200: Ask Alvin Anything (Part 1!)

When I saw that our 200th episode was coming up, I knew I wanted to do something special to celebrate. Listeners called in with questions for me for our 100th episode, which was released in September 2019. The numbering is a bit fuzzy, I have to admit - we're actually well over 200 episodes because there have been an assortment of Sharing Your Parenting Mojo conversations with parents and other folks that use a different numbering system, but whatever. It's still a milestone😊

 

Back then, I was just getting into exploring big social justice issues on the podcast. Early in 2020 I did two episodes on how patriarchy affects our parenting, followed by an extended series on the intersection of race and parenting, and several episodes on advertising and consumerism.

 

We learned a lot about sex, and I started what has become a series of 'deconstructed' episodes where I examine an idea that is usually assumed to be 'the way it is,' and find out that perhaps that isn't the way it is after all. I looked at:

How most of what we think we know about attachment theory is probably wrong
Authoritative isn't the best parenting 'style'
The current darling of anyone working on mental health, Polyvagal theory, is most likely a myth (although it may still be a somewhat useful myth)

 

In June of 2022, in preparation for a pair of episodes on supporting neurodivergent parents and children, I interviewed Dr. Hanna Bertilsdotter-Rosqvist, who is autistic, to test out the autism screener. I wasn't expecting it to return a positive result for me, ultimately resulting in a self-diagnosis that, of course, I shared in an episode. Lots of listeners reached out after that one to offer gratitude, and one message I will carry for a long time said something like: "I always conceptually knew that neurodivergent people have value but it wasn't until I heard how your autism helps you to process all of this information for us that I truly got it."

 

So given that you've heard a lot from and about me over the last few years, I thought a natural next step would be to offer listeners the option of asking my husband Alvin anything they wanted!

 

We received quite a few questions, and two listeners - iris, who has been around for many years, and Corrine who joined us more recently - stepped up to co-interview him. I was quite willing to throw him to the wolves and let him do the interview himself but he wanted me to be there, so I joined as well. (I should note that the...