Kintsugi Heroes: Uncovering our Hidden Value

Kintsugi Heroes Originals
Kintsugi Heroes Originals
  • 5.0 (2)
  • Documentary
  • Updated Weekly

Kintsugi Heroes is a powerful Australian podcast sharing real-life stories of resilience, mental health, and human transformation. Each episode features raw, honest conversations with everyday people who have overcome adversity including addiction, trauma, grief, illness, financial hardship, and life-altering challenges. Inspired by the Japanese philosophy of Kintsugi — repairing what’s broken with gold — this podcast explores how life’s toughest moments can shape strength, purpose, and connection. Kintsugi Heroes exists to remind us that our struggles do not define us — they refine us.  Through deeply human storytelling, we create a safe space for lived experiences to be shared with dignity, compassion, and authenticity. Our mission is to reduce isolation, increase connection, and promote mental wellbeing through the power of story — not as clinical advice, but as real conversations that people can relate to and learn from.  🎧 Topics covered include: Mental health, addiction recovery, trauma, grief and loss, personal growth, resilience, relationships, disability, identity, life transitions, and rebuilding after failure. 🌍 Featuring voices from diverse backgrounds across cultures, communities, and lived experiences — because everyone has a story worth hearing. 🔗 Listen, Connect & Learn More Website: https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@KintsugiHeroes 💬 Why Listen to Kintsugi Heroes? If you’re navigating a tough time, rebuilding your life, or looking for real stories that inspire hope — this podcast is for you. These are not polished success stories. These are real people, real struggles, and real comebacks. ⸻ Follow the podcast on Spotify or Apple Podcasts Subscribe on YouTube for full video episodes Share this with someone who needs to hear it

  1. 1h ago

    I Didn't Want to Die With the Wrong Name | Non-Binary Identity, Religious Cult Survival, and Chosen Family | Pride In Stories

    I didn't want to die with the wrong name At our hero's request, we've withheld their name and identifying details to protect their privacy.⚠️ Content advisory: this episode discusses abuse & exploitation and domestic & family violence, which some listeners may find distressing. If you need support, you're not alone — help is available: • Blue Knot Foundation (complex trauma): 1300 657 380 · blueknot.org.au • 1800RESPECT (family, domestic & sexual violence): 1800 737 732 · 1800respect.org.au Our hero grew up in a controlling religious cult where emotions were suppressed and difference was dangerous. After high school, while exploring their non-binary identity with supportive friends, their family's reaction escalated from verbal abuse to physical threats. On the day of their first therapy session, our hero left home with minimal belongings, relying on queer support services, a cousin's help, and friends willing to shelter them. Over months of couch-surfing, changing their phone, navigating Centrelink, and legally changing their name, our hero built a new identity and reclaimed their future. Today, they're thriving at university, surrounded by chosen family, able to invite friends over, and planning research that could expand gender-affirming care for non-binary people. In this Pride In Stories conversation with John Dwyer, our hero shares the story behind the moments below. 🎙️ IN THIS CONVERSATION: • Verbal and mental abuse can be as damaging as physical violence, yet is often dismissed or minimized. • Planning with queer-specific support services before leaving makes the immediate aftermath far less chaotic. • Friends often have more capacity and willingness to help than we assume; the work is in asking clearly. • Getting financial support through Centrelink requires acting within a 7-day window of homelessness, even if technically couch-surfing. • Legal name and gender changes in Australia are simpler and cheaper than many people expect. 🕒 CHAPTERS: 00:00 Suppressed emotions, dangerous difference 04:45 A waistcoat and a cousin's fear 09:51 The day I decided to leave 11:46 A new phone number, a new name 15:34 Safety took months, not days 18:14 The friends who showed up 23:31 I didn't want to die as the wrong person 25:25 The everyday miracles: friends over, plans made 32:43 Gender-affirming care that doesn't exist yet 36:04 Verbal abuse counts as abuse 37:15 Five years on, still building 39:39 What comes next 🎧 If this story moved you, follow Kintsugi Heroes in your podcast app so you never miss an episode. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ABOUT KINTSUGI HEROES ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Welcome. We're glad you found your way here. Kintsugi Heroes was created from a simple belief: every person has a story worth sharing, and sometimes the story we need to hear arrives exactly when we need it most. Our name comes from the Japanese art of Kintsugi, where broken pottery is repaired with gold. Rather than hiding the cracks, they are honoured as part of the object's history. We believe people are much the same. The experiences that challenge us, break us, shape us, and help us grow are often the very things that connect us to one another. This channel is home to honest conversations about resilience, hope, grief, recovery, courage, love, and what it means to keep moving forward when life doesn't go to plan. Here you'll find six podcast series, each sharing stories through a different lens: • Kintsugi Heroes, hosted by John Milham • Animals & Us, hosted by Natalie Stockdale • Grit Diaries: From Grit to Grace, hosted by Simone Allan and Maryan Bova • From There to Here, hosted by Emma Bellamy-Dodd • Golden Threads: Stories of Disability & Resilience • Pride in Stories, hosted by John Dwyer Every story shared here is offered with the hope that it helps someone feel a little less alone. A little more understood. A little more connected. Whether you're navigating a difficult season, supporting someone you love, or simply looking for meaningful conversations, you're welcome here. New episodes are released fortnightly across our series. If you'd like to help us keep these stories freely available to everyone, you can support our work here: https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au/donate Thank you for being part of this community. We help people tell the stories they need to share so others can discover the story they need to hear. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ CONNECT WITH US ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🌐 https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au ▶️ https://www.youtube.com/@kintsugiheroes 📘 https://www.facebook.com/kintsugiheroes 📸 https://www.instagram.com/kintsugi.heroes 💼 https://www.linkedin.com/company/kintsugi-heroes #KintsugiHeroes #LivedExperience #ResiliencePodcast #PrideInStories #QueerStories #LGBT #MentalHealth #FamilyTrauma #Finding Safety #Gender Identity #Cult Survivor ——— Show notes by Kintsugi Studio · Approved by Kintsugi Studio | Australian English Mentioned in this episode: Support Kintsugi Heroes Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit, and every story we share is free for the people who need it. If this show has meant something to you, you can help us keep going. Visit kintsugiheroes.com.au and click donate. Every contribution helps us keep telling these stories, and it's tax-deductible. Thank You For Listening Follow the show, share it with someone who needs it, or share your own story at kintsugiheroes.com.au. Your story matters.

    I Didn't Want to Die With the Wrong Name | Non-Binary Identity, Religious Cult Survival, and Chosen Family | Pride In Stories

  2. 1d ago

    Trauma healing: the mantra that changed everything | Mindi Kessler | Kintsugi Heroes

    The mantra that rewired my life ⚠️ Content advisory: this episode discusses abuse & exploitation and trauma & healing, which some listeners may find distressing. If you need support, you're not alone — help is available: • Blue Knot Foundation (complex trauma): 1300 657 380 · blueknot.org.au • 1800RESPECT (family, domestic & sexual violence): 1800 737 732 · 1800respect.org.au • Lifeline (24/7 crisis support): 13 11 14 · lifeline.org.au Mindi grew up in a volatile Kansas household marked by physical abuse, sexual abuse, and neglect. Her sensitive nature made her a target; she survived through perfectionism and people-pleasing, earning her way to advanced degrees and professional success. But at 18, chronic pain began. Over decades, it worsened into debilitating illness that no traditional doctor could diagnose or treat. Twelve years ago, facing complete breakdown, she heard a podcast phrase that shifted everything: what if this is happening for you, not to you? She began using a mantra, "perfect health, healing now," which aligned her with a non-traditional healer. That single tool opened her eyes to the power of mindset and led her down years of somatic work, energy sessions, and inner child healing. Now, she works with trauma survivors, trains therapists, and finds profound joy in offering the support and community she never had. Mindi Kessler is a trauma therapist, coach, and author of Cycle Breaker: A Guide for Transcending Childhood Trauma. Based in the US, she blends somatic work, energy healing, and embodied transformation to help clients unwind patterns rooted in childhood abuse. She trains other practitioners in her integrated approach and facilitates retreats and group healing circles. In this Kintsugi Heroes conversation with John Milham, Mindi shares the story behind the moments below. 🕒 CHAPTERS: 00:00 Introduction and welcome 03:30 What healing really requires 06:42 How childhood trauma wires into adulthood 10:32 The one person who changed everything 13:39 Growing up in an unsafe home 17:29 The survival strategies that saved her 20:38 Understanding her parents' unhealed wounds 27:51 Where anger lives and how to release it 35:19 The friends who disappeared 45:47 The breakdown that became a breakthrough 46:14 The mantra that rewired everything 51:53 What life looks like now 🎧 If this story moved you, follow Kintsugi Heroes in your podcast app so you never miss an episode. 📌 RESOURCES MENTIONED: Mindi Kessler's website: mindikessler.com ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ABOUT KINTSUGI HEROES ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Welcome. We're glad you found your way here. Kintsugi Heroes was created from a simple belief: every person has a story worth sharing, and sometimes the story we need to hear arrives exactly when we need it most. Our name comes from the Japanese art of Kintsugi, where broken pottery is repaired with gold. Rather than hiding the cracks, they are honoured as part of the object's history. We believe people are much the same. The experiences that challenge us, break us, shape us, and help us grow are often the very things that connect us to one another. This channel is home to honest conversations about resilience, hope, grief, recovery, courage, love, and what it means to keep moving forward when life doesn't go to plan. Here you'll find six podcast series, each sharing stories through a different lens: • Kintsugi Heroes, hosted by John Milham • Animals & Us, hosted by Natalie Stockdale • Grit Diaries: From Grit to Grace, hosted by Simone Allan and Maryan Bova • From There to Here, hosted by Emma Bellamy-Dodd • Golden Threads: Stories of Disability & Resilience • Pride in Stories, hosted by John Dwyer Every story shared here is offered with the hope that it helps someone feel a little less alone. A little more understood. A little more connected. Whether you're navigating a difficult season, supporting someone you love, or simply looking for meaningful conversations, you're welcome here. New episodes are released fortnightly across our series. If you'd like to help us keep these stories freely available to everyone, you can support our work here: https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au/donate Thank you for being part of this community. We help people tell the stories they need to share so others can discover the story they need to hear. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ CONNECT WITH US ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🌐 https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au ▶️ https://www.youtube.com/@kintsugiheroes 📘 https://www.facebook.com/kintsugiheroes 📸 https://www.instagram.com/kintsugi.heroes 💼 https://www.linkedin.com/company/kintsugi-heroes #KintsugiHeroes #LivedExperience #ResiliencePodcast #GoldInTheCracks #CycleBreaker #TraumaHealing #ChildhoodTrauma #SomaticTherapy #MentalHealthMatters #HealingJourney #InnerChild #EnergyHealing Mentioned in this episode: Thank You For Listening Follow the show, share it with someone who needs it, or share your own story at kintsugiheroes.com.au. Your story matters. Support Kintsugi Heroes Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit, and every story we share is free for the people who need it. If this show has meant something to you, you can help us keep going. Visit kintsugiheroes.com.au and click donate. Every contribution helps us keep telling these stories, and it's tax-deductible.

    Trauma healing: the mantra that changed everything | Mindi Kessler | Kintsugi Heroes

  3. Aug 4

    Self Advocacy, Mental Health and Writing Her Way Back | Sarah Rosse | Kintsugi Heroes

    The story I had to share ⚠️ Content advisory: this episode discusses suicide, grief, which some listeners may find distressing. If you need support, you're not alone — help is available: • Lifeline (24/7 crisis support): 13 11 14 · lifeline.org.au Sarah Rosse spent her career as a high-functioning professional in human services, confident in her ability to help others navigate mental health crises. In October 2023, her 16-year-old son attempted to take his life, shattering her sense of control and forcing her to confront the gap between her professional knowledge and her lived reality as a mother. The fracture triggered deep shame: she believed she had failed, that people saw her as a terrible mother. Through journaling, she moved from brain-dumping her pain to intentional reflection, eventually writing a memoir about identity, family, loss, and resilience. Today, Sarah speaks publicly about mental health, parenting, and authenticity, committed to 100 conversations over 12 months about the themes in her book. Her son received an ADHD diagnosis and ongoing support; their connection has deepened. Sarah has stopped dyeing her hair, begun public speaking despite being a self-described introvert, and embraced discomfort as the path to growth. Sarah Rosse is a memoirist, journaling coach, and human services professional who lives in regional Victoria. After her 16-year-old son attempted suicide in October 2023, she began writing the story that became her first book, framed through the lens of kintsugi. She now works to help others find their voice through writing and lived experience. In this Kintsugi Heroes conversation with John Milham, Sarah shares the story behind the moments below. 🎙️ IN THIS CONVERSATION: • Shame thrives in silence; connection breaks it. • Professional knowledge doesn't prepare you for your own crisis. • Journaling moves from survival to meaning through intentionality. • The mental health system fails without advocates. • Discomfort signals the direction of growth. 🕒 CHAPTERS: 00:00 Stories that hold us together 01:45 What is a memoirist? 05:53 Journaling as a framework 10:57 The crisis: October 2023 14:04 Shame and the weight of silence 20:35 Presence over fixing 28:28 Professional knowledge meets lived experience 33:31 Navigating the mental health system 37:52 Embracing discomfort as growth 41:24 What I hope for my son 44:32 100 Conversations: a new mission 48:27 Sharing stories so others can hear them 🎧 If this story moved you, follow Kintsugi Heroes in your podcast app so you never miss an episode. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ABOUT KINTSUGI HEROES ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Welcome. We're glad you found your way here. Kintsugi Heroes was created from a simple belief: every person has a story worth sharing, and sometimes the story we need to hear arrives exactly when we need it most. Our name comes from the Japanese art of Kintsugi, where broken pottery is repaired with gold. Rather than hiding the cracks, they are honoured as part of the object's history. We believe people are much the same. The experiences that challenge us, break us, shape us, and help us grow are often the very things that connect us to one another. This channel is home to honest conversations about resilience, hope, grief, recovery, courage, love, and what it means to keep moving forward when life doesn't go to plan. Here you'll find six podcast series, each sharing stories through a different lens: • Kintsugi Heroes, hosted by John Milham • Animals & Us, hosted by Natalie Stockdale • Grit Diaries: From Grit to Grace, hosted by Simone Allan and Maryan Bova • From There to Here, hosted by Emma Bellamy-Dodd • Golden Threads: Stories of Disability & Resilience • Pride in Stories, hosted by John Dwyer Every story shared here is offered with the hope that it helps someone feel a little less alone. A little more understood. A little more connected. Whether you're navigating a difficult season, supporting someone you love, or simply looking for meaningful conversations, you're welcome here. New episodes are released weekly across our series. If you'd like to help us keep these stories freely available to everyone, you can support our work here: https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au/donate Thank you for being part of this community. We help people tell the stories they need to share so others can discover the story they need to hear. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ CONNECT WITH US ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🌐 https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au ▶️ https://www.youtube.com/@kintsugiheroes 📘 https://www.facebook.com/kintsugiheroes 📸 https://www.instagram.com/kintsugi.heroes 💼 https://www.linkedin.com/company/kintsugi-heroes #KintsugiHeroes #LivedExperience #ResiliencePodcast #StoriesThatMatter #GoldenJoinery #MentalHealth #Motherhood #SuicidePrevention #MemoirWriting #ParentalSupport #AuthenticSelf #BreakingTheStigma Mentioned in this episode: Support Kintsugi Heroes Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit, and every story we share is free for the people who need it. If this show has meant something to you, you can help us keep going. Visit kintsugiheroes.com.au and click donate. Every contribution helps us keep telling these stories, and it's tax-deductible. Thank You For Listening Follow the show, share it with someone who needs it, or share your own story at kintsugiheroes.com.au. Your story matters.

    Self Advocacy, Mental Health and Writing Her Way Back | Sarah Rosse | Kintsugi Heroes

  4. Aug 2 ·  Bonus

    ADHD in women is one of the most missed diagnoses in adult mental health, and for three professional women, understanding why took decades. | Our Stories Matter | Kintsugi Heroes

    ADHD in women is one of the most missed diagnoses in adult mental health, and for three professional women, understanding why took decades. This is Too Much, Not Enough: Late Diagnosis of ADHD in Women, a live online panel from Kintsugi Heroes' Our Stories Matter series. Three women share what it's really like to get a late ADHD diagnosis as an adult, including the relief of finally understanding your own mind and the grief of every year that diagnosis didn't come. They talk openly about ADHD symptoms in women that often get mistaken for anxiety, what a neurodivergent diagnosis changes in your day-to-day life, and the self-compassion that comes once you finally understand how your brain works. Recorded live via Zoom as part of Kintsugi Heroes' monthly panel series, this episode is for anyone wondering if they have ADHD, anyone recently diagnosed, or anyone supporting a woman navigating a late ADHD diagnosis. Key Takeaways Why ADHD in women is so often missed: Girls and women are frequently misdiagnosed with anxiety, or missed altogether, because ADHD symptoms in women don't always match the stereotype.ADHD grief is real: Alongside the relief of a diagnosis, there's genuine grief for the years spent not understanding yourself.ADHD and everyday life: How undiagnosed and diagnosed ADHD shapes work, relationships, parenting and daily routines.Strength in a neurodivergent diagnosis: The self-compassion and resilience that comes once you understand your neurodivergent mind. About the Panel Karise McNamee — counselling social worker, founder of Paths with Purpose, supporting ADHD, AuDHD and autistic women. pathswithpurpose.com.au Angela Raspass — ADHD business coach and strategist, author of Your Next Chapter: A Business Book for Women with ADHD and Sparky Brains. angelaraspass.com.au Patricia Falcetta OAM — founder of Social Living Solutions, neurodiversity advocate and keynote speaker. sociallivingsolutions.com.au Resources Mentioned Paths with Purpose (Karise McNamee): https://pathswithpurpose.com.au/ Angela Raspass, ADHD Business Coaching: https://www.angelaraspass.com.au/ Your Next Chapter (Angela Raspass' book): https://www.angelaraspass.com.au/book Social Living Solutions (Patricia Falcetta): https://sociallivingsolutions.com.au/ Event Details Live online panel, hosted by Kintsugi Heroes Ltd, part of the monthly Our Stories Matter series. Held via Zoom, 23 July 2026 (confirm your actual AEST time before reusing this date/time anywhere). Timestamps 00:00 Introduction and welcome 01:54 Meet the panel: Karice, Angela and Patricia 08:00 Why ADHD in women is missed or misdiagnosed 09:31 How ADHD symptoms show up differently in women 14:00 Masking, overworking and what late diagnosis really means 16:53 The diagnosis moment: relief, grief and self-compassion 24:12 Living with the grief that comes after diagnosis 26:53 How undiagnosed ADHD showed up in work, relationships and parenting 34:40 What actually helped: therapy, community and workplace support 44:10 Addiction, undiagnosed ADHD and finding what works long term 54:25 Audience Q&A 63:01 Closing reflections and thanks If this episode landed for you, hit follow so you don't miss the next Our Stories Matter conversation, and if you know a woman still wondering if she has ADHD, send her this one. Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit, so if our stories matter to you, consider partnering or donating to help us keep telling them. Watch on YouTube: https://youtu.be/dxgcadlJRs0 About Kintsugi Heroes Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit storytelling platform sharing real stories of resilience and transformation. Website: https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au Partner with us: https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au/partners/ Donate: https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au/donate#donate Instagram https://www.instagram.com/kintsugi.heroes/ Facebook https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100084850387170 LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/kintsugi-heroes/ SByfoGayOfTc7xxw2B2g Mentioned in this episode: Thank You For Listening Follow the show, share it with someone who needs it, or share your own story at kintsugiheroes.com.au. Your story matters. Support Kintsugi Heroes Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit, and every story we share is free for the people who need it. If this show has meant something to you, you can help us keep going. Visit kintsugiheroes.com.au and click donate. Every contribution helps us keep telling these stories, and it's tax-deductible.

    ADHD in women is one of the most missed diagnoses in adult mental health, and for three professional women, understanding why took decades. | Our Stories Matter | Kintsugi Heroes

  5. Jul 30

    Complex trauma and self identity: Karl Germann's 20-year fog | Kintsugi Heroes

    The 20-year fog Karl grew up in apartheid South Africa in a wealthy but emotionally distant Austrian-South African family, experiencing what he now understands as complex trauma rooted in his mother's narcissism and his father's clinical detachment. For decades he dissociated, unaware he was queer until his late twenties when he met a partner and came out to indifference from his family. He moved to London at 27, then Australia, but remained numb and disconnected from himself until the last two years. Only recently, after leaving corporate work and experiencing a workplace sexual harassment case, has he begun to reclaim his creativity, healing practice, and authentic self. He now writes, mentors others in isolation, and teaches people that the answers we seek live in the quiet spaces we're taught to fear. Karl Germann is a queer South African-born Australian now based in Port Macquarie. He spent two decades navigating dissociation and emotional distance from a privileged but cold family before recognizing his lived experience as trauma. He has since become a Reiki practitioner, author of the children's book The Land Where Unicorns Are Made, and community support worker dedicated to healing and connection. In this Kintsugi Heroes conversation with John Dwyer, Karl shares the story behind the moments below. 🎙️ IN THIS CONVERSATION: • Dissociation and small-t trauma can persist silently for decades without dramatic incidents, rooted in emotional distance and hypervigilance from childhood. • Coming out as queer or reaching any milestone does not instantly resolve the foundational trauma that shaped you. • Authenticity attracts more meaningful connection and professional success than conformity or self-censorship ever will. 🕒 CHAPTERS: 00:00 Welcome and introduction 01:27 Growing up in apartheid South Africa 08:00 Dissociation, trauma, and the Austrian father 14:30 A narcissistic mother and emotional distance 19:22 Coming out as queer at 27 27:50 Leaving South Africa for London and Australia 35:00 Corporate work, authenticity, and walking away 41:00 Climbing Kilimanjaro and metaphors for life 46:35 Writing, creativity, and The Land Where Unicorns Are Made 50:14 Reiki practice and community connection through Ankali 54:20 Building community, smiling, and winning people over 57:51 Advice for younger selves and closing reflections 🎧 If this story moved you, follow Kintsugi Heroes in your podcast app so you never miss an episode. 📌 RESOURCES MENTIONED: Out of the Fog: outofthefog.website carlfox.com: carlfox.com Lightunitedreiki.com: lightunitedreiki.com ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ABOUT KINTSUGI HEROES ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Welcome. We're glad you found your way here. Kintsugi Heroes was created from a simple belief: every person has a story worth sharing, and sometimes the story we need to hear arrives exactly when we need it most. Our name comes from the Japanese art of Kintsugi, where broken pottery is repaired with gold. Rather than hiding the cracks, they are honoured as part of the object's history. We believe people are much the same. The experiences that challenge us, break us, shape us, and help us grow are often the very things that connect us to one another. This channel is home to honest conversations about resilience, hope, grief, recovery, courage, love, and what it means to keep moving forward when life doesn't go to plan. Here you'll find six podcast series, each sharing stories through a different lens: • Kintsugi Heroes, hosted by John Milham • Animals & Us, hosted by Natalie Stockdale • Grit Diaries: From Grit to Grace, hosted by Simone Allan and Maryan Bova • From There to Here, hosted by Emma Bellamy-Dodd • Golden Threads: Stories of Disability & Resilience • Pride in Stories, hosted by John Dwyer (launching 31 July 2026) Every story shared here is offered with the hope that it helps someone feel a little less alone. A little more understood. A little more connected. Whether you're navigating a difficult season, supporting someone you love, or simply looking for meaningful conversations, you're welcome here. New episodes are released weekly across our series. If you'd like to help us keep these stories freely available to everyone, you can support our work here: https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au/donate Thank you for being part of this community. We help people tell the stories they need to share so others can discover the story they need to hear. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ CONNECT WITH US ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🌐 https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au ▶️ https://www.youtube.com/@kintsugiheroes 📘 https://www.facebook.com/kintsugiheroes 📸 https://www.instagram.com/kintsugi.heroes 💼 https://www.linkedin.com/company/kintsugi-heroes #KintsugiHeroes #LivedExperience #ResiliencePodcast #PrideInStories #GoldenJoinery #QueerJourney #MentalHealth #Dissociation #AuthenticSelf #FamilyTrauma #HealingWork #CommunityConnection #CreativityHeals ——— Mentioned in this episode: Thank You For Listening Follow the show, share it with someone who needs it, or share your own story at kintsugiheroes.com.au. Your story matters. Support Kintsugi Heroes Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit, and every story we share is free for the people who need it. If this show has meant something to you, you can help us keep going. Visit kintsugiheroes.com.au and click donate. Every contribution helps us keep telling these stories, and it's tax-deductible.

    Complex trauma and self identity: Karl Germann's 20-year fog | Kintsugi Heroes

  6. Jul 21

    Phil Hugill: from slow learner to corrections leader, what prisons taught him about second chances

    The light in the tunnel ⚠️ Content advisory: this episode discusses mental health & wellbeing, which some listeners may find distressing. If you need support, you're not alone — help is available: • Lifeline (24/7 crisis support): 13 11 14 · lifeline.org.au John left school at 15 written off as a slow learner, worked manual jobs, and felt trapped. An art teacher gave him a chance on an art course despite his inability to draw; that opened a career in education and social work. Over decades, he worked with youth in diversion programs, people with disabilities, children in care, and finally prisoners in corrections. In each role, he discovered the same truth: people who've been excluded, abused, or labelled criminal carry trauma that systems punish rather than heal. He learned to see the person beneath the label, to lead with respect, and to believe that connection and opportunity prevent crime better than law and order ever will. Now retired from government work but still volunteering, he supports ex-prisoners through peer friendship. His message is clear: before you judge someone, find out their story. Goodness still outweighs the crisis narrative. John Milham is a social worker, educator, and corrections leader who spent decades working in some of Australia's most challenging environments: youth diversion programs, disability services, child protection, and prisons. He volunteered his way into these roles after leaving school at 15 with no qualifications, shaped by a mentor who helped him unpack his own biases and rebuild his moral compass. He now volunteers with ex-prisoners, believing that second chances and human connection are the only path out of cycles of trauma and incarceration. In this Kintsugi Heroes conversation with John Milham, Phil shares the story behind the moments below. 🎙️ IN THIS CONVERSATION: • Second chances are rooted in someone seeing potential you don't see in yourself. • Labelling people disempowers them and makes it easier for institutions to dehumanise. • Trauma is the root cause; punishment is the symptom we treat instead. 🕒 CHAPTERS: 00:00 Why second chances matter 01:58 Written off at school 04:50 The art teacher's chance 08:15 Unpacking bias, rebuilding values 14:59 Building community access programs 18:55 Corrections: seeing the person 29:01 Labels dehumanise 45:58 Youth crime and crisis politics 53:27 Diversion over detention 56:09 A walk to Woolworths 1:01:02 Finding light in darkness 1:06:24 Embrace the light 🎧 If this story moved you, follow Kintsugi Heroes in your podcast app so you never miss an episode. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ABOUT KINTSUGI HEROES ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Welcome. We're glad you found your way here. Kintsugi Heroes was created from a simple belief: every person has a story worth sharing, and sometimes the story we need to hear arrives exactly when we need it most. Our name comes from the Japanese art of Kintsugi, where broken pottery is repaired with gold. Rather than hiding the cracks, they are honoured as part of the object's history. We believe people are much the same. The experiences that challenge us, break us, shape us, and help us grow are often the very things that connect us to one another. This channel is home to honest conversations about resilience, hope, grief, recovery, courage, love, and what it means to keep moving forward when life doesn't go to plan. Here you'll find six podcast series, each sharing stories through a different lens: • Kintsugi Heroes, hosted by John Milham • Animals & Us, hosted by Natalie Stockdale • Grit Diaries: From Grit to Grace, hosted by Simone Allan and Maryan Bova • From There to Here, hosted by Emma Bellamy-Dodd • Golden Threads: Stories of Disability & Resilience • Pride in Stories, hosted by John Dwyer (launching 31 July 2026) Every story shared here is offered with the hope that it helps someone feel a little less alone. A little more understood. A little more connected. Whether you're navigating a difficult season, supporting someone you love, or simply looking for meaningful conversations, you're welcome here. New episodes are released weekly across our series. If you'd like to help us keep these stories freely available to everyone, you can support our work here: https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au/donate Thank you for being part of this community. We help people tell the stories they need to share so others can discover the story they need to hear. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ CONNECT WITH US ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🌐 https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au ▶️ https://www.youtube.com/@kintsugiheroes 📘 https://www.facebook.com/kintsugiheroes 📸 https://www.instagram.com/kintsugi.heroes 💼 https://www.linkedin.com/company/kintsugi-heroes #KintsugiHeroes #LivedExperience #ResiliencePodcast #StoriesThatMatter #SecondChances #CriminalJustice #MentalHealth #Incarceration #HumanConnection #Redemption #SocialWork #Trauma #YouthJustice #PeerSupport ——— Show notes by TBC · Approved by TBC · Australian English Mentioned in this episode: Support Kintsugi Heroes Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit, and every story we share is free for the people who need it. If this show has meant something to you, you can help us keep going. Visit kintsugiheroes.com.au and click donate. Every contribution helps us keep telling these stories, and it's tax-deductible. Thank You For Listening Follow the show, share it with someone who needs it, or share your own story at kintsugiheroes.com.au. Your story matters.

  7. Jul 7

    Holly Deane-Johns: 17 Years Inside, One Moment of Clarity, and a Life Rebuilt with Purpose

    ⚠️ Content advisory: this episode discusses addiction & recovery and trauma & healing, which some listeners may find distressing. If you need support, you're not alone — help is available: • SMART Recovery Australia (addiction): smartrecoveryaustralia.com.au • ReachOut: au.reachout.com • Blue Knot Foundation (complex trauma): 1300 657 380 · blueknot.org.au • Lifeline (24/7 crisis support): 13 11 14 · lifeline.org.au Holly Deane-Johns grew up in a stable home until her mother's involvement with a man who introduced the family to heroin. By 16, Holly was using; by 20, she was imprisoned. Over the next nine years, she cycled through Australian jails while her family spiralled into addiction, culminating in her mother's heroin overdose. Arrested in Thailand at 29 during her husband's flight from authorities, Holly received a 31-year sentence. Seven years into a Bangkok prison, sitting on filthy ground, she had a clarity moment and made a decision to never use drugs again. She returned to Australia, completed her sentence, and studied while inside. Today she works directly with men leaving prison, using her lived experience to build trust and show them a different path. She's written a book and gives talks in schools, driven by the belief that her fractured life was always meant for this work of helping others rebuild. Holly Deane-Johns is a youth and community worker who spent 17 years in various prisons across Australia and Thailand after struggling with heroin addiction from age 16. She now works with Wadjining Aboriginal Corporation in the RESET program, supporting men transitioning out of prison, and has written a book about her journey to help others see a future beyond addiction and incarceration. In this Kintsugi Heroes conversation with John Milham, Holly shares the story behind the moments below. 🎙️ IN THIS CONVERSATION: • Addiction is rarely about drugs; it's about masking pain from trauma, and understanding this shifts how we approach people struggling with substance use. 🕒 CHAPTERS: 00:00 Welcome and Holly's Work Today 02:40 Working with RESET: Supporting Men Leaving Prison 07:34 The River: How Holly Ended Up in Heroin 10:51 A Man Entered the Family Home 13:06 The 110% Rule: Why Addicts Don't Stop 16:12 Loss: Her Mother's Overdose in Prison 20:36 Thailand: The Arrest and 31-Year Sentence 27:29 This Life Was Always for This Reason 33:00 The Heartbreaking Gap: Housing and Survival 40:48 Studying Inside: Planning for a Future 46:16 What the Community Needs to Know 48:38 Going Forward: Books in Schools and Prisons 🎧 If this story moved you, follow Kintsugi Heroes in your podcast app so you never miss an episode. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ABOUT KINTSUGI HEROES ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Welcome. We're glad you found your way here. Kintsugi Heroes was created from a simple belief: every person has a story worth sharing, and sometimes the story we need to hear arrives exactly when we need it most. Our name comes from the Japanese art of Kintsugi, where broken pottery is repaired with gold. Rather than hiding the cracks, they are honoured as part of the object's history. We believe people are much the same. The experiences that challenge us, break us, shape us, and help us grow are often the very things that connect us to one another. This channel is home to honest conversations about resilience, hope, grief, recovery, courage, love, and what it means to keep moving forward when life doesn't go to plan. Here you'll find five podcast series, each sharing stories through a different lens: • Kintsugi Heroes, hosted by John Milham • Animals & Us, hosted by Natalie Stockdale • Grit Diaries: From Grit to Grace, hosted by Simone Allan and Maryan Bova • From There to Here, hosted by Emma Bellamy-Dodd • Golden Threads: Stories of Disability & Resilience Every story shared here is offered with the hope that it helps someone feel a little less alone. A little more understood. A little more connected. Whether you're navigating a difficult season, supporting someone you love, or simply looking for meaningful conversations, you're welcome here. New episodes are released fortnightly. If you'd like to help us continue sharing these stories and keeping them freely available to everyone, you can support our work here: https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au/donate#donate Thank you for being part of this community. We help people tell the stories they need to share so others can discover the story they need to hear. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ CONNECT WITH US ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🌐 https://kintsugiheroes.com.au ▶️ https://www.youtube.com/@kintsugiheroes 📘 https://www.facebook.com/kintsugiheroes 📸 https://www.instagram.com/kintsugi.heroes 💼 https://www.linkedin.com/company/kintsugi-heroes #KintsugiHeroes #StoriesThatMatter #GoldenJoinery #TheGoldInTheCracks #LivedExperience #PrisonReform #AddictionRecovery #CommunityWork #SecondChances #HolidayDeaneJohns Mentioned in this episode: Support Kintsugi Heroes Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit, and every story we share is free for the people who need it. If this show has meant something to you, you can help us keep going. Visit kintsugiheroes.com.au and click donate. Every contribution helps us keep telling these stories, and it's tax-deductible. Thank You For Listening Follow the show, share it with someone who needs it, or share your own story at kintsugiheroes.com.au. Your story matters.

    Holly Deane-Johns: 17 Years Inside, One Moment of Clarity, and a Life Rebuilt with Purpose

  8. Jun 24

    Jason Blyth: The Gold in the Cracks, How Pain Refines and Purpose Is Built

    Jason Blyth: The Gold in the Cracks, How Pain Refines and Purpose Is Built ⚠️ Content advisory: this episode discusses abuse & exploitation, addiction & recovery and trauma & healing, which some listeners may find distressing. If you need support, you're not alone — help is available: • Blue Knot Foundation (complex trauma): 1300 657 380 · blueknot.org.au • 1800RESPECT (family, domestic & sexual violence): 1800 737 732 · 1800respect.org.au • SMART Recovery Australia (addiction): smartrecoveryaustralia.com.au • ReachOut: au.reachout.com • Lifeline (24/7 crisis support): 13 11 14 · lifeline.org.au Born from rape after his mother's catastrophic accident left her brain-damaged and emotionally dysregulated, Jason entered the world under profound darkness. The child protection and mental health systems failed him repeatedly as he cycled through twenty clinicians between ages 2 and 15. He left home at 15 believing his circumstances would change, only to discover trauma travels inward. A gifted athlete and musician, he spent 15 years seeing himself as a victim, living with rage, engaging in escapism through drugs, prostitution, and even satanic cults. At 29, drinking a litre of wine three times daily to pass out, he hit rock bottom. In rehab on his 30th birthday, a single realisation shifted everything: no one was coming to save him. His wife's ultimatum to check himself in became his turning point. Now, nearly 8 years sober with a wife of 13 years and an infant son, Jason is using his voice and storytelling gift to champion systemic child protection reform and help others recognise that pain refines rather than defines us. Jason Blyth is a speaker, advocate, and systemic change champion who survived profound childhood trauma, addiction, and a near-fatal descent into alcoholism before rebuilding his life with intention and faith. Now 8 years sober, he channels his lived experience into work protecting children and helping others recognize their own agency in rewriting their stories. 🕒 CHAPTERS: 00:00 The Riptide: A Story Shaped Before Birth 01:51 The Fracture: How Jason Came Into the World 04:46 The System That Failed: Fifteen Years in Psychology 08:58 The Hero's Journey and Necessary Trials 13:39 Being the Story: Narrative and Presence 16:50 Why Pain is the Great Initiator 22:09 One Person's Love Stops the Spiral 28:44 Marriage, Miracles, and a Son 33:54 Purpose From Pain: The Systemic Change Mission 43:27 Discipline and the Daily Regimen 59:13 Seeking His Biological Father: Closure Without Redemption 1:07:46 What's Next: Growing Into the Mission 🎧 If this story moved you, follow Kintsugi Heroes in your podcast app so you never miss an episode. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ABOUT KINTSUGI HEROES ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Welcome. We're glad you found your way here. Kintsugi Heroes was created from a simple belief: every person has a story worth sharing, and sometimes the story we need to hear arrives exactly when we need it most. Our name comes from the Japanese art of Kintsugi, where broken pottery is repaired with gold. Rather than hiding the cracks, they are honoured as part of the object's history. We believe people are much the same. The experiences that challenge us, break us, shape us, and help us grow are often the very things that connect us to one another. This channel is home to honest conversations about resilience, hope, grief, recovery, courage, love, and what it means to keep moving forward when life doesn't go to plan. Here you'll find five podcast series, each sharing stories through a different lens: • Kintsugi Heroes, hosted by John Milham • Animals & Us, hosted by Natalie Stockdale • Grit Diaries: From Grit to Grace, hosted by Simone Allan and Maryan Bova • From There to Here, hosted by Emma Bellamy-Dodd • Golden Threads: Stories of Disability & Resilience Every story shared here is offered with the hope that it helps someone feel a little less alone. A little more understood. A little more connected. Whether you're navigating a difficult season, supporting someone you love, or simply looking for meaningful conversations, you're welcome here. New episodes are released fortnightly. If you'd like to help us continue sharing these stories and keeping them freely available to everyone, you can support our work here: https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au/donate#donate Thank you for being part of this community. We help people tell the stories they need to share so others can discover the story they need to hear. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ CONNECT WITH US ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🌐 https://kintsugiheroes.com.au ▶️ https://www.youtube.com/@kintsugiheroes 📘 https://www.facebook.com/kintsugiheroes 📸 https://www.instagram.com/kintsugi.heroes 💼 https://www.linkedin.com/company/kintsugi-heroes #KintsugiHeroes #KHMainFeed #JasonBlyth #HeroJourney #GoldInTheCracks #TraumaRecovery #Redemption #ChildProtection #Faith #SystemicChange #SecondChance #PainToPurpose

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5
out of 5
2 Ratings

About

Kintsugi Heroes is a powerful Australian podcast sharing real-life stories of resilience, mental health, and human transformation. Each episode features raw, honest conversations with everyday people who have overcome adversity including addiction, trauma, grief, illness, financial hardship, and life-altering challenges. Inspired by the Japanese philosophy of Kintsugi — repairing what’s broken with gold — this podcast explores how life’s toughest moments can shape strength, purpose, and connection. Kintsugi Heroes exists to remind us that our struggles do not define us — they refine us.  Through deeply human storytelling, we create a safe space for lived experiences to be shared with dignity, compassion, and authenticity. Our mission is to reduce isolation, increase connection, and promote mental wellbeing through the power of story — not as clinical advice, but as real conversations that people can relate to and learn from.  🎧 Topics covered include: Mental health, addiction recovery, trauma, grief and loss, personal growth, resilience, relationships, disability, identity, life transitions, and rebuilding after failure. 🌍 Featuring voices from diverse backgrounds across cultures, communities, and lived experiences — because everyone has a story worth hearing. 🔗 Listen, Connect & Learn More Website: https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@KintsugiHeroes 💬 Why Listen to Kintsugi Heroes? If you’re navigating a tough time, rebuilding your life, or looking for real stories that inspire hope — this podcast is for you. These are not polished success stories. These are real people, real struggles, and real comebacks. ⸻ Follow the podcast on Spotify or Apple Podcasts Subscribe on YouTube for full video episodes Share this with someone who needs to hear it

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