Well this is all a little emotional isn’t it?! This is the final episode (FOR NOW) in the current instalment of Strong Tea & Quick Brews. With a lot happening in our personal lives right now, we’ve decided to take a break until 2024 to give us chance to focus on other areas and also to plan ahead to Strong Tea 2.0! We want to come back with a BANG!…

Now, you know we love a fan girl moment and this is the ultimate for our Katie. The incredible Naomi Channell from the brilliant true crime podcast Real joins us today to chat all things true crime and we can’t get enough! As a follow up to our Quick Brew episode (Why Are We Obsessed With True Crime - Quick Brew, ep 20), we wanted to chat to someon…

Trigger Warning: This episode and description contains details of suicide, eating disorders and depression. This episode features a truly inspiring guest. Sandeep Saib is a lived experience mental health advocate, Rethink Mental Health Charity committee member, Time to Change London champion, Samaritans volunteer, South Asian Health Action Mental H…

Valen Vain. The Filth Wizard. What can we say about the incredible Valen?! Valen is the founder and the face behind KEN - Kinky Erotic Nature events in Hull - Yorkshire's Largest Kinky Cabaret, he’s a compere, a singer, a pole & aerial hoop dancer, he’s the founder and presenter of the podcast Thirsty Work (see the link below) and he’s a sexual edu…

Today we meet with the absolutely lovely Dr Ellie Birtley. You only need take a peek at her website, which you can do here, to see what a brilliantly talented woman this is. Dr Ellie explains the top reasons that people come to sex therapy, we ask just how she helps her clients and delve into why sex is STILL (in 2023) a taboo topic! If you'd like …

We are once again, extremely honoured to have the wonderful Finlay Games joining us, this time to get a little intimate to talk all about sex and trans. One reoccurring theme that we seem to continue to trip over with our wonderful trans guests is that other people always seem to be obsessed with what’s in their pants. You wouldn’t ask a cis person…

Sex Toys. Gone are the days of skulking into a seedy back alley shop to purchase them. Sex toys are now more readily available than ever and the number of companies and distributors in the UK is growing all the time. And so, we came across the wonderful Sam Evans from Jo Divine (see the links below), the most wonderful and customer centred toy shop…

When we first interviewed our wonderful friend of the show, Dom Smith (episode 24 if you haven’t listened - you really should!), we were stunned as he talked about his journey with Cerebral Palsy and the questions he gets asked - so many of those questions are extremely personal and normally about sex. Dom is the first person to put his hands up an…

Trigger Warning: This episode contains details of addiction, depression and other mental health issues. Bella Goode is the very definition of the term strong woman. Bella has tackled many hard times and traumas in her life and it’s never once stopped her. For years, after suffering with depression, addiction and PND amongst damaging relationships, …

Katie Neeves calls herself the gobby trans woman and we love her for that. Katie is a woman on a mission - but not just any woman and not just any mission! She lived for 48 years as a man while struggling with her gender from the age of 3 and hiding her big secret to the World. She was thrown into turmoil when her gender dysphoria increased dramati…

The history of witchcraft is a long and harrowing one. Witchcraft was not made a capital offence in Britain until 1563 although it was deemed heresy and was denounced as such by Pope Innocent VIII in 1484. From 1484 until around 1750 some 200,000 witches were tortured, burnt or hanged in Western Europe. Brett, know as the Witch of Salopia grew up s…

Trigger Warning: Episode discusses mental health disorders, intrusive thoughts and self harm. Brooke Miller joins us all the way from Wisconsin for this episode to discuss her mental health advocacy journey. Brooke discusses her own journey and experiences of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, eating disorders, panic attacks, panic disorder and Bipolar…

Jennie is an award-winning freelance health journalist, writing features for national newspapers and magazines. Her work has appeared in The Times, the Daily Telegraph, the Daily Mail, the i paper, Red magazine, Women’s Health, Grazia, ELLE UK, the Guardian, and the Observer, among others. Jennie's first book, Life, Almost: Miscarriage, misconcepti…

Madeleine Black is the courage cultivator. And my goodness, there couldn't be a more appropriate phrase for her if we'd come up with it ourselves! Madeleine Black grew up in London in the late 1970’s and she was brutally raped at the age of 13 by two American teenagers. In 2014, having come to terms with how the trauma had shaped her life, she deci…

Today’s episode is with a fantastic human, author of the book OCDad: Learning to be a Parent with a Mental Health Disorder, Jason Adams. Obsessive Compulsive Disorder is something we should all know more about as it is frequently mis-referenced when people say they are “a little bit OCD” because they like cleaning or symmetry. Miseducation is sadly…

Trigger Warning: Episode contains descriptions of childhood sexual abuse. Strong Tea podcast is all about talking about issues which people find difficult to discuss, the things that people shy away from talking about and this was one of the hardest topics to talk about. Our guest "Sam" has asked to remain anonymous as she tells her story of childh…

Bisexual Erasure. A pervasive problem in which the existence or legitimacy of bisexuality (either in general or in regard to an individual) is questioned or denied outright. In this episode, we chat with our own fabulous Vikki and our fantastic, returning Strong Tea family favourite April Kelley, all about their own experiences of bisexual erasure …

Marianne Oakes is an extraordinary woman, not only has she been through her own transitional journey, she now dedicates her life to helping and supporting others in the LGBTQ+ community. Assigned male at birth, Marianne grew up with a feeling of not fitting in her body, that something wasn’t quite right. She started presenting female in the privacy…

Welcome to the third episode in our 2023 Pride series! This is a hugely important episode for us. Terminology and what you can and can't say these days can be incredibly confusing in an ever changing culture so, as part of our Pride series, we've decided to round up an extensive (but not exhaustive) list of LGBTQ+ terminology to help you understand…

We are so lucky to be bringing you the second episode in our Pride series with the incredible Tom Hayes-Isaacs who is a passionate HIV activist and advocate. Working across the UK and Europe he aims to both help reduce the number of new diagnoses, and improve life for those living with HIV. Born in October 1985, Tom grew up in the the Midlands. Tom…

Welcome to our first episode of our Pride series, 2023!! Finn is transgender which means he was assigned female at birth but is, in fact, male. Finn came out as transgender in 2012 and began his medical transition in 2013. The medical side of his transition was completed in 2018, but the social aspect of transition is, and likely always will be, on…

Trigger Warning: Child loss, mental health, traumatic birth, and pregnancy after loss. Back in 2021, our very own Katie suffered unimaginable loss when her daughter died. What came next was a traumatic, emotional and grief stricken journey to have another baby. Katie shares with us her journey, the feelings she experienced, the things that helped a…

Sarah Wallace is supermum. Today's episode is like no other, we talk to Sarah Wallace who talks us through her life parenting two children with special educational needs.Ollie has Down's syndrome and Alfie has autism. Sarah talks us through what it's like parenting with these additional challenges and how she now supports others by sharing her stor…

Living on the bipolar spectrum, with a side order of PTSD & ADHD, there are very few who command a room like Thomas. After growing up in difficult circumstances, Thomas successfully turned his life around to help other people, saving countless lives along the way. Thomas Duncan Bell is often better known across the UK & Internationally as The Bipol…

We are so pleased to have our friend and member of the Strong Tea family back with us today! George Mycock’s is the founder of Myominds, a company that works to shine a light on and unravel what mental health means in the exercising community. Myominds lead on research projects alongside some of the UK’s top universities whilst also creating conver…

This Quick Brew tackles a really tricky, but relevant, topic. We explore the pandora’s box that is cancel culture. Cancel culture is the mass withdrawal of support from public figures or celebrities who have done things that aren't socially accepted today. This practice of "cancelling" or mass shaming often occurs on social media platforms such as …

You know when you meet someone who just kicks the butt out of being awesome? Get ready to meet Kaddy, faced with challenging adversity throughout her life, she’s remained strong and positive and has become a force to be reckoned with. Listen to Kaddy’s story as she tells it from the perspective of a mother, a full-time care giver and advocate for c…

Time for another Tea Break! 2023 has been so busy for us already, we wanted to take five, grab a cuppa and take stock. This mini episode sees us chat what's been released this year so far, what topics and guests are coming up for Strong Tea, some highlights and some of the juicy content we want to get into for Quick Brews, all this AND what the bes…

The book, Don’t Forget To Scream : Untold Truths About Motherhood speaks for itself when it comes to reviews:To describe this book as honest, brave, empathetic and powerful doesn't do it justice – it is all these things in abundance, but also funny and beautifulAdam Kay Don’t Forget To Scream is a stunning, urgent, feminist masterpiece. Many of the…

Katie & Vikki are back again with a follow up to the extremely popular and heated episode discussing Euthanasia, released on February 17th 2023. This time we are joined by the wonderful Dr Tom Petrie. At the time of recording, Tom is in his final few weeks of medical training at Leicester University. Tom has a special interest in rheumatology and c…

We were first introduced to Gina Kinson by Michael Johnson-Ellis who was the guest in our first episode in the Becoming a Parent series, My Surrogacy Journey. We learnt so much about the process and experience of surrogate parents but we also had so many questions and wanted to learn more about these incredible humans who are the surrogates. The wo…

Next up in our Becoming A Parent mini series, we delve into the world of adoption. In 2022, just under 3000 children were adopted, an increase from the previous year. There are so many reasons that people look to adopt and in today’s episode, Katy Smith shares her own personal experience. Katy is a wellbeing and self-development coach for parents a…

In the next episode of our Becoming a Parent series, we are joined by our very special guest, Kate Draper. Kate talks to us about her experience in becoming a solo mum by choice. Motherhood is not contingent on a romantic relationship, marriage, or partnership (even though arguably, our culture holds bias against single parenting and encourages the…

Excited to bring you a special midweek podcast this week in honour of International Women’s Day! Today’s episode is a Quick Brew but with a very special guest, Krisi Smith of the awesome Bird & Blend tea! Bird & Blend was founded in 2014 and has since becoming one of the greatest boutique tea brands in the UK with 14 retail stores and a significant…

So excited to bring you the first instalment in our Becoming A Parent series. Today, the incredible Michael Johnson-Ellis from TwoDadsUK® joins us to talk all about his and his husband Wes’ journey to become parents using a surrogate. Surrogacy is becoming an increasingly popular way in the UK to become a parent for a variety of different people wh…

Today's episode is something a little different. We teamed up with the fantastic Tyler Copenhaver-Heath and Clifford Starks from the Bully This - A Hero's Journey podcast to talk all things bullying. Both of these gents have incredible stories and experiences that they share with us in this episode, along with talking about how they created the awa…

TRIGGER WARNING: discusses suicide, dying, and terminal illness. The right to die. Morally, a tough debate to have, but so very important.Imagine suffering with an incurable illness that offered an extremely limited quality of life, you’ve spent your life independent, happy and active. This illness will destroy your body and mind, it will be extrem…

Katie has known Joe since she was a teeny tiny girl, their mums worked together many moons ago and are life long friends. Joe is one hell of a human! Tenacious, outgoing and supremely positive, he has lived all over the world and had an array of jobs. In his late 20s, during training for a half marathon, Joe noticed some changes in his body, a seri…

Social Media. Best thing since sliced bread or a recipe for disaster? We delve into the toxic world of social media. Deep fakes to fake news - just how toxic is social media for us? We look at social media and freedom of speech, is everyone entitled to say and post what they think? So many questions, so little time! In this hour long episode we dis…

We are so excited to be bringing you the first of several fantastic episodes with the very lovely Finlay Games. Finlay, also known as Finn, has a huge following online thanks to his wonderfully honest accounts of his life journey. In this episode, Finn discusses his journey with drugs and alcohol and how he used these to block out feelings, emotion…

True Crime is a loved genre of books, podcasts, movies and tv shows and documentaries the World over, but why? Why does watching or listening to, in some cases, seriously hideous crimes, fascinate us so much? In this episode Katie & Vikki delve into the world of murderers, kidnappers, cannibals and cults to discover why true crime has so many fans …

Victoria Kleinsman returns as a very loved member of the Strong Tea family to talk openly and honestly about surviving eating disorders. Vic has overcome anorexia, binge eating disorder, and bulimia. Vic’s battle with food started at a very young age and plagued her for many years but strength and resilience has not only helped her survive these di…

It's 2023, and we are LIVE!! Happy new year folks and thank you for joining us for another exciting year of podcasting delights! This episode sees us chat through many of the forthcoming episodes and topics we will be covering in 2023 and what our new year's resolutions are! Whatever the new year holds for you, we are pleased to have you with us so…

Welcome to the last podcast of 2022, the big Christmas Tea Party! 2022 has been an incredible year for us and so we take the opportunity to chat through some of the incredible guests and topics from the year, discuss some of the biggest moment of 2022 in the media (who could forget the slap heard around the World!) and if we actually stuck with any…

Have you ever met someone that just oozes with loveliness? That’s Jonathan. We came across Jonathan Blake following his appearance on the recent Sky documentary, Positive. This incredible three part series looked at the AIDS epidemic during the 80s and how people’s lives were affected, the persecution that the gay community faced and how the media …

Stress. Our body and mind’s natural reaction to pressure. Being triggered when we experience something new or unexpected that threatens our sense of self or when we feel we have little control over a situation. Stress can be experienced anywhere and at any time in many different scenarios, in this episode we talk about when and where it can happen,…

Trigger warning: This episode contains details of violence, rape, animal abuse, depression and emotive content. Contains some swearing. Victoria Kleinsman is an inspiration. In what is one of the most emotional episodes in the Strong Tea series so far, we cannot tell you how wonderful this lady is. Vic is a coach who provides food freedom and body …

This episode sees Katie & Vikki delve into the dark world of bullying which happens in school, the workplace, online and in the home. It happens far more than you’d think. Not beating around the bush, we talk about the types of bullying, the stats and our own personal experiences. Bullying is damaging and can have a profound effect on mental health…

Birth control. It's been around for a long long time, and yet this topic is still not talked about enough. This episode sees us discuss the different types, the pros and cons, the dangers, the myths, the politics and the inequalities...we cover it all. This episode has some surprising moments and includes research that we hope will give you food fo…

This episode brings us the wonderful Dom. And he really is, wonderful that is. Dom is an absolute powerhouse of a human being, his positivity is impossible not to warm to. This podcast details Dom’s journey with cerebral palsy and how the alternative community became a huge part of his life and support structure. We just had to invite him on and th…