Baggage Claim
Baggage Claim is a space for blended families, marriage, and friendship.
Here, we dive into real-life conversations about the ups and downs of relationships, from navigating second marriages to unpacking the baggage we all bring. Hosted by Greg and Jessica, who both have rich experiences with love, loss, and family, this community is about sharing stories, learning together, and growing stronger as couples and individuals. Grab a drink and join us as we unpack, laugh, and claim our baggage—one conversation at a time
Baggage Claim
The Scheduling Dance of Blended Families
The scheduling dance of blended families might be the most challenging choreography you'll ever learn. In this heartfelt episode, Greg and Jess dive deep into the complexities, frustrations, and unexpected joys of figuring out who gets the kids when—and how to do it with grace.
Drawing from their 13 years of experience navigating the waters of shared custody, they reveal how color-coded calendars became their lifeline and why perspective changes everything. With a simple yet powerful finger-pointing exercise, they demonstrate how two people can look at the exact same situation yet see completely different things—a perfect metaphor for co-parenting negotiations.
The conversation takes an honest turn as they address the painful reality that children will inevitably miss events that feel important to you. Rather than creating guilt or making demands, they share their philosophy of always extending invitations while accepting that kids will make their own choices, especially as they grow older. "It's not about you" becomes their mantra, repeated throughout as a necessary reminder for anyone trying to navigate these tricky waters.
Most powerfully, Greg shares the story of the mule in the well—a touching metaphor for how the dirt that seems to be burying you can actually become the steps that lead you out if you just keep shaking it off and stepping up. For anyone feeling stuck in the scheduling conflicts and emotional turbulence of blended family life, this episode offers not just practical advice but genuine hope that there's light at the end of the tunnel.
Whether you're newly navigating the blended family journey or have been at it for years, this conversation delivers equal parts practical wisdom and emotional reassurance. The key takeaway? Keep communicating, keep perspective, and above all—keep moving forward.
Hey guys, what's up? I'm Greg. I hope you guys are ready to unpack and get into some good conversations today.
Speaker 2:And I'm Jess, and this is our podcast Baggage Claim. Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 1:What's up? Baggage Claim. Thank you guys so much for joining us again, for just taking the time to pull up to our table with us. Wherever you're at, whatever you're doing, Grab your favorite drink, Settle in, because we're talking about one of those really really fun things that we all deal with in a blended family. If you are in a blended family, this is the message podcast for you. You've all dealt with this. You've all dealt with this. You've all struggled through this.
Speaker 2:Some of our podcasts that we've done have been kind of across the board, marriage friendly. This is really speaking of blended families.
Speaker 1:Now if you are in marriage, you can grab something out of this, but this is coming from our real life situation of living in a blended family. But welcome to Baggage Claim. Thank you guys, so much for listening. We now have downloads and some of you guys may be like. So what? Over 77 different cities across America, we've finally topped the 750 mark.
Speaker 2:And this is episode number 10. We are double digits old.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we just went into double digits. Yeah, so we're like—.
Speaker 2:Two hands old.
Speaker 1:We're excited. Thank you, guys, so much for downloading and listening. Thank you for sharing with friends. Yes, sharing with others. Please let us know. Jump in the comments. We do read all those things If there's something you want to hear, something you want us to talk about, something you want us to address.
Speaker 2:Yes, and a shout-out to Holly. I feel like Holly's probably one of our number one fans and I appreciate your encouragement and I appreciate your enthusiasm and for sharing and listening. It really helps encourage us to keep going and it does our heart a lot of good to know that you are so excited about what we're doing. Thank you, holly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, those do matter, like those emails, those text messages, those messages that we get do matter, because sometimes it feels like we're just talking into a microphone and talking to each other, which we love because it's kind of therapeutic for us and Producer Michael.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we're talking to you.
Speaker 1:And our Producer, michael, is there with us. But it's just, you know. Thank you for your feedback, so appreciate it, but today, I mean, we just had Easter and for those of you, so we're going to talk about the big S word.
Speaker 2:Scheduling yeah.
Speaker 1:Schedules. It can be the life and the death of a blended family. It can. It sounds so silly. You're like how is that possible? Yeah, but if you're in a blended family, you know exactly what I'm talking about. You're like oh yeah, 100% yeah, even in your own family, though, like if you're not in a blended family, if you don't schedule and you don't handle your schedule you don't handle your calendar.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's going to be crazy anyway. So maybe you can glean some things out of this, as we share out of some of the struggles and some of the things we've learned over the years of sharing kids. What we've done and what we've done and we say this with this is our perspective of what happened. It is, it's not. Let me start with this Divorce sucks. I don't care what side you're on, I don't care if you were the side that was done wrong or you were the side that was just done, yeah, it doesn't matter which side you're on.
Speaker 1:Divorce sucks. It's hard on everybody. It's hard on both couples. It's hard on spouses. It's hard on spouses. It's both on.
Speaker 2:It's hard on the kids, um, and then that just continues, yeah, and I'll say, on my perspective of even being a widow at a young age, you still want to balance both sides of the family, like the family's not over, so trying to also incorporate everything that you've always done to try to keep normalcy for the littles involved.
Speaker 1:Like it's hard, yeah it is hard and you have these grandiose ideas when you're like, oh, I love you, you love me, this is awesome, we're going to come back from our honeymoon and it's just going to be this beautiful family. And then you get into a cussing match with—.
Speaker 2:No, we didn't cuss. No, we didn't cuss.
Speaker 1:No, we didn't, but you get into this, okay? Intense negotiation about.
Speaker 2:Intense fellowships.
Speaker 1:Yeah, who's spending time with who? When are they doing that? What does that look like? How does that happen? Yeah, you know. So there's just so much involved with that, yes, and it's not fun, no. So I'm going to ask you, though, before we get started, jess is going to be TikTok to me, because I know you guys are listening wherever you're at, whatever you're doing I want you to do hopefully you're at a stop sign or whatnot but I want you to physically do something with me. Right now I'm on the wherever you're at. I want you to take your finger and point, like you're pointing to the sky, and I want you to point it above your head, Like, so, you're pointing your finger above your head. Jess, you're not doing it. Put your finger up, and then I want you to start moving your finger clockwise.
Speaker 2:So move your finger clockwise once over your head, left to right, for my challenge. Friends, yeah.
Speaker 1:Okay, if you don't know which way the clock goes, we've got a wholly different podcast for you.
Speaker 2:Your finger is still above your head. Okay, I teach first grade, so we have to be very explicit with our instructions.
Speaker 1:Your finger is above your head, you're going clockwise. Start bringing it down to where it's in front of your eyes. Yes, still coming down in front of you.
Speaker 2:Just keep going until it's below you, and it's still going in the same direction.
Speaker 1:Which way is?
Speaker 2:it going. Now it changed, changed to what Right to left, which is Towards yourself, counterclockwise.
Speaker 1:Sorry, she can't use the word counterclockwise. We're using it as clockwise when we're looking at it above. I don't know why that's complicated for you.
Speaker 2:As I said, I teach first grade and so what is down here?
Speaker 1:it's counterclockwise. So, I teach first grade, and so what is down here? It's counterclockwise, so nothing changed other than the way that we're looking at that.
Speaker 2:Other than your perspective.
Speaker 1:Okay, so when we say perspective, you're all like yeah, yeah, yeah, I want you to think of it in a different way, though, not just perspective. It's the way you're seeing things, so I may be looking at my finger spinning this way over my head.
Speaker 2:For our fans listening. If you're not watching on YouTube, they're recording.
Speaker 1:Someone who's spinning. If you're looking, you may be looking as the finger is spinning over your head, going dude. That's counterclockwise. Your ex or your other person in your life who you're negotiating with for scheduling may be looking at their finger down below them, and it's going counterclockwise. You're seeing the same thing, but you're arguing about not seeing the same thing. So I'm going to challenge you as you listen to this episode, I want you to think about your perspective, but more so, I want you to think about the perspective of the other person that you're talking to.
Speaker 2:And you'll hear us say this a lot if you listen to us from start to finish. And even today, the big picture is it's not about you.
Speaker 1:No, and that's the hard part.
Speaker 2:That is the hard part.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because when you're talking about scheduling with who gets who win, how does that work out? If you're looking to win that battle every time you've already lost. You're not going to win that every time.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:And it's not about winning or losing.
Speaker 2:No, that's kind of the loss In our experience. One thing that your ex-wife did that was very helpful is that she would make a calendar, and it would typically start around spring break.
Speaker 1:We had two calendars One would come in October and we would start negotiations in. October, and then we would have one in early spring.
Speaker 2:So that would include fall break to Christmas break would be one calendar, and then the next calendar would be spring break through summer, and so it was super helpful and she would do it color-coded, like what she had planned versus what she knew, what we had planned, and we could go back and forth and negotiations weren't negative all the time. It was difficult sometimes, it wasn't always negative, but that was one thing.
Speaker 1:And it's not one of those things. So if you're listening, you're like I really want my kids. Here's some things. Like you have negotiables, like hey, these are activities that if my kids are a part of, awesome. If they're not, it's not the end of the world.
Speaker 2:It's not a deal breaker.
Speaker 1:But here's my. I have one or two that I really really really need the kids to be at this, and so we both kind of tried to say, hey, we have these things that I really want the kids to be at on her side and on our side.
Speaker 2:But the reason why I brought that up is because we had to keep the focus and you had to help me remember too and that is that it's not about ourselves. There's other pieces of family involved.
Speaker 1:Well, it's not only her and her time with them but, their time with her extended family and those things, and we wanted our kids to be a part of their lives in that too. So this is not a—if you're in a blended family and you're in a take take, take, take take situation, it's not going to work. Yeah, it's going to be hard. Now there are some God help us. There's some deadbeat dads out there, there's some deadbeat moms out there who don't really want to have time with their kids, and for that I just say love on your kids, support them, don't bad mouth.
Speaker 1:We never, ever, ever, under any circumstance bad mouth. We never, ever, ever, under any circumstance, bad mouth. Anybody, um, my ex, her husband, we were. That was never on the table for us. I was like I'm never going to say anything harsh or ill-willed about them because mama, yeah, I was like, and I'm not, I'm not going to do that, I want to support them and what they're doing and what they're at. So that's not on scheduling, but anyway, that's a part, it's a part of that whole idea, because what happens is we get so passionately involved with the idea of my kids have to be here.
Speaker 1:They want to be here. If they don't, their life will never be the same. If they're not a part of this going to the zoo with the class that I set up to do that, and it's like wait a minute, okay. Is it really like? And we can, and some things you can do together.
Speaker 2:It's okay to do things together, but then sometimes there's there's things to just be like okay that's yours, Because ultimately, you know, no matter how hard you work at it and no matter how selfless you try to be or understanding, kids are going to miss stuff that you don't want them to miss. So how do you handle that? It hurts.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the reality of that is that if you're a couple and I see this a lot when talking to blended couples, and I see this a lot when talking to blended couples because when you first separate, your life is your kids, like your health and your kids and sometimes you don't do it intentionally, but sometimes you put too much focus on the kids and their happiness that you forget about yourself and becoming the healthy version of yourself. Well, that doesn't change when you meet some guy. There's that honeymoon stage, but then all of a sudden, it's like it's all about the kids, it's the kids, the kids, the kids. And it's like we always said this and we always reminded ourselves of this. One of the artists was like I love you guys, but you guys are going to leave us one day. Like one day you're literally going to leave the house and go do your own thing.
Speaker 2:It really does happen, we're living in that. Yeah, and it happens, except for one baby in the nest.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we're, you know, lover, but it's just one of those things. It's when they do leave, you're like, oh God, that was real, I wasn't just blowing smoke.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, it's real, yeah, I know it's real.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so they're leaving. So it's like keeping the focus. All that to say if your happiness with each other as a couple is dependent on your kids' happiness.
Speaker 2:You are doomed. I mean, just to put it harshly. You're doomed because your happiness as husband and wife should not be dependent on the happiness of your children, and I don't care if that's a core family or a blended family.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's true.
Speaker 2:I mean, that's the focus.
Speaker 1:I mean, I think all families deal with that. It's easier for moms. Moms do this harder and you can speak to this, so I don't want to counsel myself in saying this.
Speaker 2:Hashtag cancel Greg.
Speaker 1:I think moms connect with their kids in a way for they just love them and it's just like they can be jerks, they can be brats. It's like, oh, I still love them, they're my kids. It's my baby, but then if I leave my socks on the floor, you're like you're such a nasty rat person, how could you ever live in a home.
Speaker 2:That's not a personal thing.
Speaker 1:No, no, no.
Speaker 2:You walked in today from work trying to find your flip-flops in the closet.
Speaker 1:No, I did not walk in from work. I got out of the shower and I was like where are my flip-flops? Well, I had a stockpile in the living room.
Speaker 2:You had a collection in the living room. It it's been there for a few days and I have not said one word.
Speaker 1:Apparently my full-fledged living with me. So when you're making that analogy. That is not a personal analogy, I say that Okay, I do.
Speaker 2:But I'm saying we tend to sometimes see the best in our kids and not the best in our spouse and the worst in the spouse. Yes, I would agree with that.
Speaker 1:So the idea is that sometimes, when we come to scheduling an event, we think if our kids aren't here, it is a utter failure. It is just like, oh my gosh, this is not going to work, it's a failure.
Speaker 2:What if, when we're scheduling an activity now with Mother's Day coming up? I never fought for a Mother's Day. Actually, on Mother's Day situation with your children, right? Because duh Well, we always encourage them to situation with your children. Right Because duh.
Speaker 1:We always encourage them to spend with their mom Because, duh, they're going to be with their mama, right.
Speaker 2:But if it was another thing, if there was a situation where I felt like it was really important that Callie and Cody be there with me and you didn't agree, what if you didn't see it as important as I did?
Speaker 1:Okay, what's your question? Did we become enemies, did you? That's right, did you?
Speaker 2:ask the question how would you handle that? I don't feel like you and I personally ever really experienced that. Just because we were really mindful of the whole thing. But for other folks, what if there was just this one thing? I was adamant that all the kids had to be at and you just really didn't feel like it was a thing that was not. How would you have handled that?
Speaker 1:I would have asked the questions for you, like what is the significance of this thing that you really really want them to be at? Yeah, and why is it you really want them to be at this thing? What are you really really want them to be at? Yeah, and why is it you really want them to be at this thing? Right, what are you looking like? What do you want to accomplish with that? What are you trying to achieve with that? I'm going to, as your husband, one thing we always do is we always supported each other in front of the kids. Yes, whether I agree with you or not, I was going to support you.
Speaker 2:And we still do that with the grown-ups.
Speaker 1:Now, sometimes I would support you, and then we'd pull aside and be like please help me understand what you meant by that.
Speaker 2:You're full of crap. I don't know what you're talking about. I don't get that, but we would never do that in front of the kids. No, never, no.
Speaker 1:So it was always like, okay, I'm going to figure, make sure, because I want to honor you as my wife, because Thomas and Grace, you're their mom, Callie and Cody you're their extra mom. I'm the extra, the bonus mom, yeah, the bonus mom. So it's not like they have a mom, so it's not like we're asking you to take the place of that. That's not, it at all, absolutely not, and I never intended to. And so we always try to do something all together outside of Mother's Day, like a couple days before.
Speaker 2:Even the weekend before, weekend after we did this one of my favorite things a strawberry picking day that we did. Do you remember that?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's at Jaymoor.
Speaker 2:Yeah, jaymoor.
Speaker 1:Farms. Yeah, it's become Shout out.
Speaker 2:In our local area. It's an orchard and farm for produce.
Speaker 1:But it was one of those things that was a—you have to be—like for you. You were always flexible in the sense of like it didn't have to happen on Mother's Day.
Speaker 2:No, I learned—I had learned to find joy in what I could do with all of them. What I could do with all of them and just experiencing family as growing up or as an adult, and having my own mom and a mother-in-law, and then now your mother is my mother-in-law and it's like you have to find joy where it happens. And it may not be actually literally on Mother's Day, but that was just what my heart had to learn.
Speaker 1:But Mother's Day also is just a time to celebrate moms.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So it doesn't have to be on—it doesn't count if it doesn't happen on that day.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:So sometimes we get so caught up and in blended families like sometimes we celebrate Christmas, it's not on Christmas, you celebrate holidays not on that holiday, but you celebrate them when you have them.
Speaker 2:Because kids will miss things that you really wouldn't want them to miss. If you boil it down honestly.
Speaker 1:Oh, they're going to 100%. They're not going to be at everything that you want them to be at.
Speaker 2:No, and as they grow up, they may not see things as important as you do.
Speaker 1:Well, I can guarantee you, they will not.
Speaker 2:I was being sweet about it. I can guarantee you so all we can do is invite them and let them know that it's important to you.
Speaker 1:Yep, and I got in a conversation with a friend of mine because we were talking about this very same issue and he goes man, I keep inviting the kids, inviting the kids, inviting the kids, and they just keep turning me down. He's like I just don't want to invite them anymore because it just feels like I'm just banging my head against the wall. And I was like, well, it feels that way, but you need to always know like for me, and I was like I can't answer for you and your situation, but for me and mine, I'm going to constantly push for my kids. I'm going to invite my kids to every single thing I do because I want them to be a part of my—if they show up for every single thing, I'm going to be stoked.
Speaker 2:Fantastic. Yeah, I'm going to be like so excited I'm going to love them anyway.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but if they don't, I'm not going to love them any less, but at the same time, because they're living their own lives, but when I start saying, well, I'm just not going to invite them because they don't ever come, I don't want my kids to ever feel not welcome. You can show up at my house anytime you want, as my kids. That's our policy.
Speaker 2:Right, we have four kids together and some of them live one in our home, one in our city and then the other two live either 45 minutes or five hours away. But we invite all four of them to be a part of the same things and sometimes the five-hour-away kid might show up. This is hypothetically speaking. Sometimes the kid that lives in the same city as us might show up and sometimes the kid that lives in our home may not show up and the 45-minute-away kid may not show up A combination of whatever. But all four of them always know that they are invited and they're wanted.
Speaker 1:Yes, you're always welcome. Yes and so— You're always welcome, yes.
Speaker 2:We have the, I guess the benefit, I guess maybe the word of we have adult children where we can invite and they can make that choice, but also that's like yikes. This is where we're at.
Speaker 1:You had to be okay. For when they say no, no, I'm good.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's just like— Thank you for inviting me. I was like, ah, but at the same, no, I'm good.
Speaker 1:Yeah, thank you for inviting me, but at the same time, I want to be excited for them and having their own thing. So, whether you're at, you may be in this and you'll be like bro, my kids are hanging on my leg right now, like I'm listening to this and I got kids calling on my head. I'm telling you, I am telling you 100%, they're going to grow up and they're going to move out. They're going to go to college, they're going to go do their own thing. So make sure, when you're thinking through this, don't think of this one event being the end-all be-all. Think of the big picture, take back and remember. Am I looking at my fingers spinning underneath or am I looking at it from above? Are we looking at the same thing? Look at the big picture of it and constantly remember that Perspective is everything.
Speaker 2:So I know that we just and we talk a lot about our point of view with our adult children, but when they were little and we were scheduling with people outside of our control and the kids were outside of our control for of our control when they weren't- with us. But the main thing that we always kept in mind and we had to remind each other, sometimes when the kids weren't looking, but the kids are always watching and listening to how you behave when the scheduling or the conflicts or the disagreements happen.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So, say you're in negotiations of who's going to do when, and sometimes you get frustrated, or sometimes you get— we didn't always succeed in this, but it wasn't— but it was something we tried really hard to do, but we didn't always succeed. No, it wasn't terrible.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:Like my ex was very good about working through things.
Speaker 2:Yeah, she was, and so we always had the opportunity to— I love that when we would make a change, that she would go in and she would fix the calendar and she would email us a new one so we could immediately print it and put it back on the fridge so we could figure it out.
Speaker 1:Yes, it was amazing that she would actually print the schedule out Like we would work through the calendar and have it Colored, and so it would be up for all of us to see, because that's a huge thing, for it's that whole communication. It's not just about you saying something, it's about what the other person is hearing. Yeah, communication is not, so she wanted to make sure that all that was clear. Yeah, um, who's going where when? What timers are we dropping off? Because sometimes, with the way our family, she has a big family, I have a big family.
Speaker 2:Uh, we have a big family and then we had to mix in my little family in that too, it was just like yeah so there's lots of like times were like hey, these times we can stick, these times, which was good.
Speaker 1:So, in all of that, what we're talking about, though, is like, if I'm frustrated or I'm mad, or I'm upset, those kids are watching what I say, they're watching how I react. They're watching everything that has to do with them, so be very, very, very mindful of how you respond, how you react, and then again.
Speaker 2:If I'm— you have to be the good example.
Speaker 1:Right. If I'm frustrated, I'm mad. I'm not saying that in front of the kids.
Speaker 2:You get to feel that way.
Speaker 1:Obviously you have every right to feel those ways, Because I will guarantee you she felt the same way about us Totally And—.
Speaker 2:And that's not being ugly. That's just saying that's just part of it. It's just a whole big picture.
Speaker 1:That's trying to figure out the whole scheduling thing, and so it's tough, because you got Mother's Day, you got Father's Day, then you got vacations, and then, when the kids are going on vacation, she goes on vacation or he goes on vacation, then we go on vacation, and so it's like trying to figure all those vacations out. And, oh yeah, the kids are playing sports during the summer, so we got a summer camp. It's not only all of those, but then we'd have summer camps on top of that.
Speaker 2:The kids would go off to church camps.
Speaker 1:And so it's just like it's a nightmare. So I want to say it right now Just take, if you're there and you're in this, take a deep breath, just go. Okay, let's keep our eyes on the big picture.
Speaker 2:It's not about you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and just be like what's best for the kids, because those poor little kids, what's best for us as a family?
Speaker 2:How old they are, however old they are, because when you and I got together, callie and Cody were relatively young. Yep, and those poor little kids, they're the ones that are going back and forth and feeling pulled, this and that, and your children, friends that are listening. If you're sharing your children with their mother or father, they are the ones you're going to and fro. And it goes back to kind of like what I was saying earlier that kids are going to miss some things that you really wish that they wouldn't, Right and it.
Speaker 2:whether it be for scheduling conflict or it's by choice, at some point it's going to happen.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And it's not the kid's fault.
Speaker 1:No, it's really not. No, it's really not. There has to be a point where you're like you just got to be okay with it. You have to Like the very first time because I don't even know what's the date. When does Father's Day fall? It's in June, like mid-June. Okay, so Father's Day falls in the absolute worst time. Everybody who planned Father's Day give me a buzz. I want to talk to you.
Speaker 2:It probably was a day, because it's a crappy timing. They were just trying to make up for Mother's Day. It was like, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, oh, if you get a day, then I get a day too. I'll get a day.
Speaker 1:So because, like Mother's Day, there's absolutely nothing going on other than let's set the world on fire for moms and we're about to get out of school, but we're still in a relatively normal schedule.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we just get to celebrate woo for that weekend. Father's Day is like man, we're out of school. Oh wait, no, we're not home.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we're not even in town, we're not even in the state of Georgia, so bye. I think the first time my kids weren't around for Father's Day it was one of those kind of like—.
Speaker 2:It was difficult.
Speaker 1:C Like this isn't fun. But I didn't say that to the kids. No, what we did is we're like okay.
Speaker 2:We had already planned to go out of town the next weekend with the kids.
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, they were gone on vacation with their mom during Father's Day and of course I could get, because this was a part of me, this is my perspective. Yeah, it's just where I was. I was like how dare you plan a vacation on Father's Day? You intentionally take them from me on Father's Day.
Speaker 2:Meanwhile on the other end of it, your ex and all of her siblings and there's a bunch of them had rented this home for all of them to stay in and their mother and father were still with us and it was a huge deal that they could all go together. So on the reverse side, it was this huge, wonderful time where they got to go to be together with their father, granddad, still with them. So it was like okay, we got to look at the big picture, not to say that you and I silently didn't be like okay, I want to pitch a little bit of a fit.
Speaker 1:Well, right, yeah, because that's normal.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And for you to say you know you'd be like, well, you should just demand. I can demand those things, but who does that help?
Speaker 2:And what does that do? But would that be fair on the other side?
Speaker 1:Right, because I don't want to take them from that trip and that opportunity too. So it's like look, we can celebrate Father's Day some day outside of Father's Day?
Speaker 2:The following weekend when we went to the beach together. So it was just like, like you said, like when we're talking about Mother's Day, it doesn't have to be on that day, it doesn't have to be on that day, right?
Speaker 1:So this is that thing I'm telling you, and you know this. If you're a blended family, because between you and I, jess, this had an opportunity to become a really big rift between us, you would be like, well, why don't you demand this or why don't you do this? And we went back and forth a lot of times, but it was just like this is not what's.
Speaker 2:Silly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we can't do that, no, so.
Speaker 2:No, it's silly and like I mean this might be the third or fourth time I've said that in this very episode. It's not about you, Because it's not Right.
Speaker 1:It's just not.
Speaker 2:Right, it's just not Right. You have a good knowledge. Are you allowed to have feelings and wants for what's going on in your family? Yes, of course you are.
Speaker 1:Yeah, a thousand percent.
Speaker 2:When you and I chose to put our collective families together, with all the baggage and the stories and the wounds that came with it. We can't make that be about what we want.
Speaker 1:Right, yeah, that baggage is not our baggage.
Speaker 2:No, we just kind of got to carry it and be done it would not be kind of us nor right in any way to ask our kids to carry that baggage with us.
Speaker 1:So yes, 100% yeah. So you have spring, you have fall, you're two big scheduling times. Jess has made it abundantly clear it's not about you. But in the same sense, I want to stress to you please don't make your happiness as a couple all about the happiness of your kids. Love your kids, instruct your kids. Love your kids, instruct your kids. Tell them the truth. Don't bring your crap and your baggage into your kids' lives and unpack it on them. It's not theirs, it's yours, it's not.
Speaker 1:So when you're scheduling, sometimes you get frustrated and you tend to want to do that. Don't no, it's just not, it's not, it's not right. And so it's like allow yourself to step back and say, okay, what's my perspective? Look at your perspective and it's not that the other person. Now, I'm not saying there's some people out there who may intentionally just try to do things to hurt you. That's not the majority of places. Even if they're trying to do that to hurt you, that's not the majority of places. Even if they're trying to do that to hurt you, don't give them the satisfaction of allowing them to do that.
Speaker 2:Of allowing it to hurt you.
Speaker 1:Yeah just you deal with it, you figure it out, you control what you can control.
Speaker 2:You can.
Speaker 1:And that's up to you.
Speaker 2:What you can't, you can't make those decisions, you can't stretch the boundaries, no, and if you're in what feels like a battle, with a person that you might share your children with outside of your current situation, if your kids are old enough, keep inviting them. Let them know what's happening. Give them the schedule. If you have to print it out, if you have to send an invite to their phone, invite them and they can help make choices for what they want to do.
Speaker 1:Correct.
Speaker 2:Will they choose to not to? Yeah they might. And will that hurt and break your heart? Yeah it will. But at least you can know that they know that you want them there Right.
Speaker 1:Yep 1,000%.
Speaker 2:I feel like that's the bottom line is that the kids no matter whose actual children they are, you know, they need to know that you want them there and then at some point it is their choice.
Speaker 1:Yeah that's true. So how do we unpack this? So what does the unpack look like, the section where we look at and go okay, so we've talked about a lot of application. We've talked about the hard things, the fun things, the bad things. So how do we, if we're unpacking this, what is one thing we can do to try to fix this or make this better?
Speaker 2:Well, one thing that we've touched on a couple times is better. Well, one thing that we've touched on a couple times is, although it may not be comfortable or always positive, the communication with the other parent is number one. You just have to. I mean, whether or not it's received in a positive light or they choose to incorporate your wishes into their plans, you have to be able to tell yourself now I know that I communicated.
Speaker 1:Right, and I'll say how you communicate. That is huge. Yes, like when we would always do a calendar even in spring or in fall, the very first email slash text message was like this is a working calendar. This is our starting point. This is not our end point.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:So we're starting with this, and there was always always.
Speaker 2:Always.
Speaker 1:We always made changes. We did so when starting don't start like and go this is what I want.
Speaker 2:If I don't get this, I'm going to pitch a fee and nine times out of ten, your ex-wife, she, would start the calendar and she would email it to both of us with quote, unquote editing access so that we could add to or do whatever.
Speaker 1:Well, we always, too, communicated with her. Here's when our vacation is, as soon as we try to nail down our vacation. Here's our vacations. Here's what we're trying to do. Here's something fun we're trying to do that we want the kids to be a part of Like with Thomas.
Speaker 2:He would be out of town, we would go out of town, and usually in the summer once a month for about three days for his mountain bike races or whatever.
Speaker 1:But also, too, we would schedule out because we had kids for seven days, she had for seven days, so we would schedule out all summer. Hey, when summer's out 7-7-7, when they would switch vacations when we were switching. So we tried to plan.
Speaker 2:And we would work with one another. To like if a vacation with you and I would back up to the following week that was for you and I, we would split.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we figured it out, but because?
Speaker 2:we communicated.
Speaker 1:It's a give and take. It's not always going to be favorable to you, but you know what it wasn't always easy, but we really did.
Speaker 2:truly, it's all about communication with the other parent and, like I said a minute ago, it's about communication with the kids as you go through it. And, like we said a few minutes ago, too earlier, when you're communicating with the kids, it's about modeling that behavior of not being ugly, not saying ugly things about their other parent. It's about modeling like, okay, here's what we're doing and here's the dates, so this is what we're communicating with your mother slash father and this is what we're doing Because they're going to pay attention to how you do that.
Speaker 1:So this is for and this is a side note, I don't this just literally just came to me because we dealt with this for a while and this was hard for me. This just literally just came to me because we dealt with this for a while and this was hard for me. This was really hard for me in the beginning because I had the kids for seven. So, like best case scenario, I had the kids for 15 days a month. That's it period.
Speaker 2:Period.
Speaker 1:A lot of those were school days. We're just doing school, we're just doing things but say it's a Friday, we're switching on a Friday, it's a Friday, we're switching on a Friday, my kids are having a—a friend's having a sleepover and they want to go sleepover on a Friday. We had something planned as a family that we wanted to do fun on a Friday. So do I tell my kids no, you can't go do that, sleep in, I want you to go do this. That was one of those things where it was like I got to let go and do what's best for the kid and be like go have fun, be your friends, go enjoy that. What we try to do in that is the exchange and we'll talk about this in a later episode, about the whole exchange, our exchange. We moved it to a Sunday night because nothing it was Fridays in the beginning.
Speaker 1:Yes, and then we just realized that's crazy. It's in the middle of everything, so let's do Sunday nights, because nothing happens on Sunday nights.
Speaker 2:We're just going to go home and eat supper and get baths and get ready for school. Yeah, nobody's going out.
Speaker 1:Nobody's going to do things. It's a good night to switch, so we move that to Sunday nights. But just be mindful if it's your weekend to have the kids and your kids and they want to go do something with their friends, allow them to go do that, because if you don't and you're like, no, no, no, this is your time with me, you're going to spend this time with me.
Speaker 2:You create a guilt complex. Yes, and that's not healthy for anybody. No, it's not. And so again, that's probably a story for another day, but at the same time but I also, as a part of the communication, with the calendar, with the ex, the families that are outside your family, and the children. Don't make the kids feel guilty.
Speaker 1:No.
Speaker 2:Don't make them feel guilty.
Speaker 1:Do not use your kids as a bargain. No, like, that's not the role of that. Do not do that. If you're doing that, bro, stop. You got some issues you need to work out within yourself.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Go see a counselor. Work through your crap.
Speaker 2:Don't use kids as a bargaining tool or a guilt trip, even when they're little, and you're trying to guilt them into wanting to be with you. And as they grow up, you might be trying to guilt them to want to do what you want to do. Yeah, but we don't want to make them feel guilty.
Speaker 1:Yeah, don't put that crap on your kids, because the bottom line is it's not about you. Yes, dang it, I'm getting good. Okay, well, let's. You got anything else to end in the wrap up? I don't think so.
Speaker 2:I didn't pick out a question for today.
Speaker 1:Okay, that's cool. So I just want to say again I'm so excited you guys are listening and, man, we get positive feedback from you guys and it's so fun. Please, if you haven't already hit the like, hit the subscribe button, Tell your friends. Tell your friends Share it with someone. Just hit that share button, Send it over to some friends and just—.
Speaker 2:We had a lot of excitement and a lot of shares when we first started. We want to pick that back up. Yeah, because we truly are investing a lot of time in this, not because, like hey, I want to make you feel guilty, like we just talked about Not trying to make you feel guilty. It's just like we really are investing in this because we truly feel like this is a thing that we're supposed to be doing.
Speaker 1:Right. Well, when we put this together, we were looking, looking, looking, looking for something to help us, just some encouragement, some advice and some things, just to keep going. And so that's why, that's literally why we're doing this. So I want to tell you, and I'm not going to get emotional, so I'm going to try not to it's okay, if you do, though it's meaningful for us.
Speaker 1:I was texting with someone today who just has gone through a divorce Kids and it brought me back to I remember how lonely it felt, how defeated I felt, how horrible I felt about myself and that's no slam on anyone, that was me. But that conversation I was having took me back to there and I just want to say, if you're listening to this and you just came through a divorce, I'm going to tell you this Reach? Out. Yeah, and get up and put one foot in front of the other.
Speaker 2:And reach out to us yeah keep moving, keep moving forward.
Speaker 1:Like I know, sometimes you just want to sit and you don't want to do anything. You don't want to get out of bed, you don't want to do anything productive. Just go, do something productive. If it's just walk, just I'm telling you there's light at the end of the tunnel.
Speaker 2:Keep moving forward.
Speaker 1:Yeah, don't give up and just keep moving, because we're married 13 years, almost, yeah, this October. If you would have asked me this 14 years ago Absolutely not I would have been like absolutely, I could not have seen this. You can't see what's around the corner. But I'm telling you there's something really, really good there. I'm going to share the story and I promise this will be it. Okay, I remember it was always like it felt like every time you got a good, like you made a step forward. There was two steps back and I heard this story and it so reminded me. I got emotional when I heard this story, but it's an old fable, an old story, and just bear with me.
Speaker 1:There's a mule who falls in this well on a farm. A mule falls in the well and he's just like it's an old, dry well and so he's in the bottom of this well and he's like, oh my gosh, I can't get out of this. Well, what am I going to do? This is it? This is like I'm done. I'm in the bottom of this well and the mule is oh my gosh, there's a farmer. I'm saved. Well, the farmer takes the shovel and just takes the dirt and starts throwing it in on top of the mule. The mule's like what is he doing? He's just burying me. And so, as he's throwing the dirt and the gravel on top of him, the mule starts to shake the dust and the gravel off and he takes a step up. And he realizes, as the farmer keeps throwing more and more on top of him, as he shakes and as he takes a step up, I'm getting closer to the top.
Speaker 1:And so the reality is is that the things that are in your life that feel like you're just getting beat down, thing after thing after thing, is just falling on top of your head. If you just shake it off and keep stepping up, you're going to get out of it. It will happen. Just don't get caught up in the. I'm a victim. I can't get out of this. Nothing's going to change. There is light. Just keep moving. So, even if you're in your blended family and you're just feeling stressed and you're just like dude, I can't do this anymore.
Speaker 2:It's not fun anymore.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yes, you can. Yes, you can. And if you feel like you can't, reach out to us and I would love to just chat with you and just see what we can do to help you. So not to end on a happy note I don't know, maybe this is a good note, but I'm just saying whatever it is that's hitting you this week, shake it off and step up. Shake it off and step up, because there's more coming to that. And they were just all the old mules stuck in the bottom of a well just trying to get out.
Speaker 2:Oh, that is so funny.
Speaker 1:But anyway, thanks for listening to Baggage Clean, yeah, woo-hoo.
Speaker 2:So again, hey, if you're a teacher like me, I can tell you we're less than 30 days 24 days left until kids are gone. If you're in my school system, yes, yes, so in Georgia or my. Abc countdown in first grade. Tomorrow is day for dance party Woo.
Speaker 1:I have no comment to any of that. I'm a fan, hey listen. Thank you guys for listening, thank you for all the downloads, thank you for the shares.
Speaker 2:We really appreciate it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so peace out. Have a good one.
