Parenting Doctors Podcast

About Parenting Doctors Podcast

What We Were Never Taught is a podcast about the emotional and relationship skills that shape the most important connections in our lives. The show explores love, marriage, attachment, communication, conflict, emotional availability, healing, resilience, parenting, and personal growth — especially the skills many of us were never explicitly taught but are expected to somehow know. Through honest reflection, psychological insight, real-life examples, and practical strategies, each episode looks at why relationships become difficult, why people repeat patterns they don’t fully understand, and what helps individuals, couples, and families create healthier and more lasting connection. At its core, the podcast is about learning how to listen, communicate, repair, stay emotionally present, and grow through the inevitable challenges of close relationships. Originally launched as the Parenting Doctors Podcast, the show has grown into a broader conversation about relationships, marriage, family life, and the skills that help us love one another well. Love begins relationships. Skills sustain them.

Publisher

Dr. Daniel van Ingen

Category

health & fitness · kids & family

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

4 Jul 2015

Latest episode

4 Oct 2026

Latest episodes

160 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   4 Oct 2026

   Are You Carrying the Relationship? When Connection Exists Without Reciprocity

   Episode 20: Are You Carrying the Relationship? When Connection Exists Without Reciprocity Two people can have extraordinary connection and still have a profoundly one-sided relationship. They may talk for hours. They laugh, share vulnerabilities, feel deeply understood, and experience genuine emotional intimacy. But when the conversation ends, another set of questions begins to matter: Who calls? Who initiates? Who makes the plans? Who accommodates? Who comes back after conflict? Who keeps the relationship moving? In Episode 20 of What We Were Never Taught, Dr. Dan explores reciprocity—the difference between someone participating in a relationship when the opportunity is created for them and two people actively building a relationship together. Reciprocity isn't about keeping score or expecting relationships to be 50/50 every day. Healthy relationships have seasons when one person carries more. Rather, reciprocity asks whether, across time, both people are investing in what they are creating together. This episode explores how a relationship can contain tremendous emotional connection while lacking reciprocity, why one person can gradually become the "relationship manager," and how imbalance can appear in initiation, curiosity, accommodation, sacrifice, emotional labor, and even repair. It also introduces an important distinction: Two people can participate equally in an extraordinary conversation while participating very unequally in the relationship. As part of an ongoing exploration of five dimensions of healthy relationships—Connection, Continuity, Repair, Reciprocity, and Progression—Episode 20 asks perhaps the most revealing question yet: Does the person I love merely participate in the relationship when I create it—or are we creating the relationship together? Because there is an enormous difference between being loved inside a moment and experiencing another person consistently helping you build a life. 🎙️ What We Were Never Taught with Dr. Dan

2. 

   27 Sept 2026

   The Big Five — What Thriving Relationships Actually Require

   Episode 19: The Big Five — A Framework for Relationship Health What actually makes a relationship thrive? In this episode of What We Were Never Taught, Dr. Dan presents The Big Five—five core relationship processes that help explain why some relationships deepen while others slowly deteriorate: connection, continuity, repair, reciprocity, and progression. This framework applies whether two people have been dating for three months or married for fifteen years. Dr. Dan examines what each process looks like early in dating and how the same process changes across the seasons of a long-term marriage. For each of the Big Five, he takes listeners into the therapy room with both a light conflict and a heavy conflict—showing how perspective-taking, emotional regulation, accountability, and communication can look very different when the issue is something relatively small versus something involving deep hurt, betrayal, resentment, or infidelity. Dr. Dan also introduces the idea of relationship momentum windows: seasons when a couple may be moving toward greater closeness or greater distance. During these windows, certain behaviors act as accelerators—curiosity, ownership, repair, generosity, affection, follow-through, and willingness to understand one another—while other behaviors become brakes, including contempt, defensiveness, withdrawal, scorekeeping, secrecy, repeated broken promises, and negative assumptions about a partner’s motives. Some couples reach moments when the relationship appears close to ending, yet those same moments can become turning points if the couple begins relating differently. The episode explores how relationships can develop positive or negative momentum over time—and how small relational processes can eventually produce very large outcomes. Through clinical examples, personal reflection, and relationship research, Dr. Dan offers one of the podcast’s most complete frameworks yet for understanding relationship health. Whether you are newly dating, trying to strengthen a long-term marriage, recovering from betrayal, or simply trying to understand why relationships succeed or fail, this episode provides a practical way to evaluate what is actually happening between two people. Connection creates closeness.Continuity creates security.Repair creates resilience.Reciprocity creates mutuality.Progression creates a shared life. And throughout all five, the question becomes: What is accelerating this relationship toward flourishing—and what is putting on the brakes? Love begins relationships. Skills sustain them.

3. 

   20 Sept 2026

   When Connection Isn't Enough: The Three Essentials of a Lasting Marriage

   WHEN CONNECTION ISN’T ENOUGHEpisode 18 | What We Were Never Taught How can two people genuinely love each other, remain committed to their marriage, and still feel profoundly disconnected? I've seen couples experience extraordinary moments of closeness. They sit together for hours, share their feelings, remember why they fell in love, and promise to make their relationship a priority. For a moment, everything feels different. But then life resumes. Work gets busy. Responsibilities take over. The conversations become less frequent, the promises lose momentum, and the same disappointments return. The connection was real. So why didn't it last? I've spent years reflecting on this question, both professionally and personally. My own marriage ended, and that experience has deepened my appreciation for how much more a lasting relationship requires than love and good intentions. In Episode 18 of What We Were Never Taught, I explore three essentials of a lasting marriage. Connection: Do we still feel emotionally known, understood, and valued? Continuity: Are we consistently doing the things that demonstrate our commitment, or are we relying on occasional moments of closeness? Repair: When we hurt one another, do we actually address the injury and change our behavior, or do we simply reconnect until the same problem returns? A wonderful conversation can restore hope. An apology can begin healing. But neither replaces the consistent actions that help build trust over time. I believe marriage is worth investing in. And part of that investment is learning how to listen, take responsibility, follow through, and continue getting to know the person beside us as life changes. Connection brings us close. Continuity helps us remain close. Repair helps us find our way back when we've lost that closeness. These are some of the relationship skills we were never taught. 🎙️ Episode 18: When Connection Isn't Enough — The Three Essentials of a Lasting Marriage What We Were Never Taught with Dr. Dan #WhatWeWereNeverTaught #Marriage #Relationships #EmotionalConnection #RelationshipGrowth

Who has been a guest on Parenting Doctors Podcast

Names identified in recent episode analyses. Showing up to five guests.

• Addison Ruscoe
• Meghan Buchanon
• Meghan Buchanan
• Ariel Faulkner

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

Apple Podcasts (US)

5.0 / 5

5 ratings

Podcast Authority Score: 19 / 100

A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.

Quality

24

Social presence

0

YouTube

0

Engagement

32

Contact Parenting Doctors Podcast

Guest appearances

Does not typically book guests

Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.

Questions about Parenting Doctors Podcast