S3 Episode 3 - Victoria's Secret

[00:00:00]Hello, Harry.

[00:00:01]>> [music] >> We actually dated.

[00:00:05]I'm just going to let that hang for a minute.

[00:00:08]Oh, dear. And that's it for this week.

[00:00:11]Goodbye, everybody.

[00:00:12]>> I can't wait for this one. Yeah.

[00:00:15]A bit of housekeeping before [music] we begin where you left them, the Dad Hugs podcast. Harry and Emma are not therapists, and [music] your needs will be specific to your circumstances.

[00:00:25]The opinions expressed in this podcast should not be construed as [music] formal advice.

[00:00:30]Some stories have been amended and simplified for narrative flow, and names have been changed to protect the anonymity of our contributors.

[00:00:41]Go on, then. There it is.

[00:00:43]Hello, and welcome to Where You Left Them, the Dad Hugs for Your Soul podcast, where we share real people's real relationship stories, and then we kind of look at what answers we can give those people to the problems they're facing, and look at how we might be able to apply those answers in our own relationships and our own lives. My name's Harry. You might have seen me on social media or on the radio. And I'm here with my good friend Emma.

[00:01:10]Hello.

[00:01:11]>> Hello, hello. I have not been on the BBC, so you won't have seen me there. In fact, I've not been anywhere, really.

[00:01:17]I've been in my garden, mostly. Um yes, I'm friends with Harry for my sins, and I'm here because because we've um sort of well, we kind of have gone through a lot of this stuff together, but rather than wallow, like me, he actually did something productive.

[00:01:37]Yeah.

[00:01:37]>> So, being resentful, but also learning from him, so that's nice. We have kayaked together up the Murray meandering river of um relationship poo.

[00:01:48]That's beautiful. It was beautiful imagery until the end there. Thanks very much. Thanks a lot. Very good.

[00:01:55]And this week we are going to tell a story that's been sent in that Emma hasn't seen, and there's a very good reason for that, and it's very humiliating for me, so you're all going to enjoy that. Um and then we've got some quick-fire questions that have been sent in around attachment styles, relationships, breakups, and no contact. So, there's an awful lot to get through, and first comes my ritual and public humiliation, so we should probably get started, right? Is Is that true? You look so happy.

[00:02:25]>> Oh, fair. That it was from my ex-husband.

[00:02:29]Yeah, I know it's not.

[00:02:30]So exciting. I'm ready.

[00:02:33]So, this week's story is from Victoria.

[00:02:37]Are you ready? Wait, I'm I'm ready. I've got a pencil, so I can make notes. I've dropped the pencil. That's worrying.

[00:02:44]It's very nice. Look, it's from the Tower of London. Go ahead.

[00:02:49]You sure?

[00:02:50]Yes.

[00:02:51]Right, this week's story is from Victoria.

[00:02:55]Hello, Harry.

[00:02:57]Hello, Harry.

[00:02:59]We actually dated.

[00:03:01]I'm just going to let that hang for a minute.

[00:03:05]>> [gasps] >> Oh, dear. And that's it for this week.

[00:03:08]Goodbye, everybody. I can't wait for this one. Yeah. [gasps] We actually dated briefly.

[00:03:15]You might not remember me.

[00:03:17]Or maybe you will. I'm not going to say much more. Well, I'm not going to say much more, either.

[00:03:22]But I was 19, and I wasn't very nice to you.

[00:03:28]And you were just back from traveling Europe, and were the kind of boy who made everything feel like it was about to get very interesting, and then rightly disappeared to make it someone else's interesting.

[00:03:38]That's very sweet. Thank you, Victoria.

[00:03:41]So, here we are. Oh, I'm old. So, here we are, 30-odd years later. Oh. And you're on my phone every other day telling me things about myself that I probably should have figured out back then.

[00:03:57]That's quite weird, isn't it? This poor woman. I'm so sorry, Victoria. Not sorry. Be nice to people. Anyway, I haven't told anyone this. I have a therapist, and for some reason I can't say it in that room.

[00:04:10]I have my sister.

[00:04:12]Yeah, I remember her. I have close friends.

[00:04:16]And I haven't told any of them, either.

[00:04:18]So, here I am, telling you instead, a man from 30 years ago. Whoa.

[00:04:24]Make of that what you will. I will.

[00:04:27]I was married for 16 years. I'm so old.

[00:04:31]Two children, a beautiful house, a husband who, by every measurable standard, was a good man, reliable, kind, present. He came to all the school stuff, the plays and sports events, and he remembered anniversaries. Never raised his voice.

[00:04:46]He loved me the way a person loves a business or a project, I'd say. Very steadily, without any drama, the way that you'd look after a garden.

[00:04:57]Right. Interesting.

[00:05:00]I was suffocating. I didn't know that's what it was for a long time. I called it other things, comfortable, settled, grown-up. We'd built something real and grown-up, and I told myself that the flatness was just what long marriages feel like, that women who said otherwise were either pretending or chasing something that doesn't exist.

[00:05:21]That I was lucky, and that I should behave accordingly.

[00:05:25]And then I met Daniel.

[00:05:29]Looking at Emma's eyes.

[00:05:32]Nothing remarkable on paper, same industry, a conference, a drink that went on longer than it should have. He was funny and flirty and slightly careless, and he looked at me the way my husband had stopped looking at me around year four.

[00:05:48]Like I was interesting. Like what I said actually mattered. I knew within a couple of weeks that I was in trouble.

[00:05:55]Oh, dear.

[00:05:58]This goes back to the work affair last week, doesn't it?

[00:06:01]>> say it's really similar. And I'm really I like it because we will compare and contrast how we And she's utterly beautiful, cuz she dated me, obviously.

[00:06:09]Um The affair I'm judging. I'm judging. The affair lasted 14 months. I'm not going to dress it up. It was secretive and complicated and morally indefensible, and I knew exactly what I was doing, and I did it anyway.

[00:06:26]What I didn't expect was what it showed me.

[00:06:29]Daniel turned out to be exactly what anyone looking from the outside would have predicted.

[00:06:35]Charming, inconsistent, ultimately unwilling to blow up his own life in the way that I was apparently willing to blow up mine. When it ended, and it ended very badly, I was devastated in a way I hadn't been since my 20s.

[00:06:51]The kind of devastated that makes you realize that you've been numb for years. The devastation was the first real thing I think I'd felt in decades, and that's the part that I can't make peace with.

[00:07:03]I went back to my marriage after Daniel ended it.

[00:07:07]Sat across the table from my husband every morning and looked at him and understood for the first time with any real clarity that what I'd been calling suffocation was actually a safe, lovely marriage.

[00:07:21]And I'd spent 16 years unable to feel it because I'd never really learned what safety was supposed to feel like.

[00:07:29]I'd been so calibrated to earn love that a relationship where it was gentle, smooth, and flat felt like nothing at all.

[00:07:39]Yeah.

[00:07:40]The affair didn't save my marriage. I want to be very clear about that. It did end 18 months later, and not because he found out. He never has.

[00:07:50]But because I can't pretend anymore that what we had was enough for me.

[00:07:57]The clarity Daniel gave me, as humiliating as that is to write, was that I'd married a good man and made him invisible.

[00:08:05]And that my inability to feel safe and comfortable and excited in something safe was not his failure, it was mine.

[00:08:13]We co-parent now. He's met someone, and from what I can see, she makes him genuinely happy in a way that I don't think I ever did.

[00:08:22]I'm glad about that.

[00:08:24]I'm devastated by it. Both things at the same time.

[00:08:27]>> Yes, I understand that.

[00:08:29]>> All at the same time in my lonely life.

[00:08:32]What I want to ask you, Harry, this feels personal.

[00:08:37]What I want to ask you, Harry, is can something that was wrong lead you somewhere that's right? Can the worst thing you ever did be the thing that finally showed you clearly where you're supposed to be, and show you enough to make you change, finally? I did something that I'm really ashamed of, and I hurt someone who didn't deserve it, and I came out of it more honest about who I am, and what I need, than 16 years of trying to be a good wife ever made me.

[00:09:07]I don't know if I'm allowed to be grateful for something I should only be ashamed of.

[00:09:11]I don't know if the clarity was worth the cost.

[00:09:15]I'm not sure if I get to decide that.

[00:09:18]But I haven't been able to stop thinking about it for 2 years.

[00:09:22]And while I lie awake, you're popping up on my phone, so I thought I might as well ask you.

[00:09:29]Right, before we Victoria.

[00:09:32]Right, so before we go on, are you I believe the answer can be yes, but you're able to look at this objectively, given your course. A lot of time has passed, hasn't it? Yeah, I mean, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I was not devastated or broken-hearted over lovely Victoria. I can tell you that.

[00:09:51]I was not I was never um heartbroken over lovely >> But was she heartbroken over you? Oh, no, no. She went off with some other bloke.

[00:09:58]Good for her.

[00:10:00]Oh, my Oh, wow.

[00:10:02]>> [laughter] >> Now, this is I'm First of all, I have to say I really want to make notes, but the pencil was broken and I dare not move from my seat. Um it is I've This is incredibly interesting, isn't it? And she has basically taken the step that or she took the step that the the chap last week whose name I've obviously forgotten cuz I can't remember what I had for breakfast. Rob.

[00:10:24]>> It's a long uh name. Yeah. Yes. All right. She's taken the step that Rob stalled at and what he hasn't hadn't taken that action step. But all of the stuff that's going was that she's talked about was going on in his brain as well. And this is fantastically interesting because she's gone about it the other way. You talk about this a lot. You talk about when you're anxiously attached or you've come out of a turbulent relationship, stability looks boring. Mhm.

[00:10:58]Right? But what is not clear is how she went into that relationship. Yeah.

[00:11:05]>> And that the stability And she sort of I I thought she contradicted herself because that First of all, I thought, "Oh, yes, it's that."

[00:11:12]And then she's needed this turbulence to make her see what it is. Yeah.

[00:11:15]>> But then I thought it's almost like she was she sort of initially thought, "Oh, yes, this is where I should be. This is my husband, blah blah blah." But then she came out of it again said, "No, that's not enough for me." Mhm.

[00:11:26]>> where I don't understand. Don't understand it.

[00:11:28]Please explain. It's interesting, isn't it? Because at first, I thought that and and my memory of this person is obviously it's a long time ago is um that she was very unavailable emotionally and that you know, we were young and it was all madness and I was I lived very fast when I was young.

[00:11:49]And so, she talked about me coming back from traveling, but just to let you know, by the the time I come back from traveling for 2 years in Europe, I was just over 18. So, it was a long time I was young. Very young, yes.

[00:12:05]And the way this read was when I first read through this, I thought she's not avoidant. She's anxious. Um but I think what's happening here is that she's she had an established pattern of avoidance from being young and being in relationships like the one with me, you know, where she cheated or moved on or whatever.

[00:12:28]>> [clears throat] >> And then, she got into a long marriage and became kind of fearfully avoidant through the boredom.

[00:12:34]I think she sat in the boredom of the marriage and avoided emotion because it was so dull. And this is something that nobody really mentions, you know, people think that we only avoid emotional high emotion because it's so jarring and so painful, but actually a lot of people avoid emotion because the person that they've connected with years ago, they feel the emotion's sort of gone away from it.

[00:12:59]They find it very hard to generate any emotional connection and then they avoid it because it bores them or it feels like work or tedium. And I think that's where she is and I think that I mean, it's just so common that people meet people at work and they present and they think, "Oh, this person's exciting and this is more interesting than what I'm in." And of course it is. Yeah, if you've been married for 16 years, then yeah.

[00:13:21]But it it's sad that I I think the catalyst for leaving the marriage was the wrong one, but I think she needed to leave the marriage. Can I just pick you up on something you said there? Yes, she did say he was exciting and and all this, but what I really picked up on was she said "He found me exciting." Yeah.

[00:13:43]>> "He looked at me in a way my husband stopped looking at me in years."

[00:13:47]Right?

[00:13:48]>> And I think I actually don't think it's anything to do with him. I think it's to do with that that exact thing. Her feeling desired. Yes. He made her feel Not even Maybe not even desired. She didn't mention desired. She mentioned exciting and interesting. Yeah. And I think that's huge. That is huge. And I think if that's what she's been craving, truthfully, 16 years is a long time to wait for it.

[00:14:14]Yeah. Or 12.

[00:14:15]>> The The other thing that struck me as well is that she says um towards the end of the letter, she says, "You know, I hurt someone that I was with for a long time." But then she also said that she didn't tell him or that he never found out. And so, she hurt him by leaving him, but she left she left him without explanation as well. Or does she mean she hurt him by not being properly in that marriage? By feeling about him in the right way.

[00:14:41]>> of the above. I I expect all of the above.

[00:14:44]Um I think it's it's tricky because the question of um does your partner deserve to know always splits the room because quite a lot of the time they don't. Quite a lot of the time it's not about them deserving to know, it's about is it helpful?

[00:15:01]Um is it useful for your ex to know? No.

[00:15:06]>> It It is it going to help them recover and move on? And this person has recovered and moved on by the sound of it. So, and and Victoria hasn't. No.

[00:15:15]And And so, she's carrying I think the burden is with the correct person there.

[00:15:19]That's my opinion.

[00:15:21]Yeah. Yeah, I I mean, I I'd agree with you. I think that's fair, you know.

[00:15:25]If you make these difficult calls and you make all what you call these micro decisions, all these decision points along the way, then yeah, the consequences are yours. Like that's that's fair, I think. I think that's reasonable.

[00:15:38]I think um the other thing that's interesting is that she's so far from healed and has still I mean, I can't I I don't know because I don't know this person really, you know, they were when we were kids essentially.

[00:15:56]But it's the If If the pattern is roughly what I described earlier, you know, anxious and avoidant, then she's still still burning her life to the ground before doing the work, you know, before applying the healing.

[00:16:11]Yes.

[00:16:11]>> So, buy a pack, Victoria. I'll give you a discount. You'll have £5 off. Mate's rates. So, I think there's there's themes here and I would like to to talk about them, if that's okay.

[00:16:22]>> Yeah. You talk about them. So, yes, there's obviously the attachment style and we are assuming that she has this avoidant thing. But she speaks at So, we'll talk about that. But she speaks a lot about >> [clears throat] >> the boredom or as you just said or the tea What I can't remember how she phrased it. That's a whole other thing.

[00:16:41]And Do you not feel that people Do you think that that is indicative of an of an attachment issue or is that just life in a long-term relationship?

[00:16:53]I think some marriages are dynamic from beginning to the end and last for 50 years. And some marriages are boring and some marriages are up and down.

[00:17:06]And the worst ones are the up and down ones cuz Mhm. during the downs, you can really hurt the person and cheat and leave and all that stuff. Mhm.

[00:17:16]The the ones that stay together tend to be the ones where it's um fascinating all the way through where you're obsessed with the person in terms of and I don't mean obsessed, I mean where you are as invested in that person's success in life as you are in your own. They're the ones that really work. The tedious ones, the boring ones, the ones that one partner's finding boring are going to fail because we are um flawed mammals, right? And sex drives and interest, you know, drives of interest really, things where we go, "Oh, that That might be a nice life."

[00:17:54]Maybe you know, that person lives in a better way than I do. You know, you watch people's habits and you think, "Oh, that's nice." They are actually allowed to have a sports car or that person's allowed to go on holiday three times a year. All these little things that lead you to construct this kind of nirvana that you then leave your own marriage for. I mean, obviously when you get there, you find out it's just as bad. You brought your own problems with you. In a different way, yeah.

[00:18:17]>> But then I I think the saddest part of this as well, one of the really significant parts of this story is that she has a sister, close friends, and a therapist and hasn't told the therapist.

[00:18:32]So, I I have a theory on that. Yeah.

[00:18:35]>> I think people withhold things from their therapist because they don't they're not ready They know what the answer is. This woman, I think, knows the answer. She's not ready to hear it.

[00:18:45]Yes. Yeah.

[00:18:46]>> because you know, when you hear that thing, it's going to make you feel pretty rotten. Yes.

[00:18:53]>> Although I feel like she is Well, maybe she's giving lip service to the guilt she feels over the affair. But you are you tend to feel pretty rotten and more than that, you know that there are is work ahead of you. And it is exhausting, you know, she seems to have been she's she's she's had a long time with thinking about this and fighting these feelings and all of those things. It's exhausting, so I suspect she just knows what she's going to be told and she's not like I can't I just can't put any more into it at the minute. It is the work. It is that. It's the fact that the minute you open up to the therapist, the therapist is going to say, "Right, here's what we can do. This is what we can do to get you through this, blah blah." And then you've got to start work, haven't you? And what she avoided doing throughout the whole 16 years is the work. At no point did was there a mention of um we tried to recover the marriage. It was just this thing where I went back and was bored again. You know, there was no kind of I went back and we worked really hard and we talked about the problems and all.

[00:19:52]That didn't seem to come up. So, the avoidance of the work is is definitely true. I think also that the the idea that um that any of this is on the Daniel guy is is tricky as well because Daniel was consistent in his inconsistency, right?

[00:20:09]>> Yeah. Yeah. He presented us what he was.

[00:20:11]He didn't want to leave his marriage. He said that. Um he was just there for the affair, right? And that's what she got. And it's horrible, but he was consistent in his inconsistency. So, he's not really the villain in it either. So, he didn't want to he was never there to sort of save her from her own decision.

[00:20:34]I don't know that she want I just think she's I think she's looking for that hit, that high, that um she couldn't get in a long-term safe safe stable marriage was not going to give her that high, was it? She needed more.

[00:20:50]>> Uncertainty and danger.

[00:20:51]Yeah, I think so.

[00:20:53]>> had her fill, she decided well, when she'd had her fill and it wasn't going to go anywhere, it was like, yeah, no, that's actually the stability is what I actually need actually. When she'd had her fill. Well, you know what I mean?

[00:21:04]When she'd I know you, mate. Sweetheart.

[00:21:07]Treacle. When she'd had all of the um you know, and it is of course it's like um all of the lovely compliments that she would have had and the exciting language and all that kind of stuff. She'd have had all of that and then she'd have and then hit it burned out because he was in it just for the thrill also. What did you think of the line at the end, you know, that it was she was glad that he'd found someone new, but she was glad and devastated that he'd found someone new.

[00:21:35]>> Yeah, that sounds familiar.

[00:21:38]>> [laughter] >> It's because it's that thing they were together a long time and you retain and I think about this a lot. You retain a connection to a person that you've loved. Yes. And you I don't know that there's a word for how you feel about that.

[00:21:54]Some of my friends who have gone through breakups are like, nope, nope, would you know, would definitely say there's nothing there at all. And I I have to take that face value. They've no reason to tell me you know, tell me a lie. Yeah. I don't feel like that with my ex-husband. I don't feel that at all.

[00:22:12]I've got some I don't know what the word is.

[00:22:15]>> It's yeah, I mean it'd be to be honest, it's a kind of a healthier response to say there is something there. Of course there is.

[00:22:21]Like you don't Otherwise, what was the whole the whole thing was the wrong decision, was it?

[00:22:26]From start to finish. It's ridiculous.

[00:22:28]Of course.

[00:22:28]>> Yeah, it's not and I always and I this is and again, this is this is growth and learning that's got me here. And I And there were there are what I think that she has taken a step towards actually by voicing it to you is and again, I speak from bitter experience that you've been proved right frequently. But you you sort of allow a self-awareness into your world where what I find myself doing now and I know this is personal and I'm sorry, but I can only draw on my personal experience. I've no training or anything like that.

[00:23:05]This is only now arising. Some of these things are only now arising in my 2-year relationship.

[00:23:11]But what I find myself doing is going, well, that's blatantly unreasonable what you're how you've reacted there. Mhm. What is it actually, Emma, that you actually are feeling?

[00:23:24]What is it? And I'm finding myself and it's such a revelation. It's annoying, isn't it? You become your own annoying therapist. It's so annoying because unfortunately, you sort of feel like you're you're you're this awful flawed person and you're constantly trying to fix. Yeah.

[00:23:42]>> what you're doing is going, no, that's a a sort of a mask. What I'm getting angry about or upset about or feeling bad about is a mask to to something which is entirely fixable by me. Yeah, that's that's it, yeah. That's the top layer.

[00:23:58]>> Yeah. So, I think that hopefully can't remember her name, Victoria.

[00:24:03]Hopefully, Victoria has now will open up to that and saying, okay, it's not boredom. What if I'm feeling bored, what am I actually wanting? Yeah, and I think there's some hope in the um I think that paragraph that I just described, you know, the whole I'm glad and devastated in my loneliness. I think that's a really that's a lovely hopeful sign that she can feel lonely, that she can feel glad for him and she can feel devastated. You know, that means she's connected to her her emotions at least there's something.

[00:24:33]There's some strong connection there and that's brilliant. That's really good.

[00:24:36]It's what you've just described.

[00:24:37]She can admit that love was there and that she feels lonely now that it's not there.

[00:24:45]Um even even if she feels she's done the right thing, which she she may well feel.

[00:24:49]Well, she said she makes him happy like I that in a way I never could. So, it's to me it sounds like she really she's really she's feeling really let down by herself, isn't she? She's We'll always say having an affair is never the right thing. It's never the right thing and we will we'll just we always say that. So, that's there, but she feels I think she feels let down in a wider way than that. I feel like she feels by herself, I mean, I think she feels like what you had everything. He's a good man. He's this. He's that. Why wasn't that enough for you? Yes, I think I think that's absolutely right. I think a lot of people expect an awful lot from other people and outsource a lot of feeling to other people. And actually, if your life's boring, you're the main character, whoever you're in relationships or not, you're the main character. It's up to you. And you know, my mum my dear old mum, when I used to say, "I'm bored." And I'm sure you say this to your son all the time. I say, "I'm bored." And she just go, "Boring people get bored." And it's it's it's true, you know, if you allow yourself um to be that person, you will be bored all the time. And one interesting thing as well, the last observation I'll make on this is that boredom and loneliness are probably the two most useful states to get the work done in cuz it's where it happens, you know, when you're when you're sort of sitting there on a Saturday night with no one to go out with or you're sitting there thinking about your ex going out on dates and stuff, that's when you have to examine yourself and say, right, so what am I doing? What am I going to do? And that's where the build happens, isn't it? Yeah, absolutely. I think you get to the point you get there's all stages of the of this, isn't there, when you break up with someone.

[00:26:36]You're in that awful free fall of pain and panic. Yeah. And then you and then you're like, oh, I really miss him and it's not fair, is it? Like you know, it's that. But then you get to this well, I know that was awful and we didn't get on and it and we should have to split up. And of course I wouldn't go back. Excuse me. So, why do I miss them?

[00:26:55]And then that is again that's that thing.

[00:26:58]>> It's not that thing. What is it in me?

[00:27:01]What is it in me that that is causing this? And I that I mean, we've been doing it we've been A talking forever about this. B we've been doing this since September. You know, you've involved me in this since September. And only now there are still things coming out now.

[00:27:18]Only now have I got a word in edgeways.

[00:27:20]So, you've been able to actually listen.

[00:27:22]Yes. [laughter] I don't credit you at all. Oh god, don't do that. Yeah. I don't want people I think I what I'm trying to say is I think that this could be an ongoing forever thing really, but not in a really, oh my gosh, it's you're going to feel awful forever.

[00:27:37]Just in a the the sort of the learning the tools to be able to recognize that it is not the situation that's bothering you. It's a thing that within you.

[00:27:46]Yeah, I mean the the best things, the things that you get best at in life are the things you never finish, right? Like I'm writing a book. I'll just mention.

[00:27:56]I'm writing a book on no contact.

[00:27:59]And I'm still doing the stuff from the no contact pack and from my own learning. I'm still applying it. I'm still learning about it. That's that's the point of of life, right? The minute you feel like you've completed every level, you just bored. You're back in that place. So, yeah, you've got to keep healing all the time, keep doing the work all the time. And the work can be just like I say like I said last week, the work can be a hot bath with a candle, you know, it's not um it's not about having to do EMDR every day or meditate every day or whatever it is. It's just doing what you can to to get yourself forward a bit. And when I hear stories like um the lovely Victoria's story, we one of the things that come across is this is someone who doesn't spend enough time with themselves. This is someone who has got the therapist, isn't talking to the therapist. Has got the close friends, isn't talking to the close friends. This is someone who is avoiding knowing themself deeply.

[00:28:57]>> Right.

[00:28:57]And the change that would make in her life.

[00:29:00]Just getting to know yourself. Just what you're talking about, you know, finding out the behaviors underneath that top layer. Why am I doing this? Why did I actually cheat? Because it wasn't boredom. I promise you that. Yeah, so that's a good question. That's what I was going to say. So, what is it then? Sum up what you think what you think has caused this whole thing for Victoria?

[00:29:22]>> So, if I had to guess, I would say that Victoria was bored, was in a very steady relationship with a very safe person and then self-sabotaged, blew it up. I think there was kind of a an opportunity to shake life and see what landed where really. And you know what, [clears throat] a lot of us a lot of people in life aren't meant to be married for 30 years and that's okay. That's fine.

[00:29:52]A lot of people hurt people repeatedly without being bad people. You know, this is this is something that's nuanced and difficult for us to understand especially those of us who've been betrayed or been through hard situations, but most of our behaviors are based on our own wounds, our own experiences, a compilation like a concatenation of all the stuff that's happened to us through our lives.

[00:30:16]Um and these behaviors are no different.

[00:30:18]You know, these these come from things that we've been exposed to as children or in early life or whatever it is. And I think self-sabotage is one of the most common reasons people have affairs. I think a lot of people light the blue touch paper just to see just to see what will happen because a lot of us, you know, life gets very um samey. It's not the boredom, it's the fact that it's predictable. It's the fact that you know where you're going to be in a year's time, which room you'll be in, where you'll be sitting, what you'll be talking about, where you'll be going for dinner.

[00:30:51]Um and without injecting something into that you won't feel alive and sometimes that something is chaos and maybe she maybe she did that. We don't know, but Is she always going to feel bored and because of her personality type, is that relationship specific or is she just going to go around that cycle again if she doesn't Um she needs to talk to her therapist about it. She needs to have conversations about what's underneath, what the feelings are, what the motivation was underneath the affair, all of that.

[00:31:22]Um it needs to be unpacked and dealt with.

[00:31:26]Um if she doesn't do that and the cynic in me tells me that this isn't a letter from someone who's about to do that.

[00:31:36]Um but if Victoria doesn't do that and I don't have time to chat to Victoria.

[00:31:40]Sorry, Victoria. Um on the regular. So, I think unless she takes the action, unless she does the work um she'll repeat the cycle, yeah. I think, you know, because it's exciting, right? You know, there's these things that look terrible from outside. Now that Victoria's in this place where she's single um I don't know what she looks like now, but you know, is is single and on the market, let's say, right?

[00:32:07]And in this state of coming out of an affair and a boring, in her words, marriage maybe she's wanting to go on the Waltzers and the Dodgems, right? Maybe she's wanting to try all the things at the fair and see what happens and that that would be the most predictable and unexpected route. And that's fine for a little while. Do that. Have the fun, but please please find out why you did this and what's underneath it so that you can actually be happy instead of just feeding the dopamine in the meantime.

[00:32:37]So, that's it. What you've just said, feeding the dopamine and I feel like I mean, come on. Doesn't isn't it could you not just say, well, all people in relationships, how whatever that however they're attached get to that point of like, oh, this is imagine if it was all sparkly new again. Yeah.

[00:32:55]Yeah, of course.

[00:32:57]We're human beings, you know, the the honesty behind most relationships is that we are in the we we stay in the relationships because of our ethics, because of our morals, because we are decent people, right?

[00:33:14]And there is nuanced levels of this. There are people who stay in relationships because they don't have opportunity to cheat, as horrible as that is. There are people who stay in relationships um despite having every opportunity to cheat. If you think of um the most beautiful and brilliant Hollywood film stars or actors or models or whatever um who would have every opportunity to cheat with as many people as they wanted to and don't and are utterly faithful and brilliant and stay solid in the marriage and all of that.

[00:33:48]And I know it feels like there's hardly any of those, but there are a lot of those. Strangely, there are a lot of those. You just don't hear about them because it's less interesting.

[00:33:56]Um so I think the the reason that most people stay in relationships isn't just love. I think that would be a ludicrous, an absurd thing to suggest. I think most people stay in relationships because the love is what um becomes the value, that becomes the thing of why would I ever cheat on this person, you know?

[00:34:19]I may not have had sex for 2 years. I may feel neglected or bored or abandoned in this relationship, but the love that we've got is enough. Like that's never going to let me cheat. So, I never would.

[00:34:32]And there are some people who will go back Oh, look, off they go. And you know, these aren't just attachment styles, these are personality traits, these are wounds that we're all carrying.

[00:34:43]But um that doesn't mean they have to be repeated forever, but to stop repeating this stuff, you've got to peel it back and look at it. That means telling a therapist.

[00:34:52]And I get I suppose as with all of the things which I'm only now discovering and it feels so fundamental, you feel ridiculous. When these pennies drop, don't you feel ridiculous because it's they're actually such fundamental ideas. So, again with the with the yearning for something sparkly and new and exciting, what you actually need to do there isn't what is go but why do I need to feel that sort of validation of someone going, oh my god, I can't wait to see you. You're amazing. It's that's what it is, isn't it? That's what we're chasing.

[00:35:22]We're chasing this need to feel magnificent in some way. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And you know the the stoic principle of life, you're not meant to be happy. You know, you don't get to be ecstatic every day. Some days are just days, you know? Um and they are what make the really good days really good. The the flat days are what makes the good days really good. And you know, I've been in relationships where I've been head over heels with people and I've been in relationships where things were steadier and more solid and I choose the last one every time. Like every time, especially having come through what I've come through. So um you've got to consider how much of things like adulation and obsession and butterflies and electricity and chemistry, you've got to think about how much of those things are you constructing. How many things are of of those things are of your own construct. So if you build a relationship around butterflies and incredible sex and amazing chemistry that's all you.

[00:36:25]Just so you know, that's not your um partner giving you these incredible That's you constructing that so that you can hit your own dopamine receptors so you can fill yourself with all these amazing love chemicals and everything else. If you build a relationship on more steady, solid things that's much more likely to be a real partnership and a much more even, balanced partnership. So, yeah.

[00:36:50]That's that's very, very interesting.

[00:36:52]That's very interesting, Harry. And I feel >> Thank you, Emma. Yeah, it is. On your nice. Well, it's unfortunately it's you that said it, but you know, you did.

[00:37:01]>> So, anyway, Victoria and I are together now and Don't you're you're diminishing this person's I'm not. I'm not. I'm not.

[00:37:08]>> And and I I just don't know.

[00:37:11]She's got to open up, hasn't she? That's what you need to do.

[00:37:14]>> actually sent a message and I've said um a few things and one of the things I've said is I want you to talk to your therapist and I want you to update us when you've talked to your therapist because I think it'd be interesting in a few months time if she's having these consis- con- if she's having these consistent conversations with her therapist I think it'd be really interesting for us to find out what comes out of those, you know? Yeah, what they sort of said.

[00:37:39]Because because, you know, she's able to take ownership, but she it's it's almost like she did this thing, this affair, and she knew that she didn't really want the affair and when it was happening she didn't want it and it wasn't scratching the itch anyway and So, this is where she's got to go and you do have to push through some real difficulties cuz you she's going to feel regret over things, isn't she? And maybe that is the kicker at the moment. Yeah. Walking being all shying away from the regret. That's the tricky one, isn't it? Regret.

[00:38:11]>> Yeah.

[00:38:12]Eat it up.

[00:38:13]Really? Pull up a chair.

[00:38:16]>> regret? Pull up a chair and eat it. Sit in it. Say, yeah, I did that. That was wrong. That was my fault.

[00:38:23]Take on as much accountability as you can. What an opportunity, you know, you've had an affair, you've cheated on someone, you've blown up a marriage.

[00:38:28]What an opportunity for you to sit and eat that and work out how you're going to digest it, how you're going to process it through your body and change yourself because of that. It's it's an amazing opportunity. Sounds mad, right?

[00:38:39]But >> No, it doesn't. No. the bigger the things we do in life, good and bad the bigger the lesson from those things.

[00:38:46]It's cheesy as hell, but it's so true.

[00:38:48]If you do something that you are deeply ashamed of in the moment or the next day or for the next 10 years of your life and you sit in that shame and think, right, why the hell did I do that when I knew it was going to feel like that? You will learn things about yourself that you wouldn't have got close to without doing the thing. So yeah, sit sit in it. Pull a chair up.

[00:39:08]So, that's a really that's a sound piece of advice and I think another thing is um I don't I think all of us maybe is the thing that I'm still not able to do um is put distance between like the trigger or whatever you want to call it. I hate the word trigger, but you know, like the situation. My the way I react, for example, I'm very loud and I'm very dramatic and very >> No, I will not accept this.

[00:39:34]Harry, try and stretch your imagination.

[00:39:36]Okay. And it's awful because I'm like a bomb going off in that moment and And my real feelings about things come out about 2 days later. Right. Yeah.

[00:39:44]>> what, you know, and this is that but big what she's saying here, right? So how do you you know, that's another thing you need I don't know how to do it and I'm going to try but trying to sort of put space between the response or the reaction leaving out a reaction and getting to a response is where I need to get to and >> Yeah, and the way to do that by the way just just for future is when you react sit down and make a mental note or write it down or talk in your phone make a real point of understanding the reaction itself and saying right so I said this and I reacted this way. Give it a few days get to a point where you you feel emotionally level and write the response down next to it. Then look at the difference between the two.

[00:40:30]>> I know it's incredible.

[00:40:31]>> One's one's a parent one's a a kid. It's they're so different and >> it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's exactly it.

[00:40:38]That is what I am finding myself at the moment. They I think this is where Victoria will get to as well. You sort of feel ashamed I suppose that's the word cuz I feel so emotionally immature.

[00:40:49]I feel like a child [clears throat] still kind of learning and I would have told anyone that listened that I was emotionally intelligent and not at all.

[00:40:56]That's because you are that's because we are we're all kids. Like when we react we're kids. When we respond we're adults. So that's what what I said there about you know, one's a parent one's a kid. That's literal, you know, the the way that we react in terms of love and relationships is child versus parent. So if you meet someone you get butterflies you get loads of chemistry sleep with them early and you think they're amazing. That's your kid. That's you being a kid.

[00:41:23]If you meet someone and you stop and you slow it down and you see them when you want to see them and you respond instead of reacting and you leave gaps and you let space let let emotional closeness build in the space between you and you foster something adult and ongoing and steady that's adult. That's the parent.

[00:41:42]So yeah, it's it's that difference.

[00:41:45]Okay, so thank you very much Victoria for sending that in blast from the past much to my wasn't much humiliation really was there in the end but very sweet and I hope you're okay and yeah, stay in touch and we'll give you an update on Victoria in a few months time hopefully. If she tells the therapist. So thank you.

[00:42:06]We hope you're enjoying the stories on where you left them the Dad Hugs podcast.

[00:42:10]>> [music] >> But how's your emotional health? At Dad Hugs we help thousands of people to solve their emotional challenges now and lead more fulfilling lives [music] in their future relationships. Check out the no contact pack. It's brutal but it works and it'll help you break the cycle and rebuild after a relationship [music] breakdown.

[00:42:29]Or the healing anxious attachment pack a deep reset for anxious attachers which will help you calm the fear of abandonment stop the spiral of overthinking and feel secure in yourself. Find our packs and see what hundreds of other happy users have said at dadhugsforursoul.com/packs.

[00:42:50]Right. Harry, we are back and we're going to do some quick fire questions now. Oh, okay. I better get some quick fire answers in my head.

[00:42:58]>> Are you ready? I mean if they're not too quick that's okay but you know, these are Slow fire. I'm 53. These will be slow fire.

[00:43:06]>> and you're creaky so we'll go slow.

[00:43:08]Sorry. This is are you ready? Always.

[00:43:12]Okay.

[00:43:14]Is it possible Harry to love someone and not be in love with them at the same time?

[00:43:20]Oh, I mean that's straight to the story, isn't it? Um not only is it possible it's one of the most common experiences in adult relationships.

[00:43:32]The distinction So if somebody ever says to you, I love you but I'm not in love with you. That person doesn't love you. That's the first thing to say. There is no distinction between those two things.

[00:43:45]You either love someone or you don't and people will comment on this and say, oh no, no, you can be in love with someone and you can be you can love someone and not not be in love with them. No, no, no, no, no. No. You either love someone or you don't and it's it's very common in long relationships and people don't talk about it because instead of the butterflies and the fast stuff at the beginning it becomes about care and familiarity and proper closeness and all the grown-up stuff. That's being in love with someone even if you don't feel like it's the same as at the beginning you're deeply in love with someone if you care about them. So yeah. Not a thing.

[00:44:26]I don't think so. Like this.

[00:44:28]Uh is jealousy ever healthy?

[00:44:32]Asking for a friend.

[00:44:35]What's happened Emma? Well, who is she?

[00:44:38]>> [laughter] >> I'm awful. I hate it. It's the worst thing about me and I'm really I'm working on it. Oh, there's much worse things about you. There's um >> [laughter] >> I I joke OF COURSE.

[00:44:51]I LOVE YOU. Carry on.

[00:44:54]Is jealousy ever healthy? Yeah. Little doses I don't see why it isn't, you know, it it can tell you on a low level and take this the right way like not big bits of jealousy but a little wave of jealousy can tell you that you care about someone that someone matters to you and that can be like useful bit of information in a relationship with someone. It can teach you stuff.

[00:45:15]Um the difficulty is when jealousy becomes anxiety because it becomes the signal of threat and that makes you think, oh, I'm under threat here. The relationship's under threat and then as somebody formerly anxious or anxious you'll begin to behave in a different way and that will push your partner away and you'll feel more needy and they'll pull away and you'll lean in. So in little doses yeah, jealousy can be perfectly healthy.

[00:45:40]Right.

[00:45:41]Uh can you be friends with an ex? No.

[00:45:45]I mean yes, you can. You can eventually.

[00:45:49]But not yet.

[00:45:51]Not yet.

[00:45:52]>> Also not in the going down the pub way, you know, I'm talk I think I mean I >> It may be in 20 years you can go down the pub with them but the thing is that the this is one of those questions that you only ask when you're in a position where it would be unhealthy for you to be friends with your ex. If you say, well, can I be friends with my ex? Then you're in the wrong place to be friends with your ex.

[00:46:14]Um so usually no.

[00:46:17]Um Eventually yes after a couple of decades but it needs you to have really genuinely moved on and that doesn't happen fast.

[00:46:30]Like that. Is it possible to fall back in love with someone you fell out of love with?

[00:46:36]Yeah, I mean this is the same as the in love and loving question. It's semantics.

[00:46:41]Um and and actually this goes back to what we were talking about earlier about ex-partners and what you feel for them and you know, you were saying there should be a word. The word is love Emma.

[00:46:50]I'm sorry to tell you and it doesn't mean that you're um it doesn't mean you're having an emotional affair because you still love the ex. Of course you still love the ex.

[00:46:59]I love um friends of mine. I love people I've been close to in the past. Love is a lovely lovely lovely thing. More love.

[00:47:08]So um Yeah, you can fall back in love with someone if um if things are right, you know, if you've done work in between quite often you can come back together and really find the adult version of the child that you were dating and that can be beautiful. You know, that can be lovely.

[00:47:25]Unless Victoria sent this in.

[00:47:28]I don't. No, she hasn't. She sent me a message saying I'm really glad I escaped him. Yeah. Um yes, okay. Well, I wonder then with that where you where you sort sort of saying you're falling back in love with them maybe you never did love them. Yeah, maybe. Yeah.

[00:47:43]Is there a difference between settling and accepting someone's flaws? That's a good question. Oh god, it is, isn't it?

[00:47:51]Um yeah, settling is settling is accepting someone while hoping they'll change. Accepting someone's flaws is accepting someone um fully whatever they're like.

[00:48:05]Yeah, that's great.

[00:48:08]Is it ever too late to leave a long marriage?

[00:48:12]No.

[00:48:13]Absolutely not. The sunk cost fallacy is [ __ ] Um Yeah. And there is very often more than a renaissance when you've left as most people will tell you who've left long marriages.

[00:48:27]Um it's like asking if you should walk out if you're unhappy in a marriage it's like asking if you should walk out of a prison cell or just stay sitting in the corner with the door open. Of course you should walk out. You have a life to live, right? Put yourself first.

[00:48:41]Yep.

[00:48:42]Um Can a relationship survive one person growing faster than the other?

[00:48:49]Ooh. What does that mean?

[00:48:52]Ooh.

[00:48:53]Adapting and what does it mean?

[00:48:56]Quite often if some if if people in a relationship if one of them goes to therapy quite often the relationship can end. Oh, okay.

[00:49:05]>> because therapy is an indulgent process for a lot of people. They feel that it's indulgent. It never is. It's it's an essential process. Everyone should go to therapy. But it feels indulgent. Um and it's often the first time that that person's put themselves first.

[00:49:20]The problem that you have when people are in a relationship and only one of them goes to therapy is they begin to learn how to center themselves and to center yourself you sometimes have to step away from the closeness that you had with your partner.

[00:49:33]So it can be a really difficult thing.

[00:49:36]Um quite often there's kind of this specific loneliness that comes through learning about yourself, which is really difficult to articulate to someone who's not going through that process at the same time. So, all the things you're experiencing, Emma, over the last few months, it's great that you're able to talk to Steve about what you're going through, what you're doing.

[00:49:57]If you're in a relationship where you can't have those conversations because they either trigger the other person or you feel guilty about them, quite often therapy can lead to that relationship breaking down. So, go together or go separately to therapy at the same time.

[00:50:10]Um but yeah, it's it's a really it's a really interesting one that and tricky.

[00:50:16]Mm, that is, isn't it?

[00:50:17]That is, it's a good question. Um cuz also that can come at any time. It's not It can come at any time, can't it, in a relationship?

[00:50:25]>> Um [clears throat] Uh well, we sort of already answered this. Is chemistry enough? No.

[00:50:32]No. No. No, it's just not though, is it?

[00:50:35]It's just Tell me about the relationships you've had in your life where there's been huge chemistry at the beginning. Where are they? They're not there. You just That's just not how um grown-up relationships work. No. Chem Yeah, exactly right. Um uh There's a couple that are related the same as this really in this list. Can you ever fully trust someone who has cheated once?

[00:50:59]Um so a lot of kind of therapy answers to this question are based on the security of the person who's been betrayed. Yes.

[00:51:10]I find that a bit disingenuous. Do you?

[00:51:13]>> Yeah, because I I think that a problem that requires the victim of the problem to resolve it is not a fair problem. I think the work is on the person who cheated.

[00:51:26]Yeah. And I think that you may need to do work to recover from someone cheating on you and betraying you and you you may need to grow and you may need to move forward with more confidence and perhaps you can forgive them and move on, but the question isn't whether you can forgive the person. The question is, has the person who's cheated done enough work to actually be changed, to move on, to to grow, and never do it again, and to understand, and this is the really crucial bit, to understand the depth to which that action has hurt you and hurt your relationship. Because quite often what the person who's cheated is looking for isn't um redemption, it's forgiveness. It's this kind of just let me off the hook. Just let me off the hook. I'm going to apologize and beg and beg and be really attentive for a year until you've let me off the hook.

[00:52:18]Yeah. And then it's going to just fizzle away in back of your mind and every time I'm late you're going to think, "Where is he? Where is she?" Yeah.

[00:52:25]So, what do you think? What do you think? I think no.

[00:52:29]Yeah.

[00:52:31]I think I think no because I think you sort of said with the therapy answer there, you can't avoid that being put on you.

[00:52:40]You are If you've been cheated on, you've got work to do.

[00:52:43]Unless you don't give a monkeys and mostly people who are cheated on do give a monkeys because else you would just be out of that relationship because you carry that in ways you don't realize for a long time, for a very long time. And um so, you're automatically being put in a position of having to do some work whether you stay with that person or not. So, I'd say no.

[00:53:05]Yeah.

[00:53:05]>> Um Right. Is I love this one. Is forgiveness necessary for healing or is it optional?

[00:53:13]People always ask this and it's such a it's such a room splitter, this. Um Yeah.

[00:53:22]There are there are different kind of you can reframe this. There are different ways of approaching forgiveness. So, that the one-word answer to this question is it's optional. It is optional. Healing doesn't require forgiveness. It requires you putting down the emotional weight of what's happened to you. It means you offloading the the the stuff that's happened to you, which is different.

[00:53:50]It's I think one of the things that people try and do early after betrayal and stuff is forgive early. And doing it too early leaves you with too much hidden stuff. It's like sweeping stuff under the rug and then saying, "Okay, we're through this."

[00:54:08]That's the most dangerous point because that's when you'll snap at someone and you know, you'll pretend it's just cuz you're tired or or because they didn't load the dishwasher or they scratched the car or whatever it is, when really it's because you feel betrayed by them and you haven't had enough work, you haven't had enough conversations. So, for me, personally, forgiveness was necessary.

[00:54:31]Mm. And I would never have just forgiven for the sake of it. It took me it took me to get to the point where I'd completely understood the accountability that I carried. Yes. Which really jars just saying it, to be honest. It's not a comfortable thing. It isn't. You cannot blame yourself for someone cheating on you, but you can adopt a lot of accountability for relationships that don't work where people do cheat. Yes.

[00:54:56]And I think once I've done that and stepped back and gone, "Do you know what? I was a lot. That person had a lot on their plate." I talked about this the other day on a live and I said, you know, the people who cheated The person actually who cheated on me was like a mum and had all sorts of busy life stuff going on and all the rest of it. And of course they cheated. Like, when I look at the volume of just stuff that must have been in their head day to day, then cheating was kind of an inevitable incidental thing. They weren't fully in the relationship. All of that stuff. And once you can take accountability for that, you can say, "Okay, fine." Yeah.

[00:55:30]>> It doesn't mean that you forgive the act. It means that you It It's actually more that you're kind of forgiving yourself and going, "Yeah, I mean, come on. What did you expect?" I heard a nice thing. I think we've said this before, I don't know. I heard something about it forgiveness is the apology you're not going to get.

[00:55:47]Yeah.

[00:55:47]>> of does put you back into that place.

[00:55:49]So, again, for me personally, the took my choice was yes, I did what you did and it is difficult and it is It still weighs a little bit, but it is very helpful. I found it very helpful to move on.

[00:56:03]>> So, um I'm going to do just one more cuz I'm looking at the time.

[00:56:06]Um Is loneliness worse when you're inside a relationship or outside of a relationship?

[00:56:14]>> Oh, it's much worse inside one, isn't it? I mean, I'm sure there are a lot of people who've who've lived this. It's so much worse. And it's worse, you know, in the context of the story that we read today, Yeah. that's an awful loneliness that Victoria was existing in. And as as horrible as it seems to read out the person who perpetrated a cheating situation, loneliness is real in those situations.

[00:56:37]So, yeah, I think it's much worse inside without question. The loneliness outside a relationship is painful and awful, but at least there's kind of a a clear honesty to it. There's a logic, isn't there? Yeah.

[00:56:51]>> Yeah. And when you're inside >> you're kind of living under this veil of [ __ ] while you're saying, Yeah. "I'm fine. How are you? Oh, yeah, I'm fine.

[00:56:59]How's How's the wife? How's the marriage? Yeah, fine. All good." Yeah.

[00:57:03]How is the fact that, you know, you haven't had an orgasm in 18 months? Oh, yeah, it's great. It's fine. It's little things though, isn't it? It's like How is it walking around Tesco's cuz you don't want to go home just yet? Exactly.

[00:57:15]Why do you sit in the car for 5 minutes when you get home? All of that stuff.

[00:57:18]Yeah.

[00:57:18]>> And that is the loneliness that you'll find within relationships and it's It's brutal.

[00:57:25]>> It's awful. It's a proper like Soviet black and white loneliness, isn't it? It is. It's brutal.

[00:57:32]Well, that was a cheery thing, wasn't it? I tell you what, we're going to end on something Oh, are we?

[00:57:37]>> I'm just going to Yes, I'm going to say >> to tell a joke? No. Oh. to ask you Oh.

[00:57:42]something that's made you happy today.

[00:57:44]Oh, so much. Like, genuinely so much.

[00:57:47]So, the >> Yeah, go on. Yeah.

[00:57:49]The first thing is that my I'm so excited. I know, look at you.

[00:57:52]>> me, right? This is real me.

[00:57:54]I'm very excited because my camper van had his I won't go into details.

[00:57:59]Had his pipes flushed and he's tip-top.

[00:58:01]That's the first thing. And I got pictures of the stuff in the bucket that was flushed out of his pipes and that was my dream. The mechanic was very confused by insisted he sent me the pictures. It was like um sexting but for buckets of exhaust filth.

[00:58:16]Um so, there.

[00:58:17]I want to say that I know how you feel because I made the surgeon show me the sludge out of my gallbladder.

[00:58:22]>> [laughter] >> Oh my god. There we are, readers. I mean, that's going to cheer everyone I hope. This is >> That's what made you happy. Have you got another one quickly?

[00:58:30]>> Oh, I mean, well, I've got thousands. Uh my friend's going to launch an Instagram account because she walks dogs using the app Rover where you borrow a dog and walk it. I love that.

[00:58:42]And um is going to create an Instagram account where it's like dog of the week.

[00:58:46]And you go on the dog walk. I mean, come on. Love it.

[00:58:49]>> going to overtake mine and I'm going to feel very um inferior.

[00:58:53]>> Can I tell you mine?

[00:58:55]No. Yes, of course. Come on. Mine is that I got two loads of washing dry on the on the on the outside.

[00:59:01]>> Oh, I mean, it's sunny, isn't it? Do you have a rotating I was going to say a rotisserie.

[00:59:07]I don't have a rotisserie chicken, no. I have an oldy-worldy going zigzagging across the garden and I love when I'm working looking out at it and seeing the washing on the line. It makes me genuinely happy. Looking out the window and seeing Steve's wife's pants next to your pants blowing in the wind.

[00:59:23]>> [laughter] >> Flapping away. Absolutely. That's a lovely slag. It's like Wuthering Heights.

[00:59:30]>> [laughter] >> How lovely.

[00:59:33]Good. On that note, We shall end. Yeah.

[00:59:37]>> We shall end. Thank you for coming along and listening to the story and the questions and answers. Please send us your story in, send us your questions and answers and we'll get through them and just send the questions actually, we'll do the answers. Actually, you can do the answers if you like. If you disagree with stuff, please comment.

[00:59:53]Actually, you can find us um on YouTube if you want to watch these and you're just listening to it at the moment. This is on YouTube. So, if you search for where you left them, the Dad Hugs for Your Soul Podcast, you'll find us there.

[01:00:04]Follow me on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, all those other places.

[01:00:09]And um get yourself a pack.

[01:00:11]There's a lot of packs going at the moment. I think the spring air is getting people motivated to make changes in their emotional state and their relationships and that's a brilliant thing and the packs are fabulous. So, do have a look at those at dadhugsforoursoul.com/packs.

[01:00:25][music] And from here, we shall say goodbye. So, thank you very much for coming along. If you're wondering where your ex is and what they're up to, they're exactly where you left them and they're doing exactly what they were doing. [music] Big hug.