Spring Clean Your Marriage (Ep. 43)

Justin: [00:00:00] We’re back with In Your Best Interest. As promised, we’re doing our spring cleaning your marriage, and we’re gonna talk a little bit about whether or not we did what we said we’re gonna do about our goals. Or maybe we just are not gonna talk about that. But the reality is, I wanna talk a little bit on this episode about what the spring cleaning looks like ’cause we talked right after the New Year’s of New Year’s new me. So this is a segue from that last podcast, and I hope this really helps.

Mary: Yeah. So I mean, I mean the first part I wanna dive into here is that we all know marriage is hard. I think we’ve all experienced that in our lives, but some people just call it quits without trying to fix things, without taking any steps there. So, well, some people probably need to get a divorce. Can you help talk some of those people that are kind of teetering there, can you help talk him off the ledge?

Justin: I think one of the things that we highlight the most is just because we’re divorce attorneys, I don’t like divorce. I, I, in fact hate it. Um, I really want people to stay together and one of the challenges I, I go into, when I think about when I meet my maker at the Pearly Gates, hopefully, is were you the facilitator of divorce? Were you the person that was encouraging it or were you really trying to keep people together? I know I can say now in this stage of my career, I really do try to make sure that if we can, we fix some of the problems and provide some solutions. And sometimes that includes filing for divorce. I mean, somebody’s just not making any kind of progress in not holding themselves accountable and always blaming the other side. You know, sometimes they need that reality check of filing for divorce. I definitely believe that this time of year, until we get to spring, usually when the weather’s worse, honestly, you just kind of cooped up and you feel like you don’t, you’re not making any significant changes. It’s kind of that, that weird time until spring hits. You know, where it’s like everything’s just kind of sitting idle and nothing. Hibernation mode. Hibernation mode. That’s a good one, Mary. So I think, I think the, the best way to answer that question is to say like, let’s, let’s really pull back the curtain. Let’s remember that life is full of seasons and the one that’s coming up is generally the most uplifting. And so don’t just jump into it because you’re at a stale point. It needs to, in my mind, you need to really look back and we talked about that checklist of the dos and don’ts and the un, the non-negotiables. If that, if those non-negotiables are getting worse and they’re, and they’re adding more to it, we need to look at spring cleaning. We really do. ’cause when that sun really comes up and you’re out and about and everything you do is wrong, and no matter what steps you’re making to get, make your marriage better, uh, they just keep kicking you while you’re down. That’s not right. Mm-hmm.

Mary: I wanna tie in, we alluded to this in the previous podcast too, but, um, I, readers Digest, I don’t even know if they publish that thing anymore, but they used to have a column called Can [00:03:00] this Marriage be Saved? Remember that? So, how do, how do people assess their situations regarding whether or not they can be saved or not?

Justin: I, I, I think I get that question quite a bit. Like I don’t really want a divorce. I don’t, you know, I just am getting information and I do love those calls. they’re some of my favorite consults. ’cause when I talk about putting people together, I don’t do anything. It’s a God thing, right? All I do is kind of. Like a counselor does ask some questions and make them think. Um, and so when you talk about how do you assess, it’s not like you have this Excel spreadsheet and you’re checking off, you know, did they work out on a Tuesday? Did they drink on a Wednesday? Did they come and take the child to school? You shouldn’t be like. That regimented. I’m sure there’s people out there that are, and that’s probably why they’re making the phone call in the first place. But I think it’s important to really understand what makes you tick and your non-negotiables. And you know, if somebody is continuously, I. You know, being violent, that’s an [00:04:00] obvious, if they’re continuously using cruel treatment, continuously belittling you, uh, continuously undermining your parenting ability, not checking themselves with finances, not going to do the work if you’re a spiritual person to go to church. And in fact undermining that, uh, undermining your family, like the significant values that, that you have or should have going into a marriage. Those are the ones where. It’s really identifiable and you can make a checklist. You don’t have to have it written down, but you can make a mental checklist and I think it’s important to go back to it.

Andrea: Yeah, I mean there’s, there’s, for me, there’s lots of things. There’s the trust. If the trust is gone, you can’t trust the other person anymore. The person leaves the house and you don’t. You have uneasy about the person, person not coming home at night. So the trust, not being honest about finances, things like that are important. If you’re always unhappy, I think if you, if you’re constantly unhappy, my father told me I was very young, he said, if you are, if it’s more than 50% unhappiness, you need to need to really take a good look at this. If you, if you are sometimes unhappy, okay, but if you feel like you’re more than 50% unhappy in your marriage, [00:05:00] it might not be the right place for you Again, you have to do more things. Resentment, I think is a big piece. If there’s no understanding for the other side and resentment builds, that’s a, that’s a time I think you need to take a hard look at yourself and a hard look at the other person. Intimacy doesn’t exist anymore or is, is, is not there. That’s important in a marriage if that doesn’t exist anymore. And I think another one that’s important. What do your loved ones say about you? Mm-hmm. Are in which space you are. ’cause if you have people around you that keep telling you, you don’t look happy or you don’t look good, or are you happy, constantly ask you that. That’s also ’cause you, we, we can kind of like push that up under the carpet because you’re so busy with life and work. But if other people start noticing that you are in the wrong spot, I think that’s. That’s the time when you need, really need to look at your marriage. I think.

Justin: Yeah. I had this really neat lady, she called me about two months ago, and literally one of the sweetest, most wholesome, she was just in tears. She’s like, I, I don’t believe in divorce. This is against my spiritual, but I don’t know what else to do. I’ve, I’ve tried to go to [00:06:00] counseling. I’ve tried to play pickleball with him. I’ve tried to go to the gym. I’ve tried to go do trips and all the things that we talk about like you do life and if you’ve got somebody rowing alongside of you, that’s the person you need to continue life with. Now nothing is cupcakes and butterflies in any form of relationship, but I do think that it’s really important, in that specific instance with her, she very much beat herself down so much for so many years that she didn’t even realize what a awesome woman she was. And it, it kind of pisses me off. ’cause I’m like, I want to, I, if this was your sister mm-hmm. You would go, hell no. This guy is a total prick. He’s beat you down. He’s kept you in a cage on finances when they have millions of dollars. And she’s just like, well, I don’t spend much. And I was like, what’s not much? She’s like, I mean, maybe like three or 4,000 bucks a month. These people have millions, and I know that that’s different for everybody, but he’s got her kind of off to the side. He’s running around, you know, he’s always gone. He’s doing whatever he wants to do, and she’s the punching bag and feels just like [00:07:00] everything’s normal.

Andrea: But I mean, I guess it, it has, it has to do with how you’ve been raised. Like, I mean, for, for me it was for better or worse. So that means there are gonna be times that it’s worse. And then if you raised like that, I was raised like that, you just don’t call it quits. You make it work. But then if you try to make it all the work from your side, I, I’ve been in that situation. I’ve honestly been in that same situation where I felt the other part is not doing it. So I just gotta hold the fort and hold onto this because there’s kids involved and everything. You don’t wanna just let it go. I’ve been raised, so I’m in the same situation. But, but that’s what I said. When your other friend’s, friends, family start seeing and they should speak up, when they see how you become a shell of yourself and how you’re not the same person, then it’s time to, to leave. But it’s not easy if you have that mindset. I think it’s not easy.

Justin: But you, you said something earlier, like you, your dad said, if you’re not happy 50% of the time, you need to take a,

Andrea: take a hard look at your, take a hard look because life is too short. I mean, if you are feeling. Most of the time, 60, 70% of the time that you’re not happy and you just have those spurts of where it’s good, [00:08:00] then something is off.

Justin: So in in that situation where the effort’s there, like to me effort, if you’ve got 50% of the time, I’m gonna take that, break that down. If you’re putting in a hundred percent of the effort on your side, and then the other side’s, 50% effort, I don’t know that your dad would tell you. Hey, you need to stay in that situation forever. I’m

Andrea: saying, no, it’s not. You know what I’m, it’s not the, it’s not the effort that, that’s, I agree. That’s not the effort. It’s, it’s like how you feel. If you feel, most of the time it’s not right. Mm-hmm. If you feel, most of the time there’s distrust, there’s dishonesty, then we don’t talk the finances. If there’s, it’s more than, again, if you look at every day, if four or five days out of the week you feel like crap or it’s not good. The one or two days that you maybe I go out and have fun. That’s not enough for you. Yeah, that’s ’cause ’cause again, then you, you have more than half the time you’re not gonna be good. And, and I always felt to the kids, if you have kids involved, what example are you setting for your kids? If you are unhappy, you don’t have to say anything to the kids. You can be away and never even fight or [00:09:00] argue in front of the kids. Kids are very smart. I mean, I always say like, don’t stay together for the kids. The kids know. You should stay together when you have kids and you should try much, much harder when you have kids to stay together. But you don’t have to fight to argue that they know exactly what’s going on. Kid. Kids have a sense for that. So that’s why I said 50%

Mary: and, and I think kind of in the situation that you’re talking about that the other party is not really wanting to. Do any heavier lifting to make things work. They’re happy with the way things are. They’re living in life. They wanna live them. So how do you know if that person is gonna be receptive to change? I mean that because I mean, there’s marriage counseling and there’s all that kind of stuff. So kind of what’s the process there to kind of figure out if there’s gonna be some. Ways to make changes.

Justin: I think direct communication is the most critical thing. Andrea told me about this guy that all he does is talks about communication styles, but you know, when you’ve been beaten down or put in a corner over and over again, it’s really hard to be direct. Mm-hmm. and I don’t pretend [00:10:00] to be able to, in one podcast or whatever, talk through how you can do that. But the, the easiest way in my mind about direct communication is really write down your non-negotiables. And and be able to just rehearse them directly to the individual. Mm-hmm. And, and I don’t even care if you hide a recorder in your pocket. ’cause you need reassurance. I tell people all the time, these timelines, they read through ’em and it’s therapeutic. ’cause they’re just like, oh my gosh, this actually was crazy. Like Valentine’s and Christmas and birthdays and I’m not allowed to have my family around. And all of these things like when you read your story back to yourself. It’s much easier to know that you’re not crazy. Mm-hmm. So I think, I think if you’re one of those people struggling with direct communication, you, you really do write down and you, I don’t care if you practice it in your bathroom mirror. I’m gonna be strong today and I’m going to say, Hey, you’ve been gone for two weeks doing X, Y, and Z. We can’t do that as a family. I don’t need a [00:11:00] counselor to tell me that this is a non-negotiable. I want date night on the put down the solutions. Not just the problem, but the solutions. And they can, you can start small and you’ll see your confidence begin to come back to you. And that’s, that’s really 90% of the reason we do this job is watch people at their weakest point get to their strongest.  It’s, it’s super, it’s a cool transition when that happens.

Mary: For sure. So people who want to make things work, um, what would their first step?

Justin: think you, you break down, Andrea, chime in here. I think you break down what is really in your mind that you feel is broken. Like we always talk about make the list and then shorten it. Okay. So if, as far as the brokenness of, you know, the first thing to make something better is to identify what’s broken and try to come up with alternative solutions. So it doesn’t have to be you need to do this exactly, you give it this or that. I love this or that scenarios. [00:12:00] and, and really think outside of your own box. you know, I, I, I love when people say, Hey. You know, you, you say these things to me. How can I, how can I make it to where you’re not so frustrated at me, what can I do? Right? And, and just listen to their response back. Because you’re gonna know pretty quickly, like someone’s true heart, if, if their response is, well, you’re just a da, da da, da, and they just keep going, okay, I understand what you just said. Well, so how do I change that? And just keep pressing them on the how questions and the why questions. Um, and, and you’ll hear pretty quickly, I think, um, you know what things you really need to focus on. Um, and that’s just from the communication style. I mean, obviously if there are issues with finance, um, maybe it is, Hey, listen, I don’t really feel very secure in the event something happens to you or I, and I wanna make sure our kids are taken care of. So can we go, I need to get more financially savvy. Call me the dumb kid. Right? Follow on your own sword and then just play like the little humble person for a minute. [00:13:00] And what you might find is that they go, no, you’re not gonna see our bank accounts, or, and they’re gonna keep saying the same stuff when it’s not even about you. It’s not even control about you. And then you’d be like, okay, wait a minute. I don’t know if we can fix this. So exposing those flaws, I think.

Andrea: And what is underlying, like we said earlier, when you have resentment, I think what is really underlying those issues that we have? What issues do we have? Do we argue all the time? Do we don’t spend enough time together? Whatever it is, what is the underlying, what is my underlying issue and what’s potentially the underlying your, his or her underlying issues? What you said, I think is good to, to really put this on a table. Figure out what the main things are and then, and then see where the action is taken on the other side. I think that’s the, but I think the most important, the actions has to be stake. And if you have somebody, for example, that gets hammered every night and I have a issue with that, then we need to find a solution. They don’t have to be cold or, what do you guys do Monday in in January?

Justin: Well,

Andrea: so I don’t do that dry January.That

Justin: didn’t work out what happened to us. We’re supposed to be reporting all our accolades. Yeah.

Andrea: Okay. I

Mary: [00:14:00] failed.

Justin: So

Andrea: what I mean if that, uh, two, two weeks. Two weeks. Or at least. So what I mean, if that’s an issue for me, that the, the other one drinks too much then, or, or they complain that I drink too much. You can’t expect stuff overnight to happen. But it, if it’s a non-negotiable, ’cause one of, one of the two doesn’t wanna be married to an alcoholic. Because it can easily lead to that, then, then I need to see some action taken. If they can’t do it by themselves, then they need to seek help. But then action has to be taken and if the answer is always, I got it under control, I can do it. And then next party you go to, they get hammered again. Or get hammered in front of the TV at night. I mean, there is only so much you can take where you need to say. That’s it.

Justin: Yeah. That’s a good segue of like when we talk about giving options. So, you know, for example, we, we get the alcohol stuff happen a lot in our business. You can imagine alcohol, drugs and everything else, but, but specifically alcohol. Um, you know, when it comes to solutions, you don’t just put the hard demand on you must stop drinking tomorrow. Right? Tomorrow, exactly. Because your or else you better be ready to do the or else. So what I [00:15:00] encourage clients to do is say, all right. Tuesday night, go find an activity that’s, it was a tennis or some whatever, and you say, Hey, I want to go with you to play tennis on that night. By operation of a physical activity, it’s going to prevent some of the things that you’re concerned about potentially, uh,

Andrea: unless you get hammered afterwards, unless you hammered it at the tennis or

Justin: afterwards, which, you know, sometimes you need to, but, but, but for real, if it’s a serious problem in that regard, and you’re putting. Forth alternative solutions that are fun. Like, I think a lot of people in those situations are like, well, hell, what am I supposed to do? I’m not just gonna sit here with you and stare at the wall. That’s weird, right? Mm-hmm. So be thinking for yourself, like, how can I make this more fun? How can I, you know, add activities to the list? And, and I think that when you do that and you, you’re trying, you’re giving all that effort, you’re gonna see real quickly what you should do and whether you’re gonna make progress. Mm-hmm.

Mary: Yeah. And, and, and. In the previous podcast too, we talked about those boundaries and then also having consequences to those boundaries.So, and, and I think you covered that pretty well and I’d like you to just touch on that again, Andrea. ’cause you

Andrea: Yeah, I mean, you have to, there has to be a consequence. It’s like with your kids, if you tell your kids don’t do that, or if you don’t, you don’t clean your room, access is gonna happen. I think in a relationship it has to be the same thing. If you, if you decide not to come home, guess what? You’re sleeping on a couch. And that happens every night, then that’s the consequence or then whatever, whatever you wanna come up with. If you drink, then this is gonna happen, but you have to have a consequence. ’cause otherwise you’re gonna be a pushover. And the, and my son’s actually told me this, which I thought is so wise from them. They, they said, if, if as a man, and I is not cliche or anything, but my, my son said is, if you as a woman. Let a guy do something. Guys tend tend to push a little further next time, and if you let it go again, then they push a little further and a little further. It’s probably the other way around. The same thing, but, but that hard line has to be in sand. There has to be a consequence. If you tell the kids don’t clean your room and there’s nothing happening, they’re not gonna clean the room for what? There’s no, there’s nothing, mom. Mama’s just gonna be little upset. And then we go back to business. And I think in a marriage it’s the same [00:17:00] thing. You have to. Non-negotiables. If you cross that line, then this is gonna happen. Like you said, the finances, you don’t give us, you don’t give me access to the finances. Mm-hmm. We have a series of trust and finances are, as you know, the, the biggest ones. Right. I can’t have access to the finances, then that’s, that’s not a marriage, that’s not, there’s no trust there.

Justin: Yeah. I’d like to soften the word consequences to accountability. Mm-hmm. just, just from a standpoint of we’re, we’re saying the same things, but, but accountability and saying, Hey, listen, you know, I, I really told you this was my concern for our family and I don’t know anything about the finances. I’ve kind of got my head buried in the sand and it’s really making me scared and insecure. And I’m really fearful. So, you know, accountability is saying I am fearful. And you know, for example, if you’re just sleeping on the couch, well, if he’s like, well hell, I get to go out and stay out all night and I’m just sleeping on the couch. Cool. Like, sometimes the accountability is not even there because the, the consequences is what we’re really [00:18:00] talking about are not strong enough or they don’t escalate or they’re not consistent. You know, you have that, those kids, and you discipline ’em really well for like a day or two, twice. And then, and then the next week they’re like, oh, cool. She quit. She quit worrying about discipline. Oh, she’s busy. I am. Right. So I think accountability and, and going back to those, if you’re forgetting or you, you’re having trouble keeping people or holding yourself accountable, those lists and just setting the time on your calendar to like go back and do a self check. Did I actually schedule some activities, do some self internalization checks too? For sure. Yeah. Did I do these things? Am I, am I just getting mad about things that I did not make myself or the other person accountable for? Correct. That’s not fair.

Mary: Yeah,

Justin: right. It goes both ways. Yeah.

Mary: Yeah. I was gonna say, that does go both ways too. So it’s, it takes two to make a marriage great or not so great. Right. So you have to yourself. Yeah. You can’t be the only

Andrea: one bitching, complaining and No, and, and indeed the changes the other person wants you don’t take into consideration. Yeah, I totally agree.

Mary: So, um, most [00:19:00] people say we get mar married for better or worse. You talked about that earlier, Andrea, and, but how do you know that you’re at that point, Justin, when it’s like, it’s just not gonna work? And we kind of talked about this earlier and that it, that really it’s, it’s time to file.

Justin: Yeah. I don’t wanna skip over the, the marriage part either, right? Mm-hmm. I mean, there’s a lot of people out there that. Think they need to get married or remarried ’cause they’re lonely. Uh, or they just, they just want to get married for the wrong reasons. And we all hear that sounds cliche, but the reality is, you all these checks that we’re talking about to keep you away from divorce are also the checks you need when you’re finding a partner. because these issues that you know and you hear your family and friends talk about, they come up in. Almost every marriage, and there’s reasons why they have that premarital counseling. There’s reasons why you think about these issues. You know, churches have these premarital counseling where you go in and you ask the tough questions about life insurance and sharing finances and kids and, and whether they’re gonna go to this church or that church. They ask those tough [00:20:00] questions so you can see the reaction. I think we live in this world where we’re so afraid to be direct or we just don’t want to deal with direct ’cause we’ve got so many other distractions that we don’t do it. So before we get to the divorce thing, I would say start with the same questions if you’re in the process of thinking about getting married. I agree. I agree. Number one, that’s, that’s huge. And then, you know, how do you know, uh, when it’s bad enough to pull the trigger? I’ve never had to tell a client You need a divorce. Ever. Mm-hmm. Um, I, I often will say, Hey, is this really a, a thing that you can’t fix after 25 years of being with this person? You know, irreconcilable differences are just, you’re just outta love, right? Mm-hmm. you, you know, whatever causes that, I don’t know. I think that there’s plenty of ways to get back in love, um, if you’re out of love and you’re not having these bigger trigger points, but. For sure when it comes to spring cleaning and pulling the trigger to your question, uh, you need to make sure [00:21:00] that when you have these accountability matrix and they’re not being met, when you’ve talked to counselors, when you’ve talked to an attorney and you’ve gone through all the things that are already a pain and you’re getting nothing back and you’ve done your self-assessment. You know, they just, I get, I, I have people, literally, I’ll do a consult and a year and a half later they’ll call and say, Hey, I’m ready.

Andrea: Yeah. And I think that’s a good, it’s not, it’s not the spur of the moment decision. I agree. Yeah. It has to be. I mean, if you feel bad, then you have to try. That’s the better, worst piece. You have to try everything in your power. Even if the other party is not doing anything, try everything in your power to save it. But if you don’t, like you said, if you don’t, don’t see any work on the other side. Then at some point, but I always say like, it’s, it’s, the grass is not greener on the other side. So if, if you don’t do a self assessment, the next relationship you’re gonna get in, guess what’s gonna be the same thing? Because there’s part of that, I think in marriage failing. There’s always, there’s both, both, both parties have something to, unless you deal with somebody, there’s an addict or [00:22:00] whatever, then there’s not much you can do. But all the other issues, they don’t come overnight and they will not go away overnight.

Justin: Yeah. I, I think on the feeling piece, I, I, I firmly believe that feelings are a product of what’s happening around you. sometimes they’re just a, a, a, a notion that goes through your head. I mean, you hear it all the time.It’s all in your head. And a lot of I, there, there are so many studies on the fact that it’s all in your head, right? and so I, I really hope that, um, if we’re trying to really do some internal analysis, we think about how to get outside of our head and ask people the tough questions that are really close to you. You know, I, I think that he or she is this way. What is your perception of me? Like, give me the raw, I’m not gonna not be friends with you. I’m not gonna not be your son. What is your real perception of it? Get

Andrea: the German version.

Justin: Get the, yeah, get and skip the freaking Bs. Like, and don’t get your all butt hurt or whatever.You, well, I can’t say that.

Andrea: Yeah,

Justin: don’t get your feelings all hurt because somebody tells it to you raw, [00:23:00] that you’ve asked them a question. Like that’s what you need to hear sometimes. And I, I need to hear it. We all need to hear it. We’re human beings.

Andrea: And I think always that’s, to me, that’s always written. I tell my kids the same thing, is get the. You dealing as a girl, you have a guy, or vice versa. The guy has a girl. Ask the other gender also for a little bit for advice. ’cause when we girls talk, we tend to go a certain direction. That’s not necessarily how a guy thinks. So did you get some advice also from the other gender? Did you ask your brother, did he ask your father? Somebody like that? And then maybe they have a totally different perspective and what you are complaining about is just like, what? So I think that’s, that’s, that’s very important to get input from other people, but you have to have people around you and hopefully you have that people surround yourself with, that are honest with you and will not just. Speak what you like to hear in those situations. I think divorce, it’s very important that you have honest and straightforward and you might not like what you get to hear, but if they tell you you constantly the B word, then maybe you’re part of the big picture and the reason that this is going down south.

Mary: Right. So, um, [00:24:00] any final thoughts on this topic today?

Andrea: I think, I think the topics, the re the big ticket, like Justin said, addiction, abuse and infidelity are huge. So it might be, it. It’s harder to get around those, those big ticket items. Mm-hmm. If it’s other things, like you said, falling out of love, can you not fix it? You were in love at some point. Maybe think about, go back to those times you were in love. If you have kids, you should try even more harder. Then, then, then when you don’t have kids. I think because you have other people involved, they can, they will get affected by your, your decision. But the big ticket items, I don’t know. You’ve seen this many times. Big ticket items. I don’t know. If you have somebody that has an addiction, you can try. You can try. You can support you support, but at some point

Mary: you have to love yourself enough

Andrea: to,

Justin: yes, you gotta remember the zebra that you married and don’t try to change all the stripes. I think that you also have to address it real time and when someone makes progress, don’t keep going backwards with them. If they make progress and they’re, and they may, they may retread a little bit. It’s [00:25:00] okay. Like it’s part of what, it’s part of who you married. You knew that person was a party animal when you married them. They’re not just gonna all of a sudden stop being that social person or if they were very meek and mild. They’re not just gonna, and that’s what you loved

Andrea: about them. That’s you loved. That’s, that’s what you love that. Yeah. So you, yeah, I, I agree. Because you, you loved, that’s what you loved about the person. So don’t try to change them now years later and said, I don’t love you. What you said, party animal. That’s why you fell in love with the party animal. ’cause it was something different that you were,

Mary: let’s just dial it, dial it back a little bit, and then also not expecting you’re supposed to be perfect either. I think that’s, I, I look at myself when I was first married, you know, I. I had a lot less patience because I was, I wanted things a certain way and I was expecting perfection And I didn’t get perfection, but I got a lot of wonderful things, you know? So, I mean, I think you’re pretty perfect, Mary. Well, yeah, whatever. I’ve yet

Justin: to find any flaw.

Mary: Oh, well let’s start a list. but I think, I think for people that are newly married and they’re frustrating [00:26:00] and they’re, they, they’re frustrated and that with their partner, it’s like you, you have to cut, cut them some slack too, you know? And. Note, know that you’re not perfect either.

Andrea: And you come to the table with a, with a history. I mean, when we, when you meet your significant, significant other, you both come, you only know what, you know, you come to the table with, with your, with whatever the family you grew up in, the values that were installed in you, and there’s a totally different person, so That’s so true. Yeah. They have to, and this is not gonna always be the same. Like I’m from a different country, different culture. We do things that Americans don’t do. So having an American husband is, there’s things that are off. And you have to find that way. Mm-hmm. I mean, if you, that’s just, you have to learn about the other,

Justin: the other

Andrea: side.

Justin: And I love, I love the concept of quarterly assessments. Mm-hmm. We do ’em in business, you know, we talked about new year, new me spring cleaning. That’s a, that’s one quarter. You can’t just go all these things, all of life. Then just now I’m done. 10 years later. Yeah. Yeah. Just kind of check in every quarter, be like, Hey [00:27:00] man, you know, we had a great, uh, great couple months together. What, what are some of your favorite things about it? Write ’em down. That’s a good idea. Yeah. You know, go back through the, the, the, the pros as much as the cons. You know, Hey, we can do this. What can we do next, next quarter? I don’t wanna make it like a business, but hell, if you’re going through struggles, make it like a freaking business. Every business meets good business meets monthly, quarterly, weekly. And they go through the assessments and you can expect what you inspect and

Andrea: he can steer it back on the tracks without it going.

Justin: That’s right.

Andrea: Derailing if you, if you have those check-ins.

Mary: I like that idea. Yeah, just don’t let it get that far. So if you live in Texas and you would like to speak to attorney Justin Sisemore and his team, you can call 817-336-4444 or visit www.lawyerdfw.com. Thanks so much for listening and have a great day.