Romesh Ranganathan said he was “one of the best places in my life ever” after years of mental health struggles.

Speaking on the BBC Radio 4's deserted island disc, the comedian described how he used running, reading and breathing exercises to help himself center, having previously had the idea of ​​committing suicide.

"Recognizing that it's half the battle," he told host Lauren Laverne, who said. "So sometimes I just went through a dark time and I knew I had to do something about it."

The broadcaster also said he was often ambivalent about how much his publicly shared mental health journey was, noting: “You have to be careful because it’s triggering (for others).

"The way I'm trying to solve this problem, I'm trying to normalize this feeling, not normal, but I'm trying to make it abnormal to make the conversation normal," he said.

“You’re going to talk openly about physical illness, ideally you’re going to talk openly about (mental health), you’re going to express all of these things, but you also have to be mindful of the fact that people might be affected by it.

“And then, if I suddenly say that I have thought about my life and someone lost someone because of that moment, then you have to be sensitive to that.

“You don’t always do this correctly, but I think the reward outweighs the risk,” he reflected.

The 47-year-old also said he had learned that it was important to take time to do activities and he knew it would make him feel better.

“One of the things I’ve noticed in terms of mental health is that what you do is effective and proves to be useful to you personally and then you stop doing it for some reason,” he said.

“You’re gone, ‘Oh, it’s great if I take some time to reflect, run or do some reading or some breathing exercises, it’s going to make me feel better.”

"Oh, I've been doing this for a week every day, I'm really feeling much better, will I stop? Yes!" he said with a smile. “And then a few weeks later, wondering why I was much worse than me.”

The host made her first comedy in the early 2010s, picking tracks from Kanye West, Eminem and Huey Lewis and News for Desert Island Discs, which aired Sunday.

Ranganathan, who hosted a weekend show at BBC Radio 2, also talked about how his family moved to the UK from Sri Lanka in 1970 and was born eight years later.

"My father was a little tornado, he came to England and he was used to the Sri Lanka lifestyle," he recalled. "He was like a kid in a candy shop, people were drinking and going out, and he was completely and thoroughly into British life.

Ranganathan smiled and said, “The boundaries that he should implement have stronger arguments than he did.” “He is the life and soul of the party.”

The comedian said one of his biggest regrets “not enough empathy or understanding” about the situation his mother Shanthi faced when she moved to the 19-year-old UK.

“The difference between her experience and my dad’s experience is that my dad is going to work, where you immediately get into social contacts and situations, and you just make friends through this lifestyle.”

By contrast, he said: "My mom is at home and goes to the store to do anything, but now consider it, it's a 19-year-old girl with kids in a foreign country. I'm not saying softly, my mom is one of my heroes."

He recalled that when he was 12, his father was “in financial trouble, he lost his job, and he was trying to make money with his Sri Lankan del Boy Way, which was not working hard to repay the mortgage in their home”.

His father was later arrested and imprisoned for two years for fraud, when Romesh was still a teenager.

Ranganathan said he had been struggling with his mental health, but as a teenager, his father was in jail when he was doing A-level. His father died in 2011.

"I have experienced a lot of suicidal thoughts in my life, but I'm now saying, "As I say now, this is almost one of the best places I've ever lived spiritually." ”