This is doctor Wendy Walsh, and you're listening to kf I Am six forty,
the Doctor Wendy Waalsh Show on demand on the iHeartRadio appf I Am six
forty. You've got doctor Wendy Walsh with you. This is the Doctor Wendy
Walsh Show. Now, I'd like to welcome my Instagram audience. Hi everybody,
If you'd like to come into the studio here at iHeartRadio, just log
onto my Instagram. The handle is at doctor Wendy Walsh. All right.
So a reminder, I'm a psychology professor, not a therapist, but I'm
obsessed with the science of love and I did a dissertation on attachment theory and
I've written three books on relationships. So hey, I've got a lot of
life experience. Let me weigh in on your love life. Okay, Producer
Kayla, who do we have on the line. We have Mike with a
question. Mike. Hi, Mike, It's doctor Wendy, Doctor Wendy.
This is Mike from Riverside, California. Hi, Mike from Riverside. What's
your question? Yeah? Well, and I don't want to argue with you.
I just want to, uh, Sometimes when I listen to you on
the radio, it seems like you think marriage should have an expiration date on
it. When you get married married for forty two years, Ah, congratulations,
and you know it's the anniversary of her passing. Oh. I just
think you're wrong. Smtimes when you just say, well, you know,
we didn't live that long before, so it's just natural to have two or
three marriages, and I, well, I think I don't agree with that.
Well, what I think is that my language is many people may find
themselves having two or three long stints of monogamy or marriage because of their long
life expectations. You are one of the lucky people who naturally had a secure
attachment style and was able to stay married for forty two years. But for
those who weren't able to I don't want them to feel shame. I don't
like them to hear the term failed marriage is if they're a failure and you
were, you might are successful. You're successful because you I had good,
loving parents who loved you, and you learned to accept love, and you
learned to give love, and you built a wonderful, secure relationship for forty
two years. But not everybody has those tools that you had, and I
don't want them walking around with shame that they're trying over and over again to
figure it out. So thank you for letting me clarify that, Mike,
And I'm sorry it sounds like you lost your spouse, but it sounds like
it was just a joyful few decades. So thank you for calling. All
Right, who do we have next? I made mis pronounce this and I
apologize, but we have Yara with a question? Yara? Did I say
that right? Is it? Yara? Yeah? Hi, that's doct you
Wendy. Hi. Well, I'm just calling to ask for a little advice.
I met a wonderful man and he wanted to see me every day.
We saw each other for four days in a row. On Friday he was
yeah, super nice. On Friday he was tired, so I went out
to have dinner with a friend. Are they I do my regular yoga.
We went to brunch and I did not talk to him the rest On Saturday.
He did text me and call me, but I was not available.
So I'm here in the home. You met a guy a week ago,
you saw him four days in a row, you took one night off,
then you saw him for brunch, So what's the question. He wants to
see me, but he cannot make plans, So I say, text me
or call me whenever you can make plans. Ah, yeah, that's fine.
That's setting up a boundary. I also think, Yara, that seeing
a new person four days in a row is a little too much too soon,
all right, So slow down that and you're doing it. It sounds
like you're doing it the right way by saying, hey, dude, I
can't just like it sounds like he's calling and going, hey, you want
to get together this afternoon or want to get together tonight and no, no,
no. You can say I'm sorry, I have plans. Let me
know what night you're available. We can book it for next week. And
that's cool. I think you're doing the right thing. So slow that boat
down. I don't want to see too much too fast for you. Thanks
for calling you. Rah okay, producer, Kayla. Who do we have
next? Do you have? Mary? With the question? Mary? Hi
Mary, it's doctor Wendy, Hi doctor Indie. This is Mary from Arizona.
Hi Mary, Arizona. What's your question? I have a question.
My question is I broke up with my boyfriend for eight months ago and we
had no contact, and we are both mature. I am forty five fifty
three, and we are both highly educated, so we had zerto contact that
time. But I'm still in love with him and I think he is.
He reached me out a few days ago for Persian new We are to greet
me for persion you here, et cetera. And then we had a After
a few texts, we had a conversation and I asked him, let's meet
because the baby broke up after one year relationship. It was just text and
voice on WhatsApp, so I really didn't have closure for myself, right.
So now we're going to meet each other soon in the next couple of days.
And I really don't know why did you break up? So wait,
you dated him for a year eight months ago you broke up. He now
reaches out to you. You didn't contact, nobody, had any contact for
eight months. He reaches out to you to wish you happy person New Year,
and now you're going to meet to have closure. But you did just
tell me that you're still in love with him, So is this really about
closure or rekindling for you? I would like to get connected because I think
we both are good people, and why did you break up? Why did
you break up? The breakup was because the reason where I am actually initiated
a little bit as a frustration, not really meaningfully. You did the girls
saying a lot of women trying to break up with a guy to bring him
closer. Yes, exactly, you laid down the gardlet he went away.
All right, So here's what I here's the advice I want to give you.
First of all, what's your question? Should you try to rekindle?
How to how to initiate the discussion? Because he told me you asked me
to me, so probably he's expecting me I start the conversation. Why don't
you start by telling him the truth? Why don't you say to him?
Mary, I have to share something with you. I was feeling frustrated and
I actually broke up with you to try to bring you closer, And then
I realized how much I've missed you. Just tell him the truth. See
what happens, novel thing the truth? Thanks for calling Mary? All right?
Who do we have next? Do you have? Mel with a question?
Mal? Hi? Mal? It's doctor Wendy. Are you doing tonight?
Hi? Mail from Los Angeles? What's your question? You sound like
you're on a Los Angeles freeway. I am. I'm on the two tree,
on the two ten. Okay, what's your question? All right,
So, so, pretty much recently, well not recent, maybe like about
three years ago, I broke up with somebody that I that I met at
work while I was in a relationship with, you know, the mother of
my kids, and now she's my fiance, so you know, pretty much
stepped out of the relationship, cheated on my girlfriend. Then I try to
break things off with this girl. Yeah, I'll I'll say responsibility, you
know, trying to break this big break things off with the word girlfriend or
whatever. And I guess she started she started kind of like threatening me to
because at first everything was okay, yeah, I know you're married pretty much
and that you have a girlfriend. Ball us trying to pretty much just some
kind of what do you call that porn revenge where she kept threatening me I'm
gonna send this to her, and I was just like, what, okay,
so I can get this clear. Wait, I want to make sure
I understand this now. So you were you're married, you've got kids,
you had an affair, you broke up with this girl, and now she's
threatening to send porn to your wife and blow up your marriage. Well she
this was three years ago, was like two years ago when it happened,
right, Okay, she ended up doing it, right, she did it?
Oh yeah, yeah, she did it. Yeah, she did it.
And then you know my my my girlfriend at that time now she's my
fiancea she told me, hey, this is what I got. I never
talked to the girl again. Right, I never talked to her again.
And I feel guilty because I know how much I hurt you know, my
my my, my wife or whatever. Yeah so so, but but and
I hate to say it, but it was like a weight off my shoulders,
right yeah, because there's no secrets. Yeah exactly. So everything is
fine. Actually, things between me and my girlfriend or whatever, my wife,
my fiance, they've never been better. Where like you know, well,
the thing is this other girl reached out to me again. Okay,
no, no, no, I hope you didn't respond mail. I hope
you didn't respond. I have I did I have that respond. Okay,
here's what you need to do. Listen to me. I know people,
she is trying to get you again. So Mel, you need to tell
come clean and even send the email to your fiance, so you can,
cause you're earning trust back with the mother of your children. You're planning a
wedding together. And here's this girl from three years ago who you cheated,
you know, by a mistake, you had an affair with and then she
tried to blow up your this relationship. No, no, no, no
no. This bad girl needs to be out of your life, so do
not respond to her. Send the email to your fiance and say, I
just want to be completely open. This one reached out to me. What
do you want me to do? Let her help you make all those decisions.
You are a team, You're a united front, you and her.
Keeping that crazy girl away. Hate to use that term, but really she's
not being nice at this point. You know she lost three years ago,
had an affair. Now she's gone. You're working on things with the mother
of your children. This is about your kids right now. Make that one
work. Thanks for calling, melt Do we have time for one more kla?
The last one we have Mario with the question Mario, Hi, Mario,
it's doctor Wendy. Hello. Are you there? Mario? Yeah,
I'm here. What's your question? Love? Yes, I have a blind
date. Oh Friday, you have a blind date on Friday. How exciting?
Yes, yes it is exciting. But I I want to know if
you have any advice for me? What I should? You know? What
I should say? As far as my life? Why? What I should?
What I should not say? As far as revealing about my personal life?
Are what I mean? What should be my any advice? Okay,
let me just tell you Mario. First of all, congratulations on the blind
date on Friday night. Dates are to a first date are two people pretending
to be the person they wish they were. They're a CAD award winning performances.
Now, here's the thing you're going to talk about, you know,
movies that you like and restaurants that you're like, you're gonna keep it really
light. And then when you start to get into something that might be a
little bit sensitive, like maybe you have shame about something like maybe you've had
four divorces or whatever, it's okay to say, hey, you know,
I hope to get to know you well enough to be able to share that
we're just meeting each other now and so I'm not ready to share that with
you. That's perfectly okay. It's showing that you have boundaries. But talk
about everything if you want love and life and whatever. But feel free to
put up a boundary in a loving way, like, hey, you know,
I'd love to get to know you well enough to be able to share
that topic, but I'm not ready right now. But have fun, just
keep it light, have fun. First date, line date. All right,
let me come back. I'm sliding into my dms because so many people
have been sending me messages on social media. You are listening to the doctor
Wendy Walls Show on kf I am six forty. We're live everywhere on the
iHeartRadio app. You're listening to doctor Wendy Walsh on demand from KFI AM six
forty. Welcome back to the Dodtor Wendy wallsh Show. I'm i am six
forty, Live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app. I wanted to give social media
people a chance because you guys send me those private dms all week on my
social If you would like to send me a question on my social media,
you certainly may. The handle is at doctor Wendy Walsh at Dr Wendy Walsh
and reminder, I'm a psychology professor, but not a therapist. But I'm
obsessed with the science of love, and I've been through quite a rocky with
highs and lows, learned the hard way kind of love life. So I've
got lots of wisdom to share with you. All Right, here we go
into my DMS. Who's sladen into my DMS? Okay, this listener says,
Hey, doctor Wendy, I just found out that the mid thirties guy
I've been dating for a couple months has been depressed his entire entire all in
cap life and has never gotten professional help. Would you walk away? He
was even suicidal for a period of time, but not anymore. He said.
His father also has a history of severe depression. So, first of
all, I'm not adverse to people with mental health issues having love relationships.
I mean, it's probably the healthiest thing we can do for ourselves, right,
is to have a good, healthy relationship, because that's good for your
mental health. On the other hand, the big issue here is that he's
never gotten treated. I'm wondering if with him telling you this, he's testing
you. He's putting out this big red flag that says I'm about to make
your life miserable. You're going to hang on for that and I'm not going
to try to help myself. So your question you're asking me is would I
walk away? I would ask more questions and make some suggestions, and also
see how this so called depression. If he's never sought help for it,
then he hasn't been diagnosed, So his version of depression might just be a
little bit of low self esteem, of low motivation, slower processing speed,
whatever. Watch how it shows up in your life and in the relationship,
and talk about the symptoms. And if the symptoms are something you cannot live
with, and you suggest he gets help and he doesn't, then I would
close it, because ultimately your happiness is important too. Thanks for writing,
Dear doctor Wendy. I'm thirty three with no kids, but I do want
one. I met a forty seven year old man. He said he'd be
open to the idea. Is this reasonable or weird? I don't know the
question. I'm not sure if I should pursue dating. So what's weird about
it? Forty seven year old men have babies all the time. We do
know the rates of autism a h in older fathers. And then you're thirty
three, so you're gonna want to get on this pretty quickly. It's reasonable.
If the only two choices you're giving me reasonable or weird, it's reasonable.
Maybe he's been binding away for a family too, but get into a
healthy relationship too. Maybe go see a couple's therapists figure out how that you
guys can have a healthy relationship if you're going to rush right into baby making.
I didn't do that, by the way, I literally, at the
age of like thirty thirty five, met a guy and was pregnant within eight
weeks. Problem, problem with the relationship. I love my daughter, she's
great, but you know we were rushing into it because of that, and
we should have gone to couple's therapy and figured out some stuff first. Uh.
Dear doctor Wendy says this listener, how do you feel about your girlfriend
of one year talking to her male friend about everything? A male friend who
I'm I've never met. Okay, Well, this is a problem because this
is emotional betrayal. Right, If this male friend, if she has emotional
intimacy with him, that is no different than you having physical intimacy with a
woman. Right, So I think you want to say to her, Hey,
if you're going to continue this relationship, I need to meet this dude.
We need to be buds. We need to share a beer. But
if you have a separate emotional compartment off to the side with another person who
might be a backup mate, come on, think about it. We all
keep backup mates. It's healthy, it's normal, somebody in the wings.
If something ever happened in your current relationship, who would you call? Right,
So, don't let this guy hang there as the backup mate. Insist
that you meet him and I you know, you know what Shakespeare says,
keep your friends close, we keep your enemies closer. Get close to that
guy. I know what's up, all right, Dear doctor Wendy. Last
night I hooked up with a guy I really like. It was the first
time we'd had a few dates. He texted immediately afterwards, which was nice.
He's leaving today for a week and a half trip. How do I
not be how do I not be anxious on keeping connection while he's away?
So you're asking me for anxiety management, right, because there's nothing you can
do. Now is a time of weight and watch to see if you move
too quickly, to see if he's going to try to keep in touch,
and in between you're going to breathe. You're going to exercise, you're going
to hang out with your friends, you're going to practice self care, you're
going to meditate, hopefully, you're not going to drink too much, and
you're going to wait and watch tell yourself that there's no mistakes in life.
But now you're really the test is on to see if he's really there for
a real relation. If that's what you want. It sounds like you do
a real relationship right all right? Uh, Dear doctor Wendy, I want
to know how you handle this. So you go on a date and it
goes well, Okay, you like the guy, he says he likes you.
You both agree you'd like to go out again, so you exchange numbers.
Do you expect him to text the very next day or is it normal
to wait a few days before he reaches out again. I'm just trying to
figure out if I'm overthinking this scenario. Yes, you're overthinking the scenario,
but we all think overthink the scenario. So to show that somebody has good
or impulse control, you want them to be able to control themselves. The
ones that text right away and all over you you should worry about. You
become enmeshed with those people. They're controlling. You want them to be cool
and confident. You want them to wait a couple days. Just see,
two to four days is the industry standard. He wants you to chill and
make sure that he feels worthy. Don't you reach out to him first,
just saying don't all right? So just wait. You guys have trouble calming
yourself. Waiting and seeing is very important. I think I have time for
one more real quick, quick, quick, quick, Dear doctor Wendy.
When I'm on dating apps, one of the first questions men ask me is
do you live alone? Can you please help me? Understand why they would
ask that? Oh? Simple. They want to know if there's you alone
in a warm bed waiting for them. They want to know if you're with
your parents. They want to know if there's roommates around. They want to
know if there's another guy around. They want to know how they can quarantine
with you. Yes, of course they're going to ask that. You don't
have to answer it right away. You can just say, wouldn't you like
to know? No, I don't know. Maybe you're going to grow intimacy,
but right away, at the beginning, you can have boundaries because if
you feel creeped out, if a guy thinks you're alone and he's gonna find
your address, you know you can have some privacy. Uh, okay,
when we come back. I'm getting married this summer. I've been reading a
lot about why couples have conflicts over wedding planning. We're not, by the
way, but there's some common conflicts. And if you are engaged or your
daughter or son is engaged, this stuff might be going on. Let's talk
about it when we come back. You are listening to the Doctor Wendy Wall
Show on KFI AM six forty were live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app. You're
listening to Doctor Wendy Walsh on demand from KFI AM six forty. Welcome back
to the Doctor Wendy Wall Show on KFI AM six forty, Live everywhere on
the iHeartRadio App. Now, as I said, I'm getting married and I
think I'm becoming a bit of a bridezilla. Now that term bridezilla is so
bad. It's so negative, right, I mean, as if when a
woman is planning one of the most exciting days of her life, she's going
to get in a bad mood with everybody, it's not that. I'll tell
you what it is. And first of all, here's my history. So
you guys know, I had a big white Catholic wedding for my mother when
I was twenty one years old because I had shacked up with my college boyfriend
and she did not like that, and she got mad at me and said
she wasn't going to talk to me as long as I lived with him.
And I had this crazy way to assess it at the time, twenty one
year old brain not fully developed prefrontal cortex, and that was well, I've
had a relationship with this woman for more than twenty years. I've had a
relationship with this guy for a year. I guess I should listen to the
woman instead of this guy. So I had him propose. What did he
say? What did he say? He said, oh, all right,
Uh. You know, somehow I managed to put the full cord pressure on
and the next thing you know, I was full on into Bridezilla mode at
the age of twenty one. Now here's the interesting thing I took it.
I'm very diy handygirl. I was working at the time. I was doing
like a gap year in college or a gap half year or something, and
I was working for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in their Historical Archives division,
and so I took two months off work, set up a little sewing studio
in my parents' dining room, and I personally sewed five bridesmaid dresses to flower
girl dresses, and designed and made my own wedding dress. Oh yes,
I even made my own wedding cake. Yeah, those fruitcakes that you feed
rum to for like six weeks, that was me. I did the flowers.
It was winter in Canada, so they were all silk. That was
the big deal back then in the early eighties. Now I would go the
barf, that's fake. But at the time it was cool. And we
were divorced three years later. I have never been married since. It has
been decades and decades and decades and decades. As you probably know, I
was a single mom for eighteen years, kids on my own, no child
support, one hundred percent child custody. There was no way that I could
ever fit in a relationship. I dated a bit here and there and tried,
but my kids came first. So now that I have an impending empty
nest. As you know, if you listen to KFI, you can actually
go on my YouTube channel and see the whole propose here in the KFI studios.
Julio and I have been together almost four years and we're getting married this
summer. So exciting, and I started the planning. Now here's the irony
about a woman of a certain age. When you're planning your wedding, everyone
keeps saying, did you get the dress? Shet. I have not even
thought about a dress. But let me tell you, those tabletops are well
designed. I got the hurricane candles, I got the floor length at table
Claws, I got the flowers set up everything. All the decorating stuff is
done, has been done in my head. I have mood boards, I
got it all. Yes, I'm diying my own flowers, going to a
wholesaler. So but the thing I think that turns women into Bridezilla is the
stuff that happens leading up to the wedding and the conflicts. And there are
common conflicts that couples have. I'm gonna go through right now all the common
conflicts and tell you if we have any of those. I don't even I
know Julia's listening. I think he's still on a plane from New York,
so he probably is not listening, but I will tell the truth, all
right. So the first question, the first common conflict for most couples planning
a wedding is the money question. Because weddings are expensive. Now we are
finding ways DIY to do it a little less expensive than some people would.
We're also placing great value on the people we want there and a smaller group
of people, so we don't need to go over the top with big,
showy crazy whatever. So so far, money hasn't been a big issue.
We're we're sharing, splitting it fifty to fifty, but it's not a big,
big budget. I mean, we're probably three thousand dollars over our original
budget, so we're sticking pretty close to it. Now. Another thing couples,
and here's the by the way, here's the take home for you.
Figure out what your budget is, figure out who's paying for that budget,
and stick to it. Literally. And we had to downce certain events.
It's a weekend thing, right and destination things. So certain events I'm like,
oh, nope, we're not providing booze for that. It's day drinking.
We don't need to do that. Soft drinks there. Cut it down.
So we're just finding ways to cut costs, and you should too.
Now, what about family traditions. You might be of differing religions, or
you might you know your parents, Your family might celebrate things in certain ways.
You need to have these discussions. Who's walking the bride or groom or
brides or which brides which grooms down the aisle. However the combination is.
In our case, my daughters, it makes perfect sense. My parents have
passed away. My dad's not walking me anywhere. My two young adult daughters
are going to walk me down the aisle, and his children will stand up
beside him. So it's really a family thing. But there are lots of
family traditions people argue about. Maybe there's a family wedding dress that some grandmother
wants you to wear that you don't like. Maybe there's a particular piece of
jewelry. I'll tell you one of our wedding rituals. He's not so thrilled
about, but he's going to have to put up with it because we're Canadian.
And that is the What is it called a shot ski? If you
don't know what a shot ski is, look it up online. It's a
ski, usually a long, skinny cross country ski. And you bore drill
four holes in it, exactly the size of little shot glasses. We now
use the disposable little mini red cups, and you line up four people and
they all hold the ski and they do the shots together. It's a late
night wedding tradition amongst the Canadians. Ah, so I know my brother's going
to bring a shot ski. They'll figure out a way to do it.
You might have disagreements about your future in laws and how much meddling they might
have. We don't have that problem. His mother's lovely. I love her,
she loves me. All good there, we're fine. But in your
case, you may need to talk to your partner about setting some boundaries right.
The other big fight, of course, are guest lists. Don't let
it grow. We kind of did the opposite. We started with all the
people that were the most far away and gave them really early notice to book
their airfare, hotel, et cetera. And once we knew that number of
people who are going to make that sacrifice, they were first comfort serf.
Then we're kind of opening it up, you know, as seats open.
But we're pretty good with that. And some people fight over clashing visions of
what it's going to look like. Here's the thing about my Julio. He
loves all my taste, or at least he's pretending to love all my taste.
I don't care. He's really he hasn't complained or said anything, but
he goes it just great. It looks beautiful, it's wonderful. Looks wonderful.
Also, the planning duties. Some people argue about who's doing what.
I'm happy to take most of it on. It's what I'm good at.
I'm very, very efficient at this. So but you might both be really
busy with full time jobs and you want, you know, one person to
do one or the other think about it. So that is the stress that
creates a bridezilla. It's all the billing pressure that comes with a wedding.
You know, I think that Julio and I have what is called mature love.
When we come back, let's talk about whether your love is an immature
love or a mature love. You're listening to the Doctor Wendy Walls Show on
KFI AM six forty. We're live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app. You're listening
to Doctor Wendy Walsh on demand from KFI AM six forty. Welcome back to
the Doctor Wendy Wall Show on KFI AM six forty. We're live everywhere on
the iHeartRadio app. You know, I have been writing about, talking about,
singing about everything about the science of love for quite a few decades now.
My journey started with me having so many bad boys and so many bad
relationships. And then I learned there was this common denominator in every single one
of my relationships, and it was me. I was picking them and I
was participating in them. And so as I started to study psychology, study
the science of love, I started taking the jewels of wisdom that I would
unearth and sharing them as a journalist in language that everybody can understand. But
here's the other thing, you know, Richard Bach, who wrote that book
Jonathan Livington Seagull, once said, we teach best what we most need to
learn. And so along the way, as I was writing books and blogs
and making podcasts and radio shows and sharing all this amazing wisdom and skills of
relationship. Remember, relationships are far more about skill than they are luck,
I was doing this stuff myself. I was learning, I was practicing.
We teach best what we most need to learn. I think when I was
young, I had immature love, and now I'm so happy to say that
I believe I have mature love. So let's talk about this. Are you
in a relationship that feels like a roller coaster with ups and downs all the
time, where you're so excited at such highs and then such lows. This
is not mature love. If you have poor conflict resolution skills, if after
a fight, somebody gives somebody the silent treatment, or you just wash it
under the bridge and don't even work it through and process it, and somebody
has to say, you know, I'm sorry, and somebody else says,
oh, we both messed up, and they both need to take responsibility for
their individual pieces. If you're not doing that, you're probably in immature love.
Also, maybe your relationship has some level of codependency. When people rely
on another person or each other to help them regulate their emotions and that's the
only way they can feel happiness. It is unbalanced. Right. It is
not your partner's job to make you happy. In fact, your job is
to make yourself happy. Your job is to change your reaction to them.
If you believe you're in a relationship where you need to change your partner.
And I did have that thought many many times when I was young. It's
like, Okay, it's good in this area. I just got to get
him to change this. You know, my life got better and I got
happier when I instead focused on how it could change myself and what I could
learn to accept in my partner. Another thing that I think makes a relationship
immature is feelings of insecurity. If you're worried that you're going to lose your
partner, if you're worried that you're not good enough for your partner, you'll
never be able to have a healthy, confident, strong relationship. And the
final thing I want to say about immature love is it often involves fear of
autonomy. You're afraid to grow separately or do things on your own, or
you're afraid to allow your partner to grow individually. You know, I always
think of a good healthy relationship as a ven diagram, you know, those
two overlapping circles where you have two individuals who are still growing and they have
their own friends and jobs and fun. I mean, they share news of
it all with their partner, and then they have this overlap where they have
one life together, right, that's a healthy relationship, and they accommodate and
adapt as each other grows and changes and brings new energy into the relationship.
You don't want to get your growth stunted. So I talked a lot here
about what is immature love? What do I think is mature love like I
have right now? Let's start with trust. I mean it is the foundation
of all healthy, mature relationships when you feel safe to completely confide in your
partner, tell them anything, and you know you will still be loved.
If I'm talking about my relationship right now, I always say the thing I
love beat does I get to be me in it? You know, I
spent a lot of years being told by men that I talk too much,
or I have such strong opinions, or you know, don't say that,
And I'm just I hate being shut down by men. And I have a
guy who says, oh, we go out for a hike, and we'll
go for thirty minutes and you're still talking, and I'm so entertained by you.
The time just goes by, and he's happy with that, he's not
complaining. It's wonderful also that there's just no judgment. What I do in
my relationship is I try to explore the why, why did you say that,
Why did you do that? What were you afraid of there? What
happened there? Right? That is called being non judgmental, and that is
a healthy, happy place to be. And while you're busy non judging and
asking why they did something that maybe you weren't happy with, it gives you
an opportunity to do the other big skill of mature love, and that is
empathizing with them, putting yourself in their shoes, imagining that you're them.
If both partners learn to do that on a regular basis, you will grow
into a safe, committed relationship. Now I mentioned conflicts earlier. The way
we do not resolve conflict, we meaning the greater we of everybody in the
world. We shouldn't name call yell. Obviously, no physical violence, obviously,
no blaming like something is always one person's fault and the other person gets
to be the hero because it's never their fault. No. Resolving conflicts means
trying to understand what each other meant or did right and not getting highly defensive
or when we do, because it's human, finding a way to get back
to love afterwards. For sure. The worst way to have conflict is that
silent treatment. You got to talk about stuff, You got to bring it
up. Also, mature love involved supporting each other no matter what. You
know, we are trying to figure out what our wedding vows are going to
be next summer, and he said, why don't we just do the old
fashioned traditional ones in sickness and in health, richer and poor till death to
us part Because we're at a certain age. You know, I've always said
that when till death Do us Part was invented, death was pretty imminent,
right, But because of our long life expectancies, people may have two or
three long stints of monogamy, They may have two or three marriages in their
life, and so it's more likely to end with divorce. And that doesn't
mean it's a failed marriage, just means it came to a closure, culmination,
its purpose was done. And so but we're at that age where we're
actually maybe someday facing death, and so as a result, we are going
to use I think those words. We're gonna work on it. And finally,
as I mentioned before, maintaining your own independence, getting to do your
own stuff and then bring it back like pots of gold to the relationship.
Guess what I did today? Yes, so I saw today. I mean
Julio and I check in probably too much, at least two, if not
three times a day, but usually it's to bring Monday news. Guess We're
just called Guess what just happened? Right? We literally function as any one
mind, but we grow individually and we're so happy to bring that to each
other. And that is what I wish for you. On that note that
brings the Doctor Wendy Wallh Show to a close. You know, I'm always
here for you every Sunday from seven to nine pm Pacific time, and you
can also follow me on my social media. The handle everywhere is at doctor
Wendy Walsh. I don't know if you've been on my TikTok lately, but
I'm doing this new series as I mentioned that on identity, so you might
want to follow it my little identity change. And also I do a Patreon
zoom room every Wednesday night and you're welcome to join us there. Just go
to patreon dot com slash doctor Wendy Walsh. But I'm always here for you
on KFI even listening to the Doctor Wendy Walls Show on KFI AM six forty
live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app. You've been listening to Doctor Wendy Walsh.
You can always hear us live on KFI A M six forty from seven to
nine pm on Sunday and anytime on demand on the iHeartRadio app