Feel Better, Live More with Dr Rangan Chatterjee - #57 Mental Fitness and Body Image with Natasha Devon MBE

Episode Date: April 10, 2019

We all know what to do to keep physically fit, but few of us think about what we need to do to keep our minds fit and healthy. Writer and mental-health and body image campaigner, Natasha Devon argues that just as there is mental illness, there is also mental fitness. She believes that mental illness is no different to physical illness – the mind and body do not exist in silos. She talks about her campaign to get parity of treatment for mental illness and require workplaces to have mental health first aiders – just as there are physical health first aiders. We talk about body image for both men and women and the role of social media. We also discuss why debating is excellent for building resilience in children. Finally, Natasha gives her top tips for maintaining mental fitness. This is a really informative and thought-provoking conversation – I hope you enjoy it as much as I did! Show notes available at drchatterjee.com/natasha  Follow me on instagram.com/drchatterjee/ Follow me on facebook.com/DrChatterjee/ Follow me on twitter.com/drchatterjeeuk DISCLAIMER: The content in the podcast and on this webpage is not intended to constitute or be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your doctor or other qualified health care provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have heard on the podcast or on my website. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

There is such a thing as mental fitness. So I think we're starting to understand mental illness, but there is also mental fitness, which is like if it was a graph, that would be the vertical axis. And if you think it's important, for example, to take time to exercise every day for your physical health, there are equivalents that you can do for your mental health. Hi, my name is Dr. Rangan Chatterjee, medical doctor, author of The Four Pillar Plan and television presenter. I believe that all of us have the ability to feel better than we currently do, but getting healthy has become far too complicated. With this podcast, I aim to simplify it. I'm going to be having conversations with some of the most interesting and exciting people both within as well as outside the health space to hopefully inspire you as well as empower you with simple tips that you can put into practice immediately

to transform the way that you feel. I believe that when we are healthier, we are happier because when we feel better, we live more. Hello and welcome to episode 57 of my Feel Better Live More podcast. My name is Rangan Chatterjee and I am your host. My guest on this week's show is the body image and mental health campaigner, Natasha Devon. Now, we all know what to do to keep physically fit and healthy, but few of us think about what we need to do to keep our minds fit and healthy as well. Natasha argues that just as there is mental illness, there is also mental fitness.

Natasha shares her own journey and what has inspired her to do some incredible campaigning work for which she has received an MBE for services to young people. We talk about body image and how our society often teaches us from a young age to see our bodies as an enemy, something that we need to tweak and shape into an acceptable form. Yet we should be celebrating our bodies, not punishing them for not looking a certain way or being a certain shape. We chat about the impact of social media and selfies, and how we often do things for external validation rather than for intrinsic value. She also talks about her campaign to get parity of treatment for mental illness, and require workplaces to have mental health aid first aiders, just as there are physical health first aiders. health first aiders. We also discuss why debating is excellent for building resilience in children. And finally, Natasha shares her top tips for maintaining mental fitness. This is a really informative and thought-provoking conversation. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did. Now,

before we get started, I do need to give a very quick shout out to our sponsors, who are essential in order for me to be able to put out weekly podcast episodes like this one. Athletic Greens continue their support of my podcast. Now whilst I prefer that people get all of their nutrition from foods, I recognize that for some of us it is not always possible. In my opinion, Athletic Greens is one of the most nutrient-dense whole food supplements that I have come across and contains vitamins, minerals, prebiotics, and digestive enzymes. So if you're looking to take something each morning as an insurance policy to make sure that you are meeting your nutritional needs, I can highly recommend it. For listeners of this

podcast, if you go to athleticgreens.com forward slash live more, you will be able to access a special offer where you get a free travel pack box containing 20 servings of Athletic Greens, which is worth around £70 with your first order. You can check it out at athleticgreens.com forward slash live more. Now, on to today's conversation. So Natasha, welcome to the Feel Better Live More podcast. Thanks for having me. Hey, not at all. So we both had the pleasure of speaking at the Edinburgh Wellbeing Festival yesterday. We've been put up in this just gorgeous building, the Edinburgh Grand, and

I'm delighted I managed to get some time in your busy schedule for you to come and talk to me on my podcast. Thank you for that. Natasha, you are doing some really phenomenal work in terms of campaigning for mental health. And I really want to get into that and why you think that's so important at the moment. But I guess a good place to start is why does mental health mean so much to you? Yes, a good place to start is why does mental health mean so much to you? Wow, that's a big question. Well, I have a diagnosis of panic disorder myself. And I didn't receive that diagnosis until I was 31.

I'm almost 38 now. So that's a very small chunk of my life where I actually knew who my enemy was. But that didn't, of course, stop me trying to fight that enemy in the kind of intervening years. So when I look back with the knowledge that I have now, I realized I had my first panic attack when I was 10. But I didn't know what it was and neither did anyone around me. And I was misdiagnosed quite a lot with asthma and allergies and all kinds of things which were sort of physical in their nature as opposed to psychological and it struck me that we we're so fearful around mental illness diagnosis we see it as a label and in fact for me it was the opposite it was when when I received the diagnosis it was just such a huge relief because I could make the necessary alterations to my life

to live with this thing you know and and just the same as if I had diabetes it's part of who I am but it's not it doesn't define me you know as a person so I guess I'm trying to be um the sort of friendly face of mental illness and say to people it doesn't have to be a life sentence yeah I mean it's pretty inspiring that um and we think about that you say you had your first panic attack with hindsight when you were 10 years old but you didn't know it was that at the time so I'm trying to put my head in to you know you know I'm trying to imagine if I was 10 and I was suffering with something like that but nobody knew what it was. And you mentioned that you were diagnosed with asthma.

So I guess a quick question is, do you have asthma? No. Right. So you don't have asthma, yet you were diagnosed with it. Yeah. And as a doctor, what I'm thinking is if you were having panic attacks and anxiety and the stress response in your body was mounting up, that can lead to physical symptoms, including issues with breathing. Right. But you're right, a lot of us typically,

certainly if we look back 15, 20 years, probably weren't aware of it. Do you think that's changing? Do you think that awareness is changing? Or is that what you're trying to do? I definitely think it is. But I think in terms of talking to your GP it can be a game of Russian roulette because um as you know mental health training is a tiny component of the compulsory stuff so you will either have a GP who has an interest in it or you won't and for me the the big change was when I moved to West London um I had a youngish GP who just got it. And it was so wonderful to

have that support. They're just somebody who understood and didn't think I was making it up. And, you know, my GP back at home in Essex, where I grew up, just looked at my symptom was I was having difficulty breathing, and just literally looked at that and went, Oh, it's probably asthma then and gave me an inhaler, which I remember being really chuffed with because back in 1991 when this was happening an inhaler was quite a cool playground accessory do you remember this yeah um but you know celebrity status in the playgrounds yeah yeah yeah it's incredible I think when you think about what you just said about Russian roulette, I think that's something that, since I've started working in the media,

maybe five years or so now, and I go around the country talking to people, a lot of people say that it seems to be hit and miss. As in, who do I get as my GP? Are they interested in this or are they not? Are they familiar with this? And, you know, this Saturday, obviously, we're speaking on a monday morning the edinburgh well-being festival is on the sunday and saturday i was i was teaching a course called prescribing lifestyle medicine in london all day and it's a course that i uh created with a colleague of mine last year which is accredited by the world college

of gps first course of its kind where we teach doctors um a lot of the sort of lifestyle factors that we frankly weren't taught about at medical school and a big part of that is stress and how it can actually have physical symptoms on the body and we talk about mental health and it's incredible we trained over 500 doctors now hopefully going to make it past a thousand this year but the feedback is you know we don't just get gps we get you consultant psychiatrists coming, rheumatologists, because across medicine, I think there's a recognition that actually we don't learn this much about what you're talking about at medical school. And I think you're then left, someone like yourself

who's suffering with a mental health issue, is left trying to figure it out for yourself. Is that what you felt you had to do? Yeah, the way that it happened for me, and again, these are kind of retrospective observations that I'm making, but I developed lots of really bad coping strategies for anxiety throughout my teenage years

when I was at university in my 20s, the worst of which was an eating disorder. And I felt that the eating disorder was very easily understood because there was a behavioral element to it and after I recovered from my eating disorder I was left with still something's not right and I and I think that's where we are really more broadly with mental health is that if there is a behavioral element, if it's something like self-harm or if somebody has a psychosis, it's almost, it's something that you can treat because it's a symptom. I think we're less good at looking at the root causes. And also I think we're less good at understanding that mental illness very rarely presents in a neat way like if somebody has

for example depression but they're using drinking to medicate that you know I hear lots of stories of people ping-ponging between different service providers with neither really wanting to take responsibility for them. Yeah I think that's a very common story, isn't it? We're treating the symptoms a lot of the time. Yes, as doctors, we often treat the symptoms, but I guess, as you've just highlighted, you sort of self-medicate with various things in your lifestyle. You mentioned an eating disorder. Is there anything else you sort of can think of in your lifestyle

that you were using to help you deal with this issue? can think of in your lifestyle that you were using to help you deal with this issue? When I was at school, I was a classic sort of perfectionist overachiever, which a lot of people would think is a good thing. But what people don't understand about perfectionists is that, first of all, you are constantly beating yourself up. Nothing you ever do is good enough in your mind. But also that you don't do things that you think you won't be good at so there's loads of things that have intrinsic value like for example you know now I love to exercise but I will never be any good at it you know I'm never going to be an athlete a natural athlete that doesn't matter because excuse me because I enjoy it and it and

it gives me it gives me something, you know, that I need. So I would say throughout school, I was kind of channeling my nervous energy into studying, overachieving, always wanting the top grade, never thinking that anything I did was good enough. And whilst on paper, my academic career looks like a successful one, doesn't really tell the story of how I felt about it. Yeah, I think that's, I guess I was pausing and reflecting as you were saying that because some of those personality traits I can recognise in myself and the striving for perfection and only doing things that you know you can be good at. And I feel I've changed a lot in that area over last years as I've done a lot of deep emotional work on myself and actually tried to figure out where that stuff comes from.

Do you feel that you've had an evolution in the last few years whereby you can now enjoy something, as you say, for its intrinsic value rather than because it's going to get that external validation? That's right. And there's another element to it as well of being a woman in the society, the culture that we have in Britain and in America and other places throughout the world, where you are from your earliest moments kind of taught to see your body as an enemy or something that you need to sort of tweak and shape into an acceptable form. And a lot of people, I think, exercise because they're trying to change their body rather than for the joy of it. And like a lot of people that grew up in Essex, I used to go to the gym and I used to hate it it was it was a you know a bi-daily torture that was all about shaping my body into and punishing my body for not being that shape naturally whereas now I go to the park you know I do it in nature that there's actually a lot of evidence to show that if you exercise outside it magnifies the endorphin production um and and i do it because you know i'm celebrating

my body rather than apologizing for my body yeah absolutely um have you heard of something called fractals before no yes fractals are these geometric shapes that you only get in nature and we and science has shown that um that when you look at fractals, when a human being looks at a fractal, you lower levels of the stress hormone cortisol, which is one of the reasons, one of the many reasons why nature is so powerful for us. But you only get fractals in nature in trees, in grass, in coastlines, in lakes. And it's incredible. So it's like we're hardwired to be in nature. So it doesn't surprise me that you're also finding that. You mentioned body and we're taught to think about our bodies as an enemy.

And I guess typically males and females might have had a different perspective on this, although I think that's changing now. I think there's a lot of pressure on guys now as well in a way that maybe women felt it for years. And again, I appreciate I'm a man sort of trying to speculate on this issue. So I need to be very careful. But body image and the way we view our bodies, is that a problem at the moment? So the way it was explained to me, there's a small group of scientists at University of Central London who specifically

look at gender and its relationship to mental health and their everything that they write is endlessly fascinating to me and one of the things that they say in their research is it's about shame triggers so for for women the majority not all but for the majority of women the shame trigger relates to beauty and for the majority of men the shame trigger relates to strength and so when you look at body image issues in men they most often begin with an obsession with exercise and muscle building and then the the food restrictions come later whereas with women it's more likely to be the other way around it begins with food restriction and then compulsive exercise. And that's because of the differences in the shame trigger. So it's harder to shame a man just for not looking the way we think men

should look. Whereas with women, it's pretty straightforward, which is why low body image is correlated in women with things like depression and anxiety. For people listening who don't understand the term shame trigger, are you able to elaborate on that a little bit? Yeah, so it's to do with what can I accuse you of that's going to make you feel shame? So if you say to me, I think you're ugly, that is going to create shame in me more than if you say to me, I think you're weak and vice versa. If I say to you, I think you're weak because you're a man, you have this kind of inbuilt, probably, shame trigger around strength. The interesting question for me is whether that's nature or nurture. are we born primed with that inbuilt shame trigger

or is it the culture that we live in that teaches little boys that they have to aspire to a kind of culturally constructed idea of what strength is and vice versa with girls and beauty? Yeah, I mean, it is fascinating, isn't it? I guess naturally thinking about it, I would think there probably are some sort of, you know, that there's probably something in nature, but I guess the society we live in, you know, the nurture, the ways we're surrounded, I think would probably have a key, key

role there. I certainly would imagine. And so when I, you know, I think back to me as a teenager and, you know, as a teenager, I remember being in the changing rooms at school. Actually, I was a, you know, skinny Indian kid at school. You know, you could see my ribs. And I felt, you know, pretty, you know, I wouldn't say nervous, but you're self-conscious of that. And then I think, I don't know when Men's Health magazine started coming out, but I seem to remember in my sort of teenagers, you know, you'd you know men's health magazine on the shelves and you know there'd be this ripped guy on the front with a six-pack and smiling and you kind of I feel I was really um you know I feel I was affected by that and I would buy men's health magazine and I would think okay you know I don't

think I consciously thought I was trying to look like that I was just I felt that that's what I should be trying to do so I was trying to do their workouts at home and I you know I think I consciously thought I was trying to look like that. I was just, I felt that that's what I should be trying to do. So I was trying to do their workouts at home. And I think I wrecked my back actually just from trying to hammer all these workouts because I wanted to sort of bulk up a little bit. So that's me as a sort of, you know, a male perspective on this. I would imagine this is what women have been going through for years. Yes. Or many women. Yeah, but I think what has happened recently is this conflation with beauty and health,

which is really dangerous. Because if you'd have asked most of the girls in my year group at school, why are you dieting? They would say to be thinner. And you would say, well, that's going to have a negative impact on your health and they would say i don't care whereas now that young women on exactly the same diet but they've somehow been persuaded that it has health benefits um and this idea that i'm you know it's almost like a fake narrative of i'm going to the gym to be strong and you know the fact that it makes me look like kim kardashian is just a side aspect of it. And there's so much kind of pseudoscience, particularly on protein products and things like

this, that, you know, it has no basis in reality, really, but they use impressive sounding language. And so it's unpicking that with young people now and saying, you know, it's so boring health advice, isn't it? It's like what your nan would say. It's like, you know, eat your now and saying, you know, it's so boring health advice, isn't it? It's like what your nan would say. It's like, you know, eat your fruit and veg, drink enough water, move around a bit, try not to feel too guilty if you eat cake and your body will be as it's meant to be, you know, and there's nothing sexy about that. It's the same advice. Actually, what I often say to people is the rules of good health have always been the same. The only thing that's changed is the modern lifestyle. And actually, we're just trying to reiterate um the principles of good health that frankly have been the same

for donkey's years um you've been quoted i think as saying health is a lifestyle not a look yeah which is frankly incredible and just so um just such a powerful statement. Where did you first say that and why did you say it? I said it, first of all, I worked with a guy called Dr. David Bainbridge. He's at Cambridge University and he wrote a book called Curvology and it was looking at the evolution of female body shape. And one of the things it says in the book is there are all kinds of reasons why women in particular are incredibly diverse in our body shape and it was the first time that I went oh so we're meant to look radically different from one another and yet we're all aspiring to this very narrow idea of what beauty is and I think in in in recent years there's there's been this trend for being

kind of visual doctors where people assume that if they, you know, if you're overweight, you're automatically unhealthy. And if you're slim, you're automatically healthy. And, you know, there's been books written about how people have misinterpreted what the scientific data says. There's a really great book by Megan Jane Crabb, where she says, you know, saying that being fat causes disease is like saying yellow teeth cause lung cancer. You know, that there is something that you're doing in both instances that causes the disease. So if you sit on your bum all day and eat lard, that's not healthy. And that might cause you to be overweight and it might also cause disease but the simple fact of being overweight isn't what causes the disease and equally you can just

have a very fast metabolism but be leading a very unhealthy lifestyle so um that was when i first coined this health is a lifestyle not a look line which is always handy when you're in a kind of media situation where you have a hop or a Morgan who doesn't really understand health you know and you've been in that situation many times haven't you yeah you're right it is you know the the difference as we were saying before between um going on a tv show or a news section to talk about something as you often get what three minutes four minutes and so a soundbite like that is very very very useful in those settings for sure. Hopefully, you know, what I love about this podcast is that we can go a bit deeper

and we don't have to, you know, resort to soundbites. Not that there's anything wrong with soundbites, but it's more we can just hopefully take a deeper dive into a topic. You mentioned something interesting before, which is about the sort of the narratives that we're seeing online a little bit and how they've subtly shifted. People say, I'm going to go to the gym to get strong. But there's still an underlying tone of, you know, there's an underlying feeling of, I guess, inauthenticity on one level, which probably isn't dissimilar to what people were

doing 10 or 15 years ago and actually they were going there you know they were openly saying I'm going there to look thin I'm going there to look at my look after my body whereas we sort of changed that narrative some people have anyway I'm sure some people authentically are are doing that and I don't want to tarnish everyone with the same brush but I guess the question is what role do you feel that social media is playing in the prevalence of mental health in society oh so I think only a person who doesn't understand anything would ever argue that social media hasn't had a massive impact on how we think and behave and communicate. However, I do think that the tendency is to blame social media for everything when it comes to mental health. Like I remember last year, I was

at this conference and there was a kind of government policy representative there and he had this graph and he said, oh, you can see that anxiety and self-harm in particular have risen very steeply since 2010. And he said, of course, we are attributing this to smartphones. And I thought, yeah, I bet you are because, you know, obviously in 2010, that's when austerity measures really kicked in. There were cuts to services, you know, people lost their communities. And also there were massive changes to the education system, which had an impact on young people. So I think maybe we should see social media as like a mirror for the culture that we live in. It might be exacerbating certain issues. And I think with body image, that's almost definitely true. But if you look at, for example, what the evidence shows is that it's not simply being on social media, but how you use it, that is the determining

factor in whether it's healthy or not. So if you can spend a lot of time on social media, but if you are, for example, photoshopping and filtering your selfies, that would indicate that you don't have a great relationship with social media and then i'm looking at right who are the people who are photoshopping their selfies it's predominantly women and we socialize girls from a very young age to kind of seek validation and outsource their self-esteem so when you talk to teenage girls they'll say things like i'll put i'll put up a selfie and it hasn't got 30 likes within the first five minutes i take it down because it's no good is that happening, really?

I've never heard of that before. That's a symptom, isn't it? That's a symptom of the way they've been socialized. It's not social media's fault. That's just the platform by which they're doing it. So if they don't get that external validation very quickly, it means that actually they've got to take it down. So, yeah, I had no idea that was going on actually.

Yeah. Well, I talk about in my book, um, at this thing called good box mentality. So I was working with a therapist who said, he told me this story about a client that he had who, um, he was a painter and decorator. And every time he did a job as a kind of thank you at the end, he used to make these kind of ornamental trinket boxes and he would give a trinket box to every client. And his hope was that they would display it somewhere in their home. And then someone would come over and they'd say, where did you get that? And then he'd get recommendations through it. And he put this trinket box on the table between him and the therapist. And the therapist said, oh, that's nice. Where'd you get that? He said, I made it. And he said, that's one of my best. And then the next time he came in, he said, did your client like the trinket box? And he said,

no, she didn't. She gave it back. And he said, that wasn't a good box anyway. And what he, the point he's trying to make is when he made the box, he assessed it to be a good box, but because the client didn't like it, he changed his opinion on the box. And that's kind of the, ultimately the root of self-esteem is like, are you a good box? Because if you think you're a good box, it doesn't really matter what anyone else thinks of you. Yeah, absolutely. I really liked what you said about maybe we should look at it as a mirror of society. And I guess in many ways it mirrors many other things. It's how you use it. So alcohol, for example, right? Is alcohol inherently bad?

Okay. Well, that's, that's the subject of a, an entirely different podcast conversation. But the point I'm trying to make is if you have got a, you know, if you're, if you're using alcohol now and again, uh, let's say in company, uh, to help you enjoy a meal, for example, um, you know, and, and, you know, it's, I don't want to say minimal enjoy a meal, for example. You know, and, you know, I don't want to say minimal as opposed to, I don't want to sort of cast aspersions on how much people are drinking. What I'm trying to say is,

it's the intention behind which you use it. So if you're using it now and again to help enjoy a social setting, for example, it might have a very different impact on you than if you're coming home from work each night, super stressed out, and you're using home from work each night super stressed out and you're using it to sort of medicate that stress and i guess i don't want to put words in your mouth but maybe it's not dissimilar to social media it's not the social media that's actually

the problem it's how we use it are we using it to fill a void in our life and using it you know day and day out all the time uh are we you? Is it feeding self-esteem problems in us? Or are we using it to really engage with other like-minded people? You mentioned community, right? You said of the 2,000 people who have lost their communities in this age of austerity, and community is a huge part of health. If arguably, if you look at the longevity populations

around the world in the blue zones, these five areas around the world where people live to a ripe old age with low rates of chronic disease, actually the commonality between all of them is a strong sense of community. Yeah. And I guess social media can be used to provide community for some people, would you say? Particularly if you, let's say, for example lgbtq and you're not out yet or you don't feel like you can come out to your friends or family um it's going to plug you into a group of like-minded people it's also a great source of information like you know particularly if you're struggling

with your mental health there are so many people out there who are providing, you know, really good quality sources of support. It can be a really useful resource. But going back to what you were saying about coping strategies, there's an exercise that I do in the classes that I do in school sometimes where I say to them, this would be like a sixth form group, right? And I'll say, think of the last time you had a stressful day, got home you closed the door what did you do to take the edge off and I write it all down and some of them will say video games some of them will say I had a drink a smoke some of them will say I played with the dog you know I went for a walk blah blah blah and then we go through each one and I say right do you think this is good coping or bad coping and they're always very

definite you know eating a crispy cream donut is bad going for a walk is good and so then we go through it and i say actually it may surprise you to know that none of these are inherently either good or bad it's to what extent we're doing them and why we're doing them that is the issue so it's a much more nuanced conversation than people give it credit for i think and and when you discuss these concepts with them um and you explain this to them what's the feedback after that you know and does it does it cause them to reflect and maybe for some of them would it would it cause them to change their behavior do you think i would hope so what i'm trying to convey at the moment to young people is there is such a thing as mental fitness.

So I think we're starting to understand mental illness, but there is also mental fitness, which is like if it was a graph, that would be the vertical axis. Yeah. And if you think it's important, for example, to take time to exercise every day for your physical health, there are equivalents that you can do for your mental health. that you can do for your mental health. And I believe that we live in a culture which kind of fetishizes overworking and not taking time for self-care. And as well, the notion of self-care has been commoditized. So it's almost become this laughable thing of like,

ooh, have a lavender bath type thing. But actually that's not what it is. All self-care is is is ring fencing time every day to restore your chemical balance and that's what mental fitness is yeah i just could not agree with that more i mean it is just you put it so beautifully um and i think it's i think it's never been as important as the sort of fast-paced, busy, super stressful lives that many of us are now leading, which of course the World Health Organization calls stress the health epidemic of the 21st century, which I think is really reflective of what's going on in society and probably in many ways mirrors the growing numbers of mental health problems in society so if we just move

on a little bit to your campaigning work um you there's so much you're doing i mean you got an mbe for services to young people a few years back congratulations thank you that's absolutely incredible um there's a few things i really want to touch on. You've got this, you know, you're involved with a campaign called Where's Your Head At? What is that campaign all about? That is a campaign to change the law so that for every first aider in a workplace, there's a mental health first aider. So I'm sure people listening will know that there is a legal obligation upon employers in a business above a certain size, so medium to large businesses, to ensure that there is provision for medical first aid. So if you cut your finger at work or you faint or you need an ambulance, there's usually somebody on site who knows the protocol to follow.

It is possible to train as a mental health first aider. And what you learn is if your colleague has a panic attack, for example, or they're exhibiting symptoms of depression, even if they're suicidal, you learn what to say, what not to say, and then what it's appropriate to recommend in terms of further advice and support. It's in just the same way as medical first aiders. This is not meant to be a substitute for professional care. This is about first intervention. So what the evidence shows is if you're struggling with your mental health, the first person who talks to you about it is really fundamental in your recovery pathway. So basically, if the first person that notices

is compassionate, non-judgmental and helpful, you'll get better faster than if they're not. That's incredible to hear. And it really makes intuitive sense, doesn't it? And it's, I guess, all of us, all the people listening to this podcast, you know, we can think about that and think about if anyone, if one of our friends opens up to us, you know, how we interact with them right at that starting point, you know, could, could really have a huge influence on the, on the overall outcome, you know, that sort of kindness, compassion. And it also mirrors what you said, um, you know, a little while ago when we've been talking about, you may think that, yes, I'm going to exercise every day for my physical health. But you also mentioned that there's something you can do for your mental health and, you know,

mental fitness. And this is kind of the same really in the workplace, isn't it? Where, you know, if you had, you know, cut your shin and you were bleeding, you'd go and there'd be plasters there and there'd be the first aid box. And all you're saying is we just need the same for mental health. That's exactly right. And, you're saying is, we just need the same for mental health. That's exactly right. And there's this phrase that's thrown around in the kind of political corridors of power, parity of esteem.

I don't know if you've heard it, but it was something that was promised originally in 2011. And what it means is that we aim to treat mental health issues in the same way as we do physical health issues. And yet when you look at funding and services, we're nowhere near on an even keel. And I believe making this law change would be one really simple way of working towards parity of esteem. Yeah. It's incredible you're

doing that. And you've also said, you know, this is not going to solve all mental health problems, but it's just a very important first step. And I would absolutely agree when I was looking through your Twitter feed this morning and, um, which is, which is brilliant actually. So I'd encourage people to listen to this, to really, to follow you on Twitter. There's lots of really great information on there. Um, what was, I came across, well, what was really interesting, I came across an article where I think you, you had basically said that you received, I think, was it an email from your boss when you explained or they'd found out? I don't know why, when you said you were suffering from bulimia

and your boss said, you know, something like, so that's what we're paying you for, is it? I wonder if you could just expand on that because that really was quite troubling to read. Yeah, so this was when I was about 24. It was just before I recovered from my eating disorder and um I was not a I should say in any way an effective employee at that point because I was very very poorly and so from my boss's point of view he's thinking why isn't this

person performing and so what he did was he asked the IT guy in our office to log into my computer so that he could see everything that I was doing and screenshot anything that he felt was evidence of why I was underperforming. And one of the things he screenshot was I sent an email to a friend in which I said, sort of confessed that I had bulimia. And I said, I'm spending every night binging and purging. And in the morning, you know, I find it really difficult to get up in the mornings. And I think because I still saw at that point, my eating disorder is like a bad habit as opposed to an illness. I think this was around New Year. And I was kind of going, well, my New Year's resolution is to not do that anymore. Like, I mean, ridiculous, but that, that was how I kind of framed it at that time. And so I was subsequently, I was pulled into a disciplinary and that's when my boss said, so this is why we're paying you, is it? So you can spend money

on food to throw up. And that's what he was angry about, which I remember thinking was strange at the time. And how did that make you feel? Well, it kind of compounded for me the idea that it was something that I could choose to get over and that I didn't have enough willpower. It made me feel really ashamed. But the reason that I mentioned it in that article is because, you know, this was more than 10 years ago. And yet, as a mental health campaigner, I know that those scenarios are still going on in offices up and down the country every day. Now, if you're reflecting 10 years on, you know, how do you feel about it now? What do you think about it? And what has changed,

if anything, in society? Well, people often ask me, they say, there's a person in my life who I suspect is struggling with their mental health. What should do what should I say and my answer is almost always well what would you do if it was a physical health problem and I wonder if I'd written in that email you know the reason that I'm late to work every morning is because I have a broken leg and I'm dragging myself in every morning and I'm in pain and that's why I'm not performing how different my boss's response would have been then then it would have been what can we do to support you to get better? That's what he should have said. And again, sort of going back to where's your head at, my sense still is that people want to help, but there's this fear of saying the wrong thing. I think when you have a mental health problem,

people still take a step back because they don't know the protocol if someone's physically ill we know the drill buy them grapes i don't know why grapes are the fruit of illness you know and so it's just it's just helping people to it's kind of trying to ingrain it into our culture so people are responding instinctually in in what would be the right way. I've seen you write before about how many people take time off work for mental health problems each year. But then more importantly, I thought, well, not more importantly, but I guess the thing that really struck me is how many of them don't tell their bosses the truth. Yeah. So the partner in Where's Your Head At was Bauer Media, who own a huge number of different radio stations and magazines, which are really sort of across demographics. So it's everything from Empire Magazine to Absolute Radio to Grazia.

Yeah, Haas as well, I think. Yeah. So you've got a real mix of age groups and demographics that engage with that brand. And so what they did was they did a survey across all their different brands. And what they discovered was that about 50% of people who have had to take time off work for mental ill health told their boss that they had a physical health problem. And that means that, you know, when you learn, for example, that time taken off for mental ill health costs the economy £35 billion every year. It's about £1,600 for every employee. That's really only scratching the surface because we don't know the true cost.

Yeah. I mean, just staggering statistics. Absolutely staggering. And I guess I would be thinking, I'm an optimist, right? I'm an eternal optimist I think things are always going to change um do you think that kind of compelling financial case means that this is going to be almost impossible for business employers the government to ignore do you think that you know yes it would be nice if that sort of human narrative was the reason why things are going to change and i hope that's a huge part of it but ultimately i've seen that the way the way often the world works is that needs to be that strong economic

case do you think the economic case is so compelling now that people are going to have to do something about this well that i should say where's Head At? has brought together MPs of all different stripes. We've got every party, I think, apart from UKIP and SOD them. And the only people who have objected in any way to the campaign are government cabinet members, which suggests that there's a lack of impartiality there. But what they say is that if they make mental health first aid mandatory it could become a flaw so that there are lots of employers out there who are already doing mental health first aid and more that you know they're implementing lots of strategies and they're saying well if we make mental health first

aid mandatory employers will think that's all that they have to do so they'll strip away all the other stuff that to me it's exactly the same argument as um the government also refuses to ring fence mental health funding and they say that's because it will become a ceiling and we might want to give more but we know that people only get half on the ground of what is invested into mental health so it's like i'll take that ceiling and in the same way, what you find at the moment is there are employers who are doing loads because they get it. And then there are people who are being actively bullied for having mental health problems at work to make mental health first aid mandatory, I think would provide some equality in what people can expect at work. Yeah. Have you seen things change since you started campaigning? Yeah. Have you seen things change since you started campaigning?

Yes, I have seen it snowball, which has been incredible. And the support has come in three strands. We've got a Change.org petition, which has more than 200,000 signatures. We've had 50 of the UK's leading businesses, WH Smith, Ford, Thames Water, write to the Prime Minister and say, we back this change. And we've also had immense political support, more than 60 MPs who back it. That's incredible. What worries me is that this is going to get buried under Brexit. I think we're all worried that everything we're doing is going to get buried under Brexit. Yeah.

But I guess what can people listening to this podcast do to help you with the work that you're doing? Because I'm very lucky that this podcast gets tens of thousands of listeners each week and it's a very engaged community. I think people are really going to enjoy this conversation we're having and a lot of them will want to help. Is there anything they could do? Are there petitions out there? Are there things that you're doing this very engaged community, I think people are really going to enjoy this conversation we're having,

and a lot of them will want to help. Is there anything they could do? Are there petitions out there? Are there things that you're doing that they can actually help you support? So you can find the petition at whereisyourheadat.org. If you sign up to that, not only does it show that we are getting continuous public support, but it also means that you'll receive email updates letting you know where

we are in changing the law. What you'll also find on there is a template that you can download where you can write to your local MP. There's a link to find out who your local MP is, and then you can just download a letter and just fill in the details. Please do that. Let your local MP know that you want them to support it. There's another campaign that I have at the moment called the Mental Health Media Charter. And that is guidance for anybody who wants to speak or write publicly about mental health in a way that is responsible and safe. And if listeners want to find out more about that, you can also buy a badge if you want to support it. And you can find out about that on my website, which is natashadevan.com.

Yeah, fantastic. But guys, you know, the show notes page for today's podcast is going to be drchatty.com forward slash Natasha and everything Natasha has spoken about, including these links, her website, her book, but also, you know, videos she's done in the media. I'm going to link to all of them there. So if you want one area, you can actually link to all of Natasha's work and these exciting petitions. And please do check it out after the episode. Natasha, there's a few more things I just want to touch on with you. We're speaking a lot about physical health and mental health and how we're trying to give mental health the same or similar awareness to physical health.

Now, a lot of people will say that there's no difference. Why are we separating out physical health and mental health? Surely it's part of the same picture. What are your views on that? I agree with that. The body and the mind don't exist in silos and something i discovered recently is that eight out of ten primary age children who go to their school nurse with stomachache are experiencing stomachache because they're anxious and the

ancient egyptians actually believe that your brain and your stomach were the same organ yeah they're so closely correlated and then then I also read that 90% of back pain has no physically attributable cause that you could see in an x-ray. It's where people hold their stress. So I think utopia would be a culture in which we just talk about health, but we're not there yet. So we need to raise the awareness of mental health to a point where people are taking it as seriously first. Yeah, I think that's a great way to put it. I also agree.

I think they are the same thing. I think health is health and it's all interconnected. And, you know, you mentioned, was it the Egyptians? Yes. Yeah, which is incredible because what I find fascinating as a doctor is that we're getting a lot of science now to back up what a lot of these ancient cultures have been saying for donkey's years. You know, the gut-brain axis, right well the egyptians were saying that but you know maybe we in the west have sort of not taken that kind of stuff seriously because it's not based on hard science whereas actually now you know what you know i think human beings have known intuitively for thousands tens of thousand years how to take care of ourselves. And so I find that super interesting. One of my friends is a theoretical physicist.

Her brain is amazing. Every time I spend time with her, I just ask her endlessly to explain the universe to me. And one of the things she was telling me recently is that physics has now proved that it is possible to have an out-of-body experience because you can shoot an atom through a tiny hole and it's in two different places at once this is a very basic layman's explanation of it

but it always fascinates me how quite often science is catching up yeah with things that people already knew so with ancient human wisdom yeah you know i i totally agree and i'm finding more and more as a doctor that i'm just you know you know whether it's seeing patients or with with this podcast or with books or whatever it's kind of just going back'm just, you know, you know, whether it's seeing patients or with this podcast or with books or whatever, it's kind of just going back to basics. Like, you know, not really trying to invent anything new because I kind of, I'm not sure there's much there to invent. I think these basic core rules have been the same forever. And it's just, we need a bit of a reminder of them in this sort of modern society and how things have changed. And I do agree with you.

You know, if physical and mental health had parity, we can talk about one health. But until we raise, you know, levels of awareness and acceptance of mental health, I do agree we need to sort of fight this battle to sort of, you know, to raise awareness. Children's resilience, something that is close to my heart. I'm a parent of two young kids, eight and six-year-olds, and we do a lot of things at home to try and support their mental health and resilience. Like all parents, I'm trying to do the best that I can for my kids. I don't know if I am or not. I'm certainly trying, like I think all parents are. I recently wrote an article in The Guardian on six ways to help your children have more resilience. And, you know, it's become really popular. Lots of teachers and organizations have been in touch to say, well, how can we get this out there to schools? I know you've written about this before,

and I noticed that you write for the Times Educational Supplements. That's right. And there was a piece that I saw on debating yeah and I thought that's really fascinating that how you were sort of saying that debating has lots of positive benefits for resilience in children I wonder if you could explain yes so Ofsted recently announced that they are going to be giving extra credit to schools that have a debating society um and I was saying in in the piece I have a weekly column in the times educational supplement and I was saying in my column last week that's great but the league tables won't look any different because by definition it's the schools with the most money that have a debating society but what I was arguing for is

actually sort of having some some investment so that all schools can have a debating society because I think it's a really important skill because what it teaches you is first of all it's confidence building in of itself it teaches you to think on your feet, but it also, it teaches you when someone's talking to you to kind of pick out the thread of what they're saying, rather than to focus on how they're saying it or the parts that you feel relate to you. So, you know, I never think I'm a controversial character, but a lot of people find what I say controversial. And I, you know, I get a lot of people who are angry with me. And what learning debating at school taught me was how to pick out what, okay, what is it that they're actually saying here?

What's going on with them that's led them to this conclusion? And to respond rather than to react and I think that stops then us having an argument which is potentially going to impact my self-worth. Yeah it was so exciting to hear that because now that you're explaining it it would absolutely make sense of course it's a great skill but I don't think I'd really thought about it as a great skill until I read that piece that you wrote so um yeah I'm gonna be thinking about that with my kids already actually so thank you for that um but it would make sense wouldn't it it would also I guess help to foster empathy a little bit I would imagine um and an understanding that

there are different opinions out there and sort of trying to be okay with that and I guess that's gonna that's always been an important skill I guess just to interact in communities and with other people but arguably with social media being so prevalent and with the divisive nature of some of it I kind of feel that social media ain't going away although I do think I do see a bit of a kickback against it in some younger age groups now, which is, you know, it's interesting to see, but I kind of feel is not one of the most important skills we're going to need in this era of information overloads is how do we, you know, how do we pull out the themes that are important? How

do we not let it affect us? How do we learn to respect other people's points of view even though they're different from our own yes and actually i had lunch the other week with uh one of the uh someone who works for microsoft in in the coding bit you know the really technical bit and what he was saying was we always assumed that giving people access to the internet and and to people in far-flung corners of the globe would make us more intelligent as a species because we literally have access to more information but what it's actually done is it's made us more binary in our thinking because most people i think are overwhelmed there's just so much conflicting information out there and what that makes you do then is you you kind of hold on to a simple idea that makes you feel better. So, you know,

an example would be build a wall. Yeah, that will solve everything, you know? And, and as long as you can cling onto that, then it's helping, it's, it's almost like a coping mechanism for how overwhelming the world is. It's almost like an anchor, right? Yeah, exactly. To keep you grounded. overwhelming the world. It's almost like an anchor, right? Yeah, exactly. To keep you grounded. Yeah. So that's why you end up with these people, you know, furiously arguing in 280 character chunks across the no man's land of nuance. And in fact, the truth is in that nuanced bit. Exactly. Well, at least it's 280 now. Did it not used to be 140? I know, and it was impossible. Which is frankly, you know, I realized that she's trying to win a debate on twitter well that's the wrong way trying to engage in a meaningful debate on twitter can yes it can be done it's quite time consuming and it's quite mentally taxing to do

that but yeah it's it's incredibly it's incredibly difficult to do so natasha i'm so enjoying this conversation i could probably go on for another hour or so but um we probably better start thinking about wrapping it up uh thank you for making time today i really think the work you're doing is incredible big supporter of it and i hope people do start following you um really get behind what you're doing i just want to finish off on one thing which is i really like this idea of mental fitness yeah okay it's a really nice concept that feels very fresh to me um which it shouldn't feel fresh, but it does, because I think it's something that is quite, it just makes a lot of sense. And this podcast is really about trying to have interesting conversations, sure, but it's about trying to inspire each and every listener to become the architects of their own health. the architects of their own health. And I wonder if you can leave the listeners with some of your top tips on what they can do, achievable things that they can do that are hopefully going to

improve their mental fitness. So you want to, like I said, ring fence time every day for your mental fitness. So Mental Health First Aid England, who I do a lot of work with, they recommend an hour of self-care a day. I happen to think that that's slightly unrealistic for the average person. So I always ask people to aim for half an hour. And in that half an hour, you want to be doing an activity which falls into one of these three categories. The first is physical activity. The second is relaxation. And the third is creativity. And there's a huge number of things that you could do um that that fall into those categories but you know listening to or making music writing in a journal going for a walk uh you know walking the dog um doing a you know there's some great

mindfulness apps out there headspace is the one that i use but you're just uh topping up then your mental fitness or mental health first aid England describe it as emptying your stress bucket yeah I love it I think that's such a good tip in fact I think if we all did that and applied in our lives um I think we'd all lower our stress levels and feel better it's interesting to see the three themes you thought of there and it reminded me a little bit of the, in my book on stress, I write about morning routines and how I'm a big fan. I've got what I call the three M's of a morning routine, which are mindfulness, movement, and mindset, which is actually pretty similar

to what you're suggesting people do in their half hour of self-care. Yeah, that's brilliant. It's identical, really. Yeah. And, you know, I also think, bear in mind that's that's identical really yeah and you know i also think bear in mind that you are unique and whatever works for you works for you and just to give you a quick example so as somebody with a type of anxiety disorder i was constantly being told you need to slow down you need to calm down you need to relax and whilst that would be good advice generally speaking i'm not a person

who finds it possible to do that and then I was working with a therapist the same therapist who talked about good box mentality actually who said to me no he said you've got so much nervous energy and if you're not channeling it into something it will turn inwards and that's why you feel anxious so now when i feel um a bit overwhelmed i i literally i walk it off i go for a walk because or you know i punch a punch bag because i know that that is energy that has to go somewhere whereas the traditional wisdom would would say you know go and lie in a meadow or have your lavender bath you know so it's whatever works for you yeah and absolutely the the other thing there is that this kind of stress response that we've got inside us, you know, evolved millions of years ago and ultimately is there to keep us safe.

And often it was there to help us, you know, run away from danger. So the stress response in many ways is priming our body for physical activity. Yeah. Yet actually if we're getting stressed out by our email inbox in many ways is priming our body for physical activity. Yeah. Yeah. Actually, if we're getting stressed out by our email inbox and we're just sat on our bums all day, we're not utilizing, you know, our body's expecting physical activity and it ain't getting it.

So I think that's a great, great tip and a really nice place to finish off this conversation. Natasha, where can people follow you if they want to keep up to date with what you're doing? My website is natashadevan.com and I am on Twitter and Instagram. I'm underscore Natasha Devon. Fantastic. And guys, just a reminder, everything we spoke about today will be on the show notes page

for this episode, drchassie.com forward slash Natasha. Natasha, thanks for your time. I hope to get you back on the podcast very, very soon. Thank you. I hope to get you back on the podcast very, very soon. Thank you. That concludes today's episode of the Feel Better Live More podcast. I really hope you enjoyed the conversation and that it has inspired you to think about how much time you dedicate each day to your own mental fitness.

It may be something that you've really not thought about much before. So hopefully this episode has shone a light on a very important part of our well-being. As always, please do let Natasha and I know what you thought of today's show on social media. Natasha is on Twitter and on Instagram. Everything that Natasha and I discussed today, as well as links to some quite brilliant articles that she has written online and in the press, as well as links to some quite brilliant articles that she has written online and in the press, will be available on the show notes page for this episode, which is drchastity.com forward slash Natasha. So I really would encourage you to check it out if you want to continue your learning experience now that the podcast is over. Of course, mental health was the major area that

I discussed in my conversation today with Natasha. On my latest book, The Stress Solution, Four Steps to a Calmer, Happier, Healthier You, is packed full of tips and tools to help all of us live happier and calmer lives. And it's especially helpful for those who are suffering with their mental health. I have had so many positive messages on social media, basically telling me how the tools in the book are helping them to feel calmer, happier, really helping them with their mental health. I've also actually had a lot of positive feedback from teenagers and adolescents who are using the tools in this book to help them. Some of them are not huge fans of actually reading paperback books, so are actually accessing the audiobook version, which I am narrating. So if you or someone close to you feel that you could benefit from some really actionable tips

like the three M's of your morning routine which I discussed with Natasha to really help improve your mental health, I would highly encourage you to pick up a copy of The Stress Solution. If you enjoy my weekly podcast, one of the best ways that you can support them is by leaving a review or whichever platform you listen to podcasts on and do help me spread the word by taking a screenshot right now and sharing with your friends and family on your social media channels or simply by telling your friends about the show i really do appreciate your support a big thank you to richard hughes for editing the podcast and to Ali Ferguson and Liam Saunders for the theme tune that is it for today I hope you have a fabulous week make sure that you

press subscribe and I'll be back in one week's time with my latest episode remember you are the architects of your own health making lifestyle changes always worth it because when you feel better, you live more. I'll see you next time. Thank you.