EPS 125 - This is my 3rd year anniversary for "The Extraordinary Marriage" and I'm excited to share with you our 1st episode. Enjoy!
Welcome to The Extraordinary Marriage. I'm Connie, and this is my husband, Jeff. Hi, everybody. And today we are recording the very first episode of the Extraordinary Marriage podcast. And we had a request. Someone asked that we talk about all the different stages of marriage. And so we're just going to begin. We're going to have a conversation, and we hope that you enjoy this today. And if you do,
Please subscribe. Please share it with your friends because the month of November 2023 is when we launched this podcast. And how many people listen matters. My younger son actually told me that he would listen to it on replay over and over while he was sleeping at night. Was that a compliment? I'm not sure. Anyway, so today we're gonna start out with actually talking about.
Our own families and how we grew up just a little bit because this is just a 30-minute podcast. All right. So I'm gonna start out. And basically, I grew up in North Carolina. I had a sister, I had a mom and a dad. And you know, it was through those early years that you know my mom taught me good manners and to care for other people, to be thoughtful of people. you know, it is our moms that teach us.
what's right and what's wrong most of the time. Now to for some families they say, you know, when the kids misbehaving, it's wait till your father gets home. But for my mom, it was, hey, she took care of it herself. So guess what? When my kids came along, I took care of it myself too. Instead of leaving it for my husband to have to, you know, scold and discipline the kids. Well, maybe until they got to be teenagers, right? But so basically I grew up with a sister, no brothers.
And my family moved from North Carolina to California whenever I was eight years old. And, you know, all the things of childhood really mold who we are. And when I was a teenager, sophomore in high school, my dad was moved. He worked for JCPenney's. He was moved to Georgia. And that is where I am now. And that's where I met my husband. And that's where my whole life really has begun as far as my family goes.
EPS. 1 Early Years Extraordinary Marriage (02:23.244)
And did I say that we had been married 44 years? Yeah. And let me tell you, you know, it doesn't seem like that. I remember when I was married seven years and somebody had been married 44 years. And I thought, my gosh. Well, let me tell you, you know, you change on the outside a little bit, but not so much on the inside, except you get a little bit wiser. So Jeff, tell us a little bit about your family and how you grew up.
Well, I grew up in military family. My dad was in the Marine Corps. And for the first 20 plus years of of their marriage and my first 15, 16 years of life, I was in a military family. And I had three brothers, and we lived all over the place because in the military, every three years they moved you somewhere else. And so I ended up in Georgia when my dad retired. His family was originally from Dallas, Georgia, so we moved back here.
And we lived over in the South Atlanta area. And it was during that time that I had the pleasure of going to North Clayton Senior High School. And I met my lovely bride there. And then we had more life that came after that. But your dad was a Marine. And so that meant that you really moved a lot often. Yeah. And you know, there's probably somebody out there that has had to move often. I think that whenever you move a lot, I think it helps you.
be more comfortable meeting new people and that kind of thing. Would you say that? it's you become e it becomes easier to make new friends because of you know, just because of life and all the different things there. So yes. Well I know when I was a kid, I was really bashful. And really for years as an adult, I was still bashful. A lot of times people didn't think I was, but I really was very bashful or
Know intimidated when I met new people and that kind of thing. And I have to say for you, I really haven't ever known you to be that way. I'm sure I was somewhere along the line. But the I remember the hardest thing I had was when we first started dating was to actually pull information out of you because sometimes you would claim it up. I think that's taking us a little farther ahead than we're supposed to go right now. Sorry. pulling information from a
EPS. 1 Early Years Extraordinary Marriage (04:43.168)
Okay, so we'll go ahead and share that story since you said that, but then I'm gonna backtrack. Okay. And this is our first podcast together. Basically, when I've been doing recordings the last four years for blogs, I literally did them all by myself. Nobody in the room, nobody in the house. If if Jeff was here, then I said, Can you please go up to your room so that I can I can have so I can have full focus while I'm recording? Because let's face it.
You know, it's not really a comfort zone, but as long as there was nobody actually looking at me, like I was okay with that. So, all right. So, like I said, this is his first one doing this, and here we're doing it side by side. So it's a little different for him and it's a little different for me. Well, and the reason he says that when we started dating, I was one of those who kind of clammed up, you know. I don't like confrontation. And so
You know, if I was bothered about something, I just didn't say anything at all. But there was one point whenever we were dating that my mom really liked Jeff because he was that, you know, nice guy. And so she really liked him. And after we had dated for a little bit, our first date literally, he wouldn't dance. excuse me, we went to the homecoming dance, but he would slow dance. He wouldn't fast dance because he didn't know how to fast dance. But you know, I was young and
I didn't think about the fact that he might not know how or he might not be comfortable because I had danced since I was six years old. I taught ballet and jazz, and I loved to dance. I bet somebody's relating to me on that. The fact that, you know, you love to dance and your spouse is like so uncomfortable with it that they will not dance. And so actually we broke up and we quit dating at that point. So see that led us somewhere else, didn't it? We quit dating, but
At one point later, so this was even later when we were dating another time a second time, our senior year in high school, I was ready to break up with him. And my mom said, Why? And I said, Well, we don't go anywhere anymore. He just comes to the house and we don't do any fun stuff. And you know, I guess I had just gotten a little bored or restless. Maybe it wasn't quite love yet, right?
EPS. 1 Early Years Extraordinary Marriage (07:06.062)
Because I was like, I'm really not having any fun. And so I think that I'm gonna break up with him. Boy, this could take us from one story to the next to the next. That's for sure. But basically, my mom said to him when he came in, and she actually was a person who didn't butt into my business. But when he came in, she said, I think Connie has something that she needs to talk to you about.
And may I say I gave her a look that I didn't get reprimanded for later. Normally a look like that would have got me in trouble. But I gave her a look because I thought, what? And so my parents went upstairs and left us in the den. And there we were. And he's looking at me saying, What? And I'm like, nothing, nothing, nothing. Anybody else do that?
And let's just say that the my mild-mannered boyfriend, he was very supportive, easy going, smiling, laughing, let's just say he got angry at me. And yeah, he got angry and so I started to talk. And when I started to talk, it all came out. And guess what? He was a good listener. and
He hasn't been able to shut me up. He hasn't been able to shut me up since. So well, I'm gonna I'm just gonna touch on our high school part then because we're actually really backing up, you know, on this. but we met in high school and we met in course because we are both musicians. And so I sing and and he sings and plays the piano.
And so we've had that in common all of these years, but we met in chorus. And you know, that wasn't the simplest easy story, but I like to tell a story about when we when we first met, there was a friend who introduced us and I'm gonna let you show your part first. Susan. yeah, I mean, we were in course together and I don't I have to be honest, I don't remember Susan introducing us, but I'll take it over then.
EPS. 1 Early Years Extraordinary Marriage (09:18.38)
Okay. Thanks. I was supposed to leave. Okay. So I was sitting at lunch and I had a friend named Susan in high school. And so she had walked over to me in the lunchroom because probably we're going to sit together to eat lunch. And she said, Hey, Connie, let me introduce you to Jeff. And I looked up. Yeah. And so I looked up and I I see this big smiling guy. Like maybe he just got his braces off or something. I'm not sure. Did you have braces? It was that big goofy, you know, I just got my braces off look.
And he's looking at me and he's smiling so big. Yes, I do like smiles, but he was looking so goofy. So I thought, well, well, hi Jeff. And so I just spoke to him. I thought, he kind of looks goofy. Why is he looking at me like that? He probably was a little goofy, but anyway. Anyway. So later on, I saw him in Korra's class because I hadn't noticed him before. I saw him in Koris class and he was playing the piano.
And so since I like music, piano, dance, my mom played the piano. I thought, he plays the piano. And I thought, wow, that's pretty cool. So it kind of switched me up a little bit. So do you remember thing from that day when we first met, now that I said that? I just I remember in the the lunchroom when Susan introduced you to me, that I thought, wow, she's really pretty. And but I was a little bashful, believe it or not.
We all get bashful. And that smile was that smile was that my smile saying, Hey, I'm glad to meet you. I'm really nervous at this moment. And you know, that type thing. So the thing that most teenage boys go through. Yeah. To relate, I guarantee it. And most girls too. Like, you know, the the times you're at the dance and you're a wallflower wanting to dance and there's no one asking you. And then years later, some guy says, I wanted to ask you to dance, but everybody's so bashful back then, right?
Who knows? All right. So I'm gonna fast forward a little bit. So so we went to high school our junior and our senior year. He had moved here from North Carolina at that time. Yeah, because his dad was a Marine and he was always moving. And I had just moved here from California. And and so, like I said, we met in chorus. Well, we enjoyed our course years together and we were in a group actually I'll tell our age, won't it?
EPS. 1 Early Years Extraordinary Marriage (11:43.65)
I think 44 years still are age anyway. Madrigal singers. Yes, we were in the madrigals together. It was a special group that was chosen to sing together. And it was like maybe what, 10 or 12, 8, 12? There was 12 of us total. Okay. He has a better memory than me. So there was like 12 people. We had our special little outfits. There were those satiny looking outfits. I can't remember what the guys look like. maybe we won't go there.
Thanks. But anyway, and it was the celebration of 200 years. 1776 to 1976. And that means it was 1976. Right. Yeah. So we did a lot of stuff together through that madrigals group. We had extra rehearsals and different things like that. And at the end of our senior year, we started to date. So that's when we started dating seriously.
And maybe I'll tell our earlier story at another time, but okay, so we started dating seriously there. So into school, he goes off to college. We did have a breakup because his parents were like, Hey, you need to like cut your strings and be free because you might meet somebody at school, right? So we kind of cut those strings and or he got those strings. I was devastated.
And a few months later, then he wrote me a letter and said he wanted to get back together. And so that is where the story starts. So shortly after that, after we dated several years, we were engaged to get married. And I want to tell our chicken story. And you know, sometimes we I think the male, the male species has to kind of think, show their macho-ness or that they know how to do everything, right, hun? No, but
Okay. All right. Before you get into the details of that, all right. Just so you know, I worked at a restaurant and I really thought I knew what I was doing. Now go ahead. I don't think I ever heard that before. Yeah. It's the truth. Did you cut chickens where you were? At at Bonanza, we did all kinds of stuff. Meat and You did steaks. Yeah. Whatever. Go ahead. I thought I knew, just for the record. yeah. It's the male thing. I guarantee you it's the male thing. Okay. So
EPS. 1 Early Years Extraordinary Marriage (13:59.816)
I was like a a person who I learned from my dad to make good use of money, you know, and make it you know, stretch a dollar and all that kind of stuff. So I we saw some chickens on sale at the store and whole chickens. You know, this was back in the day where you didn't get debone chicken at a great price at Sam's, right? So all your chickens, I mean, it was a lot if you bought chicken breast on the bone, right? So back in that day we
We ate whole chickens and everybody got a piece, right? So there was a great price on chickens. I can't exactly remember how much it was. Do you have any idea? No, it was it was cheap, a lot cheaper than maybe like 69 cent a pound or something real cheap. I don't know. You know, somebody could look that up from 1979. How much was chicken in 1979? So I'm like, gosh, they're really a great price. And we can put them in my mom's mom and dad's freezer.
But I don't even know how to cut them up. You know, you wanna, I was thinking cutting them up before you put them in the freezer. I don't know why we didn't just cook them the way they were, but whatever. That's the thought I had. So I didn't know how to cut them up. And guess what he said? I know how to do it. It sounded like you said I don't know how to do it. I I know how to do it. That's what you said. I know I know how to do it. I'm like, you do? Great. I've seen it. So we bought 10.
Chickens. Chickens. Pin whole chickens. And one day we were in my mom's kitchen, who didn't like for me to make a mess. we put we took out all 10 of these chickens and I gave him a big knife and we started cutting on them. And at first I watched him cut on the big chickens, on the chickens, and then I said, Are you sure you know how to cut chickens? yes, I know how to cut chickens. Yeah. Well, we quickly found out that Jeff didn't know how to cut chickens.
I am not a butcher. So we had chickens all over the counter, chopped to the pieces. Like, yeah, legs or legs and something else. And yeah, we had the biggest mess of chickens. So that is one of the funniest things. And one of the first things where I realized that guys like to tell you they know how to do things. They don't like to say, I don't know how to do that. But girls, we do that. We're like, well, we don't know how to do that. But
EPS. 1 Early Years Extraordinary Marriage (16:24.3)
Well, in all honesty, most of the time guys do know how or at least something about what they're talking about. So anyway. But I didn't at night, evidently. I thought I knew, but I sure didn't. I found out the hard way. See, here's now here's my words nowadays. I use this all the time. It is what it is, right? Yeah. It was. Yeah. Your mom was not happy with us, by the way. I don't remember that part.
We did not clean like she cleaned, that's for sure. But anyway. no, no. I didn't remember the clean it up, just the cutting them up. That's all I remember. Yeah. Maybe we didn't clean it up. that would have meant no wonder. That would have got me in trouble. Okay. So so we got married, and in that first year and a half, suddenly we found ourselves expecting. So I think we were like nine months we'd been married. Yeah, nine months we had been married, and I found out I was expecting.
Let's clarify that, right? Anyway, and so when I had to go to the doctor, because I didn't go to the doctor at first because I did several of those little tests and they always came out negative. So I'm like, it's okay, it's okay. And so then I had to go to the doctor, of which I'd never been to the women's doctor before. No, I hadn't. And I was sitting in the little office and there was all these girls sitting around the around me in the in the doctor's office, and they were all waiting for their little test to come back, you know, and I was sitting there.
And I kind of had my head down. And and the nurse said, Well, Miss Durham, you're due on October 13th. Although I didn't hear that, I suddenly realized I had heard the word Miss Durham. And if anybody knows me, lots of times I don't hear what somebody says, and it takes me a second to get back in there. You know, I'm thinking about something. So I looked up and all these women sitting all around the room against the wall.
Raw looking at me, smiling. And I said, Were you talking to me? And she said, Yes, Miss Durham, you're due October 13th. And I was like, suddenly I felt this hot rush of heat go all over me. I just about felt like I was gonna pass out. I thought, my gosh, no, this was not planned. No, it wasn't planned. But we had started our family.
EPS. 1 Early Years Extraordinary Marriage (18:47.692)
Yeah, well, you know what? And I probably would have been one of those that waited forever to get around to having babies because I knew I wanted to have a family. But to be honest, you know, I was a dancer. I taught ballet at night and and I was still going to college and I was working and we were busy and we were from paycheck to paycheck and all that kind of stuff. So who would even think of such a thing?
Besides, that's a really big decision to carry a baby for nine months, right? Absolutely. Yeah, it is. Can I tell my side of that story? Sure. I might not have heard it. Okay. The so I get this phone call at work and I could tell she was worried. You know, it's kind of like you know, one of those phone calls that you get and you think, okay, all right, what's going on? What we I went to the doctor today. Okay, well, what happened? Well, we're expecting. Really? That was my response.
Awesome, you know, and so she tells me all the information and she tells me the story about her being in the waiting room. And then when I hang up the phone from her, I'm just like on cloud nine, I'm just busted. I told everybody in my office right around me that my wife is expecting. I was so excited. And then I went and I ran around all of inventory management, which is I worked for APHIS at that time, and I worked, I ran around inventory management telling everybody I knew that my wife is expecting I was going to be a dad.
I mean, I was pumped. She was a little bit less pumped than I was, but like I said, I had to carry a baby for nine months I wasn't carrying and deliver it. You know, it's got to go from the belly. It's like it's got to appear in the world. It's like, wow, that's big. That is really big. And you know what? I don't think I ever heard that. And that's what I realized that as we do this podcast, the first of the month together, that I I might hear things.
I haven't heard before. And to be honest, I was so nervous today because it is different when you're recording with somebody else. That's cool. That's so awesome to hear that. Well, it was a great day. Well, I was gonna be a dad. And I was like, my gosh, I'm gonna be a mom. That's from two different perspectives, right? Exactly. and marriage is full of different perspectives. And I'll just add this: as I've been sharing in the last four years in blogs.
EPS. 1 Early Years Extraordinary Marriage (21:07.37)
So often our perspectives are so different and we don't realize there's another perspective because we only know what we felt and what happened to us in our world. And we forget about that with our spouse that they took that a whole nother way and they had a whole nother experience. You're at work and I was in the doctor's office. Exactly. Wow. Well, I'm gonna then move forward to you know, sometimes how we we deal with frustration.
And when we were first married, first of all, like I said, Jeff is pretty easygoing and he's mild mannered and he's a gentleman, he's kind hearted, and he really doesn't lose his temper very often. Really, this is true. Did you know some people lose their temper all the time, and that's in their DNA? Well, he doesn't lose his temper, and I'm still very blessed to have married someone who doesn't have a bad temper. But sometimes he would get mad at me about something.
And he's a bit indirect. So he doesn't just tell me. And so, you know, I don't know what it is. And so when we were first married and he would start to get irritated with me, I would start to giggle. And I would start to laugh. And so I would know that I had made him mad, bothered, mad, bothered about something. And so I would start to laugh. And not to be like silly or or on purpose. It's like.
That was my defense mechanism. Evidently, I would start to giggle. And so, you know, when I would start to giggle, first he'd look like he was really mad. And then he would start laughing with me. Great diffuser, by the way. He would start laughing with me. So let me interject in right here that we have a code word that you're gonna know more about at the end of this podcast.
And the code word today that you're going to use is called is laugh. Okay. The code word is laugh. And I'm going to tell you more about that at the end. So during this time, like I mean, it would happen every so often because he was doing a lot. He was going to he was working full time, he was going to college at night. and I think you were even playing the organ at church at that point. So he was doing a lot of different things. And you know, this is the first time in life you gotta like.
EPS. 1 Early Years Extraordinary Marriage (23:33.058)
Take care of your family and pay the bills and do all of that kind of stuff. So sometimes that brings on a bit of stress. Another thing that he did to help out with stress, because you know, we all diffuse stress differently, was he would get really mad at me and he would go and play the piano. So
You want to tell a little bit about that, or is it really from my perspective of watching you bang on the piano and go fast and hard because you are getting out your frustration on the piano? Sometimes I did that. I mean, sometimes the music is supposed to be that way, but you know, when you play a Tarantella or you tell do something like that, then it's supposed to be like that, which is a great hiding feature. So you say, Well, that's the way the music's written. So it doesn't matter if you're pounding, but.
Sometimes it's good just to go take frustration out on the piano or piano. Well, actually, and since then I've learned that he does everything fast and hard to the best of his ability. And so yeah, but he he doesn't have much temper. And I really don't have much temper until you press my button or I'm in a bad mood or I'm tired or that kind of thing. So then, you know, my buttons are pressed a little bit quicker. Do you
Can you think of anything on that? I didn't ask you before. And I have one more thing on you. That's not fair, is it? Sure. Go ahead. That I'm leading, and then you didn't get a chance, like well, I just said something about the piano. It's okay. I know. I I don't I mean like to share something on me, like, well, here's what she did when she was mad. Don't think Well, I'm sure sometime in the future it'll come to my mind and I'll Okay, this is true.
This is true. And this is part one of a three part as we share our about marriage and the different stages of life because 44 years, you can't really get that in in one episode, one 30 minute episode. So, all right. So, another thing that he did that do that showed his anger, and this really goes into the thing that sometimes we get married, sometimes we get married, sometimes we get married and
EPS. 1 Early Years Extraordinary Marriage (25:45.056)
Yeah, we're we're married to that. We get the best from our spouse. You know, he gets the best from you and like he get like my husband gets the best from me when we're dating and I get the same from him when we're dating. But when you get married, there's little things that are uncovered little by little. And we weren't married yet, but we are seriously dating. And I went to the ball field with him because he likes a challenge and tell us how you feel about the ball game. This was baseball or softball, right? Softball.
Church softball, and I am very competitive. Well, I was back then, because I was young and I grew up with a family of three brothers. And listen, we had knocked down drag outs at my house, whether it was football, basketball, baseball, whatever it was. Four boys. Four boys. Yeah. And so my dad would all time quarterback, and it would be always be me and my brother Joe, who were the middle children, against my older brother Mike and my youngest brother, Sean.
And and we had knocked down drag house. I'm talking about bloody lips and everything. because we were so competitive. We always wanted to to win. And unfortunately, with my older brother being almost three years older than me, they always had an advantage. And anyway, but we did win sometimes, but I was very competitive. So go ahead and finish the story about softball.
So I'm sure that really is the thing. Whenever you're you you have a competitive family, it makes you competitive, right? Absolutely. Okay. So we went to the ball field and it was actually the church team. Okay, the church team playing ball. And so I went up and got on the bleachers and I sat with probably with his mom and and I was sitting there, you know, we just were watching the game. And something happened in the game. Probably somebody didn't catch a ball or somebody didn't hit the ball, or possibly.
He had made a mistake. I don't remember exactly. Maybe he made a mistake because when he made a mistake, he was probably more hard on himself than he was on others. And so all of a sudden, there is this, I'm sorry, honey, but skinny guy out at one time I was. There's this skinny guy out in the outfield. He is dancing around. And earlier in our dating, like he didn't dance. I don't know if I shared that this time or not.
EPS. 1 Early Years Extraordinary Marriage (28:01.56)
But he didn't dance, and but he's dancing around like a rooster or a mad bull or something to that effect. Look at him out there. He's fussing, like he didn't cuss because he didn't cuss. But he was fussing loud and he was throwing his fist down and stumping his foot and he was so mad. And I was like, as I looked at that, I thought, my.
Actually, I hadn't ever seen anyone do that before. She evidently not been to the ball field very much. Anyway, so that's whenever I realized too that wow, you know, sometimes you're you are dating somebody and you and you get married even and you you find out more about your spouse after you get married, although that was before, but be yeah, you find out so much about your spouse after you get married.
And I'm sure that was the same for really for both of us. But you know, as we we had our little kids, we basically had all three of our kids within what five years. So once that first kid came along, we were married what 18 months or whatever when that first child came along. And so from there, within from from from when that one was born in the next five years, we had three kids. So we have two sons and we have a daughter in the middle.
And you know, life gets different when you have kids. When you first get married, everything is about you. You get to enjoy each other, sit down and have dinner together. Well, or maybe not, because sometimes when you first get married, paycheck to paycheck, you're literally working all the time. I taught dance at night. Yeah. And you were in insurance, and so you had long nights all day working, and then long nights because you're building up your insurance business.
That is if you weren't at school because you were going to school at night. That's true. Yeah. So it was a very busy time. So when we had started having children, then you know, you start really focusing on those kids. All that love and fun and laughter that you had, you know, with your spouse whenever you first got married. Now the kids have come into play. I mean, it's a different time in life, but it, you know, it's okay. It's a season of life. That's right. And it's okay. But
EPS. 1 Early Years Extraordinary Marriage (30:26.254)
I think probably one of the last things I'll probably share here is that I know for me as I look back on those days when we were when we had three small kids, one of the things I would probably change is I hardly ever left my kids. Unless I was, you know, going to work and I had to leave home. I hardly ever left my kids. And, you know, yes, I was a clingy mom, or I don't know, I just didn't want to part with them. And
Everybody's not like that. You know, it's how maybe how our own mom was or you know, our personality of of how we are. Some moms need a break. They need to let those kids go. And they're like, thank goodness, I I got a life here, you know. But for me, I was home with the kids. I taught dance at night and I really couldn't hardly let them go. So one of the things I probably would change now and tell young couples is it's important to have a date night.
So that you know, you don't get to talk and communicate. You don't know what's going on at work for him, and he doesn't know what's going on for you. Well, my husband did because when he came in, you know, I'm a chatterbox and I told him everything that had happened that day. And he was a great listener. Thanks. He was a great listener. But you know, making it from one time of marriage to the next one to the next one, there's change.
different things come into play. And, you know, we all just do the best we can and we're all trying to figure it out. And when you're in the middle of it, you're not always, you know, you're not aware of all the different things that come into play. You're just making it and you're just trying to figure it out. And so we were very fortunate because we did come from families that
had similar, you know, morals, values, raised us, you know, the same way and that kind of thing. And so, but I will say this, and I've learned this since I've been working with people in the extraordinary marriage. I have found that according to our childhood and and even in our teenage years, maybe mistakes you made of a as a young person, maybe you got married.
EPS. 1 Early Years Extraordinary Marriage (32:42.766)
And then it didn't last very long. And then you're on your next one. We like bring all that baggage in. And and sometimes, you know, we hurt the person we love the most. And we don't mean to. It's like our emotions, our feelings, and we just can't help ourselves. And we hurt the person that we love the most. And so I just want to leave you with this today. I want you to think about that fact of what do you love about your spouse? I love.
about my spouse that he is kind, he's a great listener. Boy, do I need one. He's a great listener and he encourages me all the time. And he's always acts loving, you know, towards me. And everybody doesn't always get that. So that's because I love you. Yeah. And so his mama raised him right. I am thankful. That's for sure. I did have a great mom. The
One thing I want to talk about, say about Kanye too, is that besides being loving and kind and and just thoughtful, that type thing, she also is always pondering, looking for the answer, how to make things better, how to adjust this or adjust that to make things better. And she does the same thing in the extraordinary marriage, looking for answers to make things better for you as a couple. But you know, I always start with, is it me?
sure. You gotta do introspection first. And that could be a whole nother story, right? Is it me? I think one of the things that's probably helped us the most in our marriage in our young years is that we always have each other's back. Yep. That's exactly right. We always have each other's back. And guess what? When we did have an argument, we had to work it out before we went to bed. Yep. Because if you go to sleep on it, I don't know. I don't know about you because you never go to sleep. You go to sleep so easy. That's true.
That's why I have to sit up sometimes so that we can finish the conversation. Yeah, because its eyes just start closing. I'm like, are you listening? You know, the other thing too is that in the Bible it says, Don't let the sun go down on your anger. So that's why it's so important that you resolve that situation with your spouse, the one you love, the one you care the most about, resolve that issue before you lay your head on that pillow. And the reason that's important is because what's there's another verse in there that says something about.
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it's never good to have an angry woman. that too. It is an angry woman. And I can't tell I can't say for anybody else out there, but when I go to sleep, angry, first of all, it took me a while to go to sleep because I'm thinking about it. I'm thinking about it and I'm getting more bothered. And if I sleep on it the next day, I wake up worse. That's true. Worse. So it's important to forgive.
To let go of things, and I would say that's one of the biggest barriers in your young days of a marriage is forgiving and letting go. And there are some people that cannot say they're sorry. And that's a specific personality style. That's what I teach on is personality styles. There's a specific style now that I understand that I can let that go. But you know, when somebody doesn't say, man, you know what? I'm so sorry, then
We don't think they are and we don't think they care. And so if it's easy to say you're sorry, that's great. But if it's not, or if your spouse won't say they're sorry, you have to read between the lines and figure that out because they may be that style person, like I said, it's in your DNA, although they literally won't be able to say they're sorry. Now talk about division and the building of bitterness. Now that can be a whole nother story.
So next time we're gonna share with you our you know as our kids became teenagers and and that kind of thing and a little bit on that. But I want to share with you because this is the first podcast, I want to share you with you three ways that you can win a prize with me. First of all, my email is Connie at the Extraordinary Marriage. Connie at the extraordinary marriage, three ways that you can win. Dot com. Dot com. That's that's important. Yes.
And so three ways to win. By the end of November, and when you've watched all seven debuting episodes, the very first person to email me is going to get a free one hour coaching. Now, this is not just a QA. This is actual coaching where you can you can share a little bit with me and I'll give you some pointers, pointers that some takeaways that will actually help you have a better marriage because of how your personality style is and how your
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Your husband's personality style. And the second way to win is the first seven people that email me are going to get my 10 days to a happier, healthier marriage. It's just a little bite-sized piece for 10 days. You're going to get that free. And then the first, the first person, then the third reason, the I'm sorry, the third way that you can win is.
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The third the third way to win is everyone, every person who emails me with those seven keywords or seven clues, one word from each one of the seven episodes is going to get my discover work and family dynamics online course where you get an assessment with that, which talks all about your personality style. It talks tells you about you, it tells you how to deal with other people.
And that's where it starts as learning how to communicate better. All right. What was that clue word again today? Laugh. It was laugh. And I would say the reason we gave that today is because that's one of the ways we made it through life. We were very fortunate that we both find things funny most of the time instead of stressful. I could think of more stories on that. So the keyword laugh. All right. So I thank you for listening. And if this is meant.
anything to you or if you think it'll help a friend, be sure and share this episode and subscribe so that you don't miss a single weekly episode of The Extraordinary Marriage. And I thank you for listening today and I'll see you next week.
Grow Together, Laugh Together, Love Forever!
