Voice notes are my love language. Why put your thumbs through all that tapping when you can just waffle on to your heart’s content and send it to your loved ones, whether they want to listen to it or not.
After sending a particularly long voice note (from memory it was about how astronauts pee in space, fascinating) one of my friends said I should really start my own podcast. I absolutely loved that idea. A podcast is basically a very long voice note, my dream medium.
In hindsight, my friends might have suggested a podcast in an attempt to get me to stop sending them podcast length voice notes, but I thought it was a great idea. I knew I had to find a subject for my podcast, as much as I would like to just record my stream of consciousness and release it out into the world, if I wanted other people to listen it was important to have a topic I was passionate about.
I had the light bulb moment of starting a podcast all about mental health and counselling.
I first went to counselling three years ago but I should have started a lot earlier, it took me several years to get up the courage to book the first appointment. There is still so much stigma around seeking help for your mental health and it took me a long time to get over that. I thought counselling wasn’t for someone like me, I wasn’t depressed, I didn’t think I was ill, I was just a bit sad sometimes and my brain felt a bit scattered and tangled up.
The thing that finally helped me pluck up the courage and book an appointment was hearing from people my own age, people who were in the same stage of life as me, talk really openly about seeing a counsellor. This helped me realise that counselling was a really beneficial act of self-care.
We’re happy to talk about how we maintain and look after our cars, computers, pets, bodies and everything in between, but talking about how we look after our mental health can be more difficult. So this is what I try to do in my podcast. I chat to people about their experiences in counselling, to try and normalise talking about our mental health.
In September 2020 “And How Did That Make You Feel” was born, as well as liking long voice notes I also like long names for podcasts.
My first two guests were the two friends who had spoken to me so openly about going to counselling. Since then I’ve interviewed more of my friends, strangers, other podcasters and bloggers. I love speaking to people about their journey, even though they are all talking about counselling everyone’s experiences are so different, it’s fascinating.
You can find the podcast at all the usual places. If you have been thinking about counselling but need a gentle nudge to help you make that final step of booking an appointment, you might it find it helpful to have a listen. You can find out more about the podcast by following me on Instagram @andhowdidthat or If you have been to counselling and would like to be a guest send me a DM.
I am really passionate about normalising the conversation around mental health and I hope my podcast will continue to plat a small part in this.
You’ll be pleased to know that I still send my friends very long voice notes.