Wellness, Actually with Emily Oster & Perry Wilson, MD

Exercise. Whether you’re an athlete or just depend on activity for a little dose of sanity, the pregnancy and postpartum periods can knock you sideways and make you feel estranged from your own body. Today on ParentData, Megan Roche — researcher, podcaster, and trail runner machine — joins to discuss how to ease back into activity postpartum, why women’s health is understudied, and the value of ca...

Through coos and cries, babbles and thbbbbts, babies are learning how to communicate from the earliest days of life. Language development is a magical opportunity to watch a child learn to engage with both you and the world. It also feels highly consequential, and for so many parents, it’s an incredibly stressful milestone. Watching your kid learn to talk is at once neat and frustrating and harrow...

Earlier this year, Emily interviewed Majka Burhardt, a professional ice climber (seriously) and the author of “ More: Life on the Edge of Adventure and Motherhood ,” a raw, gripping book about the first years of parenthood. The book has recently been released as an audiobook, and in this bonus episode of ParentData, we’re thrilled to share some clips and re-run the interview. Majka tackles the unc...

Grief can mean a lot of different things, from the loss of a loved one to the loss of a much-wanted pregnancy or marriage. It’s a heavy topic for the holidays, but this can also be a tough time when you’re dealing with loss. Today on ParentData, writer Marisa Renee Lee gets into the heart of grief - which, from a data perspective, will affect approximately 100% of us - in her book " Grief Is Love...

Labor induction did not used to be the norm, but it increasingly is. A big reason for this change is something called the ARRIVE trial, which was designed to test whether routine induction would increase the risk of cesarean section - which, according to the results, it did not. In the wake of the trial, with that concern limited, many more doctors began recommending inductions as routine. (This r...

Self-care is everywhere. Bubble baths, massages, Instagram encouraging you to “take time for yourself.” Get up early to have  coffee  and meditate, or take a forest walk. It can get to the point where self-care itself is yet another thing to check off the to-do list. Send emails. Make lunches. Clean Cheerios off floor. Take forest walk. Today on ParentData, psychiatrist Dr. Pooja Lakshmin wants to...

Earlier this year, Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy issued a new advisory about the effects of social media on the mental health of young people. These advisories are rare; we're used to seeing them on the sides of cigarette packs, where the negative health risks are indisputable. But social media and smartphones are more complicated. Today on ParentData, Dr. Murthy discusses the individual and sy...

It’s time to make things awkward! Our journey through puberty is mercifully over, but we’ve still got to help our kids through it… and it may not be what we remember. Pediatrician Dr. Cara Natterson and journalist Vanessa Kroll Bennett, authors of “ This is So Awkward: Modern Puberty Explained ,” are here to dive headfirst into the surprising complexities of the endocrine system and how to stay cl...

Even under the best of circumstances, the decision to end a marriage is often painful and always complicated - and even more so when kids are involved. Today on ParentData, writer and social worker Miranda Featherstone delves into the endless choices that accompany divorce, including making the initial decision, what it means to share your kids, what (and how much) to tell them, and other ways of...

You probably remember peanut butter being everywhere when you were a kid: commercials, birthday parties, packed in your school lunchbox. Now peanuts are notable for their absence. What accounts for such a dramatic change in such a short amount of time? When did something so commonplace become so high-risk? Dr. Gideon Lack led the study that aimed to understand what happened. Today on ParentData, h...

Kids today face an unprecedented pressure to succeed, and it's pushing their mental health, and their families, to a breaking point. Today on ParentData, journalist Jennifer Breheny Wallace explains her research in her bestselling book, " Never Enough ," how we got here, how these problems exist across both class and culture, and how we can combat this pressure by simply allowing our kids to matte...

Becoming a parent is transformative. It is also terrifying. From conception and pregnancy onwards, you’re handed a new set of rules to follow with little explanation of the reasons or risks. For each decision, you want to do the “right” thing — but how, with conflicting advice from all directions? For the past decade, Emily Oster has been a guide through the biggest decisions and most challenging...

I’m thrilled to share the audio from an event we held earlier this month to mark the 10-year anniversary of my first book, Expecting Better . It was hosted by Dr. Sara Readon (also known as The Vagina Whisperer) and we were joined by Amy Schumer, who helped put the book on the map. We also announced my new book, The Unexpected , which is coming out next spring! ParentData relaunched in September 2...

I spoke with Dr. Anupam Jena, known as Bapu, who hosts the podcast Freakonomics, MD , about his new book, Random Acts of Medicine , written jointly with Dr. Christopher Worsham. The book is out this week, and after you listen here, I highly recommend you pick it up. ParentData relaunched in September 2023. Please enjoy this episode of the earlier version of the podcast from our archives. You can r...

Anna Gifty Opoku-Agyeman is a PhD student at Harvard in economics and public policy. Last year, she edited The Black Agenda: Bold Solutions for a Broken System , which features Black scholars and experts across economics, education, health, climate, criminal justice, and technology. This week, the book is out in paperback. In honor of this, she and I connected to chat about two of the chapters — o...

When I do my weekly Q&A on Instagram (@profemilyoster), I get a lot of questions about running. Rather than interrupt the parenting content, we thought we’d collect those separately and put them in podcast form. And then I convinced Laura Green to ask the questions. If you do not follow Laura on Instagram, she puts out very funny running comedy; it is seriously the best. So: if you like runnin...

I heard about Virginia Sole-Smith’s new book, Fat Talk: Parenting in the Age of Diet Culture , a few months ago and was so excited I immediately insisted on reading it and interviewing her. I’m a big fan of Virginia’s — she is a journalist, an author, a podcaster, the writer of the excellent Substack newsletter Burnt Toast , and a mom. Her new book is about kids and weight and food, and I think it...

I speak with Megan Nix about her book Remedies for Sorrow , in which she recounts her journey with her daughter, Anna, who was born with congenital CMV. I would highly recommend the book, which is a combination of informative and deeply affecting. ParentData relaunched in September 2023. Please enjoy this episode of the earlier version of the podcast from our archives. You can read transcripts and...

I’m finishing out Black Maternal Health Week with an interview with Erica Chidi — writer, entrepreneur, doula, and more. We talk about issues around Black maternal health, maternal health in general, and possible solutions. ParentData relaunched in September 2023. Please enjoy this episode of the earlier version of the podcast from our archives. You can read transcripts and listen to all of our ep...

I’m excited to be joined today by Kelly Fradin, who wrote a new book called Advanced Parenting: Advice for Helping Kids Through Diagnoses, Differences, and Mental Health Challenges . I think this book is a must-read for any parent struggling with a complicated parenting problem. And as Kelly describes in this conversation, it’s also a book for every parent, since all of us face the challenges of a...

A bonus episode where Emily answers your personal questions about her journey with pregnancy and parenting — thanks for sending in so many great questions on Instagram at @profemilyoster! ParentData relaunched in September 2023. Please enjoy this episode of the earlier version of the podcast from our archives. You can read transcripts and listen to all of our episodes at parentdata.org/podcast. Wa...

Today’s episode is an audio recording from one of my recent appearances in Montclair, New Jersey. It was an amazing night. I was so lucky to be joined by Hillary, who asked me some really thoughtful, smart questions about my book The Family Firm and my work on parenting. If you don’t know her, Hillary is the creator of the podcasts The Longest Shortest Time and Here Lies Me and author of the book...

I am thrilled to feature an interview with Majka Burhardt, a professional ice climber (seriously) and the author of a new book called More: Life on the Edge of Adventure and Motherhood , which is a really raw, gripping book about the first years of parenthood. It’s a book that I had a hard time putting down, even when it pulled me back into the uncertainties and fears of the beginning of parenting...

A bonus episode where Emily answers your personal questions about her career and more — thanks for sending in so many great questions on Instagram at @profemilyoster!  ParentData relaunched in September 2023. Please enjoy this episode of the earlier version of the podcast from our archives. You can read transcripts and listen to all of our episodes at parentdata.org/podcast. Want more on data, pre...

I am thrilled to feature an interview with two professional women runners, Lauren Fleshman and Molly Huddle. Lauren has a new book out tomorrow called Good for a Girl , which is the impetus for our interview, and we’ll also talk about Molly’s book How She Did It from last spring. We talk about running, but I promise this is really a conversation about postpartum and post-puberty and finding a way...