Fear of childbirth does not always look like panic. Sometimes it shows up as silence, stoicism, anger, or a private sense that you have lost control of your own body and your own story. We sit down with nurse, midwife, and researcher Jonathan Dominguez Hernandez to talk about how digital storytelling in healthcare can help people make meaning from vulnerable moments, and why the process needs strong ethics when trauma is close to the surface. We break down his meta-synthesis findings and why narrative, ethics, and facilitation style can determine whether storytelling becomes support, advocacy, or too much.

Episode Key Messages

• Jonathan’s path from pediatric nursing to midwifery and public health research

• What it is like being a male midwife across countries and workplace cultures

• How digital storytelling training shaped Jonathan’s research direction

• Why he shifted from group workshops to one on one online storytelling

• Ethics, consent, ownership, and when stories can or cannot be shared

• How the meta-synthesis was built from qualitative studies and assessed for confidence

• Four key themes: re-authoring lived experience, processing emotions, ripple effects of empathy, gaining agency

• Trauma informed facilitation and the role of distress protocols

• What research misses when it ignores the narratives people borrow and retell

• How salutogenesis and sense of coherence guide narrative analysis in fear of childbirth

Other Links Mentioned

• Read this episode's blog post
• Read Jonathan's meta-synthesis from Frontiers in Digital Health
• Learn more about Jonathan's work

About Our Guest

​​Jonathan Dominguez Hernandez is a researcher, educator, and midwife specialising in public health, Evidence-Based practice, and qualitative health research. He currently works as a researcher and lecturer at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences, where his work focuses on sex- and gender-sensitive healthcare, perinatal mental health, and inclusive approaches to care. With a background that combines clinical practice, public health, law, and education, Jonathan has worked across the UK, Austria, Switzerland, and Spain in both frontline maternity care and academic leadership roles. His research explores how narratives and digital storytelling can support health and wellbeing, and he is particularly interested in translating research into practical, compassionate, and Evidence-Based guidelines for clinical practice. Alongside teaching and research, he contributes to international guideline development and interdisciplinary projects aimed at improving maternal and perinatal health outcomes. Jonathan is currently completing a PhD in Public Health at Lancaster University, focusing on dialogical narrative analysis and health-promoting storytelling in women’s reproductive health.

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One gesture can keep a patient in care. That’s the charge running through our conversation with Jack Bones, a transgender cancer survivor whose digital story takes us from a tense biopsy room to a stage where an audience of clinicians wiped away tears and leaned into hard, necessary dialogue. We walk through how a politicized identity collided with late-stage Hodgkin’s lymphoma, how bias nearly closed a door, and how a single act of compassion reopened it.

Episode Key Messages

• the craft of digital storytelling as patient advocacy

• bias in clinical encounters and its real-world risks

• the technician’s gesture that restored safety and trust

• workshop process from script to screening

• reactions at the BC Cancer Summit and productive dialogue

• reaching missing audiences in shame and stigma work

• plans to use film and allegory for future stories

• the ocean moment as a metaphor for freedom

• how stories support training, orientation and culture change

Other Links Mentioned

• Read this episode's blog post
• Watch Jack's digital story
• Jack created their digital story in a BC Cancer workshop facilitated by Krystle Schofield
• Check out Jack's work, Brassthorn Art

About Our Guest

Jackdaw Bones describes them self as an "eremite" and occasionally ventures out of their home in the woods to show the shiny things they've made, in true covid style.

They've been a practising artist ever since their youth, using the lenses of cameras and inks to explore ideas of self, relationships to the natural world, and the terror/joy of living.

Jack is a dropout from an art school that has since disappeared to make way for training industrial workers, though they consider their experiences with disastrous experiments over the years their most valuable teacher. They revel in the beautiful chaos of learning from other artists, from books, other artists, and fucking up. The process is where the joy lay for them, and indeed that joy is built into the foundation of every piece they make.

They are disabled, and a cancer survivor. They have worked hard over the years to get to the level where they can produce art without sacrificing their health, so while their pieces may not be perfect, the imperfection belies the passion, determination, joy, and gratitude they feel when practising.

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What if a two-minute story could change how a care team sees you? We dive into the power of short, first-person narratives to bring dignity, clarity, and warmth back into healthcare, especially in dementia care where behaviour, memory, and language can obscure the person beneath the chart. Lisa Joworski returns to share how Capturing Essence For Care has evolved from interviews into a connector hub for life story methods, linking digital storytellers, guided autobiographers, videographers, and families who want practical ways to preserve identity.

Episode Key Messages

• why capturing essence improves care and communication
• what digital storytelling is and why ownership stays with the storyteller
• creating clear elevator pitches and scripts that set expectations
• many paths to story including music, photos, writing and family podcasts
• building a connector hub for life story resources across methods
• Beth’s digital story, Story Slam and the impact of public sharing, Capturing Essence for Care Ep 21
• advocacy links to Waiting Room Revolution and practical workbooks, Capturing Essence for Care Ep 16
• VR training for person-centred communication and reading environments, Capturing Essence for Care Ep 17
• using AI for drafts while keeping the human voice
• prompts that unlock memory such as tattoos and scars
• upcoming projects and finding one’s voice with assertiveness

Other Links Mentioned

• Read this episode's blog post
• Watch Lisa's digital story
• Listen to Lisa's original Co-Created episode
• Get your ticket to the April 30th 2026 Story Slam

About Our Guest

Lisa Joworski works in Therapeutic Recreation and is a Life Story Resource who brings together storytellers, artists, musicians, advocates, people living with dementia, healthcare practitioners, and life story experts. Each conversation of her Capturing Essence for Care podcast offers insights and practical approaches for the beautiful ways we can honour our own stories and the stories of those we love—not just for memory's sake, but for the fullness of living and for the care we may one day need.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.