Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder can wreak havoc in a person’s life, especially when you don’t know you have it and especially when you have to deal with a lot of people who don’t understand it. We hear stories of those struggles this week but we also hear about victories that were earned through hard work and wisdom. For writer and comedian Dave Holmes, the best part of getting his ADHD diagnosed, treated, and under control is the experience of drying the last dish when he does the dishes. Before he made his improvement, that simply never happened because he was drawn away by other tasks that became crucially important (and that he never finished either). Comedian Carolina Hidalgo has been dealing with ADHD for most of her life and now has it tamed enough that she can take on a task that seems pretty intimidating for someone in her position: she hosts a music history podcast that requires massive amounts of research, book after book after book on the same topics. She gets it done. Carolina's Playlist: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2DTloiK4aOEVmJCqcuqii4?si=e2c093f905674b63Carolina also recommends this playlist for reading: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1ByzdKSKWgv9M18IEUScfQ?si=7f05b873e4da4fb5Listen to No Dogs In Space and Troubled Waters on the podcatcher of your choice. Follow Carolina Hidalgo and Dave Holmes on Twitter @CarolinaDoesOk and @DaveHolmes.Carolina also recommends this playlist for reading: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1ByzdKSKWgv9M18IEUScfQ?si=7f05b873e4da4fb5Thank 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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

There is plenty of information coming out of the CDC about COVID that has nothing to do with actual viruses in droplets. America’s mental health condition is not really good right now, with rates of anxiety, depression, and suicidal ideation measuring way, way above how they were before the pandemic. Once the virus is contained and the worst of the threat has passed, we won’t be out of the woods. We’ll just be entering a different kind of woods. In this week’s episode, a talk about how complex trauma from a period such as this is likely to affect us in the long term. Short answer: it’s going to get nasty. At the same time, we are well positioned to talk to each other, share sympathy, and share kindness because of modern technology and because of a growing openness in society to talk about mental health challenges.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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

Sure, we know Santa Claus flies around the world delivering presents, but doesn’t that seem awfully compulsive? And what’s with the meticulous list of judgments he keeps? And why is he fixated on everyone believing in him? Like, ultimately, what’s Santa’s deal, mental health wise?John is joined by Broti Gupta, Carolina Hidalgo, and Hal Lublin to analyze (without being at all qualified to do so) a variety of Christmas figures who seem prone to rather odd behaviors. We have familiar characters like the Grinch, Scrooge, and the Little Drummer Boy but we also dive deep with Jack Skellington, the Gremlins, and Det. Martin Riggs from Lethal Weapon. It’s all very tongue-in-cheek. Please note, if you are an actual gremlin or reindeer with a glowing nose and you’re having a tough time, please consult an actual therapist.Listen to Tights and Fights and No Dogs in Space on the podcatcher of your choice. Subscribe to Broti's Patreon to listen to the Lecture Hall podcast. Follow Broti Gupta, Carolina Hidalgo, and Hal Lublin on Twitter @BrotiGupta, @CarolinaDoesOk, and @hallublin.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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

It’s not really the most direct route to comedy success: grow up in conservative Mormon Utah, be closeted about your sexuality even to yourself, try to live up to what is expected of you, ditch it all for show biz, come out of the closet, and then make it big. But we know it’s worked for at least one person: Bridger Winegar. The host of the I Said No Gifts podcasts walks us through his effort to figure out who he was, which included a long stretch of figuring he’d have to keep his homosexuality shielded for the rest of his life. We hear about a Mormon mission to Malaysia that ended very prematurely with a nervous breakdown, an offer to get treatment in a Singapore mental hospital, and a return to Utah. And we hear about the extraordinary support and kindness he received from his boss when his boss happened to be Jimmy Kimmel.Listen to I Said No Gifts on the podcatcher of your choice.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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

Aimee Mann has a brilliant new album out called Queens of the Summer Hotel with songs about mental illness and identity, all inspired by the book Girl, Interrupted. The album is new but the songs are not, mostly written and recorded before Aimee had a career-threatening health scare. About a year ago, she lost part of her hearing, leaving her unable to pick up on certain frequencies. What had been music before became what she describes as a fuzzy, distorted electronic sound. This presented a significant problem for Aimee as a musician and songwriter. It was like having broken instruments and gear but much more significant because you can’t just swap out your own head at a music store. Eventually, Aimee found that the problem was coming from her brain in the form of stress and trauma. With that knowledge, she set about addressing those issues and began to make progress. She says she’s about 80% recovered.Turns out sometimes it helpful to not think of “mental health” as something separate from “physical health”. There’s just health.Get your copy of Queens of the Summer Hotel wherever albums are sold. Follow Aimee Mann on Twitter @aimeemann.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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this for Broti Gupta. This comedy thing. It wasn’t supposed to be happening at all. She grew up the daughter of a doctor and there was an expectation she’d follow the same path. But as a college student, she just couldn’t shake the strong interest in comedy that led her down a different path entirely, away from med school and toward places like the New Yorker, McSweeney’s, and Second City. Today, she’s a writer for The Simpsons and a rising star in comedy circles.One indication that her heart was not in medicine? A visit to a college counselor who challenged Broti to not try to make him laugh for one entire appointment. It’s a challenge she did not accept. For Broti Gupta, the laughs were not just a way of coping with some mental health issues but also a way of approaching life itself.Follow Broti Gupta on Twitter @BrotiGupta. Listen to and support Broti's podcast with Dylan Gelula, Lecture Hall, on Patreon.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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

(takes a moment to secure tongue firmly in cheek)It would be rude to make fun of Josh Gondelman just because he’s a little strange. Or not strange. Instead, we’re going to learn from Josh about his career, his life, and how, even though he’s very bad at dancing he does it anyway. Then our pal comedian Gary Gulman for a response to what we heard. Gary is arguably the king of depressed comedy, having taken off the issue in his special The Great Depresh.Follow Josh Gondelman and Gary Gulman on Twitter @joshgondelman and @GaryGulman. Visit JoshGondelman.com and GaryGulman.com for tour dates, books, and more.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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

Ivan Maisel’s words have been available to the general public for decades. It’s just that those words have tended to be about what’s happening with the Crimson Tide’s offense or who got the head coach job at UCLA. And although his work as a college football reporter is important to him, Ivan’s writing about his late son, Max Maisel, goes infinitely deeper.Max died by suicide in 2015. Max’s death, and more so his life, are the subject of I Keep Trying To Catch His Eye, Ivan Maisel’s new memoir. Ivan has decided to be very open about everything including Max’s neurodivergence, his depression, the weight of grief and guilt that followed his death, and the conscious effort to move forward with full descriptions of everything.Ivan’s story is often sad, because of course it is, but it’s not really about sadness. It’s about accepting the incomprehensible and leaning on love.Get your copy of I Keep Trying To Catch His Eye: A Memoir of Loss, Grief, and Love wherever books are sold. Follow Ivan on Twitter @Ivan_Maisel.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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

You’ve seen John Ross Bowie on a screen before. I’m sure of it. Maybe it was the Big Bang Theory or Curb Your Enthusiasm or some of the other eight zillion credits he has. John’s been dealing with depression and anxiety even longer than he’s been an actor, which has meant guiding a complicated brain across uncertain situations for quite a while. And maybe, if we believe the forecasts about the gig economy, a lot more of us will be living a similar lifestyle before too long. No, we won’t all be on tv shows but you know what I mean. John gives us some applicable wisdom.Morra Aarons-Mele is the host of The Anxious Achiever podcast and has spent a lot of time in both traditional and self-employed jobs. And she’s been battling a nasty depression as well. Morra talks about some specific techniques for not letting your anxious brain take over. You’ll learn exactly how to figure out what to put on the piece of paper you tape to the wall in front of you.Listen to Household Faces and The Anxious Achiever on the podcatcher of your choice. Follow Household Faces and Morra Aarons-Mele on Twitter @HouseholdFaces and @morraam.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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

Let’s get this out of the way first: there are a LOT of video games available, including a lot of games that don’t require you to kill people and don’t involve Mario, Luigi, Wario, or Waluigi. And among those are several games that approach mental health issues in a truthful and sympathetic way. These games, often made by small independent studios, might take place in fantastical worlds but they can involve honest examinations of depression, trauma, and anxiety. And playing the games can bring a lot more insight and relief to the player than you might think.We talk with Maddy Myers of the Max Fun podcast Triple Click for her recommendations on enlightened independent games and Gregory Lobanov, creator of the game Chicory: A Colorful Tale.Listen to Triple Click on the podcatcher of your choice. Visit Greg's website at greg.style. Follow Maddy on Twitter @MIDImyers and Greg @thebanov.Maddy’s Game Recommendations:GAMES LITERALLY ABOUT DEPRESSIONChicory: A Colorful Tale (2021)Depression Quest (2013)Actual Sunlight (2014)GAMES FIGURATIVELY ABOUT DEPRESSIONCeleste (2018)Gris (2018)Sea of Solitude (2019)GAMES I’VE PLAYED WHEN DEPRESSED AND I’VE FOUND MEANING IN THEMThe Metroid SeriesDark Souls (2011)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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

Forming emotional bonds with fellow human beings is one of the most basic instincts we have. There’s a primal urge to attach yourself to others, for safety, for mating purposes, or hell just to have lunch. But just because that desire is present doesn’t mean that it’s easy or even inevitable to actually form those connections. At the same time, we’re all going to spend some time alone. Maybe in brief moments, maybe for very long stretches. Comedian, actor, and writer Lane Moore thinks about these things a lot. She is perhaps best known for Tinder Live, a touring series of live shows where she checks out profiles of men looking for connections and provides live commentary and live swiping before an audience. She finds that most people are pretty nice, honest people but that some of them do some pretty weird stuff. Stuff like posing for their profile pictures while covered in blood, naked, next to a deer they killed. Or being naked except for a strategically placed top hat. She tours with the show a lot but has also given quite a bit of thought to the other side of the coin and has written a book titled “How To Be Alone.”Lane shares her thoughts on all this plus living with complex post-traumatic stress disorder in a deeply personal conversation that’s valuable if you’ve ever been alone or with someone else. Which covers everyone, I’m pretty sure.Also, stick around after the main interview for a meditation minute with our pal Laura House.Visit Lane's website at lanemoore.org or her Linktree at linktr.ee/hellolanemoore for tour dates, her book, and more. Follow Lane on Twitter @hellolanemoore and on Instagram @hellolanemoore. Understanding Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder: https://www.healthline.com/health/cptsdThank 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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

Depresh Mode with John Moe and Go Fact Yourself got together to celebrate MaxFun Block Party!If you enjoyed this conversation we had with host J. Keith van Straaten, be sure to subscribe to Go Fact Yourself on maximumfun.org.

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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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. 

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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

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-covid19Center 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.pdfhttps://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/daily-life-coping/for-parents.htmlAmerican 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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

It’s tricky. That’s what we found when we set out to answer a question we get a lot: “How do I approach a loved one who I’m worried about in terms of mental health?” Obviously, you want to let them know you care but you want to express the depth of your concern. You don’t want to scare them away and make them less likely to seek help. So where’s the line?According to Quanah Walker, of MakeItOK.org and Director of Behavioral Health at HealthPartners, it starts with knowing the person you’re talking to and knowing yourself. It’s not so much a matter of picking the right words as it is gaining an understanding of your friend.Megan Auster-Rosen, a licensed psychotherapist in Los Angeles, says it’s important also to know your limitations and respects someone’s boundaries. Don’t go busting in to solve all their problems. Maybe just keep your mouth shut once in a while and learn how to listen a bit more. Depresh Mode burnout episode - https://maximumfun.org/episodes/depresh-mode/if-youre-miserable-at-work-maybe-its-not-your-fault/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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

You’ll notice that this episode is longer than most of our episodes. That’s just the way it tends to go with Griffin Newman. Episodes of his own podcast, Blank Check, regularly clock in at more than two hours. He acts in films and those often top two hours as well. And although he’s only in his thirties, Griffin has had a long career, growing up in a showbiz-adjacent family and starting in standup while not yet out of middle school. We hear how he quit acting (several times) and always got pulled back in, sometimes for dream-come-true roles like Arthur in The Tick, sometimes for experiences that ended up being nightmares, like acting in and then deeply regretting acting in a Woody Allen movie. Griffin Newman examines the roles that depression and anxiety played in his life decisions and where one can see them poking out in his performances.Listen to Blank Check with Griffin & David on the podcatcher of your choice. Watch The Tick on Amazon Prime and Masters of the Universe: Revelation on Netflix. Watch The George Lucas Talk Show live Sunday nights 8 pm ET / 5 pm PT on PlanetScum or on YouTube. Follow Griffin Newman on Twitter @grifflightning and on Instagram @GriffLightning.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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

In this Song Imploder edition of our show (borrowing a format from the podcast Song Exploder), Carl (who records as A.C.) Newman walks us through “Whiteout Conditions”, a song created when his sister was dying of cancer but when he had to get into the studio.Seems like it’s safe to say that when people are in a terrible mental state, they are least equipped to do something as creative as writing songs. But Carl isn’t like most people. The leader of the Canadian group The New Pornographers says that he simply can’t stop writing songs. There’s nothing elective about it. He has 50 songs in various states of completion all loaded up on the computers in his Woodstock, New York home.He also talks about how despite battling depression and anxiety his whole life, he’s still able to get up on stage and sing and lead a band. It helps, he says, having Neko Case in his band because he thinks audiences figure if Neko’s okay with him then he must be an acceptable guy.Purchase your copy of the Whiteout Conditions album at The New Pornographer's website or on Apple Music. Follow A.C. Newman on Twitter @ACNewman and The New Pornographers @TheNewPornos. 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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

Rock music isn’t a cure for depression or anxiety. You can’t wail away on “Smoke on the Water” and have all your mental difficulties melt away. That would be awesome, sure, but that’s not how it works. But for Chelsea Ursin, playing was a lot of other things: a break from the nagging mental disorders that created so many problems from a young age, a channel through which to express herself, and an opportunity to help the next generation of girls have a smoother and healthier time than she did. Ursin is the creator and host of Dear Young Rocker, a podcast that started with letters from her modern-day self to her teenage self and which now features other women in rock telling the stories of their younger selves.Listen to Dear Young Rocker here or on the podcatcher of your choice. Listen to Chelsea's band Banana on Bandcamp. Follow Chelsea on Twitter @RockerDear and on Instagram @dearyoungrocker.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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

You can tell a lot about Kelly Williams Brown’s life by looking at her multiple bowls of tiny origami. Her “lucky stars” are folded in a pattern that Kelly learned and then repeated over and over and over to help her get through the moments of her life when all seemed lost, when death felt preferable. There are many bowls filled with these stars and they are all very large bowls. There must be tens of thousands of these stars and she keeps the bowls in easy reach in her Salem, Ore. home, reminders of how horrible her depression got and how she got through the worst of it. The title of her memoir, which is not a craft book but a memoir, reflects the sense of humor that was with her all along.Watch Kelly Williams Brown teach John how to make a yarn ball friend.Get your copy of Kelly Williams Brown's Easy Crafts for the Insane: A Mostly Funny Memoir of Mental Illness and Making Things here or wherever books are sold. Visit Kelly's website here. Follow her on Twitter @KWilliamsBrown and on Instagram @kellywilliamsbrown.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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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.

It’s much easier to talk about the weather than it is about mental health. We all know this. Because it’s a lot easier to face the idea of a rainy day than the idea of a mental disorder that might last the rest of one’s life. Still, getting those conversations going with a friend, with a therapist or psychiatrist, or even with yourself is the best way to make the situation less scary and more easily managed.After facing up to some tough issues in the wake of the end of her first marriage, public radio veteran Anna Sale became interested in our collective resistance to talk about touchy topics, like the three mentioned in her podcast’s title. Now she’s added family and identity to that list in her new book, Let’s Talk About Hard Things.Anna talks about why mental health is one of those scary things to talk about that could benefit from the conversation. She also offers some insight on how to approach a difficult conversation you need to have for yourself. It’s a great episode for people looking to make talking about all this stuff less weird and more productive.Get your copy of Let's Talk About Hard Things here or wherever books are sold. Visit Anna Sale's website here. Listen to Anna's podcast, Death, Sex & Money, here or wherever pods are cast. Follow Anna on Twitter @annasale and on Instagram @annasalepics.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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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. https://read.macmillan.com/lp/the-hilarious-world-of-depression/Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.John is on Twitter @johnmoe.

Alexandra Paul wasn’t allowed sugar as a kid but she snuck it anyway, not for the taste but for the comfort it provided. As a teen, Alexandra’s modeling and acting careers were going great. Her relationship with food, on the other hand, had become a real mess. At boarding school, it seemed right and normal to deny herself food in order to be as skinny as possible. The other girls were doing it and no one ever talked about it as a disorder. Over time, as she moved into modeling in New York City and acting in Hollywood, the anorexia turned to bulimia and she got hooked on the ritual of bingeing and purging. She’s stayed away from that behavior for the last 30 years but still feels like she could slip back if she’s not careful.Dr. Jillian Lampert, who also dealt with eating disorders herself as a young person, is the Chief Strategy Officer for the Emily Project, an organization that treats and studies eating disorders. She says there’s a lot of recent research indicating that genetics are much more responsible for who will develop eating disorders of all kinds than we previously thought. Alexandra Paul personal site Alexandra Paul IMDb pageAlexandra Paul WikipediaAlexandra Paul on Twitter - @alexandra_paulThe Emily Program - https://www.emilyprogram.com/Dr. Jillian Lampert - https://www.emilyprogram.com/about-us/leadership-team/jillian-lampert/Reward sensitivity article: https://jeatdisord.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s40337-017-0138-2Sensation and emotion study in progress: http://eatingdisorders.ucsd.edu/research/our-research.htmlSensation study: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3955712/Another sensation study: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7230430/Bodily sensations study: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29483865/Sensation study looking particularly at disgust: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6759364/Broader study on interoceptive awareness (awareness of body cues): https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7927286/Genetics and neurobiology: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21243469/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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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. https://read.macmillan.com/lp/the-hilarious-world-of-depression/Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.John is on Twitter @johnmoe.

When a loved one dies, the world can become chaos. Everything has changed. The way you drive a car, the way food tastes, the way you even talk to people can feel different and wrong and weird. It feels like you are - for lack of a better term - going crazy. How far apart are grief and mental illness? The DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual), the standard reference for mental illness, says that if you’re still messed up from grief six months after the death of your person, you have something called Prolonged Grief Disorder.For Megan Devine, an author and psychotherapist who specializes in grief, the sudden loss of her partner Matt meant being at the grocery store and temporarily forgetting how money worked. But she says that’s not a problem. That’s a truthful response to a horrifying event. That’s just being horrified.Megan rejects the idea that being upset for as long as you need to be is a problem. She advocates recognizing the personal truth and reality of what’s going on inside yourself. Megan’s website Refuge in Grief - https://refugeingrief.com/Our previous episode with Stephanie Wittels Wachs, which gets referenced a lot - https://maximumfun.org/episodes/depresh-mode/stephanie-wittels-wachs-and-the-pain-and-frustration-of-watching-addiction-happen/Get your copy of Megan's books, How to Carry What Can't be Fixed: A Journal for Grief and It's OK That You're Not OK here or wherever books are sold. Follow Megan on Twitter @refugeingrief and on Instagram @refugeingrief.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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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. https://read.macmillan.com/lp/the-hilarious-world-of-depression/Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.John is on Twitter @johnmoe.

Hi, folks. John Moe here. I knew about Stephanie Wittels Wachs for quite a while before I met her but correctly figured I’d get to know her one of these days. That’s because our stories have an awful lot of overlap. We’re both writer, we both host podcasts, I live in the Twin Cities and her company, Lemonada, is based here, and most importantly, we both lost our brothers. Lost them twice, really. First to addiction, at which they became different people. Someone in the grip of an addiction exists to get more of the substance and their personal relationships are secondary to that. From there, I lost my brother Rick to suicide, Steph lost her brother, the well-known and successful comedy writer Harris Wittels to an overdose. Looking back on it, I think I was nervous to read what she had written about Harris because I’d be overwhelmed.  And yes, we finally did meet up and became instant friends. And I read what she wrote, of course, and I was comforted by the similarities and the differences. Mostly, I was comforted that in this hell of grief and loss, I was able to find someone in the same kind of hell. Someone who could say, “Man, it’s so hot!”Listen to Last Day here or wherever podcasts are found. Get your copy of Everything is Horrible and Wonderful: A Tragicomic Memoir of Genius, Heroin, Love and Loss here or wherever books are sold. Follow Stephanie on Twitter @wittelstephanie and on Instagram @wittelstephanie. 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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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. https://read.macmillan.com/lp/the-hilarious-world-of-depression/Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.John is on Twitter @johnmoe. 

No, bipolar disorder doesn’t mean that you’re kind of cheerful one day and a little bit glum the next. Those are just moods. That’s not a disorder. The Mayo Clinic says of bipolar, “When you become depressed, you may feel sad or hopeless and lose interest or pleasure in most activities. When your mood shifts to mania or hypomania (less extreme than mania), you may feel euphoric, full of energy or unusually irritable. These mood swings can affect sleep, energy, activity, judgment, behavior and the ability to think clearly.”We unpack what bipolar means from the perspective of our friend, Dr. Ken Duckworth, medical director for the National Alliance on Mental Alliance. He’s a psychiatrist and also grew up with a bipolar father. Writer and pundit Ana Marie Cox is in recovery from drug and alcohol addiction and she deals with what’s known as bipolar II, a variation on the disorder, that comes with symptoms that can be subtle but powerful.Visit the National Alliance on Mental Illness or NAMI here.Visit Ana Marie Cox's website here. Listen to her podcast With Friends Like These on the podcatcher of your choice. Follow Ana Marie Cox on Twitter @anamariecox and on Instagram @anamariecox.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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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. https://read.macmillan.com/lp/the-hilarious-world-of-depression/Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.John is on Twitter @johnmoe.

Allison Raskin has been attempting to manage her obsessive compulsive disorder for most of her life. It’s meant knowing when she can be home to take a shower during the day. It’s meant not being able to pet a friendly dog she met because even though she adores dogs, the thought of contamination was too overwhelming. She’s treated her OCD to help get the symptoms more under control but it’s a daily challenge to manage things.Allison is pretty honest about that and other struggles on the very popular Just Between Us, the YouTube comedy and conversation series she co-hosts with creative partner Gaby Dunn. Recently, however, all of her efforts to have a normal, stable life have been put to the test, first by the pandemic and also by the abrupt end of her engagement last fall to the man she figured she’d be with forever.Subscribe to the Just Between Us Youtube channel and listen to the Just Between Us podcast on the podcatcher of your choice. Visit Allison's website, follow her on Instagram @AllisonRaskin and on Twitter @AllisonRaskin. Follow her mental health account @emotionalsupportlady and support her Patreon 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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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. https://read.macmillan.com/lp/the-hilarious-world-of-depression/Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.John is on Twitter @johnmoe.

Before he was a podcast host, radio personality, or a journalist breaking major political news, Jarrett Hill was a kid growing up gay in a religiously conservative environment. So when it was time to come out, it meant defying the homophobic words of his pastor who had urged parents to not let their kids grow up to be “sissies”. He had first started seeing therapists as a result of his parents’ protracted divorce and went intermittently over the years. Finally, with the help of a particularly observant therapist, he put it together that a pattern of thinking and behavior he had experienced was, in fact, major depressive disorder.Jarrett Hill has found that the most helpful therapist for him is a woman of color. He was used to opening up to women in his life more than men and having a person of color meant that his therapist would know what he’d been through and believe him. Dr. Ksera Dyette, who is a therapist and sought help herself, talks about how safety itself is at stake in a search for people who share your cultural experiences. She offers advice on how she screens potential therapists and the difference it makes.Listen to Jarrett's podcast with Tre'vell Anderson, FANTI, here or wherever podcasts are found. Follow FANTI on Twitter @fantipodcast, follow Jarrett Hill on Twitter @JarrettHill and on Instagram @jarretthill, and visit Jarett's website here.Visit Dr. Ksera Dyette's website here as well as her COVID-19 Resources page here. Follow her on Instagram @cteacounselling and on TikTok @drdyette. Visit Dr. Dyette's linktree 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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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. https://read.macmillan.com/lp/the-hilarious-world-of-depression/Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.John is on Twitter @johnmoe.

The American mental health care system has had some very fundamental problems for a while now: there are too few therapists, way too few psychiatrists, and it all adds up to not enough people getting the care they need. With COVID, the system needed to make some rapid changes that might go a long way to addressing the problems. Dr. Anthony Sossong is a psychiatrist and he does a lot of work on telehealth platforms. He says the technology has been in place for a while and even though there are some glitches, the necessity of long-distance psychiatry has brought some gifts. Doctors can see more people, which is especially important in underserved communities. Chet Wisniewski, an online security and privacy expert, joins us with a look at the app side of behavioral health. He examines the fine print on apps like Talkspace and reveals the personal information you give up for the convenience of hand-held therapy. We also hear about the ups and downs of the new online mental health world from some of our listeners and learn a bit more about Preshies, the new online mental health discussion group that we started.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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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. https://read.macmillan.com/lp/the-hilarious-world-of-depression/Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.John is on Twitter @johnmoe.

Yeah, this became a pretty big show. Just kept filling up with more guests. It started with a conversation with Zach Kornfeld of The Try Guys, a YouTube comedy troupe that is preposterously famous and beloved. Because these guys are open about their lives and challenges, we know that Zach had a bumpy ride full of mental illness diagnoses and possible trauma. Zach mentioned a talk he heard from Ira Glass that was very influential so we called Ira to see if we could talk to him as well and Ira said sure. Then it was the Max Fun Drive so we did a little chat with Rhett Miller of the Old 97's, who wrote and recorded our show's theme song "Building Wings". And that's not all! Even Gabe Mara, the producer of the show, got on the mic to talk about the importance of supporting Depresh Mode. Whew. Lot of show. Good show, though. You'll like it.It's Max Fun Drive! Support Depresh Mode here at www.maximumfun.org/join. Get your Depresh Mode pin starting at the $10 donation level.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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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. https://read.macmillan.com/lp/the-hilarious-world-of-depression/Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.John is on Twitter @johnmoe.

Peter Sagal always sounds chipper and fun on the hit NPR quiz show Wait Wait Don't Tell Me but that's always been just one part of his personality. In recent years, Sagal went through a divorce that resulted in his three daughters cutting off all contact with him. He spent some time coming to grips with some depression issues that he had been experiencing and largely walking away from most of his lifePeter was also up against the portrayal of the dad who loses everything in movies and television, where said dad somehow proves to be a hero and wins back the hearts of everyone who left him. Because in Peter's case, that's not how it worked. His daughters still don't speak to him.But now some other people do. He remarried and recently became the father to a baby boy named Elliott ("two Ls, two Ts, don't get it wrong, I have," he says). It's been a hard road in recent years but Peter's learned a lot about walking through it and he likes where he ended up.Joining us on Depresh Mode this week for the Max Fund Drive are Maximum Fun founder and Bullseye host Jesse Thorn and Depresh Mode senior producer Laura Swisher.It's Max Fun Drive! Support Depresh Mode here at www.maximumfun.org/join! 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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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. https://read.macmillan.com/lp/the-hilarious-world-of-depression/Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.John is on Twitter @johnmoe.

Look, we’re all going to be messed up for a while from COVID. Some of us a lot, some of us a little, some for a very long time, others for not as long. But it’s trauma. It’s an event more powerful than the brain can handle and that means mental health repercussions down the road. So let’s talk about what might happen. Dr. Ken Duckworth, medical director of NAMI, provides insight into how trauma works. Then therapist Dr. Ksera Dyette tells us the trauma signs she’s already seeing in her practice.Visit the National Alliance on Mental Illness or NAMI here.Visit Dr. Dyette's website here as well as her COVID-19 Resources page here. Follow her on Instagram @cteacounselling and on TikTok @drdyette. Visit Dr. Dyette's linktree here. Dr. Dyette recommends these additional resources:Website: Mental Health Resources for BIPOC Massachusetts General Hospital ListingWebsite: Inclusive Therapists; IG: @inclusivetherapists Website: Mental Health Mukbang - Asian Mental Health CollectiveThank you to all our listeners who support the show as monthly members of MaximumFun.orgHey, 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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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. https://read.macmillan.com/lp/the-hilarious-world-of-depression/Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.John is on Twitter @johnmoe

Author Jenny Lawson, aka The Bloggess, has connected with a lot of people through her essays and books about the challenges of daily life, getting a lot of laughs from topics that might not appear all that funny. Jenny deals with depression and anxiety that can get pretty fierce. In her new book, Broken, she details her semi-successful TMS treatment and she explains to John Moe how odd and helpful it was. Nowhere, Jenny’s new bookstore in San Antonio, is now open.Get your copy of Broken (in the Best Possible Way) here or wherever books are sold. Visit Jenny's website here. Check out Jenny's bookstore in San Antonio, Texas and join her Fantastic Strangelings Book of the Month Club here: Nowhere Bookshop.Thank you to all our listeners who support the show as monthly members of MaximumFun.orgHey, 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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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. https://read.macmillan.com/lp/the-hilarious-world-of-depression/Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.John is on Twitter @johnmoe

Burnout is burning out of control. A lack of motivation at work. A sense that the effort you put in ultimately has no point. A feeling that all of this stuff is getting worse and you can’t do anything about it. Sound familiar? The levels of burnout among employees all over the world are soaring as we pass the year mark of the pandemic. In a global survey, 89% of people say their well being has diminished as part of work. It comes at a time when burnout is listed in the International Classification of Diseases as a legit phenomenon. And the response of employers? Maybe a discounted gym membership or a Zoom yoga class. In other words, it’s an employee problem when in generally the issue is a lack of understanding and compassion in the way humans are treated. We’ll talk about what to do about it and hear from a top researcher in burnout, Jennifer Moss, and get listener tales of workplace burnout in the past year. Including autopsy burnout, which seems really next level.So hey. Maybe it’s not you. Maybe it’s them.Visit Jennifer Moss' website here. Her book, The Burnout Epidemic, is available for pre-order here or wherever books are sold. Follow her on Twitter @JenLeighMoss.Thank you to all our listeners who support the show as monthly members of MaximumFun.orgHey, 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] is available right away.The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255, 1-800-273-TALKCrisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741.International suicide hotline numbers available here: https://www.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlinesThe 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. https://read.macmillan.com/lp/the-hilarious-world-of-depression/Find the show on Twitter @depreshpod and Instagram @depreshpod.John is on Twitter @johnmoe