In this deeply honest and moving episode, Ashley sits down with Sam Thomas, a Brighton-based entrepreneur, podcast host, mental health advocate and founder of the Y'Alright Mate? campaign.

Sam shares, with remarkable openness, the moments that brought him to his knees, from nearly losing his daughter at birth, to the self-worth challenges that led him to thoughts of suicide in his late 30s.

What unfolds is not just a story of survival, but a powerful reflection on why asking for help is so hard, and why it can be life-saving. And transformative from shame and feeling “I’m not enough” to believing “I am enough”, we discuss how how asking for help transforms self-worth, dissolves inadequacy and opens the door to genuine support

Together, Ashley and Sam explore:

• How early childhood narratives shape our relationship with vulnerability
• Why men are often taught to “get on with it”, and the cost of that silence
• From shame and feeling “I’m not enough” to believing “I am enough” - how asking for help transforms self-worth, dissolves inadequacy and opens the door to genuine support
• How outdated definitions of success quietly damage mental health
• Why and how two emotions can coexist: strength and fear, optimism and grief
• How asking for help can become a life-changing gift, not a burden

This episode is a raw, human conversation about shame, identity, masculinity and the courage it takes to let others in - especially when you’ve spent your life being the strong one.

Key Themes & Moments

• Growing up working-class and learning to survive without asking for help
• Becoming a father, and navigating three weeks of terrifying uncertainty
• Toxic positivity and emotional suppression
• Hitting rock bottom and questioning whether life was worth continuing
• Redefining success as love, relationships and alignment
• Learning to say: “I need help” and letting others respond
• Why reframing help as a gift changes everything
• The power of a simple question: “You Alright, mate?”

About Sam Thomas

Sam is a social entrepreneur and mental health advocate based in Brighton. He is the founder of the You Alright Mate? campaign, encouraging men to check in on each other and normalise honest conversations around mental health and suicide prevention.

A Simple Ask

Sam’s invitation is beautifully simple:
Check in on someone this week and ask "You Alright mate?"
One message. One question. One moment of connection.

Because sometimes, that question really can save a life.

Links & Resources

• You Alright Mate? Campaign - https://www.different-hats.co.uk/you-alright-mate
• The Gift of Help mission and services - www.thegiftofhelp.org

If this conversation resonated with you, please consider sharing it with someone who might need it, and remember: asking for help is not weakness, it’s courage.

You can contact me on:
Email: ashley@thegiftofhelp.org
Facebook: Ashley Usiskin
Instagram: @gift_of_accepting_help_podcast
Linked: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashleyusiskin/

This episode is with Nicolette Lazarus, a self-described midlife woman, solo female founder with a 100% record of getting through bad days.

Her life has been quite a journey - growing up in an immigrant family in the early 70s, having her attitude to help inadvertently imprinted by an incident with her younger smarter brother, battling to have a successful career in advertising, a post-divorce transformational solo adventure through Australia’s outback, through to a deeply challenging time during her 40’s navigating perimenopause.

All of this has led her to follow her purpose and start Womanship, a game-changing help each other community for women and wellness providers.

Some themes we cover:

The influence on her attitude to help of a seemingly innocuous encounters in ur childhood

Eldest child syndrome and expectation to help other people

Needing to prove we can do things and as good as other people prevent us from us asking for help

How self-acceptance is vital to getting comfortable to have the self-worth to ask for help.

Holding space for people to talk is a priceless form of offering help

Difficulty to talk about the very private experience of miscarriage

The importance of asking for help you become the person that you know you have the potential to become.

The historical negative cognation of therapy and help can hold people back from seeking support

The easier approach to ask for help on behalf of your passion project versus asking explicitly for yourself.

Being specific with your ask is a great way to increase your success at getting a successful outcome to your request.

Telling yourself what’s the worst that can happen will help get over your fears of asking.

Want to get early access to Nicolette's Womanship platform? You can sign up at www.womanship.co and/or follow @_Womanship on Instagram for inspirational content and exclusive updates. #sharemoreworryless

You can contact me on:
Email: ashley@thegiftofhelp.org
Facebook: Ashley Usiskin
Instagram: @gift_of_accepting_help_podcast
Linked: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashleyusiskin/

This episode is with Greg Allon, father of 3, Chief Operating Officer at a TV Production company, enthusiastic runner, blog writer and aspirational author

15 years ago he was diagnosed with malignant melanoma whilst his youngest of three kids was 9 months old. And then a couple of years later, he started a spinning studios business with his sister and brother-in-law.

We discuss his insights on help from these life-changing experiences and how they have fundamentally changed his outlook on life. How they’ve acted as a reminder of how priceless the help from his wife, family and friends was during those tough times, and even now as he takes on new challenges including writing a novel.

Some of themes we cover are:

• Children naturally ask for help, as we become adults we overthink it.
• Hierarchy of help - the multiple ways it can be offered, publicly or anonymously help, accepted and asked for
• The challenge help offerers experience in asking for help themselves
• The resistance to asking for help, and the reliance on your partner to be one’s ‘help crutch’
• The importance of asking for help for emotional and mental support as much as for practical, logistical support
• The closer you are to your family and friends the easier to ask for help
• Illness is more straight forward to ask for help, but it’s other less obvious situations that are nearly as valuable to ask for help, but it’s harder because it’s less obvious you need it.
• The partner needs as much if not more help and support than the person who’s sick.
• When starting a business how important it is consider what happens if it just goes, ok and to keep going only if you maintain your current job commitment. Not just consider if it’s a failure or a great success.
• Starting and running a business has inevitable waves of crisis and low points, where you’re verging on being desperate and forced to ask for help
• How one particular friend went way beyond expectations to help and find ways to keep Greg’s business going
• Asking people for favours, help, advice and intros historically didn’t come naturally, but the harsh start up experience has now made that much more natural.
• The more times you now practise asking for help and make it become a habit, the more proficient and comfortable you become
• The Benjamin Franklin effect - by asking a favour and advice can reframe an adversarial relationship to a trusting and valued one.
• How giving help is part of self-fulfilment and as such can be considered the top of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

You can contact me on:
Email: ashley@thegiftofhelp.org
Facebook: Ashley Usiskin
Instagram: @gift_of_accepting_help_podcast
Linked: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashleyusiskin/