Lively Minds, the UK Mental Health Podcast

On the Lively Minds UK mental health podcast, Will and Ellie discuss a teenage episode of Will’s OCD from the mid-1990s, before he knew what OCD was.

After an infatuation, Will developed intrusive harm fears about the person being hurt, followed by a dread that aliens were listening to his thoughts and might treat them as instructions; his compulsions included mentally sending “no/don’t” messages, then symbols, and finally looking at drawings by his bed.

The distress was intense for about a year and lasted roughly two years, mainly internally and worse when alone, while he remained outwardly “high functioning.”

They explain OCD as intrusive thoughts plus compulsions, ego-dystonia, doubt, and maintained insight.

Will sought help but was not diagnosed, only recognizing it as OCD about 20 years later; the alien theme later returned briefly and he dismissed it, and he notes guilt and black-and-white moral thinking as key drivers.

They mention OCD Action and OCD UK as support resources.

Our content does not constitute medical advice and should not be considered a replacement for seeking professional support. Signposting to resources can be found on our website livelymindspod.com

Please subscribe wherever you get your podcasts by searching Lively Minds in your favourite podcast app.

Please consider leaving us a rating or review, it really helps others to find the show!

It's easy to assume that proximity to greenery or stretches of water (rivers, lakes, the sea) is good for your mental health.... Not so fast... Ellie dismantles some of Will's assumptions in this episode!

They discuss Ellie's new PhD at the University of Cumbria, funded through an NIHR-supported Mental Health Leaders Award focused on mental health inequalities in Cumbria.

Ellie’s research explores how disabled young people living rurally or coastally in Cumbria perceive green and blue spaces (parks, woodlands, gardens, seas, rivers, lakes) and other “third spaces” outside home and work/school as affecting their mental health and wellbeing.

She critiques romanticised assumptions and lab-based or map-proximity studies that ignore access and infrastructure barriers, sharing personal experiences of feeling excluded from nature and reframing the issue as accessibility. 

00:00 Welcome Back Update
00:49 Podcast Return Intro
01:25 Ellie PhD Overview
02:30 Defining Green Blue
03:19 Why Disabled Youth
05:07 Nature Access Epiphany
07:23 Research Questions Approach
08:21 Critiquing Nature Studies
12:55 Access Versus Proximity
17:48 Romanticizing Landscapes
20:45 Colonial Rurality Debate
22:44 What The PhD Hopes
24:15 Subscribe And Goodbye
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Our content does not constitute medical advice and should not be considered a replacement for seeking professional support. Signposting to resources can be found on our website livelymindspod.com

Please subscribe wherever you get your podcasts by searching Lively Minds in your favourite podcast app.

Please consider leaving us a rating or review, it really helps others to find the show!

We are pleased to announce that we plan to start new episodes of Lively Minds again from next month!

In the meantime, here is a re-run of another of our favourite episodes - this time from August 2023.

Kema Sikawe recently appeared in a BBC 3 documentary: Therapy: Tough Talking in which he gives viewers a front-row seat at a series of therapy sessions where he opens up and discusses his mental health challenges. 

Kema, who is also known as Kema Kay, is a musician, actor and broadcaster based in Newcastle.

In this episode we talk with Kema about the pros and cons of talking publicly about your mental health, and what safeguards need to be in place to make it a positive experience. T

herapy: Tough Talking can be found on BBC iPlayer here. Y
ou can find out more about Will and Kema’s work with Radio Film and the BBC World Service here.

Find out more about Lively Minds at livelymindspod.com


Our content does not constitute medical advice and should not be considered a replacement for seeking professional support. Signposting to resources can be found on our website livelymindspod.com

Please subscribe wherever you get your podcasts by searching Lively Minds in your favourite podcast app.

Please consider leaving us a rating or review, it really helps others to find the show!

Hello everyone, it’s Will here. We are still in the process of resuming normal service, but we’re aware that today is the first Friday of the month so we’d ordinarily be releasing a new episode.

We are really pleased we managed to get out 2 new episodes over the past couple of months; this month we are taking another dive into our archives and re-playing a conversation that Ellie and I had with Paul Wilshaw to talk about learning disability and mental health.

Paul is a learning disabled artist, producer and advocate who works for Mind the Gap Theatre Company and we found our discussion, which covered the confusion between learning disability and mental health, and how the two interact really fascinating.

Hope you enjoy the programme.

Why is mental health and learning disability so often confused? How do they interact? Why are learning disabled people more likely to experience mental health problems than the general population?

In this episode, we will be talking to Paul Wilshaw, who is Associate Producer at Mind the Gap Theatre Company. As well as being an advocate for Mind the Gap, Paul uses his own lived experience to be an advocate for learning disabled people.

Paul is also presenter of Mind the Gap and Disability Arts Online’s podcast, Disability And…

Again, we make quite a few references to websites and research in this show. Here are the links!

• The connections between mental health and learning disability according to Mencap and Mind.
• Some research suggests that learning disabled people are more than twice as likely to experience a mental health problem than the population at large: see results on Consensus.app
• Disabled people are more at risk of loneliness than non-learning disabled people: ses results on Consensus.app

Follow @livelymindspod on X, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and more at https://www.bio.link/livelyminds

Please note that this show does not constitute medical advice and is not a replacement for seeking professional help. You can find our more about the show and get signposting to support on our website anyamedia.net/livelyminds

Our content does not constitute medical advice and should not be considered a replacement for seeking professional support. Signposting to resources can be found on our website livelymindspod.com

Please subscribe wherever you get your podcasts by searching Lively Minds in your favourite podcast app.

Please consider leaving us a rating or review, it really helps others to find the show!

In late November 2025, Will was told that what was thought to be a lingering infection was in fact advanced testicular cancer.

Within about 36 hours of being rediagnosed he had been admitted to hospital and was starting an intensive 12-week BEP chemotherapy regimen.

Will describes shock, dream-like dissociation, fear of death, and the balance between trying to feel positive, hopeful and grateful for the support he was receiving on the one hand, with space to feel gloom, hopelessness and fear on the other.

Will and Ellie discuss uncertainty, loss of agency in healthcare, the pros and cons of researching your condition and treatment, upcoming RPLND open surgery, lack of in-house NHS mental health support, communication problems with appointments, and how returning to everyday life can feel disorientating.

Lively Minds is still following an irregular schedule but we hope to get back to our monthly show soon.

UK cancer charities mentioned in this conversation include:
Maggies - https://www.maggies.org/
MacMillian - https://www.macmillan.org.uk/

Please note that this show does not constitute medical advice and is not a replacement for seeking professional help. You can find out more about the show and get signposting to support on our website livelymindspod.com

Follow @livelymindspod on social media, or see our links at  https://www.bio.link/livelyminds 

00:00 Welcome Back Intro
00:52 Cancer Diagnosis Shock
05:45 Dreamlike Hospital Week
06:47 Facing Mortality Numbers
08:58 Coping Mindsets Shift
13:15 Agency And Research
19:09 Information Staging Debate
22:36 NHS Pride And Problems
26:56 Mental Health Support Gap
31:40 Communication Breakdown
35:00 Surgery Fears And Trauma
40:01 Returning Temporarily To Normal Life
42:22 Closing And Resources


Our content does not constitute medical advice and should not be considered a replacement for seeking professional support. Signposting to resources can be found on our website livelymindspod.com

Please subscribe wherever you get your podcasts by searching Lively Minds in your favourite podcast app.

Please consider leaving us a rating or review, it really helps others to find the show!

Hosts Will and Ellie interview therapist and crocheter Olivia Dieterich about her book Random Acts of Crochet Kindness and the global movement she founded.

After losing a friend, Natalie, to suicide, Olivia used crochet to cope with grief and set a 100-day challenge to crochet a flower each day and leave it for strangers with a note inviting them to take it home, sparking the hashtag.

During lockdown, a found item was shared on a local Facebook group, leading to BBC coverage and the creation of a UK-based Facebook community now exceeding 350,000 members worldwide.

Olivia discusses crochet’s grounding benefits, building self-esteem and purpose, supporting urges like self-harm, and creating “glimmers” of joy for others.

The book offers beginner-friendly patterns, tags, guidance, and stories, and Olivia hopes to create a children’s version and more in-person meetups.

Please note that this show does not constitute medical advice and is not a replacement for seeking professional help. You can find out more about the show and get signposting to support on our website livelymindspod.com

Follow @livelymindspod on social media, or see our links at  https://www.bio.link/livelyminds 

00:00 Welcome to Lively Minds
01:07 How Crochet Kindness Began
02:23 Crochet as Therapy
05:09 Why Giving Helps You
06:28 Going Viral in Lockdown
08:10 A Global Kindness Community
09:59 Small Joys and Glimmers
0:53 Inside the New Book
13:23 Mental Health Lessons
15:14 Community and Connection
16:39 Letting Go of Projects
18:24 Whats Next and Wrap Up

Our content does not constitute medical advice and should not be considered a replacement for seeking professional support. Signposting to resources can be found on our website livelymindspod.com

Please subscribe wherever you get your podcasts by searching Lively Minds in your favourite podcast app.

Please consider leaving us a rating or review, it really helps others to find the show!

Hello everyone, it’s Will here.

As you know, Ellie and I have had to take a break from the podcast due to some ongoing health issues. We are still hoping to bring you new episodes in late Spring or Summer 2026 but in the meantime, we thought we’d go back through our archives and bring you some of our favourite episodes from the 3 years we’ve been doing the show.

And so, here is an episode from May 2024. Matt Ottley is a multi-award winning graphic novelist and composer, who was Australia’s nominee for the Hans Christian Andersen award. Matt joined us for a conversation about how he interprets his experiences of bipolar and psychosis through art, words and music. We focus on his book: The Tree of Ecstasy and Unbearable Sadness which had just been released at the time and you can find links to more information about, in the show notes.

Just a heads up that there is a brief reference to a suicide attempt in the episode, but we don’t go into any detail.

I hope you enjoy the show, and please do remember it would really help us out if you could rate or review us via your podcast app.

You can find out more about The Tree of Ecstasy and Unbearable Sadness by following these links
Matt Ottley’s website
Publisher: One Tentacle’s website

Please note that this show does not constitute medical advice and is not a replacement for seeking professional help. You can find our more about the show and get signposting to support on our website livelymindspod.com






Our content does not constitute medical advice and should not be considered a replacement for seeking professional support. Signposting to resources can be found on our website livelymindspod.com

Please subscribe wherever you get your podcasts by searching Lively Minds in your favourite podcast app.

Please consider leaving us a rating or review, it really helps others to find the show!

Hello everyone, it’s Ellie here.
Thank you so much to all of you for following our podcast over the last few years. It has meant the world to us, and we’ve loved every part of the podcasting process so far.
Unfortunately, due to various health issues, we are going to take a slightly-longer-than-planned break from recording new Lively Minds episodes. We hope to return to your ears for a new season sometime in 2026.
Thank you again to everyone who has listened, subscribed, downloaded and donated to us so far - we are looking forward to picking things up again with you when we can. 
In the meantime, Will and I both wish you all a safe and warm winter, and we look forward to reconnecting with you when we are able to. 
Bye for now!

Our content does not constitute medical advice and should not be considered a replacement for seeking professional support. Signposting to resources can be found on our website livelymindspod.com

Please subscribe wherever you get your podcasts by searching Lively Minds in your favourite podcast app.

Please consider leaving us a rating or review, it really helps others to find the show!

What is a 'patient-centred approach'? What systemic challenges get in the way of making it a reality?What does the biopsychosocial model tell us about how to choose the best pathways for treatment?

Alex Curmi, a consultant psychiatrist and trainee psychotherapist from The Thinking Mind Podcast discusses how he helps clients determine the best treatment plans based on a multitude of factors.

He elaborates on his diverse experiences across various mental health settings and the importance of recognising biological, psychological, and social inputs in mental health. He also touches on the challenges and methodologies involved in acute and planned mental health interventions, patient-centred care, and the role of systemic integration in improving outcomes.

The conversation highlights the need for a holistic, collaborative, and anti-tribalistic approach in mental health practice.

Please note that this show does not constitute medical advice and is not a replacement for seeking professional help. You can find out more about the show and get signposting to support on our website livelymindspod.com

Follow @livelymindspod on social media, or see our links at  https://www.bio.link/livelyminds 

00:00 Introduction and Welcome
00:16 Guest Introduction: Dr. Alex Curmi
00:44 Diverse Practice Environments
02:23 Challenges in Crisis Situations
04:52 Responsibilities in Patient Care
07:39 Patient-Centered Care Approach
21:59 Existential and Nihilistic Issues
27:41 Holistic Treatment Plans
35:10 Collaboration and Integration in Mental Health
41:03 Conclusion and Farewell

Our content does not constitute medical advice and should not be considered a replacement for seeking professional support. Signposting to resources can be found on our website livelymindspod.com

Please subscribe wherever you get your podcasts by searching Lively Minds in your favourite podcast app.

Please consider leaving us a rating or review, it really helps others to find the show!

In this episode we are joined by Dr. Elspeth Davies, a medical anthropologist from the University of Oxford, and Dr. Helen Salisbury, a GP and BMJ columnist, about their BMJ article: How do we talk about overdiagnosis of mental health conditions without dismissing people’s suffering?

Our discussion explores the fine line between validating patients' experiences and the potential harms of unnecessary diagnostic labels. We examine the influence of medicalisation, the role of diagnoses in accessing care and benefits, and the broad societal implications.

The conversation also highlights the need for improved communication between doctors and patients and the importance of considering alternative approaches to understanding mental health issues.

Please note that this show does not constitute medical advice and is not a replacement for seeking professional help. You can find out more about the show and get signposting to support on our website livelymindspod.com

Follow @livelymindspod on social media, or see our links at  https://www.bio.link/livelyminds 

00:00 Introduction to Lively Minds Podcast
00:20 Introducing the Topic of Over-Diagnosis
00:27 Meet the Experts: Dr. Elspeth Davies and Dr. Helen Salisbury
01:28 Defining Over-Diagnosis in Mental Health
02:24 The Complexity of Diagnosing Mental Health Conditions
04:39 The Role of Diagnoses in Accessing Support
07:36 The Impact of Diagnoses on Patients
09:48 The Debate on Over-Diagnosis and Medicalization
25:52 The Influence of Pharmaceutical Companies
26:26 Improving Conversations Between Doctors and Patients
29:11 The Political Context of Over-Diagnosis
31:03 Conclusion and Final Thoughts

Our content does not constitute medical advice and should not be considered a replacement for seeking professional support. Signposting to resources can be found on our website livelymindspod.com

Please subscribe wherever you get your podcasts by searching Lively Minds in your favourite podcast app.

Please consider leaving us a rating or review, it really helps others to find the show!