Crazy Little Thing Called Marriage

Dr. Greg Smalley: Welcome to Crazy Little Thing Called Marriage. I'm Dr. Greg Smalley.

Erin Smalley: And I'm Erin Smalley. Today is a very special episode celebrating women and celebrating Mother's Day. We're breaking that up with distinction today because Mother's Day can be very painful for those who have had infertility issues or maybe someone who has lost a child.

Dr. Greg Smalley: We want to really recognize that. Even if a woman hasn't had a child, God still created her to nurture, to create, to give life to others through her words or her actions or maybe involvement in projects. Many women have fostered and adopted children, becoming a mother without delivering a baby.

Erin Smalley: Moms come in all shapes and sizes. We're going to share some ideas about something all women think about, and that's beauty. What does beauty really mean? Women are so hard on themselves, but today's episode is going to focus on how God looks at us and how He says we are beautiful.

Adjust your crowns, ladies. We're going to feature some excerpts of Elisa Morgan sharing about her book *Hello Beauty Full*. Elisa was the CEO of MOPS, Mothers of Preschoolers, which is now called MomCo, for over 20 years. She knows what's going on in the heart of a woman. She was on the Focus on the Family daily broadcast with Jim Daly and John Fuller. If you're one of those gals who looks into the mirror and thinks "ugh," we hope what you hear today will change your perspective moving forward and you'll find and believe in your beauty by remembering just how beautiful you are and how God sees you.

Dr. Greg Smalley: It's going to be a great conversation. Later, we're going to encourage you to have a role reversal day, and then we're going to answer a husband's question about his wife's relationship with his mom.

Erin Smalley: That's going to be a good one.

Dr. Greg Smalley: All this is coming up right after this.

Jim Daly: Is your marriage struggling? Communication breaking down? Trust fading? Conflict that never seems to resolve? There's still hope.

Hope Restored Marriage Intensives by Focus on the Family help couples step away from daily life and focus fully on rebuilding their relationship. And right now, through the Marriage Investment Initiative, Hope Restored is investing $1,000 toward marriage intensives. Visit HopeRestored.com/marriage-investment.

Erin Smalley: Ladies, let's be vulnerable here. Have you ever heard women say things like this?

Guest (Female): I really wish that my voice didn't sound so high-pitched and young for my age and people would take me more seriously on the phone or even in work, where my voice makes me sound very juvenile and I just wish it sounded more serious.

Guest (Female): Too often I realize that the self-centered and selfish part of me ends up taking front and center instead of the kinder part of me that I know I want to be.

Guest (Female): When I look in the mirror I see all of the acne, all the scars, all the spots on my face that aren't supposed to be there.

Guest (Female): I know where God has gifted me specifically, but at the same time, I always feel like I am not measuring up.

Erin Smalley: Maybe you've said things like this to yourself. There's definitely a self-love crisis happening among women today. There was a study not too long ago that actually showed that 91% of women and girls reported dissatisfaction with their bodies.

Dr. Greg Smalley: That's heartbreaking. Obviously, social media has played a huge role in the lack of confidence in women. Listen now to Elisa Morgan and how she backs up that statistic and then how she talks about the five dimensions of beauty.

Elisa Morgan: 96% of women worldwide, including followers of Jesus, would never use the word beautiful to describe themselves. Isn't that stunning? Why? Because it's not me. We think about magazines and polished ads and airbrushed photos. We think about models, we think about celebrities, we think about babies maybe, but we don't think of ourselves as beautiful.

I honestly think the answer to why is kind of complex. I think there are a couple of things going on. One is we're fallen beings, we're fallen creatures. Back in the garden in Genesis, God created man and woman and He said we were good. I think that's a strong reality.

I love Sally Lloyd-Jones' book *The Jesus Storybook Bible*, and I love how she talks about what we call the fall. Bottom line, what she suggests with her playful, beautiful wording is that we believed the hiss of the enemy who says, "God does not love you." That means He doesn't think I'm beautiful. He doesn't think I'm good. It's all a lie.

We might want to redefine beauty. We've already gone immediately to the external, it's what we look like. I don't think that's a complete definition of how God sees us as good. I think beauty, as God sees it, is five-dimensional.

First is Voice, our unique personality. Who are you? The second is Vessel, our physical body. There is a part of our beauty that includes our vessel. Then comes Womb, and that's our creative potential, our creative purpose. The fourth one is Scar, our painful story. And then the fifth one is Sway, our influential legacy.

I hope immediately people's brains are going, "What? But they're also going, whoa." That is a lot more than just what we look like physically. I think these five dimensions and as we unpack them help us understand this holistic approach to beauty and to who we are and at how God loves who we are and then wants to bring forth the best of who we are.

Dr. Greg Smalley: Erin, I've never heard that statistic that 96% of women worldwide, including followers of Jesus, would never use the word beautiful to describe themselves. Has that been your experience as you and your friends talk about this?

Erin Smalley: I would never guess 96%. But having raised three daughters, it is, yes, that is very relevant because we're constantly comparing ourselves to some standard of perfection.

Even for our daughter who's 18 and she has cleft lip and palate, for her there's been this difference that she was born with and I'm constantly working with her trying to encourage her to recognize her beauty and to tell her that we all have something that we don't like about ourselves, whether it's my thighs are big, my feet are too big, my nose is too long, whatever. We all have something.

But she's had to deal with this on a daily basis for her entire life. I love that Elisa is talking about it's not only the vessel, the external beauty. There's so much more to a woman. A woman is a fascinating human being, and we all are created so uniquely with such beautiful characteristics and personalities and traits and quirks and all the things that make up who we really are.

Dr. Greg Smalley: I remember one time with our middle daughter, Murphy. Remember when she was in junior high and she came home crying this one day? She talked about how she and her friends had sat down at this table they usually hadn't sat at during lunch and this group of guys came over and they're like, "Hey, that's our table." Murphy, of course your daughter, is never going to stand for that and so she stood up for herself and for her friends and said, "We don't care. Move on. We're here first."

Remember that kid looked at her and he said, "You're worthless, you're ugly, and no one is ever going to want to marry you." I mean, that's the most bizarre thing anyway for a junior high kid to say. But remember how much that impacted her.

So as she came home really crying about that, what I really wanted to do though was to take her to God's Word because again, like Elisa's talking about, there's such a demonic part of this, how Satan wants to convince all of us of lies. He was using that experience to convince Murphy that, "Yeah, in fact, you are ugly and no one's ever going to want to marry you."

So as much as I tried to comfort her, I really wanted to take her to scripture. So I said, "Let's just spend a little bit of time and let's just look for verses. What does God say about your beauty and who you are inside and out?" I just remember that was such a powerful experience because she found some really cool ones.

She found one, I can't even tell you the reference, but it said that the King, so talking about God, the King is enthralled with your beauty. Talking about that man sees the outer like this stupid little junior high kid, but God sees the inside. When she really started choosing these verses and just letting them touch her heart, you could just remember she just kind of it just relaxed her. It just filled her with God's truth and she was able to say, "Yeah, that guy's an idiot." And then I was like, "Well, good, because we're going to get your older brother to show up and put the fear of God into this kid."

Erin Smalley: It's actually her younger brother.

Dr. Greg Smalley: That's true. Either way, her brother would have stood up for her. I just love how Elisa is really directing us back to battling Satan's lies with the God's truth. Why do you think women just struggle with this? Why is there such a battle with kind of loving themselves?

Erin Smalley: Well, you think about the enemy, the devil, he's the father of lies, so he hisses these lies to women and they begin believing those lies. Especially based on what was said to them when they were younger, what was done to them, what they heard and how they interpreted it, all those things influence the lies that we believe about ourselves.

It's rampant. Obviously, 96% of women are dealing with this. But yet they don't recognize that the enemy is all over it. Elisa shared some reasons why she was listening to that hiss. See if you can relate to this next clip.

Elisa Morgan: I have wrestled through why I have such a difficult time letting God love me. It's just disbelief. I disbelieve who He is. I have sat and struggled with that for the longest time and I've come up with a whole bunch of reasons I think, well, I'm the big one exception to God's love. I believe He loves you because you're awesome. I'm not sure He loves me. I believe that there's something I can do ultimately that will push away His love.

I actually bumped into part of my own cause on this topic when I looked at my life. I come from a broken family. When I was five, my dad told me that he'd decided he didn't love my mom anymore and he was going to divorce her. That was an initial core wound that made me go, I'm not lovable. If I was, he would stay.

But I go on to look at my mom who struggled with alcohol and I think, well, if I was lovable I would be able to keep her from drinking and those kinds of things. As I looked at that and I look at my life, I realized even as my mom grew older and died, I wouldn't let her love me because it didn't feel safe to me. I wonder now how have I pushed God's love away, thinking I'm not enough, thinking I'm too ugly, thinking that my soul is just a mess and so He couldn't possibly love me.

I think that's a human dilemma. When we fall into that even after we know Jesus, it's tough to see ourselves the way God sees us. I love thinking about how Jesus went down into the Jordan and he came back up when he's baptized and a voice from heaven, a dove descends, and a voice from heaven, his Father in heaven says, "This is my beloved Son. In him I am well pleased."

I have read that a million times and I think, cool for Jesus. That's awesome. He's perfect. I'm sure God loves him. But when I began to understand that God sees me through Jesus. He sees us through Jesus. So when Jesus goes down and he comes back up and God says this is my beloved son, the same thing's happening to me as I put my hope in God. As I say, You see me just as I am and I'm going to trust You. I need You in my life. I want a relationship with You. I just scream out to be saved, if you will. Then He looks at me and He goes, this is my beloved daughter. In her I am well pleased.

Dr. Greg Smalley: That just breaks my heart. I could imagine that five-year-old Elisa just saying, hey, if I was more lovable, if I was better, whatever, he would have stayed. As a dad, that just kills me.

Erin Smalley: So often as women, we look for value in our relationships, relationships with our spouse, connection, because we were created to be the more relational being. So if things aren't going well, if we're rejected, if our dad rejects us, if our mom rejects us—and I'm not saying like they leave like Elisa's dad did, but maybe they say something that lands on us and we're like, oh they don't like me, they don't accept me.

It's recognizing it's those little things and it might even be that it's not what our parent intended, but it's how we interpreted it at that very young age. They say that the majority of these lies start forming between the ages of four and six years old and we develop this filter and then we begin looking for evidence of that lie that we are believing about ourselves that's beginning to develop, and before we know it, it is really who we believe we are.

Dr. Greg Smalley: Although this show is directed towards women in honor of Mother's Day, Elisa is speaking directly to me. Guys, this happens to us. It may not be around the idea of beauty, but we can feel as guys unlovable, unworthy, do we have what it takes? I think that's one of the big ones that Satan really goes after guys around is do we really have what it takes? He's wanting to convince us that not really. You're never going to measure up, never going to be good enough, you're inadequate. I know for me, feeling failed, that was how Satan went after me.

Erin Smalley: Let's dive a little deeper into a couple of those dimensions of beauty that Elisa mentioned. One thing I know that affects our self-worth and the devil loves to throw into our faces is our past. Whether we've made mistakes, made ungodly choices, or have had relationship failures, those are all the things that the Lord will redeem if we let Him. This next clip really spoke to me.

Elisa Morgan: One of the elements of beauty and we would never innately think this is part of beauty, but it is. One of the elements is Scar. It's your painful story. When you embrace your painful story, you can realize that God can use everything. He loves the broken, He uses the broken. In fact, when we put our brokenness, our places of wounding in the hands of Jesus and He redeems them, He can sometimes make us even more useful after we've been broken than before.

Scar is this element of a blemish, the imperfections, the stuff that we come with, you know, maybe maybe we have a physical disability, maybe we have a mental challenge, maybe we have a learning disability. These things that we didn't control, we didn't ask for, but they're a true blemish. We're not perfect, okay?

Or a wound, something that's happened by the hand of another. Something that's changed our if a parent's divorce, a parent's struggle with drugs, a car accident, something that's happened, sexual abuse, that's happened by the hand of another. When we take those elements of scar and we put them into God's hand, begin to see ourselves the way He sees us, we actually can see the beauty.

Jesus dying on a cross, crucified, nails in his hands, and then he rose again with the scars of nails still visible in his hands. His resurrected body is a body with scars. Consequently it's a thing of beauty because it tells a story. That's what a scar does. It tells a story of a healing from a wound that's in process. I look at my life and the things that have hurt me, things in my first family and goodness in my second family, and I know that those scars actually become part of my offering of beauty.

Erin Smalley: Words of wisdom. Elisa definitely draws a meaningful distinction between a blemish, something that we were born with, a disability, something that we came with, something we didn't choose, or a wound which is something that someone did to us. We all have these experiences and I even think of a blemish could lead to a wound because of these differences we're born with. Sometimes people say really harsh things or they even do things. So it's recognizing we all have this, but yet so often the enemy leads us down that road of isolation, leading us to believe no, you're the only one.

Dr. Greg Smalley: For me the blemish, at least one blemish, was that I had a reading disability. So when I would try to read out loud, I'd get teased. Well, that that created such an insecurity in me that it's like the only place I could go was that something was wrong with me. I was defective, I was failed, and I really started to believe that I was a failure.

Certainly Satan played upon that in convinced me of that was true, that I was a failure. I walked that straight into our marriage. That's why this matters, that's why we're talking about these issues. I felt failed. So when you would bring up an issue like we needed to talk through something or you were unhappy or something was frustrating you, all I could hear was the message, "See Greg, she's just pointing out one more reason why you're a total failure."

It was so hard then to even listen to you because I'd get so defensive and I didn't want that to be true, so I'd debate you and argue and made it so difficult for you to bring anything up.

Erin Smalley: Absolutely.

Dr. Greg Smalley: What's fascinating to me, when you go back to the story of Adam and Eve, when they ate of the fruit and they now gained knowledge and wisdom, see, they instantly it talks about they felt shame. Why the order of that is so important is that once their eyes were opened, now they're their brains, their awareness is full of what's good and evil and all that knowledge and all of that, that it created shame because for the first time they now had departed from how God saw them.

Up to that point, Adam and Eve's whole perspective of who they were as individuals and as a couple, all that came from God. That's a part of the problem of why He didn't want them to ever eat of that fruit because separate from then how God sees us, now we're wide open to our own interpretations, how Satan will come after us and and that's what's so interesting. In the Garden of Eden, their whole awareness of who they were were directly tied to how God saw them, and once they chose to gain all that wisdom, that's also where they were impacted. Now all of a sudden they started to have insecurities and they weren't sure what was true. Satan goes after them, and that's what created that shame for them. Apart from how God sees us, there will always be shame.

Sometimes that shame can be self-inflicted. That's the last thing that God really wants us to do. I really loved how Elisa put our self-condemnation into perspective.

Elisa Morgan: In 2 Corinthians, I think it's 7:10, Paul talks about how worldly sorrow gives way to to death. But he talks about godly sorrow leads to repentance which leads to salvation and leaves no regret. No regret.

Shame, I think, is one of the tools of the hiss. You just are so lousy, you are so bad, you made this mistake and you're going to be defined by it always. You thought this in your heart and that's all you're ever going to be. Well, that's worldly sorrow and it leads to death. That's shame.

But godly sorrow goes, eek, I'm sorry I rattled the jars in the refrigerator by slamming the door because I lost my temper. I'm sorry. It leads to repentance. Okay, that leads to salvation. It's where I turn another direction and I'm not I don't have to live under shame and regret. That's whole. That's the process of becoming like Jesus.

Every time I believe I'm selfish and I'm angry and I'm a loser, every time I do that, I'm not listening to God. I'm listening to the hiss. My Father wants to speak joy and love and belovedness. Listen to that. Be-loved. Be loved. That's what that word means. Be loved. That's what God wants to speak over me. So when I diminish that, I'm listening to the hiss, I'm not listening to my great God.

Erin Smalley: "Be loved." When we're not allowing God to love us, we are believing the lies. Shame is one of the greatest tools of the enemy and I hear about it continuously because often people are coming into counseling after they have done something that they know doesn't align with who they are, but instead of recognizing it, they begin believing that somewhere inside they are a mistake.

Dr. Greg Smalley: Isn't that fascinating how that's when shame really came in? So that's why we battle shame like Elisa is talking about when we go back to the source of truth. Maybe this sounds too simple, but the power is when I go back to God: How do You see me? What is true about me? When we resist being the ones to define our worth and value and our beauty and who we are and do we measure up, do we have what it takes? When we define that, Satan's always going to be a part of that. We're going to miss it, he's going to corrupt it, and we're going to feel that shame and all those other feelings. But when we are able to say, "God, wait, I want to rest in who You are and how You see me," when we can really do that, that's the game changer.

Erin Smalley: Another area that women struggle with when it comes to their ideas of beauty is body issues. This is probably one that is most important to women because of the pressures of society to be picture perfect. Here's Elisa discussing the importance of the vessel that we've been given.

Elisa Morgan: One of my favorite passages is Psalm 139, where he talks about that we're knit together in our mother's womb. Every one of us. Think about that we're fearfully and wonderfully made.

I love another element of beauty is vessel, and we started talking about that, our physical body. But think of it this way. A vessel is a container, it's a jar, it's a bottle, it's a container and it allows us to access the contents within. You think about a square box of Kleenex that you can pull out one little tissue and the next one pops up, or you think about a toothpaste tube where you can neatly squirt a line of toothpaste onto your toothbrush. Vessels have a purpose and their purpose is to give us access to what they contain.

What if our physical body is that thing that on this planet allows others to have access to God? If our vessel is the container of the Holy Spirit, that's how Paul talks about it in 1 Corinthians. If we are able then through our vessel to give people access to God, that blows me away and that changes how I view my body.

From Psalm 139 up to the New Testament, to understand that we are fearfully and wonderfully made and that God has chosen to make us the temple that houses Him right here. Whoa. Paul talks about that we have this treasure, the gospel, the hope of being beyond who we are, in jars of clay so that people can see that the power in us comes from God. That's blah-blah-blah words until you unpack it and realize God put Himself in a human vessel.

Think about it. God scrunched Himself into the tiny fetus of a baby and put Himself into the womb of a woman and came to Earth and walked on this planet in the vessel feet of a man with the vessel hands of a carpenter and that vessel was nailed to a cross and that vessel has scars on it even in its resurrected form. There is something beautiful about God's vessel and then entrusting us to be formed in His likeness.

That's nothing to sneeze at. It's kind of interesting just to pause on vessel to understand that different attributes are valued in different cultures. In Thailand you may want to have light skin. In Africa, some countries actually fatten up women before marriage. So it depends on our culture. In the U.S. we have a certain understanding of what is beautiful in the vessel.

But what if we pop our understanding to view beauty as including our vessel, our physical body, but also—and let's just not just spiritualize it with fruit of the Spirit, because the fruit of the Spirit is what we look like when we look like Jesus. He made us to be beautiful beings, He made us He christened us good. When we come to know Him, the mess of the fall, of our sin, begins a healing process and we grow to look like the fruit of the Spirit, but there's more to us than just that.

Just briefly, let me just share. I think we have voice which is our unique personality. Yours is going to look different than mine. In some cultures, being extroverted and, can we use the word "bubbly," is beautiful. In some cultures being gentle and quiet is beautiful. What is your personality? Voice, just like the whorls on a fingerprint, the timbers of your voice are unique.

We need to model it, we need to get it in ourselves. We get up in the morning and we get padded and wash our face and brush our teeth and we're standing there going, "Ew, look at you." You've got these bags. Then we go and we get ready for the day and we get in the car and we look in the rearview mirror and it's like, "Ew, that's too close, look at you." Then we get out of the car and we go into the grocery store and we catch a glimpse of ourselves in the glass of the door and we're like, "Really? Your hair looks terrible." Now we're washing dishes at night and we see the lumpy bumps and we just all day we're talking to ourselves about how ugly we are.

And we think to ourselves, you know, if I just had Jesus telling me full time that I'm gorgeous instead, maybe I could believe it. Maybe. But here's the thing. He became flesh and dwelt among us and He is with us all the time.

So what if we place Him with us when we go to brush our teeth in the morning? What if we place Him with us in the passenger seat as we back out of our car? What if we place Him with us as we go into the grocery store and as we stand in front of the kitchen window washing our dishes and remind ourselves constantly that He sees us through Jesus and He sees us as beautiful? We begin to then be that mirror back to others.

Dr. Greg Smalley: That was such a powerful thought. I've really never considered what she's saying that you can't simultaneously believe that God chose a human body as worthy of Himself and believe that our body is something to be ashamed of. That was really good.

Erin Smalley: I think it's good to recognize something that our culture doesn't value is very valuable somewhere else. And we get to decide what is true about us even physically. I know for me with perimenopause and menopause, I gained some extra weight, which many women do. I was really struggling and especially struggling getting on a stage and speaking.

It was so interesting because one day the Lord said to me, "Erin, I called you to get on that stage, so you get on that stage and you get to decide what you believe about yourself." In that moment I said, "You know what? No more body shaming. No more. I'm going to get on that stage and do what God is calling me to do and do it confidently because He made me just like this for this season. I get to decide what I'm telling myself about me."

No more body shaming. Get up there and do your thing, do God's thing. I actually took that with my friends. When I hear them complaining or saying that they're overweight, I'll say, "Hey, no body shaming." You can evaluate, hey, I need to lose some weight without saying, hey, I'm fat.

So be kind to yourself and as women and as spouses, we can be kind to each other and not speak those words of you are fat versus entering into a helpful conversation about health and your body. Honestly, that's a tender topic. We handle that because that is something in your individual yard and my individual yard. Granted, it can impact the relationship, but be careful. Be kind, be gentle to each other and to yourself. Finally, we don't have to agree with every thought that speaks against us. Ladies, that harsh voice that condemns your looks and your actions—it feels convincing, but it isn't the truth. It's an accusation. Scripture is clear about where accusations come from. The devil's voice hisses shame, distortion, and hopelessness. But God speaks differently.

Dr. Greg Smalley: Certainly shutting out those lies is not easy. That's difficult and even Elisa had to struggle with it. Erin and I want to leave you with this one last thought that she shared.

Elisa Morgan: I think about John 10:10 where Jesus says, "I've come to give you life and life to the full." That's why He came, to give us life more than we can even imagine is what Eugene Peterson suggests in *The Message*. That's what He came to give us.

And you know what I realize? I settle for empty when Jesus came to give us life to the full. I want that. I'm scared of it. I don't know how to get it sometimes, it intimidates me. I don't really have much experience with it. I'm actually a little bit afraid of all the full that it might include if I let myself go for it. But what I do know is that Jesus died to give it to me. So what I want to say is take a baby step toward him. Take a baby step toward him.

Dr. Greg Smalley: Elisa is so right that the enemy doesn't always attack us loudly, that sometimes he's just trying to keep us small. I like just the practical thinking of, thus, we don't have to make these big sweeping changes or these grand steps. What if the next step we take is just towards him, towards Christ?

Erin Smalley: Just a baby step towards him is what Elisa said, and you just don't know where that breakthrough moment is going to be. We hope you've been challenged to not settle for the emptiness. God didn't just forgive you, He made a way for you to be restored, seen, and loved as you truly are. Not at your worst moment, not as your inner critic defines you, but as heaven defines you.

Dr. Greg Smalley: Erin and I so encourage you to get a copy of Elisa Morgan's book *Hello Beauty Full*. It's available for a gift of any amount. Just click on the show notes and we appreciate those of you who round up and give extra support to this podcast and to the ministry of Focus on the Family. Thank you for your kindness. You're making such a big difference in the lives of families everywhere.

Erin Smalley: And we want to let you know that Focus on the Family has produced a Mother's Day podcast series called *The Legacy of Love*. I'm super excited about this one.

Dr. Greg Smalley: I know. Who hosted that one?

Erin Smalley: It might be me and our dear friend Whitney Lowe. We had so much fun just talking about mothering and real mothering as well as our own mothers.

Dr. Greg Smalley: I sat in and heard you guys. What I really appreciated that you guys did is you guys are so transparent, you're so honest about the highs, the lows, the good, the bad, the ugly of motherhood. I really loved listening to you guys. I can't wait to hear the finished product.

Erin Smalley: Me too. And we've put a link in the show notes so you can listen to the entire series.

Dr. Greg Smalley: Erin and I love to give you ideas that you can use in your home. Since we're getting ready for Mother's Day this Sunday, we thought we'd propose this idea: role reversal day. This can be a powerful, eye-opening, and even a little funny real-life connection. The point is not to do more but to experience what Mom carries every single day.

Let's maybe talk about that idea of what moms carry every day. We can call this the mental load. This is when you're planning meals, you're scheduling naps, activities, play dates, and remembering the things like snacks. That's a lot to carry.

This was something, Erin, that honestly I didn't really understand, I didn't get it until years later in our marriage, this thought of mental load because there's the doing part, doing a task, but then for moms it often is not just about the task that you have to do, it's all that pre-planning that goes into it.

Erin Smalley: I never really understood it. I knew it was there because I felt it in my body. Actually reading through this, I'm like, ah, that is exactly what it is. Anticipatory thinking, seeing what's coming up before it arrives. So doctor appointments, permission slips, season changes, shoe sizes, all of that as well as emotionally tracking which kid is struggling with what, which kid is struggling socially. I mean, I feel that every day even with our adult children. If they're struggling, it's I feel it, I carry it.

Logistical orchestrations, coordinating schedules across multiple people with competing needs. I can lie awake for hours at night just thinking about, okay, how am I going to get so and so from there to there on time? How am I going to get there on time? Well, I could finish this up early and then leave and it'll give me plenty of time.

Contingency planning: well, what happens if I get a flat tire on the way? Or I'm running late, do I miss the appointment? What do I do? The invisible checklist. I get this, we're constantly running through everything I need to get accomplished and yes, I've learned it's a lot easier to write it down, but typically we don't. We're running through it at 2 a.m. in our head and remembering what everyone else forgets. Just that alone makes me tired and no wonder moms are tired.

Dr. Greg Smalley: I'm wanting to shut down right now. Again, I didn't fully understand that that's what was going on. I mean, we just don't think we ever really talked about that mental load that you were carrying. It's not that as guys we don't carry that same load.

I think about finances that I handle, paying the bills and the finances. That's probably the closest way that I could relate to what you were saying because yes, I'm constantly running through all these checklists and what ifs and but what if this happens and when am I going to pay this and when does this bill come due?

I think what happens is we often end up feeling alone inside of our marriage, lonely and married and tired. I think this is though one of the big ways that we create loneliness in marriage is kind of like, hey Erin, you take care of that stuff, I'll take care of this stuff.

So really, what we're encouraging you to do through this idea of role reversal day is it's really trying to gain not just empathy but a greater understanding of that mental load. So this would be me asking you, make a list of the big things that you might do on an average day and then I want to do those things.

But then at the end of the day—and I'm telling you this is so critical, be willing to do this—do an appreciation debrief because what I would be wanting to know then is not just, "Hey, I hope I did the tasks today," and that gave me insight into your day. What I really want to understand is now Erin, these tasks that I did, tell me about the mental load you carry around them. That's the piece I really want to empathize with and really understand: all that pre-planning and all the thinking and the invisible list that you've got to maintain in your mind around these tasks.

So guys hear me, it's not just about executing doing the tasks, thinking, "Yeah, now I get what your world is like." We've got to dig deeper and say now what is it like? Tell me about the mental load because the more that I'm willing to empathize and to understand that and just say Erin, you're not alone. I mean, that makes sense. I'm not saying that I'm going to carry that same mental load like you would do it, but boy, I can sure carry that you do and notice it and see you for what really goes on.

Erin Smalley: Yes and then use this activity to talk about what surprised you most. What was the hardest activity? What did you underestimate? What did you think "Oh, that's no big deal" and then actually was kind of a big deal? And what can you appreciate now that you didn't before?

And you're right, take Mom out, maybe take her to brunch and then maybe order dinner and bring it in. Let Mom have a break, no mental load, no have-tos, just let Mom have a day that you celebrate her and appreciate her.

Dr. Greg Smalley: Just let her be.

Erin Smalley: It's time for Q&A. Today's question is an email from Joe and he writes: Greg and Erin, I love my mom but she drives my wife crazy. My mom is as stubborn as a mule. I guess I'm used to it. I stopped trying to change my mom a long time ago.

What can I do to help my wife of three years understand that it's not going to get any better? That we have to let things roll off our back when my mom gets on a tangent. And also that she may or may not say things that are vaguely offensive. Or is this the time to set boundaries? You guys are great. Thanks for helping me out with this one.

Dr. Greg Smalley: Joe, thank you so much for writing in. Joe, where I would encourage you to start is I think what I hear you asking is how do I get my wife to accept my mom the way that I have, which makes sense, I mean, that's a reasonable desire.

But Joe, hear us, this is the wrong starting point. You, my friend, have had a lifetime to develop your coping strategies around your mom. But your wife has only had three years. So the gap between that experience and expectation is a real issue I think underneath Joe, your question because what I think you're getting right is that you've had a chance to develop some realistic expectations around your mom, I mean, that's super healthy. You're not asking your wife to love your mom, but just to cope, again reasonable. You're talking about boundaries, and all that's good, it's just that I don't think that's the right starting place.

Erin Smalley: Absolutely, I agree 100%. And I would say, Joe, the opportunity is to lean in and understand what this has been like for your wife. Because like Greg was saying, you've lived with your mom your whole life, you know what your mom is like. So now it's impacting your new wife and what is she experiencing? How is she feeling? What is she thinking? What is she needing?

All those things, it's such an opportunity to lean in and just care and to connect. And as Greg said, it makes sense that you see this very differently and that you want to just move through it because I'm guessing for years you probably struggled through it and you landed at this way to cope. So talking with your wife, caring about her heart first and foremost is going to go a long way.

Dr. Greg Smalley: It will. And Joe, I think one of the best things that I learned around this very issue is that it's not Erin's job to set those boundaries. That's your job. We always encourage people to understand that when you're talking about your parent, so your mom, you are the one that needs to set the boundaries. That's not your wife's job.

Do not put her into that role, this is not about her figuring out how to set a boundary. This is about you guys talking all these issues through, you empathizing with her like Erin talked about, recognizing that this is new for her—newer, I mean, three years is still what we'd call new. And I loved Erin, how you said that. What an opportunity just to say what has this been like for you and lean into that, care about that and then to talk about is there a boundary that needs to get set? What does that look like? You guys agree on that, but then Joe, you are the one that needs to execute that, not her.

Erin Smalley: And it's not fair to remain silent because then guess what? She'll rise up and she'll get talking about it and set the boundary and it sets her up to be rejected, to be seen as the problem versus this is your family of origin. You speak up. I don't care if you two go together to your mom, take the lead with that. Thank you so much Joe for your question and we'll be sending you your copy of Crazy Little Thing Called Marriage.

Dr. Greg Smalley: Well, thank you for joining us on Crazy Little Thing Called Marriage.

Erin Smalley: Yes, thank you for following the show and sharing it with your friends and family. We want you to have a seat at the table every week as we help equip you and your spouse to have a lifelong satisfying marriage.

Dr. Greg Smalley: We want to see you guys growing spiritually as individuals and as a couple.

Erin Smalley: So you can turn right around and invest in other couples to help them have lifelong satisfying marriages. Well, thanks for listening. We'll talk to you again next Monday about this crazy little thing called marriage.

Jim Daly: Is your marriage struggling? Communication breaking down? Trust fading? Conflict that never seems to resolve? There's still hope.

Hope Restored Marriage Intensives by Focus on the Family help couples step away from daily life and focus fully on rebuilding their relationship. And right now, through the Marriage Investment Initiative, Hope Restored is investing $1,000 toward marriage intensives. Visit HopeRestored.com/marriage-investment.