ParentRQ

Twelve years ago, Larry Hagner raised his hand to his four year old son and saw fear in his eyes. That moment started everything.

In this episode of ParentRQ, Caitlin and David sit down with Larry Hagner, founder of The Dad Edge and host of The Dad Edge Podcast, to talk about growing up without a dad, the day he became the father he swore he would never be, and what it took to change. Larry shares what healthy masculine energy really looks like, why the person you married keeps changing, the three levels of listening, and the two words that open up every conversation with your partner and your kids: curiosity and appreciation.

Free resources from Larry
25 intimate conversation starters: thedadedge.com/25questions

Questions for the car, for kids of every age: thedadedge.com/kidquestions

Understand your child with Godmother
Godmother helps you see the world the way your child sees it, so you can choose a better next response.
Try the app: aingelic.net/godmother
Available on the App Store and Google Play.

If this conversation helped you, subscribe and turn on notifications so you never miss an episode of ParentRQ.

Can a big meltdown really be over in ninety seconds? Psychologist and certified parent coach Anastasia Goldak joins ParentRQ to break down where emotions actually come from, why "there are no bad emotions" is easier said than lived, and the simple bell-curve cycle every feeling follows if we just let it move through instead of shutting it down.

Anastasia shares her own journey from Ukraine to becoming a parent coach in the US, the six primary emotions she teaches every parent, and the exact phrases she uses with her own son to help him feel frustration, sadness, and anger without rescuing him from them. We also get into a simple reflective-listening technique — borrowed straight from sales training — that can de-escalate almost any charged moment with your child in seconds.

In this episode: Why parents (not kids) are the real leverage point for lasting change, what "primary" vs. "secondary" emotions actually means, the difference between arousal and valence, and practical, in-the-moment tools for staying grounded so your child can borrow your calm.

About Anastasia Goldak: Anastasia Goldak is a psychologist, certified parent coach, speaker, and award-winning author specializing in children's behavior, emotions, anxiety, aggression, and parent-child relationships.

Instagram: instagram.com/wisemama.blog

YouTube: youtube.com/@wisemama

Facebook: facebook.com/nastya.seleyman

About ParentRQ: ParentRQ is brought to you by Godmother, the app helping you understand your child's natural wiring so you can parent with more clarity and less guesswork. Start your 30-day free trial at godmotherapp.com

#ParentingTips #EmotionalIntelligence #GentleParenting #ParentRQ #ChildDevelopment

When her teenage son's quiet suffering surfaced all at once — a mental health crisis and a gender transition together — occupational therapist Molly McMillan had to learn to trust her own instincts over the systems that kept failing him, and found the small, daily practices that helped them both heal.

In this episode of ParentRQ, occupational therapist and parent Molly McMillan shares the story behind her upcoming book, Becoming Micah's Mom: How Parenting My Transgender Child Changed Everything. Molly describes how her son's suffering stayed hidden through years of masking, until an eighth-grade mental health crisis brought everything to the surface at once: neurodivergence, a suicidal crisis, and a gender transition, all colliding in the same season. She's honest about what she missed, what the mental health system got wrong (including therapists who refused to continue care when Micah wouldn't talk), and the moment — after a harmful experience with a parenting coach — that she decided to trust her own read of her child over outside authority. The conversation moves through practical insight (why quiet doesn't mean fine, why eye contact isn't the same as attention, how deep pressure and art became ways for Micah to communicate) into something more personal: the self-written chant Molly sang to her son every morning, which she performs live in the episode. It's a candid, hard-won account of radical acceptance, unconditional love, and learning to trust yourself as a parent when nothing you're being told quite fits your child.

In This Episode, You'll Discover

Why "masking" can hide a child's real struggles for years — especially in kids who are quiet, high-achieving, or assigned female at birth — and what to watch for instead of waiting for an obvious sign.

Why a quiet, withdrawn kid isn't necessarily a fine one, and how simply being present (without demanding conversation) can reach a child who can't yet talk about what's wrong.

What happens when the mental health system is built around a child's ability to talk — and what actually worked when talk-first therapy didn't.

A different way to understand eye contact: why looking away can mean a child is paying closer attention, not less.


Molly's own turning point — "I know better than what is being offered" — and the practice (a self-written morning chant) she used to help her son heal.

Connect With the Guest
Website: powerretrievalretreats.com
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/molly-mcmillan-2a41209
Facebook: facebook.com/molly.mcmillan.66
Instagram: @mollymcmillan30

Book: Becoming Micah's Mom: How Parenting My Transgender Child Changed Everything (forthcoming — Molly mentions building an advance reader group for early access)

If Molly's story resonated with you, take the next step: download the Godmother app or join us live at GodmotherApp.com to explore your own and your child's unique wiring.

If this conversation moved you, follow ParentRQ and share it with a parent who needs to hear that trusting their own instincts is allowed.

Keywords:

raising a transgender child
neurodivergent and transgender
masking in autistic girls
signs your child is struggling silently
how to trust your parenting instincts
child mental health crisis parent story
occupational therapist parenting advice

In this episode of ParentRQ, psychotherapist-turned-parent-coach Nicole Runyon — bestselling author of Free to Fly and a mother of two — explains why children's most alarming behaviors are often signals about their environment rather than problems to fix in isolation. Drawing on nearly twenty years of clinical work with children and adolescents, Nicole describes noticing a troubling pattern among middle-school girls with no history of trauma, and tracing it back to a broader shift: parents losing touch with their own instincts and authority, often through screens and permissive parenting. Together, she and her host unpack what authoritative parenting actually looks like, why certain ages call for specific kinds of independence, and how something as simple as an undistracted family dinner can rebuild real connection. Listeners will come away with a clearer way to read their child's behavior and concrete steps to reconnect at home.

About the Guest
Nicole Runyon, LMSW, is a psychotherapist, parent coach, and keynote speaker with a 23-year career in child and adolescent mental health. A mother of two, she is the bestselling author of Free To Fly: The Secret To Fostering Independence In The Next Generation and is known for helping parents understand how today's children think, especially around technology's effect on their development. Her work has been featured on Good Morning America, Fox News Live, and in Psychology Today.

Website: nicolerunyon.com
Resources: nicolerunyon.com/resources
Instagram: @igenerationmentalhealth

Resources Mentioned
Free To Fly: The Secret To Fostering Independence In The Next Generation — Nicole's bestselling book, recommended for parents who want to go deeper into the ideas discussed in the episode.
nicolerunyon.com/resources — a free guide Nicole offers to help parents recognize common behaviors (like sibling conflict) as possible signals of a family dynamic issue rather than a fixed trait, along with reports and practical tips.

If today's conversation about the root causes of your child's behavior resonated with you, take the next step.

Download the Godmother app or join us live at Godmother.aingelic.net

Listen to the ParentRQ podcast on your favorite streaming platforms.

Learn more at parentrq.com

In this episode of ParentRQ, we sit down with two parents who were both diagnosed as neurodivergent long before the words "neurodivergent" or "autism spectrum" were common — and who each raised kids of their own before they had the language to understand their own minds.

Elizabeth Kip is a certified Addiction Recovery Coach, Ancestral Clearing practitioner, and bestselling author of The Way Through Chronic Pain. She helps people rebuild self-trust and inner peace through trauma-informed, somatic recovery work — and she shares what it meant to raise a son while unlearning her own difficult, undiagnosed family history.

Mark Fister is an autistic technologist, proud ADHDer, systems thinker, and keynote speaker working to reshape the future of work for neurodivergent people. He was diagnosed autistic at 46 — well after raising three kids — and talks candidly about what that diagnosis reopened, and closed, for him.

Together they get into what it actually looks like to parent from a nervous system that works differently than the ones around it: the moment each of them realized they were "wired different," what it cost them as kids, how it showed up (and sometimes got missed) in their own parenting, and the tools — HALT, H.E.A.R., co-regulation, "duty vs. service" mindset — they wish someone had handed them decades earlier.

This is a conversation about honoring difference instead of trying to fix it — in your child, and in yourself.

Want to understand your own child a little better?

This is exactly what Godmother was built for — helping you recognize and honor how your child is actually wired, instead of guessing.

👉 Talk to Godmother: https://godmother.aingelic.net
or Install Godmother App on apple store.

Special Parent RQ Offer: Use code PARENTINGRQ for Godmother at $97/year — unlimited assessments plus full access to the Dynamic Coach.

In this episode of ParentRQ, we talk about what it really means to understand the child in front of you. Every child experiences the world differently, and the approach that works for one child may not work for another.

David, founder of Godmother, shares the experiences that led him to build Godmother, including a personal moment at his son’s birthday party that changed the way he understood his daughter.

Talk to godmother.aingelic.net

Download Godmother on the App Store
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/godmother/id...

Special ParentRQ Offer
Get Godmother for $97/year with unlimited assessments and access to the Dynamic Coach.

Use code: PARENTINGRQ

#Parenting #ParentingPodcast #Godmother #UnderstandingYourChild #ConsciousParenting #ParentChildRelationship #ParentingTips #ChildPersonality #ParentRQ #parentingsupport #parentingapp