Growing Pains is a situation comedy that aired on ABC from 1985 through 1992. The show centered on the Seaver family of Long Island, New York, and premiered at a time when working mothers and stay-at-home fathers were becoming an increasing part of the American demographic.
The show's characters included stay-at-home father Jason Seaver (Alan Thicke), who opens a psychiatrist office at the family's home after his wife, Maggie (Joanna Kerns) goes back to work as a television reporter. Their children were Mike (Kirk Cameron), Carol (Tracey Gold), Ben (Jeremy Miller) and Chrissy (Ashley Johnson); Chrissy was born during the series, and Johnson took on the role in 1990, when the character was "age-advanced" to 6 years old.
Thicke appears at the 80s TV Convention in "Brian Goes Back to College" as a guest speaker, however not on-screen, representing the show.
In "The Father, the Son, and the Holy Fonz", Kirk Cameron visits the First United Church of the Fonz, founded by Peter Griffin, to convert members of the congregation to Christianity. Peter initially thought he came to convert people to the Church of Mike Seaver.
In "The Cleveland-Loretta Quagmire", Mayor Adam West talks about his favorite Growing Pains episode.
In "Not All Dogs Go To Heaven", where Meg Griffin, while bedridden recovering from the mumps, watches an infomercial starring Cameron about Christianity. Upon learning that Brian is an atheist, begins behaving toward him in the same way series star Kirk Cameron did to the show's cast and crew after he converted to Christianity (such as Cameron's purported influence on casting and storylines). In addition to Cameron, Alan Thicke and Jeremy Miller appear, as Cameron was unavailable to convince Brian to convert. Thicke and Miller were used in his place.
In the opening segment of "Three Kings" parodying Stand by Me, Petey LaChance, Quag Chambers, Joey Duchamps and Cleve Brown sing the opening theme to the show, "As Long As We Got Each Other".
Brian uses the troubled lives of former child actors to convince Stewie to give up acting in "The Peanut Butter Kid", including Andrew Koenig who played Mike's friend "Boner" on Growing Pains, who died an early death.
Brian wonders if the park that he and Peter are drinking in is where Boner died in "Underage Peter".