The In-Between Years with Dr. Sheryl

Sam Kelly didn't set out to build a parenting framework. She was standing at the kitchen counter one Friday night, watching her kids clear out without a second thought, and something in her broke. She'd spent a year trying to teach her husband the mental load by talking him through it. That night, she realized talking wasn't the lesson. The chore chart was.

Out of that moment came Notice and Do: a framework for raising kids who see what needs doing and do it, without being told. Sam built it for her three kids, all with ADHD...

Clay Vilhauer wrote his first book at six. It won three awards. At nine, he and his mom, author and strategist Amber Vilhauer, wrote a second one: What Nature Teaches Us, a book that looks at a mountain like a feelings chart.

Dr. Sheryl talks with Amber and Clay about how the book got written: on hiking trails outside their home in northern Colorado, with Amber asking Clay open questions and refusing to edit his answers into something more adult. One line came from a drawing Clay made in January: a mountain with one side in shadow...

Many of us grew up hearing, “Don’t cry, you’re fine” or “Stop overreacting!” Now, we want to raise our kids differently… but how? In this audience favorite from the Good Inside podcast, Dr. Becky sits down with Dr. Marc Brackett, founding director of the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence, to talk about his powerful personal story and research. They discuss understanding emotions as data, validating kids’ feelings without overindulging them, and building emotional literacy for the whole family - especially relevant for teens back in the swing of school!

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Thank you to our partners for mak...

Michaeleen Doucleff is a science journalist. Which only partly explains why, a few years ago, she packed up her four-year-old and moved in with a Maya family in the Yucatan, an Inuit family in the Arctic, and a group of Hadza hunter-gatherers in Tanzania. She wanted to know why kids in those cultures grow up more capable, less anxious - and honestly, easier to live with - than ours. T

She wrote a NYT bestselling book about the experience, and what she learned, called Hunt, Gather, Parent.

The book mostly addresses the parenting of toddlers...

Gretchen Rubin has done this twice: watched one daughter leave for college, and now she's doing it again with her younger one, no sibling left behind to soften the landing. The happiness researcher and #1 New York Times bestselling author joins Dr. Sheryl to make her case for retiring "empty nest" in favor of a phrase she's convinced changes what parents actually do next: open door. They get into what predicts a hard transition, why growth is the real engine of happiness, the line between a friendly acquaintance and an actual friend, and the one piece of advice Gretchen keeps...

Gloria Steinem died this month at 92. Just a few weeks before she did, she sat down at home with Dr. Becky and repeated something she’s been saying for fifty years: we've raised our daughters to be more like sons, but not our sons to be more like daughters. Dr. Sheryl was also in Gloria’s living room that night, and she introduces this rare conversation about what it means for the boys and girls we're raising right now.

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Thank you to our partners for making this episode possible:

Somewhere around 12 or 13, most kids make a quiet decision about themselves: that they're likable, or too much, that they belong, or that they're better off not needing anyone. It usually happens over something small, like a friend who stopped texting back.

Psychologist Dr. Marisa Franco, author of Worth (and Platonic), sits down with Dr. Sheryl to talk about what's actually happening in that decision and what it takes to undo it. Dr. Franco breaks down the real difference between self-esteem and self-worth: one kind of high self-esteem pushes shame away and gets defensive the moment it surfaces...

Somewhere around 11, your kid stops playing “the floor is lava” with you. A lot of parents quietly stop trying to connect that way and never start again.

Dr. Kim Van Dusen isn't buying it. She's spent almost 25 years studying play, she's a licensed marriage and family therapist and registered play therapist, and she just wrote a book called Parenting Through Play. She's also a mom to a 12-year-old and a 9-year-old, so she's living the tween years right now, right alongside everyone listening.

In this conversation, Dr. Kim and Dr. Sheryl talk through what play actu...

Puberty is starting earlier—and for many parents, it’s arriving before they or their kids feel ready. In this episode, Dr. Becky sits down with Dr. Sheryl to unpack why puberty today looks so different for our kids than it did for us—and what caregivers can do to support them through it.

Together, they explore the emotional and physical shifts that are arriving sooner than expected, the impact of today’s culture on tweens, and practical tools for navigating this new stage with connection, clarity, and compassion.

Thank you to our partners for making thi...

Two days before her daughter and oldest child leaves for college, Dr. Sheryl hits record and doesn't clean it up: the grief and the relief showing up in the same moment, the packing-list control spiral, the "boring on purpose" plan for the last 48 hours, and the line she's repeated to a thousand parents that suddenly means something different from the other side of the experience.

If you're in your own version of this countdown — bins taped up, closet half empty, a text you're waiting on — this episode is for you.

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Back to school brin...

Somewhere around 9 or 10, your kid starts watching their own body: how it looks, how it compares, whether it's keeping up. And most of us freeze, because nobody handed us a script for that moment.

Dr. Sheryl sits down with pediatrician Dr. Whitney Casares, author of My One of a Kind Body and the new Raising Body Confident Kids, for a conversation every parent of a tween needs. They get specific: the exact three-step self-compassion script Whitney uses when her own daughter climbs in the car saying "I'm ugly, look at my skin." Why "you're so beautiful" is...

Middle school strips away the training wheels. Elementary school's one teacher becomes six. The hand-holding disappears. For a kid with ADHD, that's when a lot of quiet fear starts, both theirs and their parents'.

Sheryl sits down with Dr. Alex Reed, a clinical psychologist specializing in neurodevelopment, to talk about what ADHD actually looks like as kids move into the teen years, and why so many of them fall through the cracks. They get into the three ADHD subtypes, why hyperfocus (yes, the same kid who can't sit still for homework but plays video games for four...

Phyllis Fagell has spent years inside a middle school as a counselor, and she's here to make the case that the silence, the friend-group churn, and the sudden need for privacy aren't warning signs. They're the work of growing up. Dr. Sheryl and Phyllis talk through why middle schoolers pull away from their parents (and why it's not rejection), the real numbers on how often friendships shift during these years, and the "superpowers," belonging, security, self-regulation, that actually predict resilience. Also: why the popular kids aren't as happy as you'd think.

Looking for more support in the...

Your tween or teen is already using AI. For homework, for image generation, for drafting the text they're too nervous to send, and, more and more, for the human stuff: breakups, mental health, how to ask someone out, how to talk to you.

Dr. Sheryl sits down with Dr. Dana Suskind, a pediatric surgeon, professor of surgery and pediatrics at the University of Chicago, and the author of "Human Raised," to make sense of what kids actually need from us as AI moves into the middle of their lives.

Dana's take is refreshingly un-panicked: she's...

A revisit from the Good Inside archives, hosted by Dr. Becky.

As our kids grow up and pull away, it can feel like they’re breaking up with us. This week, Dr. Becky talks to a mom wondering why her son feels so distant as he begins middle school. He seems to have plenty of time to play video games and talk to his friends but she feels like she doesn’t know anything about his life anymore.

Thank you to our partners for making this episode possible:

Boys have body image issues too. They're just harder to spot.

Dr. Kyle Ganson is a researcher at the University of Toronto who studies body image, eating disorders, and masculinity in boys and young men. He's also a dad. And yes, his six-year-old already flexes at him every morning.

In this conversation, Dr. Sheryl and Dr. Kyle get into what's actually happening to boys in a culture built around gym influencers, supplement stacks, looks maxing, and bulking protocols — and why parents keep missing the warning signs. (Spoiler: it looks like discipline and it looks like he...

Your kid seems fine. Easygoing, no meltdowns. But when you ask how they're doing — nothing. "Fine." "I don't know." A shrug. And then one day you notice something's off, and you spend weeks trying to figure out what.

Sarah comes to Dr. Sheryl with exactly this. Her 10-year-old son is kind, resilient, good at everything — and totally unable to name what he's feeling. She's tried asking directly. She's tried asking sideways. She's modeled emotions, referenced Inside Out, sat on his bed and guessed out loud until something landed. And now, as his school closes and his whole worl...

Sarah Kate Ellis has spent more than a decade as President and CEO of GLAAD, the nation's largest LGBTQ media advocacy organization. She's a TIME 100 honoree. She's testified before Congress. She's had two audiences with Pope Francis.

She's also a mom of two teenagers.

In this conversation, Dr. Sheryl and Sarah Kate get into what parents actually need to know — not the policy, not the politics, but the real stuff. What does it mean when your kid starts watching shows with queer characters? What do you say when they come to you? What do you do...

What do you do when you give your teen a phone and everything you were worried about comes true? They stopped reading books like they used to. They never leave their room without their phone. Their grades slip. They’re getting into trouble socially. Can you take the phone away? Should you? And if you do, how should you go about it? This week, we're resurfacing a fan favorite from the flagship Good Inside podcast feed, in which Dr. Becky fields a few phone concerns and questions from her producer, Jesse.

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Looking for more support in...

What happens to friendship when one person has kids—and the other doesn’t?

In this episode, Dr. Sheryl sits down with two of her longtime friends, Lisa and Nancy, to talk about a friendship that has lasted through marriage, parenthood, illness, career shifts, busy seasons, and very different life choices. One of them became a mom. One of them chose not to have children. And somehow, instead of drifting apart, they kept finding ways back to each other.

Together, they talk about jealousy, flexibility, showing up, opting out, making room for someone else’s realit...

What happens when your teenager is deep in puberty, your tween is just starting to feel the first shifts — and meanwhile, you're navigating perimenopause on your own?

In this episode, Dr. Sheryl talks with Camille, a single mom of two outside Nashville, who's living that exact season right now. They talk about what it really means to parent alone — not just the logistics, but the emotional weight of having no one to tap out to, no one to download the day to at night. They get into the "mom AND dad" myth (and why letting go of it c...

Tweens and teens today are growing up without something many of us took for granted: an off switch.

No break from comparison. No break from group chats, social pressure, performance, opinions, or the feeling of always being “on.”

This week, Dr. Sheryl talks with producer, writer, and Amy Poehler's Smart Girls co-founder Meredith Walker about what years of listening to girls has taught her about confidence, belonging, perfectionism, identity, and the exhausting pressure so many girls feel to get everything “right.”

They talk about:

You ask your kid to do something simple — put their shoes away, come downstairs, stop snapping at their sibling — and suddenly you’re in a full blown argument about your tone, your words, or whether you’re being “mean.”

In this episode, Dr. Sheryl sits down with Emily, a mom of five navigating life with her 12-year-old son, Cooper, who was recently diagnosed with ADHD. But what starts as a conversation about missing assignments and emotional reactions becomes something much deeper: a conversation about sensitivity, literal thinking, overwhelm, repair, and what happens when a parent realizes they might actual...

When should you start talking to your child about puberty and periods? What’s actually normal when it comes to cramps, mood changes, and cycle symptoms — and what’s not?

In this episode, Dr. Sheryl sits down with pediatric and adolescent gynecologist Dr. Charis Chambers, also known as “The Period Doctor,” for a conversation that every parent of a tween or teen needs to hear.

Together, they talk about:

One minute they're playing, the next they're snapping or shutting down. When your kids are fighting, it’s easy to wonder: What am I doing wrong? Should I step in… or stay out of it?

In this episode, Dr. Sheryl sits down with therapist and mom of seven Bridget KerMorris to unpack what’s really happening between siblings — especially when one child is entering the tween years and everything starts to shift.

Together, they explore:

You know the feeling.

You replay something you said.

You second-guess a decision.

You wonder, “Did I mess that up?”

That’s parental guilt—and for most of us, it shows up a lot more than we talk about.

In this episode, Dr. Sheryl is joined by psychologist Dr. Juli Fraga, who has spent years studying the emotional lives of parents. Together, they unpack why guilt shows up so quickly in parenting—and why it’s often pointing us in the wrong direction.

You’ll learn:

Eating disorders affect an estimated 30 million Americans in their lifetime. They are common. They are serious. And they are not caused by “bad parenting.”

Dr. Sheryl revisits a recent conversation between Dr. Becky and Dr. Erin Parks, Chief Clinical Officer at Equip Health, to talk about eating disorders and disordered eating in kids and teens—what the early signs look like, what’s happening emotionally underneath, and how parents can respond without escalating shame or control struggles. In this episode, we cover:

The majority of kids today say they want to be influencers. What happens when that shows up in your own home?

When your child isn’t just playing or performing… but actively trying to be seen, followed, and validated online?

In this episode, a mom of a 10-year-old shares a tension so many parents feel but don’t always say out loud:

I’m proud of her confidence… and I’m scared of what she’s chasing.

Dr. Sheryl unpacks what’s really driving this desire to be “famous,” why it makes so much sense...

Eye rolls. Talking back. That tone that seems to come out of nowhere.

A lot of parents hit this moment around age 9 or 10 — when their once easygoing kid suddenly feels harder to reach, harder to guide, and harder to understand.

In this episode, Dr. Sheryl talks with a mom named Anna who’s navigating this exact shift with her daughter. Alongside the attitude and pushback, her daughter is also dealing with anxiety — leaving Anna wondering:

Are these things connected? And how do I respond in a way that actually helps?

Together, they u...

You finally feel like you’ve figured out your kid.

You know what works! You feel connected! Things make sense!

And then… something shifts.

Suddenly your child is making choices that don’t add up. They’re lying, cutting corners, or acting in ways that feel completely unlike them. And you’re left wondering:
Am I losing influence? Should I step in more? Or am I about to become too controlling?

In today’s episode, Dr. Sheryl sits down with a mom navigating exactly this moment with her 11-year-old son — a child who ha...

Friendships get more complicated around age 10 — and sometimes kids find themselves caught in the middle of dynamics they don’t know how to handle.

In this episode, Dr. Sheryl sits down with a mom named Erin, whose daughter is trying to stay close with two friends who don’t get along… and keeps getting pulled into the conflict.

Together, they unpack a question so many parents face:
How do I help my child without stepping in too much — or not enough?

You’ll hear:

AI is moving fast. Faster than most parents can keep up with.And that’s exactly what scares Carolyn — a mom of two kids who knows technology is coming into her daughter’s life soon, but has no idea how to prepare for something that keeps changing.In this episode, Dr. Sheryl helps reframe the entire problem. Together they explore:

This episode marks the launch of Good Inside’s new podcast, The In-Between Years with Dr. Sheryl — a show about raising tweens and teens.

To kick things off, Dr. Becky sits down with the show’s host, clinical psychologist Dr. Sheryl Ziegler, to talk about the parenting shift that catches so many families off guard when kids enter the tween years.

One day your child wants you for everything. The next, they’re shutting their bedroom door, wearing AirPods, and suddenly the strategies that used to work… don’t. In this conversation, Becky and Sheryl unpack what’...