Leading Through Stories: When Your World Stops

Digital storytelling is a powerful tool in the realm of health and wellness. It allows individuals to capture and share their experiences in a deeply emotional and engaging way. This was the focus of our recent podcast episode where we sat down with Jennifer, a congenital heart parent and advocate. Jennifer shared her journey with digital storytelling and the profound impact it has had not only on her life but on the lives of others in similar situations.

Jennifer’s journey with digital storytelling began when she heard Kristy speak at a virtual conference, which led her to create ‘Day One’, a compelling digital narrative of her child’s diagnosis. This powerful tool enabled her to encapsulate the emotions and impacts of the moment, creating a poignant story that resonates with many families navigating similar experiences. She discovered the therapeutic potential of digital storytelling, using it as an education and advocacy tool.

Creating a digital story is a process that involves finding the essence of a story, weaving it together with captivating audio-visual elements, and setting the mood with the perfect score. This process is not just about capturing moments but also about unearthing the therapeutic impact of storytelling. It allows individuals to process their experiences in a deeply personal and meaningful way, providing a sense of comfort and understanding that can be invaluable in navigating health and wellness challenges.

The potential of digital stories as a platform for connection was also highlighted in our conversation with Jennifer. She shared her vision of fostering a community of shared experiences and her hopes of establishing a digital story library based on the stories in her book, When Your World Stops; Finding Hope in Your Child’s Medical Journey.

The power of digital storytelling extends beyond self-expression. It can serve as a tool for fostering empathy and understanding, allowing individuals to connect on a deeper level. Our conversation with Jennifer illustrates this beautifully, providing a glimpse into the profound impact of digital storytelling in the health and wellness realm. Her journey serves as an inspiration, highlighting the potential of digital storytelling to make a difference in our lives.

In conclusion, digital storytelling offers a compelling platform for sharing and understanding health and wellness experiences. Whether you are a health professional, a patient, or a family member navigating a health challenge, this tool can provide comfort, connection, and understanding. As Jennifer’s experience demonstrates, digital storytelling is not just about capturing moments; it’s about creating connections, fostering empathy, and promoting healing. Tune in to listen to Jen’s inspiring journey and discover how digital storytelling can make a difference in your own life.

About Our Guest

Jennifer Siran lives in Manitoba, Canada, with her husband and three children. For over a decade, she worked with marginalized youth in Winnipeg’s Inner City, learning the power of story when overcoming hardship. Writing has been a tool that she has used to process many complex emotions and all that life brings. After spending the last 12 years raising an amazing heart hero and navigating some major setbacks, she took time during Covid to write her book—a project to support fellow heart families in a unique way. Their family continues to navigate their son’s chronic illness in the midst of all the amazing things that childhood contains. 

Website: jennifersiran.com
Digital Story: Day One
Book:  When Your World Stops; Finding Hope in Your Child’s Medical Journey

About Leading Through Stories

Everyone has a story to tell—and what we do with that story can create lasting impact. Every episode, Leading Through Stories, helps unravel the how and why of digital storytelling with host Kristy Wolfe.

Life is made up of meaningful moments—which ones do you want to share?

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Health Promoting Experiences of Storytellers: A Meta-Synthesis – Co-Created

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 childbirthOther Links MentionedRead this episode's blog postRead Jonathan's meta-synthesis from Frontiers in Digital HealthLearn more about Jonathan's workAbout 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. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

1. Health Promoting Experiences of Storytellers: A Meta-Synthesis 49:36
2. Isolation to Impact: DST in Cancer Care 25:57
3. The Storyteller’s Yellow Pages 33:23
4. Neurodevelopment, Advocacy & Heart Families 01:06:11
5. Shame, Story, & Healing in Medicine 47:38

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