Hi Tova! We are big fans of you over here at Le Wand, but our friends who right not know you, can you give us a brief introduction?
Tova Leigh: Hi Le Wand! I was born in Israel and I practiced law and worked as a Labor Law Attorney for two years before moving to the UK in 2006 to pursue a career in acting.
I started my blog – My Thoughts About Stuff – in 2015 as a creative outlet and because I wanted to share the struggles I face as a mom with other women. My viral online series Mom Life Crisis which documents my own midlife crisis following a health scare, resonated with millions of women across the world and later became a documentary film on Amazon Prime Video.
In March 2019, I released my first book ‘F*cked at 40: Life Beyond Suburbia, Monogamy, and Stretch Marks.’ It is about rediscovering who I was apart from being a mom and beyond the norms society forces upon women. I also co-host a weekly podcast Till Death Do Us Pod with my husband Mike and have a one-woman comedy show which I took on tour around North America, Canada, and the UK. I am a mother of three girls and live together with my family in London.
You are fearless on the internet — truly letting it all hang out with no topic too taboo. What made you want to use your platform in a way that empowers others not to take themselves too seriously?
Tova Leigh: I love talking about taboo topics and especially in a humorous way when possible. I think comedy helps put everyone at ease and allow people to listen and consider ideas they are usually closed off to.
Being a sex-positive mom is one of the things we love most about you. Can you talk a little bit about your relationship with your body and sex since having children? What’s changed and what hasn’t?
Tova Leigh: First few years of being a mom… what sex?! I totally lost my sex drive and even a connection with my own body. I felt like I didn’t own it. I wrote about this in my book in detail – that feeling that your body belongs to everyone else but you. I think as women we are so used to it that we don’t even see it. Then in my 40s something changed. Hormones kicked in, my kids were older… and I basically woke up one morning feeling horny AF! It was a midlife crisis I realized later only I didn’t know at the time because no one ever talks about women having a midlife crisis.
You Google ‘men and midlife crisis’ you get all the symptoms: hair plugs, sports car, shagging the 20-year-old secretary. I Googled ‘women and midlife crisis’ and got a recipe for a quinoa salad. And I was like – where are all the articles about women wanting to shag a 20-year-old? Because I sure as hell did! What I realized after I started saying this out loud was that there were many women out there who felt the same but it was another taboo. But that’s what’s great about your 40s – you no longer care what other people think of you.
We love your Facebook Live show Pyjama Party — where people write in real confessions that you then read and viewers vote on. How did you come up with this idea, and is there a favorite confession out of all the confessions you’ve received that sticks out to you?
Tova Leigh: It started five years ago. The kids were very young and going out on a Friday night was just not something we did. I figured there must be so many other parents who feel the same, why not have a party together online?! The confessions were a way to show people that no matter where in the world or what background, we are actually more alike than we think. It was also a way to break some taboos and end the shame surrounding topics like sex, self-pleasure, etc.
As for favorite confessions, there are so many good ones that it’s hard to choose! I think when people confessed the serious stuff (like not having love or living a lie, etc.) it always stuck more because it took a lot of bravery to admit those things. I am actually now writing a confessions book which is due out in September 2021 and I am so excited about it! People from all over the world have been sending confessions in, some are really funny, and some are very heartfelt. I think it will open people’s eyes when they read the book.
Do you have any advice for bringing some humor and levity into the bedroom?
Tova Leigh: Sex toys! Also biscuits… lol!