Parents We've Met

Dayna and Jenny are joined this week by a very special guest, Vasa Fia Collins. Fia is the wife of the late Fa'anānā Efeso Collins - a deeply respected Samoan community leader, Auckland politician, educator and advocate - whose sudden passing in February 2024 had a profound impact on his family and the communities he served. Fia shares what it’s been like to walk through deep loss and grief, supporting her two daughters while also finding her own footing. She reflects on the individual ways her girls have navigated grief, the challenge of rebuilding routines and confidence after profound change, and how Samoan culture, faith and community have anchored their whānau through it all. She honours the dedicated father that Efeso was to their daughters – his humour, playfulness, strengths and hope for their futures – and shares how she hopes to carry forward the dreams that they had so intentionally built together. Parents We’ve Met is brought to you by Parenting Place – a charity with a heart for New Zealand families. Explore our self-guided online courses and hundreds of free parenting articles and ideas HERE. Find us on:⁠ YouTube⁠ / ⁠Instagram⁠ / ⁠Facebook⁠ / ⁠Tik Tok ⁠/⁠LinkedIn Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If you’re feeling defeated by sleep, or lack thereof, this episode is for you. Sleep psychologist Dan Ford, founder of The Better Sleep Clinic, joins Dayna for a straight-up chat on sleep, stress, melatonin and magnesium, and how genetics might have a role to play in your bedtime struggles. From snoring to nightmares, insomnia to 3am wakeups, Dan unpacks some common sleep challenges and sheds light on how our kids' sleep habits might be affecting their brain development and wellbeing. Together they also explore some of your burning sleep questions, including: Why do kids get hyperactive when they’re tired? (and fool you into thinking they’re not tired) How do screens affect sleep and bedtimes? How do hormones and perimenopause affect women's sleep? Why does trying harder to sleep sometimes make insomnia worse? Kids snoring - when is it harmless and when should you get it checked? The ABCs of children’s sleep: age, bedtime, consistency. Dan also shares plenty of practical, realistic advice for parents, from creating healthy routines, to understanding why wake times matter more than bedtimes. He talks about how to support teens whose body clocks naturally run late and offers gentle strategies for those moments when a child simply can’t fall asleep without you. Parents We’ve Met is brought to you by Parenting Place – a charity with a heart for New Zealand families. Explore our self-guided online courses and hundreds of free parenting articles and ideas HERE. Find us on:⁠ YouTube⁠ / ⁠Instagram⁠ / ⁠Facebook⁠ / ⁠Tik Tok ⁠/⁠LinkedIn Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Neuroscience educator ⁠Kathryn Berkett⁠ joins Jenny and Dayna for a deep dive into our kids’ brain development, with tips on how we can support them through every leap, wobble and wild moment that these changes bring. In the first three years of life, babies’ brains form an astonishing thousand trillion connections - and then, just when we’ve caught our breath, the second massive brain upgrade arrives in early adolescence. In this episode, Kathryn shares more on: The physical impact of screens on developing brains How to nurture a teen brain as it learns to take perspective and make sense of a changing world How gratitude, free play, and movement literally shape neural pathways Why kids need tolerable stress (and moments of fear!) to build resilience The influence of gaming on dopamine and desensitisation. Kathryn Berkett’s new book: ‘What’s going on in there? The Neuroscience of the Adolescent Brain’ is available to purchase from 27 November, 2025. Want to learn more about navigating devices and screens with kids? Check out 'Digital Parenting: Raising kids in an online world' - a course by Parenting Place. Find us on:⁠⁠ YouTube⁠⁠ / ⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠ / ⁠⁠Facebook⁠⁠ / ⁠⁠Tik Tok ⁠⁠/⁠⁠LinkedIn ⁠⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jenny and Dayna are joined by the inimitable Jack Tame, a dad, stepdad, journo and familiar voice of New Zealand media, for an honest kōrero about the ups, downs, joys and ‘marrow-deep’ exhaustion that make up modern dad-hood. Jack shares about the wave of love that struck the moment his newborn entered the world - the kind that gets you in the guts as well as the heart. He shares the challenges of the work/whānau juggle, the secret power to be found in the dependability of routines, and how becoming a parent has changed the way he sees himself and the world around him. Jack also offers his reflections on the daunting task of raising kids in a digital age, and what it looks like to stay as grounded and intentional as possible. Parents We’ve Met is brought to you by Parenting Place – a charity with a heart for New Zealand families. Explore our self-guided online courses and hundreds of free parenting articles and ideas HERE. Follow us on: YouTube / Instagram / Facebook / Tik Tok Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

“Rowing is my job; my autopilot. Being a mum is the hard part,” says gold-medal-winning Olympic rower, mum and newlywed Lucy Spoors. Rowing legend Lucy Spoors joins Dayna and Jenny for an inspiring and honest chat about what it takes to be a new parent in high-performance sport. Not long after giving birth to her son Rupert – and after a nine-month battle with hyperemesis gravidarum – the ever-determined athlete was back on the water with rowing partner and fellow mum Brooke Francis, and an Olympic gold medal in their sights. Lucy regales Jenny and Dayna with her journey to the Paris Olympics in 2024; the realities of early-morning training sessions after sleepless nights, travelling with toddlers in tow, the power of leaning into the ‘village’ and the moment that stole hearts around the world when the rowing ‘super mums’ were reunited with their kids at the medal ceremony in Paris. She also shares about the wonderful relationship her son has with his grandparents and the incredible support they’ve given her and husband Brook (also a rower), enabling them to achieve success in both their work and parenthood. Parents We’ve Met is brought to you by Parenting Place – a charity with a heart for New Zealand families. Explore our self-guided online courses and hundreds of free parenting articles and ideas HERE. You can also find Parenting Place on Instagram / Facebook / Tik Tok @parentingplacenz Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If you're in the thick of parenting and want to protect and strengthen your relationships – and improve intimacy with your partner – this one is for you! Sex and relationship therapist Jo Robertson (recently an expert on Married at First Sight New Zealand) is back on the Parents We’ve Met couch to answer some questions from our podcast community (and a few from us) around sex, communication, blended families and making relationships the best they can be. Join us as we dig into topics including: How to navigate differences in libido in a committed relationship, especially after kids. Love languages – are they useful when it comes to improving intimacy? The Marriage WOF—some helpful questions to help you check in with your partner and yourself. What to consider when blending families or introducing new partners after a separation. Protecting relationships from betrayal and recognising areas of vulnerability. The impact of betrayals – big and small - on relationships and how to approach big conversations in a constructive way. Since we last spoke to Jo in 2023, (you can listen to her other episode here), as well as her TV season on MAFS she’s travelled to Sri Lanka and French Polynesia with her husband and three young boys, campaigned for better online filtering via Makes Sense and launched three new online courses: Better sex for couples, Postpartum sex and Painful sex. We love this wāhine toa! Parents We’ve Met is brought to you by Parenting Place – a charity with a heart for New Zealand families. Explore our self-guided online courses and hundreds of free parenting articles and ideas HERE. Instagram / Facebook / Tik Tok @parentingplacenz Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We're into a new year and to start things off on a high, we're chatting with Dr. Jin Russell - a consultant developmental paediatrician at Auckland's Starship Children’s Health, a Growing Up in New Zealand researcher and tireless champion of better health and developmental outcomes for New Zealand kids. In this episode Jin touches on some of the findings of her PhD thesis into the effects of health inequities on kids’ development, which at times is confronting, but at other times is incredibly hopeful. On the hopeful end of the spectrum, Jin shares some of her positive findings on the power of reading to kids, which is not just great for development but moves them “forwards towards flourishing.” How good is that!! Jin also gets personal about her motherhood journey to date (she has two gorgeous young boys with her husband Matheson), her village, the tricky juggle of work and PhD studies and the powerful stories that have shaped her mindset growing up in a high-achieving migrant family. She also touches on the challenge of childhood anxiety and recommends Parenting Place's Untangling Anxiety parenting course as a wonderful resource for parents and caregivers. Anxiety isn't a simple fix, but there are ways that you can support your child to navigate those big feelings that tangle up everyday life. Visit Parenting Place to FIND OUT MORE. You can also find more parenting resources over on our Instagram, Facebook and Tik Tok accounts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices