On this episode of Splintered Spirits, Gary Shapiro and John Santa sit down with Canadian evidential medium Joelle Tremblay to explore how a corporate high achiever became the only medium in Canada certified by the Forever Family Foundation. Joelle shares the emotional story of four years of fertility treatments, a surprise “spiritual boot camp” retreat, and the moment during pregnancy when she suddenly started knowing and hearing things she could not logically explain. She talks about the strange sequence of events that turned a yoga teacher and doctorate candidate into a working medium whose abilities seemed to arrive hand in hand with new life.

From there, Gary and John dive into what evidential mediumship looks like in real practice. Joelle explains how her clairs developed from pure claircognizance into powerful clairsentience and clairaudience, why she prefers not to see too much, and how she experiences spirits as distinct, personality-filled presences rather than just a vague field of consciousness. She walks the audience through the rigorous Forever Family Foundation testing process, including the infamous video-off sitter who would only respond with “tell me more.” The conversation also tackles ethics, boundaries with spirit, the reality of doing highly emotional grief work, and what it means to practice mediumship inside science-minded Canadian culture while still honoring angels, spirit guides, and the raw, human weight of loss.

If you are searching for paranormal podcasts that blend psychic mediumship, afterlife evidence, and real human stories, you’ll get all that in this episode and hear why Joelle walked away from corporate life, how she handles skeptics and non-ethical practitioners, and why she thinks grief itself is a universal language that cuts across borders, beliefs, and platforms.

Spend the night in a haunted hotel where the guests aren’t the only ones checking in. In this episode of Splintered Spirits, Gary and John sit down with Kelly Hammerling, the owner of The Haunted Shanley Hotel, a 19th‑century boarding house turned mafia hangout, brothel, and bar that now hosts more than 50 reported spirits. From a rebuilt 1800s hotel with Irish mob ties and personal tragedy to the present‑day caretaker who actually lives there full‑time with her “second family” of ghosts, this episode dives into the building’s wild history.

From jaw‑dropping first‑hand accounts of spirit box sessions that spit out non‑human voices, a digital temperature gauge jumping to 66.6 degrees mid‑communication, and a bouncer spirit named Frank who has been known to put hands around Kelly’s throat, The Shanley doesn't disappoint.

Along the way, Kelly breaks down why investigators keep coming back for new evidence: from disembodied voices and full‑body apparitions to deeply personal messages from loved ones during seances. If you’re into haunted hotels, ghost hunting, EVPs, ITC, spirit boxes, the Estes Method, portals, scrying, and real‑life paranormal investigations at historic locations- Let's face it - ANYTHING paranormal related - the Shanley has to be on your list. and this episode will make you rethink what it means to live, and sleep, inside an intelligent haunting.

What if the ghosts haunting you aren't in a dark hallway, but buried deep inside your own mind? In this live episode of Splintered Spirits, Gary and John sit down with Brett Harpp, LMHC-D (she earned that D), better known as The Haunted Therapist, a licensed mental health counselor and EMDR-certified trauma therapist who has built an extraordinary bridge between the world of psychology and the paranormal. Brett explores how the unprocessed experiences of our past operate exactly like hauntings: surfacing without warning, replaying on loop, and refusing to rest until they're truly acknowledged.

Brett walks us through her unique therapeutic framework, blending EMDR, Parts Work (IFS), and Advanced Clinical Hypnosis to help clients identify, face, and integrate their emotional "haunts." But this conversation goes far deeper than metaphor. Brett shares her own personal paranormal experiences, including a childhood encounter with a mysterious ball of light.

If you’re someone carrying a ghost of your own, this episode will change the way you think about what it means to be haunted and what it truly means to heal. Find links to Brett in the LinkTree in our bio.

John returns from an action-packed trip to Buffalo, where he forgot his luggage, experienced overwhelming sensations at Niagara Falls, attended the premiere of The Devil's Mark with Nick and Tessa Groff, and led a one-of-a-kind cemetery walk at Sweeney Cemetery — complete with two mediums, EVP work, and a spirit that may have guided them straight to a long-lost grave. Back home, the haunted Shanley Hotel delivered its own surprises, including a spine-chilling connection to the anniversary of a little girl's death that nobody knew was coming.

Gary and John also pull back the curtain on what's ahead for Splintered Spirits — from an exciting academic study on paranormal beliefs to upcoming guests like Shari DeBenedetti from Ghost Hunters, Sean Austin, and a death doula, just to name a few. They dive into the big questions the show was built on: Why do spirits show up in cemeteries? Can emotional energy leave an imprint? And how do you deal with trolls - not the kind that live under a bridge, but the social media type. It's the usual mix of laughs, genuine curiosity, and the kind of paranormal conversation you won't find anywhere else. Dive into the conversation…

When death is your day job, what does it do to your beliefs about ghosts, the afterlife, and what comes next? In this episode of Splintered Spirits, Gary and John sit down with Dr. Dead Serious herself—parapsychological researcher and Paranormal Rescue investigator Kelly Curtis—to explore the eerie intersection of death, dying, and paranormal activity.

Kelly shares insights from her groundbreaking research with hospice workers, ER nurses, first responders, and morticians who are surrounded by death every day, yet often insist they “don’t believe” in the paranormal—even as they tell jaw-dropping stories of near-death experiences, ghostly encounters, and unexplainable phenomena. From her work with Paranormal Rescue in the UK to her data-driven look at how exposure to death rewires belief in spirits and the afterlife, this conversation is a must-listen for fans of ghost stories, true paranormal investigation, and afterlife research.

If you’re into haunted hospitals, real-life ghost hunters, NDEs, and the science of spirits, you won’t want to miss this episode with Dr. Dead Serious, Kelly Curtis.

What does it take to build a paranormal convention from scratch in a haunted Old West gold mining town, when you've never even attended one before? That's exactly what Tiffany Fox, co-founder of Haunted AF and Are You Afraid of the Dark? Paranormal Events, decided to do when she and her team set their sights on Cripple Creek, Colorado. Gary and John sit down with Tiffany to pull back the curtain on what goes into producing a full-scale paracon: finding the venue, locking in speakers like Amy Bruni, Adam Berry, and Dustin Pari, and creating overnight ghost investigations at a 150-year-old jail in a town that practically sounds haunted.

But the conversation goes much deeper than logistics. Tiffany, a Christian investigator who balances her faith with a genuine hunger for the unknown, opens up about her first paranormal experience: a spirit voice at Vermont's Wilson Castle that told her group exactly which room to visit and how that single moment turned her into a full-blown ghost hunter. The crew digs into the gear she swears by, the role group energy plays in generating activity, and whether most "demon" encounters are really just misidentified earthbound grumps. Spoiler: John has strong opinions.

Let’s dive into the conversation.

What happens when a New Orleans-born costume designer moves to Hollywood and starts seeing ghosts on every film set and haunted theater she works in? You get Tammie Merheb Chavez -- paranormal investigator, podcast host, practicing bruja, and one of the most distinctive voices in the paranormal community. Raised on a rich blend of Honduran, Lebanese, and New Orleans folklore, Tammie saw her first full-body apparition while working in a haunted theater in college, and never looked back. She went on to co-create the Hollyweird Paranormal Podcast, become a consultant for Ghost Adventures, and develop her boundary-pushing project Haunted Threads, where she builds period-accurate costumes for famous ghosts and brings their stories to life.

In this episode, Tammie takes Gary and John on a wild ride through some of the most memorable investigations of her career, from nearly falling asleep in the notoriously hyped Sally House in Kansas to conducting a spirit box session partially in Spanish during a live Ghost Adventures shoot. She unpacks her deep-rooted belief system, explains how a vintage suit from a Burbank shop turned out to be very much occupied, and shares why she thinks a ghost can be everything from residual energy to a parallel dimension traveler. She also gets candid about what it is really like to be a woman of color in a field still dominated by guys in black t-shirts. Let’s dive into the conversation with Tammie Merheb Chavez.

Nick Groff helped invent modern paranormal television, but this is the story you haven’t heard, told by the guy who shot it, cut it, and then had to walk away from it.In this episode of Splintered Spirits, Gary and John sit down with Nick to trace the wild arc from hyperactive New England horror nerd to the wedding-DJ meet‑cute that accidentally created Ghost Adventures. Nick breaks down how he actually built the original documentary: blowing his savings on cameras, piling into a tiny car with Aaron and Zak, and learning documentary storytelling on the fly while shadow figures, EVPs, and ghost-hunting-on-offense started to emerge on tape.From there, the conversation goes deep. Nick opens up about years of behind‑the‑scenes tension, the slow realization that the show he created was no longer his, and the phone calls and ultimatums that led to his quiet exit. He walks us through birthing Paranormal Lockdown and sleeping in morgue drawers until his toes went white, only to watch that series disappear in a corporate shuffle. And we end in the present: Death Walker, his upcoming feature film, and a new creative chapter built around his partnership with psychic-medium Tessa Groff and their very haunted, very busy family. If you care about ghosts, filmmaking, or what really happens when TV “bands” break up, this is Nick Groff unfiltered.