Freddie Bennett co-founded Bay Paediatrics in Tauranga, and in his words, is leading the neurodiversity revolution.

Less than 10 years ago, Freddie had the Porsche, the Rolex, the corporate life in the UK. From the outside, it looked like success. Inside, he was falling apart - stressed, depressed, seeking escape.

When his dad died suddenly, Freddie spent six months drinking away his sorrows. Then one morning, he looked in the mirror and didn't recognise the person staring back at him.

What happened next changed everything. After years of trying to 'fix' himself, transformation came when he stopped fighting his darkness and started loving who he really was.

These days, Freddie runs extreme endurance challenges - deserts, the Arctic, and next year, the Amazon jungle. He's also a Guinness World Record holder (for the fastest marathon dressed as a fisherman). At Bay Paediatrics he helps families support neurodivergent children and hosts the Epic Families podcast.

We'd love to hear from you. Send us a text or a voicemail by clicking here.

If you need support, here are helpful links, phone numbers and resources: https://ember.org.nz/resources/in-a-crisis/

Kevin Hollingsworth is a clinical practitioner, addiction counsellor, and executive director of Mana Enhancing Stop Group in Rotorua. He's been in recovery from methamphetamine addiction for over 16 years.

Kevin started using cannabis at six. He transitioned to methamphetamine. In the grip of addiction, the desire to use was stronger than the desire to live. He was arrested 29 times and spent two and a half years in prison.

Fast forward and these days, Kevin works with the same police who arrested him. He runs AOD programs in prisons and maraes. 

His message is simple - recovery doesn't happen in people, it happens between people.

We'd love to hear from you. Send us a text or a voicemail by clicking here.

If you need support, here are helpful links, phone numbers and resources: https://ember.org.nz/resources/in-a-crisis/

Kelsey Waghorn survived the Whakaari White Island volcanic eruption on December 9, 2019. In two minutes, the volcano changed the trajectory of her life.

Kelsey made split-second decisions that saved lives - staying still when she wanted to run, getting everyone on the boat when help never came. She spent five days in a coma, weeks in hospital. The burns were catastrophic.

But the darkest moment came two years later when the PTSD caught up with her. Kelsey fell into a victim mindset - isolating from family, watching everything burn down around her. Her relationship imploded. That rock bottom jolted her back to life.

A trauma specialist helped her understand: her brain had rewired itself. Understanding that changed everything.

Kelsey pulled herself out. She's just published her book and is embracing freedom - no longer living in fear. This is a story you won't forget.

We'd love to hear from you. Send us a text or a voicemail by clicking here.

If you need support, here are helpful links, phone numbers and resources: https://ember.org.nz/resources/in-a-crisis/

Liz Downes is a Peer Support Specialist and Associate Professional Lead at Counties Manukau Health, working alongside people with shared lived experience of bipolar disorder.

Liz trained as a nurse. After having her first baby, she developed postnatal depression. When her baby turned one, she had a psychotic episode and was diagnosed with bipolar.

She's lived with bipolar for 30 years. Five years after diagnosis, a psychiatrist suggested she'd make a great peer support specialist. She found her calling - using her experiences for good instead of seeing them as just a 'bad part of her life'.

Liz says peer support is about mutuality. No hierarchy, no advice-giving. The person navigates their own waka. Liz sits alongside, listening and reflecting back what she hears.

We'd love to hear from you. Send us a text or a voicemail by clicking here.

If you need support, here are helpful links, phone numbers and resources: https://ember.org.nz/resources/in-a-crisis/

Bex Waugh and Rich Rowley are self-described as 'neuro-spicy' - and they're on a mission to help workplaces understand the value neurodivergent people bring.

They're the force behind Neurofusion, an organisation helping people and workplaces find their flow - doing work that suits their cognitive style, not fighting against it.

Bex got her ADHD diagnosis after her daughter was assessed in Year 2. Rich spent years thinking negatively about himself until he discovered he wasn't broken - the systems were.

Their approach: celebrate what you're naturally good at. When you're doing work you love and are good at, it stops being work - it's fun. About 32% of the population is neurodivergent. The future is designing workplaces where everyone can thrive.

We'd love to hear from you. Send us a text or a voicemail by clicking here.

If you need support, here are helpful links, phone numbers and resources: https://ember.org.nz/resources/in-a-crisis/

Suzette Jackson has just submitted her PhD in social work at the University of Auckland, researching a unique drug treatment program for pregnant women and mothers at Higher Ground in Auckland.

Suzette is 13 years in recovery from drug addiction. Her research followed seven women - five of them Māori - at the apex of need: living in cars, multiple children removed, severe family violence.

Her big takeaway: be kind. See women as people first, not just mothers. Women who use drugs face double stigma.

Suzette would love to see these women given five years of support post-treatment with a system navigator to help hack the maze of housing, health, and Oranga Tamariki. Not a cost - an investment.

Content warning: This episode contains strong language.

We'd love to hear from you. Send us a text or a voicemail by clicking here.

If you need support, here are helpful links, phone numbers and resources: https://ember.org.nz/resources/in-a-crisis/

Asha Munn is an art psychotherapist, EMDR therapist and founder of Breathing Space Charitable Trust.

At university, Asha got unwell and didn't think she'd return for her final year. Art healed her - she made work every day, figured out her future, and decided to become a therapist.

Asha's approach: no assumptions, no judgment, no analysis. Art therapy isn't about analysing work - it's about turning up, sitting alongside, and creating safe spaces where people can be seen without words.

Creativity is ordinary and human. It's accessible to us all.

We'd love to hear from you. Send us a text or a voicemail by clicking here.

If you need support, here are helpful links, phone numbers and resources: https://ember.org.nz/resources/in-a-crisis/

Lynda Hills is a suicide researcher studying for a PhD at Auckland University, and her lived experience is informing her research.

Seventeen years ago, Lynda tried to take her own life. She was left with critical injuries and has undergone nearly 50 surgeries. She had to learn to walk again.

Lynda's research focuses on akathisia - a side effect of antidepressants and antipsychotics that research has connected to suicidality. Reading the research through the lens of her own experience was confronting.

Lynda's personal conclusion: indigenous approaches to wellbeing are safer than Western approaches. She's found healing through Havening, a psychosensory therapy involving touch.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

David Healy - Information on akathisia and medication side effects
https://davidhealy.org/

Anders Sørensen - Crossing Zero
https://crossingzero.substack.com/

Dr Robin Youngson - Havening
https://neuroscienceofhealing.com/

We'd love to hear from you. Send us a text or a voicemail by clicking here.

If you need support, here are helpful links, phone numbers and resources: https://ember.org.nz/resources/in-a-crisis/

Rose Heta-Minhinnick and her daughter Arohanui Minhinnik run Te Waa Charitable Trust, helping young people and their families in Waiuku, southwest of Auckland.

Rose is 12 years in recovery from alcohol and gambling addiction. She knows the progression - the buildup of disappointment, the rock bottom, the fear of losing her children. That fear was enough. Now she advocates for law change in New Zealand's gambling industry.

Arohanui facilitates health and wellbeing programs for rangatahi, creating spaces where young people can speak up without judgment.

Together, Rose and Arohanui are goal smashers who believe in hand-ups, not handouts.

We'd love to hear from you. Send us a text or a voicemail by clicking here.

If you need support, here are helpful links, phone numbers and resources: https://ember.org.nz/resources/in-a-crisis/

Ten years ago, online harassment followed Anna Ashton everywhere - she couldn't escape by changing schools or moving homes. She became agoraphobic, was misdiagnosed with social anxiety, and eventually attempted suicide.

Her clinician didn't understand digital harm. There were no assessment tools, no training on grooming, catfishing, or sextortion. Anna had to teach her clinician the terms.

These days, Anna is doing important work as a lived experience advisor in Canterbury working on digital harm reduction. She's developing crisis plans for young people and a screening tool - because you can get screened for domestic violence at your GP, but not for digital harm.

We'd love to hear from you. Send us a text or a voicemail by clicking here.

If you need support, here are helpful links, phone numbers and resources: https://ember.org.nz/resources/in-a-crisis/