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At a Yale fertility clinic, dozens of women began their I.V.F. cycles full of expectation and hope. Then a surgical procedure caused them excruciating pain. In the hours that followed, some of the women called the clinic to report their pain — but most of the staff members who fielded the patients’ reports did not know the real reason for the pain, which was that a nurse at the clinic was stealing fentanyl and replacing it with saline. What happened at that clinic? What are the stories we tell about women's pain and what happens when we minimize or dismiss it?

The Retrievals, a new five-part series from Serial Productions, is hosted and reported by longtime This American Life producer and editor Susan Burton. We're excited to bring you the first episode today.


Prologue: Ira Glass introduces the first episode of a new podcast from longtime This American Life producer and editor Susan Burton. (1 minute)

Act One: Susan Burton introduces some of the many women who went to a Yale fertility clinic for IVF treatment, and charts their experience from hopeful beginning to excruciatingly painful egg retrieval. (27 minutes)

Act Two: Often bypassing logic, the women go to great lengths to construct elaborate stories to make sense of their inexplicable pain. And then, a letter arrives. (25 minutes)

Humans encounter non-human intelligences of various kinds and try to make sense of them.


Prologue: Ira has some thoughts about our country’s long history of alien invasion movies. (2 minutes)

Act One: In this past year we’ve witnessed a revolution in A.I. since the public rollout of ChatGPT.  Our Senior Editor David Kestenbaum thinks that even though there’s been a ton of coverage, there’s one thing people haven’t talked much about: have these machines gotten to the point that they’re starting to have something like human intelligence? Where they actually understand language and concepts, and can reason? He talks with scientists at Microsoft who’ve been trying to figure that out. (30 minutes)

Act Two: A short piece of fiction from the perspective of aliens who’ve been scouting Earth, from writer Terry Bisson. It’s called “They're Made Out of Meat.” It’s performed by actors Maeve Higgins and H Jon Benjamin. (5 minutes)

Act Three: A species of massive, mysterious, highly intelligent beings have recently been making contact with humanity. Or our boats, anyway. Many people seem convinced they are seeking revenge for past injustices. Producer Chris Benderev wondered if that was true. (7 minutes)

Act Four: Many of us, especially when we’re young, feel like we’re the alien, trying to understand and fit in with the humans on this planet. Producer Diane Wu spent some time recently with a teenage humanoid who feels that way. (15 minutes)

Ira's own father, Barry Glass, co-hosts this special Father's Day show.


Prologue: Ira talks with his father and co-host for this show, Barry Glass, about his own early days working in radio. (3 minutes)

Act One: LA writer/performer Sandra Tsing Loh discovers that a local rock band has recorded a song about her own father, wildly misinterpreting who he is. They think he’s a free spirit; she believes he’s a worried, miserly grump. She invites the band and her father into the studio to discuss it. (10 minutes)

Act Two: Ian Brown explains the lengths a normal dad will go to give his daughter a memorable birthday party, including a birthday stunt so crass that he and his wife shocked all of their friends. (12 minutes)

Act Three: Audio artist Jay Allison and writer Dan Robb present an audio montage on the moment Robb’s parents divorced. (11 minutes)

Act Four: Chicago playwright Beau O’Reilly talks about how he reconciled with his estranged father years ago by becoming an alcoholic just like him. (14 minutes)

The one animal we can’t seem to live without, even when we really, really want to.


Prologue: At this spring’s announcement of New York City’s inaugural rat czar, we meet Darneice Foster, who despises the rats outside her apartment. And host Ira Glass introduces two special co-hosts for today’s show. (11 minutes)

Act One: Producer Elna Baker meets Todd Sklar, a man who can’t quit rats. (22 minutes)

Act Two: Fifty years ago, New York City started to put garbage out in plastic bags. This has become the number one food source for rats. Producer Ike Sriskandarajah investigates the decision that led to the city’s rat baby boom. (10 minutes)

Act Three: How did Alberta, Canada pull off a feat that has eluded the rest of human civilization? Ira visits the largest rat-less land in the world. (15 minutes)

Act Four: We drop a hot mic into a hot mess of a rats’ nest. You’ll never believe what happens next. (3 minutes)

Five years after the #MeToo explosion, what’s happened in the lives of the women who stepped forward and went public with their stories? We tell the story of a teenager who spoke out against one of the most powerful people in her state, and what happened next.


Prologue: Some powerful and well known men lost their jobs after #MeToo. But what about the women at the center of all this who’ve been way less visible after they told what happened to them? We hear about big and small ways the aftermath of coming forward continues to pop up in their daily lives. (10 minutes)

Act One: Back in 2021, a 19-year-old intern at the Idaho state legislature reported that a state Representative named Aaron von Ehlinger raped her. She went by the name Jane Doe. There was a public ethics hearing and Ehlinger resigned. State legislators talked about how proud they were of their ability to do the right thing so quickly. But the story that the public knows is very different from what actually happened to Jane. She talks about it in-depth for the first time. (25 minutes)

Act Two: Jane Doe walks into a public ethics hearing at the Idaho state capitol and navigates the aftermath. (23 minutes)

Act Three: Jane Doe sent some questions for us to ask Chanel Miller. For years, Chanel was known as Emily Doe. She wrote a victim impact statement that millions of people read. (A swimmer at Stanford University named Brock Turner sexually assaulted her while she was unconscious.) She talks about how she decided to come out with her real name and who Emily Doe is to her now. (9 minutes)

Looping thoughts about people you barely know, or don't know at all. 


Prologue: We get a tip that an entire town is consumed by a huge, elementary-school-style crush on a local veterinarian. Guest host Lilly Sullivan goes to Utah to investigate the mystery of the hot vet. (8 minutes)

Act One: We do the thing the people in town would rather die than do – spill the crush to the legendary Dr. Artz himself. Lilly Sullivan reports. (8 minutes)

Act Two: Producer Alix Spiegel talks to one of her closest friends, Sarah Blust, about the time Sarah met a stranger who, unbeknownst to her, had already spent years thinking about her. (29 minutes)

Act Three: There are certain jobs where thinking about someone else’s life is just built into it. Aviva DeKornfeld has a theory that petsitting is a job like that. She talks to a couple of pet sitters to find out. (14 minutes)