Raising Them in Your Cage — AMA with a Child Psychologist

This month's AMA started with a question most of us have never thought to ask: what if the anxiety your child carries isn't theirs? What if it was handed down — through rituals, rules, and family beliefs — before they were old enough to question any of it?

Tvarita Iyer Vemuri, award-winning child psychologist and our resident expert on The Sunday Draft, joined Raj and co-host Varun Vijay Nair for a wide-ranging conversation that began with Culture-Bound Syndromes and ended somewhere far more personal.

Here's what we covered:

What Culture-Bound Syndromes actually are — not superstitions, but clinically recognised patterns of psychological distress that only exist within specific cultural frameworks. Tvarita used Nazar, possession states, and Dhat Syndrome to explain how real suffering can wear a cultural costume — and why a doctor outside that culture might not recognise it at all.

The CBS in disguise — the everyday beliefs we pass to children without realising it. Never say no to elders. Finish everything on your plate. These feel like values. Tvarita explains why they function as something else entirely — and how the "finish your plate" rule alone has a measurable link to emotional eating and obesity in adolescence.

Why NEET isn't technically a CBS — but why the distinction matters less than the damage. When children start competitive exam prep so young they lose what Tvarita called their radiance — the natural energy and childlikeness that competition quietly erases — the psychological distress is real even if the symptoms aren't clinically new. Tvarita and Raj pushed back on each other here in a way worth listening to.

Screen addiction and what it's actually telling you — Tvarita's take was simple and stuck: children who are addicted to screens almost always have an escape they needed. The device isn't the problem. It's filling a gap. When a child has a real relationship with their parent and real alternatives, the pull weakens on its own.

Neurodivergence, over-diagnosis, and the wave of ADHD labels — Tvarita raised something the room hadn't expected: that the rise in neurodivergent diagnoses is partly a good thing — people finally understanding themselves — and partly a new problem, with parents bringing children in for traits that are just personality.

What a child-friendly society actually looks like — the answer wasn't structural. It was about inclusion, about learning and unlearning, and about making sure no child ever feels displaced or cornered. Small things. Dating culture being less taboo. Parents accepting that their child has a crush. Society catching up to children rather than asking children to hide.

The closing image that stayed with everyone — Varun said it simply near the end. A person is radiant when they are stress-free, happy, and content. That happiness radiates outward. If we raise happier children, we get a happier society. It sounds obvious. Tvarita spent the whole episode explaining why we keep failing at it.

TIMESTAMPS

• 00:00 — Welcome & Tvarita's latest achievements
• 03:00 — What is a Culture-Bound Syndrome?
• 05:00 — Nazar, possession states & Indian examples
• 07:30 — DSM to ICD-11: how CBS became Cultural Concepts of Distress
• 10:00 — How parents pass CBS to children without knowing
• 13:45 — Dhat Syndrome explained
• 15:00 — Why psychoeducation needs community & spiritual psychologists
• 18:00 — Stigma around therapy in India — who's actually coming to clinics
• 23:00 — Varun: raising a child across cultures as a single parent
• 27:00 — CBS in disguise: never say no to elders
• 32:00 — Never waste food — and how it links to emotional eating
• 36:00 — Can parents even detach from superstition to help their kids?
• 44:00 — How children see their parents across different age groups
• 47:00 — Neurodivergence, over-diagnosis and the ADHD wave
• 54:00 — Screen addiction — what it's really filling
• 1:05:00 — What should a single parent watch out for?
• 1:08:00 — How to limit screens without a fight
• 1:15:00 — What will it take to make society child-friendly?
• 1:17:00 — India's subtle shifts — dating culture, acceptance, inclusion
• 1:20:00 — What the US gets right: sports, community, cheering from the sidelines
• 1:23:00 — NEET, competition and losing your radiance
• 1:29:00 — Closing thoughts: radiant children make a radiant society

The Sunday Draft airs every Sunday at 10:00 AM EST / 7:30 PM IST. Subscribe to never miss an episode.

Tvarita Iyer Vemuri is an award-winning child psychologist, newly registered with the National Commission for Allied and Health Professions and the National Health Authority, and joins the Delhi Council of Child Welfare as a psychologist this week.

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