Latest / Marriage Life and More and Bible Study / He Cheated, She Prayed, God Changed Everything! Pt1 - Austin and Goldie Young - 366

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He Cheated, She Prayed, God Changed Everything! Pt1 - Austin and Goldie Young - 366 · Marriage Life and More and Bible Study

• 0:05
  Daniel Moore: They say marriage is a journey filled with twists, turns, unexpected detours, and occasionally a few potholes big enough to swallow your entire relationship.
• 0:14
  Daniel Moore: But what happens when those potholes turn into canyons?
• 0:18
  Daniel Moore: The road completely falls apart, and you find yourself wondering if there's even a way back.
• 0:22
  Daniel Moore: This week we're continuing our marriage unscripted series with an incredible testimony from Austin and Goldie Young.
• 0:29
  Daniel Moore: Their story isn't one of a picture perfect romance, candlelight dinners, and happily ever afters.
• 0:35
  Daniel Moore: It's a story of brokenness, betrayal, addiction, heartbreak, and a relationship that seemed beyond repair.
• 0:42
  Daniel Moore: But here's the beautiful thing about our God.
• 0:44
  Daniel Moore: He's in the restoration business.
• 0:46
  Daniel Moore: When the world says it's over, God can still write another chapter.
• 0:51
  Daniel Moore: Austin and Goldie share how their lives spiraled out of control, how they reached some of their darkest moments, and how surrendering everything to Jesus Christ completely changed the direction of their lives and the relationship.
• 1:03
  Daniel Moore: This is a powerful reminder that your past doesn't have to determine your future, your failures don't have to define you, and no situation is beyond God's ability to redeem.
• 1:13
  Daniel Moore: So grab your coffee, settle in, and get ready for a raw, honest, and inspiring conversation about second chances, the power of prayer, and what happens when God gets hold of two broken lives.
• 1:26
  Daniel Moore: Welcome to Marriage Life and More.
• 1:32
  Daniel Moore: This is a podcast about marriage, Bible, and book studies.
• 1:35
  Daniel Moore: Interview people that have inspiring stories.
• 1:37
  Daniel Moore: I'm Daniel Moore, your host, and sitting over next to me, is my beautiful co-host, my wife Michelle.
• 1:42
  Michelle Moore: Hey, hey.
• 1:42
  Daniel Moore: Thank you guys for joining us this week.
• 1:44
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• 1:50
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• 1:52
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• 1:57
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• 1:59
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• 2:03
  Daniel Moore: And we thank you in advance for doing that.
• 2:06
  Daniel Moore: Well, this week, as we continue our series, as we've been interviewing couples, we have another awesome couple in the studio this week.
• 2:15
  Daniel Moore: And uh hopefully you guys will enjoy this.
• 2:17
  Daniel Moore: Uh don't forget that if you go to our website, we do have some resources there that you can pick up there at the website, some books that we've released.
• 2:24
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• 2:26
  Daniel Moore: So have a contact page there and you can fill out the form and send that to us or email us at Daniel at connectingthegap.net.
• 2:34
  Daniel Moore: And we'd love to hear uh you guys what you think about the episodes each week as we release those.
• 2:39
  Daniel Moore: And we thank you in advance for doing that.
• 2:42
  Daniel Moore: Well, as I said, this week we have a new couple here, and we're gonna go ahead and get into an interview here on Marriage Life and More.
• 2:49
  Daniel Moore: Well, as I said, this week we have a couple here that's sitting in with us here in the studio, and we want to welcome Austin and Goldie Young.
• 3:09
  Daniel Moore: Thank you guys for being here.
• 3:10
  Michelle Moore: Yes, thank you.
• 3:11
  Daniel Moore: Yeah, we appreciate it.
• 3:13
  Daniel Moore: Uh we know that uh, I mean, I've known Goldie for a long time.
• 3:17
  Daniel Moore: Uh Austin, I've gotten just to know you here just in the last few years.
• 3:22
  Austin Young: Yeah.
• 3:22
  Daniel Moore: Um, but uh what I do know, and from what I've seen, you guys are an awesome couple.
• 3:27
  Daniel Moore: And I've heard just little bits and pieces of your story.
• 3:30
  Daniel Moore: So um this is gonna be a surprise to me this week, also.
• 3:34
  Michelle Moore: So exciting.
• 3:34
  Daniel Moore: Yeah, I don't really know the in ins and outs of of your testimony.
• 3:38
  Daniel Moore: So I'm as excited, I think, to hear this as anybody is.
• 3:41
  Daniel Moore: And uh, but the parts that I do know, I know you've got a powerful story, and God's gonna use that in a mighty way.
• 3:46
  Daniel Moore: So um I think as we get started this week, uh let's just go ahead and just get all the initial stuff out of the way.
• 3:55
  Daniel Moore: Um I guess just start, let's just tell us how you guys met.
• 3:59
  Daniel Moore: Just start the beginning and tell us how you guys met and what drew you guys to each other.
• 4:04
  Daniel Moore: Do you want me to start?
• 4:06
  Austin Young: Go ahead.
• 4:07
  Austin Young: I met her initially.
• 4:09
  Austin Young: We she worked at a restaurant here in town, a Mexican restaurant called El Coballo, the Oral.
• 4:13
  Austin Young: And I never really paid much attention to her because she always wore this fake wedding ring to ward off weirdos like me.
• 4:20
  Austin Young: Yeah.
• 4:21
  Austin Young: So I never ever really paid attention to her.
• 4:23
  Austin Young: But um it was kind of a sad time.
• 4:26
  Austin Young: But my grandma had just died, and so we're at a funeral, and then we went to the restaurant afterwards to eat with all the family that came down from like California and everywhere else, and someone had told me, and they said, Hey, that ring that she's wearing, it's just it's false news, it's not real.
• 4:40
  Austin Young: Uh so I was like, Oh, cool, open game.
• 4:42
  Austin Young: Um but later that night I was joking around with all my cousins, and I said, uh, watch, one day I'm gonna marry that girl.
• 4:48
  Austin Young: That's gonna be my new wife, or gonna be my wife.
• 4:50
  Austin Young: And uh ever since then, uh I was going in at least two or three times a week to try to build up enough courage, uh, talk to her.
• 4:57
  Austin Young: Uh it didn't work out really well.
• 5:00
  Austin Young: It was really hard to approach her because she's really outspoken, and I'm kind of the opposite.
• 5:04
  Austin Young: I'm a little bit more reserved.
• 5:06
  Daniel Moore: Yeah.
• 5:06
  Austin Young: Um so one day I had a brilliant plan.
• 5:09
  Austin Young: I was gonna take someone in there that matched her energy so we can f you know, divulge some divulge some information.
• 5:15
  Austin Young: I took my grandma in there, and I was like, I really like this girl.
• 5:19
  Austin Young: Uh go get her name for me.
• 5:21
  Austin Young: So she like uh Gordy was really busy that day.
• 5:24
  Austin Young: She was running around and she didn't, she wasn't our waitress because she was too busy with like 20 other tables.
• 5:30
  Austin Young: But my grandma had chased her down and was like, What's your name?
• 5:32
  Austin Young: And then she told her, by the time my grandma got back to the table, she forgot.
• 5:36
  Austin Young: She said, She said, Uh, I think her name's Blondie.
• 5:40
  Austin Young: I was like, that sound right, grandma.
• 5:43
  Austin Young: Um but then she came back to the table, Goldie did, and then uh we asked her, I was like, um, you know, what's your name?
• 5:49
  Austin Young: She said, It was Goldie.
• 5:50
  Austin Young: And I was like, Oh, darn it.
• 5:51
  Austin Young: I could never have guessed that.
• 5:52
  Austin Young: I tried every other name to stalk her on Facebook, and I could not have guessed Goldie.
• 5:56
  Austin Young: But um So that I knew like right then and there, I was like, okay, I got her name.
• 6:01
  Austin Young: She obviously knows I'm interested because I've been coming in here nonstop for a long time.
• 6:06
  Austin Young: Uh I told her I didn't like the food, so she said she knows something's going on.
• 6:10
  Austin Young: Um and then when I went to go check out, she's like, I thought you didn't like the food here.
• 6:14
  Austin Young: And I was like, I don't come here for the food.
• 6:16
  Austin Young: Right.
• 6:16
  Austin Young: And then took my leave.
• 6:18
  Austin Young: Nice pickup point.
• 6:20
  Austin Young: I thought so.
• 6:22
  Austin Young: But um it really picked up from there because I don't know, not even uh a week later, we were chatting it up on Facebook and then went out on a date, and then three days later, she uh she she didn't ask me, she told me.
• 6:35
  Austin Young: She's like, Hey, you're gonna meet my mom and my dad, you're my new boyfriend now.
• 6:38
  Austin Young: I was like, Oh, okay, I'm your boyfriend.
• 6:39
  Goldie Young: So Well, there's a story to that.
• 6:41
  Austin Young: Yeah.
• 6:42
  Goldie Young: My mom, every time I like brought anybody home, she's like, Is this your new boyfriend?
• 6:46
  Goldie Young: Is this your new boyfriend?
• 6:47
  Goldie Young: And so I'm like, I'm just gonna get it out of the way and just say that, and that way I I can just avoid all of her questioning.
• 6:55
  Daniel Moore: Yeah.
• 6:55
  Daniel Moore: Yeah.
• 6:56
  Daniel Moore: That's a smart way to handle that.
• 6:59
  Goldie Young: I'm like, if it is or not, that's right.
• 7:01
  Goldie Young: It's just gonna shut her up.
• 7:04
  Austin Young: Yeah, I didn't argue with it.
• 7:05
  Austin Young: She's like, You're my boyfriend now.
• 7:06
  Austin Young: I said, Yes, ma'am.
• 7:07
  Austin Young: And that's kind of how it took off from there.
• 7:09
  Michelle Moore: That's awesome.
• 7:10
  Daniel Moore: Well, I have to say I I do like the chicken fajitas that del cabal.
• 7:13
  Daniel Moore: So they're pretty good.
• 7:15
  Daniel Moore: Yeah, those are those are not too bad at all.
• 7:17
  Austin Young: Well, my the thing was I was like so picky, I didn't know what to order.
• 7:21
  Austin Young: So I literally ordered the same thing over and over again.
• 7:23
  Austin Young: I ordered a burrito.
• 7:24
  Austin Young: Yeah.
• 7:24
  Austin Young: So I was like, yeah, Mexican food is rich, really not that good.
• 7:27
  Austin Young: And she's like opened up the door, so like, oh, this is what Mexican food actually is.
• 7:30
  Austin Young: So my opinion has since changed.
• 7:32
  Goldie Young: No, good, good.
• 7:34
  Austin Young: Yeah, I like Mexican food.
• 7:38
  Goldie Young: And that way.
• 7:41
  Austin Young: That's good news for you.
• 7:42
  Goldie Young: When he met me, I started making him all the kinds of things, and then he's like, How come there's not like a breakfast restaurant with Mexican food?
• 7:49
  Goldie Young: Because there's so many different foods for breakfast you guys eat, and I've never heard of these before.
• 7:54
  Goldie Young: So he uh he likes Mexican breakfast, I think, better than anything.
• 7:59
  Daniel Moore: Yeah.
• 7:59
  Daniel Moore: Well, I'm a Mexican fan myself.
• 8:01
  Daniel Moore: Yes, it's Mexican or barbecue, and I'm happy.
• 8:04
  Daniel Moore: That's for sure.
• 8:06
  Daniel Moore: Um so Goldie, how long did you guys date and then how long have you been married?
• 8:12
  Goldie Young: And so dating I don't have the exact amount, probably.
• 8:19
  Goldie Young: Um I want to say for at least a year over a year, and then um we had gotten pregnant with Mia, which was very unplanned.
• 8:30
  Goldie Young: And uh then he proposed that our baby shower.
• 8:34
  Goldie Young: And that was very also very unexpected.
• 8:37
  Goldie Young: And uh then uh we kind of procrastinated having a wedding because we just had a lot going on in life right then.
• 8:45
  Goldie Young: Um and so it got put off and put off and put off and put off and put off.
• 8:52
  Goldie Young: And uh we didn't end up getting married until we came back to God, and then um we wanted to do things right, so we are actually separated at the moment before because we weren't married, um, and we wanted God to bless our marriage, so we said, Well, I guess we just better go to the courthouse and get married at least.
• 9:14
  Goldie Young: So that's the way that went.
• 9:18
  Austin Young: I think guesstimated because I came into your life when Dominic was six months old, and he's eight now.
• 9:23
  Austin Young: We've been married for two or three years.
• 9:25
  Austin Young: No, two years.
• 9:27
  Goldie Young: Five.
• 9:27
  Goldie Young: It'll be five this this coming November uh January.
• 9:30
  Goldie Young: Yes.
• 9:32
  Michelle Moore: That's so funny.
• 9:33
  Michelle Moore: Then be like Daniel and I.
• 9:35
  Daniel Moore: That sounds like my mathematics.
• 9:37
  Michelle Moore: He's like, it's been that long already.
• 9:39
  Michelle Moore: And then like, yes.
• 9:41
  Daniel Moore: I'm still remembering ten years ago.
• 9:43
  Daniel Moore: Where'd that go?
• 9:45
  Daniel Moore: Uh so so yeah, so uh as you guys started off, just let's go ahead and and push past the the with the wedding here and everything.
• 9:56
  Daniel Moore: Uh when you guys initially got married, I know you probably had your idea of what you thought marriage was gonna be.
• 10:03
  Daniel Moore: And when you actually tied the knot, how was the first few years of your marriage?
• 10:08
  Daniel Moore: Did it kind of fulfill the the vision of what you thought or did it kind of take off in a different direction?
• 10:15
  Goldie Young: Um We was redoing life.
• 10:18
  Goldie Young: So like we just didn't live for God the first three and a half, four years.
• 10:24
  Goldie Young: Um and I had came to God first and it was in October.
• 10:29
  Goldie Young: Um and he didn't we were split up at the time and uh he didn't end up coming to God until January.
• 10:38
  Goldie Young: No, it was end of December at the Christmas, at the James River Christmas.
• 10:43
  Goldie Young: And then um by January he got baptized and then after his baptism we got married.
• 10:48
  Goldie Young: Um so it it was it was very different, very different than um you know we thought it was gonna go.
• 10:57
  Goldie Young: Um because we were also challenging different obstacles that were going on in our life at that time, um from being split up and everything in our testimony at the moment.
• 11:14
  Goldie Young: So it was it was a lot of uh building and uh restarting, I would I would put it.
• 11:21
  Goldie Young: Yeah.
• 11:21
  Austin Young: Yeah, a lot of paving new ground for sure, because we were together for I don't know, we're still trying to figure that out, five years or something before we got married.
• 11:29
  Goldie Young: But you know, it's Psych Dominic's eight, so something something like that.
• 11:32
  Austin Young: A very long time, a very long time.
• 11:34
  Austin Young: So it was it was like basically starting a whole new relationship from what we were what we had was what we thought, you know, relationship and marriage was supposed to be.
• 11:45
  Austin Young: And we made that, you know, I wouldn't say work, but we made it happen for you know the amount of years that we did.
• 11:51
  Austin Young: And then when we got married, honestly, I didn't really have an expectation because it was like paving new ground because we both had just came back to faith.
• 12:00
  Austin Young: I always joke around and say like the the only time I ever went to a church of when they were handing out free food, you know, yeah when I was younger.
• 12:08
  Austin Young: Yeah.
• 12:08
  Austin Young: Um so it it was it was a lot of like paving new ground because I knew what we had before had to had to die, had to let go, because it wasn't gonna work now.
• 12:18
  Austin Young: So as far as like having an expectation, I didn't really have any.
• 12:21
  Austin Young: I was just kind of like, Lord, here we are, let's let's figure this out together.
• 12:24
  Austin Young: And all I know is what we would did have, we can no longer have.
• 12:28
  Austin Young: So as far as like a an expectation, I don't know.
• 12:32
  Austin Young: I still don't have one, and I just kind of live in the room.
• 12:34
  Goldie Young: I remember from going like we were in heavy therapy at the time um at church, and at the time, um some of the counselors had, you know, taken a break, and so there wasn't really a lot of counselors to go to.
• 12:48
  Goldie Young: And Nancy Shelvy was getting her license, and she had said to us, I can see that you guys are in need, and I can see that you guys need something, and me and Dean are willing to counsel you guys an hour before church starts on Wednesdays.
• 13:06
  Goldie Young: It was just right there in the foyer, and it I mean, it was messy, you know, all the crying, all the tissues, all the things, you know.
• 13:13
  Goldie Young: But it it it started there, and I'll never forget something that Nancy had told us was uh she's like, you guys are pioneers, and you're you're having to dig new ground and create new things and kill off other things um that were before.
• 13:29
  Goldie Young: And so to pave a way, you know, to start a new life.
• 13:34
  Goldie Young: And that was literally, I want to say, the first two years.
• 13:37
  Goldie Young: Like it was just constantly like tearing down things that we both knew we couldn't drag back into it and rebuilding and starting new ground.
• 13:47
  Goldie Young: So that that's the way I would explain the first two years of our marriage.
• 13:52
  Daniel Moore: And if you don't mind, what what was some of the struggles you guys were having in the first couple of years?
• 13:58
  Austin Young: Man, uh let's talk about maybe kind of the external baggage that we had brought in, and then I'll let you go first on that.
• 14:07
  Goldie Young: Okay.
• 14:07
  Goldie Young: Um, so like for example, um, at at the time, uh what drifted us apart really was uh we both just didn't have the ideal growing up uh of a good marriage modeled.
• 14:25
  Austin Young: Yeah.
• 14:26
  Goldie Young: It looked very chaotic in different ways.
• 14:28
  Goldie Young: Like my parents served the Lord, um, but they were also very busy in ministry to the point that as a kid I kind of ran and did, and just I just kind of ran and did whatever I wanted, and they were so busy I knew they wouldn't notice.
• 14:45
  Goldie Young: Yeah, and that's what it looked like for me.
• 14:48
  Goldie Young: And um my dad was very old-fashioned um in his ways, and he just honestly, he just had so many rules and so many things, and if you know they didn't get fulfilled a certain way, um, it looked like uh what nowadays would be abuse.
• 15:10
  Austin Young: Yeah.
• 15:11
  Goldie Young: So um I I I just really grew up with that being modeled, and it was very, very it was I thought that was normal.
• 15:21
  Goldie Young: I thought that's what marriage should look like.
• 15:24
  Goldie Young: Um and going into it with a person that like in my family, we had a lot of roles.
• 15:33
  Goldie Young: We had so many roles and regulations.
• 15:35
  Goldie Young: Like we weren't allowed to have a TV, we weren't allowed to watch almost anything.
• 15:42
  Goldie Young: And um we weren't allowed to have a cell phone, you know?
• 15:46
  Goldie Young: And I think I got I got my first cell phone when I was like 16.
• 15:52
  Goldie Young: And I got uh I didn't get my ears pierced till I was 17.
• 15:57
  Goldie Young: So it's like we just had so many roles, like honestly, borderline Mennonite culture.
• 16:02
  Austin Young: Yeah.
• 16:03
  Goldie Young: Like it was it was very strict.
• 16:04
  Goldie Young: Um and so that just created a a strange environment for me as a child as to watching and seeing things modeled.
• 16:13
  Goldie Young: Um and I drug that in and um just just didn't do a very well job of uh, you know, searching and looking what a marriage should have looked like, or was it led by God?
• 16:30
  Goldie Young: Or, you know, I I just didn't do the things I guess that I probably looking back now should have did my due diligence.
• 16:38
  Goldie Young: Um and I also uh I got married young in Mexico.
• 16:46
  Goldie Young: I got married originally at 16 years old.
• 16:50
  Goldie Young: Um so that marriage went terribly awful, and I was very, very bitter by the time I came to this marriage.
• 16:58
  Goldie Young: Um so my first marriage was at 16 and it was very abusive.
• 17:06
  Goldie Young: Um it was very manipulating.
• 17:10
  Goldie Young: Um he cheated all the time, he drunk all the time, um pretended before we got married to be somebody else.
• 17:18
  Goldie Young: And my dad was very old-fashioned, very predominant about getting me married.
• 17:23
  Goldie Young: Like it's it was my calling, you know, like he just had that with all of his daughters, you know, like, oh, you're gonna be 17, you're you need to get married.
• 17:31
  Goldie Young: And at the time I was I was angry because I wanted to go to school, I wanted to pursue a career, and that was just not gonna happen.
• 17:39
  Goldie Young: And I didn't have any family or support system.
• 17:43
  Goldie Young: So I'm like, well, this is what I have to do.
• 17:46
  Goldie Young: And so I did, and that went terribly wrong for about three years, and I ended up getting tired of it to the point to where I literally um reached out to some people that I knew that lived in Goodman, Missouri.
• 18:00
  Goldie Young: And I was like, Oh, I heard you guys were down in Mexico visiting.
• 18:04
  Goldie Young: I was like, Can I ride back with you guys and surprise my family?
• 18:07
  Goldie Young: Um, and I I think they knew that something was definitely wrong.
• 18:11
  Goldie Young: I was very skinny.
• 18:12
  Goldie Young: I had no money to my name.
• 18:14
  Goldie Young: I had 20 pesos, which is a dollar, and uh my passport and no clothes or anything.
• 18:20
  Goldie Young: And I just hitchhiked all the way back to the US, and then when I got here, I uh my parents were here at the time because my grandma was ill.
• 18:28
  Goldie Young: And I was like, surprise! And then after a week, I finally told my family, I'm not going back.
• 18:33
  Goldie Young: And uh my dad was very predominant, like this is the person you marry, you stay with them for the rest of your life, no matter the circumstances.
• 18:39
  Goldie Young: And that was just that was rough because at some point he did convince me to go back and try it again, and it went terribly awful again and uh got got away from it again.
• 18:50
  Goldie Young: And um after that I was like, I'm not gonna like I I I know that you say this is what's for me, but I've been trying for years and this is not working.
• 18:59
  Goldie Young: And I got tired of being beat and pushed around and cheat on and being somebody's punching bag.
• 19:07
  Goldie Young: And so I uh I decided not to go back.
• 19:10
  Goldie Young: And then I got brave after f a few years when I moved back, and I said, I'm going to um I'm gonna go back and get a divorce because I want to move on with my life, and I can't move on unless I get a divorce.
• 19:22
  Goldie Young: Well, in the process, I was I was angry at God.
• 19:25
  Goldie Young: Um, I was living the party life, and in that chaos, I had gotten pregnant with Dominic.
• 19:31
  Goldie Young: And I thought, well, I'm gonna have to make this work now um with this person because I'm having his kid.
• 19:38
  Goldie Young: Well, that went terribly wrong as well.
• 19:41
  Goldie Young: And uh that's where Dominic came along.
• 19:45
  Goldie Young: And uh I came to the US to have Dominic, and uh his dad, after he was two weeks old, ended up getting shot and killed by the mafia in Mexico.
• 19:57
  Goldie Young: And so I thought, well, I'm not going back because now I have nobody to help me, and um I don't know how to make a living in in another country by myself.
• 20:09
  Goldie Young: So I decided to stay, and that was my new beginning in America.
• 20:14
  Goldie Young: And uh Dominic was six months old, and then Austin came into the picture, and I told myself, you know, I'm like, if this does not work out, like I'm just not doing this over again.
• 20:24
  Goldie Young: So we're gonna fight with all we got because to make this one work because um I can't do it all over again.
• 20:31
  Goldie Young: Right, right.
• 20:32
  Goldie Young: Yeah.
• 20:33
  Goldie Young: So that's that was my beginning.
• 20:36
  Goldie Young: Um and before we split up and everything, I we I had drug and all of that baggage, you know, and all of the my fear, like I was constantly in fear and fear and fear um of things not working out.
• 20:49
  Goldie Young: And so when um after I had Mia, I had fallen into postpartum for a long, long time.
• 20:55
  Goldie Young: Uh I want to say it was almost two years of postpartum, and he did everything in the book to help me that he knew, which you know, at the time we were both young, so we didn't know much.
• 21:06
  Goldie Young: Um as for therapy, as for everything we tried, medicines, and and nothing worked.
• 21:14
  Goldie Young: Nothing worked until um I think he just got tired of it at some point and just gave up and was like, I'm just gonna move on with my life.
• 21:23
  Goldie Young: And um that's where that's where you know we ended up splitting up um and the affair came along and stuff.
• 21:32
  Goldie Young: And so that's that's when God met me exactly where I was at, laying in my bed, and I was like, I've tried everything, nothing's working at this point.
• 21:42
  Goldie Young: Um I'm I'm gonna lose my kids, I'm gonna lose I've already lost my partner, you know, my husband.
• 21:50
  Goldie Young: And so what am I gonna do?
• 21:52
  Goldie Young: And I thought, well, what what would my grandma do?
• 21:54
  Goldie Young: What would my mom do?
• 21:56
  Goldie Young: And I'm like, they were the biggest prayer warriors ever.
• 21:59
  Goldie Young: like ever that I've seen.
• 22:02
  Goldie Young: Like they would stay up night and day praying for something um very persistent.
• 22:08
  Goldie Young: And so I said, that's what I'm gonna do.
• 22:10
  Goldie Young: Because that's what worked for them.
• 22:12
  Goldie Young: And if it worked for them, it's gonna work for me.
• 22:14
  Goldie Young: And so laying in bed, I was like, God, you have been the only thing that I have not turned to in all of this.
• 22:24
  Goldie Young: Um I was so miserable and so depressed and I was just laying in bed and I told God I said I'm just I would have quit it all.
• 22:33
  Goldie Young: And I had at the time I did have a drinking problem.
• 22:35
  Goldie Young: Uh I did use recreational drugs and I had prescribed drugs.
• 22:41
  Goldie Young: Like I was really out of it all the time.
• 22:43
  Goldie Young: And so I was like I'm quitting it all.
• 22:47
  Goldie Young: Like you you're gonna be the only thing like I have no more backup plans.
• 22:51
  Goldie Young: I have nothing left.
• 22:53
  Goldie Young: I've lost pretty much everything and gonna lose my kids if I don't get this right.
• 22:58
  Goldie Young: And so right there in bed I was like I surrender it all.
• 23:01
  Goldie Young: I surrender it all.
• 23:02
  Goldie Young: I give it all up 30 minutes I called everybody I knew.
• 23:07
  Goldie Young: I'm like I'm new I'm new something changed.
• 23:10
  Goldie Young: I'm not depressed and obviously everybody's like okay okay you know I could see everybody through the phone literally their faces like okay like oh what is she on today you know and and you know and from that moment like I kid you not it left in a like a blink of an eye like if I told somebody that was in the natural and not the supernatural they would never believe me.
• 23:36
  Goldie Young: Yeah um but it was just like it it it was gone.
• 23:39
  Goldie Young: Like God just lifted it off of me and right then and there he started to work on me and work in my life and I I directed my focus not so much on him and that we had split up and that the fair and all the things that had happened.
• 23:54
  Goldie Young: I directed it on I've got to get myself together and that's where I was at and that's when I had tried different churches and God had spoken to me.
• 24:06
  Goldie Young: He woke me up in a dream and he said your marriage is going to be renewed and I was like at the time I was bitter I was angry and so I was like no it's not like I don't want to do blah blah blah like I was fighting it the whole way um and uh so I had so much built up to that moment and that's how come in October I had I had given my life back to God um and he came along later.
• 24:36
  Goldie Young: But I'll let him tell you the rest of catch catch his side up to that.
• 24:42
  Austin Young: I put a period on that thanks for having us you know uh what was the original question again I had forgotten.
• 24:51
  Daniel Moore: Uh so at the very beginning all the things that were going on at the beginning of your marriage what was some of that baggage that you guys were dealing with at that time and I know you you had brought some of your own yeah um I came from a really broken background uh dad was an avid drug user super abusive uh to my mom and me both um so I didn't have a very good fatherly figure first of all um and the only role model I had hit women uh all the way up until I was like eight years old so I saw that and you know uh growing up all the time and on my other side of the family that was around they're all just big partyers so I didn't really have any stability as a kid um so I kind of grew myself up in my own way right um you don't know you're wrong until you know you're wrong so in my mind this is you know this is how I defend myself that type of thing so I took that mindset and I I grew up with it which was never good but um I mean when when we moved out here um it was a lot of isolation again my mom was gone all the time partying grandma working all the time going through bankruptcy losing the house it was just it was a ton so again I grew up in isolation with everything going on trying to make it make sense in my brain it's like well this is how I have to defend myself and it always came out anger not happy not sad just angry so I was an angry person growing up quite a bit so um it was anger first um you're wrong second and then you're wrong third don't ask me for don't ask me to say sorry because I won't um and that's how I grew up so taking all that you know and then and then some more into this relationship it was really like I have my own problems and you have your own problems.
• 26:44
  Austin Young: Don't drag me into your stuff.
• 26:45
  Austin Young: You figure it out and let me know when you're better and that caused a lot of issues because she came in with a ton of stuff too to work through I mean Dominic was six months old his dad just died she's fresh out of a marriage too so she had a lot of things to work through and she was really needing some help and I was not the person to ask for help.
• 27:08
  Austin Young: I was very selfish.
• 27:10
  Austin Young: So in my mind isolation always worked for me and my problems now you need to go do it.
• 27:17
  Austin Young: You figure it out and then let me know when you're ready because I don't want to deal with your crap.
• 27:20
  Austin Young: And that's that was a stupid mindset that I had.
• 27:22
  Austin Young: So the challenge for us initially was just being vulnerable and it was really hard because I always had to defend myself no one would ever do it for me.
• 27:33
  Austin Young: And then obviously she grew up in an environment where she had to be very self-defensive from a marriage from you know situations from her dad um Dominic's dad just dying fending for herself finding a job I mean just all those things so we grew up very bitter and very hard and then when we got together it's like what does a real relationship look like I have no idea I know what I know and it's not right.
• 27:57
  Austin Young: You know what you know and it's not right.
• 27:59
  Austin Young: Well let's put us together and see if we can figure it out and it was just a rumble match of just going back and forth of like my problems trump yours um my I have bigger issues than you do.
• 28:09
  Austin Young: And unfortunately like we both came in with big issues.
• 28:13
  Austin Young: So it was um there's really no one trumped another but we constantly fought like that.
• 28:18
  Austin Young: My problems were worse than yours.
• 28:20
  Austin Young: You know get over your problem look at mine and we just go back and forth quite a bit no vulnerability no forgiveness um no middle ground there's absolutely no middle ground to be had it was like we'll argue for hours and then when we just get tired of arguing we'll just sweep it under the rug and pretend that it didn't happen.
• 28:38
  Austin Young: So we never initially got a a honeymoon face a sweet face like nothing because I worked a full-time job so did she and we're just fresh off all these problems.
• 28:48
  Austin Young: So uh we just came together and it was just like wildfire.
• 28:52
  Austin Young: Um no vulnerability no forgiveness no grace I mean we don't know any of that stuff because it was never modeled to us.
• 28:57
  Austin Young: So that was a really rough start for us in the beginning was not knowing how to forgive one another not knowing how to let stuff slide sometimes um I'm not saying that could be a pushover but you know um and just being vulnerable um hey what you said just hurt my feelings you know this is the way it makes me feel it was none of that it was just like oh you said that to me well guess what I can times two and give it back to you.
• 29:20
  Austin Young: So that was a lot of the early on baggage and it just gradually got worse.
• 29:24
  Austin Young: Yeah.
• 29:25
  Daniel Moore: You know it's amazing to me and Michelle and I've talked about this several times in a lot of the episodes that we've done is the fact that um you know a lot of times when we come into a marriage and we have these big expectations of what our marriage is going to be like and if we do have some not so great role models in our past it it doesn't take very long to be married and all of a sudden realize we're just like our parents you know it's just like somewhat point yeah yeah it's like and you know a lot of people don't really think a whole lot about that but we've we've said this time and time again that you know we all love our parents but a lot of times they were not very good role models.
• 30:05
  Daniel Moore: And that is where a lot of us truly get our marriage habits.
• 30:10
  Daniel Moore: That's the that's how we grow up you know how did my dad treat my mom well that's how I'm gonna treat my wife you know and vice versa.
• 30:17
  Daniel Moore: And you know it's it's really hard to navigate through some of that when when we get into those moments we want to blame ourselves yes we do have some of that blame but also some of that blame goes on to our history and until we can realize in our history what has caused some of this it's really hard to correct that.
• 30:37
  Daniel Moore: And so it becomes this never ending cycle a lot of times and you know when you guys when there's issues like what you guys are speaking of where you know you have the arguments and uh the competition type thing going on the the you know the constant conflicts and the things and instead of fixing those we just push them under the rug you know um basically what we do when we do that we're burying those things alive.
• 31:00
  Daniel Moore: They're not taken care of.
• 31:01
  Daniel Moore: They're gonna flare back up later because you have not killed the issue that's there and have not got to the root of all of that.
• 31:09
  Daniel Moore: And so you know I think that's also something that's very common in marriages today.
• 31:14
  Goldie Young: Yeah.
• 31:14
  Daniel Moore: And then I think another thing that I'm picking up too from here is real similar to again to my situation and even you know Michelle's uh just because you grow up in church doesn't mean that you're a shoe in to have that perfect marriage.
• 31:29
  Daniel Moore: You know it's like people think that well you you grew up in church and you know you've been around this your whole life and you know you've had all the things so what's your problem?
• 31:38
  Daniel Moore: You know what's the issue here?
• 31:40
  Daniel Moore: Because you guys are supposed to have this all figured out you know and but you know when you get down to the nuts and bolts of the whole thing uh just going to church doesn't fix all those issues.
• 31:50
  Daniel Moore: You know there's there's still something inside of us that we have to take responsibility for.
• 31:54
  Daniel Moore: We've got to have some accountability and if we don't take those steps to be accountable to each other as spouses it doesn't matter how many years of church we've got.
• 32:04
  Daniel Moore: And you know I grew up very legalistic too just like you know Goldie's describing here and I've talked about that several times and unfortunately when you grow up in a legalistic environment like that it does a lot of damage sometimes and later in life if you do happen to get out of that and really start digging into the word and what it truly says it does it can do a lot of damage to people that they have to reevaluate and rework their way back through it.
• 32:30
  Daniel Moore: You know Michelle she grew up in church but it wasn't so much the legalistic um version of it so at this point you guys so I'm hearing that there was an affair correct okay so um Michelle and I just talked about our situation because we've had that happen in our marriage as well so I think uh if you can let's talk a little bit about that situation.
• 33:12
  Daniel Moore: So what's the the story around that and then how was this handled that you two could still be together right now?
• 33:19
  Austin Young: I'll uh I'll start that um so everything we said from the beginning of relationship never got fixed.
• 33:27
  Austin Young: It's continued on and then I got a traveling job and this traveling job has just, you know, what it sounds like we traveled everywhere together.
• 33:36
  Austin Young: The cool thing is they put us in apartments me and the whole family so I forgot to come with me.
• 33:40
  Austin Young: So that was a nice thing.
• 33:42
  Austin Young: At this point we still drank a ton, we still smoked we I mean we did we did a lot of things that we you know should not have been doing too much how long have you guys been married at this point?
• 33:53
  Daniel Moore: We're not married yet you're not married yet okay I was trying to put the make sure we know where we're at here on this okay go ahead.
• 33:58
  Austin Young: We're just still together.
• 33:59
  Austin Young: She has been proposed to at this time already so she is engaged with me but um still technically just boyfriend and girlfriend.
• 34:07
  Austin Young: So it the we we moved to Alabama just on a whim.
• 34:15
  Austin Young: We got a security system installed at our house and I was like the guy that was installing I was like hey how much money do you make and he told me I was like that's what I want to do.
• 34:22
  Austin Young: So we we ended up just moving to Alabama on a whim and she uprooted the kids and she came with me.
• 34:28
  Austin Young: The problem with that is it was a it was a hard time for her at the moment um postpartum and the the initial place where they put us was not very good.
• 34:38
  Austin Young: It was at Cockroach City.
• 34:39
  Austin Young: Oh wow and looking back at it now I I can see how this can be like really bad for somebody.
• 34:44
  Austin Young: Just at the time I like again my problems are my problems I don't care about yours when I was at you know back then they put us in like an extended stay and Goldie had both of the kids and we only had one car and I was gone from sunup to sundown.
• 34:57
  Austin Young: So she was stuck in a room with two kids nowhere to go nothing to do.
• 35:02
  Austin Young: So that that you know maybe try to I think that drive anyone kind of stir crazy.
• 35:09
  Goldie Young: Yeah it's drive me crazy thinking about her and I'll just add to this because I I I couldn't like exactly like go for a walk or whatever because this extended say like there's a reason that they wanted security there.
• 35:25
  Goldie Young: Like there's like people shooting up in the hallway um there's like two men fighting in the other room next door to us and people banging on the door and the walls and I'm like just scared like I don't have a weapon what if they break the door down like like it's chaos.
• 35:41
  Goldie Young: And might I add that the cockroaches are the size of my baby.
• 35:45
  Austin Young: Yeah it was it was it was a really bad situation and you know to fix all that I thought a pack of beer would fix it.
• 35:51
  Austin Young: We I'd come home and we'd both split a pack of beer and then just drink until we fell asleep.
• 35:55
  Austin Young: That was just kind of on repeat here.
• 35:57
  Austin Young: But she started doing it um when I wasn't there she started drinking during the day um to kind of mitigate some of that.
• 36:04
  Austin Young: I mean this is mid postpartum too I mean there's a lot going on um so then we ended up getting a nice apartment finally I know but damage has been done we're there for like a solid month and now we're not a nice apartment.
• 36:16
  Austin Young: Excuse me um so then we moved to this nice one um and in the mix of trying to figure out my new job which is very demanding of my time it's sun up to sundown like it like quite literally sun up to sundown Monday through Saturday.
• 36:32
  Austin Young: Sundays were the days off so I was gone a lot so she was going through all these problems to figure it out and um sometimes a simple phone call from you know showing her some grace would have probably fixed it all but every time I got a call from her I was in the middle of doing something I was like shut up you know you need to fix you don't I might your babysitter like go go figure it out.
• 36:55
  Austin Young: Being young and dumb, you know uh we're we're like yeah let's let's get on some medication so from a simple phone call to some doctor's office or wherever they prescribed her like antidepressants like phenomines well butrol like a bunch of stuff so she just started taking them with like no regards to exactly like how these work or anything like that so it really started messing with her mind um the phenomine specifically those are those are insane but um and it was really hard for me because I was gone all the time but we we were fighting like the way it would work my job I would get dispatched to addresses.
• 37:32
  Austin Young: So it would be like argue on the way there on the phone, go in there, show face, be done, argue on the way argue over the phone to my next job just over and over and over and over and over again.
• 37:42
  Austin Young: And you know there'd be like talks of suicide from her and like and I have two kids there and I'm having to talk her down from that and it this the medicine had really did a number amongst other things.
• 37:53
  Austin Young: And I'll tell you how I know the medicine message with your mind here shortly but um so it got very tiresome trying to work um hold down the fork per se in my mind like yeah I have to make money that that was a way to be successful or like you know be good in life is you have to make a ton of money.
• 38:12
  Austin Young: Yeah.
• 38:13
  Austin Young: Right?
• 38:13
  Austin Young: That's what I thought back then.
• 38:14
  Austin Young: So all this was stirring up and it it really wore me down trying to work, manage her, manage the family, make sure everything's doing good, show face, try to be the best I could be at the job, you know, so on and so forth.
• 38:29
  Austin Young: So I I just pushed her off and I I didn't want to talk to her as much.
• 38:34
  Austin Young: I just kind of let her be I mean there'd be like a day or two I didn't talk to her at all and I was like an hour away working somewhere.
• 38:39
  Austin Young: So we're split up and it was just a long dragging effect that could have been nipped in the bud just by simple communication between us both a little bit of mercy, a little bit of grace, let's come up with a plan, maybe some foresight like hey this is not working let's let's leave let's go back home but I was very headstrong uh about making this job work right because I was gonna make tons of money and I'm using quotation marks here.
• 39:00
  Austin Young: Yeah.
• 39:00
  Austin Young: Um and uh I think she nailed it earlier I I think it just got to the point where I just got worn down.
• 39:08
  Austin Young: And she had we they moved us again to Arkansas and she had started to go back to school.
• 39:18
  Austin Young: That was a plan and she had um she had left and we just I pretty much said like I I don't you know I don't want to make this work anymore like I I'm not out the door but I'm I'm on the way there.
• 39:31
  Austin Young: And um I don't exactly recall if this was a time where you had got saved or came back to the faith or not.
• 39:39
  Austin Young: No but shortly shortly after her leaving maybe like a month or two in I developed a really bad alcoholic habit.
• 39:45
  Austin Young: It was a really party lifestyle because I've worked with like nothing but college kids.
• 39:49
  Austin Young: So there's just alcohol steadily available everywhere.
• 39:51
  Austin Young: And I had I had become depressed at this time where I was just now contemplating suicide myself and I was depressed because my job had failed, I wasn't making any money, um you know moving around and it was really hard to make everything work I was borrowing money from my mom, my grandma, anyone who would give me money I was borrowing money from just to kind of float us um at the time so it was now my my false ego had had fallen and uh I'm broke.
• 40:16
  Austin Young: Uh I feel like a failure and I have nothing to show for it.
• 40:20
  Austin Young: So now I'm in a depressed mindset.
• 40:22
  Austin Young: Now I'm kind of in the suicide talks and then I have a really bad alcoholic habit um that's now feeding all this and um they just started shipping me around everywhere.
• 40:34
  Austin Young: Like one week here, one week there buying my plane tickets here and uh there was a female coworker there and it started off nothing crazy and then one thing led to another and it and it led to an affair which I then hit from Goldie for months.
• 40:53
  Austin Young: I I lied to her she's like this is happening.
• 40:56
  Austin Young: No it's not did you do this?
• 40:57
  Austin Young: No I didn't I just lied to her nonstop and I lied to her about being alcoholic and all that stuff.
• 41:01
  Austin Young: But it had finally came crashing in I left that job and then I came back to Missouri and I'll pause that because then that goes into another story and I'll kind of let you catch up babe.
• 41:14
  Goldie Young: Well during during this time it it was just uh at the time uh our main reason for me staying and digging some roots down was like I was like it's not that bad you know like I traveled with him this summer um he's only gonna be up there like six weeks and then he's coming home and then he'll have what they call blitz trips which is once a month they go one week somewhere and I was like if that's not that bad like we'll be fine um and so I was kind of like I was kind of like trying at the time I remember him telling me like you have to learn how to not depend on me all the time like you can't just call me all the time because I'm trying to work and blah blah blah.
• 42:01
  Goldie Young: And so I was like oh I gotta show him that I can be dependable I can do my own thing and so I had originally came back to put Dominic in school because it was time for him to start school and then that's where I got the ideal I'm gonna go back to school I gotta show him that I'm dependable that I can keep my own without him and like like I like that was my only motivation then I was like I have to I can't just sit in this house and be sad all the time.
• 42:29
  Goldie Young: Um so that's where I got the ideal of going back to school.
• 42:33
  Goldie Young: So then Dominic was going back to school I was going back to school I was thinking day daycare for Mia and um I thought it was gonna be great.
• 42:41
  Goldie Young: Well I noticed that he would call me talk for two minutes and then he would skip a day like he wouldn't even call me back and so I was like oh like maybe this is doing a number on him and he's not reacting very good I'm gonna surprise him and I remember going down there and thought I was surprising him and it was gonna be a good thing.
• 43:05
  Goldie Young: He was like nervous the whole time and I was like well that's weird why is he nervous and I just noticed so many things that were off and every time I'd go to the garage where his like he was managing a team and every time that I would go out there he would be like get back in the house get back in the house and I was like why is he so paranoid about me getting in being in the garage like he works there all day why can't I just go out there and talk to him and I just remember him being like get back in the house get back in the house and I was like that's very strange thing you know and if I wanted to go somewhere because you know like we were where big shopping centers were he's like yeah yeah yeah yeah just go just go just go and and I I remember at this time I was like I'm gonna take the other vehicle he's like no no no no you have to take your vehicle and I was like that's very strange like there was just so many strange things not adding up and um Some of my things that I had left, uh, I I just always had a habit.
• 44:04
  Goldie Young: I I remember just leaving like little paper notes and stuff before I left or whatever.
• 44:09
  Goldie Young: I noticed that before I left the last time I had left him little little notes around the house.
• 44:14
  Goldie Young: Well, I noticed they were all in the garbage when I came back, and I was like, that's weird.
• 44:20
  Goldie Young: And then he's like, oh no, no, no, the kids probably did it, blah blah blah.
• 44:25
  Goldie Young: Like just just random things that were just not making sense.
• 44:29
  Goldie Young: And um at the at that point, I had so much suspicion.
• 44:36
  Goldie Young: Like I knew something was going on, but I couldn't figure out what.
• 44:39
  Goldie Young: Um, and at at the beginning I was like questioning, I was like, well, maybe it's that like he's trying to hide the alcohol because I had looked in the trash and it was just full of alcohol bottles.
• 44:49
  Goldie Young: I was like, maybe that's what he's trying to hide.
• 44:51
  Goldie Young: And he was very aggressive with his tone and stuff, and he had never been that like trying to get rid of any evidence of me anywhere.
• 45:02
  Goldie Young: And I'm like, what is happening?
• 45:04
  Goldie Young: So that's when I kind of like I definitely knew that something was up and something was different and something had changed, and I questioned him, and we got into a really bad argument, and I was like, um, you know, maybe I just need to go back home.
• 45:21
  Goldie Young: Maybe it's it's because I had chosen to leave and he is just taking it hard.
• 45:27
  Goldie Young: Um, maybe I just should leave, and he's gonna be home soon in like a week or ten days.
• 45:32
  Goldie Young: It's gonna be good.
• 45:34
  Goldie Young: So then he gets done with this whatever whatever's going on in this trip or whatever.
• 45:40
  Goldie Young: He comes home and he's not home a day, and he's like, I gotta leave.
• 45:45
  Goldie Young: I'm like, leave?
• 45:47
  Goldie Young: Yeah, I gotta go to so-and-so and so-and-so, it's for work, blah blah blah.
• 45:50
  Goldie Young: And every time he would come back home, he had to leave.
• 45:53
  Goldie Young: Like it was just all the time.
• 45:56
  Goldie Young: And I was like, I thought you guys only went like a week, and uh, and that's when things he took me.
• 46:02
  Goldie Young: I remember we were sitting in the car, we had gone somewhere, and he comes back and he's like, you know, I've been thinking, we haven't actually tied the knot yet, and uh, I think that I'm just on another level, and I just don't think you're there where I'm at, and I just think that, you know, we should just take some time and take our own way.
• 46:25
  Goldie Young: And I'm like, what?
• 46:26
  Goldie Young: What is he talking about?
• 46:28
  Goldie Young: Um, and so then we had already had both had rings, um, and the main reason we had not gotten married was because my first husband wouldn't give me a divorce and we didn't want to get in legal trouble and that kind of thing.
• 46:42
  Goldie Young: So he takes his ring off and he leaves it there, and I was just like, what is happening?
• 46:48
  Goldie Young: And he leaves again, and then he comes back, and so I'm super suspicious, and this time he leaves, he leaves his Apple Watch, and so it starts going off, and so I start going through it because it opened and reading messages, and I'm like you're talking to somebody, and you're saying some things like this isn't gonna go like this, like you need to move out if this is what's going on, and so he came back, was super defensive, and tells me that nothing's happened and that everything's fine, and that he did that because he's lashing out for what something I did, and that that that's not you know, but whatever, he's gonna move out because he's better off on his next level million dollar job, whatever.
• 47:42
  Goldie Young: So I'm like, great, and so obviously I'm super heartbroken, but I'm at the same time like there there's nothing I can do at this point, and I was very angry, and I didn't know what had happened because from the messages I couldn't figure out anything but meeting up and just regular talk, but I knew that was it.
• 48:04
  Goldie Young: Um and prior to that, I had I had been like on his social media and noticed he was liking like other girls' things and other girls' pictures, and so I was like, mm-hmm.
• 48:16
  Goldie Young: I'm like, uh, something's going on.
• 48:18
  Goldie Young: And so that's kind of what how that became about, and uh that I'm like, well, that's when it came to the moment where I was like, he's gone.
• 48:31
  Goldie Young: I have nobody to help me with my kids.
• 48:33
  Goldie Young: Like, I I don't know, I don't know what I'm gonna do.
• 48:38
  Goldie Young: And now I have to start over, and that's what I never wanted to do, you know.
• 48:43
  Goldie Young: So moving up to that point, and um us being split up, he had moved back and currently with his grandma, but not really because he kept going on his blitz trips or whatever.
• 48:57
  Goldie Young: Um so he was at his grandma's and his other family.
• 49:03
  Goldie Young: I didn't really know what the finance or what that looked like, and I didn't ask, so I was just like, okay.
• 49:09
  Goldie Young: I didn't really have any money, but at the same time, I do remember him just like giving me a credit card and being like, hey, it has this limit for diapers, milk, whatever.
• 49:19
  Goldie Young: Like, here, here's this, that that's that's what that can be for now until we figure this out.
• 49:25
  Goldie Young: And I I was just like I was so devastated until I gave my life back to God.
• 49:31
  Goldie Young: So I had told God, I was like, I don't know what I'm gonna do.
• 49:35
  Goldie Young: And I had already like signed up for this program and like and made initial payment and everything to start school myself, like not make not having a job, but starting school.
• 49:46
  Goldie Young: And so I was like, God, if like finally, like I'm saved now, and I'm like, God, if you want this to work out, like I need a daycare.
• 49:56
  Goldie Young: And I remember just like crying in the car and just talking to God, and I turn over and I see this new daycare in town, and it's like we have openings, blah, blah, blah.
• 50:06
  Goldie Young: And I'm like, I don't know how I'm gonna pay for this, but I'm gonna go in there and ask because I I don't know what you want me to do, God.
• 50:12
  Goldie Young: Do you want me to go to school?
• 50:13
  Goldie Young: Do you want me to get a job?
• 50:14
  Goldie Young: Like, what do you want me to do?
• 50:16
  Goldie Young: And I was totally like just tired of trying to figure things out my own way.
• 50:21
  Goldie Young: I was not gonna do anything unless God was like putting it in my face at this point.
• 50:25
  Goldie Young: We've been there.
• 50:26
  Austin Young: Yep.
• 50:27
  Goldie Young: Um so that that's where I was at in all of this.
• 50:31
  Goldie Young: Um, well, he is still out there on his blood strips and whatever's going on is going on, and obviously, like at this point, it's like killing me because I'm like this is my life now, and it's broke, and somehow I have managed to do everything I never wanted, and this was not what I ever wanted.
• 50:54
  Goldie Young: I never wanted to have a broken family, I never wanted um to have, you know, I'm like, if what if I have to restart and you know, like what are people gonna say about me?
• 51:05
  Goldie Young: Because I did grow up in the legalistic field and I was like, what are people gonna say about me?
• 51:09
  Goldie Young: Like, I have two kids by two different dads already, like this just can't get any worse.
• 51:13
  Goldie Young: Like, that's where I was at.
• 51:15
  Goldie Young: And uh it was it wasn't a good place, but I knew that God was just gonna guide me through it.
• 51:23
  Goldie Young: And I knew the things that God was speaking to my heart at the time that He just kept saying, I've got you and I'm gonna show you.
• 51:34
  Goldie Young: And that was my first sign, was the daycare.
• 51:37
  Goldie Young: And I'm like, okay, so you want me to go to school, God?
• 51:40
  Goldie Young: Is this what I'm understanding?
• 51:41
  Goldie Young: And so, like, I just I'm like, this makes no sense to the human eye, but to the spiritual round, God just kept setting things in place that I thought were impossible.
• 51:56
  Goldie Young: It's like if you're going to school, like government aid kicked in, like just so many things that I never knew that at the time I was broke financially.
• 52:11
  Goldie Young: And God gave me like a happiness where I had no stress about anything.
• 52:17
  Goldie Young: And I I remember at the time it just it really sucked for him because every time we would like meet up or whatever, I'd be like, Hey, do you want to see your kids or whatever?
• 52:26
  Goldie Young: You know, he was just like, Why are you so stinking happy?
• 52:29
  Goldie Young: Like, what is wrong with you?
• 52:30
  Goldie Young: You know?
• 52:31
  Goldie Young: It was it was so crazy uh at the time, but uh I don't know, do you want to catch up to that or yeah?
• 52:40
  Daniel Moore: What was your breaking point that actually started reversing this situation to where you started gravitating back towards the relationship?
• 52:51
  Michelle Moore: And I before you answer that, I know that you were fighting for your marriage.
• 52:54
  Michelle Moore: Oh yes.
• 52:55
  Michelle Moore: Because I can remember you coming to church and we would talk and you'd be pray for him, pray for him.
• 53:01
  Michelle Moore: And because of what we had walked through, I can remember specifically, she didn't go in any detail, she just said pray for him.
• 53:08
  Michelle Moore: And so I remember that specifically.
• 53:11
  Michelle Moore: So you were actually the whole like after that going to church, so seeking the Lord, and you were on your knees, whatever God's will, whatever it may be.
• 53:20
  Goldie Young: Yep.
• 53:21
  Goldie Young: Okay.
• 53:21
  Goldie Young: That's where I was at.
• 53:22
  Goldie Young: Yeah.
• 53:22
  Goldie Young: Okay.
• 53:23
  Austin Young: Yeah, that's a funny thing.
• 53:24
  Austin Young: Um, when I finally came to church, everybody knew me.
• 53:28
  Austin Young: They didn't know my name, but they knew I was Goldie's husband.
• 53:32
  Michelle Moore: I remember that.
• 53:32
  Michelle Moore: I remember being introduced to you.
• 53:34
  Austin Young: I was like, how do all these people know who I am?
• 53:37
  Austin Young: Why is everyone so happy to see me?
• 53:39
  Austin Young: Um I'm sorry, what was the what was the question?
• 53:43
  Austin Young: Sorry, baby.
• 53:43
  Daniel Moore: Uh yeah, just so what was the breaking point that started you reversing everything and kind of getting back where you needed to be?
• 53:53
  Austin Young: I think I think God knows how to work in our lives and has to speak to us.
• 53:56
  Austin Young: And um, it's that it's that weird saying that no one likes us here, but like, you know, pray your pray them to the hands of the devil.
• 54:03
  Austin Young: Yeah.
• 54:04
  Austin Young: Um I don't I don't mean this like literally just metaphorically speaking, just prerequisite before I say it, but I think the deal that I made with the devil, again metaphorically speaking, not like I didn't sign a contract anymore, but was that like money was the key.
• 54:18
  Austin Young: I had to have money, money, fame, you know, that was the key.
• 54:22
  Austin Young: I was gonna make it in life as long as I had money.
• 54:25
  Austin Young: I didn't need anything else.
• 54:27
  Austin Young: Um but my job started failing really bad after the affair happened, and then I I doubled down on alcohol, like terribly bad.
• 54:37
  Austin Young: But I at that point I already had told myself I remember laying there in bed, feeling like a failure again.
• 54:44
  Austin Young: Um my job failed.
• 54:46
  Austin Young: Um I'm making zero to you know, maybe two hundred bucks a week.
• 54:51
  Austin Young: Um I've opened up as many credit cards as I could to afford my alcohol habit.
• 54:55
  Austin Young: And you know, give some money to Goldie.
• 54:57
  Austin Young: I mean, just like you max out that credit card, here's another one, you know.
• 55:00
  Austin Young: But um God he knows how to he know he knows how to speak to us.
• 55:11
  Austin Young: I had lost everything that I thought was important.
• 55:13
  Austin Young: I lost money, my status, my ego, um and I I all that made me really chronically suicidal uh to the point to where um it sounds really silly when I say it out loud, and it still kinda makes me cringe when I think about it, but um I carried a gun with me everywhere and I I could never pull the trigger.
• 55:35
  Austin Young: I was too scared every time I did it.
• 55:37
  Austin Young: Um so I started I started doing something and I was like, this is I look back and I'm like, this is so stupid.
• 55:43
  Austin Young: Like this was like prime devil activity here.
• 55:45
  Austin Young: Um I was like, I'll just train to pull the trigger with an empty gun until it becomes so natural to me that I can load it and just do it without thinking about it.
• 55:56
  Austin Young: So I would sit there for however long I sat there for with an empty gun and I would load it empty.
• 56:01
  Austin Young: I'd load it but pull it to my head dry over and over and over and over again.
• 56:05
  Austin Young: And then um everything was gone.
• 56:09
  Austin Young: No money, no more credit cards.
• 56:11
  Austin Young: I was on a blitz trip trying to make some money.
• 56:15
  Austin Young: Um and I sat in a this is the tipping point.
• 56:20
  Austin Young: I sat in a car and I had decided I had enough alcohol in my system now to where I was like stumbled around, couldn't stand up.
• 56:27
  Austin Young: Um, that this was the night that I was gonna do it.
• 56:30
  Austin Young: I was I've I've been practicing for months.
• 56:32
  Austin Young: This is the night I'm gonna do it.
• 56:34
  Austin Young: And I had had some pre-written text, it was like three o'clock in the morning, four o'clock in the morning, um, that I had was ready to send out.
• 56:42
  Austin Young: You know, you can press send later on some.
• 56:43
  Austin Young: I downloaded an app that'll let me send text later.
• 56:46
  Austin Young: So I had it all scheduled out.
• 56:47
  Austin Young: I wrote texts out, you know, just goodbye letters to everybody.
• 56:51
  Austin Young: Um I can't find this app anymore, but uh it's a poor design because um you can you can type a message and like right there next to each other it says send now or send later.
• 57:01
  Austin Young: I I was you know belligerent and I'm I'm sobbing, I'm crying so hard that I had to take my glasses off and nonstop tears.
• 57:08
  Austin Young: And uh I I got to Goldie's and I sent a really long message and I accidentally pressed send now.
• 57:13
  Austin Young: So she got it.
• 57:14
  Austin Young: And it's like four o'clock in the morning.
• 57:16
  Austin Young: And uh I remember it was like probably like a book of a text, and all she texts back was, No.
• 57:21
  Austin Young: No, that's not gonna happen.
• 57:24
  Austin Young: Um but when she had text back, I started freaking out, and I was like, oh no.
• 57:28
  Austin Young: Now I really have to do it because I I did it now, like she she knows.
• 57:32
  Austin Young: And uh I'm screaming in the car, I'm like yelling, I'm screaming, I'm sobbing, snot, tear just everywhere, it's gross.
• 57:39
  Austin Young: But um I loaded the gun and I tried to put it up to my head again, and I just I couldn't do it.
• 57:44
  Austin Young: And then I set it down and I put my head in the same room, and I remember just crying and crying and crying, and then I just fell asleep.
• 57:50
  Austin Young: Just passed out.
• 57:52
  Austin Young: Um I wasn't tired, I was wide awake.
• 57:54
  Austin Young: Like I'm a night out, like even to this day, like three o'clock is no big deal.
• 57:58
  Austin Young: Um it's just really supernaturally weird.
• 58:00
  Austin Young: I just passed out just like that.
• 58:02
  Austin Young: It was just so weird.
• 58:02
  Austin Young: I was sleeping.
• 58:03
  Austin Young: Um I woke up the next morning, not groggy like I usually am, you know, from drinking all night, and I was like, kind of had some clarity, and I just the gun was still in my hand.
• 58:12
  Austin Young: No, thank goodness no cop drove by, you know.
• 58:14
  Austin Young: But um well, I was in the back of a strip mall, but um I threw it in the other, uh threw it in the floorboard over there, and I said, This is not working out.
• 58:24
  Austin Young: Like this is this is not good.
• 58:26
  Austin Young: I left the bridge blitz trip early.
• 58:28
  Austin Young: I called and asked to borrow some gas money from my mom again, and I drove home.
• 58:33
  Austin Young: Um that did not fix the depression.
• 58:37
  Austin Young: I was no longer suicidal, but I was still chronically depressed, and I still had a bad alcohol habit still.
• 58:43
  Austin Young: Um and by this time, Goldie had came around already.
• 58:47
  Austin Young: She had been seeking the Lord, she had been praying for me.
• 58:50
  Austin Young: That night, her mom had told me that that night I sent her the text, that she stayed up, like like quite literally stayed up all night long, like stomping and just praying until she had to get the kids up and get to school and get herself to school.
• 59:02
  Austin Young: Um so she had already been seeking the Lord.
• 59:06
  Austin Young: And uh I remember that weird joy that she had when she came around and it made me so mad.
• 59:11
  Austin Young: I don't know why she was just so happy.
• 59:13
  Austin Young: She's just being she I'm so used to like butting heads with her at this point that like she came around, she was being nice to me.
• 59:19
  Austin Young: I was like, get away.
• 59:20
  Austin Young: Yeah.
• 59:20
  Austin Young: I don't want to be around you.
• 59:22
  Austin Young: But I had this like weird supernatural anger, sad depression over me that did not like what was going on with Goldie.
• 59:29
  Austin Young: I just whatever she had going on at the time I didn't know.
• 59:32
  Austin Young: We clashed.
• 59:32
  Austin Young: Every time she was around, I was just mad.
• 59:34
  Austin Young: Even if she didn't even speak, I was just mad.
• 59:37
  Austin Young: Um she came around a lot because I think my family loves her more than I do, so or more than me.
• 59:42
  Austin Young: She they love her more than me sometimes, is what I meant to say.
• 59:44
  Austin Young: Yeah.
• 59:45
  Austin Young: Um so she still kept coming around, like family events and stuff.
• 59:49
  Austin Young: Um we just never got along.
• 59:51
  Austin Young: And um the tipping point to that was she guilt tripped me in a good way.
• 59:59
  Austin Young: She's like, hey, I'm getting baptized tonight.
• 1:00:02
  Austin Young: And I'd already been drinking this night.
• 1:00:04
  Austin Young: And I was like, okay, and she goes, I need you to watch the kids so I can get baptized.
• 1:00:09
  Austin Young: And um I was like, No.
• 1:00:12
  Austin Young: And she said, You haven't seen your kids in three months.
• 1:00:15
  Austin Young: Stop being a piece of crap, come see your kids.
• 1:00:17
  Austin Young: I said, Okay, someone has to drive me though.
• 1:00:19
  Austin Young: So, but no one drove me, I ended up driving myself.
• 1:00:21
  Austin Young: But um went in there, watched her get baptized.
• 1:00:25
  Austin Young: Nothing magical, like there's nothing.
• 1:00:27
  Austin Young: I'm I've been drinking.
• 1:00:28
  Austin Young: Like I said, I walked in and everyone's like greeting me.
• 1:00:30
  Austin Young: I'm not happy.
• 1:00:31
  Austin Young: I'm still like angry and like depressed and stuff, so everyone's like, hey, and I was like, get away from me.
• 1:00:36
  Austin Young: Uh after she got baptized, we're leaving, and I was just ready to go.
• 1:00:40
  Austin Young: I was ready to get out of this airport of a church.
• 1:00:42
  Austin Young: Like, I was ready to leave.
• 1:00:43
  Austin Young: No big deal.
• 1:00:44
  Austin Young: Let's get out of here.
• 1:00:45
  Austin Young: And then one thing after another, I saw a friend from high school, came and talked to me, talked my ear off for a minute.
• 1:00:49
  Austin Young: Then he left because he had to go do something.
• 1:00:51
  Austin Young: Saw another friend that I knew, he talked my ear off.
• 1:00:54
  Austin Young: And then I saw another one talk my ear off, and then after the third one, they're like, You should stay for the church service.
• 1:00:59
  Austin Young: And I was like, No, I don't want to.
• 1:01:00
  Austin Young: The lady I'd baptized Goldie was like, I got you guys front row seats.
• 1:01:05
  Austin Young: You gotta stay now.
• 1:01:06
  Austin Young: I was like, Oh crap.
• 1:01:08
  Austin Young: So we stayed, and um they did the whole Christmas thing, and it was the weirdest thing ever.
• 1:01:13
  Austin Young: There was like handing out chickens and people on people on pogo sticks.
• 1:01:19
  Austin Young: I was like, it's my first time in this church, right?
• 1:01:22
  Austin Young: So I remember thinking, like, why are they handing out pogo sticks?
• 1:01:24
  Austin Young: Like, that's like a like they're gonna get in a legal matter if someone falls.
• 1:01:27
  Austin Young: That doesn't make sense.
• 1:01:27
  Austin Young: And then coincidentally, they just happened to find the guy that could do backflips off him.
• 1:01:31
  Austin Young: I was like, oh what a lucky shot, you know?
• 1:01:33
  Austin Young: How'd they do that?
• 1:01:34
  Austin Young: So but uh all for good fun.
• 1:01:38
  Austin Young: Um and then the testimony came up on the screen, and uh it was a very similar story to what we were going through at the moment.
• 1:01:46
  Austin Young: And I remember like sitting back, and at this time I'm still I'm still drunk.
• 1:01:50
  Austin Young: Um I'm sitting back in my seat, but I remember by the end of it, I'm like leaning forward and like staring at this screen like, did Goldie tip these people off?
• 1:01:57
  Daniel Moore: Like, does she like submit in the story?
• 1:02:01
  Austin Young: Are these actors right here?
• 1:02:02
  Austin Young: Is he supposed to be me?
• 1:02:03
  Austin Young: Like, what's going on here?
• 1:02:04
  Austin Young: But uh at that moment there was something stirring in me.
• 1:02:08
  Austin Young: Um still don't know what it is at that time, you know, it's just uh you know adrenaline anxiety, whatever, something stirring in me.
• 1:02:14
  Austin Young: And uh it's really weird.
• 1:02:16
  Austin Young: They called for salvation afterwards, and it was almost like this like tear I felt in my body.
• 1:02:22
  Austin Young: It was like a pull uh between sitting back down and walking forward to go get saved.
• 1:02:28
  Austin Young: It was the strangest feeling ever.
• 1:02:30
  Austin Young: Like I my body was like almost shaking because I didn't I didn't know what to do.
• 1:02:34
  Austin Young: And uh I fought it so long that everyone left.
• 1:02:37
  Austin Young: They called for salvation, everyone walked out the door, and it was gone.
• 1:02:42
  Austin Young: And uh part of me felt relieved.
• 1:02:45
  Austin Young: It was really weird.
• 1:02:45
  Austin Young: I felt kind of relieved that everyone was gone, that feeling was gone.
• 1:02:48
  Austin Young: And then I looked at Goldie and I said, like, I can't move.
• 1:02:52
  Austin Young: Will you walk with me so I can go get my life, you know, go save go get my life saved?
• 1:02:58
  Austin Young: And uh she said no, no, I'm just kidding.
• 1:03:00
  Austin Young: She said, Yeah, and um she took me by the hand, uh, we walked over there and we found someone and we sat down and I gave my life to the Lord that night.
• 1:03:12
  Michelle Moore: Wow.
• 1:03:12
  Austin Young: Um and uh that very night um I stopped drinking alcohol, I stopped doing drugs, um, I quit that job.
• 1:03:22
  Austin Young: You know, within the weeks to come I ended up quitting that job, and that's kind of what the tipping point was um to changing the life around.
• 1:03:30
  Austin Young: I got saved that night.
• 1:03:32
  Austin Young: And um I didn't really realize that till later on, but someone was like, Well, how'd you deal with withdrawals?
• 1:03:36
  Austin Young: Because when I say I was drinking heavy, like I was I was waking up and taking, you know, drinking immediately as soon as I woke up, and I was poor, so I was drinking like really nasty stuff that was just like peroxide, like four locos, like just really nasty stuff.
• 1:03:50
  Austin Young: Yeah.
• 1:03:50
  Austin Young: So like ew, but um and I didn't have any withdrawals.
• 1:03:55
  Austin Young: No withdrawals.
• 1:03:57
  Austin Young: My my craving for it was gone, um, my anger was gone, I didn't feel depressed anymore.
• 1:04:04
  Austin Young: Suicide was out of the picture, and I didn't know much about Jesus.
• 1:04:08
  Austin Young: I still, you know, back then I still didn't I didn't know anything at all.
• 1:04:11
  Austin Young: But I just knew that if I didn't care about my life, I needed to give it to someone who did, you know.
• 1:04:16
  Austin Young: Yeah.
• 1:04:16
  Austin Young: And um that was a tipping point to kind of you know change our life around.
• 1:04:21
  Daniel Moore: So well, I don't know about you, but if there's one thing we've learned about Austin and Goldie's story this week, it's that sometimes life doesn't just throw you a curveball, it throws the whole pitching machine at you.
• 1:04:52
  Daniel Moore: And when you hear everything else these two have walked through, from painful childhood experiences and broken relationships to betrayal, addiction, and moments when life seemed completely hopeless, it's incredible to see how God was working even when they couldn't see it themselves.
• 1:05:07
  Daniel Moore: Their story reminds us that the baggage we carry into a relationship doesn't magically disappear when we fall in love.
• 1:05:14
  Daniel Moore: Those old wounds, unhealthy habits and patterns we've learned along the way have a way of showing up in our marriages, whether we invite them or not.
• 1:05:22
  Daniel Moore: And here's what I love about their testimony.
• 1:05:25
  Daniel Moore: God didn't wait for Austin and Goldie to clean up their lives before he stepped into their mess.
• 1:05:30
  Daniel Moore: He met them right where they were, and what seemed like the end of their story became the beginning of something entirely new.
• 1:05:37
  Daniel Moore: And that's where we're going to leave things for this week, and there's more to this story.
• 1:05:41
  Daniel Moore: Next week in part two, we'll continue our conversation with Austin and Goldie as we explore what rebuilding a relationship actually looks like after everything has fallen apart.
• 1:05:51
  Daniel Moore: Coming to Christ is a life-changing moment, but living out that transformation in your marriage takes intentionality, humility, forgiveness, and a whole lot of grace.
• 1:06:01
  Daniel Moore: So join us next week as we continue this incredible testimony in our marriage unscripted series.
• 1:06:07
  Daniel Moore: And before we go, let me leave you with this encouragement.
• 1:06:10
  Daniel Moore: 2 Corinthians 5.17 tells us, therefore, if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature.
• 1:06:16
  Daniel Moore: Old things are passed away, behold, all things are become new.
• 1:06:20
  Daniel Moore: That's not just a nice verse to hang on your wall, that's a promise of Jesus Christ's transforming power.
• 1:06:26
  Daniel Moore: Your past may explain where you've been, but it doesn't have to dictate where you're going.
• 1:06:32
  Daniel Moore: And while restoration doesn't always look the way we expect, nothing in our lives is beyond the reach of God's grace.
• 1:06:39
  Daniel Moore: So thank you all for joining us this week.
• 1:06:41
  Daniel Moore: If this episode encouraged you, share it with someone who might need a reminder that God is still in the business of changing lives.
• 1:06:47
  Daniel Moore: Be sure to subscribe, leave a review, and visit marriagelifemore.com for more episodes and resources to help strengthen your marriage.
• 1:06:54
  Daniel Moore: Keep Christ at the center, keep fighting for your marriage, and remember, your story isn't finished just because you've reached a difficult chapter.
• 1:07:02
  Daniel Moore: God may still be writing the greatest part.
• 1:07:05
  Daniel Moore: Well, that's all for this week, and we pray that your marriage is stronger and your walk with God is closer after this episode.
• 1:07:11
  Daniel Moore: This episode's recorded in the upper room at our Connecting the Gap Studios.
• 1:07:15
  Daniel Moore: This is an extension of Connecting the Gap Ministries.
• 1:07:17
  Daniel Moore: We pray that you have a blessed week.