Kate prepares to have a child in middle school and Doree gets creative with meal planning. Then, listeners write in about putting honey on acne, the dangers of a cheap straw hat, and advice for the broken-hearted. 

Mentioned in this Episode

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• Forever35 X Balance Bound collaboration

• Trova Trip Survey 

• Give Me Some Oven Chicken Breast Recipe

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Transcript

Kate: Hello, and welcome to forever 35, a podcast about the things we do to take care of ourselves. I am Kate Spencer.

Doree: I am Doree Shafrir.

Kate: and we are not experts.

Doree: We are not, but we are two friends who like to talk a lot about serums.

Kate: And this is a mini episode where we hear from you. We share your comments and your thoughts, and we answer your questions to the best of our ability.

Doree: But please remember as mentioned, we are podcast hosts. We're not experts. And we always encourage you to seek support first and foremost, from a medical and or mental health professional as needed.

Kate: If you would like to reach us, our voicemail and text number is 7 8 1 5 9 1 0 3 9 0. You can still send us eggplant emojis by the way that hasn't stopped. Just FYI still love an eggplant. And our email is forever 35 podcast, gmail.com and please do visit our website forever 35 podcast.com for links to everything we mentioned on the show.

Doree: Follow us on Twitter at forever 35 pod on Instagram at forever 35 podcast. And join the forever 35 Facebook group at facebook.com/groups/forever 35 podcast. The password is serums and you can sign it for our newsletter@foreverthirtyfivepodcast.com slash newsletter. Also, you could check out our shop, my shelf, um, that is@shopmy.us slash 35. And while we're here, let's remind everyone about our amazing collab with balance bound.

Kate: Even my kids are into it. They like found it in my house and they were like, I want this.They were like, Doree's hotel. What's that? Are you Kate H that your Kate H Spencer for horse, right? Like they were reading all these things.

Doree: Oh my gosh.

Kate: I had to be like, oh yeah, my job is pretending to pretending hotels with Doree. Like my kids must be like, what does my mom do?

Doree: That's so funny. Um, yeah. And when you get your order, please tag us and please, please gram it.

Kate: Gram it hard. Gram it hard.

Doree: Um, we're already getting some grams by the way

Kate: we are. Okay. All right. I'll go on over to the grams and see, um, this it's just, everything is so cute. It's really great. So cute and usable. That's the best part you can really use it to.

Doree: Yes. Everything is usable. All right.

Kate: Now it's tell everybody about our other link share today.

Doree: Okay. I'm also very excited about this. Um, we are in the exploratory phase of planning, a trip with forever 35 listeners, and we're doing it with Truva trip, which is a company that does like plans, all the logistics for these trips. They know what they're doing. They've planned hundreds of these trips. And we are, when I say exploratory phase, that means we are surveying everyone, which means you to find out where do you wanna go? How long do you wanna go for how much do you wanna spend? What do you wanna do on the trip? Like, do you wanna just chill and lie on a beach? Or do you wanna be like backpacking and hiking and like repelling, but

Kate: Like spoiler alert, we've already kind of determined. We're not gonna be repelling this if we do this for the first time,

Doree: Correct.

Kate: <laugh> yeah. <laugh> I feel like that you offer that up, but you and I have privately discussed. Yes. We're not really in a repelling mood.

Doree: Funny. It would be funny if people wanted like a high adventure trip, I would

Kate: Love to do a forever 35 backpacking trip. Like I am, I would be down for that sometime, but not this first time. Not first time, time. I think we need to just decompress together as a little. We just easily

Doree: To it. Exactly. Mm-hmm so we will link to that in the show notes. So please fill out that survey. It really helps us figure out what trip to plan,

Kate: Honestly, should we do this, which we wanted to do? Should

Doree: We do this? Um, Kate today was today was a big day for you in the, in the Spencer king household.

Kate: Today was the start of school here in the greater Los Angeles county area. We went back to school and I have to tell you, it is just a roller coaster of emotions and energy. I mean, it's, it's intense too, because we were just coming off of like a very chill kind of month where my kids really got intimate with their iPads in terms of what they were up to. They were basically just swimming and on screens for a month or, you know, a few weeks. So the shift to then being like, sorry, no more screens anymore. You know, that's, that's a lot for them. Mm-hmm, <affirmative>, you know, that kind of the end of summer break this for any of us. We, I think we all feel it. I used to get so depressed as summer transition to fall, and we had to head back to school. I mean, I, I still kind of feel that way sometimes. Um, so yes, my children headed back to school. I just wanna give a shout out to all the teachers and school administrators and people who, educators, just all of you out there who are kicking back in, even though I know your job never truly slows down. Mm we are so grateful for you. You are the heroes of our lives,

Doree: Kate. How does it feel for you? Mm-hmm <affirmative> how does it feel for you as like a mom going through this right now? Well,

Kate: I have a sixth grader and that's really intense and you know what, and I it's intense in that. It, I don't, I think with middle school and I think for anything our kids go through and I've talked to my therapist about this a lot is how do we not come at it with our own baggage? You know, like I come at my children like there, like I found puberty in adolescence to be extremely traumatizing for a variety of reasons. And I think what hap, I think, I, I think what I've had to work on as a parent is a, is not just assuming that that's how my kids are gonna experience it too. Right now that might make me self-centered. This might be the general human experience. I don't know. But I, I have to remind myself that my middle school experience or any life experience is not going to be theirs.

Doree: So yeah. I mean, I think that this is like one of the hardest things in general, as a parent,

Kate: It is really hard. And I, I don't feel like this is something I've, I, I hear discussed a lot when it comes to parenting, you know, and, and, and raising kids, or even, I think even being kid adjacent, not necessarily having your own kids, but seeing other kids grow up, you know, kids who are part of your lives and other ways, like it's impossible. I think not to be taken back to our own experiences as humans. And, you know, I found middle school really tough. <laugh> like, it was really hard. And I know that's like part of the course, like find me the person who's like, I loved middle school. I don't think they're out there. Like, is there one, are you out there because, Hmm, I don't

Doree: Know. I, yeah, I, I did not love middle school. I, I didn't go like my I've, I think I've mentioned this before, but my elementary school was K through eight, so I, I didn't have the, the typical middle school experience. Um, it, and it was public school, but that's just how my town did school. Like you went straight from elementary school to high school. Um, so it was weird because we were dealing with like all the same middle school stuff, but with the same 50 kids we had been with.

Kate: Oh, that's so small. Oh my goodness.

Doree: Yeah. So it, it was, it was interesting, but I mean, it still sucked. <laugh> don't get me wrong.

Kate: No, no, nothing. I mean, I, I had a very, really kind of tough fifth grade year and I ended up going to a very small all girls private school for sixth grade. And we had 11 people in our entire grade, which was, I mean, it was, it's changed my life. And it really was saved me in a lot of ways, but middle school was still extremely hard. Yeah. So I, you know, you just have to kind of like hope, you know, you hope you've endowed them with all the tools for them to navigate the hard things and hope you've communicated enough that you're here for them and the ways that you wanna be. And, you know, and then like, you're also just like looking at these middle schoolers and they're like, so grown up and I've become like the embarrassing parent who doesn't know technology. Like, it's just like all of a sudden, all this stuff happens.

Doree: All this stuff happens all of a sudden it's crazy.

Kate: All of a sudden, so I don't know, you know, I'm hap my kids have, we I'm grateful for their teachers and their friends. And I feel like we are in a good space. And I'm trying to just focus on that and not project my anxiety onto them, but buckle up because if you have kids and you haven't gone through this yet, holy smokes, it's wacky, it's wacky. It's like any milestone, you know, like, you're just like, what the fuck? My child's going to preschool. It's just that over and over again throughout your life. So that's where I'm at over here. But I would like to shift gears a little bit and hear about how your meal planning is going, because I have to tell you I've hit a wall here. Anthony is in production. He he's a, a TV show writer, uh, in case people don't know who I'm talking about, my husband and he's working till like 11 o'clock every night or later. And so I've been in charge of dinners for a while. And I, I recently told him, like, I find cooking for our family demoralizing because <laugh> like, shit gets rejected. I put so much energy into it. I hate it. I'm so sick of it. And I told him, the second you get done with this job, like I'm out you're, you're on kitchen duty five days a week, my friend. So how you, I know have been kind of revisiting meal planning with your family unit Doree. Yes. How is that going?

Doree: Well, I just wanna just wanna kind of back up and say, okay, that <laugh>, we have been talking a lot about mental load and kind of household division of labor on my, in my newsletter. Um, and I interviewed a woman named Mary Catherine star, who does the Instagram mom life comics. I won't go into the whole thing, but she, she talks a lot about all of these things, emotional labor, mental load, et cetera. And so this has led to some very interesting conversations. And one thing that I've been thinking about, and I feel like it was a commenter who was talking about this, although I don't remember exactly, but one of the things was like, kind of like it invite, if you have a partner and you feel like they need to take on more mental, like sort of like invite them in to help you come up with a solution. So I said to Matt yesterday, I was like, I would really like us to sit down for 10 minutes once a week and just plan the meals for the week. And he was like, okay. He's like, well, I can do that right now.

Oh my God. And he's like, I'm just gonna do every day. It'll be like, every day will be sort of a pun, um,

Kate: Like taco Tuesday.

Doree: Exactly. So he said, okay, Monday, Monday, Monday. So something like a burger on a bun

Kate: Monday, Monday. That's really good. Monday. It's really good. Okay.

Doree: Taco Tuesday because obviously, uh, Wednesday prince spaghetti day. So something pasta related Thursday. Oh

Kate: My God. Wednesday prince Wednesday, like of Daniel tiger

Doree: Prince. I don't, I don't think it was a Daniel tiger reference because we don't watch Daniel tiger. Okay. Um, Thursday. Hello? Fresh.

Kate: Okay.

Doree: Friday is Friday. So something fried Saturday pizza.

Kate: Yeah. Always.

Doree: And then Sunday. So I think because I usually do get two hello, fresh meals a week. So what I can either do is I can either make one of them for my lunches, which I think I might do, or I can make one of them on Sunday. Um, but what usually ends up, but he thinks Sunday should be soup stew or sushi.

Kate: Sunday is either soup, stew or sushi. Could it be just a rotation?

Doree: Yeah.

Kate: Okay.

Doree: But I was like, I

Kate: Actually kinda like this plan. Okay.

Doree: Right. I know. I was like, oh, alright, great. That sounds like, that sounds good. Like we can just, and then he was like, this morning, he was like, remember when I made those portabello mushroom burgers? And I was like, yes, I do. He's like, so, you know, I think I started the meal planning and the cooking just as like my own thing. Mm-hmm <affirmative> and I'm trying to bring Matt on board in a way that feels like I want him to have some, um, ownership over it.

Kate: Yeah.

Doree: You know what I mean? Mm-hmm <affirmative> and also, um, be like a little more invested in it because like the way it is now, I feel like I just plan everything. And then I just like, I'm like here's dinner, you know?

Kate: Yes.

Doree: Um,

Kate: Oh, I know. I know.

Doree: So, you know, Kate feel free to steal the puns. Feel free to start Monday, Monday,

Kate: Monday really makes me chuckle, but then explain Wednesday too. Again, Wednesday prince spaghetti day. You see how I'm I tried to make the prince Wednesday connection, but where, where, where did this one come from?

Doree: Wednesday. Wednesday was I think that was their slogan. Do you remember prince pasta?

Kate: Yes. Prince pasta. I can remember.

Doree: And their slogan was Wednesday as prince spaghetti day. Okay. Generations of Americans still recall the company's memorable slogan. Wednesday is prince spaghetti day.

Kate: <laugh>. Wow. I never, <laugh> never heard that in my life. <laugh> but that works. That's perfect.

Doree: Yeah. So, you know, gonna see how that goes and I'll report back

Kate: Now. Is he taking over like the cooking of everything or?

Doree: No. Okay. But I think we could, like, I, I think, I think we will figure that out. Like, you know, I'm gonna, after I'm, after we're done, I'm gonna go check in with him about Monday, Monday. Got it. See where his head's at

Kate: Monday, Monday, Monday. Can't wait to hear what the first meal of Monday bun is. There are so many good ver like things that either are, are bun meals. I mean, there's just, there's a lot you can do with that. Totally.

Doree: Well, and here's the other thing is like, I don't eat red meat. Um, and so that, you know, I think he would prefer a little more red meat on the menu, but like, we're gonna kind of try to see how we can come up with some things that are, that are, you know, amenable to both of us. That isn't just like the same, like saute chicken breast.

Kate: Oh God. I know

Doree: That check. Although sidebar, and maybe I'll do this for Friday, Friday, but I feel like I have perfected the cooking of a breaded chicken breast.

Kate: You're doing a, an egg, a flour or a flour, an egg, and then like a Panco

Doree: Flour, egg, and then panko with Italian seasoning.

Kate: Mm-hmm <affirmative> mm-hmm

Doree: <affirmative> salt and pepper. Mm-hmm <affirmative> that's it. And I'm, I'm Browning them in a pan and then I'm putting them in the oven.

Kate: Don't say it, you do a brown and then a bake that's that's I always, that throws me off whenever you're supposed to brown first, I'm just like, can't I just put it, can I just bake it? So you give it a little bit of,

Doree: I mean, yes. Crunch, you can, but I love the crispy crunch

And you have to, I mean, you have to be, you have to be like very, um, vigilant because you, you know, the, the kiss of death with chicken breasts is overcooking them. Like there's nothing worse than a dry chicken breast. So, you know, I was really checking on and you need a meat thermometer if you don't have a meat thermometer, forget this plan. But if you do and you cook it to exactly 1 65, you will have the most delicious chicken breast crunchy on the outside, a little salty with that Italian seasoning and then nice and juicy on the inside.

Kate: Is this a recipe that you've kind of made up or do you have one that you can, that we can follow that you can, um, um, email to me so I can make this sounds good.

Doree: Um, so what happened was I had been using a recipe for chicken Palm that was baked.

Kate: Oh.

Doree: And, and I was like, this is good, but like, I'm, I'm missing the crispy. I want the crispy outside. So then I started Browning on my own and adapted the recipe a little bit.

Kate: I see. You're an innovator. Okay,

Doree: Look, I'm an innovator. What can I say? But I will write something up for you and send it to you, Kate, just for you.

Kate: I would love that. And I, while we're talking about a chicken breast, I did just wanna shout out the website, gimme some oven because their baked chicken breast recipe is a go-to and it involves a grinding, which I had never done until I read this, this, um, this recipe. I will make sure to link to it because it's, it's a, it's a classic that if you eat chicken, I feel like is easy to add to your rotation.

Doree: Okay. Well, Kate, let's take a break.

Kate: Okay. Doree

Doree: And, uh, we'll be right back. Okay. We're back with a text. Hi Kenora. How did you decide on your kids' names? 34 weeks and zero ideas help.

Kate: How did you decide on Henry?

Doree: We had a list that we would talk about mm-hmm <affirmative> going into birth, going into, going into the hospital. We had narrowed it down to Henry or Jack, and then we were going to just see like how he came out and we were both like, he's a Henry.

Kate: Oh,

Doree: Like there wasn't there wasn't like even a question.

Kate: Really?

Doree: So yeah, he was such a Henry and like, I think he remains, he, he remains a Henry.

Kate: Wow. Okay. I love that. I

Doree: Just,

Kate: I just liked my D for oldest daughter's name is Eleanor and I just liked that name. And there was a, uh, person who used to check me in, at my old yoga studio, whose name was Eleanor. And I was like, that's such a great name. I wanna name my kid that if I ever have a kid. And then I, when we got pregnant, I got pregnant. Anthony was just along for the ride. Uh, I was like, how about Eleanor? And he was like done. Great. So that was it. And then with my second Lydia, we were in when gonna name her Jane and then, mm.

I just, like, I really liked the name Lydia. Then I suggested that. And he also liked it. And so that's where we landed. But she was Jane for a while. I mean, I'm like when she was in utero, she was Jane and she's not a Jane. Like, and we talk about this at home. Like, it would be so weird if she was Jane. She just, I love the name, Jane, but that's, that's not her. That's not good there. You have it. And, and people are always, you know, it's, Lydia has come back to bite us in the ass a little bit because, uh, Anthony did write beetle juice, the musical. Yes. And some main characters named Lydia. And at the time I said to him, people are gonna think we're choosing the name because of beetle juice. And he was like, no, no, no. We have to worry about that. And now of course, people are like, is she Lydia because of, of beetle juice?

Doree: Oh my she's not.

Kate: Gosh. And Eleanor is not Eleanor for any reason, other than we just, they're just names. We liked. There's no big family connection. They're middle names are where we have like kind of family references, but I just liked the names. And luckily we agreed. Cause there are many names that we did not agree on.

Doree: Right.

Kate: Like I still want a child named Harriet, but I couldn't get him on that.

Doree: That's a cute name. Mm-hmm <affirmative>

Kate: Harriet. Right? It's

Doree: The best. Yeah. It's a cute name. Yeah. It's a cute name.

Kate: It's fun to name things. You know, even if it's not a child and a pet, an object, I don't know. I like to come up with names.

Doree: <laugh>

Kate: Okay. Here's a different, uh, different, different, very different. I can't talk here is, uh, an email about a different topic. Do, uh, this listener wrote to us, I bought a $20. Oh wait, excuse me. They said, listen to the recent hat episode and had to tell you my insane story. I bought a $20 straw hat on Amazon, that my BFF, who also listens to this pod recommended, I took my daughter camping on the ocean and wore the hat all week. And I felt like it was kind of irritating tight on the top of one of my ears, but I kept wearing it by the last day. The cartilage of my ear was killing me. When I got home, I went to the doctor and I had an infection in the cartilage of my ear. Whoops, probably caused by a tiny splinter from the straw. They put me on an antibiotic and after two doses of it, I woke up in the night and felt weird.

So I woke up my husband and then I passed out. When I came to I'd lost my vision and my arms were numb. He called 9 1 1. And I ended up going to the ER, it turns out that a medication I had recently started for anxiety interacted with the antibiotic and caused an irregular heartbeat. I'm all better now. But I just had to tell you that wild story, that all happened because of my stupid cheap straw hat from Amazon, which my daughter told me, looked ridiculous anyway. And which will probably end up costing me thousands, thanks to all the medical bills. So, wow. You gave that hat like a one star review is my guess.

Doree: This is talk about a freak accident.

Kate: This is one of those things where like what, but this kind of stuff happens.

Doree: Yeah, of course.

Kate: Can you imagine splinter from the straw hat on the ear, an ear

Doree: Splinter on the ear leading to an infection.

Kate: Ugh. Not worth it. It's not worth, not worth the hat.

Doree: No,

Kate: Not worth. I would like to know which hat <laugh>. All right. You wanna read this email to,

Doree: I would love to. Okay. Hi, cat door. Hope you enjoyed your July vacations. Hot tip for getting rid of a large slash deep pimple. I recently had a pimple directly next to my right eye for a while. I thought I was getting a new Mo because it developed so slowly. One day I woke up and it was large painful red and my eye was swollen. Half shut. I proceeded to alternate hot compresses and on the spot acne meds with the ultimate trick to getting rid of it was honey. Yep. Just plain old honey did the job. I put honey on it a few times a day and it dried that sucker out. Wow. OK. Uh, totally switching gears. But recently you were talking about families having birthdays clustered together. This is a thing because birthdays are not evenly distributed throughout the year. I worked in OB GYN research for many years and there are certain times of year with, with tons of babies. End of October slash start of November are all those Valentine's day babies end of August and early September are Christmas slash new year's babies. January statistically has the lowest B days. Also many, many babies are born nine ish months after a couple's anniversary or a spouse's B day. I've tested this on many friends and it works out more often than you'd think.

Kate: Okay, well I will, well, this is one

Doree: I'm true for

Kate: You. No it's first of all, no, I went and did the math and I was like, God, I don't have one of the, I mean, it's all fine. If you have a, a baby through what's the, what's the like proper term about a child that's conceived with sexual intercourse. What do you call that kind of baby?

Doree: Uh, we now refer to those as spontaneously conceived.

Kate: Thank you. Okay. Well, yeah. I mean, I get it look sometimes a holiday just puts you in the mood or does it

Doree: Yeah. You know, what's, you know, what's funny, Kate is, um, you know, as everyone knows, Henry was an IVF baby, but the tra the transfer, the embryo transfer for him, I believe was the day after Matt's birthday.

Kate: <laugh> so it was like spontaneous kind.

Doree: Exactly.

Kate: Oh, that's really funny. I don't

Doree: Know. It's so my, my dad's birthday is two days after mats and my birthday's in may. I'm just saying,

Kate: Wait

Doree: A second. Hold on. Oh, gross.

Kate: Wait a second. Oh, wait. Okay. So it adds up. So you did the math. Have you done the math with your own birth?

Doree: That's what I just said.

Kate: Wait that's so it was your dad's birthday. You

Doree: I know gross. And my sister also,

Kate: No, May 10th.

Doree: I know. No,

Kate: I'm sorry. Oh no, my brother and I are both born in June and July. Oh no, no, I don't wanna do it again. Why am I such a baby? Like you gotta do it. I understand people have sex.

Doree: I just want everyone to know that Kate is blushing right now. <laugh>

Kate: I am I'm so like I'm so what's the word? Not sheltered, but like, I mean, I literally read books about ORs having sex with humans. It's not that I'm modest in my interests. It's that? I still feel like a bashful young last from outside Boston where nobody talks about sex.

Doree: It's true.

Kate: Like, no, like truly the Puritan energy mixed with a bit of Catholic guilt and shame really has made me into somebody special. I'll tell you that.

Doree: Ooh.

Kate: Wow. That was a sexy conversation. Wait, can we circle back to the honey on pimples?

Doree: Yes.

Kate: Now I went through a phase where I was washing my face with honey with local honey Mandu. Manduka honey, is that the correct word or is that the name of my yoga mat? Manuka honey,

Doree: Manuka,

Kate: Manuka, honey. I was watching my face with Manuka honey, because I read that somewhere. This is prepo in my early to mid thirties where I was really figuring out what skincare was to me, but I didn't know it was a drying thing. I'm a jig.

Doree: Mm.

Kate: I mean, who knew?

Doree: Interesting.

Kate: Interesting. Also that's a sticky,

Doree: Very simple patch. Sticky, very sticky. I mean, it does make me wonder, like whether it would've just gone down anyway, <laugh>

Kate: Right. Like how much of this is a few days placebo

Doree: Effects. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. I mean, who knows, but,

Kate: But this listener is not, they didn't make this up because I did a quick Google of honey on pimple come, you know, a lot of things come up.

Doree: Yes, yes, yes, yes.

Kate: It helps with the inflammation. Well, I mean, we take honey when we have a sore throat.

Doree: That's true. That is very true. Kate,

Kate: Honey is one of those things. I just give my kids to like, make them stop complaining when they have a cold, like here's the honey that'll fix it. Doesn't doesn't do anything. Ugh. Wow. Sorry. Let's take a little break because we've got a very long email to read when we get back.

Doree: All right. We'll be right back. Okay.

Kate: This is a long one and I looked at it and I was like, is there anything we can cut? But I, I don't know if there is, so just stretch your vocal chords. I can start us off.

Doree: Okay.

Kate: Here's here's the TLDR provided by the listener. How do you cope with a breakup? When timing was the main issue? I'm 33 and I've been on and off dating apps from my, my adult life and have mostly had flings short flings. I've never had a long term relationship beyond a year. And in the past I've felt like this makes me a broken or incapable person at this point. I'm pretty cynical about love. And I'm exhausted with dating at the same time. I've been in therapy the last couple of years and feel like I'm finally in a good place with myself and I'm ready for a real connection. If I can find it. I went back on the apps in may, after a year long break and quickly started chatting with someone I truly got excited about first in a long time, we had so many similarities and compatibilities.

The only issue was that he was coming off a separation and going through finalizing a divorce. He was looking to casually date and not really ready for anything serious and not sure when he would be, I've been down this road and seriously considered ending it, but couldn't deny the strong connection we had just chatting. So I decided to keep talking and meet. Anyway, we quickly found, we enjoyed spending time together. I fell hard and fast emotionally, mentally physi, physically, sexually. I've never had this kind of chemistry with anyone. And he quickly became my favorite person. I felt him giving the same feelings back to me. I'm a slow mover when it comes to relationships, but this felt different than anything I've ever experienced. Okay. I'm gonna fast forward a little bit. Basically everything was perfect. Then the sister writes, we had serious discussions along the way, and I knew his situation might bring an end to it.

All. I told him, I loved him last weekend because frankly, I just couldn't hold it in. I felt conflicted about it since I knew he couldn't or wouldn't feel comfortable returning it, which is fine. But I also knew he would potentially feel conflicted about where he was at with things. At the end of the day, I had to be true to my feelings, but I also had reiterated multiple times over the course of things that I wanted the best for him and in no rush would give him Spacey needs, et cetera, all very true things. I've just never felt these feelings. So viscerally before do I'm gonna pass the mic.

Doree: Um, things became a bit more complicated on his end with his ex questioning the need for divorce again, and wanting desperately to work things out. Even though they had decided on this, as well as his intentions to not find anything serious. And he told me he felt confused and needed to think about things. We talked on Wednesday and he told me how great I was and that he could easily see the future with me, that he had been incredibly happy spending time with me. And that's so much of our time together has been the best he's ever felt. But with that with time to think that with time to think he can't ignore the fact that he can't fall in love right now and that he felt we needed to stop seeing each other. It's not like I didn't see this coming, but I have been feeling utterly destroyed by it.

I feel completely heartbroken in a way I've never felt before. My brain is both trying to tell myself to get my shit together and stop being so dramatic. I've only known this person two months after all that it wasn't real. And it's also trying to hold onto the possibility that there could be something in the future if he resolves his shit. But at this point, I guess, I won't even know for sure that he and his ex are finalizing their divorce. We going to try to work it out. They're talking this weekend and I wasn't expecting to hear any decisions from him so soon, I'm having a hard time coping with it. Being over before we even got started, I have no ill will towards this person. Other than wishing, we both had been more in tune with our needs slash situation before getting so close. But at the end of the day, he truly made me happy and we had such good times together that I don't regret it. It just makes me sad. Does anyone else have resources or tips on how to cope with heartbreak in this sort of situation accepting of any and all words of advice, encouragement, or suggestions for resources slash book slash TV slash movies slash things docu occupy times while I'm trying to recover from this. Thanks in advance

Kate: Doree, you are really kind of the relationship expert of the two of us. I'm wondering if you have any initial thoughts after reading this story?

Doree: Well, first of all, I'm sorry that you're going through this. I mean, breakups suck, even if you've only been seeing the person for two months, like it just, it's painful. Yeah. And sad, and you're allowed to mourn you're, you know what it like you're allowed to mourn the relationship you had and you're also allowed to mourn the relationship that you thought you could have had.

Kate: Mm.

Doree: But with that said, you did not have that relationship. And I, what I, what I'm what I'm sensing from this message is that yes, you have a lot of great times together, but it was only two months, which is not a long time. And I do think that some of what you and I could be totally off base here. I also just wanna preface this by saying, this is just what I am gleaning from this email that some of your feelings were sort of projecting something onto him that he maybe was not capable of. I don't think he was ever going to really fully commit to a relationship. He's not divorced. Honestly, to me, it sounds like he's getting back together with his ex am I being too harsh?

Kate: I don't know

Doree: If you're being too harsh.

Kate: This

Doree: Is my, this is just my analysis of the situation. This is not really addressing her question. This is just my analysis of the situation. Um, but it like, it does, it does, it really sucks. And I, and I also am not, I don't want you to think that I am in any way, like dismissing your feelings for him or that it wasn't real, or, you know, what have you, but it was two months. It was the honeymoon phase. Like you didn't know this guy super, super well, and he's going through a divorce, like, so, okay. So here's my thought on this with all of this, all of this background analysis,

I think what you have here is some really good data. And I say that because I think that when we get into these situations, they're showing us that we are capable of this, this kind of love and this kind of feeling, and this kind of connection with someone they're showing us like, Hey, that part of you that you thought was kind of dead. It's not dead. You can feel that there are people out there that you can feel this with. And it sucks that it didn't work out. But I think that now, you know, like I want someone like this, who's not going through a divorce because ultimately this particular guy is not available to you. And I personally, and I think, you know, this, I don't think it's worth like waiting around for him because he's gonna string you along. There's gonna be drama with the X. And like, ultimately, I don't know. I, I feel like these guys always go back. Um, so that's just my analysis of the situation. The in terms of advice, encouragement. I mean, I think my encouragement is like, this is data. This is, this is ultimately like, I know it doesn't feel this way right now, but like, this is good. Like you have, you have this capacity for love. It's a beautiful thing. And you're allow to wallow.

Kate: Yeah. And I, I, I don't know if there's any sort of like resources, books, TV, movies, things to occupy occupy your time. I mean, anything will do the trick, but I also think, does anything ever truly distract us when we're grieving the end of a relationship and our heart's been broken, I personally have never found anything. I mean, I did listen to a lot of like, you know, angry music at times when I've been dumped, um, or ended a relationship. But I don't know if anything does distract us. And it's just a Testament to how strong our feelings were. And I think Doree, your, I have the same reaction that is better to have loved and lost. You know, like I'm so happy for that. You got to be reawakened in this way and realize one that you can have these kinds of relationships and two that you are worthy of them and that you want them and that you deserve to be loved and received in this way. But also I think more than this, because I did

Doree: Wanna flag

Kate: Listener, look, you were really willing to give a lot to this person. And you were willing to make a lot of sacrifices, I think, to make this work. And I'm trying to find the exact spot where you said it, hold my horses. You said you wouldn't, he wouldn't be comfortable returning your feelings. And he would feel conflicted. And that you reiterated that you wanted what was best for him. You were in no rush. You would give him space. You were making a lot of accommodations when the truth is ultimately, I think you were in a space to where you should have been received the way that you were giving. Mm, even though this was a wonderful part, man, and you had a wonderful experience, you were willing to make a lot of sacrifices, which look, that's our right to make sacrifices and relationships. And we all do that.

But it's felt to me in reading that, that I didn't want that for you. I wanted someone to respond with the same level of commitment and feeling, and ultimately this person is not able to give you that. And it doesn't mean there's anything wrong or bad with them. It just means that you are ready for a different kind of love than they were able to give. And I think as hard as it is to remain open to that, just trust that that you are, you will receive it again and you'll receive it in a way that I think is better for you,

Doree: A men.

Kate: And we love you and we're here for you and I'm sure someone's gonna offer up some great, like other tips for heartbreak or TV and movies and that sort of thing. And we welcome them, but we are just here to say, we see you, it fucking sucks. Feel free to grieve as long as you need. And we're sorry that it didn't work out. And I think this is a good spot to end this episode. I think we're, we've done our jobs here.

Doree: I think so too, having ourselves on the

Kate: Back, you know, hopefully. All right. Well, thank you all for trusting us with your messages. We appreciate it.