The Unplanned Parent

IVF gets thrown around as a catch-all term. Most people — including most patients — don’t actually know what it involves. Dr. Rhea Chattopadhyay, reproductive endocrinologist and IVF specialist, joins Angel and Raman to walk through the whole process: AMH testing, ovarian stimulation, egg retrieval, embryo grading, PGT-A, expanded carrier screening, embryo transfer, and what the body still has to...

The baby is a few months away. Angel decides it’s time to talk about SIDS. Episode 10 is the safe sleep episode — what SIDS actually is, what parents can control, and what the data says about all the things new parents worry about: belly sleeping, swaddling, co-sleeping, pacifiers, reflux, over-bundling, and breathing patterns that look alarming but are completely normal. Angel also shares a Rutge...

Masha is back, and this time she goes all the way in. This episode is Masha’s divorce story — why she ended a marriage that looked fine from the outside, how she and her ex navigated separation during COVID with her mother in the house and two kids under seven, and what she’d do differently if she could go back. She also talks about introducing Raman to her kids, how her son handled learning that...

Masha is finally here. In this episode, Raman’s girlfriend joins the show to tell her side of the story — how they met, how she found out about Ashley’s proposal, and what it’s actually been like to be the partner in this particular situation. She’s an economics professor with a PhD, a mom of two navigating 50/50 shared custody, and someone who has consistently shown up for Raman throughout all of...

Dr. Samantha Johnston is back for round two. This time: early childhood vaccines. This episode covers every question new parents actually ask — why hep B is given at birth, whether the ACIP changes affect anything right now (they don’t, thanks to an AAP lawsuit), what the autism data actually shows, why spacing out vaccines backfires, what aluminum in vaccines means in context, and why giving Tyle...

Vaccines during pregnancy: what to get, what you can’t get, and why it all matters more than most people realize. In this episode, Dr. Angel is joined by Dr. Samantha Johnston, a pediatric infectious disease specialist and longtime friend. Together they walk through the four vaccines recommended during pregnancy — Tdap, RSV, COVID, and flu — and explain exactly what each one is doing for the mom a...

Ashley is 5.5 months pregnant, the baby bash is coming up, and Raman still doesn't have an apartment near the baby. Episode 7 of The Unplanned Parent is the practical one. Ashley spent 15 hours on her baby registry and is overwhelmed by the options. Raman plans to go with the flow and is grateful Ashley did the hard work. Dr. Angel steps in with the information that actually matters: what to look...

Ashley is 22 weeks pregnant. And she's finally telling her side of the story. In Episode 6, she walks through how she got here: the deadline she gave herself at 42, the FaceTime call where Raman's name came up as a joke, and the morning-after text where he said he was actually considering it. She also explains why she chose a known person over a sperm donor — and why specifically Raman. Then she g...

Ashley is finally here, and she's 22 weeks pregnant. In Episode 5, she tells her own story: why she froze her eggs at 34, what it actually felt like to give herself daily shots for three weeks, and why she went back and did it again at 40. She also shares the unexpected thing the egg freezing process gave her: a diagnosis of Hashimoto's thyroiditis that had been missed for years, and a treatment t...

The baby is coming. Raman has thought about approximately two things. Dr. Angel Rampal puts her brother through the questions every new parent should be sitting with before the due date: circumcision, breastfeeding (and whether you can have a drink while doing it), cord blood banking and what those OB-office brochures aren't telling you, infant CPR, skin-to-skin for dads, sleep safety, and a few t...

Raman thought the hard part was over after the yes text. Then Ashley called from the doctor's office. The recommendation: quit vaping for 90 days to improve sperm quality. Raman's first reaction was to hang up and vape ten times in a row. Episode 3 is the story of how he actually did it — the addiction, the logistics of quitting, the dismantled vape that ended up in a dumpster at 1:30am, and the b...

Saying yes was the easy part. In Episode 2, Raman walks through the six months between his "I'm in" text and the actual embryo implantation — and it was a lot more than just showing up to a clinic. Psychological evaluations. Lawyers. A legally binding document covering everything from vaccines to what kind of car the kid can ride in. And one sperm sample that, in his own words, could have been bet...

What does it actually take to say yes to becoming a parent — especially when it was never part of the plan? In this first episode of The Unplanned Parent, Dr. Angel Rampal (board-certified pediatrician) and her brother, Raman, kick off the season by going back to the very beginning: the moment a running joke between friends stopped being a joke. Raman's longtime friend Ashley had frozen her eggs a...

A pediatrician. Her brother. His platonic co-parenting journey. The Unplanned Parent follows one family's real-time path to baby, with the science, the decisions, and the conversations your doctor skips. New episodes every other week.