Everything Happens with Kate Bowler

Aging is a privilege — but perimenopause and menopause can still blindside you. Kate Bowler sits down with Dr. Mary Claire Haver, board-certified OB-GYN and bestselling author of The New Menopause and The New Perimenopause, to explain what’s actually happening in the body during perimenopause and menopause, why symptoms like brain fog, frozen shoulder, and anxiety get dismissed or misdiagnosed, and what the evidence really says about hormone replacement therapy after the 2002 Women’s Health Initiative study derailed women’s care for two decades.

They also cover practical, low-cost tools for this stage of life — bone density screening, strength training, protein and fiber, cardio guidelines — and why replacing shame with information changes everything.

This conversation was recorded on location at the Aspen Ideas Festival: Health.

What if becoming the parent you want to be requires unlearning some of what you were taught?

Author and creator Libby Ward joins Kate to talk about breaking generational cycles, people-pleasing, parental burnout, and the complicated work of becoming the parent you didn’t have. Libby shares how motherhood forced her to confront her own limits—and reconsider the impossible standards she’d absorbed about what makes a “good mom.”

Together, they talk about boundaries, trusting your own needs, and letting go of the exhausting work of looking like a good parent so you can focus on what actually helps your children feel safe and loved.

Show Notes:

Watch the conversation on YouTube.

Follow Libby on Instagram.

Read Libby’s book, Honest Motherhood.

Loneliness is more than just a feeling—it shapes how we see ourselves and the world around us. It can make us withdraw, hesitate to reach out, or convince us that connection is for other people. But Dr. Vivek Murthy has spent years reminding us of what is most true: we are meant to hold each other up.

As U.S. Surgeon General (twice!), Vivek confronted some of the biggest public health challenges of our time—addiction, youth mental health, the opioid crisis. But at the heart of it all was something deeply human: our need for each other. In this conversation, Kate and Vivek talk about what actually makes a life full—not perfect, not endlessly productive, but anchored in love and belonging.

Together, they discuss:

• The quiet ache of loneliness and why so many of us feel it

• Why relationships, purpose, and service are the real building blocks of a fulfilled life

• Small, practical ways to reach out, even when it feels awkward

• How asking for help might bring us closer, not pull us apart.

This episode originally aired February 2025

Historian and Canadian politician Michael Ignatieff explores the cracks in our seamless worldviews… or at least the worldviews we thought were seamless until we’re faced with tragedies of all kinds. In this wide-ranging exploration, Kate and Michael probe humanity's enduring attempt to console ourselves and construct meaning from our pain.

In this conversation, Kate and Michael discuss:

Why truth and trust are so important when it comes to finding meaning in our pain

The difference between comfort and consolation 

The limits of stoicism and hyper-futurism 

What it means to be hopeful

The importance of community through pain and suffering

Michael does not denigrate anyone’s attempt for comfort, but asks us to look carefully at the consolation that lasts. He asks: What is consolation? And why do we all crave that practice of meaning-making?

This episode originally aired March 2023.

How do you live knowing life can just come undone at a moment’s notice? In the span of a few months, Tig Notaro received three life-threatening illnesses, unexpectedly lost her mom, and went through a breakup. Tig is a brilliant comedian whose real life informs her comedy and has a lot to teach us about living honestly in the face of reality. 

In this conversation, Kate and Tig discuss: 

Tig’s “hands-off” parents and her journey of self-discovery, eventually uncovering her talents in the entertainment industry and making her a respected figure in comedy

How Tig Notaro's family of “real characters,” served as an abundant source of comedic inspiration in her life (including the best graveyard story ever)

How to live alongside fear of what you know could actually happen?

 This episode originally aired June 2023.