1 00:00:00,540 --> 00:00:04,530 Welcome to the season of Future Makers Brain and Mental Health. 2 00:00:05,100 --> 00:00:09,990 I'm Professor Belinda Lennox. I'm a psychiatrist and a researcher here in Oxford. 3 00:00:10,410 --> 00:00:17,130 And this season, you'll be joining me as we demystify the science behind the most complex object in the known universe, 4 00:00:17,340 --> 00:00:23,910 our brains, and look at the wide reaching impacts of mental illness on individuals and society. 5 00:00:24,870 --> 00:00:32,100 I'll be introducing you to some of Oxford's best academic minds working to solve the greatest challenges in brain and mental health. 6 00:00:32,700 --> 00:00:36,959 And I'll also be speaking to guests from beyond the university to bring their 7 00:00:36,960 --> 00:00:41,730 perspectives and lived experience and get a sense of the impact of what we are doing. 8 00:00:42,180 --> 00:00:47,730 Join us as we discover how Oxford is shaping the future of brain and mental health research. 9 00:00:50,650 --> 00:00:55,720 So welcome to this episode of Future Makers on Suicide and Suicide Prevention. 10 00:00:55,750 --> 00:00:59,680 I'm really delighted to be joined by my guest, Ben West. 11 00:01:00,040 --> 00:01:06,490 And Ben West is a mental health campaigner, a best selling author and social media influencer, 12 00:01:07,120 --> 00:01:13,900 and he has done amazing work, actually, in raising awareness of mental health and particularly around suicide. 13 00:01:14,230 --> 00:01:17,590 So welcome, Ben. It's lovely to be speaking with you. 14 00:01:18,550 --> 00:01:21,820 Thank you so much for having me on, Belinda. And no problem. 15 00:01:21,820 --> 00:01:28,270 And do you just want to start do you just want to tell us a bit about why this topic is so important to you? 16 00:01:28,570 --> 00:01:29,350 Absolutely. 17 00:01:29,440 --> 00:01:39,190 So for first of all, being introduced like that always feels really strange because this is just so unexpected, such an unexpected turn of of my life. 18 00:01:39,190 --> 00:01:45,940 I mean, to think that I'd be on a podcast one day talking to someone from the University of Oxford and being introduced to the social media influence, 19 00:01:46,030 --> 00:01:53,170 which I still it makes me cringe a little bit and, and being, you know, introduces a mental health campaigner suicide prevention campaign. 20 00:01:53,410 --> 00:01:57,729 It's surprising because I really didn't expect any of this to happen. 21 00:01:57,730 --> 00:02:03,610 And I guess to explain my story, I need to go back to when I was 17 years old. 22 00:02:03,610 --> 00:02:12,969 I would say at the time I was in secondary school. I grew up in Kent with two other brothers, and in the middle of nowhere I had Sam, 23 00:02:12,970 --> 00:02:16,930 who was just younger than me, and then Tom, who was younger than Sam. So that was it was three of us. 24 00:02:16,930 --> 00:02:24,940 And we had a great upbringing in Kent, really lovely school, lovely community, lovely place to live, just fields for days. 25 00:02:24,940 --> 00:02:28,179 And it was like a little adventure and you got to live with your best friends. 26 00:02:28,180 --> 00:02:32,889 It was amazing. So I was You get to the point where I'm 17. 27 00:02:32,890 --> 00:02:46,030 I was just starting my A-levels. Sam was doing his GCSE and Tom was in what must have been year seven and the 28 00:02:46,030 --> 00:02:50,050 dynamics sort of started to change and I sort of noticed it changing because that. 29 00:02:51,070 --> 00:02:57,270 Dynamic of being best friends with your brothers and mucking around and and and being really, really close. 30 00:02:57,280 --> 00:03:03,940 It did start to shift and some became in 2017 a little bit more. 31 00:03:05,520 --> 00:03:14,940 Isolated from the the family and from getting involved and and became each started to change a lot and. 32 00:03:15,960 --> 00:03:20,790 He was diagnosed with depression, clinical depression in September 2017. 33 00:03:20,940 --> 00:03:27,209 And I remember being told I never I never spoke to him about it, because for me, I didn't know what Edward Depression was like. 34 00:03:27,210 --> 00:03:31,200 I'm sure most people that are in this situation, especially at that age, 35 00:03:31,470 --> 00:03:40,020 I just I honestly thought my mama told me that he'd been diagnosed as feeling a little bit sad, and so I never spoke to him about it. 36 00:03:40,290 --> 00:03:45,690 And then in January 2018, AA took his own life. 37 00:03:45,850 --> 00:03:49,460 At 15 years old, me and my mom found him. 38 00:03:49,470 --> 00:03:55,440 It was without a doubt the one of the worst things I could ever imagine having to deal with. 39 00:03:55,440 --> 00:03:59,339 It was just awful. And I was a little back. 40 00:03:59,340 --> 00:04:09,480 Now I'm incredibly lucky that I had had first training, so I sort of knew what to do in the in the immediate situation. 41 00:04:10,530 --> 00:04:13,620 But, you know, as a 17 year old boy, you shouldn't be doing CPR on your brother. 42 00:04:13,620 --> 00:04:16,949 It was it was not nice. And he passed away. 43 00:04:16,950 --> 00:04:21,209 And here I am being introduced as suicide prevention campaigner because I think it's just so 44 00:04:21,210 --> 00:04:27,270 desperately sad that a 15 year old boy was put in a situation where he took his own life. 45 00:04:27,270 --> 00:04:31,469 I think that's so sad. And obviously in my work I see that so much nowadays. 46 00:04:31,470 --> 00:04:39,750 I mean, so many people in the same situation. And suicidality and suicidal thoughts are rife in the world at moment and especially in young people. 47 00:04:39,960 --> 00:04:40,770 But for everyone, 48 00:04:40,770 --> 00:04:47,579 it does make me incredibly sad and also incredibly driven to make sure that we can help as many people in someone's mission as possible. 49 00:04:47,580 --> 00:04:53,040 Because, you know, I'd do anything to go back and have a conversation with him and make sure he was okay. 50 00:04:53,040 --> 00:04:58,750 But I can't. What I can do is try my best to get out that influence policy, 51 00:04:58,770 --> 00:05:04,679 work with people and speak to amazing people like you and the guests you've got on and really get brains 52 00:05:04,680 --> 00:05:11,850 together and and really just try and help these people that are so lost and alone and and really struggling. 53 00:05:13,100 --> 00:05:18,380 It's a it's such a powerful and. Absolutely horrendous story, Ben. 54 00:05:19,580 --> 00:05:23,090 You know and I'm feeling, you know, sick just hearing it. 55 00:05:23,090 --> 00:05:29,420 And it's sort of complete tragedies as each and every suicide is for every family. 56 00:05:30,030 --> 00:05:33,850 I mean, and especially at such a young age. Your response to it? 57 00:05:33,860 --> 00:05:40,940 As you say, you've been on an absolute mission to improve the situation and raise awareness. 58 00:05:40,950 --> 00:05:45,050 I mean, just tell us a little bit. How did you sort of take that path? 59 00:05:45,380 --> 00:05:47,470 Well, to be honest, I didn't really have much of a choice. 60 00:05:47,480 --> 00:05:54,620 I think, you know, we talk around this is this is where we started to get into the realm of how how fascinating I find all of this. 61 00:05:54,660 --> 00:05:58,280 And I mentioned at the start, when we were just chatting before we started recording, 62 00:05:58,280 --> 00:06:02,990 I find the mental health world and psychology and emotional absolutely fascinating, 63 00:06:03,170 --> 00:06:07,790 especially going through it myself and now being able to look back and and realise the 64 00:06:07,790 --> 00:06:12,680 complexity of this thing inside my head that was just navigating this awful situation. 65 00:06:13,700 --> 00:06:21,090 And for me. Going into advocacy work and campaigning work and to try and do something positive. 66 00:06:21,390 --> 00:06:28,170 It was almost like a reflex. There was no really no choice involved, and I guess it came out of a few different places. 67 00:06:28,410 --> 00:06:35,430 One was an enormous amount of guilt. Everyone sort of looks at it on the surface and goes, Oh, you're doing such an amazing thing. 68 00:06:35,430 --> 00:06:45,060 You must be so lovely. Actually, it came out of a deep, deep sense of hatred for myself, because just before Sam died, we actually had an argument. 69 00:06:45,510 --> 00:06:54,000 And so the last thing I'd ever say to him was not a nice thing that played on my mind hugely to the point where I thought I'd caused all of it. 70 00:06:54,510 --> 00:06:57,930 So actually doing something good and trying to help other people. 71 00:06:58,380 --> 00:07:03,270 One of the reasons for that was trying to prove to myself and everyone that actually I wasn't such a bad person. 72 00:07:03,270 --> 00:07:06,910 I needed to sort of do something positive to right that wrong. 73 00:07:06,970 --> 00:07:12,990 Obviously, I know now that that's completely misplaced guilt, but at the time it felt like I had to do something good. 74 00:07:13,590 --> 00:07:19,319 But also I saw it speaking to people at school and I realised that genuinely almost 75 00:07:19,320 --> 00:07:24,209 every single person I spoke to had something going on behind the scenes depression, 76 00:07:24,210 --> 00:07:31,230 anxiety, anorexia and bulimia, suicidal thoughts just it felt endless. 77 00:07:31,230 --> 00:07:38,129 The number of conversations I was having with people and a large part of me felt sad about those conversations and wanted to help them, 78 00:07:38,130 --> 00:07:45,750 genuinely wants to help them. And but I think an even larger part of me and I remember talking to a friend of mine at Squash and saying this, 79 00:07:46,040 --> 00:07:54,570 I felt terror because I knew and I said this to this friend, I wouldn't survive losing someone else like this. 80 00:07:55,230 --> 00:07:57,340 And also, I just can't do that. I can't do it again. 81 00:07:57,360 --> 00:08:04,170 And so I think for those sort of mixture of emotions, I just naturally went, wow, we're going to have to try and do something here. 82 00:08:05,100 --> 00:08:09,329 And, you know, it's been almost six years. I know I'm into it now. 83 00:08:09,330 --> 00:08:13,260 It's out. Yeah. Yeah. And what did you find? 84 00:08:13,260 --> 00:08:16,379 Because as you say, it's such a common experience, isn't it? 85 00:08:16,380 --> 00:08:24,600 So many teenagers, young people have mental health problems and actually suicidal thoughts are incredibly common. 86 00:08:25,500 --> 00:08:30,120 And your particular focus is on the response of the education system. 87 00:08:30,120 --> 00:08:33,780 Is it I mean, is it around the school environment? Do you think more could be done? 88 00:08:34,320 --> 00:08:38,520 I do. I think in terms of my terms of campaigning from a policy point of view, 89 00:08:38,520 --> 00:08:48,780 I definitely think the area that I can have certainly I can have most impacts is through policies in in education, in schools and and in universities. 90 00:08:49,380 --> 00:08:54,300 That, for me feels like the dream where I can have the most progress. 91 00:08:54,300 --> 00:08:59,940 You know, everyone can talk about roads of the NHS and roads and all of this and that is important to having that support. 92 00:08:59,940 --> 00:09:08,639 But for me, early intervention, creating better structures in schools for support and education, it just feels like a no brainer. 93 00:09:08,640 --> 00:09:10,200 And also something I can speak to you well, 94 00:09:10,380 --> 00:09:20,610 but it comes from me being at school and one of the first things I did or one of the first events I did was a big charity walk at school, 95 00:09:21,450 --> 00:09:22,919 and it was actually a conversation. 96 00:09:22,920 --> 00:09:30,690 I had that on that walk with some teachers and my teachers, and they turned around me and they were just like, Ben, we see this all the time. 97 00:09:30,840 --> 00:09:37,319 We see self-harm injuries in our classroom all time. We see students in crisis all the time and we have no idea what to say. 98 00:09:37,320 --> 00:09:43,080 And I discovered then that there was no statutory requirement for teachers to be given 99 00:09:43,080 --> 00:09:49,770 any training on mental health in that pgce or any teacher training qualifications. 100 00:09:50,100 --> 00:09:56,340 And that for me struck me as a little bit odd. We know we've saying we know the scale of the mental health crisis. 101 00:09:56,430 --> 00:09:59,309 We know how important it is to have early intervention a young age. 102 00:09:59,310 --> 00:10:05,460 And we've got teachers who want to help, largely want to help and want to intervene, but don't have the training to do so. 103 00:10:05,550 --> 00:10:08,850 And it just felt like a missed opportunity to not implement that training, 104 00:10:09,270 --> 00:10:15,390 which actually is quite basic training into pgce and teacher training standards. 105 00:10:15,990 --> 00:10:22,950 So that really led me on to a more policy driven approach and that sort of for the last five and a half years, 106 00:10:22,950 --> 00:10:28,140 that sort of campaign, every activist policy angle has sort of laid alongside. 107 00:10:29,060 --> 00:10:38,300 You know, the other the other perspective of what I do, which is just trying to get people talking quite positive, meant to have, you know, 108 00:10:38,600 --> 00:10:47,120 events and language about, you know, helping and and how we can talk to each other and volunteering for certain charities and and doing that. 109 00:10:47,120 --> 00:10:51,679 But no, there is a definite policy campaigning line that I go on. 110 00:10:51,680 --> 00:10:54,920 But majority of the stuff I do is around education. For sure. 111 00:10:55,550 --> 00:11:01,160 Yeah. And how have you found your experience of working at a sort of government policy level? 112 00:11:02,450 --> 00:11:06,740 Got to be careful. I say slow. Slow. 113 00:11:07,700 --> 00:11:19,970 It's it's it's incredibly difficult because especially with mental health, it is a it's a health issue, but it's also an education issue. 114 00:11:20,870 --> 00:11:26,240 So when you go to the government, what happens is the Department of Health goes, it's not us. 115 00:11:26,600 --> 00:11:27,709 You've got to be talking to education. 116 00:11:27,710 --> 00:11:32,780 And the Department of Education goes, this is a health problem and you end up getting sort of bounced between the two. 117 00:11:33,350 --> 00:11:38,020 And so it's quite difficult. And with mental health awareness, really amazing space now. 118 00:11:38,030 --> 00:11:41,800 And we're in a great position now where actually it's become very non-partisan. 119 00:11:42,920 --> 00:11:46,550 No one doesn't have a political colour. It's and have a political affinity. 120 00:11:46,730 --> 00:11:53,570 Pretty much everyone across the political spectrum knows that we need to tackle this mental health crisis we're in and stopping suicide. 121 00:11:53,600 --> 00:11:56,570 No one disagrees with that, which is great. 122 00:11:56,900 --> 00:12:04,190 But what we do see is a and what the challenge I have is actually trying to pin down who's responsible for it. 123 00:12:04,910 --> 00:12:12,100 And that's not the people are trying to avoid responsibility necessarily, but it's actually about understanding who who is it? 124 00:12:12,710 --> 00:12:21,050 You know, in a government that's very secular and deals with very different issues, we've got this issue that crosses a gap between two departments. 125 00:12:21,050 --> 00:12:25,610 And that is so let me tell you that it's a headache sometimes, but I. 126 00:12:25,910 --> 00:12:29,990 Oh, it is. And, you know, it's progress and it's it's very slow. 127 00:12:30,200 --> 00:12:39,170 I've been told by numerous civil servants that, you know, we're not going to see legislative statutory statutory change for eight, eight, ten years. 128 00:12:39,830 --> 00:12:46,309 So it's it's a long, long process. But you've got to just give that process a push at the beginning to get it going. 129 00:12:46,310 --> 00:12:49,880 And that's really what I try and do and then just encourage it along a little bit. 130 00:12:50,540 --> 00:12:51,649 Well, completely. 131 00:12:51,650 --> 00:12:59,840 And I suppose, as you say, actually, everybody accepts that this is a hugely important area and you've won over the hearts and minds. 132 00:12:59,840 --> 00:13:08,900 I mean, so actually maybe the legislation might be slow in arriving, but actually the case of need is accepted, isn't it? 133 00:13:09,080 --> 00:13:14,059 And actually the solutions that you're proposing are extremely achievable, aren't they? 134 00:13:14,060 --> 00:13:18,080 You're not asking for a complete restructure of our education system. 135 00:13:18,080 --> 00:13:25,280 You're asking for all teachers to have a level of mental health first aid awareness, which is not unreasonable. 136 00:13:25,430 --> 00:13:29,930 No. And the government agrees, Right. They've already got a programme that trains mental health. 137 00:13:29,930 --> 00:13:34,309 First aid is in schools. I just think it's completely unsustainable and a waste of money. 138 00:13:34,310 --> 00:13:35,270 What they're doing at the moment. 139 00:13:35,480 --> 00:13:41,180 You're basically taking a member of staff out of a school for two days, training them, putting them back into school. 140 00:13:41,210 --> 00:13:45,050 You've got them one mental health first aid in a school of, say, a thousand. 141 00:13:45,300 --> 00:13:50,420 I mean, the impact of that is negligible, right? And that's a huge cost. 142 00:13:50,420 --> 00:13:53,210 And then the time cost as well of taking a teacher out of school for two days. 143 00:13:53,780 --> 00:13:59,900 But we already have a training system in place for every teacher that has to go through qualification. 144 00:14:00,140 --> 00:14:04,850 Why on earth are we not updating the statutory requirements so that we eventually end up 145 00:14:04,850 --> 00:14:09,500 with an education system where everyone has got a basic understanding of this anyway? 146 00:14:09,620 --> 00:14:13,430 You know, that to me is ever what we anything to do with the government in one night. 147 00:14:13,700 --> 00:14:14,980 They want to know if it's cost effective. 148 00:14:14,990 --> 00:14:23,600 That seems like an incredibly cost effective way of revolutionising and putting their foundations into creating amazingly, 149 00:14:24,410 --> 00:14:27,559 you know, mental health friendly. That's an awful phrase. 150 00:14:27,560 --> 00:14:34,670 These mental health friendly schools that are well capable of looking after students mental health and makes sense to me. 151 00:14:34,670 --> 00:14:38,480 And it makes sense to most people because it's a sensible idea. 152 00:14:39,050 --> 00:14:42,550 Completely. Yes. Hello. 153 00:14:42,610 --> 00:14:46,390 I hope you're enjoying this episode of Future Makers Brain and Mental Health. 154 00:14:46,990 --> 00:14:52,270 If you'd like to learn more about our work here in Oxford, head to OCS, dot, AC, dot, 155 00:14:52,270 --> 00:14:58,450 UK forward slash brain or let us know what you think on social media using the hashtag. 156 00:14:58,720 --> 00:15:06,540 Oxford Brain. Do you want to say a bit about how you went about writing your book? 157 00:15:07,260 --> 00:15:13,750 My book. So I guess for me. Suicide is. 158 00:15:14,850 --> 00:15:17,910 He does still have. We talk a lot about stigma and mental health. 159 00:15:17,920 --> 00:15:23,370 I think suicide still has an enormous stigma. People talk about it more than ever, don't get me wrong. 160 00:15:23,490 --> 00:15:32,850 And we can talk about it very openly. But I think the nitty gritty of what it actually is is still quite shrouded in secrecy. 161 00:15:32,850 --> 00:15:37,530 It's still quite a debate. And I found that and I really just wanted. 162 00:15:38,530 --> 00:15:49,330 So in a world of tech talking algorithms and 15 second videos, I really just wanted an opportunity to tell my story from 2017 to now. 163 00:15:49,960 --> 00:15:54,250 Get it up on paper. Give the details. What is it actually like to go through that? 164 00:15:54,820 --> 00:15:58,290 Because we can't have a sensible, proper debate about, you know, 165 00:15:58,360 --> 00:16:06,220 how we move forward with funding and research and education and health without actually understanding what the problem is. 166 00:16:06,400 --> 00:16:14,890 And so I wanted to get it on the record of what it is actually like to go through losing someone so, so especially someone so young. 167 00:16:15,190 --> 00:16:18,610 What my experience is like quite unfiltered in a quite unfiltered way. 168 00:16:20,050 --> 00:16:23,890 But also, you know, I've been through this enormous trauma, an enormous amount of grief. 169 00:16:24,640 --> 00:16:30,130 And I think it's I've learnt a huge amount over the last five years that is just been invaluable to me. 170 00:16:30,700 --> 00:16:33,430 I've gone through something or gone through a childhood trauma, 171 00:16:33,700 --> 00:16:40,960 and actually I've learnt an enormous amount about my own mental health to the point where now I've been working on Twitter for almost six years. 172 00:16:41,740 --> 00:16:48,880 And I wanted to get that on paper because, you know, a lot of the time when you read stuff that's a bit self-help, 173 00:16:48,910 --> 00:16:52,629 it can come across as being very clinical and to a young audience, 174 00:16:52,630 --> 00:16:59,020 anything with clinical white code, it just not it's not going to be read and taken in. 175 00:16:59,350 --> 00:17:06,670 And I thought I'd like to think like I'm relatable, approachable and sort of understandable person. 176 00:17:07,390 --> 00:17:12,640 So, you know, I thought it was important to get my experience down on paper and and try and hopefully 177 00:17:12,640 --> 00:17:17,920 then inspire people to follow suit and take some of my lessons I've learned. 178 00:17:18,550 --> 00:17:21,610 But writing at the price of writing, it was just incredible. 179 00:17:21,610 --> 00:17:26,499 Absolutely incredible. I wrote the book and I called it This book Could Save Your Life because I was just like, you know, 180 00:17:26,500 --> 00:17:30,280 everyone needs to know this stuff and we need to adapt policies, blah, blah, blah to help people. 181 00:17:31,060 --> 00:17:36,880 And I wrote it without realising this, but I think actually it helped me so much. 182 00:17:37,990 --> 00:17:46,090 So, so much. And we talk a lot in sort of mental health and wellbeing around journaling and oh my goodness, 183 00:17:46,090 --> 00:17:50,260 is there power in just sitting there with your thoughts and writing on paper? 184 00:17:50,470 --> 00:17:56,290 And I spent three months just writing about my experience and for the first time a lot of stuff came out for the first time. 185 00:17:57,100 --> 00:17:59,650 It was just an incredible experience for me. 186 00:18:00,400 --> 00:18:06,820 And to then be able to process and things, I'd really stuff to the back of my head and really try to ignore. 187 00:18:07,330 --> 00:18:13,090 Once I felt safe enough and it did take while it just poured out and it was just such a useful experience. 188 00:18:13,930 --> 00:18:21,280 MM Yes, completely powerful to have it written down and having it documented for everyone. 189 00:18:21,520 --> 00:18:29,800 But yes, I love the title of the book, you know, Breaking the Silence around the Mental Health Emergency, because it is a mental health emergency. 190 00:18:30,070 --> 00:18:39,129 And, you know, I was thinking about this with various other guests as to why there isn't just the outrage that, 191 00:18:39,130 --> 00:18:45,610 you know, young people are dying, you know, a leading cause of death in young people. 192 00:18:45,610 --> 00:18:58,570 And it is preventable. You know, why aren't we putting billions into research to work out how we can actually save each and every young person? 193 00:18:59,590 --> 00:19:03,969 Precisely. And I think actually it can be you can be led down a reach of believing that we've 194 00:19:03,970 --> 00:19:08,290 sort of solved this mental health problem and that we've tick the box of awareness. 195 00:19:08,290 --> 00:19:10,070 But I don't think we have an all we have to do. 196 00:19:10,090 --> 00:19:14,649 I mean, you mentioned research, and I would say it's at the way we're talking about it from a research perspective, 197 00:19:14,650 --> 00:19:18,360 this podcast, you know, we've we've made massive strides, 198 00:19:18,380 --> 00:19:26,200 mental health awareness, but the research level, the public donation research level to mental health research is so small, 199 00:19:26,440 --> 00:19:30,489 it's shockingly small compared to the likes of heart disease and cancer. 200 00:19:30,490 --> 00:19:34,059 And the, you know, the big research funders. It's really very small. 201 00:19:34,060 --> 00:19:41,230 And that to me shows me that actually whilst we have a massive awareness of mental health at a very low level of depth, 202 00:19:41,500 --> 00:19:48,729 we really like mental health understanding and, and empathy for what some people actually go through and the effect that it can have on some people. 203 00:19:48,730 --> 00:19:53,500 And that's why I wanted to be really honest about what it was like losing a 15 year old brother to suicide. 204 00:19:53,650 --> 00:19:56,140 I mean, that is shocking, absolutely awful. 205 00:19:56,740 --> 00:20:04,650 And that, for me, is a real big driver of what I do, trying to open conversations, trying to tell the truth about what it's like. 206 00:20:05,710 --> 00:20:12,460 And it's only when you're in this world you realise just how horrific, really awful it can be for certain patients. 207 00:20:13,240 --> 00:20:16,390 I mean, across the board is psychosis. 208 00:20:16,780 --> 00:20:22,390 That's just the most horrific thing to go through, clinical depression and awful things go through. 209 00:20:22,400 --> 00:20:29,440 You talk about I've got friends and people that I know that work in psycho psycho pink units, 210 00:20:29,440 --> 00:20:36,370 psychiatric intensive care units and the stories you hear from that, these are people that that have lost their lives to illness. 211 00:20:36,580 --> 00:20:41,880 And it does sometimes. So like, we're not as angry and not as passionate about this as we should be. 212 00:20:42,060 --> 00:20:50,220 And that, for me, is reflected in in the public research donations and public research budget and even mental health charities. 213 00:20:51,090 --> 00:20:59,970 It's it still feels very top level, you know, very mental health in a very shallow way, 214 00:21:00,240 --> 00:21:08,040 whereas actually the real impact needs to come from anger and passion about the really deep stuff about dealing with psychosis, 215 00:21:08,040 --> 00:21:12,000 dealing with clinical depression, dealing with suicide and putting the funding there. 216 00:21:12,810 --> 00:21:17,720 And so, yeah, part of part of my job, I guess, is highlighting the fact that, hey, suicide is still there. 217 00:21:17,730 --> 00:21:19,860 It's still absolutely awful. And I think. 218 00:21:19,890 --> 00:21:28,740 Do you think more people need to need to be vocal about that and supportive of this issue in the same way that we are incredibly with cancer 219 00:21:28,740 --> 00:21:35,760 and with heart disease and with with those sorts of illnesses that do have a massive amount of public support and public pressure for funding. 220 00:21:35,940 --> 00:21:42,630 And we are yet to see that level of of passion for mental health, which I absolutely think it deserves. 221 00:21:43,050 --> 00:21:52,460 Yeah, completely. And it goes back to what you say is fundamentally, I think it's the stigma and the shame around mental illness. 222 00:21:52,470 --> 00:21:58,860 You know, people have feelings of guilt. I mean, you know, and they blame themselves and family members. 223 00:21:58,860 --> 00:22:02,069 I mean, your response that you described. Absolutely. 224 00:22:02,070 --> 00:22:11,490 In my experience is, you know, it's pretty universal and and it's just completely different to other forms of, you know, serious illness. 225 00:22:11,490 --> 00:22:15,510 I mean, we really need to to grasp. 226 00:22:15,510 --> 00:22:20,700 But I mean, that's almost the biggest issue from my point of view. Yeah, absolutely. 227 00:22:20,910 --> 00:22:27,840 And you know what? I'm so I'm an engineer by by my that's what I once you need to do. 228 00:22:28,560 --> 00:22:32,850 I've worked in sort of engineering. I feel like I was like, born to do that job. 229 00:22:32,930 --> 00:22:35,940 I love Lego. And then I worked in a boatyard for a few years. 230 00:22:35,940 --> 00:22:43,200 I was engine one. And, you know, I'm not working in engineering now, but I still have that mind and I like to fix problems. 231 00:22:43,410 --> 00:22:48,690 I wouldn't be working in this if I didn't think we're on the cusp of really 232 00:22:48,690 --> 00:22:54,419 creating massive progress and it's a solvable issue and that's really positive. 233 00:22:54,420 --> 00:22:59,129 It's all very incredibly solvable. And actually psychosis is a great example of that. 234 00:22:59,130 --> 00:23:04,020 The progress we've made in terms of treating psychosis is absolutely amazing. 235 00:23:04,200 --> 00:23:09,930 We can very confidently treat early onset psychosis pretty it's pretty easy right now. 236 00:23:10,170 --> 00:23:15,810 And that, I think, should give so many people hope that there are people out there doing an amazing amount of research. 237 00:23:15,990 --> 00:23:20,460 There are lots and lots of there's lots and lots of things happening and the solution is almost there. 238 00:23:20,790 --> 00:23:22,720 But it's a case of bringing it all together. 239 00:23:22,740 --> 00:23:28,890 We need the education piece, we need the health piece and the research piece and it all together and the stigma bashing stuff. 240 00:23:29,130 --> 00:23:34,470 I'm an engineer. Like I wouldn't be wasting six years of my life trying to push for less if I didn't think anything was going to change. 241 00:23:34,470 --> 00:23:39,930 I have a lot of hope for the next decade and two decades for how much is genuinely going to change. 242 00:23:39,930 --> 00:23:48,120 And and it just it only takes a flick on Google to see a search on Google to see just how many really exciting projects are 243 00:23:48,120 --> 00:23:54,750 going on at the moment that could absolutely change people's lives and and hopefully save a lot of people's lives as well. 244 00:23:55,350 --> 00:24:01,830 Absolutely. Do you want to tell us a bit more about the work you're doing with businesses like Wagamama, for example? 245 00:24:03,340 --> 00:24:06,989 Yeah, absolutely. I mean, say businesses, Where do we start with this? 246 00:24:06,990 --> 00:24:13,740 There's a huge push at the moment for people to deal with internal stuff, mental health, huge push, rightly so, 247 00:24:13,740 --> 00:24:17,940 because employees know that they deserve to be looked after by their employer, 248 00:24:18,180 --> 00:24:22,260 and employers also want to help keep their staff and keep their staff happy and productive. 249 00:24:23,040 --> 00:24:27,509 The problem is not a lot of people really understand how they're doing it. 250 00:24:27,510 --> 00:24:33,810 And I guess for me, you know, I've always just been sort of the person that likes to chat to people and likes to listen. 251 00:24:33,820 --> 00:24:42,150 And again, engineering brain likes to solve problems. And so I've worked with a few companies now on really trying to understand how to 252 00:24:42,780 --> 00:24:47,040 how businesses can help their employees and what are some of the problems there. 253 00:24:47,280 --> 00:24:55,050 And my biggest client and I actually adore them. In fact, actually it was after Sam died, I didn't eat anything and it was the first meal I had. 254 00:24:55,290 --> 00:25:00,869 And after that it was the first bit of food I kept down and it was a wagamama and so it feels very full circle. 255 00:25:00,870 --> 00:25:02,339 Nice to be working so closely with them. 256 00:25:02,340 --> 00:25:13,890 But really it's it's about trying to help staff and also trying to help society through the partnership with Wagamama and. 257 00:25:14,840 --> 00:25:22,550 Especially in the hospitality industry. It's got it's not got a very good history of mental health and being mentally positive place to work. 258 00:25:22,940 --> 00:25:28,010 So really trying to come up with solutions to that, work with that people team. 259 00:25:28,400 --> 00:25:36,170 And it's obvious things like collecting data and understanding what people are dealing with and actually, you know, cost of living. 260 00:25:36,770 --> 00:25:43,140 How do we know whether the cost of living crisis is something that we need to to tackle internally with our asking? 261 00:25:43,610 --> 00:25:48,260 It seems obvious, right? But how do we know that the cost of living crisis is something we need to deal with internally? 262 00:25:48,440 --> 00:25:53,100 Or is it actually that people are struggling with another issue? 263 00:25:53,120 --> 00:25:56,300 You don't know if you didn't ask, and that was one of the early things I started with. 264 00:25:57,200 --> 00:26:02,360 But it's a journey, and I think for me it's always been a case of just bringing my story to the table. 265 00:26:02,390 --> 00:26:05,900 As soon as you introduce yourself and you say, This is why I'm doing this. 266 00:26:05,960 --> 00:26:11,330 I lost my brother. All the barriers are down. Everyone's happy to talk about the deepest, darkest things about life, 267 00:26:11,600 --> 00:26:18,890 which is great because what it means I can have really vulnerable conversations with people and understand actually how we can help going forwards. 268 00:26:19,250 --> 00:26:28,340 And so, yeah, I do love working with our great team and they're trying their best in a really, really challenging industry at the moment. 269 00:26:28,610 --> 00:26:33,889 Hospitality is just I mean, talk about COVID and what it did to us today. 270 00:26:33,890 --> 00:26:36,470 It's, it's, it's a very, very challenging industry to work in. 271 00:26:37,280 --> 00:26:42,320 So we really are trying to understand that and help, but that my mission is pretty simple. 272 00:26:43,190 --> 00:26:48,860 I'm not going and I'm going to do this for a very, very long time. I don't think anyone should want to kill themselves. 273 00:26:48,860 --> 00:26:50,690 I don't think anyone should have to die from suicide. 274 00:26:50,930 --> 00:26:57,230 I don't actually think anyone should have to face depression and face long bouts of mental illness. 275 00:26:58,070 --> 00:27:02,360 It shouldn't be the case that we have that happen in the society. 276 00:27:02,360 --> 00:27:06,530 So I'm going to do what I can to help on a personal level, on a professional level, 277 00:27:06,530 --> 00:27:15,530 on a government level, to try my very best alongside an amazing sector to improve this around. 278 00:27:16,460 --> 00:27:27,740 Wow. Well, thank you, Ben, for your energy, your optimism, your absolute inspirational level of drive. 279 00:27:27,740 --> 00:27:31,610 I mean, you know. Wow. Thank you. Thank you so much. 280 00:27:34,820 --> 00:27:38,660 I hope you enjoyed this episode of Future Makers Brain and Mental Health. 281 00:27:39,170 --> 00:27:46,340 You can find more episodes of future makers wherever you get your podcasts and more on Oxford's research at Oxford. 282 00:27:46,460 --> 00:27:50,690 AC DC's UK Forward Slash Brain. Thanks for listening.