Beyond the Label: How I Learned to See the Person, Not the Disability
Stories about growing up with disability, mental health, and what it means to see the person first. Sally Pymer was diagnosed with chronic lung disease at 19, told she’d have emphysema by 40, and spent decades running from that truth. But growing up with her brother’s severe disabilities taught her something the world forgot: how […]
What I Do While I Can Walk | Alyssa Chhim-Michelle | Golden Threads
What I do while I can walk Alyssa grew up in a Cambodian Australian family shaped by her parents’ escape from genocide. In high school, she learned her father and sister carried the spinocerebellar ataxia gene. After years of uncertainty, she found courage to test for the gene herself through a partner’s unconditional support in […]
Jeff Parker: From Weightlifter to Blind Advocate — 36 Years of Showing Up
SUMMARY At 25, Jeff Parker was a weightlifter in country New South Wales. A week later, he was paralysed from the waist down by a tumour in his spinal cord no doctor had seen coming. In this episode of Golden Threads, host Daniel Dougherty sits down with Jeff — now 61, blind, an NDIS advocate, […]
“Give People a Chance and Watch Them Shine” | Julie Fisher | Golden Threads | Kintsugi Heroes
Two years before Julie Fisher fell pregnant with her third child, the universe set her up. She’d just made a friend whose daughter Amy had Down syndrome. Julie watched the playground, asked the questions, and quietly decided that if it ever happened to her family, she would want to know. Two years later, an ultrasound […]
31 Years of Support: Why Jeff Parker Says ‘You Don’t Have to Do It Alone’
SUMMARY At 25, Jeff Parker was a weightlifter in country New South Wales. A week later, he was paralysed from the waist down by a tumour in his spinal cord no doctor had seen coming. In this episode of Golden Threads, host Daniel Dougherty sits down with Jeff — now 61, blind, an NDIS advocate, […]
Just Say Hello First | Leanne Watson | Kintsugi Heroes Shorts
The most inclusive thing you can do for someone with a disability is also the simplest — just say hello. Leanne Watson lives with Limb Girdle Muscular Dystrophy and has spent years navigating well-meaning but unhelpful interactions. In this clip she breaks down the practical, everyday ways you can include someone — without assumptions, without […]
Twenty years numb: Karl Germann on complex trauma, queerness, and finding himself at 46 | Pride I…
The 20-year fog Karl grew up in apartheid South Africa in a wealthy but emotionally distant Austrian-South African family, experiencing what he now understands as complex trauma rooted in his mother’s narcissism and his father’s clinical detachment. For decades he dissociated, unaware he was queer until his late twenties when he met a partner and […]
Golden Threads: Stories of Disability & Resilience @kintsugiheroes Coming Soon
New Podcast Series Coming Soon ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🎙️ ABOUT KINTSUGI HEROES ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit Australian podcast network sharing real stories of resilience, disability, and transformation. Named after the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery with gold — the philosophy that what’s been broken can become more beautiful for the mending — every episode […]
I Didn’t Ask for Your Prayers | Leanne Watson | Kintsugi Heroes Shorts
A stranger walked up and started praying over her — without asking, without warning. Leanne Watson lives with Limb Girdle Muscular Dystrophy and has experienced her share of well-intentioned but deeply awkward moments in public. This clip captures one of the most striking: being approached in a hotel foyer and having someone pray over her […]
My sister’s disability changed everything I thought I wanted
Alyssa Chhim-Michelle grew up in a Cambodian Australian family shaped by her parents’ escape from genocide. When she learned her father carried a rare genetic condition, she faced an impossible choice about her own future. Now as her sister’s caregiver, she confronts the gap between family duty and the life she wants to build. Alyssa […]