Lynn & Tony Know
Lynn & Tony Know
Our Four Year Anniversary!
Have you ever wondered how to maintain a thriving marriage amidst the chaos of life? Join us from our intimate Sukkah setting, where we share the joys of Sukkot, a dream realized with Tony’s hard work, and reveal how the same dedication applies to nurturing a loving relationship. As we navigate the personal and global events that weigh on our hearts, including the tragic events in Israel, we reflect on justice, pain, and hope. Our four-year journey together comes alive through cherished memories and the lessons we've learned along the way.
Marriage is a journey filled with both challenges and triumphs, and we explore what it truly means to foster a genuine partnership. From sharing responsibilities to understanding the mental load each partner carries, we unravel the complexities of modern adult life. Through effective communication and role adaptation, we find harmony amidst parenting and work pressures. Discover how we handle these dynamics, ensuring resentment doesn’t take root, and how we maintain intimacy and connection, especially through life's transitions like postpartum.
Tune in as we unpack the importance of vigilance and self-awareness, offering practical advice to keep your relationship thriving. We dive into the significance of physical intimacy, friendship, and mutual respect, all while enjoying shared activities that keep the spark alive. Our candid discussion on maintaining boundaries and supporting each other’s growth serves as a reminder of the healing power of communication. As we celebrate our four-year anniversary, we cherish the fulfilling journey of love and partnership, with a touch of humor from our shared love for reality shows like "Love is Blind.
Your hosts: @lynnhazan_ and @tonydoesknow
follow us on social @ltkpod!
Hey, welcome to the Lynn and Tony Know podcast. I'm your host, Lynn.
Speaker 2:And I'm Tony. We are both wellness coaches and married with kids.
Speaker 1:Join us as we talk about all things health, wellness, relationships, life hacks, parenting and everything in between, unfiltered. Thanks for listening and let's get into it. Welcome to the show Welcome back. We're in a special location.
Speaker 2:We're doing a SukaPod.
Speaker 1:Okay, well, to those who don't know what a sukkah is, can you explain what a sukkah is?
Speaker 2:Yes, a sukkah is a temporary structure built outside for the holiday of Sukkot, and you are meant to eat all your meals in it. Some people go as far, apparently, as to sleep in it.
Speaker 1:Not many.
Speaker 2:How many?
Speaker 1:I don't know. I think maybe the ultra religious, but even then I don't think they are but it stays up for eight days.
Speaker 2:Eight days you eat all your meals in it and, uh, I figured we should record a pod in it. It's so cute in here, I love it. It's a vibe, so, and it's a vibe.
Speaker 1:And Tony built this for me, for us, I know, but she's been wanting one since we started dating.
Speaker 1:Since we started dating, I was always like oh, it's Sukkot, it's such a cute holiday and this is before, obviously, pre-October 7th, where we've become a little bit more traditional in a sense. I've always talked about Sukkot. I always thought it was like a really cute holiday. My parents never had a sukkah so I was always jealous at, like, the other kids in my school who had a sukkah, because, like we would like, it was just cute, you know, it's fun. My uncle used to host us and he had a sukkah and I always, like, loved it suki, sukkah yeah, shuki sukkah.
Speaker 1:yeah, my uncle's name is shuki, so, um, yeah, so we used to hang out there and eat meals, and then this year we have we had the opportunity of building one, and Tony did it. So to all the women listening, whether you're single in a relationship. If he wanted to, he would.
Speaker 2:Tony knew that I really wanted this and he figured it out and fucking built it and it was the sexiest thing ever and he gets blowjobs forever built it and it was the sexiest thing ever, and he gets blowjobs forever. Um, also, huge shout out to super jew christopher columbus, because without columbus day I wouldn't have had the time to do so yeah, it's true, and it looks great and it came out great and I'm like really grateful for it yeah, it's fun and it's gonna be sad for it to come down.
Speaker 2:That will be sad because then I'll have to find another day to take it down, which is hard, but yeah.
Speaker 1:So before we get into the four, so this is a special episode it's our four-year anniversary when this comes out, so tomorrow. And we want to kind of talk about our relationship and what makes it work.
Speaker 2:But before that, last week, it was a very joyous day because yeah, four days ago Senwar was killed in Rafah, and it was not an assassination. It was simply a routine military exercise where terrorists were identified in a building and taken out, and one of them happened to be Yahasenwar.
Speaker 1:I can't believe this day has come.
Speaker 2:No, it's a remarkable day and in the smaller context of the war, it's going to go down as one of the more remarkable days in Israel's history.
Speaker 1:And it was a 19-year-old who did it, a 19-year-old who was only 19 year old.
Speaker 2:Who did it? 19 year old who?
Speaker 1:was only, who was only in nine months in his service.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And he's old. Apparently he was ultra Orthodox as well. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, Hashem guided his hand into history with that, so and see where it goes now.
Speaker 1:The community, the Jewish community and obviously in Israel. Everyone was just ecstatic about this because this person has caused so much pain and suffering to Israelis and Palestinians.
Speaker 2:For sure.
Speaker 1:And, all that being said, that day was very happy for me because it was like it's just like justice is served type thing. But I think the day after was like the reality of like we still have a hundred hostages, the war isn't over, it's still going on, and like real victory will be when our hostages come home and are with their families and can begin the healing process. Like we're still going through this and it's just like so many mixed feelings. You know like we could be happy that he's gone but also continue. And you know also Jew hatred, aside from the war, is just the anti-Semitism that is happening around us. And now you know it's election season and things are so prolific and crazy and it's just like it's intense, like social media has created this just place of just toxicity and I just like can't handle it sometimes yeah, listen, go back to our last episode and and check out what we had to say with an expert on all of that, but yeah, it's.
Speaker 2:it's a tough place to exist without the right mindset, um, and probably most importantly, without the ability to regulate and put it down once in a while, 100%. So, with all that being said, stay on long enough to listen to this episode and to follow us on Instagram so that you can get, hopefully, some uplifting stuff in your feed every once in a while.
Speaker 1:So I want to talk about Okay. So we're in our four-year anniversary tomorrow and I remember this Q&A that we did in December of 2020, which is four years ago, and it was two months after we started dating, and we did a long Q&A. I hard-launched Tony onober 31st like it was a hard launch on instagram mostly because you had to show off your halloween costume yeah, so like you were for your.
Speaker 1:Your hand was sort of forced right and here's the thing we talked like in our first and second episode of our first season. We talk about how we met. So we're not going to talk about that today, um, but here's a funny video. Like one of us asked us, hold on, hold on One of us. Somebody asked us how good is the NRE, the new relationship energy, hold on. Um, clearly awesome. We're very happy, but I feel like we're going to sustain this energy for a while now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think it's. I think it's very possible to keep new relationship energy the whole time and not have it be like a new thing.
Speaker 1:Yes, agreed how do you keep the new relationship energy going by like not?
Speaker 2:by not not labeling it as new relationship energy. That implies that, like when it disappears, it's okay so god I was smart four years ago, isn't?
Speaker 1:it crazy that four years has passed since then. Like obviously we're not in a new relationship, like no, so how do you feel about our energy?
Speaker 2:I love it. I I feel exactly like even watching that video. Like that feels normal, Like that that entered the way we were talking about it, your reaction, all of it feels like us today.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Like nothing about that feels foreign or like, oh man, I wish we could go back there, granted the, you know, the parameters on which we can operate in terms of us hanging out and us going out and us doing stuff are different now because we obviously we have, we have, um, an amazing almost two-year-old and so that, and real life problems like like I, at the time that we started dating, you were living in brooklyn, I was living in jersey city, like you had met mia, but we weren't like living together, we were still.
Speaker 1:We were just like dating and you know, we weren't talking about like moving in yet I don't think, and we weren't talking about marriage.
Speaker 1:We haven't merged our our lives, and it all we had to focus on was each other that's true you know, like I had I have 50 50 custody with my ex-husband and so like on the days that I didn't have mia, we would spend time. So like it was like very separate from like real life decisions and and you know we're adults. It's not like normal people necessarily dating who don't have kids, who don't have a mortgage. It's like easier, that's all you can focus on. But, like in my case, I had an ex-husband, I have an ex-husband and I have a kid and I have a full-grown bit like business and and like we didn't merge our lives together. So it's cool watching us back then and we still have that like fun, energy and like in like being in love on top of all the problems that surround us. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:Like yeah, it's a good point actually you know what I'm saying, like we still.
Speaker 1:We still are excited to like hang out, we're still excited to like try new things and we're not like jaded by like real life stuff. And I want to talk about what. How did we, how were we able to sustain this energy? Um, and you know, it's four years and again, I know that people have been together for longer and it gets sometimes more complicated depending on when you meet each other. But I can only talk about us, right, and I've been married before, so I have something to like compare it to, in a way, and there are three things that I think are essential in a marriage. Do you want to hear the three things?
Speaker 2:I would love to.
Speaker 1:Number one is true partnership, like real partnership, meaning we both carry the load of the day to day Right.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:You know, tony knows if there's dishes like, I don't have to tell him, like, go wash the dishes. He knows if he walks into the kitchen and there's a mountain of dishes, he just does them Right. And vice versa. Same with me. If, like, the living room is a mess, we clean the living room. Either he does or I do. We are a true partnership. And then within that container of our partnership is also we each have our roles, like. My role is to like make sure that the groceries are done every week and there's meal planning and activities and paying bills. Tony does all the drop-offs and and uh, uh, for you know he takes care of all the soccer stuff. He, you know, he like.
Speaker 2:I, I'm pretty much uh the general in the mornings and for bedtime, at least for Noah. Um, those are my uh to take over and I'm with noah from three to six yeah, we have a division of labor that is is pretty clearly defined.
Speaker 2:Although we didn't, we didn't necessarily define them outright from the beginning, we they were relatively natural roles that we settled into, um, and then along the way there's definitely been conversations where things have been off or adjustments need to be made that we talk about and make those adjustments along the way. So we adjust our roles pretty fluidly as needed, yeah, and it's about.
Speaker 1:So I think that. So, back to the point, is that it's a true partnership and some weeks he picks up the slack if I'm not feeling well and some weeks I pick up the slack if he has a lot going on. And again, there's a lot of communication involved and, of course, things fall through the cracks and we're not perfect. And as a woman and as a mom, sometimes I feel like the mental load can be overwhelming and it's something that we definitely definitely had to discuss, you know, had to discuss right and work through. But in general I don't have like I don't feel resentment towards him for not putting in the time, you know, and I feel like a lot of men in marriages they kind of just like go to work and they don't really have to deal with the mental load. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:They don't care, I'll push back on that a little bit. The mental load for men is not as commonly discussed, and the mental load for us that isn't discussed is to, in a lot of cases, provide and then ultimately protect, like to protect your family. To be vigilant to threats to your family, whether they're real or not, is a mental load that there are very few outside of that that could understand what that feels like and over the past year specifically, has been amplified to a degree that I would never have guessed Like there is. There is a weight of making sure that your family is safe within the home when you go out. Whatever you're doing that is is heavy. I mean that that that's a heavy load.
Speaker 1:I mean, I'm not saying all men I think you specifically carry a mental load, like I know you do. But I think from conversations that I have with women and their issues in marriages is that they feel like they're carrying most of the mental load. They're the default parent. They're, you know the kids always go to them, you know, for stuff like they need. Mommy, mommy, daddy is just like goes to play golf on Sundays and does his own thing, and and there's there, like goes to play golf on Sundays and does his own thing, and and there's there's a lot of issues like that in marriages and and that kind of breaks things down and you know the woman starts feeling like resentful. Like you know there was a lot of on our plate right now.
Speaker 1:Like as women, like we're expected to have kids to, we're expected to be home with our kids, but then we're expected to also make money and contribute and pay half the bills. We're expected to look good and work out while also having time for our husbands and our kids. There's just so much expectation for being a woman. It's like it's almost like impossible and having a partner a partner in crime in that sense that takes the load off or it makes life easier. Like you're in this together. It shouldn't be. You know, some husbands are like, oh, I'll help you. Like no, you're not helping me. This is your house too, it's your kids, you know. Like this is your.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's a mindset thing. Right Like men, don't babysit. Right, it's your child. You know what? Right Like men, don't babysit, right, it's your child.
Speaker 1:You know what I mean. Like it's your kid, and there are situations where some men become like the you know, like, let's say, you have two kids, they become like the third child, like you need to make them lunch and you need to like do the laundry and you need to like almost baby them and give them a list. Oh, these are the things that need to get done. Like that adds to the mental load, you know, and I think that me and you have worked through some of that stuff and like like I do feel like you, you push, you pull your weight, and when I feel like you don't, like we have a discussion, we have a discussion around it. So that's number one. I think is key is is true partnership and and and obviously communication comes, comes with that.
Speaker 1:The second thing is sex. Okay, a lot of have sex, like continue having sex, and it's really easy, especially for you know, when you have kids, to find excuses not to. We have our nights where we don't want to have sex, but we know we have to do it, and you know what I mean Like we have to do it, no, no no, okay, there are nights where we could easily just not do it and it doesn't take too much to flip the switch and go.
Speaker 2:Oh wait, we both really like this part. Yeah, let's just do it.
Speaker 1:We never, you never it's like. It's like you never regret a workout. You never regret having sex Like with your, with your partner, yeah, Obviously not with somebody else. No, I mean With your partner. Yeah, obviously not with somebody else.
Speaker 2:No, I mean in your marriage, In your marriage right?
Speaker 1:Yes, Because if you take the intimacy part out of the equation, you're just roommates and it's so easy, like once you stop having sex. It makes it like the longer you go without having sex, the harder it is to get back on the horse no pun. You know what I mean. And I think the biggest thing in longevity in a marriage is physical intimacy. And I work with you know moms who are postpartum and it's challenging because your body's changed.
Speaker 1:You don't feel great, right, like you've gained weight, you're still trying to figure yourself out, you're touched out, you're, you know you're breastfeeding, like your body is not yours anymore. It's so understandable that the last thing you're thinking about is sex. Yeah, right, so what I usually advise, like my clients in those in that, in those cases, like, okay, you don't want to have sex, that's totally fine, you have to. You know, obviously, listen to yourself and but how about, like some sort of intimacy? Right, talk to your partner and say, listen, I'm not ready for sex yet, but let's slowly get there, right, let's remove the sex out of the equation. Let's just build some sort of physical intimacy. So, having a massage night? Right, like, give each other back massages.
Speaker 2:Oh, I dare you to give each other massage and that not lead to sex.
Speaker 1:Not always does, but back massages are great, or just like cuddle or make out, like just kiss, with no you know expectations for it to lead to anything else. And once you kind of get comfortable with that physical intimacy and doing it daily, like it doesn't take long. You know, I love the Gottman Institute. They are a couple and they've been advising marriages for years. They have multiple books. I love them on social media and they have something called the six-second kiss. Make out for six seconds, like create that intimacy and slowly build to a place where you can feel good to have sex again.
Speaker 1:Now I was nervous after having Noah. Like you know it was postpartum. You know six weeks you're not supposed to have sex. I was nervous, like I don't feel sexy, I feel like shit. But seeing Tony in his element, be a good dad and just like just be so helpful and just so there for me emotionally and physically and just like I wanted to be, you know, physical with him. So it goes both ways, right. So if you're a husband and you're listening to this, like when's the last time you've told your wife that you think she's beautiful or that you showed some sort of gratitude or appreciation, it goes both ways.
Speaker 2:Sure, and this part also builds on one of the fundamental parts of number one that you gave, where, when you find yourself in a relationship where the arc between you two is not right and the man becomes the extra child moms don't want to fuck their kids usually.
Speaker 1:Ew yeah.
Speaker 2:So yeah, if you are in a dynamic where you're being mothered by your wife, the sex will die a hundred percent and will not come back until that role is redefined. So very important to build number one in where you are carrying your weight you don't become a burden on her, because then there's not going to be an attraction. There's no chance for intimacy once you've found yourself in that position.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, and yeah, sex is really important. I think if, like, you're struggling in that area, go see a therapist. Like work on it.
Speaker 2:I'll redefine it slightly Intimacy.
Speaker 1:Intimacy yes.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because you can go through the motions of sex and not be beneficial to your marriage Like you have to have the intimacy part of that in order for it to matter.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you know, sometimes we schedule it, sometimes we you know we'll do like a massage night and it always leads to sex Because you know you're relaxed and we try to do it a couple times a week, like two. Three times is like a good week. Yeah, it's healthy. So that's number two is intimacy, right.
Speaker 2:I feel like a listener right now because we did not discuss this at all and you have this whole hypothesis here, I just like in my brain. I know, it's just in my brain, okay.
Speaker 1:So number three. What was number three Shit? We should have talked about it before. I had a number three. Oh no, okay she got it friendship, friendship okay you have to like really like each other, yeah like. You have to like like hanging out together like this seems really simple why it's really, really simple. I just feel like some people like are married to people they don't like necessarily what do you mean?
Speaker 1:Like they love each other but like they have nothing in common or they don't enjoy doing the same thing and it's okay to be different people.
Speaker 2:Sure.
Speaker 1:But you need to like each other and you need to have fun together. You know, like I think it's not about who you want to grow old with is who you want to be a kid with. I heard that quote somewhere. You know, like that's what. That's what it is Like we. When I'm with Tony, I feel like my inner child is just beaming.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we're sitting in a tent right now. I know we have fun and we're.
Speaker 1:you know, I'm in my forties and I feel like like a kid sometimes and people always tell me that I look young is because, like Tony and I have a good time. Like aside from like life's shitty moments, we have a good time.
Speaker 2:We have a great time. I'm almost in my forties and still feel like a kid.
Speaker 1:Okay, rub that shit in you asshole, um, but yeah, that's the point is like, have is having fun together and again, we understand having kids and schedule constraints and things like that, but your kids?
Speaker 2:Doing nothing is so easy. I get it, like doing that, staying in and doing nothing is easy. But when you go online and when you see the reels of us going out to the dance party, like in the afternoon on a Saturday, or going to the cupcake store or going to wherever, like, yes, it would be so much easier not to do any of those things, and we get it. There are always going to be reasons not to do it, but those are the things that keep us connected, that keep us in the spirit of play and keep us childlike. Yeah, like it would be so easy not to do any of that stuff. Yeah, we could easily sit on the couch and we're not rich people.
Speaker 1:We don't have like full-time help like we, we make it work and with some, you know, a lot of times we have to say no to things and we make it. Where I have a, a wonderful house sitter, like she's amazing, she's been with us for years and she helps. And album might be might be number four. Yeah, having an alibi is number four for a marriage. Um, we're not the richest people, but we make it work. And if you are really unable to go out, there could be many reasons. You set up a date night at home, like once the kids are in bed, like cook a sexy meal together, open a bottle of wine or whatever you know, watch a movie or just talk, play a board game. Likeal hanging out time with your partner is so necessary. Do it for your kids. The happiest kids are the kids who have parents that hang out and like each other.
Speaker 2:That makes sense.
Speaker 1:You need to have connection time at least once a week, tony and I. If we go days without our hanging out we also build it in. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Like we have little built-in moments throughout the day that we've essentially trained ourselves on.
Speaker 1:Okay, so you want to give that detail.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I mean, it's mostly at night, and the two things at night are number one, the gratitude journal, where we just we talk about all the things that stood out to us about the day that we liked, right, whether it was a moment, a meal, playing with Noah it can be so simple, but what that effectively does is number one. It ends the day talking about all the good. Okay, and then what I've noticed over the course I mean, we've been doing this for years now and what it has trained you to do over the course of probably not even more than a two-week period is you start looking for those moments in the day. So you're reframing your brain to look for positive moments throughout the day, because you know you're going to be talking about them later and that's just good for anybody to have that lens on of what is good about the day.
Speaker 2:Number two is we've gone through so many decks of these style of cards where it's just, they're just prompts, they're relationship questions to get you thinking about your relationship in ways that you wouldn't otherwise do casually, throughout the day. So you know these questions can be all over the map and maybe we'll post like the current box that we're using because it's really good, but they just they force you into looking at your relationship and different aspects of your relationship in a way that you wouldn't otherwise do, and they can go to really deep or important places. Some of the questions are not that comfortable. It'll go into financial stuff and be like, oh, this is not what I want to talk about.
Speaker 1:We like to skip those sometimes.
Speaker 2:This is not what I want to talk about before bed. But the point is it forces you to take a look at the different corners of your relationship that might go untended if you're left to your own devices, because, again, it's easier not to. But that costs nothing. It costs maybe maximum 10 minutes of your day. So those are important and those are built in.
Speaker 1:And we have also other moments of connection, like throughout the day. Like you know, tony texts making me coffee in the morning or we have make sure to have a kiss in the morning and, you know, a nice little hug, and we text during the day like we stay, we stay connected in some sort of way. We Tony slides in my DMs and he like flirts with me and I love that shit. And like we're together for years is because we are, you know, we we haven't like gotten lazy in terms of like courting each other and making each other feel good, and it's important, you know but don't don't get it too twisted.
Speaker 2:We have seasons where we fall off a bit right, like we obviously. We go through seasons where where things aren't as tight for us in terms of our day to day that we'd like them to be, but we have such a strong foundation, of kind of the fundamentals, that we can flip the switch pretty easily, like there are absolutely times where it gets lost. Like you know, after Noah's born things changed a lot. They were surviving, or you know, this past year has had moments on and off of not being as good.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we're not perfect.
Speaker 2:So I want to say that we do fall off of our routine sometimes, but the difference is is we can get back on them quite quickly once we bring attention to it.
Speaker 1:And another point that I want to bring up is what I love about our relationship is that we show appreciation to each other. You know what I mean Like we're grateful for each other and we voice it, and I feel like a lot of times people forget, even for like the littlest things, like thank you for making a wonderful meal, like you know, even though, like you're used to it, like if your wife or husband are cooking every night or doing something that's like you don't even think about it.
Speaker 1:It's like an autopilot stuff, like show appreciation, show gratitude, like I think everybody in a relationship wants to know that they're appreciated, even if it's something they do every single day and it's just part of the routine, like thank you for doing that and thank you for you know letting me sleep in, like all these things. These are things that are important to like show appreciation and just don't take each other for granted. You know, like, yeah, like you got married, you made a commitment like be nice to each other.
Speaker 2:You know, yeah be nice to each other anything you want to, anything you want to add to my, my list yeah, I mean this is, this is pretty uh I don't know what the word is generic, I suppose but something that we remind ourselves of when things get tough is that bottom line is we're on the same team, like. We're never at odds with each other. We are always even points of contention, uh, debate, whatever, we are on the same team and our goal is to have the best, happiest, healthiest family and relationship that we can have. So whatever's in the way is not something that pits us against each other. It pits us against whatever that is, and we work together towards conquering whatever moment that is. So remembering you're on the same team is paramount and it's easy to lose sight of.
Speaker 1:Four years huh.
Speaker 2:Four years, four whole years.
Speaker 1:How do you feel about it? I feel awesome about it. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I feel wonderful about it.
Speaker 1:What's your favorite part?
Speaker 2:What's my favorite part?
Speaker 1:Yeah, the last four years.
Speaker 2:Oh man, it's a really special thing to know you have a teammate in all things, like no matter what you're going through literally it doesn't matter what you're going through you have a teammate and a partner. Like that's a really good feeling going throughout the day, like that's amazing. Um, and you have a built-in like a built-in best friend.
Speaker 1:I always tell Tony like I don't need girlfriends because like he'll do everything with me. It might be a little codependent, but I don't care, whatever He'll watch reality shows with me. Yeah, eat some snacks A snack. He'll even like go to the spa with me. Oh yeah, like we love spa days. Yeah, we need.
Speaker 2:Like we love spa days, we need one soon.
Speaker 1:We really do. We're due for one.
Speaker 2:Huh, do you have any questions?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I got two questions. One of them was how do we handle conflict?
Speaker 2:Oh, okay, I think we've. I think we covered that. Yeah, we more or less covered. That is. I mean, the basics are you're on the same team. That's it like there is almost. We had this conversation in bed not that long ago where you were asking me more or less, like are you ever, have you ever gotten like mad at me, like really mad? And I, I, I haven't, cause I never do anything wrong.
Speaker 1:Perfect.
Speaker 2:No, but here, here's here's my mindset when it comes to things that on paper and I don't have anything specific, so don't ask but on paper, something that I would have a right to be mad about. If I asked 100 people, 90 would be like yeah, that's fine, you're allowed to be like whatever. If there's something that looks like it's off, my first instinct isn't to be like you know, why the fuck did she do that? Why didn't she do this? It's oh shit. Something's going on where she didn't have the capacity to work this out in a way that she how are you talking about a scenario that never happened?
Speaker 1:I'm just saying Okay.
Speaker 2:Well then, we can speak hypothetically.
Speaker 1:Okay, continue.
Speaker 2:But basically how I've tuned myself to look at these situations is that if there's something off, if there's something that, even if I find myself getting like what the fuck is going on here, more or less I get to the place pretty quickly that she is going through something that has simply not allowed her to perform at a level that she normally would, and then that is more important for me to find out than being upset by XYZ. So I don't get mad at you. I literally don't get mad at you. There are things that happen that wouldn't normally happen, but it's not a case of me being like, oh, she fucked up. It's like, oh, something's going on I haven't.
Speaker 1:I've been mad at you maybe like a handful of times, a handful of times, like you know. Men men stuff, stupid, men shit yeah, I'm not immune.
Speaker 1:I'm not immune to stupid men shit sometimes not, not anything like disrespectful, like like, these are my boundaries, and Tony knows this. Following, liking, commenting on other women's posts, obviously, sexy posts, obviously you follow women and that's fine, but anything that's inappropriate, like like, anything that's like inappropriate, like that, it's a no. He, but he knew this like from the beginning. Um, when we were dating, like I, I set those boundaries. I was like this is a no also like that.
Speaker 2:That wasn't like. It wasn't like much that I had to adjust there yeah because that wasn't really my thing online.
Speaker 1:I wasn't like like I made you unfollow, like a chick you used to you hooked up with or something once, yeah, which is, I think, fair, right, I was fine some people don't care, but I do. I personally care about that stuff. Um, yeah, he hasn't disrespected me and like like that, but I don't even remember why I was mad at you. Really now, who knows. But we're not perfect.
Speaker 2:No, what was the other question?
Speaker 1:The other question was how did you know when it was the right time to move in together?
Speaker 2:Oh it Well for us. More or less, it sort of evolved.
Speaker 1:We didn't even talk about it.
Speaker 2:We didn't really talk about it. We didn't really talk about it. I just started spending number one you had the nicer apartment, you had mia over here, you had roots over here in some very significant ways. That that I didn't challenge. Like I was, I was ready to get out of bushwick anyway at that point, and we were. We were smack dab, smack dab in the middle of covet. It was third world, it was disgusting and I kind of had I don't know in so many ways I felt like I'd outgrown where I was so somebody.
Speaker 1:So they asked how long after dating did we move in?
Speaker 2:uh, it was sort of about four or five months before I was and I would say six out of seven days I was at your place and it was a little bit beyond that. It was more like seven months before we actually moved in together. But that was a timing situation, right, like I moved in officially when we moved apartments, yeah, and we both officially started living together, but I was more or less living with you after about five months or so.
Speaker 1:When you know. You know, we never really talked about it, it was just like.
Speaker 2:It was natural, like I was never going to, she was never going to move over to Brooklyn. It was just easy. I mean, literally we moved in the same building, just moved floors, essentially. So it was just like, yeah, that wasn't much of a conversation at all.
Speaker 1:And just kind of like if you're both ready and you know we were at an age like. I met Tony when I was 38. He was 37.
Speaker 2:Wait no, no, no.
Speaker 1:Wait, how old were we?
Speaker 2:I was 35 when we met.
Speaker 1:And I was 36. You were just turned 36?
Speaker 2:Just turned 36. That's crazy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you had just turned 36 a couple months before I was so young no, not really. Yeah, and you're in your late 30s. I already had a kid. It's like I was mid-30s. I felt safe. There was no red flags and I don't know. It was just like let's do this, you know let's's there was almost one red flag what was it? The thumb pick oh, my god, you got to talk about that. Oh, this almost, this almost ended our relationship. I, tony and I had just started talking.
Speaker 1:We were texting back and forth yeah and keep in mind this was like after covid, and and also keep in mind that I've been just so jaded by the dating process I've gotten way too many dick pics that I could even talk about how many. It's just so many. Men are just disgusting, like disgusting beings. And anyway, I was at a client site and I met.
Speaker 2:yeah, hold on, we didn.
Speaker 1:We didn't meet yet we had not met, yet it was the week like a couple days before we met Our first date. Yeah, and I was at a client site for a content shoot like middle of fucking nowhere, and I get a text message from him and I just saw the thumbnail.
Speaker 2:Yeah, a very small thumbnail come through.
Speaker 1:And I thought he sent me a dick pic and I remember being at the client, obviously I could. I was like not gonna open it because I'm like around people and I like my heart dropped because I was like, oh fuck, not him. I was like, oh man, another one bites the dust. Like I just spent a week like chatting with him, wasting my time, and it's happened before, like it's literally happened many times before. We're connecting with a guy, like great, we're going to go on a date, sends me a fucking dick pic, like fuck, you blocked Right.
Speaker 1:So I was like, oh my God, I really liked this guy, I really wanted to meet him and like I'm literally at my client and I wasn't focused because I was like so disappointed that he sent me. I thought he sent me a dick pic, anyway, literally spiraling for like two hours, and I remember Peter asking me like are you okay? I'm like, oh my God, I think the guy like just sent me a dick pic, like you know, and he's like what? Like anyway? So I go to the car and then I open the. I like let me open it.
Speaker 2:I open it and it's a thumb. What would it? What can you show it? What is it? I will, I will show it. Um, I'd have to go back way deep, but yeah, it's like it is a thumb, but it is supposed to to be like a fake out. Like it is, it is a picture that is set up to be a fake out, but it's literally just a thumb.
Speaker 1:You need to find the whole conversation. I'm going to, because it's like I was like oh my God, I thought you sent me a dick pic and there was like a lot of laughing, but it was really the I swear. I lost like a year out of my life Like I think gray hairs just like sprouted off my head because I thought he had sent me a dick pic and it was just like a funny almost.
Speaker 2:It almost ended our entire relationship. Noah wouldn't even be here, the suka wouldn't exist, all because of a thumb listen, I was traumatized from, from dating.
Speaker 1:You have no idea like you didn't get to like, experience it.
Speaker 2:It's terrible wouldn't have played it that fast and loose, that I know how close it was to ending our relationship before it began.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that was reckless of you.
Speaker 2:I didn't know it was reckless. I thought it was funny.
Speaker 1:It was, I mean it is Now.
Speaker 2:we're talking about it four years later.
Speaker 1:It's crazy. You need to pull the picture up. Don't worry, I will.
Speaker 2:I'll pull up the whole conversation Dying now it is. At the time I'm sure it was not very funny. I wonder what I was thinking for the rest, because two hours is a long time for you not to respond, especially to a picture, so I wonder what.
Speaker 1:I was on vacation. I was on vacation, so I was probably doing stuff. I think you were wondering why, but I had to have been like sweating a little bit as to like why is this context?
Speaker 2:you know, but in my head it wasn't risky and I would have no reason for you to assume that you didn't understand or wouldn't have actually opened it yet. Man, that might have been, that might have been a tough period for me also. Come to think about it it's hilarious.
Speaker 1:And now, four years later, we're, you know, in our home in jersey city, in our suka, with our, you know, noah's napping Mia. God knows what she's doing in the house right now. Two dogs Two dogs. And we're very in love, Like I'm very in love with you, babe. Good You're checking on the baby.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm just checking on the baby.
Speaker 1:She's still sleeping.
Speaker 2:She's flat as a board right now.
Speaker 1:Babe, I'm in love with you too. Give me a kiss, okay, anything else you?
Speaker 2:want to add.
Speaker 2:No, I don't think so.
Speaker 2:Like listen, great relationships take work, but it doesn't really feel like work when you address things as they come Right, like it so many times you just don't work out the communication style or the safety ultimately to have the communication that's required, so that it doesn't feel like a mountain of work because you're dealing with it all the time, like the conversations that we have. We spend 30 minutes a week organizing what needs done around the house and we started getting better at that organizing what needs to get done between the two girls or just between us, whatever it is. There are ways to make it feel like so much less work than it sounds like, but it is work and you have to be willing to have the conversations and to set yourself up for it or it all gets pushed to the side and then that's when resentment comes and that's when the blowups comes and that's when the blame comes and that's when it stops being fun and it starts being hard and it starts being a chore and that is going to be the death rattle of any relationship.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So you really just have to be willing to be a partner. It is a partnership. You are co-CEOs in your life.
Speaker 1:And you have to be vigilant Like I know that sounds stressful, but you have to be vigilant of your relationship and not let things just break down. You know what I mean Like and I'm not saying vigilance in a bad way, like walking on eggshells or being stressed about it, but like, just like, okay, when's the last you know, like we need to have. You know how many times do we have sex this week when? When can we have alone time and date night, and these are things that we have.
Speaker 2:I texted her today. Have.
Speaker 2:I facetimed her today. Yeah, you know that that sort of thing you have, you have kind of like a ticking clock on a lot of these things, like a timer going. Oh, it's been too long, like it's been too long since we did X, y, z and we need to adjust, and I mean, that type of work is what I'm talking about, right, like that is not, that's almost automated to a point. If you get to a place where it's automated, then you avoid the real work when things are in breakdown, and then you have to go to couples therapy and then you have to, you have to dig yourselves out of this hole that you put yourself in because you didn't have the vigilance required to stay afloat.
Speaker 1:And another key thing that I forgot to talk about is also working on yourself. You know you can work on, you can work through a lot of things in the container of your relationship, but if you haven't done the work on yourself and if you're unhappy like your partner can just add to your happiness. But really, when and these are this is a lesson that I've learned later in life Like, like I said, I was married before and in that container of the relationship, I didn't take care of myself, I didn't take care of my needs, I didn't take care of myself, I didn't love myself. And when, because I didn't love myself, I wasn't take care of myself, I didn't love myself. And when, because I didn't love myself, I wasn't able to ask for what I needed. You know I wasn't. And again, that relationship we were just weren't a match in general, it just would have never worked.
Speaker 1:But now that I'm older I understand that I have to work on myself, that I have to learn and this is for my kids too Like I had to learn how to regulate my emotions, and I'm still working on that and in order for me to show up as the best partner of myself, I need to be able to kind of work on my own shit. You know what I'm saying, and I'd spend years really after my divorce like really going to therapy but not only going to therapy meditating and journaling, kind of figuring out like what, what, what are my triggers, what are the things that upset me and what are my insecurities. And I got to a place where I was able to articulate those things in my relationship with Tony, so he knows when certain things come up it's not necessarily about him or it's not personal, but it's something that's.
Speaker 2:Oh, it's almost never about me, oh, excuse me no, but no, I'm being serious, like it's almost never about me. Yeah, I can sometimes help, and sometimes helping just means letting you air it out. But, but, a lot of, but, a lot of the stuff I was able to heal in our relation because we have a healthy relationship.
Speaker 1:Like I was able to heal a lot of that stuff and was able to heal in our relationship because we have a healthy relationship. Like I was able to heal a lot of that stuff and we talked about it. On the episode where we talked about Nobody Wants this the show right when it was refreshing to see two adults like work through their traumas and triggers and have healthy communication.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And it's very healing, you know, to be in that kind of relationship where people can hold space for each other and understand that. You know there's reasons why they react the way they react. Totally, you know, not take it like personal.
Speaker 2:Now we just watch Love is Blind, where it's the opposite day.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love. Love is Blind.
Speaker 2:I love and hate it, at the same train wreck my god, we said that we would talk about it. We don't have time anymore we're not gonna talk about it right now, but okay, we'll talk about after we wrap it up, we'll, we'll do uh it's, we're on the the wedding. Yeah, it's the reunion. Like we got a couple weeks we can lock in on a this blind.
Speaker 1:We have some thought. I know a lot of people shared thoughts on that.
Speaker 2:Actually, okay, yeah, this season's an absolute mess, it's just even the editing is horrendous horrendous and we have no idea what's going on.
Speaker 1:It's unbelievable.
Speaker 2:The producers don't add they think they're so clever it's like if my 12 year old produced it.
Speaker 1:You know, there's so many holes, lacks so much context there's some, there's some plot holes.
Speaker 2:Anyway, we're not going to get into that. But wrap up this. What?
Speaker 1:are we doing for our four-year anniversary?
Speaker 2:we're going to celebrate the love and enjoyment of four years together and it will be special and I'm sure there'll be a reel about it and I'm sure it'll be posted online okay, all right, on that note. Happy anniversary baby happy anniversary, my love, peace. Thank you.