Kintsugi Heroes

Both my sons held me up ⚠️ Content advisory: this episode discusses suicide & self-harm prevention and 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 Lawrence spent his career climbing the corporate ladder, believing hard work and loyalty would secure his future. When three catastrophic events collided, his father's death, retrenchment from Westpac, and a bike accident, he spiraled into severe depression twice, convinced his family would be better off without him. The breaking point came on his bed in Hornsby when both his teenage sons sat beside him, arms around his shoulders, and told him it would be all right. That moment of being held by them shattered the isolation he believed was protecting his family. With medication, therapy, and the people who showed up for him, he rebuilt. Today, he chairs Mr. Perfect barbecues across the Hunter Valley and beyond, sitting on the tongs next to men facing the same darkness he did, telling them they will get through it. Lawrence Atkinson is a retired senior financial and management consultant who spent 27 years at Westpac before moving into professional services, intellectual property management, and mental health coaching. He chairs Mr. Perfect, a community organisation that runs monthly barbecues for men navigating disconnection, loneliness, and suicidal ideation, and previously served 23 years with Rotary. In this Kintsugi Heroes conversation with John Milham, Lawrence shares the story behind the moments below. 🎙️ IN THIS CONVERSATION:• Isolation masquerades as protection: Lawrence believed his family would be better off without him, until they showed him otherwise by holding him.• Loyalty to institutions is one-directional now: 27 years at Westpac with hardship posts in Bahrain and Port Moresby did not protect him from redundancy.• Men need to be asked what they need, not told: Mr. Perfect works because it makes no clinical demands. 🕒 CHAPTERS:00:00 The two times I nearly lost myself03:00 From Perth barbecues to disconnection07:48 Seven friends lost15:41 The corporate climb and the breaking point22:34 27 years of loyalty, then retrenchment27:23 Finding worth through service33:41 What depression takes from men40:46 The night my sons saved me43:07 Why shame keeps men silent45:09 We need to teach men how to think49:31 Sharing stories from elder to younger51:30 The sausage and the witness 🎧 If this story moved you, follow Kintsugi Heroes in your podcast app so you never miss an episode. 📌 RESOURCES MENTIONED:Lifeline: https://www.lifeline.org.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 #GoldInTheCracks #MensSpeech #mentalhealth #suicideprevention #masculinity #depression #community #connection #elderhood ———Show notes by TBC · Approved by TBC · Australian EnglishMentioned in this episode:Thank You For ListeningFollow the show, share it with someone who needs it, or share your own story at kintsugiheroes.com.au. Your story matters.Support Kintsugi HeroesKintsugi 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.

The choice I never had ⚠️ Content advisory: this episode discusses suicide, 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 Saina grew up in Iran as a trans woman in a society that offered no space for her identity. At six, she was forced into an all-boys school; for 29 years she hid who she was from her family. To avoid mandatory military service, she underwent a traumatic process to obtain an exemption card that labelled her mentally disordered, then fled to Turkey at 18 with nothing. Seven years in Turkey as an LGBTQIA+ refugee meant living in a small, conservative city with no right to work, no protection, and constant danger. She endured discrimination, exploitation, and sexual harassment. After a gruelling eight-year resettlement process marked by repeated delays and rejections, she arrived in Australia in 2021. Today, she uses her lived experience to advocate for queer refugees globally, consulting with organisations and representing displaced LGBTQIA+ people at the UN. Saina Avesta is a transgender woman and LGBTQIA+ refugee rights advocate who fled Iran at 18, spent seven years in Turkey as a refugee, and now lives in Australia as a citizen. She founded the Persian Queer Network to support LGBTQIA+ refugees in processing countries and established Avesta Advisory, a consultancy helping organisations understand the intersection of refugee background and queer identity. In this Pride In Stories conversation with John Dwyer, Saina shares the story behind the moments below. 🎙️ IN THIS CONVERSATION:• Being LGBTQIA+ in Iran means the government actively forces you out while criminalising the very identity they're expelling you for, leaving no legal safe space.• Gay men in Iran are pressured to undergo forced medical transition to be legally recognised; many who comply later suicide because the surgery was coerced, not chosen. 🕒 CHAPTERS:00:00 Cold open: the choice you never had02:20 Growing up trans in Iran05:05 Hiding from family and society12:28 The military exemption trap18:10 Forced to Turkey, no alternative29:30 Unsafe from day one in Turkey36:44 Seven years waiting in limbo40:40 The resettlement maze to Australia43:14 Safety arrived, but work remains48:17 From survivor to advocate57:32 Being the voice for those still trapped59:50 What allies need to know 🎧 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 #QueerRefugee #LGBTQIA #refugee #asylum #transgender #humankindness #advocacy #safespace ———Show notes by TBC · Approved by TBC · Australian EnglishMentioned in this episode:Thank You For ListeningFollow the show, share it with someone who needs it, or share your own story at kintsugiheroes.com.au. Your story matters.Support Kintsugi HeroesKintsugi 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.

The angel I wished for Vi Do grew up in extreme poverty in rural Vietnam, watching his father sicken and become unable to work. At 14, he left for Hanoi to survive on the streets as a shoeshine boy, hiding money in his clothes and avoiding gangs. A young Australian teacher named Michael found him, offered him food and English lessons, and for the first time, told him he was smart and good. That moment shifted how Vi saw himself. He studied, worked his way into a five-star hotel, built a comfortable life. But when he encountered street kids his own age trapped by dealers and exploitation, he recognised his younger self in their eyes. He chose to help them instead of walking away. Michael later asked him a question about legacy that changed everything: at 80, would he be prouder of money or lives changed? Vi returned to Blue Dragon, where he has worked for 17 years, rescuing over 2,000 trafficking victims and building programs that help youth discover their own potential. He works toward a day when his organisation is no longer needed. Vi Do is CEO of Blue Dragon Children Foundation, an Australian charity rescuing people from human trafficking in Southeast Asia. At 14, he left his rural farming family to work as a street shoeshine boy in Hanoi, supporting his parents and siblings. An Australian English teacher named Michael offered him a path forward, which transformed his life and eventually led him to build Blue Dragon into an organisation of nearly 200 staff helping approximately 50,000 people annually. In this Kintsugi Heroes conversation with Dan Dougherty, Vi shares the story behind the moments below. 🎙️ IN THIS CONVERSATION:• A single person seeing your potential and naming it can redirect a life from survival to purpose.• Street children are systematically dehumanised, called worthless, yet they are often the most resourceful and morally grounded people in their communities. 🕒 CHAPTERS:00:00 The angel I wished for04:02 Building Blue Dragon from the street11:39 Childhood poverty and the choice to leave18:48 Surviving alone on the street24:32 Children of the dirt26:35 The man who believed in me first31:22 A good life wasn't the end36:03 The question that changed everything43:48 Working with the most challenging young people46:11 Rescuing people from trafficking51:28 Working toward the day we're no longer needed53:34 The circle of healing 🎧 If this story moved you, follow Kintsugi Heroes in your podcast app so you never miss an episode. 📌 RESOURCES MENTIONED:Blue Dragon Children Foundation: bluedragon.orgKintsugi Heroes: kintsugheroes.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 #TheGoldInTheCracks #RebuildingAfterBreaking #BluedragonChildren #HumanTrafficking #SocialEnterprise #StreetYouth #GivingBack #Purpose ———Show notes by TBC · Approved by TBC · Australian EnglishMentioned in this episode:Thank You For ListeningFollow the show, share it with someone who needs it, or share your own story at kintsugiheroes.com.au. Your story matters.Support Kintsugi HeroesKintsugi 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.

The weight I couldn't carry alone⚠️ Content advisory: this episode discusses addiction & recovery and grief & loss, 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• GriefLine: 1300 845 745 · griefline.org.auDuncan grew up in rural NSW, the son of a stock and station agent, and spent three decades chasing opportunities across three continents. He built businesses, mastered sales and fundraising, and lived what looked like an enviable life. Then in February 2020, his seven-year-old identical twin son Lachlan died unexpectedly. Days later, New York locked down. He performed CPR on his dead son and couldn't save him. His marriage fractured under the weight of unprocessed grief. He returned to Australia with four grieving children, no community, and a trauma he didn't know how to carry. Six years later, Duncan has rebuilt as a single father, stopped drinking to stay present, and found purpose working in childhood bereavement, the very space that held him when nothing else could.Duncan Schieb is a country boy from Coonamble, NSW, who built a 30-year career across London, Hong Kong, and New York before returning to Australia. In 2020, his identical twin son Lachlan died, followed by lockdown and the end of his marriage. He now leads fundraising for A Friend's Place, Australia's specialist childhood bereavement service.In this Kintsugi Heroes conversation with John Milham, Duncan shares the story behind the moments below.🎙️ IN THIS CONVERSATION:• Performing CPR on his dead son created a dual trauma, both grief and the knowledge that he could not save him.• Country values, grounding, connection to place, pragmatism, anchored him across three decades in cities and chaos.🕒 CHAPTERS:00:00 The weight of what happened03:16 A country boy's anchoring06:08 Leaving home to find his own way15:35 Three decades across continents24:28 What the world taught him32:29 Becoming the mentor he needed35:55 The decision to come home39:28 Lachlan dies, the city locks down46:46 The guilt he carried52:41 Learning he was stronger than he knew01:05:38 Finding purpose in bereavement work01:15:49 What comes next🎧 If this story moved you, follow Kintsugi Heroes in your podcast app so you never miss an episode.📌 RESOURCES MENTIONED:A Friend's Place (formerly National Centre for Childhood Grief): childhoodgrief.org.auLifeline Australia: 13 11 14━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━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 DwyerEvery 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/donateThank 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 #goldenjoinery #kintsugiprinciple #grief #fatherhood #bereavement #singleparent #mentalhealth #childloss #communitycare———Show notes by TBC · Approved by TBC · Australian English

I knew I was going away⚠️ 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.auPaul Turley grew up in Sydney with loving but distant parents who separated when he was 14. The fracture triggered years of unmanaged grief, heavy drinking, drug use, and directionless drift through his late teens and early twenties. On New Year's Eve 2004, fueled by jealousy and intoxication, Paul drove drunk and stoned from a party toward his girlfriend's house, crashed into a car at high speed, and killed Yook Wai Leung, a 62-year-old chef coming home from work. The crash shattered Paul's jaw, ruptured his bowel, and sent him to prison for two and a half years. In his hospital bed, Paul made two decisions: accept the consequence and find a way to make the tragedy mean something. He rebuilt himself through prison programs, moved to Western Australia to distance himself from old patterns, built a family and career in mining, and now speaks to schools, workplaces, and communities about decision-making, accountability, and the possibility of coming back from the worst choices. Today he honours Yook Wai Leung's name in his advocacy work and hopes one day to meet the victim's family.Paul Turley is a book publisher, author, and senior operations executive in Western Australia's mining industry. At 22, he drove drunk and stoned from a New Year's Eve party, crashed into an oncoming car, and killed a 62-year-old chef. He served two and a half years in prison and has since dedicated his life to road safety advocacy and helping young people understand the weight of decision-making.In this Kintsugi Heroes conversation with John Milham, Paul shares the story behind the moments below.🕒 CHAPTERS:00:00 The decision04:00 Broken family, spiral begins08:22 Humility and cockiness11:10 New Year's Eve 200413:30 The crash16:52 Waking in the hospital24:30 Owning the mistake28:45 First day in prison38:21 What is the why46:30 Honouring Yook Wai Leung52:45 The power of sharing56:11 Gratitude and intention🎧 If this story moved you, follow Kintsugi Heroes in your podcast app so you never miss an episode.📌 RESOURCES MENTIONED:whatforservices.com: whatforservices.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 DwyerEvery 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/donateThank 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 #goldenjointery #rebuilding #meaningfromtrauma #accountability #decision-making #roadsafety #mentoring #prisonreform #secondchances #youngpeople———Show notes by TBC · Approved by TBC · Australian EnglishMentioned in this episode:Thank You For ListeningFollow the show, share it with someone who needs it, or share your own story at kintsugiheroes.com.au. Your story matters.Support Kintsugi HeroesKintsugi 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.