DEPTH Work: A Holistic Mental Health Podcast

At a time when tools for ‘nervous system regulation’ are everywhere we look, it’s easy to forget that we aren’t meant to always be “regulated.” In this episode, I'm joined by Nkem Ndefo, trauma therapist, nurse-midwife, somatic practitioner, and founder of the Resilience Toolkit. Nkem brings a rare synthesis of biological training, lived experience, social activism, disability and systems thinkin...

Life gives many of us moments that can crack us open. For Wendy, this was a car accident that led her to seek alternative healing modalities and ultimately open up a healing center: Roslyn Salt Cave. We talk about the ups and downs, keeping faith in your vision, and letting life bring you what you need even when it’s not always what you want. We also talk about the unglamorous in-between stages of the healing journey, the som...

Seasonal depression, often called “seasonal affective disorder”, can make getting through the Wintertime much more difficult. But what’s really happening in our brains and bodies when winter darkness sets in? How do our urban environments, work culture, and economic systems create the worst conditions for winter struggles. Shouldn’t we all be hibernating anyways?

In this episode, I explore the links between s...

In this episode of the Depth Work podcast, I speak with clinical psychologist, professor, and author, Phil Yanos about his powerful new book "Exiles in New York City" an exploration of how institutionalization creates barriers of exclusion and banishment in urban landscapes.

Phil shares his unique journey growing up on Ward's Island near Manhattan Psychiatric Center, where his father worked as a psychiatrist. Through his research an...

We use frameworks and concepts to protect ourselves from the discomfort of not knowing, but these very concepts, when taken for granted, can prevent us from asking the kinds of questions that will set us free. In this episode, I'm joined by philosophy of mental health scholars, Cristiano Bacchi and Giacomo Piselli Fioroni, co-hosts of the podcast "In Front of the Mirror." Together, we dive into the critical intersection of philosop...

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 ...

“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 joine...

“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 radi...

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 ...

“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, questioning, re-exam...

“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 episod...

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,...

“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 ...

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...

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 import...

“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 und...

“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...

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, clinician...

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 radic...