Susan Kuhnhausen went home expecting an ordinary evening. Instead, she walked into a fight for her life.

In September 2006, Susan—a 51-year-old emergency room nurse—returned home from work and discovered an intruder hiding inside her house. He attacked her with a claw hammer, and Susan fought back.

What she didn't know at the time was that the man wasn't a random intruder. He had been sent there to kill her.

Susan survived the attack. Her attacker did not.

As investigators began piecing together what happened, they uncovered a deeply personal motive involving Susan's estranged husband, Michael, their impending divorce, their home, and a decision that would change Susan's life forever.

But this isn't a story I wanted to tell simply as a tale of attempted murder.

It's a story about what happens when someone tries to end your story—and you survive.

Susan's experience changed her profoundly. She had to reckon not only with what had happened to her, but with the fact that someone she had once loved had been behind it.

And yet, she kept going.

In this episode of Fate & Fables, we look at Susan's life before the attack, what happened that night, how she survived, and what came afterward—the fear, the trauma, the rebuilding, and the remarkable resilience of a woman who refused to let someone else's decision determine how her story ended.

🌿 The plant for this episode: Awapuhi ginger aka Shampoo Plant

Each week on Fate & Fables, I work with a plant connected in some way to the story's location or theme while I tell the tale.

Sources & further reading:

• Willamette Week — Beth Slovic, "A Hit Man Came to Kill Susan Kuhnhausen. She Survived. He Didn't."
• Contemporary reporting and court records relating to the 2006 attack and subsequent prosecution

Fate & Fables is a collection of extraordinary true stories about survival, resilience, fate, and the remarkable things ordinary people are capable of when their lives suddenly take an extraordinary turn.

If you enjoy stories about people who somehow make it through the impossible, consider subscribing and joining me for the next one. ❤️

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Lost in the Sahara with no idea where he was, Mauro Prosperi spent nine days fighting to stay alive.

In 1994, Italian endurance athlete Mauro Prosperi entered the Marathon des Sables, a grueling ultramarathon across the Sahara. Then a massive sandstorm swept through the race and changed everything.

Separated from the course and hundreds of kilometers from where he was supposed to be, Mauro found himself completely alone in one of the harshest environments on Earth.

What followed is one of the strangest survival stories I've ever encountered—featuring an abandoned desert shrine, bats, desperate attempts to find water, and a man who eventually came to see death in a very different way.

But this isn't just a story about surviving the Sahara.

It's a story about what happens inside your mind when you realize nobody is coming to save you.

🌿 Fate & Fables

Extraordinary true stories of survival, resilience, and the strange turns of fate that leave us wondering how anyone made it out alive.

🌿 Plant of the Week: lemon tree

This week's plant was chosen to connect us to the landscape and story we're exploring. We chose to roll with Italy in honor of Mauro.

📚 Sources & Further Reading

• Marathon des Sables — official race history
• Mauro Prosperi — interviews and first-person accounts
• The Guardian — Mauro Prosperi interview
• Additional sources referenced throughout the episode

🎙️ Fate & Fables on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@FateAndFables

If you enjoyed this story, consider subscribing and joining me every Sunday for another extraordinary true story.

Sometimes fate writes stories stranger than fiction. Those are the ones we'll tell.

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Could you survive being swallowed by a whale?

In June 2021, commercial lobster diver Michael Packard was diving off the coast of Cape Cod when the impossible happened—a humpback whale engulfed him whole.

For around 40 seconds, he believed he was going to die. Instead, he was thrown back into the ocean...alive.

In this episode of Fate & Fables, I tell the extraordinary true story of one of the most unbelievable survival stories ever recorded while working with a New England Aster, a flower native to Massachusetts, where Michael's incredible story unfolded.

Some stories sound like myths.
This one really happened.

🌿 Plant of the Week: New England Aster (Symphyotrichum novae-angliae)

📚 Sources & Further Reading
• Michael Packard – In the Whale: The True Story of a Man, His Incredible Ordeal, and the Family That Never Lost Hope
• Interviews with Michael Packard
• Cape Cod Times
• Associated Press

🎙️ Listen as a podcast:
https://fateandfables.buzzsprout.com

If you enjoy true survival stories told with a touch of nature, I'd love to have you subscribe. New episodes arrive every Survival Sunday.

Sometimes fate writes stories stranger than fiction. Those are the ones we'll tell.
— Fate & Fables

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