Jo Rust doesn't just write books, she nearly didn't survive her own. The ghostwriter who helped bring "Airing Out Your Vagina" to life joins Allie for the first time on the podcast, and what she shares will floor you.

Jo opens up about growing up with undiagnosed autism and crippling social phobia, surviving childhood trauma and multiple suicide attempts, and losing people she loved to suicide, including her first love. At her lowest point, she made a choice: succumb, or do something so big and so scary it would force her to keep living. She chose the second option and became the first woman in history to navigate the entire African continent solo, 28,000 miles across 28 countries in just over a year, first by bicycle, then by motorbike after being mugged and robbed on the side of the road.

Now Jo is a mental health and human behavior writer, a ghostwriter, and a psychology graduate heading into medical school to study psychiatry, all while running her own business. This conversation covers grief, boundaries, the danger of letting other people's fears dictate your choices, and what it actually takes to rebuild yourself from the ground up.

Grab Allie's free ebook, "It's About Damn Time," here: https://go.allietrimblelozano.com/damned-time-or

If today's episode hit home and you're ready to stop shrinking to keep other people comfortable, this is where you start.