This Breast Cancer Awareness Month, Laila is joined by Dr Niveditha Manokaran to break down the essentials of breast health. Together, they emphasise the importance of self-exams, regular screenings, and understanding what’s normal for your body, while addressing cultural barriers and myths that often hinder women.

From family history and lifestyle factors to hormones, BRCA testing, and the truth about bras and deodorants, this episode offers practical knowledge and empowering reminders. At its heart, the conversation is about self-care, awareness, and taking charge of your health.

If you’ve been putting self-exams off, this is your gentle push to start.

To learn more about Dr Nive on Instagram @untaboos 

To share your story, thoughts, and comments with us, hit us up via email at [email protected] or slide into our DM's on Instagram @thevillageforsingleparents

Until next time, this is your host, Laila, signing off with love from The Village.

This episode of The Village Voice is a real call to action.

As single parents, we’re constantly planning for the day-to-day — but what about the what-ifs? If something were to happen to us, would our kids be protected, supported, and surrounded by the right people?

In this powerful conversation, your host Laila sits down with Supriya Jain — award-winning marketer, author, storyteller, book coach, and single mom to a spirited 3-year-old and a 5-year-old Labrador. After losing her husband in a tragic accident, Supriya made the bold decision to bring their child into the world through surrogacy — a journey that became the heart of her debut book A Piece of Him. She brings both deep personal insight and practical advice to this conversation.

Together, we explore what it means to plan ahead with love and intention. Supriya walks us through the key things every single parent should be thinking about:

1. Setting up a solid term deposit or life insurance plan

2. Finding a trusted lawyer and executor

3. Making financial provisions for tuition, medical needs, and unexpected costs

4. Choosing at least three guardians — and keeping them informed

5. Remembering that guardians don’t have to be family — just the right fit

6. And most importantly: Make. That. Will.

If you’ve been putting it off — this is your gentle push to start.

🧡 Learn more about Supriya at www.supriyajain.com or find her on Instagram @jainsupriya
Share your story, thoughts, and comments with us via email at [email protected] or slide into our DM's on Instagram @thevillageforsingleparents

Until next time, this is your host Laila, signing off with love — from The Village.

Hello everybody!

In this episode, Neetu Taj sits down with Cherry Sebastian, a single dad based in Kochi, Kerala, to talk about the real, often unseen side of single fatherhood.

From juggling work and parenting to navigating legal custody and breaking societal stereotypes, Cherry opens up about the highs, the lows, and the lessons he's learned along the way.

Key takeaways:

• Single parenthood is all about adapting.

• A solid support system makes all the difference.

• Legal custody for fathers can be complicated.

• Balancing work and parenting is ongoing.

• Giving teens responsibility builds their independence.

• Talking openly with your kids about emotions matters.

• Financial stability is always on the radar.

Got thoughts, questions, or want to be a guest on The Village Voice?
Email us at [email protected] or DM us on Instagram @thevillageforsingleparents.

Until next time,
Stay awesome,
The Village for Single Parents 💛

Parenting isn’t about biology or marriage—it’s about love, commitment, and showing up every single day. In this episode of The Village Voice, I sit down with the incredible @lifewithavnish—Aditya, a single dad, social reformer, and adoption advocate who is breaking barriers and changing lives.

✨ Key Takeaways:

✅ Adopt legally via https://cara.wcd.gov.in/ -a 30-minute registration process with a total cost of ₹46,000.

✅ India has 30M orphans, but only 3,000 on record—advocate for ethical adoption.

✅ Adoption is a viable, life-changing alternative to the emotional and financial strain of IVF.

✅ Parents of children with special needs—get a disability certificate to access government benefits.

✅ Fight for an adopted child’s right to medical care, just as you would for a biological child.

✅ Challenge outdated stigmas—marriage is not a prerequisite for parenthood.

DM me or Aditya @lifewithavnish if you have any questions. Huge gratitude to Aditya for sharing his journey—sending love and joy to you and Avnish! ❤️

Hey, Village people!

In this episode, we chat with Aleesha Agarwal Goyal aka @TheMysticPurple, about the impact of an absent or strained father-child relationship on our self-worth, careers, and finances. She brings deep insight into ancestral and familial healing and helps us understand how we can break cycles, step into abundance, and truly reclaim our power.

More about our expert:
Aleesha Agarwal Goyal is a spiritual mentor specialising in animal communication, energy shifts, ancestral healing, and subconscious reprogramming. Through her work, she helps people reconnect with their inner strength and transform limiting beliefs into powerful breakthroughs.

Listen in, show us some love with a follow or review, and share this episode with a friend who needs to hear it.

Let’s keep the conversation going!

As always, if you have any questions or comments or just want to say hi, you know where to find me.

Enjoy 🎧✨

In this episode, we chat with Karishma Swarup (she/her) about Casual Dating in India and she lends immense clarity and tips on how to choose you over all else (only our kids compete with that pole position in our lives, right? :p) and so much more.

More about our expert: Karishma Swarup earned her undergraduate degree in geology-biology from Brown University in 2019 and is also a Harvard Public Health grad.

While volunteering with Planned Parenthood to teach sex Ed to high-schoolers in the U.S., she also conducted workshops in Kolkata and online webinars with top educational institutions and student groups.When not working, she enjoys acting in theatre, hiking, and writing poetry

Listen in, show us your love with a follow/review, or share it with a friend who needs to hear it, and let's keep talking!

As always, if you have any questions, queries, comments or just want to say Hi, you know where to find me,

Enjoy!

This episode of The Village Voice is all about self-love, pleasure vs orgasms, STIs, lubricants and so much more with the amazing Dr. Nive (@untaboos) as our topic expert, or should I say-SEXpert. (Give me a giggle, ok :P)

Trust me, you don’t want to miss this one.

Listen in, show us your love with a follow, share it with a friend who needs to hear it, and let’s keep talking!

Hit me up in the DMs or tag us with your thoughts—we love hearing from you.

Follow us on Instagram: @thevillageforsingleparents & @untaboos for more real talk and resources. 💛

The all-important first episode that took me months to finally getting down to recording. (Hi, I also go by Laila -Procrastination and then never satisfied- Zafar), but that's the thing about first's right? There's always that nervousness, that tendency to delay it as much as possible. 

But this is it! 

Now that it's out there, I hope that it gets better, and that my voice, as well as our collective voice as Desi Single Parents only gets stronger and more ludicrous with each episode.  

Hope you have a good listen, do give us a follow and a share! :)