The Obliterated Place with Kaye Steinsapir

I couldn’t have a podcast without introducing ya’ll to my friend, Joylene Jose. We met when we were in the first grade and soon became inseparable.  Joylene’s family provided me with security and stability I wouldn’t otherwise have had. I spent more time in their home than my own. I will forever be grateful and part Filipino at heart! We were together through it all. Joylene’s dad’s death when we...

This is one of my favorite episodes because Jennifer Lee Snowden (Bossi) is one of my favorite people. We met as young women in the fight of our lives against breast cancer. We're members of a club everyone wants to avoid at all costs, but our sisterhood is one of life's greatest gifts.  Bossi remarks that breast cancer is both the worst and best thing that ever happened to her. You have an idea o...

In this episode, I connect with a fellow writer whose work I deeply admire, Jason MacKenzie. Jason and I first crossed paths on Substack, where we both write about our beautiful, young daughters who left this world far too soon. Jason joins us from Canada to share his raw, unfiltered journey through an obliterated place that began long ago. For over five grueling years, Jason’s first wife, Cindy —...

In this episode, I was joined by another member of our extended Pacific Palisades family, Michael Geller. Like any family, we don’t share all the same political views. Mike and I vote differently. But it doesn’t matter. When we sat down, our superficial differences melted away. We became so immersed in conversation about life and loss that we never discussed the LA mayoral race (which we’d been de...

In this episode, I am honored to sit down with my friend Libby Boyce, whose only son, actor and philanthropist Cameron Boyce, passed away suddenly in 2019 at the age of twenty from a nocturnal seizure. To my children, Cameron was a bright, joyous presence on their favorite shows like Jessie and Descendants . To Libby, he was a deeply loyal, affectionate, and philanthropic soul who loved his villag...

Children can serve as our greatest teachers if we let them. My guest in this special episode is my ten-year-old son, Eli William Steinsapir. A boy with the sweetest smile and a glint of playful mischievousness in his eye, Eli brings sunshine everywhere he goes. If you met him, you’d never guess what he’s been through. Eli lived the first years of his life in the dark shadow of my battle against br...

In this episode, I am honored to sit down with my Rabbi and dear friend, Daniel Sher, from Kehillat Israel (KI) in the Pacific Palisades. Rabbi Sher has been a steadfast anchor for our congregation, even as he navigates his own "obliterated place" — having personally lost his family home and all their belongings in the devastating Palisades fire.  We sit down to discuss the profound psychological...

After the tragic loss of his teenage children, Ruby and Hart, in a drunk driving accident, Colin Campbell found most books on grief unhelpful. I had a similar experience, with the exception of the one that Colin wrote shortly after Ruby and Hart died, when his grief was raw and often felt unbearable. Finding the Words: Working Through Profound Loss with Hope and Purpose resonated deeply. It made m...

Lyle Green and I have lived across the street from each other for fifteen years, but there were parts of his story I never knew until we sat down for this conversation. We are "COVID family"—neighbors who became extended family during the pandemic and the aftermath of the accident that took Molly’s life. In this episode, Lyle shares the vivid memories of losing his father at just four years old an...

Grief often feels like a thousand paper cuts; your person’s favorite food in the grocery store that you pick up and put back, a song on the radio that suddenly transports you back to happier times, when they were still here, seeing their peers achieve new milestones while they’re forever the age they were when they died. In this episode, I sit down with my friend Carla Liber, who lost her 16-year-...

I’ve always thought of myself as an alchemist, transmuting what remains after destruction into something new. But after losing my daughter, Molly, that idea was no longer abstract. It became survival. In this episode, I’m joined by my dear friend Nikki Mark, the first person I met who had also lost a child, and the person who showed me it was possible to keep going. After her 12-year-old son, Tomm...

Ricky Saxena was a 22 year-old senior in the optical engineering program at the University of Arizona when he suddenly collapsed during labs, just weeks away from graduation. Ricky was rushed to the hospital, where doctors discovered his oxygen levels were dangerously low and his heart was enlarged by six times the normal size. Testing eventually revealed that Ricky suffers from pulmonary hyperten...

You may know me because we're friends. Or former colleagues. You may have stumbled upon my social media feed after we lost our 12-year-old daughter, Molly, in a tragic accident in 2021. Perhaps you just discovered this new podcast. No matter how we're connected or our level of familiarity, aspects of my story will surprise you. I feel like I've lived several lifetimes in my 48 years. In the immort...

At age 11, Nafiz Cekirge's daughter, Eliza, began displaying sudden and alarming symptoms of anorexia and OCD. The Cekirges went from being a typical upper-middle class family to navigating a medical crisis that is not well understood. Eliza spent most of her teenage years at numerous in-patient treatment facilities throughout the country. Despite receiving the highest level of care, the support o...

Lili Geller's husband, Damon, died unexpectedly at age 48.Damon was the most alive person that many of us ever knew. He was passionate. In his love for Lili and their kids, Delilah and Jonah, and his extended family and friends. In his athleticism. Damon physically challenged himself - skateboarding, surfing, basketball, jiu jitsu, table tennis - you name it, Damon rocked it! In the way he moved t...

Elizabeth Kopple began writing creative nonfiction after her 18-year-old son Henry was killed on his first day of college in 2022. Elizabeth wrote in an essay published in the Huffington Post, "in an instant, every expectation for our family and our future was obliterated." I met Elizabeth at her family's home shortly after Henry's funeral. In our conversation on the podcast, Elizabeth explained t...

Jill Lipsky is a lifelong Palisadian, a teacher, and one of my favorite people. She lost her brother, Darren, to fentanyl poisoning while their father was undergoing open heart surgery. Darren had been battling addiction. Jill was the person in her family who took care of everyone and tried to save him. Their parents died within the next year, during the pandemic, leaving Jill as the sole keeper o...

Kaye and her "breastie," Suzanne, reflect on the ups and downs of their breast cancer journeys as young moms. Suzanne describes her family history of cancer, tragic losses of loved ones, facing her own cancer battle at age 31 with a 16-month-old baby, and how she heals by helping others who are battling the disease. Thirteen years post-diagnosis, Suzanne continues to create a beautiful life in her...

Kaye Steinsapir has faced enormous challenges with resilience and grace. Her heart has been broken in innumerable ways - by neglect and abuse as a child, struggling her entire life with family members consumed by addiction, battling breast cancer as a young mom of 3, the tragic death of her 12-year-old daughter, Molly, followed by the destruction of her town in the Palisades Fire. Kaye refuses to...