Thrive & Decide Guide to Divorce and Beyond

Marriage Crisis Management: When “I Think I Want Out” Becomes a Plan

• Sarah Thress • Season 1 • Episode 23

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When someone says “I think I want out,” most couples are shoved into panic, not a plan. We sat down with Dr. Becky Whetstone—marriage crisis manager, author of I Think I Want Out, and long‑time advocate for evidence‑based help on the brink—to unpack what actually works when a relationship feels like it’s collapsing in real time. Becky explains the missing piece in traditional training, why so many therapists go quiet at the worst moment, and how to guide a couple through the most volatile ninety days without making things worse.

We explore her cornerstone idea of the “decider” and the “leaning‑in partner,” and why stabilization is the first intervention. You’ll learn how to choose a directive, credentialed professional who will name patterns, teach skills, and spot underlying mental health issues that can shape every decision. We get real about faith‑based counseling, the difference between licensed care and well‑meaning coaching, and the damage done by shaming or simplistic advice. From there, Becky maps two structured paths: a time‑bound, therapist‑guided separation that tests real change, or a clear route to an amicable divorce that protects kids, finances, and dignity.

We also dig into the everyday forces that push couples apart—parenthood’s chaos, identity shifts, deferred dreams—and how to rebuild connection with practical, teachable skills. Becky shares resources for co‑parenting, blending families, and keeping communication sane, plus why support groups and short, intentional “wallow” windows can speed healing. If you’re contemplating a breakup, fighting to repair, or helping a friend through the fog, this conversation offers a calm, smart roadmap for making the next right move.

If this episode helped you think or breathe easier, follow the show, share it with someone who needs it, and leave a review—your feedback keeps these conversations going.

Dr. Becky Whetstone's Info:

Website | https://marriagecrisismanager.com/
Facebook | https://www.facebook.com/relationshipcrisismanager/
X | https://x.com/DoctorBecky
Instagram | https://www.instagram.com/doctorbecky/
LinkedIn | https://www.linkedin.com/in/becky-whetstone-ph-d-33866211/
Medium | https://medium.com/@doctorbecky

Hi and welcome to Thrive and Decide. I’m your host Sarah Thress. This podcast is intended to help women who are going through a divorce, continplating divorce or have lost a spouse feel seen, heard, understood and not alone. All the beautiful souls who share on here are coming from a place of vulnerability and a common belief that sharing your story will help others. You will also hear from industry experts on what to do and not do while going through a divorce.


Sarah Thress
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SPEAKER_00:

Hi, and welcome to this week's episode of Thrive and Decide. This week we have Becky Whetstone, who is a marriage crisis manager. And she's written a book. And I think it's just such a clever book because it's I think I want out. And so, you know, it's really uh I I loved the topic and the title. You know, I just thought it was so catchy because I know that a lot of people, you know, get to that point where they're thinking people, you know, get to that point. Um, where, you know, where they're thinking like, oh my gosh, like I want, I want out, um, you know, or I think I want out. So um thank you so much for joining us. I really appreciate it.

SPEAKER_02:

Thanks so much for having me on to speak about my favorite subject. I really could talk about this all day and night. We could do a marathon on this subject. I I really feel there's a lack of information about everything about you know, deciding to divorce. Should I, shouldn't I? And all the different little things to consider. And and and I mean thousands of things to consider. So I appreciate the opportunity to come on here and talk about it.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, absolutely. So, marriage crisis manager, what what does that entail? Um, I mean, is that just like your your fancy way of of being a therapist or um, you know, are just explaining kind of what you are? I'd love for you to explain that.

SPEAKER_02:

Oh, well, in a way, I feel like I'm a referee in a wrestling ring, you know. But um that that's kind of how it goes sometimes. But the reason I created this, it came out of a need for it. Um, you know, years ago when I went through a marriage crisis and I was going through these stages and basically flipping out and didn't know if I wanted to stay married or not. And I told my husband I couldn't stand to be around him and I needed to get away from him and he needed to move out. And uh we he goes, well, let's go to a marriage therapist and ask them what to do. So we did. And the marriage therapist said, Oh, you don't want to work on your marriage? Like Becky's got zero motivated on a scale of one to ten, is there was Becky's zero. Dave is ten. I can't help y'all until Becky becomes more motivated. So go off into the ether and come back if Becky becomes motivated. And so, like, you know, after that, it was just like the disaster ensued. I mean, we and I knew at the time, like, this isn't right. Like, why isn't someone able to help us? Like, what we're making decisions on our own, we don't know what we're doing. It it just felt wrong and felt terrible. So, you know, and then now I've had like 30 years since then to see how it all played out for both of us and our two children that were six and three at the time. We ended up divorced very quickly. So that was part of the deal, is he was pushing it. He was put because if you if you want to get rid of me, well, we're gonna get a divorce right now, you know. He wouldn't give me any time to really be discerning about it. It's like decide now or you know, I'm out. So again, like I came out of that and I've always been obsessed with relationships. I I've always wanted to be a advice columnist, you know, when I was in uh a teenager and in college, and I majored in journalism, but I went the housewife route, which obviously didn't work out for me. And um, and I went to, after I got divorced, I had to get a job. I became a uh journalist at the San Antonio newspaper in the features department, and I wrote about relationships, and I got to write a column about relationships, and it was very popular, extremely popular. So I knew that I was kind of like hitting a chord with all these things that you know about dating and being a single mom and all these things that just didn't sit right with me. I find that being angry about something is very motivating as a writer. Um, and so you know, I started appearing on radio shows and TV shows in San Antonio and becoming known as a relationship guru. But of course, as people will always criticize, they told me I didn't have any credentials. You're not a therapist. And therapists would actually call. Uh psychological associations would call the stations and go, get her off. She's she has no credentials. And um, and so the pressure built up. And so these hosts were going, like, can't you go get a mail order degree or something and shut these people up? And I'm like, Becky doesn't do mail order. Becky, if Becky's gonna do it, Becky's gonna do legit, and where I have no excuses, nothing to fear, where people are gonna uncover that I have a mail order degree. So I entered graduate school, and for five years, um and I intended just to get my master's so I could get my credibility, but the cohort that I was in was was so fun to go to school with, and we bonded like family, and they encouraged me to go on and get the PhD with them. So, so I was in school for five years, and and during that five years, I researched. I'm like, damn it, I'm gonna find out if that marriage therapist, you know, like were they supposed to know how to handle the us in a marriage crisis? Like, you know, why weren't they able to help us? I'm gonna find that out. So when I had time to do my own research in the library, I would go look through the books and and the studies and stuff like that. And I found a ton of information on it. I'm like, why did anyone tell us this? Why? You know what this information is like unbelievable. Like some of this information is stuff that like everyone in the world needs to know. And why aren't therapists talking about it? I just it literally blew my mind. And so I um I came out of grad school, and you know, I'm a writer already, so I came out of grad school saying I've got to write a book about this because the the information is so phenomenal. And then having studied marriage and family therapy in grad school, I found out they don't teach you one damn thing about what to do when somebody's on the brink of divorce. They don't say a word about it. We even we do take marriage therapy classes, we take divorce and re reconciliation class, but not once did they mention anything about marriage crisis in that um in those classes. And so that's one of the things I'm trying to do right now is get marriage and family therapy, my field, to include this in their education curriculum so that every marriage therapist has at least a basic understanding of how to help people. In the meantime, I'm going around to conferences and stuff and and setting up booth. I'm either doing a presentation to my colleagues if I can, or I'm setting up a booth, going, there's this thing called marriage crisis management, and you help people whose marriages are on the brink, and there's a certain art to it that I've learned over the last 20 years. I've tweaked it. So I've learned how to help people, I've learned what works, what doesn't work, and strategies. And it's all based on the research that I pulled up so many years ago. And um, so and I'm also at the booth saying, and if you don't want to do it yourself, refer them to us, refer them for refer people to the marriage crisis managers. And I'm trying to train therapists now and how to do this work so that it's going to become commonplace. So yeah, I it took me 20 years to get the book published because publishers thought this was a very negative subject and um didn't publish it. And they wanted, you know, me to fix every marriage in the end, you know, save every marriage and have a happy ending. But after 20 years, and I kept coming back to it and pushing again and pushing again, and I finally found a publisher willing to publish it. I'm so grateful it came out this past February. So it's called I think I want out what to do when one of you wants to end your marriage. So, yeah, so I'm using every little ounce of my energy these days to try to make my mark in my field and make it something that people are commonly aware of, that there is special a specialist out there who can cradle you from the moment your spouse says, I think I want out, all the way through, whether you reconcile, separate, divorce, and beyond, when you start healing from divorce and dealing with blending family issues from start to finish, we are knowledgeable about all of this. So I'm just trying to provide really good, solid information.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. No, I love that. In a very short time.

SPEAKER_01:

Just about 15 minutes.

SPEAKER_00:

You are just fine. What I love is that you made a comment about like your therapist and how he was like, you know, I can't help, because I had um a very similar situation in my divorce. Like it was um, you know, we were at one uh one therapist, you know, we were trying to make it work and all that. And um, and then, you know, my ex-husband turned to me and he said, you know, I I don't love you anymore and I haven't loved you in years. And he's crying, and I'm just like looking at him like, I'm sorry, what? And then like the therapist was like, Well, so that's the end of our time. Um, I assume you guys will want to come back at some point. And I was like, What? Okay, he just dropped this huge bomb on me.

SPEAKER_02:

And like that's your response is like that's called the doorknob confession in the therapy world. When you're, you know, when when your client is about to walk out the door and they go, And by the way, I was raped by my father at age five, and you're like, Whoa! You know, it's just I don't know why some people do that. Yeah, maybe he didn't he probably really didn't want to deal with it in any sort of detail at that time.

SPEAKER_00:

Oh, for sure. For sure. Well, and then we like, I was like, okay, like I think that we still need to talk this through, but I think we need a new therapist. I was like, because I just didn't feel supported um by her. So then we had another one who literally would sit there silent and just look at us. And we were like, um, like, why are we paying money to talk in front of this man who's not giving any feedback at all when we could literally do this for free at home?

SPEAKER_02:

Like, I'm that's one of the, you know, there's different, that's the thing is, you know, the public is not aware of the different kinds of training and theories that therapists work from. And, you know, like some people think I'm a psychologist and they think I need to go see a psychologist. Well, I am not a psychologist, I'm a marriage and family therapist, and we are light years away from a psychologist. And you do not want a psychologist for your marriage therapy, marriage problems. You want a specialist. Marriage and family therapists are specialists, and then there are some social workers who are sp take a specific interest in it. But you know, this is the thing is you don't know what what you know where the person's coming from, and you go in them, and one of the styles, one of the theories is to just sit there and validate people. Oh, yeah, that's tough. Yeah. Mm-hmm. But the the theories that I work from are very educational, you know, and I think this is the new trend in therapy. I'm hoping that it is. It used to be verbotten, and don't you dare uh educate people and teach them like a teacher. That's not what we're doing here. But I think, you know, um that people really respond well to it. And I've learned, like I was telling you before we went on the air, that people are so not knowledgeable about relationship skills. They're not taught in our culture, our families don't teach them to us or role model them to us. We come out of life, you know, maybe we're successful business people and smart, but we don't know anything about relationships. So I feel it my duty to teach people about how to be healthy as an adult and then how to be healthy in your marriage and family. So it takes a lot of time to teach people from scratch how to do this, you know, but I think it's a really important skill. So, you know, like if you are shopping for a therapist out there, you know, be sure and tell them. Like, if you're looking for someone who's more directive and will actually tell you exactly what they're thinking and what they see and and reflect reflective, or are they the kind that are just going to mirror back whatever it is that you're saying, you know, tell people I'm looking for a directive educational, tell people, don't settle for these quiet people. I don't even know how those people don't fall asleep during a session.

SPEAKER_00:

Right. Yeah, I know it's crazy to me. Um, you know, especially seeing like those two different ones, even the one who, like, you know, the very first one when he, you know, dropped that bomb. Um, prior to that, she would just tell us stories about like her her marriage or like, you know, her relationship. And I was like, okay, I'm not like I'm not really sure why you're sharing about your relationship. It wasn't in a way of like, wow, I can understand what you're saying because blah, blah, blah. Like she would just tell me a story.

SPEAKER_02:

Not for therapeutic benefit. I mean, we're not supposed to share about ourselves unless we're making a therapeutic point.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. Yeah. So I was like, okay, we're gonna find something else. Um, but I love that you are working to make this like the new norm because I do think that, you know, to your point, when you're shopping around for a therapist, it's just like shopping around for anything. You need to make sure that you're not settling. You know, I always say, like, you should never settle on a house or a spouse. Um, you know, those are just things, um, but you should also never settle on your therapist because you need to have someone that you mesh with that gets you, but also is going to meet you. We all have different ways that we learn and cope and, you know, all the things. So you need to find someone that kind of matches what you're looking for. So I love that you're like taking that on as like, hey, you know, my superpower is that I understand this. I, you know, have studied it, I get it, and I'm trying to help others get this so that we can have this global movement of literally helping people through this crisis instead of just like, you know, giving horrible advice.

SPEAKER_02:

I just had a client today tell me he'd spent over$20,000 on uh marriage therapy, and you know, and he has what he and his wife were he he's he's decided the marriage is over. And he and and so I'm asking him, he he's telling me all these stories about their marriage. And I'm like, didn't the therapist jump in and tell you about something about that thing you just said right there? Oh no, they never said anything. And then he tells me they were going to Christian coaches, not trained therapists. And these people don't know how to diagnose mental disorders, and that's a part of this is huge. There's a lot of mental disorders and marriage problems, okay? I'm sorry, it's true, and you need someone that can spot them, and and we know the ones that are fixable and treatable, and we know the ones that are not, you know, and so in a part of this is knowing these things. And I just don't know, you know, like it. I mean, if your thing is Christian therapists, that's fine, you know, but find one that really had to have a degree. They have their trained as a therapist because you can find Christian therapists who have masters and PhDs in marriage and family therapy if you'll find them, you know.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

So don't don't be going to these husband-wife teams that they say they they say they saved their marriage and now they're gonna teach you how to do it, or you know, these people that are not thoroughly trained in mental health, emotional health, relational health. Don't be wasting your time and money doing that because your family and your marriage is important. You need somebody who really, really gives a damn about this from every aspect of it.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, I totally agree because I also know that a lot of times, um, you know, these these Christian uh counselors, you know, or whatever, even if they're not, you know, licensed, but they call themselves these counselors, um, you know, unfortunately, a lot of times they're going to, no matter what you tell them, lean towards making you feel guilty to stay in the marriage because, you know, God wouldn't, God wouldn't approve. Um, and so I actually did a podcast uh a couple of weeks ago um with uh my little sister who is a minister and a minister um that's you know, she's a co-minister at her church. And we talked about how like that's not okay. God loves you. God is okay with you ending your marriage, like he's not judging you. Um, you know, but there are some out there that force you to do that or make you feel so guilty that if you end it, God's gonna hate you and you know, you're gonna go to hell.

SPEAKER_02:

Well, I said to the man, you know, I said, you know, my impression of the Christian therapist is they're gonna shame you and disdain. And and his wife, you know, after spending time with him, I mean, his wife has clearly got a serious personality disorder. And no one ever picked up on it the whole in all these$20,000 worth of therapy. No one ever picked up on it. And and you need to know when you're deciding what to because you, if you're married to somebody with a personality disorder, which is not fixable, everybody, it's finite, it's the way it is. They'll always be difficult, they'll always be volatile, they'll always make no sense, they're always blamers. Um, no one ever told him this, you know, and and so he he questioned his own sanity, but you know, in the whole thing. So this is, you know, someone like me or a trained therapist will hone in on that stuff so fast, and we're gonna we're gonna, you know, let them know that this is probably not gonna change that much, and you have a very important decision to make. It's very sad. If I get an exit interview when I die with some sort of divine being, you know, I'm gonna ask, why did you create personality disorders? Why? Right, yeah, because it wreaks so much havoc in this world. I know.

SPEAKER_00:

It's terrible. Yeah, it really is. So, with marriage crisis management, um, you know, like kind of with your practice, is it any different than, you know, if someone listening has tried, you know, another therapist? Like, is there any difference? Like, how do they get involved? What does a typical like first session look like with you? Obviously, everybody is different. So I know it's not all cookie cutter, but um, you know, I I would assume the the intake would be about the same with everyone.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, and and you know, I don't do I'm I'm working more, uh even though I'm licensed out the the as far as you can be, and I'm as trained as you can possibly be in this field, you know, I'm I'm working more as a life coach these days. So my intake form is very short because I'm not going to be asking them about their life history and stuff on that. We may discuss it in the marriage crisis stuff if I if if it is appropriate. But what's happening is I'm usually dealing with one person who very much wants to save the marriage and one person who doesn't even want to talk about it, you know, who just wants to get away from that person and needs a respite. So we cannot do marriage therapy with that couple. We have to punch hold and get the situation stabilized and finesse it so that the person who I call the decider, the person who is thinking of leaving, very seriously thinking of leaving, and maybe pretty much there to try and get them to a place where they can come out of their nervous system activation, which they're in, they're in the flight, fight, or freeze mode, and they're in the flight mode. They want to run, you know, and no one can make wise decisions when they're in that state of mind. So, you know, I'm trying to get them calmed down so they can access their rational cognitive abilities, and we can have adult conversations, and I can at least talk to them a little bit about the relationship and what's put them in this place. And we just want to make sure that people people have tried everything they can. If you've got kids and family, you know, I want to make sure you have tried everything you can to try and fix this. I mean, you know, some people as someone, well, somebody that wrote a review about my book said that that they perceive that as me telling people to martyr themselves for their marriage. That is absolutely not what I'm asking people to do. But I know from my experience that if you just leave, just wake up one day and you've been hiding this secret for 10 or 20 years, how unhappy you are, and you haven't told your spouse, and you spring it on them that you want out and you've got kids, that you are going to pay a heavy price for that. Emotionally, your kids are gonna turn on you, they're gonna be mad at you, your spouse will never forgive you that you you're gonna have to co-parent with them. Even if your kids are adults, you're still probably gonna have to deal with them on some level. And so, um and and if you're a well kept uh balanced human being, you're probably gonna feel guilty because you didn't you didn't give the other person a chance to make it right, you know. So I'm just I'm trying to get people to do things that I know in the long run will give them peace of mind and will keep them having amicable relationships with all of their family members if possible. So, like I've got a client, you know, who's been married for 20 years, has two college-age kids, and uh he 30 years he's been married. He's never told his wife how miserably unhappy he is, and he is like one, he's like one centimeter from telling her I'm I want a divorce and I don't even want to work on it, I just want out. And I've been working with him for months to muster up the courage to tell his wife, to give her a chance to make it right. And every week I see him, he's like, I hadn't done it, I haven't talked to her yet. It's just amazing to me. It's very fascinating human phenomenon that people don't have the guts to have these serious conversations with their spouse. It just is really interesting to me. And I I tell him, like, there's so many ways you can say it, you know, and she and he'll tell me like sometimes she gives openings to him, like we hadn't been getting along that well lately, you know, so maybe we shouldn't take that trip next month. There was your opening. Why didn't you say something? You know, he just let it pass. So, you know, I'm just telling him, like, your kids are never gonna forgive you if you drop the bomb on mom without giving her at least a shot at making it right.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, and honestly, she may be just as unhappy in the relationship too, especially if she's saying stuff like, Hey, maybe we shouldn't take that trip. Probably inside, she has more anxiety that they're gonna go on this trip together than if he would just tell her, like, hey, uh like I'm not in this anymore. Like, I I think he would be shocked and like that she would probably be in the same boat. And she probably hasn't wanted to say it because, you know, after so long, it's really hard to say, hey, I know we've built this life together. I know we've been together for 30 years, but guess what? Like now, like I want out. Like that's a very hard thing to say because you're so used to it. Like it, you know, you're used to that life, you're used to that person. And you have to like really push against your fight or flight that wants to keep you there just because that's what's safe. That's what your nervous system tells you to do, to stay there. But really, like you, if you truly want to be happy, push yourself out of that comfort zone, you know, tap through it, whatever you got to do, like to control your nervous system.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, children that won't their stuff, you know. But you know, um, to your point, I told him, what if your wife is in a therapist at right now saying the same thing about you? And I and I said, if she is, we need to write a movie script about it, because it'd be a great movie script, you know, where each person doesn't know it, but the other one's in there mulling over whether they should get a divorce or not. All the research shows that even like say the decider says, I think I want out and um I want a divorce, and all of a sudden the leaning in partner who wants to save the marriage goes, Oh my god, I don't want a divorce, I'm gonna fight for this marriage. All the research shows that the leaning in partner was at maybe even equally unhappy prior to the crisis. So there's a lot of research to show that both are unhappy, and it's almost like they the leaning in partner doesn't want to admit it. Yeah, but I know no way. There's a bit it's very not realistic to think that one person's over here miserable, they're not connecting, and the other person's over there in Blissville. That's just not it just doesn't make any sense.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, well, and it's interesting that you say that because, you know, like when I look back on, you know, when I went through mine and like when my ex-husband told me, you know, I don't love you. And and I was like, wait, what? Like I thought we were happy. But then after I literally sat there and thought about it, I was like, oh, no, you know what? Maybe I wasn't as happy as I thought. And, you know, as we went through the process of everything, you know, we did a really great job with co-parenting when our daughter was younger. Um, we did a, you know, like that's changed a little bit now, but that's okay. Um, but we've, you know, like we did all the things correctly for her. And uh, you know, through therapy and all of that stuff, I realized that I wasn't as happy as I thought I was. And I've actually thanked him for having the balls to say, hey, I don't love you. Like I know that hurt him. I know it did. And of course it hurt like hell for me, but you know what? I am so much happier now. I'm remarried, he's remarried, our daughter gets to see us both be happy. And, you know, she even says now, like, I could never imagine you guys together. And so it's so funny. Like right. Yeah, she's like, I could never imagine that. And I was like, I know, right? But aren't you so lucky that you get to see both of us happy with the people that we're with now? Like now we found our people. And she's like, Yeah, it's pretty cool, you know. But to your point, I didn't know that I wasn't as unhappy. And thank God he had the balls to say, hey, like, I'm not in it anymore.

SPEAKER_02:

And as much as that hurt, like I'm supposed to say well, first of all, that that you thanked him for that is like extremely rare and um and speaks a lot, you know, to you, you know, to be humble enough to be able to do that. But I must tell you, and and you know, after seeing thousands of couples in marriage crisis over 20 plus years, I've almost never heard one of the spouses say I don't love them anymore. That's very rare. Very rare. Most people love them on some level, and and I'm even more than just the I love you as a person, but not as a spouse. More than that, you know, that and it's usually we're torn about leaving someone we love but don't want to spend our life with. You know, it's a it's an agonizing thing when you gee, I wish we could iron all this out so we could stay together, but I really don't see any hope for that. So I'm going to have to leave you. And I will miss some things about you for the rest of my life, but I have to give them up because the other stuff that I'm not getting or that you're doing or whatever is weighing me down so much that I can't carry on with it, you know. So I'm used, I'm used to hearing people that are, oh, I wish I didn't have to go. When they're like so certain that they want to go, then I start suspecting they might be having a new girlfriend or a boyfriend.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. Well, and I suspected that. I don't think that there was. I mean, I'm sure he had like he started dating pretty soon afterwards. So, you know, maybe I don't know. But it doesn't matter because regardless, like I didn't realize, I think this is the other, this is what I've found in my um, you know, in my experience with working with different women that are going through divorce and things like that, is that, you know, women, like you get married and you think, oh my gosh, this is gonna be so amazing, you know, because you're told as a child it's happily ever after. You get married and you know, you get the whole fairy tale and it's you know, it's all just like sunshine and rainbows, and there's no work. And, you know, so you're not you don't expect that. And so then, you know, you're the wife and you want to be the best wife ever, and then you have children, and then you want to be the best mom ever. And, you know, but you're not thinking, wow, I need to be that sexy wife that I was when we first got married, because I'm a mom now. My body is now like for my child, like not for you. And the men don't get that. And so then, like, that causes strain. And so if you don't get through that, then you know, that often like the woman just continues to spiral down and lose pieces of herself all along the way. And then, like, in my situation, you know, my ex husband's like, you're not the same person as I married, like you used to be the same. confident person. And I'm like, I'm sorry that I gained, you know, 65 pounds with our child and I look nothing like, you know, I did when we got married. Like so sorry for that. But I'm still, it's still me. But I I find that that is such a common thing that women just, you know, we want to be the best wife and the best mom. And then it's like once, you know, once you're a mom, you want to be just the best mom. And like being this sexy wife is, it takes a back seat.

SPEAKER_02:

I think that I think that moms don't realize how much they're going to fall in love with their child. I mean, I have had moms that never bonded with their child, to be honest. That does happen. But most of us fall so madly in love with our child and it's beyond anything we've ever experienced before. And everything else pales in comparison, you know. And so it's really hard to go, God, I'm so in love with this baby and I want to spend every waking moment with them that I can and oh yeah, look at him. You know, it's really and you know and in that of course you know 98% of the couples tell me their problems began when they had kids. And yes, the physical toll it takes on women and yes um you know there's chaos when you have kids. That's just that's just the way it is. Those of you that have never had kids I can't express to you how how children bring chaos into your life for a long time. And that that just is not conducive to keeping romance alive.

SPEAKER_00:

Right. Exactly well and as the woman you start losing pieces of yourself. So you know part of why I thanked him was because I realized that I wasn't like reaching all the goals that I had set for myself when I was younger. I'd forgotten about all of that and I was able to like start down that path and you know I got to become who I wanted to become and I didn't have anyone holding me back anymore or telling me that you know my golden dreams were stupid. You know, I got to be like no fuck that like I'm going to do this. Like and you know and I and I've done everything that I've wanted to and I just continue to you know grow and now I have a partner who supports absolutely everything that I want to do and believes in me and thinks all my ideas are great. And you know so it's just completely different. But that is why I said thank you.

SPEAKER_02:

Somebody's not supportive of your dreams and that is a terrible you know situation to be in. And just I I do have clients sometimes tell me oh well I was going to do this but my wife knocked the wind out of my sails and you know and I'm just like you know if somebody's not supporting you in your life dreams there is a huge problem there and you need to get yourself to marriage therapy and find out what it is because that's just that's just not cool. It's not cool at all to do that to anyone ever. We should be so supportive of our fellow humans and their life dreams. That just makes me sad hearing about that.

SPEAKER_00:

I know I know it makes me sad but it also it's been interesting to me because um you know like I had told my ex-husband that I wanted to be a a motivational speaker and he's like what what are you going to motivate people to do? And then you know like I told like my my current husband and he was like oh my God you would be so good at that you could motivate anybody to do anything.

SPEAKER_02:

And I was like wow there's your son right talk to me like uh your your uh former husband rained on your parade and that's why they wrote that song about don't rain on my parade. Absolutely absolutely stay away from the rainy people that's not good. It's not good. Yeah now my husband's not enthusiastic like yours but he goes along with everything that I want to do. And he has to pay our spouses have to pay a cost for us following our dreams you know because we're less available to them for things. And and you know a really great spouse though is is is willing to let you do that. Like people in marriage value freedom and anything we do in marriage that takes away our spouse's freedom to be who they are and find out who they are you're asking for trouble. I'm just telling it's a it's a warning sign down the road that you may have a marriage crisis. Just you know make sure you're with somebody that's supportive of you and your dreams. Yeah. Just geez.

SPEAKER_00:

Otherwise they need to grab your book and they need to read it to figure out like you know if they are ready to leave and I assume in there you um I mean I'd love for you to tell us more about your book like you know is it uh is it more of like kind of a helpful guide for like hey if this is how you're thinking here are some steps to to follow to make sure that's really what you want.

SPEAKER_02:

Well I think that you know the the book is um you know I really I didn't realize when we named the book I think I want out what to do when one of you wants to end the marriage that that might not be a book the average person wants to leave laying around the house. You know I I've I thought about maybe I should make some fake covers for it. So you can keep it on your bedside table. But what it what it does is you know I'm at the first chapter begins where I'm telling them that this is I bet this is what you're experiencing right now, this right here, you know so I'm and I'm I'm wanting them to know that what they're experiencing which is feeling crazy you know is is normal. So I want to normalize that. And so I talk about um don't beat yourself up for being ignorant and not recognizing that your marriage was dying um because no one knows about these things. They don't teach them to us you know and and so it catch catches most of us off guard I think and so I'm I'm just uh and then I say here's but here's what happened and then I educate them on how marriages die how the the process their stages in which marriages die and then I teach them how to diagnose their own marriage and the state that it's in and then um and I'm telling them you may want to know what do I do what do I do what do I do right now but you've got to figure some things out first before you can know what to do. So yes diagnose your marriage um and know that our first step is going to be to stabilize so if you're a leaning in partner leave your decider alone leave them be don't chase after them don't buy them flowers don't tell them all the things you're doing to try and be a better person. Just leave them alone and let the thing let them come out of their activation and then I educate people about the mental disorders that we were talking about you know like you know you need to know whether you know if your spouse has any of these things that you need to be concerned about. And then I write a chapter about how did this happen? How did this happen is how you know terrible we all are at mate choice, you know, and and uh and then we don't know anything about how to have healthy relationships. So I give a little primer on what everybody needs to know about the basics of having a healthy relationship like the that this is what's going on in your unhealthy relationship and I know it for a fact here it is here's the pattern um and we're all immature in our relationships until we learn to grow up and and so um and then I say okay now if this and this and this is true you probably need to separate um and if you separate here's how to do it exactly without ending up in separation and indecision limbo you've got to create a separation print plan where you're moving forward and you have a timeline and a purpose for it. So you're you need a therapist to oversee that for you and keep nudging you and pushing you along to to so you can make an intelligent decision. Then if you say no you know I think I I do want to get a divorce I go okay well here's how to do an amicable divorce most people say they want an amicable divorce but they don't know how to get one how to have one and so I'm I'm telling them these are the things that you need to do to have that and then I'm also telling them like okay now here's a chapter on your kids and this is what you need to consider about the children right here. And um and then I I do a whole bunch of on um you know being aware of blended families and co-parenting issues and um all that kind of stuff. So um at the end I offer exercises to help people have healthier mental and emotional health and um and tons of wonderful resources for them to look forward to to rectify the problems that they've been having and to be happier and to help their children and all of that kind of stuff.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah I love that. And I think it's so amazing that you go kind of from the very beginning through like all you know all you address all the different things and obviously that speaks volumes to the situation you went through and how you learned from it, which I think is amazing. You know, anytime we go through these types of situations, they super suck. But there's always a lesson to learn and I love that you learned the lesson and created the superpower you know to be able to help people in this manner. I love that.

SPEAKER_02:

It just had to be done. I mean it was there's you know it when I give presentations to my colleagues across the United States they all I ask them how many of you feel there's a void in our field about offering this kind of specialized care? Literally everybody raises their hand. How many of you were taught about this in graduate school you know nobody raises their hand um you know how many of you have people come in in marriage crisis and you're not sure what to do, how to help them and they raise their hand how many of you when the when the couple says okay we think we're gonna get a divorce do they do you not say anything about well you should stay in therapy and get support through this together and it'll help you have an amicable divorce or how many of you let the couple leave right then and you don't see them again? Oh everybody's letting the couples leave and you don't see them again. So there's so much support and there's so many areas where marriage therapists have been dropping the ball for couples. And I just think that we need to start going wait a minute like if you decide to get a divorce that's you're about to go through one of the most difficult periods of your life and you're gonna feel like you're crazy and you need somebody that understands this that's been through it and can coach you through it and have you come out in a best case scenario situation. So yeah it's it just you know the my colleagues have really validated me that that you know we have let people down you know when it comes to helping them through this kind of like really crazy period of time.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. Yeah I love that and I love that people are uh listening to you you know because I do agree that this is something that needs to be addressed and um you know we need to have more people like you out there uh that understand and get it and know what steps to to take to help people you know get through this crisis.

SPEAKER_02:

I love that I love yeah yeah I mean yeah I mean you know that things are become born out of need right you know like you know the polio vaccine came out of a need you know half the country most of the country was terrified of getting polio you know there was a huge need um and anyone that's been through divorce will tell you whether they were going to a marriage therapist or not that you know they probably left therapy when they decided to divorce you know it's just this stuff makes me crazy you know and and and didn't anyone ever tell you that when you're going through one of the worst upheavals of your entire life that's going to affect so many people that maybe you should have some mental and emotional health support. Like it ever like it's just amazing to me. Yeah. Have you ever have you ever heard of the book called uh crazy time which I recommend a lot of people that are going through divorce and it's it's a it's a classic it's read um it I think it's written by Abigail Trafford and it is one of the best books for understanding um divorce um and what you're gonna experience it's just so brilliantly written and this was a woman who wrote for some major newspaper like the New York Times or Washington Post or something and she went through a divorce and one of her colleagues went through a divorce and they're like I want to know more about this and they went and interviewed dozens and dozens and dozens and dozens of people that went through divorce and discerned patterns that everyone went through and so she describes these things in the book so beautifully and I highly recommend I don't know if she's still alive or still around but you might want to have her on your podcast because it is a classic it's so good. And people go oh why didn't I read this before I got married because it tells you how it's gonna go down and the errors that you're making when you're dating the person that's ultimately going to lead to your divorce so wouldn't it be cool if we could stop the madness before people got married yes yes I think that would be so great.

SPEAKER_00:

And I love that I'm gonna have to totally check that book out because I haven't um read that uh so I'll definitely put that on my list.

SPEAKER_02:

Oh do. Oh do yes so are most of your listeners people who are divorced go going through divorce or or at the back end of it?

SPEAKER_00:

So it's kind of a a mix. You know some people are at the beginning part of it um some people are contemplating it uh some people are in the thick of it um you know and some people uh you know have already have already gone through it but they're still kind of struggling with the okay what do I do now?

SPEAKER_02:

So yeah and obviously by the name of your podcast you're looking for everyone to thrive and that's that's what you know every therapist has in mind is we really value resilience. I mean we all get knocked on our bottoms right we all have horrible things happen to us in our life but the people who are most mentally and emotionally healthy will are resilient and will thrive I got a uh message from a former client who got divorced um uh several years ago and she basically told me that that you know she was mad at me just to be honest she was mad at me and um she ringed me out and said um that she couldn't work for two and a half years that she you know and I had heard reports that she'd been sleeping all day for two and a half years and um and you know she went on through all this despair that she went through and that m rendered her incapable of even functioning and while I'm reading it I'm thinking this reflects on you and your ability to keep going when life you know throws you up something terrible. Yeah you know and those people that are sitting around blaming other people for their despair Becky you didn't do this Becky you didn't see that Becky you uh Becky um I do the best I can you know but at the same time if you're a a marriage therapist you're going to deal with unstable people and that's and their you know their perception of reality may be off um but when someone writes me and tells me they could not get out of bed for two and a half years and could not work there's something wrong with that person. Okay. I mean most of us guys out there like come on I tell people it's okay to wallow every now and then for a day or two and have a pity party and say life sucks but get the hell up the other thing is we need you. We need you we need all the women out there you know making things happen in the world and so don't don't waste a day of your you know or more than a few days of your precious life you know just thinking about how awful life is like there's so much support just like this podcast you know there's so many people out there that'll you know inspire you to rise up and be better and I do have support groups online support groups for people that are um you know either divorcing or divorced they just want to you know be amongst other people who've been through the war and and and I and I lead them so that you'll be having a mental health person you know kind of overseeing this and and um and a mental health person can help you find like if you're if you're a negative thinker if you tend toward negative thinking we can teach you how to turn those negatives into positives we can teach you how to to to not tell yourself horrible things about yourself. There's so much help out there. So I really encourage people to you know use information and resources resources to thrive as you said and to get healthy. Don't don't stay down please and if you can't do it on your own get a therapist and don't be afraid of taking medications if your therapist thinks that that would be beneficial to you.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah I totally agree absolutely 100% I um I give very similar advice to to people um you know I say like first of all like nothing about divorce is fair. So like just throw that out the window nothing's fair. You're gonna have a roller coaster of emotions some days you're gonna be feeling real good and your highs are going to be real high and then your lows are going to be real low. And on the days that you feel real low, lean right in throw yourself the biggest fucking ready party you need to with everybody. And then the next day it's gonna be so much easier because you've cried it all out, you've screamed it out you've done all the things you've felt the feelings because you can't shove those down. You got to feel those if you shove it down it's just gonna come back up and it's you're gonna explode at at something that doesn't even make sense to explode at but if you deal with it just doing all that harms your health it really does harm your health yeah but like we can't afford to do that.

SPEAKER_02:

If you got kids to raise and stuff we don't like we can't afford to have you offline for that long. Yeah you know so yeah get help.

SPEAKER_00:

I love it. I love it. Well thank you so much for taking time out of your day to come on talk to us. Um I absolutely love all the work you're doing I love the book all of that so I'll make sure that we have in the show notes how to get your book um how to you know reach out to you if someone listening is like yep I need a marriage crisis manager um I need her support group you know all those things I'll have all that in the show notes.

SPEAKER_02:

I appreciate that so much. And if y'all read it and you like it, I appreciate more than anything of a review.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah I love that. Yeah I think that feedback is the best gift we can get and whenever anybody shares that you know shares their feelings that's a great gift for you. Anytime they share that book that's the biggest compliment they can give you.

SPEAKER_02:

I want to know what you think let me know.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah I love it. I love it. Well thank you so much and uh I'm sure I literally could talk to you for you know hours. So I'm sure we'll have you back on and um you know I think we can come up with probably 75 topic topics. That's fine. We can I love it. Well thank you very much. Yeah absolutely thanks everyone and we'll see you next time on Thrive and Decide.