Stories of people facing their worst-case scenario head on.

Meet David Arama, a guy who likes to be prepared for everything - storms, floods, fire.....and World War III? He takes us on a tour of his nuclear bomb shelter, tells us why he's not one of those "extreme preppers," and shares who makes the cut to get into his bunker in case the poop hits the fan.

1 in 5 new businesses in Canada don’t make it to their first year, and Nicole Drakes was determined to beat that statistic. But three months after opening her bakery in Morell, PEI, things started to unravel. Nicole shares her journey of picking herself back up after losing it all.

When Trevor Dineen was growing up, his mom kept a running tally of all the things that could maim or injure him. Kidnappings. Drowning. Car accidents. He sits down with his mom Carol to ask where that fear came from, and the lingering effects on him today - including how he parents his own kids.

Keely McCoy is 27-years-old, and has tested positive for the gene mutation that causes Huntington’s disease -

an incurable neurodegenerative disorder that both her mom and grandmother had. She tells us how she's determined to live her life differently from her own mom, who lived in denial about the disease for years.

Congratulations, you've done the thing you set out to do. Your first half-marathon. A dream job. Mastering the ukulele. But what happens AFTER you accomplish something big? On this episode, stories of people trying to figure that out.

In her twenties, Eman Bare personified 'girl boss' hustle culture. She earned degrees in law and journalism, designed clothes that showed at New York Fashion Week, became a certified yoga instructor, and wrote 11 books - all before the age of 30. Today, her main goal is to be in bed by eight. This recovering overachiever tells us how burnout taught her to finally say the word 'no.'

Jimmy Chau was excited to run his first full-marathon, he just wasn't expecting it would take him nearly seven hours to do it. He tells us about finishing dead-last in the Manitoba Marathon, and who was there for him at the end.

When Ben Scrivens retired from his career as an NHL goalie in 2016, he had to figure out how to get a “real job” for the first time in his life. Ben tells Trevor why he chose to get a master's degree in social work, helping other retired players deal with the jealousies, ego adjustments and hard truths that he struggled with after hanging up the skates for good.

And Syrian-Canadian Amrou Nayal is about to visit Syria for the first time in 16 years. He reflects on lost hope, sacrifices, and staying loyal to the revolution when others gave up, and tells Ify how this moment has allowed him to dream again about the future for Syria.

In praise of putting yourself out there.

Lynn Sainté has never planned an event before. But she wants to relive her church choir days, so she's booked a venue, hired musicians, and sent out invites to everyone she knows for a pop-up choir event. Now the question is….will anyone show up?

One year ago, Shelby Sappier, known as the musician Beaatz, made a bold prediction on Instagram: That 2024 would be his biggest year in music ever. Now that the year is almost over, Ify checks in to find out he’s one of only six people in the first ever Indigenous Music Residency at CBC. Now he just has to figure out how to keep this momentum going. 

Ben Shannon and his 9-year-old daughter entered an international whistling competition on a lark. But then they got accepted, and things got serious. Find out how this father-daughter faced tough-talking whistling coaches, a case of stage fright, and Ben’s own shield of teenage irony.

19-year-old Callum Long needs to find a job, but being on the autism spectrum is making his search a little more complicated. Trevor tags along with Callum and his dad in the family mini-van, as Callum puts on his best dress shirt and hands out resumes -- in the hopes someone says to him, "You're hired!"

For Brenda Hernandez-Acosta, making empanadas and churro cheesecake has always been her love language. But now she’s ready to turn her hobby into a full-time business. She tells Trevor why she's finally ready to bet big on herself.

People survive all kinds of things - sickness, accidents, heartache. On this episode, we're exploring how people come out on the other side of that.

Shannon Cornelsen knows she is from a family of survivors. On her mother’s side, many of her loved ones lived through the residential school system. And that’s what's motivating her to take on the task of reconnecting families of those who died in the Camsell, a hospital where many Indigenous people were taken from the North and never came home.

15-year-old Yemaya Azania-Merchant went viral on TikTok for bearing a striking resemblance to Adonis Graham, the son of Canadian rap superstar, Drake. It didn't take long for the negative comments to start pouring in. Yemaya tells us how they survived the wrath of the Internet.

Three hundred and seventy two days. That’s how long Justin Barbour survived living off the land while trekking across the tundra of northeastern Canada. It was a self-imposed expedition that pushed him to his limits - but for Justin, the biggest challenge was leaving the woods and returning to his regular life

Trousdale's General Store in Sydenham, Ontario has been around since 1836 - surviving two world wars, pandemics, even Amazon. Fifth-generation store owner John Trousdale shares the secret to lasting this long.

Back in 2016, Philippe St-Pierre's annual hunting trip with friends turned into a nightmare, when the plane he was piloting experienced engine failure and crashed into the woods. Philippe survived, but his two friends Alain Lafontaine and Eric Cossette did not. Philippe tells us how being the sole survivor left him wrestling with some big questions.

Today we're celebrating all the cool stuff people are good at, in our own version of “Canada’s Got Talent.” 

When Rick Ammazzini sees a locked safe without a key, he doesn’t see an impenetrable door, he sees an opportunity to test his skills as an amateur safe cracker. For Rick, it's not about discovering potential riches inside, it's about unlocking a portal to a specific time in history.

The newest member of the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra is also their youngest. 17-year-old Julin Cheung shares his thoughts on being labelled a prodigy, and what it really takes to be talented. 

Tanya Ryan is a talented singer-songwriter from Alberta who's won country music ‘Rising Star’ awards and performed at Calgary Stampede. But after 12 years of trying to make it in the music industry, Tanya is hanging up her guitar for good. She tells us about coming to terms with the fact that talent isn’t always enough.

Don Vickers of Sydney Mines, NS says he has a horrible memory, but he still managed to break a world record in the competitive world of memory sports.

And Paul Anthony’s "Talent Time!" is a long-running live show in Vancouver with a very broad definition of what it means to be talented. A seniors' vaudeville troupe, a kids' Kung Fu class, a rabbit agility club – all have a stage here. Paul tells Ify why he doesn’t want to put the notion of ‘talent,’ or his show, in a box. 

There are lots of reasons to volunteer - and many excuses not to. So as Canada faces a critical volunteer shortage, what is motivating those who do?

Ify takes to the streets of Toronto to find out where and why people are volunteering (or not).

Seven days a week, Ashley Van Aggelen is coaching kids in hockey, basketball, soccer, and badminton. She gives up all her evenings, barely sees her friends, and bounces between multiple practices and games in a week. So what keeps this super-volunteer going?

After getting fed up with the lack of emergency services in his community, Ian Hicks decided to buy a fire truck from the set of Rambo: First Blood. And just like that, a small town B.C. fire department was born. How a rag-tag collection of volunteers transformed into critical first-responders.

Michele Botel grew up afraid of felines. So why did she volunteer to feed a colony of feral cats?

Lyall Davis has one mission: to keep the community radio station in Killaloe, Ontario from going off the air. But without volunteers, the station will have to sign off for good - something he's worked too hard to let happen.

Vanessa Genier (Missanabie Cree First Nation) shares what she gets out of volunteering her time making quilts for residential school survivors.

Angela McBride volunteers to sit with people at the end of their lives - listening to music, playing games, and talking about whatever people want to talk about. What these end-of-life conversations have taught Angela about living.

Correction: An introduction to Now or Never originally broadcast on December 21, 2021 and rebroadcast on December 5, 2024 reported that the remains of 215 children were found at the site of a former Indian Residential School near Kamloops, B.C. in 2021. The Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation reported in May, 2021 that ground-penetrating radar had located remains. Community leaders later clarified that ground-penetrating radar had identified about 200 potential burial sites. 

Hear the stories behind the one-of-a-kind anniversaries people mark on their calendars.

Every December before Christmas, Now or Never producer Ariel Fournier goes with her mom to visit the cemetery where her dad was interred. It’s a tradition they mark on December 15 – her parents’ anniversary. But it’s not the day they got married, or the day they met...it’s the first time her parents (ahem) became intimate. Ariel and her mom, Adrienne Drobnies, address the awkwardness and discuss the deeper meaning of sharing this day together. 

For the last 102 years and counting, descendants and friends of what was once the largest Black settlement in Canada travel from all over to come to a homecoming celebration like no other. Michelle Robbins' family has been there for it all, and shares what this celebration means to her.

3…2…1…MENOPAUSE! How do you enter menopause? Well, if you’re Coral Short, you ask guests to wear red, prepare an array of red foods, and throw a party.

We asked Now or Never listeners to share a personal date they commemorate, and how they do it.

And World AIDS Day on December 1 is a personal one for Anita Ikwue. Not only is it a chance to remember her father who died of AIDS when she was four years old, it’s a time to celebrate and fight stigma for the 27-year-old who was born with HIV. 

What happens when you're known for one thing - good or bad - and now you're trying to be something else? Stories of people trying to change the way the world sees them.

Recovering addict Shane Sturby-Highfield shares the challenges of trying to make amends and regain the trust of people he's hurt.

Writer Rhea Rollman has many articles she's published, but all under a different name. Now that she's come out publicly as a trans woman, she's changing that one email at a time.

Yassine Nouah is currently on the adventure of a lifetime, travelling from the Arctic to the Antarctic — and his parents don’t even know about it. He now has aspirations to reinvent himself and morph from Yassine the cubicle-dwelling accountant, into the Yassine he really is today.

For the last two months, Stacey Chicoine has been carefully writing her own obituary. But she’s not anywhere close to death. This 41-year-old mom-of-two tells us how writing her own life story, in her own words, has been such a powerful experience - and why she’s sharing parts of herself in her obituary she’s never shared with anyone. 

All over the country, the prices we’re paying for food are giving people sticker shock, and changing behaviours.

Statistics Canada tells us food prices have gone up 22 per cent in the past four years. Food Banks Canada says 40 per cent of us are feeling financially worse off than we were last year. 

So as we enter into a season of celebration and food we want to know: how are you putting food on the table right now?

When Julianna Romanyk realized some of her friends were struggling with high grocery costs, she got an idea: invite them into her kitchen for monthly ‘meal prep parties.’ Now everyone shows up to her Toronto home with one ingredient and a stack of Tupperware, and makes a week’s worth of food together - creating community along the way.

At a free dinner in Winnipeg’s north end, we sit down with people who reveal their food security is based on dumpster diving, stealing to survive, and a calendar that keeps track of where free food can be found in the neighbourhood.

In Nunavut, grocery store prices are sky high and Kyra Kilabuk is sharing the details on TikTok so everyone can know about it. On Now or Never Kyra shares what it takes for her family of five to make ends meet in Iqaluit.

At Helen Detwiler Elementary School in Hamilton, 400 students are waiting for breakfast, but the school’s food program can only offer half of what they once did. Find out why milk is now off the table at this school in need.

If you lift the lid in Robert Gagnon’s basement, you’ll find hundreds of pounds of elk meat, some salmon fillets, and even a little bit of elk tongue and moose nose. Robert is bagging game on his Lheidli T’enneh First Nation territory, to help feed his family and put meat on elders’ tables.

40 000 Afghan refugees have settled in Canada since the Taliban's swift and dramatic return to power in Afghanistan in 2021.Today on Now or Never, five newcomers share the realities of starting over in a new country, and what they're dreaming about next.

Afghan teenager Razia Arifi grew up in a family that always encouraged education, and to get out of Afghanistan the first chance she got. So when the Taliban returned in 2021, 16-year-old Razia found herself on a plane to Canada, without her parents and siblings. Today this university student shares how she’s dealing with the weight of expectations, and why her goal is to eventually get back to Afghanistan to open a school for girls. 

In Afghanistan, she was an award-winning journalist fearlessly fighting for women’s rights and press freedom. But here, Farida Nekzad says she’s starting from zero, worried about her finances, and wondering how she will pay back the transportation loan most refugees arrive with.

Canadian military veteran Dave Lavery was on the ground helping evacuate people from Afghanistan when the Taliban took Kabul. But a few months after fleeing, he returned to take back his house from the Taliban and rebuild his business in a country he still calls his 'home away from home.'

For many Afghani kids in Edmonton, soccer games were their first taste of life in Canada. We take you to a game with head coach Hamid Atimadi, who is sharing his love of the game with the next generation.

And transgender woman Ozlam Mahshar was severely punished by her family for wearing make-up in Afghanistan. After escaping the Taliban’s rule and arriving in Canada in 2022, she now has dreams of being a make-up artist, and flexes her skills on Ify for an intimate sit-down.