Episode 15

Rewriting the story of self-harm with Beth Derry

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EPISODE SUMMARY

Join me on this episode where I’m talking with Beth Derry, founder of Lovely Messy Humans. Through this work, Beth aims to dismantle the stigmas and create a new understanding of teenage self-harm, emotional wellbeing and resilience.

Prior to founding Lovely Messy Humans, Beth spent two decades helping the world’s biggest companies communicate about sustainability, from climate change to human rights. During this time she also dived deep into her own inner world, alongside raising her two kids. It is through these combined experiences that Lovely Messy Humans came to be.

In this episode we dive into:

➡️ Why teenage self-harm is on the rise

➡️ The neuroscience of how self-harm “works”

➡️ Beth’s own journey from self-harming as a teenager to doing this work today

➡️ Building brave spaces to break the cycle

This episode comes with a trigger warning as we talk about self-harm in teenagers today and also share Beth’s own journey with self-harm. So please do take care if this is a topic that you don’t want to connect with at this time.

CONNECT WITH BETH

If you would like to find out more about Beth and Lovely Messy Humans you can do so in the following places:

• Instagram: @lovelymessyhumans

• Website: www.lovelymessyhumans.com

• Email: hello@lovelymessyhumans.com

FURTHER SUPPORT

If you have been affected by the topics discussed, here is the NHS page which includes links to resources https://www.nhs.uk/mental-health/feelings-symptoms-behaviours/behaviours/self-harm/getting-help/

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Got a topic you’d like to request or a guest to recommend? Drop me an email

EPISODE TRANSCRIPTION

00:03 - Debbie (Host)

Welcome to Beyond Business, the podcast, the show for impact-driven ecopreneurs who want to be part of a bigger change and make a difference that reaches beyond your business alone. This week on the podcast, I'm welcoming Beth Derry, founder of Lovely Messy Humans. Beth Derry, founder of Lovely Messy Humans. Through this work, beth provides training and coaching for parents and schools that is focused on dismantling stigmas and creating a new understanding of teenage self-harm, emotional well-being and resilience. Prior to this, beth spent two decades helping the world's biggest companies communicate about sustainability, from climate change to human rights. During this time, she also dived deep into her own inner world alongside raising her two kids, who are now teenagers themselves. It's through these combined experiences that lovely messy humans came to be.

01:03

Before we start, I want to share a trigger warning. Throughout the episode, we talk about self-harm in teenagers today and also share Beth's own journey with self-harm, so please do take care if this is a topic that you don't want to connect with at this time and if, after listening, you find that you need extra support. Please use the links in the show notes to find a page on the NHS website that contains several different ways to get help, and with that let's dive in. A very, very warm welcome to the podcast, Beth. It's so lovely to have you here. Really nice to see your smiling face and your beautiful background this morning.

01:47 - Beth (Guest)

Oh, thank you. I'm glad my face is smiling my first ever podcast experience.

01:54 - Debbie (Host)

So thank you. I hope it will be an enjoyable one. And I wonder on that, how are you arriving with us this morning?

02:03 - Beth (Guest)

And I wonder on that how are you arriving with us this morning? I'm good, thanks. I'm excited to be here and surprised that I'm here because it's such a massive change to where I was two years ago, when public speaking or doing anything like this was like full body fear.

02:21 - Debbie (Host)

So, yeah, thanks for having me. Yeah, you're so welcome. I awesomely named lovely messy humans, which just seems so fitting and so relatable for me. But through that, you provide resilience, training, mentoring, coaching for parents, teachers and adults working with or around young people, and it seems like such a worthy and valuable cause in today's society. But I wonder, to start with, like on the outside, lovely messy humans seems like quite a pivot from your long standing career in sustainability and I wonder if you could tell us a little bit more about your own journey and how you came to do this work. Yeah, sure.

03:34 - Beth (Guest)

So I have spent my whole career working in sustainability, studied zoology at uni and did a master's in ecology and environmental management, and then my first ever job was amazing for the Cornwall Wildlife Trust doing otter surveys around the coast. What more can you want at that age? Amazing experience managing big teams. When I became a mum, so like 12, 13 years ago, I decided to go freelance, not knowing what I was going to do, and it was at that time that sustainability, and especially corporate sustainability, was really going mainstream. So I thought I was gonna do some sort of PR. But no, everyone said your niche, focus on sustainability. So the first ever job I did a bit of a baptism of fire and I've gone on from there. So, really specializing in corporate transparency, sustainability, reporting, working a lot with B Corps and smaller companies these days, learnt so much about the world and, yeah, it's given me a pretty unique big picture of the world view of the world as well.

04:51

However, at the same time as that, as well as getting that big picture view, while I was at uni, I really struggled with my mental health for various reasons and I used self-harm as a coping strategy. It was really rare back then. I've done a lot of work since then to understand myself, to grow, to heal in all the ways I needed to heal. So I, as well as getting that big picture view, also developed that view of like what it is to be human, based on experimenting on myself. And then I'm sure we're all aware of the current mental health challenges facing young people, and particularly the huge rise in teenage self-harm since the pandemic. So I kept hearing about this. There's a little voice in my head telling me hmm, you know something about that. At the same time, I was doing this work with a lovely company called the happy startup school, who you know well. Yeah, that's how we've met, really having that sense when we get to a certain age.

06:00

I think a lot of us get to a point where we've we've had a great career, we've got loads of experience, things seem to be going well, but there's something more. I felt there was something more. In some ways, the work I've done with these huge global companies. It always felt a bit like training for the thing I'm really here to do and I didn't know what that was. So I was doing some work around that, like what is my purpose? Who am I really here to be and, yeah, keep hearing about this the rise in teenage self-harm friends who've got teenagers, teachers, everyone talking about it and I knew that I had stuff to share that would help people.

06:37

I had so much resistance I did not want to do it and it. I had to do quite a lot of groundwork first, but at the same time, I was talking to teenagers and that name lovely messy humans I love it too, but it was teenagers who helped me come up with that, because, as I'm talking to teenagers who are struggling now and they're telling me about the information they've been given and how that has made them feel, which was not good. It made them feel better in some cases, it made them want to self-harm, and so I decided I needed to do something really different, almost the antithesis of that. So I'm testing different ideas with teenagers and they love the name Lovely Messy Humans, so it's thanks to them as well. So, yeah, I've taken a leap.

07:31 - Debbie (Host)

Wow, what a journey, what a journey yeah, it's amazing and I'm really struck by your bravery in all that as well.

07:41

Like I know that it's sort of easy to tell a story in hindsight, but it sounds like there's been multiple times along the way where you've had to make really brave and courageous steps in as a lovely messy human yourself, like delving into things that feel uncomfortable and sticky and not knowing how, how it will go on the other side. But yeah, I think, like how I see that bigger picture view of your journey is one that feels relatable for myself and, I imagine, many others who've followed, I guess, our standard societal career path, where a lot of it is focused on chasing external success or external achievement, and I I find that when you get to like early 30s, early mid 30s, I think that's such a common time for people then to reassess and reconsider their career, and it sounds like for you, that turning point was then starting to look inwards as opposed to outwards, and so I wonder for you, is it and would you describe it as having find your purpose, or how would you describe that inside out journey?

09:07 - Beth (Guest)

I mean, the first thing I would say is that I'm so grateful that I came to that work for a start, so life wasn't going particularly straightforward. I got divorced and was working with a therapist and ended up continuing that work for six years with the same therapist, while I did all sorts of experiments and exploring different techniques and amazing things. But it was just too good to stop and I partly did that for myself but also partly for my kids because I wanted to understand how could I be the best mum I could be for them. But also it's just fascinating once you start to understand how our minds work and our bodies and it's all connected and the thing around purpose.

09:51

Then I I felt like I had been hiding most of my life. I had a real big fear of showing up and being seen. Some of that came from early experience. Some of it, I think, goes back generations and it's in all of us. There have been times, particularly for women, where being seen and showing up wasn't safe. So I worked with a coach and went really deep inside to uncover some of those fears and once those things were out the way, then it started to happen and I really believe it's about being who we truly are and then the work finds us, rather than the other way around. So, with the lovely messy humans, I'm trying to build it a bit differently, where I'm just staying as open as I can and not trying to control it, and seeing where it goes and it feels amazing. It's so much more alive than having a strategy. I am having to work on having a strategy as well in order to pay the bills.

10:57

It would be lovely not to. I'm still doing some of the sustainability work as well alongside while I get that transition. It's really tricky making that transition from a practical point of view, but in terms of actually having what's probably the second part of my life doing the work I'm really here to do, it feels very much like that.

11:20 - Debbie (Host)

I'm on the right track for that now and it's so so different mmm I knew and in the happy startup school I've heard they talk a lot about doing business from the inside out and that lands with me. So it feels so soothing in my nervous system and, yeah, I hear you having really drawn on that inner wisdom to you, because I think that in our society we're so we prioritize like the headspace and being like a lot of. We assume a lot of the wisdom comes from thinking about things clearly and yes, that does have its, but balancing that with the inner wisdom, just as you say.

12:05 - Beth (Guest)

Yeah, and that balance between thinking and feeling. I had a real turning point with my sustainability work. I was working with one of the major tech companies and we were putting some materials together around child labour in the tech supply chain at the same time as my son and all his friends were getting their first mobile phones, and it really affected me and it was a big lesson that that was the first time in my career that I had not just been rationally thinking about the stuff I was working on. It was a whole body, emotional experience. It was a big turning point and I think that's part of how we've got into the situation we're in. We are just so rational we don't allow ourselves to feel it and in fact, we'll do what we can to not have to feel it, because we couldn't live how we live and run our businesses like we run them if we allowed them, allowed ourselves to. But that's what I'm now doing.

13:05 - Debbie (Host)

That's what's different with this new work that it really is less about controlling it and fear and more about letting it go where people need it to go yeah, to me it seems so fitting for you, like lovely messy humans, feels such a fitting way to address like a global sustainability problem to me, because I think how I see it is like a lot of the environmental crises that we see. It's like the collective representation of what we all experience on a day-to-day basis, like the, the challenges in the way we show up.

13:48 - Beth (Guest)

When you add that up over the global population, then yeah one of the things I share when I talk to young people and when I run training for mental health professionals and schools and others around rethinking self-harm and why we are seeing this huge rise in self-harm. And we've created this world that is so good at making everyone feel that there's something wrong with them or they're not enough or they need to be a certain way. The education system is a master at doing that and it's no wonder that so many young people are struggling. So their nervous systems are completely dysregulated and they're looking for ways to calm themselves down and to feel safe. Social media is connecting them with so many things that when I was, that age just wasn't even. It was the six o'clock news or nothing, and normally I didn't bother watching the six o'clock news, so I had no awareness about things that were going on in the world. It's so different for them now, and none of us have been here before so yeah.

14:54

I look at that whole big picture. I look at where we've evolved from how long we've been on this planet, which is a very long time and what a very short time the world has been how it is now and we're just not designed for it biologically. And when you understand that, the challenges that everyone is facing start to feel less personal. So that's one of the big messages that I start with.

15:28 - Debbie (Host)

I love it and I've seen that so much of your your work draws on your scientific background as well. Like you really bring a lot of that into it, and I remember seeing what you've just described. I remember seeing that summarized in the social media. You post a post, you put up, and it was so true. It was, yeah, talking about how the world. You know, our nervous systems just were not designed to be in in this world that we've created. And I think even my own kids are very young still, but even for them I see the the almost constant access to sources of stimulation. You know, even if they watch tv, there's something there always on demand and it's it's. It's only getting more so and so it's like we're creating.

16:12

I guess our nervous systems are a lot more hyped up in the past and at the same time, life is busy and full, and so we don't come down on the other side of that.

16:24 - Beth (Guest)

It also it's constantly showing them you could be this or you could have this in a way that just wasn't in my awareness at all at that age, and teenagers are telling me that AI is making that even worse. So they're not even comparing themselves and their bodies and their summer holiday, or whatever it is, to a real alternative. Now they're comparing it to an AI alternative and they don't even know that that was AI generated. So it's, yeah, becoming harder and harder.

16:56 - Debbie (Host)

Yeah and so like. From that perspective, it seems no wonder that teenage self-harm is on the rise to the degree it is and that this work is needed now more than ever.

17:14 - Beth (Guest)

It's so common now when you talk to schools, parents, it's so common. I think the latest data was that at least 10% of teenagers have self-harmed and I think a lot of those probably have tried it once. But, given it's so common, it's so not talked about and there's still so much fear and confusion and stigma. So when I was, I guess I knew I wanted to do this work, but I was procrastinating, something was stopping me and getting in the way, and I now know from the work I've done on myself when that's happening, go there, because you can find it and you can sort it out. So I worked with a coach who helped me to go and look at what was getting in the way and I really connected with that shame that I still feel.

18:02

I did not want to go on LinkedIn and tell people that I used to self-harm, but I needed to. So that helped me connect with that shame. Why would we even do that to ourselves, unless there's something really wrong with us? And and by understanding that about myself, I could then connect with how so many young people might probably be feeling now, and I don't want them to be left with that for the rest of their lives.

18:28

So let's explain, because when you look at the science of why people self-harm and what it actually does in the body to regulate the nervous system, it is a coping strategy. It makes so much more sense. It takes all of that kind of mystery and dark confusion away and I think it really helps parents as well, who, when you know, they're, panicking a lot of the time, and once they can see it through this different lens, you can see a path ahead. And that's so important as well, because when you're talking about our nervous systems they're not separate. Co-regulation is really powerful. So if teenagers are struggling, the best thing parents can do is just be there and be calm themselves.

19:18 - Debbie (Host)

So I want to help bring that as well. It's so true. I think. When I heard you mention shame there, it reminds me of how Brené I've heard Brené Brown talk about shame, where she describes it as a cloak that like covers things up, and it's such a powerful emotion for keeping us quiet and silent and keeping things bottled up absolutely, and my work in sustainability has made me believe very much that we need teenagers to become everything they can possibly become and to reach their potential and know that they can do better.

20:06 - Beth (Guest)

And if they are holding on to this shame that they may well not even know is there and hiding parts of themselves, that's not going to happen.

20:12 - Debbie (Host)

So, yeah, let's free them from that at least. And in that, a lot of your work is with parents and carers and those who work with young people as well, and I imagine even in those positions. Shame is really present there as well, because, you know this, there hasn't been for generations, there hasn't been that understanding of why self-harm really happens.

20:37 - Beth (Guest)

Yeah, I compare it. Adults have their alternatives, don't they?

20:42 - Debbie (Host)

we all have ways.

20:43 - Beth (Guest)

We all have things that we do to avoid our difficult feelings and to calm ourselves down, so I compare it to that, also showing habits are hard to break. They take time. Neuroscience comes into this, so explaining that side of it as well, and I'm really empowering people. And then there are. We're so lucky now that all of these tools for emotional regulation are becoming so much more accessible. You can go on social media and find them. In breath work tapping, I'm training in an amazing technique called havening, which actually uses touch to show the body that we're safe so we can calm ourselves down. It's based on neuroscience as well, and all these things are so accessible. We didn't have any of that in the past, so we do have these tools and we need them, don't we?

21:35

based on the world that is out there now it's so true.

21:39 - Debbie (Host)

I love it. I love that there's the um. Yeah, I see your work is really bringing the awareness and the understanding and then providing solutions to move beyond that, and I've heard you talk about like safe self-harm is like the middle, middle way it.

21:58 - Beth (Guest)

That is a sensitive topic and it's a tricky one, but parents are getting very mixed messages about how to deal with this, and taking a real blanket approach does not seem to be effective. That's what they're telling me. So being told, remove anything from the house. Teenagers do what teenagers do and they will find a way. So instead, my approach is to talk about okay, how can you give them the advice and support they need to, at least while they're going through this difficult time and using this as a coping strategy? At least do it safely to reduce the risk, cleanly minimise scarring and give them that trust, like teenagers do also need to feel trusted.

22:53

Part of one of the reasons that some people self-harm is to get that sense of control. Life feels so out of control out there. This is one thing they can have control over, in a way similar to eating disorders. So that is one thing also we're very dismissive of. Oh, they're doing it for attention. Maybe they are doing it for attention and there's a message there. They need a connection. They're not. They're lacking that connection. Every human has core needs, and part of the training that I share with people covers those core needs. These are common to absolutely anyone, of any age, any culture, and they're basically what we need, not just to survive but to thrive, and the world now makes it hard to meet some of those core needs, and neurodiversity is massive as well. So there's the sense of belonging is a big one. That's partly what's driving it. And, yes, some teenagers are looking at self-harm as a way to belong to a group. We mustn't dismiss that again, it is connected to one of those very human core needs.

24:09

So yeah there's a lot of things going on.

24:14 - Debbie (Host)

I really, um, I can really feel that in my, like my stomach as you talk about it, like I I appreciate so much you bringing that conversation, because I imagine it's not an easy one to open or stay with by any means.

24:33 - Beth (Guest)

Yeah.

24:36 - Debbie (Host)

And, yeah, what you said about that sense of belonging, that's what really struck me, I think, in going back to what we said earlier in the conversation, like we're providing this world for teenagers where we say, you know, you can do anything and be anything, and there's these, it seems that there's these endless opportunities open and yet we've got very little in the way of like guidance to like support them along the way, whereas I think that, you know, in days gone by, when communities were so much smaller, there was that inherent sense of belonging and guidance and connection within a community, and that's just so lost in society today.

25:21 - Beth (Guest)

Yeah, and friendship issues are huge. And then you have the impact of social media on top of that. One thing I always remind people is that where we've come from, if we were excluded from the group we would not have survived. And so when we are having friendship issues, are we having the same nervous system reaction now to we how we would have back then? So it feels like it's a survival thing. It's a very overwhelming emotional experience and it's constant.

25:57 - Debbie (Host)

I think with mobile phones that's it's constant. It's not. It's not something that you can go home and like be removed from. It's still. It's still there and it's still present, um, but I know that so much of your work as well, you really focus on long-term change rather than fixing a problem. It's really using this as the base and the foundation for longer-term connection and really building the foundations of, like a strong and positive relationship for the future yeah, I mean this.

26:40 - Beth (Guest)

We've got an opportunity with what teenagers are expressing now. I see it as an opportunity to actually listen to what they're what they are expressing and then give them the tools they need to actually thrive in the long term. So a lot of what I share is what I wish I could have known back that day at that age. It wasn't so available then, but we can make that more available now everything from being able to recognize how our own thoughts impact our physical sensations and how it's all connected, and start to watch some of that and identify the thoughts that we're having and start to question are they really true? Where did they come from?

27:24

So many of us carry things around for our entire life heavy things and beliefs and we actually don't need to. If we do the work, we can choose to put those things down and be free from them. So not only am I working with young people, I do work with other individuals on that kind of thing. But what can we do now to ensure that young people are not going to be carrying those limiting beliefs around with them their whole lives that have really come from the external environment, and what other tools and the processes that they can start to use and embed in their life for long-term resilience everything, movement, nature, sleep, all of those good habits that many of us could do with a little more of. Hence, lovely messy humans no one is perfect here.

28:22 - Debbie (Host)

Very far, yeah, very far from it. I know, and basically there's like an acceptance of it, that that is a large part of what it means to be human, to not be perfect and all our messiness exactly yeah.

28:36 - Beth (Guest)

So I'm just getting to the point now I went. I was waiting. Before I worked with young people, I just knew that I needed to be ready, but parents are actually coming back to me who've done the training and had one-to-one conversations and asking are you ready yet? So yeah, I'm about to start some coaching and mentoring for young people, which is exciting amazing, amazing um which leads us really well.

29:00 - Debbie (Host)

I wanted um to to wrap us up by asking if you could share more about your work and maybe any guidance for parents, teachers, people who do work with young people, any guidance on their next steps, if they're inspired by this conversation.

29:19 - Beth (Guest)

Yeah, sure. So I have a webinar which I deliver with amazing Rose from Start the Conversation. She has loads of experience as well, so we deliver this together. There's one a month for parents and one a month for professionals, so we're getting quite a lot of mental health professionals and youth workers, teachers, dance teachers, anyone who feels that they need to understand more about the topic of teenage self-harm and how to respond, because that first response is so critical to keeping the conversation open and avoiding the shame and the judgment that does not help. So I've got that work. And then also working directly with schools and organizations to run workshops in-house, um, and, as I said, just starting to develop coaching and mentoring for young people. So if anyone is interested in that, I would love to have a conversation. The best way to find out more you can follow us on Instagram. It's just lovely messy humans. I do have a website. It really needs work, so I'm hesitant to send people to that, but also my email is hello at lovely messy humans amazing.

30:33 - Debbie (Host)

Thank you so much, and I just I think this work is so powerful and so necessary and so needed. And, circling back to what I said at the very start, reflecting on your journey, hi, it must have involved a lot of bravery and courage to get up to this point. It strikes me that that still is so core to what you do, and so I just super appreciate that you continue to stretch yourself in that way in order to spread this valuable and much needed work.

31:10 - Beth (Guest)

Thank you no worries, and can I just say, on that as well, we can change so much. My own experience has shown. I honestly believe that we can change anything if we want to and if we get the people to support us.

31:26 - Debbie (Host)

So yeah, oh, what a fitting note to end on wise words indeed. Um, I will put these links in the show notes as well, so if anybody would want to reference in there, then they'll be able to do so. And yeah, just to say thank you so much again for your time today. It's been such a pleasure and I'm so looking forward to sharing this conversation thank you, lovely to talk to you bye for now bye thank you so much for listening to this episode of beyond business.

32:04

If you've loved what you've heard, I would be incredibly grateful if you could rate and review the podcast so that together we can create a global ecosystem of change makers, pioneering business as a force for good. Until then, I look forward to speaking to you in the next episode.