Bloom: Human Stories of Resilience

While Dr Steve gallivants around Europe, Susie catches the plague and discovers you can't go back in time.  We talk about the fallibility of memory and whether the world is becoming more tolerant or less, and which of our favourite old TV shows generates side eye from teenagers today.

Ettie was a soldier, and one day the moment came to take action, whatever the cost. But doing the right thing was both hard and risky. Ettie tells Susie and Dr Stave about bravery, risks and when the other side hold all the cards.  

Your life can change, very fast - as our guest Tim discovered one fateful day.  The moment he knew is a story of emergencies, zero blood pressure, organ transplants, an Australian first - and more than that, a story of how he coped and how it changed him. 

Talking kids and  self-image through the lens of a woman born with cleft lip and palate, whose kid was born with cleft lip and palate. This is our most emotional interview yet, and Susie & Dr Steve (but mostly Dr Steve) make Megan cry, and that's OK because no Megans were harmed in the making of this podcast. Honest.

When life gives you lemons, yeah yeah... What about when life gives you cancer and amputation at seven years old? And you find yourself knocked down so deep and dark a hole you don't know how to get up again? Liam talks about the moment that changed his life...

Found guilty of hoarding 70,000 violent, racist files, a young feller is sentenced to... Shakespeare and Jane Austen?! Susie and Dr Steve ponder the redemptive power of dead white authors on living white terrorists. 

If you want to make God laugh, goes the old Yiddish saying, tell him your plans. How has life turned out for you? Susie and Steve share Sliding Doors moments, and Steve shares his theory on why those with a brilliant school leaving score may be worse off than the rest of us.

Where do we go when we fall asleep? What is it like to have a near-death experience in an hallucinogenic state? And what would you end up saying out loud if you lost your grip of reality? Meet Sarah and you'll know the answer to one of those questions. PLUS why you're a riverbed.

We’re back! We’re back! We’re baaaaaack! Susie checks up on Steve’s homework (nope) and recalls when an awful tragedy happened… nearly. And we preview our new season, our 76th (according to Steve): The Moment I Knew.

Is it curtains for the Bloom podcast? No. It's not. But it is the end of series three. Susie and Dr Steve reflect on pivotal moments that changed their lives (always easy listening here)... and unveil their cunning plan for series four. 

Good to Go. It’s going to happen to us all (except Keith Richards). This week Susie and Dr Steve explore the final frontier. What makes a good death, and who gets to have one? And when very, very bad things happen to people we love, how do we carry on - and how do we remember them? CW: discussion of death under very sad circumstances. Not for listening with kids around.

Has your life worked out the way you expected? Guest Elizabeth found the resilience to do something extraordinary. She tells us about processing her daughter’s Down syndrome diagnosis with aplomb, humour and support and solace for others - oh, and she made a podcast! And we talk about brain loops. Why do Susie’s worries keep bobbing back up at 2am and how can she make them go away?

Susie and Dr Steve talk to Andrew, who was a Roman Catholic priest for a decade, and then… wasn’t. What is it like entering the outside world? Steve should know, because something like that happened to him, too. PLUS we reveal the meaning of life. Sort of.

Is it possible to store up resilience? Susie and Dr Steve talk about building up your reserves for when life throws lemons at you. Today's guest is Paul, who has taken advantage of a terrible period of his life to help others as a Speaker for Beyond Blue. 

You CAN be what you can't see, but it's harder when you have to forge your own path.  Guest Cath describes building a life as a gay single parent and corporate boss.  Susie and Dr Steve talk about confidence and how to find it, and for the rest of us - just what is required to get the doona off your head of a morning...

Hemingway's definition of guts never applied better than to Liz, today's guest. A bitter divorce is one thing, but coping with years of manipulation and emotional abuse quite another. Susie and Dr Steve talk about resilience when things are bleak and how to find it. [CW: discussion of emotional and legal abuse.]

What’s your earliest memory? Probably never happened – at least, not like that. Susie and Dr Steve talk about memory and how time changes perspectives and getting the view from the other side. In this two guest special you’ll meet Catherine, wife of Andy (who’s not an arsehole). Catherine tells us what it is to build a life with someone with ADHD. Then our second guest Brennan shares his memories of growing up in a cult, and his relationship now with his parents. [CW: violence against children, coercive control.]

If I exorcise my devils, my angels may leave too. When the life you plan is snatched from you, how to do you get the point of being glad of it? Susie and Dr Steve meet Kenny, a remarkable man who wouldn’t have his sight back even if he could. Plus BONUS Tom Waits reference.

Belief in religion is in decline. In this episode we discuss faith, its absence from our lives and what it means to live in a secular world. Joining Susie and Dr Steve is Father Bob, a Roman Catholic priest driven to serve the poor and excluded. Steve talks about the time he very nearly became a priest himself (yes really) and Susie  explains that Faith is her middle name (yes really). 

Susie and Dr Steve are back for season 3! In the trailer we give a sneak preview introducing our first guest (world famous in Melbourne) and talk about how and why we tweaked the formula to focus on 'human stories'.