Grit Diaries: From Grit to Grace with Mon and Mazz

Kintsugi Heroes
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Welcome to The Grit Diaries: From Grit to Grace, a podcast where resilience meets real life. Hosted by dynamic duo Mon and Mazz, we shine a light on the powerful, untold stories of people who have overcome adversity, hardship, and life's toughest challenges - with grit, heart, and grace. Each episode, we sit down with unsung heroes from all walks of life to explore their journeys through struggle, survival, and transformation. These are raw, honest conversations that go beyond the headlines - stories that inspire, challenge, and remind us of the strength within us all. Whether it's bouncing back from rock bottom, navigating personal loss, or turning pain into purpose, The Grit Diaries is a tribute to the human spirit - and a space where vulnerability meets victory. Real stories. Real people. Real resilience. Subscribe, listen, and join us on the journey from Grit to Grace. The Grit Diaries is a flagship series within the Kintsugi Heroes network — built on the belief that the most powerful stories aren't the polished ones, they're the honest ones. Through Mon and Mazz's warm, no-filter conversations, our guests share the moments most people don't talk about: the rock-bottom days, the quiet rebuilds, the family they leaned on, the help they finally asked for, and the small wins that turned into whole new lives. This isn't a series about perfect comebacks or neat endings. It's about real people doing the hard, messy, beautiful work of becoming themselves again — and the grace that's found on the other side of grit. Whether you're walking through something heavy right now, supporting someone who is, or simply need a reminder that you're not alone, The Grit Diaries is for you. Kintsugi Heroes is an Australian not-for-profit (DGR endorsed) dedicated to strengthening mental wellbeing through the power of storytelling. We believe lived experience is a gift to be shared, not a scar to be hidden. To find out more about Kintsugi Heroes and our other podcast series, head to KintsugiHeroes.com.au. Connect With Us: 🌐 Website: https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au 📺 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@kintsugiheroes 📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kintsugi.heroes/ 👥 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/p/Kintsugi-Heroes-100084850387170/ ❤️ Donate (tax-deductible): https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au/donate/#donate

  1. Aug 11

    Addiction recovery: the reality partner | Melanie Marshall | Grit Diaries

    The reality partner I had to become⚠️ Content advisory: this episode discusses addiction & recovery and mental health & wellbeing, 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 • Lifeline (24/7 crisis support): 13 11 14 · lifeline.org.au Melanie grew up in a loving, faith-based family with early exposure to addiction through her grandfather and mental health challenges through her sister. After 10 years in the Air Force, she entered a relationship with Rob, a man caught between his party lifestyle and his desire to be a family man. When their son Hayden was born, the pressure fractured Rob. He drank heavily, became emotionally absent, and refused professional help. Melanie wrote three letters spelling out the reality he faced, each clearer than the last. When she finally withdrew her support to force him toward help, he broke down. He moved closer to his family for better support, and they became closer friends apart than together. She prepared her young son for the possibility of losing his father. Rob died on a bender less than a week after their last conversation. Melanie now speaks about processing rage and grief safely, accepting what she cannot control, and the cost of loving someone through addiction. Melanie Marshall is a leadership executive, author of Adaptive Excellence, and former Air Force intelligence analyst. She spent a decade as a reality partner to her partner Rob, navigating his addiction and mental health crisis while protecting her two children, until his death by overdose. In this Grit Diaries conversation with Mon & Mazz, Melanie shares the story behind the moments below. 🕒 CHAPTERS: 00:00 Reality partner, not carer 04:05 Growing up in faith, seeing addiction close 08:12 Her sister's crisis, learning where to draw the line 16:23 Exam anxiety to Air Force service 24:39 Meeting Rob, naming what needed to change 31:45 Becoming a parent, watching him fracture 36:37 Coming home to find him paralytic on the couch 39:29 Writing three letters that forced the truth 43:01 His breakdown, her moment of knowing 46:50 Telling Hayden his father could die 47:45 His final thank you, her last wish for him 49:29 Rage, grief, and the validity of everything unsaid 🎧 If this story moved you, follow Kintsugi Heroes in your podcast app so you never miss an episode. 📌 RESOURCES MENTIONED: Lifeline Australia: https://www.lifeline.org.au Carers Australia: https://www.carersaustralia.com.au ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 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 #GritDiaries #AddictionAndMentalHealth #CarerWellness #FamilyResilience #BoundariesInLove #ProcessingGrief #RealityPartner 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. Kintsugi Heroes Follow the show, share it with someone who needs it, or share your own story at kintsugiheroes.com.au. Your story matters.

    Addiction recovery: the reality partner | Melanie Marshall | Grit Diaries

  2. Jul 30 ·  Bonus

    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

  3. Jul 28

    Dr Heena Cheung: From Childhood Sexual Abuse Survivor to Senate Candidate | Grit Diaries

    ⚠️ Content advisory: this episode discusses abuse, violence, 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 Dr Heena Cheung survived childhood sexual abuse from age 13, followed by repeated abuse in college. At 27, she migrated from India to Australia, initially working low-wage jobs while pursuing a Master's in Public Health. A mental health crisis in 2017 involving anorexia became a turning point when Tony Robbins' phrase 'life doesn't happen to you, it happens for you' reframed her trauma. She has since founded My Second Home, an NDIS housing provider; co-founded Simple AI for aged care technology; established My Safe Circle to support abuse survivors; and ran as an independent Senate candidate in 2025, breaking voting records for independents in Victoria. Today, she advocates across disability rights, migrant women's legal protections, childhood sexual abuse prevention, access to justice for First Nations communities, and climate action, driven by the conviction that her past does not define her future. Dr Heena Cheung is a childhood sexual abuse survivor, public health advocate, and independent Senate candidate in Victoria who has channeled her lived experience into multifaceted community work spanning disability rights, migrant women's advocacy, justice reform, and climate action. In this Grit Diaries conversation with Mon & Mazz, Dr shares the story behind the moments below. 🎙️ IN THIS CONVERSATION: • Trauma does not define your future-your present actions and choices determine who you become and what impact you create. 🕒 CHAPTERS: 00:00 Welcome and Episode Overview 02:03 Dr Heena Cheung Introduction and Content Warning 07:00 From Dentistry to Public Health: Finding True Purpose 09:12 Family Pressure, Sisterhood, and Migration to Australia 16:39 Kintsugi Principle: Reframing Trauma as Strength 19:27 Statistics, Underreporting, and the Definition of Abuse 22:50 Access to Justice: First Nations, Migrant Women, and Global Rights 25:06 Protect Our Children Jail Not Bail: Changing Suppression Laws 28:34 Neuroscience of Trauma: Why Healing Opens Horizons 30:18 Pearls of Wisdom: Small Actions, Big Change 35:34 Closing Message: Non-Judgment and Compassion 37:22 Farewell and Episode Close 🎧 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 #GritDiaries #KintsugiHeroes #GritToGrace #DrHeenaCheung #AustralianAdvocacy #ChildhoodSexualAbuseRecovery #SurvivorToAdvocate #MentalHealthHealing #JusticeReform #MigrantWomensRights #DisabilityAdvocacy #ClimateAction #KintsugiPrinciple #SmallActionsLargeChange #CommunityLeadership Y6fRaRiZz6oYxQIxAVGn Mentioned in this episode: Kintsugi Heroes 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.

  4. Jul 14

    Deborah Weed: The 1943 Penny, a Health Collapse, and the Difference Between Self-Esteem and Self-Worth | Grit Diaries

    ⚠️ 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 For ten years, Deborah climbed the corporate ladder at Citibank, building a high-profile career to escape the label of sensitivity. She learned to equate self-esteem with achievement, never smiling at her desk, performing a version of herself that felt increasingly hollow. Then came three years of debilitating, misdiagnosed illness: severe pain, hemorrhaging, doctors telling her it was MS, Lou Gehrig's disease, or all in her head. Bedridden and alone, everything she had built her identity on was stripped away. In that crisis, she heard about a 1943 copper penny worth a million dollars, and the metaphor cracked something open. She realised she had never learned self-worth, only self-esteem. She wrote a children's book, Paisley's Last Quill, about a porcupine who gives away her power piece by piece. Now she is developing a Broadway-scale musical based on the story, determined to teach others what took her a health collapse to learn. Deborah Weed is a US-based former corporate executive who spent a decade at Citibank leading multimillion-dollar projects before a three-year health crisis forced her to confront the difference between achievement and intrinsic worth. She is now a creative entrepreneur, children's book author, and founder of Quills Up, a movement centred on reclaiming personal power through self-worth. In this Grit Diaries conversation with Mon & Mazz, Deborah shares the story behind the moments below. 🎙️ IN THIS CONVERSATION: • Self-esteem is built on achievement and requires constant proof; self-worth is intrinsic and survives when everything external is stripped away. 🕒 CHAPTERS: 00:00 Introduction to Deborah Weed and her Broadway dreams 03:07 How sensitivity became a wound that drove her corporate climb 04:27 The misalignment of heart in a brain-focused corporate world 05:04 Self-esteem vs. self-worth: the distinction that matters 08:54 What true self-worth looks like when achievement is stripped away 10:47 Three years bedridden: the fracture that changed everything 13:28 The 1943 penny: the metaphor that saved her life 18:23 Paisley's Last Quill: turning pain into a story about reclaiming power 22:20 From children's book to Broadway dreams: the musical and the challenge of funding 26:01 Her father's wisdom on disappointment as the real barrier to perseverance 29:44 The cork that keeps bubbling: knowing what you're meant to do 31:22 Closing: gratitude and the power of stories that touch us 🎧 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 #GritDiaries #KintsugiHeroes #TheLastQuill #PaisleysLastQuill #QuillsUp #BroadwayDreams #FashionForest #SelfWorth #SelfEsteem #PersonalPower #Authenticity #HealthCrisis #CreativeHealing #MentalWellness #CorporateToCreative Mentioned in this episode: Kintsugi Heroes 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.

  5. Jun 30

    Roula Selinas: 19 Years Post-Transplant, Two Cancers, and the One Thing She Could Control

    ⚠️ Content advisory: this episode discusses 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.auIn April 2007, Rula's world fractured when she was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukaemia. What followed was eight months of intensive chemotherapy and a bone marrow transplant using a donor from Germany who was only 80 percent compatible. The transplant triggered graft versus host disease twice, steroid-induced diabetes, five eye surgeries, a mini-stroke, and a year-long hospital stay. Years later, just as she'd rebuilt her strength and fitness, she was diagnosed with secondary cancer. Through it all, Rula held fast to one practice: controlling what she could control-her mind. She learned to break recovery into one step at a time, lean on faith and hope, build a support network, and transform her pain into purpose. Now 19 years post-transplant, she runs a counselling practice and has written Stronger, a guide to healing from adversity. Rula Selinas is a counsellor, life coach, author, and founder of Transform Counselling and Coaching on the Gold Coast. A two-time cancer survivor who navigated acute lymphoblastic leukaemia and bone marrow transplant in 2007-2008, then secondary cancer years later, she channels her lived experience into guiding clients through adversity and building resilience. In this Grit Diaries conversation with Mon & Mazz, Roula shares the story behind the moments below. 🎙️ IN THIS CONVERSATION: • Mental control is agency: when your body is under siege, the mind is the one place… 🕒 CHAPTERS: 00:00 Welcome to The Grit Diaries 03:20 Childhood in Haverfield: Milk Bar, Books, and Belonging 08:00 After High School: Admin, Business, Personal Development 13:00 Understanding Bone Marrow Transplant and the Catch-22 of Survival 15:50 The Cascade: Graft Versus Host, Diabetes, Stroke, and What Came After 17:00 Mental Control: The One Thing She Could Govern 18:40 Ten Years to Rebuild: Relationship Breakdown and Finding Purpose on the Kayak 20:00 One Step at a Time: From Walking to Kayaking 22:50 Secondary Cancer: The Second Fracture and a Calling to Study 27:00 The Sacred Role of Support Networks and How to Ask for Help 31:00 Presence Over Words: The Power of Sitting, Silence, and Touch 34:50 Closing: Transform Counselling, Breaking Barriers, and Rula's Gift 🎧 If this story moved you, follow Kintsugi Heroes in your podcast app so you never miss an episode. 🌐 CONNECT WITH ROULA SELINAS: Transform Counselling and Coaching: www.transformcounsellingcoaching.com.au ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 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 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 #GritDiaries #KintsugiHeroes #KintsujiHeroes #gritandgrace #cancersurvivor #bonemarrowtransplant #mentalhealth #grief #resilience #supportnetwork #counselling #adversity #hope #goldcoast Mentioned in this episode: Kintsugi Heroes 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.

  6. Jun 16

    Fire Horse: Going Through Fire to Become Pure Gold | Ingrid Hu Dahl | Grit Diaries

    Fire Horse: Going Through Fire to Become Pure Gold | Ingrid Hu Dahl | Grit Diaries ⚠️ Content advisory: this episode discusses grief & loss, 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 • GriefLine: 1300 845 745 · griefline.org.au Ingrid grew up as a mixed-race child in New Jersey, retreating into horses and later punk rock music to survive feeling othered by adults and society. She came out as a lesbian in her mid-20s, facing rejection from her mother. Years later, after moving apart and her mother's battle with cancer, they reconciled through open-heartedness and forgiveness. In her mother's final years, despite COVID restrictions limiting visits, they rebuilt their relationship from soul to soul. After her mother's passing, Ingrid wrote her memoir and became a grief coach, learning that walking through fire refines us into gold. Ingrid Hu Dahl is an American TEDx speaker, author, ICF-certified leadership and grief coach, and lifelong musician who has toured internationally with multiple bands. She wrote Sun Shining on Morning Snow, a memoir exploring identity, grief, and reconciliation with her mother, and has directed short films on mixed-race representation and experience. In this Grit Diaries conversation with Mon & Mazz, Ingrid shares the story behind the moments below. 🎙️ IN THIS CONVERSATION: • Being othered as a child for your identity teaches you to read subtlety and energy, skills that later become invaluable in coaching and human connection. • Coming out authentically, even when facing rejection, creates the possibility for deeper reconciliation later because you refuse to diminish yourself. • Grief and identity loss can catalyze profound growth, especially when you're willing to write your story and integrate what you've learned. • Forgiveness and reconciliation often require the person who rejected you to choose openness first, but you can still hold the door… 🕒 CHAPTERS: 00:00 Introduction and Ingrid's Background 04:35 Growing Up Mixed-Race on the East Coast 06:44 Horses as Refuge and Nonverbal Communication 10:13 Finding Voice Through Punk, Grunge and Riot Grrrl 13:40 Coming Out and Complex Family Dynamics 17:33 Mother's Rejection and the Long Separation 22:33 The Reconciliation Begins: Mother Reaches Out 24:35 Cancer, COVID, and Final Moments Together 26:30 The Book and Its Symbolism 28:22 Fire, Gold and the Year of the Fire Horse 31:13 Leadership Lessons and Writing Through Grief 36:34 Closing Thoughts on Authenticity and Hope 🎧 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 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 #GritDiaries #KintsugiHeroes #GritDiariesPodcast #SunShiningOnMorningSnow #MothersAndDaughters #ComingOut #Reconciliation #MixedRaceIdentity #Grief #Authenticity #Leadership #Music #FamilyHealing 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. Kintsugi Heroes Follow the show, share it with someone who needs it, or share your own story at kintsugiheroes.com.au. Your story matters.

  7. Jun 2

    Locked Out: How a Senior Public Servant Sued Parliament House — Jo Tarnawsky | Grit Diaries

    Locked Out: How a Senior Public Servant Sued Parliament House | Jo Tarnawsky | Grit Diaries Jo Tarnawsky entered Parliament House at 12 after winning a TV competition, carrying a dream forged in that single afternoon. She built a two-decade career as a diplomat and political operative, thriving in crisis zones and complex postings. In 2022, she returned to Australia as Chief of Staff to the Deputy Prime Minister—her childhood dream role. Within two years, she was locked out of her office, barred from her workplace, and pushed toward silence. Rather than slip away quietly, she chose to speak publicly, eventually filing suit against the Deputy PM, the PM's Chief of Staff, and the Commonwealth. The case settled on a no-liability basis in early 2025. Since then, she has redirected her energy into helping others navigate toxic workplaces through educational resources, videos, and advocacy work. Jo Tarnawsky is a career diplomat and political staffer who worked for the Australian Government across multiple continents—from Iraq to Italy to Zimbabwe—before returning to Australia as Chief of Staff to the Deputy Prime Minister. In 2024, she took the federal government to court over workplace bullying in Parliament House. In this Grit Diaries conversation with Mon & Mazz, Jo shares the story behind the moments below. 🎙️ IN THIS CONVERSATION: • Workplace bullying in institutional settings is often covert and sophisticated—exclusion, email omission, and exclusion from meetings rather than overt aggression—making it harder to name and easier to doubt yourself. • High performers and ethical people are targeted specifically because they pose a threat to systems that want to remain unchanged; the bullier's insecurity manifests as a need to neutralize those who shine a light. • Early intervention with human dignity, apology, and reasonable accommodation can prevent escalation to litigation; institutions that default to legal protection and risk management often create the very crisis they're trying to avoid. • Isolation is the most damaging weapon in workplace bullying; when you cannot eat in the cafeteria, access your own office, or know what's happening in your own portfolio, the psychological toll accelerates rapidly. • Children offer clarity in moments of despair; a child's simple suggestion to tell someone what is happening can become the permission slip to stop protecting the system that harmed you. • Speaking publicly about a painful experience does… 🕒 CHAPTERS: 00:31 Introduction: Workplace bullying in Parliament House 04:12 The moment at Parliament House that changed everything 09:11 Falling into diplomatic career with DFAT 12:11 Deputy Ambassador posting to Italy and family 15:42 Starting dream job and initial success 20:00 Locked out of Parliament House 24:30 The choice: be pushed out quietly or call them out 29:13 First press conference and initial requests 35:12 Final return to office and settlement 38:25 Pivoting to purposeful work helping others 42:39 Upcoming resources for safe work transitions 48:11 Book-ending: starting and ending career at Parliament with press conference 🎧 If this story moved you, follow Kintsugi Heroes in your podcast app so you never miss an episode. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🎙️ ABOUT KINTSUGI HEROES ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit Australian podcast network sharing real stories of resilience and transformation. Named after the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery with gold — the philosophy that what's been broken can become more beautiful for the mending — every episode honours the cracks, the rebuild, and the human underneath. We believe every story matters. Every scar has something to say. And every person quietly finding their way through deserves to be heard. 📺 Series on this channel: – Kintsugi Heroes — real stories of resilience | hosted by John Milham – Animals & Us | hosted by Natalie Stockdale – Grit Diaries: from Grit to Grace | hosted by Simone Allan & Maryan Bova – Golden Threads — stories of disability & resilience | hosted by Dan Dougherty ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🔗 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 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 💛 SUPPORT THE NETWORK ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Kintsugi Heroes is listener-supported and run entirely by volunteers. Your support helps us keep sharing stories that matter. ❤️ Donate (tax-deductible): https://kintsugiheroes.com.au/donate 🤝 Partner with us: https://kintsugiheroes.com.au 🔔 Subscribe for new episodes every week and join a community that believes in the power of human stories. We're all in this together. 💛 #GritDiaries #KintsugiHeroes #FromGritToGrace #WorkplaceBullying #ParliamentHouse #ToxicWorkplace #MentalHealth #AustralianPolitics #CourageToSpeak #WorkplaceCulture #ConstructiveConflict ——— Show notes by Tony Bailey · Approved by Tony Bailey · 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. Kintsugi Heroes Follow the show, share it with someone who needs it, or share your own story at kintsugiheroes.com.au. Your story matters.

  8. May 19

    Lindsay Ziehl: From Grief and Cancer to Humanitarian Change-Maker

    Episode Summary Lindsay Ziehl has lived enough lives for ten people — and at 77, she’s still not done. Born in Britain and raised across Australia, Zimbabwe, and South Africa, Lindsay survived two cancers, raised her son Andrew alone after her husband walked out, and was stranded in South Africa during COVID when she received the phone call every parent dreads. Rather than be consumed by grief, she channelled it into the Andrew Ziehl Foundation and a lifetime of frontline humanitarian work — training over 3,000 women escaping domestic violence and personally intervening to secure the release of trafficked women. In this conversation with Mon and Mazz, Lindsay shares two unforgettable pieces of wisdom: a rabbi’s three-word reframe, and a little cat with a frozen chicken that changed the way she saw her own strength. Episode Pillars • The Nomadic Foundation: How a childhood of constant movement across Australia, the UK and Africa shaped Lindsay’s resilience and her lifelong instinct to help others. • A Son Called Andrew: Raising him alone, letting him fly back to Australia, and receiving the phone call no parent ever expects — during a global pandemic, unable to travel. • Turning Grief Into Purpose: The rabbi’s three-word reframe — “Not why, but what now?” — and how that single shift led to founding the Andrew Ziehl Foundation. • Two Cancers and a Cat: Surviving Paget’s disease and breast cancer, riding a four-hour bus to chemo alone, and the moment a tiny cat with a frozen chicken reminded her to get back up. • Domestic Violence Frontlines: Over 25 years running shelters, training 3,000 women, and securing the release of trafficked women just one day before they were sent abroad. The Kintsugi Connection To see the visual story of Lindsay’s journey and explore more episodes of resilience, visit our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@kintsugiheroes/videos If Lindsay’s story moved you, explore these related Hero conversations: • Navigating grief and loss? Explore another Grit Diaries episode on life after unimaginable loss. • Finding purpose after adversity? Explore another episode on turning pain into action 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. Kintsugi Heroes Follow the show, share it with someone who needs it, or share your own story at kintsugiheroes.com.au. Your story matters.

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About

Welcome to The Grit Diaries: From Grit to Grace, a podcast where resilience meets real life. Hosted by dynamic duo Mon and Mazz, we shine a light on the powerful, untold stories of people who have overcome adversity, hardship, and life's toughest challenges - with grit, heart, and grace. Each episode, we sit down with unsung heroes from all walks of life to explore their journeys through struggle, survival, and transformation. These are raw, honest conversations that go beyond the headlines - stories that inspire, challenge, and remind us of the strength within us all. Whether it's bouncing back from rock bottom, navigating personal loss, or turning pain into purpose, The Grit Diaries is a tribute to the human spirit - and a space where vulnerability meets victory. Real stories. Real people. Real resilience. Subscribe, listen, and join us on the journey from Grit to Grace. The Grit Diaries is a flagship series within the Kintsugi Heroes network — built on the belief that the most powerful stories aren't the polished ones, they're the honest ones. Through Mon and Mazz's warm, no-filter conversations, our guests share the moments most people don't talk about: the rock-bottom days, the quiet rebuilds, the family they leaned on, the help they finally asked for, and the small wins that turned into whole new lives. This isn't a series about perfect comebacks or neat endings. It's about real people doing the hard, messy, beautiful work of becoming themselves again — and the grace that's found on the other side of grit. Whether you're walking through something heavy right now, supporting someone who is, or simply need a reminder that you're not alone, The Grit Diaries is for you. Kintsugi Heroes is an Australian not-for-profit (DGR endorsed) dedicated to strengthening mental wellbeing through the power of storytelling. We believe lived experience is a gift to be shared, not a scar to be hidden. To find out more about Kintsugi Heroes and our other podcast series, head to KintsugiHeroes.com.au. Connect With Us: 🌐 Website: https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au 📺 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@kintsugiheroes 📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kintsugi.heroes/ 👥 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/p/Kintsugi-Heroes-100084850387170/ ❤️ Donate (tax-deductible): https://www.kintsugiheroes.com.au/donate/#donate

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