Caitlin Moran: “I Thought My Brain Had Broken” Becoming Hopeful After A Life Of Anxiety

September 10, 2026

AI Summary

5 min read

One morning at 13, Caitlin Moran told an elderly neighbor that her family was on benefits. Halfway down the street, the sugar rush from the chocolate biscuits wore off, and the reality hit: she had broken the family's rule of secrecy. If the wrong person found out, she believed, they would lose everything and end up in the poorhouse. "In that moment," she recalls, "the world changed." A wave of physical terror washed through her—racing heart, dark thoughts, a sense of being poisoned from inside. She had just had her first panic attack. For the next 36 years, she would call that anxiety her "best bad friend," the fuel that drove her to write nine books in ten years, a sitcom, a film, and two columns a week. Then, at 49, she realized she had to break up with it.

The Cortisol Engine and How It Burned Out

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What you'll learn

1 (00:00) **Opening & Advertisements** - A series of ads for Primark, Equinox, and Altra running shoes.
2 (01:15) **Introduction: Davina McCall introduces Caitlin Moran** - Davina describes Caitlin's ability to articulate complex feelings for women, referencing her book *How to Be a Woman*.
3 (05:04) **The Difference Between Male and Female Communication** - Caitlin contrasts how women quickly connect on deep, personal topics versus men's tendency to stay on surface-level subjects.
4 (06:39) **Feminism as a Tool for Men Too** - Caitlin discusses how feminism's tools for analyzing women's problems could also help solve the crisis in masculinity.
5 (10:33) **The Danger of Labels & The Power of Being an Enthusiast** - Caitlin explains why she is anti-labels, especially for young people, and shares the story of how a compliment from Russell T. Davies changed her career.
6 (14:04) **The Limits of Digital Connection** - Caitlin and Davina discuss how social media creates a false sense of connection and can actually increase loneliness.
7 (17:44) **The Predatory Nature of Social Media** - Caitlin highlights the dark side of social media algorithms, especially for teenage girls, referencing the book *Careless People*.

+ Full timestamped outline available in the app

Show Notes

How do we find hope when the world feels increasingly overwhelming?

In this episode of Begin Again, Caitlin Moran joins Davina McCall for a funny, moving and hopeful conversation about love, anxiety, feminism, loneliness and finding your way back to joy.

Caitlin opens up about experiencing her first panic attack at 13, after revealing her family were living on benefits, and how anxiety became the fuel that drove her extraordinary career.

Decades later, she reached breaking point and realised: “I can’t be this scared anymore.” She shares how she finally broke up with anxiety and why she wishes she had done it 30 years earlier.

She and Davina also explore the growing crisis facing men, why loneliness and social media are leaving us disconnected, and the simple changes Caitlin believes can help us feel hopeful again, from putting down our phones to reconnecting with our communities.

Caitlin also reflects on growing up poor, writing her first novel as a teenager, her 33-year relationship with husband Pete, and the extraordinary night she went clubbing with Lady Gaga.

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Buy ‘How to be Hopeful - A Year of Attempting to Feel Less Awful About the World’ by Caitlin Moran, Ebury Press, £22

Purchase tickets to Caitlin’s book tour here: https://www.gigantic.com/caitlin-moran-tickets

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(00:00) Intro

(01:11) Caitlin's New Book

(03:22) The Impact Of "How To Be A Woman"

(06:09) Foreseeing The Masculinity Crisis

(09:15) Being An Enthusiast vs. A Critic

(12:01) Writing About Hope

(13:00) The Value Of In-Person Connection

(18:56) Monzo GBL Ad

(20:27) Developing Anxiety At 13

(24:50) Learning To Write

(27:03) The Journey Out Of Poverty

(31:57) Her First Publishing Deal

(35:14) Monzo 90 Days Ad

(36:23) Caitlin's 'How To Be Hopeful' List

(43:11) Do This To Improve Your Own Happiness

(52:05) Clubbing In Berlin With Lady Gaga

(57:37) Finally Getting Over Anxiety

(01:02:49) Her 26 Year Marriage