"Beyond The Breakdown" by Underdog Crew Studios
🔥 Beyond the Breakdown is a podcast that dives beneath the surface of neurodiversity - beyond the labels, beyond the assumptions and beyond the silence. This is where we unpack the real stories.
Lived experiences from people who navigate it every day. Who carry the scars, are still fighting and those finding strength in the struggle to be heard and understood.
We explore what it truly means to be neurodivergent in a world that doesn’t always understand - breaking stigma, challenging misconceptions and presenting the honest conversations that matter.
No filters. No pretending. Just real voices, real journeys, and real connection. No masks. No filters. Just real voices.
Hosted by multi award winning Underdog Crew Studios (The Underdog Crew CIC). Where misunderstood youth find their voice, their tribe, and their power through the creative arts. www.underdogcrew.org
"Beyond The Breakdown" by Underdog Crew Studios
The Arachnaphobia Challenge.
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What happens when your worst fear is placed right in your hands?
In this powerful and deeply human episode, Assunta is joined by SEN Mum, Claire, who lives with an intense and lifelong fear of spiders. As part of our 'Face the Fears Weekender', we set out to confront that fear head-on - not just in theory, but in reality.
Enter Tara… the tarantula.
Alongside co-presenter Dom and a small group of brave participants, Claire takes on the unimaginable challenge: facing, approaching, and ultimately holding one of her greatest fears.
This episode captures the raw emotion, tension, courage and unexpected breakthroughs that come when we step outside our comfort zones and into growth.
It’s not just about spiders - it’s about fear, trust and what we’re truly capable of when we dare to face what terrifies us most.
Will Claire go through with it?
There’s only one way to find out.
#arachnaphobia #faceyourfears #beyondthebreakdown #underdogcrewstudios
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This episode is brought to you by Mum's Collection Club at Underdog Crew Studios, chatting out life problems with coffee, cake and community. Oh my god. Oh my god.
SPEAKER_02But I was at a point I couldn't um look at pictures of them, images, still images. You know.
SPEAKER_03So how does it make you feel now that today you're holding one? What would your old self say to you now that you're holding one? I wouldn't have even been in the building. Not at all. How does it like what is she could you describe what she feels like and how she is?
SPEAKER_02Um can't really you can't really feel her. Um she's gonna fall off. It's just it's bizarre. I think because you have it like if that was a before I was scared of spiders, if that was a fairy mouse that could run up my arm, I'd have no problem with that. I could hold that, it's the mental block that it's a big hairy spider. I forage foliage in the winter to do reef workshops, and my car is full of these tiny little I call them crab spiders, and they kind of like drop down from my rear view mirror. They're only tiny, but that would have sent me into a panic of stop the car and get out. People don't realise it, but it's debilitating like having a fear, it just affects every corner of your life, and to be free of that is like amazing. It must feel like when like someone's had an addiction and they don't think they could ever be free of it, if that makes sense, and then they are, and they can live again. Like I know it sounds silly, but that's exactly how it is. And look at me now. Lived again.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, it's amazing. Yeah, it's surreal, really. How do you feel?
SPEAKER_00I feel you you I was convinced I wasn't gonna do it because of that. But to see that you just went through that, it it made me feel I had to know heaven. Nobody gets it, nobody understands unless they But do you feel better for doing it?
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, me too.
SPEAKER_03And Dum's mom.
SPEAKER_02Dumb had a go, yeah, didn't you? Yeah, dumb had a go. And he he said only up to my elbow, isn't it? And she did start to crawl, and he I think about a third of the way. He's like, Yeah, it's enough, but because he saw how how nervous I was and that I faced it, he did it as well.
SPEAKER_03It's amazing. Yeah. There you go. Face your fears, it's worth it.
