Content Warning: these podcasts talk about the real experiences of living with mental illnesses. Content includes addiction, post-partum psychosis, depression, hearing voices, bipolar disorder and living in a secure psychiatric hospital.  

I wanted to offer a long list of recommendations for podcasts about mental health. But as I began writing the article, I became a bit overwhelmed by how many there are! It’s fantastic to see that mental health and wellbeing podcasts are becoming more mainstream.

For general mental health conversations, I definitely encourage you to go and listen to amazing shows like Happy Place, Griefcast, Terrible, Thanks for Asking and of course Scroobius Pip’s mental health specials.

There are, however, far fewer podcasts focused on mental illness – which is slightly different to mental health. We all have mental health on a spectrum of ‘good’ to ‘bad’. But around 1 in 4 of us will also have a clinical mental illness at some point in our life. Conditions such depression, psychosis, bipolar disorder can still hold a lot of stigma, but podcasts are great way to learn more about the realities of such conditions.

So for this article, I want to highlight some podcasts about specific mental illness diagnoses, where we can listen to the people that live with them. I hope you find these episodes useful.

OLOGIES WITH ALIE WARD
Addictionology (ADDICTION) with Erin Parisi

In the Ologies podcast, science communicator Alie Ward talks to different scientists (or ‘ologists’) about their field of expertise. Whilst many episodes are whimsical (Pumpkins! Jellyfish!) others are more serious. I wasn’t expecting this episode about addiction, but it has been one of the most useful. It covers both substance and behavioural addiction in a non-judgemental way. Knowing someone with an addiction myself, it was a real insight into the behaviours and interventions. Listen on your podcast app >>

ON THE WARD
S1:Ep5 | On the Ward: Your questions answered

Created by St Andrew’s Healthcare, this podcast is hosted by staff nurse John-Barry Waldron, who has worked there for 15 years, ‘On the Ward’ challenges some of the myths and taboos around complex mental illness in the UK today, as it explores what really happens behind the walls of a secure psychiatric hospital. This episode is a good point of entry, as it answers some common listener questions – which cover everything from electric shock therapy, to the routine of the hospital. Listen on your podcast app >>

THE HILARIOUS WORLD OF DEPRESSION
Movies That Get Depression Right

“A show about clinical depression…with laughs?” Depression is one of the most common mental illnesses, and yet it is still often stigmatised by society. The Hilarious World of Depression tackles it with laughs. Hosted by comedian John Moe, he talks to other comedians who have lived with depression. Unsurprisingly, putting multiple comics on a podcast makes anything funny! This episode is the opposite of Mad Chat, and looks at the films that give an accurate portrayal of depression. Listen on your podcast app >>

ZOMBIEMUM
Catherine Cho | ‘I’d better act sane’

For illustrator and writer Laura Dockrill, becoming a mum was life-changing in a very unexpected way. After a traumatic delivery Laura was diagnosed with postpartum psychosis. It’s a serious mental illness that affects around 1 in 500 women, yet people rarely talk about it. In Zombiemum, Laura talks to other parents about aspects of motherhood that aren’t discussed enough. In this episode, she speaks to writer and literary agent Catherine Cho. They discuss their shared experience of postpartum psychosis, the cultural and familial pressures she faced when having a child, and the ways she explored this through writing her memoir ‘Inferno’. Listen on your podcast app >>

MENTALLY YOURS
Mental Illness in Literature

A weekly mental health podcast from Metro.co.uk, journalists Ellen Scott and Yvette Caster chat to people who have lived with mental illness. What adds to the authenticity of this podcast is the fact that Ellen has OCD, depression and anxiety, whilst Yvette has bipolar disorder and binge eating disorder. ‘Mental Illness in Literature’ is an interesting look at the way culture adds to stigma around conditions. Listen on your podcast app >>

MENTAL
Transition Plus Anxiety, labels and finding the real you with Miss Peppermint

Mental was created by Bobby Temps to break down mental health stigma and discrimination, and does not shy away from the true experiences of living with a diagnosis. In this episode Bobby speaks to singer, host and drag icon Peppermint to explore gender transition as a factor in mental health. But the talk also goes into alcoholism as a sickness, how it affects the family and much more. Listen on your podcast app >>

MINDCAST
Bryony’s story

MIND is one of the most prominent mental health charities in the UK and is a great resource for information, support and help. Their website has resources on a wide range of mental health problems… Their podcast is much harder to find! But it’s worth it to listen to the first-hand accounts of what it feels like to live with specific mental health problems. There are nine episodes in total, covering a range of topics such as OCD, crisis, bipolar, psychosis and more. I would recommend Bryony’s story where she talks about the challenges of being a full time carer and managing her bipolar disorder. Listen on the MIND website or  listen on your podcast app >>

MAD CHAT
Six Feet Under

Mad Chat is one of those genius podcasts that was sadly short-lived.  Host, Sandy Allen, invites a guest to discuss a piece of pop culture through the lens of their lived experience of mental illness. You quickly find out how wrong media’s portrayal of ‘madness’ is. The show discussed classics such as Dawson’s Creek, BoJack Horseman, Killing Eve and Donnie Darko. In this episode, they unpack the TV show Six Feet Under in context of Hearing Voices activism. The RSS feed for this show seems to be no more, but you can still listen on YouTube >>

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Mental health is an issue that we’re all beginning to talk more about, but what exactly gave Yvette and Ellen the seeds of inspiration to start a podcast about mental health?

Yvette: Both Ellen and I have long term mental health issues, we know how isolating it can feel. We’ve both written about mental health and this felt like the next step. We’ve covered everything from schizophrenia to anxiety and borderline personality, and we’ve had celebrity guests including Ruby Wax, Audley Harrison, Kelly Holmes and Rose McGowan.

Ellen: Back in 2017, when we started the podcast, I was in the middle of a personal series about my own mental health journey, called Getting Better, and the response was incredible. I was getting messages every day from people thanking me for speaking up and saying that as a result of my articles they had gone to the doctor and finally asked for help, so podcasting felt like the perfect medium because it’s intimate. You can hear people telling their stories in their words.

Collecting memories along the way, the podcast has also taken to the stage:

Y: I’ll never forget our first Mentally Yours Live – a panel event in which top speakers Natasha Devon, Matthew Todd, Carl Anka and Dr Pragya Agarwal discussed mental health and work. We had a great turnout and it was brilliant to meet listeners in person. One listener in particular said it had really helped her when she was off work, which meant a lot.

E: My favourite episodes are always the ones where we talk to someone with a radically different experience to our own. Talking about mental illness when you yourself are struggling can bring up a lot of emotional stuff and it can be draining. I’ve recorded some episodes then gone home and cried because it resonated too much. I’ve had to learn how to decompress after each episode and be aware that listening is emotionally challenging.

As ever with podcasts, there can often be guests and topics that the hosts would love to get stuck into, so what would those topics be fore Mentally Yours?

Y: I’d love to have Mariah Carey on. She has bipolar disorder and it would be interesting to hear how she’s managed it throughout her life and career. I’m a huge fan too, so I’d just like an excuse to talk to her to be honest.

E: I would love to cover psychopathy. It’s another area that I have preconceptions about that I would love to have challenged, and ‘psychopath’ is such a strong label that it would be so powerful to have someone come on, say they identify with that label, and explain what it means to me

And what may the future hold for the podcast?

Y: As well as more great guests and interesting topics I’d love to host more live events and to also do some episodes out on location too. There’s a lot of great projects going on and it would be good to go to them if we can.

E: I’d like to chat to someone in the government and funding side of things to get their perspective on why on earth mental health care still isn’t being properly funded. We’ve had a mental health nurse, and someone who set up a ‘poetry pharmacy’ to prescribe poems to people struggling – I like what we’re doing at the moment, which is coming at mental illness from different angles.

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Listen to Mentally Yours, on ACAST, SPOTIFY and OTHER PLATFORMS. Read more Good Samaritan articles in the Pod Bible magazine, which you can read online or buy in our shop.

Follow us on Twitter and Instagram so you don’t miss the rest of our recommendations for podcasts about mental health. 

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After broadcaster Mark Goodier suffered a stroke in 2016, he found that there weren’t too many resources to help survivors, this led him to set up Stroke Stories, a podcast dedicated to those who have lived-experiences.

STROKE STORIES: There weren’t many resources that were available to help stroke survivors during their recovery. Also, once a stroke survivor is away from constant medical supervision, and their friends and family return to their normal, daily lives, it can be a lonely time. The podcast is there to fill in that gap: to give stroke survivors an opportunity to tell their story in their own words, and in doing so providing insight and support to other survivors.

WITH OVER 100,000 SUFFERING STROKES IN THE UK, IT’S FAIR TO SAY THAT STROKE STORIES HAS AN IMPORTANT ROLE TO PLAY.

SS: The podcast is there as a resource for survivors and their families. Often, the stories will involve the guest telling us about their stroke and aftermath, the challenges that they faced while recovering, and their tips and advice that they pass on to other survivors. A universal theme from all of our stories is that sometimes getting your life back takes time but for most people, a rewarding and fulfilling life is very achievable. A stroke can be an incredibly isolating experience, and the feedback we’ve had suggests that having these stories readily available can help survivors realise that they aren’t alone in the world.

SO, WHAT SHOULD WE BE AWARE OF?

SS: Every 6 seconds, someone will suffer a stroke. That’s 15 million people every year, and roughly a third of those will die from their stroke. The majority of the rest will be left with disabilities that they will often carry with them for the rest of their life. Strokes can happen to anyone at any age. Because stroke is so widespread and can affect such a large cross section of the world’s population, we want to feature as many people from the widest possible range of ages, backgrounds, and locations.

LIKE MANY ILLNESSES AND PROBLEMS WITH HEALTH, STROKES ARE INDISCRIMINATE, THEY CAN IMPACT ANY OF US AT ANY TIME, THIS IS WHY STROKE STORIES IS KEEN TO KEEP THE CONVERSATION GOING AND RAISE AWARENESS IN A NUMBER OF WAYS:

SS: The good news is there are things that we can do that can decrease risk: maintaining a healthy lifestyle and a balanced diet. Keeping a check on the amount of alcohol we consume and the amount of exercise that we do, getting enough sleep at night, and managing your work/personal life properly to ensure that you aren’t consumed by stress.

AND DON’T FORGET THE SIMPLE THINGS TOO!

SS: Something else that is important is understanding how difficult life post-stroke can be for a survivor. If they are left with mobility, speech, or fatigue issues then they can often find themselves out of work and less able to navigate the day to day. If you know, or are related to a stroke survivor, then doing something as simple as sending a text or calling them up to check on how they can really make a difference in their recovery.

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Listen to Stroke Stories on ACAST, SPOTIFY and OTHER PLATFORMS. Read more Good Samaritan articles in the Pod Bible magazine, which you can read online or buy in our shop. 

The post THE GOOD SAMARITAN // Stroke Stories appeared first on POD BIBLE.