Kevin Thompson [00:00:00]:
Hey. Welcome back to Change the Odds. The podcast for marriage and family were never meant to be. A game of chance. Kevin Thompson with you, Blaine Neufeld.
Blaine Neufeld [00:00:05]:
Yes, sir.
Kevin Thompson [00:00:06]:
Here we are. No Adrienne today, sadly sad. Oh, you know what that means?
Blaine Neufeld [00:00:10]:
No.
Kevin Thompson [00:00:11]:
Whatever you say. We're going to assume that's the way it goes.
Blaine Neufeld [00:00:14]:
That is finally, finally, there's no accountability.
Kevin Thompson [00:00:19]:
All right, so. So I don't. I don't know if you notice this, but there is one of our co workers that I'm not going to name.
Blaine Neufeld [00:00:25]:
Okay.
Kevin Thompson [00:00:26]:
There is one of our co workers who regularly preaches at Granite Bay Bayside. Granite Bay. Who? He will tell a story on Saturday night.
Blaine Neufeld [00:00:33]:
Oh, yes.
Kevin Thompson [00:00:34]:
In which he's the hero, his wife is the villain. 8:15. He's the hero, his wife is the villain. 9:45. Oh, my goodness. This story has radically changed.
Blaine Neufeld [00:00:46]:
Oh, why is that, Kevin?
Kevin Thompson [00:00:47]:
She is brilliant. And then 11:30, we're back to the normal story.
Blaine Neufeld [00:00:51]:
Have you noticed what service does she attend?
Kevin Thompson [00:00:53]:
No, it's probably 9:45, I have to admit. So as a who does marriage conferences all over the country? It does. You're aware.
Blaine Neufeld [00:01:02]:
Oh, it's got to change the vibe.
Kevin Thompson [00:01:04]:
You are aware. Yes, but I mean, my general theory is, look, I'm not going to tell a story in which Jenny's the idiot and I'm the hero, because first of all, how rare would that be? I wouldn't have enough material. But then beyond that, that's unfair. I'm on stage, Right? Yeah. But it is funny. It does impact. And so Adrienne's absence today frees you up.
Blaine Neufeld [00:01:25]:
One thing we've like, and I think this is just like I'm thankful for these traits in our marriage is we're pretty brutally honest in front of each other.
Kevin Thompson [00:01:33]:
Yeah.
Blaine Neufeld [00:01:33]:
So that we can just be ourselves. So it doesn't. You know what I'm saying? Oh, yeah. I know a lot of buddies that. That, Whatever. Hey, don't, you know, post a picture because I'm golfing today because my wife doesn't know I'm golfing today. Come on, guys.
Kevin Thompson [00:01:46]:
That's a problem. Just admit problem.
Blaine Neufeld [00:01:48]:
Working in the schedule. Be respectful of her schedule because clearly you're feeling guilty about something. So just face the facts.
Kevin Thompson [00:01:55]:
Yeah. If you can't tell it, yes, we are. It is hard to sit here with you today, Blaine, because yesterday you did give me a beating on the golf course.
Blaine Neufeld [00:02:02]:
Wasn't necessarily me, it was others that.
Kevin Thompson [00:02:05]:
My wife does know happened, by the way.
Blaine Neufeld [00:02:06]:
She did? Yes.
Kevin Thompson [00:02:07]:
She knew we were playing and she knew I Did not play well at all. And I really, I'm confused here today.
Blaine Neufeld [00:02:14]:
But at least it's one out of ten that you didn't play bad. The other nine, you were fantastic.
Kevin Thompson [00:02:18]:
That was horrible. All right, so today, yes, we're talking about marriage. Clearly change the odds. Yeah. We're also talking about parenting. But our focus today is not so much on how to parent, Although there's gonna be some elements that go with that. But I wanna focus more in on how can we make sure that these lovely, beautiful, God ordained children who can sometimes be anything but that, don't create a wedge between us. And so Jenna and I, before we had kids, we could see that we're very compatible people.
Kevin Thompson [00:02:56]:
Our personalities are extremely compatible. We're different, but we're different in very complimentary kind of ways, all those kind of things. But we could see what was coming, that she and I were raised in radically different ways. Okay, so she is rural Oklahoma. It was, you wake up on Saturday morning and you start doing the chores and you're working and you're doing all these things. Right. And I was in suburbia. Right.
Kevin Thompson [00:03:21]:
You sleep in on Saturday morning, you relax. And it's kind of a kid centric culture. The kids sports and all those things. Her parents, the kids sports mattered. But man, you still had all these chores to do and doing all that. And so we could see heading into parenting, this will probably be our toughest issue. Now what's intriguing to me is for her and I, we have been more unified, I think, in parenting than maybe we thought we would be. But parenting has been the most difficult aspect of marriage for us.
Kevin Thompson [00:03:55]:
Jenny and I joke all the time, man, marriage is easy. It's parenting.
Blaine Neufeld [00:03:59]:
Oh yeah.
Kevin Thompson [00:04:00]:
That's so difficult. What does Yalls experience?
Blaine Neufeld [00:04:02]:
Yeah, it would be somewhat similar, I think, about the upbringings. I mean, sport for my family was it, that was my career. So it, it was around that. And we like to go have fun and be busy and do things. I always think about a vacation. We've talked about this in the past. For us, it's going, doing. For Adrienne's family, it was sitting and relaxing.
Blaine Neufeld [00:04:23]:
And so it was kind of that. What are the priorities? You know, we're out going, seeing people doing the things, they're more introverted, they have their family, their, their cousins and they would really see them a lot. Right. That was just. It was kind of different. But when it comes to now, how do we adapt that to our parent? We're in the mix of it right now. Like I've Got stories coming out of my mind right now over the last couple of weeks of just how our kids personalities have dictated how we parent them and how we're navigating how to make a decision, but also include our kids, but not let our kids be the ones to truly dictate the decision to for gain their happiness. So that's an interesting one that we've just experienced because, you know, we're traveling back and forth from Canada to here, and we're trying to figure out what to do at the end of the school year and, you know, do we take him out early and hey, Cash, what do you want to do? And he was like, well, I want to stay.
Blaine Neufeld [00:05:21]:
Okay, we'll stay. Adrienne, you and the girls go, I'll come later. And then my grandma passed away, so then we had to go quicker. And then it was like, hey, Cash, we're going to go quicker. No, I don't want to. You know, and just like we're learning. Don't ask him. Tell him.
Kevin Thompson [00:05:36]:
Yeah, yeah. There is an element of that.
Blaine Neufeld [00:05:38]:
And every time it wasn't good enough anyway for him. So we're going to stop letting him decide.
Kevin Thompson [00:05:43]:
Oh, yeah. It's difficult to. You want your kids to be empowered to have a say over their life. I think that's a very important concept whenever they're little, specifically. But at the same time, we can't allow them to become the ultimate decision makers. So for this conversation, we're gonna look across the life spectrum. What I like about kind of where we are at this moment is your kids are a little bit younger than mine. So I'm at 17 and 19.
Blaine Neufeld [00:06:08]:
Yeah, we're 9, 7, and 4.
Kevin Thompson [00:06:10]:
Oh, there we go. So we basically have 0 to 19 covered. But let's recognize that means we don't have 20 to 60 covered. And if there's anything pastoring has taught me, it's that parenting doesn't stop. As a matter of fact, it sometimes gets more difficult because what happens is. And this is true across the life stage, I would say, generally speaking, is as the consequences of your kids decisions increase, your power decreases.
Blaine Neufeld [00:06:41]:
Interesting.
Kevin Thompson [00:06:42]:
Which is what makes it so difficult from a parenting perspective. And I mean, that's one reason I wrote Stay in youn Lane is just that idea to empower parents, specifically of adult children, of how do you navigate the season of life? Cause it used to be that you got to say, here's what's happening. It used to be that you had a right to say, even if they didn't follow it, then it Transitions into a season. You have no right to speak unless invited into kind of that circumstance. So we are going across the life stage, the lifespan. So here's what we have today. We have five points, five basic principles of how to keep parenting from dividing your marriage. And so we want to be unified now as a family.
Kevin Thompson [00:07:28]:
And the family is now built on this foundation of marriage. So let's start here. Let's start with number one, that I want couples to reaffirm that their marriage does, in fact, come first. I remember years ago, I was playing golf. This is back in the Twitter days. You remember Twitter X? Yes. Now X. And so this is when everybody had a Twitter account and it was politically acceptable to have one.
Kevin Thompson [00:07:51]:
So I'm walking down the golf course, having this conversation, and I just quickly tweeted out. This is like 2010. I just quickly tweeted out, wife before kids, both win. Kids before wife, both lose. Right. Quickly got this response in which a friend of mine was thinking about that in terms of chronology. And so he had had a child before he got married, and he thought I was taking a shot, basically saying, you have no chance whatsoever because of this. I was so apologetic because I read the tweet, and I'm like, I can totally see how he interpreted that way.
Kevin Thompson [00:08:35]:
That was not at all what I had intended. Now, I do believe there's an order to things that's preferred, but it doesn't mean you're doomed. Now, that doesn't happen. But it is this principle that when I put Jenny before my children, it's actually to the benefit of my children. And yet whenever I prioritize them over her, then that actually endangers them. And so we need to come back to this idea that we were married before them. We hopefully will be married after they're out of the house.
Blaine Neufeld [00:09:08]:
Absolutely.
Kevin Thompson [00:09:09]:
And literally that the foundation of this family is now built upon primarily my love for Jenny, her love for me, and then everything else ripples from that, because when that is not solid, there are consequences that flow out that we can't even begin to imagine.
Blaine Neufeld [00:09:27]:
Yeah. Yeah. No. It brings me up to think of how intentional we've been lately, too, of just how we interact. We often say. I often ask, hey, guys, do you guys know who I love the most out of all? You. And they're like, me, Daddy, me. And I was like, no, not you.
Blaine Neufeld [00:09:46]:
And then one of them will eventually say, oh, you love Jesus the most? I'm like, yes, I do love Jesus the most, but who do I love second most? And it's I love mommy. I love mommy more than you. Like, we're joking. It's a good. It's a good banter. But it's like, I love mommy the most and we're the best friends and they get a little annoyed, but then, you know, we'll be affectionate in front of them. I just need them to know that your spouse is your teammate and you love them the most. And I love my kids so much.
Blaine Neufeld [00:10:15]:
But it's fun to banter back and forth because when age and I are unified, it's a happy house. Like, to my point about Cash trying to dictate or us actually giving him the power, we're setting him up to fail because he doesn't know how to wield that power. He doesn't know what decisions are, what flight are we taking, what are the costs, what are the things. He knows one thing. I want to have fun with my buddies, and I don't want to miss out on that. Nothing else matters. We're thinking about all these things. So it's unfair to your point of division, because now suddenly if I want to give my kid the power or make him happy and the spouse is like, no, that actually makes no sense.
Blaine Neufeld [00:10:54]:
We got to do this, this, and this. Suddenly we're fighting for what reason? Because we're trying to appease somebody. But when we're unified and we come first and we've discussed the plan, I got no problem now actually going, say, K, Cash, here's one option or two option. Which one do you want? Because mom and I have figured out which two options we can do here. Perfect. Great. Right? That sort of thing.
Kevin Thompson [00:11:16]:
I love that because you're empowering him to be a part of the process, but you're not making him king by any means. I do think. Let's look at this from a couple different angles. So the idea that marriage comes first. So one of the temptations, especially in the culture in which we live, that we live, and you're right in the middle of it, we're just coming out of it, is to run a child centric home to where the kids unintentionally, almost, it's not like we consciously choose this, but we are continually elevating them and their schedules, their decisions, their desires, above the whole, above the marriage. And what happens then in that moment is they never learn to be a part of something bigger than themselves. It actually just kind of reestablishes kind of western thought of the most important thing is the individual. And so of course, my parents that's good.
Kevin Thompson [00:12:10]:
Lives are centered around me. Isn't everybody's lives centered around me? But there is something powerful about recognizing I matter. But I'm not the only thing that I am fully loved. Dad can love mom too. And that's not a shot at me in any way. So one of the dangers that we have is a kid centric home. And whenever the children become the first priority, the ultimate priority at the expense of everybody else, specifically your spouse, then your marriage isn't going to come first. But then there's another danger that I think that we have within this, and this is just a practical reality of kids are demanding depending on what age they are.
Kevin Thompson [00:12:55]:
And the bad news for you is this, that Sometimes, sometimes the 19 year old can be more time consuming than the 9 year old.
Blaine Neufeld [00:13:02]:
I bet.
Kevin Thompson [00:13:02]:
FYI, you never know. And obviously we're in a situation where we have a child with special needs as well. But just the practical time demands. There are seasons in which your kids will need more of you than your spouse gets. Have no problem with that. That's life. Here's where I have a problem. When that becomes the norm.
Blaine Neufeld [00:13:25]:
Right.
Kevin Thompson [00:13:26]:
And I think one of the great dangers to the idea of your marriage not coming first is when you cognitively say, yes, my marriage is first, but practically the time it's never prioritized.
Blaine Neufeld [00:13:40]:
Yeah. And I am beyond grateful seeing our rhythm. So, pastor to church, what's the busiest day? Sunday. So Sunday has been a day where a lot of families are getting together and people are doing fun things and that's kind of a work day for us. I'm beyond thankful for the fact that Friday is our day off because the kids are in school and age and I are together all morning for three, four focused hours with each other. Right. Sometimes we even come on here and this is fun for us to do together. And then we go for lunch and whatever.
Blaine Neufeld [00:14:12]:
But to have that focus, time has been allowing us to just like talk through. I remember one was like, what's bugging you? Wow. It bugs me when you were doing bedtime and you take cash because he's easy and I'm stuck with the girls and I'm.
Kevin Thompson [00:14:28]:
That's just gender, gender specific.
Blaine Neufeld [00:14:31]:
What's the guy to do? And then not only do I do that, I take my laptop in there and we watch baseball highlights together. So in my mind I'm thinking, and this wasn't communicated before, we did it seven nights in a row. And she's annoyed now because he's like, you gotta go to bed. Why Are you watching highlights? Because I am thinking about how special in the future it's gonna be for Cash to think back. Wow, dad spent all this time together. I didn't think about Adrienne at all in that moment. Right. And.
Blaine Neufeld [00:15:00]:
And so to be able to communicate that and do quality time and, like, have a conflict with each other before we go and do the thing, you know, has been really. We've seen the results really improve in our fights, because now it's like, no, Cash, I'm not going to do this tonight because I want to also spend time with the girls. I'm going to help mom. That's important. Mom comes before your desire to watch Mariner highlights with me. You know, that sort of thing. It allows us to be unified. And Cash, I love you.
Blaine Neufeld [00:15:32]:
Like, to your point, you're fully loved, but at the same time, this is my priority. Priority is mom's happiness and our marriage. So that's been a cool example, I think, of this point.
Kevin Thompson [00:15:43]:
Oh, yeah. I do think there's one caveat within this, and I'm not gonna have a definitive answer on it, but I do recognize the difficulty of it. What you and I are talking about is a traditional nuclear family.
Blaine Neufeld [00:15:55]:
Correct.
Kevin Thompson [00:15:55]:
Where there is no question when I prioritize Jenny, that is to the benefit of Ella and Silas.
Blaine Neufeld [00:16:00]:
Yeah.
Kevin Thompson [00:16:00]:
Where families have blended, this is not as clear cut. And this is very fairly debated. And I have seen it done poorly, where people, man, honestly and humbly, hear a conversation like this, and then they're like, oh, I gotta prioritize my new wife over my kids.
Blaine Neufeld [00:16:19]:
I see. Yeah.
Kevin Thompson [00:16:20]:
And there's just a more complicated dynamic in that, because when I prioritize Jenny over Ellen Silas, in the long run, there is no question Ellen Silas are going to benefit from that. And eventually they will actually be able to one day see that and recognize, oh, I'm glad dad did this. It's not as simple. It's not as simple in a blended family that there has to be some give and take there, where the kids are prioritized in such a way that the spouse sometimes is kind of off to the side. And how do you fairly prioritize this new marriage without doing more harm and damage to the children? That's one of the reasons, I think, it's so important as couples are blending, to make sure that there is counseling that's involved, to make sure there is a healthy community to help process through so that we can properly apply some general principles that are easy to apply in other situations that are just more complicated here. So I just want to make sure that we got that caveat. All right, so step number one, we're going to reaffirm that our marriage comes first. Number two, we're going to get on the same page before the conflict happens.
Kevin Thompson [00:17:30]:
Here's what I think happens in so many couples with parenting. What makes parenting divisive for couples is we don't recognize how we were raised differently. We make assumptions of how we're going to handle circumstances. Something happens, and we just launch into how we're going to handle it. Well, suddenly our spouse has a different opinion about it. Yes. And if you don't recognize when something happens, my spouse might have a different viewpoint of how to parent this based on her personality, her background, her upbringing, her experiences, as opposed to mine. Then you're just going to assume y' all are on the same page instead of actually working to get on the same page.
Kevin Thompson [00:18:13]:
So maybe another way to write this. If step number one is reaffirm that your marriage comes first, step number two is this idea of work to get on the same page. Don't assume it.
Blaine Neufeld [00:18:25]:
Yeah. I wonder how involved personalities are here, because now I'm thinking about how we handle conflict 100% right? It's Blaine. Go deal with that. Hold on. Why do I have to go deal with it? You and the child are in conflict with one another, right? Because her personality doesn't want argument. So I come and be, let's say, the bad guy.
Kevin Thompson [00:18:48]:
Right.
Blaine Neufeld [00:18:49]:
And there's been times where not that I'm Adrienne's coach, but we're working together. It's like, what I see here is don't ask. Tell them what we're going to do. Right?
Kevin Thompson [00:18:59]:
Yes.
Blaine Neufeld [00:19:00]:
And. Well, that's not her personality. So then there's times where it's like, just tell them we don't want dad to be involved if we. I don't know what the right word is, because we want dad to be involved. But at the same, you know, I'm saying it's just like how interesting personalities create the conflict because of that difference.
Kevin Thompson [00:19:21]:
No question. We'll actually come back to that point. We can talk about it now. I want to talk about it now. But we will hit that point again later where we talk about strengths and weaknesses of each other. But let's talk about this for a moment, because there's two things that I think are integrally in play that you and I have talked about at length here and now it applies from a parenting and a marriage standpoint, and that is personality and attachment. So you do Have. Let's go personality first.
Kevin Thompson [00:19:48]:
So Adrienne, right, is going to be a primarily agency dyadic. We've talked about this. A peacemaker, a harmonizer with everything that's going on. So she's going to have this very natural ability to come in and actually lower tension, ease tension. If she's not careful, she'll actually sideline herself on occasion to keep the peace of what's going on. Right. Well, you're going to be much more agency outward. Just come in and handle it.
Kevin Thompson [00:20:16]:
Like, let's take care of this. Why are we wasting time on all of this?
Blaine Neufeld [00:20:20]:
It sounds like bedtime. Yes.
Kevin Thompson [00:20:22]:
It can be solved so quickly. So there's great strengths in both of those personalities. Those are pathways you both just very naturally flow to, and so you can leverage those, which is great. And on a good amount of time, it's no problem for Adrienne to say, hey, Dad's going to handle that, and you're going to walk in and handle it. It's not that big of a deal. However, if you're always the bad guy and she's always kind of avoiding the tension that's there, that can get into a bad pattern. Right. And so what needs to happen there is.
Kevin Thompson [00:20:55]:
She can recognize my tendency will be to diminish this, downplay this, and expect Blaine to handle it. There are times when we have to lean in.
Blaine Neufeld [00:21:04]:
Right.
Kevin Thompson [00:21:05]:
And in the same way that you're going to naturally come in and sweep in and take care of things, there are going to be actually times which you have to back off. So think about what we talked about in the past as far as personality. If there are nine basic personality pathways and we primarily lean toward one or two, it doesn't mean that we don't have the capability to leverage the other ones.
Blaine Neufeld [00:21:25]:
Yeah, right.
Kevin Thompson [00:21:26]:
We have to recognize, here's my tendency. Does this situation need my tendency, or does it need me to intentionally take on a different pathway? That doesn't come as easy, But I do have the capability to do that. Adrienne. I have no doubt Adrienne has the capability of putting her foot down.
Blaine Neufeld [00:21:46]:
Oh, yes. Oh, yes. And so to that point, like, no different than, I don't want her to make me the bad guy. I have a tendency to almost make her the bad guy. So now when you say, I come in and do it and get it done, I also come in and make all kinds of fun, Right? So let's talk bedtime. I'm all, don't rile them up. Oh, yeah, But I can rile them up because I also know how to stop it and say, I remember like literally going back to like sixth grade right now, where the teacher was like, took me aside. It was a profound lesson they taught me was Blaine, you're very, very good at having lots of fun and then stopping and focusing.
Blaine Neufeld [00:22:25]:
The person sitting beside you has no chance. They're having so much fun. And then they just keep floating in fun. They don't know how to turn it off. So can you be a leader and make sure that you don't get them down the wrong path? Cuz I know you can. And I'm like, whoa, what a responsibility. And that's the same way that it goes to bedtime. It's just like, I can.
Blaine Neufeld [00:22:45]:
I had no stress riling them up because I'm like, okay, lights off, done. And I take him and I rock Raya. And she goes to sleep, you know, like this. But Adrienne is. Is quitting because she's so overwhelmed, because she doesn't know how to stop the fun. Right. So that I'm setting her up to then get mad and snap on the. The situation, you know, and it's like, not fair to her because that.
Blaine Neufeld [00:23:09]:
So it's interesting how we can go both ways.
Kevin Thompson [00:23:11]:
Oh, there's no question. So you have personality on one hand, so you got to recognize your personality, your tendency. See. But then be mature enough to leverage other patterns. No doubt. But then you also have attachment. And I see this within Jenny and I. So Jenny has primarily a secure attachment pathway.
Kevin Thompson [00:23:28]:
I have a more anxious attachment pathway, which means from a parenting perspective, there are times in which I will be afraid to confront because I don't want the tension. How is that going to be received? I'm so worried about, you know, the. The relationship dynamic.
Blaine Neufeld [00:23:46]:
Yeah.
Kevin Thompson [00:23:48]:
Instead of just being the parent.
Blaine Neufeld [00:23:50]:
Right.
Kevin Thompson [00:23:50]:
Well, Jenny has no hesitation.
Blaine Neufeld [00:23:53]:
Right.
Kevin Thompson [00:23:54]:
With that and is looking at me going, what's going on? So whereas personality, there's no right or wrong. We need to be able to leverage other attachment. We have to recognize there is a healthy approach and an unhealthy approach. And so if I'm not very careful, my anxious attachment can prevent me from really being the parent that Ellen Silas needs me to be. And in those moments, Jenny can encourage me. I can feel my own conviction and seeing as she models what we actually should be doing and to move forward in some way. But the key to all of that, I think, is this awareness before you get into the dynamic in the situation. Because I think what happens with a lot of families is they don't think about These things beforehand, and then you have very little chance to process them properly for sure.
Kevin Thompson [00:24:42]:
In the moment. You're just gonna be frustrated with yourself.
Blaine Neufeld [00:24:44]:
That's great. And with others as well, I think quickly. Also, when you're not unified. As much as we love our children, their survival instincts are to push the boundary, oh, 100%. And they're learning our personalities quicker than we probably want to admit. So I know where to push the line on mom, and I know where to push the line on dad.
Kevin Thompson [00:25:03]:
You're telling me you don't know with your parents? Exactly. To this day, if you want something, if you need something, which one am I going to ask? When am I going to ask them? How am I going to ask them? What am I going to say?
Blaine Neufeld [00:25:14]:
Literally last night.
Kevin Thompson [00:25:15]:
So even the idea as a small.
Blaine Neufeld [00:25:17]:
Kid'S got no time for it. Mom, I can push, right?
Kevin Thompson [00:25:22]:
Or you could go to your dad and say, hey, if mom agrees, will you do this? Or can I do this? Well, yeah, if mom agrees, then you go to Mom. Hey, dad has said that I can do this. Are you okay? Right? So you can. I mean, the kids are brilliant in that, and we can't blame them for that. That's just.
Blaine Neufeld [00:25:42]:
I know dad wouldn't agree. So I just go to Mom. Mom, Mom, Mom, Mom. Okay, sure. Of course. Baby, Baby Blaine. Still baby Blaine.
Kevin Thompson [00:25:50]:
Oh, there you go.
Blaine Neufeld [00:25:51]:
Still semester.
Kevin Thompson [00:25:53]:
Where are you?
Blaine Neufeld [00:25:54]:
I'm the fourth boy of the four.
Kevin Thompson [00:25:56]:
Oh, you are literally the.
Blaine Neufeld [00:25:57]:
Literally the baby.
Kevin Thompson [00:25:58]:
Oh, he's still leveraging.
Blaine Neufeld [00:25:59]:
Oh, I love it. Yeah, 38. Still the baby.
Kevin Thompson [00:26:04]:
On this same topic, and I think we've talked about this previously, but on the same topic, there's another area where I think, especially when your kids are little, I don't know if it's the same whenever they're older. It's kind of the same for us at the age that we're at now. And that is the more you can clarify the expectations before a situation and what the consequences of those expectations are, the easier life will be. But when you have not in your own mind and with your children communicated, here's the punishment, here's the consequence. If this family rule is violated, then it puts pressure on you in the moment to. Not only now do you have to litigate the circumstance. You know how to judiciate what's going to happen. And that is a lot of pressure on us at times that we're already frustrated, we're probably tired.
Kevin Thompson [00:26:55]:
It just puts ourselves in a position where we're almost guaranteed to fail. It would Be the equivalent of, I'm never. If I'm a basketball player, I'm never gonna practice free throws. But now I expect in the pressure moment of the big game to hit the free throw. It doesn't work. How do you hit the free throw in the big game? You practice so much that it's now just this automatic thing. If parents would clarify, whatever our basic values, what are our basic rules, if those are violated, what are the consequences that are age appropriate now, then it takes all the pressure off. And notice this, not only does it take the pressure off from me getting the ruling right, but then beyond that, it then puts me in a position where I'm supporting my child through the consequences that they have chosen to experience, rather than being the one who's forcing those consequences upon them.
Blaine Neufeld [00:27:46]:
Totally. Yeah. Nevermind when the kids don't even know the rules. So if you haven't established the rules, how is it fair to the child that's trying to walk the line and figure out where is the limit here? Right. So what is the. I wouldn't have done that if I knew the consequence, you know? Can I use one example?
Kevin Thompson [00:28:01]:
Yeah, please.
Blaine Neufeld [00:28:02]:
So we, we. We just don't like YouTube, okay. For kids. Okay. That's just where we're at because of the language. A lot of these videos, just casual, fun, great videos. But then they'll say some sort of word or swear word or whatever. So suddenly we're like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
Blaine Neufeld [00:28:18]:
No, but the child's heard it. Cash is nine. He's heard some word, and now he accidentally said something at home. And I said, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. If you say that word again. So I didn't discipline him that time. A, he doesn't know how severe the word is. But also he doesn't.
Blaine Neufeld [00:28:34]:
He's testing out the boundaries, right? And so I said, okay, if you said that word ever again, you will be getting hot sauce. Oh, he hated it. Oh, you're gonna get a little bit of hot sauce into your mouth.
Kevin Thompson [00:28:48]:
Wow.
Blaine Neufeld [00:28:48]:
And that's gonna.
Kevin Thompson [00:28:50]:
Where's Barbara Wilson? Can we get her back on the program?
Blaine Neufeld [00:28:52]:
We don't want soap. You know, the old trick was soap, right? And hot sauce is fine. It's a food. You know, this is where my mind's going. And he says, no, no, not the hot sauce. I said, then just don't say the word again. It's pretty simple, right? He doesn't say the word. Doesn't say the word.
Blaine Neufeld [00:29:07]:
One day happens to say the word. I was like, oh, boy, here comes the hot sauce. Because I also have to follow through.
Kevin Thompson [00:29:12]:
Oh, have to.
Blaine Neufeld [00:29:14]:
So get the hot sauce. We're talking like a little speck on a spoon, right? And it's a fight. And he's crying, and I'm like, gosh, this is tough, because this is the thing. He's like, okay, this was the rule, you know, Licks it. And that was it. And never has said the word again. He doesn't want the discipline of that scenario. But there was a pretty extreme example.
Blaine Neufeld [00:29:34]:
But we're going to.
Kevin Thompson [00:29:35]:
Let's note, next time Barbara's on the show, we're going to have a hypothetical scenario to see what the.
Blaine Neufeld [00:29:40]:
And you can see Adrienne, who doesn't want conflict. No, not Cash.
Kevin Thompson [00:29:43]:
Don't.
Blaine Neufeld [00:29:44]:
Don't, Daddy. I'm like, no, I have to do it.
Kevin Thompson [00:29:47]:
Oh, you have to. Yeah. You have to. Stick with the loop.
Blaine Neufeld [00:29:49]:
Stick with the loop.
Kevin Thompson [00:29:49]:
Anyway, so let's talk about this. Here's a big issue. I think we got to move on from this topic, but sure. Do we fight in front of the kids or not? That's the question. Wow.
Blaine Neufeld [00:29:59]:
If. Here's. Here's something. Our good friend who pastors on Sunday, and his wife, you know, I guarantee.
Kevin Thompson [00:30:06]:
You they fight in front of the kids.
Blaine Neufeld [00:30:07]:
So where we've. We've learned from her, she said, what we don't ever do is we don't reconcile in front of the kids enough. So, like, if you fight in front of the kids, you have to reconcile in front of the kids. Sorry to make that point clear. Right. So we always fight. We fight, fight, and then we go to bed, and we're like, what are we doing? I'm so sorry. But the kids are sleeping.
Blaine Neufeld [00:30:26]:
They don't see that mom and dad made up. So the next day, is everything okay? Like, what's going on? Are mom and dad still mad at each other? In their world, in their shoes, they have no idea. So. And this has helped. I've helped a few marriages recently. I was like, have you ever considered reconciling in front of the kids to just unify your home and saying, it's a safe place again? Yeah, we are to going. Good to go. And that has radically changed their marriages because the kids are now feeling safe, everybody's a little bit easier, you know, that sort of thing.
Blaine Neufeld [00:30:55]:
So that's one thing. If you happen to fight in front of your kids, which I think is okay, because you're human beings, make sure you reconcile in front of your kids.
Kevin Thompson [00:31:04]:
To know that I love. What I love about that is it's such an important marital skill, life skill, parenting skill, something we have to train our kids on. And that is the psychological term or the term that's used in married life a lot is rupture and repair. Ruptures are gonna happen. Disagreement's gonna take place. Relationships are gonna be severed a little bit. You have to learn to repair those. And so from a marriage standpoint, the old assumption was that bad marriages just experience more fights, more conflict, and good marriages experience less.
Kevin Thompson [00:31:35]:
That's really not true. Basically, the difference between healthy marriages and unhealthy marriages is healthy marriages have this ability to. To repair. The connection is recreated after the vision that takes place. So what I love about that example that you just gave is now we're modeling for our kids how we can repair this. Yeah, I would be very careful.
Blaine Neufeld [00:31:58]:
Okay.
Kevin Thompson [00:31:59]:
I think it is good and fair to disagree in front of the kids, to have conversations about those disagreements. I would be very hesitant to, quote, unquote, fight in front of the kids because our children do not have the capability to recognize this disagreement in the context in which it is in. And literally, especially if you are angry and frustrated. In my opinion, that needs to be taken into privacy where we can work it out. Now, there's no doubt there's gonna be frustrations that spill out in front of the kids. I have no problem with that. And. And where your point needs to be taken is that we do need to repair in front of that.
Kevin Thompson [00:32:41]:
Am I going to fight with Jenny in front of my children at any age? No, I'm not. I'm not. I'm just uncomfortable with. To me, that is such a personal thing that's going on now. I don't believe that we fake it in front of the kids and all that kind of thing. And again, Jenny and I can have a very honest conversation. I remember when the kids were little, we're having just an honest conversation. We have differing opinions.
Kevin Thompson [00:33:08]:
And Silas is there, and he's like, mommy and daddy are fighting. And I'm like, no, actually, we're not. You want to see that? That's a whole different viewpoint. Right. But even there, he could sense the disagreement, which I'm totally good with that. But if you emotionally cannot regulate in that moment, and then I don't want the kids to be around in the midst of our own emotional dysregulation. But let's be honest. Different personalities of marriages are going to have different things.
Kevin Thompson [00:33:41]:
You think about the old Italian marriage, right? I mean, not to be stereotypical, but, I mean, that's the concept. Well, all right, that's going to be a louder house, right? Jenny and I don't ever communicate in that way, but I would be hesitant, especially based on age kids also, you got to watch out for temperament of kids. So even the dynamic, you know, my son is a more sensitive temperament. And so by sensitivity, I don't mean soft by any means. What I mean is it takes less stimulus to get a response. So sensitivity is about how much stimulus creates a response. So he is more sensitive. So he's more aware, he can see some nuance and things.
Kevin Thompson [00:34:23]:
He'll struggle sometimes with Jenny and Ella and just that. Mother, daughter, back and forth. And I think we have to be. We have to be sensitive to recognize. I'm having no problem with this conversation whatsoever what's going on in the heart of this person. And so especially you take somebody like Adrienne who loves peace, right? So Adrienne and Silas are actually going to have the same personality kind of pathway. Well, disagreement, a lack of unity in that moment is going to create more internal chaos in some people than it would in others. You're going to have no problem.
Kevin Thompson [00:34:59]:
Problem with it is my general guess. For a little flare up, a moment of disagreement, you're probably going to be pretty comfortable with. Adrienne's not. Silas isn't. Sometimes I can struggle with it. I don't think that's my personality as much as that is my attachment. But Jenny and Ella can be bickering back and forth and I can get really uncomfortable very quickly. So we have to be aware of.
Blaine Neufeld [00:35:23]:
Even though to them nothing. It's just like say, saying what it is okay for. For me maybe, and the listener too. It's just like, I think, am I okay to say having a natural disagreement in front of a kid or your kids, and this is life and you are aware of that feeling they're having. Silas is now uncomfortable coming back to that and say, hey, Silas, mom and I, I've asked for forgiveness. I shouldn't have maybe gone. You know, that I'm. We're good, you know, like, oh, because Silas can now feel safe again.
Blaine Neufeld [00:35:55]:
I'm sure I would fully agree. Like, you can't do that in front of the kids. Oh, no, Please, no. Right. So now if that has happened, because there's people that have done this and this is, can it be stopped? Can it be corrected? What do we do? Because I gotta think the embarrassment sometimes on or the. The one side being very heavy on the other side and there's a victim in the scenario because it's very unlikely that it's like this. What do they do? What do we do in that household?
Kevin Thompson [00:36:26]:
Then that repair needs to happen as a family. To the extent that it was seen, it needs to happen in that moment. And again, let's remove the shame. Conviction's good, but the shame is not going to be useful. But to recognize there's a great power now in repairing in front of our children and dad saying, look, I should not have talked to mom that way. I want to apologize not only to her. And so literally, I'm going to apologize to her in front of the kids, but I also want to apologize to you, because you shouldn't have to see something like that. So I think, should we fight in front of the kids? I would say no.
Kevin Thompson [00:37:01]:
Should we disagree in front of the kids? Absolutely. Should we have conversations in which we have different opinions, passionate, no problem with any of that. Should there ever be a scenario in which a husband yells at a wife in front of the children?
Blaine Neufeld [00:37:15]:
No.
Kevin Thompson [00:37:16]:
Should there ever be a scenario in which a wife says demeaning things to the husband in front of the children? Absolutely not. I don't care what age they are. I don't care what's happening in that moment. We have to model respect. We have to model emotional regulation. And whenever that is violated, that then has to be repaired. Not just in the privacy of the bedroom. That has to be repaired in the publicity of the family room to where I am confessing to everybody.
Kevin Thompson [00:37:42]:
And let's face it, every family's gonna make mistakes. Every person's gonna make a mistake. This is not. We have to be 100% on this. This is a guiding principle. In the same way that whenever your kids violate a family rule, there are consequences that take place. When I, as a parent, violate a family rule that I am disrespectful in the midst of disagreement to my spouse, that has to be a public repair that takes place. And here's the power of it.
Kevin Thompson [00:38:08]:
It actually could be that the repair does more good than never making the mistake at all. And so you just lean into that.
Blaine Neufeld [00:38:17]:
Because I think about when you say, like, Italian or just a loud marriage, let's say, right? It's. You have the opportunity as a parent right now to humble yourself, apologize, or do the things. Because what you're doing is, I'm teaching Cash how to be married.
Kevin Thompson [00:38:31]:
Yes.
Blaine Neufeld [00:38:32]:
Right now, at nine years old, he has no idea, but I'm doing that. And I want to rectify any mistakes I've learned or done so that he has a better chance of recognizing that when he's married subconsciously. Right. So those. Those loud marriages can be stopped with you for your next generation.
Kevin Thompson [00:38:50]:
It can be. It literally changes. Game changing. There's no. And. And I gotta be careful because, again, I. I can't read my personality and Jenny's personality into every marriage. Marriages are gonna have different volumes.
Blaine Neufeld [00:39:01]:
Yeah.
Kevin Thompson [00:39:01]:
And that's okay. Families are gonna have different volumes. To me, it's not necessarily the volume.
Blaine Neufeld [00:39:05]:
It's the intent.
Kevin Thompson [00:39:06]:
It's respect.
Blaine Neufeld [00:39:07]:
Yeah. Respect. Yeah.
Kevin Thompson [00:39:08]:
Disrespect is unacceptable. Can we talk loudly? Absolutely. You know. You know how this works. You're never going to hear me yelling Right. At anybody, Anything. Right. But.
Kevin Thompson [00:39:19]:
But I can. I can quietly be disrespectful. Well, that's not allowed. In the same way that. That, you know, other friends of ours can be very loud, and yet they are respectful.
Blaine Neufeld [00:39:28]:
Yeah.
Kevin Thompson [00:39:29]:
All right, we got to pick it up. We got to start up. No, no, this is brilliant.
Blaine Neufeld [00:39:32]:
No time for Adrienne. I just keep talking, you know?
Kevin Thompson [00:39:34]:
All right, here we go. We got. We got five minutes, and we got three points, so we got to get through. All right, so one thing. And this kind of goes with what we were just saying, to speak as one voice in front of the kids, and I do think that, ironically, this continues kind of throughout the life stage, that what we're getting back to is what we talked about earlier. We get the picture of the small kid recognizing how to divide mom and dad and get what they want, and that's good. But if parents can get in the habit now of whenever they're children of any age, ask of them something, something, instead of even tipping their hat at their opinion and say, oh, I'm fine with it. If your dad is, let me talk to him.
Kevin Thompson [00:40:10]:
Because then that makes dad the bad guy.
Blaine Neufeld [00:40:12]:
Totally. Yeah.
Kevin Thompson [00:40:13]:
Instead it's, man, that's a great question. I'll talk to dad about it, and we will get back to you. Right. And so you just get in this habit now of you're seeing yourself as a unified team, so you can actually never speak fully for the team. There are some decisions you have to make together in a room, and one of you cannot make it for the other. And so you just communicate that in the same way we see this in workplaces all the time. Somebody asked me, an employee asked me a question. Well, you know what? I don't have the full authority to make that decision.
Kevin Thompson [00:40:46]:
I get to be a part of that decision. I don't have the full authority to make it. So what do I tell them? Let me check and I'll get back with you. We need to create that habit within our marriages so that we do have a unified front in front of our kids. And this isn't hypocrisy. This isn't. We're appearing unified when we're really not.
Blaine Neufeld [00:41:02]:
No, no, no. This is unified.
Kevin Thompson [00:41:04]:
We actually are unified. And the way that we do that is we make some decisions in private that then we take public.
Blaine Neufeld [00:41:11]:
And I think a little trick that we've learned is very valuable is we've been proactive spending the Friday mornings together. We've talked about so many things that were maybe potential conflicts that we get on the same page and. And then as they come up again because kids are pretty repetitive. Yeah, we know what we're deciding together. So I. Can I get to proactively speak? No. That is something that mom and I don't agree that we do YouTube. Okay.
Blaine Neufeld [00:41:37]:
That is no Cash in the mornings. No. And so anyway, a proactive approach versus Let me get back to you, son. You know, like you want to be able to react to them in the moments too. So be proactive. Get on the same page before some of these things.
Kevin Thompson [00:41:54]:
Before we hit the last two points. I think this is a great time to bring up. Hey, if you're listening today, don't forget Kevin a. Thompson at YouTube is a great YouTube channel there. One day.
Blaine Neufeld [00:42:01]:
Catch you on YouTube.
Kevin Thompson [00:42:02]:
One day when Cash is old enough he can look at it. But follow us on all social media, especially YouTube. I love it. All great clips there. All right, number four. We've talked about this already so we can go quickly. But there are a couple of points I think we need to make. Number four is let's respect each other's strengths and roles.
Kevin Thompson [00:42:18]:
And so here's what I love. Here's where a healthy marriage has such an advantage over an unhealthy marriage. In a healthy marriage, their differences are appreciated and then leveraged for the well being of everybody. Jenny and I could not in some ways parent more differently. We were brought up in different ways. We have different personalities. In some ways that is so different. And that has been one of our greatest advantages.
Kevin Thompson [00:42:46]:
Because when my way doesn't work, guess what? There's more in the toolbox.
Blaine Neufeld [00:42:50]:
So good.
Kevin Thompson [00:42:50]:
Oh, it hadn't worked. Well, here comes your mother. Yeah, let's see. And seriously, there have been times throughout our kids lives now, two decades in which we've had this disagreement. We're trying to figure out how we're going to handle this. And I'll say You try it. Let's go with your way. And we try her way and great success.
Kevin Thompson [00:43:09]:
And I think to myself, wow, I didn't think that would work. And look at how it did. And then there's other times in which it's not working. Working very well. And then we're like, well, let's try my way. And man, times that that works. And Jenny's like, I never knew that would have worked. And other times in which she's thinking.
Kevin Thompson [00:43:23]:
She's probably thinking, although she doesn't say, I told you, probably not the best.
Blaine Neufeld [00:43:26]:
Way to do it.
Kevin Thompson [00:43:27]:
But unhealthy couples see those differences as a battle between the parents. Instead of recognizing we now have two different ways that we can try and parent these kids. And so to leverage that for our benefit.
Blaine Neufeld [00:43:41]:
Yeah, yeah. The 1.2 I just bring attention you wrote down too, is name the one thing that you're supposed to do well that week. Like, I've never thought about that.
Kevin Thompson [00:43:51]:
Yes.
Blaine Neufeld [00:43:51]:
But the fact that I could go, babe, I love it. You're so good at this. She feels better about it. Like, that made our team better. Wow, what an attribute versus. Yeah, exactly.
Kevin Thompson [00:44:04]:
As opposed to what? Yeah, as opposed.
Blaine Neufeld [00:44:06]:
I wouldn't have done it that way.
Kevin Thompson [00:44:08]:
Let me call out your parenting fail of the week. Right? It's on the screen. I've watched the video cameras. Let's see how you handle this.
Blaine Neufeld [00:44:15]:
Let's run the tape.
Kevin Thompson [00:44:15]:
So I do think now there is a place. I think there is a place where you have someone who's in the trenches with you but just stands a little bit outside of you that can help you see, hey, here's why what you're trying isn't working. I do think there is a place for that. We have to be very careful with that because the last thing that we want is as we're parenting, to feel like our spouse is over there judging how we're parenting is gonna fill our ear with all the mistakes that we've made. So we gotta be careful about that. But there is maybe a way to go about it is if you're struggling, ask your spouse. Hey, is there anything that you see in my parenting that I think I'm doing one thing, but I'm actually coming across in a different way. You said one thing earlier.
Kevin Thompson [00:45:03]:
That's something Jenny and I talk about on occasion of, hey, I heard what you said. And you think you told the child to do this? You actually gave them a choice, and when they didn't do it, you got frustrated, but you couldn't figure Out. Why? Let's go back and listen to what you actually said. Right. And sometimes it's helpful. I mean, I'll tell Jenny, look, in the old days, she would say, hey, do you want to empty the dishwasher? Nope, I don't want to. There's actually no desire in me whatsoever. Will I? 100%.
Kevin Thompson [00:45:39]:
So even the question will you empty the dishwasher? Yes. Do you want to empty the dishwasher? No. All right. In her mind, those mean the same thing. They're radically different. Well, if that's true to her 47 year old husband, how much more true is that to a 17 year old boy, a 19 year old girl, who are masters at reading the parenting contract that has just been stated to find the loophole, to get out of what is going on. So I do think that we can provide that compassionate outside perspective if asked. I think that's one thing we should do.
Kevin Thompson [00:46:15]:
We should ask more often, be slower to offer that, but then to be more likely to praise what we see going well rather than to critique what isn't going well.
Blaine Neufeld [00:46:29]:
I love it.
Kevin Thompson [00:46:29]:
All right, finally, number five, we got to make sure that we're going to fight the real enemy. And who is the enemy? It is not each other. It's also not the kids. Right. We have an opponent who doesn't want us to love each other well. And to recognize life itself is going to be difficult. But the moment it turns into me versus you, we're in a great deal of trouble. And what's funny is, and it's not funny, it's sad.
Kevin Thompson [00:46:57]:
Our kids will feel that totally. And then think about what that forces them to do. They're having to pick a side.
Blaine Neufeld [00:47:03]:
Yeah.
Kevin Thompson [00:47:03]:
And kids shouldn't have to do that. Kids can't do that. So we have to make sure that we are now prioritizing each other in such a way that we recognize who the real enemy is. So let's review this real fast. We're going to, number one, reaffirm that our marriage comes first. We're going to get on the same page. We're going to do the work to get on the same page before the conflict actually happens. We're going to speak in one voice in front of the kids.
Kevin Thompson [00:47:29]:
We're going to respect each other's strengths and differences and roles and then we're going to fight the real enemy, which is not each other. If you and I can do that, it will go a long way to making sure that our parenting doesn't divide our marriage. Instead, it becomes a platform and a playground in which our marriage is actually strengthened.
Blaine Neufeld [00:47:49]:
Love it.
Kevin Thompson [00:47:50]:
Yeah, sounds great. Until next time. Don't forget, marriage and family never meant to be a game of chance, parent. Well, and that itself will change the odds. See you next time.