The Wellness Edit Series 3

29/06/20233 min read

Dr Gemma Newman, the Plant Power Doctor, is our host for the podcast series, the Wellness Edit, brought to you by Holland & Barrett.

In season three Gemma's guests discuss some of the biggest topics in wellness, including sleep, gut health, mental wellbeing and menopause. From leading gut health expert Dr Megan Rossi to Harry Potter actor and vegan podcaster Evanna Lynch, and so much more, in each episode our guests share some advice and inspiration, and get pretty honest about their own experiences too. Join Gemma every Wednesday from 5 January as we deep dive into these wellness topics, learn something, and have some fun along the way.

Latest episode

Evanna Lynch might have shot to fame as a child actor playing Luna Lovegood in the Harry Potter films, but she’s also a committed vegan, a body positivity ambassador and the author of a powerful new book charting her eating disorder and subsequent mental health journey and recovery – The Opposite of Butterfly Hunting.

In this honest and sometimes emotional conversation, she talks about why she wrote the book to change the conversation around eating disorders and put the focus on mental wellbeing, and to give comfort to other sufferers.

If you’re part of Julie’s social media audience of three million, you’ll already know how brilliant she is at distilling complex mental health issues and creating simple tools you can use if you want to know how to improve your own mental wellbeing.

In this cannot-miss-it conversation with Gemma, she unpacks some of the key ideas in her new book, ‘Why Has Nobody Told Me This Before?’, from answering the questions ‘What is self-compassion?, ‘What is the difference between low mood and depression’ and ‘How to have a growth mindset’, to why values are more important than self-esteem and the importance of facing your fears.

Dr Zoe shares her tips on how exercise can lift your mood, how to get the best from your GP, plus her three ingredients for success. In this wide-ranging conversation, Zoe also talks about her experience as a new mum, and why she feels it’s so important to be honest on social media about motherhood.

In this friendly and open chat, the Happy Pear Twins, Stephen and David Flynn, talk to Gemma about their journey running a plant-based business and what they’ve learnt along the way.

Plus they share heaps of easy, achievable healthy habits – like how to start being plant-based, some quick plant-based recipes for busy people, and how to choose healthy ingredients (and what counts as a superfood).

This episode is both a personal campaign from Mariella and Alice to break the stigma around menopause, and an invaluable resource - it’s packed with information and advice both from themselves and the many experts they have spoken to.

As Mariella might put it, don’t think that if you’re not menopausal, this episode isn’t for you - listening to it will empower anyone who is interested in health and wellness.

Dr Megan Rossi, known as the Gut Health Doctor, is one of the leading experts in the world when it comes to gut health. In this information-packed episode, she explains why we should all be eating more plant-based foods for better gut health, and gives us some recipe inspiration for sneaking and squeezing more plants into our diets – she even turns white chocolate into a gut-friendly food.

She also explains why restrictive diets, like the keto diet which involves cutting out a whole food group, can be bad for our gut health. Gemma and Megan also talk about some of the most common gut health issues, such as bloating and IBS, and Megan offers a wealth of interventions to try if you are suffering from any of them.

In this powerful and honest conversation, Emma talks about the power of failure as she shares how it was failure that led to her subsequent success as a podcaster.

With her extensive knowledge of beauty, she talks about how there are two types of beauty personality and takes us through the best beauty skincare ingredients that work for everyone. She also gets honest with Gemma about her personal weight loss story and discusses the weight loss advice that works for her.

Whether it’s caused by anxiety over the pandemic, or our always-on lifestyles and inability to stop the scroll, we’re in the midst of a sleep crisis. In this episode, leading sleep physiologist Stephanie Romiszewski explains that so much of what we are being told to do to improve our sleep is actually making it worse.

But, if we think about our sleep differently, there are simple changes we can make to our behaviour to help us sleep better. In this advice-packed podcast, she talks to Gemma about her tools for sleep, including why getting up at the same time every day is so important and why we shouldn’t go to bed unless we’re tired.

In this relaxed chat, Madeleine talks to Gemma about starting out on her wellness journey when she was diagnosed with IBS, at a time when our knowledge of gut health and what constitutes a healthy diet was far less evolved than it is now.

She discusses her morning and evening routines, why meditation brings her comfort and gives her tips for how to do it. She also shares advice on instilling healthy habits in children and her favourite snacks if you’re on the go – plus why how you eat is as important as what you eat.