.patreon.com/toughgirlpodcast (http://www.patreon.com/toughgirlpodcast) Show notes
• Who is Frankie
• What she loves
• Growing up in the countryside in Devon
• Moving to rural France when she was young
• Wanting to live in the city
• Moving to Brighton, UK at 17/18 years old
• Living in France
• Doing an exchange to New Zealand
• Being broke and living on a tight budget
• Investing in a pair of hiking boots, sleeping bag and backpack
• Getting into hiking in New Zealand
• Having fun on a budget
• Connecting with awesome people
• Not planning on going to university
• Studying childcare in college
• Working seasons for 2 years as a kids rep
• Wanting to move up or move on
• Deciding to go to university to study Tourism
• Wanting to work and travel!
• Not having a plan for the future
• Doing a placement year in Chamonix – Action Outdoors (https://www.action-outdoors.co.uk)
• Playing catch up and wanting to do as much as she could
• Heading back to the UK to finish her degree
• Having a go with the flow plan for after university
• Starting working as a freelancer and wanting to work from her van
• Getting injured at the climbing gym
• Having a tough few months in rehab in 2019
• The start of 2020 and dealing with the UK lockdown
• Moving to Hastings to stay in a holiday home
• Having negative thoughts about prioritising adventure
• When things go wrong, while living an alternative life
• Wanting to ask people for advice
• Wanting to do a cycling trip
• Buying a bike for £70
• Wanting to find more role models
• Deciding to cycle around the UK and interview as many women as possible
• Taking the first step and putting herself out there
• Dealing with imposter syndrome and feeling anxious about putting herself out there
• Was the trip too big and too cool for her?
• Extraordinary Ordinary Womxn
• Speaking to 51 amazing women and non-binary folk
• Judging the success of the podcast
• Re-branding to Extraordinary Ordinary You
• Reflection on using the term “Womxn”
• Reaching out to her community
• Book: What the T?: The no-nonsense guide to all things trans and/or non-binary for teens (https://amzn.to/3ayV5RY)
• Book: Life Isn’t Binary: On Being Both, Beyond, and In-Between (https://amzn.to/3tHfRGm)
• Womxn Instagram post on @Extraordinaryordinaryyou (https://www.instagram.com/p/CMZVCvFDrGu/)
• Moving to Sheffield
• Plans for 2021
• Supporting Frit (@frit_tam (https://www.instagram.com/frit_tam/) ) on their 2 month trip doing a zig-zag across the UK – starting on the 15th May 2021 – #glideforpride (https://www.instagram.com/explore/tags/glideforpride/) Rollerblading England tackling the issue of belonging in the LGBTQIA+ community
• LGBTQIA+ – Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer and/or Questioning, Intersex, and Asexual and/or Ally.
• Working with RachelSarahM (https://rachelsarahmedia.com)
• Final words of advice
Social Media Personal Website – www.frankiedewar.co (https://www.frankiedewar.co/) Instagram @frankie_dewar (https://www.instagram.com/frankie_dewar/) Extraordinary Ordinary You Website www.extraordinaryordinarywomxn.co (https://www.extraordinaryordinarywomxn.co/) Instagram @extraordinaryyou (https://www.instagram.com/extraordinaryordinaryyou/) Facebook @ExtraordinaryOrdinaryYou (https://www.facebook.com/ExtraordinaryOrdinar…
I’m Frankie and I would describe myself by saying that I love big days outdoors and big days Outdoors for me don’t necessarily mean climbing the hardest rout or the highest peak or doing the most difficult ski tour but big days for me are just days where I start really
Early carry on the whole day have an incredible time enjoy every single moment of it and come back at the end of the day feeling like it’s been an entire week and I love doing that whether I’m hiking or skiing or climbing or camping out in my van or wild swimming or
Anything I’ll really do everything and anything that’s outdoors I think outside of that I have a podcast called extraordinary ordinary you which documents the stories and voices from a 3,000 kilometer cycle that I did around the UK last summer in between lockdown one and lockdown 2 where I speak to
Women and non-binary folk about what they do in the outdoors and I particularly spoke to people who were older than myself and ask them really about their life journey and how they got to where they are now and talking of the life journey and how people got to
Where they are now let’s go back to your childhood and growing up were you always into the outdoors and having big days out was that a part of your childhood absolutely not I did grow up in the countryside originally I was in Devon and then my parents moved to very
Rural France when I was quite young um and I hated the countryside I just wanted to be nearer the town where all my friends were I wanted to be in a bigger city where there were more people I didn’t really want to do the outdoors things and I didn’t want to spend you
Know time in the middle of nowhere and I moved back to the UK and to Brighton when I was 17 18 and I can remember being in Brighton and having absolutely no idea really what the South Downs were or that they were there because all I wanted to was spend time
In the city and you know I guess catch up on all those things that I didn’t have growing up in the middle of nowhere so it wasn’t actually until my 20s when I was lucky enough to do an exchange in New Zealand that I really discovered what the outdoors was and that actually
It’s quite a fun place to spend your time so what was it like growing up in France then are you fluent in French I wouldn’t say that I’m first language fluent but I am pretty good at French I grew up very much in the middle of nowhere no public transport none of that
So it was an experience if I look at it now I would absolutely love to spend time there you know there’s some amazing cycling there’s some amazing walking just like endless Rolling Hills for views but as a 12 13 14 15 year old I wasn’t that impressed by views if I’m
Honest it sort of changed for you when you went on an exchange in your 20s tell us a little bit more about that was how did that come about it came about because I budgeted really badly and ended up completely flat broke so I was really lucky to go on
Exchange um and I thought I’d budgeted enough and I was really lucky that I received a couple of grants that paid for my flights and contributed a little bit towards some of my living costs but unfortunately my rent back in the UK there was a real shortage of houses
Around the university so I ended up in this house that was a little bit more expensive than I could afford and it just kept eating in and eating in and eating into my travel budget no matter how much I sort of worked and I thought it’ be okay because I thought I was
Going to be able to work in New Zealand you know pick up some part-time hours and when I got there it said I’m really love large letters on my Visa student visa not allowed to work so I was like oh no what am I going to do and I
Literally just had to take my budget that I had left split it up into the amount of weeks I was going to be there and that was very literally all I could spend because I wouldn’t have any more money coming in at all and it is the tightest budget I’ve
Lived on but also it really showed me the value of things that make me happy and so I wasn’t able to go and do all the touristy things that everybody else was doing but what I did do is in the first week I bought myself a pair of
Hiking boots a secondhand backpack and a secondhand sleeping bag and now this backpack I bought was completely ridiculous it wasn’t a hiking backpack at all it was like a backpacking backpack so all the straps were wrong it wasn’t my size and it was about three
Times bigger than I was but with that it meant that I could start hiking and start walking and I was lucky to be part of the tramping which is like the hiking club and go out and start doing trips on the weekend and because I didn’t have money
To go into all the touristy things I didn’t hang out with the other exchange students as much but what I did have or what I could afford to do was pack a picnic and go out for a long walk and it just really opened my eyes to how much
Fun you can have and actually how much more fun it feels especially at the end of the day to go out and go hiking and get back and be that real like happy tired sort of feeling rather than go out on a night out and then wake up the next
Day just full of dread and wondering what you did the night before was it easy to make friends over there or did you feel as though that you were almost having exclude yourself because you couldn’t afford to join in with the other exchange students there were some really awesome
People I met who completely got it and so rather than being a socialite and hanging out with lots of different groups of people who were going out all the time that was kind of my previous experience of you know big friendship groups instead of that I made friends
With a much smaller much more intimate group of close friends who were either in similar situations or just got it completely and were happy to pack a picnic and go for the walk were happy to understand that you know going out for a beer would be a treat and going out for
A beer literally meant going out for a beer and it didn’t mean going out for a beer and then spending all your money in one night I think what was tricky was having to make that shift from inviting people you know as you would do oh do
You want to go out for a coffee or should we go to the cinema all those sorts of usual social ways of meeting up I didn’t have access to them anymore but I don’t remember finding it that difficult to come up with new ideas and actually I think it meant that I put
Myself out there a lot more because I would invite people to do what I could do rather than waiting for people to invite me and having to turn it down yeah how long were you over in New Zealand for I was there for six months oh wow what an amazing experience to
Have your having your early 20s it was incredible and I budgeted a lot at the start and a lot at the end and took two weeks out in the Middle with three other fantastic women we hired the smallest hire car that could fit four people packed in all our stuff and did this
Very dirt baggy road trip of the south island with all of us in tents camped out every single night it was a real Sho string dirt bag trip I think we maybe showered once over the two weeks um but it was just fantastic and I’ve just got
So many good memories from it and it really set me up for so many of the other things that I’ve gone on to do when you think back to that time do you remember thinking about what is it that I’m going to do with my life like did
You plan on going to university did you want to go to university did you want to lead to a more alternative lifestyle or was there pressure to conform and get the job to earn the money to to have a car and buy a house and you know all of
The other stuff that goes along with that I left College not wanting to go to university at all a lot of my teachers encouraged me to at least apply and then defer and I was so set in not wanting to go that I didn’t apply at all and after college I
I actually studied child care in college so then I worked in a nursery liit and then I went and worked overseas working seasons for two years as a kids rep in hotels so working summer seasons running kids activities and then working winter seasons in the mountains more as a
Nanny and then after that I didn’t want to keep doing that anymore I kind of wanted to move up or move on but then I didn’t want to just come back to England and get a minimum wage job so I had this idea that I could go to university not
Because I really wanted to study anything but because I could get a student loan and a student grant and that would give me the money if I worked part-time as well I could use that to pay for my living and the part-time work to pay pay for my travel and so all I
Really wanted to do through uni was work and travel um that’s not what I wrote on my application but I went to UNI to study tourism and so it was as part of my degree that I managed to do the exchange in New Zealand and I think whilst I was
There in New Zealand I wasn’t really planning anything in my future at all other than working and traveling and working and traveling and straight off the back of New Zealand I went in and did a placement year in Shaman with a company called action Outdoors so I knew that I was going to
Come off the back of New Zealand and go straight into another incredible trip what was it like working out in Shaman that must been an incredible experience it was amazing and I’m so glad that I did New Zealand first and had an insight into hiking first Sometimes I describe it a little
Bit as sort of my journey into the outdoors is a little bit like do you know if you get to a pre-drinks house party and everybody else is already a little bit drunk and you’re completely sober and you feel like you want to catch up that’s how my Outdoors is I
Sort of started hiking and then realized that so many other people were doing so much awesome stuff and I just wanted to catch up so badly and do as much as I could and out in Shaman was where I started climbing it’s where my skiing went from
Being like a quite a competent PE skier to I started skiing off piece doing more glacia stuff ski touring it was just incredible and it’s a really beautiful place to live and watch the seasons change like whether you’re in summer and there’s climbing or it’s Autumn and you can go hiking and
Trail running or winter in their skiing there’s just always something new to do a new adventure to have why did you decide to leave Shaman I had to finish my degree so I did my placement year in Shaman and then I had my final year of
My degree to come back to and let me tell you coming from a six months in New Zealand and then a year in Shaman and then going back to Guilford in Su was just so tough all I wanted to do was be in the mountains and having actually worked
Within the tourism industry I realized that a lot of the theory we were learning was Theory it it isn’t practical stuff it isn’t related to what I was doing in the dayto day and so I didn’t really enjoy the modules that I was studying at Uni I
Didn’t really enjoy where I was living and now looking back I guess that that was almost like post trip blues that you can get after doing a long trip or a long Expedition but that Autumn was really really tough oh God I can’t even imagine like I as brutal from being in the
Outdoors and the fresh air and in the mountains in Shaman and the you know the snow peak mountains and then suddenly you’re back in a classroom and writing essays and preparing for your final year of exams it must have been such relief finishing did did you have a plan for
After you finished like are you a are you a planner are you a goal Setter or are you more sort of go with the flow I did I had quite a go with the flow plan but it was more of a plan than most the
Other people in my class um but the plan didn’t work out at all so my plan was that I was going to move into my Renault kangu van and I was going to drive it to Spain and I was going to take three months off driving around Spain climbing
As much as I could and try and pick pick up more freelance work because i’ started doing some freelance work alongside uni so I wanted to try and pick up some more freelance work work from my van work from my laptop and climb as much as I could and I had my
Ferry booked for the 5th of August and on the 21st of July I was in the Bouldering Gym my just my local Bouldering Gym and I was having a bit of a bad day outside outside of climbing so I was like I’m just going to go have a
CH session see what I can do and when I was there I started just getting into this mindset where I could just work on problems and send them more and more and more and more so I ticked off two of my hardest climbs one of them was a really
Dynamic climb and I was really rolling and I was started working on another third climb that was really really difficult and I got two holds up and then three holds up and then four holds up and then I tried it again and I thought I was going to send it and my
Hand my right hand popped really unexpectedly I was kind of expecting to fall left but my right hand popped it just caught me completely off guard and I fell almost from the top of the climb in a really awkward position and I dislocated my ankle breaking both the
Bones and my leg and shattering the cartilage so that was the end of that plan basically and after that I had to spend sort of a month not walking and then another few months learning how to walk again that must have been God that must have been a tough couple of months
How did you get through that it was really tough in a lot of ways I found it really mentally tough but then also because I’d been doing so much climbing and training almost the rest of my body did didn’t understand why we were resting all of a
Sudden so I was exhausted and Restless at the same time that was yeah it was really tough to get through I looking back now I think I got through it just by being a little bit goal focused and maybe a little bit you know filling up
The time as much as possible if you go into flight fight or freeze I think I went into fight mode so before I could wait there I started doing core workouts again I started fingerboarding again I was back in the climbing gym when I had the boot on and The Climbing Gym
Actually the the health and safety team came in and asked me to leave and I had to wait a week for them to do a safety check to say whether or not I could climb in my boot or not I think I just tried to fill my time as much as
Possible to help make it go quicker and help get through it so what came first was it extraordinary ordinary women came first or was it the cycle trip came first like what was the what was the order or was it a combination of both this cycling trip definitely came first
Okay so let’s let’s go back to the cycling trip then so um yeah tell everybody a little bit more about your cycling trip in 2020 where the idea came from how it came about and how you took th took those first steps to getting on your bike and taking on this incredible
Journey before lockdown one myself and my partner frit were living in the van finally climbing in Spain finally finally got there had a week’s worth of climbing and then lockdown happened and we went to France did a couple of days climbing lockdown happened we stood didn’t really realize quite how serious
It was we came back to the UK tried to stay in the van and then when the UK went on lockdown we realized that we wouldn’t be able to stay in the van anymore put a shout out managed to find someone with a holiday home we could
Stay in and move to Hastings and these people let us stay in their holiday home and they kind of described it as a bit of like a static caravan and so we were expecting something you know run down and not very nice and actually it was
This little wooden Heart by the sea that was absolutely gorgeous and I was so grateful to be there but also so I felt really overwhelmed and really quite selfish and you know I had these thoughts in my head why do I think that I can try and live this adventurous life
Why do I think that I can try and prioritize Adventure when I always come back and end up you know leaning on other people had to lean on other people when I broke my ankle had to lean on other people during lockdown and I just really struggled with that and with accepting their
Generosity and you know I think if you live the very normal 9-to-5 work life then something goes wrong and everybody understands but if you try and live a very different life or an alternative life and something goes wrong it’s almost as if people are waiting there to
Sort of say ah you’ve had to go but didn’t work out did it so come back and come back and live the normal life now and I was just really in this situation and I just wanted to look up to somebody who was older than me who’d
Lived this adventurous life and I wanted to ask them how they did it I wanted to ask them how they did it when they felt like they were going against the grain I wanted to ask them if they ever felt the way that I was feeling and what
They did and was it okay I wanted a mentor but I didn’t want a mentor in the way that I wanted somebody who had a really successful career and a huge house and loads of money like I’m sure they mean something to somebody but they
Aren’t really what I want I just want to be out there having a great time and so I wanted to ask someone for advice who had those values and I just couldn’t see who that was and you know it’s like when you do meet somebody who’s older than you who’s
In the outdoor doors and they are maybe 60 or 70 and they’re still cycling or hiking or running and you see them and you think wow I want to be like that when I’m their age I wanted to go find that person and just give myself a
Little bit of hope that it was okay and I didn’t have to settle down soon there isn’t some sort of Cliff that I’m gonna drop off where I get too old to live this life that I want and so I kind of had this idea that if I felt that
Way maybe other people do too and so i’ known I wanted to do a cycling trip for a long time and then in lockdown one myself and my partner to explore around Hastings a little bit more cycling and walking were like the only two things you’re allowed
To do and we found a secondhand bike shop that was open so I S of phon them up and I was like can I have two of your cheapest bikes please and we didn’t quite get their cheapest bikes but I got one that was £70 and my partner frit got one that was
£65 and we just started getting out and exploring I can remember the first day I Rod this bike I was so afraid of riding it and I was so you know I’d never ridden a bike really before we had had to ride 200 M
Up the road to get from the bike shop to the car park and I couldn’t take my hand off the handle bars to indicate I was so nervous but this all kind of happened at the same time that we got the bikes and we started riding and I had this idea
That I wanted to find more people and more role models and so it just all came together in this idea that at the time seemed to make complete sense that why don’t I cycle around the UK and on the way interview as many people as I can to
Ask them about what they do in the outdoors and just ask them all those questions and all those worries that I was having it makes me reflect back to when I sort of first started with with tough girl challenges and the tough girl podcast and you know not really knowing
Anything just knowing that I wanted to make a change and one of the things that really helped me was when I spoke with with Ross Savage who is a is an ocean RAR she’s first a British woman or first woman to row across the India and the
Pacific and the Atlantic and I remember when I was speaking to her she her story or her journey started at 38 and I was thinking well I’m I’m only 32 so that means you know I’ve almost got like you know a six-year Head Start but but to me
It was something like this is doable this is feasible but it does come down to almost like you said like having these Role Models finding these these mentors and and speaking to to older women who who have lived an alternative life or you know lived life differently
How did you go about finding these women I just want to say I completely agree with you that’s the feeling entirely that’s sort of like oh wait she’s older than me so I’ve still got time like that sums it up completely so I had no idea to be with
Whether anyone actually would feel this way or whether anyone actually would agree with what I was doing or support what I was doing and although I had an inkling that you know like if I felt like that other people probably would too there was also all these demons in
My head that were like no don’t be silly no one wants to talk to you this is a ridiculous idea what are you doing and I was so nervous I put a post on a Facebook group and I sort of said hi my name is Frankie I’ve got this idea
For a trip I’d love to speak to people older than myself about what they do in the outdoors let me know if anyone would be be able to speak to me or if anyone has any suggestions of people I should speak to and I did keep it really open
That I just said older than myself and I was 27 at the time and I was so nervous I just had to shut the laptop and walk away and I couldn’t look and then I came back to the laptop and there were already like 75 comments on there and
Then within the first day there was over 150 comments just all of people saying either that they felt it too or that they’d love to support the trip or that I could talk to them and I’ve now got this map that I’ve had to stop adding pins to it because it just
Became so overwhelming the number of people that I could have gone to visit and I could have spoken to but the map already has over 200 pins of people who are out there who are living life on their terms and getting into the outdoors whatever it means to them so I
Was just completely blown away the the key things there are you know it’s a it’s having the idea and you know this this this inkling of an idea this this possibility of what it could be but then you did the most crucial thing you took the first step and you put yourself out
There you know not knowing what was going to happen were you going to get any replies and and you might not have done and then you think well okay I put myself out there but actually you ended up getting know 200 pins you know amazing women reaching out wanting to
Support you encourage you want to answer your questions and you know provide advice and top tips I mean that must have also been quite overwhelming as well now because suddenly this the idea that you had is now a reality and actually you’ve got to turn that dream
In into an actual plan and you know set a start date plan a route you know get the gear together how long did you give yourself to plan and prepare to head off on this journey to VIs at these incredible women yeah completely it was it was super nerve-wracking putting myself out
There um but then also I kind of told myself when I put myself out there that it would be okay because if six people replied I’d just go and see those six people and that would be the trip sorted and so when over 150 people replied all
Of a sudden I had this huge job of trying to work out who I could visit and where I could go I was working full-time right up until about a month before my trip so really I didn’t have very much time to get ready at all I sort of started putting a rout
Together working out how far I could roughly cycle in a day and how much time I had and that kind of dictated the route and where I could go so I had about a month month but very much fitting it in around work and I think something that I was hanging
On to a lot at the time was this idea that you don’t have to feel ready to start and you’re probably not going to feel ready ever so you might as well start also before the trip I I was very nervous about the fact that I never interviewed anyone before and a
Big part of the trip was speaking to people and doing these interviews and before the trip I wouldn’t have even described myself as a very good conversationalist let alone an interviewer and I was so anxious and had so much impostor syndrome almost that I can remember messaging my friend before
The start and saying I’ve had this really cool idea for a trip I’m really excited for it but also I feel like maybe it’s such a cool trip that it would be better if somebody else did it for me I think the trip that I’ve
Dreamed up is just a little bit too big and just a little bit too cool for me which now looking back is obviously a ridiculous thing to think but at the time that just summarizes completely how exciting but also petrifying it was how did you come up with the the name extraordinary
Ordinary women was that before the trip was that during the trip did you know that I mean I know that you that you were going to interview these women and speak to these women did you did you have a plan to turn it into a podcast I
Was very nervous before the trip that the interviews wouldn’t go very well and that I maybe wouldn’t be able to get that good quality of stuff not because the people that I was speaking to weren’t amazing they all were but just because I didn’t really trust my own
Abilities and my own skills so I told everybody before the start of the trip that I had a few ideas for what I’d like to do with it but i’ never really told anybody my bigger plans and my bigger dreams for it I think from very early on I had this
Idea that I’d love to turn it into a podcast and I’d love to collect the these images I took uh my grandmother’s old film camera with me and I took black and white photos of every single person I interviewed and had this idea that I’d love to colate these images together
Whether it’s just online or whether I could have them exhibited somewhere someday and I knew I’d love to write about the trip but I was really nervous to tell anybody beforehand so even though I had had those dreams I never imagined that I would actually be sitting here A year
Later with the podcast out there you know I get it it sometimes um it can be really difficult to put yourself and your Big Dreams out there and I I almost liken it to you having like this little candle inside of you or this little flame inside of you which the early
Stages it can be so fragile that if somebody says something negative it can just blow the flame out and it can like crush your soul and everything and sometimes I mean I’ve definitely felt this where I thought I’m just not I just can’t deal with any criticism or other people’s
Self-doubt of me and what I’m doing and actually I I just can’t handle that so I just need to be really really protective of what it is that I’m doing until I feel stronger and more confident and more self assured and have more belief
In myself and what I’m doing so I so I don’t think you’re alone in you know having those feelings um how did the interviews go I believe you spoke with some incredible women yeah absolutely particularly one called Sarah Williams um I was just thinking it would
Be so funny if you just blew right past that no I did I spoke to 51 incredible women and non-binary folk along the trip and the on honestly the stories in the conversations we had went way beyond anything that I could ever have imagined I’m sure you’ll get this too but I was
Just really honored and Blown Away by how much people were willing to share and how vulnerable people were willing to be with their stories and where I thought we’d talk about the outdoors quite a lot actually conversations that started in the outdoors would very quickly go to all other
Aspects of life and you know some really either tough times or Tricky Tricky Tricky parts of life would come up whether that would be losing your job or getting a divorce having a miscarriage or whether it be about people’s experiences being part of the lgbtqia+ community just a whole range of different things
And people were so open with their stories and yeah I’m just so grateful to absolutely everyone that I spoke to for for sharing that with me oh 100% it’s such a it’s a real privilege when you get to to speak to people and people do share those really vulnerable moments
With you which are so powerful for especially you know other other women to be able to hear and also I think think the power of the podcast is by hearing these women’s voices their tone of their voice The Passion of their voice um just you know the pauses and just you know
Thinking back and Reflections it’s incredibly powerful how was it for you ping putting the podcast together and I suppose getting ready to release these episodes it has been a roller coaster in all honesty so I really wanted to get as much done as possible coming straight
Off the back of the trip so I came off the trip and went straight from cycling 60 kilometers a day interviewing Somebody almost every day different places really really social loads of interaction to lockdown and that was really tough and as much as in my head I decided that I
Just didn’t have postp blues and that everything was great um I think I did that thing again where I try and cope just by filling up my time and doing as much as possible and the the first season of the podcast was absolutely that it was so exciting every single time somebody
Listened every single time somebody messaged me or downloaded the podcast or liked us on social media or commented it just it just filled me with joy and somebody asked me right at the start like what’s your goal for the podcast how will you know it’s been successful
And I said to them that I don’t really think the number of people listening is a good sign of success but I think for me just knowing that one episode has reached one person and that it’s helped them with what they’re going through that for me was be
Successful and I was just really Blown Away particularly in that first season the amount of people that were messaging me and reaching out and saying that the stories they’d been listened to did have an impact that was really magical 100% I was going to say it’s um I’ve probably
Said this to you before as well but it’s so nice to have like a little email folder or a little box where you can you know put those messages to reflect back on because it’s easy to forget sometimes the impact that sharing stories can can have and and you’re absolutely right
Like the numbers are amazing and it and it’s you know it’s incredible to hit Milestones but I always think that that’s like the ego part of it but actually the purpose of doing it is to enable these conversations to we have for other women to be to know that other
People have been through similar situations and have got through them and how they got through them and they shared their fears and their beliefs and the lessons and and what they’ve and what they’ve learned one of the the things that I think has always struck me
With with what you’ve been doing is how inclusive that inclusive you have been since the very very beginning by you know extraordinary ordinary women and women spell with an ex and earlier on this year you actually you you made some changes to to the name about using the
Word woman with an X in it um with the spelling of an X in it and I’d love you maybe just to share a little bit more about the reasons behind the rebranding the lessons that you’ve learned I think that would be really fascinating yeah absolutely I’d love to talk about it I
Really hoped with the podcast that other people would be able to see themselves in the stories in the same way that I wanted a role model that I could see myself in and I was very aware that if I just spoke to sort of one person from
One background with almost one sort of lived experience that wouldn’t as bigger impact in terms of other people seeing themsel in those stories and so I just wanted to speak to as many different people from as many different backgrounds as possible originally I called it extraordinary ordinary women with W
MXN and for me I was using that as a term to include women and non-binary folk that were happy to be included within that term and then earlier on this year a lot of people within the non-binary and gender non-conforming communities started sharing posts on social media about how much actually the
Term can be really harmful that for a lot of people it can be misgendering so if you are don’t identify as female or as a woman having the word woman even though it’s about with an ex is still misgender for you if that’s not a term that you’re happy or
You want to use or that you think represents your gender there is also a lot of a lot of advice out there around the fact that using the term women with an X to Signal an inclusive space for trans women actually it can be other ring and if you were to
Say this space is inclusive for s women and trans women for example you know there’s no othering there but if you were to say this space is for women and trans women it’s almost as if trans women are just an other there are some positives to using
It I think in that there are some people who do still identify with women with the ex but what I would say is that I would never argue with somebody using it for for themselves but for me it didn’t feel as if it was the right word to use
Anymore and it felt like it could be mistaken within that very short phrase within extraordinary women people only see the title and it felt like people might be able to mistake that and might think it means something other than the way that I was intending it to be
Used and so I put it out to the community to Rebrand and see if anyone had any thoughts on a new name and somebody suggested extraordin you and it got a whole load of likes and votes for that one as well and that’s what we’ve gone with and I’m so proud of
It every time I see the podcast name or the podcast logo it just feels so warm and so joyful to know how many different people’s thoughts and opinions went into that name change and what I would say is that I definitely don’t speak as a sort of spokesperson for an
Entire community and I think the lived experiences of non-binary folk of trans people and of people who are within binary genders non-conforming their experiences can all be very very different in the same way that anyone’s lived experience can be very different and so I would really encourage people especially allies to go
Out and read as much as they can or find athletes to follow or find incredible people to follow on the extraordin ordinary you Instagram page I’ve got a highlight that is just called women with an ex and in there I’ve shared a whole load of different resources and
Different posts that people can link through and read that are that are from those communities and I would really encourage people to do that and then I’d also say there are some great books out there there’s just for anyone interested there’s a book called what the tea which
Is actually designed for teenagers but it is all about understanding more around being trans and I’m reading a really interesting book at the moment called beyond the binary um which is also just mind-blowing it doesn’t just focus on gender and sexuality it focuses on a whole range of different things I’m not
Going to go into because it’s a huge tangent but I’d really recommend those two books so far they’ve been hugely informative and helpful yeah no thank you for showing those resources and what I’ll make sure I do as well is I’ll put the links to the books that you’ve
Mentioned and also a link to to that Instagram post that you talked about as well with all of the resources so that people can do their own research do their own reading but thank you so much for sharing that because I think it’s incredibly powerful to be able to also
You to reach out to your community and to ask for advice ask for feedback get their thoughts and then actually listen learn and apply those changes so um absolutely fantastic now I believe there’s also been some changes have you you’ve moved from Hastings and you’re are you now are you van lifing in
Sheffield or have you have you got a more permanent abode in Sheffield we’re not we are now semi-permanent so we spent lockdown 3 in the very adventurous brel which is it’s just kind of suburban near Reading near London if people stood it know where reading is and not very
Glamorous at all it’s very very flat and it’s very very housy and I feel like we we did our time there and as soon as we could after restrictions lift myself and my partner frit we pet a shout out for to see if anyone had a room to rent in
Sheffield and we’ve rented a really lovely Rim in a house just outside Sheffield it’s 15 minute drive from the Peaks and yeah really excited to be able to get out walking again and just see something other than flat residential areas have you got any plans for the rest of
This year I do indeed I don’t have my own plans but my partner frit is about to set off rollerblading on the 15th of May so not very far after this episode comes out they are going to rollerblade a zigzag across England raising awareness of belonging in the lgbtq IA plus
Community and they want to interview and speak to members of the community and find relevant members of the community who are historical figures as well to sort of show that wherever you are in the country there is support there for you and there are communities there for
You but also to show that it’s not something new and you know we have always been here so I’m very excited that’s going to be a two Monon trip very very excited to support frit on that whilst also I work freelance and help small businesses and individuals with their social media and content
Strategies and so I’m going to be working at the same time and supporting for and managing the podcast so I’m gonna have two very busy months coming up and then I think in August I might just be in bed for a month oh but what an incredible thing to do will frit be
Filming it as well yeah absolutely it will be filmed fit’s gonna self film I’m going to be supporting frit with the filming and as a photographer and we’ve also got Rachel Sarah media so Rachel Sarah M who is a fantastic filmmaker and drone pilot who is going to be helping
To film that and pull the film together Frankie where can people find out more information about you find information about the extraordinary ordinary you podcast you know where should they go the very best place to go is on my personal Instagram that is Frankie duer you can also find me on my website
Frankie j.co and I’m also on Twitter Frankie Jer and Linkedin Frankie hyen duer for the podcast you can find us on Instagram extraordinary ordinary U on Facebook and on the website we are still extraordinary ordinary women we’re in the process of changing the domain over at the moment but it is a pretty
Mighty task so it will hopefully change to extraordinary ordinary U very very soon but you can still find us at extraordinary ordinary women at the moment and it’s the same for Facebook I’m just waiting for permission to change the name of the Facebook page and we’ll be switching over fantastic and
Frankie I’d love to you I’d love for you to have the final words of advice for other women out there who want to lead a more alternative lifestyle they want to not follow the status quo they want to live life on their terms live a life of
Adventure and spend more time in the outdoors after speaking to so many incredible women for your podcast what would be your top piece of advice or pieces of advice I think there is so much advice I could give you know there is so much phenomenal advice that each of the
People I spoke to gave me um but there are two pieces I think tie really nicely together and the first one is that you should just go with what feels right you know if you’re doing it and it feels great even if you’re maybe worried about what happens next next even if you’re
Worried about if it’s the right thing to do if it feels right then keep going and go for that and the second one is that I ask everybody do they ever feel like they’re going against the grain and if they do how do they deal with that and you know
Not everybody but a lot of people said that yeah they do feel like they’re going against the grain sometimes and I think that’s really nice because you know you’re not alone in feeling that way but one person sorry one person I spoke to said that if you feel like
You’re going against the grain maybe you just need to find a new forest and I absolutely loved that like this idea that actually you’re not going against the grain you’re just comparing yourself or you know listening to the opinions of people that maybe don’t align with what
It is you’re doing or what it is you want to do and so that’s what I’d like to finish on that maybe you’re not going against the grain maybe you just need to find a new Forest absolutely Frankie thank you so much for coming on tough go podcast and
Sharing more of your story and the journey it’s been absolutely inspiring to speak to you and best of luck with all your future adventures and challenges thank you so much Hey tribe I hope you enjoyed the episode with Frankie now you may have noticed that I occasionally basically I don’t do an intro and I do that because I just assumed that people who listen to the tough girl podcast generally know why they’re coming to listen to the podcast
And hopefully know who I am but then I keep remembering new people are finding the tough girl podcast all the time and probably have no idea who I am what the podcast is about so very very briefly my name is Sarah Williams I’m the host of the tough girl podcast and the founder
Of tough girl challenges which is all about motivating and inspiring you while increasing the amount of female role models in the media so I interview incredible women from all over the world who do Amazing Adventures and challenges and I ask them all the questions how did
They do it why did they do it what challenges did they face how did they overcome them what were their fears what’s their advice what are their top tips and basically dig into the detail the money Family Support back story drivers motivators etc etc etc there’s now probably over 400 episodes for you
To listen to the tough God podcast was started way back on the 4th of August in 2015 new episodes have been coming out every Tuesday and every Thursday at 7:00 a.m. UK time for quite a while now but if you go and visit tgir challenges.com you can find loads more information
About me the tough girl podcast you can also find the show notes so everything that Frankie has talked about today will be written in the show notes with links to the books that she mentioned for example there’s also links to her social media to the website um and you can go
And find that all at tgir challenges.com so please do go and check it out just want to say a massive thank you to all the patrons who are supporting the work that I do so the tough girl podcast is sponsorship ad free and that’s thanks to 273 patrons who believe in the mission
And what I’m doing if you’d like to support the mission then please visit patreon p o n.com podcast you can sign up monthly there’s also an annual option and you can do it in your currency so whether that’s US Dollars euros Sterling Etc so just please do go and check it out I’m
Also delighted to say that I actually support Frankie I’m one of her patrons so if you like the work that Frankie is doing love the episodes that she’s producing then please go check Frankie out on patreon as well and like I alluded to a little bit earlier in the
Podcast me and Frankie it’s it was quite weird actually because normally um I interview people um first and then I end up meeting generally them meeting them face to face at some point later on where this was quite a sort of a flip reverse of that because Frankie came to
Came to my house on the Whirl we had um we had afternoon tea in the kitchen and Frankie had like a protein vegan Shake which was very nice and Frankie interviewed me first of all and that episode came out on the 15th of February 2021 so if you haven’t listened to that
Please do go and listen to it it’s about an hour long you can always listen to it to a speed and a half but if you want some more of like my backstory where it all started the different Ventures and challenges that I’ve gone on you know
The high points the low points what I’ve learned then you can take a listen to the episode it will be worth your time and I imagine that you will enjoy it what else do I want to say I think that’s pretty much it just you know a
Massive thank you for tuning in and listening we’ve got an amazing lineup of guests coming out in May and if you are a patron you will found out who all the guests are um a couple of weeks ago probably when I when I shared but just
To give you a few little heads up on the six of May we’re speaking to Patty alar who’s a professional boxer turn Mountaineer she shares more about climbing Kilimanjaro which she did in two days she’s also climbed Aon cagua and Mount Elbrus we speak with Ellie
Douglas on the 11th of May she’s a mental health personal trainer who’s aiming to raise awareness and challenge stigma around Mental Health on the 13th of May we’ve got Jordan Marie Daniel coming on who’s using her running platform to raise awareness over the epidemic of missing and murdered
Indigenous women girls two spirits and relatives which is the hashtag running for just for justice you may have seen Jordan um Jordan Daniel on the news she uh runs with a red um hand print across her face I’m just putting my hand over my face so I think the sound probably
Went a bit funny um but Inc incredible woman incredible story and the work that she is doing is just um um amazing we then speak with Jesse Morton langha who’s a high school chemistry teacher mother and Ultra Runner and she was the women’s winner of Moab 240 s rning 240
Miles so a whole host of amazing episodes coming out in May so make sure you hit that subscribe button so you don’t miss out and just a few little requests from me if you could tell one friend about the tough guard podcast that would be amazing if you could share
It on your social media tag me on your Instagram stories share a post on Instagram send a tweet put it on Facebook that would make a world of difference because this is how these stories get out there this is how more women get inspired and think right
What’s the next challenge that I’m going to take on I hope by listening to Frankie it’s inspired you to to think a little bit more about what it is that you’re doing with your life how you’re living it and if there’s any changes that you want to make if so now is the
Time to make that change but a massive thank you again for all your incredible support and wherever you are whatever you are doing give it your all give it 110% get after it go for it believe in yourself because I believe in you take care lots of love and I’ll speak to you
Soon bye go