Happy New Year - No Filter listeners - how are you going so far in 2025? Did you survive the silly season? Did you make any “new year, new me” resolutions?

Maybe you’re one of the many people who chose to get through the holidays sober…or maybe you enjoyed some Christmas tipple but now you’re feeling sober-curious. Wherever you might be on the mocktail to cocktail spectrum - this conversation is for you because our guest, author and health & wellbeing coach, Sarah Rusbatch, has lived it all.

She has written a book called Beyond Booze, How to Create A Life You Love Alcohol Free’ - Sarah lived through what she describes as her own “dysfunctional relationship with alcohol” but - as you’ll hear - she’s not at all preachy, she just happens to know a lot about how hard it can be to be sober, but how good it can be on the other side.

You can follow Sarah on Instagram here. And to join Sarah’s free Facebook community please click here. The Facebook community encourages women who want support, a safe space where women are talking about booze and sobriety and how to step into their best lives.  

Everything you need to know about Sarah’s book and work is here.

THE END BITS:

Listen to more No Filter interviews here and follow us on Instagram here.

Discover more Mamamia podcasts here.

Feedback: [email protected]

Share your story, feedback, or dilemma! Send us a voice message, and one of our Podcast Producers will get back to you ASAP.

Rate or review us on Apple by clicking on the three dots in the top right-hand corner, click Go To Show then scroll down to the bottom of the page, click on the stars at the bottom and write a review.  

CREDITS:

Host: Holly Wainwright

Executive Producer: Naima Brown

Producer: Tahli Blackman

Audio Producer: Jacob Round

Mamamia acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the Land we have recorded this podcast on, the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present, and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures

Become a Mamamia subscriber: https://www.mamamia.com.au/subscribe

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

What do you do when you receive a phone call saying that your daughter has murdered someone?

Mary Pershall spent 28 years trying to shield her youngest daughter Anna from her demons. First, it was anorexia, then other mental health issues and later drug use including marijuana and ice.

But one act of rage in 2015 changed the course of Anna and her mother's life forever.

So how do you deal with the fact your daughter is a murderer?

Listen to part two of this conversation where Mia talks to Mary's sister Katie Horneshaw here. 

Click here to subscribe to No Filter.

CREDITS:

Host: Mia Freedman 

With thanks to special guest Mary K. Pershall.

Buy her book Gorgeous Girl here.

Producer: Elissa Ratliff

GET IN TOUCH:

Listen to more No Filter interviews here and follow us on Instagram here.

Discover more Mamamia podcasts here.

Feedback: [email protected]

Share your story, feedback, or dilemma! Send us a voice message, and one of our Podcast Producers will get back to you ASAP.

Rate or review us on Apple by clicking on the three dots in the top right-hand corner, click Go To Show then scroll down to the bottom of the page, click on the stars at the bottom and write a review.  

Mamamia acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the Land we have recorded this podcast on, the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present, and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures. 

Become a Mamamia subscriber: https://www.mamamia.com.au/subscribe

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Tara Westover was 16 when she stepped into a classroom for the first time.

She didn’t know how to talk to her peers, had never heard of the Holocaust and thought that she was sitting amongst heathens.

Today Tara holds a PHD in intellectual history and political thought from Cambridge University. She’s attended Harvard as a fellow, and has just written her first book, a memoir called Educated. So how did she get here?

Click here to subscribe to No Filter.

CREDITS:

Host: Mia Freedman 

With thanks to special guest Tara Westover.

Producer: Elissa Ratliff

GET IN TOUCH:

Listen to more No Filter interviews here and follow us on Instagram here.

Discover more Mamamia podcasts here.

Feedback: [email protected]

Share your story, feedback, or dilemma! Send us a voice message, and one of our Podcast Producers will get back to you ASAP.

Rate or review us on Apple by clicking on the three dots in the top right-hand corner, click Go To Show then scroll down to the bottom of the page, click on the stars at the bottom and write a review.  

Mamamia acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the Land we have recorded this podcast on, the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present, and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures

Become a Mamamia subscriber: https://www.mamamia.com.au/subscribe

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Never has the cliche “truth is stranger than fiction” applied more than to the woman on today's episode. You couldn’t make Susan Francis’s life up - it has too many twists.

It begins with an adoption story and the mystery of her biological parents, it includes a secret sister, a heartbreaking confrontation, unexpected love and a series of events that were so dramatic that she had to write them down in a memoir just to make sense of them. It’s called The Love That Remains. 

Read an extract of The Love That Remains here. 

Listen to part two of Mia's conversation with Susan here. 

CREDITS:

Host: Mia Freedman . You can find Mia on Instagram here

Guest: Susan Francis 

Producer: Melanie Tait 

GET IN TOUCH:

Listen to more No Filter interviews here and follow us on Instagram here.

Discover more Mamamia podcasts here.

Feedback: [email protected]

Share your story, feedback, or dilemma! Send us a voice message, and one of our Podcast Producers will get back to you ASAP.

Rate or review us on Apple by clicking on the three dots in the top right-hand corner, click Go To Show then scroll down to the bottom of the page, click on the stars at the bottom and write a review.  

Mamamia acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the Land we have recorded this podcast on, the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present, and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures

Become a Mamamia subscriber: https://www.mamamia.com.au/subscribe

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

How do you prepare for prison? How do you tell your young daughters that you aren’t going to see them for a very long time?

Kerry Tucker was jailed in 2004 for one of the biggest white-collar crimes committed by a female in Victoria at the time. She’d been stealing money from her employers. She owned up to it, went through the process and spent 4.5 years behind bars in a maximum security prison away from her two daughters. Surprisingly for Kerry, jail was the making of her and she’s written a book all about it...

Click here to subscribe to No Filter.

CREDITS:

Host: Mia Freedman 

With thanks to special guest Kerry Tucker.

Buy her book The Prisoner

Producer: Elissa Ratliff

GET IN TOUCH:

THE END BITS:

Listen to more No Filter interviews here and follow us on Instagram here.

Discover more Mamamia podcasts here.

Feedback: [email protected]

Share your story, feedback, or dilemma! Send us a voice message, and one of our Podcast Producers will get back to you ASAP.

Rate or review us on Apple by clicking on the three dots in the top right-hand corner, click Go To Show then scroll down to the bottom of the page, click on the stars at the bottom and write a review.  

Mamamia acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the Land we have recorded this podcast on, the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present, and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures

Become a Mamamia subscriber: https://www.mamamia.com.au/subscribe

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

When you think of a psychopath, you probably imagine someone like serial killer Ivan Milat. But according to David Gillespie, it's more likely to be your boss or your grandma. Five to 10 per cent of the population qualify as psychopathic, and the rate can be as high as 20 per cent among corporate leaders and politicians.

So how do you spot them? What do you do if you have to work for or with them, or better yet, date them? Grab a cup of tea and get ready to go ‘OH MY GOD’...

THE END BITS

Your host is Mia Freedman.

With thanks to special guest David Gillespie

Find Taming Toxic People: The Science of Identifying and Dealing with Psychopaths at apple.co/mamamia

This podcast was produced by Elissa Ratliff 

CONTACT US

Listen to more No Filter interviews here and follow us on Instagram here.

Discover more Mamamia podcasts here.

Feedback: [email protected]

Share your story, feedback, or dilemma! Send us a voice message, and one of our Podcast Producers will get back to you ASAP.

Rate or review us on Apple by clicking on the three dots in the top right-hand corner, click Go To Show then scroll down to the bottom of the page, click on the stars at the bottom and write a review.  

Mamamia acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the Land we have recorded this podcast on, the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present, and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures

Become a Mamamia subscriber: https://www.mamamia.com.au/subscribe

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It was an ordinary day on the 30th of July, 1997 in Thredbo, but at 11:35pm the earth moved. Lives were changed and lost in just a few minutes. The Thredbo Landslide happened fast. It hit two ski lodges where 19 people were sleeping. It destroyed the buildings, ripped them off their foundations, and plunged those inside under tonnes of debris and concrete. 

For the first two days, we were told that there would be no survivors. However, on the morning of the third day, 66 hours after he was buried, Stuart Diver was found alive. He was the lone survivor of one of the most famous tragedies in Australia’s history. 

THE END BITS:

With thanks to Stuart Diver 

Listen to Stuart's podcast The Elements, wherever you get your pods. 

Feedback? We’re listening! Email us at [email protected]

Need more lols, info and inspo in your ears? Find more Mamamia podcasts here... https://www.mamamia.com.au/podcasts/

Check out our No Filter YouTube channel here... https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvoiVNEFfHiJl8nC4NepRNw?view_as=subscriber

CREDITS:

Host: Mia Freedman. You can find Mia on Instagram here and get her newsletter here.

Executive Producer: Elissa Ratliff

Assistant Producer: Lucy Neville 

Mamamia acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the Land we have recorded this podcast on, the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present, and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures.

Become a Mamamia subscriber: https://www.mamamia.com.au/subscribe

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

What were you doing on Boxing Day morning in 2004? 

Sarah Ayles was on a beach in Sri Lanka, putting on a mask about to go snorkelling with her business partner and ex-boyfriend, when her life changed forever. 

The Boxing Day Tsunami was caused by an earthquake in the Indian Ocean and experts say it had the energy of 23,000 Hiroshima-type atomic bombs. 

227,898 people lost their lives across Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India, and Thailand but Sarah survived.

Click here to subscribe to No Filter.

Listen to Sam Bloom's inspiring story here: https://omny.fm/shows/no-filter/an-extraordinary-tale-of-tragedy-and-beauty 

CREDITS:

Host: Mia Freedman 

With thanks to special guest Sarah Ayles.

Producer: Elissa Ratliff

GET IN TOUCH:

Email the show at [email protected]

Find any book mentioned at apple.co/mamamia

No Filter is a podcast by Mamamia. Find more shows here.

Become a Mamamia subscriber: https://www.mamamia.com.au/subscribe

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

On the 12th of September, 2018, Australian Academic Kylie Moore-Gilbert was arrested at Tehran’s International Airport in Iran. She spent 804 days incarcerated in Tehran’s Evin and Qarchak prison for espionage, a crime she never committed.

She was an innocent Australian stuck in a foreign prison...with no way of getting home. Kylie’s story about her imprisonment, and what happened after she was finally released is unbelievable. Except it really happened.

Want more of Kylie? Listen to Mia’s bonus episode with her here.

END BITS:

With thanks to Kylie Moore Gilbert. Find her book The Uncaged Sky here: https://bit.ly/3DazEDI 

Feedback? We’re listening! Email us at [email protected]

Need more lols, info, and inspo in your ears? Find more Mamamia podcasts here.

Check out our No Filter YouTube channel here.

CREDITS:

Host: Mia Freedman. You can find Mia on Instagram here and get her newsletter here.

Producer: Gia Moylan

Executive Producer: Elissa Ratliff

Mamamia acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the Land we have recorded this podcast on, the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present, and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures.

Become a Mamamia subscriber: https://www.mamamia.com.au/subscribe

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The last few years of Abi Morgan’s life would make an incredible TV show, although you might not believe it because of the plot twists. One of those twists is that Abi herself is an Emmy-award-winning screenwriter of movies like Iron Lady, with Meryl Streep, and TV dramas like The Split.

But nothing could have prepared her for the cascading series of events that began on a very ordinary day. The crescendo of this story is that, after waking up from a coma, Abi's partner of 20 years didn't recognise her. And only her...

Listen to the second half of Mia's conversation with Abi here. 

THE END BITS:

Subscribe to Mamamia

With thanks to Abi Morgan

You can buy her book This Is Not A Pity Memoir here

Feedback? We’re listening! Email us at [email protected]

Need more lols, info, and inspo in your ears? Find more Mamamia podcasts here.

CREDITS:

Host: Mia Freedman. You can find Mia on Instagram here and get her newsletter here.

Executive Producer: Elissa Ratliff

Assistant Producer: Emmeline Peterson

Mamamia acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the Land we have recorded this podcast on, the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present, and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures.

Become a Mamamia subscriber: https://www.mamamia.com.au/subscribe

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

When Louisa Hope walked into Sydney’s Lindt Cafe 10 years ago she didn't expect her life would change forever.

Louisa is one of the survivors of the Sydney Siege. She and her mother were held at gunpoint and trapped for 17 hours before the gunman executed cafe manager Tori Johnston on his knees in front of her. Another hostage, Katrina Dawson was killed moments later in gunfire when police stormed the cafe.

Louisa joined Mia Freedman for a conversation in 2019 to talk through what happened that day and how she felt five years on.

CREDITS:

Host: Mia Freedman 

With thanks to Louisa Hope

Producer:  Bridget Northeast

GET IN TOUCH:

Email the show at [email protected]

No Filter is a podcast by Mamamia. Find more shows here

Become a Mamamia subscriber: https://www.mamamia.com.au/subscribe

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.