Ep. 8 'I Love You, But...What If This Ends?'

In this episode, we sit inside one of the most uncomfortable questions you can ask in a relationship: What if this ends? Not as a threat. Not as a fear spiral. But as a way to tell the truth about what love actually is.

We talk about non-attachment, the myth of “being enough,” and why trying to guarantee a future might quietly ruin the present. We get into the tension between deep connection and individual freedom, the reality of single parenting, and the emotional weight of doing life without a safety net.

This is a conversation about loving fully without holding on.
About staying awake in the middle of it.
And about not throwing away something beautiful just because it didn’t last forever.

You can support the show through our Patreon. Get access to full length video and be part of the community - patreon.com/iloveyoubut

Transcript

unknown 0:00

I love you.

SPEAKER_03 0:01

I love you. Love you. I love you. I love you.

SPEAKER_00 0:05

But hi baby.

SPEAKER_04 0:10

Hi, baby.

SPEAKER_00 0:15

Oh no. Do you have something you want to share with me that's the potential of just ending this?

SPEAKER_03 0:23

Destroying this whole thing. Um, I'll go first. I love you. But what if this ends?

SPEAKER_00 0:37

We'll be right back. Um, do you want to imagine every scenario in which it ends, and then we can answer specifically if it ends in a meteor strike or if it ends in infidelity, and we'll just kind of have that spectrum.

SPEAKER_04 0:51

I love that you said if it ends in fidelity. He was faithful until the meteors.

SPEAKER_00 1:00

Um, have I mean that's obviously something we've both considered. I don't know that, yeah, we haven't talked about uh what is this, like an exit strategy or like how do we maintain our own separate lives? I don't know. I mean it's yeah, I don't know. We'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

SPEAKER_03 1:18

I'm asking because there have been many comments, but specifically one that stood out to me. This woman commented, what if this relationship ends and you just wasted your time? And I have never thought of love as a waste of time. And I've had relationships like most of us, I've had relationships end, and some of them have taken two years, some of them have taken more years, and I've never felt like what do you mean they've taken, like the relationship have lasted for that long?

SPEAKER_00 1:55

Yeah, they've taken two years from your life. Um, you can keep talking. I know I'm seeming like I'm distracted, but I'm with you.

SPEAKER_03 2:05

Yeah, so I feel like that is the fear for most people in relationship that it ends.

SPEAKER_00 2:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 2:15

So I want to address it.

SPEAKER_00 2:17

Um well, I mean, I think that when we've imagined you and I and the relationship that we've established and the dynamic that we have, and we say, okay, like sometimes you'll say, What if this, this being the abundance of our love, what if this lasts for 50 years? And I think it's a beautiful inquiry. And imagining imagining how good this feels right now, what if, what if? And obviously the answer is then we have an amazing life together. Now, I think that taking that and saying, Well, what if this ends? Is is any of that, um, is any of that dynamic still possible outside of a relationship? Do we find ourselves this relationship ending and then we're still remain really good friends, but somehow the love, the romantic love is no longer there, but like we're we're best friends in separate relationships. That's where it gets like crazy for me because I have to really stretch my imagination and say, like, it's so good, but we couldn't find the romantic dynamic.

SPEAKER_03 3:17

Not even that. Like, what if it's so good and our lives do not line up in ways that are required for relationships to continue? Like I want to become a firefighter and no, like if I want to move out of the town that we live in. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think that that's if we or if we our relationship is beautiful, but the merging of families is not seamless. Are you crying?

SPEAKER_00 3:49

No, I'm not crying, but I mean I could get there for sure. Because I mean, I think that that is one that I've pushed really as far back into my mind as possible. Of the fact that I know this isn't this place we live in, isn't the place that you've chosen, and you've ended up here on in due to circumstances out of your control, and you this isn't your dream place. And I mean, for me, it's like it's also where I ended up through my own choice. But you know, it's like we we end up in places regardless of how we've ended up there. And when we're there, we have decisions to make and whether or not it still works. And as we grow and continue to evolve, it may change. And so, yeah, I mean, I think that that's a very real consideration of as we continue to evolve and continue to grow, and our lives continue to shift uh in ways that require us to make different decisions. Yeah, I mean, I can very much see, I mean, ah man, yeah, this definitely could make me cry. Um, what do we do?

SPEAKER_03 4:45

Then we so last night we had a conversation when we were in bed, and I said, if you could know how long this relationship lasts, would you want to know? And you said, No. And I said, Yes, which is like the same kind of question that I asked Noah, which is if you knew how you were going to die, or if you knew when, would you want to know? And he always says no, and I always say yes, like it's information, and what you do with that information is up to you.

SPEAKER_00 5:23

But what does that solve in terms of knowing? Because that then does that then inform which is the only thing we have is this present moment. Is knowing that this relationship lasts for only one more week, what would what's your different well, how are you acting differently? Are you gonna love harder? Are we gonna make insane amounts of love together? Are we going to, or you said you're gonna start preparing yourself for the separation?

SPEAKER_02 5:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:45

And I don't I don't know. I don't know how that I don't understand how that information changes anything because it all is kind of future tripping and saying, anticipating a thing that's not here yet, why would that why should that affect the now?

SPEAKER_03 6:00

I think it's important to acknowledge that we have zero markers and no boxes have been checked that would indicate this is ending.

SPEAKER_02 6:08

Oh no, no, no, I'm not responding to that. I know, I know that.

SPEAKER_03 6:11

I know this is all hypothetical. Like a fun game I play for self-preservation is what if this all ended? And that I think, you know, it would be irresponsible and delusional for both of us to not think that at some point any grown human who's been in relationship and who's watched it end goes into the next relationship knowing that is a possible that's a possibility. Except for this one death meteor fidelity. Yeah, and I think you know, I you want to cry? No, I don't want to cry. Like if this ended now, how fucking great was that you know what I mean? Like, I think that is the part of love that that really fucks all of us up is throwing away all the good because it ended. And so when I say I love you, but what if this ends? I'm holding it up against my experience, which is when it ends, the people that I've loved have set fire to the entire beautiful path that we made together. Yes, there were issues, yes, there were hurdles, yes, there was pain, but also like wasn't that beautiful what we lived. And I feel like I don't I I don't do that in relationship. I don't do that in life. I I feel that I'm grateful for every piece of it.

SPEAKER_02 7:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 7:59

And so I am asking you, yeah, if this ends for any reason, for whatever reason, the many reasons that relationships can end. And so often that's not because of some horrible betrayal. It's because life turns in different directions or because you outgrow each other, which is such a beautiful, painful thing, right? To like want your person and want yourself to grow and also not be able to control the direction that growth is in.

SPEAKER_00 8:30

Yeah, I mean, I think it it kind of to imagine a scenario where it ends in uh because of a logistical factor, which I think would be in my mind the most um most I think possible thing is that it's a yeah, it's a logistical thing, it's not infidelity or anything that one of us did to one another. So to oh man, I don't like this.

SPEAKER_04 9:01

Sorry.

SPEAKER_00 9:05

Yeah, so you you move away. Um and I know I think I think a like an a part that's hard, but also really clean and mature about the way that you've lived the lives you've lived and been in the relationships that you've been in, and reached the level of clarity that you have, is that you have you were in a relationship that was there was an attempt to to to do it long distance, and then you got the the very crystal clear um understanding that that's not something you want to do. And so even within that of saying we love each other and that love hasn't changed, but I or you need to go, I need to explore, I need to do something else. To to voluntarily sever that relationship, I think is really, I think would be very, very hard for me. Now I would have to accept that. And so that would be my own process. And I don't have an answer as to say, like, what would that look like? It would be that I still have to wake up every day and I still have to take care of myself and do all the things that are required in order to like live a life and not fall completely apart because something ended. That's it. I mean, that's all there is. Like, I I that's the answer to the question. It's just you keep going. And I don't know. I mean, I like I know that to your point, it's like there is uh a certain sense of chosen ignorance or naivety around like the way that I've said, oh well, I I could never find this sort of love again, or I, you know, I I couldn't imagine, you know, anything outside of this is limiting and is putting myself in a place of of believing that you putting way too much on you and believing that you are responsible for all these things, things we've covered before. It it's just a hard, it is impossible for me to imagine. And I've I could have traced back my entire life. I could have said it's impossible for you to imagine any insert any scenario in which my life has has turned out. So it's an it's a big, unknowable thing, but it is then just comes back to the moment of like, okay, the next day you've left and we're not in a relationship anymore. I don't know why this makes me cry so much. It's just like waking up and doing the next thing, doing the next thing.

unknown 11:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:33

But I I mean, I appreciate this.

SPEAKER_04 11:37

Like I fucking hate this game.

SPEAKER_00 11:40

No, I mean, it's so incredible to like to to not we've not um we've not denied or ignored anything in this dynamic. Everything has been brought up and felt and discussed. And I mean the amount of times that I've imagined and felt, I mean, even up to and including now, of just like what would that feel like, this heaviness in my chest and all these like ways of really tapping into like what does it feel like? What does loss feel like? I mean, when early on when I thought that you had a you know what terminal like cancer, and and so just I've imagined losing you a lot.

SPEAKER_03 12:23

And I think that when you imagine losing the person that you love, it does one of two things. It either makes you fully dive into this moment where you have them and and live that and extract as much juice from that as you can, or it puts you in such a place of fear that you start to step out so that when the inevitable ending comes, it doesn't hurt as much. Well, that's my mode.

SPEAKER_00 12:51

Yeah, that's what I was gonna say. That's that is um concerning to me because it because I think that that's sort of been your 80%. We've talked about you giving 80% to this. I think that there has been, and it's again something you've been very disclosing about, is that you don't see a future that is really centered around you and I. You see one that is for yourself and for your child, and it's kind of like I'm, you know, maybe I'm not it may not even be third. There might be some other factors in there. And so it's just have I said this? Well, no.

SPEAKER_03 13:25

We've intuited this from what I've said.

SPEAKER_00 13:28

Yes, it's been when we because because I think of the nature of how we became a couple wasn't rooted in like, I need to find a partner, I need to find a husband, I need to like you had all the things, you've had all the things you've been through, and you've gotten to enough clarity uh in in your the potential for yourself, like that, that you are this sort of autonomous existence, and then who whatever comes in is is however it fits, but it doesn't really re-root or or have any real factor. And I think that's been the hard part for me because I'm like, then it challenges my own sense of like, well, I thought I'm enough to and ago, no, no, no, that's no, that's not it. That's that's possessive. And even in early on, very early on, you were like saying you were already talking about this of like, I don't know that I'll be here for you know, plus or past five years once snow has grown, and I might be gone. And so like that was already triggering such sense of like of of a finiteness to this. And so, yeah, I mean, we've kind of been we've been living in this, it hasn't come up in a while. Um and it sucks.

SPEAKER_03 14:36

Yeah, I don't know that it does suck though. I think that it No, it sucks. I think that because my life, the way that it it has unfolded, where I was married when I was 19 years old.

SPEAKER_00 14:57

Whose fault was that?

SPEAKER_03 14:59

Jesus, mostly. Um I was married, I was married young, and that experience, like I just I have a very you know, and then of course like I got divorced when I was 21 or 22, and then Met Noah's father married him when I was 25, 26. Like I very much have a track record of going in the direction, turning my life in the direction of a partner, and it has left such a bad taste in my mouth. I I just can't imagine that I would ever choose that again for myself. And you've never asked me to, and you've never in any way put me in a position where it's like your path or mine, and yeah, I mean, the hesitation that I have is just because, like most people, I don't want to repeat the past. And I do believe that there is such a value, especially for women, because our roles in this life are so attached to other people. I am a wife, I am a mother, I am a daughter, I am a friend, I am a witch. But you know what I mean? It's like our identity is so tethered to someone else, and I'll always have that. Yeah, I'm always going to be my kid's mom forever and ever and ever. So I feel like there's this resistance in me to add another role to that list. It's why I'm hesitating about marriage. It's why I it's why I do what I do and show up this way.

SPEAKER_00 16:42

And I mean, I see the value in not imposing or or asking anything of you beyond can you just be with uh can you just be with me in this moment? And where I would move towards wanting to marry you or do any of these things is is that uh guaranteeing or securing some sort of future with you. And I've seen how that doesn't, that is first of all, isn't something that you're interested in and also doesn't guarantee no, not in the slightest. And so this conversation requires us to imagine everything. And I think that that's an uncomfortable place for anyone to really consider because it when you imagine everything, it not only imagines the good, but it imagines the things that are counter to what you are kind of holding on to. And I think that this allows us to practice non-attachment and allows us to really just, I don't know, like without having to make any decisions. Like this isn't always things, whenever this kind of uh conversation comes up, it's it's needing to remind each other, like we're not making decisions right now, right? We're just considering, and I think that that you gave me that book early on, the um the uh uh Lindbergh, um what's her name? I'm sorry, I know uh Anne Mara Lindbergh. Ann Marlowe Lindbergh.

SPEAKER_03 18:01

And it is it's called Gifts from the Sea.

SPEAKER_00 18:03

Yeah, it's beautiful, and it is that I think where she doesn't so much discuss the kind of the masculine perspective or side of it, but I do see it as the more that I can allow for you to have this space, and even if it if it's remains in this kind of just an ethereal imagination space of like, I want you to consider every possibility. And my I think role as a partner in this is to be as supportive in that, and and I'm just you know, as I do, imagining it as just this strong, consistent, predictable place that allows for you to have this very kind of material, like just liquidy space of of exploration, and and I can't hold on to that. You can't I can't grab that. And so it is the greatest exercise in non-attachment to enter into a relationship and just take it for what get get from it what you have in the moment. And there's nothing, there's no guarantee. I mean, even just like taking out this relationship and and just putting life into it and saying, what if this ends? Well, guess what? It does. Yeah, it's gonna have end, it's gonna end one way or the other. And with all that being said, I it will continue to pull at parts of me that feel less so as they did early on, but that feeling of like, I do want to be enough for you. Like, I the idea that you would would move on to a different phase in your life and say, man, Darren was great, but this thing that I need to move towards is bigger and more substantial, and I'll miss him, and not like, man, I want to do whatever I can to make it so that Darren remains in my life to this degree. That like that's that's a that really is a tough one because I'd like to say, and this may not be true, but like I would want to consider any way that would allow for you to stay in my life, however that looks.

SPEAKER_03 20:13

I want to tell you that you will never be enough for me. And I will never be enough for you. We have all been raised on this narrative. One person is going to come into your life. And they're going to be everything that you need. They're going to be your savior and your best friend and your collaborator and your par your co-parent and your lover and your all of these roles that we as human beings need, that that's gonna come from one other person. Like you will never be able to fulfill the creative hunger that I have within myself. And same. I don't believe that one person will ever be enough for another, and I don't think it's supposed to be that way. And I think that we set ourselves up for such a heartbreak when we start the expectation with that narrative. I want to be enough for you so that you fill in the blank. Like I have done that in relationship where if I just love them enough and if I'm enough and if I'm good enough, which is such a bizarre statement. But if I am enough, then they will love me, stay, be faithful, be kind, right? Like that's just never how it's ever worked. Um I put this on social media the other day, but there's a quote by Kurt Vonnegut that I I love so much. And he wrote that whenever a couple has an argument about money or power or sex or how to raise the children or whatever, what they're really saying to one another is you are not enough people. And I love that because it alleviates the weight and the expectation that we put on one another. And I know that that's not exactly what you're saying. You're not saying that you want to be the only source of happiness and fulfillment in my life. But aren't you saying that?

SPEAKER_00 22:45

No, I'm saying I just keep imagining the life that you are seeking. We're I know we're kind of just theorizing or hypothesizing right now as what this imagined future is gonna come where you say I need to go to this place in order to seek this thing. I guess it's a I wonder yeah, I'm not I'm making myself so important in this in this scenario because it's like I just think of the day that you move to this place and you wake up day one and I'm not there, and it's like the thing that you went to is like so incredible, incredible that you can accept the fact that you needed to sacrifice this relationship in order to leave to get to this thing. And I guess that's where it comes to me having to be like, oh my god, Jess is living in Morocco, writing every day, drinking tea, and and that's what she needed. And it doesn't it, I it it's something I can't be there with. And so it's having that very much that sort of unconditional love of like, if that's what you want, it's it's it is the this this relationship is the is the greatest boot camp test in unconditional love. Because if that unconditional love means that we're not together, then it truly is the most unconditional love. And so I just I don't know, like I I can, I'm so fulfilled in my own kind of self and the ways that I can sort of carry out my practices and my my the things that I do that bring me fulfillment, and you're a huge aspect of all of that. And so I couldn't imagine, like, I gotta go do this thing, and that means we can't be together. And I know that that's just different because you said, like I said at the beginning of this, you said you don't know that you don't know what this your time in this place is. So I mean, like none of us know, more specifically where we live currently, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 24:53

And I feel like, you know, when just just that example that you just described of me being in this foreign place by myself, waking up, like, yeah, that is something you can't give me, which is me being confronted with me with no distraction, no nothing to pull me out of that moment of of self-confrontation. Like well, the reason we're talking about travel, I think, is because it's been such a part of my life um forever. I as as young as I can remember, I have always wanted to leave where I am.

SPEAKER_00 25:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 25:29

And you know, some therapists would look at that and say, What are you running away from? But it's like there's something that happens when you strip familiarity away from you in terms of culture and language and relationship, and you're so confronted with your own discomfort of self. And I love that.

SPEAKER_00 25:52

Yeah, no, no, I'm not denying that that is an incredibly um um fulfilling and necessary part of development. I just wonder, like, can I come too? Yeah, yeah. I think that that's like what what I'm imagining here is that something's coming up where you're just like that. You could I I'm I'm only imagining this through the idea that I would be so unimportant that it would just be like a not even a consideration. You're like, I'm doing this big thing, it's been great, I'll see you later. Yeah, like yeah.

SPEAKER_03 26:28

Well, two things one, I feel so unimportant is a running dialogue in your head. Is that would you say that's correct? That's like a deep-seated belief that comes from childhood and then continues to be a front.

SPEAKER_00 26:48

Well, it's it's rooted in codependency because the idea that like someone can say at any given time, this is a thing that I need, um, and I still love you, that we I think we I experienced this with you in a smaller, more manageable degree is like we spend a lot of time together, and there are still things that I like to do that require me to be on my own, or at least, you know, have some time put towards it. And I still struggle with that advocating for myself in that time. And because uh because I know how much you love spending time with me and how much you like it, just it's a it still requires some effort on my end to say I'm going to go do this thing now because it's the right thing for me, and I still love you, or these things that don't even really require me to state because they're implicit, but you that's what I'm imagining the scenario is like the greatest exercise in just saying, I'm gonna do the thing that I I want to do. And and I think I've perceived that in the past or in my childhood as selfish, or that how dare you, or like, oh, well, now you've hurt another person by doing these things. And so it really does come back to that kind of codependency where the other day we were at the at the um at a pool, and I had to go. I had to go go do some things. I or as there's something I wanted to do, and then there was a thing I had to do, which is go get my child. And I sat there next to you, and like I said, hey, I need to leave. And you I'm gonna say you didn't allow me to leave.

SPEAKER_04 28:23

It's gonna be taken out of content.

SPEAKER_00 28:25

Well, it's just grabbed my handcuffs. It feels like the confidence or the the the boldness that is leaving you in a place that I know you like being with me so much that it really does pull at my feeling of that, of that exact thing of like, oh my god, I'm so wanted in this, I'm so desired.

SPEAKER_04 28:48

That sounds so crazy. It is crazy. No, no.

SPEAKER_00 28:52

Which part?

SPEAKER_04 28:54

You didn't let me leave.

SPEAKER_03 28:55

Like, I'm just imagining the visual that comes up. No, I know. I okay, so I think that it's hysterical that we're talking about this like hypothetical situation where I leave you and go to another life in another country and live out that experience when literally every single day that we're together, I'm like, why do you have to go? Don't go, stay here.

SPEAKER_01 29:16

I know.

SPEAKER_03 29:17

You just just don't get out of bed. And of course, like it's you know, I'm 90% joking. I know you're gonna go. I know that these are things that are beautiful and that you that you need to tend to. And also, I miss you. I love being with you. Then why are you going to Morocco? To drink tea. It's waiting for me. But it's that, it's like both of those truths can exist. I love you. I love I love sharing a life with you. Don't fucking cry. I love sharing a life with you, and I think that this is not really something that I've experienced. That might be the end of the sentence.

SPEAKER_00 30:04

Yeah, and I think that that is often I I don't really consider the meanness and the like I see you as this person who does live this kind of you don't do what you want to, you know, you know, you never do anything that you don't want to do, and you move always move towards the thing that you want, and you have a lot of clarity. And so when I do have to consider, like she oh my god.

SPEAKER_04 30:30

I can't wait for all the clips that are just gonna be you crying this time, not me.

SPEAKER_00 30:36

That's that you love me, like it really is obviously an indication of my own level of of self-worth or lack thereof, of like yeah.

SPEAKER_03 30:51

I mean, it's so wild to experience this relationship. Like we do everything together, and I have hated that in other couples. Like, you know, when you see a couple and they're never without their person, you're like, what's wrong with them? I don't understand this level of codependence. But I it never occurred to me that, oh, then maybe they just like each other, yeah. Maybe they're just having a really good time, and so they would rather go to the car dealership to get their oil changed, or go to run errands, or go to the doctor, or go do all of these things together because that's better than doing them separately, they enjoy it more, and we are doing life together, like in such a beautifully mundane way, and that is its own adventure, that's its own exciting thing because it's completely new for me. I mean, I had the experiences that I had in marriage, which even in my marriage was not this, right? Like it wasn't this much togetherness and this much cohesion and shared reality, it was always some form of separation. It was always somebody leaving, not me, and me just kind of like waiting for the time that that that they would tap back into the relationship. And that's not a relationship. Yeah, I don't know, you know, I want to be generous and I want to be compassionate and say, well, maybe that works for some people. Yeah, some people who don't want a real relationship. Yeah. Because a real relationship is when you are sitting in like the thick of life with me, where we are having, you know, talks and conversations about our children and how to raise them and planning like just all of this like minutia that life is so often filled with. I mean, baby, how many teams how many times have you driven me to court? Like I had to go pay parking or not parking, stop sign tickets, bank robberies, all of the crimes that I've been committing. And I you have taken me there and you're so present and you're so not like bored or inconvenienced, or to me, that is love. That is a love language in itself. Will you do the boring part of life with me? Because if you can't do that, if you can't just sit in that together, that relationship has no hope.

SPEAKER_00 33:19

Yeah. I mean, our problem is that in which we have to find a way to separate from each other. And you know, we've both of our levels of productivity have dramatically decreased.

SPEAKER_03 33:32

But it's crazy. Like we were away from each other for I don't know, a week in in February.

SPEAKER_00 33:38

Jess wrote a book and I I wrote an entire book of poetry. I painted an entire art show.

SPEAKER_03 33:42

It was like five days, and there was so much productivity. And I remember saying that to you when we first got together because I could see, like, oh god, this is doomed all the time, each other. Yeah, we're doomed because unless we figure out a way to be in our lives and also in this relationship, this will never work. And so, what we've done is really, I think, fully enter the other person's world.

SPEAKER_02 34:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 34:08

And you know, I keep saying we need to find a way to work together, like do our separate work side by side.

SPEAKER_00 34:15

Yeah, and we have like it's like it could be a partition between us to keep us from touching each other. Well, the thing that that is challenging, and you s and you spoke to it the 90% of joking, the 10% still is very, it's very real. It's very, I believe the 10% of don't go. And then I'll and I will if you told this is gonna sound really bad for me, but if you said, Darren, I want you to sit, can you just sit in this chair for eight hours today? Cause I don't, because I feel uncomfortable. I I would, and I know that that's really bad.

SPEAKER_03 34:54

Baby, I have asked you to sit in many chairs for many hours, and why is that bad? I think it's only bad if it well, honestly, then it's on me. Um, the bad part is on me because I think I think that my obligation to you as your partner is to make sure that you are feeding yourself. That's our responsibility toward to one another. And I think of course it's like flattering to know that someone loves you so much they want you there forever.

SPEAKER_02 35:29

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 35:30

And also go do the things that you need to do in this life that make you happy, that make you feel full because I can't give you what you get from those things.

SPEAKER_00 35:42

Yeah, yeah. And it's still like and stay in that chamber. I mean, like we, you know, we joke about the like the yesterday. I was like, do you should I, you know, do I need to just start waking up two hours earlier and wake up at two o'clock in the morning to get and you're like, yeah, get all your stuff done and then come back into bed. Like yeah, yeah. I mean, honestly, it to me it's it's such a beautiful problem to have because it allows for us to there doesn't feel like that's it's not like uh actually um it's just it's cute to me. Yeah and it but uh but I do I have noticed in in times where I'm not actually communicating like what I need, and and I don't I don't think it's um just in you know if it's if it's um not going to run errands with you.

SPEAKER_03 36:34

Okay, so yesterday's a great example. We went we volunteer at the Turtle Conservancy every week religiously. We've never missed once, we're always on time, and we spent the morning together, and then I had a three and a half hour window, and I needed a I had to do a bunch of errands in another town, so I was like, Oh, I want you to come with me, and really I just wanted Boba. That's the truth of the matter, but I wanted I didn't want to separate from you just yet because we'd had such a sweet morning together, and I could see like you have also your own mental list of errands that you need to do that don't align with mine, and so what happened?

SPEAKER_00 37:12

We separated.

unknown 37:14

Oh god.

SPEAKER_03 37:16

No, I said, baby, do you? And I think I think sometimes I do this because I feel I feel in you when you're not saying the thing.

SPEAKER_00 37:23

Yep, yep.

SPEAKER_03 37:24

And I don't think that I have any problem asking for what I want or what I need or or just kind of dictating.

SPEAKER_00 37:30

Um but I was gonna say, you it's I don't believe that it's your obligation to smell it on me that I'm not expressing myself.

SPEAKER_03 37:38

It's not, and this is baby, we're still very early in our life together. And so it's not about me doing it for you, it's me modeling for you that it's fine.

SPEAKER_02 37:49

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 37:50

And this is not going to be a thing that I hold over your head. And remember that time I needed you and you didn't show up for me? Like that's crazy. You've already built up so much reliability credit that you could tap out for a few weeks and still be totally fine, you know?

SPEAKER_00 38:06

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I do think that it we get to have these, these very um safe environments to to let our insecurities or our habits and these things that we hope to, you know. I know you say the last time I talked about it having these like kind of bad habits or or putting any sort of bad connotation on it. But I do know, I do recognize that in myself when there's an opportunity to advocate for myself. And this goes beyond our romantic relationship. It's me in life, it's the waiter bringing the wrong food and saying, not saying something like it's it's a big, bigger thing. And so to have a safe environment and the like still the still the love in that where you're like, yeah, it's okay, and I do want to spend all day with you. Like to for those two truths to live together is beautiful, like it's it's really, really incredible. And so I'm grateful for the fact that you in the short amount of time we've been together, my you know, the ways that I operate are very clear to you already. I don't think that there's you you see my behaviors, and you also, like we've always say, you know my heart in all of it. And so the the environment in which we can support each other is by knowing, oh, Darren kind of does this and Jess kind of does this.

SPEAKER_03 39:22

Yeah, and I think that's just a matter of observing one another, like without the sheen. Like, yes, there is for sure the beautiful filter, and I don't know, I don't know that that goes away or how much that goes away. But I think that we've been observing each other with pretty specific clarity and intention. And it's not just one way, like you, you fully I mean, we're I just feel like we're so good about stopping the moment and saying, what do you need right now? And not just what do you need that I can do for you, but what do you need? What are your needs? And I I do that with my child, I do that with myself, but like to do it in partnership for one another, you know, yesterday is in yesterday morning is another moment of just like seeing you in an emotion that could very easily become a loop, like a mental loop. And I know you have the ability to stop yourself before it gets to that point, but just stepping up as a partner and say, like I know that when I'm emotionally challenged or if I'm stressed, the last thing I want to do is eat. It's not it, I could have food coming to me to the table, and just suddenly my appetite is gone. And so just that knowing how you operate and knowing how your mind works, and also knowing your needs, because I've watched you meet your own needs for the last number of months, stepping up, making sure that you have food and also support while you're going through your own process. It's so easy for us. And I don't know that it always will be, but fuck, these are like very solid foundations we're laying for this life.

SPEAKER_00 41:09

It's just, it feels like it's the I always say the kind of equanimity that the levels that we're operating on this, even just that moment where you're saying, like, I'm kind of in this independent, independent of you loop that I'm in mentally, and you're just right alongside me. It's like, I don't know, I just running like we're we're going the same speed, and you just pass something over to me, and it's it becomes this very supportive thing. What is that? Whose child is that screaming right now?

SPEAKER_03 41:38

Um, they're not screaming, they're just acknowledging me.

SPEAKER_00 41:43

Um, yeah, it just it does feel like the and then the morning before yesterday, I guess. Yeah, I've been in kind of a very deeply emotional place in the past few days. I was here and I I got into the bathroom and I closed the bathroom door and I just started sobbing. And I got to the shower and sobbed in the shower and they came out and was like full sob, like snotty. And I was, I don't know, I felt like, and I guess this is where we're still learning each other, and maybe haven't had enough of these to really trust it, or or it was very much like I don't want to burden you, or I don't want to put this on you because it was me. It was a it was something that I was dealing with personally, and and then even within that, now I'm feeling like sadness for the fact that a child my child self was ever in a place where I'm like, I don't want to burden somebody with my emotions. So now I'm like doubling down on on the crying and I'm crying about that. And I can I tried to like kind of just enough get myself together. And I came out to the living room and you were on the couch and you said, Are you getting sick? And I was like, No, I was just sobbing. And you're like, come here, and and that, even just that, it's like the feeling of come here, not well, what's wrong? Or like the in a like you're not activated by my emotions.

SPEAKER_03 43:06

I also don't ever take them personally because I know that 99.9% of the time it's not something I did, right? And it's not something that I caused. I feel like in partnership, it's so um in an unstable, lacking foundation partnership where you don't feel as safe, it's very easy for one partner to be in tears and the other to think it's about something they did or some way they failed, and then they're in their own internal loop. So rather than reaching out for connection, it's defense. Yeah. Oh fuck, now what? Now what is this person upset about? How did I fail you today?

SPEAKER_00 43:44

This is gonna require something of me now that I yeah, yeah. And I think that that neutral place that we both kind of meet each other in is is beautiful. And so yeah, I mean, I was held by you literally and emotionally, and and just allowing for me to. Continue to process what I'm feeling verbally and work it through and just yeah, it's just us just talking about how great our relationship is.

SPEAKER_03 44:08

But also how great our relationship is. And we just described three days in a row where one or both of us were crying. Yeah, for sure. Yes. So it's that like what does great look like? Great doesn't look like the absence of struggle or the absence of grief or the absence of of disconnection or not having your needs met. It just means you're being present, you're allowing these things to come up for each other and for yourself.

SPEAKER_00 44:35

Well, I think we the the the way that we stepped into each other's lives at a time where it's not like, you know, we're not in our 20s where it's just like whatever, we'll do whatever. It's it's like life is kind of happening. It's it's we're in situations that are very mature, very grown, being in the the line of like the ways that we provide for ourselves are very much on us, and then that we have children that we provide for that's very much on us without without kind of direct support. And so to kind of meet each other in these very relatable aspects of our of our own individual lives. Like I said to you the other day, it just feels like it feels amazing to be in a partnership with someone where so many we relate on so many aspects of of life. And so that's ways so we can support each other.

SPEAKER_03 45:21

And so what I was experiencing yesterday is a little bit specific without getting into it.

SPEAKER_00 45:28

Yeah, yeah. I mean, my my child had a birthday, and that alone is enough to just realize like how much time has passed and like wonder as a father like, am I doing enough? Am I doing the right thing? Just all these ways that you know, I think are healthy to question and and bring up in a way that feel um worth exploring in order to check in and not just be this kind of checked-out parent and and assume that everything's good. I mean, the fact that I think it brings up sadness or tears or or this sort of thing is is enough that you're paying attention and that you're being affected by the fact that there is a very substantial thing happening outside of you that you're responsible for and just the heaviness of all of that. It's like, I don't know. I mean, if being a parent doesn't move you to tears regularly, I don't know how tuned in you are to it.

SPEAKER_03 46:18

It's yeah, and I what came up, the conversation that came out of that, is single parenting is not for the weak. It is something that will fundamentally change you as a human. I mean, you're holding so much and there's no one else to carry that with you. And that's not even to say like there's no one else to carry it with you, it being the difficult things, but single parenting is there's nobody in the room with you to celebrate milestones.

SPEAKER_00 46:54

Yeah, there's no, I mean, we as the child being the independent factor in this, and then two people on either side of it. So, so in the fact that you and I have no one to share it with, the other people that we have that child with also have no one to share it with. And so it's this weird group of people who are isolated around a singular thing that yeah, yeah. And so that is enough again to to just bring up feelings of like wanting things or wishing things to be different, and then that's already just an act in futility, and and and then just requiring to like what you were very helpful with is they're just a reminder of like what's true here is that these you can get real spiritual, but the kind of the the the people, the child in this having their this is the experience they chose in ways that you know are are helpful and still also are just like heavy because you're wanting only the best for your child, and you don't want them to ever suffer. And and then, you know, that disregards the fact that these are substantial things that have allowed us to be who we are through the things we've experienced and things, but to be responsible for that, to like to have the awareness of like any time where I go, uh, that's a thing I did, and my kid is gonna have some something out of that, and I don't know, but then again, I just that's prescribing it as good or bad, anyways.

SPEAKER_03 48:15

And also, I think this is something that's taken me a long time to learn. Just because I'm suffering over something does not mean my child is feeling any pain around it because we're both having a different experience.

SPEAKER_02 48:28

Right.

SPEAKER_03 48:29

I think one of the hardest parts of single parenthood that came up in the morning that you're talking about is that in and maybe I'm maybe I am glamorizing or glorifying a nuclear family where there's no divorce, there's no shared custody, there's no separation. But I imagine that when you have the front row seat to the other person's experience of parenthood, you can offer feedback in real time. You know how you're doing as a parent, because one you feel it, but also you have somebody reflecting back to you and and giving you moments of praise or moments of of critique or you're getting something back. But in single parenting, it's you and it's your child. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 49:17

And you're in kind of your own echo chamber of your mind and saying, kind of, you know, flogging yourself instead of uh hardly ever praising yourself.

SPEAKER_03 49:25

Yeah, and I feel like that's the that for me, like that's one of the pieces of, but also I as I'm saying this out loud, I'm immediately realizing that even when I was in partnership, I never had that feeling.

SPEAKER_00 49:36

No, I know I it is a it is a an a a huge glamorization of a nuclear family because that presumes that there's a healthy enough dynamic and awareness between the two people, where I think more often than not, just that triangulation of those people causes a whole new dynamic where you're just now seeing your partner through your own insecurities and judgments, and oh, I would have done it this way. And you know, it's no, it doesn't work. It's not, it's all fucked. I mean, really.

SPEAKER_04 50:00

It's like wait, wait, wait, wait, that's not what we want to go.

SPEAKER_03 50:05

But I will say, like, you know, I yeah, it's there's something that's so beautiful about watching you be a father, and I'm not trying to make you cry this morning. I really am not trying to, but you know, oh man, if you're listening and you are with a partner and you don't have children yet, and that's an experience you want to have, I highly recommend it because you get to see your person in a such a different form. Like without sharing the intimacies of your relationship with your child, there's such a softness between you and Daily, and there's such a imaginative, playful. I mean, you have to go above and beyond in terms of like imagination to to create the um entertainment that you do for Daily. Like, I'll come over, there's hot glue guns, there's wood, there's your child was running around with an axe the other day. So it's like, yeah, what standard are we holding ourselves to? Because I think if any of us look at our parents or grandparents, immediately we're succeeding in levels that they couldn't even imagine. But witnessing you as my partner is very different. Like you are, you are you are showing up in partnership in a beautiful form of masculinity that in fatherhood it's very different, and it's still very masculine, it's still very much protector, provider, but it's it's different. And also watching you as a father has given me a front row seat to your own internal struggle. Yeah, and I'm sorry if you don't agree with this, you're a liar. You're not being honest with yourself, but having a child is the most uncomfortable confrontation with all of the growth you still have left to do. Every single day of motherhood, I show up, give everything, do my absolute best. Why are we both gonna be sitting here crying? And then at the end of the day, I think, huh, I could have done this differently.

SPEAKER_00 52:18

And we're the only ones keeping that score. I mean, I don't think that our kids have a scoreboard where they're adding that up. I mean, they're so in their own experience. And I mean, the, like you said, the the I thought of having 40 plus years of context for existence versus this, you know, eight years or 13 years that we of course then will see. Well, I could have done this better, where our kids aren't holding, don't have that really that spectrum, or they do, and they're very clear about it. And then I'm also like, you don't know anything. Yeah, it's it is very, very confrontation confront confronting, and the the level of of grace that's required for ourselves. And again, as single parents, grace being an internal thing because it's not going to be offered, or it's unlikely that it'll be offered externally, and the level of forgiveness and just how much we do our best. And I know that that was something that was always so hard for me with my father, who I felt had many, many shortcomings, and who fell very short of being what I now attempt to be as a father, as present as possible, and as loving and and forgiving and accepting and supportive, is that yeah, that concept of we're all doing our best with what we have is applicable in parenting and in relationships and everything. It's just this human experience is so much. And I heard a quote that I think of frequently is stay awake during the surgery. And I think that that uh surgery is the precision of incision excavation that is just being alive and as aware as you can stay, and finding these ways of being supportive to each other in that and reminding, I mean, just that way that you're not my co-parent, but you offer a co-parent or a parental input or insight, and having a few years of experience ahead of me has been so incredible. And to do that, you do that with such grace. You do that with such grace because you have seen me as a parent at my absolute limit and at my absolute most activated and most absolute triggered. And there's still such a loving touch to hey, you know, that softness, and it brings me back, it pulls me back out, it pulls me out of that activated state, and I can carry that with me even when you're not there, and that reminder. So that's something I think in the dynamic that we have as people with children coming together, that's a beautiful aspect because we're bringing our own experience into it and sharing without that, like I said, that that nuclear family where there's that kind of now new third dynamic, that is the two of us were resentful, and I don't feel like I ever get enough time for myself, and blah blah blah, you know, the story that comes out with that.

SPEAKER_03 55:26

And also I think um there's such a resounding repetitive message in all of the feedback that I give you and also myself, and also my child, and also my students and everyone, which is that you're not failing. And I think that we have so such a lack of generosity and grace with ourselves that if you have one bad day, or if you have you know one difficult experience, we we like whip ourselves. And I think that's the most important thing is like you're not failing, you're just learning how to do this. And yeah, I think that's something that I as a parent and a woman and a partner have needed the reminder again and again. But when you said um stay awake through the surgery, there are a hundred ways to go back to sleep in this life, and that might look like alcohol, that might look like drugs, that might look like getting into relationships that allow you to press snooze and go right back to not knowing who you are or what this is or where you come from. This relationship is not that. And I think if anything, this entire first season of this podcast has been a reminder that I will not let you sleep through the surgery. That is this relationship, that is life. Like these conversations are meant to do exactly that, which is confront you and and each other and your own sore spots and your own points of growth. That's why we keep doing this.

SPEAKER_00 57:12

You know what smell insults, you know, is like when someone passes out and you put that under their nose. I feel like that's a just constantly Yeah, because I think the the especially in the length of a relationship and the kind of the once the whatever these kind of idea of the chemicals, yeah, the fading and then just locking into consistency isn't something that uh either of us are interested in. And so it's a it's a it's a smell and salts.

SPEAKER_03 57:41

And it feels it feels good. There's not been one conversation that we've had that's been uncomfortable where I don't feel better afterwards.

SPEAKER_00 57:50

Absolutely, or that it remains that there's a residue, yeah, exactly. That residue of just that that reverberation of it internally. And it and yeah, I mean, we had a moment yesterday where I was about to do host uh this thing that I host online and and just was tired.

SPEAKER_03 58:08

It was on a thing that he hosts online, ladies and games. This is a beautiful idea that you decided to launch. It's called Adult Show and Tell, and he's doing it monthly. I assume that you'll keep it going. And every month it grows and it grows and it grows. And it's such a beautiful idea for people to come and share space and to offer to a group who's giving them attention and time to just offer them their gift or this thing that they made or how they're spending their time or something that they learned. It is such a beautiful and and collaborative and and encouraging space that you've created. So that is the thing that he was doing.

SPEAKER_00 58:51

Who was this attitude yesterday?

SPEAKER_03 58:53

So I signed up because I'm dealing with my own, I'm confronting my own demons of showing up in the world and sharing my words and not feeling so silenced all of the time. And so I signed up. And yesterday, after juggling a hundred different things in the air, I got home and I laid down and I was like, oh my God.

SPEAKER_00 59:10

And I called you and I said, What time does this thing start?

SPEAKER_03 59:13

Hey, baby, what time does this thing start?

SPEAKER_00 59:16

You know, on the lead up to these, I have, you know, I have like a just a little bit of like, okay, nervousness. I'm about to host something and I don't know how it's gonna go. And so the kind of unknown factor of it. And I think that we have a good way of like of doing when we do we joke a lot, but obviously we've talked about like there's always truth in a joke. There's some percentage of it is like uh meaningful, and so you know, I was just like, oh, well, you know, in in that kind of frustrated um mode or mood, but not really, because I know your heart and this is the thing. And so I'm just like, oh, thing? What do you mean thing? You know, and it turns into a you're like like a bit- You know what?

SPEAKER_04 59:53

Don't worry about it.

SPEAKER_00 59:53

Yeah, I said just show up whenever you can. We'll start whenever you're ready, you know. And it this passive aggressive, but it's to me, it's like I know you're not really saying what time does this. What time do I have to be with this obligation that I and I also know that there was a there's some trepidation, like you just acknowledged is that you're putting yourself out there in a place that's like even signing up was like I knew that that meant something. I knew that that was like something that you was pulling you out of your comfort zone to a certain degree. And so, like, I'm considering that all all of it as one. And then later on, you asked me, like, do you think that that could have been could have that turned into a fight? And it hadn't even crossed my mind. I go, no, because it wasn't even real, and then it ended with like laughter and I'll I love you, I'll see you in a bit.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:39

Like, I just think that that's you said, Do you have the Zoom link? I was like, I don't know. I signed up and looked and I never looked back.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:47

Yeah, I don't know. I just I that was m meaningful to me because of acknowledging where I think maybe you have been and I've been before of of the potential for that to have turned into something. And now I'm lingering on the thought of like she was so disregarding, and none of none of that stayed, none of that remained.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:08

I have been in relationships where I have stepped on landmines that I did not have any clue were there.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:15

Well, what's the point of a landmine? You're not supposed to landmines ahead.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:20

There should be signs, but I I was just shut.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:28

I do science, I do war. Um, I've been in relationships where I've said something offhand and something light, and then the the oh god, it makes me nauseous to think of those moments where I am now it's feeding all of my I'm in trouble, I did something wrong, I said something wrong, I shouldn't have.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:49

Because of the person's reaction, because of their reaction, because of their inability to not take something personally or to know your heart and all of this.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:59

I mean, you didn't say at all yesterday that you were feeling nervous, but I know you enough to know the last three times, like there's nerves that it's yeah, it's not a big deal. And it's not just adult show and tell. It's like everything that you do, it looks so easy from where I'm sitting because you make it look so easy and you make it look so light and so low stakes and so fun, but also everything is always putting myself into a place of vulnerability.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:26

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:27

And I know what that feels like, and I can relate to that, and I know that sometimes that puts you in kind of like a little prickly state, not you, but like you as an all of us. It makes you just a little bit more sensitive, so that when I say it's a good thing.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:40

Yeah, you're a little flippant, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:43

That it can that it could have been given like why aren't you taking this as serious?

SPEAKER_00 1:02:48

Why aren't you as yeah? And I know that that's not a fair place to put you in. And so again, and you're yeah, I don't know, man. It's it can always so easily turn into just me really just praising the dynamic of this relationship, um, which I know people love to hear.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:03

Honestly, they should, because we've been through some shit. I feel like it people would have a lot more tolerance for our joy if they knew if you could just peek inside of each of our past.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:18

Like well, I also feel like isn't I mean who hasn't who's not been through love unscathed?

SPEAKER_03 1:03:24

Some people, yeah, because they're some people are the scathers, right? Uh yeah, is it's this relationship is beautiful. I don't give a can I uh people think about it.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:36

Can we talk a little bit about the um I mean, yeah, we're an hour past. Are you good? Are you out of time?

SPEAKER_03 1:03:44

Actually, um Do you have to go?

SPEAKER_00 1:03:46

It's uh 1015.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:48

Okay, we can do 15 more minutes. Okay, perfect. Sorry, we had to do a quick check and we're juggling some things this morning.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:54

Um the the how do I say these?

SPEAKER_03 1:03:57

The way that our relationship is different on top of the many ways you've already heard in the last six, seven episodes, is that we have kind of like an unspoken. I think it was unspoken. We kind of have like this um how we show up in relationship. They're not rules per se, but they're things that we brought into our life. Do you want to go?

SPEAKER_00 1:04:23

Well, I want to say we, it was you, and I all of them? I I think so, yeah. So when we met early on, Jess stated, and and it's again, it never it never has never felt like um this is a requirement. This is something that it was more, this is something that I do, I do. And to me, it wasn't anything I've experienced, so it was um sharing location on the phone.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:47

Yeah. We can go through them one by one. Okay. So I share my location with both of my parents, with my siblings, with my cousins, with my closest friends, and with my child, and now with you. And for me, like again, like technology has infiltrated the relationship, whether we like it or not. And I've never had this technology available in relationship or yeah, I mean, not really. So the idea of sharing location, that is something that to me, um, I mean, I well, like let's just look at it, let's zoom out. When I look at my friends' locations or my cousins or my family, it's like I just like to know that they're okay. And I look at it whenever I'm thinking of them or like whenever I'm wondering where they are, if they're traveling. And it's so just like a little tap in. Um I didn't have this available in my last relationship. I think until toward the end, I realized it was a thing. And I remember asking, like, should we share locations with each other? And he said, No. And this is in a long distance relationship. And of course, like, the I'm not gonna put any meeting. On that, but he was adamant that that was a no, and now I know why, but then I just felt like okay, everyone has like a different approach or a different comfort level, whatever. Um, so when this relationship started, I mentioned it to you. I was traveling from where we are now to San Diego with a friend, and I forget how it came up. I texted you.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:27

I think it was just it was app didn't seem apropos of anything. It was just this is something that I like to do in relationship. And this is when we're still like very it wasn't well, we're not in a relationship, and so I'm so like I'm already to like what out, what do you, what do you need, what makes you feel safe, what makes you feel good?

SPEAKER_03 1:06:44

And and so I was shared his relate his his relationship. You shared your location with me so fast.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:51

Like I said, this makes me feel safe, and you were like, Yeah, I was gonna say, if you give me an opportunity to make you feel more comfortable, safe, protected, cared for, and it's as easy as flipping a little switch on the phone, I'm gonna do it.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:05

But for so many couples, it's not as easy as flipping a little switch because that little switch removes the element of secrecy.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:11

Why would you want to maintain secrecy in a relationship?

SPEAKER_03 1:07:14

I have some people you can call. Do you need phone numbers? I need locations because it's that, it's that it's that need for autonomy. I love that we share locations. I love that I don't have to know if you've left your house, if you're on your way, if you're well, yeah, even just from a logistical standpoint, it's absolutely incredible.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:39

And it's for me as a as a total like stoppy romantic, it allows for me to show up where I know you are. And it just, it's it's it's easeful. It's it's deep, it's intimate. It's very, very intimate. It's like literally knowing where you are in time and space. It's so intimate. And I think for me, I I guess I'm I'm it seems so naive to be like, why would anybody want to just not disclose their location? Because they're not where they're that aside. Yeah. I just to me to give you the opportunity, give us the opportunity to always just feel just in that act of like, I have nothing to hide from you. So that one is for me is was a no-brainer, easy.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:19

And it's such a it's such a divisive topic. Oh, well, cool.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:24

Thank you right. Yeah, a lot of people do.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:26

I would love to know what people do because uh it's not consistent.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:30

Yeah. I told a friend when I did that, and he was a little, he was, he'd been, he's been married for over 20 years. It was just like, what? Like, I don't even share it with my wife. And I'm like, okay, well, great. Let me know how that goes. Um, read receipts.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:46

Yeah, I love those.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:48

Tell me about it.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:49

It's a power move, to be honest. I like that it doesn't it makes it so that I don't really have to respond. If you've this is not about us, this is just I have them on, they're set on for every conversation. Um, you know that I've seen it. Yeah. And depending on the person and depending on the conversation, it can be very competitive.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:10

Well, let's keep it in within the dynamic of this relationship.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:13

Yeah. Um, well, I feel like I'm we're both very accessible to one another. So there's very little I don't disappear for hours. You don't disappear for hours. Um, yeah. I mean, for us, mine were automatically turned on. So you tell me because you're the one who had to be.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:31

Yeah, for me, it was it's definitely been situations where I've been in in my own insecurity, in my own uh desperation of feeling like there's a uh okay, I feel like there's something going on here, and we haven't talked about it. That kind of like that ephemeral dis uncomf discomfort that's in the air when we've added technology to this, where previously it used to be like if I come home and there's no messages on the answer machine, I don't think about the fact that we can communicate. So now we have this thing where we can always stay in touch. And so it's for me, it provides in times where I'm deeply, deeply insecure about anything within this relationship. Is if I see you haven't seen it, I don't need to run away with a story. She hasn't seen the thing. So like I send something, and this I don't even know if this just happened in our relationship, but I send something where it's like, ooh, oh fuck, I don't feel great about that. I don't have to worry that you saw it and now you're you're so mad you can't answer. You know, it's just like it just it helps me not run away with story. I'll just keep it simple.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:35

So yeah, that's I love when I think probably we both of us have been driving quite a bit the last month, but I sent you a text message that said, I love you, baby. And then it didn't go red for a while. So then I like exclamation pointed in after an hour. I love you. Uh-huh. But I think again, that just keeps us it. The more I can do in my own life to stay in clarity, transparency, and alignment. Yes, that's not just this relationship, that's everywhere. So the more I can do that here, and whether that involves technology or not, the better it is for both of us.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:12

Yeah, yeah. I think it keeps things really clear. Um, what was is there a third one or a fourth one? Locations, read receipts, not cheating on each other. That was a big one right away.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:26

Um, I mean, I think what we're describing is just tether. You're my emergency contact, you're my legacy contact on Meta. If I die tomorrow, you have to uh you have to leave comments on fun memes that I appreciate.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:42

Um You're the executor of my will.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:44

I'm the executor of your will.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:45

That's just ways of maintaining that we always stay in each other's lives.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:49

Yeah. And I just feel like there's there's so much oh god, there's just so much room in this relationship to expand because I don't wonder if it's going to be here tomorrow. I don't wonder, is this going to end tomorrow? Like, I mean, as far as I can see, I know I'm locked in for at least four years just by way of like geography.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:15

You're like blown up the roads, landmines everywhere.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:19

So I feel like this is new for me. This level of the foundation is being set. I am in this, you are in this. There's no part of me that's like, are we gonna be together by the end of the year? Should we start planning for the summer? Like, that is not that I have operated in relationship that way where I'm like, I'm kind of one foot in, one foot out because the other person is one foot in, one foot out, and it doesn't feel like solid ground to build a home. And this is not that.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:47

Yep. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:49

So I feel like the more ways that we continue to enmesh our lives and our existence, it feels natural and it doesn't feel like it doesn't feel like we are trying to create anchors um where there would otherwise be none.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:04

Yeah, I mean, especially not through the traditional channels of Western anchors that lock us into something, like you know, getting a co-signing on a on a mortgage or something like that.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:12

It's kind of timeshare together.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:14

I love that in Morocco. All right, well.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:20

So this is the end of our, in case it wasn't clear, by our one hour and four minute um length of our finale, this is the end of the first season of this podcast.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:32

Yeah, we didn't disclose that. We didn't we'll put it in the title. Well, no, but I mean that in that in regards to we knew this was gonna be the way we do this, and I think that that helps us kind of lock into what is our first year of our relationship, and I think we've kind of not necessarily decided exactly when we're gonna come back.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:50

August.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:51

Oh, we're coming back in August. So what we're taking the spring to spring is almost over, baby. Oh, spring has sprung and is sprung.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:01

I would like to ask you what is one thing that this dynamic, like what's one thing that you've learned about yourself or me in doing this together, this podcast, not this relationship.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:14

Yeah, I mean, I think that the the more truth and the more honesty that is expressed, that the more comfortable and safe someone can feel with each other. I mean, I said this in the first episode, is it used to be for me, I love you, so I won't say this. And now it's I love you, and I will say this, and it will make me love you more and feel loved and safe. So it's it's a level of deepening of uh it's it's a level of safety I I didn't know was possible.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:47

That's beautiful, thank you. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:50

You're welcome.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:51

For me, I have seen firsthand how you manage a project. I would like everyone to know that this is the extent of my contribution to this podcast. I come here, I sit down, I make sure my mic is on, and I just have conversations with you that I would. Oh, I guess, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:15:10

I'm sorry, the question. Thank you for that. I guess I I want to I want to answer it separately. Or I want another chance. Because I'm I was doing it more in the relationship thing. You're like literally the the podcast, like doing a thing.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:21

Karen does everything. He cuts every clip, he does the audio, he does the editing, he does all of the little things that are put up on social media, you do the Patreon, you are fully managing this project because you want it to exist. And I am so appreciative of that, and I fully trust you. Yesterday I called you and I said, Oh, yeah, I was just listening to it, and I think you should make this a clip. And you're like, I'm already on it. I think that you I remember after the first episode, we sat together and we were listening to the first episode to try to find, you know, things to pull out. And um, it was just so clear that we both share the same view of the intention here, and we both share the same view of how this should be presented to the world in a way that feels so that it's super authentic to who and how we are in our own lives and in this relationship. And after we did that the first time, I was like, You got it. I don't you don't need me. I fully trust you. And I think that carries through so much of our relationship where you ask me like my preference of something, and I'm like, you know, you I fully trust that you know what I would say or what you'd like to do.

SPEAKER_00 1:16:32

Yeah, and I don't I don't like belabor the idea that is this gonna be the right thing. Like, I think that yeah, that that implicit trust that we have for each other helps things just move along, that we don't get stuck in things. And I think that that's is a is the entire basis and foundation of the way that we operate. And so having taken on this creative project together is is not the first time I've collaborated with someone close in my life, and and there can be opportunities for there to be creative differences and things that can very much bring up kind of these egoic touch points and and what it is to express and create. And for me, back to the to the actual question is that I am absolutely a fan of you. I think that you are so intelligent and wise, and that I get to sit here. I don't uh I definitely discount my contribution to this creative process in what it actually is, is what we're sharing with our words. So when I do the things that I do, that's all logistical, that is just me curating this opportunity to learn from you and to sit with you and to hear from you. And and and also I am in this too. And so it's it's an honor. And I I time I say that it feels fucking cheesy, but like it is an honor to be with you and then to have entered into this collateral collaborative process with you.

SPEAKER_03 1:17:55

I love you, baby.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:56

I love you too. Don't end this relationship, please. Um, okay.

SPEAKER_03 1:18:02

Well, thank you all for being here, patreon.com slash I love you, but there are some QA's that we will trickle out over the next few months of quiet while we go back to our lives and back to our love and continue to grow with each other. And yeah, you can come support there. Um we hope you have taken something, even just a little gem that you can apply to your own life or your own relationship. This has not been easy for me to be super open and vulnerable. And so if anything that I have shared or said or that Darren has shared about this relationship or our parenting or our lives, if it spoke to you or moved you in any way, I would love for you to say that to let us know. Um sometimes it feels like when you put something out into the world in the form of art or in the form of poetry or in the form of a podcast, that um it might feel like a little bit of an echo chamber. So it's nice to know that what our words continue to ripple out into the world.