Wedding season is right around the corner, and love is in the air! It’s a beautiful time in life and one to be cherished for sure, but what a lot of young lovers don’t realize is that their wedding lasts only for a day and marriage lasts a lifetime…or at least we hope. Now that we have a couple of years of marriage under our belt, we wanted to share some things that we wish we knew before we said our vows. These are things that we believe would have helped save us from many arguments, stress and conflict especially in our first year of marriage. Even though we are incredibly happy together, we still have a lot to learn and work on if we want to keep it that way.

0:00

1:15 Welcome banter

3:55 Start of topic

6:10 Premarital counseling

8:19 Love is not enough

11:46 Learning to be a better communicator

16:14 Apologizing correctly and forgiveness

21:30 Getting to know in laws before marriage

25:55 Defining your roles in marriage

32:45 Everything you do impacts your spouse

36:28 Marriage takes work

When you get married, you’re not just marrying your future husband or wife. In reality, you’re also marrying their family! Of course that includes your in laws, who for some reason seem to have a bad reputation. We’ve all at least heard a couple of horror stories regarding monster in laws misbehaving. But is it really always that bad? Do our relationships with our in laws always need to be stressful, filled with tension and full of drama?

In this episode, we discuss the importance of building strong relationships with your in laws and why it should be a positive experience. We also share some of our own personal strategies for strengthening our relationships with our parents and in laws to promote a healthy marriage.

0:00 Intro

1:13 Welcome banter

3:54 Start of topic

4:55 Monster in law

11:51 Mama’s boy

14:45 The importance and impact of in laws

20:18 Strategies to improve relationship with in laws

27:00 Your parents and in laws are people too

28:00 Building new memories together

29:15 Empty nest syndrome

30:30 Takeaways and lessons learned

We're back! Life has been pretty busy for us recently with lots of changes including the addition of a new puppy to our family, moving out of our apartment, changing jobs and taking care of aging parents. What we realized was how easily it is to run at 100 mph just living life and not notice what it might be doing to our relationships, mental health, mood and just overall well-being.

In this episode, we wanted to share a little bit about what we've been up to and why we chose to take a time out from the podcast. We're not going anywhere, but we did feel that it was necessary to take a pause while we got settled. We plan on getting back to our regular schedule of releasing new episodes every Thursday again so please do stay tuned.

As always, thank you so much for continuing to support our show even while we were gone! We feel so fortunate to be able to not only share our stories, but to hear about yours too. Many of you have reached out to us on Instagram and we love hearing your thoughts on our topics as well as giving us insights into your personal experiences.

0:00 Intro

1:16 Our puppy is a monster

6:25 Mental health, burnout and time out

16:19 And the Oscar goes to…

19:15 Taking ownership

22:15 Did we make the right choice

23:51 Rolling with the punches

WARNING: NEW PUPPY ALERT!

Please meet and welcome our newest co-host, his name is Latte! He is the most adorable and dapper Boston Terrier (aka The American Gentleman) you’ll ever meet! Oh and yes, he already has his very own Instagram account @LatteTheBostie. Please make sure to give him a follow, cuteness overload guaranteed!

Anyways, we couldn’t be more excited to share this news with all of you in this special episode where we talk about our experience of getting our first puppy, and what we’ve learned so far about how pets can impact the health of a relationship with your partner. As new dog parents, we are definitely learning a lot about taking care of a puppy (mostly as we go along…yikes), but also about how well we work together as a couple. Whether it’s deciding who’s turn it is to get up after being woken up every couple of hours in the middle of the night or which one of us is doing more work like scooping puppy poop, we now have a shared responsibility to another living being that will test our patience and relationship. Even though it’s scary, a ton of work, and time consuming we are overjoyed with our puppy and look forward to the many beautiful memories we get to build together in the coming years.

0:00 Intro

1:18 Welcome banter

1:49 Start of topic

2:26 How we got our puppy

10:20 After the ride home

13:51 Latte’s first day at home

17:52 Potty training and feeding time

24:10 Becoming dog parents

27:40 Why we wanted a puppy

35:22 Impact of having pets on relationships

43:00 Should you get a pet

47:26 Takeaways & lessons learned

Have you ever thought to yourself that maybe you’re just unlucky when it comes to love and romance? Does it feel like there just aren’t any good men or women out there for you, and you’re destined to be alone forever? When it comes to finding love and dating, it can sometimes feel like you’re cursed because of how society defines what a “successful” relationship is or should be. So is it really any wonder that when a relationship fails, we automatically associate that failure to ourselves? What if we were to change how we measured our luck in love, not by marriage or finding the one, but by the memories and moments we experience being in love even if things don’t ultimately work out?

In this episode, we challenge the idea of what being unlucky in love really means, and search for practical ways to improve our success in this area of our lives. We believe that it starts by being brutally honest with ourselves, taking back our power through personal responsibility, self-reflection and having a desire to work on the things that are within our control.

0:00 Intro

2:04 Welcome banter

3:38 Start of topic

4:18 Jennifer Aniston unlucky in love

6:52 Dating and marriage expectations

8:36 It’s better to have loved and lost

11:26 Why can’t I find love

16:24 Knowing what you want in a relationship

19:11 How to improve your luck in love

22:00 Are you emotionally ready for a relationship

25:50 Don’t try so hard

28:12 Feel your emotions

32:11 Be honest with yourself

Let’s face it: change is a big part of life, and relationships are no exception. No matter how long you’ve been with someone, the reality is that the person you are with today is not exactly the same person they were when you first met them, and the same goes for you. Hopefully, the changes are positive and you’ve both evolved as people. But the truth is that change is always hard, and it’s not always an easy journey. There will likely be obstacles and road blocks that will put even the strongest relationships to the test. Change itself is not necessarily bad, it’s just typically very uncomfortable and most people don’t know how to respond properly. In fact, one could argue that if you and your partner can harness the power of change, it might even strengthen and take your relationship to new heights.

In this episode, we dive into the 5 stages of a relationship, how it progresses over time and some of the challenges partners face as the relationship matures. We also offer suggestions that have helped us in our relationship to stay happy as we continue to change and grow as individuals and as a couple. It’s never pretty nor perfect and it absolutely takes a ton of effort, but we argue that in the end if the result is a stronger, deeper and more meaningful relationship, then it’s 100% worth every bit of struggle and pain.

0:00 Intro

0:56 Welcome banter & big news

5:13 Start of topic

7:28 5 stages of a relationship

8:23 Stage 1: The Romance

10:57 Stage 2: The Power Struggle

16:58 Stage 3: Stability

22:41 Stage 4: Commitment

26:44 Stage 5: Bliss

28:50 How do couples stay happy

37:07 Dealing with change

40:50 Takeaways & lessons learned

Should you get married? Many of us grew up with the pressure and expectation of finding a partner and getting married to live happily ever after, but is it necessary to be happy? It seems like more and more people are choosing not to get married, but many of us still face pushback from our parents, religion and society.

In this episode we discuss the reasons to get married and the reasons to think more before jumping in. We also chat about why we personally chose to get hitched and why it took Will so long to propose, and what has changed after being married vs dating.

0:00 Intro

1:01 Welcome banter

5:39 Start of topic

7:24 On the fence with marriage

13:26 Why we chose to get married

20:34 Reasons to get married

25:13 Reasons not to get married

36:07 Marrying for money

38:40 What changed after marriage

43:00 Takeaways & lessons learned

Are you keeping score in your relationship? Do you constantly point out all the things you do for the relationship, but also make it known the things your partner isn’t doing? Maybe you’re not even aware that you’re doing it, and the impact it’s having on your relationship. Oftentimes, keeping score creates a rift and divide between the couple because in order for a partner to “win”, the relationship must lose. Feelings of resentment, anger, and frustration lead to stress and tension that continues to build up until eventually the relationship breaks and is destroyed.

In this episode, we reflect on how we catch ourselves keeping score even after being together in a healthy and loving relationship for over a decade. We explore why most of us recognize that keeping score is not good for our relationships, yet we end up doing it anyways. We offer suggestions through our own journey on how to stop keeping score all the time, and work on learning to think more with a single team mentality. What we realized is that when we stop competing with each other and only pointing out our flaws, we are happier, stronger and more grateful for our partners.

0:00 Intro

1:16 Welcome banter

3:11 Start of topic

6:44 How we keep score

9:57 Why do we keep score in relationships

16:04 Keeping score hurts your relationship

19:09 We’re on the same team

23:24 How do you stop keeping score

29:51 Takeaways & lessons learned