Brace Belden was 27 when he snuck into Syria to enlist in a Kurdish militia, leaving his girlfriend, job, and hometown of San Francisco behind. Even he thought it was a dumb idea, but it was also a chance to finally put his beliefs into action.

I’m Your Man

Jul 10th, 2018 57m 54s

April hasn't seen Steve in 15 years. So when she gets a call from a lawyer asking about him, she's not sure what to think. As memories from long ago crowd her mind, she's also confronted by an ugly new truth. One that haunts her present and mak

17andMe

1 Jun 26th, 2018 29m 55s

Daley Dunham was a junior in college at UC Berkeley when he decided to donate sperm. He likened it to donating blood -- an opportunity to do something good for a person in need. Except when you donate blood, you don’t get a tidal wave of childr

The Company We Keep

Jun 12th, 2018 31m 50s

Stories of unlikely friendships. A man finds himself the sole confidant of an eccentric old man. A woman finds companionship with a catfish that leads her on a journey to the Amazon.

Her Double Life

May 29th, 2018 29m 47s

My Linh Le has been lying to her parents about who she is for decades. When she’s with them, she gives them the daughter they want, and she keeps the truth about who she is to herself. But then one night, My Linh has a strange dream and wakes u

Little Girl Lost

May 15th, 2018 41m 5s

Sunday, December 9, 1984 is a day Beth McGhee will never forget. It’s the day her three year-old daughter, Neola, vanished, kidnapped by her ex-husband. As Beth launched into the painful search for Neola, she had no idea how long she would be w

S2 Episode 6: Listener Stories- A Boat, a Baby and the Blue Skies of Montana

May 9th, 2017 41m 9s

We’ve been asking for your stories, and on the last episode of Season 2, we highlight three of our listeners’ leaps. Gavin McClurg embarked on a death-defying adventure on the Pacific that changed the direction of his life. Amy Gotliffe decided

Listener Stories – A Boat, a Baby and the Blue Skies of Montana

May 9th, 2017 43m 28s

We've been asking for your stories, and on the last episode of Season 2, we highlight three of our listeners' leaps.Gavin McClurg embarked on a death-defying adventure on the Pacific that changed the direction of his life. Amy Gotliffe decid

An Unorthodox Life

Apr 25th, 2017 36m 34s

Henny Kupferstein grew up in the Belz sect of ultra-orthodox, Hasidic Jews in Borough Park, Brooklyn. From early childhood, she felt like a misfit. After getting married to a virtual stranger at age 18, Henny began secretly rebelling against th

An Unorthodox Life

Apr 25th, 2017 36m 34s

The Elementary Kool-Aid Acid Test

Apr 11th, 2017 35m 28s

In the early 1960’s, a psychologist named Gary Fisher carried out a radical experiment on severely emotionally disturbed children at a residential hospital in Southern California. Fisher believed these children’s behavioral problems could be tr

The Elementary Kool-Aid Acid Test

Apr 11th, 2017 35m 28s

Mirror Mirror

Mar 28th, 2017 31m 21s

Jill Sutherland has been numbing her feelings of emptiness with food, drugs and alcohol since she was a child growing up in California’s Central Valley. Several years ago she did something she's always wanted to do, something she didn't know sh

Mirror Mirror

Mar 28th, 2017 31m 21s

The Big Pitch

Mar 14th, 2017 25m 42s

San Francisco International High School is the city’s only high school exclusively for recently arrived immigrants. But you can also think of it as a factory.What comes in are immigrant teenagers speaking 18 different languages, including Ar

The Big Pitch

Mar 14th, 2017 25m 42s

San Francisco International High School is the city’s only high school exclusively for recently arrived immigrants. But you can also think of it as a factory. What comes in are immigrant teenagers speaking 18 different languages, including Arab

Out of the Pond

Feb 28th, 2017 38m 45s

Tesilya Hanauer grew up on a commune deep in a Northern California forest. When she was five, her mother joined a nomadic group of people whose philosophy involved breaking the bond between mother and child. They were called the Shivalila, and

Out of the Pond

Feb 28th, 2017 38m 45s

My Name Is Shawn and I Prefer He

Dec 16th, 2015 24m 25s

Lately we’ve heard a lot of stories about people who, after years in the closet, found the courage to come out as transgender. But for Shawn, courage was never the problem.

My Name Is Shawn and I Prefer He

Dec 16th, 2015 24m 25s

Lately we’ve heard a lot of stories about people who, after years in the closet, found the courage to come out as transgender. But for Shawn, courage was never the problem.

Caught in a Pipe

Dec 3rd, 2015 21m 15s

It started with a knocking sound, then whispers, then the strange conviction that he could read people’s minds. In this story, we meet Frankie as he sprints away from his history of mental illness and toward the “normal” life he always wanted.

Caught in a Pipe

Dec 3rd, 2015 21m 15s

The Improbable Transformation of a Punk Pioneer

Nov 18th, 2015 28m 10s

James Williamson became a punk rock legend as part the 1970s band The Stooges. But, a few years into it, he just walked away.

The Improbable Transformation of a Punk Pioneer

Nov 18th, 2015 28m 10s

James Williamson became a punk rock legend as part the 1970s band The Stooges. But, a few years into it, he just walked away.

When a Stranger Gives You $125 Million

Nov 3rd, 2015 26m 55s

After a Seattle businessman left his fortune to a San Francisco blindness organization, its director went in search of an explanation. He found a secret the two men had shared.