It's a candid conversation, one where we strip back the layers of societal expectations and look squarely at the realities of modern marriage. We're not just talking about staying together; we're exploring what it truly means to grow together. Tune in to hear why it's not about keeping score, but rather about nurturing a relationship through communication, understanding, and shared support. Catch our latest episode for an infusion of insight and laughter, and let's continue the conversation on social media. Until next Wednesday, peace, peace.
It's a candid conversation, one where we strip back the layers of societal expectations and look squarely at the realities of modern marriage. We're not just talking about staying together; we're exploring what it truly means to grow together. Tune in to hear why it's not about keeping score, but rather about nurturing a relationship through communication, understanding, and shared support. Catch our latest episode for an infusion of insight and laughter, and let's continue the conversation on social media. Until next Wednesday, peace, peace.
So that's when people say, oh, all men do is protect to provide. No, that's all your man does. Because I see protecting and providing as more than just a physical and a financial thing. I have to provide you with a safe space. I have to provide my daughter with a safe space, right, I have to protect your emotional well-being, your mental. I have to protect her mental well-being. It's not just me going to work, covering the bills and make sure you have food and putting things in place. That's just where it starts, that's not where it ends.
Speaker 2:That's where it starts, hey everybody, welcome back to Life After I Do podcast. I'm your host, nisha G, and I'm here with my husband.
Speaker 1:Mollito.
Speaker 2:Hey, booski's Ronys, hi Bo, that's what me and Phoenix say. We say hey, booski, ronys, I feel like I'm glistening.
Speaker 1:Are you sweating? No, that's the Uncle Butter.
Speaker 2:Oh yes, oh, who is it? I forgot the company we bought it from Uncle Butter.
Speaker 1:It's that same company.
Speaker 2:Is that the name of the company too? Yes, oh, ok, we went to Black on the Block. What was it last year? And it's basically like a market.
Speaker 1:It's all black and excellent.
Speaker 2:Yes, it's a market where it's all black-owned companies black food, like everything and we got some really cool stuff. And one of the things that we picked up was there's Uncle Butter and they also have Auntie Butter, but it's like a multi-purposeful cream, so you can put it in your hair, you can put it in your beard, on your body, and it smells wonderful, smells so good, and it's called Uncle Butter Uncle Butter, for sure, for sure yeah. That's probably why he's glistening. You really like it. Huh, You're almost done with it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm almost done, I got it, I got it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we got it. That'd be nice. Well, how was your week?
Speaker 1:It was cool, you know what I'm saying. Like I just lived my dad and my husband.
Speaker 2:How did you dad?
Speaker 1:That little girl's just be stressing me out, but I love her. You dad, hard Dad dad, dad.
Speaker 2:Did you dad hard.
Speaker 1:Yes, I listened to 1,278 stories about nothing.
Speaker 2:All her stories are important and they're all about it To her they are, they are. Okay.
Speaker 1:They are.
Speaker 2:I mean, I listened to Show Yourself from the Frozen 2 soundtrack.
Speaker 1:But you got to show yourself when I ain't got time. So it is what it is. Which one Ain't got time for messing.
Speaker 2:They're almost there, I was gonna say it ain't calling, I ain't got time.
Speaker 1:I don't know what's wrong, but you know Almost there from the.
Speaker 2:In a nutshell, I had a.
Speaker 1:I had a productive, efficient week. A weekend was tiring.
Speaker 2:I was gonna say yeah like post.
Speaker 1:Super Bowl weekend. My weekend was tiring.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Post Super Bowl was before Last Spot.
Speaker 2:I know, but I'm just saying it's still post Super Bowl weekend because we've been pretty much busy like Since the Friday before Super Bowl, right I was saying We've been on a tear. Yeah, Father, daughter Dan all that stuff.
Speaker 1:As the young folks will say, we've been on a tear.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so, but yeah.
Speaker 1:How you doing Booboo.
Speaker 2:I'm okay, I'm surviving.
Speaker 1:Booskies.
Speaker 2:I'm surviving. You're also serving You're a daughter. Oh, I'm trying a new foundation, so I'm really happy that you've noticed, I was not.
Speaker 1:I was not, I was not Okay.
Speaker 2:But I am trying a new foundation Like what do you think about it?
Speaker 1:I think of like the last one, which was beautiful.
Speaker 2:So I don't know, no, I don't know, no need to spend $70 on it. Huh.
Speaker 1:Is it? Is it? Is it other one cheaper I?
Speaker 2:don't know. I can tell a difference. The other one's 50.
Speaker 1:Oh, ain't got time for that song. That's the best song right now.
Speaker 2:And it's not my style. No, I don't think it's 50. Actually, I think it's like 38. It don't matter.
Speaker 1:You get what you get.
Speaker 2:And you don't throw a fit. I'm going to make a sweater that says you get what you get and you don't throw a fit.
Speaker 1:That's fine I don't know, tick tock shop, bye.
Speaker 2:It'll be up there soon. Yeah. So I mean, my week was, my week was good. Your daughter your daughter is so funny. I had posted a video.
Speaker 2:So she, we were making hot chocolate. She came in and she was like mom. She was like, oh, are you drinking coffee? And I was like yeah. She was like can you make me hot chocolate? And I was like yeah. She was like then we can drink it together and I was like okay. So she's like can I help you make it? And I was like, yeah. So we're getting like all the stuff out for to make hot chocolate and so I get the little pot thing because I'm going to eat up the milk and so I'm putting the milk in there. And I was like, oh, let me put a little bit more in there. I said because sometimes if you let it cook too long, it can like disappear or evaporate. I was like some of it disappears a little bit and she goes, yeah, like poop. And I was like, excuse me. And she was like, yeah, sometimes my poop disappears. And I was like, oh, does it? And she was like, yes. I was like, okay, I'm so interested in hearing.
Speaker 1:Disappear where.
Speaker 2:I'm so interested in hearing this. So the first thing I did is I got my phone and I started recording and I was like Phoenix, so tell me about this disappearing poop? And she was like, yeah, so sometimes you know, you go to the bathroom and your poop disappears. And so in my mind I'm literally thinking to myself, but I know exactly what she's talking about. What is she talking about? Disappearing poop.
Speaker 1:Okay, I don't.
Speaker 2:You've never pooped before. And like after you like cleaned yourself and everything, you turn around and the poop is not there before you flush the toilet. Nope, Well, it happens. And there's people on TikTok who agree with me and know about it, and most of them are moms too, but anyway, most of them agree and everybody knows about disappearing poop. But the fact that my child was just like. She was like yeah, like the milk disappears, just like poop. And so I was like um, I said so does this happen before or after you flush? And she was like no, like it disappears, Like before. And so I said what do you think happens? And she was like I think it's like a witch or something in the something in the toilet that goes abracadabra, poop disappear abracadabra.
Speaker 2:I think it's a witch or something in the toilet. And it goes, abracadabra it goes, abracadabra, poop disappear, wow, and I was like no words.
Speaker 1:I have no words.
Speaker 2:I was like I absolutely love her. I absolutely like she was just dropping gyms like all week. And then, of course, I was having another like semi emotional week, I think, as we get closer to her birthday. And she talks about her birthday every single day, every day. So today when she came home she was like First we went to sam's club when I picked her up from school and she was like mom, I want to invite all my cousins to my birthday. And I was like all your cousins? And she goes okay, only seven, because it's my seventh birthday. And so I was like I was logic. She said I want to invite seven cousins because it's my seventh birthday. Okay, so she's naming the seven cousins that she wants to invite to her birthday.
Speaker 2:So we get home after sam's club and she sits on the couch and she's got like this mopey look on her face and I'm like what's what's going on, like what's the deal? And she goes mom, and I'm like yes, oh, can you make sure I have a great birthday? And I was like it's a little bit, so what makes you think you're not gonna have a great birthday this year? I was like you're gonna have a great birthday, babe, and she was like, okay, and then she was like did I have a um, um, a oneth birthday?
Speaker 1:A oneth like a. What a one month old birthday.
Speaker 2:She was trying to say her first birthday. Oh, because she's turning like a seventh birthday, a sixth birthday, a fifth birthday. So she was like, did I, did I have a oneth birthday?
Speaker 1:Yes, baby.
Speaker 2:I said phoenix. I said she was one of the things that phoenix likes to do is go through all of our our pictures, right? So like I've made her fold like actual physical photo albums, and then she also likes to go through all of the pictures like in my phone. Yeah, so she has seen her her first First birthday pictures like a million times. And so I was like, yes, you had a first birthday, phoenix. And I was like you don't, you don't remember looking at the pictures showing your first birthday? And she was like, yeah, she was like I remember my cake was a unicorn and I was like it was. And so then she cuddles up next to me and she goes Mom, can we look at those pictures together?
Speaker 2:Wow she, she'd be doing too much needless to say, we sat on the couch for a legit like 20 minutes and went through all of her pictures From her first birthday with her commentary. I even have the pictures of when she took a nap on her first birthday, and then she gave me the whole backstory. Like she speaks, like she remembers. I mean she swears to us that she remembers. I Don't know how much she really remember, but I can't say she can't or she can't whatever.
Speaker 2:But got some details right because she's got some details right and like we've looked at each other like how the hell do you know that or how do you remember that? So, but she swears like she remembers, but you know what. That just brings me to something else, because I'm like I really feel like sometimes I underestimate her and when she does something or say something I'd be like, okay, that was my bad, because I looked at you as if, like you shouldn't have known or you didn't know, like as she did. You know what I'm saying? Like okay, for instance today, when I was taking her to school, so last week she has a spelling test like every week, right, and she, like I didn't study her as much as we normally study to prepare her for the spelling test, right, and so in my mind I was like, okay, if she doesn't bring home a great spelling test, like I'm not gonna like, I'm not gonna like come down on her anything, because we didn't study as hard like we studied, but we didn't study as hard as we normally do for the spelling test. So before school I was like I just want to see what I could possibly be expecting when her spelling test comes back home. So I decided to give her a little like practice spelling test of my own. So I gave her the 10 words, I gave her the sentence and she was like, going through the words, like I was saying I mean she, she wrote them out and she was like, okay, next word, next word, and the only word that she kind of like got a little stumbled on will start. So before she gave me the, the paper, she was like mom, I'm pretty sure they're right, except for the word start. I don't really remember that one and so I'm thinking, okay, so I pick up the spelling test. And she got them all right with the exception of the word start. She got the whole sentence right. She used the capital letter in the beginning, her handwriting looks good. She had a period, she used the, she used the question mark. I mean, at the end she got the words right, with the exception to start.
Speaker 2:In my head I was like why did I underestimate her so much? Like I I'd be stepping back sometimes because I have to think that I think I'd be implementing like my own expectations or Thinking about trying to think about myself too much in like her age that she is now, and thinking to myself like, okay, like if she doesn't get it, it's fine, because she's this, she's that. It's like, even when she does something like at dance, when I saw her perfect a move that they've been working on at dance when I was sending all the photos in the family group, I'm just like she wasn't, she wasn't doing that like four weeks ago. She wasn't, she wasn't doing that four weeks ago like those moves. And I'm like looking at her now and I'm like well, dang, like baby girl is looking really good. You know what I'm saying. So, but yeah, but other than that, I've been having a little bit of an emotional week because, like I said, as we get closer to her Seventh birthday, I'm I feel like I'm starting to see, I know it's an August, it's an August, but still it I'm very, very like I mean, she's our only one, right. So A lot of all my emotions not all my emotions, but my motherly emotions are really invested in her, and so the more I look at her, I feel like my, my baby, is getting further and further and further. She's definitely further.
Speaker 2:So as we get closer to seven, like I had posted a video because she was and she was playing dress-up and she put her tutu on and she put like her princess gloves and stuff and she was just like in her kid era and she was Talking to her imaginary friends, twirling around the room and everything. And I was just looking at her and I was like there's gonna be one day where I'm not gonna have Barbies all over the floor. Like she was playing with her toys and her Barbies and stuff we're on the bed and it's like in those moments sometimes I can get super annoyed because it's like I'm trying to keep the house together, I'm trying to keep the house clean. I was doing laundry at the time but I just took a moment and I was like looking at her just be in her zone and her element, and I was like there's gonna come a day where there's not gonna be Barbies around my house and she's not gonna be playing dress-up just for fun and I'm not gonna have to hear or know the lyrics to every new Disney movie soundtrack. Like those days are coming in the closer that we get to seven, I feel like she has.
Speaker 2:She's still a kid, but she's not two anymore and she's not three anymore and you know what I'm saying, because as she gets older it's gonna be something else. Like she would. She turns eight, it's gonna be something with turns nine and she like, for instance, she asked for a brand new bed. She was like, oh, can I get a really big bed for my birthday? I think I want a big girl bed. And I'm like when we bought the big girl and that's what I was thinking I was like when we bought that bed, that was your big girl bed. It was it's her first bed since she's been out of the crib, you know. But it's still a low-profile safety bed. You know what I'm saying? Like it's like a little cute kid princess bed.
Speaker 2:But now she's like no, like, can I get a bed like you and dad, like I can't. Can we step it up a little bit? And I'm just like you're only seven, calm down. So I want to hop into what we were talking about last week. So we were talking about I Mean the title of episode from last week was why did I get married? But it was also centered around like what was it? Women being able to tolerate more, and that's how Longevity in marriage is like, classified, with women being more tolerable. And there was a lot more that Was stated like inside that, but I kind of just wanted us to Elaborate a little bit more and talk about that more and see if you had any new ideas or Anything else to add to last week's conversation.
Speaker 1:I Don't have anything, necessarily the ad. Sorry to catch you off guard. You catch me off guard you know I normally just respond to what you're saying. Give my honest.
Speaker 2:Opinion opinion. Well, let's go ahead and roll the clip straight from the mouth oh man, let's just go ahead and roll the clip right now, yeah, are you being so we? Can, so we can like refresh what the clip was.
Speaker 3:When I hear long marriages, a lot of these women have put up with so much just to say that they stayed married at the end.
Speaker 3:What of what does anybody really gain outside of a title and and for the?
Speaker 3:Specifically for the woman, because it's the women who are having the complaints and it is the women who need to be full and whole To be able to do what the nature of the feminine is to do, which is to nurture and Sustain life.
Speaker 3:If you take the life away from a woman and you deplete her, there's only so much she can give after that, and typically when a male has gotten everything that he wants out of her, he might not end the marriage. He might not end the marriage which is mainly a lot of the times why the divorces are on women to actually initiate and go through but he might not end the marriage. He may go get his needs met from other places Right and sustain that marriage while she's in a relationship by herself. Now the time might be ticking and ticking and ticking to say, oh, I've been married, this, that the other one. But it's just so many women who are disgruntled and unhappy with these setups because they all have the same complaints and the marriage, the divorce statistics actually reflect these complaints. So how do we, says, how do we promote a, a marriage where the heavy Coaching is basically on the woman and not enough coaching on what the male is to do, because if a woman wants to be married, she can be married?
Speaker 2:Okay, so what are what remind me of what your thoughts were? I don't agree any to the clip.
Speaker 1:I don't agree. I think that goes both ways and I think a lot of times I don't. What I think statistics cannot show is that a lot of times people get married just to say they have a title. Sometimes people get married just for the title and you're not pair bonding with the person did you need to be pair bonding with or the person you actually want to be pair bonding with. A lot of times, people, especially when they get older and up in age, they'll they'll settle for you know what's available, and not necessarily because it's not the one they want. You know, I'm saying, a lot of times people don't take marriage seriously and I think that's really the reason why. Why the the divorce? What rates are as high as they are? And then a lot of times, women are initiating reward Divorce is more than men because as men, as men, we're problem solvers.
Speaker 1:We're not gonna, we're not a lot of times of, you're not just gonna give up, we're gonna try, we're gonna see every avenue possible before we'll just give up. That's I think. That's built in most of them. I'm not gonna say all me, but mostly good men, most good men. It's okay. Yeah, I entering this. I entered this into this union. For a reason. I saw her, as you know, my forever person. I'm going to do what I have to do, or what I what I deem is necessary to make it work, and a lot of times that's why you know it takes so long before a man to initiate divorce, like I cuz, and you know I can say that from personal experience with with people I know and In other things I've seen. Like, yeah, and a lot of times you know these women are. I know cases where women are asking for divorce or giving divorce because they got married under false pretenses. Anyway, they just wanted, they just wanted the title.
Speaker 2:Frost pretenses like right on like they.
Speaker 1:They got married because, because they thought things would be different once they were married. And then, when things and when and when things are not different, you know what I'm saying? Are they got married because of the child? Are they got married because of whatever the case may be? But the problem is that some people think that once you're married, the problems go away. It's not going to solve what's wrong, just like having a kid is not going to repair, it's not going to bring you closer, it's just going to complicate the situation. And that's the same thing with marriage.
Speaker 1:A lot of people think that, oh well, I love them, I love them, I love them. I mean, I have love for them. I may not be necessarily in love with them, but I'm going to marry them anyway. I can grow to love them, the whole concept of grow to love. But the thing is that you already have, you've already seen the red flags or you've already seen things or characters that you don't like, that you don't, that you don't necessarily can take, but you still go forward with their marriage anyway. And you're doing it. You're doing it for the title, you're doing it for what you can gain, and now there's two, three years down the road. Now you're miserable because it's not something that you want to start with, like sisters. Don't take those kind of marriages into account.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:So the women who marry for money? The stats don't show that. The stats just show that a woman initiated a divorce. That's why you can't always look at numbers and take them completely at face value.
Speaker 2:Okay. So would your perspective change a bit if I told you that 54% of women who divorce say that they would not remarry?
Speaker 1:No, it wouldn't change.
Speaker 2:Okay. So with this clip in particular, just a little bit of the backstory. The topic of discussion from that clip was how she was basically challenging the norms of the nuclear family right, having men and women live in the same household, raising children. The backstory to that is how men are basically so incompatible with women that we shouldn't cohabitate together under the same roof because of how women are inherently nurturers, men are inherently hierarchical how do you say it Hierarchical? But anyway, just like the tone and energy of men and the tone and energy of women, they clash.
Speaker 2:And so she's basically trying to challenge that norm that we could co-parent children. Hold on, that we could co-parent children, but it's not necessary for men and women to live in the same household. And also that marriage is more beneficial to men than it is to women. And I think the part that I really want to dig deep in and talk about is the portion in which she talks about. There's a portion in there that in that episode that she talks about, where women, when she hears men talk about longevity in a marriage and when she hears a man who says that he's been married for 20 years, 30 years, 40 years, that doesn't make her ears perk up. She said it does nothing for her because she understands that what the woman had to go through to sustain the relationship is not the same that the man has to go through. I disagree with that.
Speaker 1:It's the same thing because we are not the same. We know that, yes, we are not the same. Yes, and she can't quantify the emotional and mental state that a man goes through being a husband and maintaining a marriage for 20 plus years. She can't quantify that because she's not a man. All she can speak of is whatever statistical facts that she has right. That we can't prove. We don't know if they have bases behind it. We don't know who they surveyed, how many, how many. We don't know the sample pool, we don't know the sample size, we don't know the sample duration. There's too many factors to generalize the institution of marriage, because throughout time there's been successful marriages and there's been not successful marriage. You know what I'm saying. There's been marriages that last generations on top of generations on top of generations, because those people who got together they were really for each other, and that changes the whole dynamic of everything.
Speaker 2:So it's almost like. I think what you're trying to say too is almost like when you ask someone how do you know you're in love? It's going to be different for everybody. Why would you say that? You don't want to say it with a TikTok? Why would you say that? Because now it's going to seem super random if we don't give context about it. You don't want to say it with a TikTok. That's the first thing I thought about. Okay, now we got to get off into a tangent and then I'm going to lose my train of thought, because this is what he does. But now I feel the need to explain why. I just said that. If you guys heard what he said.
Speaker 1:They might not even heard, it doesn't matter.
Speaker 2:And if they did hear, then they're going to be like what did he just say? So, anyway, there was a TikTok that I had sent him. See, now we're getting into a tangent. There was a TikTok that I had sent him and it was a video of this girl video taping her boyfriend and she was asking her boyfriend. I feel like when we talked about it before, but she was video taping her boyfriend and she was asking her boyfriend. How did he know? Let me do it.
Speaker 1:No, let me do it, let me do it. Let me do it. No, let me finish. She was pretty much asking her boyfriend how did he know he loved her?
Speaker 2:He loved her.
Speaker 1:Right and essentially he said that the bang bang wasn't that great. That's how he knew.
Speaker 2:No, that's not what he said. See, now let me finish.
Speaker 1:She said that her lady bits wasn't that great. That's how he knew he loved her because he still wanted to say but he had to go back to the top of her talking about. There's a lot of men out there that will accept the 80 because they know it's going to be damn near impossible to get the 20 or part of that 20. It's the whole 80 20 rule.
Speaker 2:Okay, but it's impossible to get the 20.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:So like the 20 by leaving the 80.
Speaker 1:Right, but what I'm saying is we got 20 and now what I'm saying is in the example of that TikTok you sent me. That was hilarious. She had the 80 and he was on the lift without the 20.
Speaker 2:But that 20 is also like, anyway any who? Now I forgot my train of thought, but anyway I just I want to ask you that?
Speaker 1:what I was saying was listen. Here You're trying to summarize my thoughts and woman talk.
Speaker 2:Okay, I still don't know, but anyway I do want to ask you this.
Speaker 2:Okay, because she also talks about how the majority of essentially like compromise has been placed on women, and then it kind of talks a little bit about, you know, how that can be really aligned with the type of male traits that women pick up like from males. So what are your thoughts about? Women take on more than men do. So if you have women who carry the child, have to take care of the child majority of the time, still taking care of the household, still having to provide an income, still having to be a supportive partner, still having to satisfy a man sexually, still having to manage and stroke a man's ego, do all of those things and then what society predominantly wants from men is to protect and provide. So women are expected to do all of X, y and Z, which goes into what she was talking about how marriage is more beneficial to men than it is to women. That's why she was talking about women don't get a lot out of marriage, not as much the men do. What do you? How do you feel about that?
Speaker 1:And I to that was. I would say that society has tried to narrow the scope of what protect would protect and provide means.
Speaker 2:Narrow the scope yes.
Speaker 1:And they try to. They try to not cover everything that it encumbers like what to protect them, to provide right.
Speaker 2:Because you're not protecting me from lions. Okay, I'm just saying.
Speaker 1:But if we were in public and someone hit you, you would expect me to step up and say to do something.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:Yes. So my mere presence with you, around the people, protects you. Right, because they have to think twice, because they know that you have someone in front of you that will protect you. Correct, right, and that's not something I can switch off. Correct, that's not something that I can just not do. Correct, right, you can take weeks off from doing housework and cooking.
Speaker 2:Not really, because you.
Speaker 1:If you choose to. I'm not saying I would pick up the stack. I mean, if you need me to, I would, but I'm not saying that things wouldn't get done. I said but these are certain things that you can go without doing.
Speaker 2:But you said for like weeks, because what I would say is, how often? Sorry, but I mean, hey, you can be off track with what you said.
Speaker 1:Okay, I'm not talking, but but I'm Okay, I'm talking in generalities now, right, Okay.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:Things that you can do as far as taking care of the house, things in the house, things that they would consider a wifely duties, that you can turn off. Right, that you can turn off. You just ain't got it in you today, right, but you don't believe that.
Speaker 2:No, I would just go ahead, right.
Speaker 1:As your husband, as your protector, as her father as her protector. These are roles I can never switch off. These are jobs that I can never take a vacation from. I have to be on guard 24, seven, right.
Speaker 1:And that protecting you, when done correctly, doesn't Does not mean just physical threats when it comes, when it pertains to my family, I am supposed to protect my family for not from the physical and the mental threats of society, right, I am supposed to bear the weight and the responsibility of everyone's life and the pressure and the weight that that carries Do not discount the weight of those things. So I have to carry the weight of all those things and then, when you feel as if you are having a bad time or she's having a bad time, I have to step in and now cater to your needs directly, for whatever your needs is in that moment, outside the greater needs of protecting and providing for you. So that's when people say, oh, all men do is protect the provider. No, that's all your man does, because I see protecting and providing as more than just a physical and a financial thing. I have to provide you with a safe space. I have to provide my daughter with a safe space. Right, I have to protect your emotional well-being, your mental. I have to protect her mental well-being.
Speaker 1:It's not just me going to work, covering the bills and make sure you have food and putting things in place. That's just where it starts, that's not where it ends, that's where it starts so from. That's why I say being a man is a selfless job that you get no appreciation for. I'm somehow being a good man I'm not talking about being a deadbeat when you are a good man and you go out there and you provide and protect. Now I'm providing and I'm protecting. Now you want to say that's all you do. So now you want to belittle what I do Because you're going to say what I'm doing doesn't weigh as much or not as important, as much as what the mother does, which just again will show that that is false.
Speaker 1:That's what is false that what I do is not more, is less than what you do. Because if that was the case, the statisticians of single mother household with boys and with girls the girls with the daddy issues, the boys with unchecked emotions and leadership the product that a single mother household produces based on statistics that's what she likes to go to all the time is not, that does not measure up to the same product that a single father household produces. So I don't want to don't sit here and discount what I do as a man because you can't quantify or appreciate it, because you don't. You don't see the world and you don't see the dangers in the, in what I do from a male perspective. Right, I understand, as a man, that violent is always around the corner, right, and I understand that there are some men that can check the violence that's inside them, and there's some men there's not. And regardless of whether you can or cannot, I have to be ready and on guard to protect my family and what is mine at all times.
Speaker 1:It is a job that never stops. It is a job that you never stop worrying about whether you're completing that task properly and efficiently. It is something that never, ever ends, just how you always say a mother work is never done, a father in a husband's job is never done. I go out and I work. I provide so that you can rest easy at night, so you don't worry about if someone comes in here at night. Who's?
Speaker 2:going to? Who's going?
Speaker 1:to protect you. You don't worry about how you're going to get X, y and Z. That's my worry, even when I know that the ends, if the ends ain't meeting this month, you don't know when they ain't meeting until they can, until they completely night at a meeting Because you don't know the Titanic is sinking until you see the water on the deck.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but I mean, I wouldn't want to be put in a position.
Speaker 1:That's just a hypothetical thing.
Speaker 2:But I'm just saying some people do operate like that and then it's like you can't. For me that's not provision. That's not provision. Telling me that we've already hit the iceberg and now we're one deck to sinking, that's not provision.
Speaker 1:That's just. That's just and that's understandable in your eyes. Some people want one of your blinks, right, ignorance with the blinks Some people want. But what I'm saying is as your husband. I'm not talking personal.
Speaker 2:Now you're talking personal.
Speaker 1:As your husband, as her father, you are protected in more ways than just physical. You are protected mentally. I'll tell you straight up all the time I don't care if it's your mama, your sister, your daddy I'll tell you that ain't right and I'm not going to allow it. And I will, you know real quick. You have a. You have that nurturing and loving thing where you are willing and easily forgiving to some people and you let people push you. And when I see you letting people push you, that's when I step in and say you need to stop this. That's another way. That's another way of me protecting you that has nothing to do with me physically protecting you.
Speaker 2:That's me protecting you for what this could lead to so like protecting me from myself, yes, or my own actions, yes.
Speaker 1:Because you're allowing other people to manipulate you or not necessarily manipulate you. You're allowing other people to use you in a way that is not beneficial to you and that down the road, it's going to affect you mentally. So a lot of times I have to step in and say no. Like I tell you all the time, I don't mind being the bad guy. I can be the bad guy all day. I don't care. Because, like I always tell you, the only opinions that matter to me are you and my child.
Speaker 2:Okay, so let's okay, so let's talk in general. Do you still think that that's how most men operate?
Speaker 1:Like how you say it. I think any good man thinks that way. Okay, Any good man understands that it's me and my wife and my and technically it's me and my wife against the world. That includes your children.
Speaker 2:Okay, so what about.
Speaker 1:That includes your children, your adult children, okay, right, because sometimes I have to protect you from our own daughter, because sometimes listen, I'm not talking about physically, because she's not healthy physically, but sometimes she has a way of hitting the nerves and pushing you to your limits mentally, where you can't, when you start to lose yourself, because she's a kid, right, because she's a kid Like a couple weeks ago with the homework, where I had to step in, because that's me protecting you, that's me saying, hey, you knew, even though I was a little upset, which is, like I said, that you didn't tap me sooner.
Speaker 1:But that's part of protecting. Part of protecting is not only protecting you physically, but protecting you emotionally and mentally, and I believe that any good man will do the same for his wife or his woman. It's about being a husband, and being a good provider is putting your woman in the most comfortable position possible. Okay, right. And if you're not able to do that and you have and if you're not able to do that at the current time, you're going outside your roles to be useful, because, as a man, we innately have to be useful. We want to be useful, right, that's part of our DNA, right? So we're going to do what we have to do to feel as if we belong.
Speaker 2:Elaborate on that. What do you mean? Do what you have to do to feel like you belong.
Speaker 1:We're gonna. We're gonna take up the roles and responsibilities that we feel are required of us and necessary of us so that we Obtain that image, of that image from you of that we're good leaders, that we uphold that.
Speaker 2:Oh, like to make it basically to make yourself more attractive amongst the herd right right.
Speaker 1:So we're gonna. We're gonna do what's what is. We're gonna do what is required, and it and and. When you can't do what's required, a lot of times we will overstep and do things, go above and beyond to feel them for what we're lacking, while trying to achieve that of what we're lacking. So, as the the progress of being a man, a good man, is always bettering yourself, not for yourself, but for the benefit of your wife and your children.
Speaker 2:So, okay, when we look at, like, the divorce rate, right, and then we hear that big question of like what's what's the purpose in marriage, or what's the reason for marriage, and we look at the divorce rate and we see that the divorce rate is over 50% If men are intended to be leaders and women are intended to be helpers. But women are filing for a divorce at a faster rate Than men are, and 54% of women have said that they will not remarry once they divorced. Are we attributing that to they're just not being enough good men? No, because, like how you just said, you're no like so. So what do you think contributes to that?
Speaker 1:again, this is like like I, like I. I agree with what I heard the other day and I think this has been part of it. I'm not saying this is for everyone right.
Speaker 1:So you, speaking generally speaking, in general, when you have a young lady that comes from a single parent household, nine times out of ten that's a mother and they've seen their mother do everything Be the provider, be the protector, all that right. They are not taught how to Then be in a subservient role, are a submissive role because their use of seeing their mother always in charge you said this all yourself. You come from a single family. A dynamic. I come from a dynamic to where I was in a two-parent household, right, and it wasn't a. The dynamic of my grandfather was a In total control. God knows if anyone who knows my, knows my family, knows my upbringing, they know that my grandmother's word had had weight. That's what I always say the the person who is in the family.
Speaker 2:They say the the person who is in a quote-on quote submissive role.
Speaker 1:They're usually the one who has the control and granted, she didn't necessarily live a what they would deem now a soft life, because you know she did have employment. But you got to think it's a time, the time, the times are different. It was, you know, 40, 50, 60s and they had, they had that, children that they care of and everybody did their, did their part. But, that being said, when my grandmother said something, she was heard. She, it was Her. Her thoughts, her concerns were heard. And not only were they heard.
Speaker 1:My grandfather's actions was always for the betterment of his family, not himself, right, and that has more to say about his character, and that's what I always say. A lot of times people get married based off of what things appear and not the character of that person, because we can see us now as, as as older, older adults. We know now what we thought we were looking for and what was important to us has changed in our eight, when we were in our teenage years, and our twenties have changed. I think we were just blessed enough to find that person, or that, that soulmate that we we meshed good, that we could actually evolve together. A lot of times people are taking their upbringing because that's all they know, and then when they move that into marriage, they're going off of what they've seen doing their growing While they're raised, so taking it as their bible, right, right. So if you weren't raised in a household when there was a marriage, how do you know how to be married? What is your example?
Speaker 2:But I think that goes for men and women too. It goes both ways, I mean, because it's like it goes, it does go both ways.
Speaker 1:But, like I said before, I feel like a lot of people Most of the people that get married and then obviously get divorced divorce soon after, when it's not dealing with infidelity or anything like that, like the quick turnarounds are people who just got married for the title. Now I feel a lot of times when it's later on and the marriage has been around five, six, seven, eight years and you start getting through that rough patch, it's because people are not Either emotionally available enough or more or more emotionally and sure enough to actually have the hard conversations and get to the root of problems. So a lot of times we live in a day, because we live in a day and age, where everything is so accessible. So a lot of times people feel like, oh, it's easy for me to go get this over here then to repair what's here.
Speaker 1:Like I don't have to because it was yeah, like it's, it's easy for me Just to like cut this out and go get what I think it is that I really want and I think the difference is it's that on top of the times right, because because of the internet and everybody seems so accessible, you can always you know, you got millions of you know Suders in your phone and monogamy is on the bottom there if that's what you're looking for.
Speaker 1:You know I'm saying it is. It is a different time. We come from a time you know where, um, you know you pretty much only associated with people you want the school with or that were friends of your cousins from other. You know I'm saying we we didn't have this dynamic of I can get on my phone right now and Conversate with someone across the country and and build some type of bond this way. Yeah, you know I'm saying so. We actually had to um, go out, talk to people, interact, build those relationships, naturally through time and and through time in conversation and and we would actually, you know, from speaking for my grandparents, they, they lived in time where they worked together to make it work. You know, because, when I look at them, like they were married at their 16, 15, 60 married.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that was a completely different right, completely different time, but they got together and they made it. They made it work, yeah.
Speaker 2:Unlike your elaborations, gill all right walls. I think, basically what it comes down to in a nutshell. It's like Both men and women, we both have our own crosses to bear right, and I think it's always going to be one of those things that One side either will sometimes feel like they're giving more than the other, or one side will feel like they're responsibilities and compromise outweigh the other sides, and that's where you get this quote on quote Gender war.
Speaker 1:Well, that's, but that's people understand. That's life. Right? You don't walk into work every day at 100%? Right? You expect to what wake up every day in a marriage at 100%?
Speaker 2:Listen here, some people do.
Speaker 1:That's not reality. Some people do. Some days you're gonna wake up and I only got. I got 60 and I just need you to carry that 40. And if you ain't got that 40, I'm at the point now where I'm mature enough to know Well, hey, maybe, maybe we got Our day, maybe we got to roll with the 90, we go, we go, we go, make it to what it is.
Speaker 2:This week ain't our week, and we'll try again in 30 days, we don't, we go make it do what it do.
Speaker 1:That's the thing. People think that there's going to be rough times. Yeah, regardless of how compatible you are, yeah, regardless of how much you love each other, regardless how much time you spend together, you are going to see something. Something's not going to be eye to eye right, and that's Part of the work we always talk about and that's the part where people need to understand that, hey, it's not me versus you, it's us versus the problem or the issue, right.
Speaker 1:That's that, and that's a lot of a lot of times. And you really only have an issue if the other side don't want to address the problem. That's when you have the issue. But when you have two people working together to address the issue the actual issue, the actual elephant in the room that's something worth fighting for, right, and a lot of times people don't want to fight for things because they don't want to feel as if they're doing more than the other or they don't want to look at themselves, to take accountability and be able to say you know what you might be, you might be right, there might be some truths to what you're saying about me, or what you feel is not going right, because accountability goes a long way.
Speaker 2:Right on, both sides but. But it can feel like an attack too, so you know.
Speaker 1:I always. I always feel like if you feel like I'm gonna speak for me, I'm not gonna. I always feel like, when it comes to you, whenever I feel like I'm being attacked, and I sit back and listen to it. I buy, she wasn't attacking me, I was just in my feelings, because she was right, because you agreed on something and I and I need to own, I need, I need to own that shit, but that's part of me growing.
Speaker 2:I was gonna say yeah, because that now that has to do with you. That's not you know so longer has anything to do with me.
Speaker 1:That has everything to do with you and I think that that that's something people need to go do, both male and female. You have to do the work on yourself. Yeah, you have to have a self-account ability to understand and realize that a lot of these problems it ain't about me, it's about what I did and it's not about it's not always trying to shine a light on what your partner is doing.
Speaker 2:That's affecting your attitude, but it could also be your approach. It could be how you're internalizing something. It could be your thought process on something. It's not necessarily that your life will be better if they did x, y and z, because because if you can say like, if If you like you could have done better or you can do better, then you can do better too as the person right and, as you said, that made me think about this A while back.
Speaker 1:I used to think of a oil. She's not doing this, this, this for me, so I ain't gonna do this distance for her that's keeping score right and you know, I had to mature to the point where it's like I have. Maybe I should just go ask her why she's not doing this, instead of just assuming she's purposely doing this. And then when we start having those conversations and things change. We start to have longer stretches where everything was okay and then something like serious had to happen for us to have a fall.
Speaker 2:Now, right you know we get off track and then we have to get back on track through a conversation To bring it back to each other's forefront. So I mean it's track last night. Oh don't start, gil. Oh Don't. Now for our two cents. Let's go ahead and wrap this up. Final stop you now. So for today, for today, on our two cents would you say Huey pop, lock and drop it. This one is titled. Husband wants me to watch baby all day and also get a night job.
Speaker 1:Yeah okay. I mean he's gonna watch the baby all night.
Speaker 2:Oh listen, I'm still on unpaid maternity leave and have been watching the baby every day while he works, and then on the weekdays, I'm the only one who gets up through the night to feed and change the baby because, quote-unquote, he works and can't be tired in the mornings from waking up to do all of that. We both work for the same company and I'm supposed to return to work on the 28th, but he tells me I shouldn't return to that job because I have to watch the baby during the day and he wants me to get a night job instead. So I'd be watching the baby all day, then leaving to go do a night job that, let's just say, ends around midnight, come home, then get up throughout the night to change and feed the baby and start that all over again while he gets to go to his regular job and come home. And I'm running around 24-7 just to try and cover my bills that he hasn't helped me with while I've been on maternity leave.
Speaker 2:I've used all my savings to cover my half of the rent and my bills this past month and I feel like I'm in over my head when I told him today. I feel like it's unfair. I'm the one who has to leave my job and find a night job while taking care of the baby all day. He just said that he didn't want to art, that I just wanted to argue and he hung up the phone in my face All the while. When I do stay home, he says I don't do enough and taking care of a baby is not that hard and it's actually quite easy, and that I should be doing more like cleaning the house, vacuuming and organizing and doing laundry because, quote-unquote, it doesn't take three hours a day to watch a baby. He wow, any advice?
Speaker 1:This is my advice. That one this is my advice job this is my advice Friday night when he gets off work if he doesn't work weekends if he doesn't work weekends, put the baby down, leave.
Speaker 2:Give him the baby leave leave for at least four hours.
Speaker 1:No, no, no, four hours. Come back Sunday night and see how much you got.
Speaker 2:And I and I would come back and be like I didn't dirty, not dance crazy. Cook nothing, so everything that's here. I would leave his butt with the baby in a clean house.
Speaker 1:I'll say this like I was blessed enough to spend a lot of time with our child once she was still in diapers to a baby and you know, I, I got all. I got all three stages. I got worse. It weren't where she couldn't move, then I had it when she was crawling, then I had it when she was running. And I will say that, like I always say, what you do, I would not do, I have no interest in doing, I don't want to do. And now we only got one. It is, it is work. He's tripping, taking care of a child.
Speaker 2:It's not that difficult taking care of a child and being attentive to that child and I think that's what it is right.
Speaker 1:He don't understand that this is somebody that you have to entertain for 18 hours a day not eight, not 18 hours, not entertain.
Speaker 2:Yes, 18 hours like it sounds like there, because she's still on maternity leave, though Not even that then he's not.
Speaker 1:He's making you pay half the rent you got his child. Well, this is what I talked about earlier when I said people begin this situation they don't need to be in, but it sounds like before they had kids, it what that's what it sounds like.
Speaker 2:It sounds like everything was split Kind of 50-50, because that's how it was before they had children. But now that they have a child and she's on unpaid maternity leave, so and yeah, she says her husband I was gonna say I don't know if they are married, but yes, they are married because it's her husband, but she's on unpaid maternity leave and she's depleted her savings.
Speaker 2:Yeah her say, to pay her bills. So now she's also getting behind on her bills because he's also not assisting her with covering the bills but telling her she needs to get a night job.
Speaker 1:I normally try to sign with the fellow.
Speaker 2:I don't know if he likes you.
Speaker 1:That's you. This is what I say. Do? I'm not sure he likes. This is what I say. Do, ma'am, just go ahead and leave. Bibery, listen to me, go ahead and leave, take the baby with you. So now, when he's paying the child support, now he can work all day and all night.
Speaker 2:So he wants they once they start garnishing this page. So then he'll understand that. You know what maybe I should have, just Maybe I should have just maybe said a couple of gave her some grace. I think that's so weird too when people like when men refer to watching their own children as babysitting. It's your child, you're not baby. You're not like baby sitting. A random stranger Don't work at a daycare, it is your kid.
Speaker 1:That's wild.
Speaker 2:I thought you would like that one. I said I'm gonna read this one to my husband because I think he's gonna like this Wild, is that wild?
Speaker 1:I was like, if you saw my facial reaction, we just read and then like, when she said I gotta pay my house.
Speaker 2:Pick your hand Now. Here's the thing, though Turn what. What is he doing? I am trying to, like you know, play devil's advocate. Yes, if they, if they, if their original arrangement. Oh yes because some people know listen, because some married couples do keep money completely separate. I know that there's some people who do the whole combined thing and then you know we all get like an allotted whatever she's Listen you're, she bared your child.
Speaker 2:I know, but we also suck. We have discussed in the past that some men don't view that as such a big, like a big thing like a lot of.
Speaker 2:There's a, it sucks, but there's a lot of men who have, who are on the air of like, okay, so you had a baby, like Like many women have babies, and I don't understand why you feel like you need this special treatment. That's because that's basically what he's saying. He's like, okay, you had a baby and Okay, so now you can go back to work. I need you to get a night job so you can be here with your baby and take care of your baby during the day. Then you can still contribute to the household by going to work at night. And then I need to get my rest because I can't do too many things at one time and I can only work, so no, no okay you are Responsible for 50% of raising that child.
Speaker 2:He will say that she's responsible for 50% of the bills.
Speaker 1:Okay, that's what happened, okay so here's what we're gonna do. That's what we're gonna do. If you want to be paid like that, fine, okay. So you, I'm a watch the kids for 12, for the first 12 hours of the day, while you at work, all me, I'm gonna go get this part-time job, work four hours, and when I come home, no, ain't I worth this to you right.
Speaker 2:I was gonna say now does it have to be a full time? But if she's got to cover her own bills, obviously she has to work full time. I mean, look or go somewhere and try to get fired and collect unemployment, I don't know. Anyway, this has been another episode of life after I do podcast. If you are not currently following us on social media, you can follow us on Instagram at life after I do, at life after I do podcast. You can follow us on YouTube, on Facebook and on Tiktok at life after I do podcast. If you have any topics that you want us to discuss or if you feel like you want some advice on something, feel free to reach out to us at life after our new podcast at gmailcom. We will love to hear from you guys and, as always, you will be getting a new episode on Wednesday, okay, peace peace.