DEPTH Work: A Holistic Mental Health Podcast

I speak with sociologist Neil Gong about his book: Sons, Daughters, and Sidewalk Psychotics, which explores how mental health care in the U.S. is deeply shaped by class divides. We talk about the legacy of deinstitutionalization, how public systems rely on what he calls “tolerant containment” while elite institutions often impose surveillance and control, and the different ways each system can fail. Neil and I dig into housing-firs...

“One reason why it can feel so hard to listen to your body is because it is not normalized to move in a variety of ways that you would want to. There are certain ways of moving that are allowed or socially accepted but others are very rare to see. Therefore, it makes a lot of sense that we don't know what our body wants or can't listen to it because we always shut it down.” - David Bantje

In this episode, I’m joined by natur...

“Your questioning and critiquing is everything that is needed for 2025 and beyond. And if or when it is construed [by the system] as as a deficiency, unprofessionalism, or ineptitude, I hope that by priming people to keep their eyes open for those responses, it can be more of a collective yawn.” - Rupi Legha

In this episode I’m joined by Rupi Legha, psychiatrist, educator, and scholar-activist—whose work radically interrogates the r...

20% of the population is on the hypermobile spectrum and can struggle with chronic pain because of it. At the more extreme end of the spectrum is Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome (EDS), a genetic disorder that affects not not muscles and joints but the whole body in ongoing feedback loops. Perhaps most significantly, 80% of people with EDS have generalized anxiety. Most doctors or practitioners seeing people with vague symptoms from chronic ...

Our brains are one of the most adaptable and dynamic parts of the body. Brain injuries, however, can disrupt all facets of our lives from personality to relationships to how we move through the world. Even a minor concussion can have lingering effects to mood and executive functioning and attention that can slip under the radar. On this episode, I’m joined by a lived experiencer of traumatic brain injuries, Kayleigh Stack. She shar...

“Any movement that aspires to be critical must be self-critical. There is value in approaching 'critical' not as an identity, a label, or a dividing line, but rather as a mode of engagement, as a virtue of philosophical and scientific thought. Critical psychiatry, if it is to embody this virtue, can only do so by insisting that it is a 'theory in the making' and by demonstrating continuous self-criticism, questionin...

“One thing that I want people to understand is that if you live in America, you live in a business and you are a customer in that business.” - Thabiso Mthimkhulu

I’m really exited to have Thabiso Mthimkhulu back on the podcast for a follow up conversation. Our discussion on “Redefining Crazy” and how we think about mental health was one of the most popular episodes on Depth Work to date. In this episode, Thabiso and I talk about th...

Building visions towards a liberatory future will take creative power, vulnerability, radical imagination, and the capacity to honor difference in all its beauty. Lyo-Demi exemplifies this courage and power in their writing and poetry: “My diagnosis of “bipolar disorder,” in my opinion, is both a sensitivity towards and reaction to traumas (both personal and systemic) that yields strength, creativity, and passion, and my diagnosis ...

“I wish somebody had presented these ideas that what we call mental disorders, they're not like diabetes. They're not like cancer. They're more like fever or pain. They're meaningful responses to something going on in your life. And they are part of your inner self trying to tell you to look more closely.” - Justin Garson

If you’ve ever felt as though there may be a purpose or function to the experiences that get labeled as a ‘ment...

Have you ever felt frustrated by the narrow, rigid ways we’re encouraged to think about mental health and experiences considered ‘madness’? Whether you are a person with mental health experiences and feel discouraged by the lack of options or support, a family member or clinician concerned by the way people are treated, a scholar who wants to think outside the box, or an activist combatting discrimination, you may be excited to hea...

In everyday life, we might label irrational, illogical, or absurd beliefs as ‘delusional’, and dismiss the person who expresses them on these grounds. This tendency is common when it comes to conspiracy beliefs or beliefs held by individuals labeled with psychosis, where such views are frequently pathologized. But can beliefs themselves really be pathological? What if they can also be meaningful, informative, and important? We all ...

“It is valuable for our culture and our society to work towards disability rights, disability justice, and a disability inclusive lens, because it's going to benefit all of us.”- Sarah Napoli

Each of us, at some point in life, will have some type of disabling experience whether that’s from natural aging, illness, burnout, trauma, accidents or structural factors. Building communities of care and mentorship, and undoing ablism is int...

“As long as we insist that we absolutely don't want dark, freaky, unpleasant things, a major part of our full spectrum human curiosity gets cut off, repressed, denied, and made unconscious.”- Carolyn Lovewell, Existential Kink

With the rise in popularity of shadow work, inner child work, and healing unconscious pain and trauma, many are eager to explore the depths of our wholeness. However, a willingness to do this work requires an...

Commercialized psychiatric and psychological knowledge encourages us to think of ourselves primarily as consumers and promotes a set of values that suggest some of us have minds or brains that should be ‘fixed’ with particular products or services. These neoliberal values have led to a great deal of institutional corruption and also has been exported beyond the western world across the globe. Many researchers, clinicians and activi...

The language we have for describing mental health challenges and suffering can constrict or expand the realm of possibilities for how we define ourselves. Sascha Altman DuBrul has spent his life challenging mainstream assumptions about mental health, what’s normal and abnormal, and built a community around shifting the narrative. Drawing from his personal experiences of getting locked up in a psych ward, he co-founded a radical men...

Are most mental health concerns a result of issues with cellular metabolism? In this episode, I discuss Dr. Chris Palmer’s 'brain energy theory,' which draws on decades of cross-disciplinary research, positing that metabolic dysfunctions throughout the body may underlie various mental health conditions. I explore how mental health, chronic illness, stress, modern lifestyle, and cellular metabolism are all related in an ongo...

“Our mental health is a cumulative product of the story of the body.” Why do mental and physical health concerns seem to go hand in hand? At which levels can and should we intervene and develop more agency in our whole health trajectory? Too many people are getting more sick with traditional interventions, but many are taking their power back and finding ways that basic and sustainable changes can change our outcomes. In this episo...

“A new order will emerge from within the chaos” - Sara Avant Stover

Being human means experiencing loss. If we let it, these moments can propel us towards a deeper, richer inner journey. In this episode of the Depth Work podcast, Sarah Avant Stover shares her profound experiences through many circumstances of grief and heartbreak, detailing the events that led her to write her latest book. She discusses the unique nature of betraya...