Philippa Perry: “I could not wait to grow up.”
5/8/20261 hr 2 min
Before she became one of Britain’s most trusted psychotherapists and writers, Philippa Perry had already lived many different lives: boarding school child, dyslexic misfit, debt collector, McDonald’s manager, art student, Samaritan volunteer and a blooming therapist.
In this episode of Full Disclosure, James O’Brien sits down with Philippa to trace the winding path behind her public voice on relationships, parenting and emotional life - from a childhood shaped by emotional restraint, class anxiety and the sense of never quite being seen, to the books, ideas and experiences that helped her begin to understand herself.
Philippa reflects on growing up in a materially comfortable but emotionally limited world, being sent away to boarding school, and the long-lasting effects of feeling misunderstood both at home and at school. She describes how reading, work and sheer curiosity opened up new ways of seeing people- and how her early jobs, from tracing debtors in Oxford to managing staff at McDonald’s, taught her as much about human nature as any formal training.
They discuss class, confidence and social mobility; the hidden damage of criticism and the transformative power of kindness; why so many therapists are trying to make sense of their own lives; and how motherhood changed Philippa’s understanding of what a child needs in order to feel safe, known and loved.
Funny, searching and deeply moving, this is a conversation about childhood, reinvention, emotional survival and the lifelong work of becoming yourself.
Find out more about Shrink Solves Murder by Philippa Perry here
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Clips
Transcript preview
First 90 secondsPhilippa Perry· Guest0:01
[upbeat jingle] This is a Global Player original podcast. I was such an awful person that nobody would want to marry me.
James O'Brien· Host0:08
What do you mean by awful?
Philippa Perry· Guest0:09
I don't think they were interested in me as an individual. I could not wait to grow up. I felt like I was in prison. I had to break the ice on alcohol-based deodorant at my boarding school 'cause it was so bloody cold.
James O'Brien· Host0:26
Good Lord.
Philippa Perry· Guest0:26
When you put your inchoate miserable feelings into words, you can take ownership of the feelings.
James O'Brien· Host0:34
[upbeat jingle] Hello, and welcome to Full Disclosure, a podcast project conceived entirely to let me spend more time with interesting people than I would ever get on the radio show. Um, I, I say that's almost an understatement in your case, Philippa Perry. Welcome.
Philippa Perry· Guest0:49
Hello.
James O'Brien· Host0:50
Uh, w- uh, polyglot or, or not polyglot, polymath, I'm thinking.
Philippa Perry· Guest0:54
Just a drifter, just a ch- chancer, really.
James O'Brien· Host0:57
And, and, and most recently, um, a, a, a novelist, a, a, um, crime fiction novelist, which we will work our way towards. But we will begin as we always do at the beginning. And I, I had to double-check. I mean, uh, not because of, um, any, any sort of confusion necessarily, but elements of your childhood sounded as though you'd been born much earlier than 1957.
Philippa Perry· Guest1:22
Yes, I think they do. I agree with you. My parents were both very old.
James O'Brien· Host1:28
Right.
Philippa Perry· Guest1:28
And their parents were very