Sex Isn’t Optional: Why Wives Should Pursue Pleasure | Wife School #1 Tilly Dillehay

You've written that a healthy marriage shouldn't treat sex as optional. 1 Corinthians 7, husbands and wives have authority over each other's bodies. Your husband's body will belong to you. It's a godly endeavor for a wife to learn how to love this institution because it's the only hobby that God has commanded you to participate in as a couple. He has a right to an opinion about this. These are his children too. Maybe what you've been attracted to, which is sort of flippancy, maybe that's not the kind of thing you want to build a life on. I think we underappreciate the steady man. A man should be more willing to say no to his wife sometimes. If he can't stand up to you, he won't be able to stand up for you. It's a godly endeavor for a wife to learn how to love this institution. She's back! One of the most requested guests in culture apothecary history is back on the show. Tilly Dillehay's last episode on marriage absolutely exploded. So naturally, I had to invite her back to kick off a brand new mini-series I'm calling Wife School. As I'm entering my. Wife era, I thought, who better to learn from than women who have actually built long, strong, lasting Christ-centered marriages? Whether you're engaged, hoping to be married one day, newly married, or you've been married for decades, this series is for you. Over the next few episodes, we'll be talking about everything that no one prepares you for, honor and respect, intimacy, resentment, submission, communication, homemaking, and how to build a marriage that actually gets better instead of drifting apart. Today's Wife School professor is Tilly Dillehay. Author, pastor's wife, homeschooling mom of four, and one of my favorite voices on biblical marriage. This episode is almost entirely driven by your questions. We cover everything from how to stop comparing your husband to other men, to what submission actually looks like in everyday life, to sexless marriages, difficult in-laws, feeling unappreciated, rebuilding trust after betrayal, co-sleeping debates, and what to do when you wake up feeling more like roommates than lovers. Ironically, Tilly just started her own digital classroom series called Wife School, which we talk about towards the end. There are so many moments in this conversation that challenged me, encouraged me, and honestly convicted me. I have a feeling that you're going to walk away with at least one answer you've been needing for a long time. Watch on the real Alex Clark YouTube channel or Culture Apothecary on Spotify. Please leave a giant five-star review for Tilly since she came back on the show. Please welcome back author Tilly Dillehay to Culture Apothecary. I want to know what happened with you after our first interview. Because that episode blew up. I still get messages from people about that first interview we did last year. So do I. That's the main thing that happened is I just got messages and messages and emails somehow. I don't even know how they found my email account, honestly. But I've been off of Instagram for a long time, and they found me mostly on Instagram and started messaging. So I went into that old account and started just finding messages and messages and trying to answer them and getting frustrated because I realized, like, I cannot. I can't answer them. I can't answer all the questions. Like, I just can't. It's too much time. Because of that interview, that's why I went and created that video course. I have a sister who's a vocal instructor in Nashville. She, like, teaches commercial voice, and she has these videos that she makes. So I asked her, like, how do you make a video course? And she's like, well, here's what you should use or whatever. So I made a video course. It took me, you know, a couple days. And I went ahead and just put it out. And it makes me feel like, okay, here's what I have to say on this. It's out there. In years to come, I expect to turn it into a book. But I'd like to hear a lot more from women first. So that's what the course has kind of helped me to do. And you called it Wife School. I did. I bummed your title. Totally bummed it. No, I love that. Because I had this idea, and I was like, you know, I'm getting married. So wouldn't it be so fun to do, like, a short little series with a couple just solid Christian women talking about marriage and being a wife and tips and tricks, you know, no matter if you are a Christian or not. Or you are a newlywed or about to get married like me. Or you are a seasoned married woman. I think it's always good to have, like, a refresher. Yeah. And maybe learn new things or have encouragement. And so I just thought, man, this would be so cool. And I thought, well, of course, I have to bring Tilly. I mean, Tilly is, like, she's the reason, like, we got to do this. It was so popular with the audience. And then my team looked you up, and they're like, she's doing Wife School. So it was totally kismet. It was perfect. And I have to tell you, like, after the first episode, I was a little bit nervous. I was a little bit in a spiral. Because I had just gotten out of a horrible relationship. And I really. I remember that coming up when we were together last year. It was, it really messed with my head. Because a lot of the stuff that was told to me, it was just really warping me of, like, you know, basically I don't want to be with a woman who has a very big personality. I don't want to be with somebody who has tons of opinions. You know, I expect you to make sure our children never make a peep. I don't ever want to hear you guys when we're home. Like, just, like. You know, it was just really hard for me, like, thinking, like, well, I don't know. And I remember saying this to you in the interview, like, well, you are even so different personality-wise than me. Like, if I can't be more, like, mild, gentle speaker type of person, what if I never get married? Right. Is there hope? Yes. And so then I met Vance, my fiance. And it was, like, one of the first things he says to me, which was totally God, was just, you know, I grew up in a home. I grew up in a homeschool community, you know, dated a lot of homeschool Christian girls. My biggest struggle was I'm not interested in, like, a really, like, gentle. The mousy girl. Go with the flow, mousy girl. I really am attracted to louder-than-life, big personalities. I like that, like, back and forth. I like, you know, debating ideas. And that's one of the main things I really am attracted to with you. And it was just, like, everything that had been drained out of me in the last relationship was filled back up with this one. And just all of my worries and my fears and my anxiety that was, like, put into my heart, he just totally squashed. And so, anyway, it just made me happy because just the conversation, talking with you, and I was like, you know, what is the right thing? Like, how do you be submissive and respect your husband and all these things if you are a kind of a bigger personality person? And so, I don't know. There's so much I want to dive into based on that same kind of theme. And I also ask the audience to submit a ton of questions for you just because now they know you. So, they're like, okay, ask Tilly this scenario. But I want to start with what is the biggest lie that modern women believe you think about choosing a husband? I think the biggest problem is just lists that are extremely long and unrealistic. I know that it's important to have high standards when it comes to specific things. So, I would say never compromise when it comes to things like, faith, like a man who is in church, who is active about his faith, a man who has some kind of a plan for his life, where he's pursuing a career, where he could eventually support a family. I think it's completely fine to, in fact, I think you should be really, really picky about those things. But we have lists that go way beyond that, some of us. And I do think that it's preventing some people from getting married. And I see men doing it too, honestly. I see some really picky guys out there who are in the church and complaining that there are no women and are not married. They say, I want to be married, and they're not. And I have way less, honestly, way less patience for the men who say that than the women. With the women, I know how possible it is to be in the church, to be super open, and to not be overly picky and yet to be waiting on a man to step up, you know. But with the men, I have no patience at all. I'm just like— I think they struggle with that. Is it the grass is always greener? I have access on social media to see all the different types of women out there. Could there be something better? Absolutely. It's the illusion of endless options that we all have. We have it in every area of life. Because of the way that we live, we have to be more intentional than I think any other generation has had to be, that eventually freedom comes from making a decision. And making a decision means excluding other options. And going all in on the thing that you've decided, whether it's buying a house or— which is not a permanent decision, but nothing can happen until you make a decision. Nothing can happen in business. Nothing can happen in relationships until you commit and move forward. Nothing can happen in your relationship with the Lord. You know, you can't learn Jesus until you commit to Him. So just, I think we are, you know, my generation, the generation maybe older than me and younger than me, I think it's a whole group of people who are afraid. I think it's a whole group of people who are afraid of missing out by making decisions. And so we're missing our lives. You argue that a lot of women make the mistake of marrying the best boyfriend, but not marrying the best husband. Yes. What is the difference? Okay, well, I could use my life as an example of this. I dated and was, you know, attracted to a very specific kind of dude. And I think after a few really bad experiences, not similar to what you had, but not great experiences, I started to think, is it possible? possible that they're is a different rubric that I should be using in deciding who to marry? Is it possible that there's something else I should be looking at to marry on? And so when I met my husband, I was not immediately attracted to him. And I don't think he was attracted to me, actually. We met in the church. He was a pastoral intern. He wasn't like super smooth with women, I would say. And it took a little while, like it took a little while of just friendship before we started to kind of move towards each other. But what eventually attracted me in him was recognizing that there were men in his life who respected him. I could see that there were men around who respected him. And I could see that he was a man of his word and that he did not play around with ideas and he didn't play around with, he wasn't flippant. And I kind of was actually. I was kind of a flippant person, I would say. I like to play with ideas. I like to joke even about things that maybe shouldn't be joked about. And he was serious about things that you should be serious about. And eventually, I think I just came to realize maybe what you've been attracted to, which is sort of flippancy, maybe that's not the kind of thing you want to build a life on. Maybe that's not the kind of person you marry. And I will say that it is really born out in life to marry the steady man. I think we underappreciate the steady man as a gender. Women do, I mean. How do you stop the habit of comparing your husband to other husbands? It's hard. It's hard not to. You know, I think women really do this a lot because I hear it. I hear it in their comments. I see it in my own heart. I will say that one of the things that actually helps me a lot is to go ahead and compare my husband to someone who he looks really good next to. Like if you're going to play that game, discipline yourself. If you're going to use your discipline, discipline yourself to remember that there are a lot of women out there whose husbands are at the bar tonight and they're not coming home. Like there are a lot of women who are raising children alone. There are a lot of women whose husbands are not going to work today. And a lot of the women that I know, I mean, so many women that I know are married to good men who are church going men who go to work and support their family every day. And somehow it's not enough. And it's to discipline yourself to want what you have. Do you think that the husbands feel that they feel that in her eyes it's not enough? They do. They can't help it. But no, you've written that a healthy marriage shouldn't treat sex as optional. Now, practically speaking, what does that look like? Where are the healthy boundaries? You know, and where do couples get this wrong? Because a lot of people here that may think, you know, you're suggesting consent doesn't exist in marriage, or maybe you are. Explain that. Yeah, I had some very, very angry liberal publications write about wife school. And that was one of the things that they disliked the most, I think, in all of it. So we have a passage in the epistles, 1 Corinthians 7, that says husbands and wives have authority over each other's bodies, meaning that your husband, when you get married here in a little bit, your husband's body will belong to you. And that means that it's like, it is like a, it's a thing that you now cultivate. It's now one of your jobs in life is to help cultivate this other person's body and care for it and love it. And his for you. And, and that same passage says, because of this, because you are responsible for each other in a very unique way, you should have sex often, like you should keep this up as a regular part of your life. And this is not, here's something that the wife just does for her husband to please her husband, like a wife should take her pleasure seriously and learn about it. And I think a lot of Christian women maybe misunderstand this, like they misunderstand that when you learn to accept pleasure, you are giving pleasure to, to a good normal man, like a normal guy. He wants to see that you're having a good time. And so you take that seriously, like you learn your own, you know, body with him. And it's a godly endeavor for a wife to learn how to love this institution, because it's the only hobby that God has commanded you to participate in as a couple. Like he hasn't told you, make sure that you do pickleball together, you know, like that's fine. It's a great way to build a relationship. But like, this is a thing that he said, don't neglect this thing. And then in that same passage, he, the argument is that this is a way that you protect each other from infidelity. Like, and it's not like, oh, do this, or he's going to cheat. But it's just, I like to picture it as like you and him holding up a shield. Like there's two handles on the shield, and you both have to hold the shield up to protect both of you from inevitable temptation and, you know, from without. So it's a, it's a wonderful thing that you, that you uphold it together. Do you think more marriages would be happier if women did say in the mood, but they said, sure, and they were willing to have sex anyways? Yeah. Well, we, we know this is, this is something we all know about women. It's the microwave versus the slow cooker, right? That he's ready to go quickly and she takes longer. Half of the time you go and you, you, you say yes, and you get started. And it, and it's only in, in getting started that you even start to be in the mood. Like that's just kind of how it works. You, I feel like, um, is that you kind of, it's kind of like that committing and then you, you only learn after you commit. Like you're not gonna, you're not gonna half the time feel like this is happening now until you're halfway in, you know? And it's not, I just, I don't understand why there's this sort of horrified reaction to the idea that you might start doing this wonderful, pleasurable thing that you didn't happen to be in the mood for at that moment. Like, oh no, you might experience too much pleasure that you just, that you, you know, intentionally chose to have. I don't, I'm not sure what the downside is exactly. I know I'm, I'm, you know, the, the poor single liberal writer from the Guardian who wrote an article about this was very concerned that a woman might be, I guess, mistreated sexually by her husband. And of course that would be terrible, but that is not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about you offering yourself freely to your husband and learning to accept pleasure from him. Also, like, as he, as you both age and have children, there will be seasons when it's a discipline for either of you. Like it's a discipline for him too late, you know, especially later on when you recognize we do this, we come together and we do this for the same reason we pray at night before we go to sleep. We do it because it's, it's a rhythm that is clearly good for our marriage and the, and the way that you feel after when you've made that reconnection physically will teach you that it'll teach you, oh yeah, you'll need to do that. And so I think that's, I think that's a really good thing to do. I think that's a really good thing to do. I'll never regret it. At least I never have. biomarkers tested and all of your blood work actually turns into this expensive scavenger hunt where nothing connects. So this is why I switched to Jevity. 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One night, I finally got them to bed, sat down on the couch, and then I made the mistake of eating one of those healthy, I'm saying that in quotes, tortilla chips. Well, halfway through an episode of Rock of Love on VH1, which was so much better than Love Island ever would be, I felt like I'd swallowed a Home Depot receipt, okay? I turned the bag over. Of course, there's seed oils, preservatives, natural flavors. The ingredients look like they were approved by the CIA. I mean, I didn't know anything about health then, but I knew that that wasn't good. and they tasted awful. That's why as an adult, I only keep masa chips in my house now. Three ingredients, organic nixtamalized corn, sea salt, and 100% grass-fed beef tallow. That's it. No seed oils, no mystery chemicals, just real food like your great-grandparents would have recognized. You will love the hatch chili flavor. They actually taste incredible. 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Like, he's in charge of himself. He has to be making his own decisions and deciding what his priorities are. And it's not your job to. control what those things are. I think if we're talking about confronting sin, where he's your brother in Christ and you're both commanded to watch out for each other's souls, I think there are a lot of situations I could think of where you gently, the way you would with a friend, if you've ever confronted sin in a friend, you know that it has to be done gently. But where you gently bring sin to him, to his attention, prayerfully, using scripture to show him where it is that you're seeing what you're seeing and being willing to, I guess, to have the thing explained in a way that will make it where you'll understand it better or whatever, like having an open mind. Again, the way you would with a friend. If you're talking about holding him accountable to things like he didn't pick up his socks and he didn't take the trash out and the kinds of things that I think women do tend to just just kind of tap about, just tap, just drip, drip, drip. That's, that is. That is where you're mothering him. And that's what's going to feel like mothering. And it can harm your marriage. It can. It can because it is, it communicates to him disrespect. One of my biggest fears going into marriage is, you know, what if like 20 years from now we're in the roommate stage and we've run out of things to talk about. Now, Vance makes fun of me for this. He's like, this is ridiculous. You and I both cannot stop talking. We never run out of things to talk about. This is such an irrational fear. But, you know, I don't know. You know, I've definitely seen that in people's marriages that I know. And maybe there are seasons where there will be a more roommate stage than others. But I guess, how do you overcome that? And if you are somebody listening who finds themselves in the roommate stage, what is your advice for getting out of it? Being two people who are still learning helps a lot. Like I read a lot. My husband reads a lot. If we run out of other things to talk about, there's always something that we're reading. So that tends to be a lot of our downtime conversation. Yeah. You know, but not everybody is going to be reading all the time. But you're probably listening to podcasts. Yeah. You know, you're probably learning in different ways. I think that if you're engaged with each other, running out of things to talk about, you'll feel it, I'm sure, at times. But full stop, that's not going to happen in the long run. But what could and often does happen is people who start living in the room with each other on their screens and not giving each other the honor of their attention. I hear wives complaining about this more because I think they're more aware of the fact that it is a problem. Like that. We get together in the evening, like the kids go down, we sit down, and we're both just kind of scrolling. And, you know, an hour goes by and we're still scrolling or we're Netflixing or whatever. And she's going to feel it as a pain point probably before he will, even though it's a problem for both of them. And I would say to a wife who's in that situation where she's just like, he's just not, he's not interested in conversation with me. I'm not that interested in conversation with him. You know, and you get this kind of cycle going of just disrespect. You're not giving each other the honor of attention. And you can, you can reverse that really well by giving him the honor of your attention. Like sitting down and just saying, what'd you, what did you think about today? Like, what did you accomplish at work today? Instead of being like, you're really on your phone a lot. Like, could you get off your phone? You get off your phone and talk to me? Like how, how much more irritating is it? I mean, you would feel it as an irritation if he was like, you're going to get off your phone and talk to me, you know? I mean, so what a, what a rude way. Obviously there's always a rude way to say something and there's always a. Even you just practicing there, like, you saying like, what'd you accomplish at work today? I, if I'm like thinking of myself on my phone, I'm like, oh, like that's an engaging question. That's a thoughtful question. Like I'm going to answer. But if you were to say to me, can you please get off your phone? Like I can't stand it. Can we just talk? Can we just talk? I'm immediately defensive and I'm immediately annoyed and irritable. Right. Okay. So take that and put, like, apply that to almost every area of life. And there is almost always a way of approaching, you know, a topic that's super, um, productive in a way that's, that's going to immediately put him on the defensive. And I would say the defensiveness that you would feel, you should multiply it because men are just more sensitive to disrespect. What is something that a wife thinks is loving, but it actually emasculates her husband? I can think of examples of like, where she's, she's doing like a replay with him of a social situation where he said something and she thought it wasn't the right way to say something. So she's like coaching him on the way home. Like you shouldn't, you shouldn't have said it that way or whatever. And maybe she's genuinely just trying to help him in his social skills or help, you know, helping him make a good impression. And, and he's, he, it's just, it's, you know, it's, it's you trying to control his life is what it really is. So what's the best way to handle that? You could wait until it comes up naturally, or you could not mention it and wait for him to learn on his own. And then, you know, I mean, I think that there are, maybe there are some situations where he brings it up and you can tell he's kind of wondering what was going on. And then you can offer input. I mean, I offer input into my husband's life for sure. But I just think there was a long time, or especially early in our marriage, where I was absolutely trying to manage. I was his PR lady. Like I just really, what? Like I didn't even know. Well, and as a pastor's wife, that makes sense. That's right. Because he's got all kinds of tricky situations to handle. Yeah, the stakes are so high, right? But, but let me tell you why I was doing that. It wasn't really love, pure love for my husband. It was his reputation. It was my reputation. I was trying to manage my reputation because he said something that embarrassed me. So you can remove that a little bit and remove your attempts to control. I just think that lifting him up in every way that you can, supporting the work that he's doing in every way that you can with positive, productive input, that's mostly just praise and thanks. I think that's way more productive. What is something that a husband, a woman thinks is loving, but actually is something that wounds his wife? There is this thing where he thinks he's being super loving by leaving all the decisions up to you and saying like, well, where do you want to go out to eat? By whatever couch you want, or I'm trying to think of actual decision-making that he would just kind of let go of, a decision that he could be involved in. Picking the church. Picking the church. Okay. Yeah. What do you, whatever you think, whatever. Any of those I think are great. Yeah. So things, things that in my mind, a man should be actively involved in the decision. He may think he's being so chivalrous by floating through without making decisions because it means, oh, she gets what she wants. She can decide whatever she wants. And actually it makes her feel like she has to be the mom of him as well as, you know, the kids. I think that a man should be more willing to say no to his wife sometimes. I don't know if you've heard the phrase, if he can't stand up to you, he won't be able to stand up for you. This is not a popular thing, I guess, to say, but I do think that it was very attractive to me the first time my husband said, no, we're not going to do that. And I was like, okay, honey. Okay. Like now we're talking. I just, just the idea that he's not afraid of you is extremely important in just a masculine feminine marriage relationship. Yeah. That Vance is definitely, like that with me. I'll tell you that. Right. As much as he loves my opinions and stuff, he's definitely not afraid. He's willing to oppose them. Oh, yeah. Oh, majorly. There's big things that we disagree on, even when it comes to like, I mean, we agree on all the things that are important, but like there are other things, like when it comes to like raising children or whatever, that he has a really strong opinion on that I'm like, I think I disagree, but I've already thought about that. Like, okay, I'm marrying him. So at the end of the day, if when these children arrive, if we're still on opposite ends of these things, like then I have to, I have to defer to him. That's great. What he wants to do. But I actually rest in that. The first time you actually do that, Alex, like the first time you have that thing, and I was just telling your sweet pregnant intern about this, that the stakes immediately just skyrocket when the children come. Because that's when you suddenly realize, here is this thing. I love this, this little baby more than I can imagine having loved anything before. If I mess this up, my life is, you know, like it just feels like this. It feels like the, thing that now I've got to control this or else. And this is the opportunity for you to lean into 1 Peter 3, do not fear anything that is frightening, trust the Lord, and you will have an opportunity to let go of that control with your husband, letting your husband make a decision that's not the same as what you would have made, and do that as soon as you possibly can. I'm just saying, demonstrate where it counts, where the rubber actually meets the road, that you're willing to let him take the lead in your parenting early, and you will reap the dividends in his being an active father later on. Is there anything that you think wives complain about today that previous generations just accepted as part of being married, but new generations are like always bickering about? So many things. There's so many things we complain about now. Even just like the fact that you might have, that there's a division of labor in the home, that there's anything at all in the home that wouldn't be just written down on paper and divided half by half all the way down the line between a husband and a wife. And I'm not saying it'd be, you know, wrong for y'all to share household responsibilities. I'm just saying like, yeah, there are women, there are women in my church in their fifties and their sixties, and they have never, I don't think their husband has ever made a sandwich. Like, I don't think he's ever cooked before, full stop, you know, this is in the South, you know, like it's just, this isn't a point of irritation to them. Like they, they take pride in running their home well, and they don't see it as a point of contention. I'm sure someone has written about this a lot, just about the fact that our work has changed so much in the last 150 years. And a man's work has been feminized and a woman's work has been even still more feminized because none of us are doing hard physical work anymore. Even women, I mean, even women, like I was, this past summer I was, I was milking my friend's cow because she was, she was pregnant and she was having trouble getting the milking in. So I was milking her cow and we were like harvesting chickens also last summer. And I just realized this is some of the most difficult physical work I've done in a very long time. Like, like pushing a cow around in order to get it milked is actually very difficult to do. And, and harvesting a chicken is very difficult to do, but this was normal, like farm work for, for most of history. And, and most men have never done such difficult work as that now. Like they're all, everybody's work is like this now. Yeah. Typing. It's typing. And I think that it's hard for a wife to see that her husband is doing this kind of work and to see it as the work and the, and the burden that it actually is that he, he sees the responsibility of financially providing for the family. And he feels that as a burden and a weight and it's, but it's not the weight that you could see. Maybe a hundred years ago when he was out like killing, trapping animals and, you know, doing, doing the farm labor that was, that she literally couldn't do, like her arms couldn't do it. You know, she couldn't chop down a tree. He could. So men and women needed each other in a way that I think it's, we still need each other now, but I think it's harder for us to see it now. Well, and I also think compared to previous generations, you have way more women working outside of the home, also doing nine to five jobs. And so I think that is probably where this is coming from of like everything in the house has to be divided 50, 50 because I'm not home. That's right. Cause you're, you're gone. He's gone. You come home and then it all just kind of naturally flows to you. And, and I get that. I mean, that's, it's, it's a, it's a hard thing. One thing to keep in mind, if you're in that situation where you're both working, maybe it's, you know, it's a season, maybe it's not a season, but, but in a season like that, I think it's really important to remember that you see these household tasks in a way that he just doesn't. And there are things like that that are, that are reversed. For instance, I have never gotten my oil changed since I've been married. And I just realized this the other day, like, I actually haven't thought about this. I don't, I don't worry about it. Like it doesn't even occur to me that it needs to be done. And it's just been, I guess, a natural thing that he's, you know, seen it and taken care of it. And, and I'm not saying like every man, every woman has to be the one who changes the oil and every woman has to be the one who, you know, mops the floor. I'm just saying that like, when you look at a bathroom, you probably see it differently than he does. Yeah. And that is not our nature. It is. It's just, it's not, that's not his fault. You have, you have an orientation to the environment that is deeply feminine. And it's all right to lean into that. It's also all right to say like, okay, I'm working full time. Can we, you know, get, what if, what if you do this and I do this? Like, that's totally fine. But I'm just saying, recognize that he may not do it the way that you wanted it done. And you got to be okay with that. What is an opinion about marriage that you have changed your mind on the most since being married? When I got married, I thought that submission was basically just wait until you have a big picture decision that you disagree about, like whether to vaccinate your kids or something, and then kind of argue about it a little bit. And then if you can't reach an agreement, defer. And like, I thought that's kind of what submission is. And I did not understand that submission and his honoring you as, as the woman is a pattern of day-to-day interactions that are deeply masculine and feminine. And there's a way of being in all of the everyday little moments that show honor or show disrespect for both, for both of you. And a lot of it comes down to just how you speak to each other. Like, can you give an example? When he comes home at the end of the day and I keep doing what I'm doing and don't even look up and greet him, that's a demonstration. That's an opportunity to demonstrate honor by saying hello and greeting him, um, or an opportunity to communicate to him. I have a life that's separate from you. And, and I'm, I'm, you know, I don't care basically that you got home when, when anyone else who came home, you would stop and you would greet them. Like anyone, any friend who dropped in, you would stop everything and you would go say, hello. But also even just things like, um, telling the kids, you know, I'm not sure about that. Let's ask daddy. Um, or finding ways just in everyday conversation to prioritize him even over the children, which that's a, that'll get me in hot water probably to say, but when, when our kids were toddlers, I would let them interrupt Justin all the time. Like we'd be in the car and he's, he's telling me a story. He's saying something and the two-year-old starts talking in the backseat. And I say, wait one second. What is it, honey? Over and over and over again. And it doesn't, I mean, it sounds perfectly reasonable, right? Like it's a two-year-old you're so excited. They're just, they're learning to talk. Like you don't want to shut that down. But what it communicated was this two-year-old is more important than he is. And it's not like he would, I don't think he even knew that he was being disrespected, but I noticed over time, this is a problem. Like I'm, I'm regularly letting the kids talk. And I'm like, well, the kids know you're more important and you, you get to talk even when an adult is talking, which is a problem in itself. So that to, so to the two-year-old, the message is I am the most important thing in the world. But also to your husband, it's a message that says, you know, you're not the priority. So you became convicted over that on your own. I did. Yeah. And then just started to actively try to change it. Did you notice positive differences when you stopped letting your kids interrupt your husband? Yes. Yes. I mean, it's, it's, I mean, any human being would, would understand that this is a demonstration of respect to say, Oh no, no, no. Daddy was talking and to keep like, to let him finish his story. Like that's just, that's just normal human, you know, polite interaction. So it's something the kids have to learn too. I don't think that he has ever had a, an active complaint in the marriage about being disrespected. I've never, I've always heard him say, you know, you're a, you're a great wife. I, you know, I just, you're doing a great job. Like, but I, I have noticed a big difference since I started actively doing some of the things that I was not doing. He just, he leads better. He's, um, he's more confident in what he's doing. I think he's less irritable. I think I used to just think he's just kind of an irritable guy. And, um, I didn't know how much I was really actively contributing to that. So introspective and wise, I think of you to kind of have that, like step away from the situation, assess, like, could I be contributing to him being a more irritable person? Well, that's definitely something that I think women are training each other online since I've, I've been back on Instagram for six months or so and it's a wild West out there. Oh my goodness. Um, just watching women advise women and train each other to never question yourself, like never question your motives, never question your, your, your, your, question that you might possibly be able to just, um, change your course. Well, and that's, I think that's super dangerous rhetoric, especially for Christian women to fall into because where that's taking you is a place of you're sinless. Right. And we know, we know from scripture that we are not, like if we're not, if we don't sin, then we're, we don't have access to the great, like we want to be Christians, right? And we cannot trust our hearts. Our hearts can be wrong and have wrong desires. Right. Right. So it's just like Christianity 101 to recognize that You are suspect on some level and that sin will trick you. It will affect your mind as well as the rest of you. I have a terrible habit. I'll be researching for an interview, writing scripts, recording a podcast, giving a speech, and then suddenly it's four in the afternoon and I realize, oh, I have had approximately a cup of coffee and positive intentions. I know. Now, don't yell at me. Some people stress eat. I accidentally stress fast, which is why I always keep Prima protein bars in my bag. Because if you're someone who struggles to eat enough, getting 21 grams of complete protein is a total game changer, especially in only one bar. It's made with grass-fed whey plus grass-fed collagen, and it's sweetened with raw organic honey instead of a bunch of artificial junk and sugar. I also love that every ingredient actually looks like food. Egg yolk as a binder. No seed oils, no gums, no emulsifiers. My rule is pretty simple. If I wouldn't keep the ingredient in my own kitchen, I probably. probably don't want it in my protein bar either. Protein isn't just for people to look like they wrestle bears. It's foundational for hormones, metabolism, blood sugar balance, and actually staying full between meals. So whether you're constantly on the go like me or you just need something that you can throw in your purse to give to yourself or kids that doesn't taste like cardboard, Prima protein bars are the only protein bar I eat. Go to eatprima.com. Use code alexclark20. That's eatprima.com. Code alexclark20 for 20% off your order. That's alexclark20 at eatprima.com or find them at Sprouts, Kroger's. King Soopers and Ralph's Nationwide. You ever been on a first date with someone and they hit you with, so, did you vote? And you have that moment where you're like, okay, wait, do I lie? Do I cry? Do I explain that there was a typo on my voter registration and I didn't find out until it was too late? Because that's the reality. Most people think they're registered. They assume everything is fine. Meanwhile, like one in four people either aren't registered to vote or aren't even sure. And you don't realize it until you're standing there looking like you just failed a citizenship test. You move. You change your name. You haven't voted. You haven't voted in a while or there's just some random error. So, if you want to make sure that you're registered to vote, go to realalexclark.com slash vote. You can check your registration in like 30 seconds from your phone. Realalexclark.com slash vote. It walks you through everything. Just handle it now so you're not explaining typos on the first date. If you're a young woman and you know one day you'd love to be married, but you're not even dating anyone at this point. I mean, you're really young. What advice would you give her just as a woman? As a way to best prepare for marriage one day, knowing sometime in your future that might be something you want. Yeah. So, what I always tell young women who ask me this question is acquire skills. Like, spend all this excess energy that you have that is I want to be married energy and use that energy to acquire all of the skills that you possibly can and become a person who knows how to grab life and take advantage of it. Take ownership of your faith and repent to people that you know you're already in relationship with. There are already people that you can practice good relationship with by learning to confess then to them, to have conversation with them and not just live here. There are so many things that you can do to become a more alive person. And none of that stuff is ever going to go to waste in your life. It's not going to stop when you get married that suddenly you don't have to grow anymore. So, start now. And every skill that you acquire is going to bless your future life, whether you're married or single. I also think that a lot of women, single and married, are passive about their faith in a really weird way. I think, especially in certain pockets, I think of Christianity, there's a feeling that your husband is supposed to be a spiritual leader. And so, that means you're not in charge of pursuing spiritual maturity. I'm waiting on him. I'm waiting on him to lead me so that I can be, so that I can grow. And it's just not true. You know, you're not going to be mediating, your husband's not going to mediate your relationship with the Lord. When you stand before the Lord on the final day, you'll stand alone and you'll be covered by Christ. He's your mediator. So, your husband is not mediating between you and the Lord. You can pray for your husband now. You can pray with your husband. You can pray with your husband now. You can read the Bible and grow in your understanding. Like, these are things that you're responsible for. And what a blessing if you have a Christian husband who is pursuing those things as well. What needs to happen if both spouses feel unappreciated? Someone's got to end the cycle. Right? And how many men have we heard who maybe wouldn't say this out loud, but are basically saying, I'll love her when she's lovable. Like, when she earns love, I'll love her. Yeah. Because women are also saying, I will respect him when he becomes respectable. When he earns my respect, then I will give it. It's a stalemate. You know? They can live that way for 50 years. Imagine if the gospel was based on that. Right. Only if we're lovable. Right. Right. Imagine if that's what Christ had said. Yeah. So, you as a woman have every opportunity to go ahead and interrupt that cycle and you continue. Do it by pouring respect and love on your husband and honor. There's an illustration that I started using, I guess, last year sometime where I realized a lot of women think of themselves as like the check engine light of their relationship. Like, their job is they're going to see that something's wrong. Like, you're not growing spiritually or you're not doing that well at work or the kids are having a problem. We need to do this thing. So, they see themselves as kind of like, my job is to alert him when there's a problem. And truly, she is more likely to see a problem than he is. She's oriented so much towards the family and towards him that she's going to see flaws in him where he's not going to notice as many in her because he's just, he's not thinking about her and analyzing her as much as she is him. It's just, it's a woman thing. So, she sees the problem. She sees the flaws and she thinks, my job is. To bring this stuff to his attention. Like, you need to work out more. You're not very healthy. You need to be, I think you need to be doing devotions of some kind. Like, you know, you need to be doing this. You need to be doing this. So, she's beeping at him all the time. And she doesn't understand that if she were to see herself as the fuel tank of the relationship instead of the check engine light, she would get so much more mileage. Man, I'm just piling the car metaphors on. The mileage. She would get so much more power and for good in the relationship. She would be so much more effective as a helper to him if she learned that one of her big jobs is to see where he's excelling or even just where he's faithfully plugging and to point those things out to him in gratitude. It changes her, but it really does change him. I asked the audience to submit. Okay. A lot of their own questions. Just because I got so many questions after our first interview. I'm like, I don't know why you're asking me. I'm in the same boat as you. I have no idea. So, a lot of these are from them. One says, when one spouse is grieving the children they hoped they'd have, how do you protect your marriage while you're both carrying that loss differently? I guess this is a couple that is having trouble having children. Right. And she would feel it probably differently than him. Yeah. I think it's helpful in those situations. We had a couple of early miscarriages early in our marriage, and I do remember it being different for me than for him. I think it was really helpful for me to just learn to very, very clearly describe what I was feeling and then be understanding that he's not going to experience it the same way as me. It's my body. It's my gut. I'm not gifting as a woman that I can nurture life, and so it's especially painful when you find that your body is either not able to or something has gone wrong in that way. It's so impactful to your heart. And I think it's also just important to remember to spend sweet time with each other, doing things that you enjoy, even as you're mourning. And don't let yourself go off and be alone in a room for days and days. You need to continue to connect with each other, even in loss. My husband has lost the art of being a gentleman to me. I miss when he used to open doors for me or pull out my chair. How can I get that husband back? Focus on acting like the lady who receives things like that. So I would say, wait for a moment where he does something, you know, gentlemanly of any kind, or even just thank you for going to work and supporting us today. Begin that. Begin to say, to point out things like that, and you'll get more of what you point out and thank. And I know, I know you could, you can, your response could be, well, he's never going to pull out my chair. How can I thank him for pulling out my chair? Cause he's not doing it. But there's something in your life that you can thank him for some, some masculine husbandly thing that he does and you can find it and point it out. And I know that you'll get more of the same, but you also need to not be keeping a tally over on the side, like to be remembering, well, he used to pull out my chair, open the door, walk on the outside of the pavement, choose the restaurant. like to remember this is how it was And I need I need all those things back. And I'm going to be waiting, you know, until those things happen. Don't keep that tally. You're you're married now for I don't know how long. It's a different relationship now than it was. And you'll find this as you grow together and you have children together and then they become teenagers and then you start aging and dying together, which is another journey. Is the best way to describe marriage like you're constantly in new relationships with the same person? Yes. OK, that's a good way to describe it. Because all these seasons and differences is like, OK, who is this person going to be now? Who's this person going to be now? But you're still actively choosing to love them through all those different iterations of the same person. That's right. That's right. And it's true because they they take on new roles as the seasons go by. I have really close friends who are becoming grandparents right now and they're in their 40s, you know, and they probably don't feel like, wow, I should be a grandmother. But this is the role they're about to take on. And so her husband then gets to watch her take on this new role, you know, where you didn't think of yourself in this way. But here's a new hat that you're putting on. And your husband is doing that all the time, too, as he takes on new new responsibilities and you form new relationships with other couples and become different people with them. Like it's it is amazing. Your husband is always a stranger in some ways because there's always some part of him that you don't know. Mm hmm. How do you maintain intimacy? As new parents with difficulty. So just like managing expectations, acknowledging, hey, yes, we're about to have this baby. I'm going to be so tired. You're going to be so tight. Both of you are going to be so tired. You're going to you're going to not know what hit you because it's a truck that hits you. And it's unbelievable and great. But you're going to have to learn new disciplines to enjoy each other. Take opportunities for sweet times of just kindness. To each other when you don't feel like it because you had to get up last night, you know, and don't keep don't keep records. This person says my husband said he isn't attracted to me anymore and I'm totally insecure and crushed. I don't know how to get over this. I guess. I mean, yeah, to a woman whose husband is willing to say something like that to her. I think it would be totally natural and right for her to communicate clearly. That was crushing for you to say that was crushing. Then for her to go to the Lord and ask for his help because when you are married to a person they have access to the soft parts of you and if they're willing to hurt you in the soft parts of your of your heart, it's they have a lot of power to do that, you know, and the Lord is with her and he has offered unconditional love to her. What her husband says cannot alter. Change that but I think it's totally totally fine to treat something like that as this is a wound, you know, and it's a wound that I'm gonna have to bring to the Lord for help with because it hurts, you know, I have no idea what your personal opinions are on this co-sleeping is massive with my audience massive almost everybody is choosing to do that in their own families. I have my own opinions, but this person's husband is asking her. Can we please stop? Co-sleeping and she does not want to submit on this issue. She thinks that it is harmful to their children to deny them the ability to sleep with them. She thinks there's a lot of benefits for development, whatever. And so she wants to know from you. I as a mother feel like this is a terrible move for my children's emotional well-being to not co-sleep with them. My husband is asking me basically I think she wants an excuse of do I not have to submit on this? Can I fight for this? Right. I'm so glad you brought that's such a great specific example. And I bet that there are a lot like that for your listeners specifically because you know that they're health conscious. So they're going to have some strong opinions about things that their husbands may not share. So co-sleeping I co-slept quite a bit sometimes not even intending to but it's just so easy to nurse in the night with that baby. So always bringing babies in in bed to nurse and there was all with all four of our children. There was a point where my husband was like this child has got to learn to sleep. On their own so different ages with different ones, but there would be a point where he would say I am bodily lifting this child off of your body because you don't you can't I just I didn't even have the wherewithal to try to sleep train anybody. So he would just pick them up take them to a crib and put them in the crib and that would happen. I think that happened at some stage with all four of the kids. It was super helpful honestly because when when that did finally happen. I realized. That I had not been sleeping that well and I love I still love co-sleeping. I think it's great actually, but there was a time where it was time to be done. And it's it's his bed with you, you know, and I've known families who were co-sleeping up into way past where I would have thought that would be a good idea. So I don't know what kind of co-sleeping we're talking about here, but I guess I'm just saying I think that you should listen take your husband's lead on this. They are families I know and in my audience even that you know, they've got eight or nine-year-olds in bed with them. I mean, they just never leave that's outrageous. I'm sorry Yeah, I agree Okay, this person says I know my husband loves me but our marriage has become dry I want to feel that my husband appreciates me. I feel needy begging for just an unexpected kiss or a hug How did we get here? Well, we all have things that we want in them in them and we get really specific about it I think it take it takes us a few months of like I'm not I don't know what I'm doing. I'm unhappy about what am I unhappy about? I know what it is. He's not kissing me unexpectedly That's what it is. So we get a very specific. I think like if I can rat it rectify this. That's right. That's right It'll be and I think this is the kind of thing that women do a lot that I don't hear men doing as much which is just to try really hard to come up with a specific set of Desires that are going to make everything better so like if we could just move Into a better house. Yeah. Yeah, if we could just so we do this in life all the time but we do it in our relationships by Making a little list in our minds of like if he would just change in this way I would be happy if he would just show me affection in this particular way. I like I want surprise kisses That's it or like I need a date night that he plans. So it's it's always specific But what you really need to be careful about because it happens all the time with the women that I'm speaking to is that you Move the goalposts You think that if he was just gonna do this one thing that you require that everything would be good but I'm telling you what will happen is that he will start kissing you unexpectedly or whatever it is you asked him to do and There will be a new thing that emerges that you realize actually this is the thing that I needed I need him to take me away for the weekend every once in a while and that that would really show me so I'm not saying that there's that this is all relative like I You know that that some that there's not an Unaffectionate marriage that's genuinely an unaffectionate marriage. I guess I'm just saying beware of being overly demanding about specific thresholds that you've created for him to meet and Focus I think I would focus your efforts on showing affection to him Yeah, because that's what you is that your your jam like go kiss him unexpectedly, you know it it generally Generates more of the same. Okay, this is a detailed question How can a couple build a shared vision for their marriage when one spouse values playfulness caution with money and simplicity? While the other values emotional leadership Intentional experiences and growing the family. I think this is the real question How do you move from compromising issue by issue to actually creating a shared direction for your marriage? I have an answer for this, but They're probably not gonna like it Oh Because it means at some point you're gonna have to look at what his vision is for the family and say How can I align myself better with this vision? Yeah, how can I become the engine that tries to push his? his idea forward of what you know his priority and I know it there there will be a feeling of like, okay. What about all my great ideas? There will be a use for those ideas, but I'm just saying you've got to communicate to him Clearly I am on board with your direction for this family Yeah He has got to feel like he's got the freedom to set some course, but it looks like to me in this question I have more easygoing and she's got more ideas. Yeah, so I think I'm describing the husband like right He like loves to be playful and he doesn't want to spend a lot of money and I'm like, can we get serious? Can we start talking about how we're gonna? Intentionally grow our family and have kids and put the money aside for that and spend money in order to do that We need a bigger house to have you know, I'm this is what I'm watching based on the question Yeah, so it's like so she's wanting this like leader that's making decisions for the family She I think she feels like he's not then. How does she submit? Yeah, absolutely. Well, that's the most common problem honestly, it's it's she's got very clear ideas for what needs to happen and he's more kind of See it taken every day. Yeah, and that's a very very common dynamic from what I've seen So what I would say is well, I'll take the example of like the kind of husband And he wants to, like, take the kids out for ice cream. And she's like, actually, we ate vegetable, you know, we're trying to eat healthy. I don't really want to spend the money. Like she's got a lot of reasons why they don't need to go out for ice cream tonight. And so she's got a decision to make about embracing the fact that he's a dad who wants to go have a good time bringing, you know, taking his kids for ice cream. She can embrace that or she can make it a really unfun night. And so if you take that one situation and sort of apply it more broadly, it is recognizing, okay, my husband is an entrepreneur-ish type. Like our future is going to look a little different than somebody else's future because he might start businesses and they might fail. Am I willing to be along for the ride? Like, am I willing to be the person on the tandem bike who's pedaling really hard while he goes in directions that I wasn't really picturing, you know? And, and I would say with the, he's just not making any decisions. Like things are just stagnant. He's not making any changes. He's not saving for, you know, whatever the, the kind of specific plans she would like to see him making and he's not making them at all. I do think I've got, I've got some things in my course where I call them leadership pitches and it's basically like you pitching decisions to him in a way that is open and not condemning, like, why didn't you make this decision already? But just more like. Okay. I'm looking at these two curriculums. Which one do you think I should use? Would you tell me which one you, you like or. And what if his answer is, I don't know, whatever you care, you pick, then you pick, then you do what he, you know, sometimes he is just, I'm delegating this, you know, I'm totally, I'm delegating it. But when you can, when you continue to bring things to him like that, it begins to send him the, and then go with what he says and not just go with whatever you, you already thought. It begins to send him the signal. That says, oh, this is actually my job is I, I'm making decisions that affect this whole family. Oh, she actually wants my input. Oh, she actually values my opinion. You know, sometimes women are like, my husband has terrible judgment. He's not, you know, he's just kind of an idiot. I mean, I'm just amazed at what women think about their husbands, but often they haven't let their husband make a decision in like 10 years, you know, and their husband knows that they think they're an idiot because they get, they get that. That message every day, you know, so get showing him that you value his judgment by asking for his input. When my fiance, Vance was little, his family was actually approached by multiple TV shows and networks wanting to make a show about them because there are 10 vote burn kids and they're basically all musical prodigies. Now, Vance is going to hate me saying that because he's very modest, but at 12 years old, he was national fiddle champion. Just ask Candace Owens. She knows. It's all about it. 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Well, that rabbit hole eventually led them to wool and an old wool mill in Montana. Today, wool Shire makes pillows with pure virgin wool from American flocks and American grown organic cotton. So there's actually traceability behind what you're sleeping on. No additives in your pillow. No chemical treatments, no greenwashing, because I'm sorry. Why are we letting petrochemical companies take their byproducts, fluff them up and put them inside a pillow and convince us that that's great and we should be sleeping on that? No, you spend roughly a third of your life sleeping. I want my pillow to be completely traceable and all natural fibers and nothing weird from a petrochemical company. Go to woolshire.com. Use code Alex 10 for 10% off your order of totally non-toxic pillows. That's woolshire.com. Code Alex 10 for 10% off non-toxic wool pillows that are phenomenal. I've got them in my room and my guest room. What is the godly way to handle overbearing in-laws? We are to honor our parents. We're to honor our parents in the Lord. So the people at church that we respect and learn from, we honor the legacy that they've passed on to us. And we're to honor our parents. Even our underprivileged. Even believing parents who are maybe horrible. There's a way to honor. So we have to find out what that way is. And I think some of it is just honor within boundaries. Yeah. You don't have, like they're not in charge of your life. You have your own family. You left them and cleaved to each other so that neither of your parents are now in charge of your family that you're building together. But you don't speak disrespectfully to them or about them. You don't. You don't. You don't take every opportunity to complain about them to other people or to your husband. I've noticed this a lot in marriage that you help each other honor each other's parents because there are going to be moments when one or both of you is tempted to just mouth off about them, you know, like just kind of vent. And my husband is so, has blessed me so much in not liking to talk badly about people. Like if I, if I ever, just a couple of months ago, I was, I was asking him, well, what was it that person did? You know, someone had like wrecked their ministry and I was curious about the details. What, what did they do? And he's like, you don't need to know that. He's like, we don't need to talk about that. It wasn't part of my, like it wasn't touching my life or affecting my life at all. He has no appetite for talking badly about people. So that, that is the kind of thing you can lead each other in, I think, in the marriage about your parents to honor and not have a, not have an appetite for the morsel. What is the healthiest way to, to manage each other's burdens in marriage? Pray with each other. If you can start the habit early of praying for like two minutes before you fall asleep, it will change the trajectory of your marriage because the burden that you didn't even know you were carrying will come out in that moment and you will both be able to cast it off on the Lord and you'll be able to lift each other up before the Lord. How many times, how many times my husband has been struggling under something in ministry and praying 60 seconds for him, I can, I can see that it lifts things off of it. And how many times he's prayed for me when I was just a hot mess, you know, luteal phase, hot mess. What are the first steps to take when you're trapped in a sexless marriage? I know that there are women who approach their husbands and are turned, are turned away, like who are shut down. I know that, I know that those women are out there. I know that there are probably more men out there. Who've, who have that experience, but I know some women who've had that experience and I guess aside from just making overtures, I don't know that there's anything to do but pray. I think that if you're in the church and you're in a totally sexless marriage, it is the kind of thing you could bring to a pastor. Yeah. Cause it's, it is actually, someone's in disobedience if that's, if that's happening in a marriage. I agree with that. I also think that if it's a man who is. If he's turning you down for sex often and regularly, I would say there is. It might be something physical. Yeah. There's a hormonal, like he's got low testosterone that needs, that needs checked. And I almost wonder if just bringing it to him, like, Hey, like not even complaining about the sex part, maybe, but if also I've never been married, so I'm just thinking out loud, brainstorming, like what I would do in this situation. But I would be like, Hey, you know, I'm really interested in running my laps. It's been a while since I've seen what's going on with my hormones. I think it'd be a really great idea if we do this together. Just see where we're at so that that way, like if it is a medical thing, then the doc, the doctor reading the labs and be like, Hey, there's some, there's something really, do you experience like you're not in, you have no appetite for sex. You, you know, do you feel like super emotional all the time as a man? That's like abnormal, you know, those different things. I feel like let the, let the health practitioner say it. And that's, I think that that's really true in so many areas of life. And it's a frustrating thing, but it's just the truth that men listen to expertise and men listen to other men. And there have been a lot of times that. I had patiently hinted about something for a year and then, you know, his best friend it to him and he comes back joking to me about like, man, you'll never guess what what so-and-so said. I should really I should really do something about that. Yeah. Just realize, you know, he knows it, too. I mean, it's a joke between us that that he it just it's a different thing to hear it from a man. And I mean, this you don't have to be married to know about low testosterone. I mean, I know this from talking to experts on the show, but like, you know, encouraging him weightlifting, changing diet, you know, if he's primarily eating ultra processed food, that's really going to wreck testosterone hormone levels for both of you, really. So I mean, those are practical things. I'm going to say this, though, and this is the kind of thing is the kind of thing that you that I hear all the time, honestly, is women who want their men to take better care of their bodies. Yeah. And it's it's it's just a super common complaint. And I have watched marriages where the woman is on him about what he's eating for 20 years. And guess what? She gets she gets nowhere. Like he is no closer to eating healthy food because of her kind of harassing him about it all the time. And that's honestly, that's one of the best examples I can think of of an area of life where you can you can lead a horse to water, but you can't like you can cook great food. You know, you can bless him. You can cook things that, you know, he loves that you find a way to make nourishing and awesome. You know, that's all great. But you cannot manage his life for him. And when if he wants to take care of his body in those particular ways, he will do it. And maybe some some friend of his starts lifting and invite, you know, like you never know what may happen in the future, but you cannot manage him into caring about that. But and we can also be examples as women. You know, if we're eating healthier or we're working out, we can just be talking about like, man, I feel so great. Like I've cut out fast food and I'm feeling like a million dollars. And just talk about your own experience. That's it. Not asking him to do it. Join you. Like just kind of leading by example thing. Yeah, I feel like that can be helpful. Very good. When is it OK to leave a marriage? I think biblically we have a pattern of infidelity is a is a grounds for marriage. This is the way I interpret the words of Jesus on this topic is that if there's sexual infidelity, you have grounds to leave your marriage. I think that if you're physically unsafe in your marriage, you could really you should you should make yourself safe and definitely make your children safe. I try to be careful. And talking about abuse in languages that are going to change the definition of the word abuse, which is something that I'm seeing online also speaking of Instagram, I think because in a really healthy way, the church and the world at large has has opened up the conversation about abuse and what it can look like and that it can look in ways that we don't maybe expect. Um, but I think because of that, you have a lot of women online really eager to label their husbands as narcissists. What are some other labels we give? I think that once we get emotionally abusive, emotionally abusive. And I just think it's very important as we have these conversations with each other, like you're talking to a friend who's who's starting to use those kinds of words. It's really important that we be specific about what we mean, because I have I have heard stories of women who said I'm in an emotionally abusive marriage. I'm in an emotionally abusive marriage. And asked for specifics. She said he always eats the good bread, leaves the bad bread for me. Like, that's just a story that is in my memory, because you can't forget it. Like, it's so important that we that we use specific examples to understand what what are we talking about here. And I really like biblical language. I've been reading a couple books about like biblical counseling type books about abuse, where they use language of oppression, instead, which is a bit more of a biblical term. And if you use language of oppression, I think it, it also helps to clarify a little bit what what can happen with men who are oppressing their wives in in a relationship, like just using the power of the relationship to cause pain, you know. But I also think it clarifies the fact that women can really do this with men, too, even though men are more physically powerful. I think in some ways, women are more emotionally or relationally powerful. And so I've just known so many marriages where I feel like the woman kind of just has the power in the relationship and uses it to his disadvantage, and to cause pain, you know, and it looks very different than when you when you have a man abusing a woman. But I think that the language of oppression maybe is helpful, because it helps you to say, Okay, what kind of a thing are we talking about here? And to be really specific and clear? Is it a valid reason to end a marriage if you don't feel in love with your spouse, anymore? No, it is not. If you're a Christian, and you're married, the Bible has nowhere given you that as a rubric, not even for getting married, much less for whether you're going to stay in your marriage. It's a covenant. And language of love is used in Scripture all the time around it. But has anyone ever come up with a definition for in love that makes sense to anyone? Like, every time I watch a movie, I'm like, when, when did we get this? Capital I, capital L in love, like legal term that is used in all the movies where there's always like a moment in the movie where someone says, I realized I was always I was, you know, confused about it all. But now I've suddenly realized I'm in love with him. And the person they're talking to is always like, Oh, yes, everything's different than you're in. You're telling me you're in love. And as if we know what what are they talking about? Like, what? What is that? Does anyone know what that actually means? I think it just means surprise that someone is attracted to you or newness, maybe, like novelty. I don't know what else in love is made out of. So love is not like that. And in the Bible, love is an act, an active thing that you pursue. First Corinthians 13 has a really great description of love, but it's not. It's not the movie's. What is the best strategy to rebuild trust after it has been broken and doing so without holding on to bitterness? I was just reading Matthew 18 yesterday. And Matthew 18 is that passage where when you have a you have a problem with your brother, you go with your brother in the Lord, you go and you you confront him with his sin if he's sinned against you. And if he doesn't listen to you, you go and get another friend and you you bring another friend and confront him. And if he doesn't listen, then you bring it to the church. And so there's this sort of step by step process with dealing with sin in the church. And that passage flows immediately into a conversation about forgiveness and about the fact that you have been forgiven so much where the disciples are asking Jesus, like, are you saying that we should forgive people even if they sin like seven times against us? And he's like, I'm saying 70 times you should forgive because you are the servant who was forgiven, you know, 40 years worth of salary and you don't go out and collar your friend and shake, you know, grab him by the shirt and say, give me my one day's salary. You've been you've been forgiven so much more by God than you've ever had to forgive any other person in a marriage. There are there are always things to forgive. And you he is having to bear with and forgive you so many things day in and day out. There are just little things that you can some of them are just irritations, but some of them are, you know, sin. And if you forget where you stand before the Lord as a forgiven person, you will begin to keep accounts. You may you can make it right with each other. And that helps a lot if you're continually confessing sin to each other and forgiving. But you can begin to keep a little list in your mind that you use, you know, what about for the really significant troubles for the huge, you know, which can be one big thing all at once, or it can be medium betrayals that just go on. You know, I think if you've decided to stay in the marriage, and you've said, I forgive you, it doesn't mean that it's not going to hurt, or that you're not going to have to actively lay it before the Lord again later, because it's going to keep hurting. And one of the signs of repentance in a person is that they're willing to accept that, like to accept that there are consequences to your sin that mean your wife can't trust you right now, and that your wife is hurting. And the more that they balk and complain about the fact that there are consequences, I think the further they are from repentance. I was going to say that too. How do you submit to a husband who is spiritually weaker and a baby Christian? There is that beautiful passage that I think we talked about last year in 1 Peter 3 that talks about being married to an unbeliever. Um, and it's funny because I've had women email me since last year to tell their story of being married to an unbeliever. Some of them whose husbands are still unbelievers and some who's, who were telling the story to say, I won my husband without a word, like to say that the passage talks about showing honor to your unbelieving husband, um, not trying to like force feed him the Bible until he grows or until he, you know, becomes a Christian, but to show kindness and honor. and respect to him and let the Lord do his work. of the ladies told me their story of how that's exactly what happened actually in their marriage because she became a Christian first. I think they were both from unbelieving backgrounds in that case. So assuming that that can be done with a man who's not got the Holy Spirit at all, is not even a Christian, can it be done for a man who's just further behind, I guess? And also, you may find that he's not as immature in relation to you as you think. I believe that when I got married, I thought I was further along than I really was. And it is amazing how after years of marriage, you start to see that their way of interacting with him is maybe different than yours. And not to relativize it. I mean, obviously, there are clear signs of that. But I think that's the way it is. There are clear signs of maturity and immaturity in a believer. But you can show honor to a man who's not even a believer at all. So can you show honor to a man who's just maybe not doing the things you think a mature Christian should do? I heard such a cool testimony. Somebody, an older lady, was talking about her father, who's now passed. But her dad, her whole life, all the siblings, the mother, everybody was a Christian except the father. And they loved their dad, and they were constantly trying to share the gospel with him. But he just did not. And he just didn't want anything to do with it their entire life. Well, then he becomes a very, very old man. He's like 99 years old. And all these siblings over all these decades have been trying to get him saved. He was not interested. And then I think it was like a random stranger or something was just like, one day, would you like to know Jesus? And he was like, yeah. And then he accepted Christ. I mean, basically on his deathbed. And then he, I mean, he says yes, but then is very like, just talking at his assisted living home or whatever about like, let me tell you about Jesus. I mean, and it was like a total miracle at the very, very, very end of his life. And so I'm not saying that wouldn't be difficult to be married to somebody who's an unbeliever, but that was just such a cool story. Can you trust the Lord with your husband? Do you believe that when people change, it's because God has worked and moved? Yeah. Can you trust him with that? This person says, my husband goes to church. He's in line with the word, but he refuses to join any men's group or be discipled by older, wiser men. Any advice? This is a classic example to me of the moving goalposts. So he's in church, he's doing this thing, but I wish that he was in a men's group. He joins a men's group. I really, if he was learning from the other men in the men's group, he'd be doing family devotions. We're doing family devotions, but, and I heard a woman had said this to me recently. I wanted him to do family devotions. I asked him about it all the time for years. He started doing family devotions, and it just wasn't what I thought it was going to be. Yeah. Or then it's like, then I want him to become a deacon. That's right. Yeah, I know. And I've known women who, I don't think the man even really cared about being a deacon, but she wanted him to be an elder or a deacon so bad that you could just see it was like compelling and propelling everything that she did. Yeah. It's just, you cannot set spiritual goals for your husband. You've got to set them for yourself. That's your job. I like that. This is interesting. If you are the breadwinner as the wife, how do you still let him feel like he is providing? Well, I assume that in that case, he's doing something. I can't, I can't picture right now what it would be, but he's doing something to build your family together. He's around, right? Maybe he's in school or maybe he's with the kids right now, or maybe he's sick. I don't know. I don't know what, what would lead to something like that where he's not at work and she is, but. Or maybe she just makes more money. Okay. Yeah. So yeah, if you, if you happen to make more money than him, then just recognize that that may be true, but he still feels the responsibility for your family staying whole and being provided for. Like he feels that. He can't not feel that. Yeah. I guess it just means you have to be even more careful about bringing decisions, bringing input, bringing all those little cues of letting yourself and the kids and him know, I think of him as the leader of this family. We need daddy. How do you balance a spouse who loves to open up the home, having people in and out all the time, somebody new for dinner every night with a very serious introvert, who is not interested in having people over. I've known women who wanted to have people over more than their husbands, I think more often than the other way around. And definitely some of them just accept the fact that we just, we have people over for supper about once a month and that's what we do. Yeah. Yeah. Vance is way more extroverted than I am. Okay. Yep. Yeah. So in that case, I mean, you may learn somebody's question, right. You know, let's, let's say it's the other way. You might have to learn something. You might have to learn some skills. Oh, I know. I already know that's the case. I know it. Um, this person says my husband is indecisive about big issues for our family. I've asked him a million times to seek counsel, but he won't. And he still hasn't made a decision. I'm losing my mind. I don't love the ask, ask him to go get counsel thing. Um, cause it just, it feels like a management. It feels like a management move. It feels like you're trying to go and control him. I've, I've never heard of it turning out. Well, when I'm, when a woman's like, you need to go talk to so-and-so about this, because I really think you need some input on this thing. Like go, you need to go talk to, you know, Tom, because Tom is really great at blah, blah, blah. Like, is that a subtle way we disrespect our husbands? I think so. I mean, I, I would, even if it was me, I think I would, I don't know how I would feel about it. I guess I just think usually it works better to bring, bring the decision to him and then just wait. And sometimes I'll say, let me know what you decide. And I like that phrase a lot because it lets him know, like, I'm actively part of the solution here. Like I'm, I'm wanting to be part of the solution, but I'm also, I'm waiting on you to tell me what you want me to do. I think we rush in a little bit. Sometimes we rush to get to a solution because we're just not willing to wait on his timing. My husband is amazing with me, but doesn't seem to have any true desire to spend much time with our children. I thought it would grow as they've gotten older, but it hasn't. I don't think so. I don't think so. I don't think so. I don't think it hasn't. It's a deep pain in my heart. I know that there are all kinds of ways that we can facilitate, you know, daddy child time. Like, Hey, why don't you, you want to take so-and-so out for coffee? My, my husband takes our kids out for coffee dates. That's like what we do. I'll stay home and do this if y'all want to go get coffee. So there are like fun, I guess, fun ways that you could have of inviting him to spend time with one of the kids or something, you know, he loves doing that. I don't know. I'm just trying to think of things that are going to be more of an invitation than a guilt trip, because I don't think we realize how often our suggestions come off as a guilt trip. And then the other thing I would just say is you've got to, you've got to pray. Like you, you're not going to be able to, there's so many, and parenting is just like this. It's so, it makes you feel so powerless because you are powerless. And, because no matter how hard you try, you know that you're failing your kids in some ways, and you see your husband failing your kids in some ways. It's inevitable. It just, if you, if you'll let it drive you to the Lord, it will. But if you don't let it drive you to the Lord, you will turn into a hand-wringing, shrill, worrying woman, because the stakes are high. You care about these kids. So pray for, pray for your relationship, the relationship with with dad and the kids. Pray for those things. They do matter. If the husband wants to go to a church where the wife disagrees with the theology, what should she do? Yeah. I mean, I think if it's a really major theological issue, I think it would be really wise for a husband not to, not to press if it's really violating her conscience in some way. I can, I'm trying to think of specifics, but if it's just like, well, I don't really love this music over this music. music, or I'm a, how about this? You're a Baptist and you marry a Presbyterian. I think you should probably just go to the Presbyterian church and just deal with it. Like you should, if at all possible, try to be in church together. And that usually means if it's not a huge violation, again, a violation of conscience where you're just. So what if it is like prosperity gospel? I mean, he really is obsessed with Joel Osteen. What's she doing? I would say that your responsibility before the Lord is not to follow a, like a heretical teacher. Just be really careful what you call heresy. Since we have been dating, my husband has been adamant that he is saved, but after years together, I've not noticed any progression in his faith. How do I dig deeper? How are you going to go in and measure your husband's sanctification? I know that there are markers. They're clear. Like if there's sin that's not being dealt with, it's clear that can be sort of addressed. Um, but if it's just like, he doesn't seem as active as I think he should be. Um, there's a lack of interest or something. It needs to be concrete, I guess, for you to, to have some specific thing to mention. But again, I just don't I don't think it's that helpful for you to be trying to manage his sanctification You're trying to be the holy spirit And you you can't be the holy spirit for someone else for anyone else I want to quit working and be a stay-at-home mom, but my husband doesn't make enough money for me to do that How do I not resent him? I would just say like you were working on this family together This is a shared project that you're building together And it's going to require different things from each of you in different seasons There was a point when I was working and justin was in school and I remember that feeling I remember just being very like Just feeling like what's what is this all about? This isn't natural, you know and just not understanding There are seasons of self-sacrifice for both of you Um, I also think this about a wife who's home with young children and exhaust, you know It's like the exhausted season which is like 10 years Basically when you're having young when your kids are really young You just feel like i'm putting way more out in energy than he can possibly understand, you know He just goes To work and and I think it's really important to to look long Um, look at the long goal use your distance vision To see that there will be a season when your life is actually easier than his by quite a bit if he let's say He keeps working and your your kids are in elementary school even or high school Your your exhaustion level and your responsibilities do come down after those young years and his remained constant usually so just And that's not i'm not i'm not trying to say everyone's life looks like this I'm, just saying remember that it never pays for anyone to count Effort and measure it against the effort of the other person. Yeah because that is not what What love does and it's also not how you build a family together So there are going to be seasons when you feel like your output Is is larger than his and they're going to be seasons when you might be right um, but they're probably going to be Seasons when it's the other way around my husband recently made a terrible decision that has impacted our family greatly I am scared angry. All I want to do is give him a piece of my mind I am battling rage every day. Is this the hardest type of submission? Yes when you see him make a just make a mistake Even a big mistake. That's the hard part. He must have bought a boat He probably bought a boat I'm kidding. It does sound like a boat. Yeah I mean that is going to happen and it would be I think it would be very helpful if she has older Happily married couples in her life. I think it'd be really helpful to go ask some of the middle-aged married women about Stories for just some stories about when their husband made a big mistake and how they weathered it, you know, because It feels like the absolute end of the world when your husband makes a mistake I feel that way when my husband makes a mistake I feel that way when my husband makes a small mistake. Honestly, I feel like what are we even doing? How are we ever gonna come back and it's in a big financial mistake and feel like the end of the world but In 10 years, you probably won't be feeling the effects of whatever this mistake is. Maybe you will But you will be feeling the effects of how you handled it Yeah, and how you handle it when he's on the outs because he knows he just made a big mistake He will remember that in 10 years. So ask ask some wives What does it feel like? Okay, last question My husband complains that my tone isn't nice. Do I have to always be nice and sweet? Yeah, if you possibly can It would be great to be kind. She doesn't like that This is these are the rules of engagement for interacting with other human beings sometimes I wonder and I've just picked up on this Different friends of mine different seasons. I had a friend at one point. It was like I noticed every time she spoke to her husband it was extremely cutting everything was negative and Maybe she wasn't even speaking in some sort of tone It was just that it was like you didn't do hey, you didn't do this, babe Or can you please do this for me? It was just like or like we should have done this and we did it It wasn't like necessarily she had an attitude but it was just like everything coming out of her mouth was a gripe or a complaint or some kind of Criticism and sometimes I just wonder if as women were men are saying it's a tone thing But I wonder if it's just that we never are uplifting them Ever like if all he hears his complaints like he's just gonna be like your tone is always naggy Your tone is always criticism. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, I mean Proverbs calls this the contentious woman It says that it would be better to live in the corner of a housetop than to have to live with a wife Who's constantly dripping? negative words Even if they're not super, you know, she's not cussing people out or whatever using a mean voice Yeah, if all you have to say is negative or even even if half of what you have to say is negative You will sound you will be a negative person Yeah, and those couples are never fun fun to be around but it's just like, you know, if every single thing is like Oh my gosh, did you forget how to park? So it's like, you know this constant thing and and it's uncomfortable, you know to be around it It is and if you can't hear yourself, you can't you know, you it's hard to hear yourself Yeah, but see I would I'm the type person I'd be asking my best friend I'd be like, hey, like you spent time with my husband. I we went on a family vacation together Do you think I do a good job of uplifting and praising my husband? I would just want honest feedback Yeah, sometimes I think when it's like the you're the person you're with like maybe it's it's hard for you to hear that from your husband But I'd be like, okay, I'm gonna go to somebody else and I'm just gonna be like, what do you pick up on? Ask your mom ask, you know, I don't know. Yeah. Yeah if you have a person in your life Who's not a yes man to you all the time? Yeah, then ask them. I mean, that's a great idea I could ask you trillion questions We'd be here all day I know this is already a long episode But I really wanted to get as many questions from the audience and as possible The great news is you have your own wife school where you are delving into all of these topics and more So, um, how do people sign up for wife school? Uh, what does it cost? What does it entail? So I am unfortunately for me back on instagram So you can find me there. I do have a website just tilly dillahay.com. That's another place to find that stuff um, the course is is like the price of a book and I just Honestly, I've I give it away to anyone who emails and says hey, can I just have it for free? I'll just give it to you. Just email me I just want I want women to be part of this conversation I want them to be growing and and I want them to be having this conversation with each other too It's really blessed me to see women doing this like with groups Because they hold each other accountable and I think they just really enjoy The the kind of bouncing ideas off with each other of it So i've had a lot of people do that and that really blesses me to see those They'll send me pictures of them like graduating from wife school. It's really cute. That's adorable Yeah, where can people read more of your work? Yeah, so I have three books. Um, most recent is my dear hemlock and then my my first book was about envy um, so that's a fun topic and then Um, my second book is about food, but if you google my name, i'm sure you can find that stuff food Yeah, like what? well, um that book it it Talks about four different food poles. So it compares like asceticism and gluttony And then snobbery and apathy so it's like interesting four ditches around the conversation about food and It came straight out of my own experience. I was I had like eating disorder history um You know just watching people in the church Navigate the world of food. It's a hard hard thing to navigate It's really interesting in the church Yeah, how we deal with food and and some of the food that we you know have at different church get-togethers and things like that could be Could be really triggering for people that struggle with binge eating or or whatever. Well, honestly Um, so my church has a potluck every sunday And I think that food in group in company and serving people food has been one of the most healing things for me in in my journey like of of just navigating the Eating disorder thing recognizing like food isn't just it's not a guilt thing and it's not like a private thing It's it builds relationships. I love that. I want to read that now. I'm glad that you brought that up I asked you this before but I'll ask you again. Maybe your answer has changed Maybe it hasn't if you could offer one remedy to heal a sick culture physically emotionally or spiritually What would it be build your family go all-in and build up your family beautiful Tilly. Thank you for coming on again Please just keep coming back. We love you here anytime. Yeah And we're so excited about wife school. You're the actual og wife school person. I'm just you know, I'm just LARPing but thank you for coming back on. Thanks for having me This episode is just the beginning of our wife school series over the next few weeks We're gonna dive into marriage homemaking respect intimacy communication and building families that are healthy joyful and rooted in God's design I'll see you back here for the next class reminder. We meet on Mondays and Thursdays at 6 p.m Pacific 9 p.m. Eastern wherever you get your podcast be leaving those five-star reviews Let us know how many years you've been in your wife era. I'm Alex Clark and this is culture apothecary