Mental Wealth is Newstalk’s brand new podcast series about people’s mental health experiences and the tools of recovery.
The first episode has launched (click on the above link) and takes a fresh approach to mental health discussion in Ireland. As opposed to looking at sufferers as victims, this programme engages with sufferers as people of mental wealth, people who have experienced hardship in their lives and, as a result, have important and useful insights. The series benefits from a vibrant and irreverent approach, using music, movies, books and other interests to bring each interviewee’s story to life. Mental Wealth focuses on experiences of recovery and is concerned with empowering listeners with helpful advice.
Newstalk’s Simon Tierney presents the podcast, with new episodes available on a monthly basis, dealing with depression, anorexia, bipolar disorder, generalised anxiety disorder, trichotillomania and OCD.
John Moynes, pictured above with host Simon Tierney, is an Irish comedian, poet and writer. John is the guest for the first episode, which deals with depression. In 1998, John was the Welfare Officer for the UCD Students Union. The committee decided to run an awareness campaign about depression. The organisation Aware sent the union a list of symptoms of the condition. There were eight symptoms on their list and it advised visiting a GP if you were experiencing more than three or four of them.
“I was typing up these symptoms on to a poster I was designing, and literally every single symptom on the list, I thought, ‘Yeah, I get that’”.
During the episode, John talks extensively about his coping mechanisms for dealing with depression, including a look at how cognitive behavioural therapy has helped him. He discusses the solace he finds in comic films such as Kelly’s Heroes and the wit of Spike Milligan and considers his trials and tribulations with dating, eating and socialising while experiencing a depressive episode.
Follow updates on Twitter (@NewstalkFM) and use the hashtag #MentalWealthNT
Simply click on the above link to listen to the full episode.
