Listen Now: Alive with Steve Burns

Summary

Episode Overview

Podcast: Still My Baby
Episode: Listen Now: Alive with Steve Burns
Air Date: September 17, 2025
Host: Steve Burns (guest hosting/presenting for "Alive with Steve Burns")
Guest: Julie McFadden, hospice and palliative care nurse, author of "Nothing to Fear: Demystifying Death to Live More Fully"

This episode is a crossover or featured segment from Steve Burns’ new show "Alive," where he dives into conversations about life, death, and everything in between. Burns, known for his warm, familiar tone (notably from “Blue’s Clues”), opens up about personal brushes with Internet death rumors and his real-life encounters with loss, before welcoming hospice nurse Julie McFadden. The heart of the conversation centers on demystifying death, understanding hospice and palliative care, and the human experiences that surround dying.

---

Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Steve’s Personal Relationship with Mortality and the Internet (00:02–06:28)

• Steve reflects on adulthood’s challenges—money, privacy, and existential topics like death.
• He recounts how persistent Internet rumors of his own death affected him:

  "There was this Internet rumor going around that I was dead...no matter what we did, we couldn't get rid of the rumor." (A, 02:40)

  • The rumor lasted over a decade and became "a cultural preference."
• He shares how real losses—his father and his dog—have given him a new lens through which to view mortality:

  "The inevitable fact of our death is the one certainty we hold while we're alive." (A, 05:21)

2. Introducing Julie McFadden: "Nothing to Fear" (06:28–06:48)

• Steve credits TikTok for discovering nurse Julie’s work and lauds her transparent, approachable education about death and dying online.
• Julie is introduced as a guest who deeply understands the process of dying from her years in hospice and palliative care nursing.

3. Demystifying Hospice and Palliative Care (06:48–09:00)

• Hospice:
  • Julie reframes hospice as being about living, not just dying:

    "Hospice is about living. People think it's about dying...but it is for people who want to live out the rest of their lives, wherever that may be." (B, 06:51)

  • In the U.S., home hospice (care at home by a team) is the most common.
• Palliative Care:
  • Focuses on symptom management and holistic care, even through ongoing treatment:

    "A team of people...looks at you like as a whole person and manages your symptoms while you go through treatment..." (B, 07:36)

  • Julie advocates for immediate palliative care post-diagnosis, which is not yet standard because of limited physician awareness and strict criteria.

    "Many doctors aren't fully aware of what palliative care actually is and what it's for, so they won't refer early enough." (B, 08:13)

4. Steve’s Personal Experience as a Caregiver (08:40–10:06)

• Steve describes his father's passing as a slow, subtractive process:

  "Things were being taken. You know, things were taken forever and gone. His strength was taken forever and gone. I remember his beard was taken forever and gone. And it occurred to me that I had never seen my father's face until he was dying of cancer, you know, and it was such a gradual dimming..." (A, 08:56)

• He notes the difficulty of pinpointing the moment of death, even from close proximity:

  "I was right there with him...I couldn't identify the moment. You know what I mean?" (A, 09:43)

5. The Line Between Life and Death (10:06–10:35)

• Julie affirms the complexity in identifying "the moment" of someone's passing and offers a physiological perspective:

  "There really is a biological, physiological, metabolic thing that is going on when someone's dying. And our bodies are built to die." (B, 10:09)

  • She reveals there’s a chapter in her upcoming book dedicated to this.

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On death rumors and cultural myth-making:

  "It started to feel like a cultural preference. Does that make sense? Yeah. If I'm being honest, it actually...kind of messed me up." — Steve Burns (A, 04:25)

• On the certainty of death:

  "The inevitable fact of our death is the one certainty we hold while we're alive." — Steve Burns (A, 05:21)

• On the mission of hospice:

  "Hospice is about living. People think it's about dying...but it is for people who want to live out the rest of their lives." — Julie McFadden (B, 06:51)

• On automatic palliative care:

  "I wish everyone could be on palliative care the second they got diagnosed with any kind of life limiting terminal or chronic illness...everyone needs it, I think." — Julie McFadden (B, 07:48)

• On the gradual nature of dying:

  "It was such a gradual dimming...I couldn't identify the moment." — Steve Burns (A, 09:40)

• On the biology of dying:

  "Our bodies are built to die." — Julie McFadden (B, 10:24)

---

Important Segment Timestamps

| Time (MM:SS) | Segment/Topic | |------------------|--------------------------------------------------------------| | 00:02–03:00 | Steve reflects on adulthood and existential anxieties | | 03:00–06:28 | Persistent Internet rumors of Steve’s death; real loss | | 06:28–06:48 | Welcoming Julie McFadden | | 06:48–08:05 | Demystifying hospice and palliative care | | 08:05–08:40 | Doctor awareness and access difficulties | | 08:40–10:06 | Steve’s story about losing his father, witnessing dying | | 10:06–10:35 | Where is the "line" between life and death? |

---

Tone & Takeaways

Steve Burns brings approachable vulnerability, honesty, and warmth; he’s open about his fears and confusion regarding mortality. Julie McFadden provides both reassurance ("hospice is about living") and direct language ("our bodies are built to die"). The episode feels intimate, reassuring, and deeply human, providing listeners with frameworks to confront mortality openly and compassionately.

---

For listeners new to this episode:
You’ll find a frank, heartfelt discussion on the stigma and reality of death, made accessible by Steve’s personal stories and Julie’s professional expertise. The conversation deftly moves from the surreal experience of being the subject of your own death rumors to the universal realities of losing loved ones, and finally to the ongoing challenge of demystifying death in a culture conditioned to avoid it.

Transcript

[A]

Lemonade. Hey. Hi. Yeah, it's me, Steve Burns. It's great to see you. And you and I go way back. Really, like, way back. And now look at us, right? We're all grown up, and we're facing all of these crazy challenges of being an adult. Like, why does money stress me out so bad? And is there such a thing as privacy in the digital age? Stuff like that. And today I. I want to share a little bit of one of my first episodes where I get into something big, like, really big. Do you ever think about death? Yeah. I mean, it's for sure an important conversation. And if it is one that you'd like to have, just search for Alive with Steve Burns and hit that follow button. Or you can watch the whole thing on YouTube. Anyway, you look great. Alive with Steve Burns. There you are. Come on in, Come on in, come on in. Welcome to Alive. I'm very glad you're here. You look great, by the way. Anyway, so thanks for coming today. I kind of want to talk about something kind of big. Like, real big. Can I ask you, do you ever think about death? Yeah. Okay. Do you ever think about dying? Like what? Like, what is that? Like, what is the experience of someone who is physically dying? Yeah, yeah, yeah. That is something that I think about, like, all the time, actually. I'm making tea. Do you want tea? There's tea. It's actually a thing that I feel like I was kind of forced to think about a lot back in the day, kind of against my will, because there was, like, this Internet rumor going around that I was dead, that I had died and was not alive. Yeah. And it was always some weird way, right? Like, I. Like, I died in a car crash or a heroin overdose or, like, suicide. That was one of them. And it was nuts. And no matter what we did, we couldn't get rid of the rumor, Right? Like, it didn't matter. No matter how many talk shows I went on and said, oh, I feel fine, or how many new episodes of Blue's Clues we made, it didn't matter. It was like this indelible Internet rumor that I died. And I actually would get into arguments with people on the street, like, arguing whether or not I was, in fact, alive. It was crazy. And this was also when the Internet was just beginning to Internet. So it was like millions of people online all telling me that I had died. Imagine that. It went on for, like, five years, then it went on for, like, 10 years, then it went on for 15 years. And I'll tell you, it started to Feel like a cultural preference. Does that make sense? Yeah. If I'm being honest, it actually. It kind of messed me up. It did. I'm older now, and I've experienced some death and dying. I lost my dog. I lost my dad. And those were painful and profound experiences, and they changed me. Right. And they reminded me that death is a fact of living. Right. Of course it is. It is. The inevitable fact of our death is the one certainty we hold while we're alive. And that got me thinking, why not confront that? Right? I mean, why not talk about it? You know? I mean, because if you think about it, we're all going to die. We're all dying while we're living. So why not ask the question, what is that? What is dying? Yes. Yes. This is. This is what I'm saying. I'm fascinated by this, and I'm actually super excited to talk to our guest today about this. She knows so much about death, so much about the process of dying. I can't wait to talk to her. Come on, let's go. Let's go. Okay. All righty. Okay, so our guest today is Julie McFadden, and I'm super excited to talk to her. She has been a hospice and palliative care nurse for, like, 15 years. She has a new book coming out on June 11, and it's called nothing to Fear Demystifying Death to Live More Fully. I could not be more excited to read that and to talk to her. I found her through TikTok and her TikTok page. I'm not kidding. It's important, I think, and it's profound. And it's all about demystifying death and dying, and it's a little scary in places, but it's also, like, super beautiful and super amazing and. Oh, she's here. Hang on. Hey.

[B]

Hello.

[A]

Hi. Julie McFadden. Thank you so much for coming by. We're so excited to talk to you. I really, truly, truly, truly am a fan of what you do.

[B]

Thank you. It is such an honor.

[A]

So I was thinking maybe we should just start kind of simply, like, tell us, what is hospice? What is palliative care? What do you do?

[B]

Okay, so those are big questions that I'm going to try to generally answer. So we're not here all day, because there is a lot of things that can go into that. So what is hospice? I mean this with all sincerity. Hospice is about living. People think it's about dying. People die on hospice. You go there at the end of your life, but it is for people who want to live out the rest of their lives, you know, wherever that may be. Most people choose home, Especially in the United States. There are like homes and places you can go, but most people choose to be in home hospice, which means they're in their home and then a team of people comes to care for them to help manage symptoms of their disease that they're dying from.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So palliative care is more about managing your symptoms. So a team of people that looks at you like as a whole person and manages your symptoms while you go through treatment of a disease or you have some kind of chronic illness. For me, I have a big soapbox that I wish everyone could be on palliative care the second they got diagnosed with any kind of like life limiting terminal or chronic IL illness. I feel like everyone should just get a palliative care team right away, can't they?

[A]

Is there a reason why they can't? I mean, it's just a choice. Is that a choice that people can make?

[B]

They can. Ish. Many doctors aren't fully aware of, like what, what palliative care actually is and what it's for. So they won't refer early enough. And there is criteria to get onto palliative care. And sometimes those people, when you first get diagnosed, they don't meet criteria. I see more debilitated, which I think is ridiculous. You shouldn't have to be more debilitated. You should just get it because everyone needs it, I think.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I remember I was, you know, I was a caregiver for my father. When my father passed. He died of lung cancer. And it was a very gradual process. You know, he didn't, he didn't die all at once. You know, there. It's just. It was a subtractive process, if that makes sense. Like things were being taken. You know, things were taken forever and gone. His strength was taken forever and gone. I remember his beard was taken forever and gone. And it occurred to me that I had never seen my father's face until he was dying of cancer, you know, and it was such a gradual dimming is. Is how it felt. And I was right there with him, you know, when he passed, I was right there. It's hard to talk about. It's years ago, but I knew he was there and I knew he was gone, but I never saw it happen. Yeah. You know, and I was inches from his face, you know, and I never saw it happen. I couldn't. I couldn't identify the moment. You know what I mean? So I guess that's why I'm asking, like, is there. Is there a hard line somewhere? You know, where they're like, okay, there. Now it happened. The. The Whatever has left, and now this person is gone forever.

[B]

I think it depends on who you talk to.

[A]

Okay. Okay.

[B]

And I will say, I mean, I could talk about this topic forever and ever. And there really is a biological, physiological, metabolic thing that is going on when someone's dying. And our bodies are built to die.

[A]

I'm looking for a pen. I'm writing that down. Our bodies are built to die.

[B]

Oh, baby. There's a whole chapter in my book about it.

[A]

I'm reading your book for 100% sure.

[B]

Thank you. Thank you.