199-SYNCPodcast_MonicaNeubauer

[00:00:00] Jenny Swisher: welcome friends to this episode of the Sync Your Life podcast. Today I am joined by my new friend, Monica Neubauer. Monica has an extensive background in real estate.

[00:01:08] Jenny Swisher: She has her own podcast, which we’ll make sure that we link up in the show notes for you so you guys can go over there and take a listen to her over there. But right before we hit record, she’s telling me that since we met, uh, all of a sudden now she has more to share as it pertains to her, her journey with hormones and stepping into this phase of life where her children are grown.

[00:01:27] Jenny Swisher: And menopause is here and we’re going to talk about all the different things today. So I would love to just welcome you to the show. First of all, Monica, I’m so glad that you’ve taken the time to be with us today, but I would also love for you to introduce yourself to my listeners. Tell us more about who you are, what you do and everything, everything good.

[00:01:43] Monica Neubauer: Everything good. Thank you so much for having me to be with you today, Jenny. I’m so excited to talk about this topic. I am a lifelong learner. I have a varied background. I lived overseas for a number of years. And then when my kids were small, I stayed at home and even did some homeschooling with them, then didn’t do homeschooling with them.

[00:02:04] Monica Neubauer: And I tell you some of this because I then came into my career in my late thirties, actually at 37. So that’s just kind of a little reminder too, for folks who did get a late start, that you can still have a full career as I have had in real estate and in speaking. Which I just absolutely love. I speak on a lot of real estate topics, which create many varied opportunities.

[00:02:27] Monica Neubauer: I love to talk about communication and entrepreneurship and life balance, which I’m going to say, that’s not a place you arrive to. It’s a place you kind of keep talking about. And I’m, I arrive at certain levels with that, but I think it’s always something, especially in this age, we’re having a conversation about.

[00:02:46] Monica Neubauer: So I consider myself a hobby sociologist. I’m always observing things, but you know, I have to read Brene Brown and Adam Grant to get the verification for what I’m seeing in the culture.

[00:03:00] Jenny Swisher: And I love that. I’m a personal development junkie, and you know you are one when you have a waterproof speaker in your shower. The woman who sleeps in my house, she said to me one time, she’s like, what is that? I said, Oh, that’s, that’s for my personal development. That’s like the audible books and stuff in the shower.

[00:03:18] Jenny Swisher: And she just looked at me like. That’s different. Like, you know, I’ve not seen that before. So too funny. Awesome. Well, I know when we had a chance to connect before, this is one thing I told you that I need, I need this topic more on the podcast because I lead women of all ages, women who are on oral contraceptives in their twenties, usually, um, women who are in their thirties looking to conceive and maybe struggling with infertility or their hormones are out of balance.

[00:03:43] Jenny Swisher: And they’re wondering what’s going on. Women in their forties who are entering. Perry menopause. And they don’t know why the things that used to work no longer work for them. And then I also have my, my post fifties menopausal women. Um, and it’s not determined by age. I’m just, I’m sort of generalizing

[00:03:56] Monica Neubauer: that right.

[00:03:56] Monica Neubauer: Generalizes. Yeah.

[00:03:58] Jenny Swisher: Menopause women who are like, Oh, if only I could go back and tell the younger me what I know now. So I’m so excited because you’re like, I’m an open book. I’m open to spontaneous questions. Like, let’s just talk about this whole, this whole journey. And let’s talk about what this phase of life looks like.

[00:04:12] Jenny Swisher: So I think this is something that’s very needed because while I might be over here with A three year old who got Play Doh stuck up her nose last night and a seven year old. There are also, you know, I know someday I’m going to be at this place where life really, I’ve heard this said so many times, where life sort of gets to begin again.

[00:04:29] Jenny Swisher: Once your children are sort of grown and you’ve, you know, maybe the hormone rollercoaster is no longer much of a thing. And I’d love to talk about that. So would you tell us more just about your transition and what your hormone health has looked like over the years?

[00:04:44] Monica Neubauer: Well, it’s interesting in listening to you kind of talk about the stages because when I got married, I did take the birth control pill and except when I gave birth to my two children, I largely stayed on that because it did regulate my hormones.

[00:05:00] Monica Neubauer: And I have a history of hormonal issues with my mom and her family, so I stayed on them my whole adult life. And one thing I would like to say about that is. I’m maybe 50, 48. I got blood clot. I got a blood clot or many little blood clots in my lungs. And gratefully, we found them. Nothing serious happened.

[00:05:22] Monica Neubauer: Birth control pills do have that effect. You know, once something like that happens to you, Oh, now I notice how many women have had strokes at that point in time. So my only word with that would be, uh, the birth control pill is. Good for what it’s good for but it’s not the end all for your whole life So that would be my thought with that and um, so I got off of that and that was fun You know, and then I was also in perimenopause which these phrases are all kind of weird perimenopause you’re in between Well now what am I postmenopause in menopause?

[00:05:52] Monica Neubauer: I’m I’m done. I’m finished so that’s where I am now and It does come along with many other life changes. it’s kind of interesting, I’m such a kind of stoic person and there were definitely some challenges that I had when I was in Perry and maybe even still. But some of the women, I’m in a group on Facebook who are going through menopause, and some of the things they’re going through are just like, oh my gosh, that’s horrible, and I kind of think it’s worse than mine, but also I wonder, is it worse than mine, or are they struggling more to deal with it, and probably both are true.

[00:06:31] Monica Neubauer: You know, in some. Sure. Some journey. Yeah.

[00:06:34] Jenny Swisher: Well, you know, I found that like that lifestyle plays such a critical role as well, right? Like how active you are, how, you know, how you prioritize your sleep, your nutrition, you know, a lot of women will ask me about hot flashes and they don’t want to believe me when I tell them that hot flashes are oftentimes can be somewhat controlled through nutrition, right?

[00:06:52] Jenny Swisher: Making sure we’re not drinking that nightly glass of wine, or we’re avoiding that refined sugar though. Those can make big impacts. Yeah. Symptoms that we’re having. I also want to make sure that I, I clarify, I say this a lot on the podcast, but in case this is the first time someone’s listening, you know, we identify menopause as a birthday, right?

[00:07:08] Jenny Swisher: Like it is officially 12 months from your last period means you’re in menopause. You’re no longer bleeding. Congratulations, you’re menopause. I interchange menopause, post menopause because it’s basically the same thing. Perimenopause is the decade leading up to menopause, right? So 8 to 10 years on average, that’s when a lot of women will complain and they think they’re going through the change, right?

[00:07:29] Jenny Swisher: I put that in quotations because the hot flashes or the brain fog, the sleepless nights, like that, that type of thing can happen. Doesn’t have to happen. But can happen. So, what was your transition light? Like looking back now, knowing what you know now, like what types of things did you struggle with?

[00:07:45] Jenny Swisher: And if you could share more about that, that would, that would help.

[00:07:49] Monica Neubauer: Okay. This is one of those things that’s like, uh, Let’s touch on some of this quick, um, but my general things, I did have hot flashes and the wine is definitely an effector for hot flashes or, you know, even coffee. I would have them during the day if I’d had coffee, you know, foods definitely can trigger it.

[00:08:11] Monica Neubauer: So I did have hot flashes and I remember the first time I saw a woman having a hot flash in front of me and I was in my thirties or forties and she just literally started having beads of sweat on her head and she. gently and politely took off her jacket. She had this hot flash and when she was done, she put her jacket back on.

[00:08:27] Monica Neubauer: She didn’t apologize for having the hot flash. She didn’t say anything about it. And I, I was just in awe of the grace that she carried that through with. so I was kind of After seeing it, I could see what was going to happen. But anyway, so I had some hot flashes and I tried to control it. The other thing, two other things happened to me personally.

[00:08:48] Monica Neubauer: And this is the one I’m going to jump on and off really quick. My flow was very heavy. So, without getting into too much detail, um, there were fibroids. And that was pretty bad. Um, just, you know, I handled it though, cause that’s what I do. I handled it. Um, but that was probably the biggest factor that was a challenge.

[00:09:13] Monica Neubauer: Well, the other thing that happened though, kind of came along with COVID. This all happened to me with COVID was, um, brain fog. I’ll just say that, you know, there were other things that kind of went with it, but I had COVID and I was going through the change. It was in that year and. So I’m reading about a lot of people starting to take hormones afterwards, and that kind of goes back to that birth control and the blood clots, is if you’ve had a stroke or blood clots, you don’t get hormones later.

[00:09:41] Monica Neubauer: That’s not an option for you because it’s a suspect. It may not be the cause you had those issues, but it’s definitely a suspect. So here I am now. And one thing I’ve kind of summarized with this, and I’m not a doctor, so maybe people would learn some more things. I’d be interested to hear what you’ve heard about this, Jenny, but, or what, you know.

[00:10:01] Monica Neubauer: Um, you can have hormones if you need something else beside that, it’s going to be some kind of an antidepressant or mood helper like that. So yeah, I take wellbutrin and that that’s helpful and it’s good and I don’t have a lot of side effects with it. So that has been helpful for me. And you say

[00:10:18] Jenny Swisher: that because I’m glad you did, because I think this is the common experience from a lot of women, whether it’s with the brain fog, I just actually just spoke with a woman this weekend who said that she thinks she’s dealing with fibroids because she literally couldn’t.

[00:10:30] Jenny Swisher: be far from a bathroom during her period. She had to cancel work. She had to cancel her plans because it was so miserable. And, um, isn’t it interesting, right? Like we, as women, we suffer through hormonal migraines, fibroids, bleeding, all the things cramping, you know, and you’re like, sometimes you’re like, man, men have it so easy.

[00:10:47] Jenny Swisher: Uh, but anyways, coming back to your experience, you know, this is, in my opinion, the difference between sort of modern medicine approach versus Functional medicine approach. And that’s, that’s what I try to teach here on the podcast is like helping people to understand that there’s always a place for modern medicine, right?

[00:11:03] Jenny Swisher: Whether it’s with Wellbutrin for you, or for me, I have a migraine medication that I need that works for me, like, and I, so I never want to make it sound like I’m against modern medicine, but there is also this sort of. Like I said, like, um, lifestyle root cause approach that we can take. I started doing consults with Dr.

[00:11:19] Jenny Swisher: Paige Gutile, uh, with, for my course takers recently. And we’re really having to sort of reeducate women about hormones. So yes, you have a history of blood clot. That’s actually is pretty common. I mean, unfortunately we’re just not educated about the impact that things like synthetic hormones, like birth control can have on blood clotting potential.

[00:11:37] Jenny Swisher: So yes, absolutely correct. That like synthetic hormone would not be an option for you. Right. Because. Obviously your body didn’t respond well with that, but bioidentical hormone replacement therapy is a whole different ballgame and it’s a whole different category. Right? So just yesterday, Dr. Paige and I were working with somebody and we were telling them all about like, she has a history of breast cancer, but we’ve been able to prove through her Dutch testing that she actually has protective pathways with her estrogen.

[00:12:04] Jenny Swisher: So going on something like a vaginal estrogen or even a transdermal estrogen is something that’s an option for her if it’s a bioidentical, because it’s just the body handles it differently than it would, um, synthetic. So that’s something that I want to bring up for people listening that if bioidentical hormone replacement therapy is not something you’ve considered, even if you have that history of blood clot, et cetera, working with a functional doctor might be able to be.

[00:12:27] Jenny Swisher: The best option for you. So let’s talk more about like, just, you know, I know you mentioned that, um, your kids are grown, you’re kind of in this new phase of life. Tell us what that looks like for you.

[00:12:40] Monica Neubauer: Well, this has kind of been the fun journey since I started talking to Jenny about sharing kind of my journey was my kids have been out, my son’s 30, my daughter’s 28, so my husband and I were married, we’re still married.

[00:12:54] Monica Neubauer: It’s a 35 years. We’ve been married. And I’ve been in business, like I said, you know, 20 years. So, and it’s been a good run and it’s still a good run. But I’m also kind of then looking around and I look around and I see women who are featured in, you know, women’s magazines or news articles, and they’ve gone through the change and, oh my gosh, now they’ve just found themselves in a new way.

[00:13:19] Monica Neubauer: My life is amazing. I’m the fullest version of myself I’ve ever been. And I’ve looked at that. And I look at myself and I say, Hmm, I thought that was going to be kind of automatic. Like you get here and there’s just some great, uh huh. And it hasn’t been that way. So then I have to say, okay, it’s not happening for that way.

[00:13:45] Monica Neubauer: It happened for them. Why is that? What’s happening there? And what. What would my journey look like to potentially get there? for myself, I have to say that having a great relationship with my husband and having experienced a lot of things, I have had a strong sense of who I am for a long time. And he has encouraged me and I have walked in the strength of who I am for a long time.

[00:14:13] Monica Neubauer: And what I’m seeing in some of these women, as I’m kind of starting to watch more women is there’s not a few women who. Literally have never been able to explore who they are as an individual. They were married young. They had kids young. They took care of their parents. They’d been such a caregiver and their identity has been so taken up with, um, family and even, you know, as I was listening to one of your episodes, thinking about even being taken care, you know, young moms now are also working.

[00:14:45] Monica Neubauer: And so there are so many identities that younger women are taken up with and. Are they able to explore generally? No. So what I’ve observed in my friends in some women is that they’re divorced, they’re widowed, or something has just happened that has changed their life so much that they’re finally allowed to just, it’s almost like taking a big old deep breath and saying, wow, I, I, There’s, it’s like things have fallen off of them and they get to look around and figure out who they are in a new way.

[00:15:24] Monica Neubauer: And to kind of wrap that concept up, we can go, you know, there’s a lot more to say about it, but to kind of wrap up just the surface level of this observation, I talked it over with one of my friends who’s definitely going through that, but she’s also going through a divorce. And she said, you know, I took that home and I thought about it.

[00:15:41] Monica Neubauer: And I said, yes, that’s happening. I’m having a Renaissance. I’m also having a divorce. And so this Renaissance. is coming to me at a very high cost. And I was like, wow, wow, that’s really interesting. So mine won’t be at that cost and I’m still in it, but that just opened up my mind of, yes, I’m doing that and that’s good, but I almost wish it hadn’t been this way.

[00:16:07] Jenny Swisher: Yeah. That’s so good. I see this too. And I mean, I’ll be 40 here in a couple of weeks. But I’ve seen this in, in friends that are going through period menopausal changes. I mean, like I just mentioned, I’m doing health consults with women. So I’m hearing day in and day out about the hormonal impacts that are made, you know, are made on the woman as she goes through different transitions.

[00:16:26] Jenny Swisher: I just saw a video yesterday that was talking about aside from initial puberty. Men don’t really have any transitions through life. It’s just a sort of a slow, steady decline of testosterone over time, where with women, right, we have that puberty. And then we have, like we talked about, we essentially have babies.

[00:16:42] Jenny Swisher: We have post pregnancy we have, you know, we have perimenopause a lot. And so it’s interesting because the one thing that I’m hearing often on. These, uh, consults is related to low libido, not feeling disconnected from my partner feeling, uh, high stress, right? Especially as we go through, through perimenopause and our stress levels are higher.

[00:17:03] Jenny Swisher: And so it’s interesting, like, I, I love to sort of make the correlations and connections to like, it would be interesting to know, well. As we see divorce rates go up with women in their 40s and beyond right we see this as you’re talking about this, this new woman up here like how much does do hormone shifts and changes have to do with that.

[00:17:19] Jenny Swisher: So I do want to dial in more on this conversation of just building a strong relationship, and what that looks like. Over time, because I think you’re on to something here. I think we can all agree that that that does tend to happen. And while there’s certainly just unhealthy relationships that need to end, right?

[00:17:34] Jenny Swisher: That’s always a thing too. We also need to talk more about how we get into this good place in our relationship. So I’d love for you to touch more on that.

[00:17:43] Monica Neubauer: Oh, thank you so much for the opportunity because that, you know, another thing I watch with some of my older female friends who have been divorced is just how hard it is to find another partner if that’s what they want.

[00:17:54] Monica Neubauer: And so I’m so grateful for the opportunity to encourage younger women in a practical way how to stay in an awesome relationship with your spouse. And so here’s kind of my tips, uh, conversation. That, that was the thing that saved my relationship with my husband. My husband is very introverted. I’m extroverted, you know, big personality.

[00:18:16] Monica Neubauer: He’s introverted, an artist, a creator. And so we did our love languages and his love language was, you know, referring to the Chapman’s book on five love languages. His was, acts of service was his primary love language. Well, I am not about acts of service. If the house is a little bit of mess, I didn’t care.

[00:18:36] Monica Neubauer: Um, he cared, you know, he has some of those perfectionist tendencies. Well, my love language is quality time. So I want you to sit down and talk to me. And he was content to not talk hardly at all because he was so introverted. So we made a trade. We made a deal. I was going to focus on acts of service in the specific rooms that he needed.

[00:18:59] Monica Neubauer: Like, okay, Monica, I need to have the kitchen and the living room picked up and clean generally. If that room’s a mess and that room’s a mess, I don’t care, but I need you to focus and help on this. And I said, okay, I need you to sit down and have conversation with me every day. So I started working on picking up more and we committed.

[00:19:20] Monica Neubauer: We committed, we were in our 30s, to sit down after dinner, generally after our kids were in bed, because they were small, and we had one hour of conversation every night. And there’s an audible gasp in the room. Um. Yeah, that’s when I say that in class, you know, and I’m teaching folks, sometimes there is an audible gasp

[00:19:41] Jenny Swisher: saying here is you’re saying not the television, not talking about actual conversation.

[00:19:47] Jenny Swisher: I love that. Yes.

[00:19:48] Monica Neubauer: No television. You put your phones away. Of course, at that point, we didn’t have cell phones weren’t as pervasive as they are. No, we had cell phones, but smartphones and. We just sat there for an hour and we talked about stuff. Did we always have something to say? No, we didn’t always have something to say.

[00:20:06] Monica Neubauer: So we have books that had questions in them and we love questions so much. We actually wrote a book on some questions so we can talk about that at the end. But, you know, we. We use the catalyst even to this day sometimes to sit down and have conversation. We still use those question books, um, to stimulate conversation, whether it goes anywhere or not doesn’t matter.

[00:20:29] Monica Neubauer: So that taught. That gave me space to talk it out. Cause I’m a verbal processor. So that just gave me time to talk. And, you know, sometimes I talk about nothing, but he would still be learning things about me. What was really important too, was as an introvert, it taught him the value of conversation. And one of our therapists said, Mark.

[00:20:52] Monica Neubauer: You have to learn how to express your emotions and that was a space where he could safely say, I think I’m feeling this way, you know, good, excited, bad, you know, and we had one of those charts with all the emotion faces on them. So we could use words like disappointed and delightful, not just sad, angry, emotional, you know, not just those.

[00:21:16] Monica Neubauer: Those high level ones, but dig down a little deeper. So he learned that he could talk about these things. Now I’m also going to say, did these conversations facilitate some fights? Yeah, they did. You know, especially if you’re having two glasses of wine and, you know, now you’re becoming, you got a little buzz or you’re becoming a little comfortable.

[00:21:36] Monica Neubauer: We did have some fights. Yes. But. All of that still led to the transformation of Mark and Monica into people that we understood, people that we respect. We, we express things that were important to us. We didn’t leave things, stuff down. You know, when something would happen, I, you know, if he’s going to be passive aggressive, I would say, uh, no, you’re not doing that.

[00:22:01] Monica Neubauer: What, what are you feeling you need to say? So it just taught us how to express ourselves. And that has then opened up the path for. When he’s gone through his pain journey or his situation where his work environment changed, um, and we talk about our sex life, we could talk about that, you know, so when there’s changes with that, you have a conversation, you make it just because you’re comfortable now sharing and you’re comfortable loving each other in your brains, then you can talk about everything else.

[00:22:31] Monica Neubauer: And that’s. How we got through, you know, this hard adulting life. And as our kids had their challenges and grew up and all of the things that we’ve been through, it was the fact that we could sit down and have a conversation.

[00:22:44] Jenny Swisher: Yeah. Yeah. That’s, that’s so good. And I think communication is the ultimate, you know, message there is, is how well are we upkeeping our communication as, as the parent of, like I said, a three year old and a seven year old, it can be hard because sometimes even at the end of the day, when the kids are in bed, you know, it’s like, you’re sometimes you’re just looking for, you know, relief.

[00:23:03] Jenny Swisher: Like, can I just do something? And so I love that you guys made that intentional effort to connect every single day. I think that’s, that’s so good. I’m going to mention to my listeners too. I’ve recently heard about an app that my husband and I are interested in trying as well. And I know you just said, put the phones away, turn off the TV.

[00:23:20] Jenny Swisher: But I know, you know, this day and age with, with us, especially, we will text throughout the day. So even though we both work from home, you know, one of us is always running to get the kids or whatever. So we will text back and forth, like, throughout the day. And there’s an app that you can download called Paired, P A I R E D.

[00:23:36] Jenny Swisher: And it’s a relationship app that will give couple questions. It’s got games in it, sort of like flirtation games. I’ve heard about this from a lot of credible sources. And so it’s something that I want to try just to kind of keep the communication with him going through the day, because to make this all connected, right?

[00:23:51] Jenny Swisher: Like. To help people understand not only is the communication key, but just the, the relationship of the couple itself outside of who you are as parents and outside of who you are in your careers is so important, right? I can remember my mom always saying that, like, your number one relationship should be with your spouse, right?

[00:24:07] Jenny Swisher: Like, always prioritize that relationship because. Your kids are gonna see that. Your kids are gonna see how happy you are or how stressed you are, right? And it’s, it is hard. It is very hard when you have a kid who doesn’t sleep through the night or you have a, you know, you have behavioral issues popping up with your children or whatever the case is.

[00:24:23] Jenny Swisher: It can be very hard. So I wanted to mention that app. I also wanted to touch on the five love languages. I’m glad you brought that up. Uh, Chris and I did the five love languages through a workshop with our church early on in our marriage and it was so enlightening. Um, I know it sounds so pokey. So if you’re listening to this and you’ve not read the book, I’ll link it up for you in the show notes, but my love language is also acts of service.

[00:24:45] Jenny Swisher: So if he gets out the vacuum cleaner, it’s like, The hottest thing, you know, I’m like, Oh, thank you for doing that. That’s just, that’s, that’s what I want. Right. But for him, it’s physical touch and it’s not always like sexual, but it’s just physical touch, sitting close to him on the couch, like, you know, putting my legs across his lap, holding his hand, giving him a hug.

[00:25:06] Jenny Swisher: And that is not my love language, nor does it come natural to me. Like I am not a hugger. My friends will tell you like Jenny is not a hugger. So I have to really be intentional about it. I recently heard, on a podcast. This this concept of releasing oxytocin throughout the day with your significant other and so we have the great fortune of like I said working from home together so we’re around each other a lot that doesn’t mean we’re always like together together.

[00:25:30] Jenny Swisher: But I heard this on the podcast they said six second hugs. Even just six second hugs can release oxy oxytocin and improve like, you know, physical connection, just six seconds, right? So all of us have six seconds throughout the day, whether you only see your spouse or significant other in the morning or the evening or whatever.

[00:25:50] Jenny Swisher: I feel like that’s something that can be very easy and intentional to do. So I just wanted to bring those things up. Um,

[00:25:57] Monica Neubauer: I will, let me say something about the hug. Six seconds is short. But when you’re actually having a hug, cause we both have always worked from home as well and been at home together. The six seconds is actually a situation where you have to stop and focus, because it’s not something that you just pop in and out, here’s a quick hug.

[00:26:15] Monica Neubauer: And I think that’s part of it, is it’s actually the stop and connect.

[00:26:19] Jenny Swisher: Yeah, you’re so right, you’re so right. So what you’re telling us then, is that we don’t have to wait until we’re 60 to necessarily… Work on our relationship and we shouldn’t be, we should be, you shouldn’t. Stating this and making this an intentional effort as we go.

[00:26:34] Jenny Swisher: So what would you have to say to the woman who’s sort of, what I like to call, I, I think the, the token phrase in society is like the midlife crisis, right? Like the perimenopausal woman who maybe isn’t feeling herself already given hormone situation, maybe feels a little disconnected in her relationship, maybe feels like what’s happening?

[00:26:52] Jenny Swisher: Who am I? Like, you know, and she’s kind of in this discovery phase. ’cause I think a lot of. My women listening are in that period of life. What would you have to say to that woman or the former you?

[00:27:02] Monica Neubauer: Well, one of the things that helped us another thing with the, you know, understanding each other is we did some personality profiling work.

[00:27:10] Monica Neubauer: And so we would understand how I behaved and then we could also understand when I was off. And so when you don’t understand each other’s personalities or you don’t have a clear recognition of how you are in a natural state, which some people just observe that they’re observant and they’re smart and they get it.

[00:27:32] Monica Neubauer: But the personality profiling saved our marriage and it helped us understand why are you acting that way? And when something looks different because of your hormones, okay, we could recognize that. And by the time you get in your forties, you should be able to stop having the conversation of. Gosh, your hormones made you do that, man, that annoys the heck out of us.

[00:27:51] Monica Neubauer: But in reality, it often is true. Um, but the men need to have another word or something. I don’t know. So that’s one thing is if you haven’t done personality profiling to help you get kind of a baseline, please at any point is good to do that. But the other thing that I, I just, it’s such a hard situation because in the forties is this culmination of.

[00:28:15] Monica Neubauer: If you have a job of any kind, it’s going to be your big wage earning years. So you’re probably at some level of success. So there’s some pressure there and it’s kind of time consuming. Your kids are teenagers. Um, you know, if you’re kind of going in the quote, normal way of things, and that can be a stressful season.

[00:28:36] Monica Neubauer: So, if you haven’t developed the relationship with your spouse, start then, take, and it’s not going to be done quickly with just the conversations at night. I would say take some marriage retreats, um, take some time together where you, you like bring the question and answer it, you know, kind of accelerate that to say, we’re, we’re, we’re not communicating great.

[00:28:59] Monica Neubauer: Don’t say things like, I don’t love you anymore. We’re not doing good because the grass is not greener. So, you know, when we’re in that peristate, there’s kind of this reactionary thing. I am so done with my body or I, you know, we feel everything feels kind of extreme. And I would say dial it back.

[00:29:20] Monica Neubauer: And take the pause times you have to find the pause times, you know, and I’m super type a and driven and all of this. And yet, over the course of my, in my 40s, it kind of worked out that every year my husband and I took a big trip. And so we carved it out and I mean, I’m self employed. If I don’t work, I don’t get paid.

[00:29:42] Monica Neubauer: And people who are self employed, one of the things that we figured out gratefully fairly early on was, Oh, well, if I’m not making money and I’m paying 4, 000 for that vacation, that means it’s actually costing me six or 7, 000. You have to get out of that mentality because. You can work yourself to death.

[00:30:00] Monica Neubauer: At some point you have to say that at whatever amount I’m willing to pay for some time off, you have to take it, you must, must take the time off to communicate and play games and laugh together. Uh, that’s another thing. My husband is so awesome at just making me laugh. And he taught me that young as well.

[00:30:20] Monica Neubauer: I, I see so many women who push back on their husband’s. Attempt to make their wives laugh and they’re like, stop being stupid. Stop being ridiculous. Don’t make fun of me. And I’m like, please make fun of me. I mean, he taught me that, but every time I see a husband trying to get his wife to laugh and her turning into something, um, defensive or rejectionary, that just breaks my heart.

[00:30:47] Monica Neubauer: Yeah. There’s a bunch.

[00:30:50] Jenny Swisher: There’s so many different, like a hundred directions to choose from here. Um, yeah, I mean, I think you’re right. I think when it comes to, you know, we get used, we get used to our partner. Right. So in the early phases of our relationship. They may, it might, they might make us laugh and they’re, it’s like flirtatious.

[00:31:05] Jenny Swisher: And then you get to know the person and you’re married and two years down the road. And it’s like, no longer funny. Now, you know, you’re thinking, Oh, here he goes again with that same joke. Right. But I love, I love what you just said. And I’ve actually heard Chalene Johnson. Um, I’ve listened to her podcast as well.

[00:31:19] Jenny Swisher: And she talks a lot about this, especially in the phase of life that she’s in with grown children and prioritizing her relationship with Brett. She talks a lot about this idea too, of like. Laugh at the jokes. Like, life is too short. Like, laugh at the jokes. Like, give in to the flirtation. Like, Stop being such a stick in the mud, you know, I think.

[00:31:38] Jenny Swisher: Yes, especially because we are hormonal. Um, and, you know, as we’re going through different changes, it’s like sometimes the things that annoy us are we need to have a shift in perspective. You know what I mean? Like, what is that shift in perspective? So I want to ask you a question. With, you know, I don’t know, I don’t know if you mentioned how many kids you have, um, two.

[00:31:58] Jenny Swisher: Okay. Two kids. So I would love to hear, you said they’re grown. What would you say if I were, if they were here right now, what would you say that they would say about your relationship with your husband? Oh,

[00:32:13] Monica Neubauer: gosh. Well, I know what my daughter would say, cause she talks all the time. She’s a big, you know, extrovert. And she would say. I love how you guys always come back together because I mean, we’ve had some serious fights and the kids have seen it, but we always come back together and. We stay in the room. We stay in the conversation.

[00:32:33] Monica Neubauer: Now, we’ll still go to bed angry sometimes because I’m a firm believer that you can’t resolve everything. You know, when you’re in that passionate state of a fight, you can’t resolve things. So, we would go to bed and revisit things the next day or two days later. So, my daughter would definitely say, Well, yeah, y’all had fights, but we had fun.

[00:32:52] Monica Neubauer: You took us places. You laughed with us. Um, my, my son, he just doesn’t express what he sees and feels as much. So I can’t say for sure what he would say other than, um, he just. Enjoyed having two parents with him and he enjoyed that I would stay up late and be available when he was, you know, on those rare occasions when he wanted to talk to somebody, he would be grateful for that for me.

[00:33:18] Monica Neubauer: He was grateful for the things that his dad taught him that he would embrace. Yeah, I think for the kids, there’s a little bit. in my son a little bit. I mean, I, I don’t want to put words in his mouth too much, but my son is actually kind of handy. Well, my husband is really handy, but my son didn’t really lean into that when he was young.

[00:33:40] Monica Neubauer: And sometimes I wonder if he would have learned it or he’s just as glad because I’d rather pay somebody. He makes a good salary. So he’d rather just pay somebody anyway. Um, yeah. So I think my kids. Um, benefit from the strong marriage we had. And sometimes I, I think they may not know how good they have it.

[00:34:01] Monica Neubauer: Yeah. I really think that it’s one of those beneficial things when something goes well, you don’t always know how grateful you should be for it because you don’t know how bad it could have been.

[00:34:11] Jenny Swisher: Sure. Well, I love what you said at the beginning of this, which is that basically what I, what I gathered from it was.

[00:34:16] Jenny Swisher: You know, that you showed up for each other and you showed up for them and that’s ultimately what matters. Right. And so, as I sit here and think about, I asked it as a selfish question thinking, you know, uh, last night was a really funny evening. Like I said, my, my three year old got Plato stuck up on her nose.

[00:34:33] Jenny Swisher: We had to go to the urgent care. It was a whole thing. So without sharing the whole story, the details of just small details here of my oldest daughter is my rule follower would never put Plato up her nose. It was like. You know, she’s, and she’s, she was very overly concerned last night that, that my youngest was going to have to have surgery.

[00:34:52] Jenny Swisher: I mean, she was in like full on drama mode crying, and it wasn’t even my, my youngest who had the Play Doh up her nose was completely fine. Like she was laughing, smiling, and we were, you know, so reached out to our doctor, our doctor said, probably need to have it removed. We need to go to an urgent care or something.

[00:35:08] Jenny Swisher: We get to the urgent care. Of course, my husband is like really mad, right? Like he’s, he doesn’t want to spend the money on the urgent care. He’s thinking this is ridiculous. Like we should be able to get it out on our own. And so it was a heated moment. You know what I mean? Like looking back, we laughed so hard last night.

[00:35:23] Jenny Swisher: Like after it was all over, we were like, was this our evening? Like if we just shell out 800 for playdough out of our nose, like, but. But in that, you know, in the moment, it’s a very heated moment, right? So he’s upset. He doesn’t want to have to go to the urgent care. I’m trying to get the kids to go. My oldest daughter’s concerned and thinking my youngest is going to die from the Play Doh overnights.

[00:35:41] Jenny Swisher: Like it was a very high tense situation. And so it was funny because as you’re talking about it, I’m thinking, you know, what would my kids say about our relationship and it’s funny because, um. I think my oldest, she’ll, she’ll make comments sometimes about like, well, why do you get mad at daddy? Like she’s starting to figure out, like she’s starting to see moments where we might argue or we might have a conflict.

[00:36:02] Jenny Swisher: Right. And it was very important for me from the beginning when we first got married. His, you know, he grew up in a family that was very non confrontational, like if you had a concern or something was bothering you, you just dealt with it and you just internalized it and that was it. And I grew up in a family that was almost the opposite like the far extreme opposite where it was like, honey, I don’t like that frown, like you need to tell me everything about what’s going on right so it was almost like the extreme opposite and so I wanted in our relationship before we ever had kids I wanted to be in a place where we were somewhere in the happy medium.

[00:36:33] Jenny Swisher: Where it was like, we’re okay confronting our emotions, sharing how we feel, which is what you talked about earlier in those evening conversations. And so I think, you know, for me, my goal is for my children to grow up saying the same thing. Like mom and dad showed up for me and they showed up for each other.

[00:36:47] Jenny Swisher: And even when they were arguing, even when there were tense moments, we knew that, you know, there was never, it was never a crisis of like, someone’s going to leave or someone’s this, you know, this is a distrust situation. It was always just. It was a moment, right? It was just a moment that we knew everything was, was going to be fine.

[00:37:04] Jenny Swisher: So I love that. Well, what am I missing? What other, what other pieces would you love to share before we wrap this up today? Yes. You

[00:37:10] Monica Neubauer: know, it was one of the things was we told our kids when we were young that we’re not getting a divorce. We’re in this, we, we, you know, does that mean you’re, you can totally promise that not 100%, but we told our kids that we were committed.

[00:37:24] Monica Neubauer: And so that was something that they always knew, you know, at least to the degree that You know that you can fulfill that, but I do have two other things that I thought of real quick. Um, one of the things that we used as a guiding factor and I think of this again in context when I look at some of the young parents now is, you know, I told you I’d homeschool my kids a little bit and then I didn’t homeschool my kids.

[00:37:48] Monica Neubauer: And, you know, there’s a story with that, of course, but my kids. I spent time in a homeschool environment, in private school environment, in homeschool supplement schools, and in public school. And I started work when my kids were, you know, five and seven or something like that. My husband worked from home.

[00:38:06] Monica Neubauer: And one of the guidelines that we would use to make decisions about the kids activities was or where they went to school. I mean, the whole thing was what’s best for our family. So we never gave our kids so many of the things that a lot of parents feel like they need to give their kids now. Oh, they got to do four sports and dance and piano and sit down and do, you know, it’s like, no, no, no.

[00:38:33] Monica Neubauer: So many kids are so stressed. And so we looked at our whole life, you know, because if If the kids are doing too much and I have to go drive them around everywhere, then I’m not doing my job well. And then I’m cranky. And so when mom and dad are better, the kids are also better. So everything we looked at was for the whole family, not just, you know, the parents giving their whole selves up for their career and their kids and not their own relationship is just.

[00:39:00] Monica Neubauer: That’s just not good. Um, so that was one thing I wanted to say. It’s the whole it’s about what’s good for the whole family. And the other thing I’m going to send you off with a word of wisdom from my son. Um, you know, we had some challenges in his teenage years, his older teenage years, and I was blaming myself, you know, Oh, what did I do?

[00:39:22] Monica Neubauer: I raised you wrong. What, what, what did I not do to help you? Because starting really with my generation, we had this belief that we could raise our kids perfectly. And if younger parents haven’t realized that yet. That’s an impossibility. All kids are different. You can’t raise them all the same and you can’t raise them all without little t trauma.

[00:39:44] Monica Neubauer: Little t trauma is what forms us and learns us. That’s what teaches us how to move into conflict and how to make, solve problems and all of that. And I wish parents would release the idea that they can have a perfect family life and they can raise perfect kids. It’s not a thing. So. One of the things when my son was older, you know, we’d done all these things we thought were so good.

[00:40:08] Monica Neubauer: And then when he struggled, I was blaming myself. What did I miss in here? You know, in trying to raise these perfect kids. And he finally said to me, Mom, you are not the only influence in my life. Which what he was saying was you did you there’s a lot of other things that contributed to me Being who I am now and that’s especially true when they’re 18 or 19 Parents forget how much influence they have at school and from other kids and now, you know If they start having especially unfettered internet, oh my gosh, we could talk about that Y’all need to put those phones away at 9 o’clock at night.

[00:40:46] Monica Neubauer: I just that’s one of my must Must do’s, but you know, kids have so many influences and parents need to recognize that you have to teach kids how to live in this world. You cannot raise perfect kids and, and there are lots of influences. So when they do struggle, when they get older, it’s not. It’s not your fault.

[00:41:05] Monica Neubauer: You may be con, you know, a contributor because of course you were their parent and they’re gonna have things they’re gonna have to talk about with you and release and all that, blah, blah, blah. But they, they grow up with a lot of influences and we can’t raise perfect kids. So him saying that was really, really wise and I appreciated that he saw that.

[00:41:22] Monica Neubauer: Yeah. That’s

[00:41:22] Jenny Swisher: so good. So good. I, um, my husband and I recently started watching, uh, a show. We , we watched this show ’cause my doctor actually recommended it. She was like, oh, you. She has a similar taste in television as we do. We reserve, so we do, we are going to start doing after this, after this call. He’s gonna, he actually edits my podcast, so he’s gonna hear this before.

[00:41:46] Jenny Swisher: But I like the idea of the conversation. We usually will, like when the girls are in the bathtub or whatever, when they’re getting ready for bed, we kind of chit chat and. Um, give them their privacy and all that kind of stuff. And then usually we have our time together when they go to bed, but we do like to watch a show on occasion.

[00:42:00] Jenny Swisher: And we started watching this show. If anybody’s listening, it’s called Jenny and Georgia on Netflix. And, um, the first couple of episodes, I was like, uh, like, I don’t know, like, this is sort of hokey. It seems like the first season, especially seemed very high school. I was like, I don’t know if I really care about like.

[00:42:15] Jenny Swisher: What these high schoolers are doing, but the second season, especially like it really starts to open up into showing a lot of the side of parenting and what our kids inherit from us, like what influence we have on them versus what influence outside culture and school and all that kind of stuff has on them.

[00:42:34] Jenny Swisher: So as you were talking, it made me think of this, this mother daughter relationship that’s in the show. And, um. How much the mother beats herself up over something that the younger one is experiencing and going through a little t trauma that she’s going through and, and in reality, there are so many factors in the equation.

[00:42:51] Jenny Swisher: So I love I love that. And if anybody listening has watched any in Georgia, you know what I mean? If not check it out on Netflix after you have your nightly, um, cutie husband, of course, but yeah, I think you’re so right. And I love that. As he grows older and gets that sort of, you know, mature perspective on life that he’s able to say to you, like, Mom, look, like, there are other factors in my life.

[00:43:13] Jenny Swisher: It’s not just, it’s not just this. So that’s amazing. Well, I know you mentioned a lot of different things on the show today. You mentioned a book I would love for you to share with us as well as however you’d like people to get in contact with you. So whether that’s a website. Um, whatever you want to share, go for it.

[00:43:28] Monica Neubauer: Well, just briefly, because I think what’s relevant to this is that my husband are slowly producing, we’re slowly producing a podcast. Um, and that would be most relevant to your audience. I mean, you can find me at Monica Neubauer. com if you’re interested in me as a speaker. But what’s more valuable for your listeners would be if they want to join us at an open conversation with Mark and Monica.

[00:43:48] Monica Neubauer: And that’s the title of our podcast. We’ve got about 20 episodes now and we’re committed to it, but I can’t guarantee they’re going to come out every week. Um, and we are at an open conversation. com and that’s where they can buy our PDF book if they want. Yeah. So I think that’s, yeah. If you can find me there, if you need to be in touch with me, you know, find me through my website or Monica at Monica, new Bauer.

[00:44:13] Monica Neubauer: com. Um, I’m easy to find you. Google me. There I am. My phone number, all my email addresses.

[00:44:20] Jenny Swisher: We’ll definitely link up the podcast and everything else that you mentioned in the show notes. So if you’re listening to this, all you have to do is swipe up and you can simply click on those links to go right directly to Monica.

[00:44:29] Jenny Swisher: But Monica, thank you so much for taking the time today. Uh, this is a topic that. I know I needed to hear, and I’m sure my listeners needed to hear as well. There’s something that we can glean from this and use in our own relationships, um, as we go through the many transitions of womanhood and of life. So thank you so much for taking time today.

[00:44:46] Jenny Swisher: Thank you so much for having me. All right. We’ll take care. We’ll talk soon. Bye bye.