My Other Stimulant Is Public Nudity

Notes on fear, ADHD, and the North East Skinny Dip

North East Skinny Dip

A year ago I joined friends and partook in my first mass skinny dip. I’ve been skinny dipping since my 40th birthday, when I wanted to do something outrageous (for me), and I’ve loved it. But I never spoke about it. I assumed people would look at me differently if they knew I liked to skinny dip. As a “man” in a skirt, it’s silly to think that but we’re silly little things aren’t we? With last year’s skinny dip booked, I wanted to see if I could handle going to a naturist beach and be seen. So I did. I was, and I was fine. Yet I didn’t feel able to tell friends about the experience in case I was seen as some weird naked person, due to years of internalised anti-naturist thinking by British culture. I should have trusted my friends more, and thankfully my wife did, so she opened up the topic of conversation for me. Of course, I had nothing to fear, and they were cool with me doing a solstice sunrise skinny dip as practice for NESD (North East Skinny Dip).

And so, as the sun rose midway through the year, I ran naked into the water in front of friends and felt no fear.

I was left with the bittersweet feeling of joy with a hint of sorrow. Most days of the year, I am struggling with anxiety. There’s a good chance that I’m dealing with depression too. In order to function, I have to work to get past the feeling that I’m an absolute failure and that everything is pointless, to then deal with social anxiety when meeting clients and the struggles with being deaf. Yet there I was, running around naked on a public beach feeling free of all that. Why isn’t life always like that, or at least closer to that than not?

When NESD 2025 approached, I was excited to recapture that feeling of freedom. Freedom from my own personal demons for the most part, and also freedom from society’s idea of how you should live. I was overjoyed to find those weights lifted during the morning I spent in Druridge Bay, splashing about naked and eating birthday cake. But again, the feeling somehow never makes it into your suitcase and you leave it behind as you head home.

Returning to NESD in 2026, I wanted to do more. I bought a waterproof cover for my camera and hoped to do some portraits. I’m happy to say that I did. It was both surreal and empowering to have naked people come up to me and ask to be photographed. All in all, I was splashing about naked in the water for over 2 hours, making photos and basking in the sunshine feeling like everything in my life worked. The event is a charity fundraiser for the mental health charity MIND, and you can absolutely see why. For a moment, you live without burdens and it truly reminds you why the fight against anxiety and depression, telling your demons to fuck right off, is worth doing. All so you can actually feel alive.

It’s the holding on to that feeling that is the struggle. While going through ADHD medication titration, I would get hints of that feeling from the methylphenidate pills. The doctor and I both agreed that maybe feeling euphoric every morning was a bad thing. However, feeling empowered and enabled each morning is something that I could really go for. If that skinny dip feeling is just a result of chemicals in my brain, maybe it is possible to recreate with ADHD medication when I eventually get back to the front of the titration queue. I enjoy cold water dips more than summer dips is because the cold fires me up. The dopamine release quietens my anxious side and I function. Is it too much to ask to have that every day?

Some people get that hit from caffeine. For me, it seems to be running round naked on a beach and cold water dipping. I kind of wish it was caffeine. It would be so much easier. But until my brain chemistry embraces caffeine, I'll keep going to NESD to run at the sea naked at dawn.

I made a video about the experience of attending NESD with my immediate thoughts as I got back into the car after the dip.