Amos Lee has a wonderfully smooth singing voice and plays the acoustic guitar beautifully. And if you never paid attention to his lyrics, you might even find his music to soothing and mellow. If you do lean into his lyrics a little and if you open yourself up to his tone and phrasing, you will soon find references to pain, loneliness, depression, anxiety, and trauma. This is especially the case on Amos’s upcoming album, Dreamland. He says he’s more comfortable talking about that side of himself now than on the other seven albums he’s released dating back to 2005.

In this interview, Amos shares plenty, including how he went from being a second grade teacher named Ryan Massaro to being a musical sensation named Amos Lee pretty much in one night. We also hear about a pivotal mental health crisis in college that realigned his priorities and how he made a woman in hospice dance when she didn’t think she wanted to.

Visit Amos Lee's website and listen to Shoulda Known Better and Worry No More at www.amoslee.com. Follow Amos on Twitter @amoslee and Instagram @am0slee.

Thank you to all our listeners who support the show as monthly members of Maximum Fun. 

Hey, remember, you’re part of Depresh Mode and we want to hear what you want to hear about. What guests and issues would you like to have covered in a future episode? Write us at [email protected].

Help is available right away.

The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALK

Crisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.

International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlines

The Depresh Mode newsletter is available twice a week. Subscribe for free and stay up to date on the show and mental health issues. https://johnmoe.substack.com/

John's acclaimed memoir, The Hilarious World of Depression, is available here.

Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.

John is on Twitter @johnmoe.

Help support this show and unlock bonus content! Become a member at https://maximumfun.org/joindepresh

Within the comedy world, Tom Scharpling is known as a bit of a Swiss Army Knife. He’s the host of the long running Best Show, online now and on WFMU before that. He’s a veteran TV writer on shows like Monk and What We Do In The Shadows. He directs music videos. Now he’s a book writer, with the memoir It Never Ends. In that book and in our interview, he tells stories of his own mental health journey that he’s never shared with an audience before.

Tom started running into trouble with depression when he was around ten years old, which evolved into two hospital stays, the second of which involved electroconvulsive therapy. That treatment wiped out the depression but wiped out a big chunk of his memory in the process.

Get your copy of It Never Ends: A Memoir With Nice Memories! at www.tomwroteabook.com or wherever books are found. Follow Tom on Twitter @scharpling.

Thank you to all our listeners who support the show as monthly members of Maximum Fun. 

Hey, remember, you’re part of Depresh Mode and we want to hear what you want to hear about. What guests and issues would you like to have covered in a future episode? Write us at [email protected].

Help is available right away.

The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALK

Crisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.

International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlines

The Depresh Mode newsletter is available twice a week. Subscribe for free and stay up to date on the show and mental health issues. https://johnmoe.substack.com/

John's acclaimed memoir, The Hilarious World of Depression, is available here.

Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.

John is on Twitter @johnmoe.

Help support this show and unlock bonus content! Become a member at https://maximumfun.org/joindepresh

World Mental Health Day is this coming weekend and Depresh Mode host John Moe is feeling a bit reflective. When your job involves talking about mental health all the time, every day is kind of World Mental Health Day. All the ones ending in Y anyway. 

In this special bonus episode, John narrows down what could have been a list of hundreds of important things to know to just six. It was hard to pack in. He was shooting for three or four. Please listen to the episode for full elaboration but you should know certain things. Thing 1: you’re okay. Thing 2: not you’re fault. Thing 3: shit’s fucked up. Thing 4. Depression lies. Thing 5: don’t get hung up on terms. Thing 6: actively seek hope. 

Join us for a mini-episode and then all your mental health issues will be solved forever. Well, maybe not, but it might he helpful.

Thank you to all our listeners who support the show as monthly members of Maximum Fun. 

Hey, remember, you’re part of Depresh Mode and we want to hear what you want to hear about. What guests and issues would you like to have covered in a future episode? Write us at [email protected].

Help is available right away.

The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALK

Crisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.

International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlines

The Depresh Mode newsletter is available twice a week. Subscribe for free and stay up to date on the show and mental health issues. https://johnmoe.substack.com/

John's acclaimed memoir, The Hilarious World of Depression, is available here.

Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.

John is on Twitter @johnmoe.

Help support this show and unlock bonus content! Become a member at https://maximumfun.org/joindepresh

Alison Rosen cautions us to not read too much into the title of her show. It’s really just an expression that was popular in slang vernacular a few years ago when the podcast started. Besides, if every person listening or appearing on the show was her new best friend, that makes her pretty fickle on friendship. But the name works really well because she does things a friend should. She shares her stories, she’s vulnerable, and she genuinely cares about the person she’s talking to. 

In this episode, we hear how postpartum depression kicked her into taking therapy a lot more seriously. She tells us how she still struggles with not tying her quantitative measurement on a bathroom scale to her value as a person. And she shares why it didn’t really bother her when Adam Carolla called her “baby girl” as long as it was on the air.

Listen to Alison Rosen Is Your New Best Friend on the podcatcher of your choice. Follow her podcast on Twitter @ARIYNBF and Alison herself on Twitter @AlisonRosen and Instagram @alisonrosen.

Thank you to all our listeners who support the show as monthly members of Maximum Fun. 

Hey, remember, you’re part of Depresh Mode and we want to hear what you want to hear about. What guests and issues would you like to have covered in a future episode? Write us at [email protected].

Help is available right away.

The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALK

Crisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.

International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlines

The Depresh Mode newsletter is available twice a week. Subscribe for free and stay up to date on the show and mental health issues. https://johnmoe.substack.com/

John's acclaimed memoir, The Hilarious World of Depression, is available here.

Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.

John is on Twitter @johnmoe.

Help support this show and unlock bonus content! Become a member at https://maximumfun.org/joindepresh

Podcast listeners know Janet from the JV Club podcast here on Maximum Fun. Television audiences know her from You’re The Worst and Stan Against Evil, among many other credits. And fans of live comedy might know Janet as one of the founders of SF Sketchfest. 

But there was a time in Janet’s life when she didn’t know her as much of anything. As a young person, she dealt with depression and anxiety as well as a condition that you don’t hear talked about nearly as often: DPDR, or depersonalization derealization disorder. It’s a condition that brings about periods where you feel like you’re separate from the body that you’re traveling around in and like the world you’re in isn’t necessarily real.

Janet says the movie Being John Malkovich was a revelation in that she saw a big screen depiction of what this felt like.

We learn about Janet’s girlhood goth phase, wearing lots of black in the hot Arizona sun, an exciting move to California, a dispiriting foray into live journalism, and, well, figuring out who she is.

Listen to Janet Varney's podcast The JV Club on the podcatcher of your choice. Follow Janet on Twitter @janetvarney and on Instagram @thejvclub.

Thank you to all our listeners who support the show as monthly members of Maximum Fun. 

Hey, remember, you’re part of Depresh Mode and we want to hear what you want to hear about. What guests and issues would you like to have covered in a future episode? Write us at [email protected].

Help is available right away.

The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALK

Crisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.

International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlines

The Depresh Mode newsletter is available twice a week. Subscribe for free and stay up to date on the show and mental health issues. https://johnmoe.substack.com/

John's acclaimed memoir, The Hilarious World of Depression, is available here.

Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.

John is on Twitter @johnmoe.

Help support this show and unlock bonus content! Become a member at https://maximumfun.org/joindepresh

We’ve all seen screen portrayals of people with mental illnesses and we’ve all seen ones that miss the mark pretty badly. Someone has a vague sense of “crazy” about them so they turn into an evil sadist. A motel manager in the rather broadly titled film “Psycho” dresses up as his dead mother and murders a guest in the shower. Or someone just hamming through an over the top performance as a person with multiple personalities.

In this episode, we blow the whistle on some stuff like that but we also recognize some artists who go the extra mile to create portrayals of mental illness that are truthful and integral to the story. We have two sharp-eyed pop culture watchers with us and some guest commentators from our Preshies group on Facebook.

Listen to FANTI and Pop Culture Happy Hour on the podcatcher of your choice. Follow Tre'vell Anderson and Linda Holmes on Twitter @TrevellAnderson and @lindaholmes.

Thank you to all our listeners who support the show as monthly members of Maximum Fun. 

Hey, remember, you’re part of Depresh Mode and we want to hear what you want to hear about. What guests and issues would you like to have covered in a future episode? Write us at [email protected].

Help is available right away.

The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALK

Crisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.

International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlines

The Depresh Mode newsletter is available twice a week. Subscribe for free and stay up to date on the show and mental health issues. https://johnmoe.substack.com/

John's acclaimed memoir, The Hilarious World of Depression, is available here.

Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.

John is on Twitter @johnmoe.

Help support this show and unlock bonus content! Become a member at https://maximumfun.org/joindepresh

Therapy isn’t about hating your mother. It’s not about crying over something that happened when you were six and then dwelling on it for the rest of your life. And the difficulty or trauma you faced back then is not something you can simply “get over” or “move past”.

Good therapy is much more like what Jackie Kashian did, as she describes in this episode. She talks about the violence in her home growing up. And the neglect. And the substance use and death of her mother. Then she talks about going to therapy and figuring out how that past informed her adult life, how it guided her decisions, and how it laid a foundation for the life she would live.

With that understanding in place, she could better distinguish between healthy and unhealthy habits. It’s not dwelling in the past, it’s getting a map for the future.

Listen to Jackie Kashian's podcasts, The Jackie and Laurie Show and The Dork Forest on the podcatcher of your choice. For tour dates, visit Jackie's website, JackieKashian.com. Follow her on Twitter @jackiekashian.

Thank you to all our listeners who support the show as monthly members of Maximum Fun. 

Hey, remember, you’re part of Depresh Mode and we want to hear what you want to hear about. What guests and issues would you like to have covered in a future episode? Write us at [email protected].

Help is available right away.

The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALK

Crisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.

International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlines

The Depresh Mode newsletter is available twice a week. Subscribe for free and stay up to date on the show and mental health issues. https://johnmoe.substack.com/

John's acclaimed memoir, The Hilarious World of Depression, is available here.

Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.

John is on Twitter @johnmoe.

Help support this show and unlock bonus content! Become a member at https://maximumfun.org/joindepresh

COVID has been traumatic for young people. For a year and a half now, it’s either been impossible to go to school or the place that they go to doesn’t match what they used to know as school. The virus may have caused severe illness or death in their families. It’s a frightening time for all of us and especially so among the youngest and most vulnerable. So as in-class education really begins again in earnest, what’s the state of these people showing up to the classrooms and how can we, not just as parents or teachers but members of society, help?

We speak with Ruby Ramirez, principal in the Dallas Independent School District, about how she prepared her school for the state of mind the students are returning with. One thing that’s helped everyone feel better? Masks. Yep, the things that made everyone so uncomfortable in the earlier days of COVID now give students a sense of security in the classroom and hallways.

Masks are a big deal for Dr. Robin Gurwitch as well. She’s a psychologist and Professor in Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Duke University School of Medicine and she points out that one of the best ways to recover from our societal trauma is to stop the virus itself. To do that, wear your dang masks where you’re told to wear it. In the interview, Robin mentions some online resources that could help anyone.

Here they are:

National Child Traumatic Stress Network (www.nctsn.org or https://www.nctsn.org/what-is-child-trauma/trauma-types/disasters/pandemic-resources)
American Psychological Association (https://www.apa.org/topics/covid-19/parenting-caregiving) 
National Child Traumatic Stress Network: Parent/Caregiver Guide to Helping Families Cope with COVID-19   
https://www.nctsn.org/resources/supporting-children-during-coronavirus-covid19
Center for the Study of Traumatic Stress: https://www.cstsonline.org/assets/media/documents/CSTS_FS_Discussing_Coronavirus_w_Your_Children.pdf  
https://www.cstsonline.org/assets/media/documents/CSTS_FS_Finding_Right_Words_Talk_Children_Teens_Coronavirus.pdf
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/daily-life-coping/for-parents.html
American Psychological Association at https://www.apa.org/topics/covid-19). 

Thank you to all our listeners who support the show as monthly members of Maximum Fun. 

Hey, remember, you’re part of Depresh Mode and we want to hear what you want to hear about. What guests and issues would you like to have covered in a future episode? Write us at [email protected].

Help is available right away.

The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALK

Crisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.

International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlines

The Depresh Mode newsletter is available twice a week. Subscribe for free and stay up to date on the show and mental health issues. https://johnmoe.substack.com/

John's acclaimed memoir, The Hilarious World of Depression, is available here.

Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.

John is on Twitter @johnmoe.

Help support this show and unlock bonus content! Become a member at https://maximumfun.org/joindepresh

When we asked Dr. Darshan Mehta, Medical Director of the Benson-Henry Institute for Mind Body Medicine in Boston and an Assistant Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School, about the image problem that meditation had, he knew exactly what we were talking about. As he points out, when media outlets write about meditation, it tends to be accompanied by a photo or illustration of a glowing, athletic white woman in a particular yoga pose. This tendency is kind of funny, sure, but it also conveys that unless you look like that, you can’t meditate.

Not so. Laura House, a comedian, writer, podcaster, and meditation instructor, explains that anyone can learn to meditate, reduce stress, and find more calm in their lives. It doesn’t necessitate any religious beliefs or New Age philosophy.

Dr. Mehta walks us through the medical side of it and how it helps blood pressure levels and recurrence of depression. It can also give your immune system help as it broadly reduces inflammation of cells and tissue.

Listen to Tiny Victories here or on the podcatcher of your choice. Visit Laura House's website and follow her on Twitter @imlaurahouse. Find out more about the Benson-Henry Institute for Mind Body Medicine at their website here.

Thank you to all our listeners who support the show as monthly members of Maximum Fun. 

Hey, remember, you’re part of Depresh Mode and we want to hear what you want to hear about. What guests and issues would you like to have covered in a future episode? Write us at [email protected].

Help is available right away.

The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALK

Crisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.

International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlines

The Depresh Mode newsletter is available twice a week. Subscribe for free and stay up to date on the show and mental health issues. https://johnmoe.substack.com/

John's acclaimed memoir, The Hilarious World of Depression, is available here.

Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.

John is on Twitter @johnmoe.

Help support this show and unlock bonus content! Become a member at https://maximumfun.org/joindepresh

The first thing that I noticed when watching Tuca & Bertie was that there was a LOT going on. Bertie is frantically trying to navigate her magazine job at Conde Nest AND her dream of being professional baker AND her relationship with her loving and sometimes perplexing boyfriend Speckle. Tuca is just trying to navigate what it means to be a responsible adult as she manages sobriety, romance, and a changing relationship with her best friend, Bertie. Beyond that, there’s just a lot happening on the screen, like quick visual gags, complex background characters, and a universe where plants sometimes have human bodies and are somewhat mystical. 

We were excited to find out all about it from our Maximum Fun colleague, Lisa Hanawalt (co-host of Baby Geniuses), who created the show and runs it. Lisa shares her stories of mental health’s role in her life from being a shockingly morbid preschooler to panic attacks on the freeway as an adult. We never do get her to explain the plants with human bodies but she does fill us in on the Sex Bugs, which may be both pubic lice AND a touring rock band.

Watch Tuca & Bertie Sundays at 11:30 pm on adultswim or online. Listen to Baby Geniuses here on on the podcatcher of your choice. Visit Lisa Hanawalt's website for books and prints.

Thank you to all our listeners who support the show as monthly members of Maximum Fun. 

Hey, remember, you’re part of Depresh Mode and we want to hear what you want to hear about. What guests and issues would you like to have covered in a future episode? Write us at [email protected].

Help is available right away.

The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALK

Crisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.

International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlines

The Depresh Mode newsletter is available twice a week. Subscribe for free and stay up to date on the show and mental health issues. https://johnmoe.substack.com/

John's acclaimed memoir, The Hilarious World of Depression, is available here.

Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.

John is on Twitter @johnmoe.

Help support this show and unlock bonus content! Become a member at https://maximumfun.org/joindepresh