Dumped & Divorced

Reflecting on the Windy City and the Overall Highs and Lows

Natalie & Maressa Season 1 Episode 2

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0:00 | 27:10

Ever wondered how a stroll through Chicago's windy streets could lead to profound realizations about personal growth? From the Bean to deep-dish pizzas, our shared annual birthday escapade becomes more than just a trip—it's an anchor for reflection, laughter, and occasionally, a heartfelt tear or two. Despite missing out on recording in the vibrant city, we bring back stories of iconic landmarks and culinary indulgence, pairing them with the mixed reviews of our podcast debut. Addressing both cheers and critiques, we stand by our mission to protect those entwined in our narratives while embracing the diverse perspectives of our listeners. 

Journey with us as we navigate the tender terrain of relationships, heartbreak, and the quest for personal evolution. The emotional depth of breakups isn't easy to articulate, but it's a crucial part of feeling understood and validated. Sharing our own tales of resilience, we touch on the dreams of motherhood, the pressures of fertility, and the unexpected paths life sometimes offers. Reflecting on the importance of individuality within relationships, we discuss how our upbringing shapes our views and how journaling and therapy serve as allies in our growth. From the choice of divorce to the role of social media in finding community, we create a sanctuary of vulnerability and solidarity, offering support to anyone facing similar struggles.

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Maressa

are we on?

Natalie

is this thing on this?

Maressa

thing on. Is that going to be your entry every single time?

Natalie

I don't know. Maybe for?

Natalie

the first couple until I get tired of it, but I swear every time I do that I feel a little bit like britney spears in the movie crossroads where she's like is this thing on such a good movie?

Maressa

such a good movie. Well, we don't messed up, guys.

Natalie

We did

Maressa

did not record in chicago, like we said we were and

Natalie

the reason for that is a couple of reasons Lugging all of this stuff, the microphones, the laptop, the podcast recorder.

Maressa

It would have been a lot. It was a lot, but we're going to talk about Chicago.

Maressa

We will While we're here,

Natalie

yes, so welcome to Dumped and Divorced. My name is Natalie

Maressa

and my name is Maressa

Natalie

and we are sisters,

Maressa

we're sisters and this is our podcast.

Natalie

Yes, welcome. Okay. So Chicago, chicago, we went last weekend as our annual birthday trip.

Maressa

We've done it every year since our breakups, and so it's been a new tradition. So 2023 was our first year, and so it's going on year three. Yeah, so we went to Chicago. We've never been, actually, I've never been, you have

Natalie

, I went for like a conference for unique, which I was like a makeup business, yeah you did an MLM forever ago, but anyways, yeah, so it was really fun. It was the windy city, that is true, some truth right there. I mean it was windy. I bought this like really nice fur winter jacket for Colorado and I feel like I needed it more in Chicago than when we were in Breckenridge

Maressa

When we were there. So it was only really cold on Friday. Saturday and Sunday was like like sunny, but cold. It was still like 20, 30 degrees, yeah, but like with the wind chill, it was like, um, like 17, 15.

Natalie

When we went on Friday, there was no one at the bean.

Maressa

No, no one was at the bean, it was totally empty. It was very empty there was.

Natalie

They had like a little ice skating rink right there.

Maressa

It was cute. It was very cute. It was kind of like Rockefeller vibes with the tree and the ice skating rink, but it was the bean with the ice skating rink, yep.

Natalie

So we did. We had some suggestions from some of our friends to go to some places and monuments. So we did Sears Tower

Maressa

Willis. Towers, but AKA the Sears Tower for the local Chicagoans.

Natalie

Yep, and then we did Cindy's Rooftop, which overlooked into Millennial Park.

Maressa

We did a walking and food tour, which I personally loved. The nerd in me thought it was so insightful because I just love learning new things about cities.

Natalie

You do, you love history

Maressa

I love history.

Maressa

It was so funny when we were on the loop cause we took the loop train back to our hotel.

Maressa

When we first arrived the L line.

Maressa

The L line. Now I was like this looks like Gotham city and I was like I don't. I've never watched Batman, but you know, I was like I feel like a lot of movies have been filmed here. Save the.

Maressa

Last Dance, save the.

Maressa

Last Dance, the V dance, save the last dance, the vow batman. Yes, I think a fast and the furious scene was there from that like cool architectural building, the the like corn and the cob looking building off of the river. But we and so like when she said that I was like huh, interesting, I've never seen it. And then in our tour guide he was like that building is where christian, uh bateman bait bail bateman, that's a different one.

Maressa

Christian blank from batman did his Gotham City where he was on, and you were like I told you. But we had the best time because we also ate like true Chicago dishes. We had deep dish pizza, we had a Chicago hot dog and an Italian beef sandwich, and then we ended at the hotel where the brownie was invented and.

Maressa

I just loved that knowledge because a lot of people are like that's so random and I'm like, yeah, it happened. The wife of the owner of the hotel was making chocolate fondue cake and then like pastries for the people going to the market and then like the 1800s, and somehow it fell and they liked the gooey part and the brownie was invented

Natalie

yeah, in like 1893, I think yeah.

Natalie

I don't know.

Maressa

But we had the best time. We bounced between bars, bar hopped, we went to a couple of speakeasies I love a speakeasy. I think they're so fun. We had a great time. It was a quick birthday trip and then we got back and after we launched our episode one, we've been on this high of everyone being really supportive and loving. We've had family friends reach out to us, um, but we've also had some backlash.

Natalie

I can understand why the backlash has happened and it's you know. Just to just to continue saying what we said last week we're not here to

Maressa

talk ill of our exes, talk ill.

Natalie

Um, obviously we will protect everyone that we can in this segment.

Maressa

Yeah

Maressa

think we were going in a different direction on this episode, but now we're going to address some of those feelings. Maybe Are we. Well, we don't have to.

Natalie

I mean, what is there to say? People are listening More people loved it than didn't like it, and I think that the reason why they don't like it is because they don't know what, what we have in store, what can be said right. I mean because any hardship, any relationship isn't perfect,

Maressa

it's going to be divided.

Maressa

People are going to side and I feel like we've had a lot of cheerleaders on our side, but we have people that are loyal to the other side and there's no wrong in that?

Natalie

There's not.

Maressa

We understand that. You know you want to be supportive, but there are those lines where you're like I'm not crossing that line to talk bad about that person. We're just the goal of this and we said this in episode one. The goal of this podcast is to talk about our healing journey

Natalie

Normalize experiencing hardship.

Maressa

Totally. And that's the thing is. I think, a lot of the positive, you know, feedback we've gotten is people actually going through broken engagements and divorces and saying like, wow, I felt those things but my friends couldn't relate to that because they were just being supportive of me. But we're being supportive of what you've gone through and feeling that way of you know being sad and you know not understanding where your life is going to go from now, because you and I had both long-term relationships and we were focusing on the good. I was, you know, focusing on my future with my ex and that obviously was taken away and there's no future anymore and that's fine. But I think it's acknowledging that you had this idea of what would happen and now it's no longer there, and how can you move forward from it?

Natalie

Yeah, I mean. Breakups are hard and breaking up relationships, whether it's an engagement or a marriage, is part of life.

Maressa

And a lot of people go through it. And just no one likes to talk about it.

Natalie

And it's not like we have a huge following where we have millions and millions of people listening. I mean we were impressed with our numbers and again, thank you so much to everyone who tuned in and felt like they were a small part of our story, that we kind of became a part of your story, that we were, you know, connected and sitting down on a couch with a glass of wine and having these girl talks this girl talk.

Maressa

Yeah, well, and I've even had, I've had coworkers that have shared our podcast because they're like I have a girlfriend that was going through a divorce, or I have a girlfriend that was in a long-term relationship with her significant other and is having a hard time. So we, again, the goal is to make you feel seen and also know that you're not alone. We're going to stay classy. We're not going to muddy any waters

Natalie

no, muddying of water,

Maressa

we are not and we're not even really going to focus on them. No, we're going to focus on us because, again, we have had so much growth individually, the amount of growth you've you've had.

Maressa

Natalie, I'm so impressed and I think so highly of you because, out of your situation, yours was the toughest, because you have a family at stake and you've been so and she's getting emotional. Um, because you've been so strong and you have every right to feel all of those feelings you felt. So I'm so proud of you and we're just here to talk about that and our growth and how much we've learned about ourselves, because if it wasn't for my ex breaking my heart, I wouldn't be who I am today.

Natalie

Um, you'd probably just be like I'd be.

Maressa

No, you'd probably just be like a snooty wife that didn't want to work and then just moseyed around.

Maressa

I wanted babies so bad I wanted to pop babies out immediately. And then, actually so random, I saw a friend. You guys know I'm in my early thirties and I've had some questions about freezing my eggs and that's like a terrifying topic to think about. But having a family was such a big thing for me and I've had some questions about freezing my eggs and that's like a terrifying topic to think about. But having a family was such a big thing for me and I can't wait to be a mom and I do feel like that was robbed for me. In a sense it was.

Maressa

And now I'm getting emotional. But I know my time will come and I know getting pregnant in your mid 30s is not uncommon anymore. But I saw a girlfriend I knew from college that froze her eggs and she's my age and she has this story and like I can't wait to just reach out to her just to pick her brain, because she's again my age and she was like I was confident in knowing that. I told myself that at the age of 30, I'm not having a family.

Maressa

I want to freeze my eggs because I don't know what's going to look like in my future and she said she had a fight like based and this is based on her Facebook post. She said that based on her like OBGYN, she kind of had a fight with her but then they ran tests and they realized that she does have fertility, like issues, and she's like I'm so grateful. I stuck to my gut and had that conversation and push for my like the future of my family and I was like, wow, so that kind of moved me. I was like, should I start?

Maressa

freezing my eggs

Natalie

and the thing is is like getting pregnant is actually it's when we grow up and we start, you know, experimenting with

Maressa

having sex partners

Maressa

We know I'm not a prude guy. A prune, oh my.

Natalie

God, uh, when, when you're young and you start learning that and experiencing that for the first time, like your parents are, like you can get pregnant yada yada, and I'm sure that maybe when you're younger you're, you're higher fertility. I have no idea.

Natalie

I have no, I, we are no medical doctors or scientists,

Maressa

but I would love to know what my eggs look like.

Natalie

But that's what I'm saying. Like, as the older you get, your fertility does decrease. Yeah, does decrease, and that's so wonderful that she advocated for herself.

Maressa

Right I'm, I cannot wait and I like, told myself. I read the post and I was like I'm going to text her.

Maressa

Um because.

Maressa

I just I would love to know like her process and she I mean, it's essentially like I have girlfriends, I've had a girlfriend that gone through IVF, so I know like the process of all the shots and stuff. And so she kind of elaborated a little bit on her post but but yeah, like I was like whoa that's crazy Cause.

Natalie

I think I mentioned it to you a couple of years ago.

Maressa

Mom's like I want my, I want babies. And then I'm like what about Chad?

Maressa

Chad can have babies too, yeah

Natalie

Well when I mentioned it to you, you got like really upset.

Maressa

I got upset because, yeah, well, I literally envisioned. I mean, my ex and I talked about our family, we talked about babies, we talked about how many babies, baby names, and so it sucks that that was taken away from me. Not that I can't have that, but I'm not in a relationship right now.

Natalie

Um, so here's the thing Anytime you start envisioning your life and whether you settle or not cause we settled, we did you still envision your future, right? I mean, I, I did say last week that I settled. However, because I settled, I have a beautiful family. I do. I do, and you know what. Like, okay, get it together, natalie, I'm okay with that, like I've. I've accepted that, that the love that my kids give me is all I need in this chapter of my life right now. That my kids give me is all I need in this chapter of my life right now. And it wasn't the end goal to get divorced, but I did marry and I did have kids and I do have my wonderful children because of that. So me saying I settled is not a reflection on anything about the foundation and the family that we created.

Maressa

That's extremely mature for you to say.

Natalie

It's just that we were not good for each other, and anyone that knew us as a couple probably could relate to me saying that or understand why I'm saying that one way or the other.

Maressa

Well, and this kind of goes back to what we said in episode one about being naive and falling in love and not knowing what we wanted, and I think you kind of elaborated a little bit more, like you. There's nothing wrong with what happened, like y'all's future was, was there, or you guys got married, had a family, but you guys weren't made for each other.

Maressa

And.

Maressa

I truly believe that when you are looking for a partner, you do look for your soulmate and that missing puzzle piece, and sometimes you want to think that that person is it, but it's not.

Natalie

You try to make it work

Maressa

you try to make it work so much Because I'm thinking back on had my ex and I continued and got married, we would have still had that broken foundation of the issues that was led to us breaking up and I think I would have a thousand percent walked away from my family. I would have lost my relationship with my parents. And I also think the scary thought of had I lost my relationship with my parents, like what that would have looked like when dad got sick. So I'm grateful that I was he walked away from that relationship because that was not my choice, like that was his choice.

Natalie

Yeah, but it gave you those extra years with dad where you were with him a lot.

Maressa

Yeah, totally, and I am grateful for those years. I wouldn't have wanted to walk away because I wanted to make that work. So again and I've mentioned this before like I'm a hard lover, I love hard and I, you know, will do anything to make my partner happy. So it's just saying that we always want to make things work and we want to love people. But that doesn't mean that it's okay to feel like you are stuck in it. Right, you can walk away.

Maressa

You can walk away if it's not doing good to your heart or if you feel like you're getting, or if you feel overwhelmed or you're feeling pulled in a direction like your gut feeling is never wrong. And I have realized that I've had multiple gut feelings over the years of me being in my relationship and even in the wedding planning. It was such a fucking nightmare, Gosh, like now, like thinking back of everything and again, I might dive into those details later. But we pivoted on this episode because we want to address that while we've been so, so happy with the support we've received, we've also received some backlash and we just want to address that.

Maressa

Again, we're not here to speak bad

Natalie

One thing that I do in on, to kind of focus on is those boundaries, the boundaries, absolutely right? So, thinking back on even mom and dad's relationship and mom might get a little, hopefully I'm gonna, I'm not again. I'm not saying anything as an attack, I'm not saying anything as a a direct hit, right, but back in the 80s, back in the 90s, people I don't know, we probably need to pull up divorce stats.

Maressa

Oh my.

Maressa

God, we should, we should.

Natalie

I feel like before it was based on cheating or like huge scandals.

Maressa

Yes

Natalie

might have been the base of divorce, but I feel like now even people that I went to college with or high school with that have married. A lot of people are just separating because they are no longer good for each other.

Natalie

Yeah, and that the compatibility issue.

Natalie

Yes, and you don't have to stay with someone just because you're married, right? Sure, it makes things a lot easier in the legal piece, in the financial piece, but in your heart and in your mind it's not easy. It's actually harder to stay with someone because of that.

Maressa

Yeah, and I think too, um, the yeah, the divorce rates. While you pull up some divorce rates, um, also, I feel like our parents generation even though our dad was a little bit older than our mom, even like his generation to our mom's generation, talking about getting divorced was not like a thing, and also talking about your feelings like therapy wasn't really a thing, like I feel like you and I have really really done some work in therapy, you with your situation and me with, just like you know, trying to find myself. Now we know what we want and we're not settling, and that's also why I've just been constantly dating, because I know what I want in a person and dating is fun. It's supposed to be fun. I mean, maybe I make it fun, but you're supposed to laugh at that, natalie?

Natalie

Dating is not fun.

Natalie

I don't like to date.

Maressa

Okay, well, I love to date. I've been on my dating game for a minute and, while I'm not on the apps, I've been interdating with, like people I've known or just people I've met, you know. But something I've learned from my therapy is in, like, my inner work, I've been journaling, I've been focusing on that growth of myself.

Maressa

It's helped me realize that, you know, our parents didn't talk about their feelings openly and that's always why there's been issues with like marriages, um, and you know you feel like you can't walk away from a marriage because, like there has to be a scandal. And the thing is, is there doesn't have to be a scandal? Um, but then sometimes people lose themselves in their marriage or relationship and they feel like they can't do things they want to do. I think it's like really important to acknowledge that you want to be your individual self, but also your partner's addition, if you will. You want to be who you are, but you also want to have a relationship that's so healthy and the boundaries are just easily communicated and not like causing stress.

Natalie

I mean, we're no like medical or therapists, so what we say is simply our personal opinion and our personal feelings. I agree with you in the sense that setting those boundaries is important, and I don't know if you've well, you've definitely been on TikTok. But there's all these like TikTok accounts about generational trauma and breaking curse, not breaking curses, breaking generational gaps and starting over. So I feel that in today's world, we're moving more towards that.

Natalie

Yeah.

Natalie

So episode two, this is just going to be an episode of our feelings and our headspace.

Maressa

Yeah, we were in a really good headspace episode one and we were excited.

Maressa

Episode two it's kind of rocky, and that's another thing too is we're going to let you in in our lives and we're going to walk you through our journeys, but also let you know what's happening currently and how we are trying to navigate that, because we again are wanting to make this about our growth and, while I could talk a lot about mine, your growth, yeah, yeah, yeah, and you can too.

Maressa

I think we're trying to stay in a lane that's respectful and we're not crossing that lane. We have a lot of really good ideas of what we want to talk about and a lot of fun events. We'll get there, because this was just a really weird situation where we weren't as excited to film this episode because of the mental headspace we were in, and we're not going to fake talking about something where it's not real and authentic, and I think that's also what people are going to be able to take away from this is they're like, wow, they are being so raw and vulnerable talking about this topic and they're also letting us know that shit hit the fan and a little bit, and we're not like, we're not backing down because we are so. We're like trying to make this more about our girl gang. Maybe some guys too,

Natalie

so remember when we got our cards read

Maressa

oh our tarot cards, oh my gosh, yes.

Natalie

So one thing that I know we're cat, we grew up Catholic and it's very not Catholic. I'm not necessarily a practicing Catholic anymore, but we we had our card reds, our cards read in 23.

Maressa

Yeah, the year after. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Cause it was talking about this guy I was currently hooking up with and I was like, oh yeah, well, the best way to get over somebody is to get under somebody that is it.

Natalie

Didn't dad used to say that,

Maressa

oh my god, ew, oh wow oh,

Natalie

I feel like he told Chad that

Maressa

he's probably rolling in his grave right now. After you just said that,

Natalie

I feel like he told Chad

Maressa

Well, I've been doing that a couple of times, so yeah, sorry, mom,

Natalie

But what I'm'm saying, why I brought up the cards, is because that card reader told me that in my heart and in my soul I kind of had I don't want to say a philanthropic concept, but I had something that wanted to create safe space and create a place where people didn't feel like they were alone. Because, like Maressa mentioned, when you're in the middle of life-changing events it's hard to talk about publicly.

Natalie

Like sure you'll reach out to your besties and your close friends, but none of my like true close friends went through a divorce and I, like, leaned into TikTok, I leaned into Instagram. I I just needed to feel validated that my feelings were like normal.

Natalie

Yeah, and that you know I couldn't not listen to my gut anymore, which?

Natalie

I do.

Maressa

You made that decision for you and your family and you are forever grateful for it, because you know, I think, and you made that decision what would have been like my wedding weekend and yeah, so I was literally like going through the motions of I was supposed to get married this weekend.

Natalie

Oh shit, you were, yeah that was like it was literally that weekend.

Maressa

So you made the decision that you wanted to, you wanted a divorce, and it was what would have been my wedding weekend, and we were heading. My girls took me to Charlotte and we rallied, um, but, yeah, like, so you decided. And so that goes back to like you made that decision and you were in an unspeakable, you were in a weird spot, but you had no one to talk about. And then you also didn't want to leash those emotions on me, because I was going through my emotions when, like, of what would have been the most important weekend of my life getting married. But you suppressed that and so you leaned in on strangers talking about these feelings and saying, like, you're not alone, it's okay to feel these things, and so we're wanting to do that with other women, and maybe even men too, where they're not alone and like, even though everyone's story is different, our stories are kind of, in a sense, like relatable and we're sisters and we had each other.

Natalie

Yeah

Maressa

some people don't have that beauty.

Natalie

I mean, I remember having to call mom and I guess maybe I called you first.

Natalie

I don't know,

Maressa

I think you called me first, yeah.

Natalie

Like it's almost embarrassing. It's embarrassing too. It's just been an emotional day for me.

Maressa

I think.

Maressa

I think it's yeah, this again. This episode was a turn on what we had outlined. I was going to focus on my damn breakup, but it's okay, because you know we're addressing some things, but we're also setting those lines of this is going to be. This is not a hate podcast, this is a love podcast and we want it. We want you to know that you're not alone, and I think I feel like I've said that so many times, but I'm just trying to reiterate because we know that there's some listeners that are going to try to take our words and I don't want to say twist them, but they're not understanding our end goal.

Maressa

We're just trying to make you feel seen. And if you do feel seen, I would love for you just to shoot us a quick message while we have had friends, like tell us, you know it's great, you guys are doing an amazing job. Like how vulnerable you are to even talk about this. And while we love that, we also want to hear, like the people that are like I was suggested your podcast or I heard about it through a friend and I just want to like say thank you, you know, like hey, like I appreciate you even acknowledging all of these things because it's hard and like no one wants to talk about it, and sometimes talking about a failed relationship makes you feel like something's wrong with you, when in reality, nothing's wrong with us. I mean, sure, like we're not perfect Our exes aren't perfect but we just weren't perfect together. Yeah, and what we're looking for is that perfect mate, the perfect match.

Natalie

Yeah, the TV show Jack and uh.

Natalie

Jack and uh, oh my God.

Maressa

Mel Mel on the.

Maressa

Virgin River is just like the perfect couple Goal, goal, couple goals.

Natalie

Okay, so we are. I think that I don't want to say it was a wash, but I think coming off of last week, we had a different. Maressa said we've had a different direction. So thanks for listening in. On today's episode, it was more of our feelings and again reiterating our goals and, you know, just being just being honest and truthful in the most respectful way, and I think that I think that that's important because that's how we are in our real lives. You know, I don't think that either one of us what is that word Like? Talked so poorly about the other individual and tarnish their name.

Maressa

Yeah, so we didn't I mean gosh, I don't even like,

Natalie

I don't want to say could we have, because that's not our intention. That is not our intention and it will never be our intention.

Maressa

No, it will never be our intention.

Maressa

I mean, some people could be like you have so much more you can say and the thing is is like we're just we just don't have the energy to get that deep, because we're wanting to focus on us.

Natalie

Yeah, so thank you for everyone who tuned in this week. Thank you for listening to the background sniffles and the background cries, and if we had a camera, you guys would see like the tears running down our face. But we appreciate you guys and if you want to write a review, we would appreciate it. But next week will be better.

Maressa

Next week will be in a different focus. I think we'll have, um, maybe pivot back to. What we had anticipated for episode two and I also mentioned this last week is we're not pros. We are going to walk through this podcast journey and the healing journey together and I think it's important to realize that when things get you know, mentioned or discussed amongst other people based on our podcast, we will pivot and we will address anything that needs to be addressed and also set those goals and understanding of what we're wanting to talk about, moving forward in all of our episodes, um, and also just focus again on Natalie and Maressa.

Maressa

Natalie and Maressa, we don't even know anything. Well, actually, I'm not going to say that because you know something about your ex. I know nothing about my ex. So, and we're just going to keep it that way.

Natalie

Um, you have no connection to your.

Maressa

I have no connection to my ex, no, but we're just going to keep it that way. You have no connection to your ex. I have no connection to my ex, no, but we're just focusing on us and we're going to keep on saying that because the haters are going to hate and, like Cardi B said in her speech, in 2023, I'm going to do a line.

Maressa

Our girlfriend sent us a funny Cardi B speech where she literally was just like and for the haters, thanks for listening in, because you want to talk shit about things. I'm saying you know. So if the haters want to keep hating, they'll hate, but the supporters will keep supporting, yes, and we love all of our supporters and our listeners and all of our friends and family, and we are just so thankful that we have been given so much happy and positive feedback from this all and we'll just continue along with our journeys. So thank you and we will see you next week.

Natalie

Thanks for listening, guys.

Maressa

Thanks, bye. Are you going to say your toodles,

Natalie

toodles?

Maressa

That's going to be your tagline? Deuces