Top tips for speaking live on BBC: toilet roll, rescue remedy and your husband's pants.

Yesterday saw my first live national BBC TV interview on an emotive subject via Skype, as I contributed to a discussion on disability abortion law and screening for Down's Syndrome on Sunday Morning Live hosted by Samira Ahmed.

Nervous doesn't come close. Honoured and proud, determined to make every word count, yet scared of who would be on the panel and the questions they might ask, yes. But more a faint shade of petrified I would say. 

And live. Did I mention it was live? Oh, and did I also mention I have a deep-rooted loathing of Skype (other similary offputting online video conferencing applications are available). I like to see the non-verbal cues going on in a room when I speak to people. Oh, and no-one looks at their perkiest no matter how much slap you apply do they?

So here are my top tips for surviving such a live online interview:

Don't run out of rescue remedy 24 hours before.

Prepare thoroughly even if it means staying awake most of 2 nights.

Don't over-prepare, it won't seem natural.

Get a good night's sleep the night before.

Apply even more blusher than your children do when giving you a make-over on a rainy Sunday afternoon.

Try to tame locks you didn't have time to straighten with some hair oil.

Don't apply too much hair oil or you may look like you need to be appearing on Aggie's Grimey Hoarders or similar.

Cellotape key notes to your laptop screen but not actually OVER the camera hole.

Get all your points in, starting with the most important first. 

Don't try to force all your points in like shoe-horning your swollen summer foot into a 

dainty court shoe one size too small.

Bring earphone cable to ears from behind your head to give a more professional air.

Check the sound levels aren't too high BEFORE inserting earphones and pushing them home.

Don't swear at the headphones while the researcher giggles at your efforts to remove the aforementioned objects and bring hearing levels back to normal by waggling fingers in your ears.
Very unprofessional regardless of how cable is hidden.

Stock up on toilet paper, for extreme nerves do have a very curiously unpleasant effect.

Realise that 2 minutes before you go live is not the time to need to visit the loo again.

Don't listen to friends who tell you to wear your husband's pants on the bottom half just to lighten the mood.

If your extremities begain to go numb and you feel faint, drink water, run round the garden and force down a rich tea finger. 

But not if it's 2 minutes before you go live.

2 minutes before you go live is also the wrong time to 

a) re-write your thoughts 

b) run for the hills 

c) remember to take the phone off the hook, 

switch mobile off, silence the dog with a chew.

When you've actually finished speaking, be aware they will have your face on screen about 8 feet high. The world will be able to see you sigh, slump in your chair and pick your nose. (No, of course I didn't!)

Remember to record the correct programme and not miss the first half off somehow.

Don't shout at your other half if he manages 

not to record the show.

Don't watch yourself back on iPlayer, you will be your harshest critic and spend another night wishing you had done it all differently.

At least I know for next time :)

You can watch the episode here for 6 more days. The abortion debate begins at around 20 minutes into the programme.

Opinions are like, ummm, bottom holes

When I imagine the worst possible sub-species of opinionated troll, I simply have to cast my mind's eye back 20 years to my ex Mother in Law. 

She was the personification of everything I am not. A domineering parent. A woman who always felt compelled to unthinkingly voice the strongest of opinions on every subject imaginable, with little forethought, background knowledge or consideration for others. One who played her family like puppets. 

As a young 20 something I listened to the homophobic, racist drivel, cringed inside and distanced myself from her and ultimately the son she had irrevocably damaged. Today, I would have countered her bigotry with something a little more challenging.

And so, it was with this type of minority reader in mind that we set up an interview in the Mail on Sunday for an article designed to question the increasingly accurate and routine use of screening for Down's Syndrome in unborn babies. They were in fact the only newspaper to run a story that didn't simply hail the arrival of the new test as a miracle. (For more background information on this subject read DS Screening: A Few Cautionary Thoughts.) It is a controversial subject, so we were prepared.

But we trust the freelance journalist Alison who we've worked with on Natty's modeling stories. We understood she would present both sides of thinking about the test. I think the main aim was to make parents realise that the test is not compulsory and will only bring anxiety with it. That termination is not the only option, that life with a child with DS is a real and wonderful path to take.

I think the article did achieve this. The headline was questioning, inviting a rethink, Natty's beaming face shining out from the page. The enduring image of the piece.

Of course you can nit pick over semantics, and we parents  might have written the article differently, but it was the Trojan horse inside which we got our concerns into the heads of the more unquestioning Readers.

And if just one of them steps back and has a rethink, then we have reached our goal. I believe in choice and want support for all women whatever their decisions, but we need to stop and think about what and why we are testing.

Many comments that accompanied the online article, which you can read here were unpleasant, friends have told me. We didn't look. We didn't read. The trolls were out in force. But  then we knew they would be. 

So to the ex MIL I thank you for teaching me how to ignore the opinions of those who don't warrant my attention. A valuable lesson in life indeed.

And a final thought. In all matters such as this, we must remember the wise words of Daddy Downs Side Up:

"Everyone is entitled to his or her opinion. 

However opinions are like, well, ummm, bottom holes. 

(My clean version for the blog)

Everyone has one, but some of them really stink."

For more thoughts on dealing with hurtful comments, read Outshining the Bigots.

You might also like to read the evidence I gave in the Parliamentary Inquiry into Disability Abortion Law.