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Everything You Want to Ask Someone In an Open Marriage with Molly Roden Winter · QUESTION EVERYTHING

0:04
Speaker 1: Big things happen when you're pretty, pretty bold, pretty clever,
0:08
Speaker 1: pretty strong. I'm Danielle Robe, and each week my guests
0:12
Speaker 1: and I have conversations that put a new spin on pretty.
0:17
Speaker 1: This is pretty smart. Scrolling through Instagram one afternoon, I
0:22
Speaker 1: stumbled upon a book title that, well, it stopped me
0:26
Speaker 1: mid scroll more. A memoir of open marriage. The author
0:33
Speaker 1: is Molly Rode in Winter, a thirty five year old teacher,
0:37
Speaker 1: the mother of two little boys, and happily married for
0:40
Speaker 1: almost ten years to her husband Stewart, until one night
0:44
Speaker 1: she feels suffocated, vaguely dissatisfied, so she leaves her brownstone,
0:50
Speaker 1: walks into the neighborhood bar in Brooklyn, and finds herself
0:54
Speaker 1: steeped in desire for another man.
0:58
Speaker 2: I was an obsession with with how it made me
1:01
Speaker 2: feel that it was. It was like a dopamine hit.
1:06
Speaker 2: When I saw the way he looked at me, I
1:08
Speaker 2: saw myself differently, and it was a way that I
1:12
Speaker 2: hadn't seen myself for a while, being in total mother
1:17
Speaker 2: mode for the previous six years seven if you count pregnancy,
1:21
Speaker 2: which I kind of do, so, it had been a
1:24
Speaker 2: while and since I had felt that way, and I
1:26
Speaker 2: think I got kind of addicted to that feeling and
1:29
Speaker 2: wanting more of that.
1:30
Speaker 1: So at this point, most women would do one of
1:33
Speaker 1: two things, probably one suppressed their longing or two have
1:39
Speaker 1: an affair. Molly does neither. Instead, she goes to her
1:44
Speaker 1: husband Stuart and asks for permission, and what does her
1:48
Speaker 1: husband say? Go for it. Her book chronicles her journey
1:53
Speaker 1: with herself, her partners, and of course her husband Stuart.
1:57
Speaker 1: Though they struggle with everything you think will jealousy and
2:01
Speaker 1: security doubts, Molly and Stuart have this remarkable way of
2:06
Speaker 1: negotiating their desires and making what seems impossible for most
2:10
Speaker 1: couple's work. They're still married and in love going on
2:14
Speaker 1: twenty five years.
2:16
Speaker 2: I did not expect what happened, which was that when
2:21
Speaker 2: I loved another person, it made me love Stuart more.
2:26
Speaker 2: There's something so beautiful about the fact that we choose
2:29
Speaker 2: each other over and over and over again.
2:31
Speaker 1: And Molly wrote in Winter went on a journey that
2:34
Speaker 1: some may never ever take, or even ever consider, but
2:38
Speaker 1: her final destination may resonate more than you know.
2:43
Speaker 2: As I was opening the marriage, as I was having
2:47
Speaker 2: to dig deep within myself to explain what I wanted
2:51
Speaker 2: to Stuart, I was also explaining what I wanted to myself.
2:54
Speaker 1: Molly's stories about something many women neglect, thinking about themselves,
3:00
Speaker 1: thinking about themselves ahead of everybody else, thinking for themselves,
3:05
Speaker 1: redefining what is normal, and to stop sacrificing our own
3:10
Speaker 1: discomfort for everybody else's comfort. It's really a story about
3:15
Speaker 1: taking responsibility for your own happiness.
3:19
Speaker 2: I am a mother who is revealing myself as a
3:23
Speaker 2: whole person, as a sexual being, as somebody with wants
3:27
Speaker 2: and needs and desires that don't just get turned off
3:32
Speaker 2: when you, you know, walk down the aisle or have
3:35
Speaker 2: a baby. I'm not just here to make you snacks
3:38
Speaker 2: and pick up your socks like I actually am a
3:41
Speaker 2: person with thoughts and feelings.
3:43
Speaker 1: As Molly journeys through the emotions that make us all
3:46
Speaker 1: just so human, heartache, betrayal, rage, she discovers a new
3:53
Speaker 1: courage to face her insecurities. In my opinion, she excavates
3:58
Speaker 1: things that most people want through life, never even considering
4:02
Speaker 1: or wanting to uncover about themselves. And because of that
4:07
Speaker 1: hard work, she unexpectedly renews her sense of joy and
4:12
Speaker 1: passion and gains a profound trust in those that she
4:15
Speaker 1: loves and ultimately discovers her truest self, showing what's possible
4:21
Speaker 1: for anyone, any woman who yearns to break through boundaries
4:25
Speaker 1: and dares to ask for more. Mollie, your memoir More
4:36
Speaker 1: has been described as brutally honest words and all the
4:41
Speaker 1: story of your journey into polyamory and more so even
4:45
Speaker 1: into self discovery. So why did you want to share
4:48
Speaker 1: this part of your life with the world.
4:51
Speaker 2: No, it's such a good question, which I sometimes ask
4:54
Speaker 2: myself over and over and over as I face the music,
4:59
Speaker 2: so to speak. Yeah, it was kind of a naive
5:02
Speaker 2: decision in many ways because I don't know that I
5:07
Speaker 2: fully knew the impact it was going to have. I mean,
5:09
Speaker 2: I wrote the book in some ways not really expecting
5:13
Speaker 2: it to be published, not expecting it to make the
5:17
Speaker 2: splash that it has made, and not thinking about people like,
5:22
Speaker 2: you know, my children and my parents reading it. But ultimately,
5:27
Speaker 2: I think I'm still I still stand aside, you know,
5:30
Speaker 2: and behind the decision to write it because I felt
5:33
Speaker 2: like nobody else was telling this story. And I think
5:37
Speaker 2: just whether you have an open marriage or not, which
5:42
Speaker 2: most people do not, I think the fact that I
5:45
Speaker 2: am a mother who is revealing myself as a whole person,
5:50
Speaker 2: as a sexual being, as somebody with wants and needs
5:54
Speaker 2: and desires that don't just get turned off when you,
5:59
Speaker 2: you know, walk down the eye or have a baby.
6:02
Speaker 2: I wanted to tell that story and felt like I
6:04
Speaker 2: was well positioned to tell it better than anyone else
6:08
Speaker 2: maybe would. So I'm still glad I did it, even
6:13
Speaker 2: though there's been a little more fallout than I had anticipated.
6:17
Speaker 1: Your husband, Stewart is your co conspirator in all of this.
6:22
Speaker 1: The question I know that is on everybody's mind is
6:26
Speaker 1: how about your children? So what kind of conversations did
6:29
Speaker 1: you have with them as this book was being published.
6:32
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean they're very different my two kids. So
6:35
Speaker 2: my older son, who I called Daniel in the book.
6:38
Speaker 2: These are not their real names, but he's very chill,
6:42
Speaker 2: and he's the one you know when the book opens,
6:46
Speaker 2: it's him learning that we have an open marriage at
6:48
Speaker 2: age thirteen. And he has always been not just you know,
6:54
Speaker 2: even keel within himself, but also kind of just an
6:57
Speaker 2: old soul. I've always felt like contemporaries more than I'm
7:02
Speaker 2: like his mom and he's my kid. I am his
7:05
Speaker 2: mom and he is my kid. But now he's twenty two,
7:07
Speaker 2: so he's very well launched. He read the book and said, yeah,
7:12
Speaker 2: it's good. Mom, He said, I skipped over the nitty
7:14
Speaker 2: gritty parts, but he mostly took it in stride. My
7:17
Speaker 2: youngest did not want to read it and still has
7:21
Speaker 2: some anxiety around my promoting it talking about it, but
7:25
Speaker 2: he's also nineteen. One of the beautiful things that we've
7:29
Speaker 2: been able to talk about as we've been moving forward
7:32
Speaker 2: is the fact that we now have an adult relationship
7:34
Speaker 2: in many ways, and most of your relationship years with
7:39
Speaker 2: a child is with them as an adult. I mean,
7:41
Speaker 2: if you think about your own relationship with your parents,
7:45
Speaker 2: you're a kid for a short amount of time. Many
7:48
Speaker 2: of those years you don't even remember, and then you're
7:50
Speaker 2: a teenager and you're already, you know, pressing up against it.
7:54
Speaker 2: So there's a lot to be said, I think for
7:58
Speaker 2: reshaping the relationship and the dynamic between a parent and
8:02
Speaker 2: child as they get older. And it doesn't mean that
8:04
Speaker 2: all of the boundaries are down, all of the privacy
8:06
Speaker 2: is lost. I think it's ultimately positive because we were
8:11
Speaker 2: kind of been catapulted into a more adult relationship.
8:15
Speaker 1: I've never thought about that. Molly you're right. We do
8:17
Speaker 1: spend so many more years as adults in the parental
8:21
Speaker 1: child relationship.
8:24
Speaker 2: Yeah, and we put so much focus on well, the kids,
8:27
Speaker 2: the kids, the kids. The kids are only kids for
8:29
Speaker 2: like a minute, you know what I mean, And then
8:33
Speaker 2: you're like, whoa, ye, yeah mine, And I still feel
8:36
Speaker 2: like I hope to be alive for decades more. And so,
8:40
Speaker 2: you know, if you want to have a relationship that
8:43
Speaker 2: grows and evolves with your kids, you need to lay
8:47
Speaker 2: some groundwork early. I think that, hey, I'm not just
8:50
Speaker 2: here to make you snacks and pick up your socks,
8:53
Speaker 2: like I actually am a person with thoughts and feelings.
8:58
Speaker 1: I heard this the other day too, that how your
9:00
Speaker 1: children treat you once they're adults and no longer need
9:04
Speaker 1: food or shelter is a reflection of how you treated
9:07
Speaker 1: them as children. That's very true.
9:10
Speaker 2: Also, all right, I like that. I like that, and
9:14
Speaker 2: I do feel like I have a good respect for
9:16
Speaker 2: relationship with both my kids, not without its tensions, not
9:19
Speaker 2: without its issues. But they've been really good sports, I'll
9:22
Speaker 2: say that much. They've been really good sports. They're pretty
9:24
Speaker 2: nice to me.
9:25
Speaker 1: So this all started because of a man that you
9:29
Speaker 1: call Matt in this Orange book. Okay, yes, yes, for
9:33
Speaker 1: anyone who hasn't read it yet, can you take us
9:36
Speaker 1: back to the moment that you met this man. They
9:38
Speaker 1: met and he was the one who sparked the open
9:41
Speaker 1: marriage conversations with your husband Stewart.
9:44
Speaker 2: Yeah, so it was a solid sixteen years ago. Now,
9:48
Speaker 2: my kids, it's crazy. My kids were six and three
9:52
Speaker 2: at the time, and I was, you know, you're in
9:56
Speaker 2: the trenches in those years when your kids are little.
9:58
Speaker 2: It's just like it's just non stop. You don't go
10:01
Speaker 2: to the bathroom by yourself, you don't like sleep, you
10:05
Speaker 2: don't you know, all those things are just distant memories,
10:09
Speaker 2: let alone your own you know, sexuality or vibrancy as
10:13
Speaker 2: a woman. So I was staying home from work for
10:16
Speaker 2: a while. I had worked right away after my kids
10:20
Speaker 2: were born, and then was like, wait a minute, what
10:21
Speaker 2: am I doing. I gotta stay home. And so my
10:24
Speaker 2: husband was working late. He did, I have to work
10:27
Speaker 2: late sometimes, and it was part of our agreement really
10:30
Speaker 2: that this was going to be the way it was
10:32
Speaker 2: if I was staying home. But I still got mad,
10:36
Speaker 2: and so he was late and I just stormed out
10:39
Speaker 2: when he got home. I mean, the kids were in bed,
10:41
Speaker 2: but I was like, the other thing they don't tell
10:43
Speaker 2: you about parenting is that it kind of feels like
10:45
Speaker 2: house arrests sometimes because they're in bed. They don't actually
10:48
Speaker 2: need you to do anything, but you can't leave. And
10:51
Speaker 2: so this is where we've lost the nature of the village,
10:54
Speaker 2: when you can just like step outside of your hut
10:57
Speaker 2: and get some air. Maybe like in Brooklyn, that I
11:00
Speaker 2: ever feel like an option. So I waited till I
11:02
Speaker 2: got home, and then I stormed out and I ran
11:05
Speaker 2: into a person that I used to teach with on
11:08
Speaker 2: the street, and she took me to a bar where
11:11
Speaker 2: Matt and some other of her friends were, and we
11:14
Speaker 2: started flirting with each other. And it was like I
11:16
Speaker 2: was like, literally just in a hoodie, no makeup. You know,
11:20
Speaker 2: I'm not like a big makeup person anyway, but like
11:23
Speaker 2: I was, I was not feeling my best, and here's
11:27
Speaker 2: this younger, cute guy who was interested in me in
11:30
Speaker 2: a way that really really sent some sparks flyang that
11:35
Speaker 2: I wasn't expecting at all. I wasn't expecting to go
11:39
Speaker 2: out that night. I wasn't expecting to go into a
11:42
Speaker 2: bar with a friend. I wasn't expecting to meet somebody
11:44
Speaker 2: who flirted with me, and I certainly wasn't expecting the
11:48
Speaker 2: feelings that that all brought up and the excitement around
11:52
Speaker 2: it that simultaneously felt thrilling and terrifying, because I was like,
11:58
Speaker 2: what do I do with this? You know?
12:01
Speaker 1: So you describe this feeling almost as an obsession. But
12:05
Speaker 1: what I found really interesting is that you say the
12:08
Speaker 1: obsession with Matt wasn't actually about him, it was about you.
12:13
Speaker 1: What do you mean by.
12:15
Speaker 2: I think it was an obsession with how it made
12:18
Speaker 2: me feel that it was. It was like a dopamine hit,
12:23
Speaker 2: you know what I mean. That's what all obsessions really are.
12:26
Speaker 2: It wasn't that he was you know, he was a
12:30
Speaker 2: great guy, but he wasn't the be all and all
12:33
Speaker 2: like It wasn't he wasn't actually secretly my soulmate or
12:37
Speaker 2: something like that. It was just someone who reflected back
12:42
Speaker 2: to me my own desirability, my own vitality. When I
12:48
Speaker 2: saw the way he looked at me, I saw myself differently,
12:52
Speaker 2: and it was a way that I hadn't seen myself
12:54
Speaker 2: for a while, being in total mother mode for the
12:59
Speaker 2: previous six years seven if you count pregnancy, which I
13:02
Speaker 2: kind of do. So it had been a while and
13:06
Speaker 2: since I had felt that way, and I think I
13:07
Speaker 2: got kind of addicted to that feeling and wanting more
13:11
Speaker 2: of that.
13:12
Speaker 1: That feeling is addicting. Yeah, yeah, So you go home
13:16
Speaker 1: and you chat with Stuart. Most people, I think would
13:19
Speaker 1: just like go home and be like that was fun
13:21
Speaker 1: and suppress it all. You do the opposite. You go
13:24
Speaker 1: home and you talk to your husband Stuart about it,
13:28
Speaker 1: and he says something that I think is surprising to people,
13:31
Speaker 1: which is, why don't you go pursue this?
13:34
Speaker 2: Yeah?
13:35
Speaker 1: Yeah, did any part of you want him to be
13:38
Speaker 1: territorial over you or did you appreciate that he said,
13:41
Speaker 1: go explore this.
13:43
Speaker 2: I don't think I ever have really wanted him to
13:45
Speaker 2: be territorial, because it didn't ever feel like he was saying, oh, oh,
13:52
Speaker 2: you know, wiping his hands, or you know, getting rid
13:55
Speaker 2: of me and sending me off on my way. He's
13:57
Speaker 2: he's always been somewhat titillated by the idea of me
14:01
Speaker 2: with other people, and I write about this in the book.
14:04
Speaker 2: We had done the little bit of experimenting a couple
14:07
Speaker 2: trips to a sex club, you know, a threesome with
14:11
Speaker 2: one of his ex girlfriends, but just you know, few
14:14
Speaker 2: and far between kinds of experiences that I thought was
14:17
Speaker 2: just done by the time we had kids, you know,
14:20
Speaker 2: as most people do that. I'm like, well, that was
14:24
Speaker 2: you know, fun for him more than it was fun
14:26
Speaker 2: for me, because I didn't never really like the anonymity
14:29
Speaker 2: of it. I don't really It took me a while
14:31
Speaker 2: to figure this out. It's kind of an embarrassingly long time,
14:35
Speaker 2: and you see the trajectory of this and more. But
14:38
Speaker 2: it took me a long time to figure out that
14:40
Speaker 2: I really prefer connected sex to just physical, casual sex.
14:46
Speaker 2: But I didn't think that connected sex was available to
14:50
Speaker 2: me anymore. I thought like, okay, well maybe I can
14:54
Speaker 2: just have some fun experiences and get that out of
14:58
Speaker 2: my system, because of of course, I can't ever have
15:01
Speaker 2: a connection with another person once I'm married. So everything
15:04
Speaker 2: that happened after that was an evolution, was a transformation
15:08
Speaker 2: from that point for it. But Stuart has always been
15:10
Speaker 2: pretty consistent. I think I changed a lot more than
15:14
Speaker 2: he did. He's always kind of been this way. He's
15:17
Speaker 2: never been a territorial jealous type, and he's always been
15:21
Speaker 2: wanting me to be my happiest self. So He called
15:25
Speaker 2: it years before we got married, before we even got engaged,
15:30
Speaker 2: that I was going to want to explore my sexuality more.
15:34
Speaker 2: Even after we got married, I was very you know,
15:37
Speaker 2: not a virgin, but virginal. I will say when we
15:40
Speaker 2: got married, I had had just you know, one boyfriend
15:44
Speaker 2: for four years and a couple other like brief brief encounters,
15:49
Speaker 2: and he had been with a lot more people than
15:51
Speaker 2: that and was kind of like, I don't think you're
15:53
Speaker 2: going to be okay with this, And maybe in part
15:56
Speaker 2: he also wasn't going to be okay with it. People
15:58
Speaker 2: have asked me that question, We've talked a lot about
16:00
Speaker 2: it since, But I also think he knew it was
16:04
Speaker 2: going to be something I needed to explore and he
16:08
Speaker 2: wasn't wrong.
16:10
Speaker 1: Well, one of the things that I loved reading about
16:13
Speaker 1: was your commitment to each other, because I think people
16:16
Speaker 1: hear the term open marriage and they think, like, kind
16:21
Speaker 1: of that it means that you're not fully committed to
16:24
Speaker 1: that other person, Yeah, one person, And I felt like
16:28
Speaker 1: your story shared the exact opposite, Like you even turned
16:32
Speaker 1: to Stuart to be the one to comfort during a
16:35
Speaker 1: hard breakup, which was really interesting for me to read.
16:39
Speaker 1: What were some of the preconceived notions of open marriages
16:43
Speaker 1: that you had that like absolutely just broke through once
16:46
Speaker 1: you experienced it.
16:48
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, that's a great question. I mean, for one thing,
16:51
Speaker 2: I thought that it was not possible to love more
16:54
Speaker 2: than one person, that loving another person would mean I
16:59
Speaker 2: loved or that him loving another person would mean there
17:03
Speaker 2: was less love for me. And so early on when
17:07
Speaker 2: we started really opening up our marriage, that was like
17:09
Speaker 2: a firm rule, no falling in love, that had to
17:12
Speaker 2: be just sex. And as I said, that wasn't really
17:16
Speaker 2: didn't really end up doing it for me, But I
17:20
Speaker 2: did not expect what happened, which was that when I
17:24
Speaker 2: loved another person, it made me love Stuart more. And
17:29
Speaker 2: I once I had experienced that, then I could believe
17:33
Speaker 2: the same was true for him. I only know my
17:35
Speaker 2: own experience, but I know I feel more connected to
17:39
Speaker 2: Stuart now and he does have. You know, the person
17:43
Speaker 2: who I call Kiwi in the book. They're still going
17:46
Speaker 2: strong and they're nine years in now at this point,
17:48
Speaker 2: and he's had other relationships too, and it doesn't actually
17:52
Speaker 2: take away from his love for me, And in some
17:55
Speaker 2: ways it just makes it kind of crystallizes it, and
17:58
Speaker 2: it makes it. So there's something so beautiful about the
18:02
Speaker 2: fact that we choose each other over and over and
18:05
Speaker 2: over again, and we understand each other and each other's
18:09
Speaker 2: history more than any other person can. So new people
18:13
Speaker 2: can come and some go and some stay. But there's
18:16
Speaker 2: nobody that I have built a life with the way
18:21
Speaker 2: I've built a life with Stuart. There's nobody I've been
18:24
Speaker 2: through all of these different stages with and we do.
18:27
Speaker 2: We have each other's back, and we understand how to
18:32
Speaker 2: support each other better than maybe anybody else ever could.
18:35
Speaker 2: So I don't ever feel like I'm in competition with
18:38
Speaker 2: somebody else, and I don't think Stuart ever feels like
18:40
Speaker 2: he's in competition. Like nobody can ever replace Stuart in
18:45
Speaker 2: my life, but there are people who can add to it,
18:48
Speaker 2: add to my life. And Stuart is always on board
18:53
Speaker 2: for me having another positive relationship because he knows that
18:58
Speaker 2: it just ends up making me happier and therefore a
19:03
Speaker 2: stronger kind of person than partner for him.
19:07
Speaker 1: I'm going to ask you a question that I don't
19:08
Speaker 1: quite know how to phrase, So bear with me as
19:11
Speaker 1: humble through this. You and Steward are each other's love
19:15
Speaker 1: and life partners. So you just described like building this life,
19:20
Speaker 1: which includes holidays and funerals and all the things that
19:25
Speaker 1: come with building a family. Yeah, how does it work
19:29
Speaker 1: with these other partners that you two have, because it's
19:33
Speaker 1: not just disconnected sex, like, these are relationships. How does
19:36
Speaker 1: it work when something monumental, good or bad happens in
19:41
Speaker 1: your life or in these partners' lives? Like, for instance,
19:45
Speaker 1: say someone has a parent who passes, do you go
19:49
Speaker 1: to the funeral? Do they join you?
19:53
Speaker 2: Like?
19:53
Speaker 1: How does it work logistically within your lives?
19:56
Speaker 2: Yeah? I mean it really depends on the relationship in
20:00
Speaker 2: the person. So there are some people we date who,
20:03
Speaker 2: like Kiwi, for example, has a husband and so she
20:07
Speaker 2: has her primary partner who can support her when things
20:10
Speaker 2: like that happen. So I think it gets trickier when
20:14
Speaker 2: there's somebody who maybe doesn't have that primary partner. But
20:19
Speaker 2: the way the way I phrase it, actually with a
20:23
Speaker 2: partner I've had for like two and a half years
20:25
Speaker 2: who doesn't have another primary partner, because he was kind
20:29
Speaker 2: of trying to figure out He's like, well, how will
20:30
Speaker 2: this work if you're you know what I mean? And
20:33
Speaker 2: I was like, well, let's think of it this way.
20:34
Speaker 2: And I kind of like this analogy, you know, like
20:37
Speaker 2: when you have to fill out your emergency contact form
20:41
Speaker 2: and you have to list like three people maybe that
20:45
Speaker 2: you know to call in case of an emergency. So
20:48
Speaker 2: I was telling him, I was asking him, like, who's
20:50
Speaker 2: on your list right now? And he's like, yeah, well
20:52
Speaker 2: my mom and you know, my best friend and whatever.
20:54
Speaker 2: And I was like, well, I'd like to be on
20:56
Speaker 2: the list, you know what I mean. I'd like to
20:58
Speaker 2: be on your emergency contact list. When something goes down,
21:03
Speaker 2: you can you can call on me, and maybe I
21:05
Speaker 2: can't be always there all the time. If like what
21:10
Speaker 2: my partner I've had for three and a half years,
21:12
Speaker 2: had knee surgery and his wife was out of the country,
21:15
Speaker 2: and I went and stayed with him for four or
21:18
Speaker 2: five days after his while he was recovering and was
21:21
Speaker 2: taking care of him whatever. And I asked Stuart, I
21:24
Speaker 2: was like, is that cool? And he said sure, he
21:25
Speaker 2: didn't need me home. If they both had like ben
21:28
Speaker 2: in body casts at the same time, that would have
21:31
Speaker 2: been challenging. But it's also true, like when you have
21:34
Speaker 2: more than one child, you know, if both your kids
21:37
Speaker 2: really need you at the same time, it's a challenging time.
21:40
Speaker 2: But usually there's a little bit ebb and flow where
21:43
Speaker 2: one person is like, you know, hopefully we don't have
21:47
Speaker 2: everybody in crisis all the time, but you do your best,
21:51
Speaker 2: just like when you have good friends too, and not
21:53
Speaker 2: everybody can show up for you all the time because
21:56
Speaker 2: other things might be going on in their life, but
21:58
Speaker 2: you know that they're what they can to you because
22:01
Speaker 2: they love you, and so that's kind of the way
22:05
Speaker 2: I think about it. If that helps.
22:08
Speaker 1: Yeah, Well, one of the guys that you dated, Scott,
22:12
Speaker 1: turned out to be not on the same page regarding
22:15
Speaker 1: some of the open relationship rules or ideas, and just
22:19
Speaker 1: to set the stage, he started dating you when his
22:21
Speaker 1: wife wanted to be in an open relationship. She ended
22:24
Speaker 1: up meeting somebody else and asking for a divorce. And
22:27
Speaker 1: then Scott wanted you to leave Stuart for him, which
22:30
Speaker 1: you ultimately would not, so right, I can imagine these
22:34
Speaker 1: situations do come up when you're feeling really connected to people.
22:37
Speaker 1: Like when you just said I stayed with him in
22:40
Speaker 1: the house for five days, Miami thought was, Ooh, it's
22:44
Speaker 1: kind of interesting to like play house with somebody. Do
22:47
Speaker 1: you get yea to them? And then think, oh, maybe
22:49
Speaker 1: I don't want to go home. How does that work?
22:53
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, it's funny, like there is. It was lovely
22:56
Speaker 2: being with him that time. He has a dog. I
22:58
Speaker 2: don't have a dog. He has, like he lives in
23:01
Speaker 2: a cool part of Brooklyn, way cooler than my part
23:03
Speaker 2: of Brooklyn. But I still like love my home and
23:05
Speaker 2: my family, and he also loves his freedom. Oh you
23:10
Speaker 2: know what I mean. I don't think he wanted me
23:12
Speaker 2: to move in any more than I wanted to move in.
23:14
Speaker 2: So yeah, I mean, I guess what Stuart and I
23:16
Speaker 2: have always said to each other is not always said
23:19
Speaker 2: to each other. We had to kind of arrive at
23:20
Speaker 2: this place. But now we say to each other, you
23:23
Speaker 2: know what, if you end up meeting somebody that you
23:25
Speaker 2: would just much rather build a life with than me,
23:29
Speaker 2: then I don't want to be the one to hold
23:30
Speaker 2: you back. We kind of laugh at that now, because
23:33
Speaker 2: we are now fifteen years into this and that hasn't
23:37
Speaker 2: happened yet. We give each other so much freedom and
23:41
Speaker 2: space to do the things we want to do. I
23:44
Speaker 2: don't know, I don't know what it is that I
23:46
Speaker 2: would want, what I would want that Stuart doesn't already
23:50
Speaker 2: give me the space to do so, yeah, but I
23:54
Speaker 2: think it's still like, you know, there are things we
23:57
Speaker 2: have to maybe navigate if somebody wants to take a
24:00
Speaker 2: trip for somebody once, which we've done. We've kind of
24:04
Speaker 2: checked almost every box you can think of at this point,
24:07
Speaker 2: so it's like we just kind of deal with it
24:09
Speaker 2: as things come up, with the understanding that we want
24:13
Speaker 2: to be honest with each other and respect each other's feelings.
24:16
Speaker 2: I don't want to hurt Stuart, just he doesn't want
24:19
Speaker 2: to hurt me. We love each other, so we try
24:22
Speaker 2: to be reasonable and also consider it of what the
24:25
Speaker 2: other person wants. But there are way fewer things that
24:29
Speaker 2: come up now that rankle the other person. You know.
24:32
Speaker 2: It's we're getting pretty good at this navigation thing.
24:39
Speaker 1: It seems like it requires radical honesty though.
24:42
Speaker 2: Oh it does. It does, and both of us would say,
24:46
Speaker 2: you know, we not only know each other better as
24:49
Speaker 2: a result, but we know ourselves a lot better. And
24:51
Speaker 2: as you said right at the beginning of this, that
24:55
Speaker 2: more is the story of self discovery just as much
24:57
Speaker 2: as it is of everything else. Because as I I
25:00
Speaker 2: was opening the marriage, as I was you know, having
25:03
Speaker 2: to dig deep within myself to explain what I wanted
25:07
Speaker 2: to Stewart. I was also explaining what I wanted to
25:09
Speaker 2: myself and finding some information that I wouldn't have known otherwise.
25:15
Speaker 2: I was in therapy for those ten years that I
25:18
Speaker 2: write about, and more we did couple's therapy for a
25:20
Speaker 2: year in order to get some good communication skills under
25:25
Speaker 2: our belt, and I think all of that was super helpful.
25:28
Speaker 2: But yeah, you can't you know people who who want
25:32
Speaker 2: to do an open marriage without the honesty part. That's
25:37
Speaker 2: It's just these are just terms, right open marriage. There's
25:41
Speaker 2: like degrees maybe of openness. There's some people who have
25:44
Speaker 2: more of a don't ask, don't tell policy, which we
25:47
Speaker 2: tried briefly and it failed miserably. Stuart as a terrible liar,
25:52
Speaker 2: you know, which like when people ask like do you
25:54
Speaker 2: think when he said he was at work, like even
25:57
Speaker 2: before you open the marriage, do you think he really was?
25:59
Speaker 2: And I'm like, if he was pulling that off, like
26:02
Speaker 2: he can't lie to save his life, and so I
26:04
Speaker 2: was finding him out and when I was asking him
26:07
Speaker 2: to lie and then getting angry at him when he
26:09
Speaker 2: wasn't lying well enough. So that was no good. But
26:11
Speaker 2: it maybe different things work for different people. And I
26:14
Speaker 2: think we had to go through all of these different
26:16
Speaker 2: stages in order to you know, mess up and hit
26:21
Speaker 2: up against the guardrails and see like, oh, I don't
26:23
Speaker 2: think this is gonna work. So, like all of the
26:26
Speaker 2: steps along the way, we didn't just jump from from
26:29
Speaker 2: there to where we are now. It was a long road. Well,
26:33
Speaker 2: and not everybody would like to take to be on
26:35
Speaker 2: that road, and I don't blame them at all.
26:38
Speaker 1: I love that you mentioned therapy because your therapist had
26:42
Speaker 1: you do something that really caught my eye. It was
26:44
Speaker 1: a freedom list. So, yeah, you want freedom from things,
26:48
Speaker 1: you want freedom to be and freedom to do.
26:51
Speaker 2: Yeah.
26:52
Speaker 1: Why was that an exercise that your therapist thought you
26:56
Speaker 1: should do?
26:57
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I think part of it is. And
27:00
Speaker 2: my therapist had a nickname for me for like kind
27:02
Speaker 2: of like part of myself. Now I feel like people
27:05
Speaker 2: do parts work more like looking at the different parts
27:08
Speaker 2: of themselves. But it was a revelation to me that
27:11
Speaker 2: there was this person inside me who he called straight
27:13
Speaker 2: A Molly because I was always a very good girl.
27:16
Speaker 2: I skipped a grade, I was young and like kind
27:19
Speaker 2: of an overachiever my whole life, and straight a Molly
27:24
Speaker 2: just followed the rules and did everything she was supposed
27:26
Speaker 2: to do. And part of I think what open marriage
27:28
Speaker 2: was for me was this opportunity to be transgressive. So
27:32
Speaker 2: it was kind of funny that I needed my therapist
27:34
Speaker 2: to then give me permission to be transgressive, but he did,
27:38
Speaker 2: and so like the kind of freedom, Like there was
27:40
Speaker 2: something I wrote in my freedom list, like freedom to
27:42
Speaker 2: do stupid shit, which was a big catch all, you
27:45
Speaker 2: know what I mean. But what that allowed me to
27:48
Speaker 2: do is to make mistakes and to say, like I'm
27:50
Speaker 2: not going to And I loved my therapist for this.
27:55
Speaker 2: That it wasn't about me getting an A plus an
27:59
Speaker 2: open marriage that you know, that was kind of what
28:01
Speaker 2: I wanted to do.
28:03
Speaker 1: Oh my god, it's so funny.
28:05
Speaker 2: Yeah, Like but I definitely you read the book and
28:08
Speaker 2: you know, like, oh, this is not like a how
28:10
Speaker 2: to manual at all. What I needed to do was
28:14
Speaker 2: to just be messy and let it all hang out
28:18
Speaker 2: and find out that like find out what my shadowside
28:23
Speaker 2: looks like, and find out that my husband loves all
28:27
Speaker 2: the parts of me, even even the messy parts, and
28:30
Speaker 2: even the parts that weren't really doing the right thing
28:35
Speaker 2: much of the time.
28:36
Speaker 1: How do you do that in a responsible way, because like,
28:40
Speaker 1: you have a job and you have children, so like,
28:44
Speaker 1: how do you incorporate straight a Molly who like needs
28:48
Speaker 1: to exist in the world and give yourself permission to
28:51
Speaker 1: be a human mess?
28:54
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean it wasn't It wasn't pretty. I feel
28:57
Speaker 2: like I kept myself together with the kids and with
29:01
Speaker 2: at work, but I feel like I was. I feel
29:04
Speaker 2: like one kind of serves the other in some ways.
29:06
Speaker 2: The thing that comes later is the integration. But at
29:10
Speaker 2: first I think I just needed to let this part
29:13
Speaker 2: out of me. One of the things I wrote about
29:15
Speaker 2: in the book, which is a real theme of my
29:17
Speaker 2: life for a while, as migraines. I had these terrible
29:20
Speaker 2: migraines that I think came from repression and repressing like
29:25
Speaker 2: anything that didn't fit the straight a Molly mold or
29:28
Speaker 2: even thinking about it. But I think I had a
29:30
Speaker 2: lot of anger, and I think I had a lot
29:32
Speaker 2: of you know, pent up frustration and wants and needs
29:37
Speaker 2: that I wasn't expressing because I was trying to be
29:40
Speaker 2: a good mother and a good wife, and a good
29:42
Speaker 2: teacher and a good friend and a good daughter and
29:44
Speaker 2: a fill in the blank, just a good everything, and
29:48
Speaker 2: I needed to just you know, it usually happened late
29:52
Speaker 2: at night when I would go out and go do
29:55
Speaker 2: crazy shit and then come back in and have the
29:58
Speaker 2: stability of my husband. And luckily, yeah, things could have
30:02
Speaker 2: gone badly. I didn't end up having you know, I
30:05
Speaker 2: had a couple of bad experiences with men that I
30:08
Speaker 2: write about, nothing that you know, ended up endangering my
30:13
Speaker 2: well being, luckily, but that's the risk you take. In
30:16
Speaker 2: my opinion, everybody is managing their own risk when they
30:19
Speaker 2: step out of their house, like you can get hit
30:21
Speaker 2: by a bus. But not everybody agrees with that framework
30:25
Speaker 2: for life. But it's kind of the way I roll
30:27
Speaker 2: these days. So I had to. I had to explore
30:29
Speaker 2: that part of myself separately from my good girl self,
30:33
Speaker 2: and I think the stage I'm in now in my
30:36
Speaker 2: life in the book has been a huge part of
30:38
Speaker 2: is integrating those two things and being like, well, this
30:41
Speaker 2: is me, this is all of me, and not partitioning
30:45
Speaker 2: and not compartmentalizing, but just being like, yeah, this is
30:49
Speaker 2: what it means to be a person. And I think
30:53
Speaker 2: ultimately that's a better thing to model for children than
30:56
Speaker 2: it is to pretend. Especially you know, I have boys,
31:00
Speaker 2: so for boys, I think it's important for them to
31:03
Speaker 2: see that, you know, this is this is what a
31:06
Speaker 2: whole woman is like, not you know, some kind of
31:09
Speaker 2: idealized you know, virgin figure that we often define women
31:15
Speaker 2: as either the virgin or the whore, and guess what
31:18
Speaker 2: we're like. We're a little bit of both. We're everything
31:21
Speaker 2: in between. And for girls, if you have daughters, I
31:24
Speaker 2: think it's super important for girls to see the range
31:28
Speaker 2: that goes into being a full grown woman.
31:32
Speaker 1: As I'm hearing you say this, I'm thinking about how
31:34
Speaker 1: few people ever reached that point, even at their life,
31:39
Speaker 1: to really have lived authentically and interact of their parts.
31:44
Speaker 1: Kudos Toe, I mean, I'm.
31:46
Speaker 2: Still a work in progress. I don't want to get to.
31:48
Speaker 1: No idea about it. You're honest about it in the book,
31:52
Speaker 1: Like I think there are hot and alluring elements to
31:55
Speaker 1: the story. But you talk about how you felt alone
31:58
Speaker 1: in your relationship and your struggle with jealousy. You let
32:02
Speaker 1: it all hang out. It doesn't sound arrogant at all.
32:05
Speaker 1: All right, well good, Yeah, I'm wondering if you can
32:08
Speaker 1: talk about what it's like to experience heartbreak and rejection
32:12
Speaker 1: within a relationship, how did you guys navigate those experiences together.
32:19
Speaker 2: Well, it's always been harder for me to help Stuart
32:23
Speaker 2: through his feelings, but I'm way better at it now.
32:26
Speaker 2: So when he's had breakups, it's been harder for me
32:31
Speaker 2: to see how hurt he is and to see the
32:36
Speaker 2: loss he's experiencing, because it would sounds kind of messed up,
32:40
Speaker 2: but it would sparks some jealousy in me that like, oh,
32:42
Speaker 2: you really do care about her, because the fact that
32:46
Speaker 2: it's ending is making you this upset. I feel a
32:49
Speaker 2: lot easier with it now than I did even five
32:52
Speaker 2: years ago. And you know, the book ends at a
32:54
Speaker 2: moment more than six years ago, so we've been through
32:57
Speaker 2: a lot even since the book ends. For me, it's
33:01
Speaker 2: been so lovely having Stuart there to help me metabolize
33:08
Speaker 2: the feelings. I think sometimes my friends, in particular my friends,
33:13
Speaker 2: especially my married friends, sometimes have a hard time taking
33:16
Speaker 2: my outside relationships seriously, like they're not real. But they
33:20
Speaker 2: see it, you know, now that they've met more of
33:23
Speaker 2: my partners, and currently I have a partner that I've
33:25
Speaker 2: had for three and a half years and one for
33:27
Speaker 2: two and a half years, and most of my friends
33:29
Speaker 2: have met both of them, and it's like it's like
33:31
Speaker 2: a little more real to them, Like these people are
33:34
Speaker 2: real people to me. But for a while, Stuart was
33:38
Speaker 2: kind of one of the only people who could really
33:39
Speaker 2: understand what I was going through, and the other one
33:41
Speaker 2: was my mother. My mother was also really helpful to me.
33:45
Speaker 1: Will you share why that is?
33:46
Speaker 2: Yeah, spoiler alert. My parents also had an open marriage,
33:49
Speaker 2: but they didn't tell me at all. My aunt told
33:52
Speaker 2: me when I was twenty eight, and so Sue and
33:54
Speaker 2: I were already like kind of on our journey, Like
33:57
Speaker 2: we had had the conversation where he was like, I
33:59
Speaker 2: don't think you're going to be okay never sleeping with
34:01
Speaker 2: someone else. But I didn't really talk about it with
34:04
Speaker 2: my mother until after the Matt episode in the book.
34:11
Speaker 2: I reached out to her and she's continued to be
34:15
Speaker 2: a really great person for me to talk to about
34:18
Speaker 2: my relationships. She always says, you know, she's living vicariously
34:22
Speaker 2: through me. She's eighty one now and you know, in
34:24
Speaker 2: a wheelchair. But she's still good friends with the person
34:28
Speaker 2: who I called Jim in the book, who was one
34:30
Speaker 2: of her partners. I just knew him as her best
34:33
Speaker 2: friend when I was a kid. But they've continued a
34:37
Speaker 2: really lovely friendship. And my father also has friendships with
34:41
Speaker 2: women that he was once intimate with, so I can
34:44
Speaker 2: see from the other side now too, like kind of
34:48
Speaker 2: what this might look like in the future. And I
34:50
Speaker 2: think it's really lovely to be able to have those relationships.
34:55
Speaker 2: And I have friends who are still close in some
34:58
Speaker 2: way with an ex for example, Well not everybody, but
35:02
Speaker 2: that's you know, I didn't really have that going into
35:06
Speaker 2: my marriage. So it's nice to I think, have that
35:09
Speaker 2: kind of energy with somebody that you once shared intimacy with.
35:13
Speaker 2: But maybe that part of your relationship is over, but
35:16
Speaker 2: it still adds something special to the mix as you
35:21
Speaker 2: as you age.
35:22
Speaker 1: You know, you just mentioned that your friends have met
35:26
Speaker 1: some of your partners. Yeah, what does dating look like
35:31
Speaker 1: for you? What is dating and sort of having these
35:35
Speaker 1: multiple relationships at once look like for your friends, Because
35:39
Speaker 1: I'll I'm thirty three, I'm single, and I'm like, it's
35:43
Speaker 1: so complicated. How do you do this with multiple people?
35:48
Speaker 2: Well, part of it is when you're non monogamous, nobody
35:52
Speaker 2: expects to be your everything, you know what I mean,
35:56
Speaker 2: And if they do, it's not going to work, which
35:57
Speaker 2: is why my relationship with Scott and did, So you're
36:01
Speaker 2: kind of creating the relationship as you go. Over the years,
36:05
Speaker 2: I've had partners that also have a wife, and then
36:08
Speaker 2: it's kind of clear like, Okay, you've got your people.
36:11
Speaker 2: I've got my you know, family, my butt and dry
36:15
Speaker 2: yeah a little bit. My current partners don't have primary
36:19
Speaker 2: partners right now, but one of them he laughs at
36:24
Speaker 2: me whenever he hears me say this on a podcast,
36:26
Speaker 2: but he would agree it's true. Like his his work
36:28
Speaker 2: is his primary partner. He owns a couple nightclubs in Brooklyn,
36:32
Speaker 2: and he's working late, and he has to work pretty
36:35
Speaker 2: much like every Friday and Saturday night. So it's like
36:38
Speaker 2: it's great for him that I am not like, really,
36:42
Speaker 2: you can't see me again on Friday night. I'm like,
36:45
Speaker 2: have a great weekend, what I mean. So it's like
36:49
Speaker 2: it's like very freeing fore too. Yeah. Or my other
36:53
Speaker 2: partner still has like young children that he's with as
36:56
Speaker 2: much time as he can be with them, and so like,
37:00
Speaker 2: I'm also not going to be like, what, you can't
37:02
Speaker 2: spend Christmas with me? Like no, you can't, you know
37:05
Speaker 2: what I mean. So it's like it kind of works
37:07
Speaker 2: and in lots of ways both of them are free
37:10
Speaker 2: also to see other people as am I if it
37:14
Speaker 2: comes up. But yeah, it just it kind of looks
37:16
Speaker 2: like that does answer that answer your question.
37:19
Speaker 1: Yeah completely. Did you lose any friends when you decided
37:23
Speaker 1: to be public about your open marriage.
37:26
Speaker 2: No, I haven't lost any friends. I haven't like no
37:30
Speaker 2: family members have been upset. Like you know, it's been
37:33
Speaker 2: really great in so many ways. My sister read the book,
37:36
Speaker 2: like several of my cousins read the book, my aunts,
37:41
Speaker 2: my you know, both my parents, my older son read it,
37:44
Speaker 2: as I said, and ended up just like reaching out
37:47
Speaker 2: to me and it's it's if anything, made our relationships deeper,
37:52
Speaker 2: and my parents too. My mother was concerned that like
37:56
Speaker 2: she's getting outed that especially people of her generation, and
38:00
Speaker 2: would be judgmental or she and you know, to your
38:04
Speaker 2: point earlier about you know, so few people really living authentically.
38:08
Speaker 2: She had a college friend email her and say, oh,
38:11
Speaker 2: I just read Molly's book. You're so brave to be,
38:15
Speaker 2: you know, showing yourself like this, And she said, this
38:19
Speaker 2: woman said, I don't think I've ever done anything without
38:22
Speaker 2: worrying what other people would think for my whole life.
38:26
Speaker 2: And she's eighty one years old. And it just oh.
38:29
Speaker 2: But it was so touching that she recognized that in
38:33
Speaker 2: herself and recognized at this moment like, oh, maybe there
38:37
Speaker 2: are things that I don't have to keep secret. Maybe
38:40
Speaker 2: this isn't a source of shame or you know, I've
38:43
Speaker 2: also had a lot of people that either I know
38:46
Speaker 2: or don't know quite as well sharing all sorts of
38:49
Speaker 2: things with me.
38:50
Speaker 1: You know, I'm sure if you've been led for people
38:53
Speaker 1: to just really tell you about their experiences.
38:56
Speaker 2: Right, And I think that's cool because I think it's like,
38:59
Speaker 2: it's it's just permission. And when we walk through the
39:02
Speaker 2: world owning our messiness and not trying to pretend like, oh, yeah,
39:07
Speaker 2: I've got to pick a fence in the whatever, it
39:10
Speaker 2: invites people to be vulnerable and to share more of themselves,
39:14
Speaker 2: and it deepens connections, and it deepens relationships, and it
39:18
Speaker 2: lets the shame out of the bag and allows, you know,
39:22
Speaker 2: those kinds of things to heal. So I think it's
39:25
Speaker 2: that makes me really happy in terms of the way
39:28
Speaker 2: the book's been received.
39:30
Speaker 1: Do you think we put too much stock in one
39:34
Speaker 1: person being everything? Do you believe in soulmates?
39:38
Speaker 2: I don't believe in in everybody having a soulmate. I
39:43
Speaker 2: believe that you can have multiple soulmates. I think of
39:47
Speaker 2: soulmate kind of like in terms of where you and
39:50
Speaker 2: another person are, in terms of your your path of
39:54
Speaker 2: growth and evolution, Like we're all I believe here on
39:59
Speaker 2: this planet in these bodies to learn and to grow,
40:02
Speaker 2: and so finding the person or people and it can
40:07
Speaker 2: be multiple people. And I think we feel this way
40:09
Speaker 2: with our friends. There are multiple people usually in our
40:12
Speaker 2: lives that we feel like we can reveal parts of
40:14
Speaker 2: ourselves too, that that's one person understands this part of
40:18
Speaker 2: ourselves better than somebody than anybody else, and so it
40:22
Speaker 2: allows us to grow in that way. So it is
40:25
Speaker 2: possible for one person to check a bunch of boxes,
40:28
Speaker 2: for sure, but I think it's okay to like have
40:32
Speaker 2: some boxes that are not checked by that person and
40:34
Speaker 2: to find that connection elsewhere, be it through friendship or
40:38
Speaker 2: you know, non monogamy.
40:41
Speaker 1: Has this changed the way that you would have viewed
40:45
Speaker 1: going into marriage as your younger self? Like, do you
40:48
Speaker 1: think you would have looked for the same things in
40:50
Speaker 1: a partner? Did your subconscious lead you to what you
40:54
Speaker 1: were meant for? It sounds like the answer is yes, Actually.
40:58
Speaker 2: Yeah, Well, Stuart said, here, it's five years older than me,
41:01
Speaker 2: and he had dated a lot, and so he met
41:04
Speaker 2: me when I was still with my college boyfriend. We
41:05
Speaker 2: met at my best friend's birthday party when she was
41:08
Speaker 2: twenty five. I was still twenty three. But he says
41:11
Speaker 2: he saw me and he just knew, and then it
41:13
Speaker 2: was a matter of like convincing me, which didn't take long.
41:19
Speaker 2: Once I had broken up with the boyfriend. It was
41:21
Speaker 2: like by our second date, I was like, Okay, this
41:23
Speaker 2: is good. My mother asked me a question, which was,
41:26
Speaker 2: how do you feel about yourself when you're with him?
41:29
Speaker 2: And I said, I just I feel amazing. He made
41:31
Speaker 2: me feel amazing, and I always felt with him like
41:37
Speaker 2: like I could be my whole self, like he saw
41:40
Speaker 2: my whole self. I say in the book at one point,
41:42
Speaker 2: I feel like he knows me better than I know myself.
41:45
Speaker 2: I don't know that that's true anymore, but back when
41:47
Speaker 2: I was hiding lots of parts of myself from myself,
41:50
Speaker 2: I think he saw those parts before I honored them.
41:54
Speaker 2: And his being able to like see them, see those parts,
41:58
Speaker 2: love those parts has always made it easier for me
42:01
Speaker 2: to be my most authentic self. So in that sense. Yes,
42:05
Speaker 2: he's he is the perfect partner for me. I have
42:09
Speaker 2: a high standard now though, so when I look for
42:11
Speaker 2: other partners, I only want to be with other partners
42:15
Speaker 2: who also make me feel amazing and maybe in a
42:19
Speaker 2: slightly different way, and maybe you know, we do different
42:22
Speaker 2: things together, we share different things, but I always have
42:25
Speaker 2: that base with Stuart. And it feels like I'm obscenely
42:29
Speaker 2: lucky to have this because it also you asked the
42:33
Speaker 2: question before about what's it like to have to have
42:35
Speaker 2: a breakup within a marriage, and it just it takes
42:38
Speaker 2: a lot of the pressure off, don't I don't agonize
42:42
Speaker 2: so much over what's going to happen with my other relationships.
42:45
Speaker 2: I trust. I mean, I don't see my other relationships
42:48
Speaker 2: ending maybe ever, I don't see any reason to stop
42:53
Speaker 2: loving another person. I still love Scott, I do. There's
42:57
Speaker 2: no reason for me to withhold my love from somebody else.
43:00
Speaker 2: Is I'm good. I have all the love I need
43:02
Speaker 2: and I can offer that if if they love me back,
43:06
Speaker 2: that's great. But I don't feel yeah more I've got
43:11
Speaker 2: I've got more love begets love is one of my
43:15
Speaker 2: lines from the book. So it does feel less angsty now, like, oh,
43:22
Speaker 2: will this last? What will happen? And I'm like, things
43:24
Speaker 2: will happen the way they're supposed to happen is kind
43:26
Speaker 2: of where I've landed.
43:27
Speaker 1: Now, I'm going to break one of my personal and
43:30
Speaker 1: professional rules on apps.
43:33
Speaker 2: It is good breaks.
43:35
Speaker 1: I try to stay away from always, never, best, worst,
43:38
Speaker 1: et cetera.
43:39
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, what has been.
43:41
Speaker 1: The best and worst part of this experience?
43:44
Speaker 2: Yeah? The best and worst part? I mean I can
43:51
Speaker 2: be like frustrating and saying it's the same, it's like,
43:55
Speaker 2: but I do think cracking myself open like a walnut,
43:59
Speaker 2: you know, like hell In many ways, if I'm thinking
44:03
Speaker 2: I cand a big picture. The worst part was having
44:06
Speaker 2: to look inward and realize that I didn't have a
44:12
Speaker 2: lot of self worth. I didn't have a lot of
44:15
Speaker 2: inner resources. I was outsourcing to Stuart in a lot
44:21
Speaker 2: of cases my sense of self and my feelings of worth,
44:25
Speaker 2: and so in some ways that was really hard to
44:28
Speaker 2: realize and to like kind of feel the loneliness of that,
44:32
Speaker 2: of feeling like I couldn't give to myself what I
44:35
Speaker 2: wanted him to give me. And then the best is realizing,
44:39
Speaker 2: oh wait a minute, I can give it to myself
44:42
Speaker 2: and then I can receive it from him and from
44:44
Speaker 2: anybody else.
44:46
Speaker 1: Congratulations, that's really hard to do. You've touched on this
44:50
Speaker 1: a little bit throughout our conversation, but I want to
44:53
Speaker 1: sort of touch on it explicitly. In the book, you
44:56
Speaker 1: talk about the stigma around women and their sexuality. Yeah,
45:01
Speaker 1: how do you think we break through this? Like, I
45:04
Speaker 1: think that this has been sort of a stereotype and
45:08
Speaker 1: plate of women from the beginning of time. I think
45:13
Speaker 1: back to Greek mythology and it's written in all of it,
45:18
Speaker 1: like we're always the seductress and yeah, our sexuality is
45:22
Speaker 1: always seen as sort of elicit. Yeah, or how do
45:30
Speaker 1: we change that? I think you're part of changing that.
45:32
Speaker 2: I hope. So. I will also say, I feel like
45:36
Speaker 2: the place we're in as a society with gender, I
45:40
Speaker 2: think is going to reap some huge benefits for both
45:44
Speaker 2: genders ultimately for all genders. I think, as everyone you
45:50
Speaker 2: know in Brooklyn, non binary people are everywhere and part
45:58
Speaker 2: of the fabric of life now, and you know, sharing
46:01
Speaker 2: your pronouns is part of the fabric of life in Brooklyn,
46:05
Speaker 2: and I hope that will continue to expand. I think
46:08
Speaker 2: what that allows for and I think some people are
46:11
Speaker 2: very afraid of because change can be scary. But I
46:15
Speaker 2: think it's helping us maybe as a society, redefine what
46:19
Speaker 2: does it even mean to be female or male? I mean,
46:23
Speaker 2: when you look at it, biologically speaking, a fetus looks
46:28
Speaker 2: the same whether it's a baby boy or a baby
46:31
Speaker 2: girl until a certain stage of development and elderly people
46:36
Speaker 2: start to lose their sex hormones and kind of become
46:42
Speaker 2: more like one another. You know, testosterone dies down and you'll,
46:46
Speaker 2: you know, see see men with hips and women with
46:49
Speaker 2: little beards, and you know what, we were human beings ultimately,
46:55
Speaker 2: so we we evolve into and out of our gender,
46:59
Speaker 2: just biological speaking, and so I think these rules that
47:02
Speaker 2: we've attached to this is what women do and this
47:05
Speaker 2: is what men do. I think it's going to start
47:07
Speaker 2: to naturally break down as we kind of loosen this grip,
47:11
Speaker 2: this binary of like this is what it means to
47:14
Speaker 2: be one thing or the other. And I hope that
47:16
Speaker 2: spreads more globally too. We're in a time where the
47:21
Speaker 2: binaries and the polarization is not serving anybody. We need
47:26
Speaker 2: to find our human essence and our humanity in the
47:29
Speaker 2: middle as much as we can we are not all
47:32
Speaker 2: one thing or the other. It's not us versus them.
47:35
Speaker 2: We are all in this together. Well, so thank you. Yeah,
47:40
Speaker 2: we can hope. We can hope.
47:42
Speaker 1: So one of my favorite quotes in the book is this,
47:45
Speaker 1: everything that happens in life is an opportunity to learn
47:48
Speaker 1: about yourself, marriage, motherhood, relationships, even anger and illness. Everything
47:55
Speaker 1: is an opportunity to learn and grow.
47:58
Speaker 2: That's my mom. My Mom's that she.
48:01
Speaker 1: Is so wise.
48:03
Speaker 2: I've got time.
48:04
Speaker 1: I did too as I read it. She's so ahead
48:06
Speaker 1: of her time. What has been the biggest learning for you?
48:10
Speaker 1: I know that's a hard question because it's been an
48:13
Speaker 1: excavation of self.
48:15
Speaker 2: I think it's both kind of the internal and the external.
48:18
Speaker 2: And the internal I feel like the opportunity has been
48:22
Speaker 2: to befriend my quote unquote flaws, to make peace with,
48:28
Speaker 2: like my anxiety or the times that I don't feel
48:34
Speaker 2: like being a mother because sometimes I don't, you know,
48:38
Speaker 2: to own that and to be like that's okay. You know,
48:41
Speaker 2: it doesn't mean I don't want my kids to exist.
48:43
Speaker 2: It just means I don't want to have to take
48:45
Speaker 2: care of anyone right now, you know. So making peace
48:48
Speaker 2: with that and being like that's okay that I feel
48:51
Speaker 2: that way. So that's a big opportunity. And then I
48:54
Speaker 2: think also it just makes you if you can really
48:58
Speaker 2: take that in, it makes you move through the world differently.
49:00
Speaker 2: So when you're standing in line and you're like annoyed
49:04
Speaker 2: or you're stuck in traffic or something, to be like, okay,
49:08
Speaker 2: there's some impatience coming up here, like what's that about?
49:11
Speaker 2: Like what am I in such a hurry to get to?
49:14
Speaker 2: Maybe now? As actually maybe I could like do some breathing,
49:17
Speaker 2: maybe I could listen to an audio. But like little,
49:19
Speaker 2: it can range from the small to the huge. If
49:22
Speaker 2: you really start viewing everything as an opportunity or every argument,
49:26
Speaker 2: I think we I think that's a big one for
49:29
Speaker 2: me too, Like instead of seeing conflict as like, oh no,
49:32
Speaker 2: we're fighting, be like, okay, we're fighting, Like what are
49:36
Speaker 2: the feelings that are coming up here? And how can
49:41
Speaker 2: I respond and learn something about myself? Or maybe you
49:45
Speaker 2: learn something about yourself that we don't have to We
49:48
Speaker 2: don't have to fear conflict. We can just kind of
49:50
Speaker 2: like see it as an opportunity.
49:54
Speaker 1: I'm going to do a few rapid fire questions with you.
49:56
Speaker 2: Oh boy, Okay, let me get ready.
49:58
Speaker 1: What is the best communication tip that you've learned in relationships?
50:03
Speaker 2: Carving out time for it if things are coming up,
50:08
Speaker 2: especially in marriage when you've got kids. If you don't
50:12
Speaker 2: it doesn't mean sweep it under the rug. But it's
50:16
Speaker 2: not always the right time to have a fight, right
50:19
Speaker 2: So if you can just put a pin in it
50:21
Speaker 2: and say to your partner, I'm going to need to
50:23
Speaker 2: talk about what's happening right now, but not now, like,
50:26
Speaker 2: can we please make some time to talk about it later.
50:29
Speaker 2: Because if you can talk about it when you're not
50:31
Speaker 2: in the heat of the moment, it's gonna it's gonna
50:33
Speaker 2: be a lot more efficient, you know what I mean.
50:35
Speaker 2: You're gonna be able to have a little time to
50:37
Speaker 2: think about it. You'll have time carved out. People won't
50:39
Speaker 2: be reactive. That's really hard to do. But if you
50:42
Speaker 2: can swing it to like make make kind of like fighting.
50:46
Speaker 1: Dates, really good advice or state deal breaker.
50:53
Speaker 2: Not asking questions just being too you know, and sometimes
50:58
Speaker 2: people are just very quiet. It's not even that they're
51:01
Speaker 2: they're grandstanding. But if you can't ask questions, I'm not interested.
51:07
Speaker 1: What is a book that you think everybody should read?
51:10
Speaker 2: Yeah, this is tough because I wanted to say A
51:13
Speaker 2: New Earth by Eckartole, which is really was like deeply
51:18
Speaker 2: impactful for me. I don't know if everybody should read
51:22
Speaker 2: it because I don't know that it would be speaking
51:24
Speaker 2: to everybody, you know what I mean, If you open
51:26
Speaker 2: it up and it's not speaking to you, then maybe not, I.
51:31
Speaker 1: May add really quickly. Yeah, I spend it a few
51:33
Speaker 1: times and it didn't speak to me because I yeah,
51:37
Speaker 1: and I it up and it does speak to me.
51:39
Speaker 1: So you're right, isn't that interesting?
51:42
Speaker 2: Yeah? So like this is what's hard with books, Like
51:44
Speaker 2: I can say the books that have spoken to me,
51:47
Speaker 2: but I don't actually believe that everybody should read certain
51:50
Speaker 2: books because some people will feel it and some people won't.
51:54
Speaker 2: For me, I read Anna Karenina three times. I read
51:58
Speaker 2: it when I was twenty, when I was thirty, and
52:00
Speaker 2: when I was forty. But you have to get like
52:03
Speaker 2: a really good translation, like look up the award winning translations.
52:07
Speaker 2: There are a couple, and I learned a lot about
52:10
Speaker 2: myself from different vantage points. Then when I turned fifty,
52:14
Speaker 2: I didn't want to read it again, and I was surprised,
52:16
Speaker 2: and I looked it up and Tolstoy wrote it when
52:18
Speaker 2: he was forty eight, so then I was like, oh,
52:21
Speaker 2: I think I that made me feel like, oh, I've
52:22
Speaker 2: passed Tolstoy. I was like, Okay, I think I got
52:24
Speaker 2: it read right now. I don't think. I don't think
52:26
Speaker 2: he has anything for fifty year old me, but twenty
52:28
Speaker 2: year old me, thirty year old me, forty year old me.
52:30
Speaker 2: I got a lot out of it.
52:32
Speaker 1: That's really interesting.
52:34
Speaker 2: And we will say, don't think I'm just dissying female writers,
52:38
Speaker 2: because it is widely believed that his wife's editing is
52:42
Speaker 2: what made that book what it is. So Tolstoy's name
52:45
Speaker 2: is on it, but his wife is an equal co author.
52:49
Speaker 2: It's a great book to understand relationships.
52:52
Speaker 1: I think I actually haven't read it, so I'm going
52:55
Speaker 1: to add that to my library.
52:56
Speaker 2: Thank you get a good translation.
52:58
Speaker 1: So, in the spirit of questioning everything, which is my motto,
53:02
Speaker 1: but it actually is your motto too, we share it. Yeah,
53:05
Speaker 1: I'm gonna pick a card, so you let me know what.
53:09
Speaker 2: Oh, I tell you to stop.
53:10
Speaker 1: Stop. What's the best thing you've ever quit?
53:13
Speaker 2: I quit a relationship pretty recently that by all, like
53:18
Speaker 2: on paper, it seemed great, and we had been dating
53:22
Speaker 2: for about six months, but it wasn't feeding me. I
53:27
Speaker 2: was feeling more drained than fed by the time I
53:31
Speaker 2: was spending with him, and I couldn't put my finger
53:34
Speaker 2: on why. One thing, very interesting thing that happened along
53:38
Speaker 2: the way, though, is he started this sounds really weird,
53:42
Speaker 2: like when I kissed him, like he started to taste
53:44
Speaker 2: and smell different to me, And Stuart is like has
53:48
Speaker 2: like a super smell sense or whatever, and so that
53:51
Speaker 2: made total sense to him. It's never happened to me before.
53:54
Speaker 2: But I felt like it was my body telling me,
53:57
Speaker 2: like not for you, and I I still like I
54:00
Speaker 2: ran into recently gave him a big hug, like no
54:03
Speaker 2: hard feelings, but like it was good for me to
54:06
Speaker 2: just really listen to my inner self and not be like, oh,
54:09
Speaker 2: there's no reason to break up with it. I just
54:11
Speaker 2: didn't want to. I just didn't want to anymore, and
54:13
Speaker 2: I didn't have to, so I stopped and I did
54:16
Speaker 2: this kindly and as honestly as I could. I didn't
54:18
Speaker 2: tell him about the taste and smell though, because I
54:20
Speaker 2: felt that might make him. I don't know, that felt
54:23
Speaker 2: like it might be mean.
54:25
Speaker 1: Or it was like, like you said it was your body.
54:27
Speaker 2: He didn't need to know, right, right, It was just
54:29
Speaker 2: something in my chemistry that was saying like, yeah, move
54:33
Speaker 2: away from this.
54:34
Speaker 1: This is like totally TMI. But in the spirit of
54:37
Speaker 1: this interview, I one time kept having ut I was
54:41
Speaker 1: with a boyfriend and I kept getting UTI's and I
54:44
Speaker 1: really think it was my body saying no more. And
54:46
Speaker 1: we I broke up and I stopped getting them.
54:49
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, And utiyes can really be a stress response too.
54:53
Speaker 2: It's like when your body is not I I've had
54:55
Speaker 2: periods of time where I've gotten lots of them. Actually
54:58
Speaker 2: with Laurent that god, I was getting quite a few.
55:02
Speaker 2: So yeah, I think that's you know, it doesn't necessarily
55:05
Speaker 2: mean like it's the partner. It can be other things.
55:08
Speaker 2: I don't want every woman to be like I just
55:10
Speaker 2: got a uti. I'm getting a divorce. But it's worth investigating,
55:14
Speaker 2: it's worth taking a look at what's happening.
55:17
Speaker 1: My last question for you is what is the smartest
55:20
Speaker 1: decision you've ever made?
55:22
Speaker 2: I mean, marrying Stewart is up there. That was a
55:24
Speaker 2: good one. More recently, starting meditation. Starting a meditation practice
55:30
Speaker 2: was the best gift I've ever given myself.
55:33
Speaker 1: Did you start with guided?
55:35
Speaker 2: I had tried a bunch of things, and I will
55:39
Speaker 2: tell you the type that I do. It doesn't mean that,
55:41
Speaker 2: I think again, just like I don't think everybody should
55:43
Speaker 2: read the same books, I don't think the same style
55:45
Speaker 2: of meditation works for everybody. For me, I love transcendental meditation.
55:49
Speaker 2: That's what I learned Tom, and I've been doing it
55:52
Speaker 2: for five and a half years now and it's been
55:57
Speaker 2: a gift. So decide to do that was and committing
56:03
Speaker 2: to it because I do really meditate twice a day
56:05
Speaker 2: and I've been doing that for five and a half years,
56:07
Speaker 2: So that's a top one.
56:10
Speaker 1: Mollie, thank you so much for your time, and even
56:13
Speaker 1: more so, thank you for writing this book.
56:15
Speaker 2: Oh, thank you so much. This was a great, great conversation.
56:24
Speaker 1: Okay, you know what time it is. Today's a good day.
56:27
Speaker 1: To have a good day. I'll see you next week.