Navigating Disability
What if the conversation around disability focused on possibility instead of limitation?
Welcome to the Navigating Disability Podcast Show, hosted by Kate Read, a passionate advocate dedicated to changing the narrative around “normal” and “ability.”
Each week, Kate sits down with inspiring guests to explore lived experiences, expert insights, practical advice, and powerful stories from across the disability community. From advocacy and education to honest discussions about systems, supports, and real-life challenges, this podcast is about helping people feel informed, empowered, and connected.
Whether you’re living with disability, supporting a family member, working in the sector, or wanting to better understand the journey — this podcast is for you.
So get ready to be inspired, informed, and reminded that you are not navigating this journey alone.
Subscribe and turn on notifications so you never miss an episode of Navigating Disability with Kate Read.
Episodes
62 episodes
Seeing The Unseen: Advocacy and Hidden Disability
Join us for a profoundly personal and impactful conversation with Morgan Fitzpatrick—a visionary advocate, transformative leader, and unwavering champion for inclusion and early childhood development.In this episode, we move beyond theo...
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Season 1
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Episode 62
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34:42
Redefining Ability: A Conversation with Isaac Harvey
Join us today for an inspiring episode of Navigating Disability with Isaac Harvey MBE—a remarkable disability advocate, acclaimed content creator, and President of Wheels and Wheelchairs.Born with limb-pelvic hypoplasia, Isaac has maste...
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Season 1
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Episode 61
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24:44
Lived Experience & Leadership: Clare Stewart’s Journey with Youngcare
In this profoundly moving episode of Navigating Disability, we sit down with Clare Stewart, whose remarkable journey as a barrister, author, and former Mayor of Noosa is underpinned by a pivotal, life-shattering event. Cl...
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Season 1
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Episode 60
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28:51
Two Lenses, One Focus: From Lived Experience to Corporate Life
This time, Navigating Disability sit with a leader whose life and work are woven from both profound professional expertise and deeply personal experience. Meet Jeramy, he steers the ship as CEO of a Specialist Disability Accommodati...
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Season 1
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Episode 59
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36:49
The Insider Advocate: Parenting Through NDIS, Reforming from Within
How can personal experience create more effective public policy? In this episode of Navigating Disability, we speak with Chloe Jesson, a passionate advocate for community mental health, a policy reformer, and the Deputy Chief Execut...
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Season 1
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Episode 58
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29:12
Lost in Plain Sight: An ADHD Journey to Self-Discovery
In this reflective episode, Navigating Disability sit down with Abdul Haseeb, a figure whose personal story has inspired a global conversation. Known as Pakistan's first ADHD coach, Haseeb's true identity is that of a neurodiversity...
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Season 1
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Episode 57
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43:58
Seeing in The Dark: The Unwavering Vision of Fiona Demark
What does it mean to truly see? For disability advocate Fiona Demark, vision was never a guarantee, but a diminishing resource. Today, Navigating Disability sit with Fiona Demark, an advocate for disability.Born with approxim...
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Season 1
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Episode 56
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33:10
Between Two Worlds: A Journey Through Profound Differences and Finding Her Voice
What does it mean to feel different, even within the community where you're supposed to belong? In today's episode, Navigating Disability seat with Fiona Fonti, a dedicated advocate for disability rights and accessibility. Fiona wor...
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Season 1
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Episode 55
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40:07
The Height of Fatherhood: From Dwarfism to Dad-ism.
What defines a life? Is it the challenges we're born with or the choices we make in spite of them?In this powerful episode of Navigating Disability, we sit down with Kris Hammons, a man whose first memory isn't of a birthday or a holida...
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Season 1
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Episode 54
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40:39
Born to Rise: From Childhood Cancer to The Paralympic Stage
Trigger Warning: This episode contains discussions about medical trauma and PTSD. Please take care while listening.Need support? Call Lifeline on 13 11 14From a challenging start as a toddler to becoming Australia's most decorated...
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Season 1
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Episode 53
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46:32
Beyond Survival: A Life Reclaimed After Rare Diagnosis
Trigger warning: This episode contains discussion of health struggles and trauma. Please take care while listening.Need support? Call Lifeline on 13 11 14.What does it mean to build a life of purpose when your body has been fighti...
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Season 1
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Episode 52
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26:30
Disability Isn’t Broken: It’s Insight, Identity, and Strength
What happens when you grow up expecting to be “fixed” and later learn that your disability isn’t something to hide, but a source of insight, purpose and power? In this episode, Kate and Jenn sit down with Anja Christoffer...
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Season 1
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Episode 51
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30:17
Wheels in Motion: Eamon Wood's Journey from Paraplegia to Pro Athlete & Entrepreneur
After a devastating car accident at age four, Eamon Wood's life was forever changed. But instead of letting paraplegia define him, he forged a path that redefines what resilience looks like. In this powerful episode, Eamon shares his journey fr...
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Season 1
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Episode 50
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37:08
When Caring Becomes a Calling: Cassie Day on Love, Loss & Leading Change
Cassie Day never expected her life to unfold this way. At 23, she was thrown into the deep end when her newborn son was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis. What followed was a rollercoaster of medical trauma, emotional resilience, and a relentless ...
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Season 1
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Episode 49
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54:36
Defying the Diagnosis: Dr. Azi Jankovic on Whole‑Person Healing and Hope
Trigger warning: This episode discusses psychiatric hospitalization and suicidal thoughts. If you need support, please call Lifeline on 13 11 14 (Australia) or your local crisis line.At 17, Dr. Azi Jankovic was diagnosed with bi...
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Season 1
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Episode 48
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39:24
Beyond the Voice: Carer, Advocate & Lived Experience with Lisa Grech
In this episode of Navigating Disability, Kate and Jenn speak with Lisa Grech, living with multiple sclerosis while caring full time for her adult daughter, Hannah, who experiences a severe intellectual disability and is non-verbal. Li...
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Season 1
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Episode 47
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36:12
Finding Strength in the Chaos: A Carer’s Story of Grit, Grief & Growth
Natalie Terry Bedwell never planned for a life filled with diagnoses, advocacy, and navigating complex care systems, but it’s the life she’s embraced with courage and clarity. In this moving episode, Natalie shares what it's like to raise seven...
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Season 1
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Episode 46
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25:48
Living Your Truth Out Loud: Disability, Queer Pride & Power with William Ward-Boas
In this moving episode of Navigating Disability, we sit down with William Ward-Boas, an Autistic, First Nations, gay self-advocate and deputy chair of VALID. Diagnosed as non-verbal with intellectual disability and written off by profe...
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Season 1
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Episode 45
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31:40
From Vision Loss to Victory: How Sport Helped Aaron Fowler Reclaim His Life
In this powerful episode of Navigating Disability, Kate and Jenn sit down with Aaron Fowler. He’s a senior physiotherapist, sports journalist, and vision-sports advocate living with retinitis pigmentosa (RP). Diagnosed at age five, Aar...
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Season 1
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Episode 44
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39:05
We All Have Unique Needs: Mel James on Motherhood & Advocacy
Mel James is a force of lived experience, resilience, and truth-telling. In this powerful episode, she shares her journey as a mother of children with "unique needs," her advocacy within the disability and education systems, and her personal he...
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Episode 43
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55:48
Everything Changed in 7 Seconds: What Came After the Fall
When 19-year-old Jonathan Sigworth fell off a 70-foot cliff in the Himalayas, his life changed forever. But what followed wasn’t just recovery, it was revolution. In this episode, Jonathan shares how a spinal cord injury transformed his path, i...
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Episode 42
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44:24
Disability, Visibility & Self‑Love with Zoe Simmons
In this raw and inspiring conversation, Zoe Simmons, award-winning journalist, author, and fierce disability advocate, shares her journey from medical gaslighting and feeling invisible to embracing her identity as autistic, chronically ill, and...
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Episode 41
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29:16
Lessons from 42 Years in a Wheelchair: Jeremy Muir on Life After Injury
At just 19, Jeremy Muir’s life changed forever after a car accident left him with a spinal cord injury. But as Jeremy says, “Why not me?”, a question that became a driving force behind his journey of resilience, reflection, and radical independ...
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Episode 40
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40:04
Fighting for Two: Navigating Cancer and Her Daughter’s Disability
When life delivered two seismic blows, her daughter’s rare genetic diagnosis and her own cancer battle, Hayley Thiele didn’t crumble. She transformed.In this episode, Hayley shares her raw and remarkable story of parenting her daughter P...
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Episode 39
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47:30
The Attitude of Gratitude: Turning ‘Why Me?’ into ‘What’s Next?’
Born without arms or legs, Nick Vujicic has spent his life proving that limitations don’t define us, they refine us. In this powerful episode of Navigating Disability, Kate and Jenn sit down with the world-renowned motivational ...
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Episode 38
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54:34