Best Of: Emotional Bravery with Last Day's Stephanie Wittels Wachs

This transcript was auto-generated from an audio recording. Please excuse any typos or grammatical errors. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

Hi, storytellers. As writers, journalists, podcasters, we often deal with very hard subjects, topics that are painful to explore and to tell. So why do we do it? I think because telling the hard stories—well, sometimes that’s our job. Sometimes, done well, those hard stories lead to change. They lead to help and they lead to healing. 

May is Mental Health Awareness Month, and we could think of no better way to help raise awareness than to re-release one of my favorite episodes of Sound Judgment. It’s a conversation with Stephanie Wittels Wachs, host of Last Day. We talked about her favorite episode, called A Love Story. In it, we meet a couple named Larry and Shannon who lost their son to suicide. And just like life, it’s tragic, but there’s also laughter and pride and celebration. This episode, A Love Story, just won a well-deserved 2023 Webby Award for Best Documentary. 

When I think about the effort it takes for storytellers like Stephanie, like us, to report and share stories like this, I think three things. One, that mental illness of some sort affects every one of us. And that rarely does it define anyone. Two, that it takes openness and sensitivity and bravery and skill to weave a rich and truthful story about people’s humanity, as Stephanie and her team do here. And three, fifty percent of Americans suffer from loneliness. It’s an epidemic. Share your story. Listen. Stories connect us, and that helps.

If you or someone you know is in crisis, get help, by calling or texting 988. And now, let’s go behind the scenes of Last Day.  

Elaine Appleton Grant

What would you do if your beloved brother died of a drug overdose? Would you write a book? Start a podcast? Maybe start a whole podcast company that in three years has grown to 35 shows and 70 employees. Maybe that's not what you would do. But it is what Stephanie Wittels Wachs did with her grief, her creativity, and her concern for the world. And what she did with her hosting skills. Listening to her, I feel simultaneously like my new best friend is hanging out with me in my kitchen, maybe drinking a glass of wine, and that I'm with someone who sees the world more clearly than I do, and calls it like she sees it. No holds barred.

If you forced me to choose a single reason why I invited Stephanie onto this show, it's that last thing—courage, boldness. I want more of that. Maybe you do too. 

We're going to delve into emotional bravery today with Stephanie Wittels Wachs. On Sound Judgment, where we investigate just what it takes to become a beloved podcast host by pulling apart one episode at a time, together. I'm Elaine Appleton Grant.

Elaine Appleton Grant

Stephanie Wittels Wachs, I'm so happy you're here. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Oh my goodness, that was the nicest thing anyone's ever said about me. Thank you so much. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

Ever, I just don't believe that, but thank you. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

It's true, it's true. No one's ever said anything nice to me and that was the first time I've ever heard anything nice. So thank you. I appreciate that. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

Well, you're welcome, you're welcome. You know—I knew about Lemonada Media. I almost feel guilty saying this to you, but I had not listened to Last Day. It was on my list. I knew it was a hit. But to be honest, I also knew that your subject matter could be kind of dark. What got my attention was your recent newsletter saying how thrilled you were that you and your co-CEO, Jessica Cordova Kramer, had been invited to the White House to witness the signing of the gun safety bill because of the third season of Last Day, which is about guns. So then I listened. And I was—honestly, I was blown away by how great the show is. And I was really blown away by how you managed to deal with subjects like opioid abuse and suicide and guns and still somehow make it fun to listen to. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Yeah, I like to make jokes about very serious things. It's on my resume. That's one of my most impressive skills. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

I wish I had that skill. I think it's—I think that's one thing you're either born with or not. So before we dive in, listeners, you probably have already figured this out, but we're gonna talk about tough stuff, including all of the above—substance abuse, suicide, and guns. I hope you'll listen, but probably without your kids around. And Stephanie, I just wanna say there's pretty serious substance abuse in my family, and I'm so sorry about your brother. And I can't thank you enough for your great work. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Thank you. That means a lot to me. I think it's actually rare to find a family that has not been touched by it, hence why we did the podcast. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

Yeah, I guess so. So on to more cheerful things, just tell me really quickly about that White House visit. Where were you when you got this invitation? 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

I was walking, I was like three days from vacation. I was going to actually take some time off for the first time in—I don't know, three years. And I was walking by the ocean, and I got an email on my phone, and I—like, what, what? No, surely this is not for the right person. Why would I be invited to the White House? Had to reroute some trips and—you know, luckily I'm married to a saint, and I came home and I said, yeah, I was invited to the White House. And he was like, what? And I said, but it's right at the end of the trip and you're gonna be with the kids alone, so I'm not gonna go. And he said, you're a lunatic. Yes, you're gonna go. And, you know, made a bunch of quick arrangements and made it happen, yeah.

Elaine Appleton Grant

So you told me it was cool, but it's just one marker, not even the most important one, for what your work on Last Day has meant. We're gonna dive into an episode in just a minute. But try to put that in perspective. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Yeah, the show came out of a real desperation on our parts to have a show that we could have listened to that would have helped us, I think. It was a very personal mission for us at the beginning. It was to try to figure out how we had gotten here, to retrace our steps and understand if there's anything we could have done differently to save our loved ones. We followed the recommendations, we loved really hard, and they still died. And so many families are in this position right now where they love someone who is struggling, or they are struggling. And if willpower was enough, oh my goodness, my brother would still be alive. He was the smartest and the most brilliant, capable person I ever knew. So it's not about willpower. It's about something else. And we really wanted to get to the root of that. 

And these numbers for overdose deaths and homicides and suicides keep rising, right? Deaths of despair is what they call them. They keep rising. We're not doing something right systemically. We're not doing something right on a much deeper level. And the podcast—I didn't know it at the time—was going to uncover a lot of that. And the podcast—I didn't know it at the time—was going to help a lot of people who were feeling really alone and desperate. And I have gotten actual emails, texts, Tweets, from people saying, I listened and this saved me. I don't have the words for what that is. I—It's really unfathomably meaningful.

Elaine Appleton Grant

I actually think that perhaps I can fathom it. You know, as I said, there's pretty serious substance abuse in my family and in part why it was hard, I think, for me to consider listening to this show. And I'm so glad that I did. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

People think, you know, oh God, why would I wanna listen to that? And I'm always like, no, no, no, no, I make a lot of jokes and I say a lot of bad words and we have a good time talking about really miserable things. But yeah—we joke, like I'm the queen of darkness and it's really fun though, come, come on the ride. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

So the show is about the question of what does it take to become a really good host, to make a compelling show that people wanna listen to, which I think is much, much, much harder than people think that it is. There's this myth that anybody can be a host, right? That you can just get behind a mic and you're fine. And it's just, in my mind, completely wrong, which is one of the reasons why I decided to make the show. So I went back to the very first episode of Last Day, because what I was struck by when I listened to the episode you chose was, you know, how sort of raw and out there—and you're just—you know, it feels like I said in the introduction, like you're in my kitchen and you would go into the refrigerator and say, Hey, can I have some leftovers? Which is a very unusual thing. It's even an unusual thing just for people getting to know each other for the first time, let alone being behind a mic. So I wondered, maybe on her first episode, she didn't sound like this. And on your first episode, you did.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Probably even more. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

It was as raw—I mean…it's about the death of your brother. It was as raw as anything I'd ever heard, and funny. You know, you just didn't shy away from penis jokes. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Yeah, well, listen, I'm honoring my brother and he liked penis jokes. So what am I—what do you want, you know? Gotta honor him somehow, Elaine. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

So people ask me a lot how to be vulnerable on tape. They say I'm scared. So much so that I think it might be the hardest thing to do as a host. So what's your take on this? 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Oh my goodness. I am that person. I don't have a take. I don't even have a toolkit. I think I—this is the first narrative podcast I have hosted. Ever. I've been an actor, a director, a writer, a storyteller, a performer, a voiceover actor, for decades. But this genre was new to me. So I had written a memoir where I had—you know—poured my entire soul out onto the page. I had done 150 episodes of a weekly parenting show where my two-year-old was running around in the background and a girlfriend and I were drinking wine and raiding each other's fridges. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

I was right. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Yeah, you nailed me. You nailed me. I will go in your fridge and I will take your food. Shamelessly.

But I am wired that way. I don't know how else to be. I am who I am in every setting. I try to use less bad words in front of my children, even though I slip and then my daughter scolds me. But what you see is pretty much what you get. So I think I have worked with wonderful producers who have encouraged me to keep that. And I think it's a really important part of the ethos of the show. I think the show works because I am putting myself out there. I am raw and vulnerable. I'm inviting other people. I start every interview by saying, hey, I know we're about to talk about the worst thing that ever happened to you. I talked all about the worst thing that ever happened to me on the first season of the show. So I get it. I feel how vulnerable and hard that can be, and let's do it together.

I don't know. I wish I could maybe be more professional, Elaine, or more serious, but this is what comes out. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

It's interesting though, because that sort of goes into that category of like, well, if you've got talent, you've got talent, you can't learn it. You're either born with it or you're not. And I don't know if that's true, but you did say your producers have encouraged you to keep this. Are there points at which you've had a question, like, oh, you know, have I gone too far? Or should I not do this?

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

I mean, when you're crying on a microphone and you know people are gonna be consuming it, there's always like—is this terrible? Does anyone care about this? Is this landing? Is this working? Is this too much? We have a joke about crying tape. Is this too much crying tape? And I mean, there was one episode, back in episode one, where we were writing the show about kids who are in vulnerable positions. And I just had an absolute meltdown, you know? I just started crying. I was like, I don't wanna do this. I am not playing a character. This is actually my life. This is really hard and painful. And my producer recorded this. “Let me just record this, cause this is really authentic what's going on right here.”

I'm used to collaborating very deeply and closely and trusting one another through that process. I don't know how I would do this with a team I didn't trust, and feel kind of safe with. The show is a real team sport. You hear my voice, but my goodness, there are four other people who are cranking away in the background making it all happen. And that feels to me like the real magic of the show. And then obviously finding stories that we wanna tell and finding people who have lived experience that we think will shine a light on something we wanna talk about. 

And then it's funny because when I was working on No One Is Coming to Save Us with Gloria Rivera—she was our host, it's a show about the childcare crisis—Gloria was a news reporter, broadcaster, forever. That was her career. And I remember the first time we got on, and she was doing tracking, she was like, “And today, this is—” You know, using her broadcast voice. And I was like, oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. The microphone hates that. Let's shake that off. We're gonna play this tape. Can you just listen to this woman talking about how hard it is for her to juggle a newborn with a toddler with her own job? And I know you've experienced some of that yourself. And can you just close your eyes and then respond to it, just however you feel? And Gloria is so—she's so amazing. And she's so full of heart and soul and vulnerability herself.

And once she had that permission, she started crying and she started talking about her own experience, having to go to actual war zones with little kids at home and how painful that was for her to have to balance. And we kept that as the first moment of the first episode. So I do think it's—yeah, there's talent and also there's a willingness and a permission that you give to just let whatever comes out happen. And the worst thing that happens is, you use a different take. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

Right, right, right. What I'm struck by is the permission, right? Giving that permission in collaboration, in a safe space, to be who you are, to let it all out. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

We also have fun making the show, and that feels really important because it's real dark, you know? 

Elaine Appleton Grant

It is, but the fun comes through. So let's dive into the episode that you chose, because we're gonna get into a little bit of fun, actually. You chose an episode called A Love Story. What did you love in particular about this episode as opposed to all the others in Last Day? 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

I know, we've made 50 episodes. And this is my favorite. I love it so much. So we did season three on guns. And the central question of the series is how do we live more safely in a world with 400 million guns? And by world, I mean America. America has more guns than people. And it's really important for us in Last Day land to come from a place of—opioids don't care who you voted for. Depression and suicide is an equal opportunity destroyer. You know? These are universal human experiences and we're very divided. I was very afraid to delve into guns because it's so polarizing. And I felt like we could not tell the story effectively without understanding why people have guns, why they would ever be in somebody's home. What is the point? 

I am not from a gun-owning world. And I thought if we wanted to try to understand how to live more safely, we needed to go into this environment. That's the beginning, middle, and end of what we do. I wanna understand why you do what you do so I can figure out how we can maybe do it better, right? 

And so we went to Montana. And we were in a town of 272 people. The town is called Drummond, Montana. And being in somebody's home, being in somebody's living room—we were there for three hours. There was a Christmas tree. The living room was really tiny. We were all sort of packed in there. And just sharing space and sharing stories and—I don't know, it was transformative. It was one of those interviews where I lost track of time and space. I did not realize we had been talking for two and a half hours. It was an incredibly emotional interview. I was weeping, they were weeping, the team was weeping. And we called it A Love Story, because at the end of the day, it wasn't a story about death, it was a story about love and life and the stuff that keeps us anchored to the ground. And I just, I love these people so much. Anyway.

Elaine Appleton Grant

Oh, you're going to make me cry, because Shannon and Larry became so real to me just listening to it. I want to start with the introduction, because you made a very particular choice here. Let me play it for you.

Clip from Last Day

Man: Did you hear the ding? It's shooting all right now. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs: Yeah, the ding! 

Man: Hey, guys. How about that? 

Man: All right, now. 

Man: 100 yards. 

Man: You're not done yet. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs: Good job, Jack. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs: That's our team, hanging out with Wayne Yates and his neighbor, Lloyd. You might remember those squeals of delight from our last episode. All of us were—shockingly—super into shooting guns. The one you're hearing now is a vintage hunting rifle. And every time we heard that little ding as the bullet hit this tiny piece of steel, a hundred yards away, it was thrilling, like winning an arcade game. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

This isn't the first episode, obviously, where you and your team tried shooting guns. That was pretty out of the box thinking for a series about the gun control controversy. Although you just explained you felt like you needed to go to a culture where they’re prevalent because you didn't understand. 

But take me to the meeting where you and your team decided—oh, let's start this whole introduction to this episode about this lovely middle-aged couple who lost their son to suicide by a gun with you guys going, woo-hoo, this is really fun, shooting at the range. Who was in the room when you had that discussion? 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Yeah, it doesn't make any sense on paper, right? We started the episode initially with the whole knock on the door, open the door. Hi, Larry. Hi, Shannon. I'm Stephanie. Here's some cookies. Yay. And really, what happened that day, why that day was so mind-bending, was that we did start the day in Florence, Montana. We did start the day shooting guns. And then we drove hours to Shannon and Larry's house. We were exhausted. We were like, okay, we're just gonna stop by. We're gonna drop off the cookies and then we'll come back into the bulk of the interview the next day. That is what happened. And I felt like what was so striking about Shannon and Larry's story is that hunting was such an integral part of the fabric of their family. It was a pastime. It was like me going for a walk or playing softball with my daughter. This is what they did. They went hunting. It was something that brought them a ton of joy.

And I had never understood how could hunting bring somebody joy—until I shot a gun that morning. And I was like, whoa, this is actually fun. Can I say that? Is that allowed? I had a ton of fun. And then—this is my thought process, seven hours later, we were in a living room talking to a family who lost their son because he took his life with a hunting rifle. I didn't know how else to tell that story, honestly, because that's such a part of the story. And I always—I'm always—my team probably is like, please, please, please stop. But I'm always like, show, not tell, show, not tell, show, not tell. How can we show this? And the way that we showed it was, let's have fun shooting the guns and then let's see the pain that this causes. And you have to have both of those to understand the issue.

I think when I suggested it, I think my team was like, are you a monster? Maybe a little bit. I think it was one of those things. It was probably a story meeting where it's like, this just isn't working as it is. What could we do? 

Elaine Appleton Grant

Did you listen to that original—did you get that far in post that you were listening to the knock on the door, here's some cookies? 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We go through like 20 revisions on every script. It's a deeply—

Elaine Appleton Grant

Deeply produced, I can tell. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Maddening, I was gonna say maddening. Everyone's like, I wanna do narrative, and I'm like, do you? 

Elaine Appleton Grant

Are you sure? Do you really wanna give up your life? Yeah, exactly. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

I calculated the amount of time it takes to make one episode. It's 187 hours. That's what I calculated. Per 45 minutes. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

Oh my Lord. Oh my Lord, yeah. People don't understand because they just hear it and it sounds so seamless. And I have to tell you, as somebody who loves narrative, I heard that cold open and I was like, oh my Lord, that's brilliant. And it's beautifully sound designed and it's completely unexpected. I mean, you do that thing that an old TV producer friend of mine used to always say—you got to have the left turn. And there's this huge left turn, you know, here you are shooting, you're on your way to this couple with cookies. And then all of a sudden you're not. So it's interesting that you say show, not tell, show, not tell so much that they hate you for it. 

The next piece that I wanna play is sort of a fun conversation about Shannon and Larry's early history. 

Clip from Last Day

Larry: I worked at a gas station, basically just cleaning gas pumps and everything. And I was born and raised in Libby, Montana. That was—the way I describe it is as close to homeless as you can be with a roof over your head. We lived on nothing but deer meat for three months. It was miserable. 

Shannon: Yeah, it was horrible.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs: Pretty soon after their son Gage was born, Larry started looking for work in nearby Drummond. 

Larry: They said, well, the Swiss ranch needs help. And I said, I'm not a rancher. I'll hate this job. Well, we went out there to interview, and he said, what do you know about cows? I say, I think that is one there. And he says, you're hired. Because he said, there's cowboys everywhere. And loved it. 

Shannon: Oh, and it was good for us because it was like we got a free place to stay. They gave us half a beef. So it was like, oh, we have to pay—no rent? I'm like, we're there, let's go. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs: A half a beef to eat and a roof over their heads was exactly what they needed because another baby was on the way. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

We all who love narrative podcasts love them in part because they're going from scene to scene to scene and you get swept into that scene and you're there. But it's hard to get the average person to talk that way. Not everybody is a natural storyteller. Right? So I was curious about this particular one. Were Shannon, and Larry in particular, were they natural storytellers? Did they just speak that way? Like, oh, let me tell you about when such and such happened. Or did you have to prompt them? 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Yes, yes. We had a plan to talk about Austin and what had happened. And I walked in, and Shannon was really funny, and she was wearing these sloth pajamas, and I thought they were really cute. And I don't know, they just had this energy about them. And I was like, you know what? I just wanted to hear about them. I just started with, tell me about you two. Tell me your love story. How did you meet? I didn't plan to do that, but I just—that and that's what—this was the beginning of the interview. This is why it's my favorite interview because Shannon and Larry, they are amazing and I love them.

Elaine Appleton Grant

Okay, so that said, you know, I haven't listened to all 50 episodes. But you have scenes all over the place. So tell me about one where it was actually hard to get somebody to say, well, I was walking on the beach when I got the email and went, White House? You know, people don't all do that. So tell me about one where it was hard. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Oh, gosh, let me think.

We did this show remotely for all of season two. It was during the pandemic. So we were talking about mental health and suicide. We'd have to do Zoom calls and we'd have to talk to various family members at different times. We did this episode about—I think it was called Psychological Autopsy. And it was one family, and we talked to all the sisters and the mom, and then had to kind of piece that together and try to paint the picture.

And so something like that is just more manufactured than you've got these two people in a room, they're a married couple, their banter is so adorable. They've been together since they were 16 years old. They just know each other's breaths and isms. And when you talk about scenes—I mean, this is the theater part, right? It's about character and it's about humanity. And that's the stuff we try to capture, right? What are the  human things about you? And what are the human things about me? And then when we put those things in a room together, human things happen. And that's interesting. You know what I mean? 

Elaine Appleton Grant

I love that. So it's really cute. I mean, the whole thing about the cow is just really cute. And the narrative unwinds in a chronological way. You're taking them through their lives, and having Austin and his twin and the older brother and so forth, up to the day that Austin killed himself. And it gets very very gut-wrenching and in this next passage they're talking about going to psychotherapy about nine months or so after Austin died. 

Clip from Last Day

Shannon: And of course it was mainly for me. He wasn't getting therapy for him. It was going to be for me but he would go, you know, and stuff, but I do think that it... 

Larry: And I didn't think I need...I didn't...Yeah, I thought it was all for her at the time, but... 

Shannon: But I think he got... 

Larry: It helped us both. 

Shannon: Yeah.

Larry: But Austin was the...I mean, he was… 

Goodness. Sorry.

Anything I was doing, he had to be right in the middle of all the time. 

Shannon: Even when he was little.

Stephanie Wittels Wachs: I don't—I—Larry, you may not do the talking mostly, but you're hitting the depths of my soul right now. 

Larry: This has been, well, nine years this coming May. Had you contacted us a year ago, I guarantee I wouldn't sit here and talk with you at all. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs: Yeah. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

So the first thing that struck me in that passage is that your feelings are on display throughout the whole story. Even though you don't actually have a ton of narration. You say to him, you're hitting the depths of my soul right now. So just tell me about that moment. And then in post-production, the decision to keep that in, because in a newsroom, where I come from, there's this knee jerk—we gotta take that out. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Totally. I think—I don't come from a newsroom. That's probably why I'm able to—I don't know what the rules are around that. You know what I mean? It's funny that you're picking up on that because we typically have a lot of tracking in these episodes.

And we made a very conscious choice with this to keep a lot of the conversation intact. They were so honest. And we had this really amazing moment together. And let's just try to keep a lot of that together and take me as narrator out as much as we could. And we wanted to have this be very linear. A lot of our episodes are seven voices, going decades of time from decades of time. I mean, it's really woven together and patchworked. I'm glad you picked up on that, because it was intentional. 

I was weeping at that. I mean, I really was absolutely annihilated, by that point. Everyone in the room—my producers, we were wearing masks. We were still in the pandemic and we just had snot all over our masks. And I could hear my producers behind me like, ugh, just not able to catch their breath. And I wanted Larry to know that I know it's hard for him to say this to a bunch of strangers with mics in their faces. And it was meaningful. And I was really grateful. And I didn't take it for granted. Larry's a logger. He's not like, let me sit around and tell you how I feel. That's not this guy. And it was a lot. It was a lot. And I...I'm an active complimenter, praiser. I want people to know. You know? I just—I just—I don't know. I didn't even know what I was saying. I didn't even know that that came out. And it was true. He touched all of us in such a profound way. I was so moved by what he said. And I think we all felt it was really important to keep that.

Elaine Appleton Grant

It was a beautiful moment. It's a beautiful, beautiful moment. The other thing, of course, that I picked up on—this has been nine years this coming May. Had you contacted us a year ago, I guarantee I wouldn't sit here and talk with you at all. Well, you know, from the outside in, what's the difference between eight years and nine years? Who on your team found Larry and Shannon, and then persuaded Larry in particular to talk to you?

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Yeah, I mean, again, super team sport. We had a lot of trouble tracking down people to talk to us in Montana, to be honest. It took many, many months. We started with this guy named Carl, who I absolutely love. He heads up mental health for the Department of Health and Human Services in Montana. We connected with Carl first, and in our very first call, which is on this as well, Carl said something like, you're gonna have to fix your poker face before you come to Montana, or no one's gonna talk to you.

And we kept that in. We wanted to show everyone how there's barrier here. There is barrier to entry. And if we came in with our guns aren't good and you shouldn't have guns, then we would not get anywhere. So he kind of culturally put us through the wringer at the start of this process. And once he could see that we were down to not come in and tell everyone the way that they should live their lives, he kind of opened the gate and he connected us to the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention in Montana. And it's three moms who sit on the board. One of them was Shannon, one of them was Nancy, and one of them was Tracy. And those are the three families we interviewed in Montana. And we had a Zoom meeting with them, an introductory Zoom call. And I told them my story. I listened to their stories and we sent all of them samples of the show. We wanted to show them, we're not going to come in and exploit your stories. We're not going to paint you in a negative light. That is not the goal here. And we just worked really hard as a team to gain their trust. 

Jackie's our supervising producer. Julia is one of our producers on the team. Julia is just like the most incredible follow-upper, booker, connector. And we just stayed in contact. And Shannon, we had to stay on top of, because I think she was the one who was least right off the bat willing to do it. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

She does not come across that way at all. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

She is awesome. Right off the bat was just like, you are great. I want to be friends. We just were able to connect. And I think why they ultimately decided to do it is that they have an organization. They are so committed to advocacy and they are so committed to preventing this from happening to other families that sharing their story—while painful—is really part of how they keep going. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

You highlighted a couple of things that seem like second nature to me, but certainly aren't for a lot of people. And one is finding a champion. So you start with that guy in a suicide prevention group, who believes in what you're doing and becomes almost like if you were going to a foreign country, you need a—what do they call them? A connector…

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Translator…

Elaine Appleton Grant

Fixer… 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

What we call it in a series as a credible messenger. You know, you need somebody who is from the community who can vouch for you and say, talk to these people. I mean, we did a whole other storyline in Atlanta. And it was the same thing there. We had to have people in the community saying, come in, let's all sit down together. Otherwise, why would somebody trust us? I wouldn't. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

Here's another clip I'd like us to talk about. 

Clip from Last Day

Stephanie Wittels Wachs: If you live near the ocean, you swim. If you live in the city, you go out. And if you live around here, you hunt. You go out in nature. It's a chance to be by yourself or to bond with your people.

We heard this over and over again last season that the best form of suicide prevention is to create a life worth living. And part of that is doing what you love. For Austin, he loved going hunting. So what do you do when you are trying to bring your kid back to life and all he wants is the one thing that is also putting him at risk? 

Elaine Appleton Grant

You pose a really big question. What do you do when you're trying to bring your kid back to life and all he wants is the one thing that is also putting him at risk. Did you know when you started that this would be one of the central questions of this story, or did that emerge from the reporting? 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Oh, it always emerges from that. I mean—no, of course I didn't know. You know, we have some idea of what we want, but—

Elaine Appleton Grant

But it's interesting that you framed the question. I mean, it became such a—almost the question that the whole story revolves around. And that, I think, is often a hard thing to get to. What is the driving question? What is the central question of the story? 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Oh my gosh, I'm like a central question psychopath. I'm always like, what's the central question? What's the central question? Show, not tell. And what's the central question? I'm always saying, OK, but what's the question? What are we trying to figure out? What's the point? That's really critical to storytelling, any storytelling. But I think it's something that does happen over time. And it's so baked in to the process of revision and collaboration. And you know when you've found it. And you know when you haven't. If the episode isn't working, it's typically because you haven't nailed down what that central question is. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

I agree. That and the lack of scenes, the lack of storytelling, the lack of honesty. We news broadcasters suffer greatly from that. Let me ask you a couple of lightning round questions. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Okay. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

What's the one thing about hosting you wish you had known about hosting when you started? And you can start with when you started Last Day or when you started your parenting show. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Oh, that it would take 187 hours. I mean, I didn't realize. I was like—I want to make a show that's like This American Life, you know? Everyone wants to do that. And yeah, I had no idea the amount of time and effort and life force that it would take to do a show like this. 

And I always say when we're talking about doing new shows with new hosts, however long you think it's gonna take, triple that and then also count your sleeping hours because there's so many times I would wake up in the middle of the night and then have a thought about a script that I would put down in my notes app. Okay, I figured it out, I have to write this down at three in the morning. And then I'm up for the next two hours thinking about it. It really does take over your brain. So yeah, that's what I would have known. Maybe I wouldn't have done it, but I probably would have, because I'm a masochist. I don't know. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

But is it worth it? 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Yeah, oh my gosh, totally. Yeah. For sure. It's like, is it worth it to have children? Yeah. Will it take your entire life? Totally. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

Yeah. Okay.

Who's your dream guest for Sound Judgment? 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Oh my goodness. There's so many shows that I love. This is tough, Elaine. Who do I want to hear from? 

There was a series called Believed. It was about the Larry Nassar case that came out a couple years ago. I was so moved by that. I remember listening to it and then sharing it with my team and saying, hey, this is a really painful topic that they are handling with utmost sensitivity. I just thought it was so masterfully done. I just loved it. As much as you can love something that's really difficult, you know, but I think these shows like our show and that show, it's such a different formula that you're working with when you're talking about really traumatic things with people.

And then on another—I loved My Year in Mensa with Jamie Loftus, totally different vibe. Absolutely hilarious. And then, yeah. Narrative hosting is so hard and amazing and torturous and I love us all. And we need a support group. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

Last lightning question here is what's the next thing at Lemonada Media that you're most excited about? 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Oh my goodness, we have a show coming out with Ricki Lake and Kalen Allen coming out in September called Raised by Ricki, looking back at the Ricki Lake show and the 90s culture and what it was like and why we did what we did, which wasn't great with today's lens all the time, but it's so much fun. So I'm super excited about that. We have a show coming out with Elyse Myers, who is a TikTok star, young mom, comedian. It's called It's Funny Cuz It's True. We're producing that with Powderkeg So I'm super excited about that. And...another big project that I can't tell you about, but I'm very excited about. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

Oh, well, we'll have to keep an eye out. Stephanie, thank you so much for being here and for being you. And I feel like I've made a friend. 

Stephanie Wittels Wachs

Oh my gosh, it was so much fun talking about this very sad show. And thank you for listening, and all the nice things you said about it, because we do work really hard on it and it's nice to hear that it's landing. You don't know in podcast land who's consuming it and not, so I always appreciate talking to people about this work. So thank you.

Elaine Appleton Grant

I loved that conversation with Stephanie. Now at the end of each episode, I'm gonna try to give you a few of the takeaways—the many takeaways—from each conversation. We'll put the full list in the show notes. So here are a few from Stephanie's.

1. Be curious. Frame your story around a central question. Now that central question might change if you're reporting or researching or even just having conversations with a guest or guests. It may emerge as it did for Stephanie.

• To be vulnerable on tape, you need at least one partner who encourages vulnerability, who gives you permission and a psychologically safe space to be who you are and to say your truth. 

1. Great storytelling is built on truth, as Stephanie said. It's also built on contrast and unexpected turns. We’re looking for pivot points. This is why Stephanie led an episode about suicide with a scene of her team whooping it up at a shooting range. That was the truth. There's enormous contrast between that and most of the episode, which takes place in a living room. And that is a very unexpected turn to start an episode like this at a shooting range, having fun.
2. Find a champion. If you're wondering how Stephanie finds people who are willing to bare their souls to her, it was a month-long process and it started with someone who gave her access into the community and told her how to build trust. 

Thanks so much for listening to the very first episode of Sound Judgment. Please take a moment to rate and review us on your listening app and better yet, share the show with a friend, personally or on social media. Tag us with the hashtag, great host. We need your help to grow this brand new show. Every single one of you matters. 

Do you have your own dream guest for Sound Judgment? Write to us at allies@podcastallies or tweet me at Elaine A. Grant and tell us who it is and why. 

Sound Judgment is produced by me, Elaine Appleton Grant. Sound design by Andrew Parrella. Our gorgeous cover art is by Sarah Edgell. Project management and all the things by the inimitable Tina Bassir. 

See you soon.