Relationship between mental ill-health and loneliness | MP Tracey Crouch

[Music] Before we begin, I would just like to start by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land from which I am recording. The Gadigal people of the Oranation. I acknowledge their elders past, present and emerging. I would also like to acknowledge those with lived experience of mental health who are listening. I extend this to their carers, their clinicians and their families who have supported them along the way. Over these last few years, many of us have had an introduction to the experience of loneliness. As we have been isolated from our regular routines, our families, our friends, our co-workers, baristas and bartenders, it is only normal for us to experience some form of loneliness. In this episode, I sat down with our world's first Minister for Loneliness, Tracy Crouch. Tracy was inducted in 2018 and was tasked with solving the loneliness epidemic that they saw folding out in the UK. Tracy's portfolio for loneliness was part of the legacy left from former Parliament member and advocate for loneliness, Joe Cox, who, as Tracy notes in this episode, was tragically murdered in 2016. As this is a mental health podcast, it is imperative I make the statement that loneliness is not a symptom of mental ill health. Instead, just like some other emotions, it can be a causing factor in developing mental illness. As I said before, I believe loneliness is an emotion we have all experienced to a degree these last few years. So it feels apt that as we're starting to resurface and re-enter our communities, routines and workplaces, we gain further understanding into the experience of loneliness and how we can help ourselves and help others going through it. Thank you so much, Tracy, for joining me. It's so exciting to be chatting with you, having known about you and your position world first position for many years now. And it's really exciting to actually sit down across from you digitally and have a chat. So thank you so much for coming on. Thank you for having me. It's really exciting. So I guess to start off before we jump into your position, this episode is about loneliness and the distinction between loneliness and mental health. So are you able to define for us what loneliness actually is and what's the effect on us as individuals, but also us in the broader sense of society? Yeah, loneliness is a subjective emotion. It is something that we should all feel. It is a very human aspect of our lives and it's, you know, it's part of our growth and our development. But the problem comes as when you feel acute levels of loneliness. And there is a significant health impact on people who suffer loneliness and isolation. And two are actually quite separate, but they're getting their route into length. And so what we found when we were doing the loneliness strategy was that the impact of loneliness is the equivalent of smoking cigarettes. And actually there's this sort of kind of long term consequence on health. The relation that you relationship that you end up having with your doctor is more significant than perhaps if you didn't feel those levels of loneliness. Loneliness and health are very much, you know, related, but people shouldn't be afraid of feeling lonely because it is something that we naturally have. Absolutely. I think that that's a really good disclaimer as well because a lot of us, you know, are chasing after the positive. So the grass is always greener and things like that. And I think previously it's been, you know, around anger, the stigma around it and that particular feeling that it's, you know, it's a negative emotional things like that. But to actually realize that we are individuals in a swimming in a sea of emotions and it could be loneliness at one point, it could be anger, it could be happiness, sadness, grief, a whole bunch of things. I mean, Brenne Brown recently has authored the book detailing. I think she said 84 different human emotions, which, you know, flows my mind and I'm still yet to read it. So I think it's a place loneliness within that and to know that this is something that we haven't acknowledged for so long. I guess that kind of perfectly leads into your position being the world's first minister for loneliness or holding that, having held that position. And I remember I was on a plane headed to Canberra when I first heard about you and your position in, I think it was, it must have been in 2018 just after you were appointed. And I could not get past, I told everyone I'd talk to that day that, you know, the UK is so progressive in identifying this. What actually led to your position becoming solidified and what did or does it entail? It's really important to put the appointment into context because when I got elected in 2010, I did actually talk about loneliness on a regular basis as a member of Parliament. You know, it is something that we recognize in our own constituencies, particularly among the older community. And so I'd spoken about the issue of loneliness as had other MPs. And then in 2015, we had a colleague join us from the lab party called Joe Cox and she spoke about loneliness in a very different context. She talked about it in everyday terms, you know, she talked about her own personal experiences, a new mum, she talked about it, you know, in a sort of kind of very, sort of kind of wider context, not just about something that afflicts older people. So she took the issue of loneliness and catapulted it into the stratosphere and it became something that was much broader than, you know, grandma feeling a bit lonely because, you know, she's living at home and no one ever picks up the phone to talk to her. And and then Joe was tragically murdered and one of the things that sort of kind of came out of that was a real desire by cross party group of MPs to continue her legacy on the issue of loneliness. So a commission was set up to look at the issue and one of the recommendations within that commission was to appoint a minister with responsibility for loneliness and to deliver a cross government strategy on how to tackle loneliness. And I was the, I was already a minister in a department that had a brief to look across all other departments and collate sort of various issues into one part. And so I was appointed the minister and it was a very, I was very humble to be appointed it because particularly because of the context and the background. So, you know, I think it was really exciting, but we were really hard to make sure that we had the announcement made that, you know, there was, there was no sniggering in the British media about the appointment and that we were going to have something tangible come from it. And that was the, the government strategy on how to tackle loneliness. I mean, when I sort of was looking into essentially this whole context, the joecox situation really hit a heart string. And I think that that was really huge. Like you said, for propelling this piece of work into sort of a physiology and into something that was going to actually something was going to come of it. When in this role, what were the biggest challenges that your strategy needed to address given that there were, I guess there is still to an extent predispositioning to stigma. And again, like you've noted the consistency and measuring loneliness in different age groups and populations, but then also like you alluded the media and the way in which the media then reflects that as well. So actually on this occasion, the media would not challenge at all. I think they completely got it. And the only negative comment I got was from the Stephen Colbert show in America. And I watched it actually. And although he started sort of kind of joshing about it, by the end of his mucking around, he actually recognized that there was, there was an issue. And I think actually because I think people can reflect, they can self reflect. And the thing about loneliness is that it does impact everybody in different times of their lives. And when we did the strategy, we actually put a map of our life, you know, going to university, losing a loved one. You know, all these things are really sort of kind of important parts. And it may well be the same actually in Australia, but you know, some, there's actually, we have a perception that there's going to be a greater level of loneliness in rural areas. Actually, there's a higher level in urban areas. And particularly in professional areas, we think that it's something that impacts on the older generation. generation and yet all our statistics show that the 16 to 24 year olds are more likely to be low-need than an over 65 year old. And so I think even though Stephen Colbert starts on this journey of taking the Mickey, actually, I think he recognised that this is something that's not funny and it does impact on a lot of people. And it also impacts on people, you know, in high level positions, you know, chief executives of major companies are exceptionally lonely. It's lonely at the top of the park that you've heard the phrase, right? So, you know, that's why there wasn't sort of kind of people mocking it in the British media because I think there was a recognition that there was something that there was a problem. And interestingly, it did get global reporting as you yourself, you know, to stay on a plane. And we had visits from ministers from New Zealand, from Japan, from Canada, from Scandinavia, from the UAE, you know, people who are really interested in the health impact, the actual statistical health impact and, you know, what could be done to try and stop acute loneliness levels leading to significant health problems, which is where it gets costly. You know, you can make interventions at an early stage, connect people to communities, regardless of how big that community is, and that can reduce the level of cost to the health service. It is such an interesting battle, isn't it? I mean, we see this same battle, you know, about sort of upfront paying that all eventually save us money at the back end in things like mental health, in physical health, you know, like you were noting before, like smoking, for example. And it's absolutely baffling that, you know, we still haven't come to that point that sometimes we need to put out before we can get back and what we reap is far greater than what we've sowed. It was really interesting when you were saying about sort of the age brackets that we often consider to be more lonely than others. And there was this great piece that was written, I can't remember who it was, but I was forwarded it on by my mother, who's studying sociology. And it was the fact that the younger generations are the most connected, socially connected generation to date, but they are also experiencing the highest rates of loneliness. And I mean, that was just huge to actually sort of comprehend and then to internally sort of process, which I think is really interesting. And again, we have the exact same problem when it comes to location-based loneliness. There is the conception that, you know, the small towns or the rural towns are more lonely, but they're far more connected in a community sense. And I come from a rural town who, and migrated to the city, would not ever, would do that all over again every other time, but it is so stark and it is so hard to establish roots in a brand new city. And I think it depends what kind of work you're doing as well, right? Because if you're a young person moving into a city from a rural location, very ambitious, you're going to spend all the hours that you possibly can have in the office and then go back to your flat, maybe by yourself, maybe living with somebody else. And then you get up and do it all over again. And I don't know what it's like in Sydney, but-- Very much that. Yeah, but here in London, particularly in the city of London, where all the financial institutions are, there is no weekend life. Right? So if you're an office worker in the city in a financial kind of institution, you work all the hours, you do play hard as well, but you work hard, you play hard, but then we can do nothing. There's parts of London that are vibrant and everything else, but you wouldn't go out there necessarily by yourself. And so it's a really weird place, whereas the connectivity in a rural community is more constant. And it's not the peaks and troughs that you have. There's definitely a constant to it. People get bored by that constant. At the end of day, it's very different. Yeah, it is very. And I mean, hearing stories about my grandmother who sort of moved to the town that I grew up in from another rural town way up north of New South Wales in Australia, and the way in which she was able to so seamlessly sort of become part of that community. And there really wasn't that because I think there's an element of stake holdership and within a small community, there's more ability to be more interconnected, whereas like you are saying, like financial districts and certain job positions, they don't allow for that. Or there isn't much wiggle room around that. And I personally, I've definitely found that. I used to be in design, and there was such a thriving community from sort of midweek drinks to pub lunches on Fridays, to the infamous Friday night office drinks, to sort of events and things that we all went to. And we all sort of did things on the weekends together as well, to moving to research, for example, where it is very siloed. And it is very singular. I mean, I left work today because I was feeling I was the only one in the office and I was like, oh, this is a bit lonely. I'm going to go home to my dog. Well, I think COVID has really exposed and, you know, and shown a spotlight on it. And just in your intro point, you pointed out about the connectivity of youngsters from a social perspective, but also from a digital perspective. And that is the case, you know, that I'm 47 this year, right? I grew up before the internet existed. I grew up before, you know, I didn't have a mobile phone until I was 18 and then that was a brand new thing. You know, I was the first generation at university to have an email address. Oh my God, wow. Yeah. Oh, no problem. And the truth is, it means that the friendships were very personal. You know, they were real. And I can still, you know, I can't, I can't tell you my other half's telephone number, but I can still remember my best friend's telephone number from school because you had to physically dial it. So, you know, there's, there's sort of kind of, there's a very, there's a huge difference about it, but also your perception of who you should be and what you want to be is very different. And one of the things about the actual definition of loneliness is about the life that you have versus the life that you want. And you know, that in turn can create that disconnect from a community because you think you should have more. And what, while digital connectivity can be a solution for some people's loneliness, it can also be a cause of other people's. And the cause for 16 to 25, 24 year olds is potentially the digital connectivity. The solution for the over 65s is digital connectivity. So it's very, you know, it's, it's, it's a real sort of kind of interesting kind of paradox to be like. And I think like you were saying, I think we have seen a lot of that flesh out in, or during COVID through even things like telehealth, you know, the accessibility, the services like that or I'm not sure if in the UK you have, actually, I'm sure I'm pretty sure I've read about it. Yeah, it was in your report. Like men's shits, those sorts of situations, they went all online as well. Like little things like that that previously we'd considered like only a physical thing. And if you couldn't get to them, you couldn't get to them has enabled access for people with a whole range of things like aquifobia and all sorts of stuff. And it comes to the linkages and sort of definite separations of mental health and loneliness. What is the differences in the misconceptions, I guess, between mental health and loneliness? Yeah, I think it's really important to differentiate between the two. There is a connection, but they're not the same thing. loneliness is not a mental health condition, it's a natural emotion. However, poor mental health can lead to loneliness and loneliness can lead to poor mental health. So, you know, there is definitely a relationship, but they are not the same thing. When you were just saying that, it kind of reminds me of that feeling depressed is a symptom of depression. You know, sort of that flatness or that depressed sort of emotional state arguably is its own emotion, but can lead to a clinical depression or a depression diagnosis, which is, I don't think we really ever sort of separate the two generally when it comes to an emotion. And it's potential as an etiology for. disorder or a situation? Yeah, I've been through my own journey with depression and anxiety and I think as a consequence of that, I always try to be very careful with my own language. So I talk about being down rather than depressed because actually I think again going back to the 82 different emotions or being down is perfectly fine. It's when it gets through a cute level. That's what we try to talk about in the report. There are natural waves of loneliness, there's natural waves of poor mental well-being, but it's about resilience and coping strategies and connectivity and all those things to try and stop it from going to an acute level. And that was incredibly evident as well and absolute kudos to yourself and your team for writing that and the way that you wrote it to really distinguish the differences and that mental health was arguably another player like physical health and things like that where it wasn't seen as the soul driving force or it was encompassed within that. It very much was just another element that it can interrelate with but is completely different from or separate from naturally. Which I thought was really wonderful, also really hard to find the crossovers when you're doing a word search and you're like, "Oh, no, no." Yeah, it just keeps coming back. It's like a worm. But I'm really proud of the report. The report set out a really strong direction and actually we have seen other nations look at the report and try and deliver their own loneliness strategy because I think people have recognised that there is an impact on their communities but there are some really simple solutions that are not particularly costly in order to try and connect people and it is all about connectivity. We have a system here now which has been developed since the loneliness strategy of social prescribing. So instead of going to your doctor and getting a prescription from medication, you can go to your doctor and you can effectively be prescribed into a walking group or if you're an older person or into a men's shed and our surgery is not all of them but a huge number now have something called link workers and they effectively signpost people into those services, into those groups and that helps. It does and we know this from the fact that we are social beings. We are very similar, I think I mentioned a couple of episodes ago, very similar to elephants. We are innately social. So when we remove ourselves or are removed from that we are obviously going to experience ramifications of that and sluice of emotions which could be loneliness, it could be sadness or being down, it could be longing, it could be so many things and it's really interesting actually that you said that there's a social prescription because we know from a mental health perspective that social routine therapy is so pertinent when it comes to being able to become like we were saying before a stakeholder within our own communities, whether they be online in person, whole city networks or tiny rural networks, it's incredibly needed. And I actually heard the other day from one of our, they called the ACT Health Network and they kind of like the primary health network or the local health district for camera and some of their outline areas and they have this similar thing they are called a green prescription and it's to go out, go for a walk, it's to have five mindfulness minutes on a park bench in outdoors, those sorts of things which are just so brilliant but also so chafing to a lot of Western sort of ideologies as to what a prescription is. It is. I mean this is a thing that I'm a big advocate for well being. I believe that there are a couple of things that I really fundamentally believe are the solutions to everything in life, show me a problem and somewhere this will be able to solve it, support, I mean it's born exercise and being outdoors in nature and that will solve everything. I can't think of a problem but any of those things can't somehow resolve. To me it's just like, I don't understand why we even have in this conversation, it's just like it's clear. So, green therapy, blue therapy which is anything by the water, forest bathing, mindfulness, high ease sort of kind of obviously anything involving a breathing technique. That's not going to solve loneliness, doing a meditation but it doesn't improve your own resilience. Exactly. So, pet ownership is another thing. You said you left the office to come home to your dog. So, you don't have some, you know, four-legged thing that is keeping you company but actually you have to take that dog out and you'll meet other people with dogs. So, there's a connection there, your dog is making you make another connection. And so, you know, I just think that we have so much that we need to do. One of the things that we did put in the report relating to older people is about pet ownership because unfortunately a lot of care homes here for older people don't allow pets to go with them. Yes, I'm here. And it's to say why? Yeah. So, what is a cat, you know, in some room that you're now confined to for the rest of your life? Yeah. And what harm is that going to do? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Who is it placing in, you know, in any position to be a deterrent for overall health, let alone their own mental well and well-being, mental health and well-being? It is absolutely discombobulating when you talk about it from that perspective. Well, companion animals are proven to improve mental well-being. So, you know, there's been a great deal of research here about pet ownership and the consequence on mental health. And the physical act of stroking a cat, I don't, I can't remember the precise sort of kind of statistics, but physically stroking a cat can change your neurological process. And make you feel better, which is why we have things like patty dogs going into special education needs schools here or schools with high need in other sort of kind of aspects. Patty dogs going to care homes, because the physical act of stroking an animal releases, I don't know what it does, you know, it's not what it's been. But it releases something. Yeah, something that makes you feel better. So, you know, we could just like make the world better place. Look, through sport, for legged friends and differing prescriptions, being green, social, blue, like the world cannot stop us, right? No, exactly, exactly. I'm ready to take over the world from this end. We do it from down there. Done. And I'm sure by the end we'll meet together in the middle somewhere. We'll meet you equator. Yeah, exactly. Maybe somewhere tropical, that might be now. Yeah, I'll meet you in Bali. Perfect, perfect. What have been some of the sort of the measured outcomes or the significant outcomes you've mentioned, things like those individuals who place people in. Link workers. Link workers, that's it. And you had something to do with a poll and linking. Don't ask me how. But what are some of the other outcomes or sort of products that have come from this report? So, the report was published in October 2018. And then I left government actually quite soon after. But I think there was good progress being made and then COVID hit. And the pandemic just changed everything. Not in terms of the recognition of the issue. And if anything, I think the pandemic helped with the conversation about loneliness. I think it probably reduced the stigma around loneliness. But where it didn't help was that there was a growth in terms of activity to tackling loneliness. And Link workers are part of our national health system and they were redirected into helping fight the pandemic and provide a better understanding. vaccinations, supporting surgeries in different ways. Of course, groups didn't meet. So your Rambler group couldn't meet, your WR, your women's institute couldn't meet, your walking network couldn't meet, things like that. So unfortunately, I think while the structural kind of activity had got to a really good place when it came to them being implemented, the pandemic struck and it was removed. However, I think now that we're pretty much out the other side and all the restrictions are lifted here. That is gaining traction again. I as a local MP do an event for the over 55s. It's like a freshest fair for older people. Can any younger people join? No, no, no, you can't stand, right? I'll do that. It's for the over 55s on purpose because the nearing retirement or for those who have already retired and it's about connecting people to hobby groups and activity groups but also to expyfile services that they might not know that's been out there. We've had a significant amount of interest in either being an exhibitor at those things or from coming to them because people are desperately keen to go out there again and to meet people again and to resume the lives that they had pre in February 2020. So those sorts of things are becoming really important now. That's so great to hear about that. I think more people should take a leaf out of your political run in the sense of what you've done in the varying positions because like we're chatting just before, there is so much simple things that we can implement within ourselves and those around us that will help us not negate the emotion but navigate the emotion of loneliness to desigmatize it in the sense that we all feel it and we all will feel it from time to time but it shouldn't be affecting us in the rate that things like smoking does from a physical health standpoint. I think part of it is about consciousness of other people as well and we all get very aware of our older neighbours at Christmas time. They're not going to neighbour check, they're okay because they might not actually see anyone for five days. We had some research that showed us that people are more lonely in the summer because they've got all their windows open and they can hear everyone and the gardens having fun, having barbecues and they're sat there watching the TV because that's all they've got for company. I appreciate you're just going into winter so maybe the barbies are being stopped but one of those things just to think about is to invite a neighbour because that might be the only connection that they have for weeks. There was that phomo element is huge isn't it when it comes to any situation but that's really interesting about summer and the fact that you can be so close to something and it's just out of reach that sort of almost glass perspective or imprisonment within your own home in that sense. There was a gentleman who I was actually just thinking about the other day a couple of years ago I used to live opposite him in an apartment complex and he would leave a new book on my doorstep for me to read and in turn I would leave something for him or it'd come in and I'd fix his DVR or things like that and it was so lovely and I was thinking the other day that I needed to drop a postcard in his mailbox to sort of see how he's doing but I know that that interaction between himself and myself I'm sure met just as much as it did to him as it did to me. I gained so much belonging and importance or self importance in that sense because I knew that there was that neighbour across the hall who at the time my four-legged friend was a puppy and with how when I would leave and he would come and stand at the door and how back at the dog. So there was so many cute interactions within that sort of one living circumstance but it was so easy to extend that hand I guess and it made me feel a lot less lonely and I'm sure it made him equal. One of the recommendations we put in the report was volunteering. How can you help others but how can you also make yourself a less lonely and volunteering as part of a befriending service was one of those things and it's again it's proven that volunteering improves your wellbeing for exactly that reason right because you get something out of it as much as the person that you are helping or supporting and that's you know that's a classic example. You were basically you did a sort of a pen pal type befriending service. I know and it probably when you came back and there was a possibly it probably you know made you really excited it was you know it's like receiving a letter from a loved one from afar right you didn't know when it was coming and it was exciting and I think yeah befriending services are huge and you know really really important people's lives speaking up that phone and saying hi how are you you know it's just it's massively important yeah there's this show the ed on the abc here which documented it must I think it was something like six or 12 weeks of these toddlers sort of roughly around the preschool age that sort of three to four age group coming into a nursing home and each week same day each week and interacting and building these relationships with these these residents and it was you were you were crying out of pure joy and and being from being touched I mean there was this one narrative of this woman who was so hard and so sheld over and it sort of took a number of times but then you could see that she came she came right out and by the end of it it was she really missed them and and that from that it's starting to become something that is being implemented again it's community based and local parliament based but it's something that starting to be implemented and sort of reflecting across the nation in those that all moments because that we all as a public got to see firsthand through documentation the impact it made it was incredible I think and these things are really important and actually they do quite a lot of the intergenerational groups here as well and the outcomes are absolutely lovely um you know we all get excited about no reality TV when it's sort of kind of you know love for a citer and all that malarkey um and um but actually the things that really touch our hearts are those where that people are overcoming challenges in different ways and there are so many different challenges that people face every day and yet somehow there is a solution around connectivity um and you know we had a similar reality show here called the restaurant that made the restaurant that made mistakes and basically it was all people with out-simers or severe learning disabilities and they but they ran a restaurant and you know they were positive that there were hilarious right you know someone without some taking an order you know and then by the time they got to the you know past they had no idea who it's for and things like but actually what was heartwarming was the connections that they made the relationships that they made and how they all became friends and they were all helping each other and supporting each other and as a consequence their own well-being was improved and that's what it's all about you know this is about you know your podcast is about mental health and mental well-being but you know mental well-being and physical well-being are very much things and loneliness can impact on both of those things yeah i mean we experience emotion across both and when you were saying that just before because you also read the reward and and feel good it was reminding me of that episode in friends where Phoebe and Joey are having a sort of an episode long argument that Phoebe was saying that there is no selfless deed and Joey was like yeah it's volunteering or doing this and she goes and then she sort of repute him and she'd be like but don't you feel good after that so you're getting something from that and it was really like for me that sort of put in contents the facts that the fact that there is an element of interest that we can all have within these these positions of volunteering and in opening a conversation with someone in an elevator or talking that little bit more with the person at the front desk of your work where your apartment complex. Like those tiny interactions, I know it's usually helped me in my daily life by walking first thing in the door of work and seeing Sheila who men's the front desk and we both smile at each other, ask how we've been, how you know what we're up to today or if today's the daunting day. And the days when she's not there, I sorely miss her. I miss seeing that face when you walk in and it makes you feel again that bit less lonely and has that positive impact on our wellbeing both mental and physical. - Yeah, clearly. Well, one of the things that we found here is that sole workers or loan workers, you know, actually suffer quite high levels of loneliness and the chancellor, who was chancellor when I was doing this report, was particularly concerned about those kind of loan workers because of the impact on productivity. And he was thinking of things like Amazon delivery drivers, right? You know, they sit there in their van all day by themselves, just jumping out, knocking on the door, putting a parcel on and then jumping back in again. And you have a very different relationship with your Amazon delivery driver than you do with your postman. And you know, your postman, you'll sit and have a long conversation with or I certainly do. Whereas my Amazon delivery driver, you know, I just wanted to give me my parcel and go again. - If I could ask one last question, what is one thing that you could do for someone and yourself and I think we've talked about a number of these, but what is one thing that anyone can do here and now tomorrow today to help sort of negate loneliness? - Well, I think it's making a connection with somebody. It is talking to somebody who is sat at a front desk. It is picking up the phone to your grandparents that you haven't spoken to for weeks on end. It is, you know, with everyone working from home at the moment, it's actually just having a phone conversation or trying to meet for a coffee in a park. Because, you know, the world has changed quite significantly since we wrote the report. Work from home has many advantages, but one of the disadvantages is the actual real life connections. So, you know, pick a, work from home buddy and just say, hey, let's go for a coffee in the park at lunchtime. Because that will improve your life, but it will improve theirs as well. - That's so perfect. Thank you so much, Tracy. It's been an absolute pleasure chatting with you and feeling a whole range of emotions, not just, you know, lowliness in isolation to pardon the pun. - Well, thank you for having me. It's been a pleasure. (upbeat music) - If you liked this episode and you want to hear more, click the subscribe button. Feel free to even give us a rating or add a review. I would dearly love to see and hear your thoughts. If you're on Instagram, head over to the informed. THE, I-N-F-O-R-M-D. Just take out the E. where I post episode related content each week. (upbeat music)