In this episode of On One Condition, Sylvain talks to Niamh Foster about the ischaemic stroke she had at just 26 years old, a stroke caused by a blood clot blocking blood flow to part of her brain.

Niamh describes the middle-of-the-night onset she initially put down to stress, the drooping face and slurred speech that finally sent her to hospital, and the ten transient ischaemic attacks (TIAs), or mini-strokes, that had quietly warned her for weeks beforehand, mistaken at the time for migraines. Doctors eventually traced the cause to a two-centimetre hole in her heart — a patent foramen ovale (PFO) that many people are born with and never notice, unless, like Niamh, it lets a clot travel straight to the brain.

She talks openly about relearning to speak through aphasia and dysarthria, the frustration of losing words she knew perfectly well, and the fourteen months off work that felt like watching her life pause while everyone else's carried on. That period also led her somewhere new: from a career in fashion into a job supporting fellow stroke survivors at the Stroke Association, now contributing to the very Life After Stroke group she once attended as a patient.

This episode is about diagnostic delay, the science of neuroplasticity, and finding purpose on the other side of a life-changing event.

The song that Niamh chose is I'm Still Standing by Elton John.

Andrew is the father of Diego, who was diagnosed with peroxisome biogenesis disorder (PBD), a rare and potentially devastating genetic condition affecting an organelle found in every cell of the body.

Andrew shares the emotional reality of receiving a diagnosis when doctors could not tell his family what the future would look like, and that there were no treatments available. But alongside the uncertainty came a determination to understand the disease and do something about it. What began with Andrew learning how to read scientific papers and reaching out to researchers eventually led him to leave his career and work full-time to build an ecosystem around peroxisome research.

The conversation goes beyond Diego's story. Andrew explains why the peroxisome has historically received far less attention and funding than other areas of biology, and why changing that requires more than scientific discovery.

Ultimately, this is a story about turning an incredibly difficult diagnosis into purpose, while never losing sight of the child and family at the heart of it.

Andrew chose the song Un Poco Loco by Anthony Gonzalez and Gael García Bernal.

Katie's journey with hypoparathyroidism began unexpectedly, following surgery for thyroid cancer in her twenties. What followed was a profound period of uncertainty, brain fog, fatigue and loss of independence, during which Katie often had to become her own advocate while struggling with the very symptoms that made advocacy difficult. Her story is also one of resilience, community and partnership. She describes how family and friends helped her through some of her darkest moments, how a clinical trial became a turning point in her treatment journey, and how working alongside her physician, the patient community, pharmaceutical companies and the FDA ultimately helped bring a treatment to patients. Most importantly, Katie reflects on what it means to have your voice heard when living with a rare or chronic condition. Her message to everyone working with patients is beautifully simple: patients need to feel heard, understood and believed. The song that Katie chose is The Cure by Little Mix.