The Shift with Sam Baker

Today’s guest is the comedian Josie Long. Josie started early – and I mean EARLY. She has been performing standup since she was 14, and by 17 won the BBC New comedy award. She was the first woman to be nominated for the Edinburgh Comedy Award three times and is co-founder of the education charity, Arts Emergency.Josie is also a regular on those terrifying panel shows where you just know you’d think of the smart thing to say when you were on the bus home (if at all!) has written for TV, radio and stage and has now turned her hand to short stories with Because I Don’t Know What You Mean And What You Don’t, a funny, dark, poignant (and occasionally jaded!) look at lifeJosie and I are both Scottish emigres, so we met up in her publishers atmospheric 16th century office in Edinburgh’s old town to talk about everything from house prices to climate change, how hormones and ADHD affect pregnancy and perimenopause (clue, it’s not great), breaking free of diet culture, living in a two comedian household and why she hopes she’ll still be performing stand up at 80. Oh and she shares her secret past as a fake tarot reader!AND IF ANYONE KNOWS ANYTHING ABOUT HOW ADHD AFFECTS PERIMENOPAUSE PLEASE MESSAGE ME ON INSTAGRAM @THEOTHERSAMBAKER!See Josie on tour - find out more at linktr.ee/josielongtour.* You can buy all the books mentioned in this podcast at The Shift bookshop on Bookshop.org, including Because I Don't Know What You Mean And What You Don't by Josie Long and the book that inspired this podcast, The Shift: how I lost and found myself after 40 - and you can too, by me.* And if you'd like to support the work that goes into making this podcast and get a weekly newsletter plus loads more content including transcripts of the podcast, please consider joining The Shift community. Find out more at www.theshiftwithsambaker.substack.com• The Shift (on life after 40) with Sam Baker is created and hosted by Sam Baker and edited by Emily Sandford. If you enjoyed this podcast, please rate/review/follow as it really does help other people find us. And let me know what you think on twitter @sambaker or instagram @theothersambaker

My guest for Mental Health Awareness Week 2023 is mental health campaigner, psychiatrist and bestselling novelist Joanna Cannon.Jo left school at 15 only returning to complete her A levels when she decided to train as a doctor in her late 30s. She specialised in psychiatry before leaving medicine to write in her mid-40s. (How many life shifts can one woman handle!?) But Jo’s passion for psychiatry, her patients and the way their stories changed her has stayed with her. Which is why she has compiled Will You Read This Please, a unique collection of stories of 12 mental health patients in the hope of shining a light on the stigma and isolation that still impact those living with mental illness.Joanna joined me to from her home in the peak district, where she was born and still lives, to talk about the long family history of mental illness that formed her lifelong fascination with psychiatry, training as a doctor in midlife and the grim reality of working in the NHS. We also discussed why your date of birth is irrelevant, why you don’t have to have loads of friends to live a meaningful life, being a bad feminist and how red lipstick helped her change her attitude to life.* You can buy all the books mentioned in this podcast at The Shift bookshop on Bookshop.org, including Will You Read This Please and A Tidy Ending by Joanna Cannon, and the book that inspired this podcast, The Shift: how I lost and found myself after 40 - and you can too, by me.* And if you'd like to support the work that goes into making this podcast and get a weekly newsletter plus loads more content including transcripts of the podcast, please consider joining The Shift community. Find out more at www.theshiftwithsambaker.substack.comAnd if you already subscribe - did you know you can buy a Gift Membership of The Shift for a friend at https://steadyhq.com/en/theshift/gift_plans• The Shift (on life after 40) with Sam Baker is created and hosted by Sam Baker and edited by Emily Sandford. If you enjoyed this podcast, please rate/review/follow as it really does help other people find us. And let me know what you think on twitter @sambaker or instagram @theothersambaker

OK, I admit it, I’m a bit in awe, because today’s guest is someone I’ve wanted to get on The Shift for the longest time. You might know Ruby Wax as a successful comedian and presenter, one of the funniest women of her generation. Or you might know her as a mental health campaigner and best-selling author. One thing’s for sure, she has been using humour to make the rest of us feel better for decades.Having suffered depression her whole life, Ruby had a breakdown after losing her job on the BBC in her 50s (hold that thought!). Determined not to “go down with the career ship” she took herself off to Oxford university where she got a masters degree in mindfulness based cognitive therapy, was subsequently awarded an OBE for services to mental health and has written several bestselling books about our brains - and hers. Then, last year, 12 years after her last bout of depression, she discovered she wasn’t actually as well as she thought she was… Cue the inspiration for a new book, and tour.Ruby and I met in an office overlooking the Thames the day after a big birthday (which we will not be talking about!!) to discuss why depression is the wrong word for mental illness and the journeys to find meaning that saw her end up on a journey to a 6 week stay in a mental clinic.We also talked about building a new emotional toolkit for the second half of your life, the secret to her 35 year marriage and why we need to stop talking ageing and start talking evolving. There’s also hair dye, mindfulness, a Carrie Fisher love-in, jewellery and toe nails. It’s all going on in this episode!Falling Upward by Richard Rohr, the book Ruby talks about in this episode, is available here.You can catch Ruby on a UK wide tour, starting in September, tickets are available now via LiveNation.co.uk* You can buy all the books mentioned in this podcast at The Shift bookshop on Bookshop.org, including I'm Not As Well As I Thought I Was by Ruby Wax and the book that inspired this podcast, The Shift: how I lost and found myself after 40 - and you can too, by me.* And if you'd like to support the work that goes into making this podcast and get a weekly newsletter plus loads more content including transcripts of the podcast, please consider joining The Shift community. Find out more at www.theshiftwithsambaker.substack.comAnd if you already subscribe - did you know you can buy a Gift Membership of The Shift for a friend at https://steadyhq.com/en/theshift/gift_plans• The Shift (on life after 40) with Sam Baker is created and hosted by Sam Baker and edited by Emily Sandford. If you enjoyed this podcast, please rate/review/follow as it really does help other people find us. And let me know what you think on twitter @sambaker or instagram @theothersambaker