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Can You Build a Life With Someone Without Losing Yourself? · Bro-ing Pains

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Everything you do affects your partner.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_01: That is not your PTO.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_01: That's our PTO.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: You're looking at it from a very all or nothing type of perspective.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_00: What's up, world?
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to Browing Pains, where we have the conversations that live somewhere between your therapist's office and the group chat.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_01: I'm Chad, a licensed marriage and family therapist, but my friends like to call me Papa Chat.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm Carlos, theater kid turned self-proclaimed corporate puppy.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_01: And a quick reminder: this podcast is not a substitute for professional mental health care.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_01: If you're struggling or know someone who is, please reach out to a licensed mental health professional in your area.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_00: All right, welcome back, everybody.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: This is season number three.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: Episode number three.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: Last episode we talked about self-esteem versus self-efficacy.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_00: And if you were to uh pop quiz me, maybe I don't know the answer still.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_00: But we we move on regardless.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_00: Also, I wanted to take a brief moment.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: We completely missed our one-year anniversary.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_01: The big 13-month anniversary.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, happy anniversary, Chad.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_01: That's crazy.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: So today we're exploring what it really means to be a partner and how relationships can challenge, reshape, and even strengthen our sense of identity.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: From balancing independence and commitment to navigating expectations around masculinity, vulnerability, and emotional labor, we unpack the ways partnership forces us to confront who we are and who we're becoming.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_01: Can you maintain your individuality while building a life with someone else?
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_01: How much of your identity should evolve in a relationship and how much should remain your own?
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_01: In this episode, we're examining the tension between the me and the we and what it takes to show up as an authentic partner.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: Whether you're single, dating, healing from heartbreak, or building a future with someone, this episode invites you to consider one of the biggest questions of adulthood.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: Who are you when your identity becomes intertwined with another person's?
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: And with that, we introduced vignette number 10, Us versus Me.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_01: Dylan had been looking forward to this for months.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_01: It's just like my favorite videos that I watch every day.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_01: You know, and it's never like the videos, you know.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_01: Um Dylan had been looking forward to this for months.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: After three years of dating, he and his girlfriend Lauren finally signed the lease on their first apartment together.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_01: For the first couple of weeks, it felt exciting.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_01: They spent weekends assembling furniture, doing all the classics of arguing over where pictures should go, and laughing about how neither of them knew how to cook anything beyond pasta.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_01: It felt like they were playing house.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_01: Then real life showed up.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_01: Dylan had always enjoyed coming home after work, putting on his headphones, disappearing into a quick game or woodworking project in the garage.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_01: It was how he unwound.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_01: He never had to explain it to anyone.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_01: Now every evening felt like there was a choice to make.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_01: If he spent time by himself, Lauren seemed disappointed and alone.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_01: If they spent the whole evening together, he found himself feeling restless.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_01: When she asked what's wrong, he honestly didn't know how to answer because he hadn't thought about it.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_01: Nothing was wrong per se, he just missed having his own space.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_01: The little things started turning into bigger conversations.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_01: Why did he always assume she'd cook if she got home first?
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_01: Why did she want to talk about plans for the weekend when he just wanted to decompress and relax?
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_01: Why did he feel irritated every time she asked where he was going, even though she was simply trying to coordinate dinner plans?
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_01: Neither of them thought they were asking for much, but somehow both of them felt misunderstood.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_01: One evening, after another disagreement that started over dirty dishes and somehow turned into whether they were making each other a priority or not, Dylan sat alone on the apartment balcony.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_01: He realized something that hadn't occurred to him before.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: For 25 years, he'd been practicing how to be a son, a brother, a friend, a student, and an employee.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_01: No one had ever taught him how to become a partner.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe living together wasn't just about sharing an apartment.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe it was about learning to become someone who could build a life with another person without losing himself in the process.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_01: No, for sure.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it even came up when in the part of the vignette would talked about like, why did I assume like when if she got home first, she was gonna cook dinner, right?
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_01: I'm thinking about like how people just learn that, like you said, this passive learning that happens about what is supposed to happen in a relationship.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like you can imagine, like as a kid, like growing up, when you're watching your parents interact, you know, if they're both in the home, you are learning these quote unquote truths about what people are supposed to do.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, you don't start challenging that until you have like your first sleepover and dinner over your friend's house, and you know you don't start learning different people's ways of life until you know you start getting older, but you've learned already, like passively, you know, all of these expectations that you have.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_01: And that's why I I like to do a lot of deconstructing work and figure out like where this stuff came from.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_01: Having to navigate like making spending time a priority, like you know, I wonder where that comes from for her, and like why, you know, does she feel like she has to, you know, say something in order for her partner to make it feel like it's a priority to them?
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_01: Or like another one I hear all the time is like, oh, no one ever taught me like finances, so like I didn't know I was supposed to be like putting money away and blah, blah, blah.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_01: It's like, at what point do we say like negligence is not an excuse to break the law?
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: Just because you didn't know doesn't mean that like you don't have the responsibility to learn yourself, you know, and it's like you, it's time, it's time to learn.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_01: Like you're you're an adult now, you're 25.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_01: You it's it's time to learn.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: So I wanted to start with what does it actually mean to be someone's partner?
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_00: Season one was about relationships.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: And so that was a lot about the sort of everyday interpersonal things of how to be a good friend, you know, uh family member, lover.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_00: This episode is more about your identity and how being a partner can shape or or affect that.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_01: People's idea of what it means to be a quote unquote like good or committed partner is is vastly different, you know, and how how do you navigate what that means for you, also versus going up against what we know from research, what makes positive relationships, right?
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_01: Like some of it is like, hey, well, we know that's not gonna work.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_01: And then other parts of it is like, well, it's your relationship.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_01: Like, what do you want to do?
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_01: And and what is your level of commitment?
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't know, it's it's a it's a balancing act for sure.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_00: Going back to the the whole art imitating life thing, specifically this podcast, imitating life, I think that I've I've learned so much from our discussions, but then also, you know, just getting older and things like that.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: One of the biggest things that has shifted for me, it's like I'm no longer I would say I'm no longer afraid of sharing my life with somebody.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: And like that's that's something that I want, right?
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_00: And and like understanding that that's that's where I want to go.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_00: Even a few years ago, I feel like it was a it was just a little more daunting to that like the thought of of um like merging my life with somebody else.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: One of the biggest lessons I've learned from doing this podcast is really just it's it's about what type of relationship are you trying to build?
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_00: What type of um talking about the relationship contract and things like that and and what what do you want it to look like?
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, this is big for me.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_01: This is the first time I mean, just kind of explicitly saying that like you do want a not that you didn't want a committed relationship before, but like you've talked about some of the fears about intertwining your life with somebody else.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, you spent a lot of time, you know, living alone, and you like your alone time and your alone space, and that would cause a whole rift into all of that, but you're still willing to want to do you it's not like you're more willing to want to do that more.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm wondering if you could share why.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_01: What what do you think has shifted besides you being more comfortable to go through some of those challenging like moments with a partner?
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's two things.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_00: I would say number one is the something that comes keeps coming up here is, you know, we can do hard things, you know?
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: And so like just because it's just because it might seem uh daunting or it might seem a little scary to to navigate that, I think it's worth it.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_00: And and number two, I would say it's honestly, I think it's it's just feeling feeling whole and feeling complete within myself and wanting somebody to compliment that.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_00: I've never expected anybody to complete me or, you know, like to meet my other half or whatever.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_00: That that's not a a trope that I've played into.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_01: Just me?
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_01: All right, just me.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_00: My last situationship showed that or proved that to me of like, okay, we can be two whole people and merge our lives together.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: And and like that's and that's the goal, you know what I mean?
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_00: And to be able to merge and and and um compromise.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: And um, do you know who Justin Baldoni is?
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_00: Something that he said has always stuck with me, and and I'm gonna butcher it, but it's something along the lines of being a partner.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_00: It's about actively choosing them every day and like waking up and making that decision.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_00: Like I love you and I and I want to grow with you, and I want to um actively, you know, work through things with you.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: Like you choose this person every single day.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_00: And that's something that stuck with me since I heard it.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_00: It also puts things into perspective for me too, because it can go both ways, right?
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_00: Like it's it's um like either you or your partner could also wake up one day and choose not to pursue or continue that.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I mean?
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_00: Like it's that's that's part of life.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_00: And so I think that that's helped put things into perspective.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_00: I think for me it was a lot of just like fear of rejection, you know what I mean?
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: Fear of fear of abandonment.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_00: I've I have a lot of abandonment issues.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_00: It was a self-protection thing.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_01: For sure.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's a feel wanted and desired for the long term, like it's hard to imagine.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and just speaking more about like what it means to be a partner and like how do you develop that sense of identity?
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_01: Like for me, I mean, commitment is a is a big part of it.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_01: I do want to preface what I'm about to say is I think that I am a little more intense with the commitment kind of word than No, Chad, intense?
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_00: Probably the majority of people, but believe you.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_01: No, maybe but um I always give this example that I I I say the words, I say the phrase, everything you do affects your partner.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if I've have I described this, and like sometimes I'll get pushback on that, but like, really?
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_01: Everything?
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_01: Like I could decide what I want to eat for lunch when I go out, you know, for lunch for during my work day.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_01: Like, that doesn't matter to them.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_01: And I was like, oh, really?
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_01: So you mean when you are get that bean and cheese burrito and at nighttime you're going to bed and you're farting up a storm and you they can't sleep, you don't think that that affects them?
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_01: You can't just eat whatever you want, you can't just do whatever you want.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_01: I even go as far as saying, you know, this thing called PTO from your job, and you get to decide when to have vacation days.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_01: That is not your PTO.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_01: That is that's our PTO because that's money behind that.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_01: If you those that vacation time, if you lose, if you if you leave that job, they have to pay you out for that vacation time.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_01: So, and also what you just get to decide when to have vacation independently from your partner.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_01: What if they have a week off too and they want to spend it with you?
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like that's these are things I think that like, in my opinion, frame my lens of what commitment looks like and how to partner with somebody.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_01: But a lot of people maybe don't don't disagree, you know, would disagree.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_01: What what are your thoughts on on uh farting up a storm at night and being cool with that?
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_00: You're looking at it from a from a very not very, I would say more of an all or nothing type of perspective.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_00: For sure.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_00: And it's up to you to decide what type of relationship you want.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_00: And and it's and it's um it should be a mutual thing, right?
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_00: That you both agree on.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: And so I think the example that you gave with like the PTO and things like that, that's a that's a I think that's a perfect example, right?
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_00: If like these are two people that are that are that are merging their lives together, then yeah, it would be weird if you on a vacation and use all your PTO without your partner, you know what I mean?
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_00: Like that's um well, I get I guess it depends on Right.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_01: It's not it's it's not necessarily weird, right?
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_01: It's just it's just something that feels weird to you, but this is the part of the development of what it means to be a partner.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_01: Is have you talked about that with your partner?
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_01: Like, do you guys are you guys cool with taking vacations independently on your own?
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_01: Like I know some couples that do do that.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_01: Boys' trip.
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_01: Boys' trip, or even just like a solo trip.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_01: And I know some people get really nervous about solo trips and feeling like it's you know, infidelity on the other end of that and you don't know and all that stuff.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_01: And and I get that.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_01: It's that's a real fear.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_00: I'm in the um the school of thought or whatever that like if you don't really trust your partner, then why are you together?
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_00: You know?
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: Clearly something to work on there if you don't trust.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_01: The behavior of taking a solo trip by yourself somewhere is not inherently evil, right?
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_01: Like it's just if you have this fear that it's something on the other end of that is not going to be good for you, you should probably talk about it.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_00: I am somebody who loves my alone time.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_00: My idea of like a good time with my partner, or or one idea of a good time with my partner is us at home together and we we could be like doing our own thing, but together or in the same room, you know what I mean?
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_00: And we don't even have to really be talking or or whatever.
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_00: That to me qualifies as um spending quality time together, you know?
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_01: For some people, they would say, no, there's no interaction there.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't feel like we are spending quality time.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_01: The dialogue part of communication for some people is a lot more important.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, being able to talk about those, about how do you want to partner with your with your relationship and and what does that look like, I think is really important.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_01: There's a lot of like the love and connection and date nights and things like that.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_01: But one of the big things that I see a lot of trip-ups with is the basically the daily managing of a household.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_01: And you talked about it earlier, like emotional labor and how do you navigate how often you should clean the the bathroom toilet, or you know, the emotional labor of making sure that there's food in the fridge for the kids, um, or just different things like that.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_01: That like I think oftentimes women do take take on that role.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_01: And as a man, I think it's a many of us didn't have fathers who were actively involved in the emotional labor of the household.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_01: And so I think now like the modern relationship is asking a lot more of men on that part of the relationship, and I think that's a big growing, a big growing pain of uh of people in relationships.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_01: I think.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if we talked about this in the podcast with the Jimmy Kimmel goes out on the street and asks people questions, and it was like a Father's Day one, and they were with their kids, you know, they asked, like, you know, what is your what what's school, what's the school name that your child goes to?
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_01: Or um, who's their dentist?
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_01: Or like just different things.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, how do you not know?
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_01: But you know, I don't know.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, that's the part of the emotional labor that I think is is expected in committed relationships that I think men need to do a better job of doing, but it's hard when you're stressing about, you know, work or whatever and you have different priorities.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_01: And so the partnership has to be more explicit about what is the expectation of how do we partner together.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_00: I also I wanted to expand or zoom out a little bit from the emotional labor to how can you support your partner without trying to to fix them or or save them, like a a woman taking on the the motherly role for for their partner, right?
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_00: And and taking, you know, taking care of the household and taking care of of all of the sort of daily things.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_01: Puppy training.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_00: Puppy training.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think that's a perfect way to put it.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_01: That's what my wife calls it.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_00: For the partner that takes on the Captain Savajo role, I think it comes from from like wanting that validation and and wanting wanting somebody to need them, you know what I mean?
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_00: Um and on the the flip side of that, it's it's somebody wanting to be taken care of and and wanting that that type of love and affection from a psychological standpoint.
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_00: If you can break that down for us, what are some things that you see in the room?
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_00: And also just like, where's that line, right?
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_00: Or like how do you find that balance between like, no, this is just like normal things that I'm doing as a partner, as a partner should, you know what I mean, versus you're the one saving this person because this this like doing the puppy training.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_01: I think it actually relates more to what you said about yourself and saying that like you feel more comfortable and secure with yourself, which is why you'd be interested in having them taking that leap of faith with with somebody and having a committed relationship and move in and all that stuff.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_01: If your secret agenda is to make sure that you puppy train somebody so that you feel loved and validated and they they do that, I think that that's that's not really gonna work for you long term.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_01: I think being able to understand exactly why you're getting into a relationship needs to be much more than that.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it can't be from this fear-based, deficit language-based kind of mentality.
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_01: If you're entering into a relationship with this, these hidden agendas of like, oh, well, I want to like puppy train this person and fix them so that I can make sure that I'm loved, like, then I feel that feels more of like a like an individual identity challenge that you need to work through so that you're not craving this codependence of your partner and validating you and your existence.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_00: For me, where my mind goes then is resentment, right?
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_00: And and these negative feelings that may or may not start you start harboring those feelings, right?
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_00: Because it's like, oh, I'm the one that's constantly doing this and this and this for them, and they can't, they're not reciprocating or they're not doing enough, or blah, blah, blah, right?
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_00: And then you become the nagging partner.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_00: So I I think it's trickier to find that balance.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_00: It's easier said than done.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's why like, you know, becoming a partner as part of your identity, you know, and and thinking of identity development, like, you know, it can't, the car can't go before the horse.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you you I think the most important thing to do to become a partner is to know that you've done the work to understand yourself.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and it's not like you you like need to reach this certain level before you're allowed to go.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I think two things can happen at the same time, but that internal development of the relationship with yourself, I think, is really important in in being a partner.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_00: I'm wondering if you can share how did you know?
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: Navigate such a pivotal moment in your life of going off to college or graduating college and your identity being reshapen and then also falling in love, I guess.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_01: One thing for me, thinking about like how I wanted to be a partner and in my identity as a potential partner was, I mean, thought about for a long time.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, I I wasn't one to want to just um casually date.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_01: I just kind of never really was like in my DNA or something that I wanted to do.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_01: I I've I've always wanted a partner partner.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_01: I think if I'm just being vulnerable and honest, I think the the reason what I was gonna say was why I wanted a partner was because I wanted to have someone to love me.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_01: It was definitely from a speaking about like the parallel development of my own self-identity about loving myself and um you know believing in myself and not feeling like I, you know, am not worth anything, that hadn't that hadn't developed.
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_01: And I think for me, being able to partner with somebody and challenge all of those preconceived notions really helped build that sense with me.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_01: Like I essentially the way I looked at it is like I didn't know this at the time, but as I'm looking back on it, it it seemed like I needed somebody to tell me that I was wrong, that you are lovable for who you are as a person.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_01: And um all these uh beliefs about yourself um were incorrect.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_01: And I needed, I needed an outside external party to be able to help me with that because I wasn't at that young age, I was not able to do that internally.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and so I think that's why like even since like high school, like that I've I've wanted like a partner to be able to maybe do too much of the work of validating me, right?
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_01: And I think you're right, at a at a young age, I think at 24, you know, meeting my now wife, like there was still a flavor of that.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_01: Not even a flavor, probably uh the main course was was that for sure.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_01: And and and part of that development of becoming a partner is realizing that that's not sustainable, right?
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_01: You can't you can't put that expectation on your partner.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_01: You have to be able to do that work internally.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_01: And so there was reverse puppy training, if you will, of having to say, no, like I, you know, essentially my partner saying, like, I'm not gonna be your everlasting source of acceptance.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_01: Like you're gonna have to figure that out because I hate to say it to you, but I love you just for who you are, and you're just gonna have to learn how to accept that.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_01: If you can't accept that, then that that's literally gonna be a problem and and causing internal, you know, internal and interpersonal conflict.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_01: And um, I had to grow a lot.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_01: I had to grow a lot really, you know, quickly because I didn't want to, I didn't want to let this one go.
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_00: That's beautiful.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_00: And bringing that full circle.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_00: Where are you right now in terms of your identity as Chad, as a husband, as now a father?
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_00: Where are you with all of that?
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_01: I definitely have felt it in the most recent months, because my boy is not even three months yet, which is crazy.
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_01: I definitely felt it all coming back again of like having to feel like, you know, in order to be a good father, I need to do this and I need to do that, and um, you know, falling into those same like thought processes.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_01: And um, I don't know.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, clearly I've been doing a lot of work on myself and still doing work on myself for the course of better course of a decade.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_00: And um I mean, it's a lifelong journey, like we said.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, I don't know.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_01: I I think I've been able to catch it more uh now and having to actively have the different conversation with myself about why is it that I want to take better care of myself?
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_01: You know, why is it that I want to be more, you know, physically in shape?
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_01: Is it because my kid needs me, right?
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_01: Or is it also because I need me?
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_01: And that that's still something that is hard for me, you know.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_01: But I I am not just saying, oh yeah, it's because it's because my son needs me and blah, blah, blah.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm gonna I'm I'm not just doing that anymore, but it's still hard to do it like just for me, you know?
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_00: What a great place to be in, because now you're at the center of it all, right?
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_00: And like you, you matter.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's what this whole podcast, I mean, talk about the development of yourself doing this pod.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_01: Like, it's also just like another reminder for me about I'm just doing this podcast with you just because this takes a lot of time, you know, and and energy and and thinking about.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_01: Um, this is just for me.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_01: This is just me being me, me being Chad, and being with my my good friend, and that part is is important.
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_01: Tying it back to being a partner, like it can't be your your only sense of of acceptance.
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_01: You have to find these things that you have to matter more than your identity as a partner.
• 27:39
  SPEAKER_01: Otherwise, you know, you're you're putting you're putting too much stock on the relationship and it's gonna it's gonna come back to backfire.
• 27:47
  SPEAKER_01: I was just thinking about like someone's like first dating experience, you know, and like learning how to become a partner.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_01: It's a multifaceted thing.
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_01: Like you have hormones involved, you have um influence from media, you have influence from your childhood about what is right and what is wrong about how to treat another person.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_01: Um, there's this desire of acceptance within all of that.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_01: And so I think like this this development of identity of becoming a partner is really multifaceted and uh and takes a lot of time to to develop and unpack what is that going to look like for you.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_00: And it and it's something that you do together, you know, like with your partner.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, very well said.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you don't just get to decide independently how, you know, what kind of a partner um you're going to be in this relationship.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_01: You can have non-negotiables and things like that, but when it comes to joining with somebody, it's the the skills of um collaboration and compromise and and conflict resolution, like those are all you know part of the development of being a partner, um, because you're not gonna agree on everything.
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_01: So, well, I was gonna say like you know, it's a it's a part of uh you know identity that everyone goes through, but not everybody wants to have a partner, and that's okay too.
• 29:12
  SPEAKER_01: It's harder for me to relate, and I I have so many questions, um, but um becoming a partner with somebody is is a choice you have to choose.
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_01: Thing about becoming a partner, I think the broing pain is what is enough and what is right, and I think a lot of times we just get caught up in that, like you know, is it okay if I want to spend a night alone or you know, or am I being a bad partner and my partner is deserving of ridiculing me?
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_01: Which is not true, but um I think that's that's tough because there there isn't like a like a one model to look after, you know, to say this is this is right and this is wrong, and it's it's human beings that you're developing a relationship with.
• 30:13
  SPEAKER_01: So I think it needs to be really flexible, but I think wanting wanting some guidance and wanting to understand like, am I on the right track?
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_01: I think is is a big challenge for trying to become a partner.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_01: And like you, you don't you don't know if if what you're doing is quote unquote okay.
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_00: The grow pain for this episode is there's still a lot for me to learn when it comes to being a partner and the idea or the thought of merging my life with somebody.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_00: I think there's there's a lot of there's a lot of growing pains that will that are going to come with that.
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_00: My perspective has shifted from being scary to now exciting.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_00: And in that excitement, obviously there's like, you know, there's still some fear of the unknown, but it's more I think approaching it from a different perspective of like, if this person is worth it, you know what I mean, and if I'm actively choosing this person and this person is actively choosing me, then at the end of the day, we can all do hard things, but also it's worth it at the end of the day, right?
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_00: Like it's it's worth it to go through the hard times together and to work through things.
• 31:21
  SPEAKER_01: So what you're saying is that at the end of the day, like you're taking application.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_00: This is um me putting it out to the universe, you know, slide into the DMs.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_01: Um You take an application.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_01: That's funny.
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_01: That's cool.
• 31:37
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for joining us, everybody.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, we will leave you with this closing question.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_00: What's one part of yourself you refuse to sacrifice for love?
• 31:48
  SPEAKER_01: Boom.
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_01: Please join us next week uh as we continue this identity development exploration, and uh we talk about being a friend and all of the different ways that you learn how to be be a friend um and much more than just the show, friends.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_01: Because um throw up in my mouth.
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_01: Look forward to unpacking that with you.
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_01: Celos.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for hanging with us for another episode of Growing Pains.
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_00: If this episode shifted your perspective at all, don't just keep it to yourself, pass it on.
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_01: Follow us on TikTok and Instagram at GrowingPains to stay tapped in with the community.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_01: And if you've got a story, question, or a hot take you want us to unpack, type into our inbox at growingpainspod at gmail.com.
• 32:37
  SPEAKER_01: We'd love to hear from you.