ReThreading Madness
Bernadine Fox
Bernadine Fox brings a rare and powerful combination of lived experience, long-term disability rights advocacy, and creative insight to her role as host and producer of ReThreading Madness, the award-winning radio show and podcast that dares to shift how we think about mental health.A recipient of the 2022 Courage to Come Back Award, Bernadine is a white settler of Scottish, Irish, and French heritage with a familial connection to the Tsuut'ina nation. She has spent over 30 years advocating for those with lived experience of mental health challenges including survivors of trauma and therapy harm. She is an intersectional feminist, artist, and author of Coming to Voice: Surviving an Abusive Therapist—a memoir that confronts the devastating misuse of power in therapeutic relationships.Bernadine is not a clinician, but she is a deeply informed mental health advocate with firsthand knowledge of trauma, CPTSD, and disability. Her background includes decades of work as a support worker for survivors of severe childhood trauma, a trauma consultant, and public speaker. She has led expressive arts groups in collaboration with Richmond Mental Health and Gallery Gachet, where she also served on the board and helped publish The Ear magazine. She has served on the board of such organizations as Kickstart (Disability Arts and Culture) which focused on breaking down barriers to creative access for people with disabilities.What sets Bernadine apart as a radio host is her unwavering commitment to telling the truth—even when it's uncomfortable. She doesn't shy away from difficult conversations; she invites them. With compassion and clarity, she brings forward voices that are often silenced, challenges harmful narratives, and explores the messy realities of mental health, trauma, and recovery.ReThreading Madness is more than a show. Under Bernadine's guidance, it's a platform for unfiltered, survivor-centered dialogue—one that refuses to pathologize trauma and instead builds community through shared truth. RTM won the Breaking Barriers CRABO award through the NCRA. Bernadine currently lives in the forest with two cats, raises her grandchild, and continues to create, speak, and advocate for a world where mental health care is ethical, accessible, and just.ReThreading Madness is produced and aired on the ancestral and unceded traditional territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. We extend our gratitude and appreciation to the Indigenous people who have been living and working on this land from time immemorial.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/rethreading-madness--5675300/support.
Episodes
Mentioned books
Jan 1, 2025 • 1h
It's a New Year
It’s a New Year Today’s program is a slightly different structure. As we walk into the next year, several people came to share their hopes for themselves, their family and friends - with all of you. It is an uplifting show that demonstrates the amount of care and generosity that exists all around us. The program is our personal thank you to all who have been a part of the ReThreading Madness family whether as a guest or behind the scenes making sure the show goes out each week. This has been a hell of a year – monumental even. A big part of that was being able to chat with some of the most incredible people from around the world. As the host of ReThreading Madness, I consider myself blessed because of it. But also because of you, our listeners, who join us each week. Today we are joined by Jodi Grey, Charlene Hellson, Kayle Ackerman, Jackie Crowchild, Michelle Oucharek Deo, Peter Morin, Kagan Goh, Alex Sangha and Amy Avalon. Our inspirational music today was by the Animals, Sara Barielles, Anna Glendening, Rachel Platten, Josh Groban, Kelly Clarkson, Zach Williams, Scott Callum, Peter Morin, and as always Shari Ulrich sings us into and out of each program each week. Bernadine’s personal message to our listeners: So here is wishing you a year full of caring, compassionate and supportive people, safe and gentle havens, along with personal growth, brave new insights, spontaneous, joyful fun and a trust in yourself that grows every day. But most of all she wishes for you a peace which settles into your heart as though it has always belonged there. Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/rethreading-madness--5675300/support.
Dec 19, 2024 • 1h
Importance of Lived Experience in Mental Health Issues: A Conversation with Matthew Jackman
Importance of Lived Experience in Mental Health Issues: A Conversation with Matthew Jackman Matthew Jackman has an intense conversation with Bernadine about the importance of the recognizing the immense value of those with lived experience as we examine mental health challenges. Matthew Jackman is a mental health advocate promoting human rights, social justice … he is activist from an academic science from a public health and mad studies knowledge base. He trained as social worker and has partnered with different marginalized and disadvantaged communities which focus on mental health. Matthew is a representative, ambassador or advisor with the Global Mental Health Peer Network, the World Economic Forum, the Australian Association of Social Workers, Generation Mental Health, and the World Health Organisation on key global mental health documents requiring lived experience perspective. He is a certified peer specialist and a visiting scholar in Psychiatry at Yale and Harvard University. He focuses on alternatives to psychiatry. Most recently he has accepted the role of Commissioner on Lived Experience in Mental Health Research for the Lancet Psychiatry. For those of who do not know the Lancet is one of the oldest peer-reviewed medical journals. Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/rethreading-madness--5675300/support.
Nov 27, 2024 • 1h
Getting Over the Wrong Relationship with Sean Bridges
Sean Bridges, award-winning screenwriter and author, had never been married until at the age of 55, he found, what he described as, the love of his life. He was about to be married. He was her fourth husband (to-be). Then something in his gut started shaking him awake to the realization that his life and his own personage had morphed into something he didn’t recognize; didn’t feel comfortable in. He packed his bags and left the million-dollar home he and his fiancé lived in. Traded it for a bartending job in a small town. And slowly found himself again. He talks with us about what happened and what he did to put the pieces back together.Sean Bridges is a Stephen King Dollar Baby with his festival winning audio production of One for the Road. His latest screenplay, Beginner's Luck, is a 2024 award-winner at the San Antonio and Austin Film Festivals. His new novel, Gunbarrel Highway, will be released as a paperback, e-book and audio book on November 20th. He lives and works in the Texas Hill Country, in central Texas USAMusic by Fearless Soul and Shari UlrichBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/rethreading-madness--5675300/support.
Nov 12, 2024 • 1h
A Conversation on grief... that morphs into one about death
A Chat about Grief… that Morphs into one about Death Rebecca Coleman joins Bernadine to chat about grief. Layers of grief the represent what she is experiencing currently in her life. However, as these things go, one conversation morphs into another and by the end of this program they are looking at the issue of death: facing it, planning for it. It is a frank, easygoing, and important conversation. Music by Shari UlrichBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/rethreading-madness--5675300/support.
Oct 31, 2024 • 1h
Theatre for Living with David Diamond
Theatre for Living with David DiamondDavid Diamond joins Bernadine on ReThreading Madness to discuss his Theatre for Living Workshops. TFL, as the website states, is about empowerment. Taking the living organism, which is a community, and providing a platform for its expression to create “creative, community-based dialogue.” It sounds esoteric until you are inside the dialogue and then, as you will hear David describe, it becomes a natural process for learning, listening, healing, and recovering. As Gina Beltran commented, “The Theatre for Living workshop was a wonderful and profound experience for me. It allowed me to realize the potential of people coming together and connecting in genuine and honest ways that build meaningful and lasting relationships. In other words, it allowed me to see what a strong community can look like.” David facilitates these workshops for all sorts of groups including indigenous, recovery,Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/rethreading-madness--5675300/support.
Oct 28, 2024 • 1h
Post Traumatic Growth with Joanne R. Green
Post Traumatic Growth: Joanne Green Style Joanne R. Green joins Bernadine on ReThreading Madness to talk about what inspired her book: By Accident: A Memoir of Letting Go. Joanne shares her journey through a variety of personal losses: mom, sister, father, brother and struggles like anorexia and cancer. In the midst of all that it was a car sliding into her, a pedestrian, at an ungodly speed that brought her to the place where she embraced stillness and learned to let go. Joanne talks about transforming the negative self-take we all experience, how to use gratitude in the moment, and how to turn adversity into an opportunity and that into strength. Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/rethreading-madness--5675300/support.
Sep 24, 2024 • 1h
Tools for Change and Employing Forgiveness
Tools for Change and Employing Forgiveness Rhonda Parker Taylor talks about how she learned how to support herself and cultivate meaning in the relationship she had with herself after the murder of her son. In that she used writing as a tool for change. Rhonda tells us about her journey and her fictional book Crossroads and her workbook coming out in December of 2024. Then Katharine Giovanni talks about her book, “The Ultimate Path to Forgiveness: Unlocking Your Power “giving us insight into the process of forgiveness and why it might be important for some of us to look at it. Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/rethreading-madness--5675300/support.
Sep 20, 2024 • 1h
Art and Peer Support at the Coast Mental Health Resource Centre
Art and Peer Support at the Coast Mental Health Resource Centre. Bernadine heads down to Coast Mental Health Resource Centre on Seymour St in downtown Vancouver and speaks with folks about the Art Studio which is open to anyone with a mental health challenge. Betty Yan tells us about the Peer SupportTraining Program that Coast Mental Health has developed and runs. Shahal Bozorgzadeh was trained here as a Peer Support Worker and she describes why this job is so vital to her and those she works with. Shawna Butterwick is a volunteer at the Art Studio and fills us in on the day to day activities there and then artist, Leef Evans, talks a bit about his process, his depression and Margaret, the “spider” inside him (represents his depression) and how he has come to resolve that Margaret needs to get out every once and a while. Music by Shari Ulrich, Jack Harris, and Milanda Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/rethreading-madness--5675300/support.
Sep 4, 2024 • 1h
Pathologizing Trauma
Pathologizing Trauma Trigger Warning: Description of sexual assaults.Andrea takes us on a journey through what her childhood, in the 60s and 70s, was like coping with sexual assaults from several males around her from a very young age both in and outside her family. Like other women growing up in this era, she was assaulted, blamed for it, and then punished for making men do this to her. Andrea fought back. Sexual assaults happened and her family along with the social constructs and institutions, of that time, enabled abusers and covered up their crimes while victims who were disclosing, like Andrea, were made into the problem. Her drive to survive made her doggedly save her money so she could escape her family. After graduation, she moved away to college. But physical ailments, again rooted in the sexual abuse she experienced, made her so ill the College sent her home: back to the abusive environment she had worked so hard to break free. She always knew that her difficulties were rooted in those assaults but instead of recognizing this truth the mental health industry, from whom she sought help for being unable to eat and being underweight, pathologized what were her normal reactions to trauma. Her disclosures of sexual abuse were dismissed as schizophrenic delusions. It was a diagnosis that gave everyone carte blanche to harm her with impunity. Ultimately, Andrea was put on 58 different forms of psychiatric medications including large doses of anti-psychotic meds and given ECT. Several times, doctors were shocked by the large doses she had been prescribed but didn't change it. She received no assistance, no therapy. She wasn’t regularly seen by a psychiatrist or therapist. No one talked to her. No one mentioned the abuse she had endured. Andrea broke free. This time from the mental health industry. On her own, over ten years, she weaned herself off of all the psych meds she had been prescribed. She has been med-free now for a year and is focusing her time on working to ensure other people don't go through what she did. Music by Shari UlrichBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/rethreading-madness--5675300/support.
Aug 28, 2024 • 1h
Coping with Mental Health Challenges with JaneA Kelley
Coping with Mental Health Challenges with JaneA Kelley JaneA Kelley has throughout her life gathered mental health diagnoses. She has Bipolar 2, PTSD, and ADHD. JaneA candidly talks about these diagnoses; what they mean to her; how they complicate or add to her life; and how she copes with them. She talks about finding herself at rock bottom and the things (mostly her cats) who have brought her back forward. She talks of betrayals and of stigma that originate out of misunderstandings and the impact of her challenges. As a writer, it is no wonder she uses writing to work through these issues and find herself again. Music by Shari Ulrich, Jann Arden, Brandi CarisleBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/rethreading-madness--5675300/support.
