"Why Didn't No One Tell Me?": Samantha Alice Leigh on Motherhood, Hyperemesis Gravidarum, and Finding Herself Again

I want to come back to your mum, because your mum has been a really big part of your life.

Obviously she's your mum, but you said when we first spoke that she's really kind of shaped who you are as well.

Why do you feel that she's been such a kind of inspirational character?

A few reasons.

So my mum had me when she was 21.

She's the youngest of four siblings.

And she grew up in a town outside of Manchester, not too far from my side.

That's where my grandparents lived and brought up their children.

And she was the kind of the first of the family to go off to university and want that sort of educated career, if you like.

Yeah.

but she got pregnant with me and she got pregnant with me but she still went to university and she literally took me with her.

I was in seminars with her where the tutor would come and get me and rock me at the front of the class because she was like so determined to, it sounds bad saying improve her life just she had ambitions and she was so set on, set on those that she was like, and also now she had me, there was another reason, you know, to, um, you know, to build on her career and build this like wonderful life that she now has.

Um, but not through a lot of, not through lack of trying and also so much like determination and grit.

Like, so my, so she now runs a really successful company in brain injury case management.

So if someone suffers with a brain injury through accident or negligence, um, her company will go in and assess them.

And I won't get into that too much, but yeah, she's worked really, really hard and she always has been a really, really hard worker.

Um, And she wasn't a stay-at-home mum.

My stepdad was a stay-at-home dad.

And when my brother was six weeks old, she went back to work and she built this career and then essentially went on to build her company that she's got now.

But my mum's always kind of been like, because I've been the other female in the family and her eldest.

And, you know, I think she's also, she's been like, she'd say things to me like, make sure you look after yourself, Sam.

No one's going to look after you, you look after yourself.

Or like, you know, when Paul and I got together and obviously years down the line, she'd be like,

make sure you have a

secret stash son like yeah you know things like that like she is very kind of like women like yeah you know look after yourself be your own like cheerleader like do things for you like sort of thing um and I think that is definitely ingrained in me I feel like it was more ingrained in me like growing up and living with her and things like that and then I've obviously grown to be my own person and have my own views on things but she yeah she is really kind of like power to the women and I think I love that like her entire company is women like they're all women