EPISODE 2

Written By Kelly Butler

THE RAW HONEST TRUTH BEHIND SUICIDAL THOUGHTS AND POST-NATAL DEPRESSION

FORMER CEO OF A MENTAL HEALTH CHARITY, MARIANNE STOREY

To what extent are mental health issues truly on the rise, and how do we fight back?

Marianne Storey is the former-CEO of Dorset Mind, now Chair of Women’s Action Network Dorset - an incredibly prolific, insightful woman whose career reinforces her commitment to making the world a better place.

We go Off Script with Marianne, who bravely shares her deep, personal experiences with mental wellbeing, how Postnatal Depression & Menopause factor in, the ‘3 Must Myths’, the link between psychology & physiology, and much more.

TW // We tackle some challenging topics around self-harm and suicide in this episode, with an aim to bring hope to those affected. We’ve linked resources for people after support or who are in crisis in the ‘Links & References’ section of the shownotes.

This episode covers

  • To what extent mental health issues are truly on the rise

  • Marianne’s ‘3 Must Myths’, and how they’re affecting your life

  • The true value of therapy

  • How mental health is affecting your physiology

  • Postnatal Depression and Menopause’s effects on women’s wellbeing

  • Routes of support for people in mental crisis

 

Samaritans

Phone (Free): 116 123

https://www.samaritans.org/



EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS

 

“Can you rehabilitate someone who's physically got the wherewithal but isn't mentally in the right place for it? You can ask a depressed person to go home and do exercises, but it's just not gonna happen. You have to get to the bottom of why they're depressed, which is probably how they got injured in the first place.” Marianne Storey

25:35 - Marianne Storey

——

“When I had my first child, I had severe postnatal depression. Before that happened to me, I didn't even really know what it was.” - 9:00 - Marianne Storey

——

“When I first started taking HRT, I started to feel a lot better and it flattened out some of these episodes for me. I was really angry that I hadn't had access to this kind of treatment before because it was so easy treating menopause - slap on an oestrogen patch, have a bit of progesterone, maybe a bit of testosterone if you’re lucky. Suddenly, you feel so much better, and I thought ‘Why haven't I had this for 40 years?’” - 16:05 - Marianne Storey

——

“What I always used to say about Dorset Mind was that we wanted people to feel like they're part of something, like we care about them. When they come to us for help, they aren't just passive recipients, they actually then become part of what we used to call a movement.” - 20:45 - Marianne Storey

——

“It's not healthy for either person for you to encourage people to come to you. It’s not healthy for you, and you're not teaching that person how to build their own resilience. You're just providing a solution. Every time you pick up a phone and say, ‘Yeah, talk to me’, you're reinforcing that person's dependency on somebody other than themselves. The best way to help somebody who's struggling with mental health is to teach them how to manage it themselves. Harsh as that might seem, it's a very important message.” - 25:45 - Marianne Storey

——

“People with serious mental health illnesses do end their lives, but those numbers are reasonably stable and predictable. It's not just suicide rates, but the the numbers of people reaching out to NHS 111, going to the GP, on antidepressants and reaching out to charities like Dorset Mind - those numbers are all going up.” - 27:50 - Marianne Storey

——

“We do make conscious decisions as parents to teach what we pick out as the good things from our childhood, but what we don't realise is what we're teaching our children unconsciously. So I noticed this thing about my kids, who’re both adults now. I learned this thing recently about the ‘3 Must Myths’, and I've realised that I have passed this unconsciously on to my children. ” - 34:30 - Marianne Storey

——

People just presume you see them when you're down, or in a negative place. A Premier League footballer said, ‘We're at the top of our game, wouldn't we want to stay at the top of our game?’ That changed my whole concept of therapy, I had it so wrong.” - 41:30 - Ty Temel

——

“To one extent or another, most of us are addicted to something, and a lot of people are addicted to their work ethic. I'm not criticising those people or suggesting that everybody who does it shouldn't be doing it. It's just that I think we've got into this societal thing where we're addicted to that being a good thing.” - 47:25 - Marianne Storey

——

Kelly Butler
Previous

EPISODE 1