What if the most important parenting skill isn't discipline, communication, or even patience, but emotional fitness?

In this episode, Kate and Rachel sit down with parenting coach and emotional fitness expert Natalie Costa to explore how our relationship with emotions shapes everything from our parenting to our partnerships.

Natalie explains why so many adults struggle to navigate difficult emotions, how emotional patterns are passed down through generations, and why resilience isn't about avoiding feelings, it's about learning to move forward with them.

We dive into the invisible emotional labour that often falls to mothers, why many fathers have never been taught the emotional skills modern parenting requires, and practical ways couples can create a more emotionally connected family culture together.

You'll also hear why repair matters more than perfection, how to help children develop emotional security, and the powerful reminder that every child needs to hear:

"You are easy to love."

Whether you're raising toddlers, teens, or simply trying to break old patterns in your own family, this conversation offers practical tools and reassuring wisdom for becoming the steady parent your children need.

• What emotional fitness actually means

• Why happiness shouldn't be the ultimate parenting goal

• The connection between emotional awareness and resilience

• How emotional patterns are inherited across generations

• The invisible emotional labour carried by many mothers

• Helping fathers build emotional confidence and connection

• Why repair is more important than getting it right

• How to raise emotionally secure children without striving for perfection

Meet Natalie Costa:https://nataliecosta.co.uk 

Find out more about your hosts Kate Mangino and Rachel Childs.

For today's fathers, the expectations have changed.

Men are no longer expected to simply provide financially. They are expected to be present, emotionally engaged, active parents while still succeeding at work and somehow finding time for themselves too.

But what happens when all of those demands collide?

In this thought-provoking conversation, Rachel and Kate sit down with Deliberate Dad founder Steve Cardwell to explore what it means to be an ambitious father in a world where the rules of parenting are changing faster than the systems around us.

Steve shares his philosophy of being a "deliberate dad"—someone who consciously chooses how to spend their time, energy and attention rather than living on autopilot. Together they unpack guilt, mental load, workplace expectations, partnership dynamics, self-care, and the pressure to excel in every area of life.

The conversation explores why so many fathers feel pulled between work and home, why agency matters more than perfection, and how couples can define their own version of equality rather than chasing impossible standards.

Along the way, Rachel, Kate and Steve wrestle with some of the biggest questions facing modern parents:

Can you really have it all?

What sacrifices are unavoidable?

How do we model healthy fatherhood for the next generation?

And what happens when being a "good parent" looks very different from the image social media keeps selling us?

A nuanced conversation about ambition, agency, equality, and the realities of parenting in today's world.

Meet Steve Cardwell: https://deliberate.dad/ 

https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevedeliberatedad/

https://www.instagram.com/deliberatedad_ 

Find out more about your hosts Kate Mangino and Rachel Childs.

We are all familiar with the jokes.

The exhausted mum carrying everything.The lovable but clueless dad.The wife who nags.The husband who "helps."

But what if the jokes aren't harmless?

This week Rachel and Kate are joined by Laura Danger, author of No More Mediocre, to explore the hidden relationship dynamics that have been normalised for generations.

Laura shares how a flood of "couples comedy" videos during the pandemic sparked her now-famous work on the mental load, weaponized incompetence, and what she calls the "nag paradox", the exhausting cycle where one partner carries the responsibility, then gets blamed for managing it.

Together we unpack:

• Why so many unequal relationships feel "normal"

• The hidden emotional cost of being indispensable

• Why progressive couples often struggle behind closed doors

• How social media is changing the conversation around the mental load

• The fear that comes with demanding more from your relationship

• Why changing your relationship means accepting that things will be different

This isn't a conversation about blaming men or women.

It's a conversation about questioning the stories we've inherited, challenging what we've accepted as inevitable, and asking whether "good enough" is really good enough.

Because maybe the goal isn't perfection. Maybe it's refusing to settle for mediocre.

Find out more about Laura at www.lauradanger.com, and on Instagram @thatdarnchat

Subscribe to Equal-ish on Apple Podcasts or Spotify to be the first to hear the coaching edit from our interview. 

Find out more about your hosts Kate Mangino and Rachel Childs.

In this Equal-ish Edit, Rachel Childs and Kate Mangino reflect on the last three powerful conversations with: Professor Leah Ruppanner (ep 36 & 37) on redefining the mental load, Dr. Taveeshi Gupta (ep 38) on the global state of fatherhood, and Danny Mercer (ep 39) on life as an at-home dad.

Together, they unpack one huge question: if men increasingly say they want to care more, why are so many families still stuck in unequal systems?

This episode explores:

• Why caregiving is still culturally coded as “women’s work”
• How workplaces continue to shape parenting roles
• The mental load beyond motherhood and domestic labour
• The invisible pressure many fathers carry as providers
• Why modern parenting feels so isolating and overwhelming
• The role community, vulnerability and systems change play in creating more equal families

It’s an honest, emotional and deeply nuanced conversation about the tension many families live inside every day: wanting equality, while operating inside systems that make it incredibly hard to achieve.

And in one particularly moving moment, Kate reflects on the simple but powerful truth many parents need most: not solutions, just someone willing to listen.

Subscribe to Equal-ish on Apple Podcasts or Spotify to be the first to hear the coaching edit from our interview. 

Find out more about your hosts Kate Mangino and Rachel Childs.

Danny Mercer has spent 16 years as the primary caregiver for his four children, and what started as a practical family decision became a complete redefinition of identity, fatherhood, care and partnership.

In this deeply honest conversation, Danny shares what it means to be the default parent as a father: the exhaustion, the invisible labour, the mental load, the resentment, the joy, and the relentless nature of caregiving. He talks openly about losing the identity that came with a paycheck, navigating judgement from society, and why community became essential to survival.

As Vice President of the National At-Home Dad Network, Danny also reflects on the growing movement of fathers stepping more fully into caregiving roles, and why many men still struggle to ask for help, build support systems, or believe they are “allowed” to parent this way at all.

This episode explores:

• how gender shapes caregiving expectations

• why the mental load burns out anyone carrying it

• the hidden emotional realities of being an at-home dad 

• why appreciation, communication and self-care matter more than rigid equality

Explore the National at Home Dads Network:

athomedad.org

dadsgottatalk.org

Find out more about your hosts Kate Mangino and Rachel Childs.

What if the biggest lie we’ve been told about caregiving is that people don’t want to do it?

In this powerful conversation, Rachel Childs and Kate Mangino sit down with Dr. Taveeshi Gupta, Senior Director of Research, Evaluation, and Learning from Equimundo to unpack the newly released State of the World’s Fathers 2026 report (a landmark global study spanning 16 countries and 8,000 parents).

The findings are both devastating and hopeful.

Parents overwhelmingly say caregiving brings joy, purpose and connection. Fathers want meaningful relationships with their children. Mothers and fathers alike say men are doing more care work than previous generations ever did.

But the systems surrounding families (workplaces, economies, public policy, gender norms, childcare structures and cultural expectations) are failing caregivers at every turn.

In this week’s conversation we explore:

• Why care should be treated as a basic human good, like food or shelter

• The dangerous rise of hyper-traditional gender narratives among younger men

• Why couples who hold more traditional gender beliefs actually report more conflict

• Why the manosphere is thriving in an era of economic insecurity

• The hidden “fatherhood flexibility stigma” in workplaces

• The tension between fathers wanting to care and not always defining care the same way women do

• Why caregiving conversations cannot be separated from capitalism, policy and structural inequality

• And why Taveeshi believes we are on the brink of a global “care revolution”

This is a conversation about the systems we’ve built around care, and whether humanity can survive without rebuilding them.

Read the report here: State of the World’s Fathers 2026

Subscribe to Equal-ish on Apple Podcasts or Spotify to be the first to hear the coaching edit from our interview. 

Find out more about your hosts Kate Mangino and Rachel Childs.

Last week, we redefined the mental load. This week, Rachel Childs and Kate Mangino ask the harder question:

What do you actually do about it?

In Part 2 of our conversation with Professor Leah Ruppanner, we move from awareness to action.

Because once you realise you’re not just carrying one mental load (but eight) it can feel even heavier.

So how do you:

• stop feeling responsible for everything?

• challenge the “shoulds” shaping your decisions?

• share the load in a way that actually works?

Leah introduces a powerful reframe: The goal isn’t doing more. The goal is being intentional about what you carry, and what you don’t.

From dropping unnecessary standards to recognising how social norms quietly increase your load, this episode is about reclaiming your time, energy, and headspace.

You don’t need to carry it all. In fact, you were never meant to.

Click here to find out more about Professor Leah Ruppaner

• Measure your mental load - Lighten Lab

• Buy Drained now

• Listen to Leah on Miss Perceived Podcast

Subscribe to Equal-ish on Apple Podcasts or Spotify to be the first to hear the coaching edit from our interview. 

Find out more about your hosts Kate Mangino and Rachel Childs.

This week, Rachel Childs and Kate Mangino sit down with Professor Leah Ruppanner to unpack one of the most misunderstood (and underestimated) forces shaping modern relationships: the mental load.

Leah is Professor of Sociology at the University of Melbourne and Founder of LightenLab. She is the author of Drained: Reduce Your Mental Load to Do Less and Be More and Motherlands: How States Push Mothers Out of Employment.

Drawing on years of global research and hundreds of interviews, Leah challenges the narrow way we’ve been taught to think about it. Because it’s not just about remembering the shopping list or organising the calendar.

It’s emotional, it’s invisible. it’s boundaryless. And crucially, it doesn’t stop.

From “emotional thinking work” to the eight different types of mental load we’re all carrying, this conversation explains why even the most well-intentioned, modern couples still feel overwhelmed—and what we’ve been missing all along.

Click here to find out more about Leah Ruppaner

• Measure your mental load - Lighten Lab

• Buy Drained now

Subscribe to Equal-ish on Apple Podcasts or Spotify to be the first to hear the coaching edit from our interview. 

Find out more about your hosts Kate Mangino and Rachel Childs.

What if the way you’ve been measuring yourself as a parent is the very thing making it harder?

In this raw and reflective “After the Interview” episode, Rachel Childs and Kate Mangino unpack the uncomfortable truths from their conversation with parenting expert Anita Cleare, and what it actually means to live those insights in real life.

Because it’s one thing to say “focus on the relationship, not the outcome.” But it’s another thing entirely when your child is:

• having a meltdown in public

• pushing boundaries

• or making choices you fundamentally disagree with

Together, we explore:

• Why even “progressive parenting” is still often outcome-driven

• The hidden pressure of constantly evaluating your child’s behaviour

• What “being in relationship” actually looks like in difficult moments

• Why letting go of control feels so uncomfortable (especially for high-achievers)

• The tension between preparing your child for the real world vs staying connected to them

• And the surprising question every couple should ask before (or during) parenthood

Meet our guest, Anita Cleare, here. Author of:

• The Work/Parent Switch (UK)

• (The Working Parent’s Survival Guide in the USA)

• How To Get Your Teenager Out Of Their Bedroom

Subscribe to Equal-ish on Apple Podcasts or Spotify to be the first to hear the coaching edit from our interview. 

Find out more about your hosts Kate Mangino and Rachel Childs.

What if the biggest mistake we’re making as parents is thinking it’s our job to shape our children?

This week, Rachel Childs and Kate Mangino sit down with parenting expert Anita Cleare to challenge everything we think we know about “good parenting.”

From the myth of perfect outcomes to the reality of relationship-building, Anita reframes parenting as something far less controllable and far more human.

Together, we explore:

• Why parenting isn’t something you do to your child, but a relationship you build with them

• How modern “performance parenting” is setting us up to feel like failures

• The hidden cost of doing too much (for our kids and ourselves)

• Why conflict between parents is inevitable (and even valuable)

• The uncomfortable truth about letting go, stepping back, and allowing failure

• How to stay connected to teenagers when they’re pulling away

This episode will challenge your assumptions, ease your guilt, and invite you into a more realistic and joyful way of parenting.

Meet our guest, Anita Cleare, here. 

The Work/Parent Switch (UK)

(The Working Parent’s Survival Guide in the USA)

How To Get Your Teenager Out Of Their Bedroom

Subscribe to Equal-ish on Apple Podcasts or Spotify to be the first to hear the coaching edit from our interview. 

Find out more about your hosts Kate Mangino and Rachel Childs.