This is Doctor Wendy Walsh and you're listening to KF I Am six forty the
Doctor Wendy Walsh Show on demand on the iHeartRadio app. They have I Am
six forty. You have Doctor Wendy Walsh with you. This is the Doctor
Wendy Walsh Show. Oh my goodness. I find statistics on marriage so interesting
because there's so much talk. I've had lots of conversations recently with friends who
of a certain age, who have teenager or young adult kids, who say
either I'm never gonna have kids because of global warming, they're all afraid of
this, or I'm never ever going to get married. Well, I want
you to understand about the history of marriage. Marriage in many ways was a
safety net for women during patriarchy. I know we're still in patriarchy if you
believe the Barbie movie. They're just hiding it better. But now women need
marriage less. I will say that statistically, marriage is still the best nest
we have for children, until we have free childcare in every workplace, until
we have good child tax credits for parents who are single parents, until we
have ways to build villages around different shapes and looks and compositions. Of families,
then that traditional marriage thing is going to linger around. One of the
things we're finding is that the reason why marriage rates have fallen, and they've
fallen by sixty percent over the past fifty years, is that the age of
marriage is moving up. They're just not getting married yet, right, So
the average age of marriage that you know, a couple decades ago is in
the early twenties is in the early thirties now. Also, there are still
places where gay people are not allowed to marry, So that's going to impact
marriage rates because in the past, society might have forced gay people into heterosexual
looking marriages. Right. People with attachment issues who feel very uncomfortable with emotional
intimacy, who used to get into marriages because society said they had to,
and then they become a workaholic or a traveling person, or they detach in
some way to create mental space for themselves. These people now don't have to
get married. Right. Remember, marriage isn't for everything. As I said,
it's not for everyone, but statistically speaking, it's still the best protection
we have for kids. And just because people aren't getting married doesn't mean they're
not coupling up. The rate of people living together is bigger than ever.
The good news is the divorce rate has been slowly declining for the past twenty
years. People are waiting. They're waiting to get married so they're older,
they have a better brain, they have better decision making ability. They're just
making better choices of mates. I want to remind you I say it all
the time. I'll say it again until death do us part was invented.
Death was pretty imminent, and so because of our very long newish life expectancies,
And for you anti vaxxers out there, I want to say, the
only reason, the biggest reason why we're living so long has to do with
childhood vaccination. It's okay, and so were. Our long life expectancies mean
that even the most monogamous of humans and human beings have the widest range of
sexual behavior of any primate species. Some people just aren't monogamous. Some people
are monogamous. I actually think that should be a good question to ask on
a first date. Do you consider yourself a monogamous person? I used to
say on dates I didn't have the language for monogamy. I would say I'm
a couple person. I do better when I'm in a couple remember saying that
on dates and if it scares off guys, ladies could do the touchdown cheer.
Those are the ones you don't want around. You're not trying to find
someone that you're in love with and make him love you. No, you're
supposed to find somebody who's ready to take on the same things that you want
to take on. That's all that matters, all right. So what we
do know is that divorce is very contagious. Well, marriage is contagious.
To remember in your twenties, one person would get married and the next person
would get married, and before you know you're buying all these wedding gifts and
going on. It's very contagious. Divorce is also contagious because if you have
a friend of a friend, it's like supposedly six degrees of separation. If
you have a friend of a friend of a friend who gets divorced and you
hear about it, they're grapevine and you're kind of in a bad relationship.
You were sticking it out because everybody in your circles stayed married. You're kind
of going, huh, they did it. Let me get some info on
how they're faring, right, And then you separate, and then your neighbor
next door goes, wow, they separated. Maybe it's actually okay. Now
that's how it becomes contagious. So a little bit of research, new research
that shows the ten states in the United States with the absolute shortest marriages.
Don't worry. I have a list coming up for the longest marriages, Kaylea.
If you had to guess which state you think has the shortest marriages,
what would it be? Florida, Florida. Yeah, I want to guess
Florida too. I would have Yeah, but it's not on the list.
It's not even in the top ten. Man, and that interesting, Yeah
it is. Wow, Maybe they say because Miami is its own little island
and it's got a lot of Latin influence on Catholic influence, so we'd being
forced to stay together. Roll. If you had to guess which state has
the shortest marriages, what would it be? Maybe in New York, Like,
oh why, just because it's like such a like hustle and bustle,
quick moving, very fast city. So I feel like people were like that
there, Well it's not New York, not even in the top ten.
I know, Sandy. If you had a guess which state had the shortest
marriages the most divorces? What would it be? Gosh, um gosh,
what kind of you would think? It'd be kind of a state where everybody
was kind of hedonistic and selfish, right, And I'm trying to oh yeah,
and you're gonna say it now, aren't you. Yeah, you're gonna
say the name of that state. Utah. No, I don't know.
They just add on wives. They just add on wives. They don't divorce
it. Okay, Well, let's see. I suppose you know, it
could be you'd thinking eastern state, but it could be someplace out west,
maybe like um, let's see, perhaps uh, Nevada. I'll try that
way. Okay, you ready, Washington, d C. You say,
on the east, and that's not a state. The median day of marriage
in Washington, DC is ten years Okay. Then followed by Alaska, Texas,
Nevada, and then there we go and then Utah. So you were
getting close there. All right, let's go with the longest marriages. Which
states do you think have the longest marriages? Fingers cross California. You know,
California is so eclectic, it doesn't end up on the top ten of
either of these lists a man. Well, let's see what main is Number
two. You're very good media and duration of marriage is twenty one point eight
years. It's number two. Its neighbor is number one, New Hampshire and
then Pennsylvania. They just stay married. They stay. Mar I used to
host this show on you know, one of those Home and Garden Networks things,
and it was called Splurge, and it was about sort of average middle
class people who took all their life savings and splurged on something. Why right,
So we did this thing in the suburbs of Pennsylvania and there was this
happily married couple and they had planned to splurge by moving to Florida, and
they couldn't pull the trigger on it because they were so darn in love with
their grandkids. So instead he built like an entire sports bar, literally bigger
than the bungalow house in his backyard, filled with sports memorabilia so that all
the family could come over every Sunday and just watch sports games, had big
screens on the It was wild. And so that's a splurch But they stay
together all those years. It wasn't going to be okay, Well, you
go to Florida, then it's let's find a compromise. What else did I
want to say about marriage being on the decline and the divorce rate? So
yeah, I must be early dimension because I'm starting to forget what I was
going to say. I want to say this about marriage. Obviously, religiosity
is most highly associated with marriage because every religion, no matter what the religion,
is invested in making rules around sex and love and marriage because they want
to grow the number of members they have. So if they're always encouraging marriage
and encouraging that those children be raised in that religion, and so as a
result, highly correlated. Another thing highly correlated with religion is politics. Sorry,
with the marriage is politics. As you can imagine, on the right,
the conservatives more likely to marry early. But interesting enough, people who
identify as conservative have more divorces. Who knew so people who identify getting married
too young. That's the difference, right, So they you still they like
there's some weird people who identify conservative still use the term pre marital sex as
if sex is something you would do on your way to marriage. It wouldn't
be like just sex for fun or sex for a fling, or sex for
this summer or sex for this night. So people who identify liberal tend to
more like shorter relationship, sex for fun, etc. And when they do
marry, they marry later in life and as a result, they have less
time to have that many divorces. Also, we know the prefrontal cortex is
not fully developed until you're at least twenty five or twenty six, and that's
the part of your brain that is well, it's a good decision making part
of your brain. Right, So the highest rate of divorces are with anybody
who gets married before the age of twenty three. All right, so you
want to the fact that this marriage rate is going up. I think it's
good for finding good partners, right if you're thirty one years old, if
that's now the new average age of first time marriage. But it's hard for
women and fertility because the height of female fertility has not changed in thousands of
years, and it is the age of twenty I'm not joking twenty now.
It hovers about that through the for a decade or so. It takes a
big dive at thirty falls off a cliff at thirty five. So, ladies,
if you're not marrying until you're thirty one, or thirty two. Get
on it right, get on it if you want to have kids. Reminder
pulling all those child free adults off the guilt wagon here that also throughout history,
twenty percent one in five humans do not biologically procreate because evolution made it
that. We need alloparents. We need coaches and teachers and aunties and uncles
and all kinds of helpers babysitters to help us with our kids. And you
raise the species two. You really do. Parents are just too busy,
all right. When we come back, I am going to social media.
I see a lot of questions coming in on my DMS and I would love
to answer your relationship questions when we come back. You're listening to the Doctor
Wendy Walsh Show on kf I AM six forty. We live everywhere on the
iHeartRadio app. Right now, let's go to Sandy Wells in the twenty four
hour Camfin Newsroom. You're listening to Doctor Wendy Walsh on demand from kf I
AM six forty. Kay, bye Am six forty. You have Doctor Wendy
Walsh with you. This is the Doctor Wendy Walsh Show. This is the
time in the show when I answer your dating and relationship questions or reminder,
I'm not a therapist. I'm a psychology professor, but I'm a woman with
a lot of life experience and I've written a number of books on relationships.
I'm really obsessed with the science of love. So let's get to it.
If you would like to send in a question, just y m me on
my social media. The handle everywhere is at doctor Wendy Walsh. That's at
dr Wendy Walsh. That's everywhere on social media. All right, Hi,
doctor Wendy. I'm thinking about getting a dating coach to help me with approach,
anxiety and getting a date. Is this a good idea? If so,
what would you look for in getting someone who is good. I have
a few opinions about this, and some of you are not going to like
to hear my opinions. I think if anybody has issues that include anxiety,
worry, depression, fears, attachment issues, you need to see a licensed
therapist. Now, if you're somebody who you know just hasn't dated a lot
of years and you need a wingman or a wingwoman, you know psychologically,
they're not going to probably go out on a scouting with you, but someone
to help you go through the dating apps or help you build your profile,
a friend who understands the mating marketplace. Then yeah, call one of the
dating coaches out there, see if they can help you out. But if
you're working on mental health stuff, your best wingman is a therapist and they
can give you man or woman and they can give you great advice. Dear
doctor Wendy, my date doesn't tip weight staff. He had such strong opinions
about it when I brought it up. I'm no longer interested in him.
How do I tell him? All right? First of all, you didn't
refer to him as your partner, your boyfriend, your husband, your love,
none of that. You called it your date. You owe nothing,
nothing, not even an explanation. I know, but don't ghost him.
We all wonder after someone has broken up, I like, why what did
I do wrong? If you want to talk about your values, if you
want to talk about how you don't believe your values match his value, okay,
fine, you can say it like this. Hey, you know,
I really liked you. It's nice getting to know you. That conversation we
had about you not wanting to tip showed me that your values in mind don't
really match, right, So you're not saying he's bad, you're good.
You're just saying that you know we're not really a good match in the value
department, So good luck to you, that's all you say. You've got
to remember everybody that when you end a relationship, whether that relationship was one
phone call with somebody you met on a dating app, or whether you went
for a coffee date, or whether you went for a real date, a
long date at dinner date, you may see that person again. You may
see them online, you may see them in the real world. You may
walk into a job interview one day and they're the person interviewing. So I
want you to imagine that you live in a very small town, because this
is how it happens in big cities, that they're a bunch of little,
small small towns connected. And I want you to imagine you're going to see
this person again, and that's how you should always break up with them.
Ghosting it is for the week, that's what it's for. Oh, here's
not a good one. My new boyfriend took the condom off in the middle
of sex without telling me. There's a word for that now. It's called
stealth thing. I felt betrayed and gross, and I thought and he thought
I was being overly dramatic. You know, it still haunts me, and
so I can't be intimate with him yet. How can we get back to
where we were? All right? So you referred to him as your new
boyfriend, so you don't have to go forward with this, but I understand
the trust has been broken. You know, if a woman gets an STI
from a man, that's bad enough, But if a woman gets pregnant,
depending on what state you live in these days, that's twenty years of hard
labor. This is no joke. This is a very very serious thing.
I think in a few it sounds like you really want to mend this,
you really want to give make this relationship great. Then you guys need to
get into couples therapy because it's going to take a long time for him to
earn your trust back after something that bad. But I know some of you
out there like, how did she not know? You know what, when
you're in the throes of passion, sometimes you don't know what's going on.
Okay, Dear doctor Wendy, I decided to go natural. I barely wear
makeup, congratulations. I wear my curls. Yeay, I do that too
all summer long. I'm brunette again. Who I love myself so much more,
but I get a lot less attention. Men don't approach me anymore.
I still think I'm attractive. Why are men more standoffish? Well, you're
talking to a woman who's had every hair color. Well, no, mostly
blond, brunette, gray, blonde, brunet, gray. I'll probably go
in the coffin with hair color because I go gray. I went gray so
early, but I've gone brunette because I wanted to match my kids when they
were little. I know what you're talking about. When you walk out in
the world, you are treated differently when you're a blonde. I want to
say this, though, you know who's the most attractive, People who like
themselves, And if you feel you're attractive, that's all that matters, you
know. I keep quoting the Barbie movie because it's just so amazing. Times
you saw it three times? No, Tis, I'm going to see it
a third time. I'm going to see it a third time. Okay,
Gayla. But there's a line that's kind of my favorite dark joke that says,
you're either you're one of two Barbies. You're either brainwashed by Ken or
you're considered weird Barbie. And I thought I'm gonna be weird Barbie. That's
so much better. So don't be afraid to be weird Barbie, even if
it's curly brown hair. I mean, what's wrong with curly brown hair?
Gorgeous? Gorgeous, gorgeous. However, if you're imagining that men are being
more standoffish, you need to stand taller, love yourself, and have a
different kind of man and man come up to you. It's going to work
because you need to like yourself. Dear doctor Wendy, Why am I attracted
to what I can't have and doesn't want me? I do like people,
but when they start to like me back, I lose interests. Okay,
I hear yah, you'll preaching to the choir. This is exactly how I
was when I was young. It's I couldn't. It was only after years
of therapy when I learned that I had all these attachment issues. It's somehow
I had this crazy belief system that if I could make this out of touch,
out of reach mate love me, then I would like myself. But
it's actually the other way around. If you can get to a place of
deeply liking yourself and knowing that you deserve love and care, then more people
are going to be attracted to you, and you'll be comfortable being loved.
Remember what I said, I had to learn to tolerate kindness. Isn't that
crazy? Because I was in love with longing. I wasn't in love with
the secure feeling of love. I was in love with the loss. Crazy.
But that's how it is. It's all about early childhood programming. Okay,
On that same note, when we come back, I want to talk
about why mates who have partners already are just so darn attractive to us.
And if you are dating a married person, here's what you need to do.
You're listening to the Doctor Wendy Wells Show on kf I AM six forty
Relive everywhere on the iHeartRadio app. You're listening to Doctor Wendy Walsh on demand
from kf I AM six forty fi Am six forty. You have Doctor Wendy
Walsh with you. This is the Doctor Wendy Wealsh Show. Oh don't you
wish every married person would say that my baby's got all my love already.
Some do, some do, but plenty of them loved to have backup mates
or other mating opportunities. I have a little disclosure here. This is not
a segment about morality. I don't believe even morality. I don't believe in
a sense that one thing is right and another thing is wrong. I think
that human beings are built for survival, and they make individual decisions about what
is best for their survival. Sometimes making a decision that you might think is
immoral actually helps their survival. For instance, if they go after a partner
who is richer, then maybe their kids will get to eat better and go
to better schools. It's a survival decision. So sometimes though, they'll make
a mating decision that they think might help their survival, but then they get
ostracized by the tribe and told, oh, what you're doing is immoral,
like dating that married person, and as a result, it hurts their survival
chances. So sometimes dating a married person, don't shoot the messenger. Sometimes
it works. Lauren Sanchez Jeff Bezos pretty well understood. They were both married
to other people when they met, and now they're together and she's living with
the richest man in the world right. At other times it's total social suicide,
right because you can be ostracized for it. Kayla, did you hear
about Arian Grande so messy? Well, yes, she supposedly is dating her
news she's making a movie of that Broadway show Wicket, and she's supposedly dating
her co star Ethan Slater, and people are shocked. One of the main
reasons why they're shocked is that they're both married to other people. Now she's
separated, right and now, of course, since it's all you know,
since TMC has done their magic and told the whole world everybody seems to be
getting separated. But they have supposedly been seeing each other for a few months.
Have you seen pictures of this guy? Yeah? Okay, are you
gonna say it? Am I gonna say it? I don't get why anybody
will want to um do anything with him. That wasn't exactly what I was
gonna say, but it was kind of close. I just think as far
as mate status, he's a giant step down for her. He must be
one charm in something. I don't know what it is. Not that Pete
what's his name? David Comedian was Davidson was so gorgeous. I heard I
heard he had he had a Can I say third legoed out being dumped?
I think, yeah, I heard you had one of those, So that
gets you a lot further apparently. Yeah, I mean Kim Kardashian enjoyed it
for a while. Uh So there's that. And also, comedians, I
believe, tend to be the smartest people in the world. So they're smart
and lots of other ways mating strategy, and they're just fun to be around.
But here's the interesting in the tabloids are doing, and you can google
it online. They're taking pictures of Ethan Slater, the actor who she's allegedly
having her relationship with now, and putting it side beside with pictures of her
brother, and they look like identical twins. Really, I mean, I
guess that's human mating strategy, right. Couldn't marry within the family or people
that are likewise in some way? I don't know anyway. Um, the
sadder thing for me because again I don't judge. It's not about morals,
but I am here telling everything I'm telling because I care about kids and them
not having their own attachment injuries, et cetera. He is married to a
singer named Lily Jay since twenty eighteen and they just welcome to baby's son,
who I heard an. I know that's the bad part, all right,
but I want to say I'm not sitting here at virtuous. Okay. When
I was young and dumb and damaged, I had affairs twice with married men
and one two maybe maybe it was three exactly. You know, it gets
a little fuzzy back there, um, and you know, and you would
think that, being logical and rational, it would the news would be that
getting with a partnered person somebody who is unavailable is not a good thing.
However, evolutionary psychologists would say that is exactly the thing that makes them attractive.
One of my favorite books is called The Evolution of Desire by doctor David
Boss, and he talks about this, that a partnered person has romantic value
because it shows that somebody picked them right. They might be good for something,
you know. The number one thing I'll tell girlfriends and they'll be like,
Oh, I'm dating this guy and he's really nice and he hasn't had
he has never been married, so there's no baggage, there's no kids,
and he's and I'm like an how old is he and he's not always forty
two? And I'm like, hold stop the trains, hold the horse.
What the hell If you get to be half of your lifespan and have never
made a commitment to somebody, that's a red flag, Like do you think
you're suddenly going to be the one? And he said, but having said
that, I heard a beautiful story today. A friend of mine told me
that her brother, who was a confirmed bachelor, but not a playboy bachelor,
a more introvert, nerdy engineer, afraid of women bachelor, met a
woman and married her within six months when they were both fifty. And they've
been married now for ten years, so it can happen. But that's a
bit of an anomaly. It's not you know, generally, we like people
like I like guys that another woman has trained. That's what I say.
I just want another woman to have gotten in there and shown him like,
this is what marriage is. Okay, these are what the ropes are.
And if she was a particularly bad wife, all the better for me.
Train him and let him dislike you, and then I'll show I'll look good.
I should say this, if you are dating a married person, just
break up. Immediately. It's just going to be a mess. It's going
to continue to be a mess, unless he's Jeff Bezos and you really want
to throw all your chips on the table or somebody like him. I mean,
Lauren, I'm not trying to get someone to steal your man. Somebody
like that. And you want to throw all your chips down on the table
and go for broke, go for it. But if you're sitting there in
pain hoping they're going to leave their person for you, break up immediately,
go no contact. Examine the root of why you're doing it. Do you
have attachment issues? Some people have an avoidant attachment love married people because then
they don't have to worry about actually having a real relationship with them. Or
if they have an anxious attachment like I used to, then they're like,
oh, he's longing for them and hoping and waiting for them to leave.
You also need to remove any temptations to cheat, because the research is very
clear. You know what cheating does, whether you're cheating on them, they're
cheating on you, or whatever. It teaches you how to cheat and you
can survive it. So you have to move all temptations. Don't go out
without your spouse all that stuff, and guess what. All these affairs that
you have you think are in a box in the past, forgotten, etc.
Remember I told you that I had one or two or five affairs with
married men when I was very young. Well, one of them, years
later, decided to tell his wife in therapy. Can you imagine? No,
did she find you? I used to have to see her at church?
Oh, I know that was so wrong on everything, like he had
an abortion with our secret. I was so mad, so mad. I
think his wife was a little more mad. But I see why you were
mad. Terrible, But you know it's in the best. Go away,
all right, let me come back. Do you ever wonder if your marriage
is salvageable? Do you ever wonder what would happen if you went to couples
therapy? Well, I'm going to tell you the first ten questions they're going
to ask you, so you can think about them before you go in.
You're listening to the Doctor Wendy Welsh show on k IF I AM six forty
alive everywhere on the iHeartRadio app. You're listening to Doctor Wendy Walsh Onto Man
from kf I am sixty am six forty. You have doctor Wendy Walsh with
you. This is the Doctor Wendey Walls show. Oh kay law in the
home Stretch already, How does that happen? It goes so fast, so
fast, these two hours. I want to remind everybody before I get into
is your marriage salvageable and what you can do about it? That you can
follow me on social media. My handle everywhere is at doctor Wendy Walsh.
That's TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, whatever, blah blah blah.
And then I have this wonderful Patreon zoom room every Wednesday at six thirty.
Some of the people in my zoom room have been there, like, oh
gosh, almost two years, and they're from all over the world. It's
a great group of people, many Kafi listeners. And it's not therapy.
It's not group therapy even it's really just like a friendship hang and I usually
talk about some relationship issue and lots of people share and it's great fun.
So you're welcome to join me at Patreon, pa t R e o N
dot com slash doctor Wendy. Well, you know, having a long term
monogamous relationship can sometimes be hard work. It's hard because we're always changing and
growing, and our partner is always changing and growing too, So at the
same time we may be growing into different directions, but there should always be
a place in the middle for the two right and that's where the work is
to continue to shape that, to be creative in ways that you can keep
your relationship strong. I think one of the biggest mistakes. I think couples
make two big mistakes in their marriages. One is allowing, you know,
basically the doldrums to set in boredom, not creating enough novelty and interest and
newness in their relationship. And this second thing is and I remember asking this
marriage and family therapist friend of mine, I said, what is the most
common thing that you see in couples therapy? Like when people come in and
they present, what are they most often complaining about? What's the biggest issue?
Is it sex? Is it money? Is it family? What is
it? And she says, it doesn't matter what it is, whatever it
is, it never changes. In other words, there is one core issue
that was probably discovered in the first year of marriage. Maybe it was happening
the week before the wedding, but it was discovered, and so I think
that people don't take the time to work through and resolve. And resolve doesn't
mean one side winning or the other side winning. It means both of you
finding workarounds to accommodate the needs of the other so that you can back to
each other. So when you go into couples therapy, there is something that
most couples therapists do to get you into dealing with that core issue, and
they start by priming your brain with positivity so that you remember why you're there,
You remember who you love. So one of the most common questions they
might ask is, and I'm asking you to maybe even ask each other this,
why do you feel most connected to me? Or when do you feel
most connected? Like? What is it? What? At what moment?
Julio is not here, I'm wondering what I could ask. If I said
to him, when do you feel most connected to me? When you're reading?
I would say he loves when you read, He loves when ready and
you're teaching him whatever you're learning. Yeah, yeah, he likes that.
I think he likes that when we go to sleep at night, I keep
reading and he goes to sleep, and I'm just like they're watching over him
like an angel. I don't know if he thinks that. When do I
feel most connected to him? When we are in sometimes great debate and sparring
with each other, and yes, so good for me. And then the
next question I want you guys to ask each other is what do you enjoy
doing most together? You know, I have friends who recently went to couples
therapy, and the therapist actually worded it differently. She didn't say what do
you enjoy doing most together? She didn't have that together word, So what
do you most enjoy doing? And the husband only answered things that didn't have
anything to do with her, like hanging out with dudes, go to the
gym, working, I like to golf, I like to go on my
motorcycle, I like to game, and she's sitting there like, uh okay.
Another question of therapist might have you ask each other is are there things
that you use to do together that you'd like to start again. You know,
if I had to answer that question today, it would be that Julio
and I met during quarantine and we could not be indoors during the beginning of
our relationship, and so I packed so many picnics. We picnicked all over
Los Angeles County sometimes Orange County. We found places to picnic and we don't
do it anymore because we can go to restaurants so we can sit outside.
So that's something I'd like us to get back to, to spread the blanket,
sit around and chat. Another question might be what are you most proud
of about our life together? Think about it? Why are you there?
What have you accomplished together? Could it be that you've created kids. I'm
proud of our family. I'm proud that our kids are healthy and doing well.
Or I'm proud that we've built this financial stability, or I'm proud that
we do this charity work together. I'm proud that we have this social standing.
I'm proud to be seen in public with you. I like the way
you look, whatever, Just where's the pride? And if you listen to
those questions, when do you feel most connected to me? What do you
enjoy most doing with me? I know dudes are going to say sex,
but that's okay. They're allowed to. Hey, I'm not being sexist.
Didn't you know that men want sex more often than women? Promise you that
that's all in the research. Things like are the things we used to do
you'd like to do again? What are you most proud of? What this
does is it primes your brain. It gets your brain ready for now problem
solving together as a team. So now come the hard questions. What do
you think our biggest issues are? You might be surprised by the answer.
Your partner might have a different example, what do you think the biggest issues
are, or another way of wording it, what concerns you about us?
Now? At this point I want you to open your mind and open your
ears and just listen. This is not an opportunity to get defensive. Never
should you be saying I don't know why you worry about that. That didn't
even matter, that's not even an is show stop it. Just listen.
Just be calm because the next section, section, and maybe in the next
session that a therapist might do with you, that you could even try together,
is about solving these problems. Simply asking an open ended question, how
can we improve our relationship? How can we improve brainstorm together? Or maybe
say something like, hey, are there things that you'd like to do together
that we've never tried before? Oh, that's what the research says. Novelty
novelty. Novelty, doing new things, putting your partner in a new setting,
doing something different can bring feelings of love and attachment. And here's a
big one, what can we both do to increase trust in each other?
Then, after all the problem solving, you're going to close it by remembering
to get back to love. Here's the question, what's the most recent thing
I did for you that you really appreciate? You might not even realize the
best thing they want from you, So ask them, what's the most recent
thing that I did for you that you really appreciate? Get back to love?
And then the biggest question you have to ask right now is are you
finally ready for marital counseling? Because that's where the work is. You don't
have to be in counseling forever. Plenty of long term relationships have little touch
ups. Look even the Obamas. In Michelle's book, they talk about the
therapy that can you imagine being the therapist to the Obamas? That's some big
secret holder, but you have to That's how you make it work. You
go every once in a while to a licensed therapist who's going to help you
solve your core conflict. That is not going to go away on its own.
And also if it's boredom, they're going to help you add that novelty
that you need to. Oh, okay, are we really at the end?
I can't believe it? Why do it go so far? Every time?
I'm here as I have been for the last almost nine years on KFI
AM six forty every Sunday. Now it's Doctor Wendy after dark from seven to
nine, which I like a lot better. It seems more relaxed, and
then we're talking about relationships instead of being in the car with the kids on
the way back from a weekend at four o'clock. I like the seven pm
thing. Anyway. I'm always here for you every Sunday between seven and nine
pm. You can also follow me on my social media, Kayla. It's
always a pleasure to see you. We'll see you next week. You've been
listening to the Doctor Wendy Walls showing KFI AM six forty. We're live everywhere
on the iHeartRadio app. You've been listening to Doctor Wendy Walsh. You can
always hear us live on KFI AM six forty from seven to nine pm on
Sunday and anytime on demand on the iHeartRadio app,