Ben West on the book that could save your life

Virgin Radio

9 May 2022, 11:22

Chris Evans and Ben West at Virgin Radio.

Trigger warning: Suicide/Depression

Mental health activist Ben West joined the Chris Evans Breakfast Show with Sky to talk about how, when he was 17, he lost his 15-year-old brother to suicide. Ben has since found the strength to learn, educate and campaign about mental health, and his first book has just been published.

This Book Could Save Your Life: Breaking The Silence Around The Mental Health Emergency serves as a reminder that in despair you can always find hope, with advice and practical takeaways. At the start of Mental Health Awareness Week, which starts today (Monday 9th May to Sunday 15th May), Ben told Chris: “I had absolutely no idea what mental health was. It was never something that anyone spoke to me about, it’s not something I ever learnt at school. It’s not something that was ever on my radar, and then in September 2017, my brother Sam was diagnosed with clinical depression.”

Ben admitted: “I never talked to Sam about it, I never asked about it, because in my world, I was like, if I was sad, I’d go and play football in the park with my mates, or go and see my friends, or go for a run. So, I couldn’t understand how you could be diagnosed with being sad. So I didn’t really give two thoughts to it.”

In January 2018, Sam took his own life just before his 16th birthday. Ben said: “That for me was obviously an incredibly awful experience. Me and my mum found him. I had the traumatic experience of having to do CPR for about 25 minutes, and I guess that experience just sort of opened my eyes up to the fact that, not only was Sam really struggling in a way that I didn’t comprehend before, but actually in the response after this happened, so many of my friends started talking about what they were going through. So many people at school started talking about what they were going through… Eating disorders, depression, anxiety, suicidal thoughts. Almost everyone I knew at school had something that they weren’t talking about with people. 

“I just remember thinking, I need to do something now, in the wake of this awful tragedy, to help those people who are still alive, and to stop those families that would otherwise lose their own children if things don’t change.”

Speaking further about his brother Sam, Ben said: “It’s so, so sad that he came into the grips of such an awful illness, because he did love life, and he loved what it was about, and he loved art, and he loved music, and he loved making people laugh. And that’s one of the things that I noticed when he turned 15, was that sort of laughter, and that passion for what he loved sort of started to disappear a little bit, or at least it did to me.

“When he was at the worst, it was very obvious that he wasn’t okay, but I didn’t know what that meant. I didn’t know that not okay actually meant he has what is going to be a fatal illness. I didn’t know that. I just thought he was moody and stroppy, like we all are at 15.”

Each of the eight main chapters of Ben’s book has a ‘Takeaways’ section with tips, and the book also has short guides including How To Do CPR, What To Do If You/Someone Else Is Going Into Shock, and Tips For Managing Social Anxiety. He told Chris: “I’m not a professional, but one of the tools in my repertoire is that you don’t have to be a professional to truly understand, to be able to spot this, and I think really the key is, when I was trying to spot this, when Sam was struggling, I said it was subtle, and that he was moody. And you don’t necessarily have to identify the difference between someone being normal, healthy moody, and unhealthy, depressed symptoms. You don’t have to spot the signs of that. All you need to do is identify when someone’s not looking okay. It doesn’t matter why they’re not okay, ask them about it.

“Talking about our mental health is very, very easy. You spot someone that’s suffering or maybe unhappy in some way, and have a conversation with them. I think we need to start changing this preaching narrative around talking about mental health, away from telling people to talk if they’re struggling, and actually telling people to start talking to those people and start listening more.”

He added: “Pour them a cup of tea. I always say a cup of tea is like honesty juice.” 

Ben has won a Pride Of Britain Award, The Diana Award and the Mental Health Hero Award as part of the Sun Who Cares initiative. Speaking about living with grief and trauma, he told Chris: “I call it my pet dog, because actually grief and trauma, people say, ‘Oh it doesn’t go away,’ and all of this stuff, and it’s so negative. And for a long time I looked at grief and trauma as the enemy, and actually I’m in a position now where it’s not the enemy at all. It’s like my pet dog. It’s not going to go away, it’s never going to leave me, but that’s not a reason to call it the enemy. 

“And actually it’s a part of me, and it’s something I’m going to try and learn to live with, and learn to protect and learn to care for, and if you can do that, that’s a really important step, to understand that actually, the difficult parts of your life, they’re not necessarily parts of your life that you want to reject and forget about and move on, actually the difficult parts of your life are something to really treasure, because you’ve managed to get through that.”

Ben continued: “There’s a Japanese artform, Kintsugi, which is where broken pottery gets remade with gold filling, and it’s all about trying to embrace our flaws, and go through difficult times and have those cracks, but actually be like, ‘You know what, I got through that.’ 

“If you were to run an ultramarathon, you’d feel really good about that for the rest of your life. I’ve gone through the equivalent of an ultramarathon mentally, and, actually, I’m going to feel good about the fact that I’ve got through that. Obviously it’s a very difficult memory, but I’ve got through it, and that’s something to embrace and be proud of.”

On the release of his book, Ben said: “When Sam died, I honestly - and I really mean this - I honestly didn’t see how anything in my life would ever be positive again. I honestly didn’t see how anything would be good in my life ever again. And it’s actually quite emotional to see the book, because it’s living, physical proof that something positive has happened out of this.”

This Book Could Save Your Life is out now. 

At Virgin Radio, we are committed to improving the wellbeing of our audience wherever possible. Whilst we ourselves are not Mental Health experts or qualified to directly assist those in need, we have compiled useful resources to help point you in the right direction, should you need help, at virginradio.co.uk/mental-health-resources.

For more great interviews listen to  The Chris Evans Breakfast Show with Sky, weekdays from 6:30am on Virgin Radio, or  catch up on-demand here.

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