Often when I start an interview with a patient, I will let them know how important it is I hear from them because I don’t think their parent, or I, can read their mind. I then joke that it would make me really good at my job if I could. The truth is, of course, that none of us can read someone’s mind or fully know what someone else is thinking. As child psychiatrists, there is a good chance that we have not experienced many of the situations we are working on with the families we see. The experience of receiving a psychiatric diagnosis, of going on medications, or going into the hospital can be very impactful moments in a person’s life. The feelings and thoughts that come with that might be hard to grasp without having experienced them. The same could be said with having a panic attack, paranoia, a depressive episode, or other symptoms of a psychiatric diagnosis. As a graduate from a triple board program who still practices some general pediatrics, I remember a shift in some of my conversations after I had my own child and experienced my first few months of near sleepless nights. Currently, I work in a clinic where we are very lucky to have family peers who can help us to better understand many of what these experiences can be like. They can also connect with families, often in a way that is different from that of the clinical staff.