Episodes

  • Historical Mad Voices from Inside the Asylum with Michael Rembis

    Historical Mad Voices from Inside the Asylum with Michael Rembis
    Feb 25 2026
    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 Voices from Inside the Asylum with Michael Rembis we center the voices of those labeled “mad.” Drawing from firsthand accounts of institutionalization between 1830 and 1950, Rembis reveals a long and often hidden history of resistance, reform, abuse, survival, and self-advocacy. The asylum was never a neutral or purely benevolent space. It was contested from the very beginning. Together, they examine psychiatric power, forced treatment, gendered confinement, trauma pathologization, violence narratives in the media, and the enduring struggle to be heard within systems that claim to help. This episode moves beyond simplistic binaries of “care” versus “control” and instead asks deeper questions: Who gets to define madness? Who holds authority? And what happens when we reclaim our own stories? This is a conversation about history, yes—but also about the present moment, and the ongoing fight for dignity, agency, and community care.

    Music by Shari Ulrich and Sia


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    1 hr
  • Red-Thunderwoman-MichelleRobinson-re-reconciliation-final

    Red-Thunderwoman-MichelleRobinson-re-reconciliation-final
    Feb 18 2026
    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 health, colonial policy, and what Michelle calls “racial battle fatigue.” From land acknowledgments to treaties, from internalized racism to systemic healthcare discrimination, Michelle speaks candidly about the emotional toll of living in a country that still resists truth while claiming reconciliation. The conversation moves beyond surface-level allyship into harder territory: how Indigenous erasure was built into Canadian education, media, and law; how racism shapes mental health outcomes; and how colonial systems continue to police, dismiss, and pathologize Indigenous voices. Michelle reflects on growing up navigating internalized racism, raising a proud Dene daughter in a climate of rising hate, and why mental health conversations cannot be separated from oppression dynamics. This is not an abstract discussion — it is lived reality. But this episode is also about solutions. Michelle outlines concrete pathways forward through meaningful listening, engaging Indigenous voices in good faith, amplifying media accountability, and acting on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s Calls to Action and the National Inquiry’s Calls to Justice. This conversation invites listeners to move past fear-based narratives and into relationship — to see Indigenous people not as caricatures or symbols, but as neighbors, leaders, and full human beings. Honest, challenging, and urgent, this is an episode about what it takes to heal in a system not designed for everyone.

    Music Shari Ulrich
    Photo Michelle Robinson


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    1 hr
  • After My Mother Died: In Conversation with Christa Ovenell, Funeral Director and End-of-Life Doula

    After My Mother Died: In Conversation with Christa Ovenell, Funeral Director and End-of-Life Doula
    Feb 4 2026
    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, Christa reflects on the strange dissonance of grieving personally while holding professional knowledge about dying, funerals, and end-of-life care. Together, they explore what death really looks like beyond movies and platitudes, and why avoiding conversations about mortality often leaves the living more vulnerable. Christa shares how her mother’s final weeks unfolded, how grief collided with the holiday season, and what helped her survive that first raw stretch after loss. The conversation gently challenges cultural habits that rush, sanitize, or silence grief, and instead invites curiosity, ritual, and community. From what not to say to someone who is grieving, to why funerals and gatherings still matter, Christa offers practical, compassionate insights rooted in both lived experience and decades of deathcare work. This episode is for anyone who has lost someone, fears losing someone, or knows they will someday. It’s about making space for complexity, letting grief be what it is, and learning how to show up for ourselves and others when death enters the room. Honest, humane, and quietly radical, this conversation reminds us that facing death more openly can deepen how we live.

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    1 hr
  • Choosing to Breathe with author Emma Stevens

    Choosing to Breathe with author Emma Stevens
    Jan 30 2026
    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. She speaks candidly about the long internal work of listening to the parts of herself that were forced to stay quiet, and the moment when merely surviving was no longer enough.

    The conversation weaves through themes from Emma’s memoirs, including Choosing to Breathe and The Gathering Place, where she traces her search for truth about her origins and the slow, deliberate process of reuniting a fractured sense of self. Emma describes how identity can splinter when a child learns early that certain questions, emotions, or needs are unwelcome, and how reclaiming wholeness requires welcoming even the most wounded parts back into the story. Her reflections are raw, meditative, and grounded in lived experience rather than abstraction.

    Emma also speaks about her earlier experience of exploitation within a therapeutic relationship, explored in A Fire Is Coming, and how earlier attachment wounds created vulnerability to professional harm. Rather than centering pathology, this episode focuses on agency. On learning to trust one’s own perception, on speaking truth to power, and on choosing to breathe fully into a life that is no longer shaped by secrecy or coercion. This is a conversation for anyone who has felt they were performing themselves for others, and who is ready to begin living from a place that is truly their own.

    You can find Emma’s books on Amazon

    Bernadine’s monologue 50 Years After I Fled can be downloaded at https://www.spreaker.com/episode/fifty-years-after-i-fled-rural-alberta-is-still-failing-to-protect-its-children--69044526

    Music by Shari Ulrich, Omar Rudberg

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    1 hr
  • Al Galves on MindFreedom Shield and Human Rights in Mental Health

    Al Galves on MindFreedom Shield and Human Rights in Mental Health
    Jan 21 2026
    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 “broken brains,” but are responding to pain, trauma, and social conditions that have gone unrecognized. He explains how the profession’s unquestioned assumptions shape public attitudes, legal systems, and the treatment people receive — often to their detriment. Together, they explore the work of MindFreedom International, an organization founded by survivors of forced psychiatric treatment who refused to accept coercion as care. Al details the MindFreedom Shield, a global solidarity network that mobilizes members to advocate for individuals who have been involuntarily hospitalized or forcibly medicated. Through coordinated phone calls, emails, and public pressure, Shield members confront institutions directly, helping free people or improve their conditions while offering something even more vital: the knowledge that someone on the outside sees them, believes them, and is fighting for their human rights. The conversation widens to look at why coercive practices persist, how legal systems reinforce them, and what happens when professionals treat trauma as pathology instead of a human response to harm. Bernadine and Al discuss the dangers of a society that equates distress with incompetence, the long history of dismissing survivors’ realities, and the urgent need for alternatives such as Soteria houses, Open Dialogue, and peer-led supports. This is a powerful episode for anyone interested in human rights in mental health, systemic reform, or survivor-driven advocacy — and a reminder that solidarity can be lifesaving.

    Music: Shari Ulrich

    Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/rethreading-madness--5675300/support.
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    1 hr
  • A Word About Mental Health with Isabella Mori

    A Word About Mental Health with Isabella Mori
    Jan 16 2026
    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, poetry, and connection can support recovery and understanding. Léa Taranto, a disabled Chinese Jewish Canadian writer living with OCD and comorbid disorders, shares how writing becomes both anchor and release. Her debut novel, A Drop in the Ocean, was a finalist for the Governor General’s Literary Award and the Forest of Reading’s White Pine Award. Lynn, a retired English professor, writer, and advocate for brain health, reflects on her experiences as a participant in the series and on the healing power of shared presence and curiosity. Together they explore what happens when we talk openly about mental health, how art and community intertwine, and why sometimes the most powerful act of healing begins with a single word. A Word About Mental Health: where stories, art, and conversation help rethread the world one voice at a time.

    Music by Shari Ulrich, Billie Ellish and Callum Scott

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    1 hr
  • From Bunny Hugs to Transgression: Conversations on Healing and Identity with Todd Rennebohm

    From Bunny Hugs to Transgression: Conversations on Healing and Identity with Todd Rennebohm
    Dec 30 2025
    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-term recovery from substance abuse, Todd brings lived experience and compassion to dialogues with professionals, survivors, and families affected by mental health and addiction. His podcast has featured hundreds of episodes of candid storytelling and is recognized among top mental health podcasts for its combination of depth, vulnerability, and warmth. Bunny Hugs Podcast+1 Todd is also the author of the children’s book Sometimes Daddy Cries, a story told through the eyes of a child whose father experiences depression, designed to help families talk about mental health with sensitivity and insight.

    Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/rethreading-madness--5675300/support.
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    1 hr
  • Homecoming: Ovid Thomas Reclaims History on the Poundmaker Cree Nation

    Homecoming: Ovid Thomas Reclaims History on the Poundmaker Cree Nation
    Dec 29 2025
    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, and systemic discrimination.

    Ovid shares his journey of survival—from enduring racial bias in education and being falsely accused of cheating, to challenging policies that barred First Nations students from university-track courses. He opens up about how trauma, partial deafness, and years of misdiagnosis shaped his early life, and how returning to his community became a path toward healing.

    Together, Bernadine and Ovid explore his reconnection with the Poundmaker Cree Nation, where he discovered family, belonging, and cultural roots long denied to him. They discuss his efforts to correct mistranslations of speeches by Poundmaker and Big Bear, his research into colonial distortions of Cree history, and his ongoing fight against medical and institutional racism.

    This conversation moves from the personal to the political—linking Ovid’s lived experience with the
    broader legacy of colonial systems that continue to harm Indigenous peoples. It’s a story of truthtelling, reclamation, and resilience.

    Music by Shari Ulrich

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    1 hr