Showy Ovaries with Penny Ashton.

Send us Fan Mail In March 2020, NZ Girl and Powered by Flossie co-founder, Jenene Crossan, (Ngai Tahu) flew back to NZ from London and a pesky spiky virus hitched on for the ride. Developing Covid a few days after landing, Jenene became NZ's 37th covid case but one of its most visible after going public on instagram. After a particularly brutal case she is still left with ramifications and ha...

Send us Fan Mail NZ's very own Dr Hu took some time out from her Multiple Sclerosis and disability advocacy to chat to Penny about her incredible life. From having her whakapapa stripped from her birth certificate when she was adopted, to her surviving sexual assault and familial abuse, to discovering her various indigenous identities, to her fistful of academic qualifications, Dr Huhana has...

Send us Fan Mail Freelance writer Sarah Connor was 46 when her usually trustworthy body started misbehaving. Anxiety, panic attacks, loss of joy and lack of sleep saw her undertake an investigation into just what the hell was happening. She visited a litany of specialists before finally settling on a visit to the Wellington Menopause Clinic that changed her life.  Once diagnosed and using HRT to a...

Send us Fan Mail When perimenopause came knocking at Kate Billing's door with all its insomnia and anxiety she had no idea what the hell was happening. Once armed with a diagnosis she was pissed off, and so set about educating as many people as possible through her Linked In Group - Menopause Awareness and Action. Determined that Generation X will be the last to be blindsided, she is well on...

Send us Fan Mail Dr Geri McLeod is a senior research fellow in the Otago University’s Department of Psychological Medicine, and recently published findings around supplements, which she describes as expensive wees. She chatted with Penny around medical misogyny, the predatory nature of some supplement companies, the lack of evidence into their efficacy but also the appallingly low funding for stud...

Send us Fan Mail Penny's theatre wife Lori Dungey, dropped into her house to chat about her virtually non-existant menopause. Despite working together for 22 years this is the first time they have really discussed menopause and so much more besides. They cover the origins of Theatresports in NZ, Lori's sexual awakening, sanitary belts, her horny mother and perhaps a wee ditty on the ukul...

Send us Fan Mail Today Penny is talking and laughing with the prolific and inspiring award-winning writer; Lynda Chanwai-Earle. Lynda is the originator and performer in Ka Shue - Letters Home, which was the first mainstream theatre show for a universal audience by a Chinese New Zealander in Aotearoa. The show premiered in 1996 and Penny chats to Lynda after she remounted the show in the Auckland W...

Send us Fan Mail Former punk icon and current witch, Yvette Parsons is one of the most prolific actresses working in NZ today. From What We Do in the Shadows , to The Luminaries to The Power of the Dog to Nude Tuesday, her comic talents are in hot demand in many genres and often without any clothes. She and Penny discuss her years as a musician in NZ's small punk scene in the 70's and 80...

Send us Fan Mail In a break from menopause, Penny invites two of her globe trotting performer buddies to drop in and spill their souls about their troublesome bits. Both diagnosed with a condition they share with Penny, vulvodynia, they talk about their long and frustrating journeys to being diagnosed, treated and even believed.  Ingrid Garner who is an award winning performer of Eleanor's St...

Send us Fan Mail Wooohoooo. Here is a bonus documentary to honour of all Penny's good friends currently battling in the Edinburgh Fringe Festival trenches. She produced it way back in the Jurassic period, aka 2004, about her first ever time presenting a show there. Since then she been 4 times with varying degrees of success and there really is nothing like it; fucking amazing one day, fucking...

Send us Fan Mail Shortland Street's first ever murderer drops in on Showy Ovaries to discuss her blood letting onscreen and in life.  Having absolutely no symptoms Elisabeth thought this podcast would be short and uninteresting  but she and Penny managed to fill the space with chats of orgasms, early diplomacy by Nanaia Mahuta on school camp and being the daughter of one of NZ's most  fa...

Send us Fan Mail Ōtautahi born and bred, former MP, soon to be former mayor, but still current mayor Lianne Dalziel, beamed into Penny's Covid isolation at her parent's house to chat about various things. A advocate for the people of Christchurch for just over half her life, she discussed what she loved about wearing those mayoral chains and what she is looking forward to next. She patie...

Send us Fan Mail Fifth Generation Kiwi, Jenny Agnew, welcomed fellow 5th Generation Kiwi Penny into her home to chat all about what it is to be a Chinese New Zealander. A descendant of Choie Sew Hoy who moved to NZ in 1869, Jenny was recently awarded a Queen's Service Medal along with her husband Trevor, for their research into her ancestor. She talked to Penny about her menopause, about arri...

Send us Fan Mail Wellllllllll it finally caught up with Penny. The Vid, the Rona, the virus that's the least desirous, and it has a bit of a story so Penny thought she'd overshare it.  For a change.  Coming to you from Day 7 of isolation in Christchurch where she has turfed her own mother out of her bedroom, Penny is here to dish the deets on the spiky protein that had the same swooning...

Send us Fan Mail *Sorry for the delay Ovarians, covid finally got me.  Ren Lunicke has lived many lives and tackled each wholeheartedly. Deeply uncomfortable within their evangelical upbringing, they went through a journey of discovery with their body from sexual discovery, to gender identity and finally hormonal balance. Now proudly Non-Binary, taking testosterone and happily married to Willow, t...

Send us Fan Mail Green Party MP and self described lefty feminist lesbian, Jan Logie beamed into Penny's office during a recess in that hive of human activity that is the NZ Parliament. Penny divulged that Jan's work in boosting funding to Women's Refuge was a big part of her decision to vote Green in the last two elections and thanked her for helping reverse some historic cuts. The...

Send us Fan Mail Penny had a bloody hilarious time getting honest AF with Stephanie Tauevihi, aka Shortland St's crack paramedic and iconic character Donna Heka. Of Danish and Niuean heritage, Steph spoke of her heartbreaking struggles with her body and was brutally honest about her complex relationship with her beloved Mum who passed away aged only 49. Penny's kindred spirit in the art...

Send us Fan Mail 2020 Senior New Zealander of the year, Dame Margaret Sparrow, delighted Penny by agreeing to chat about her very minor menopause plus her very major life's work in freeing NZ's women from the forced burden of child birth through abortion reform. A lifelong champion of the notion of choice, Dame Margaret regaled Penny with tales of her own illegal abortion in 1956, being...

Send us Fan Mail It's the queen of Jazzy Ovaries this week, who shares her journey of suddenly losing her voice on tour thanks to menopause's effects. Caitlin opens up as wide as a pharynx to regale former pupil Penny with a cavalcade of stories, potions and spells in her journey with her body, her blindness and her daily supplement regime. Spiritual Caitlin and deeply deeply atheist Pen...

Send us Fan Mail To celebrate the 30th anniversary of Shortland St, NZ's longest running soap opera, Penny headed to see one of the longest stars of the street - Angela Bloomfield. A veteran of 24 years of both acting and directing in Ferndale, Angela opened up about what's it's like to grow up onscreen, the pressures of looking your best and how trying to trounce your kids at board...

Send us Fan Mail Hawkes Bay founder of The Female GP, Dr Samantha Newman, joined Penny to share her passion for vaginas, vulvas and all thing science. A self described happy geek, she is an advocate for women's health not only in her private clinic, but also as a campaigner for equitable access to advice and medicines for those who cannot afford it. Penny invited her along as her first ever c...

Send us Fan Mail When Catherine formed the NZ Prostitute's Collective (now the Sex Worker's Collective) with her co-workers back in 1987, she never dreamed that would one day lead to a nod from the crown and a Dame-hood. But her advocacy for the rights, health and dignity of those in the world's oldest profession did just that and Penny was excited to chat to a woman who led the cha...

Send us Fan Mail This week's guest is the very gorgeous Jeanette Thomas, co-host of one of Auckland's most popular breakfast radio shows on The Breeze, and former presenter of Good Morning. She beamed into Penny's office to chat about their time together on Good Morning, about how her perimenopause was camouflaged by her intense grief and the one symptom of menopause she would rathe...

Send us Fan Mail This week it's Good Morning's doyenne of the daisy and dazzler of the doily, Astar, so fabulous she only needs one name. She entertained Penny in her home with her tales of working for the Sultan of Brunei, about growing up in Tuatapere and shouting at a GP. A devotee of HRT for some time, she is a woman who knows her own body and just what it needs. They chat her endome...

Send us Fan Mail For a Mother's Day special here's Showy Ovaries' first mother/daughter combo with TV director Carolyn Sylvester and artist Meg Mahy. Carolyn (Penny's first adult showbiz employer) told Penny all about her struggles with menopause and how she realised her mother's "break-down" was no such thing, about how not all hormone treatments are created equ...