How To Avoid Divorce During The Holidays

Did you know that divorce filings increase by 30% in January? It’s not a coincidence. The holidays don't just magnify relationship problems; they market a perfection that no marriage actually has. If you are dreading this Christmas because you feel like you are walking on eggshells, you are not alone.

In this video, I’m sharing the exact "Stop The Chaos" plan you need to implement next week. This isn't about fixing your whole marriage in one day. It is about damage control. It is about getting through the holidays without becoming a statistic.

I was where you are 12 years ago. I know the fear, the loneliness, and the overwhelming anxiety. But I also know there is hope.

In this video, we cover:

• The "Knee Surgery" Analogy: Why you need to calm the inflammation (the chaos) before you can have the surgery (the workshop) to fix the root cause.
• The Holiday Truce: Why you must stop all relationship talks from Dec 23rd to 26th.
• Managing External Chaos: How to handle nosy family members and protect your children from the tension.
• The "If/Then" Plan: Practical ways to manage your own anxiety if your spouse doesn't show up or acts distant.
• The PIES of Attraction: How to focus on YOU physically, intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually to become a safe place.

🎄 THE "STOP THE CHAOS" PLAN FOR CHRISTMAS:

1. Stop Pushing: No begging, pleading, or "heavy" talks.
2. Be A Safe Place: Warm, kind, and accepting (but not smothering).
3. Manage Expectations: If your spouse is distant, treat them like a guest. Be hospitable, but don't force connection.
4. Damage Control: Your goal this week is not to "save" the marriage, but to prevent making it worse.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Holidays, Pressure, And Perfection
• 3:15 Why January Divorces Spike
• 6:45 The Seven Steps To Save A Marriage
• 11:30 The Knee Surgery Analogy
• 16:20 Workshop Vs. Community Support
• 21:50 Kimberly’s Crisis Story
• 28:20 The Holiday Truce: No Relationship Talks
• 33:45 Managing Family, Friends, And Kids
• 39:30 Boundaries, Stops, And If-Then Plans
• 46:00 Be A Safe Place And Stay Steady
• 50:40 PIES: Rebuilding Personal Attraction
• 58:30 Two Scenarios: Present Or Absent Spouse
• 1:04:10 Recap, Takeaways, And Hope
• 1:07:30 Offers: Community And Workshops
• 1:13:40 Closing Reflection And Prayer

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

My name is Kimberly. I am joining you from my mother's house. So you get to see all of her amazing Christmas decor and all the things. Uh we've been we've been staying here for a while as our house has been redone, but we are moving back in over the holidays and it's been a sweet time, but I am ready to get back to my own house. You're gonna get to know a little bit more about me over the next hour as we work together to uncover what it is that you need to do over this next week in order for you to not become a divorce statistic. What do I mean by that? I know that the holidays is a very stressful time for marriages for two reasons. The first one is that the holidays magnify problems. They magnify problems that have already existed due to the expectations that we have for the holiday season and due to just the overwhelming amount of stress. We're spending more money than ever this time of year. We're going to a lot of things. There are holiday parties, there's gifts to buy, there's kids, all the different parties that the kids go to and getting all their teachers' presents and the 15 days of the month that they need to dress up in a completely different outfit for school each day. Does anyone know what I'm talking about? Y'all, I gave up on that this year. I was like, y'all figure it out if you want to do it. And if not, just wear whatever you want to school. And so uh all of those things are happening during this season, and it is so stressful. It's so stressful. There's continued piling up expectations, but also there's the expectation that we have going into this season of marketing perfection. Here's what I mean by that. The holidays don't just magnify problems, they also market perfection. Enter the Hallmark channel. Anyone who knows anything about me knows I'm not ashamed to say it, I do love Hallmark Christmas movies. They are heartwarming, they are wholesome, they are just something I can put on and chill and know that for the most part, if my kids walk in the room, it's not going to be a problem. On the other hand, this Hallmark expectation level of relationship and level of what the holidays should do for us or should bring to us leads not just for Hallmark, but for a lot of the marketing that we see throughout the holiday season, that we should have this perfect holiday, that we should have the perfect traditions, the perfectly roasted turkey, the perfectly set table, the perfect family gatherings where everyone is getting along. All of those things are our hopes and desires for this Christmas season, because Christmas is a time for joy, joy to the world, silent night. Oh, come all ye faithful. All of those things that we just hear and we think about how inviting and how calm and how hopeful and how wonderful this holiday season is. Yet, when we look at the actual hustle and bustle, when we begin to look at all of the things that we see around us, the perfect Christmas cards that we get from our friends, where they have the happy family all together, it can begin to feel like the holidays are maybe more pressure than excitement. And that's why when we look at the past 10, 15 years of data, we know from research given to us by by uh divorce lawyers, by the New York Post even said this recently, and we hear it every year that January is the month that divorce filings increase by 30%. And there's a 100% increase in the amount of people who are looking and searching for things like how to get a divorce, quickie divorce, how to end my marriage peacefully. We see all of those things shoot up after the holiday season, and it can't be a coincidence. It's not that the Christmas holidays create problems, it's that they magnify problems and they market a perfection, which no marriage has. And so for the people who were already wanting out of their marriage, who were just trying to make it through the last holiday together with their kids so they could have one final Christmas as a family. January is that time where the they begin hearing messages such as new year, new you. Do what makes you happy. And this absolutely leads to an increase of divorce filings going into January. But many of you here today are saying you've already experienced it. You've recently got served divorce papers, you're currently separated and maybe going through a divorce. All of those things are adding up to the pressure you're feeling right now. Does this sound like what you're going through? I would actually love to know what is one, if you could pick one word to describe how you're feeling right now going into the the week of Christmas. How do you feel? How do you feel? Sad, tired, alone, exhausted, hopeless, fearful. This is what you're saying right now. Betrayed, alone, alone, overwhelmed, sad, hopeless, lonely, fear of the unknown. Uh one of you says resourced. I would love to know why. Unsure, hopeful, devastated, angry, anxious, like crap, dreading it. I don't want you to have to feel this going into what should be the most joyful, happiest, family-oriented day of the year. But I know you are, but you're not alone. You're not alone today. I'm here with you. We have a ton of other people who are here with you as well, like our members and our graduates. But I'm going to show you today the plan, at least a huge, a big part of the plan that we use at Marriage Helper, that we've used with thousands of people who have been in situations just like yours. And I believe that the plan that we're going to walk through today is going to help you walk into next week with confidence, to where you don't have to feel so hopeless, so alone, so betrayed, so hurt, so scared, that you can walk into next week with more confidence, more clarity, and a plan to soften the chaos that's currently going on in your life. Now, at Marriage Helper, we talk about seven steps to save a marriage. I'm on a high level, the seven steps that we talk about to save your marriage is step one to calm down. So you want to be able to manage your emotions so that you don't go into every situation frantic, angry, anxious, hurt, because those things will impact the continue, the ability to save your marriage, the ability to calm things down in order to actually fix things, right? We have to learn how to calm down. And then also to get clarity. In fact, I'm gonna also, alongside of these seven steps, I'm gonna give you an analogy to think through, which I think will help you understand what we do at Marriage Helper and how we do it. So we uh we have this live show that we do every Wednesday, and I shared this for the first time this past week in our live show on YouTube that I do with Dr. Joe. When you think about knee surgery, so both of my parents have had total knee replacement. My mom's had it, I think, twice. And my dad's had it once. And so this total knee replacement, like my mom, especially, I remember when her knee started hurting her. I remember that happened years before she had the surgery, and there was a ton of inflammation. Maybe some of you have experienced this. There was a ton of inflammation all around her knee. She wasn't quite sure what was wrong. In fact, we were on a trip together and she tripped and fell one day, and she actually ended up tripping and falling twice. And in like her knee got so swollen, and she wasn't quite sure what the real problem was, but her knee had given out. That's why she fell. And so it ended up being this whole problem. And so what needed to happen first was that the area of the knee needed to calm down, right? The inflammation, the pain that was causing there to be even more fluid buildup, even more muscle pain, joint pain, all of that. It needed to calm down in order for the doctor to be able to get clarity, right? Because when there's just a bunch of like, I know me, when I've gone to the physical therapist before, he's like, man, there's just a lot going on. You need to stop doing the things that are hurting your situation right now, so that we can really get clarity on what the underlying cause is that's going on. It's exactly what we do at marriage helper. Things need to calm down in order to get true clarity about what it is that is happening. Another thing that when someone is is having knee problems is that helps give clarity is that there are x-rays that are done, MRIs, there are scans that happen in order for the person who is responsible for helping navigate the patient through this process so that they have clarity on what do we need to do moving forward. And then there's things you need to stop doing, right? If you're about to have knee surgery or if your knees are hurting you, there's things you need to stop doing, the things that are making it worse, and there's things you need to start doing in order to heal the pain and be able to prepare yourself for surgery, right? This is part, this is what we do at Marriage Helper. So in our process, you need to calm down. We need to help you get clarity. And if you're working with our team, we need to get clarity by asking you some questions and assessments, which our team has to best understand what it is you need to stop doing and what you need to start doing, which is step three. Stop doing the things that push your spouse away, start doing the things that will pull them back. And then step four is forgiveness and reconciliation. So forgiveness needs to happen no matter what, but then there's a whole process for reconciliation. And then you build back trust as step five. Step six, you reignite passion and intimacy. And step seven, you you create your dream life together. Now, for many of you, where you're sitting right now, you are saying things like, I don't see how this can turn around. Someone just put this in the comments. I don't see how this can turn around. I am so smart with my contact. I meet him with kindness and acceptance, but he's still so cruel towards me. I don't see the hope in this. But here's the thing: if you continue to follow the plan, we can't guarantee, unlike a total knee replacement, which still can't even guarantee that you're fully going to heal properly and all of those things. What we can say is this is the process that of all of the people, the thousands of people we've worked with, this is the process that our most successful clients follow in order to see their marriage calmed down in order for it to be saved so that you can reconcile. Now, just like going back to this knee surgery analogy, y'all stay, y'all stay with me. I hope this is making sense. You do this pre-work, but the thing that makes the huge difference in actually taking out the thing that is that is causing you pain and replacing it with something new that's going to put you on the right track is the surgery, right? Once you get most people have knee replacement because it becomes bone on boy, bone on bone, you've lost the joint. And that joint has eroded because of all of the friction between both of the top of the knee and the bottom of the knee over the years. Just like in so many marriages, what has eroded is that trust, is that ability to communicate without fighting, because the friction has been so high for so long that these things have eroded. And what has to happen is you have to rebuild it. A surgery, so to say, has to occur in order for what you in order for your marriage to be able to be new again. And that's what our workshop does at Marriage Helper. We have a marriage helper community that helps you with that prep work, with everything before the surgery happens. And if you have time, and some people wait, they wait a couple of years, they keep putting off the surgery because the pain isn't big enough right now. And so our marriage helper community helps with that. But then the intervention of the surgery is our workshop. And when someone, when the pain is so high that they can't go another day, then that is when they get surgery, just like with our workshop. When you get to the point where it's critical, where your pain is high enough, that's when the workshop is what you want more than anything. And then just like after you get knee surgery, you the next day, the day of, they have you up and walking. And the next day you're in physical therapy, continuing to do those things you did before in order for you to set you up for success so that you heal, so that you can walk the best way possible, so that you can go back to doing the things you love, so that you can create your dream life. You can go back to doing the things you love, which is what we help you do at Marriage Helper. After you go through our workshop, you're right back in the Marriage Helper community because it's going to help you do the exercises and the things that will strengthen your marriage so that you can create that dream life, the things like rebuilding trust, reigniting passion and intimacy, and creating that dream life together. That's what we do at Marriage Helper. And I say all of this as we go into creating your plan for Christmas so that you know that there are options for you. A lot of people say to me, Well, I tried counseling, I tried therapy, or I just don't think anything will work. I don't know who to trust. There was someone just yesterday who said to me, uh, there's just so much out there. I see so many different marriage help type programs on social media. I just don't know who to trust. And yeah, there's a lot. There's a lot that have come up over the past two years and don't have a track record, don't have the success that we do at Marriage Helper. I'm letting you know that what we do is there are options. And I'm just gonna tell you this up front. Today, you can you can get more information about our workshop. There's some of you saying, I have to like, I want the surgery. I'm in a critical situation. If I think about where I'm gonna be in the next six months, we might be divorced. That's critical. You need to go learn and start learning, learning about our workshop. We have a way that we can uh navigate you through how to talk to your spouse about going. And maybe during Christmas, this is the best time to ask your spouse to go with you as a Christmas gift. Maybe we're gonna, we're gonna evaluate that later. But maybe, right? But if divorce is happening and it's on the table, then just like I said to someone else last week, what do you have to lose at this point? Because if you don't do anything, where are you gonna be in six months? If the answer is divorced, then it is time for you to do something instead of just being too scared to do anything because your marriage is headed towards ending anyway. So I encourage you, go go learn more about our workshops and that is the place you should start if it's critical. But if you're saying, I don't really know yet, it I don't know where it's headed, it's frustrating, I don't know what to do, then I'm offering you today one of the best things I've ever done. One of the best things I've ever offered. Uh, you can join our marriage helper online community. There's members here today. You can get it for 50% off for the first month and a 100% money-back guarantee if you don't like it in the first 30 days. Literally, there's no risk. And so I just want to go ahead and let you know. Merry Christmas. You can try our marriage helper online community that our members are a part of, and you can do it risk-free for 30 days because I don't want you to be another statistic come January. And I believe in what our team does in the membership. And I believe you're gonna have amazing value from it. You're gonna get tools you need. I believe you're gonna start seeing change and that you're gonna want to stay. And so those are just two things that I want to offer you today as we go into the plan for going into the holidays. There are a lot of comments that I see coming in. Um, I have I have some people, some marriage helper people on the call today that are helping. You'll see Kelly, you'll see an amazing woman named Kelly in the chat. Um, she is a trusted figure in our marriage helper community. She's a graduate. Um, she'll be answering some of your questions in the chat at as they come today. But then you'll also see uh other the marriage helper team. Um, that's Jason. He's gonna be answering questions and things like that today through the chat. So those are the team members that I have with me today as we go into the plan. The plan for what to do. As we go into the plan, though, I just want to say um it was it was 12 years ago, around this time. It was right in this time. It was uh like December 12th of 2013 that I thought my marriage was done. I knew my marriage was done. It was the worst weekend of my life, truly. And I try not to talk about it a lot because it still hurts to think about, even though my marriage is amazing right now, even though uh, and it has been for years. My husband's my absolute best friend. And I told him he's like off uh doing stuff at our house today. I was like, if you come in to the to the to the in-law suite that we're living in, you're gonna be on camera. And he's one of those people who says, to love me is to not put me on camera. Like he loves being a behind the scenes person, but I always love when he comes on and does things with me. Um, but y'all, 12 years ago, it was bad. It was it was really bad. And my husband was in the army at that time, and there was a weekend um where everyone in his career uh he was going through this thing called captain's career course, and everyone in his career course group was going down to New Orleans. Um and even just like on the way that morning, we left at 5 a.m. on a Friday morning to to drive with everyone down to New Orleans, and we were driving over to where everyone was gonna meet, and he said to me, and things had been things had been rough, and he said to me, if you do anything this weekend that embarrasses me or makes me feel disrespected, I will divorce you when we get back. Oh my gosh, like you all some of you have heard something like this. Some of you have gotten the divorce tape, like you know that feeling for me. The feeling was right here in my throat. Like, I can't do anything. Like, what the heck am I gonna do? I I don't know what's gonna make him think everything was setting him off back then, everything was setting him off, and I was like, I I'm at a loss. I and so I just remember going through that weekend completely like walking on eggshells, not wanting to do anything to upset the apple car, not being me. Not being me, because I felt like one wrong step, and I made that one wrong step. We went into uh there's this if any of you ever been to New Orleans, which I will never go back, but if any Of you have ever been to New Orleans, there's this beautiful white uh like cathedral. And I remember we went through it and I was feeling a lot of emotions, as you can imagine. And I just started crying in that cathedral. And I went and sit sat down in one of the, you know, one of the pews and just like was praying and thinking about things and like praying to God about like my marriage. And but I was just overwhelmed with emotion. And I will never forget. We were walking out, and he he came up to me and he said, You just embarrassed me. Like, this is it. This is it. And then uh I just went back to the hotel for the for the rest of the day and the rest of the trip. And there, and there was more that happened. Um, and there was more that was that was happening. My husband was drinking a lot at that time, so um half the time he was drunk or like angry from the fact that he had drink too much. And so there was just so much, you know, there was a lot of it. There was a lot of all of that, and so um, it was just a terrible weekend, and I was scared out of my mind. I was scared out of my mind, and I knew that it was over, that he at this point, like it was done, he was done, and I could not live with that. Like it had been it had been bad for a couple of months. We had been separated for a year before this. Um, not it was out of choice, but it was like he stayed in Korea. Our marriage was bad when we first got married. The first couple of years were were pretty rough. Um, and so I ended up coming back to the States. He stayed in Korea, but we weren't separated, right? Like it wasn't like uh, I don't love you, I'm thinking about divorce, let's separate. It was like we're both unhappy, maybe we need space. Let's separate. And then he had finally gotten back from Korea, and that was in July, and this all of this happened in that December. So there was about six months of when both of us had come back together, but no issues had been fixed. We had gotten the space we wanted and kind of felt some peace. And he, we were both like geographical bachelors, geo-bachelor and geobachelorette, which is a very military term. Um, and that marriage was great. We could do whatever we wanted. We didn't have to see each other, we were a half a world apart. But when we got back together, of course, like we were excited to see each other, we had missed each other, but nothing had been fixed. And so everything got worse. And so for six months we fought and we fought and we fought and we fought until we got to that December where we were in New Orleans and all hell broke loose. And so uh that next when we got back from New Orleans, it had been rough and I don't recommend what I did next. But I I went I went in, I packed a bag in our bedroom, and I told him, I love you, but I can't live like this. I'm leaving. And I said it just like that. I wasn't angry, I wasn't yelling, I wasn't anything, but of course he was like, You're you're yeah, you're uh whatever, like stomping out of here, this is why, you know, you're the problem, all the things. And I just remember going out and sitting in my car in front of our townhome in Alabama and waiting for him to come after me. And he didn't come. So I left. So I left. And I will tell you the rest of the story in a minute. Because here's why, y'all. Here's why. Because there's this Christmas anxiety, there's a magnifying glass effect, like we've already talked about. There's the trap of the Hallmark movie, like we've already talked about. There's this pressure for everything to be perfect, all of these things. The goal is to shift. I want to shift your goal. The goal for next week for you is not to save your marriage. That's too big. The goal is damage control, to not make it worse because I've been where you are. I may not be in the exact same circumstance because ultimately my husband didn't file for divorce. He didn't. Shockingly. I'll tell you, I'm gonna tell you what happens. But the but the thing is, I should I don't think I should have left. I don't agree, and I never recommend that someone do what I did. But what I did end up doing in the way that I did it was that I did start making damage control after I left. And I'm gonna explain that a little bit in a minute. The goal for Christmas next week is not to save your marriage, it is to do damage control. So here is the stop the chaos plan. I want you to do a holiday truce where you stop pushing your spouse. As much as I just talked about my husband, he was angry, he was drinking, he was doing all of these things. I left him. I left him twice. I left him when he was in Korea and we wanted a space from each other, and he was going through some really hard personal stuff. And instead of being the wife that stayed and leaned in, I left. And then I left again when he was hurting even more because yes, like he was angry and he was drinking and he was doing these things, but he had suffered some pretty extreme losses in his life at that time. But I wasn't thinking about him, I was just thinking about me. I was thinking about how much his actions were hurting me, how emotionally I felt. I was thinking of all of those things. And I wanted relief. And so I left. I didn't leave once, I left twice. He was hurt, and that was pushing him away. Me leaving was pushing him away. Now, for some of you, it was you, it's been you like completely trying to smother them. It's been you leaning in, pleading, begging, whining. I did my fair share of that in the beginning of our marriage. And when that didn't work, I just started leaving. Right? I hurt him, but I was unwilling to see how I was hurting him. And so the best thing to happen right now is to stop doing the things that are pushing your spouse away. And we're gonna call this the holiday truce. No relationship talks. Make a rule. From now, from now or from December 23rd to December 26th, stop talking about your relationship. Stop talking about the affair, stop talking about the divorce. And if your spouse is being cold or distant, don't push, don't do something to try and retaliate. Stop chasing them. Chaos ensues when you panic and when you try to force a connection. Okay. So what do you do? Be a safe place, be warm and kind and accepting, but not smothering. Become a safe place for your spouse to land rather than a pressure cooker of emotions. Okay. So, as we said, I left. Don't recommend it, never recommend it. But he, I will say, like, I left and then I stopped. I didn't say anything more. I didn't text him. I didn't call him. I just drove away and waited. And I'll never forget it was a couple of days later. He sent me a text message and he said, I'm gonna go buy a new car. We don't have the money for a new car. But at the same time, it wasn't the hill I was willing to die on right now. Like my marriage was falling apart. It was in shambles. And the last thing that I should do at that time is respond back to him about how much of an idiot he'd be if he did that, about anything, X, Y, Z. Like that was the worst thing that could have happened. And so all I said was, okay, we're not gonna fight about this. But this is also a psychological principle. And I was kind of prepared for it, right? Because we know that when you and your spouse are used to a certain cycle of communication, that as soon as one person begins to do something to change that cycle of communication, then the other person begins to act out more or begin to act different. Like, think about your kids. Think about when maybe you have a three-year-old who really wants a cookie. And for a year, you've always given them a cookie when they wanted it. And so they know what to do. And then maybe you tried to like stop giving them cookies because they needed to eat broccoli. But as soon as you stopped giving them cookies, what would they do? Well, they would throw a temper tantrum and they would cry and they would do things until you finally gave in and gave the cookie, right? And so that became the pattern of behavior until maybe one day you're like, I'm putting my foot down, no more cookies, no more cookies, only broccoli. Well, as soon as you do that, you're holding the line at, I'm not giving you a cookie. What is the child doing? The child is gonna keep pushing. And when they realize that they get to the point where you used to give in and you don't give in, they're not all of a sudden gonna give up. They're gonna push even further to try and get the same reaction from you they used to get in the past. That's what happens. That is a psychological principle. It's how people, it's how people are wired, it's what we do. So, this is what you should expect from your spouse when you begin to bring the calm into your marriage. When you try, when all of a sudden you're not fighting back on the things you used to fight on, they're not gonna be like, oh, they've changed. This is a new person, this is a new marriage. No, they're gonna be like, this isn't right. This isn't what I'm used to. I'm gonna go even further because they're comfortable and used to, they're habituated, if you will, to the way that you have been communicating. And I'm not saying it makes logical sense, but the way that they do it is by trying to get you to react the way that you used to react. Now I've lost my comments, so I don't know if this is making sense to y'all or not, but okay, I found them. So if this makes sense to you, then just put like a yeah, that makes sense. I've experienced that. I've tried to do maybe there's some of you who are saying, I've tried smart contact. And for a while it made things worse. Like they ended up reacting even stronger when I was trying to be calm. Right? Like that's why we say at Marriage Helper, consistency over time. This is why we want you to get in the marriage helper community because you need support and you need accountability for when your spouse goes crazy, for when you try and hold the line, but they continue to push past it. You have to keep steady. You have to keep calm. This is why calm down is the first step and smart contact toolkit, which is in the which is in the membership, which you can go into now for half off and 30-day risk-free guarantee. Um, and you can understand, okay, smart contact is going to help me calm down. And then you have the community and you have the group coach, like the group coaching support calls and all those things to help you stay steady. Because the best thing you need to do right now is stay steady. Because I, that's what I did. Not just because that's what I did, but that is what I did. I stayed steady. I did not talk about my relationship with my husband when we when I after I left. And when he tried to like push, I just I I didn't fight. I didn't fight. I used to fight. I fought him on everything. I stopped fighting. Silence again. Silence again. Okay. That silence sucked, by the way. I hate, I hate the silence. I remember just like being by my phone, waiting for him to contact me, waiting for him to call, waiting for him to come after me. And he didn't. I know how it feels. It sucks. It's terrible. It is lonely. And I remember feeling so embarrassed, so ashamed. Like, who am I supposed to go to? Who can I trust? No one. I didn't feel like I had anyone to go to or anyone that I could trust. I did. I talked with my parents and all those things. But like, there's only so much I knew I could tell my parents. I don't want to poison the well. I I taught these things. And so, and so ultimately, I had to learn to stop reacting. I had to hold the line, you do too. So that's why going into next week, stop talking about your relationship. This is one of the parts about no contact anyway. And when they do open up, be the safe place. That's part number one. Here's part number two. You need to manage the external chaos, your family and your friends. So when you have nosy relatives, my sister was a no-nosy relative. I didn't tell my sister anything that was going on. And I didn't have kids at this time. Rob and I didn't have kids yet. Um, and so when my sister, for example, who would have been Joanna, when she asked, why isn't Rob here? What's going on with you two? You need to have a way pre-planned to answer that question that's not going to make things worse. So you could say, hey, we're going through a rough patch, but today I just want to focus on the kids and enjoy Christmas. Thank you for respecting that. If that doesn't feel like you, make it sound like you. So what I said to my sister was, you know, there's things that he is finishing up, there's things that he needs to focus on down in Alabama, but I'm here. I'm here now. I like I really didn't tell her anything, but I'm here now. Um, because I knew she would keep crying. Like if I kept, if I kept saying, but you just need to have something that's gonna protect you, protect you, and honestly protect your marriage, because you don't want to start saying things like, well, my husband had an affair. I, and therefore, like, I don't know if our marriage is gonna be saved or not. You don't need to tell the world what's going on in your marriage right now because it's only gonna make things harder when it's finally time for y'all to come back together. That's what you have to focus on. So find a way to manage the external chaos. Then there's your kids that you have to think of. You need to protect the kids. Ensure that your children don't become messengers or pawns. We had a caller into our live show this past week, and she was talking about how her kids uh are adults, they're older, all girls, and her husband was gone. They were separated, he wasn't living in the house. And her youngest daughter, or one of her daughters, one of her daughters was really upset about about what was going on with her parents, and rightfully so. Rightfully so. Kids are affected by divorce, it doesn't matter how old they are. And so the daughter was taking like what the daughter wanted was for her for her dad to not come around at all. She was angry at her dad. And so the key in a situation like that, and maybe some of you are in situations like that, in a situation like that, you need to be able to separate the two. You don't need to try and convince your kids that that you want to save your marriage. You don't need to try, you definitely should not convince your kids that your spouse is a bad person. You should not try to convince your kids to be on one side or the other. And if you're gonna be convincing them to be on a side, you're gonna try to convince them of being on your side. You should not share anything negative about your spouse. You should not share anything that they don't need to know. And again, like all of this depends on their age about how much they're gonna know, how much they don't need to know. But let's just say you have kids that are 10 and younger. Hey, I know it's hard for you right now that mommy and daddy aren't together right now. How do you feel? Tell me how you feel. What is something we can do together that will that would that we can do, you know, just the two of us, or if you have multiple kids, like look for the things, just try to understand. How do you feel? Talk it out with them, let them know. I know that your mom, your dad, the parents that's that's not here, I know that they love you. They're just struggling right now. Let's pray for them now and let's go do something. Be extra present with your kids during this time. That's why you also need to protect your own emotions, why you don't need to start telling everyone in your life what's going on with your marriage, because that's going to emotionally drain you, emotionally pull you, and you're not going to be there for your kids. Now, some of you are saying, like, my kids don't know anything. Um, okay. Like you have to, you know, your kids, you have to navigate it. And if your kids don't know anything and y'all are still showing up as mom and dad for the kids, then do that for this holiday season. There will come a time when things need to be discussed. But right now we're talking about next week. Protect your kids at all costs. And then some of you are saying, um, uh, what was the one I just said? My spouse told our young kids that he left our house for another woman. And now I'm left to answer all their questions. That's terrible. But you can do this. And the way that you do it is by doing it in a way that you're not throwing him under the bus, but but you are being truthful, but not that doesn't mean you have to tell them everything. Not everything is edifying for other people to hear, right? Some things you need to like use wisdom and discernment on. And so with your young kids, they're probably asking, like, why did dad leave? Who what other woman? What does that even mean? And so maybe you just respond and say, I know this is really confusing for you. I'm I'm a little confused too, but I know that we love you. And I will answer, and and I'm here for you. Tell me how you're feeling. Tell me what you need from me right now, and just lean into being more present with your kids. You're not going to be able to give them a perfect answer to any of it because they're not asking questions out of logic. They're asking their questions out of pain and fear right now. So don't try, it's not about like finding the right answer to their question so that they can logically understand this. They won't. What your kids are thinking is, this is my fault. And I'm scared. Like every kid feels like it's their fault somehow. That's what you need to reassure against. Hey, you are loved. We love you. This is not about you or your fault. This is not your fault. How can I be here for you right now? That is what you need to focus on right now. So manage the external chaos, your family and friends, have something you can say. To them, so that it protects you and it protects your marriage and protect your kids, be there for them even more right now. And then you need to manage you, manage your internal chaos, your emotions, you so you may want to think through some if-then statements. So if my spouse ends up not showing up, like what are the things you're scared of? This is what I want to ask you. Ask to write this. I'm gonna ask y'all to write this down. If your spouse doesn't show up for dinner, if that's something you're scared about, then make a plan for what you're gonna do. Start thinking about the things that will lead you to get riled up, to not be calm anymore. What are those things? Well, there what if they don't show up? What if I don't hear from them at all? What if they are texting the affair partner while they're with me? Uh yeah. We had a caller on the live show uh a couple months ago now, who this was it wasn't for about Christmas necessarily, but she said, maybe it was, maybe it was even just a month ago. She said, um, my husband has been with an he was in an affair, he was with another woman, but he's coming back home. And what do I do? Like, what do what do I do? I'm scared that he might, I don't know if it's over with her yet. I don't know why he's coming home, but I'm happy he's coming home. So what am I supposed to do? And y'all, I got some pretty bad flack on the Facebook reel that posted of this. Because I said in part of the response, well, what are you gonna do about it? What I meant by that is you can't force his actions. You can't control him texting her or not texting her, but you can implement boundaries. Boundaries at Marriage Helper, we call them stops, safeguards that offer protection. And you can learn more about it again in the Marriage Helper online community. There's a full toolkit about boundaries and stops. We call uh it's the ultimate guide to boundaries. And in it, we talk about stops and cores. Again, half off your first month and 100% money back guarantee in the first 30 days. So no reason to not go and and do this. Um, and so in that we talk about how you set up safeguards that offer protections. A boundary is not about control. A boundary is about protection for for you or for your kids. Um, and that's and that's the thing you have to think about. So if your spouse brings up the affair partner or is texting them, then what is something that you can do to protect you? You and and you have to decide what this is gonna be for you because the boundary that you set, the stop that you set has to be something you're actually gonna follow through on. So if you're gonna say, well, I'm gonna go as far as, I'm gonna kick them out of the house. Like if they're in my house and I see them texting the affair partner, then I'm gonna ask them to leave. You 100% have that right. You 100% have that right. And if that's what you want to do, okay, set that as your plan so that you know how you're gonna handle these things as you experience them. Okay. But if you're like, I don't want to do that. Like it may sound crazy, but I don't know that I want to kick them out if I see them texting the affair partner. Because what if that's also my opportunity to be able to show how I've been working on myself? And like there's a lot of things you have to consider. So you have to decide what's best for you. And either one, like, I'm not here to tell you what to do. I'm here to give you frameworks that you can use to decide what's best for you to do. Okay. And and I know someone, I know a friend who was like, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna pull that kind of ultimatum because she just knew in her heart that that would be what would be the final straw. And it would ultimately end up pushing him permanently away. And so she didn't. Now she had she endured maybe a lot more than some other people are willing to endure. Um, in terms of like the pain she ex like, you know, just the stuff with like how much anyway, I won't get into it. But um ultimately that ended it in her marriage ended up being saved. So you have to pick this for you. If they don't show up for dinner, what are you gonna do? If they say something hurtful, what are you gonna do? If they don't say anything, what are you gonna do? Just think through it. And I wouldn't try and be exhaustive here. My biggest fear 12 years ago was what if he doesn't come here for Christmas? What if I spend Christmas alone? Well, then I had a plan. I'm gonna go be with my parents, I'm going to spend time doing things that I love, things that fill me up, and I'm not going to guilt him about it. Because what good would it do? It doesn't do any good. It doesn't do any good. So think about some of the things. I'd even love to know like what are the things that you are most scared of? If you had to list maybe the one thing that you would want to create an if-then plan about. What if my kids, what if my kids are heartbroken? Okay. Then have like a perfect, perfect night. Have like a night set up in your mind that you will go. Like if you he ends up not coming, she ends up not coming, whatever. You have a pre-planned, ready to go. You're gonna go see this movie, you're gonna go look at Christmas lights, you're gonna go get hot chocolate, like just have a thing that you are gonna do if that thing happens, right? That's what I want you to think of. You can't control your spouse next week, but you can control your reaction. A calm response stops the chaos. And so it was a couple of days after my husband sent me the text message that he was gonna buy a new car, that and that uh he called me out of nowhere, out of the blue. And so, of course, I answer and I'm trying to like be calm, trying to be calm. He didn't buy a car, by the way. I thought he was calling to tell me like he had bought one or he needed my like approval, like not approval, but you know, like the car come the the dealership needed me to say anyway, no he called me and he just had this really I like un unexpected self-revelatory moment on the phone with me. And he said, I don't know that I know what love is, I know what 1 Corinthians 13 says that love is, because we're both Christians, and he said, But I just don't feel like I have been doing that or know how to do that. Like it was this very unexpected moment, and I just remember sitting in my bathroom. This one actually, like so the part of the house I'm staying in, uh, is the part of the house, my parents' house that I grew up in. It's this in-law suite that's connected to the house. And this is where I came when um when I left my husband that time. And I was in that bathroom. And I was just sitting on the floor, and I was like, there's so much of me that wants to like there's this part of me that wants to be like, why? Like we've been married for, you know, whatever, four years now. Why don't like what do you mean you don't know how to love? What do you mean? Like I wanted part of me wanted to interrogate him, part of me just wanted to shut up and hear everything he had to say, right? And I just remember sitting there and I I just kept saying, tell me more. Like, yeah, I I understand how that feels too. Tell me more. And we ended up talking for like 30 minutes, maybe. And it was one of the first times we had talked in a while where it wasn't angry, where it wasn't one of us wanted something, um, where it wasn't where we weren't mad. Like, I I just listened to him. And then there was this other part of me that wanted to be like, come home, like, where are you? Come here for Christmas. And I didn't, but he did end up saying something. Like, I don't really remember exactly how we got to this next part of the conversation, but he he was like, I'm coming, I will come, I will come be there. And and then he was like, But is your is your are your parents mad at me? Like, are people angry? What? And I I remember being able to say, no, everyone loves you because I hadn't poisoned the well. Like everyone loves you. Yes, there were some people that knew some things that were going on, but you are welcome here. Can't wait to see you. And that was the beginning of big change in our marriage. It didn't happen overnight, it didn't happen even necessarily within like a couple of months, but I remember over that next year especially, there were a lot of things that came to light and things that he shared with me about things he had been struggling with, um, all of those things that he ultimately like he became free. And he only felt free to share those things with me because I was a safe place. Finally, I wasn't, right? Like I want to make sure you all know I wasn't a super safe place the first four years of the marriage. I did a lot of controlling things, I did a lot of hurtful things, and so then he acted out of that in his anger and in his um, and in like how angry he was. Like part, a big part of how angry he was was because of things I had done that I didn't mean to come across the way that they did, but they did. And we were, we just didn't have the tools to be able to handle it, and so it led to change, it led to rebuilding trust, it led to reconciling, it led to all of these things to where I can confidently and honestly say that he is my best friend. He knows everything about me. I know everything about him. We have full, like today, now we have full access to each other's phones. We were talking about that this morning. Um, about how like it's so normal for there's nothing on this phone I wouldn't show him. There's nothing on his phone he wouldn't show me. And and I could go look at it at any moment and he would not get angry. It wasn't that way years ago. It wasn't that way, you know, 12 years ago when there were things that he was doing that he was hiding and things like that. Um, but it is now, and I say all that not so that you all are like, I feel even lonelier. I say that because 12 years ago I felt lonely, like you. I felt exhausted, tired, scared, anxious. I felt all of those things devastated. Like I just knew it was done. And it wasn't. And it wasn't. The thing that was different was I didn't have what you all have. I didn't have the marriage helper community. Like, I know that sounds so cliche, but literally I ended up a couple of years later, like us creating a lot of the things we've created at Marriage Helper was because I wanted to create what I wanted when I was going through my crisis, but didn't have. That's why I'm so passionate about it. And so you need to manage you. You need to manage the internal chaos, you need to manage those things. Now let's talk about a couple of scenarios, okay? Because there's some of you where your spouse is there, but they're distant. They're this was this was ultimately like for the most part, this was me and Rob. We were living together most of the time. We were together, except for the year, except for the year we were separated and then the two weeks we were separated. Uh, but other than that, we were together. So if there's if they're there but distant, be hospitable. Treat them like a guest, not like uh not in a way of like, oh, you're just a guest, but like maybe for those of you who are you know Christians, like a more biblical view of guests and hospitality. Uh, treat them like a guest. Don't ask all of these things, like, do you love me? Are we okay? You know, I'm scared of losing you. Why did you do this? Why did you do that? Just simply say, Hey, I'm I'm glad you're here. Go about your life in your house together in a calm way. Don't walk on eggshells. Don't worry about doing all of the wrong things. Just have a strong, calm confidence that is attractive. Speaking of attraction, get into a routine. This is gonna help you not walk on eggshells. Start working on your pies. Okay, work on yourself, physically, intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually. How many of you know about the pies? How many of you? Yes, no, love them, hate them, tell me, want to hear? I see a couple of you have raised your hand. Yes, oh yes, love them. Who doesn't love the pies? Everyone loves the pies. Someone says I need to hear them. Okay, we're gonna tell you about the pies. So, again, one of the things we teach at Love Path is this process to falling in love. And it is uh this process to falling in love, and it is uh because falling in love starts with attraction, and attraction can be broken down into four parts physic, intellectual, emotional, and and spiritual. Physical, intellectual, emotional, and spiritual. These are the four parts of attraction. So physically, it's not just about looking your best. It's not about being a 10 out of 10, it's not about being a model, it's not about being on the cover of cosmopolitan or GQ. That's not what it is. It's about looking and feeling your best for your age and situation in life. Okay, so it's not about comparing yourself to someone who's 20 years younger than you or whatever. Um it's not about that. It's about you doing the best you can to look and feel your best. I like to think about the physical part of pies in three key areas. And I am obsessive about these three areas. The first one is exercise. Well, actually, the first one is sleep. We're gonna start with sleep. The first one is sleep, because if you aren't getting good sleep, you're not able to process things well. Your emotions go haywire, your judgment falters. All of those things happen if you aren't getting enough sleep. And you're not, many of you aren't because you have insomnia, because you're staying up late, because someone just said, I don't sleep. Yeah, you've got to find a way to calm down and to sleep. This is so important for you just to like emotionally be able to process things. Getting good sleep hygiene is important. Having a set bedtime and wake time can help, even if you're only sleeping five or six hours a night right now, make it a consistent, like the same time that you're going to sleep and waking up, and then start trying to expand it to go to bed. If you're going to bed really late, then try and expand it back 15 minutes. So you're getting 15 minutes more sleep every week. That's one tip. You need to sleep in cold, in a cold environment. So make sure your temperature is at you know 68 degrees Fahrenheit or 67 degrees, something like that. Um, don't sleep in too heavy of clothes. Maybe try and use some white noise. There's some different things you can do. Uh, try not to use screens or do anything that's going to be anxiety-producing before bed. Put down the news, put down social media, put down, like for the love of everything, don't look at your spouse's social media or the affair partner social media as you're going to bed. And I know some of you have done it. Or you are doing it. Don't do it. And then there's some things. I'm not a doctor, at least not that kind of doctor, and not yet. But uh, you know, there's some things you can take, like supplements that you can look into. I'm not going to recommend any of those. Um, but there's some things you can do, right? I like sleep is so important. I'll get off my, I'll get off my high horse about it. I have a lot of episodes on my podcast about sleep that you can go and listen to as well. And Jason um can put the links in here. Sorry, Jason, you weren't expecting that. But I highly recommend you sleep. The second thing is exercise. Even if it's just going for a walk, great. Do something to get out and move your body because that helps you in so many ways. It helps release tension, it can help lower anxiety. In fact, we know that when it comes to treating depression and anxiety, that there is what they call the trifecta of therapy, exercise, and sleep. Like those things can really help you the most in being able to overcome those things. So go out and move. Or do something you love. When it comes to exercise, do what you know you're going to do. If it's not walking, if you want to go weightlifting, if you want to go start doing boxing lessons or jujitsu, do something because it's going to help you get that anger out. Okay. And then eating. Some of you are saying, I have a problem eating. What can I do to gain weight? That's what happened to one of my friends. They, when their marriage was going through crisis, they lost, like had to be hospitalized at one point because they were so dehydrated and so um, and so yeah, like that's not healthy. We don't want to get to that. Do like what if you're not eating and you're struggling with eating, which can also make you jittery, then find the things that you can eat. Like you have to at least get yourself to eat a little bit of something every couple of hours. You've got to keep your weight on. Exercise, like doing these things to help lower your anxiety will help. Maybe you need to go to a doctor, get some anxiety medication if that's needed, so that you can eat. Maybe you're eating too much. When I get stressed, that's me. I am an overeater. Um, and so focus on healthier foods, like create or uh pick healthier food options. That's a way you can work on the physical part of your pies. Intellectually, start doing things that are going to um really help you not think about this all the time. So get involved with a hobby, get involved in doing something. Go out with some of your girlfriends, go out with some of your guy friends, have some things on the books that you can do that you can look forward to. Okay. This is another thing that happens inside of our community at Marriage Helper. We have an amazing team uh in our community, like an amazing marriage helper team. And they do events all month long. They there's this thing called community club. They get together. Sometimes they just have parties. They have these pies parties, like people come, it's so close-knit. Um, all of those things help you have something to look forward to that gets you out of the rut that you're in. Emotionally, being able to do things that are going to evoke positive emotions within you. Journaling, again, hanging out with friends could be here as well. Doing things that are soothing for your own soul. Oh my gosh, there's a pies party today after this, after this webinar. So if you join membership now, if you join the marriage lover community now, um, hopefully you could like get in on that. Just keep the party going all day long. But the, and I just learned that from Jared, who's an amazing member of our team, uh, and so many of you know, and he's been a driving force behind our membership and online community for so long. But do those things that are gonna fill your cup emotionally because your spouse isn't right now. And honestly, you shouldn't depend on your spouse to do that all the time, anyway. If you when my husband and I first got married, I was like, oh, he's here to make me happy, right? He's not there to make me happy, not at all. Uh, I like joy is good and we should have we should be happy and get to a point where our marriage is happy and fulfilling. But if we think about our spouse as like we're only going to be happy if they are doing what we want them to do, treating us the way we want to be treated, paying attention to us the way we want to be treated, that's an unhealthy relationship. So we have to be able to work on filling our own emotional cup as well, or having it filled, right? Um, for my fellow people who are on here who are also people of faith, then we also know being able to find that in God and in our relationship with God is the best thing that we could do, 100%. And that leads us right into spiritual attraction. We are attracted to people who we see as having a similar or better beliefs and values that than we do. Um, and so leaning into that, like going to church, being a part of a Bible study, volunteering. Next week is a great time to volunteer. And that could be one of those things when we go up here, like uh managing your internal chaos or finding things that you can do to get your mind off of what's happening. Go and volunteer, do something to help others. This is a great time of year to do that. So I absolutely recommend that you have a routine because that will help you be able to show up better in your marriage to be calm. Definitely recommend. So then scenario B is your spouse is not there. This is probably at least half of you. Don't just sit at home in the dark. Even if you don't have kids, or even if your kids are grown and older, find a new tradition. Don't text them or guilt, send them messages. Don't drink too much spiked eggnog and drunk text. This is not the time. Don't do that. If you're in a space where you're just not talking much right now, maybe you send them a text that says Merry Christmas and that's it. Maybe like those are the things you don't want to overwhelm. We don't want to smother. These are the things that we have to be really mindful of. And it's gonna be hard to be mindful of that when you're sitting in your own pain all of the time, when you're not doing the things to calm down, when you're not doing smart contact, when you're not working on your pies, you're gonna be more likely to send these messages because that's what you naturally want to do. I know that that's what you want to do. That's what you not need to do. That's what you not need to do. That is not what you need to do. And so don't do that. Don't do that. Get into the community, find accountability, find your people inside of the community. They will keep you strong. Um, message them. Like, put a post in the community of what you want to say to your spouse, but you're not going to because it wouldn't be a good thing to do, right? Keep that routine, find a community to lean into. We have that. That's what you need to do. So, as an overview, what's the plan for next week? The plan for next week is to bring the calm, to do damage control because you don't want to make what's already bad worse, because we don't want you to end up being a statistic in January. Calm down for next week, do the damage control, don't do the things that are gonna continue to push your spouse away. And that is your plan for next week. So, as we're wrapping up, I want to know what are your key takeaways. Y'all, this has been a lively chat. I have not been able to keep up with half of what's been going on in it. Um, but I love it. I love I love that y'all are talking to each other. I love that things are happening. I want to know your key takeaway. I want to know your key takeaway from today and what you're actually going to implement from this going into next week. All right. No relationship talks. Love it. Don't talk about being divorced for the rest of this year. Be the calm, control the chaos. How are you gonna control the chaos? Life isn't over. Life is not over. There is so much hope. There's so much for your future. The pies is always a great takeaway. Be the peacemaker and focus on myself. Stay calm. It's not over yet. I'm loving these takeaways, y'all. Uh, what else are we seeing? Be present and calm, remain calm, lots of calm. I feel calmer already. Oh, good, good, Jessica. Damage control. Um, show up as my best. Yes, absolutely. That you are loved. You are loved. Feel some relief that pressure is off for next week. Yes, God's got this always. Um, my kids came in halfway through. Oh, is it possible to watch it again? I wasn't planning on sending out the the um the thing. What is this replay? But um, we'll see. We'll see, Bob. What doesn't kill me makes me stronger. Damage control, love this. No affair talk 100%. Um treat her as the guest with the love of Christ. I loved that. Awesome. Okay, so you have some great takeaways. Now, here's the thing. Again, we talked about the membership. Do something. So join the membership community,$49 off the first month, and the 30-day risk guarantee, or or and slash, and um go and look at our marriage helper workshops. They are, as we said before, the surgery. They are the surgery going into the new year. If you are like, okay, we're at a place where if I don't do something in six months, we are divorced and divorces on the table, and maybe you have some leverage to be able to work with to try and persuade your spouse to go and do something with you. Then I highly recommend that you look into our workshops. The workshop, I want to be very clear about something. The marriage helper couples workshop is the thing that has the greatest success rate at marriage helper. It's been around for 30 years. Three different times we have studied the outcomes of it, or different people have studied the outcomes of it and seen a 70% success rate at the marriage being saved from divorce that go through it. So the couples workshop is the surgery. It is the intervention. It's going to be the thing that is the pivotal moment for you and your spouse that if anything can work to turn it around, this will. Okay. Will the couples workshop work if my wife is still in an affair and the papers are already filed? You're, you're, you're explaining half of the people or more who attend the workshop. So, yes, we see that all of the time. Um if I attend a lot of questions about the workshop right now, love it. If I attend the workshop, do I also gain access to the marriage helper community? Yes, you do. So you can do this two ways. And we try to make it clear, not confusing. Okay. Um, you can start right now with the marriage helper online community. There's no reason not to, risk-free, all the things. And then it's 49 for the first month, and that's half off. So it's 99 a month after that. But what you get in there is more than 30 hours of interaction a week in all of the different things that you can do. You have a ton of content that you can go in and listen to, just like a whole backload, a thousand support calls in the library. Um, there's toolkits for every kind of situation that you are encountering right now that can give you a plan of what you need to do. And then there's the community, which is alive and active. 24-7 support, cheaper than therapy. I would say better outcome, right? Because we get because of what we do and how we're able to help people. Um that is what you that's where, like, if nothing else, start there. But that's the pre-work. That's the pre-work. Okay. It it does not have the same success rate or ability to save a marriage because it's the workshop that allows for the intervention to happen. The workshop is the surgery, especially the couples' workshop. Now, some of you are asking about the solo workshop. The solo workshop is different, it's going to be amazing for you as an individual. You're going to have a transformative weekend. Your eyes are going to be opened. You're going to be able to get more done faster and learn more things quicker and see results better, so to say, by going through the solo workshop. But the couples workshop is the thing that has the highest success rate of saving the marriage that we have documented. The membership, the online community, the marriage help for online community is the front end. It is the pre-work. It is what can help no matter what. And as soon as you're like, the pain's too high, like I gotta have the surgery now. It's bone on bone. There's nothing else I can do. It's critical. That's where the workshop comes in. And then the membership after that helps with your post-rehab. It helps you to make sure that you are the best, that you stay strong. All of those things. People are commenting. Y'all read the comments. There's so many comments. Um, people are getting confused about links. I know. So your.marriage helper.com slash marriage helper community is the membership, the marriage helper online community for 40 is starting for this month at 49. Um, and then many of you are saying, okay, well, so so if you sign up for a workshop, then then membership, a year of membership does come with your workshop at an even at a discounted price for the entire year. So it's like, we know it's gonna be so helpful for you that we include it in the workshop that you get. Um and and so that's that's how it works, right? Right there. But you can also get in the and you get a different access of membership after you go through the workshop. We unlock more levels for you, we unlock new things. There's some different um, there's just some different things you get access to that's gonna help you specifically after your workshop. Um yes, uh, I know, and then uh one person says, I know it's gonna work once we get there. Same with the solo, trying to work on both. We can help you with that. If you want more information about the workshop, then go to marriagehelper.com slash workshop experiences. And what you can do there is uh you can you can submit an application that will ultimately get you to book a call with someone on our team, and that that person can help explain to you the difference in the solo uh or the couples. They also have something they can give you. It's a video course, really. It's like a really long video and it's a PDF from Dr. Joe explaining specifically how to ask your spouse to the workshop. Okay. So that is a great, great thing that you can do. Um, what is a solo workshop? Is this something new? We've had the solo workshop for a while. It's not new, but it is absolutely the intensive that you can do for yourself when your spouse doesn't want to do the workshop with you for now. So it is uh yeah, like Grace says, it's an alternative to the couples if your spouse refuses to attend. And so all of these things we have available for you because we care. Because we care, and because we don't want you to be a statistic in January, and because um we love y'all, our whole team, we care a lot about marriages. We our core values, the very first one, is that everyone on our team is dedicated fiercely and fearlessly to saving marriages. And that's why we're here on five days before Christmas on a Saturday to give you a plan to do damage control next week, to stop the calm, so that you can have the best chance to save your marriage going into next year. As we end, someone just asked me, can I pray for everyone? I would love to, as we end, I would love to pray for every single one of you and your families and your spouses and all the things. Hopefully, I don't cry. We'll see. But as we end, let's pray. God, I'm just trying to slow down after talking for so much. Um God, I'm thankful for this beautiful day. I am, and I'm thankful for uh right seeing my kids outside of this window, just um like running around playing soccer outside and knowing that that wouldn't be possible if my marriage didn't see a turnaround 12 years ago. And so, God, today I'm thankful. And even though it's painful to like even think about sometimes, and even though it's painful sometimes to talk about, um, I'm grateful for the change and transformation you've done in my life and in Rob's life and in my marriage. And God, I want that so desperately for everyone. I think of Kelly, who's on the call, and her husband, and their story and their transformation and how they're living in their testimony right now. And God, um, I'm so thankful for that. And I'm thankful for all of the other people on here, Jared, um, and so many other of our team members who I've seen today, I'm thankful for all of them and the work that you've done in their lives. And God, if nothing else, if if this is just a way for us to say, like, this is what God has done, there is always hope for you, then that's enough. But God, going into Christmas, whoo, it's a heavy time. And God, I pray for every person and I pray for their reluctant spouses. I pray that there would be a softening of hearts, God. Um, I pray that there would be a turn back to the commitment that they originally made. I pray that there would be a um revival on marriage, for marriage, for every single person in this call, that over the next year that you would do an amazing work in their life, in their spouse's life, but also in their life. And God, through if nothing else happens, even for the people on here who may not, who may not be a Christian or may be a different faith, God, I pray that they would all come to know you or know you more because that matters the most. And ultimately, I'm thankful that you love us so much and you see us as your bride, and you have never left us and have never forsaken us. And so, even when our earthly relationships may fail, God, I pray that we are always reminded that you have an everlasting love, that you have a mercy that is new every morning, that you have an unending desire to go after us and to bring us back because you love us, even though we do stupid things against you time and time again. And God, I pray that we take that same spirit into our own marriages, that we would love with the love of Christ because you loved us first. And I pray for comfort for every single person on this call going into their next year, going into Christmas, and that we can always remember the true reason of Christmas, even with all of the chaos going on in our lives, and that we will never stop being thankful for the gift you gave us of Jesus, for his birth, for his life, for his death, and more than anything for his resurrection, because you are a God of resurrection. And we love you, and we're so grateful that you love us so much more. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Amen. Amen. Thank you all. I got through it without crying too much. So thank you all. I hope you have a Merry Christmas. We're here for you, and we'll see you next time.