Episode 144: Lifestyle Coaching in the Aftermath of Loss

Transcript

Speaker1: This podcast contains explicit language and content and is for mature audiences only. Hey, you teenagers out there. If you're under 18, this show is more for your parents. So now that you have that mental picture stuck in your head, put some music on and get back to doing your homework. We are a longtime married couple who's decided to chronicle our personal adventures and share our sex positive discussions as we navigate our way through the swinging lifestyle. Care to join us? Hello, everyone. I'm Mr. Jones. And I'm Mrs. Jones. And I'm Catherine of Expansive Connection Coaching. And we want to welcome you to episode 144 of the We Got a Thing podcast. Welcome back. It's good to see you with a smile on your face this month. It's good to see you. Yeah, we enjoyed our conversation. Well, I would say enjoyed in the fact that it was so moving and it was so honest and real and really helpful to a lot of people. And today we're going to follow up a bit on that. But before we get to that, how are you and what's going on with Expansive Connection these days? Well, I will get to plenty of personal Catherine stuff in the second section. So I will put this part in the catching up with the coaches a little more. on the professional side. And that have been, as I mentioned earlier on another episode this year, I have been doing more in-person retreats. And I'm actually leaving tomorrow for my sixth in-person retreat of the year. This one will be with April of Naughty Gem. And we're meeting up in the Smokies with 35 women for one called Wise and Wild, all about menopause, sexy ladies in menopause and talking about it from a holistic point of view. And I was just putting my last finishing touches on my nerves. of looking at the emotional and spiritual and relational impacts of menopause. So I'm really excited about that. But just in general, being able to be in retreat space has been wonderful. I love the fact that we have technology so I can meet with people from all over the world that want to talk about this stuff and I can support their relationships through the interwebs, as I like to say. But being able to be with people in person and support them in therapeutic ways, to support them just in community, and fellowship, watching them work through the things we're teaching and have their conversations with other like-minded couples and the way that they support each other. Being able to kick back in the hot tub and chat about, you know, different places, Hedo and Desire or Bliss Cruise or whatever event is coming up has been so wonderful and just has really given me a lot personally, but also professionally. And we have one more, we have another retreat on the books for February. And we'll also be with Cheryl of Devious Dragonfly. And Kelsia will be there. And Misha will be there. And we have two other special guests. One is a professional dom mistress. And the other is my best friend who is an anatomy professor and a lesbian. So she's going to teach us all the things we need to know about downstairs on the ladies. So this retreat is going to be all about sex. We're calling it Learn, Love, and Lust. And we've got lots of teaching and hands-on. We've got workshops. It's going to be in Destin, Florida. in February. So we've got, we're doing interviews right now. We're just over halfway sold out. So if you're interested at all, go to Cheryl's website, DeviousDragonfly.com, put down a deposit, do the interview. We'll answer all your questions. And then the other exciting thing I have coming up is Miche and I are doing a workshop about betrayal in open relationships. Because at a team meeting, she and I were on our soapboxes complaining about how frustrating it is that people think just because we're in an open, open relationships that we couldn't be betrayed. So we're wrapping back and forth and getting all haughty about it. And Kelsey is like, okay, well, ladies, sounds like you two have a workshop to do. So she inspired us. We're doing a workshop. And we're going to do it looking at it from people who want to safeguard their relationship as much as you can from betrayal, people that maybe were like, oh, gosh, I didn't think of that either. Maybe I need to look at all different ways that that could happen, or people that are healing from betrayal. And so we'll be offering that the first week of December. Busy is always it's always great to hear what's going on in Expansive Connection. But now we want to start asking you some little bit of tougher questions. So to begin with, to start this conversation, can you tell us how your experience and how the loss of your marriage has changed the way that you manage your counseling practice or how that's been going with Expansive Connection? or viable. And thankfully, my clients that have been with me from before and are still with me, they've said it's made me better. And at first, it was hard for me to really believe that. But with distance, I actually feel that way, too. I feel a lot stronger having gone through such something so traumatic and doing all the hard work of grieving and healing. I have this inner core of strength that I always thought I was strong. And I think I was. But there's this inner strength that has a lot of calm to it for me where it's like, I know that I can get through anything now it would suck I don't want to like I really hope that was my my real bad one for this lifetime you know like really be real great but I don't feel as scared as I think before if if you told me like your marriage might end I and I truly when it happened I was like how in the world will I live through this and I don't feel that at all anymore there's this deep strength and so having that strength feels good and you know I don't know that the jobs of healing and and grieving are ever truly complete, but I know that I can see some progress. And like when anniversaries come around and they don't bring me to my knees or like now I get more annoyed than gutted when I'm around Ray and I'm reminded of how different he is than the person I knew and loved. But I learned quickly when this happened in those hardest days, I realized that I had not spent enough time and focus on emotional regulation with my clients. And I still believe in the tools that I taught them. I still think those are solid. I use them. But if your lid is flipped, you are very likely to forget that you have a toolbox in the first place, much less pick the right one. So you're probably likely to pick up a screwdriver when you need a paintbrush and you're going to cause more damage. And I definitely did that. So it's taught me to, like, it's helped me cultivate so much more understanding and empathy for how hard it is to stay regulated and get back to regulation in order to have productive Interactive you're ill and you don't know what the diagnosis is and then even when you get the diagnosis if it's not the greatest news your attitude like okay i know what i'm dealing with now you know i i we can move forward because we can put a plan together and we know what it is and so um and and what about okay we talked about obviously losing ray but um anything else that you lost you feel like you lost during the whole time Yeah, that was a question somebody asked me that surprised me. And I had to reflect on it a little bit. And the answer was really cringey, to be honest with you. Well, the first answer was easy. I have lost a lot of confidence. But this is the part that's cringey. I think that that confidence, when I look back on and listen back to myself, it verged on arrogance. Like, I had such almost an arrogant faith in our ability to face anything. I truly thought that we had what it took to for the long haul like I really believed in like that the commitment was you know I didn't I didn't believe that like you have to be committed forever and ever even if it's terrible but you know it was like I was I did believe in a commitment that was thriving and loving because you worked at it not just stoically because we that we reached that we reached the end of the marriage we reached the end of our lives together out of obligation and so So I really believed that. And now, you know, as I said last month, now that word forever kind of makes my brain swim. It's like, I hope that I get confidence back that's more grounded than the confidence I had before. But right now, I can't imagine saying forever to Ryan. And I know that that sometimes breaks his heart a little bit. But I'm like, but what I can say is like, I will be deeply committed to, as I said, myself and our relationship. and working hard at that for as long as it serves us. But putting a timeframe on that now feels really odd after what I went through. And then, of course, I was scared that I would lose my business. But thankfully, I haven't. As I said, being being the poster child for everybody's worst fears really, really made me nervous that my calendar would be full of crickets instead of clients. But that was has not been the case. I was scared that people wouldn't have confidence in me as a therapist or a coach. But again, And I'm really thankful that that hasn't happened. And it does, especially now, as I said, since we recorded last month, I feel like now there's this other maybe pocket of our population that I can support because they know I've gone through this. I mean, I had one woman reach out. It was one of the first people that reached out and she said, it was hard for me to listen. I had to do it in sections because I kept crying because our stories are so similar. to realize that what my husband's doing is not right. It's not okay. And I've got to speak up and I've got to say something. And I haven't done it yet, but I will. And I was just like, wow, I really hadn't thought about that, being able to support people in that way. This is a tough one for me to ask, but I mean, do you feel like a failure to some degree? At first, I did all the time. I mean, I was the one that kept, I mean, work was hard for me. I mean, it was great once I logged on because it was nice to have the distraction. of other people's problems for 60 or 90 minutes. But making myself walk up these stairs and sit in front of this computer was really hard. Like, I had such imposter syndrome. Like, why would anyone want to listen to me when I can't even keep my own marriage together? But I guess as I've worked through that, I still, as I said, I feel confident that I did all that I could with the tools and resources that I had available. Again, that won't work unless the other person wants to use those tools and resources available. And I, yeah, I worried that other people would see me as a failure in my marriage and then therefore as a couples coach or therapist. But I don't feel that way anymore. And a lot of that, thankfully, is because people have spoken up. Friends, clients, certainly the feedback I've gotten from the podcast where people have said, we don't expect you to be perfect or inhuman. You are more relatable now. And you probably have more to teach us. One of my clients early on when I was really struggling, he gave me some tough love. And he, instead of like his, you know, his wife's like, oh, like being all sweet and loving. And I saw them at, I was actually at your event in DC when I told them about this. And he's like, all right, well, if you're worried about it affecting your business and you being a good therapist, then I'll be the selfish client. How are you going to be better for me? And I am still to this day so thankful for that question because it was early on. And he directed me into thinking, how am I going to leverage this and use this to help my clients and do the work that I love to do? And I feel like I've been working to answer that question. Well, the first thing that went through my mind when Mr. Jones read that question is, you weren't a failure, your marriage failed. You know, you did your level best with all the tools in your toolbox to try to figure out how to move that forward in a positive direction, but you're only half of a relationship. Yeah. And as we'll talk, we talked about a little bit last, and I know we're going to get to later, I also will say only one part of our marriage failed. Right. One iteration. And I mean, I think we all deserve a little bit of forgiveness. You included, my friend. Oh, thank you. So I want to ask a follow-on question. You mentioned last month some words that your father shared with you that kind of took us aback. when somebody that influential in your life says, well, what did you expect when you let your husband have sex with other women? Has that changed any? And I'm coming from the failure perspective, because I'm thinking if I'm the child and my parent is telling me this, I might even feel like a failure as a child or this other role. So I'm wondering, has that improved any? Have you had conversations with him? around that comment that he made we some um i definitely you know i'm an only child i'm very much a an achiever and a perfectionist and so i i can put myself in that one down failure place pretty easily that's a that's a shadow side of my personality that i have to that i have to work with and so and of course anytime i feel like my parents are disappointed in me you know i just become a six-year-old little girl trying to please them again you know and so So that was heavy. It was a heavy burden to add to what I was already dealing with. And we would have conversations. And both of my parents, I'm lucky, I've always had very open lines of communication with them. We've always had hard conversations. And at some point, he and I just kind of had to agree to disagree about ethical non-monogamy. He just could not get it through his head that, I mean, when we told him about it before this happened, And he disowned me. He said he never wanted to be in the same room with me or Ray again. And he thought that we had done such a disservice by telling our daughter, which was pretty sanctimonious because he cheated on my mom for 18 months. And he basically did the same thing, but just not ethically. But when I was really hurting, he put all that aside and he was there. And he and my mom both just, gosh, they stepped up for me and wrapped themselves around me and my daughter and helped us. us have a sense of family. And so, you know, we've touched at it here and there. I mean, you know, he's asked, like, do you think this is what, why your marriage fell apart? Would you ever do this again? You know, he'll ask me some of those things. Mostly, I think he's wanting me to say, like, oh, I learned my lesson and I was wrong and I shouldn't have. And of course, I'm not going to give him that. So then he backs off. But we, you know, we just have, it's a sensitive subject, just like politics. We, there are things that I've, With politics, I've said to my dad, we have such limited time together with you on the earth and me on the earth. Let's not waste it with things we know we don't agree on. Let's put that aside and focus on what we have. And I have been so grateful for the ways that he stepped up and loved me, even when he didn't disagree with me, which kind of similar to how healing it was for Ryan to love me at my worst after Ray rejected me at my best. all that, seeing how much disdain he had for our choices, him being able to put that aside when I was really hurting and feeling that unconditional parental love, even without approval. Oh, good, good. I'm glad I asked that question. It makes me feel better. So, you know, people, we've been podcasting a long time. We've been in the lifestyle for a while. And we meet people, and I'm not, they don't necessarily come out and say this directly to us, but it's almost like, look, the joneses have been doing this for a long time it's going to be okay for us the jones has had a tough time but look they're still get there together it's going to be okay you know we feel like they look at our relationship and our longevity and the fact that we're together and it gives them a sense of okay well we can trust them because you know they're they're it's been tough but they're still together so i'm wondering you know what do you think about do you do you wonder if people are going to be able to trust you preach and teach because of all of a sudden this big change that that's happened and now somebody has to come into your office knowing well sometimes knowing should i believe how why should i believe what she's saying because you know she and her husband are no longer together right which i think goes back to our definition of failure you know i really appreciate you mrs jones saying that i mean it we have to if someone is going to to judge me as a coach or a therapist based on a relationship that I was only 50% responsible for, we're probably not going to be a good fit anyway, right? But I think as far as like, you know, the question that a listener asked was, how can we trust, how can we trust you? How can anyone trust what you've been preaching? And I guess I would come back to like, I haven't been preaching that this is And ironically, what I end up working on with clients, the majority of the time has nothing to do with ethical non-monogamy. That's what brings them to me, and it's a safe place, and we all have the common vernacular, and we get it, but we're talking about all the same things of communication. So I, you know, I just, I lean into the things that have always served me and my, for me personally, and in my coaching work, which is the things that I think are crucial for healthy relationships, which is authenticity, transparency, a willingness to examine my role in situations, ask, push my clients to look at their role in the situation, the hard work on myself and my relationships, learning, and more learning, working to see patterns, and then taking really good care of myself. And so I've always preached those things. I mean, my, is in health promotion. So I take really good care of my body and very prevention minded. And I did that in my relationship. So I have continued to do the things that I preach. It didn't work out the way that we would have hoped or that I would have hoped. But I don't believe that that's because the things I was preaching were wrong. Yeah. So I imagine that there's a lot of people who also want to learn lessons from what you've been through. And you just mentioned communication. And I think a lot of people would think, well, certainly we don't want to make that mistake. We don't want to find ourselves in that situation. Maybe that's a better way to put it. How was your communication? Do you think the communication itself was deficient or not, you know, I don't know, deep enough or honest enough? Because other people are going to want to know because we don't want to make the same mistake. So have you looked back and thought about, you know, how the two of you communicated and what you may have missed out on? Absolutely. And I, you know, this is one that is, it is so important. And I think about the question that you asked in the last episode about like, I can't remember which one of you was like, well, like, were you and Ray talking about this stuff? Like, what was he saying? What was the, you know, you were alluding to that communication. And honestly, we communicated frequently and deeply from my point of view, always in our relationship. More so once we got into non-monogamy. A lot once things got wobbly. We were, I mean, my goodness, the times we sat down in our sunroom in our respective chairs having talks. So I thought, I feel like we communicated enough as far as frequency and depth. But again, that was from my point of view. Looking back, I don't think he was truly tuned into himself. And so he may have been communicating, and I took it, I believed him, but I don't think that he was digging deep to know himself. And so what he was sharing with me, I didn't have the full picture, but I also don't think he had the full picture. I don't think he knew and he was keeping it. So he wasn't really being dishonest. I think he was just unaware of what was in his gut. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And that is such an important distinction, Mrs. Jones, because if I had, I don't believe that Ray has a malicious bone in his body. I really don't. I think that it kills him that he had to hurt me and our family to do what he wanted to do. I mean, not enough that he didn't, but it would be such a different story if I felt like he had been holding things back or being manipulated or being malicious, I honestly just don't think he ever learned to know himself well enough. He just didn't know. And that still hurt for sure. I mean, don't get me wrong, but it would have hurt twice as much if I felt like he was doing it to hurt me, right? There's an important distinction there. I also think he was overly confident in his ability to use his brain to control his heart. And this is something that I have been a a lot more keen on working with clients like we can i mean he you know he was an engineer he's you know he's very systematical in the way he thought and i just i think he just thought that he could think his way he could keep his brain where he wanted it to be and then once his heart like because of that he probably let his heart get to a point where his head couldn't override it and it i think it shocked him i think it surprised him that so i want to ask that could happen I feel like I have to apologize before I ask all these questions, and I'm sorry. But this is really fascinating, because one of the things that I thought of about Ray, to your point, Catherine, he had some period of self-discovery. So my natural thought went to the person that he was with that was not you. whatever their dynamic and relationship was must have allowed him to see that where he wasn't seeing it before when he was with you and i wonder and i'm not i'm not suggesting this is your fault but i'm putting i'm trying to put myself in his situation if i'm married to a counselor somebody who has and i'm doing air quotes has all the answers you know could could it be that maybe he He didn't feel like he could trust his own thoughts and his own ideas about himself. And I don't know, it's just something that popped into my head as he's now having this self-discovery and he's in a relationship with someone else. What was it that he didn't allow himself to do before that he was able to do afterwards? because this is my favorite kind of thing to think about. There are so many ways that I've tried to understand or have perspective on what went on in his head and heart that I didn't have access to. I could certainly make a case for, I mean, he's a nine on the Enneagram. So that has been super helpful for me because Kelsey is a nine on the Enneagram. So she has helped me see it through that lens in a lot of ways and like one of the ways and my daughter is a nine too so she's helping me get through the teenage years with a nine also but one of the things that she she explained that has been really helpful is how much time and energy nines unconsciously spend figuring out who it will be the easiest to disappoint like they hate to disappoint anybody ever but like if they're going to like which one will be the less painful to do so And so like right now with my daughter, she never wants to let her boyfriend down. So she's happy to let me down, you know, and I have to just learn to not take that personally. Right. And so I think that what happened maybe with Ray is as his time and energy and love was getting pulled and he didn't realize that his heart was a one seater, that he probably that he was not polyamorous by nature. And Laura had, you know, wants of him or he just wanted to be with her more. I think it just, it became, he did something in his head. He made it easier to say no to me. And I think that it made it easier to say no to me by shutting down to me. Because if he didn't care that it hurt me as much, he could say no to me. I think he was terrified to say no to her because of the newness of the relationship and he didn't want to lose it. But yeah, maybe that. I also think, certainly, I can imagine. I mean, it is not lost on me how hard it would be to do in a relationship. I am hard to satisfy. I am growth minded. I am the princess and the pea. I am always striving and wanting to grow. And that can be exhausting. And, you know, Ryan says, he's like, it's ironic because it's the thing I love the most about you. And there are times where I just want to put my hands on your shoulders and say, hey, can we just enjoy the wind we had? Can we glide for a little bit? And he has taught me to do that more. But maybe it did. Maybe it was exhausting for Ray to constantly be in that growth mindset. And I don't think Laura needed that as much. I think she's a lot more go with the flow like he is. So honestly, maybe it was just... Well, you know, I'm going to... Mrs. Jones just jotted down a note that I wanted to follow up on. You just said his heart was possibly a one-seater. I've heard a lot of people, especially those engaged in polyamory, is my heart is big enough for more than one. I can love more than one. But when you said it just now, my heart is a one-seater, you know, maybe there's also a discovery by him that he does not have that capacity to love two, where a lot of people just assume everyone has that ability, even if they don't want to try it. You know, I think the thought in polyamory a little bit is, well, you've just never been there. You've never tried it before. You've never given your heart away. Well, in this case, I'm just wondering if you could follow up on that a little bit. What do you mean by that? Personally, I don't believe that we can truly know if we are polyamorous until we're faced with the loving of two people. And I didn't know. But as I said in our adulting episode, I was prepared to hurt if I found that I wasn't. And I had to let go of Ryan's, how I thought it would go. But then the more, the deeper I fell in love with Ryan, honestly, it felt like I loved more. And it just, it just felt like it expanded. And I really, I think that one of the things that we did wrong is I think Ray and I both assumed that because I was that way, that he would be that way. I don't think either one of us slowed down to consider that it might be a different, which is kind of stupid looking back at it. So I think that what happened is I had this lovely two-seater heart that had these adorable butts in them and I'm rolling along, right? And then as Ray started to fall in love with Laura and her butt kind of comes up to the seat and they're like, oh no, this is a one-seater. And I think he said, well, it's going to hurt more in this moment to not let Laura's butt get in the seat. So I'm going to shut myself off to Catherine. So it won't hurt so much. Good answer from that spot. And I will say, you know, and I will say, you know, in one of the questions later, kind of in that things that I missed, this one has haunted me many times before, right before we got into swinging, I was really wanting to have a second child. And Ray said, I'm scared that I don't have enough to be a good parent for two kids. I know I can be a great parent to our daughter I just don't know if I have enough to spread around to two kids and like I get chill bumps now and I say that out loud like I wish I could have heard that more deeply and thought about that we were considering sharing his love among two women because it could be easily misunderstood that I love our daughter so much I can't imagine letting another one share I can understand a parent saying that but and I can understand you just kind of dismissing it because oh yes you would you love this one you would love that one yeah it's It's interesting now in the rearview mirror how there are things that you can look back on and just wonder if there was anything more to that. One of the shows that we used to watch before we got into the lifestyle was, was it Swingtown? Yeah. So this next question, Mrs. Jones and I answered before we even got into the lifestyle. And so this was a neighborhood that it was a stereotypical airline pilot, flight attendant wife. They were in the lifestyle. And then one time, he flew overseas and he, quote unquote, betrayed or cheated on his wife because even though they had an open relationship, he didn't tell his wife about it. And we both instantly, this was before the lifestyle, we both threw the flag on that, like, wait a minute. That's not okay. That's not okay. Just because you're having sex, you know. So I'm just wondering now, obviously, you know, the answer to question if we were to ask ourselves, but how is betrayal possible in an open relationship? Well, good for you for seeing that nuance even before you lived it. Like that's such a good, good sign that you all would be, it would be good at this. But yes, of course it's possible. And, you know, because betrayal is, is all about trust. And, you know, one of the things that I included in my, my big course that I have called Relationship Bootcamp, the very beginning I made this pretty exhaustive list of safety statements. And these are the things that you need in your relationship to feel safe. And it's interesting. And I made this exhaustive list because people, if you can only choose five, different people choose different ones that really help them feel safe. And I pulled that out after all of this happened. And I highlighted the ones that I feel like I really needed in my primary relationship. with Ray that were betrayed. And so it wasn't as clear cut as like, oh, he cheated on me. But like one of them was, I need to know I'm your number one. Right. And I think that there were a lot of things that I overlooked because we were non-monogamous that I kind of like thought I should be okay with it. You know how Ryan was like, you're trying to maybe okay with so many things that aren't okay. But I think if we had been monogamous, those are things I totally would have questioned sooner and a lot louder. if we hadn't been open. So I think that would be, that's definitely something I feel like is a warning or again, something we want to work on in this Betrayal Workshop is don't set yourself up in this way of like, I'm supposed to be cool with everything. No, like little paper cuts are just as, lots of little paper cuts are just as hurtful as some huge knife slice and watch out for those things and be really clear with each other about what you need to be for safety. And do what you say you'll do. Be trustworthy. Do more than you promise. And I think you those are the ways that you can avoid it. But I did want to share, you know, as kind of a thank you for listening to all this. I wanted to give the listener something. So we will link in the show notes of where you can go to our website and get those safety statements, because I think that can be a really great starter conversation starter of like, what do we need to make sure that we're I think this is one time when being an Enneagram of one is a good thing because like part of my like obsessive obsession with like rules and structure is I have like like my guardrails around our rules in the lifestyle they're they're not like the little silt fence that you can step over you know if you need to when are the concrete jersey walls to keep tractor trailers in the lane like and poor Mr. Jones And sometimes he thinks I'm just a basket case, but, but like, there's no misunderstanding what I'm okay with and what I'm not okay with. So I think a lot of times the betrayals do come from misunderstandings or, you know, but yeah. So anyway, that's my, that's my 30 second therapy session for the day. Also, there are lots of things that are good about being a one on the Enneagram. We love you and we need you in all sorts of places. And you're right, that is a place where you are, you are doing a lot of risk management, and you are really clear about that. And so I doubt that you would have tried to be cool with as many things as I tried to be cool with as a two, you know, I'm like trying to just make sure that we're all like, loved and all this and I definitely let, let I took too much on and let things go that that I wasn't okay with. And I'm much clearer about that. I'll share some of my one with you. I do have a one wing. I have a one wing. I can get there. So you used the word overlooked just a minute ago. And so I'm wondering now, and I wonder if it feels a little bit selfish because here you are going through, having been through what you just went through, but my mind is going to, okay, what did she miss that we can learn from? You know, we don't want to miss the same things. So were there, do you feel like there were warning signs. I mean, we talked briefly about a couple of yellow flags, but when you look back, do you see the warning signs that you missed? And what can other people either overthink or learn from for things like that? I would say one of the biggest that has really helped me understand this story and conceptualize it is there are, I think that a lot of the things that I missed were because the illusions that I created that I needed to feel safe in this situation right we don't have we don't have this playbook we don't have a lot of rom-coms to watch and kind of know what's right or what's wrong and so because I wanted it to be all right I created there are definitely things I had an illusion of our marriage I had an illusion of him I had an illusion of of Laura I had an illusion of what our poly system was and as Kelsio would often point out to me and Thank goodness, we were over Marco Polo, so I couldn't punch her because there were times I wanted to, even with her sweet little Alabama accent. She would say, she would point out to me that I often assumed that they would be more Catherine-like in making decisions that affected me and our marriage and my family. And then she would say, it would be great if they would be more Catherine-like. And I'm like, you're damn right. But again, it was sort of this, like, I I was so willing to pour into the system, and I just assumed that what I poured in would be given back. And that isn't always the case. You know, I leaned so heavily on that illusion that I think I didn't see signs. And even though I do believe that I was betrayed by Ray and Laura because she was a friend, I did have to face, and I've had to face that In a lot of ways, I was betrayed by my illusions. I feel like I had this idea of what it was going to be that they didn't necessarily promise they would do. I mean, some of it, yes, but not all of it. I keep thinking about the visual I got when you talked about the kitchen table polyamory and about how you're living this beautiful, like the Waltons, all sitting together for family dinner. And I mean, that just, it's so like idyllic and, you know, that if everybody could live a life that happy and with love so free and open, it would be a good place. But, you know, I guess that was somewhat of an illusion. Right. And again, I think they're kind of going back to that over-functioning place that I go to. I was willing, I loved that idea so much and I believed in it that I was willing and did often and do more than my fair share of the work to make it all go than the other members of the system. And again, I assume that if I did that, that it would come back to me. And again, I was shocked when I did need them and they were unwilling. But that, I mean, again, and I can be, again, I can vilify them for that. I can feel like a victim for that. But I think the place of empowerment for me is realizing that I do have a I have a very active imagination and I have a lot of ability to lean into illusion and that's something that, again, that's something I am pushing and questioning clients on. You know, is this what you're wanting to believe? What is your evidence for this? Trying to really, I mean, not that I want to be pessimistic, but I can be not only polyamorous, I can be very Pollyanna-ish. Well, let me give you, let me defend you a minute. Okay, I'm with, is her name Laura? I'm with Laura. I want her to believe that at some point in time, I'm telling her, I want to be with you. I no longer want to be in a marriage with Catherine. But then I imagine when he, and so she has an idea of what he means by that because of what he's telling her, but she doesn't know if that's going to happen and then but he's with you he's going through the motions of of wanting to work through it to a certain degree even though his heart's not really in it so in a way he's telling you one story and he's telling her another story and i don't know that either one of you knew what the ending of that story was i don't even know if ray knew what the ending so it's only natural that you would have i agree this um cloudiness around reality and things that you believe. So I don't think that it's all your fault. I think that, you know, there had to have been some effort, even though it wasn't a lot of effort, that made you believe that, okay, well, he is still trying a little bit, or he is still saying that, until it got to a point that it wasn't. And when it got to that point, then the reality was there. And I think maybe he even discovered it for the first time. And maybe she, even discovered it for the first time. Because in the back of my mind, how many times have we seen movies where the man is cheating and he's telling his mistress, oh, I do love you. I'm going to tell her. And then it never happens. So it just seems like to me the whole thing would have caused some disillusionment that didn't enable you to see exactly what he was feeling as things were progressing. When you have a lot of faith in your relationship, when you have a really strong relationship, how easy it is to let that relationship take it on the chin to give energy and effort to other things and other people. And so I think when we started this, coming out of our swinging time, we were so strong and so close that we really just felt like our bank was so full that we could absolutely keep making withdrawals from our bank to give to our newer and needier relationships, give them more time and attention. But we had always been like that, even before ethical non-monogamy. I mean, you know, it's like maybe we needed a date night, but our friends really needed some help with their new deck, so we're going to go help them. Or like we planned, like we really need some time together, but our parents needed some help, so we'd give them that. Because we felt so, or I mean, I'll say me, I felt so lucky to have such a strong relationship and marriage that it was almost like I felt the abundance, I wanted to share that abundance. And I think that we withdrew so much from that well-stocked relationship bank during the early poly time. We didn't prioritize enough putting those deposits back in. And, you know, when I started to notice that, it was a little maybe too late because it was inconvenient for Ray. He didn't want to say no to Laura. He wanted to just say yes to her. So he kept asking me and our relationship to bend and give so he could do that. And then I felt like a needy nag and I would be like, well, I'll just, I'll figure out some way So do you think that non-monogamy, whether it's swinging or polyamory or whatever, do you think that was the cause of your divorce? That's such a hard question. I think swinging made our relationship stronger. I think poly added wonderful things to our life. I think we could still be happily married if he were capable of loving two people at once. well. I think that if he'd realized that his heart was a one-seater and he had stopped there, I think our marriage would have had a good chance at making it if we healed. Because I think if we'd healed that heartbreak and losing our other partners and learning how to shift back to that different dynamic, I do think we could have made it. But again, that would have only been possible if he was willing to do that really hard. It feels hard to say if we'd never tried Polly. I mean, maybe we would have come upon other hard relational issues that he wasn't willing to work on. I just always assumed that he would work really hard because he worked so hard in so many other areas of our life. I mean, this man would roll his sleeves up and do the dirtiest, nasty job in the basement that you could find. And so for me, I'm like, ick. I mean, if he'll do that, he'll do relational work. But keep in mind, my comfort zone is relational work. I don't want to go do the muck in the mud in the basement, right? And so it was a shock to me that that relational work was out of his scope or willingness. So maybe another issue would have come up that I would have shown his unwillingness to do that. I'm not really sure. And this next question may sound similar, but I think it's a little bit different. And that is, and let me ask you in a different way. If you could go back in time to the time that you and Ray decided to try non-monogamy and your decision was, no, we're you're not gonna try it do you think you'd still be together um that's a hard one too it's so hard because swinging added so much goodness to our marriage and and like there's even i mean sometimes i wonder if it if it extended our marriage to be able to to be happier longer You know, there was one listener wrote in after the last one, and I've chewed on this so much. It was fascinating. She also works with couples. And she wrote me and said that she said, you know, it's interesting. I've rarely seen marriages that lack of a really full and robust romantic and sexual connection between, you know, in that primary couple. I've rarely seen them thrive in the second half of life. Yeah, and as we get to this last question, what you just said reminds me a lot of the friendships that we had that we no longer have. Because typically, and it doesn't even have to be non-monogamy, you know, like you said, Catherine, you're focused on your career, you're focused on your family, you're focused on children, obligations. And then you get to a point in life where those obligations are either gone or they're a lot less. Yeah, yeah. So do you continue to stay over-involved in their lives or have surface-level friendships or let your relationship drift apart and just be kind of roommates? Or do you make a decision that you're going to reconnect? And whatever that reconnection turns into, it's something that we can create ourselves. We can create anew. We can pick up where we left off before we had children or before we had a career. And we found that a lot of our friends would choose the easiest pathway of that's just they sit at the dinner table and if there's not a dog in the room, they don't have anything to talk to. I mean, that's, you know, it's almost like that they're existing. And we found that we didn't have a lot in common with those couples, you know, that they were choosing, say, well, this is it, we're going to coast, you know, until, well, until when? That's kind of depressing in my mind. But anyway, if a couple has a good relationship, are you able to say from your position that, you know, from where you are now, are you able to say that it's a reasonable decision to risk your relationship by getting into swinging? Well, I mean, this question is kind of where we left everybody on the cliffhanger last month, right? Like, you all, with all that you do in your community and the podcast you put out, the work and the teaching that I do, that a little bit of that responsibility or, you know, are we leading people into something that could be dangerous? Do we have a responsibility about that? And so when this question came up about kind of in good conscience, could I do that? Could I say, like, this is a reasonable decision to risk this? And my answer is, of course, not very simple. There are so many risks to good relationships. And I think that monogamy can be risky for relationships, especially complacent monogamy. Kind of the way you're talking about, like, well, if it weren't for the dog, we'd have nothing to talk about. And so, you know, because swinging often motivates people to do that internal and relational work, which makes their relationships more resilient to challenges that are out of the sphere of choice, such as illness or job loss or death or something. In some ways, I could make a case for swinging, helping to build a more resilient relationship because it's forcing that communication. It's bringing, you know, as you said, as Joan, something you're jumping in and doing together. You're doing scary and hard things together. It's encouraging you to communicate and those sorts of things. You know, if someone doesn't want to do the work, doesn't want to be in the marriage, No amount of coaching, therapy, staying small in your monogamy, or going wild in your non-monogamy, none of that's really going to change, right? It really depends on how much you want to keep this relationship. And so, you know, of course, I don't, let me say that really important caveat, I don't think that getting into swinging to save your relationship is a good idea, nor do I think that complacent ethical non-monogamy is a good idea. So you can have complacent monogamy, and invested monogamy. You could have complacent, ethical non-monogamy, and engaged. You've got to be willing to do that work on yourself and the relationship, or otherwise, these extras are just going to be that pressure cooker that will make it explode faster. But so, you know, with that idea of, you know, non-monogamy maybe giving us some extra years of happiness and family stability for our daughter, prolonging and enhancing our marriage, I can in good say that that could happen. But I also have always, and you all have too, been very clear that yes, we're playing with fire. This could bring relational instability. And relationships, right now, marriages have about a 50% success rate. And most of that percentage, we're assuming that most of those are monogamous, right? So you're opening a door to this kind of risk, but there is risk to everything. This is hard and risky. So is apathy. So is roommate marriage. that's all about the kids. Those are different kinds of hard. So I guess it's more like I'm happy to help people walk through the decision about which hard they're willing to look at, like choosing your risk and which type of difficulty you're up for. Either way is risky. You can't predict or control it. You can do everything, be the best versions of yourself and your relationships. And things can still happen. So, you know, being self-reflective, having the skills, the tools, the commitment to intimacy. You know, when people ask me about our communication, I always, you know, I say like, have very frequent and deep conversations, but that can only be done when both people are doing that serious and sometimes hard personal introspection and are willing to share what these possibly difficult and conflicting things that come up from that insight and making space for that, for their own personal or good friends that will hold your feet to the fire. If we don't make space and time for that, I promise you that, number one, we know if we don't make time to spend with each other, life will gobble up our time anyway. But once we do have time together, if we don't make space and intention for that deep level communication, that deep level reflection, your logistics and your fun stuff will take precedence and gobble up that time. This will not just naturally come up. Nobody's like, let's really dive deep into an uncomfortable insight that I had today. Nobody's excited about that except maybe me and my coaches. But anyway, in the typical relationship, that isn't going to just bubble up in conversation. You have to be intentional about it. Yeah. And I wonder if a different way to look at this, because somebody's really trying to pin you down with this question, I think, because it's really not our to make that decision for a couple. But what we might be able to do, what you might be able to do, is suggest, I'm not sure that your relationship is in a position yet for that decision to be made. In other words, if you see yellow flags or red flags, let's just say, for example, the guy is pushing his wife to try to get into it, maybe for the wrong reasons, and you say, time out. I'm not saying that it is or isn't right for you. What I'm saying is it sounds like there's some other things that need to be put on the table here before you get to a point where I would say you're even ready to make that decision. Yeah. Sure. Sure. And, you know, it's funny because some people will be nervous. I say it's the part of the person in the couple who is more resistant to the idea. They're nervous about seeing me because they assume that I have some agenda to make sure that everybody gets into this. And I'll say right up front, that is absolutely not my agenda. My agenda is to be an advocate for my client, which is your relationship. And if ethical non-monogamy is hurting my client, which is your relationship, I will be the first one to tell you that. I'm not going to tell you you shouldn't do it, but I might say, you know, a pause wouldn't hurt here. Or maybe we need some time to let your nervous system heal and relax a little bit. Let's build some more, those safety statements. Let's really dive into those and build up what you have and then decide if you want to take this risk. And also remember, there's no point of no return. You can try it. And if it feels like it's not good for your relationship, stop or pivot and shift into a different type of ethical non-monogamy or shift and pivot and go do exciting things like jump out of airplanes together. Whatever. Well, you know, I appreciate the conversation again, Catherine, but something funny is sticking in my mind from when we first started this conversation tonight, and you talked about sitting in a hot tub with people at a retreat, and I thought, boy, has my image of therapy really changed from the days of my therapist sitting behind me while I'm on the leather couch, you know, espousing words of wisdom to me or asking me questions. What do you really mean by that? To now I'm thinking I could be sitting in a hot tub with my therapist. What a much more positive, enjoyable stereotype or generalization of therapy. So I think you're on to something there, the hot tub therapist, as opposed to, you know, laying on the All right. Well, you know, and I will have to say to be clear for terminology, it would be hot tub coach, because if I were working in a traditional therapy setting with traditional therapy clients, I absolutely would not be in a hot tub with them. And I think that it is a it's a pretty great thing about this, this population and this, this niche of how we're trying to meet them with our own, with our own authenticity and our the truth of our own story. that I am very much more in that coach role. And the people that I'm working with, I mean, we all have to be really good at boundaries. And we have to be really good at having hard conversations to do this thing that we do. And so I'm able to do that. If there are clients of mine that are going to be at these retreats, we talk ahead of time. We're like, okay, so we're probably going to be in a hot tub together. We might be topless. Like this is, you know, this is going to be a different, this is a different area. And then once we get back on Zoom, it's going to be clear what we're doing. Now, let me say very clearly that there's no sexual, no ever, ever sexual lives crossed with clients. But sitting there and being able to have some real conversations, just like I was willing to take my counselor hat off and be real about this. I think that's an exciting benefit of this, of working with this population and working in this area and being able to use the gifts that we get from being good at having better communication, having better boundaries, Yeah. And I think when you do wear the coach's hat, which I still say is the most valuable place to be, you're not on the sidelines. You're not in a booth up above watching everything, you know, calling plays. You're on the field. I mean, and you've been on the field and you've been injured on the field. You know, so when you're in the whole coaching illustration to me, I'm going to be more comfortable around somebody who's been in the game. Regardless of whether that's positive, neutral, or negative, you've been in the game. And when you've been in the game, you have a perspective that a lot of other people don't have. So at the end of the day, you know, I think you're, Mr. Jones's personal opinion, but I think you're a much more valuable, not that I would suggest that you go through a divorce in order to be more valuable. Thank you. But when you've taken the lumps. And you've been there. I would tend to think I would trust you more or value your coaching, let's just say. Thank you. So you mentioned Kel a couple of times. She's going to be with us next month, and we're going to talk about transitioning relationships. Maybe one way to put it, to borrow Kate's terminology, is going from pants-on friends to pants-off friends. and then back to pants on friends again or life cycles of relationships and how you can come through those and still be friends with people. So we're looking forward to that. I was just going to say, just in conclusion, before we, I'm excited to be launching from here to those transitions in relationships because it is a pretty, it's a natural segue, which you'll hear how Kel's going to bring that together. But just to wrap this up, I just want to again say the truth is that in, this can happen to anyone. And nobody wants to hear that. But honestly, I think that believing that it couldn't happen to you is probably the most dangerous stance to take. It reminds me of how we started in episode 41, that if you assume that you won't be jealous, you're in trouble. Don't assume that it can't happen to you. And if you assume that it could happen to you, then I think you are in a much more nimble place to deal with it if you start to see some signs. Now, I also want to say I'm not encouraging people to live in fear and vigilance. That is no good for relationships either. We want to be more on the like creative, curious, calm side of our brains when we're looking at this. And so I guess my takeaway that I really that I want to say to everyone is just encouraging them to keep a close eye on themselves and where their energy and attention are going. Give plenty of time and effort to the partner in relationships that are precious to you because our relationships are not silk plants. Like, our relationships bloom in direct correlation to the care that's given them. The relationships with ourselves also really help the relationships that we value. So, and then again, just one more time to continue to challenge how we define the relationship, the success of a relationship. It's very odd in our society and that it must last forever and it must have the same intensity or the same relational dynamic for it to be a success. And that's why Kel's going to pick up from here and talk about why are we so, why do we think that a friendship has failed if it's a different level of intensity than it used to be? Why do we think that a swinger relationship has failed or a quad or a marriage? So we want to keep challenging that idea of what is successful and it not be so binary or linear. Right. Okay. Well, thanks for your time again. And so how can people find expansive connection and Catherine and her team? The easiest way is expansiveconnection.com slash ENM, ethical non-monogamy. That gets you to the whole website. If you just go to expansiveconnection.com, you only get the vanilla side. So that's one way. We are on Instagram, expansive.connection.coaching. And then you can find our events with Devious Dragonfly on her website. That's where you'll find our couples retreat. And please, if you do, if you do peruse our website, sign up for our mailing list. We send out resource shares every month where what our coaches are listening to you. That's how you keep up if we've got ladies' retreats or couples' retreats going on. I'd say we try to make it about 50-50 promotion and also giveaways because we love to nerd out and share our resources with people. Yeah. And if you're in our community or you would like to be in our community, Expansive Connection is also there and you get weekly resources instead of monthly resources. So how about that? Yes. Yes, absolutely. can direct message us in that community and get some, you know, get support. We try to pop into the men's group or the ladies' group when we're invited and be available to the community. We're excited about your single guy initiation community. We're hoping to be involved in that because we think that's just a brilliant idea. And we, of course, want to remind them that the work on the inside is probably just as helpful, if not more, than the work on the six-pack to make you successful a couple. So we are here for that part. Exactly. All right. Well, finally, it's holiday season. And so we're going to be thinking about you and thinking about other people who have had changes and shifts in their relationships and family dynamics during this time of year. We hope you are able to enjoy it with your friends and your family. And again, thank you very much for sharing everything, Catherine. It's really special and we appreciate it. Well, and again, in November, I'm always, always thankful. It's the month my daughter was born. Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays. And so it's so apropos that we're doing, wrapping this up because I could not be more thankful for the two of you and all the ways you've supported my business and my personal journey. So I'm very thankful for you both. Hey, this is Jessica. If this episode stirred something in you, curiosity, comfort, or that quiet, I've been looking for this feeling, don't stop here. Go listen to episode 131, Finding Your Tribe and the We Got a Thing community. It's where the conversations go deeper, connections get real and you discover that this journey was never meant to be taken alone because if you're listening chances are you've got a thing a craving for more honesty more freedom and a space where you feel understood without having to justify who you are and we've got a thing a thriving community built exactly for like-minded couples and individuals ready to explore grow and connect with support that's as deep as the desire that brought you here and come inside, because that thing you've been craving is not just a fantasy, it's a real community, and we're waiting for you. Follow us on at WeGotAThing on Instagram and X, that's W-E-G-O-T-T-A-T-H-I-N-G, for a glimpse into the energy, inspiration, and intention behind everything we do.