LBC presenter wants to improve workplace mental health after bulimia struggle

Natasha Devon, 42, is a mental health campaigner, as well as a broadcaster, hosting a Saturday evening talk show on LBC radio. She has written four self-help books and two novels, been awarded an MBE, and was the Department of Education’s mental health champion for schools (until she was let go for criticising government policy). Natasha launched the Where’s Your Head At? campaign, calling for better mental health provision in the workplace. Here she shares her mission.

For decades, I had mental health issues myself. I started having panic attacks when I was eight years old and struggled all through my teens. Because I didn't have any coping strategies, my anxiety became worse and worse. Things got really bad when I went to university and I developed an eating disorder too.

I started modelling and, in that environment, eating disorders were incredibly prevalent. Some of the first people I tried to talk to about it went, "Yeah, everybody does that," and so there was this normalisation of bulimia.

It wasn’t until my mid to late 20s that I dedicated myself to getting better, after reaching such a low point that I was unable to work and I'd alienated most of my friends. At the time there was so much more awareness of eating disorders than of anxiety disorders so, initially, I got therapy for bulimia and realised pretty quickly that it had been a coping strategy for anxiety. But I was still struggling until I finally got diagnosed with panic disorder, aged 31. Suddenly I looked back on my life and so many things fell into place.

Panic attacks

I’d had a couple of adverse childhood experiences. My brother was born very prematurely and my cousin, who was a year younger than me, died of cancer, within six months of each other. Because I'm the oldest of my siblings, I thought, 'I'm not going to make a fuss about this, I'm going to be helpful. I’ll look after my brothers and be useful to my parents.' I didn't deal with it emotionally, and that's why I started having panic attacks.

It was from this experience that I knew education around mental health needed to be better – and I had to do something about it. At the time, the conversation was very much focused on the extremes, like what was portrayed in movies like 'Girl Interrupted'. We were never taught that everybody has mental health to look after and it's something that we should all have an awareness of.

Young people and mental health

I had the idea for a new project, talking to teenagers, asking them what was missing from their PSHE learning. I was working for the addiction therapy clinic where I’d been treated for bulimia and joined forces with the lead therapist there, as well as doctors and experts in neuroscience and psychology, to put together lesson plans for schools.

And then I thought, 'This isn't enough. Structural changes need to happen.' Teenagers were saying to me that their mum or dad was struggling with their mental health and they weren’t as open as their generation, so they didn’t know how to talk to them about it.

It planted the seed for the Where's Your Head At? campaign, which launched in 2018. The advantage of doing talks in schools is that the students have to be there, even if they don't really want to be. I decided I should tackle mental health in the workplace next.

Mental health stigma

People are fearful of the consequences of being honest about how they’re feeling at work. It is illegal to discriminate against somebody on the basis of them having mental health issues, but what you can do is not promote them or not give them the best project to work on.

The stigma around mental health is still there at work and in society, and that needs to change. Generation Z are statistically more likely to be honest when having a mental health struggle, but they are being termed as ‘generation sick note’, suggesting they're lazy and work-shy.

The aim of my campaign Where’s Your Head At? was to achieve parity between first aid for physical health and mental health in all workplaces. If you’re required by law to have a physical health first aider, I strongly believe you should also be required by law to have a mental health first aider.

In 2019, we had support from the then Shadow Minister for mental health, Luciana Berger, who got it debated during a backbench business debate. The pushback from the government was that it wasn't enough, that mental health first aid alone isn't going to fix mental health issues in workplaces. We knew that, but we've got to start somewhere. Their argument was that if they made it statutory, employers might think that's all they have to do and they won't do anything else to support staff with mental health issues.

That was in 2019 and then Brexit and Covid derailed everything but, as we were coming out of the pandemic, I was contacted by MP Dean Russell, who was elected on a manifesto pledge to train up 1000 people in mental health first aid skills in his constituency. He became an ambassador for the campaign and got it tabled again in Parliament.

Now the recommendation that all workplaces should have Mental Health First Aiders has been put in the government's anti-suicide strategy – which is a major achievement and the closest we'll ever come to getting that law change.

Helping staff to thrive

Our campaign is also focused on other aspects of workplace mental health, looking at changes that employers can make that will make the workplace more mental health-friendly, and empowering employees to have that conversation with their bosses.

There is a difference between wellbeing and self-care and those two things are often conflated so, one of my key aims is for companies to have an awareness of the difference. When employers provide cut price yoga classes or pizza Friday, yes that's self-care and it's great, but it's not the same as making sure people have a manageable workload or having policies for colleagues who experience pregnancy loss or bereavement or issues with menopause.

I’ve been in some major FTSE 100 type companies and, going into the corporate world, I was like, 'Wow, you're about 10 years behind education.' Facts that I assumed everyone knew – like that, in any given year, one in four people experience a diagnosable mental health issue – made their jaws drop.

I've researched the relationship between wellbeing and productivity and presenteeism (where somebody is physically at work, but in so much mental distress or so distracted that they might as well not be). The cost to businesses of that is astronomical – it's billions of pounds every year.

Since we started the campaign, in England alone, there have been half a million new Mental Health First Aiders trained up throughout the country. I got a message the other day, which sums up the type of feedback we get – someone said they were dragged to this training and thought it was pointless, but in fact the course had been transformative for them, as it encouraged them to think differently about their own and others' mental health.

Relieved to open up

We've also been encouraging people in manual roles, such as those working on building sites, to get a mental health first aid trainer on board. I went to a Unite Union event and there were men in their 50s who were actually crying, talking about what a relief it was to be able to discuss their mental health at work. I was so moved by that.

I've also founded the Mental Health Media Charter. I worked with BT, the Samaritans and Mental Health First Aid England on guidelines about language and imagery for broadcast or print media when discussing mental health. More than 200 magazines, radio stations, blogs and organisations have signed up, pledging that when they speak or write about mental health, they will follow these guidelines.

But my biggest achievements are when I do school talks and I get teenagers saying to me, "That really made me think" or "That was really useful." And being made a fellow of my former university was a very proud moment, even more so than receiving my MBE.

I won’t rest until I see the reversal of what austerity did to mental health services and we see investment in things like sports centres, music and drama because they have a proven therapeutic value. I just want to make sure the world is as fair as possible.

Find out more about Natasha Devon and the Where’s Your Head At? campaign