Lifespan: Stories of Illness, Accident, and Recovery

Janet Golden, professor emerita of history, Rutgers University, describes her experience with Long Covid and points out that infectious diseases often lead to chronic diseases and conditions. That’s yet another reason to make sure all your, and your children’s, vaccinations are up to date. Preventing infectious illness often prevents chronic illness.

Dylan lives in Tennessee. He’s a magazine editor. He has a wife. He has a young daughter. And he has Alport syndrome, a hereditary kidney disease. In this episode of Lifespan, Dylan describes his years on kidney dialysis, how a kidney transplant recently transformed his life, and the uniqueness of being part of an extended family with so many members affected by an inherited illness.

Larry and Carol have been married for 66 years. About 17 years ago, Carol began to show signs of memory problems. She has since been diagnosed as having Alzheimer’s. In this episode of Lifespan, Larry, and his daughter, Madeline, who are both physicians, talk about Carol and the difficulties that Alzheimer’s presents to everyone touched by the illness.

When someone suspects they have a tumor, the first thing they think about, and fear, is cancer. So, when their biopsy comes back as “benign,” they’re relieved. But the word “benign” can be deceptive. In this episode of Lifespan, our guest, Deidre Naughton, describes her experience with painful, recurring, non-cancerous tumors.

“‘Breast cancer awareness’ is a national catchphrase. There is less recognition, however, of testicular cancer, even though the average age for onset is 33, far younger than for breast cancer. At 33, few men worry about cancer and so they tend to ignore any signs of the illness. In this episode of Lifespan, Dan Skinner, a professor of health policy, and the producer and host of the podcast, Progno...

Faiza Aziz is a medical student. Before enrolling in medical school in 2020, given her public health and medical knowledge, her fluency in several languages, and her familiarity with several cultures, she trained and worked as a medical interpreter. In this episode of Lifespan, Faiza describes the vital role played by medical interpreters in the healthcare system, how interpreters help to assure q...

Bob Simpson and Estelle Carol have been together for almost 50 years. They have two grown children. Before retirement, Bob was a high school history teacher. Estelle is still working as a graphic designer. For decades, they also combined their talents to produce syndicated political cartoons under the byline Carol Simpson. Then, in 2016, Bob had a stroke. In this episode of Lifespan, Bob and Estel...

Chris Kaposy and Jan Beattie have three children: Elizabeth, 14, Aaron, 11, and Ty, 7. With each pregnancy, Jan and Chris decided in advance to refuse prenatal testing. But when Jan was pregnant with Aaron, her first ultrasound at 19 weeks showed some markers for Down syndrome and she and Chris had to revisit their original decision about prenatal testing. Chris is a biomedical ethicist and Jan is...

Anna Mehler Paperny is a Canadian journalist who has worked for Reuters, The Globe and Mail, and Global News. She’s won awards for her investigative journalism. And she’s struggled with major clinical depression for most of her adult life, attempting suicide several times. On this episode of Lifespan, Anna talks about her experience of mental illness, the stigma of mental illness, and the history...

Steve Bild, Renee Pollock, and Mary Costello have all lost their longtime spouses. In this episode of Lifespan, they describe their spouses’ lives and legacies, their partners’ deaths, and their own adjustment to living in the aftermath of grievous loss. Steve, Renee, and Mary also offer advice to others coping with similarly profound loss. If you want to view Steve’s wife’s art, you can visit Mar...

Debbie and Doug have been married for more than 40 years. In this episode of Lifespan, Doug talks candidly about his addiction to alcohol and his ongoing recovery. Debbie describes the meaning and effect of co-dependence, and the invaluable help she received from Al-Anon. Doug is now a substance abuse counselor, so his description of his recovery offers professional as well as deeply personal insi...

In the last 16 years, Bernhard Debatin has had three different types of cancer. Physicians in Germany treated his first cancer successfully; physicians in the United States successfully treated the other two. In this episode of Lifespan, Bernhard describes patients’ experience of cancer and its aftermath, and reflects on how culture, healthcare systems, and even language shape our experience and v...

While members of the medical community concede that at 32% of births obstetricians are performing too many cesareans, cesarean sections can also be life-saving. That is why listening to, and learning from, women’s experiences can benefit both the mothers who might be helped by a timely cesarean, as well as the mothers who can probably avoid the surgery if they are allowed to go into labor spontane...

We all know how sick we feel when our stomach is upset. We’ve all experienced nausea, diarrhea, and stomach pain—among the most uncomfortable symptoms we can have when we’re sick. But chronic gastro-intestinal disease and serious episodic gastro-intestinal disease take stomach discomfort to an entirely different level. On this episode of Lifespan, Matt Johnson discusses his experience with bouts o...

Last month, Jackie Wolf talked to three women, Lauren, Stacy, and Cora, who were pregnant for the first time. On this month’s episode of Lifespan, Jackie talks to them again—this time about their births. It turns out that the medical treatment and advice they received during their pregnancies set the agenda for how their babies were born. And the three births ended up representing the range of Ame...

On this episode of Lifespan, Jackie Wolf talks to three women who will soon give birth for the first time. Their experiences during pregnancy have differed because each woman received a different medical label. Doctors identified Lauren, at age 36, as “a geriatric pregnancy.” Stacy struggled with infertility before becoming pregnant. And Cora, despite a “normal” pregnancy, suffered medically induc...

Medical students of color shoulder a double burden. They are medical students, expected to do all the hard work that goes with being a medical student. And each day they also must cope with, and find ways to respond to, racism in the classroom and the clinic. They don’t have the luxury of simply being medical students. On this episode of Lifespan, four medical students of color, Alyssa Gerth, Andr...

One deceased organ donor can save up to 8 lives. Yet, on average, 20 people on the United Network for Organ Sharing waiting list die each day because so few organs are available. On this episode of Lifespan, we hear from Kelly Nottingham, who donated a kidney to her mother; David Burke, who received a liver from a deceased donor; and Cynthia Tindongan, who donated a kidney to a stranger.

Burns are among the most difficult injuries for physicians to treat. Our skin isn’t just our appearance to the world, skin helps to regulate body temperature, prevent infection, and ensure that fluids move smoothly from one part of our body to the other. When our skin is severely damaged, especially if the damage is widespread third- and fourth-degree burns, treatment is exceedingly complex. In th...

Lifespan host Jackie Wolf’s mother died of lung cancer in 2010. In this episode of Lifespan, she uses the story of her mother’s illness and death as an example of end-of-life care in the United States. The American approach to end-of-life care is often characterized by futile treatment at enormous cost. It also tends to favor quantity over quality of life. To read the article Jackie co-wrote with...

Chronic illness is, by definition, treatable but not curable. In this episode of Lifespan, Jennifer Grayson describes her struggle, beginning in high school, with unexplained symptoms. Emily Abel talks about her experience with post-cancer fatigue. Mary Ellen Croteau explains how a chronic respiratory condition impacted her work as an artist. Katy Kropf, a family physician, listens to their storie...

Sudden, catastrophic illnesses often perplex doctors and terrify patients. In Doug Mann’s case, doctors at multiple medical centers could not figure out why he was experiencing a rapidly spreading paralysis in his legs. Months passed before he received a proper diagnosis and appropriate treatment.

We hear it all the time: “breastfeeding is the most natural thing in the world.” But as you’ll learn from these stories, today’s breastfeeding mothers are running into difficulties. Sarah Rubin had been prepared to battle the medicalization of birth but had not anticipated the medicalization of breastfeeding. Clare Chambers was unprepared for sleep deprivation. Lauren Hill thought her job as a nur...

When Steve Miner was 18 years old, he fell 150 feet off a cliff in Northern California. He tells his story.

On Lifespan, you’ll hear stories about encounters with the health care system. Each show contains stories bound by a common theme: chronic illness, substance abuse, end-of-life care—the topics will keep coming. The stories are deeply personal. Some suggest the best approaches to handling or treating an illness. Other stories simply reflect on an illness after it’s over or contain lessons on how be...