The Laura Dowling Experience

Dr Louise Newson, GP, menopause specialist and founder of Newson Health and the Balance app, joins Laura Dowling for a frank conversation about hormone replacement therapy (HRT), the barriers women face in accessing treatment and the criticism she has faced for challenging established approaches to menopause care. Louise traces her advocacy back to the 2002 Women's Health Initiative (WHI) study and the publication of NICE's first menopause guidance in 2015. She explains why she believes the risks of HRT have been misunderstood, why prescribing remains low, and why the distinction between different types of hormones matters. Laura and Louise discuss testosterone for women, starting HRT later in life, individual responses to estradiol, and difficult questions around hormone treatment following breast cancer. Louise also explores progesterone, PMS, premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD) and postnatal depression, including the influence of Dr Katharina Dalton's work. These are complex areas where treatment…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, Dr Clare Cromwell explains why muscle is just as important as bone in midlife, and lays out a simple twice-weekly strength routine that protects against falls and fractures. We talk a lot about protecting our bones in midlife. But what if the real key to staying steady on your feet, and even to your brain health decades from now, is your muscles? 🔑Key Points • As oestrogen drops, bone density naturally declines, but muscle loss speeds up too, especially after menopause • Strong muscles improve balance and reaction time, so you're less likely to fall, and better protected if you do • Aim for at least two strength sessions a week: roughly three exercises for your upper body and three for your lower body, a few sets of moderate reps • It doesn't need to be heavy lifting or a gym membership; a couple of dumbbells at home can be enough, as long as you feel it 🎧 Listen to the full episode here. Thanks for listening! You can watch the…

Veterinary surgeon and founder of Village Vets, Charles Cosgrave, joins Laura to share what every pet owner should know about keeping their animals healthy, happy and safe — from neutering and pet insurance to behavioural problems, emergency care and the realities of life as a vet. Growing up on a dairy farm in County Meath, Charles watched his father answer veterinary calls at all hours, even on Christmas Day. After qualifying from UCD and working in the UK, he returned to Ireland and helped build Village Vets, which has grown to 35 locations, including three 24-hour emergency centres. Charles takes us behind the scenes of veterinary medicine, explaining what happens during overnight emergencies, why children can provide the most useful information about a sick pet and how veterinary care has evolved to include specialist treatment for conditions such as diabetes, epilepsy and cancer. Laura also asks the questions many dog owners have: Should you neuter your dog? What should you look for in pet insurance?…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, Meghan O'Neill, online content creator and mother of two explains how she holds firm boundaries for herself, then how she is teaching her young children about consent, from everyday moments like a kiss or a tickle through to the bigger conversations about porn and never being with someone who is drunk. What if the most important thing you teach your kids about sex has nothing to do with sex, and everything to do with the word no? 🔑Key Points • Meghan will not be pressured into anything; she can walk away right up to the last moment if something does not feel right • She wants her kids to know porn is not real, because no one ever told her that • At home, her kids can say no to a kiss or a tickle, and that no is respected straight away • She is direct with her son: never sleep with someone who is drunk, because they cannot consent 🎧 Listen to the full episode here. Thanks for listening! You can watch the full episode on YouTube…

#AD - This episode is sponsored by AstraZeneca Dr Tonya Leonard was a GP when she found a lump she was sure was a cyst. By half past nine that morning, she was being told it was breast cancer and asked to decide by the following week whether she had finished her family. Her twin boys were just 18 months old. Sixteen years, a second primary cancer and a diagnosis of advanced breast cancer later, Tonya joins Laura alongside Helen Forristal, Director of Nursing Services at the Marie Keating Foundation, for an honest conversation about living with advanced breast cancer. They discuss metastatic or secondary breast cancer, breast cancer recurrence and the signs and symptoms women should be aware of, alongside treatment, scans, scanxiety, cancer fatigue and the difficulty of planning life beyond the next result. Helen explains why advanced breast cancer remains largely invisible in Ireland, with no official count of how many women are living with it, and discusses the importance of specialist cancer support. Tonya…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, Dr Clodagh Campbell shares two client stories about reclaiming time for yourself, then walks through the Four Ds, a simple way to sort an overwhelming to-do list into what to delete, delegate, delay or do. When your life feels too full, the answer isn't to try harder. It's working out what can give. Psychologist Dr Clodagh Campbell shares two client stories and a simple tool for figuring out what to drop. 🔑Key Points • When life feels too full, the question isn't how to cope better, it's what can change and what can give • Alice, a successful business owner, worked herself into the ground out of a deep fear of letting her parents down • By the end of their work together, Alice had hired a manager, taken a three-month sabbatical and learned that rest could be as simple as walks on the beach • Nikki, a mother of three, couldn't imagine one hour a week for herself, until a small boundary around one yoga class let her husband step…

Dr Dan McCartney, dietitian, lecturer in Human Nutrition and Dietetics and Programme Director of the Human Nutrition and Dietetics programme at TU Dublin and Trinity College Dublin, joins Laura to discuss the vitamins and minerals many of us simply aren’t getting enough of — and why that matters for our health. Drawing on Ireland’s national food intake data, Dan reveals striking levels of inadequate intake across essential nutrients including vitamin B6, folate, vitamin C, vitamin A, zinc, magnesium and selenium. At least half of the Irish population have inadequate intakes of magnesium and selenium, while more than 40% have inadequate vitamin C intakes. Laura and Dan also discuss the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and proposals to lower or restrict the levels of certain vitamins and minerals available through supplements. Dan questions the rationale for reducing these levels when nutrient intakes are already low, discussing proposed levels for vitamin D, as well as restrictions affecting magnesium…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, Dr Denis O'Driscoll, pharmacist working in the HSE addiction services gives a straight, compassionate answer on how hard it is to come off drugs and stay off, and why staying stable on treatment counts as success too. Is staying on treatment for life a failure, or is that thinking part of the problem? Dr Denis O'Driscoll gives an honest answer. 🔑Key Points • Coming off drugs and staying off is never easy, and that is worth saying out loud • Recovery is not one straight line; staying stable on treatment is a positive outcome, not something to be ashamed of • Coming off completely is wonderful when it happens, but it is very challenging, and it is not the only measure of success • Relapse is part of recovery, not a failure, and the priority afterwards is getting people back into support quickly 💛 If you or someone you love needs support, the HSE Drugs and Alcohol Helpline is there on 1800 459 459. 🎧 Listen to the full episode…

Kenneth Keavey has a PhD in chemistry and spent his early career in pharma and biotech. He now grows organic vegetables on twenty-five acres outside Galway, and he's the first to point out the irony: he was an organic chemist, and now he's an organic farmer. In this episode he takes Laura through what's actually on the food we eat, and how little of it we're told. Around 95% of conventional fruit and veg has had some treatment or another. Citrus is dipped or sprayed after harvest in waxes containing quite toxic, in some cases carcinogenic, chemicals to stop fungus growing on the skin. Most of it is legal, disclosed somewhere, and almost never read. Then comes the detail that stops the conversation. In the EU you're allowed 10mg of glyphosate per kilogram of wheat and 20mg per kilogram of oats — twice as much of a probable carcinogen in your porridge as in your toast. Kenneth and Darina Allen went to the Department of Agriculture to ask why. They were told that people eat less porridge than they do toast. It…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, Prof Robert Kelly admits he lost his own balance after a TED Talk and book launch, then shares the pillars-of-life exercise and a patient's story that helped him refocus on family and friends. What happens when a cardiologist looks at his own heart health and realises the answer isn't his diet, it's his diary? 🔑Key Points • A busy run of a TED Talk, a book launch and Christmas left him with no space in his day for three months • Taking one full week off showed him just how stretched he had become • He learned a pillars-of-life exercise from another doctor's podcast: financial health, family, friends, own health and work • Looking at his own pillars, he realised work was crowding out everything else, especially his own health 🎧 Listen to the full episode here. Thanks for listening! You can watch the full episode on YouTube here. Don’t forget to follow The Laura Dowling Experience podcast on Instagram @lauradowlingexperience for…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, Siobhan Murray, psychotherapist and burnout strategist explains why she has banned the phrase self care, and shares the small daily habits, walks, box breathing and a mindfulness trick called the purple alien, that she uses instead to avoid burnout. What if self care isn't a retreat or a spa day at all, but something you can do in the two minutes it takes to boil the kettle? 🔑Key Points • Siobhan bans the phrase self care and replaces it with care of self, something practised daily, not as an occasional treat • A one-off pilates class, a retreat or getting your nails done is maintenance, not care of self • She does four ten-minute walks every day without fail, even in the rain, simply to change her physical state • She practises box breathing, in for four, hold for four, out for four, hold for four, while making a cup of tea 🎧 Listen to the full episode here. Thanks for listening! You can watch the full episode on YouTube here.…

Laura is joined by Dr Cillian Keogh, a GP and co-founder of Dublin City Clinic, for a frank and surprisingly funny conversation about haemorrhoids — what they actually are, who gets them, and why almost nobody wants to say the word out loud. Cillian explains that haemorrhoids are anal cushions that swell under increased pelvic pressure, and goes through who is most at risk: pregnancy, obesity, chronic coughs, straining, long hours sitting and heavy lifting in the gym. He also describes a newer group he sees far more of now, people staying on the toilet much longer than they need to because their phone is in their hand. From there, he walks the treatment ladder. Creams like Anusol and Preparation H settle a flare-up but, in his words, only paper over it. At the far end sits the haemorrhoidectomy, a hospital operation with weeks of recovery — the thing he says, with his GP hat on, you want to avoid. In between is the electrotherapy his clinic offers, where a small current constricts the blood vessel feeding…

In this episode, former Connacht rugby player Fergus Farrell tells Laura what happened after he lifted a metal bench in his own yard in October 2018 — and severed his spinal cord by ninety per cent. He was paralysed from the ribcage down and told he had a five per cent chance of walking again, on the condition he moved within seventy-two hours. He didn’t move. Instead he lay in a bed for twenty-one days and built a picture in his head: a circuit board for his brain, a light switch for his big right toe, and a wire he had to run between them. At half two in the morning on day twenty-one, the toe flickered. When the doctor came round, he watched it move three times before he’d call it anything other than a spasm. Fergus is candid about what recovery costs — pain around the clock, no balance, no feeling from his feet to his waist, and the hidden disability nobody sees in a big man walking down the street. He talks about the businesses he lost, the family who carried it, the guilt of being one who got back on…

Aimée Farrell-Courtney was six years old when she saw three girls playing the bodhrán in her school yard, the sun behind them and the sound going round the walls. She went home and announced she wanted to learn. Her mother's reply - "Oh my God, smelly pub" - is the first clue that this instrument arrived with a reputation attached, and with assumptions about who gets to hold one. She learned anyway, was helping to teach by the age of twelve, and in 2010 won the World Bodhrán Championship. What she has spent the years since doing is quieter and, in its way, harder: asking why so many women take up the drum and so few are ever seen playing it. She and Laura go from goat skin and tuning systems to the survey Aimée ran into women's experiences of trad sessions - the player left standing at the bar while everyone else is asked what they're drinking. She talks about being told she only got a Royal Albert Hall booking because she could wear a dress, about designing a drum that fits the body holding it, and about…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, consultant anaesthetist Dr Anne Doherty offers two simple, evergreen pieces of wisdom from the close of her conversation with Laura. Nothing is as permanent as you think — the good times and the bad both pass — and almost every hard choice people make, even the ones you disagree with, comes from a place of love. 🔑Key Points • Why the good times and the bad times both pass • The freedom in not needing an answer for everything right now • How love sits underneath even the choices we disagree with • A gentler, more compassionate way to see people 🎧 Listen to the full episode here. Thanks for listening! You can watch the full episode on YouTube here. Don’t forget to follow The Laura Dowling Experience podcast on Instagram @lauradowlingexperience for updates and more information. You can also follow our host, Laura Dowling, @fabulouspharmacist for more insights and tips. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe and leave a…

Daniel Buckley was thirty-two before he had a name for what was going on in his head. For as long as he could remember he had been restless, discontented, unable to sit still or hold his focus on anything that didn’t grip him - and he had simply assumed that was him. That was the way he was, and the way life was. His wife Simone saw it long before he did. For more than a decade she told him something wasn’t right, that he couldn’t rest, that he had no structure. He wasn’t ready to hear it. The day before she died, after years of illness, she went through his symptoms one by one and asked him to get help for his ADHD. Daniel tells Laura what happened next - the newspaper article that felt like a tap on the shoulder, the Irish clinics that never rang him back, the trip to England to be assessed at all. He is open about drinking to escape thoughts he had no other way of managing, about the day he stopped, and about the ordinary moment months later when he heard his son laughing outside an open window and…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, comedian and content creator Dympna Little shares how humour helped her family carry her mother's terminal illness and final days. She describes laughing together even in the palliative care room, the moment her mother noticed and said "it's lovely," and the voice message her mother recorded that became her legacy. Tender, warm and bittersweet. 🔑Key Points • How humour can hold a family together through the hardest time • Why laughter and grief are not opposites • The moment her mother noticed them laughing and said "it's lovely" • The voice message her mother left, and what legacy can look like 💛 If you're grieving, be gentle with yourself. There's no right way to do it. 🎧 Listen to the full episode here. Thanks for listening! You can watch the full episode on YouTube here. Don’t forget to follow The Laura Dowling Experience podcast on Instagram @lauradowlingexperience for updates and more information. You can also follow our…

Anna Lechleiter works with people who have never been able to speak, and who have spent their lives being treated as though they had nothing to say. She is a Spelling to Communicate practitioner, and her job is to give non-speakers a way to tell the world what has been going on in their heads all along. She explains why speech is a motor problem rather than a thinking one: the words are there, but the brain cannot reliably drive the body that produces them. That distinction changes how non-speaking people are assessed, educated and spoken to, because almost every standard autism assessment measures motor control and reports the result as intelligence. Anna talks Laura through what happens in a session, from stencil boards to a keyboard, and tells the story that changed her mind completely: a young man called Caoimh, a letter board, and a freezing afternoon when he spelled out that he hoped it would snow. The last stretch belongs to the spellers themselves, as Anna reads the words of Max, Caoimh and Megha in…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, preventive cardiologist Dr Paddy Barrett argues that most people chase health without ever defining it — like a blindfolded archer aiming at a target they can't see. He lays out three things actually worth optimising, and tells the story of walking away from the peak of his career when he realised he'd climbed the wrong mountain. 🔑Key Points • Why "I want to be healthy" means nothing without a target • The blindfolded archer, and aiming at something you can actually see • Three things worth optimising: how long you live, the quality of those years, and how you spend your time • Why it's never too late to climb back down and start again 🎧 Listen to the full episode here. Thanks for listening! You can watch the full episode on YouTube here. Don’t forget to follow The Laura Dowling Experience podcast on Instagram @lauradowlingexperience for updates and more information. You can also follow our host, Laura Dowling,…

Vicki Notaro is back! Her new novel, Anywhere but Here, follows three friends all hovering around 40 and living completely different lives. As Vicki puts it, you can be 40 and you can be a granny, or trying to conceive, or single, or divorced. She and Laura talk about the pressure women feel to have everything sorted by a certain age, and why marriage or a mortgage was never meant to be a finish line. Vicki also gives an honest update on her women's health journey: years of very painful periods, a suspected endometriosis that turned out to be ovarian cysts, a PMDD diagnosis and cyclical depression alongside lifelong anxiety, a coil, surgery, a recurrence, and the oral progesterone that cleared her brain fog within two days. From there the conversation turns to what young people lost when magazines disappeared. Vicki spent four years at Kiss from the age of 22, acting as a "big sis" to teenage readers, and she makes a warm case for edited, expert-checked advice over the "wild wild west of TikTok" — before…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, fitness coach, author and speaker Brian Keane tells the story of hating his first career as a teacher — and the line from his mum that changed everything. He's honest that reinvention isn't instant (he went broke twice before it worked) and lands on a reframe anyone can use: it's not being stuck that traps you, it's the feeling of being stuck. 🔑Key Points • The day Brian knew his first career was the wrong fit • His mum's question: "what would you do for free?" • Why it's the feeling of being stuck, not the situation, that holds you back • How reinvention can take time, including failing along the way 🎧 Listen to the full episode here. Thanks for listening! You can watch the full episode on YouTube here. Don’t forget to follow The Laura Dowling Experience podcast on Instagram @lauradowlingexperience for updates and more information. You can also follow our host, Laura Dowling, @fabulouspharmacist for more insights and tips. If…

What do you do when you feel stuck - in a job you hate, a relationship that has gone flat, or a version of yourself you no longer recognise? Life and business coach Mark Fennell joins Laura for a warm, practical conversation about how people actually get moving again - starting not with a grand plan, but with a single next step. A qualified electrician who began as a youth volunteer worker, Mark shares how coaching became his life's work, and why identity - how you see yourself - sits underneath almost everything. He speaks with real tenderness about the loss he and his wife carried when they were told they couldn't have children, and how they slowly built a genuinely contented life by asking one question: what can we still do that brings us in that direction? From the medical student who became a millionaire painter-decorator to the young carer who believed he would never laugh again, Mark's stories keep returning to the same truths: make the decision, take the action, and be careful what you define…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, former lawyer turned businesswoman Nikki Dwyer explains why coercive, narcissistic abuse rarely looks the way people expect — it's a slow erosion of confidence through criticism, gaslighting and isolation. She speaks candidly about how losing nearly everything became the moment she could stop drifting and consciously choose who she wanted to be. It's honest, raw and ultimately hopeful. 🔑Key Points • Why abusive relationships rarely look the way people expect from the outside • How criticism, gaslighting and isolation slowly wear down confidence • Why being capable or strong doesn't make you immune • Turning the loss of everything into a chance to choose who you want to be 💛 If anything here feels close to home, it's not your fault. In Ireland, Women's Aid (womensaid.ie) offers free, confidential support. 🎧 Listen to the full episode here. Thanks for listening! You can watch the full episode on YouTube here. Don’t forget to…

This week Laura sits down with Dr John Loy, one of the busiest weight-loss surgeons working between Ireland and the UK. He grew up behind the bar of a family pub in County Down, which he says was the best training in medicine he ever had, before a chance meeting in New York changed how he thinks about the whole job. It's a warm, funny and genuinely eye-opening conversation about obesity as a disease rather than a choice, and about the person on the other side of the desk. John explains why more than half of his patients cry at their first appointment, why he never asks how much weight they've lost, and why the goals that matter are seeing your own child's First Communion from behind the camera — not the number on the scales. He also gives one of the clearest explanations you'll hear of how weight-loss surgery actually works - the gastric balloon, the sleeve and the bypass - why a bypass is like "a free GLP-1 injection every day for life", and why, despite the rise of the weight-loss injections, demand for…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, broadcaster and mental health advocate Keith Walsh shares what it was like to be diagnosed with ADHD in his late forties — and how going through his son's assessment led to his own. He's honest and funny about what undiagnosed ADHD looked like day to day, the small systems he built to cope, and why a diagnosis can feel like relief rather than a label. 🔑Key Points • How going through his son's assessment led to his own diagnosis • The everyday reality of undiagnosed adult ADHD • Why a diagnosis can feel like relief rather than a label • The small systems that helped him cope 🎧 Listen to the full episode here. Thanks for listening! You can watch the full episode on YouTube here. Don’t forget to follow The Laura Dowling Experience podcast on Instagram @lauradowlingexperience for updates and more information. You can also follow our host, Laura Dowling, @fabulouspharmacist for more insights and tips. If you enjoyed this episode,…

Ahead of National Sisters Day on Sunday 2 August, Laura hands the mic to the one guest who has known her longest - her younger sister Rachel, making her podcast debut. What follows is less an interview than a lifetime of shared history: the smear tests they were both booked in for that morning, Laura's abandoned marathon training, the running mishap Rachel has never been allowed to live down, and the commentary only a sister can give. Then, halfway through, Laura mentions something she assumed Rachel already knew - that their dad wasn't there when she was born. He was at home with the other two. Rachel had no idea. What happens next is the reason this one is worth listening to: Laura calls their mother into the studio, live, to confirm it. From there it's the full archive — the crooked teeth and the orthodontist bill that nearly cost their parents the house, the green gabardine Laura convinced her was school uniform, growing up around a mother working night shifts as a midwife, and the football trials Rachel…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, psychiatric nurse and intuitive eating counsellor Sinéad Crowe explains what intuitive eating really is — a way of caring for yourself, not another set of rules. She shares why letting go of the diet mentality comes first, and how making peace with food can quiet years of guilt and reconnect you with your body's own signals. 🔑Key Points • What intuitive eating actually means (a self-care framework, not a diet) • Why "rejecting the diet mentality" is the starting point • How making peace with food can ease guilt around eating • Reconnecting with the body's own signals 💛 If anything here resonates, you're not alone. In Ireland, Bodywhys, the Eating Disorders Association of Ireland (bodywhys.ie), offers support and information. 🎧 Listen to the full episode here. Thanks for listening! You can watch the full episode on YouTube here. Don’t forget to follow The Laura Dowling Experience podcast on Instagram @lauradowlingexperience for…

Bob Cullen isn't a doctor or a traditional academic — he's a man who spent his early life around violence and addiction, spent years in prison, and has spent the time since trying to understand where that violence actually comes from. Now finishing a master's and preparing to start a PhD, he leads the Success Stories Programme, running workshops with men — including in prisons and on probation — about patriarchy, masculinity and the beliefs that quietly shape how boys become men. In this conversation, Bob and Laura trace violence back to its roots: the way boys are taught that emotion is weakness, how shame and poverty drive harm, and why Bob believes we can't reduce violence against women without understanding masculinity itself. He's honest about the misogyny he still hears from men when no women are around, and clear that shaming men or simply telling them to "talk more" misses how the harm is learned in the first place. The episode also turns inward. Bob speaks openly about the drugs, the self-harm and…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, child and adolescent psychotherapist Dr Coleman Noctor explains why so many of us feel anxious and "behind," even when life is objectively fine. He shows how the gap between expectation and reality fuels anxiety, why chasing "exceptional" leaves us discontent, and how aiming for his "four to seven zone" can bring us back to balance. 🔑Key Points • Why anxiety often lives in the gap between expectation and reality • How "demonising average" sets most of us up to feel like we're failing • Why happiness is a passing moment, not a permanent state • The "four to seven zone" as a practical way to aim for balance 🎧 Listen to the full episode here. Thanks for listening! You can watch the full episode on YouTube here. Don’t forget to follow The Laura Dowling Experience podcast on Instagram @lauradowlingexperience for updates and more information. You can also follow our host, Laura Dowling, @fabulouspharmacist for more insights and tips.…

Becca Maberly did everything "right." An A-grade student with an obstetrician father, she got to the hospital, had her baby with no pain relief, and was home for lunch - certain she was going to be brilliant at motherhood. Then the postnatal period arrived, and she went, in her words, straight to the bottom of the class. In this honest, funny and disarming conversation, Becca and Laura pull apart the gap between what we're told motherhood will feel like and what it can actually be. Becca talks about feeling like an unnatural mother, the loneliness of the long hours in between, and the maternal rage that surges from nought to a hundred over spilled milk. She shares the day she asked her GP for help and was sent to a psychiatric unit, only to be handed a leaflet and told to count to ten. She also names something few people hear about: D-MER, or dysphoric milk ejection reflex - the wave of crushing sadness that hit her at every let-down, which she only understood years later. The conversation moves on through…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, skin expert and Skin Nerd founder Jennifer Rock explains why so much health and skincare advice online is built to entertain rather than educate — and how to tell the difference. She makes a straight-talking case for checking qualifications, standards and the source behind any advice before you act on it, so the next viral "must buy" doesn't catch you out. 🔑Key Points • Why qualifications and standards matter in skincare and health • How social media is designed to entertain, not educate • Why you should always check the source of your advice • A simple filter for viral trends and "must buy" claims 🎧 Listen to the full episode here. Thanks for listening! You can watch the full episode on YouTube here. Don’t forget to follow The Laura Dowling Experience podcast on Instagram @lauradowlingexperience for updates and more information. You can also follow our host, Laura Dowling, @fabulouspharmacist for more insights and tips. If you…

Laura sits down with community pharmacist Darragh Connolly, who has built a men's health service — Men's Health Downunder — around something most clinics rush past: helping men get their sexual function back after prostate surgery. It's a candid, frequently very funny conversation about a subject usually wrapped in silence and shame. Darragh explains the male anatomy in plain (and memorable) terms, why nightly "micro-erections" keep the penis healthy, and what actually changes after a prostatectomy. He walks through how a penis pump works, what constriction rings are for, and why this isn't only for men who've had cancer surgery — smoking, diabetes, spinal injury, certain medicines and simply getting older can all play a part. Running through all of it is a hopeful message: a prostate diagnosis or surgery is not the end of sex, intimacy is far more than penetration, and men well into their 80s can still enjoy a full sex life. Darragh also makes the case for meeting men's sexual health at the pharmacy…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, GP Dr Mick Crotty explains why weight is far less within our conscious control than we are led to believe — and why so many people carry a load of self-blame they never deserved. He walks Laura through the genetics of appetite, the brain's reward response to food, and the "set point" it quietly defends, which is why weight so often returns after a diet. It's a clip that gently takes apart the "just eat less and move more" myth. 🔑Key Points • Why "just eat less and move more" is an oversimplification • How genetics and the appetite system shape hunger and fullness • What the brain's "set point" is, and why weight often returns after dieting • Why this is a medical issue, not a personal failing 🎧 Listen to the full episode here. Thanks for listening! You can watch the full episode on YouTube here. Don’t forget to follow The Laura Dowling Experience podcast on Instagram @lauradowlingexperience for updates and more information. You…

How many women quietly put up with heavy bleeding, painful periods or a difficult coil fitting, telling themselves it is just part of being a woman? In this episode, Laura sits down with obstetrician and gynaecologist Dr Áine Dempsey, who works at BlackRock Women's Health and at the Rotunda, for an honest, practical conversation about the things women are so often told to live with - and what can actually be done about them. Áine explains what a hysteroscopy really involves, why polyps and fibroids drive heavy bleeding, and when the Mirena coil is the right first step before ablation or surgery. She is candid about pain relief during coil fittings, the six-month settling period, and where the copper coil fits in. The conversation moves into perimenopause and HRT, smear tests, HPV and colposcopy, and the realities of painful sex, vaginismus and caring for women who carry past sexual trauma. She closes on labour ward life, her own two pregnancies, the magic of epidurals, and why no woman should feel she has to…

Aimee Donnellan joins Laura to talk about her new book Off the Scales: The Inside Story of Ozempic and the Race to Cure Obesity, and the much bigger story sitting underneath it - how generations of women learned to live with food. Through interviews with women across the world, Aimee found the same pattern repeating. A trip to a dietitian around the age of seven. A mother quietly carrying her own dieting story, passing it on through Weight Watchers, rice cakes and "don't think cute clothes mean you can come off your diet." For some, GLP-1 medications like Wegovy and Mounjaro have quietened the food noise for the first time in their lives. For others, the more confronting realisation is how differently the world treats them when they shrink. Aimee also explores how the men in her book relate to their bodies very differently, the rising scale of childhood obesity and the shame attached to it, and why the food industry has barely adjusted to a world where appetite itself is shifting. She and Laura reflect on…

Darragh Fleming went viral last year for a poem — but this conversation is about everything that came before it. The Cork writer talks to Laura about a childhood spent lost in books, a long detour through sport and self-doubt, and the years he spent convinced he wasn't creative at all. At seventeen, Darragh lost his close friend Irby to suicide, and the grief changed him profoundly. For years afterwards he felt almost nothing — a numbness he didn't recognise as depression — while quietly performing the emotions other people expected of him. He's honest about the survivor's guilt that made him sabotage his own happiness, the panic attack that became his rock bottom, and how therapy and journaling slowly led him back to writing. From there the conversation opens out into the work Darragh is known for now: poetry that reimagines what it means to be a man. He and Laura discuss why anger is so often the only emotion men feel allowed to show, how language like "toxic masculinity" can shape the way boys see…

In this episode, consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist Dr Fadi joins Laura for an open, practical conversation about pelvic floor health, incontinence, prolapse and the realities of modern obstetrics. Dr Fadi explains how childbirth, ageing and menopause affect the pelvic floor, and why so many women end up living with stress incontinence, prolapse and faecal incontinence in silence. He walks through the full range of treatment options — from physiotherapy and pessaries to urethral bulking, Botox, sacral neuromodulation, robotic surgery, and the mesh procedures paused in Ireland since 2018. The conversation also takes in interstitial cystitis, vaginal oestrogen, the impact of long inductions on older mothers, and the trade-offs women now weigh up between a vaginal delivery and a caesarean section. Dr Fadi closes with a reflection on his time working with Syrian refugees, where he met 13-year-old mothers and a 26-year-old grandmother. 🔑 Key Points 1. Pelvic floor problems are common and treatable — Stress…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, GP Dr Sarah Carty explains why ADHD looks so different in girls and women — and why so many only recognise it years, sometimes decades, after it first showed up. She tells Laura how the "quiet" presentation — daydreaming, internal restlessness, working twice as hard to look fine — slowly turns into anxiety, perfectionism, and a quiet erosion of confidence. It's a clip that gives language to something a lot of women have silently carried for years. 🔑 Key Points Why girls are diagnosed much later than boys — and what gets missed Masking, and how it shows up as perfectionism, daydreaming, or "just being quiet" The link between unrecognised ADHD and anxiety, panic and exhaustion How girls end up labelling themselves as "stupid", "lazy" or "not academic" — and why that's so far from the truth Why the right diagnosis can change a person's whole self-story 🎧 Listen to the full episode here. Thanks for listening! You can watch the full…

What does proper midlife care actually look like, and who keeps getting left out of it? In this episode, Laura sits down with Dr Caoimhe Hartley - founder of Menopause Health in Dalkey, clinical lead of the Complex Menopause Clinic in the Rotunda, and clinical lead for women's medicine at the new BlackRock Health Women's Health Centre. They talk about the women being told no - those over 60 who feel they have missed the boat on HRT, and those who have come through breast cancer and are still struggling with symptoms. Caoimhe explains where the evidence actually sits on bones, blood vessels and brain, why so much of what gets repeated still comes from the Women's Health Initiative, and how modern HRT differs from the older oral preparations. The conversation moves through midlife weight gain and changing body shape, the rise in adult ADHD diagnoses, and the link between oestrogen and dopamine. They also dig into osteoporosis screening in Ireland, why there is no national DEXA programme, dietary calcium, and…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, menopause specialist Dr Deirdre Lundy walks Laura through how decisions about HRT and family history of breast cancer actually get made in clinic — and why a blanket "no" rarely tells the full story. If you've ever been handed that flat refusal, this is for you. She unpacks the difference between "a family history" and a strong family history, why outdated fears around HRT and breast cancer have cost women years of their lives, and why surviving cancer shouldn't mean accepting a wrecked quality of life with no support. 🔑 Key Points What "strong family history" really means — and why it isn't a blanket no How specialists balance risk versus quality of life in real clinic conversations Why so many women have been wrongly told HRT is off the table The wider point: survivorship deserves more than "you should be grateful" What to ask for if you've been refused HRT and want a second look 🎧 Listen to the full episode here. Thanks for…

Pamela Deasy was in her early 40s, working full time and volunteering with the RNLI, when fatigue started dragging her back into bed in the middle of the day. Her bloods were clear. She was told it was perimenopause, then depression. Months passed before a kinesiologist, of all people, pointed at her pancreas — and within days she was in a Cork hospital being told she had a tumour. In this episode, Pamela sits down with Laura to walk through what happened next: the chemotherapy that made her legs turn to jelly, the five and a half weeks of daily radiotherapy that put her on her back in hospital, and the Whipple surgery that took out the head of her pancreas, part of her stomach, part of her intestine, her gallbladder and her spleen. Then the slower, quieter battle that came after — the seven and a half stone she lost, the survivor guilt nobody warned her about, the Survive and Thrive programme that helped her step back into the world, and the small camping toilet she now keeps in her car because that is the…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, endocrinologist Dr Mary Ryan opens up about losing her husband unexpectedly while raising three small children, and what grief actually looked like for her in the years that followed. She tells Laura about the shock, the anger, and the long fog of those first two years — and the small, practical things that helped: leaning into bonding routines with her kids, accepting help from family, friends and even her own patients, and letting people in when every part of her wanted to push them away. 🔑 Key Points Why grief, in her experience, takes around two years — and why the second Christmas is often the hardest The "dark hole" she fell into, and what slowly pulled her out How she kept life moving day-to-day for three young children The quiet role of family, friends and patients in keeping her going A gentle, honest take on how you don't really "get over" loss — you come through it 🎧 Listen to the full episode here. Thanks for…

Anxiety author Caroline Foran joins Laura for a deeply personal conversation about parenting a young son recently diagnosed as autistic with a PDA profile, alongside her own long history with anxiety. Caroline talks openly about the years before the diagnosis, the blame she turned inward, and everything she has had to unlearn about parenting. She explains what PDA — Pervasive Drive for Autonomy — actually looks like day to day, why traditional approaches can make things worse, and the social pressure of being seen to "manage" a child whose nervous system is set on high alert. She also shares her own anxiety story, from a frightening breakdown at sixteen in Italy through to the severe physical anxiety that took over her twenties. Caroline talks about medication, CBT, and the years of work behind her new book Everything I Wish I'd Known About Anxiety, and why so much of recovery came from showing her body safety rather than trying to outthink her own mind. 🔑 Key Points Discovering a PDA profile — Caroline…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, comedian Kyla Cobbler shares an honest, no-frills account of how her drinking quietly turned into dependency — while she was still training, working, and gigging five nights a week. She tells Laura how being a regular performer in Barcelona blurred the lines between socialising and self-medicating, and how Dry January cracked the whole thing open. What started as a simple challenge ended in withdrawal, therapy, AA, and a completely new relationship with fear, nerves, and joy on stage. 🔑 Key Points How "high-functioning" drinking can hide a much bigger problem The cycle of running, gigging, free drinks — and waking up groggy every single morning What withdrawal actually felt like by day two of Dry January Why it was never about the red wine — it was about wanting to feel different Performing sober for the first time, and learning to feel everything instead of numbing it 🎧 Listen to the full episode here. Thanks for listening! You…

Barbara Scully sits down with Laura for a wide-ranging conversation that starts with her own recent run-in with the medical system and opens out into what it actually means to age as a woman in Ireland today. Barbara talks about months of hip pain, a string of MRIs, a suspected stroke that turned out to be nothing, and the moment she decided to step off the treadmill of tests, hand back the prescription and rebuild her strength in the gym. She also shares her type 2 diabetes diagnosis in her mid-50s and the two years of remission she achieved through diet and exercise before her mother died and life became harder again. The conversation moves into menopause, brain fog, mood swings and the language used about older women. Barbara reframes brain fog as an information retrieval slowdown, makes the case that women's anger after menopause is real and warranted, and argues that being underestimated as you get older is closer to a superpower than to invisibility. There is also room for the story behind it all.…

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, GP and menopause specialist Dr Sarah Callaghan explains why perimenopause so rarely arrives with a bang — and why so many women spend years "muddling through" before they realise what's actually going on. She tells Laura about the slow, sneaky creep of symptoms, the patterns she sees most often in clinic, and the women who mistake their perimenopause for postnatal anxiety, burnout, grief, or "just life". It's a powerful reframe: if something feels off, you deserve more than "just cope". 🔑 Key Points Why perimenopause symptoms rarely arrive all at once — and why that matters The fluctuating, "good week / bad week" pattern that makes women doubt themselves Common mislabels: postnatal anxiety, stress, grief, COVID, burnout The "I just don't feel like myself" phrase she hears in clinic over and over Why you don't need to be in crisis to ask for help — even a 20–30% drop in functioning is worth investigating 🎧 Listen to the full…

Laura sits down with MEP Maria Walsh for a wide-ranging conversation about women, power and what is shifting in Europe right now. Maria has just returned from the UN Commission on the Status of Women in New York, where for the first time in seventy years member states could not agree a final text on access to justice for women. She talks honestly about online misogyny, the deepfakes already circulating in Irish secondary schools, conversion therapy, and the website created about her during the 2019 election that is still live today. Alongside that, she opens up about internalised homophobia, the loneliness of political life, and growing up as the gay Rose of Tralee at a time when Ireland was shifting on marriage equality. The conversation also moves through period poverty, FGM, the underfunding of women's healthcare, the pink tax, and what it would take to close the gap on cardiovascular care, menopause and reproductive health. It is a frank look at the work still ahead and the toll it takes on the women…

🎧 Episode Description In this episode, Michelle Flynn shares her deeply personal and professional insight into birth trauma, and why it’s not always about what happens, but how it’s experienced. Drawing on her own journey through pregnancy anxiety and her work as a perinatal psychotherapist, Michelle explains how trauma can live in the nervous system, showing up long after the moment has passed. From hypervigilance and intrusive thoughts to sensory triggers that bring the body straight back into the experience, she breaks down why these reactions happen and what they actually mean. Together, Michelle and Laura unpack the importance of feeling safe, seen and supported, both for patients and for healthcare professionals. This really comes back to understanding your body and how trauma can show up differently for each of us. 📚 Mentioned in this Episode Postnatal Depression A type of depression that can occur after childbirth, affecting mood, energy, and ability to care for yourself or your baby. Postnatal…

🎧 Episode Description How many women have been told that pain is just part of being a woman? For many women, painful or heavy periods become something they learn to live with. In this conversation, periods are reframed as something far more important - a vital sign that reflects what’s happening across the whole body, not just a monthly inconvenience. Through real clinical stories, we hear how women can spend years feeling exhausted, run down, or unwell without ever realising the root cause. These symptoms are normalised, when in reality they need to be recognised and supported much earlier. Drawing on decades of clinical experience, Mary shares how early intervention can prevent long-term conditions like PCOS and endometriosis. The discussion also expands into menopause, hormone therapy, and the importance of lifestyle - from nutrition and sleep to stress and daily habits - in supporting the body. Alongside the science, the episode reflects on modern life - the pressure to do too much, the importance of…

🎧 Episode Description Hannah Daly talks openly about the long path to understanding her brain. Growing up, she knew she experienced the world differently, but dyslexia and dyspraxia seemed to explain enough at the time. It wasn’t until much later that she began to question whether there was more to it. A period of intense physical and cognitive symptoms during perimenopause became a turning point. As her ability to cope and mask began to unravel, it led her to seek answers - and eventually to diagnoses of ADHD and autism. What follows is a process of looking back, reinterpreting her life, and starting to understand herself in a completely different way. 🔑 Key Points Growing up feeling different without the language for it Hannah describes always experiencing the world differently, but early diagnoses of dyslexia and dyspraxia seemed to explain enough at the time. Masking and the effort of trying to fit in Much of her life was shaped by adapting to environments and expectations, often suppressing her own…