From Fairy Tale to Real Life: A Marriage Therapist's Raw Take on the Journey from "I Do" to "What Now?"

Hey, everybody. Welcome to a, I would say a very special edition of the virtual couch because this one I'm leaning into this impulsivity it it might just be the riddle and talking, but I just felt so impressed to record because I just got off of a, an episode with my friends, Jeff and Tricia Jamison. We host a podcast called the Q and a files. Trisha Jamison is the, I'd say the main host. She's a life coach. Her husband, Dr. Jeff is a doctor.

And then I play the role of the therapist and we take a lot of questions and it's fun. I enjoy our banter. And then we each have a little bit of a different perspective on what the questions are. Today we interviewed a young couple named Hannah and Cody, and I don't know Hannah and Cody. I just met them on the recording, but.

Yeah. As we were talking about why couples get together, what they like about each other at first, and Trisha was asking the questions about how do you keep your love alive and what do they anticipate that will help put them in a position where they will still feel this this deep love down the road. And and I just sat there scribbling notes. , note after note, I have nine sticky notes full of things.

, it was a really fun experience for me personally, because I recognized , it's just a check this out thing of where my mind went with. Their answers. And I realized some of it is probably coming from a place that would sound a little bit cynical, almost like, and I so don't want to be this guy, but it's almost from a place of where, well, just wait till they get a little bit of road underneath the tires.

And then they see how challenging marriage can become. Because I remember very specifically my wife, Wendy and I, . We were in California. We had probably been married. I would say less than 10 years. We didn't have kids and we had kids seven years in. So it was somewhere between probably year four and seven. , I really felt like our marriage was just amazing. And it did seem like, well, this is going to be pretty easy.

, , it would frustrate me when someone would find out how long you've been married and they would say, Oh, just wait till you have kids or just wait till you've been married for 20 years, or just wait until, and throughout that period of time, it seemed to me that we would then have a kid and then think, okay, we're, we're still good. And then someone would say, well, wait, do you have two kids?

And then we'd have a couple of kids or they would say, well, wait till you've been married for 15 years. And we'd hit the 15 year mark and. It really frustrated me because I did realize at some point, someone will always have a just wait until I remember someone that I used to interact with. Often they were about five years older than me. , I remember I was in my thirties, probably mid to late thirties. And at this point I was chasing a Boston marathon qualifier.

I'm starting to run ultra marathons. And so they're saying, well, just wait until you hit 40. And then I remember hitting 40, hitting 45, 50, still Being active and wanting to do these things. And that person is still continuing to say, well, wait till you're 60. I guess we'll have to wait until I'm 60 to see what that looks like. And I know that that's a way that people want to ease their own discomfort.

Let's say that their marriage , isn't going well, or they're, they don't feel like they're in the place that they want to be from a fitness level. And so they're saying You just wait until you get to be where I'm at, because then it has to be the wheels have to fall off. Or that might mean that I could have done something different to put me in a position where let's say my wheels have not fallen off yet at this point.

And I know that isn't an all or nothing statement, or that isn't where everybody's at.

So what I wanted to do was I'm going to go through my sticky notes and I know it's going to bring up some marriage related concepts and topics that are things that I can give this perspective, coming right out of this interview with Cody and Hannah, where it does feel like wanting to say, Oh, well just wait. But I love what they said. They had a great foundation to build on.

And so whether you're listening to this right now and you've been married for a very long time, and if you find yourself saying, Oh yeah, just wait until these guys, until Cody and Hannah have more experience.

Is it because, , I don't necessarily like where I'm at currently in my marriage or where I'm at relationship wise, but I would love to just bring some awareness to that doesn't mean that then you are done, it is time to fold in the towel and I want to throw some real life marriage therapist advice in to balance where your thoughts go, when you hear some of these things, these ideals that that Cody and Hannah shared.

So I highly recommend that you go to this Q and a files episode and listen to the interview with Cody and Hannah, with Jeff and Dr. Trish and I, and maybe even go there first and then come back and listen. And it might be better. . It might be better in that context. I love doing couples therapy.

It's still odd to say that because I think you do need as a therapist to get a lot of reps under your belt, have a nice framework, be able to Have the confidence to help guide couples to these communication frameworks. My four pillars of a connected conversation, help them understand the concepts around differentiation, how to embrace the things that they have control of including their reactions, and then how to get out of their comfort zone and how to truly be known.

Which means be able and willing to share really how I feel and also to know their partner to be able to stay present and maybe check their ego if their partner is sharing things with them that might be difficult for me to hear because that is again, a me thing.

But over the past few years, I've been doing more and more premarital counseling. for having me. And also people that are newly married have come to me just to want to know what they don't know. And this has been thanks to some parents that I've worked with in the past, or even I know that some have been high school friends who are now in a position where their kids are getting married , and they've offered a, Hey, we want to give our kids a chance.

Five sessions so that they can just have a real good basis or a framework to operate from, which by the way, if that is something that you are interested in gifting your kids, then please reach out to me at contact I'm currently working on putting together some material to put out a newlywed course or a pre marriage course, because I think that would be really helpful. Here's the challenge with that though, because the newlyweds don't know what they don't know I have found it very interesting.

That when you are trying to provide them with the right tools, that it can feel really scary. And I'll give you a good example of this. I was doing some pre marriage counseling with a couple that I really like, and they appear to be doing very well. Now they've been married a few years. I'd worked with the wife and just loved her to death, worked with her as an individual. They came in for pre marriage counseling and I'm sharing my four pillars of a connected conversation.

And I'll go through these in this example. So I was talking about, Wanting to just have a low charge example of something that either one of them struggles with at this point in the relationship and I could talk about what the best way to communicate about that I'm going to change this a little bit just to try to maintain some semblance of confidentiality.

, let's say that the wife, , she was the girlfriend at the time shared that there are times when they were going to go do things with her family or his family and she just noticed or felt like he didn't put a lot of effort into his appearance. And this is where I want to say, if you are immediately thinking She seems very judgmental or shallow, I promise you that she's not, this is how she feels.

This is just coming from a place of curiosity because it's not that then she feels like she needs to get dressed like she's going to an elegant gala, but she puts herself together. It looks very presentable. And so since he doesn't, this is truly coming from a place of curiosity. So she shares that and. And so I say, okay, perfect. Let's run this through my four pillars of a connected conversation. Now I'm excited about it because I like this person. I like this girl.

I think this guy seems really cool. And I think this is it. This is a great example of where I can then say, boy, watch what we do when we don't really know what we don't know and watch our immaturity kick up here. And, but I immediately see that he looks a little shocked as if he's never heard this before. and he even said, Oh no, I can do, I can dress up. I can do better. And then I said, Oh, stop right here. So let's break this down. Let's look at the game film.

Here's the four pillars of a connected conversation in action. To him, let's just call him, I don't know what's let's go with the Brady bunch. Let's say Bobby and Cindy. I'm talking to Bobby and Cindy Brady. Although that would be awkward because I guess they were a step brother and sister Okay. Anyway, those are the names Bobby and Cindy.

So let's say that then Cindy is saying, okay, when we're going to go do something, Bobby he appears to not care much about his appearance, or he doesn't really seem to do much. And so often I'll save this because we're going to get into her train of thought in a second. So then I say to Bobby, all right, here's my pre pillar. Before we even get to pillar one of giving someone the benefit of the doubt or assuming these good intentions. There's a reason why your partner is saying this.

You need to separate your observation from your judgment. So he's observing this thing that she is saying. And I guess he's really hearing it, but for the sake of my pre pillar observation judgment, this is part of Marshall Rosenberg's book, nonviolent communications. So he needs to, what does he, if he's observing she's Making this statement about his appearance that the judgment he is putting on that is that she doesn't like me. She thinks I'm a slob.

She's embarrassed to be out in public with me. We need to separate that because the, well, all what he's hearing is her saying she thinks that he doesn't seem to care as much about his appearance and that she's curious about that because then she thinks that then when they're out and about with her family, maybe even his family it's like that song from childhood. One of these things is not like the other, maybe the rest of them look somewhat presentable and I don't know.

It doesn't seem like he's over there looking like an unmade bed. But but again, this is why I'm just grateful that. She's bringing this up because it's something to definitely look at as a muse to talk about. So then separate that observation from judgment and I walk him through that process. Now we can get to pillar one. Assuming good intentions. She's not trying to hurt him and or there's a reason why there's a reason why she's saying that. And so now we're going to start being more curious.

Now, he can't say that she's wrong, or I don't believe her. There's that there's that pillar too. Now he can think that she's wrong. He can even think that, well, I put a, I literally put on a tuxedo everywhere I go. So I don't understand. So that if that's the case, then, Oh, I can understand why he's confused but right now pillar two, he's going to, that's a internal, that's something that he just needs to notice right now.

I can't tell her that's ridiculous or you're wrong, And there's a lot of ways that we break pillar two. Some of those are immediately saying you do it too. Or, well, you don't seem to take a lot of care in what you're putting on. So that is telling that person you are wrong or I don't believe you.

Or if you jump right into, well, when, give me an example, because you can see how that would come off as very defensive and what these four pillars are trying to do is keep a conversation from veering off into the woods, as I like to say, we're trying to stay engaged with the conversation.

And you can see our immaturity is what gets us into these tip for tat all or nothing black or white thinking the pursuer and withdraw the just freeze. And then just wait until the storm of the conversation passes, which then gets us into pillar three, which is questions before comments. So he could assume good intentions, not tell her she's wrong, but then immediately say, Hey, well, you don't even understand.

This is what this was like when I was a kid, because that still feels like I'm telling her, Hey, you're actually wrong. So questions before comments, tell me more. Help me. Help me see my blind spots. And this is where if you are really doing this from a place of curiosity, then give me some examples. Cause I'm still curious to know what that's like for you. Because I want to know you. I want to understand what your experience is.

Pillar four is for him to then not go into any kind of victim mindset, for him to stay present. So let's say that he says, okay, fine. I'm going to give her the benefit of the doubt. I'm assuming good intentions. I'm not going to tell her she's wrong or that I don't believe her. And I'm going to ask questions. Tell me more. What does that look like? Give me examples. Help me see my blind spots. And she gives him some. , and then if he just says, no, yeah, you're right. I don't know.

I don't even know why you're with me because yeah, that's probably pretty embarrassing because then now she has to go rescue him. She then has to say things like, no, it's actually, no, you know what? I don't know why I said it. I don't even know why I brought it up now. That would make him feel better. That would alleviate his discomfort. Sure. But now she is feeling like I don't, I can't bring things up. You can see where even on a low charge topic, the tool I think is so powerful.

These four pillars, there can be a lot of immaturity and a lot of ways to get out of our discomfort in a conversation. So it takes a lot of courage to stay present. And it starts to, you feel some tension and we're so afraid that that tension is going to jump up the contention. And most I think of us in the relationships are somewhat conflict avoidant. We want things to just work out great, but tension is where the growth occurs. Growth comes from that discomfort.

So that's why these tools I think are so important. So in this scenario, if he can stay present and now say, thank you so much for sharing that I can understand why that might be frustrating or even just why you're curious about that, because I'm grateful that you asked me. Wouldn't that just be this amazing way to communicate in your relationship? Now he gets to. Be the speaker. She's the listener and the same rules apply. So now he gets to share. Let me go on my train of thought.

And I remember at that time, it was just something that he just wasn't necessarily as aware of. He talked about growing up in his family and, and there just wasn't as much emphasis put on. And I don't want to make it sound like looking presentable. They didn't just go out looking like cave people and just wearing loincloths and dragging clubs around.

But it was Let's just say that maybe there wasn't as much of an emphasis on this appearance going out or a certain look going out, but what happened first was he did have a hard time hearing it and he did start to shut down and she did say, I shouldn't have brought it up. And he did say, no, I can do better. I can dress up more. And it was such a fascinating experience because I'm just trying to say, Hey, let's talk about a low charge topic. Let me give you this framework.

And I promise you that if you stick to this framework, then you will know so much more about your partner. You will be able to communicate about things because if anything is on your mind, then you have this vehicle that you can then say, Hey, can I tell you something? And the other person says, of course, because I'm assuming good intentions.

Now I'm going to separate my observation from my judgment because if the person then says when you walked by me earlier today actually several times today and didn't look at me, isn't this interesting? I thought you were mad at me. Cause now if the other person can then say again, Oh, I'm, I'm assuming good intention. I'm not going to tell her you're wrong. And I'm going to say, wow, that, yeah when was that? Or what did that look like?

Or I'm curious how, what were you feeling like at that time? Tell me more about that. Then you're going to feel heard and understood. And then he could still have his experience of, honestly, I was just, I was wrapped up in something I was yes, I was on my phone, but I was trying to research something that I thought the, that I thought I really needed to do some research on or so we can both feel heard and understood. But this conversation, did tend to go toward the immature responses.

And my point with this couple was the vibe in the room that I felt was that there was this underlying discomfort and fear , and almost this feeling that they were saying, okay, I don't think this is very helpful. So , when I'm working with people in a, you know, In a premarital setting or in a newlywed setting, I still believe entirely that the tools would be amazing tools to have the four pillars or to understand about differentiation.

I could really spend time with him there and if he's saying, if I'm saying, what are you feeling? I feel embarrassed. I feel ashamed. I feel picked on. I feel scared. Well, those are you. Feelings, which is great because now we're learning here's what differentiation looks like is that when she says these things, here's the emotions and feelings that it brings up for him. Now, if we can get to a place of curiosity, that is amazing.

We can four pillar those things and you really will learn about yourself in the relationship, which is a big goal. So that was a much longer introduction to today's topic than I had intended, but I just wanted to let you know that that's what was so fascinating about hearing Chad and Hannah story. Have Because that's going through my mind and that'll maybe give you some context of the notes that I wrote down.

So I'm just going to go through the notes , and they probably won't seem like they're in order, but I think I think there's some gold here. The first one I put was, you will find what you look for. The the expectation effect or in in the Christian faith seek and ye shall find. And. I know it's not that simple, especially when people have been married for a long time and they're battling their own visceral or gut reactions.

But if I, if my wife wants to find my immaturity, she can find it on a regular basis. And then at that point, If she does that over an extended period of time, then her experience is noticing when I am not being perfect or not showing up. If we are looking for the good in our partner and looking at them with love, with empathy, making that choice, choosing them, then over time what we're seeing are those things about our partner that we really like and we really appreciate.

And whole object relations is a really fascinating concept where that does allow me to view my partner as a whole object that absolutely I can be frustrated with the way maybe they chomp their chips or I don't know, something that they do, but I also love the way that they show up as a parent. I love the way that they help take care of things in the home. I love the way that they're curious I love the things that they do to make the home feel more of a safe place.

But then I can also still notice my frustration, the way that they chomped their chips. And I also jotted down on my notes in the beginning, it's easy to talk about easy things. That was a theme that kept going through my mind in the exciting parts of the relationship, when the relationship is new, we may even say, Oh, here's what I think it will be like when we have kids and the other person can even say me too. I wonder what it will be like here. Maybe this will be a challenge.

But then when you have kids, all of a sudden it's real. And so at that point, It could be a more difficult thing to talk about, and that's really where the growth starts to occur. How do we talk about our differences? How do we talk about these things that we don't know how to talk about, which is where I would love for people to have this foundation already of these four pillars of a connected conversation or understanding these principles of differentiation.

Early in my couple's therapist career. I, and it's funny, I went back to the sticky notes for this interview as I was listening, but I would just jot down things on a sticky note that I thought were fascinating throughout the day. It could be about work. It could be about something I've heard. And I would put that sticky note in my back, right pocket.

And when I would get home, there was always almost always a sticky note in my back, right pocket with a few things that I. could share with my wife. And some of the homework I would give couples at the time was to do something similar and then try to take at least 15 minutes three times a week and make that time intentional to go over a couple of these things that happened in your day and things that show that you were being intentional about wanting to share something with your spouse.

Cody mentioned early on that he was choosing making that choice to spend time together. And I loved the fact that they were already going with this choosing being intentional. I'm choosing you. I'm making time for you because that's where the relationship has a chance to grow and flourish to really get to know each other. I wrote a note.

That said, to be %, 100 percent present when you are together and Hannah then very quickly followed up and said almost the same thing of saying that and when we're together to be intentional. And she talked about putting our phones away and just really being in the moment. And I think that's so powerful, especially for the kids these days, a younger couple like Cody and Hannah. And that would include being able to say no.

Because I think this is where you start looking at some of the origin stories and relationships of the people pleaser, where we want to spend time with our spouse. , and if we have something that we have committed to or need to do, whether it's for work or something we've committed to do , with someone else, a project, is it something that I need to honor that commitment to, to act from a place of integrity. But my fear is that my spouse will then be upset with me. While it's. Absolutely.

An important thing to be intentional and make time to be with each other. And when we're together, we're very present in those moments. But I've noticed over the years that it really is important as a me thing, a personal growth thing, that if I commit to someone, especially to my wife or my kids, that this is what I'll do. I believe that in that moment. A person truly does believe that I am there. I am all in. I will meet you wherever you need me.

I will do the things you're asking because it feels good and I want you to like me. But then let's say that several days later, someone makes me a better offer or, and I see this a lot with, okay, there's an opportunity for me to make money, provide for my family, but I've committed to do this thing for my wife, for my kids. And at that point, then I go ahead and I make the commitment. I'll say, I will do this thing to make money for the family because I know that we need more money.

But then when I go and I express that to my wife, but if this is something that she was counting on, she had built her week around, then a couple of things there. Number one, if I am going to make this other commitment, then I think it's absolutely okay to say, Hey, let me just check with the family. Let me check on the family calendar. Let me just run this by my spouse. And I'm not doing it from a place of saying, Hey, will you give me permission?

Because I don't want my wife to be my mom in that scenario. But I want to have a mature adult conversation and say Hey, tell me more about this On Saturday, because I am, I want to be, I am here for you. I want to be here for you. I'm committed to you. You are my partner. I am choosing you, but I have an opportunity to do this other thing.

And that's where you start to see, you need both people to have that courage to have a, it might be a difficult conversation because if my wife at that point had said, well, I made a bunch of different arrangements, I scheduled, this is why this is important to me. Then that might be my answer. I, man, I hear you and I want to show up for you right now. I see you.

I'm giving her that opportunity to then share her true thoughts and I want to honor my commitments and maybe the growth and the discomfort comes in, well, I need to say no to this person. That is offering me this other opportunity and I'm not doing it just because I'm afraid I'll get in trouble with my wife or I'm not doing it because I want her to say, thank you so much. You're my hero.

I'm doing it because it's the right thing to do if I'm operating from a place of integrity, but I have to have that courage to have an uncomfortable conversation. But I also have to give her a chance because let's say that then I say no to this person who had this opportunity maybe extra money to bring into the family. And I tell the person I can't, I don't, I don't know, I'm worried my wife will be mad at me. You can see the energy there. And also I never gave her a chance to show up.

If I am worried, she'll be mad at me. So therefore I did not say this thing. Then I'm not giving her a chance to even show up and have her own experience, have her own feelings, have her own emotions. I've already made that choice for her, which in that realm, it can be a little bit selfish of me. That I am saying, , I didn't think that you would be okay with that give her the chance to be okay with that, to have that courage, to be able to have that conversation.

Hannah said some amazing things in this interview.

, she just talked about curiosity, being curious about her husband, about Cody. And she said, because, and this was so important. She said, because. I know that things are going to be constantly changing later in the interview. . She said, , you change. because you're going through things. So obviously your spouse is doing the same. And when I was asked to give them some advice later on in the episode, I went back to that point.

And I said how much I appreciated going into a relationship, knowing curiosity is important, but even more so that I will change in a relationship. And of course, my partner will change as well. And I brought this up with Dr. Jeff and Trish, because Trish does a lot of couples coaching.

And we were talking about these shared experiences we have where people come into my office and they say, you've changed as if that's a bad thing, or you're not the person that I thought you were, or that you're not the person that I married 20 years ago. And I say in those sessions well, that's good. I'm glad because hopefully we are evolving and we are changing and we're on this path of learning the things we didn't know that we didn't know.

And I think it goes back to, it's easy to talk about the things that are easy early in a relationship, but then when we go through things in life, just life's all over us and we have kids and financial issues and there's pressures and there's deaths in the family extended. And there's just so many things happening that. We, of course, are going to change those things all become our muses. They become the things that are happening, that we are interacting with to understand ourselves better.

And that's why I think it's so important to have a healthy relationship, to have a partner that then I can come to and say, let me take you on my train of thought when this happened, when this experience happened, when you said this, when my boss said this, when the kids had this experience at school, this is what I'm thinking. This is what it brought up for me. And I've chosen me and I'm okay with where I'm at. What do you think?

I want to hear your opinion because now we're two completely different individuals going through life together. We've chosen each other. And of course, we're gonna have different experiences. So now we're gonna, we're going to communicate about these issues. I go back to this phrase I learned in emotionally focused therapy for couples trainings that were designed to deal with emotion in concert with another human that we are this dyadic collaborative union. That's the hope. That's the goal.

But if I say something and my partner becomes immediately offended and they then try to point out things that they think I am doing wrong, I'm just being me.

I'm expressing myself. This is the very first time that it is me going through life as me. So check this out. This is what I'm thinking. This is how I'm feeling. And I want to share that with you. I want us to be able to express these things together.

So curiosity, constantly changing with that acceptance, having the tools, being able to show up and have these, this adult mature conversations with one another is the goal.. They talked about meeting on hinge. And I just wrote out a note where I said, online dating, who do I need to be versus even older old school online dating where you filled out a 30 page questionnaire. And so did everyone else on the site.

And then the sites would make their money in the success of their algorithm to, to match people together because they had so much data. , I went with my old joke of the online dating world. Now it is puzzling to me Because, and I've, I've never been, I've never had a dating profile. I've been married 34 years. But I've worked with so many people going through, I've helped people create their dating profiles.

I've taken pictures in my own office of people where that's part of the helping them grow through their discomfort to then give them to, to work on their dating profile. I've had more sessions, individual sessions. Where we've talked about dating profiles, people showing up for dates with people that they met on these dating apps. I guess I'm trying to say here are my credentials. So hear me, but the dating apps to me are three pictures and they need to have one by a waterfall.

You must have one and you have to get ahold of a golden retriever and he needs to be wearing a red bandana and maybe a little name tag that says scout or buddy or skipper. I don't know, but you're excited to be with him and you're in the outdoors. Maybe you've been throwing a stick or a tennis ball.

And then there's one where you are holding your little adorable niece or nephew and I don't know, maybe even you're blowing some bubbles or a dandelion something that is exiting a bubble or dandelion thing. And then you have. A couple of movie quotes and there's your profile. No 30 pages of let me tell you what my junior year of high school physics and the frustrations it brought me, but it's. It's movie quotes and pictures.

It sets the table for someone to show up and try to figure out who they need to be to get this other person to like them. I think it feeds this narrative of emotional immaturity of the false self. And now it's a game of you go first. What do you like? Oh, I like baseball. Then I get to say, I love baseball. And they say, who's your favorite team? And all of a sudden, if I don't like baseball, I'm thinking, I don't even really remember what the team names are. I don't want to say the wrong one.

So I say, well, who do you like? And they say the Dodgers. And then you say, oh my goodness, I love the Dodgers. And then they say, who is your favorite player? And I say, honestly, it's hard for me to choose. Who do you like? Well, I like these two players. I like the second one. And I think that we're doing that.

And we mean well, because we don't know what we don't know. And the people that are showing up in those situations they like this person. So they, I imagine in those moments are thinking, I will learn to like baseball because I like this person. I brought this up to Cody and Hannah, and they were wonderful about this. Cody is a huge baseball guy.

Hannah said that she Admitted and acknowledged that she does not know about baseball, but she's curious because if he seems so passionate about it, then she wants to know more. She doesn't already have to know more. And Cody spoke very well to this saying that he also felt like it was difficult to be authentic in the online dating world now. And people do show up and try to. Hit the algorithm so they will get in front of more people.

So more people might swipe on them and say yes, so then they can go out on more dates. And then there's a good version of that where then I'm in this dating pool, I call it being in the laboratory and I'm gathering data about, Oh, I had a hard time really stating my opinion or being myself versus, Oh, I continued to stay. Confident.

I continue to stay emotionally consistent, but then the other person had a problem, but it can be really difficult because of the rejection that people face in that scenario. So I can understand that that can be difficult. I liked where Cody was going with that. And it sounds like they had a good experience with that. They talked about. When they said, I love you and here, we're just going to buzz through a lot of these. We're going to do a speed round.

They said it took them two to three months to say, I love you. , and I thought that was fascinating because there are people that say I love you after a week. And there are people that they're months in and still coming into my office and saying, I don't know when to say, I love you. And a lot of times their partner is saying it, but then they just say, I'm not really sure.

And that's a fascinating conversation to have, because what we're looking at now is things like, what is your definition of love? Do you feel like it is just the euphoric feeling of feel good chemicals, or is it something more? Do you feel like that is a serious commitment? And I'm not sure if I'm ready to make that while some people can. Somewhat and I, in my mind, I think of it of giving away the, I love you phrase because to them, it, it means, all right, we are locked in now.

Exploring that different meaning of what it means to say, I love you is interesting. Here's one that I thought was fascinating to Cody and Hannah like this. Hannah said that Cody would ask, Hey, what are you thinking about , there are multiple versions of. Why we do that their versions of that where there's almost this form of projection that if I want her to ask me what I'm thinking about, then I'm going to ask her what she's thinking about.

So am I asking because I'm truly curious or am I asking because then she will say something and then she knows to now say, what are you thinking about? So now I can express my feelings. And that's one I have seen often in my office, and I know that I have been that guy as well. That is a more emotionally immature version versus, Hey, can I share something with you? That was interesting. Cody had this rule out , he said, , I'm going to wait a year. And he said, it's hard set.

I will date a year before we get married, before we get engaged. And this was a really interesting part of the interview, because this is an absolutely, I love Dr. Jeff and Tricia, but they were Both they know Cody and Hannah and I thought it was really fascinating that they were both saying we knew we knew you wouldn't wait because of who Hannah was and I know they're saying it because she's an amazing human being. They know Cody and his family really well. And so it's fun. It's easy.

It's nice to say, I knew, I knew you guys were locked in before, maybe even before you did, because we do want to, it makes us feel good. And it often makes the person we're talking to feel better as well. So I just, I'm making a note of that. But what I loved was Cody had said, this is this hard set rule, but let's break that down a little bit. So he's saying, I need to set this arbitrary timeframe before I'm going to do this thing that I've never done before marriage.

And I don't even know the person yet that I will put into this, Arbitrary timeframe.

This is where I think the world of acceptance and commitment therapy comes in strong with psychological flexibility to know that I can set this goal of, all right, I am going to wait a year, but I don't even know what that will look like. I don't know what it'll look like at nine months, 10 months. And I don't even know what that will feel like. It's the great unknown. So I'm accepting the fact now that, that might change, but I would love to make it to that year. Now, why?

Because is it the, I got to see all the seasons? I want to say cliche, but that's fair. Why a year? Is it arbitrary? maybe you had a visitation from someone one evening and you can't share it. And the person said, if you don't make it through a year, then I don't know, you'll be destitute. But if I can make it to a year, but I can't tell anybody, I haven't run into that yet, but I guess technically I wouldn't because the person wouldn't be able to tell me.

Psychological flexibility is just knowing that, Oh, check this out. I wanted to wait a year, but I didn't, I wasn't with Hannah and I didn't know things would go this well. And so , I'm gonna relax that boundary. Tricia asked, how did you know that she was the right person for you? And this was great. Again Cody listed a lot of wonderful qualities. He said, I was looking for someone who was this and this and this and this. And so therefore. I deemed that she was those things.

And so then I knew and understand that this is my 20 years as a marriage therapist, just looking at this from a place of fascination. They did nothing wrong. Of course, that's what they are saying. That's how they are feeling. That's what happened. This is just me sharing that it's somewhat adorable to then we want confirmation. We want certainty. We want to know we made the right decision. We will often then say, Oh, this is, I knew that I knew it because of these things.

Is that something we're doing and as we move past the decision to then say, okay, I can't just say this is the decision I'm making based on the data I have right now. So good luck. We'll see how this goes versus no. That is when I knew that I made the right decision because. The right and wrong principle is so fascinating. I had my, in my Pathback online pornography group, which go to pathbackrecovery. com or reach out to me at , , contact. tonyoverbay. com. I'll give you a coupon code.

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I'll give you a coupon code, but we just spent an entire evening on one of the group calls talking about acceptance and commitment therapy, because I'm, I just said the year of 2025, this is something people must learn because it is. It starts from the place of I'm okay. I don't have automatic negative thoughts. I don't have stinking thinking. I just think and I feel because I'm me and I'm going through life for the very first time. So check that out.

And with that, there was a little bit of a debate about someone saying, well, I don't want to do the wrong thing. I'm going to do a thing, and then if everyone is happy with the thing, or I'm happy with the thing, then I did the right thing. But if somebody says, I don't like that thing you did, it's natural for us to feel like, oh man, I did the wrong thing. I blew it. You didn't blow it. You did the thing. You did it.

Now we can look with curiosity at, let's look at all the variables around why you did that thing that you did. again, these sticky notes are in no particular order. This one, I wrote a note. Cody wasn't looking for love, so he could be more authentic. And I really like this concept. If I'm going into the dating world, or I'm going into relationships, accepting the fact that I may not find love, then I'm not trying to figure out what to do. Um, what do I need to do to find love?

What am I looking for to know that I love her? She loves me versus I'm going in being my authentic self. And that means that I might have answers to questions that she may not appreciate and that's okay. We gotta have our differences because that's going to be a much more solid start to a healthy relationship. This was interesting and I will continue to say I love Tricia and Jeff. Tricia said. Hannah talked about a great sacrifice that Cody made.

He had been apparently accepted to medical school back in the East coast. She was in her, it sounds like going to law school where they were. He turned down this medical school back East so that he could stay and spend time with Hannah and get married. And so she said it was such a sacrifice. And I love that Tricia is such a positive person. And she said, I don't really think that that was a big sacrifice. And it's just interesting because. That's where I love the curiosity.

Hey, tell me more about that sacrifice. Cody, was that a sacrifice for you? Because often when we are telling someone, even when it sounds great, well, yeah, but I don't think that you handled that wrong. Even if I said, you know, I'm worried that that wasn't my best, the best me showing up. And if somebody said, Oh, you don't even need to worry about that. You were great. That sounds good. But then I was just told that my feelings and emotions were wrong.

So I know I'm putting more into this than it was. And Tricia is such a nice person that if she listens to this episode, Tricia, you did a great thing saying, I don't think it was a big sacrifice, but. Cody may have felt like it was, Hannah might've felt like it was. And so I love the concept of being curious about that. And that led to, I guess I will be the equal opportunity offender. Cause Jeff just said some really good things after Cody mentioned that he was putting Hannah first.

And Jeff said that it's so important to put each other first. And he had talked about that. In his more emotionally immature days that he had put himself in his career first. And I just, that's such an interesting thing because I, that's, it goes back to, is that something that just needs to happen over time is to learn that you do need to acknowledge and put your needs first because I'm the only one That over time is going to take care of me.

When I am okay, when I raise my emotional baseline, , when I feel like I'm operating from my best self, when I love me, then I can fully love you because I'm not trying to figure out how do I get you to love me? Because I don't feel like I love myself.

And this is where it can be so difficult because Early in a relationship, if I'm telling, I most likely wouldn't say you must put yourself first because it's going to sound selfish so that's one that I think is as difficult to communicate early in a relationship, because right now I would imagine people hearing this are having a lot of, yeah, butts. Oh yeah. But if you put yourself first, , And now we go all or nothing.

Well, then you're not thinking of the other person and you're selfish and you're a narcissist. And then nobody can count on you. And you're just going to do your own thing. And the next thing, you know, you're going to be living in this van down by the river and doing all kinds of. Yeah.

Bad things. In reality, what it is is it's saying that, okay, if I'm feeling emotionally overwhelmed or I'm exhausted and I need some time for myself to recover and to raise my emotional baseline and I don't advocate for myself, then I am giving up myself in order to try to please others or to fill others cups. At the expense of my own. And if I do that over a period of time, I lose myself. I don't know who I am. It's so important to find yourself, your sense of self.

What are the things that you like? What are the things that you want to do? And I think Cody then followed that up with a very emotionally mature comment where he said that over time, he recognizes that. He is going to need new things, new excitements, new passions, learn new things because he said that will reinvigorate you as an individual. And then he can share those new things with his spouse, with Hannah.

And hopefully Hannah's doing the same thing and she can share those with Cody, which right now I told them that sounds so amazing. And I stopped short of saying, when are you guys going to go buy the unicorn? And have you already seen your leprechaun? Because it just sounds like that's ideal. It's perfect because it is in. But what happens is over time, if I am not putting myself first, if I'm not engaging in self care, it is not selfish. I'm so sorry if that is a message you've been told.

I have so many stories of And a lot of them are in, I can tell you in a, I can think of one recently that was in more of a religious context where a wife who was a fantastic athlete and the competition and the, it kept her driven and helped her take care of herself and helped her exercise and helped her focus on her diet. And she showed up better for her kids. But then one of her religious leaders he just told her she is. Being selfish. She is not setting an example for her kids.

There's no curiosity there. There's nothing but shame being projected onto her that you, what you were doing is wrong. And it almost destroyed this person self care is not selfish. Self care helps you show up better. It helps you be the very best version of yourself. It helps you discover your own values. And if you, if we go back to this religious setting, you're God given talents and abilities. So there's a parable of the talents. Do not bury them when you're, using them, you discover more.

That's, that is a concept of the more I am choosing me and I'm interacting with the world, the more I can learn about myself and the more I can bring to the table in my relationships and my family. But if I am just looking to fill everybody else's cup, I will lose myself and over time that. body keeps the score, the trauma response I will start to break down. I will start to have chronic pain.

I will start to have migraines and back pain and fibromyalgia, and I will have irritable bowel syndrome and I will be fatigued. And that is your body telling you, in my opinion, that you can't keep doing this, what you're doing.

And when people get out of bad relationships or when they start to self advocate and raise their emotional baseline, do things that just bump up their baseline, even just a little bit each day or every week, then they feel better about themselves and they show up as a better human being. And then it might be difficult because. Typically that person is in a relationship and the reason why they've been giving so much is because people are willing to take.

And that is unfortunate because then when that person who has been the giver has needs and they show up and they express them, it isn't like everybody in the family system says, Oh my gosh, now we get to be here for you. No, now all of a sudden it threatens. That they may not have somebody that's going to take their anxiety, take their anger, take their frustration, show up and save them. Then they push buttons to get that person back into that one down position.

That goes right back to this concept of pathological kindness. Kindness is an amazing, wonderful thing. I want those who, feel like kindness is a value. Kindness is in their bones and their DNA. That's an amazing thing. Please do not try and take that out of you. See where it has become pathological, where it has become detrimental to your health. And that's an area to work on.

That's an area to shore up some boundaries and boundaries are difficult because when the pathologically kind person sets a boundary and again, not an ultimatum If you are saying, I just need you guys to not do this anymore, they know now, oh, that's an important button to push, whether it's conscious or subconscious, to put you in that one down position again so I can continue to get my needs met, boundary is, hey, if you guys are doing this, then I am going to withdraw,

then I am going to take care of myself. It's a me thing and know again that boundaries will be pushed, especially by the immature, especially by the narcissistic person. And by nature, every little kid is a narcissist. They are very self centered and egotistical. So . They want their needs to be met in order for them to survive.

That's why when a kid cries at the store and they want the toy desperately, then they amp up the volume more and more and they throw a fit and they make you just feel so embarrassed that then what do you say at times? Well, there goes my boundary. Okay. Just this one time. And that makes me feel better because in my mind, I'm saying it really is just this one time from this day forward. He's not getting that toy to the kid though. They got the toy mission accomplished.

Now I know I really got to amp things up if I want this toy. So next time I'm prepared. I know the drill boundaries are tough. Boundaries are a me thing. Boundaries are easier when you raise your emotional baseline, when you take care of yourself. , and one more note , what is difficult is when people show up and they start talking about their new interests, their new hobbies, maybe their new friend.

, if you as the spouse feel immediately threatened, I understand, I hear you, but that is a you thing. Is it because you haven't taken the time to develop friendships, the relationships to, to develop? Have self care. And if right now you're saying you don't understand, I can't, I don't have a minute in my day, then the difficulty, the discomfort might be me needing to ask for help. And now here come the yeah, buts of, yeah, but I don't want to bother anybody or yeah, but okay. You know what?

It's not as big of a deal right now. But if you're losing your sense of self, if you are feeling overwhelmed and overstimulated and just feeling like all I'm doing is just existing day by day, then get help. See somebody because that is where your body is telling you, craving for you to figure this out. It wants to live. The brain is a don't get killed device. Think we have one more. This was beautiful.

When Hannah was talking about as you change, and of course your spouse is going to too, she said you get to find new reasons to stay married, to choose him. And she said she knows, and it is a cliche, but it's a very good one, because love is a choice. It's an active choice. It's something that you, in a good relationship, in a healthy relationship, you're doing every day. You're choosing you, and what do you need to do to make you the best version of you?

So that you can show up and choose your family, choose your spouse. And that, that goes back into even the expectation effect. What am I looking for in my spouse? If I want to find all the little faults, no problem. That one's pretty easy, actually. If I want to look for the good and I want to be and I want to choose this person on a daily basis, Then that is what I'm doing. I've chosen me. Now I'm making that choice to choose you.

And I didn't go all in today on talking about differentiation and the four points of balance in the work of David Schnarch, which is amazing . , and you can find other episodes where I've talked about it.

And I'm, I want to go through and just break down those four points of balance again in a future episode, because they're so important because part of that, me learning how to choose myself, the differentiation concept in and of itself is I'm going to be in a relationship because I desire connection. It's one of our most basic needs, but also another one of those needs is to find myself, to develop autonomy and.

It sounds almost like a paradox, but I'm going to learn about myself and who I am in this relationship through this relationship, but it's not me needing that person to validate me or make me feel good. But in my interactions with this person, I'll learn what are the things I need to do to validate myself and to feel better about myself. So that I can choose this person and they choose me. And now we have these amazing experiences. So we'll cover that on a future episode.

Thanks everybody. This was a bit impromptu. I highly recommend that you go find the Q and a files with Tricia, Dr. Jeff and me, wherever you listen to podcasts. I think there's about 50 episodes out at the time of this taping and look for this episode with Hannah and Cody. And if you want to go listen to it now, , it will make more sense. And as always, if you have questions, marriage questions, individual questions, parenting questions, please send them in.

And I will use, I will use those on future episodes. And I just appreciate everybody who listens. I'm grateful that you're here taking us out per usual. It's a wonderful, the talented roar Florence with her song. It's wonderful because it is have an amazing week and I will see you next time on the virtual couch.