MY FIRST YEAR

What happens when you bring a dog into your life? From Sophia Media comes a new podcast exploring the profound transformation that begins when a dog enters your universe. Whether it is your first dog or your tenth, that first year reshapes far more than just your daily routine—it changes who you are.

In this trailer, hear from dog parents Brian, Jennifer, and Beth as they share the exact moments they fell in love, discovered a new sense of purpose, and realized their hearts had grown bigger than they ever thought possible.

Join us for My First Year with My Dog—an intimate look at how the dogs we welcome into our homes end up transforming our hearts, our relationships, and who we become. Premiering August 25, 2026. 

❤️ Subscribe for more conversations about life's biggest transitions.

🌐Follow the series wherever you listen to podcasts and join our growing community at sophiamedia.co.

▶️ www.youtube.com/@MyFirstYearSeries

❤️ Subscribe for more conversations about life's biggest transitions.

Email [email protected] and share your own transformative first year with us.

How is Gen Z really experiencing college? In Season 1 of My First Year in College, hosts Sophia and Rosabelle talk with college students and recent grads about the dreams and expectations they arrived with-and the anxiety, loneliness, joy, discovery and triumphs they encountered along the way.

 Going beyond the polished version of college life we see on social media, My First Year in College explores the emotional and intellectual lives of young people as they navigate a defining year of change.

🍎 Listen on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/my-first-year-in-college/id6801327435

🎵 Listen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0346Gmh7CUjMgx2wT1IRyV?si=8989f284ca3b4f1f

🌐Follow the series wherever you listen to podcasts and join our growing community at sophiamedia.co.

▶️ www.youtube.com/@MyFirstYearSeries

❤️ Subscribe for more conversations about life's biggest transitions.

Email [email protected] and share your own transformative first year with us.

Tulsa resident Eric Heimdale became a full-time caregiver for his wife Patty, who showed early dementia signs around 2014–15. Eric recounts meeting Patty in 1991, blending their families, and a serendipitous earlier connection through a shared home address. 

After Patty failed a cognitive test and was prescribed memantine and Lexapro, Eric says the drugs led to violence, hallucinations, and a sudden loss of mobility. He researched alternatives, weaned her off the medications, and regained a calmer version of Patty. 

Over eight years he learned to be proactive, adapted their home and routines, retired and closed his lighting business, and found support by writing for the caregiver Facebook group Molly’s Movement. After Patty’s death, he reengaged with music, writing, and improv while sharing caregiving lessons about attitude, patience, and acceptance. He says that caregiving was the hardest job he ever had and the best job he ever had. 

🌐Follow the series wherever you listen to podcasts and join our growing community at sophiamedia.co.

▶️ www.youtube.com/@MyFirstYearSeries

❤️ Subscribe for more conversations about life's biggest transitions.

Email [email protected] and share your own transformative first year with us.

What really happens when a woman becomes a mother?

Beyond sleepless nights and diapers, motherhood transforms every part of life—our identity, relationships, careers, priorities, and understanding of love.

In My First Year as a Mother, women share honest stories about what no one prepared them for:

😬 The anxiety of bringing home a newborn.

💙 The isolation of postpartum.

✨ The unexpected moments of joy.

🌱 The journey of rediscovering yourself.

Through each deeply personal conversation, we hope to help mothers and mothers-to-be feel less alone and more connected, less judged and better understood, less fearful and more loved.💕

🎙️ Premieres August 3, 2026.

Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

🍎 Apple Podcasts
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/my-first-year-as-a-mother/id6795897663

🎵 Spotify
https://open.spotify.com/show/033XQomO3dVAYrAqVbM0Bs?si=300d4e6d44f144c8

🌐 Learn more:
 https://sophiamedia.co/MyFirstYear

❤️ Subscribe for honest conversations about motherhood, identity, and life's biggest transitions.

🌐Follow the series wherever you listen to podcasts and join our growing community at sophiamedia.co.

▶️ www.youtube.com/@MyFirstYearSeries

❤️ Subscribe for more conversations about life's biggest transitions.

Email [email protected] and share your own transformative first year with us.

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My First Year as a Father is an interview-style podcast that centers on the often unheard stories of fatherhood, especially during that pivotal first year. By listening to these men speak openly and honestly about their own journeys – the doubts, the fears, the transformations – the listener experiences something that rarely exists elsewhere: real talk about what it actually feels like to become a father and adjust to a new reality.

Website: www.SophiaMedia.co/MyFirstYear 

🍎 Listen on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/my-first-year-as-a-father/id6798906988

🎵 Listen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0342KedHU37th2BZlvN6yA?si=5a8fb97f64c6449f 

❤️ Subscribe for more conversations about life's biggest transitions.

#Fatherhood #child #Relationships #men #Parenting #identity #purpose #love #Podcast #MyFirstYear 

🌐Follow the series wherever you listen to podcasts and join our growing community at sophiamedia.co.

▶️ www.youtube.com/@MyFirstYearSeries

❤️ Subscribe for more conversations about life's biggest transitions.

Email [email protected] and share your own transformative first year with us.

Hosts Sophia and Adoley interview Twiggy Damy, a care manager in the Bay Area, about her immigration journey from Acapulco, Mexico to California in 1991. 

Twiggy recounts losing her father at age five, being raised largely by her paternal grandmother, and her mother’s repeated moves to the U.S. that left Twiggy longing for reunification and struggling with suppressed grief. A full year after she had packed a suitcase for America, Twiggy finally reunited with her mother and stepfather in San Francisco’s Mission District, adjusting to small apartments, public transit, limited holiday traditions, and not speaking English.  Twiggy unexpectedly found belonging through community theater for high-risk youth, which shaped her path into family- and community-based support work and deepened pride in her multicultural roots.

🌐Follow the series wherever you listen to podcasts and join our growing community at sophiamedia.co.

▶️ www.youtube.com/@MyFirstYearSeries

❤️ Subscribe for more conversations about life's biggest transitions.

Email [email protected] and share your own transformative first year with us.

In this episode of “My First Year With My Dog,” Sophia and Samira interview Brian Berger, who shares his story of adopting a rescue dog with his wife, Amy, after years of wanting a dog. They initially sought a small dog but connected with a quiet blonde pit bull (later named Christie “Brinkley”) at a Brooklyn rescue. Brian describes bringing Brinkley home and early adjustments in a Brooklyn apartment, including crate training, consistent positive-reinforcement training, and milestones like learning stairs. He reflects on how Brinkley provided companionship, patience, emotional support during stressful finance work, strengthened relationships and community connections. A year after Brinkley’s death, Brian discusses grief, therapy, and complicated feelings about adopting again.

🌐Follow the series wherever you listen to podcasts and join our growing community at sophiamedia.co.

▶️ www.youtube.com/@MyFirstYearSeries

❤️ Subscribe for more conversations about life's biggest transitions.

Email [email protected] and share your own transformative first year with us.

In today’s episode, co-hosts Sophia and Rosabelle speak with Dagny, a Los Angeles–based singer-songwriter and NYU Gallatin graduate who created her own college major (“Language Curation and Ethics”). Dagny recounts growing up homeschooled in Connecticut, adjusting to public high school, and graduating in 2020 as COVID ended senior milestones. She chose NYU largely for the excitement of New York during the pandemic and moved into Brittany Hall as an athlete with online classes. Early freshman year she felt isolated, explored her sexuality through a crush on a teammate that ended painfully, and fell into depression, using journaling, songwriting, running, friends, family to cope. A supportive friend group and an influential professor helped her regain confidence, confront imposter syndrome, and reflect on slowing down, self-acceptance, and pursuing music and a grounded life.

Be sure to check out other episodes in the My First Year series, wherever you get your podcasts.

🌐Follow the series wherever you listen to podcasts and join our growing community at sophiamedia.co.

▶️ www.youtube.com/@MyFirstYearSeries

❤️ Subscribe for more conversations about life's biggest transitions.

Email [email protected] and share your own transformative first year with us.

Concert musician, food book author and Asian philosophy, Qi-Gong and Chinese medicine teacher Andrew Sterman recounts how he decided to have children with his wife Anne, a master acupuncturist, marked by a ceremony inviting “universal creative forces.” He describes two successful home births in 2004 and 2007 with midwife and doula, using acupuncture during labor, and the mystical intensity of birth. Sterman emphasizes dads focusing on postpartum recovery, being responsive, avoiding toxic masculinity, and meeting children as distinct personalities from birth, following the child’s lead, limiting overstimulating toys, and finding the first year primarily joyous despite fatigue, co-sleeping challenges, jaundice, and work-life tradeoffs.

🌐Follow the series wherever you listen to podcasts and join our growing community at sophiamedia.co.

▶️ www.youtube.com/@MyFirstYearSeries

❤️ Subscribe for more conversations about life's biggest transitions.

Email [email protected] and share your own transformative first year with us.

Sophia introduces “My First Year: The Anthology” and kicks off with an episode from the upcoming podcast “My First Year as a Mother.” The series is co-hosted by Sophia and new mom, Casey Georgi. For this episode, we learn more about Casey’s story. Casey describes pursuing IVF to avoid passing on her husband’s rare genetic brittle bone disease, osteogenesis imperfecta. She shares reluctance about invasive IVF procedures, her unexpectedly calm pregnancy, and a difficult birth after developing cholestasis that led to a three-day induction, and ultimately, a C-section. Casey discusses her physical recovery, breastfeeding journey, and the emotional toll of an exhausting feeding schedule, including the isolation she experienced. She also explores deeper tensions: career-identity struggles, her complicated relationship with her own mother, and shifts in intimacy with her husband, all while becoming more mindful and grateful as Violet grows.

🌐Follow the series wherever you listen to podcasts and join our growing community at sophiamedia.co.

▶️ www.youtube.com/@MyFirstYearSeries

❤️ Subscribe for more conversations about life's biggest transitions.

Email [email protected] and share your own transformative first year with us.