🧠 Reintroducing Research: Why Understanding Our Kids’ Development Still Matters

It’s wild how fast they grow.

One minute you’re tracking nap schedules and googling swaddles. The next, you’re negotiating screen time and watching them wrestle with big emotions and bigger questions.

For many of us, parenting feels more uncertain in these in-between years — ages 8 to 12, when they’re not quite “little” but not yet teens. We sense the emotional shifts, the new challenges, and the widening gap between what we know to do and what we feel might be right.

And that’s where I come in.

Some of you have been here since the early days, TWELVE YEARS AGO! When my feed and blog were full of research and developmental breakdowns around infancy. That’s still where my heart lives — in understanding why our kids are the way they are, what’s happening in their brains, and how we as parents can meet them where they are (not just where we wish they were).

I’ve spent years focused on pregnancy, birth, and those vulnerable first months postpartum — and that work isn’t going anywhere. But as my own children grow and as more of your children grow, I feel pulled to return to something I’ve always loved: developmental psychology for parents.

Because if we can understand what's going on under the surface, we can show up more grounded, more prepared, and less reactive.

So here’s what’s coming:

✅ Evidence-based, emotionally grounded posts about your 12-year-old’s brain

✅ What emotional co-regulation looks like after toddlerhood

✅ How peer relationships, puberty, and identity are shaping your child

✅ Tools and frameworks you can actually use — not judgment, not one-size-fits-all advice

This is just the beginning. And I want to hear from you.

👉 What are you noticing about your growing kids right now?

👉 What questions keep coming up at bedtime, during homework, or when conflict flares?

👉 What do you wish someone would explain in plain English?

Drop a comment, DM me, or reply to the newsletter version of this post.Let’s explore this next chapter of parenting together — with the same curiosity and care that brought us through the early years.

And if you are still in your early stages of expecting and parenting, this info is for you too! The things that you do in the early days combined with the "peek ahead" into what is coming will help bring things full circle for you over the years! And don't worry, I will have developmental posts for younger ages/stages too!