Our Latest Articles

Have you ever found yourself staring out of the window on a train and suddenly realised you had no idea how many stops had passed? Most of us know what it’s like to experience these mild and temporary mental “check-outs” from time to time but might not realise that these sorts of feelings or experiences exist on the spectrum of dissociation, a term used to describe a range of experiences involving a disrupted or altered sense of connection to thoughts, memories, emotions, the

My name is Liam Virgo, and I am an advocate for functional neurological disorder (FND), pushing to raise awareness for this life-changing condition. For the past ten years, I have been fighting a quiet, gruelling war to reclaim my body and my identity after a sudden illness turned my teenage world upside down. While the physical realities of severe FND are devastating, the profound mental health struggles, emotional scars.

I’ve noticed something weird, the last few years: people think I’m friendly. I’m referred to as outgoing, and even, occasionally, extroverted. It feels like I’ve pulled off some magnificent con–because for much of my childhood, I was deeply lonely, and through my adolescence, that loneliness gave me terrible anxiety. This is a story of growth before it is anything else–mostly because I started, socially, around rock bottom.

No matter what, at least I have control. Or that’s what I used to think…When I was 14, I was admitted into hospital with an eating disorder; I left my home, my family, and my community all behind. Not knowing how long it would be until I was able to go home, I was scared and very alone.

Loneliness is sometimes sad and uncomfortable, and I think we like to pretend it isn’t happening when it is. We hide the feeling from people we know, like saying it out loud means something is wrong. I now reject this and would like to say: I need social connection, and I’m not afraid to say it anymore!

Overnight, at the age of nine, I went from an energetic, sociable child to housebound and isolated as Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME/CFS) and other comorbidities shrunk my world to my bedroom. ME is a chronic, fluctuating disease that causes symptoms such as severe fatigue, post-exertional malaise, pain, sleep problems, and brain fog. It can leave people bed or housebound, and there is currently no cure. As the years passed, I tried every form of low‐energy activity that I cou

Ever heard of picture perfect? Clicking posts, attracting attention, wanting to feel validated. Validated. Something so many teenage girls, like me, crave the feeling of. Ever looked at yourself in the mirror and not seen your true potential? All you see is what others want of you. All you see is a dysmorphic image of who you seem to be, a monster to you, and a so-called ‘perfect girl’ to others. My name is Joana.

My name is Nina, and I am a Senior Research Fellow at the Children and Young People’s Centre for Justice. This year, on the occasion of Men’s Health Week, I wanted to share how co-producing research and working alongside young men can help us understand and address the crisis in men’s mental health, drawing on my experience leading the Men Minds project as Principal Investigator.

Every year during Men’s Health Week, we see more conversations around mental health, wellbeing, cancer awareness and the importance of speaking up - which of course, should absolutely be applauded. But there’s still a long way to go when it comes to helping men feel genuinely comfortable talking about their health. This is especially true when it comes to topics that feel personal, embarrassing or vulnerable - like testicular cancer.

A perfect column of khaki moves across the concrete. 300 pairs of legs marching in unison, with military precision. If not for the basketball hoops on either end of our parade square, we would be indistinguishable from professional soldiers. The occasional adolescent voice crack of the parade sergeant not withstanding, we were that good, or at least so we all believed. I am right in the centre, where everyone can see.

Let me start by dispelling the obvious– there is no such thing as a “feminazi”. There are feminists, and then there are feminists who are so unapologetic and uncompromising about their pursuit of feminism that they are derogatorily branded “feminazi” by those who are discomfited by their pursuit of a fair and equal world. It follows, therefore, that there can be no such thing as a “male feminazi”. In my opinion and experience, this is a response from men who have not been ta

With porn consumption linked to increased anxiety, depression and loneliness among men, I reveal my own porn use and what led me to stop. After being single for most of my 30’s and finding my self-esteem and body confidence at an all-time low, I decided to quit porn. I had always struggled with my use, which had morphed from an exploration of my sexuality into an unhealthy habit. As a British writer with an interest in culture and men's wellness, I share my personal journey.

I wonder when women’s health will catch up, if ever, maybe not in my lifetime, but the latest break- through for women’s health is the update in naming Polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS) to polyendocrine metabolic ovarian syndrome (PMOS), as announced in the Lancet. A global nod to the endocrine and metabolic ramifications of the condition, and coming away from viewing it as merely a gynaecological problem. Who am I, why do I care, shall I step off my soap-box now? Well no

“Let yourself be bored” It is a statement that resonated with me as I was recently reading a Substack article . From time to time, I have been thinking about the importance of boredom and how it supports my creativity. It has helped me finding new topics to write about, new hobbies, and even drive inspiration for my paintings. Upon reflection, these moments shaped my best ideas and even the best piece of work that I produced (of course, subjective to me!).

I’m sure many of you have been following the war between the US and Iran, have seen the headlines of escalations between the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and the Middle East, and are starting to feel some of the implications this war is having on the world. I previously wrote a piece covering my experiences at the beginning of the war in the UAE. Now, I am sharing my perspective again, but this time with a focus on my mother country, Lebanon.

My mother and I have been estranged for twenty years, with a few exceptions. I saw her at the hospital when my niece was born. We spoke on the phone once in 2013, and a few times in 2016. I stopped sending my annual “Merry Christmas” text message in 2019. When we first became estranged, it felt like I was the only person in the world who couldn’t maintain a relationship with my mom.

The golden wash of sunrise bathed the bedroom in a soft, buttery glow that made the dust motes dance. Such a soft, buttery glow, in fact, that Rosie didn’t even squint as she roused from sleep, reaching out her arms in a feline stretch and shaking the dregs of slumber from her body. A lazy smile tugged at the corners of her lips and she rolled into her boyfriend’s side of the bed, breathing his scent from the pillow and settling comfortably back into the sheets to watch the s

As a Research Assistant on the newly launched Cycle Study at KCL, I am hugely motivated to improve outcomes for people living with Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder (PMDD). PMDD is a severe mood disorder in which symptoms, like anxiety and depression, happen in the weeks leading up to the start of a period. For more about PMDD see earlier Inspire the Mind article by Dr Ellen Lambert.

Premenstrual syndrome (PMS) refers to the emotional and physical changes many people experience in the days before a menstrual period, including anxiety, low mood, irritability, fatigue, and bloating. At its most severe, when symptoms are debilitating and interfere with daily life, it is known as premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD). Despite affecting an estimated 250 million people worldwide, we still do not fully understand why these symptoms occur.

I’m Kate Smith, CEO and co-founder of Hey Girls, a menstrual educator with lived experience of the issues surrounding period poverty and menstrual health inequality. Those experiences are what continue to drive my mission: leading a social enterprise built to create social good, champion women’s health, and ensure everyone can manage their period with dignity. Hey Girls CIC (Community Interest Company) is a not-for-profit social enterprise working to eradicate period poverty

There’s something that has never quite sat right with me about how we discuss women’s health. We often state that the healthcare system is failing women. But when we look more closely, we can start to question whether it was ever actually designed with women in mind. Before anything else, I was a cancer clinician. I’ve sat with women at some of the hardest points in their lives, going through treatment and trying to process diagnoses that often came too late.

The term hysteria has earned a bad rap for good reasons. Originally coined as a diagnosis to refer to physical symptoms without an identifiable cause, it was soon reframed as a female malady caused by a “wandering uterus”. Although hysteria ultimately became a dismissive and misogynistic label used to pathologise women’s emotional experiences, the original diagnosis behind this popular term – now known as conversion disorder or functional neurological disorder - is far more

We have an extraordinary ability to imagine. Our imagination lets us revisit the past, rehearse the future, create entirely new experiences and worlds... all within our minds. But are we always in control of what we see in our minds?My name is Eman, I’m a PhD candidate at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience at the Imagine Better Lab. My research explores why young people with low mood and depression might experience upsetting images playing in their minds

Language is at the heart of mental health. It is how clinicians describe what they observe, and how people express what they feel. But what happens when we ask AI to read it? I am a clinical informatician at the CAMHS Digital Lab, South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust and King's College London. My work sits at the intersection of artificial intelligence and child and adolescent mental health.