The Sydney Morning Herald
· collected 2026-09-16 · by Samantha Selinger-Morris
Caitlin Moran discusses her struggle with despair and anxiety detailed in her latest book "How to Be Hopeful," which started around 2019. The article highlights Moran's journey through the chaotic period marked by personal hormonal changes and global uncertainties, including political turmoil under Donald Trump’s presidency. Moran reflects on learning to appreciate life's simple joys after a failed attempt to escape into a dream cottage that turned out to be dilapidated, illustrating her shift towards finding hope in everyday experiences despite overwhelming circumstances.
Written by the local model on 2026-09-17,
using this article's own text rather than the other coverage of the
same event (that is the story summary below).
Story summary
Caitlin Moran, a renowned author with nine books and hundreds of thousands of readers worldwide, grew up as one of eight children in a poverty-stricken English town. At 15, she needed to help support her siblings and promised them bunk beds to lift them off the floor, so she pitched an article idea to The Times in London, which accepted it. This early success led to a long-standing column at the prestigious newspaper.
Moran's resilience and creativity shone through tough times; however, 2019 marked a challenging period for her. In her new book, "How to Be Hopeful," she reflects on this difficult time and expresses her appreciation for anything positive in life, even if it is just slightly better than negative experiences. Moran continues to inspire readers with her witty insights into contemporary living and offers hope through her latest work.
Written for “Finding Meaning In Life” on 2026-09-17,
grounded in this article and the 0 other(s) covering the same event.
For nearly 35 years, hundreds of thousands of readers around the world have turned to Caitlin Moran – for laughter, and her signature wily perceptiveness about how to cope with life’s toughest parts.
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thousands → turn → parts
Provocative (just enough) and penetrating, her nine books talk to how we live now and, often, how we may be able to live better.
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we → talk → ?
How to Be a Woman was a bestseller, How to Build a Girl was made into a movie, and What About Men surprised everyone.
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What → build → everyone
One of eight children, Moran grew up in poverty in a down-at-heel English town and, at 15, needing to help support her siblings and wanting to fulfil a promise to her brothers and sisters that she’d buy them bunk beds to get them off sleeping on the floor, she pitched a piece to The Times in London to earn the money.
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she → grow → money
They bit.
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They → bite → ?
She has a column at the storied paper to this day.
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She → have → day
Moran grew up resilient, creative, realistic.
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Moran → grow → ?
She had long been “appreciative of anything and everything that scores above not actively shit on the Pantone moods chart”, as she puts it in her new book, How to Be Hopeful.
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she → score → book
She was not easily knocked over.
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She → knock → ?
But then came 2019.
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2019 → come → ?
“Around that time, I went completely crackers,” Moran tells Samantha Selinger-Morris in The Morning Edition podcast.
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Moran → go → podcast
Her family became wary of her.
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family → become → her
“They [thought] Mummy was having a nervous breakdown.”
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Mummy → think → breakdown
“It feels like it’s an overwhelm constantly.
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it → feel → ?
It’s a 24/7 news cycle, and sprinkled on top of that, you’ve got someone like Donald Trump being the most powerful man in the world, just suddenly saying things like, ‘I’m going to buy Greenland’.
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I → ’ → Greenland
Like, the human mind finds it very hard to cope with this kind of situation.”
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it → find → situation
In her new book, Moran documents what happened after she discovered that the dream Welsh cottage she had planned to escape to, as a solution to her despair, was a decrepit money pit that her husband and two twenty-something daughters were so dead-set against that “this was literally going to break up the family”.
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this → document → family
And how she learnt to adopt a new way of experiencing the humdrum efforts of living, to rediscover that life “really is a quietly loving thing”.
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life → learn → living
Your book begins in 2019.
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book → begin → 2019
Because you are feeling, it has to be said, despair.
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it → feel → despair
You write that you’re crying three to four times a day, and you say ‘I think a lot about purpose as I get older, sadness and despair.
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I → write → purpose
What was happening?
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What → happen → ?
Well, I mean that’s a combination of hormones being a bitch and the world, right?
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hormones → mean → ?
I mean that.
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I → mean → that
I didn’t know it was the menopause at the time … but the other half of it was the world.
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half → know → it
It’s a particularly chaotic time.
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It → ’ → ?
It’s a particularly anxious time.
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It → ’ → ?
Diagnoses of anxiety are rising not only in young people but in children…
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Diagnoses → rise → children
[And] I thought I had reached a new point of sanity because I was like, ‘OK, civilisation is doomed.
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civilisation → think → sanity
I’m going to accept all this information I’m being given 24/7.
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I → go → information
I am going to retreat to the mountains of Wales.
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I → go → Wales
I’m going to get a self-sufficient farm.
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I → go → farm
I’m going to have my own water source.
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I → go → source
I’m going to grow my own vegetables.
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I → go → vegetables
I’ll have my own iron forge, so I can make my own rakes in case they run out in the apocalypse, and I’m going to sit this one out’.
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I → have → one
And I was just following the money because that’s what all the billionaire tech bros have done.
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bros → follow → what
They’ve all got apocalypse bunkers in Hawaii and New Zealand, and they clearly know something we don’t know.
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we → get → something
So I was just like, follow the money.
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I → follow → money
But then I very rapidly found out why it is only millionaire tech bros that have apocalypse bunkers, because it’s incredibly expensive.
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it → find → bunkers
I could not afford to run away.
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I → afford → ?
…and 23 more, not listed.
The Aporia
