Ep 43 - What Social Media Didn’t Show: The Struggles That Strengthened Us

This week on Messy But Motivated, my husband Mike joins me for one of our most honest conversations yet. We’re pulling back the curtain on the parts of our story social media never showed—the depression, financial struggles, short sales, uncertainty, and the seasons where life felt heavier than we knew how to carry.

From the outside, things can look polished and put together, but behind closed doors we were walking through battles that tested us in ways no post could ever capture.

In this episode, we talk about the reality that things aren’t always what they seem online, the pressure of silent struggles, and how we made it through the hard seasons together.

Through every setback, every hard conversation, and every storm, one thing never wavered: our marriage.

This is a conversation about choosing commitment when life gets messy, leaning on faith when answers don’t come easy, and discovering that sometimes the hardest seasons produce the strongest foundations.

If you’ve ever felt like everyone else has it together while you’re barely holding on, this episode is for you.

Don't forget to subscribe for more real, raw, and motivating faith filled conversations.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

Welcome back to Messy But Motivated. I'm your host, Melinda. Today we have my husband here.

SPEAKER_01 0:05

Hey.

SPEAKER_02 0:06

It's Mike. You guys know Mike. He's he's he's you know, he's home today, and I was like, hey, you want to be on the podcast? And he's like, sure. I'm like, all right, cool. He is to work tonight.

SPEAKER_01 0:16

Dumb. Dumb.

SPEAKER_02 0:17

All weekend. Yeah, it's gonna be no Mother's Day for me. But we hey, let's back it up. I'm the one who was like, we have so much going on, and I know this sounds crazy, but the thought of celebrating Mother's Day right now is just like too much for me.

SPEAKER_01 0:34

Good. I agree.

SPEAKER_02 0:35

It's too much. Like we have so much going on right now, but we did take rain checks. And I think my rain check is gonna be when we are moved, I'm gonna be like, hey, can I go get a nice massage massage spa day? I think I'm gonna cash in that ticket.

SPEAKER_01 0:49

Oh, probably there's probably nice spas, doesn't it?

SPEAKER_02 0:52

Yeah. And I want one. I want a good massage. I want a good, I want to sit in a sauna, I want I want to do a spa day. So that's gonna be my mother's day, and then I'm gonna have him make me waffles because that's my favorite thing. Um, and then I'm sure he'll want a lawnmower or something. Yeah, he's not hard to please. I can give you a back rub. You'll be fine. Because we're not gonna do Father's Day either. We've we're opting out this year.

SPEAKER_01 1:17

Taking a rain check.

SPEAKER_02 1:19

We're opting out. I feel like you can do that when you know you've been doing it. Well, Chloe's 11, 11 years of it.

SPEAKER_01 1:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:26

They'll still give us cards and stuff. Guys, don't get it twisted. Like on their end. I'm saying for me and him, we usually spoil each other. This year we're like looking at each other like we have so much going on. And then we'll get into that. The move. The move. Uh, for those of you who don't know, we are moving from uh uh Iowa, northern Iowa, all the way down to Parish, Florida. And uh we close on both houses on the 12th. So we have got to make our way, we're starting our way down there on the 9th.

SPEAKER_01 1:59

10th. 10th. Swinging by a friend's house.

unknown 2:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:03

And then staying the night, then driving the rest of the way the next day.

SPEAKER_02 2:07

And it wasn't intended for me to drive at all, but the kids decided they don't want to fly. And I know why it is. Their dad's not gonna be there, so they're like, We're not flying, and we were gonna have the cats and the bunny with us. And they're like, I think they knew I would stress out, so now they're like, no, let's drive. I mean, both of them, which is so crazy. Mike's like, Are you sure?

SPEAKER_01 2:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 2:29

And they're like, Yeah, we want to drive.

SPEAKER_01 2:31

I would way rather fly.

SPEAKER_02 2:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:33

So drive the U-Haul though.

SPEAKER_02 2:35

Yeah, Mike's gonna do the U-Haul. I'm gonna do his truck um with my kids and um A dog. A dog. Yeah, I think I'm gonna take Cam because she's still she's still gotta do her insulin and all that, and I gotta check her sugars, all that. I isn't that crazy. Yeah, but she stresses me out, and I don't wanna have to be texting other people to be like, did you check her? Is she panting? Is she this? I'd rather just let her be in my backseat and me deal with it. Um, because I'm her mom.

SPEAKER_01 3:07

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 3:07

I'm her mom. I know her. I know, I know her. Um, but yeah, and then Mike's my mom and my mom's cousin Marie are gonna drive my vehicle with my cats and my bunny. And they're driving straight through.

SPEAKER_01 3:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 3:21

We have been so blessed, you guys. People who are volunteering to just go take us or drive one of the vehicles.

SPEAKER_01 3:28

I know it's not a late trip. No, it's a hefty one.

SPEAKER_02 3:31

It's a hefty. Speaking of that, you guys, I'm trying to convince Mike that I need a Tesla.

SPEAKER_01 3:36

Yeah, self-driving.

SPEAKER_02 3:37

Self-driving. I look I had to drive to Iowa City the other day and I looked over and I'm like, oh my gosh, that girl wasn't even paying attention. She was texting and she not looking at all. And I'm like, what a dream.

unknown 3:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 3:50

And then I texted you, I said I want a Tesla.

SPEAKER_00 3:52

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_02 3:53

Yeah. And I you you guys might yeah, you guys might be laughing, but uh maybe this time next year I might have one. Because I mean traffic there is crazy, and if I can just get in and tell it to take me somewhere, it can deal with the traffic, not me, right?

unknown 4:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 4:07

Does it know how to deal with traffic, right?

SPEAKER_01 4:09

I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 4:10

Oh, I gotta look into it.

SPEAKER_01 4:11

Probably.

SPEAKER_02 4:13

I gotta look into it. I think I want one.

SPEAKER_01 4:15

I mean they're in cities.

SPEAKER_02 4:20

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think I just push buttons and it gets used. We were actually talking about um when Chloe turned old enough to get her a Tesla because we were hearing about this lady who she was looking everywhere for insurance for her daughter and her because her daughter just started obviously driving, and she was like, I'll put her on our insurance. She's like, it our insurance tripled putting her on there. So then somebody told her to look in up Teslas because Teslas had their own insurance. So she did it, and she's like, the amount she she's actually saving money by putting her daughter on the Tesla insurance and got her a Tesla because it, you know, they have cameras and they know how fast somebody's driving, and yeah, I mean, insurance is no joke for kids. And by then we'll get her a used one.

SPEAKER_01 5:09

Well, I think they still have used ones now, but I think there's like perks to buy new.

SPEAKER_02 5:14

Oh, really?

SPEAKER_01 5:14

It comes with like the charging stuff. Oh. I don't know. I was semi-looking.

SPEAKER_02 5:19

Well, hopefully in about three or four years when she starts driving, we will reassess this situation. And maybe I'll have a Tesla and I could pass it down to her. Wouldn't that be cool? And then I'll get a new Tesla. It's like the new iPhones.

SPEAKER_01 5:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 5:32

Speaking of, did we tell you guys we got Chloe a phone? It's actually been going really well. We set it up on like a parenting, so anything that she does, it'll text me and say, like the other day she wanted to upgrade her storage because none of her stuff was like she had like bare minimum. And so with the cloud anyway. And so it like texted me and was like, hey, your daughter wants to upgrade her storage. And like it made me approve that, which was pretty cool. Because I'm like, oh, it it asks for everything, any app. Um, her text messages, like when her group text messages, I don't know why the other ones haven't been, but I check her phone a lot. Um, she just lays it around everywhere, she doesn't care about it. She's like me and you, she don't care, like whatever. I'm like, grab your phone. Um, but her group texts get sent to my phone, which is so weird. So I see all her group texts. She doesn't know that.

SPEAKER_01 6:20

Oh yeah, all of them.

SPEAKER_02 6:22

One's called the baddies, like they name them. Yeah. Sometimes I'll see them in their arguing, and I'm like, you guys are crazy. But yeah, you know, it's it's fifth grade stuff. She's gonna be a middle schooler next year, guys. Homeschool. I'm so excited about homeschool. What do you think?

SPEAKER_01 6:39

Yeah, I'm excited too.

SPEAKER_02 6:40

Are you?

SPEAKER_01 6:41

Yeah, Christian homeschool.

SPEAKER_02 6:43

Yeah, I'm really excited. Every curriculum we've looked at is basically for the Christian um academies we want to go to for them, is two hours a day, you guys. Yeah, two hours a day is all our kids have to do at school instead of eight hours. And they're learning things that actually matter, like and we're keeping their faith in it. And I was kind of excited yesterday. I felt like a mom win. Chloe walked up to me, she says, Mom, look at my new background. And it was like First Corinthians uh verse from first. And I'm like, Yeah, I love it. It's those little things that make me feel like I won.

SPEAKER_01 7:22

Yeah, you know, and just knowing they're not going to be indoctrinated. Yeah, yes, is a is a huge bonus.

SPEAKER_02 7:29

Yeah. So for sure. And that's it.

SPEAKER_01 7:33

That's a lot more time with them. They say what's the what's that statistic? It's like from their birth to their 18th birthday, that's you spent that's 75% of your time with your child. So getting that six extra hours a day is gonna be a huge difference.

SPEAKER_02 7:52

Huge, huge, and honestly, it's like it's yeah, that's one of the biggest perks I'm excited about. We can do our school and then you know, it we're not stuck in the house. That's why we ultimately decided homeschool when we moved to Florida. But not only because they're huge on homeschool there, um, but also I right now, you homeschool, we were stuck inside in the wintertime. And man, me and Carson were going stir crazy. Yeah, we were going crazy by the time spring came, me and him were just like, so this is gonna be great. We can do it, and all year round we can go outside and go and do things.

SPEAKER_01 8:29

Oh, it's gonna be fabulous.

SPEAKER_02 8:31

Yeah, so it'll be nice because last time me and Carson were we were going a little crazy. There it yeah, we were not well, we were not well, so but that's okay. Um, today's I always say um too much. That's okay. I think they get they get it by now. Do you guys get it by now? I don't know. Um as I say it again. Today's episode, we're going to talk about what you don't see behind the scenes of social media. So many of you know I've been in social media now since 2021, 2020, something like that. And I kind of like vlog everything. Um, I will tell you this, it used to be more like I I there was I did things a little bit different because I would show everything. Now I kind of put a little bit of a filter on because Chloe was getting to the age where she would say things to me like, Mom, I don't want you to put that on there, you know, and I didn't want that. I didn't want her to be like resenting social media. Um, and and me, you know, I didn't want to put things out there that she didn't want me to put. So now I'm very vague about what I put on there, but I did start back up. I started doing vlogs again. Um, and that took a while, you guys. How long I've been out of vlogs since a long time.

SPEAKER_01 9:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 9:49

I did.

SPEAKER_01 9:50

Hot minute.

SPEAKER_02 9:50

Hot minute. And I don't know what it is. I feel like I'm back now. I feel like I'm back. Uh I I got out of it because I was just, I don't know. I I want to say burnt out. Maybe I was burnt out.

SPEAKER_01 10:04

Maybe you were. Maybe I'm you are messy.

SPEAKER_02 10:07

Messy, real messy. Um, speaking of, let's go back because I didn't even update them on remember how I said I had uh my scalp had like things all over my scalp and I was in pain, didn't know what was going on. Um, I ended up going to the ER and I had why do I want to say scabies every time?

SPEAKER_01 10:25

I want to say scabies too. Shingles.

SPEAKER_02 10:27

Shingles. What is scabies?

SPEAKER_01 10:29

I think it's like a bug.

SPEAKER_02 10:32

I didn't have a bug. I do not have scabies. I had shingles, and I I have. I have shingles. Um, so the pain is I don't know if y'all know much about shingles, but supposedly it is a once I had the chicken pox, like it stays dormant in your body. Well, I got chicken pox when I was like five. Um, and when your body gets stressed or when your immune system's really low, um the it will come out from being dormant, and so it came out, and I'm sure it's all the stress from everything in life right now, moving and all the things. And I was on antibiotics for a month and a half, so I think it was just the antibiotics. You think so? Yeah, because he's taking the load. I do want to say that he's taking the load, you guys. Every time we do a move, you guys know we move a lot. Every time we move, the anxiety for me is too much. I'm all for it in the beginning. I'm like, let's do it, let's do it. And then when it comes time for moving parts, I literally I'm I freeze and I'm like, I don't know if I want to do this anymore. And I got to that point about two weeks ago. Um, and Mike has taken the reins like he always does, and all this.

SPEAKER_01 11:38

Yeah, it's a piece of cake.

SPEAKER_02 11:40

Yeah, so he's literally done the whole move. He will do the whole move. I am just I'm here with his kids, and um, I'm I'm I'm he tells me where to go and how to do it and when to do it. You're not stressed?

SPEAKER_01 11:53

No.

SPEAKER_02 11:56

I'm like, we close on this day, we close, and he's like, Yeah, you don't care. He's like, whatever.

SPEAKER_01 12:01

Yeah, man. It's just good communication with your lenders and realtors, make sure everybody's on the same page. Then just continuing to do that throughout the process, then scheduling all your stuff, canceling all your current stuff.

SPEAKER_02 12:16

You've done it all already.

SPEAKER_01 12:16

Yeah, it's all done.

SPEAKER_02 12:17

He's literally got every he has he has a schedule for the U-Haul, the days we need to leave at what time, all he's got it all. Do you have room for error in any of those?

SPEAKER_01 12:29

I mean, a little bit. A little bit. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 12:32

Pray that that doesn't happen. So yeah. Um, he does all the move. I I'm just here, I do all the things, and then um, I am getting ready for a yard sale. We're having a big yard sale. Um, getting rid of a lot of stuff.

SPEAKER_01 12:44

A lot of it.

unknown 12:45

A lot of it.

SPEAKER_01 12:46

Don't want to carry it across the country.

SPEAKER_02 12:48

We don't want to. There's a lot of things we're just gonna, we're we're just gonna get rid of it because there's no reason to take it. So um, but yes, back to that with social media. I I've finally gotten back into the vlogs, and I can tell you I am putting a filter up, such as not a filter like on my face or anything, but a filter on what everybody sees, but I'm still showing things and I'm still and I do feel like I'm back because I kind of am back to my goofy self. Whereas before I was just kind of like, Ugh, you know, but I I had been praying on that. I had been praying that God would bring back my personality because for some reason it started to go away. And I did I thought it was just part of my faith transfer transforming in my faith, but I guess that's not it. He's like, here, have it back. It's just I think I was just learning how to because I I don't curse anymore. I used to curse like a sailor. You were I was cursing like a sailor, and I think he wanted to clean that out before he gave me the gave me the reins to want to do vlogs again. Because he was like, You can't be out there claiming you claiming my name and throwing all these words around, you know.

SPEAKER_01 13:58

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 13:59

So I think now that that's all cleaned up, now he's like, all right, now I can put you out there and you know how to represent me. And he's like, stop wearing crop tops. You know, I do believe he said that one day. I tell you, I felt so conflicted one day, I was just like, I feel like I looked at all my crop tops and I'm like, oh my gosh, I don't even want to put them on. And that's the day I was like, I think he doesn't want me wearing crop tops anymore. And I got rid of them all. Got rid of them. So, anyways, uh just you know, going through the motions and really just transforming, and now I'm back to doing my blogs and I love it. So I I feel like I'm back and I love it. It feels good.

SPEAKER_01 14:39

Good. I'm happy you feel good about it.

SPEAKER_02 14:41

Just in time for the move because now people are like people are like, I can't believe you guys are doing this. And it's like you guys have to understand, we do we live our lives, me and Mike live our lives, as tomorrow's not promised. We didn't want to live one day being like, I wish we would have moved somewhere warmer. I wish we would have moved so that I got more time with my dad. I wish I we didn't want to live like that when we had that we can do it. Oh what? Mike's gotta find a new job.

SPEAKER_01 15:15

Piece of cake.

SPEAKER_02 15:16

Piece of cake. Like, why even like you know what I mean? So we didn't want to live like that. And so we just do things. And I encourage some of you, like, if you feel like you're like, man, I really wish I could move, I really wish I could do this this bold thing, do it.

SPEAKER_01 15:30

You can.

SPEAKER_02 15:31

Because what what's the worst that can happen, Mike? We get there in what?

SPEAKER_01 15:35

Move back, move back, yeah, right?

SPEAKER_02 15:38

But like, think about it, that's the worst that can happen. We get there and we're like, we don't like it, and then guess what happens? We move back. We would give it time because we are the type of people we want at least give it two years. Well, you know.

SPEAKER_01 15:52

Yeah, I think the longest we've stayed in a house is three years.

SPEAKER_02 15:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:57

So we move a lot, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:58

But you know what, babe? I was thinking about this. We've honestly just been trying to figure out what we want.

SPEAKER_01 16:05

Yeah, I don't really know either.

SPEAKER_02 16:07

We're still young. And people think, oh no, you guys are actually pretty well. No, we're not. We're still in our 30s. We're still young and we're still trying to figure out what we want. And I guess this is part of figuring out do we want to be in Florida?

SPEAKER_00 16:19

Yeah. Let's see. You know, just go do it.

SPEAKER_02 16:22

Have our whole lives ahead of us. And if we get more time with our kids and we get to be outdoors more and we get to spend more time together, and we just get to do all this together. I feel like what a blessing. And give it a try. Give it a try. So I'm excited about it. If you are on the edge about things, I'm telling you, what's the worst that can happen?

SPEAKER_01 16:42

Yeah. Pack in a U-Haul. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 16:46

Yeah. So yeah. Um, but behind the scenes of everything, I know I keep bouncing back to that. You guys didn't see a lot of the things that were happening behind the scenes on my social media throughout the years. And it only wasn't until I finally had a mental breakdown that I started coming out about it. And a lot of it was even before I started social media, how our marriage, you guys have to understand that no marriage, I don't care who you are, no marriage is perfect. No marriage is perfect. Now, do have we always had an amazing marriage? I think we have.

SPEAKER_01 17:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 17:22

I do. I don't want to sit here and say, oh, we've had a marriage where we've thought about leaving each other. I don't think that's ever been something that we've that's come up in our marriage ever. Um now what I I'm talking about is there's things on social media, we are our brain wants to go like straight to comparison. But if you guys only knew what was happening behind the scenes in some of these people's lives and including ours, um, there was a time in our life where we, I mean, what you were on deployment. I was completely, I was, I was depressed, depressed. Because I mean, you left me. I had a newborn.

SPEAKER_01 18:05

Deuces.

SPEAKER_02 18:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 18:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 18:08

I had a newborn. And he just up and leaves, you know, and it's not his his, and I'm in a I'm literally somewhere where I don't have any family. Like my mom, we had to move my mom there because I was in deep depression. Um, once we moved, we we moved to Illinois. Um, Mike started working at the uh recruit training command. Yes, so he was a dive motivator, dive instructor, whatever. And um that was hard because then we decided we were going to have Carson. And that in itself was Carson was a nightmare, to say the least. Baby, a nightmare.

SPEAKER_00 18:50

So hard.

SPEAKER_02 18:51

That put pressure on our marriage, and I'm and I'm not like being like, oh, it was the word, it was so much on our marriage because we were we were, we didn't know what to do. We didn't have family around, it was just us and this baby that wants to cry all the time, and we still had Chloe that we had to deal with, and then I would think because he could kind of make his own hours, he had to go in at like four in the morning, but I would think like, You're just going to work and not coming home because you don't want to be around this baby. I would get so mad at him.

SPEAKER_01 19:21

That wasn't the case, but I did not like him.

SPEAKER_02 19:23

Yeah, Mike did not. There was a time I looked at him, he was on the couch with him, and I started bawling because I had postpartum really bad. And I looked over and I said, You don't even like him. And he was like, I don't.

SPEAKER_01 19:34

Crying is like my pet peeve.

SPEAKER_02 19:36

No, he couldn't deal with it. He was literally like, This kid never stops crying, and he didn't.

SPEAKER_01 19:42

Yeah, for six months straight he cried.

SPEAKER_02 19:44

He wouldn't sleep.

SPEAKER_01 19:45

Nope.

SPEAKER_02 19:46

We took turns.

SPEAKER_01 19:47

Finally, we just strapped him into a chair.

SPEAKER_02 19:49

Well, babe, you're making it sound like we like.

SPEAKER_01 19:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 19:52

We got like this colic chair thing for his crib, and it was like a slant, and it came with a little seatbelt. Buckled him in. Yes, and we buckled him in because there were times we needed to walk away. Now we still had the monitor, we would check, but there were times you guys can only imagine when a baby's crying for six months straight, you just need to walk away, and it's for their safety and your own sanity. And we did that. Um, and we don't regret that. We will talk about that all day. We don't regret that. We that we had to do that. Um, and that was stressful um because then it it put me into postpartum depression. That's when I started anxiety meds and all that. And with that, that was just I always thought I was dying. I would literally, we'd be at the kitchen table eating, and I'd say, This is our last dinner together. Looking back, it's funny. But I would, I would think that that's our last dinner. It's the last time we're ever gonna eat dinner together because I was gonna die. I would write letters to my to my kids. Uh yeah, it was crazy. And they're probably still in our safe, too. I don't know. Um, so that was stressful. And then when we moved, Mike got out of the military, and that was stressful.

SPEAKER_01 21:06

Yeah, that was pretty stressful.

SPEAKER_02 21:08

Nobody really warns you for how stressful it is when you're getting out of the military. And I know they have us do classes and stuff because they say it's gonna be hard, but man, it's hard. Yeah, it's difficult, it's very difficult, and it's hard to even explain unless you've done it. Yeah, it is you are leaving. Uh we always had somebody to tell us what to do, how to do, when to do it, and you didn't have any discussions. It had to be done, like that was it. And there was a plan of the day, there was this is this is this. Everything was planned out, and then you go to now I have to do everything myself, plan out my days. And the transition's just really hard. And Mike became a cop at the time, and so that transition was a lot, and then we went through a death with my grandmother, and that was a whole nother move.

SPEAKER_01 21:55

Yep, another move right at the time your grandma. Passed.

SPEAKER_02 22:00

And then my grandma passed. And then um Mike was a cop on third shift, which was stressful on us. We weren't used to that.

SPEAKER_01 22:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:09

Or not used to third shift. We got used to it.

SPEAKER_01 22:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:12

And then he got hurt and they retired him. And that was a big like whoa.

SPEAKER_01 22:18

Yeah. Wouldn't let me back.

SPEAKER_02 22:20

We were like, whoa. We weren't expecting it. And so that was during COVID, which was even crazier.

SPEAKER_01 22:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:29

Um, so the stress of that, and then money got tight because we were no longer making income from Mike. They stopped it until they retired him. And so that was stressful. And his sister kind of had to help us out. My friend Janelle helped us out. Because everybody knew we'd pay him back, but it was just like that got hit. We got hit. We got hit hard. It was it was such a blessing to have good friends in our lives. Kelly helped us. Um, everybody kind of just took turns helping us, and it was great, and we got them all paid back and everything. But man, I thought that was the stress. It was a lot on our marriage. For sure.

SPEAKER_01 23:07

It's also stressful just asking somebody.

SPEAKER_02 23:09

Oh my gosh, yes. Even though if they were going through it, we would help them in a heartbeat. Um, and they knew that we weren't the kind of people to be asking. But it was kind of like, what just happened? Like it overnight your pay just gets taken from you. You didn't plan it.

SPEAKER_01 23:25

No.

SPEAKER_02 23:25

And it only lasted so long.

SPEAKER_01 23:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 23:28

Where we were like, okay, now what?

SPEAKER_01 23:30

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 23:30

It's savings is gone. Now what? Um, so yeah, that was stressful. And then we ended up being like, let's just move to Clear Lake.

SPEAKER_01 23:41

Yeah, well, you were working from home because of COVID.

SPEAKER_02 23:43

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 23:44

And then Liz and AJ wanted a fresh start somewhere. So Paul already lived here. So your mom said, Yeah, I'll go too. So then we all moved.

SPEAKER_02 23:55

We did. We all moved here.

SPEAKER_01 23:56

The whole family.

SPEAKER_02 23:57

In 2021, the beginning of 2021. Um, and I don't regret it.

SPEAKER_01 24:03

No, it was a great time.

SPEAKER_02 24:04

Met some amazing people. We're gonna be back often. But yeah, the stress of all of that too. Um just, you know, adapting to a new life. But here's the thing about me and Mike, we can be anywhere, and as long as we're together, we're home.

SPEAKER_01 24:22

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 24:24

We are. And one thing that's stayed consistent with us is our marriage has always been rock solid. Through the ups and downs, it's never been like uh first off, when money is nothing to us when it comes like in our marriage. That's not even uh we can I I told him long ago, I said we can live on the side of the interstate under a bridge, and as long as we're together, I'm okay. I don't care about the money's gonna come and go. Money will always come and go. We're not gonna lose our marriage over money. That's diabolical. It's not happening.

SPEAKER_01 25:04

Yeah, and I think we do God would not approve.

SPEAKER_02 25:07

No, and I think we do a great job. We're just, I mean, we're just a team. I love it. Yeah, if I can give you any advice, it's never let things like just remember, I guess, that you're a team through this whole marriage. We're in it for 12, we're 12 years now, deep. And I don't think we've ever thrown that D word around.

SPEAKER_01 25:32

No.

SPEAKER_02 25:33

And it it doesn't even come up. We don't want to talk about that. Um, he's gone through depression pretty bad. I've gone through depression, and we've always held each other up. Always. There's never been a time where one of us is like, all right, well, I don't know what to tell you, but now's not the time for that, girl. Figure it out yourself. It was always like, All right, we're gonna get through this, and we've been lucky enough where it's not both at the same time.

SPEAKER_01 26:01

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, that would be tough.

SPEAKER_02 26:03

It would be tough, but we would make it through.

SPEAKER_01 26:05

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 26:06

I was actually reading um in my Bible this morning on First Timothy. Um First Timothy one seven through sixteen, and it's about how God has equipped us to to not have any fear, and uh he has equipped us like that's that's from Satan. Fear and anxiety is from Satan. Yeah, it is, and we have to understand that he has given us uh his the armor because he died on the cross for us, and we have to put that armor on, and we have to make sure that we stand true to him and not let the enemy win, which is fear and anxiety. So, yeah, I was doing the Bible study on that, and I was like, that makes so much sense. I it's it's easier to say here than to live it out because life, life is hard. Life, you know, our our brains, our bodies, uh everything, our flesh is a war zone.

SPEAKER_01 27:04

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 27:05

Am I doing things right? Is he cheating on me? Am I too fat? Am I ugly? Do why don't I look like her? Um, you know, all these things. It's constant. And and they're all they're not from God. No, those are those thoughts are not from God, and we have to remember those are not from God. God would never put those thoughts in our head. It is straight from Satan, and we have to push those things aside and say, No, I know that I am made perfect, I am made in the image of our my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And so yeah, and I'm learning to do that every day because it's still hard, it's a struggle.

SPEAKER_01 27:43

Yeah, it is.

SPEAKER_02 27:44

It's a struggle. Yeah, but it helps having a partner. I I've said this, and you know, and I know there's a lot of people that are listening right now, and you're dealing with being the person, the person that's holding that family together because the person, the other person is maybe half in and half out, one foot in the door and being a Christian and one foot out. Maybe they still have questions. If I can give you any piece of advice, is the number one thing in evangelism is praying. Pray for them, pray for them constantly. There are so many non-believers that I pray for daily. And you guys make a list. I don't know when that became a thing not to make a list about things you need to pray about because how are we supposed to remember all those things?

SPEAKER_01 28:33

Especially with life. Yeah, it's way too busy.

unknown 28:36

I know.

SPEAKER_02 28:37

There's things like people will be like, Can you pray for me? And then I'm in that moment I can't do it because I'm doing something else. But I'll make a note in my phone and later on I'll take the time to pray. So I have a whole list of people who are non-believers in my life that I've been praying for. And I refer to that list. Yeah. Refer to that. So if you have non-believers in your life and you are like, man, I don't know where to start, what to do, pray. Pray is where to start. We're in um seminary and we're learning about evangelism right now, and we're pretty deep in it. And the practice they have with prayer is crazy. It's really showed me how important it is. And I didn't realize that until we started this class.

SPEAKER_01 29:20

Yeah. Well, I mean, that's your direct connection with God. Yeah. You know?

SPEAKER_02 29:25

And get you closer to him. And then he the closer you get to him, he's like, Yeah, I'm gonna fight that battle for you. And then things are gonna start happening, and then you're just gonna notice one day that maybe that person is listening more when you're talking about the Lord. Or maybe that person's like, Hey, can I go to church with you? And things will start to happen. You're gonna be like, What? So if you're doing it alone right now, I just want to tell you, you're actually not alone. You're not alone doing it. God is there with you the whole way, and now you need to treat that him like a teammate and you need to pray and talk to him about it. And within time, I I believe the power of prayer is just so beautiful. And in time, that other person that you are praying for, whether it be your husband or your children, your mom, uh doesn't matter who it is, they will they will be believers one day. They will because God works in mysterious ways, and just remember that sometimes he brings people to him in the valley. In the valley. I've been doing a lot of Bible studies lately, and that is what I keep getting from it is he will put them there, it will be so low in life that they will turn to him, and and and we're gonna say, Oh my gosh, they're going through so much, but we don't understand it. But really, God had a plan the whole time, and that was so they can get him, them closer to him. Yep, test their faith, test your faith, yep. And he's like, just surrender your life to me. I promise you, I can make it better. You know, one thing I do want to touch on because I think it's so important. You guys, the other day I was on somebody's live, and these people are pretty big. And if you know who I'm talking about, I'm not telling you to call out names, okay, in the comments. I'm not doing that. I was on their live, and the reason they had gotten big um in social media is because their their his dad is um early onset dementia or something or full-on dementia, I don't know, but um they take for him, take care of him, they're his caretaker, and so somewhere in the midst of all this, um, everybody fell in love with the dad. Well, now you know it's them mostly because his dad's gotten worse, and so it's the wife and the husband. And I was on their live the other day, I just couldn't believe they were saying that they were married over 20 years, and the way that they were degrading each other was disgusting. It was she was telling people that he had a small penis, she was saying that um, you know, I'm only with him and I've only had a life with him and had kids with him because he pays me and he made good money because I guess he was a retired attorney. And like just saying things, and you could tell it was hurting him so bad, but he wasn't saying anything. Um, he did finally get up and walk away, and then he came back, he grabbed a beer, and I'm thinking to myself, oh yeah, alcohol, I'm sure, is she because I mentioned it to my mom. My mom's like, Oh yeah, she gets drunk a lot, and then she starts being mean to him. And I'm thinking, Oh, that's Satan work right there. It's Satan's work.

SPEAKER_01 32:33

Yeah, well, drinking too much is a sin in itself.

SPEAKER_02 32:35

So yeah, but I've just looked, I just looked and I was just thinking, wow, how it it was just it literally just hurt my heart for both of them because I can't imagine having 1200 people watching me on a live and me degrade you.

SPEAKER_01 32:55

Well, like you said earlier, we're supposed to be a team.

SPEAKER_02 32:57

Yeah, yeah. And I just am like, man, uh the we have to remember when we're out there and we have a lot of people, um, a lot of followers. Why we should be setting an example, setting the bar high, showing people that this right here is possible. Not getting on and and showing people that you should degrade your husband, you should make fun of him and do all oh, it just gave me the ick. It gave me the ick. Like my stomach was just, I was like, I gotta get off this live. But I was commenting positive things thinking maybe they would see it, but I I don't think they saw it because I was just like, hey, you guys shouldn't do that, you know, love one another. And then I'm like, all right, I don't, I don't think, yeah. But yeah, um, just uh if I can give any piece of advice, never if you have something to say about your husband or your wife, do it behind closed doors to each other, yeah, to them, to them, never, and I'm guilty of it. Oh, with my ex-husband, I would say things in front of people, and I'm like you. I look back and I'm like, I should have never done that. That was so degrading. But now that I am older and wiser, I'm like, I could never, could never do that, ever. Like I I couldn't do it. I just have no I not that I have anything because usually if I have something that you're I I come to you and I'm like, hey, that was rude.

SPEAKER_01 34:26

Yeah, quit leaving the toilet seat up.

SPEAKER_02 34:28

We we uh like I'm the first and you are too. Like, we don't sit on things, we talk about things. Like I will be like, no, that really pissed me off.

SPEAKER_01 34:40

Yeah, I'll just get quiet.

SPEAKER_02 34:42

Yeah, but you apologize or we work through it because some of the times it's I'm I'm in I'm in the fault. Like you're like, no, that's actually you're taking that wrong. And I'm like, oh my bad, my be. So yeah, just don't do that, guys. Please don't do that. If you don't do it, so if there's anything that you can take from this podcast today, it is in a marriage, in our marriage, we have never pretended to have it all together, and we've never pretended that it was perfect. Um but one thing is we never gave up on our marriage. We always kept it center and always treated it as priority. Even when the baby had colic, even when you had multiple people die in your family in in a short amount of time, and I lost my grandma, and um, you know, we had to do a short sale on a house, like all of that. We never once looked at our marriage and was like, we can't do this anymore.

SPEAKER_01 35:46

Just a roadblock.

SPEAKER_02 35:47

Yeah, we're like, it's part of our story. So yeah, all right, guys. Uh thanks for being here, and I love you guys. I know I tell you guys that all the time, but I am so thankful. I have so many downloads lately, and I'm just so thankful. So uh I'm gonna take you guys along. If you guys have not been on my social medias, Mrs. Motivated 2025, I started doing my vlogs again on TikTok and they're pretty good.

SPEAKER_00 36:15

Right? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 36:16

All right. I love you guys. Have the best week. And once again, if this helped you in any way, please, please share it with a friend. Don't be a gatekeeper. Bye guys.