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Gill Castle, or as she’s known on her blog ‘Stoma Chameleon’ gave birth to her son at 34 weeks, her birth experience was traumatic and changed the course of her life forever. It resulted in Gill having a permanent stoma, PTSD and postnatal depression.

We hear Gill’s birth story and we also talk about what she has achieved since her birth experience, life with a stoma and her adventures. Gill has completed a half ironman, she’s been skydiving, scuba diving and she overcame her fear of swimming in open water to become a self-confessed cold-water swimming addict.

Talking points include:

• Gill’s traumatic birth story

• Birth trauma awareness including details about different degrees of tear

• Talking about miscarriage and shared experiences being comforting

• Recovery after trauma

• Looking to the future after recovery

• Gill's adventures

• Swimming with a stoma

• Cold water benefits for mental health

• Breaking down stigmas

• Accepting and overcoming fear

• Prepping for swimming the English Channel

You can find Gill through her blog Stoma Chameleon, on Instagram and Twitter.

Transcript

Karla: Hello and welcome to this week's podcast. As it comes to the end of birth trauma Awareness Week, I wanted to share a conversation with you that I had with Gill Castle, or as known on her blog, stoma, chameleon. 

Gill gave birth to her son at 34 weeks pregnant. Her birth experience was traumatic and changed the course of her life forever. It resulted in Gill having a permanent stoma, PTSD and postnatal depression. 

Gill shares her stories and adventures on her blog to offer hope and inspiration to other women who have experienced birth trauma, and to show that you can still do anything that you put your mind to. 

I spoke to Gill about what she's achieved since her birth experience and life with a stoma and all of her adventures. Gill has completed a half Iron Man. She's been sky diving, scuba diving, and namely, she overcame her fear of swimming in open water to become a self confessed cold water swimming addict, swimming three times a week in a bikini from October to May to raise awareness and money for the birth trauma Association. 

She's also recently climbed the national three peaks in 24 hours, and is training to swim the English Channel in 2023 she's overcome a lot to live a very active and happy life, and we discuss it all. 

Karla: So you were a police officer. You were pregnant with your first child, and then went into early labour. Could you talk us through what happened next and your stoma story?

Early Signs of Labour

Gill: I was 32 and a serving police officer in West Yorkshire, based in Bradford City Center. It was a pretty hardcore ​​placement to have when you have just qualified as a police officer. About six weeks before my due date, I was woken at 7am on my first rest day after seven consecutive shifts. It turned out to be my first contraction.

I didn't really know what was happening, and so I ignored it, because a contraction comes and then it disappears. When another one hit about an hour and a half later, I called the early pregnancy unit. I mentioned the pain and some pink spotting, and they advised me to come in for a check.

Arrival at the Hospital

My husband was home at the time—since he works away as a commercial diver - so it was just my sheer good fortune. He was about to go for a haircut when I told him, "Right, this is it. We're going to have to go to the hospital and get checked out.." So off we went, hospital bags in tow, though I wasn’t remotely concerned at all—I hadn’t had another contraction and felt fine.

That day, 20 October 2011, I went into established labour. Because the baby was premature, I was given a steroid injection to help his lungs develop. That was when it really hit me: I was having a baby today, and I wasn’t prepared. I couldn't wrap my head around it at all.

Emergency Intervention and Delivery

Since he was premature they had me in a hospital bed, covered in wires and tubes to keep an eye on his heart. It meant I couldn’t get walk around and I was having to remain basically in one position, so that was exacerbating the pain that I was in. I couldn't sit up properly, I couldn't make myself comfortable. 

They realised that his heart rate had crashed. And what happens when you give birth is that babies actually help themselves out of the birthing canal at the very end. But my son, because he was only four pounds seven, he got really tired, and he got stuck, essentially, and his heart rate crashed. When they saw his heart rate crash, it became clear he was struggling. 

They rushed me into the theater to give me an epidural, which took three attempts—which was horrendous, because they say this is a really sharp needle, you must remain still, otherwise the needle is going to go into your spine in the wrong place. And you're like ‘Right? Well, that's easy to do when you're in labour and you're holding a pillow! Once they got the epidural in, it was fine and they whipped him out using forceps. 

I remember just sort of being shown this little mucus-y, covered baby and then he was rushed away to special care because he was grunting, which is very common for a premature baby, because their lungs are the last thing to develop.

We heard him cry, so we knew he was okay, but I already felt detached. I couldn’t process what had just happened and couldn't really get my head around the fact that I just had a baby. 

I was then told I’d sustained a serious tear, so they were going to stitch me up in the theater. Then I’ll go back to the ward and I’ll be reunited with my baby. They said he's going to have to stay in until the tubes are removed, because he was fed with a tube. They said you must keep it clean and make sure you have lots of showers and if you do all of that, you'll be fine. You'll just carry on with your life. So we went back to the ward.

Reunited with their Baby

Sam was born at about 8am at night. We got him back at 2am in the morning, and that was surreal, because it was in the dark on a birthing ward. I look back and it's ridiculous, really. We were very British about it so we didn't want to make any noise, we didn't want to wake anybody else up, and we didn't even want to turn on the light. So we had our mobile phone lights looking down at him and I think that impacted me as well, because everything is in slow motion, and you're not allowed to express yourself fully, and that's the first moment, really, that you meet your baby. I think that had an impact on the bond as well. 

Sam and I were on the ward and I was in an enormous amount of pain because of the tear. My husband and I remember looking around the ward and seeing all these women clutching onto the walls and unable to walk staggering about, clearly, in lots of pain.

My husband is a former Royal Marine and he said this reminds me more of a field hospital. You know I've never seen anything like it in my life. When women have babies, you see them when they're at home having a cup of tea, or you might see them going around the shops, but you don't see them on the post birth ward, staggering about in agony. 

It was really shocking but because all these other women were displaying the same sort of pain that I was in, I thought, right, well, this is normal. I am not going to be defeated by this, because all I've done is have a baby and I'm just going to crack on with it, because that's really how I deal with everything. 

Signs Something Was Wrong

After a couple of days, the pain was getting worse and worse and I wasn't actually able to think properly because of the pain, and I started to get poo in my underwear, and it got so bad at one point that every time I was going to the toilet, I was pulling the emergency buzzer to get assistance. 

I remember having a shower and being in such distress because I couldn't work out where all this poo was coming from, and pulling the emergency buzzer, and a midwife came along, and I said I don't understand where this is coming from.

I said I don't know what's happened to my body. I didn't understand what was coming from where and she looked at me like I was insane, and said, ‘Oh, you're absolutely fine. Just finish your shower and go back to your bed and get dressed and you'll feel better after that’. 

But the pain was just getting unmanageable, basically. Four days after I had the baby, I collapsed in a corridor, and a male midwife came across me, and he asked me if I was all right. And I said, ‘no, I can't do this anymore. I cannot cope with this level of pain. I can't even think properly’. And he said this now infamous line of ‘wow, maybe it's your perception of the pain’. Basically, you're a bit of a wimp. And I thought well I will just go back to my bed and die. Because I thought that there was no way I'm coming out of this hospital with this sort of level of pain. 

I knew that this was not normal. I was a really fit and healthy person before I went into the hospital, and there's no way after four days of having a baby, I would be collapsing in corridors and pulling emergency buzzers every time I went to the toilet and having poo all over the place. That's not normal, is it? He offered to examine me, but I said no because he completely dismissed my concerns. 

He had gone and told somebody because another midwife came and tried to examine me, but I was in so much pain by that point, she couldn't actually examine me. So the alarm bells started ringing for everybody. 

Life-Changing Diagnosis

The consultant examined me—under gas and air, as the pain was too intense. That’s when they realised:

• My tear was actually fourth-degree, not third-degree as originally thought.

• A massive abscess had formed and burst.

• I had a rectovaginal fistula—a hole between the rectum and vagina, causing stool to pass through both.

The only solution was a stoma. They cut a hole in my abdomen, brought out my large intestine, and redirected waste into a bag. I agreed immediately—anything to end the pain. The consultant said I’d have that for 12 weeks that will enable the area to heal, enable the infection to go away and it was all presented as pretty straightforward and I would get on with my normal life. 

But, as we'll find out, it wasn't temporary, and I've actually got a permanent stoma. So I came home with a premature baby and a stoma to deal with as well. I then had a septic fistula tract. As you can imagine, it was absolutely horrific. After we'd been home for about a month, by which point my mum had come down to look after me because my husband had had to go back offshore to work and I couldn't drive. I wasn't really coping, unsurprisingly. 

After I'd been home for about a month, we got a letter from the hospital saying that what happened to me should not have happened, and the hospital was launching an investigation. 

Irreparable Aftermath

I thought this just happened during birth and I’d been a bit unlucky. But that's the first point when I thought this shouldn't have happened and that there had been a mistake. To be fair to the hospital, they launched an investigation and they alerted me to the fact that this was a result of malpractice, negligence. I was invited to meet the consultant who delivered the baby, and she was profusely apologetic, which I found quite difficult because, and I maintain, I'm not actually bitter about the whole thing. I've never been bitter about it, because I think that is a completely pointless emotion and does nothing for your life or for their life.

I said to her, at the end of the day, you saved my son's life because he crashed and he would have died if you hadn't got him out. Yes, she made a mistake that has had catastrophic consequences for me but at the end of the day, she was a human being, and it wouldn't bring me any closure or any happiness to make her feel worse than she already did. 

I genuinely have never been bitter about what's happened. It then transpired during the hospital investigation that when the consultant had stitched me up after the delivery, she had thought it was a second degree tear, and she realised that it wasn't, she thought it was a third degree tear, so she took all the stitches out and started again and sent me on my way, missing the fact that it was a fourth degree tear. That is the worst tear you can get, which goes all the way through the inner and outer sphincter muscles. she'd missed that, which is why faeces came out and managed to infect the area, not because she hadn't stitched it up properly, but because she'd already done a set of stitches that she'd taken out and then put in again. There then wasn't enough tissue left to be able to do a proper repair. So she essentially left me irreparable. 

 A Legal Battle 

When I realised the stoma was permanent, I realised I was going to lose my job, because at that time, the police were bringing in, well, my force anyway, new regulations which meant that if you were in the office for more than a year, they could essentially get rid of you. 

I was struggling so much with this stoma, they didn't know any other police officer with a stoma. I couldn't imagine going back out on the beat, not just because of bags leaking all over the place and access to the toilet, but also if I got stabbed in my stomach, you know, that's immediate emergency surgery, if it just nicks the stomach that's already out of my body. 

That's when I decided to go down the litigation route and I was actually advised to do that by the head of gynecology at the hospital where I had the baby, because she said the NHS Foundation Trust is for people like you. Because I was going to lose my job. I’m going to lose my pension, and I was disabled. so I sued, and I did win after only two years, because it was so cut and dry. 

Moving Forward

The experience left me with PTSD, severe anxiety, and postnatal depression. I struggled to bond with my baby. It took time to process everything, but I now share my story to raise awareness. Birth injuries are often overlooked, and women’s pain dismissed—but it shouldn’t be this way. 

The Importance of Awareness

Karla: With birth trauma, could you tell us more about what it is and injuries through childbirth and why you think it's important to raise awareness of it? Because I'm sure there must be people listening who haven't heard of it.

Gill: I think it is extremely important. I think the problem we have in our society at the moment is women are patronised. People say this to me about my blog, which is all about my birth, but also really focusing on the things I've done since, saying that we don't want people who are pregnant to know because it will frighten them. 

My argument is that it is much better to give women the opportunity to have more information about something that they're going to go through, which is having a baby. If they're pregnant, it allows them to be grown ups and make that decision about whether they want to read the information and hear the stories. 

Don't hide the information and not tell the stories just because you don't want to frighten people. Because I just think that's a really patronising way of approaching what is a really essential part of being a woman sometimes, I suppose, not all the time, because not everybody can have a baby, but for me personally. 

I didn't really know much about tears at all. All I knew was that four was really bad, and you didn't want a fourth degree tear. Third degree tears weren't quite as bad as a fourth and a first and second were nothing. But I didn't really know what this meant. 

A fourth degree tear is when you're torn all the way from your vagina all the way through your rectum and through the external and internal sphincter, the muscle itself. The third degree tear, I think it's the external. Sphincter muscle, not the internal as well. Don't quote me on any of this medical professional but there are all these categories of tears. 

The reason I think it's important that we know about these is if I had known about fourth degree tears, and I had known that getting faeces on your underwear is a sign of a fourth degree tear then, my God, I would have been shouting and screaming from day one, and had I done that, then I wouldn't have got the abscess. I wouldn't have, quite frankly, nearly died from sepsis, and maybe I could have been repaired, or they could have done something about it, or I wouldn't have been in such distress, and I wouldn't have been in such danger either. 

Knowledge is Power

I think it's a very common phrase that we say, but we don't often put it into practice, and that is, knowledge is power, and it really is. I think since I've been coming out and talking about my experiences, the amount of women have said ‘I experienced this, and I wasn't sure if anybody else did, because nobody talked about it’. 

People have some very severe injuries and lifelong incontinence issues as a result of having a baby, and if it's not talked about, then you suffer in silence and with shame. I don't think that's right, we have to look after our mothers, because we're the ones who are bringing the next generation into the world. So we're really important, so we need to be looked after, but I do want to say that it's extremely rare to get the injuries that I had. I think it's half a percent. It's very rare, but a significant proportion of women do experience some sort of injury during birth, and yes, the vast majority of them can be repaired. But I just think it's just really important to give us the information.

Karla: I think so. I did hypnobirthing, which everyone thinks is weird, but it actually gives you all the information to question. So the whole process when I was giving birth, we questioned everything. The midwives must have been like ‘who are these people?’ I just wanted to know. 

Gill: But it's your body and your baby. So of course, why shouldn't you ask.

Karla: It reminds me of miscarriage, of going through that completely alone, because you don't tell anybody, generally, and then you go through it, and it's really hard to explain it to people afterwards, because they didn't know you were pregnant. I found that really hard. I'm quite open about it.

Gill: I'm very much heart on my sleeve. I tell people everything. I'm not really bothered. It's the way I've always been. Maybe it's my way of coping with things, or maybe it's just my personality, I don't know. But I was very open about my miscarriage. And the amount of people I had no idea that had miscarriages - some really good friends of mine. I think it is comforting to know. Nobody wants anybody else to go through that experience, but that shared experience is comforting. 

A Turning Point

Karla: What was your turning point for you? Do you remember if there was a light bulb moment where you thought differently about your life with a stoma, or was it a slow process from recovery to looking to the future?

Gill: There was definitely a light bulb moment. I did accept my stoma pretty early and I do remember making a conscious decision on how I was going to think about my stoma, because a lot of people don't realise how much control and power you have over your own thoughts and feelings. 

I remember being on these miserable, awful, stoma forums full of all these miserable people. Some people said every time I look down at my stoma, I'm reminded of the awful reason as to why I have it. To be fair, most of the people have them as a result of bowel cancer or Crohn's or colitis disease. All these horrific situations that mean people end up with a stoma. And my situation wasn't any less horrific. It was awful as well. 

I thought, I am not looking at my stoma like that, because I see it every day. It's on my body every day of my life. And so if I start my day with an attitude of ‘there's my stoma, that's ruined my life’. You've ruined your day. 

Finding a New Perspective on Life with a Stoma

So I made a real conscious decision that I was not going to look at my stoma like that, and so I didn't. So that enabled me to accept it quite early on. I was rushed into accepting it as well, because I didn't have time not to, because I had a baby to look after. But then I had my light bulb moment when I read an article by someone who was an athlete with a stoma. I'm pretty sure she came from the Crohn's and Colitis community. She said my stoma has saved my life, and I'm so grateful for the life it has given me. 

I suddenly thought, well, what has my stoma given me? Because at that point, it was all focused on what it had taken away from me, which was my job, which I loved more than anything else, really. It wasn't just a job. It was like a whole way of life. It was a family, it was everything. I thought if I didn't have my stoma, I would be incontinent. I would be pooing my pants. I wouldn't be able to leave the house, and I would be miserable. 

I thought, I have a stoma so I can leave the house. By that point, I'd managed to sort out the right bags for me so they weren't leaking anymore, and I was actually able to do stuff. I'd had my fistula fixed. Then I did start doing a little bit more research, and I started looking into what stoma products were like back in, say, the 1950s and what we've got now is, I mean, incomparable to what they were like then. They're really discrete, they're really secure, they're waterproof, they're not bulky, you know, they're absolutely amazing. There are products to solve any issues that you might have with your stoma like sore skin and irritation and allergies or leaks.

I started thinking it's given me the opportunity to go out and do things and to not be incontinent. And that was like a real game changer. Okay, then, I thought, let's go off and explore everything that I can do with my stoma.

Reclaiming My Life Through Adventure

Karla: Talk to me a bit about your adventures? Because you started off with cycling and swimming to kind of build your strength?

Gill: I had quite a few years when I wasn't in control of my life, and what had happened to me had been completely out of my control. I wanted to get back control of my life, and I wanted to be the one deciding what I was and wasn't doing. 

When I was in hospital, there's a bit of a chat about how you’ve got to be really careful that you don't lift anything too heavy, because you'll get a hernia. You can't go diving because of the pressure. It was all just quite negative, really. I thought, right, well, first off, I need to lose weight. 

Triathlon Beginnings

I saw an advertisement for an indoor cycling class. I thought, right, I'm going to do this because it's inside, there will be toilets there. If I'm knackered, I can get off, and I'm not going to be stuck in the middle of the countryside somewhere, and I can go to the back of the class and no one can see me. The cycling class instructors happened to be from the local Triathlon Club. I had always wanted to do a triathlon. Even though I'd cycled when I was younger, I'd always been a really good swimmer, and I'd been a runner, you know, captain of the hockey team. I was on everything and did everything, but I was just like, ‘oh no, but I couldn't do that’. This is where I met the local tri club. So I signed up for a sprint triathlon.

I was absolutely terrified. I contacted the organisers about 1,000 times with all my worries - what if my bag leaks all the way around? What if I need to change my bag at some point? They'd never had anyone with a stoma do the triathlon, because it was just a local one and they said, don't worry about it. It's fine, you know, we'll tell the marshals, somebody will be able to come and get you. You're not going to get disqualified.

I did it, and it was absolutely fine. I didn't have any problems and I got really hooked, to be honest. I found some really good friends at the Tri club, and I really enjoyed the training, especially the swimming. I absolutely loved swimming and I decided then that I was going to do the next stage up, which is an Olympic trial. So I did the next stage up. Then the whole club, for some obscure reason, decided that they were going to do this Half Iron Man in Nottingham in 2017 and again, I just thought I could do this. I know I can do it, because this is what life is all about.

Open Water Swimming

You have to build your way up to things and get your confidence, and that confidence is what can enable you to achieve a lot more than you think you can. So anyway, by this point, I thought I'm going to do this for the Birth Trauma Association. I set up my fundraiser and I came out really publicly and told everyone my story in the media and in the local paper and I raised  £5,000 for the Birth Trauma Association. 

When I was eight, I watched Jaws and was terrified. I had been learning to sail and loved it, but after that movie, I never went sailing again. The fear of deep water stuck with me for decades. For the Half Ironman, I had to train in open water, so I forced myself to swim in a local lake—what we called "Poo Lake." It was murky, full of weeds, absolutely disgusting. I had so many panic moments, just floating on my back, trying not to freak out. But I did it, and I finished the race.

That led me to my next challenge—getting over my fear of the sea. I live just ten minutes from the coast, and I envied people who swam in the ocean. I wanted to be that little girl again, the one who wasn’t afraid. I didn’t want to reach 85 and regret not trying. I became fixated on overcoming my fear.

I joined a local sea swimming group. At first, I had this weird issue—if I put my face in the water and opened my eyes, I’d have a full-blown panic attack. My chest would tighten, and I couldn’t breathe. So I swam with my eyes shut. For a year and a half, I kept my eyes closed underwater, only opening them when I breathed. My friends eventually convinced me that I needed to open my eyes, or I might swim into a rock! So I started with three seconds, then five, slowly building up. I did this in the summer when the water was clearer, so I could see that there was nothing to fear.

One day, my brain just switched. It was like, "Okay, this is fine now." I had gone to the same spot with the same people so many times that I finally trusted it. That was a massive breakthrough. It opened up a whole new world for me. I went on to complete my diving course, something I’d always wanted to do but never dared to try because I was afraid of sharks. And you know what? It was incredible.

All of these challenges—triathlons, open water swimming, diving—have been about proving to myself that I can do anything. My body doesn’t define me, my stoma doesn’t limit me, and fear doesn’t control me. It’s been a journey of taking back control, one challenge at a time.

Karla: Let's talk about your swimming, because earlier this year, you did loads of winter sea swimming in a bikini. Firstly, how did you come up with that challenge? 

Gill: I started sea swimming in a wetsuit and did that for about two and a half years. I grew tired of it because many of the people I swam with didn’t wear one. They would arrive at the beach, get straight into the sea, and leave just as quickly, while I had to get there early to deal with my wetsuit. Eventually, I decided I’d had enough and stopped wearing it. That’s when I became what we call a skin swimmer—someone who swims without a wetsuit, just in a swimming costume.

The previous winter, I had nearly made it through the winter in a swimming costume, but I still used neoprene socks, gloves, and multiple hats. At one point, I even had a thick neoprene swimming costume. Those items make a huge difference when it’s really cold, so that was a big step for me.

My second winter was going well, but then COVID hit, and we couldn’t get to the sea. That put an end to my progress. By the following summer, in June, for the summer solstice, I decided—on a whim—to wear a bikini and expose my stoma bag in public for the first time. I often do things spontaneously because if I overthink them, I won’t follow through. I just thought, “Can you do that?” And then I realized, “Of course you can. Why not?”

It was a personal challenge, but when I actually did it, nobody reacted because they already knew I wore a bikini. It was almost an anticlimax, which made me laugh. However, a couple of people I didn’t know approached me and mentioned that a family member had a stoma due to bowel cancer. That moment made me realise that showing my stoma could start important conversations. It was a powerful way to get people talking.

By August, I was looking for a new challenge, something swim-related for the winter. Without much thought, I decided I’d swim in nothing but a bikini. People questioned me, asking if I was sure, and I just said, “Yes, because it’ll be really difficult.” Then I had the idea of putting up a sign on the beach explaining why I was doing it—that I had a stoma due to childbirth, that 30,000 women each year experience traumatic births, and that 170,000 people in the UK live with a stoma. It seemed like a great way to raise awareness.

As winter approached, COVID was still a concern, and I worried about another lockdown restricting beach access. To prepare, I set up a bath in my garden so I could still experience cold water immersion. I committed to doing this three times a week from 1st October - 1st May 2021. It was an absolutely wild experience.

Benefits of Outdoor Swimming

Karla: Do you enjoy outdoor swimming?

Gill: The cold water has definitely made me calmer. My husband might disagree because I still have a lot of energy, but the swimming community is fantastic—welcoming, understanding, and empathetic. Many people who take up cold water swimming have struggled with mental health issues. People joke that you have to be a little mad to leap into the sea in just a bikini, and maybe that’s true, but there’s something about it that brings peace.

Some people follow the “Iceman,” who takes ice baths for an endorphin rush. Personally, I don’t enjoy ice baths. If the water is below six or seven degrees, it’s just painful and miserable. The coldest bath I did was at -0.5 degrees—I had to break the ice to get in. It was horrible, but what an experience! By then, I had started my blog and was live-streaming everything. The support I received was incredible.

The story gained traction, and soon media outlets like ITV News and BBC World Service covered it. One of my videos was in the top seven “must-see” videos for three days, viewed nearly a million times on Facebook and Instagram in a week. It was surreal.

What stood out most were the conversations I had with people. Women would read my sign and simply say “thank you,” often with deep understanding. Some became emotional. Husbands would give me a nod of recognition. People were grateful that I was openly talking about birth trauma and stomas. It was never a meticulously planned campaign—it just took on a life of its own.

Karla: You’re breaking down the stigma around birth trauma and stomas. Do you get a lot of messages from women?

Gill: All the time. Just before this recording, I received a message on Instagram from someone who said, “Thank you for normalising swimming with a stoma. I have one due to birth injury, and today I took my 15-week-old daughter swimming for the first time. You made it look so simple that it gave me the confidence to do it.”

That’s what it’s all about.

Facing Fear and Taking on the English Channel

Karla: What would you say to people who struggle with fear?

Gill: Fear is normal. I’m terrified of flying—I cry on planes! But I’ve signed up to swim the English Channel in 2023, and the thought of jumping off a boat into the dark sea is terrifying. But I accept my fears and build confidence step by step. Life is about stacking small victories like bricks in a wall.

I never imagined I’d be comfortable swimming at night or with seals, but now I have. Facing fear requires motivation—there has to be something on the other side that makes it worth it. I wanted to love the sea, so I overcame my fear. I always tell people, if you don’t truly want something, you won’t bother facing your fears to get it.

Karla: So your next big adventure is the English Channel. How much preparation does that involve?

Gill: There are a lot of fears to overcome. The biggest ones are swimming alone in the sea—yes, I’ll have a boat, but I’ll be the only one in the water—and swimming in the dark. Nobody swims the entire Channel in daylight, so that’s a huge challenge.

I’m also recovering from a shoulder injury, so I only started swimming again six weeks ago. I’m adjusting my stroke technique to prevent re-injury and improve efficiency. The English Channel is the ultimate swimming challenge—more people have climbed Everest than swum the Channel.

Next year, I plan to do the 10-mile Lake Windermere swim as a stepping stone toward the 21-mile Channel swim, which, due to tides, often ends up being around 25 miles. When I say “only 25 miles,” I’m secretly thinking, “Bloody hell!” But I just have to build up gradually. I’d be the first person with a stoma to complete it, so that adds another layer of motivation. I’ve got a nutritionist helping me prepare, and I believe in pushing limits. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Even if, for some reason, I don’t finish—which won’t happen because I’m determined—I’d still be proud. Four years ago, I couldn’t even put my face in the sea without closing my eyes. Now, I’m preparing for the ultimate swim challenge. It’s incredible how far I’ve come.

 Karla: The English Channel, do you have to look out for boats?

 Gill: When you swim across the Channel, you hire a boat with a pilot, not a captain. The Channel is the busiest shipping lane in the world, so the pilot's job is to navigate you safely and make sure you don't get flattened by a passing ship.

Karla: What year is that happening?

Gill: August 2023. I’ve been really fortunate to get full sponsorship from Hollister Incorporated and Dansac, both stoma product companies. They’ve covered all the costs. Glynn Solicitors have also sponsored me to attend a swim camp in Dover this year, where I’ll meet my pilot, do some night swimming, and stand on the beach thinking, "Oh my god, I can't see France, and I have to swim over there somewhere."

Where to Follow Gill

Karla: Lastly, how can people find you? Where’s your blog?

Gill: My blog is called Stoma Chameleon, and it’s on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. I also have a website at www.stomachameleon.com. The blog is meant to make people smile, but I also cover serious topics like miscarriage and birth trauma. I’ve spoken at the International Birth Chair Conference and other events, but ultimately, my goal is to get people moving and smiling.

Karla: Brilliant. That’s a fantastic way to end. Thank you so much for coming on the podcast.

Gill: You're welcome! I’ve really enjoyed it. Thank you for having me.