Females Thriving Over Thirty

Have you ever felt like you belong to two countries but don’t fully belong to either? This week we talk about the real life of an expat: the opportunities, the personal growth, and the loneliness, identity crisis and culture shock that nobody prepares you for when you move abroad.Our guest is Juana Silva Puerta, a Colombian-born literary translator who moved to Ely in the UK five years ago. Juana shares what moving abroad was really like: the visa and bureaucracy hurdles, the housing shock, and her first dark winters. She also explains ho...

Is your dress size holding back your career? In this episode of Females Thriving Over 30, Soraya and Jasmine sit down with Rachael Hunt, TEDx speaker, marketing manager and the voice behind Fat Funny Marketer, to talk honestly about plus size discrimination in the workplace and the weight bias women face in business.Rachael shares what it's really like to be a plus size woman at work: being told at seven she couldn't be an actor because she was fat, comments about her lunch from colleagues, and being the only person in the office not...

Have you ever gone through something that changed you so completely that the person you were before feels like someone else? Grief, a relationship ending, a career change, miscarriage, IVF, becoming a mum or not becoming one: after a major life change we're told to "get our confidence back." But what if confidence isn't really what we've lost?This week, Soraya and Jasmine are joined by Tabby Kerwin, consultant psychologist, author, TEDx speaker and widow, who shares why widowhood made her happier and why rebuilding after loss starts with self-trust, not confidence....

Cornell sexual assault lawsuit: what's alleged, why the case is back in the headlines, and why so many women still don't feel safe.Content note: this episode discusses sexual assault. Please skip if that's not something you want to hear today.A former Cornell student alleges she was drugged and sexually assaulted at the Chi Phi fraternity house in 2024. Her civil lawsuit is now public, prosecutors have reopened the case, and the internet is asking how it was handled. (Cornell disputes that essays were the only consequence and says...

Why do you keep saying yes when you mean no? Transformational coach Yana German reveals why 97% of your daily life runs on subconscious programming and how to find your way back to alignment.What if the life you're living looks right on the outside but doesn't feel right anymore? In this episode of Females Thriving Over 30, Soraya and Jasmine sit down with Yana German, the Chicago-based coach, spoken word poet and creator of SoulScript Poetry, known as the "Architect of Awareness & Alignment." With nearly three decades of experience, Yana shares how she turned her...

What if turning 50 wasn't something to dread — but the moment you finally stop apologizing for who you are? This week Soraya and Jasmine sit down with Emily Sanders: a single mom of two, licensed massage therapist, pageant titleholder, and aspiring children's book author who's redefining what confidence after 50 actually looks like.Emily gets real about the parts nobody posts about — rebuilding her identity after divorce, losing a business she spent five years building, competing in pageants in her 40s and 50s, and the exact moment she decided she had "no more Fs to give." We talk about midl...

Season 8 is officially here 🎉 We're kicking things off with everything we've been dying to talk about: our reaction to Netflix's #1 true crime documentary Death of the Pastor's Wife (Mica Miller's story), Advances in IVF, The most measured woman in the world Kate Tolo, the viral trend nobody can stop talking about — aura farming — and why the Tate brothers' manosphere empire is finally crumbling after their Miami extradition hearings.We also catch up on our summer (Edinburgh, Matilda the Musical, and one very dramatic pigeon), dig into the latest wave of biohacking and women's health tech, a...

Anxiety that comes from nowhere. Brain fog that makes you feel incompetent at your own job. Exhaustion no amount of sleep fixes. If you're in your 30s or 40s and these symptoms sound familiar, you need to hear this conversation.This week on Females Thriving Over 30, Soraya sits down with Martina Loebenberg — former competitive bodybuilder turned corporate professional — who spent almost a decade being told her symptoms were depression, ADHD, burnout, or "just London life," before finally connecting the dots to perimenopause. Martina opens up about the years-long fight to be taken seriously by doctors, why...

"DINK" stands for Dual Income, No Kids — and it's become one of the fastest-growing lifestyle labels among couples choosing not to have children. This week, Soraya and Jasmine sit down with Charlie and Ali, the husband-and-wife founders of DINK Social, the first social app built specifically for child-free couples.They talk about how the DINK lifestyle actually plays out day to day, why the community around it took off faster than they ever expected, and what "child-free by choice" really looks like once you get past the internet's assumptions, backlash, and the cliché "lavish, carefree" stereotype. Along the...

Is your job successful — or does it actually feel meaningful? On this episode of Females Thriving Over 30, Jasmine and Soraya sit down with returning guest Urmi — a finance professional by day, self-published author, speaker, YouTuber and podcaster by night — to unpack what it really takes to build a career with purpose beyond a job title.Urmi shares the moment she realised a "successful" career (the promotions, the pay rises, the external validation) wasn't the same as a fulfilling one, why the hours between five and nine can matter as much as your nine-to-five, and how the Japanese concep...

Is having kids still the "default" path for women — or is that starting to change? This week, Soraya and Jasmine sit down with Ashleigh Russell to talk about her decision to be child-free, and why she's never wavered on it.They get into the judgment that comes with saying "I don't want kids" out loud, the real financial cost of raising a child in the UK today, why "selfish" might actually be "self-aware," and what it's really like navigating relationships, family, and even medical professionals when children simply aren't part of your plan....

Divorce in your 30s isn't the end of your story — it might be the redirection you never asked for. In this honest, unfiltered episode, Soraya and Jasmine sit down with Jess, who went through divorce after 13 years together and came out the other side happier, stronger, and more herself than ever.We talk about the grief no one prepares you for, why the fear is often worse than the reality, and the small moments that tell you you're healing. Jess shares how she rebuilt her confidence, rediscovered old passions, leaned into fitness and running, an...

If you've ever thought "I should have started investing years ago" — this episode is for you.We're back with qualified financial advisor and money coach Peta Kay (@yourfinancept), and this time we're going deep on investing: why so many millennial women avoid it, how to get started even if you're scared, and why the guilt of starting late is the exact thing keeping you stuck.In this episode we cover:• Why women are statistically less likely to invest than men — and the real cost of that gap•...

Gen Z has officially declared leggings cringe — and we have thoughts. In this episode we dive deep into the millennial fashion identity, from the legging wars to skinny jeans, side parts, ballet flats and everything in between.We unpack a real New York Post article showing how Gen Z gym girls are ditching fitted leggings for baggy sweats due to body image concerns — and ask whether this says more about fashion or about the damaging way women have always been taught to feel about their bodies.We also get real about the frustrations of shopping as a...

You can run a business, a household and a packed calendar — so why does eating well feel impossible? In this episode of Females Thriving Over 30, Soraya sits down with holistic nutritionist Casey Weiss to unpack why high-achieving, type A women get trapped in cycles of dieting, overeating, food guilt and starting over every Monday — and why discipline and willpower are exactly the wrong tools for the job.Casey shares her own journey from chronic dieting and food obsession to food freedom, and breaks down the psychology and biology behind the all-or-nothing eating pattern: perfectionism, "good food vs bad...

Season 7 is officially here — and we're kicking off with a completely honest catch-up on everything that's happened since end of April.Soraya opens up about her fourth embryo transfer not working, navigating IVF with endometriosis, doing fertility injections on a Ryanair flight, and the hardest question of all: how do you make peace with the possibility that motherhood might not happen — and protect your mental health while trying?We also get into the customer service crisis (cowboy builders, kitchens that arrive with missing parts, three weeks without Wi-Fi after moving house), and Jasmine's new chapter in h...

It's the Season 6 farewell episode of Females Thriving Over 30, and we're going out with a bang.Soraya and Jasmine get real about the AI trends that are genuinely frightening — including how social media platforms may already own your voice, how influencers are faking entire life moments with AI-generated photos, and why filters have become so convincing that a missing girl couldn't be identified from her own photos.Jasmine opens up about her recent visit to the hospital for genetic heart testing after her dad was diagnosed with cardiomyopathy — sharing the...

What if everything you've been told about self-love is wrong?We're taught self-love means bubble baths, face masks, and affirmations in the mirror. But real self-love in your 30s often looks uncomfortable — letting friendships go, setting boundaries that disappoint people, and choosing a life that doesn't match the timeline society handed you.This week, Jasmine and Soraya are joined by Lisa Bennett — emergency responder, open-heart surgery survivor, and the reigning Ms Universal Petite Australia 2026 — for an honest conversation about what self-love really means when you've had a brush with death...

If your foundation is creasing, your eyeliner is disappearing into your lid, and your "signature look" suddenly feels off — it's not you. It's that the makeup rules for skin over 30 are completely different, and nobody tells you when they change.In this episode, Soraya and Jasmine sit down with professional makeup artist Helena Walker to break down exactly why the products and techniques that worked in our 20s stop working after 30, 35, and 40 — and what to do instead.Soraya also announces part 1 of her secret project and you can now subs...

We've been taught to chase love — but nobody teaches us how to protect ourselves inside it.In this episode, Soraya and Jasmine are joined by financial advisor and coach Peta-Kay, known as Your Finance PT, for an honest, no-filter conversation about what really happens when love and money collide.Whether you're newly dating, in a long-term relationship, or rebuilding after a breakup — this episode is full of practical advice and real talk you won't hear anywhere else.✨ What You’ll LearnThe money re...