Begin Again Moments: The Power of the Sun & Moon

Dame Maggie Aderin-Pocock grew up in inner-city London, an insomniac who would wander the house while everyone else slept and open the curtain to let the moonlight in. The moon was her friend, the way it had been her father's friend when he cycled across the savannah in Nigeria on unlit roads, the moon lighting his way. Her father called himself a "self-certified lunatic" — the qualification matters, she insists, because he chose the label himself. She inherited the moon bug from him and passed it to her daughter, though at sixteen her daughter now says "stop that mother, we're not having a moon anymore."

The Full Moon Effect: Pattern or Cause?

Davina McCall, the host, brings up something she has heard from midwives and police: that babies tend to arrive on full moons, and that police forces brace for more callouts during disruptions at home during those nights. Aderin-Pocock confirms this is real in practice — she wrote a book about the moon and looked into it. Some police forces do put extra officers on when there's a full moon. Social workers she knows report more domestic disturbance callouts.