This week Grace (@thegracefoodfeed) has listed the top 5 health and wellness podcasts that she believes you should listen to. #expertadvice
Time to Press Play: Top five health & wellness podcasts that you need to listen to right now
As a self-proclaimed podcast junkie, I felt compelled to recommend to you my top five favourite health and wellness podcasts. I can guarantee that by listening to any one of these wonderful podcasts you will learn something new to tell your friends and get conversation flowing about some of today’s most important issues. These podcasts cover a range of topics relating to medicine, nutrition, fitness, mental health, sex life, social media, self-love and much more. So have a read an then have a listen and tell me what you think!
Women’s Health: Going For Goal
Brought to you by the UK’s top health and wellness magazine Women’s Health, ‘Going for Goal’ is my top podcast pick. Each week, Senior Editor Roisin Dervish-O’Kane speaks with experts in the fields of health, fitness, nutrition and emotional wellbeing to help you reach goals that will make you unstoppable! The topics of each episode are unique and are not just an echo-chamber for the many health and wellness resources that are out there. I have genuinely learned something new from every episode and have helped me work towards personal goals that I now know many women struggle with.
From how to meal prep and spend less on food to how to quit perfectionism, each episode will teach you something new and there is a topic that relates to everyone.
My all-star episode of the podcast: ‘Chessie King on Self Kindness and Her Body Confidence Journey’. If you haven’t heard of Chessie King, you NEED to follow her. Her Instagram feed is the happiest and most empowering feed I have ever come across. Calling herself ‘your online big sister/bestfriend’ Chessie inspires her followers to learn how to practice self-love and have confidence in their bodies. This episode covers Chessie’s personal struggles with body image and how she overcame them with tips and advice on how you can do it too. Both me and my mum listened to this and came away both enlightened and empowered. This is an episode for women AND men of all ages and it is a must-listen!
Happy Place by Fearne Cotton
The podcast that makes you feel less weird for feeling the way you do. Fearne Cotton speaks to inspiring celebrity guests about life, love, loss and reveals what happiness means to them.
Struggles with mental health or upsetting life events can often make you feel like you are the only person in the world who feels this way and it can be a very isolating experience. From the outside looking in, one would assume that celebrities with awe-inspiring careers and seemingly luxurious lifestyles are exempt from this feeling and are simply living the ‘perfect life’. This podcast teaches you that this couldn’t be further from the truth and often those who are most successful have overcome huge barriers and obstacles in their lives. From tuning in to Fearne’s conversations with her guests, you realise that (excuse my French) shitty things happen to pretty much everyone and everyone has a different way of dealing with them. You can find conversations with everyone from fitness superstar Joe Wicks to singer-songwriter Ellie Goulding.
My ‘all-star’ episode of the podcast ‘Bryony Gordon’. I have long been a fan of writer and journalist Bryony Gordon – you may know her as the legend who ran the London marathon in her underwear who is now mates with Prince Harry. I finished her books Mad Girl and Eat Drink Run within a matter of days and the rest of her books are firmly on my holiday reading list. Bryony speaks candidly with Fearne about her years of struggling with alcohol and depression and how running saved her from herself. She tells Fearne and a live audience at Babington House how she went from couch to 5k to running the London Marathon. As someone who is learning to use running as a coping mechanism for stress and anxiety, this episode felt particularly pertinent to me and would encourage you to have a listen.
The Telegraph: Bryony Gordon’s Mad World
Following on from my favourite episode of Happy Place, another fantastic podcast you should listen to is writer and journalist Bryony Gordon’s ‘Mad World’. This podcast records intimate conversations with everyone from household names to frontline NHS workers discussing all things mental health. Similar to Fearne Cotton’s podcast but with more of a focus on specific mental health struggles, this is another podcast that shines a light on how mental health does not discriminate. Whether you are a celebrity chef, a member of the royal family or an NHS nurse, you may be affected in some way by mental health. This podcast helps you realise that it is okay to not be okay and that the first and hugely important step to better mental health is to have the conversation.
My ‘all-star’ episode of the podcast: ‘Prince Harry’. In the debut episode of Bryony’s podcast she speaks with Prince Harry about his mental health experiences. Typically the royal family are very private, especially when it comes to personal issues, and are perceived by the majority as ‘untouchable’. This refreshing episode very much demonstrates that the young royal is not untouchable when it comes to mental health and has turned his experiences into a positive through joining the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s ‘Heads Together’ initiative. This initiative combines a campaign to tackle stigma around mental health and change the conversation on mental health with fundraising for a series of innovative new mental health services.
Rhiannon Lambert (Rhitrition): Food For Thought
Brought to you by one of the UK’s leading nutritionists Rhiannon Lambert, this podcast gives you evidence-based advice for living a healthy lifestyle. As the founder of private Harley Street clinic Rhitrition, and the best-selling author of Re-Nourish, A Simple Way to Eat Well, if you want to learn about nutrition, Rhiannon is certainly the person you need to listen to. Joined by expert guests, Rhiannon separates fact from fiction and offers simplified and trusted advice. The podcast doesn’t just cover exclusively nutrition focused topics, you can find episodes on vaccines, fast-fashion, social media and women’s health (menopause, periods etc).
My ‘all-star’ episode of the podcast: ‘Does Instagram Trigger Dieting’. It was really tough for me to choose my favourite episode as honestly I love every single one. However, I have picked this particular episode as it discusses an issue that is becoming increasingly important to address. Rhiannon speaks with Ysabel Gerrard, lecturer in digital media and society and policy advisor at Facebook and Instagram, about how Instagram is affecting people’s relationships with food and bringing about more cases of disordered eating. The increasing popularity and accessibility of social media as had a significant impact on the number of eating disorders we are now experiencing. This episode helps us understand why this is the case and what can be done to combat this concerning issue.
BBC Sounds: Born in Bradford
Slightly different from the other podcasts discussed above, ‘Born in Bradford’ follows Radio 4’s exclusive access to research involving the families of children born between 2007 and 2009. ‘Born in Bradford’ is one of the biggest medical research studies undertaken in the UK, with the aim of discovering more about the causes of illness by studying children as their lives unfold. The episodes cover a variety of topics including air pollution and child health, diabetes and mental illness in extended families and diabetes and tooth decay. This is an enlightening, informative and emotional podcast, highlighting various factors that can negatively impact a child’s health in the UK and what needs to be done to tackle these issues.
My ‘all-star’ episode of the podcast: ‘Diabetes and mental illness in extended families’. Amongst a number of topics, this episode looks into research into the effect of a potentially toxic chemical called acrylamide that is present in the diet of many pregnant women in the UK. Acrylamide can be found in a range of foods, particularly in products such as crisps and chips where potatoes have been cooked at a high temperature. The impact of this chemical on an unborn child is significant as it can cause lower birth rates and smaller heads which are linked to health problems in later life such as diabetes and delayed brain development. This episode highlights the important of educating pregnant women about the risks their diet may have on their children. I personally had never heard of acrylamide before listening to this podcast and had no idea how detrimental it could be therefore I highly recommend you have a listen.
All Things Women Share 