Rebel Parenting with Ryan & Laura Dobson

Rebel Parenting with Ryan & Laura Dobson is a Christian marriage and parenting show led by a husband and wife who use their own worst moments as teaching material. As Ryan frames it, the goal is better spouses and better parents through God's Word. What keeps that from turning into a lecture is how much the Dobsons admit. Ryan says he was a wretched parent for a long time. Laura says she never knew she was a yeller until she became a parent, and that God freed her of it about six years ago. Even an apology for being away gets the same treatment: one episode opens with Ryan describing his mother's broken hip and leg, a deep depression he is climbing out of, and a wife he calls 'a total legend' for her support. That episode, 'Parenting: Law vs Grace!', includes a passage holding that God's law alone cannot rescue, redeem and restore a child. Ryan hears his former self in it. Laura hopes parents hear grace in it, and an invitation. Books frame some of the conversations. The couple have read Paul Tripp's Parenting across more than one episode, and 'The Good News About Marriage!' borrows its title from a book that questions the much-repeated figure that half of all marriages end in divorce and warns that a couple's belief they won't make it can become the reason they don't. The same episode announces a talk about sex in marriage, with a promise not to get too graphic and a suggestion to move the kids to another room. The rawest material is the 'Love in the Deep End' series, pitched as preparing for the unpreparable. Approaching twenty years of marriage, the Dobsons talk through a stretch in which Laura's cancer returned, the kids got sick and Ryan cared for the whole family. He goes back to their vows: in sickness and in health, for richer or for poorer. He also calls that stretch terrible, and does not soften it. 'Love in the Deep End: Don't Punish For a Lifetime' names a practice they credit with saving their marriage more times than they can count, and Ryan illustrates it with a dream about ordering a drink, something he can now tell Laura without meeting fear or anger. 'Love In the Deep End: Going Again' closes on a plea not to quit on God, a spouse or the kids. The range reaches past hardship. In 'Love Your Family Better', recorded without Laura, Ryan reads out a text exchange with his son to show how differently he answers his children now. 'Israel Trip Recap Pt 1' is faith travel talk, with Ryan thanking Mike Evans for the trip, marvelling at the evangelical figures who shared his bus, and confessing he said wow until it embarrassed him. The hosts also describe keeping Tuesdays for marriage and parenting and Thursdays for culture and current events. A newcomer could start with 'Parenting: Law vs Grace!' for the parenting side and 'Love in the Deep End: Don't Punish For a Lifetime' for the marriage side.