Challenge Accepted is a new limited podcast series from Good Inside and Hot Wheels. Created for parents who want to raise resilient kids, this series explores the early experiences that shape who we become - and the mindset it takes to keep pushing forward. This is Episode 2 of 4.

Elana Meyers Taylor was supposed to be an Olympic softball player. She'd dreamed about it since she was nine, set records all through college, and then, at her Olympic tryout, had what she calls the worst trial of her life. She didn't make the team.

What came next was a sport she'd never touched: bobsled. She went on to five Olympics, medaling in every color but the one she wanted, until this past February, at 41 years old, on the very last run of her very last Olympics, she won gold. She's now the most decorated Black athlete in Winter Olympic history.

She talks to Dr. Becky about why that gold medal isn't really the point. The point is answering the question: am I good at getting good at things, or am I good at being a novice? Her answer, and the stories behind it, from a childhood spent trying everything and being decent at none of it, to seeing bobsledder Vonetta Flowers on TV and thinking "she looked like me," to what she's learned from raising two young sons who are each figuring out their own bodies on their own timeline.

Plus, the two-option philosophy she and her husband use to decide whether to try something hard: you either get a good story out of it, or you don't try at all.

Episode 1 of Challenge Accepted featured astronaut Kellie Gerardi. You can listen here.

Stay tuned for future episodes of Challenge Accepted, featuring New York Liberty forward Breanna Stewart; and YouTuber, engineer, and inventor Mark Rober.

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Thank you to Hot Wheels for making this episode possible.

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Dr. Sasha Hamdani walked off a TEDx stage, found her husband in the lobby, and by the time he said “I guess I was just nervous for you,” she’d already decided her medical career was over. That three-minute spiral is Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria, or RSD — a real, measurable, neurobiological response to rejection or criticism that shows up constantly in ADHD brains, in deeply feeling kids, and in the adults those kids grow into.

Dr. Becky and Dr. Hamdani, psychiatrist and author of Too Sensitive, get into the amygdala and prefrontal cortex mechanics behind RSD, the fine line between a kid being “dramatic” and a kid whose body is telling the truth, how rejection sensitivity quietly turns into people-pleasing (especially in girls), and what to do the next time your own kid rejects you.

Click here to learn more about Good Inside’s Deeply Feeling Kids 101 Workshop.

Thank you to our partners for making this episode possible:

• Tonies: Use the code DRBECKY20 for 20% off your purchase of $80+ at tonies.fun/dr-becky
• Skylight: Get $30 off a 15-inch Skylight Calendar at myskylight.com/becky
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• Offer applies to initial term of Care.com membership subscriptions. Not applicable to add-on features or non-renewing access fees or services. Expires 10/31/26. Care.com does not employ or place any caregiver. Background checks are an important start, but they have limits. Visit www.care.com/safety.

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Chelsea Handler doesn’t have kids. She also has three girls in her life who call her Dad, 11 nieces and nephews, and has taken parenting classes.

Dr. Becky asks what Chelsea can see about kids that parents can’t. Most of Chelsea's answer turns out to be about... the parents.

When a kid falls apart, a parent takes it as a verdict on themselves. Chelsea doesn’t have any reason to internalize that, and it changes how she responds. The clearest example is a teenager who backs a car into another car during a driving lesson and completely melts down, bracing for a punishment that never comes. And Chelsea gets to be the one who says: It's fine. You're fine. Everything's fine!

They get into: why consistency works better than rewards, what Chelsea’s parenting therapist told her about never meeting a kid at the anger they’re at, why trusting a kid is the thing that makes them trustworthy, boundaries (hers are terrible and she has no plans to fix them), and the one rule Chelsea would abolish in every house in America.

Chelsea Handler is on her "High & Mighty" tour through the end of the year, and she host's the advice podcast Dear Chelsea.

Heads up: some salty language, and Becky admits not all of it was Chelsea.

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Thank you to our partners for making this episode possible:

• Skylight: Get $30 off a 15-inch Skylight Calendar at myskylight.com/becky
• Perelel: Use code GOODINSIDE for 20% off your first order at perelelhealth.com/GOODINSIDE
• Yoto: Get 15% off your order with the code DRBECKY15 at YotoPlay.com. New customers only, ends October 31, offer valid on select products only. Terms apply.
• Care.com: For a limited time, you can use the code BECKY35 to save 35% on a Care.com Premium Membership.*
• Offer applies to initial term of Care.com membership subscriptions. Not applicable to add-on features or non-renewing access fees or services. Expires 10/31/26. Care.com does not employ or place any caregiver. Background checks are an important start, but they have limits. Visit www.care.com/safety.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.