ReThreading Madness

Leaving the Faith, Finding Yourself: Life After Mormonism with Audra Phelps What happens when leaving a religion means risking the loss of your community, your identity, and even your closest relationships? In this powerful conversation, Bernadine Fox speaks with Audra Phelps about her experience leaving the Mormon Church and the complex emotional landscape that follows. Together they explore the...

The Intersectionality of Mental Health, MAID, and Suicidality with Rebecca Deutsch Bernadine Fox sits down with Rebecca Deutsch, PhD candidate in Gender, Feminist and Women's Studies at York University, for a conversation that refuses to stay on safe ground. The topic is Medical Assistance in Dying and the still-unresolved question of whether Canadians whose sole underlying medical condition is a...

People, Place and Purpose: Jim Gottstein on Dismantling a Mental Health System That Harms the People It Claims to Help Jim Gottstein is an Alaskan lawyer who, at 29, found himself jumping out of a second floor window in his underwear at 1am after days without sleep. He was hauled off to a psychiatric facility, told he would never practice law again, and that he would need to be on neuroleptics for...

David Roche on Reclaiming Humanity Beyond Appearance What happens when the thing the world notices first about you becomes the very thing that teaches others how to see? In this deeply moving conversation, Bernadine Fox sits down with David Roche, a celebrated storyteller, disability arts pioneer, and recipient of the Order of Canada.  This is a re-air of a 2022 interview done in Memory of David w...

Trigger Warning:  This program talks about sibling violence and suicide ideology. This week on ReThreading Madness, Bernadine Fox speaks with three individuals - Sandra Yuen, Penny Marie, and Venge - about survival, identity, creativity, and what it means to keep living in a world that often punishes difference. Sandra Yuen who lives with schzophrenia discusses her new prose poetry collection I Wa...

A Conversation with Jonathan Rogers at 89 on Getting Old and Dying Host Bernadine Fox is joined by Jonathan Rogers — animator, artist, former supervising producer at Disney and Marvel, stand-up comedian, and the man she was once engaged to — for a rare and honest conversation about aging, dying, and what remains. At 89, Jonathan reflects on a career that took him from Second City Toronto to NBC to...

The Marks We Miss: Forensics, Trafficking, and the Path to True Trauma-Informed Justice   Trigger Warning: This episode contains detailed discussions regarding human trafficking, domestic violence, and sexual assault. It includes forensic descriptions of non-fatal strangulation, and the trafficking of children. We also discuss systemic failures affecting Indigenous and Black communities. Listener...

BiPolar Princess: Victoria Maxwell What happens when a spiritual awakening is mistaken for psychosis?  And what if the difference between harm and healing is simply being listened to? In this powerful and often funny conversation, Victoria Maxwell joins ReThreading Madness to talk about bipolar disorder, psychosis, stigma, and the fine line between spiritual experience and mental health crisis. A...

In this powerful and grounded conversation, Bob Joseph, author of 21 Things You May Not Know About the Indian Act, joins Bernadine Fox to unpack the law that has governed Indigenous lives in Canada since 1876. The Indian Act was not simply administrative policy. It was a system of control. It defined identity, stripped women of status, imposed elected governance systems, confined communities to re...

Historical Mad Voices from Inside the Asylum with Michael Rembis What happens when we stop telling the history of psychiatry from the doctor’s perspective and start listening to the people who lived it? In this powerful and wide-ranging conversation, historian Michael Rembis, author of Writing Mad Lives in the Age of the Asylum , joins Bernadine Fox to explore what changes when Historical Mad Voic...

Racial Battle Fatigue: Truth, Treaties, and Mental Health with Red Thunderwoman Write Up :  In this powerful episode of ReThreading Madness , Bernadine Fox sits down with Michelle Robinson, also known as Red Thunderwoman — a Sahtu Dene activist, political organizer, and host of the Native Calgarian Podcast . Together they explore the deep and ongoing intersections between racism, media, mental hea...

After My Mother Died: In Conversation with Christa Ovenell, Funeral Director and End-of-Life Doula In this episode of ReThreading Madness , Berni Fox is joined by Christa Ovenell , funeral director, end-of-life doula, and founder of Death’s Apprentice , for a deeply honest conversation about death, grief, and what it means to live alongside loss. Speaking shortly after the death of her own mother,...

Choosing to Breathe with Emma Stevens In this episode, Emma Stevens joins Bernadine on ReThreading Madness to talk about what it means to choose life, truth, and selfhood after years of silence, fragmentation, and survival. An adult adoptee raised to feel gratitude rather than grief, Emma reflects on how early relinquishment, adoption, and unspoken trauma shaped her sense of identity and belonging...

In this week’s episode of Rethreading Madness , Bernadine speaks with psychologist and long-time MindFreedom International board member Al Galves about the deep systemic issues in contemporary mental health care. Drawing from decades of clinical practice and activism, Al challenges the dominant bio psychiatric model, arguing that most people experiencing extreme states are not suffering from “brok...

A Word About Mental Health In this episode, we turn the spotlight on the power of creative expression and shared dialogue. Host  Bernadine Fox speaks with three remarkable guests who have helped shape and sustain this ongoing community conversation: A Word About Mental Health Isabella Mori, MEd — writer, retired counsellor, and organizer of A Word About Mental Health — discusses how storytelling,...

From Bunny Hugs to Transgression: Conversations on Healing and Identity with Todd Rennebohm Todd Rennebohm is a Canadian mental health advocate, author, public speaker, and host of the podcast Bunny Hugs and Mental Health, where he creates a free, open space for honest conversations about mental illness, trauma, suicide attempts, addiction, and recovery. A suicide attempt survivor who is in long-t...

Homecoming: Ovid Thomas Reclaims History on the Poundmaker Cree Nation This week on ReThreading Madness, Bernadine speaks with Ovid Thomas, a Sixties Scoop survivor and social media creator known for his educational content on Cree history and the Poundmaker Cree Nation.  Taken from his family at just two weeks old, Ovid grew up in a non-Indigenous home in northern Manitoba, facing  abuse, neglect...

Theo Cuthand, TherapyToo, and Venge Dixon on Art, Neurodiversity, Therapy Harm and Survival This episode brings together three voices working at the intersections of madness, creativity, survivorship, and resistance, each approaching mental health from lived experience rather than abstraction. Theo Jean Cuthand is a celebrated Indigenous filmmaker, visual artist, and game creator whose work explor...

Beyond “Don’t Kill Yourself… Yet”: Practical Tools for Survival with Michael McTeique Content note: This episode discusses suicidal ideation in a non-graphic, supportive, and prevention-focused context. What happens when depression stops being a passing feeling and becomes a constant internal state — a relentless stream of thoughts that slowly drains away your will to live? In this deeply personal...

Fifty Years After I Fled: Rural Alberta is Still Failing to Protect Its Children In this extraordinary solo episode of ReThreading Madness, host Bernadine Fox steps out from behind the mic to share one of the most personal stories she has ever told on air. Fifty years ago, as a 16-yr old teenager in rural southern Alberta, Bernadine ran away to save her life. She was growing up in a small farming...

Kevin Jesuino Reveals the Magic of Theatre Terrific and Richard Lett Let’s Us in on what Makes Magic for Him.   Kevin Jesuino is a first-generation Portuguese settler, performance-maker, director, choreographer, artist educator, and community arts organizer. He is a passionate advocate for the arts and a firm believer that everyone should have access to both creating and experiencing art and cultu...

In Memoriam of the incredible JD Derbyshire, writer, comedian, mad activist, performer, playwright, theatre maker, director, inclusive educator and innovator. Tonight on ReThreading Madness we re-air JD Derbyshire talking with Bernadine about being mad and the need for individuals who live with mental health challenges to have agency in their lives and to consider coming out. And laughing - we lau...

Meditation and Mindfulness with Alan Murdock & Impact of child sexual abuse survivors with Charlene Hellson   Since 1992, Alan Murdock has immersed himself in Soto Zen practice, seeking the stillness and clarity meditation can bring. But as a survivor of child sexual abuse, Alan also knows that mindfulness isn’t always gentle—sometimes it can open the door to old wounds and deep discomfort. To...

Mental Health and the Post – Secondary Student with Angela Sterritt   A few weeks ago, Angela Sterrit, an award-winning investigative journalist, TV, radio, and podcast host, and national bestselling author from the Wilps ‘Wii K’aax of the Gitanmaax community (Gitxsan Nation on her dad’s side and from Bell Island, Newfoundland, on her maternal side) gave a keynote address on mental health and the...

Forrest Lang, Author of Angel Blue: A Song of Redemption, talks about his journey through trauma Trigger Warning:  We talk about childhood trauma in this program.  Please make sure you do what you need to to take care of yourself. Meet Forrest. With an artist’s hands and a life forged in resilience, Forrest Lang has lived a journey carved by trauma, tempered by addiction, and transformed through r...