Season 3, Episode 13: Steadfast in Suffering

Can We Talk?
Steadfast in Suffering - Episode Description
Every so often, life throws at us challenges that test our resilience and compel us to find strength we never knew we had. That’s the essence of the remarkable conversation I had with my executive assistant, Adam Read, and his wife Trisha, who joined me to share their journey through Adam’s unexpected medical issues and the profound impact on their marriage and perspective on life. Their candid account, ripe with trials and an unwavering bond, reveals how they’ve managed to navigate the rough waters with grace and a faith that has been their anchor. Our discussion doesn’t just stop at their story—it extends to the influence such experiences have on the entire family, shaping aspirations and strengthening character, especially in their children.
We then change gears slightly to embrace our Peas and Carrots Podcast Trivia Giveaway, an engaging and heartening segment designed to connect our community through shared words of comfort. I encourage our listeners to participate by sharing Bible verses that resonate during trying times, with some delightful prizes up for grabs. The power of scripture and collective wisdom stands at the core of this chapter, a testament to the solace we find in unity and shared experience. So grab a cozy spot, and join us on this episode that’s not just about storytelling, but also about building a community that uplifts and supports one another through every twist and turn life may present.
Steadfast in Suffering - Transcript

0:00:00 – Announcer

We go together like Peas and Carrots. The Peas and Carrots Podcast, sharing life from our piece of the vegetable patch, Brian and Kayla Sanders. 

 

0:00:11 – Kayla

Welcome to the Peas and Carrots Podcast. I’m Brian and I’m Kayla. Good to have you along this week, and this is going to be a very special part one of two podcasts that we had the privilege of sitting down with your executive assistant, Adam Read, and his wife Trisha, and so we’ll get to that in a minute, but let’s start here. What’s up in the Cabbage Patch? 

 

0:00:37 – Brian

We’re very busy right now. 

 

0:00:39 – Kayla

Yes, we are. 

 

0:00:40 – Brian

We’re in the middle of our fundraising season. Well, actually it just began. It’s like a week old, I guess. 

 

0:00:46 – Kayla

Yeah, we will have three weeks to go as of the time this drops, so yeah lots of caffeine. 

 

0:00:52 – Brian

We’re in the thick of it seeing God move. Very little sleep.

 

0:00:56 – Kayla

So yeah, it’s good and in the midst of all this, for those of you who know me or have followed us for a while in this crazy adventure, I love sweets, but I’ve been trying really, really hard to choose fresh food and not junk, and man, this is hard. So, yeah, even chocolate, which we took like a three-year hiatus from each other. 

 

0:01:29 – Brian

We broke up for a while because of COVID. Are y’all back on speaking terms? 

 

0:01:33 – Kayla

Certain kinds of chocolate, yeah. 

 

0:01:36 – Brian

But I don’t crave it like I not really, not like I used to. You’re eating this hue chocolate. 

 

0:01:43 – Kayla

It’s pretty good, it’s all natural, it doesn’t have a lot of additives and it’s dark chocolate. I can only do dark chocolate now. But yeah, so there’s this meme, all of that, to say this it’s a dog and he’s sitting in front of a wall with a hole in it and it says I miss carbs, I ate a wall. So I feel like that’s who I am right now. 

 

0:02:09 – Brian

Yes, preach sister. So Sunday morning we were leaving for church and let me just say this I love pins and Adam Read. 

 

0:02:20 – Kayla

You have a little bit of a fetish over pins. 

 

0:02:23 – Brian

Adam Read, who you will hear from in a few moments. He’s my executive assistant. He also is one of my very best friends in the world. For Christmas he got me a Darth Vader pen and I loved it. I mean it writes well. I mean I love a good pen. So I went and ordered I found out where they came from Went and got the Kylo Ren pen, the R2-D2 pen and an extra Darth Vader one. Well, Sunday morning I just put the Kylo Ren pen in my Bible. 

 

0:02:54 – Kayla

And I am sitting in our women’s Sunday school class. 

 

0:02:57 – Brian

So I get to church, I drop you off at the door, we get to church and I go to the back seat to get my Bible out to walk in for Sunday school. I don’t see the pen. Well, I look all over that truck, I look outside the truck and I go into church and I’m walking by your Sunday school class. 

 

0:03:12 – Kayla

Stick your head in and say Kay, do you have my Kylo Ren pen? Do you know where it is? 

 

0:03:18 – Brian

And five ladies’ heads, five or six ladies’ heads. They turned and looked at me and our director of ministries Her name is Christy Schrader she says I think that’s fantastic that you have a Kylo Ren pen and she says, would you like a normal pen? I said no, it’s not a Kylo Ren pen, but good news. 

 

0:03:37 – Kayla

We found your pen in the front yard when we got home from church. 

 

0:03:43 – Brian

So, yeah, I’m pretty happy about that. So we spent some time with Adam and Trisha Read, okay, and we’re going to introduce them to you. He will tell his story and then we’re going to come back and we’re going to comment on some things that they said. We think that this is going to be a powerful, powerful time and, as promised, we are joined by Adam and Trisha Read. Thanks for joining us today, guys. 

 

0:04:14 – Adam

It’s good to be here. Thank you for having us, Brian and Kayla. 

 

0:04:18 – Brian

Let me just say this Adam Read is the director of digital media for the ministry that we serve at, positive alternative radio, and his other role, which is his cross to bear, is you are my executive assistant, yeah so I get a break from you during the day so I try and make your you know absorb some of it so that when he comes home, at night. 

 

0:04:43 – Adam

Thank you, it’s a little easier for you. 

 

0:04:44 – Brian

Hopefully, this is my life. Y’all, this is my life. You’re so blessed, Brian, so Trisha and I try to take some of this off of you during the day, okay. 

 

0:04:54 – Trish

We attempt to balance it out there. 

 

0:04:59 – Brian

So Adam and I, we are great friends, but I also need you to know that, Adam I’m talking to the audience right now, but you also have a medical condition, and if you could tell us that story. And then we want to ask Trisha how y’all have seen God work through this in your marriage. 

 

0:05:22 – Adam

Sure, yeah, I think it might be helpful to start just kind of explaining what the story is of. The condition is so a little bit of background into what my life is like, and my wife is such a support through all of it, and has been even before we were married, as things started to show up. So I started having some medical issues when I was about 16 and really didn’t know that they were related to anything. It was just kind of like, okay, that’s odd, and we just started to think that it was a one-time issue. And then, about the time I was 20, shortly after, well, a month after really, we started dating, I had my lung collapse once and I was like, okay, that was another really odd thing, it was just spontaneous, it just collapsed. 

 

0:06:06 – Kayla

For a 20-year-old yeah. 

 

0:06:07 – Adam

Yeah, I mean, it’s just your middle of college. You think you’re kind of invincible at that point, you know like you’re supposed to be at your peak of health or so, and just it kind of shuts you down. Ended up having surgery for that. Things looked like they recovered and then, a month to the day from the first time it collapsed, it collapsed again, oh my. So they ended up doing the same surgery again, but it didn’t work the second time and so they ended up doing a very invasive surgery where they went in through, they cut some ribs, went in and worked on the lung itself to actually staple off a bunch of what essentially most people would think of as like blisters across the lung. But I couldn’t collapse and during that time I was dating my wife and her and her family were in the area where the college were and she stuck with me through all of that, even got. Did you get a speeding ticket? 

 

0:06:57 – Trish

A warning. I just got a warning. 

 

0:06:59 – Adam

On the way to the hospital. She was so intent on coming to see me, Brian, I want you to know she cared. Would it have been worth a ticket? So intent on coming to see me, Brian? I want you to know she cares. Would it have been worth a ticket? 

 

0:07:06 – Brian

Well maybe it’s just. 

 

0:07:09 – Trish

Oh I like that. 

 

0:07:10 – Brian

She paused. She paused, I like that. 

 

0:07:13 – Trish

I think maybe the more important thing is I probably was late, which maybe is something. 

 

0:07:18 – Adam

Late to what. 

 

0:07:18 – Trish

To like. 

 

0:07:19 – Adam

Class. 

 

0:07:20 – Trish

To like when I was supposed to be there, oh so when you were supposed to be here. 

 

0:07:23 – Adam

Well, I would have forgiven you for that, but I might not have to struggle with that delay. So yeah, she was there through. All of that Ended up was actually kind of funny. After I had my second surgery it was a very long recovery just to be able to get up and walk around again, really because of the amount of work they did. So it was multiple months and she worked at camp that summer away from her home, just a few miles away, and I actually lived at her house with her parents and so I got to know her parents real well and they got to know me and they still somehow put up with me after all that and liked me. 

 

0:07:54 – Trish

Maybe like you better. They like me better than you. 

 

0:07:58 – Adam

I don’t think so. 

 

0:07:59 – Brian

I don’t think so. 

 

0:08:00 – Adam

But yeah, so that kind of started it and honestly we didn’t know what caused all that. But we kind of looked around a little bit but thought, okay, that’s probably over now. And then just through the years till now it’s just kind of been a constant roll of things. We had a lot of issues come up. I’ve had over a dozen surgeries now, including two brain surgeries, three lung surgeries and multiple other stuff, you know, cutting bones, connecting, reconnecting stuff that’s coming out of socket. So it took us. I think we decided we’re talking about it last night. Was it like? 

 

0:08:39 – Trish

Around 2013. 

 

0:08:40 – Adam

2013. So it took us like 13 years to finally get a diagnosis, because it was a rare disease. 

 

0:08:46 – Kayla

Oh, wow. 

 

0:08:47 – Adam

And so it’s called Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome. Eds is the short term and it’s a little bit more commonly known now because there’s been some awareness projects around it and there’s various types of it. But for me it’s affected my whole body, so I live every day in pain. I can’t remember what a day without pain is like. And then God brought you into my life, and then my pain tripled. Okay, maybe not that bad. 

 

0:09:19 – Kayla

I have to interject here, though, in all seriousness and I can’t speak for Trisha again home life. You know you’re entitled to be grumpy there. No-transcript, in as much pain as you wrestle. I just need to interject that, that you are one of the kindest and most gracious and, again, I know we all have our moments. So I’m sure Trish is sitting there going. Are we talking about the same? 

 

0:09:45 – Trish

No, actually I think especially specifically like hospital situations, when things are serious, like he gets calmer, I necessarily but she’s a great advocate you get calmer. 

 

0:09:56 – Adam

She’s a huge advocate for me and I’m more like, okay, like I process it and I actually get humorous at that. 

 

0:10:04 – Trish

Like it’s really bad If I get really nervous. 

 

0:10:06 – Brian

So when you’re facing death. 

 

0:10:07 – Adam

you’re cracking jokes. If it’s that serious, I’m cracking jokes and then she knows I’m worried. 

 

0:10:13 – Trish

Okay. But then there’s an aspect where then I kind of get into like, okay, let’s get things done. 

 

0:10:19 – Adam

But she’s been a great advocate for me when I’ve not been able to speak for myself, literally about what’s going on? It’s been a huge thing to have her and her support. Like me, being who I am today is obviously our savior, is who we rely on and all of it, but it is a huge part to my wife. 

 

0:10:37 – Trish

I think we all have our moments. 

 

0:10:38 – Adam

Yeah, absolutely on in all of it, but it is a huge part to my wife. I think we all have our moments. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. I mean I have a rib that’s constantly out of place and other ones that separate, if I move around too much, from the sternum or from the spine, so it’s like every breath is painful, like it’s just the way I live. And since then I’ve been diagnosed. Well, I have three rare diseases. So I’m just trying to add up and be a little more weird than I already am, Brian. 

 

0:11:05 – Brian

So yeah, nothing on that. What are those? 

 

0:11:07 – Adam

I’m trying to be really nice to you. It’s not working. 

 

0:11:11 – Brian

I can see it in your face. You don’t have a straight face. What are those three diseases? 

 

0:11:14 – Adam

So there’s of course the EDS, and then I have autoimmune autonomic ganglionopathy. 

 

0:11:22 – Kayla

Which is that sounds terrible? 

 

0:11:22 – Adam

Yeah, your body is attacking. 

 

0:11:23 – Kayla

Itself right. 

 

0:11:24 – Adam

Yourself and eventually affects the small nerve fiber system. So it creates neuropathy in my heart, in my blood vessels, like how your body communicates to those to make them contract and regulate blood pressure or to like keep the blood flow flowing correctly throughout the whole body doesn’t work properly and that’s why I have the monthly infusions that I have. They don’t do anything for the pain or whatever. It’s just to help the body not attack itself as much, so it can kind of attack the other things that I get, and then the other ones are bleeding disorder. That’s rare. 

 

0:11:55 – Brian

Yeah, let me go back to what Kayla said. I’ve never heard you grumble. 

 

0:12:01 – Kayla

I’ve never heard you complain. 

 

0:12:02 – Brian

I’d be a walking complaint department. I just want to say that, and so part of the reason why we wanted to invite you two on the podcast is because you’re both very humble. You lean into Christ more than I’ve ever seen. I mean, I don’t understand that. So here’s what I want to ask you to how do you do that? 

 

0:12:26 – Adam

Well, first of all I would say I don’t feel like I’m those things. I feel like I have a long way to go in any of those areas. I think when you have nowhere else to turn, you’re going to turn to various things. You have various options anyway to try and escape when you’re in pain. One is to just dull it by looking for hope, other places, right, and that never lasts, and I think there’s been times that I’ve done that, you know, like tried to find relief and other things that could distract from the pain. 

 

I think the other thing is trying to put your hope in things that the world holds on to and you realize when you’re in a condition like mine, that is only going to get worse over time. Those things aren’t going to last either. So it kind of gives you a different perspective on life in some ways. The things that I would normally have held on to in life the Lord has, because of his graciousness and allowing me to even have the stuff that I have and I say that in a kind of a weird way because that sounds odd, but it’s true he’s pulled some of the stuff that I would have naturally held on to away from me and that’s been not fun. That’s been a whole lot of hard days, wouldn’t you say, babe? 

 

0:13:36 – Trish

Yeah, I think one of the things we talked about with the kids last night we were asking them and they said, like we didn’t really have a choice, like it wasn’t like we picked this and so from that, then knowing that all good things, but also all things, are from our heavenly father. So just seeing that as like okay, it’s not us choosing one thing or the other, just seeing that as like okay, it’s not us choosing one thing or the other, it’s that we’ve been given this and attempting to steward it well. 

 

0:14:00 – Brian

The Lord’s given us this and we’re attempting to steward it. Well, yeah, how do you look at your husband, who you know is in pain, and say, okay, god, you’ve given this to us. Help me see this as something good and to steward it, because I find that kind of faith amazing. 

 

0:14:19 – Trish

I think it’s part of what we have like, just in our faith, trusting in Christ, and if we trust him right for eternity, right, so if I’m trusting him for eternity, then I’m also trusting him for today. So if he’s big enough for our eternity, then he’s enough for what he has given today. And I think, just remembering like the world is broken right, like all of us live in a broken world, so our broken is every day, each of us. So when we say like well, well, this situation, like he’s not grumpy or whatever, but I also see it as like, okay, we have a choice today. 

 

0:14:55 – Kayla

Yeah. 

 

0:14:55 – Trish

Just like what I tell my kids every day Okay, you have a choice, what are you going to choose? And so, if I’m living for myself, yeah, this isn’t fair, I don’t want to do this, and we have those. We have to fight that. It’s not that it’s not a battle, but it’s making sure our perspective is correct of like. I don’t deserve easy. That’s not what Christ has called us to.

 

0:15:15 – Adam

Yeah, and I think we’ve kind of come back many times to like, if I understand scripture correctly, what I deserve is death and separation from God forever in hell. That’s what I deserve, and so anything less than that is his grace. And that still doesn’t sound fun and cheery sometimes. Like we want, like we want always, like well the gospel, everything will be great. Well, the gospel doesn’t say that life on this earth is going to be all roses and happiness. And you know, rainbow, like it’s going to be hard, like it makes it clear that life on this earth is still going to be hard. And, as a believer, there’ll be difficult things. And I think some of the hardest things we had to wrestle with is like the death of what you thought were dreams about what life would be like, like thinking like life’s going to be good. 

 

0:15:59 – Brian

You got stuck with me. 

 

0:16:01 – Adam

Yeah, that On an everyday, Brian, 3 am to 5 am on my knees, but no, it’s like life is not what we expected. It. It’s just so different. 

 

0:16:13 – Trish

I think we say this is plan what. 

 

0:16:19 – Adam

Yeah, we’re like, are we through the alphabet? And starting over again on what we thought? Because then you get a new diagnosis and you’re like, okay, well, then this changes. And struggling with you know, like okay, my kid wants me to go play ball with them and not able to do that right now. Or it’s just those little life moments that you think about and you’re like, okay, like I don’t want my kids to have to deal with this issue, like I’d rather them just have a normal dad. 

 

And I struggled with that for quite some time. But I mean, this is a very simple truth. I don’t know why it took me so long to realize it and why it’s taken me so long to go. Like I have to remind myself of it is that God chose to put them in this family and he has promised to give me grace for whatever he puts in my path. He has chosen to put them here and he has promised to give them grace for what he puts in their path, and part of that is the family he’s placed them into, and so we’ve seen God work in ways in their lives through it too, even though it’s not always been easy. 

 

0:17:12 – Brian

How do the kids respond to this? 

 

0:17:14 – Trish

Before we started recording, you were telling us a story about yeah, so we have, you know, just as any like, they’re all completely different. So we have one that is absolutely fascinated with the medical field and she wants to conquer, like, she wants to figure out and solve problems. So I think some of that is because of what she has seen, and she loves to see when IVs are put in and all the details she would put it in herself if we’d let her.

 

And we have one that is incredibly just. She has a huge heart and hates to see anyone suffer, and so her processing looks differently. So, in those aspects of giving them space, first of all, to be able to discuss how they feel, what they think, but also encouraging like, hey, it’s okay to struggle, yeah, giving openness of like, yeah, it stinks, it’s hard, and not pretending it’s not, yeah, and I think that’s one thing I’ve had to work through over the years. 

 

0:18:10 – Adam

I used to think I had to have like some sort of Pollyanna attitude toward it, like rejoice in all things, Like Like I just need to be happy about it and be like well, this is what God’s given me. This is great guys. You know like just this is super, it’s OK, and just over the years coming around, like no, it stinks. 

 

0:18:30 – Kayla

But God’s given us an array of emotions. He doesn’t expect us just to be joyful all the time. 

 

0:18:36 – Adam

Yeah, Like I can of emotions. He doesn’t expect us just to be joyful all the time. Yeah, it’s okay to be sad about things. We live in a broken world and it’s not only unnatural, it’s unhealthy. It’s unhealthy in the sense that if we’re looking for hope where it should be, which is in eternity yeah these sad things help us to see and want eternity, and forever and eternity in a healthy, better way than if we just act like everything’s okay to know Adam, you would never believe he’s lived with chronic pain for as much of his life as he has. 

 

0:19:13 – Kayla

Because I’m just keeping it real, he is not an Eeyore. He is one of the most encouraging and humorous people that we’ve ever had the chance to do life with, would you agree? 

 

0:19:25 – Brian

I agree, he razzes me and you’ve heard some of that there. And let me say this he’s one of the most cheerful people. 

 

0:19:35 – Kayla

Yeah. 

 

0:19:35 – Brian

He’s the most cheerful person I’ve ever met, even as he carries all this. 

 

0:19:41 – Kayla

Yeah, he’s cheerful, he aggravates me, he tells me jokes, he smiles and I sit there in amazement at that, because that convicts me, because I don’t have three rare diseases and yet someone that does, can take the time and is willing to embrace the fact that your role requires a lot, that it’s very heavy, it bears a lot of responsibility, and so Adam’s great delight is in finding ways that he can come alongside you and gift you information that you might need, or a joke to dispel some tension. He’s not focused on how much he’s hurting or how difficult his day is. He is looking for ways to make someone else’s day less difficult, and he does this for like 60 team members in PAR. In very different ways, he finds moments for encouragement. 

 

0:20:43 – Brian

It’s pretty incredible. 

 

0:20:44 – Kayla

There was another powerful statement, and again we’re going to let you, the listener, sit with your own takeaways, so we’re just going to share a few of ours. It’s easy to look everywhere for relief, and I thought that was very powerful and we’re all guilty of it, but realizing that when we have nowhere else to turn, we can and should turn to Christ. 

 

0:21:08 – Brian

That moved me. 

 

0:21:09 – Kayla

So powerful. 

 

0:21:10 – Brian

That just. 

 

0:21:11 – Kayla

Because we all have our crutches. 

 

0:21:13 – Brian

It reminds me of a phrase that my friend Rock Collins once said. He says I’ve reached the bottom and it was there that I found the solid rock. Phew Adam said I can’t remember what a day without pain is like. That can’t remember what a day without pain is like. 

 

0:21:35 – Kayla

That. That’s a foreign concept to me, because I have many pain-free days. I wasn’t in college starting to deal with a debilitating illness, yeah, collapsed lung, I mean just the very thought of how many. 

 

It took them 13 years to get a diagnosis it’s unimaginable. It was sweet seeing how, in times of great stress, god gave each of them strengths and continues to. We even saw this sitting with them at lunch that day. He cracks jokes and it was interesting. I learned something about Adam that typically when he’s trying to use humor it’s because he’s deflecting something else. So I will be mindful to that moving forward. But Trisha is me. In stressful situations she becomes the take charge get answers. 

 

0:22:23 – Brian

What do I do? 

 

0:22:24 – Kayla

You freak out, and that’s OK. It’s just in the moment when there is a stressful situation. 

 

0:22:30 – Brian

I feel so manly right now. 

 

0:22:34 – Kayla

I felt this tug in my heart that God gives her the strength in those moments to be his advocate. He even called her that and it was very beautiful, and that’s how it looks sometimes. So yeah, and it was very beautiful, and that’s how it looks sometimes. 

 

0:22:47 – Brian

So yeah, I love seeing in the room to build on what you’re saying, is that her role of being an advocate and seeing how God has meshed them together. 

 

0:22:59 – Kayla

Yeah. 

 

0:22:59 – Brian

And they complement each other. 

 

0:23:01 – Kayla

Oh, they really do. 

 

0:23:02 – Brian

Because as the stress gets higher, he gets funnier. 

 

0:23:07 – Kayla

And she gets serious. 

 

0:23:13 – Brian

And she has to ask questions. So I find it interesting how God puts our lives together. 

 

0:23:16 – Kayla

Yeah, and it was really special seeing them together and realizing how perfect they are for each other. There was one other thing that Adam said in this part and again we’re excited to share the second episode next week but he referred to stewarding it. Well, will others be drawn to Christ because of how he handles these struggles? And he and Trisha both reference this because, after 10 minutes with them, I cannot imagine a more authentic way to sum them up is that they want to steward this struggle Well that’s a foreign concept to me. 

 

0:23:57 – Brian

I got to be honest with you because I want it to get over. 

 

0:24:01 – Kayla

Yeah. 

 

0:24:02 – Brian

You’re looking for an out, I’m looking for an out. I’m looking for relief. He’s looking to how to steward it well, how to live it well. That killed me. Trisha made a statement that if the Lord’s enough to get us to eternity, then he’s enough to get us through today. That’s going to become a little quote card for me, because there are days when I feel like he has abandoned me, that he doesn’t care, that he’s left me. But I look at them and I’m not caring near what they’re carrying. And so be of good cheer, be of hope that if he keeps his promises that Jesus came just to die for us and yet he’s going to get us to heaven, well then, certainly he can get us through the problems of today. We hope that you’ve been encouraged by today’s podcast. We know that we have been. 

 

0:24:54 – Kayla

Our hearts have been encouraged, and we want to end with something special. So for the first two people who go to our website and answer this question correctly, you will win a peas and carrots coffee mug and some cute stickers. We always refer to them correctly. You will win a peas and carrots coffee mug and some cute stickers. We always refer to them. But when you go to our website, look for the trivia button. Click that. You’ll go to the peasandcarrotspodcast.com website. Click that trivia button. Share with us a verse that sustains you in times of struggle. That’s good, and we will actually share that with Adam and Trisha. Oh so if will actually share that with Adam and Trisha, oh so if you will do that, we’re not going to ask you a cutesy trivia question this week. We want to encourage the encouragers. 

 

0:25:38 – Brian

What’s a verse that carries you through hard times? Simply go to our website peasandcarrotspodcast.com, look for the trivia button and answer that question. 

 

0:25:47 – Kayla

Share that verse with us. There you go. You can search the Peas and Carrots Podcast wherever you get your podcasts, or visit our website peasandcarrotspodcast.com. When you do, please don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast. 

 

0:25:58 – Brian

You can also follow us on Facebook and Instagram. Just search for the Peas and Carrots Podcast. 

 

0:26:03 – Announcer

For more about the Peas and Carrots Podcast and to reach out to Brian and Kayla, visit peasandcarrotspodcast.com. Life’s not perfect. That’s why God gave us friends like Melody and Candi. Check out QuirksBumpsandBruises.com, or search Quirks, Bumps, and Bruises wherever you listen to podcasts. 

 

 

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Season 3, Episode 12: Can We Talk?

Can We Talk?
Can We Talk? - Episode Description

Join us on a heartfelt journey through the ups and downs of self-improvement and relationship building. Listen in as we laugh about the aches and triumphs of our gym escapades, including the notorious “cheeks to sneaks” challenge, and share a personal triumph as our Christmas tree finally gets packed away. But it’s not all fun and games; we get real about the necessity of engaging in tough conversations for leadership and personal growth. Hear about our commitment to candor in our lives and how these essential, yet often uncomfortable, discussions keep our relationships thriving.

In our latest chat, we reflect on the 31-year adventure of our relationship, weaving through the lessons of love and the evolution of our financial journey together. We explore the art of nurturing a lasting bond, emphasizing the role of trust, kindness, and the power of prayer before entering difficult dialogues. Plus, don’t miss the anticipation as we usher in the spring season, sharing our excitement for warmer days and inviting you to participate in our podcast giveaway. Tune in for these stories and more, wrapped up in the warmth of our shared experiences and laughter.

Can We Talk? - Transcript

0:00:00 – Announcer

We go together like Peas and Carrots. The Peas and Carrots Podcast, sharing life from our piece of the vegetable patch, Brian and Kayla Sanders. 

 

0:00:11 – Brian

Welcome to the Peas and Carrots Podcast. Hi, I’m Brian. 

 

0:00:15 – Kayla

I’m Kayla, I may not have known you started the microphones on or anything. I don’t know what day is this. Microphones on or anything, I don’t know what day is this? 

 

0:00:30 – Brian

Let’s just, I want to start here, I just want to start here. Oh, my goodness, the trainer at our gym has you doing something new? 

 

0:00:39 – Kayla

It’s not new, I’ve done it before, but admittedly I have not done it for a while. 

 

0:00:44 – Brian

And tell them what this is called. 

 

0:00:46 – Kayla

It’s called a squat. It has a technical name, but you’re basically no. What’s he call it? Well, he calls it cheeks to sneaks. So basically I have to bend down and my behind has to touch the back of my shoes. I can hardly walk today. 

 

0:01:04 – Brian

Cheeks to sneaks. 

 

0:01:08 – Kayla

So he had you do this Tuesday, Wednesday 20 of them times I could only do three. Admittedly, I could only do three rounds. But he did 60 cheeks to sneaks and last night I could not sit in the bathtub. 

 

0:01:21 – Brian

When she got up, it’s like she needed a walker, and you can use your own imagination. 

 

0:01:33 – Kayla

Sitting down is precarious in all circumstances, so you’re talking about using the bathroom a little bit, but yeah, so I went to the gym this morning. 

 

0:01:38 – Brian

Did you do any cheeks to sneaks I? 

 

0:01:40 – Kayla

did not. 

 

0:01:41 – Brian

Not today. 

 

0:01:41 – Kayla

No, today was riding five miles on the bike, wow. So tomorrow I’m going to need a walker. That’s where we are. You’re doing some amazing stuff at the gym, though, too, and yes, we signed on for this. 

 

0:02:02 – Brian

Nobody’s forcing us. We pay these people to do this to us. I don’t understand that. 

 

0:02:06 – Kayla

But okay, in all seriousness, what did we admit Tuesday night? 

 

0:02:12 – Brian

I was deathly tired and needed a piece of cake. 

 

0:02:17 – Kayla

We admitted that it’s good for us and that we are thankful for the people there. 

 

0:02:22 – Brian

That was a weak moment in my life. 

 

0:02:23 – Kayla

Okay, all right it does, it makes a weak moment in my life. 

 

0:02:25 – Brian

Okay, all right, it does. It makes a difference. I feel better, I’ve lost weight. 

 

0:02:30 – Kayla

We’re healthier physically, mentally, yeah, yeah, it’s good stuff, so but we’re also very sore. 

 

0:02:36 – Brian

Yes, killing us. 

 

0:02:38 – Kayla

Breaking news for those two people that are keeping score our Christmas tree is down. 

 

0:02:46 – Brian

It only took. 

 

0:02:48 – Kayla

Listen, it normally stays up until your birthday, which is what date? 

 

0:02:53 – Brian

I like having it up, I mean March 15th. 

 

0:02:55 – Kayla

Yeah. 

 

0:02:56 – Brian

Are you trying to test my memory, if I remember stuff? 

 

0:02:58 – Kayla

I’m trying to see if you’re listening what you look a little zoned out. 

 

0:03:02 – Brian

That is not fair. 

 

0:03:03 – Kayla

This came from the person who didn’t know. You turned the microphones on. 

 

0:03:07 – Brian

This is my life, y’all. 

 

0:03:09 – Kayla

But seriously, I do want to say thank you to the friends who encouraged me to turn it into an Easter tree and then a spring tree and then a 4th of July tree. But it was time, it just felt time to tuck it away. 

 

0:03:21 – Brian

And now the den it looks huge, it looks massive. 

 

0:03:26 – Kayla

Yeah, I’m like, wow, we have all this space. 

 

0:03:27 – Brian

I’m happy to see that right corner of the tv again. I know you are. 

 

0:03:31 – Kayla

You’re very welcome so y’all. 

 

0:03:34 – Brian

Just I felt that comment. There you go, we’ve become those people. Uh-huh, we don’t start a movie after about 7, 30 or so seven is Because we’re typically asleep by 9. 

 

0:03:48 – Kayla

So if it’s a two-hour movie, we need to be starting it by 7 pm. The other night we went to bed at 7.45. And I am not sorry for it. I feel guilty. I don’t care. They don’t bother you. We get to make the rules. Oh, but we were awake at like three the next morning, so that’s probably not the greatest idea. 

 

0:04:07 – Brian

But there’s one more late breaking development I want to add to this. Ok, one of the engineers in PAR, his name is Alan. 

 

0:04:16 – Kayla

He’s bought us a popcorn machine. Now, when she says popcorn machine, we’re not talking about an air popper, no, we’re talking like one, you would go to the movie theater for, yeah, it is so cool. 

 

0:04:28 – Brian

And we just had our first bag of popcorn. 

 

0:04:30 – Kayla

We did so. Thank you, Alan. Thank you, it was very, very sweet, yeah, this is. The whole building smells like popcorn today. 

 

0:04:37 – Brian

I love popcorn, do you? 

 

0:04:38 – Kayla

I do. 

 

0:04:39 – Brian

Oh. 

 

0:04:45 – Kayla

Probably not trainer approved, but here we are. You don’t listen to them. I’ll put in another round next week. So we always say that a lot of what we talk about comes from real life, and I get that we’re probably for those of you who’ve been hanging with us for a while, we are probably revisiting some topics, and I think that’s okay, because as humans, we are ever growing, hopefully, and we start to see things differently as we experience things. And for us, we are both serving roles that require what we are going to talk about here, which is Healthy hard conversations. 

 

Yeah. 

 

0:05:27 – Brian

I’m a big believer in what’s called candor. I learned that from Jack Welch, yeah. Then Brene Brown followed that up with her book Dare to Lead, and she talks about rumbles. There’s also another book by Kim Scott that talks about candor a lot. So I’m a big believer in it. But candor doesn’t always mean hard conversations. But if you’re going to lead, if you’re going to invest in people, if you’re going to live life, you’re going to have to have some hard conversations. 

 

0:05:59 – Kayla

If you want to have a functioning relationship. Yeah, Because I mean a functioning relationship. Yeah, Because I mean it’s interesting to me the people that are conflict averse. They equate hard conversations with conflict and maybe they will lead to some conflict, but if they’re done right, that’s not always the case, and so this is kind of a rule for me. I have learned as a leader and even as a spouse and even as a friend it’s better to have a hard conversation early than to let a situation or an issue fester, Because the other side of this is nobody deserves to be blindsided by something that’s apparently been an issue for a long time, but bam, all of a sudden it’s being addressed. It’s like annual reviews. 

 

0:06:51 – Brian

I’m not a fan. Yeah, we do not do annual reviews either. You need to be having ongoing conversation. Yeah, and if you have ongoing conversations, you won’t have to have as many hard conversations. 

 

0:07:03 – Kayla

And you build trust. 

 

0:07:04 – Brian

Correct. 

 

0:07:04 – Kayla

During the regular day-to-day talking life with other people. So I think there’s this part of Brene Brown’s book where she talks about the marble jar. You remember that she talks about the marble jar and she talks about how, hopefully, you’re filling the jar with marbles. Well, there will come a point where you might have to take a marble or two out because of something that either there’s a felt lack of trust or there’s a there’s a change, and a hard conversation could possibly be perceived as one of those times. If you filled the jar full enough, it’s not going to be as hard to lose a marble here or there. 

 

0:07:48 – Brian

And I think what Ms. Kayla is referring to, as is Brene Brown, is that’s trust. You got to keep building trust, yeah, you got to keep building trust, yep, so that when those hard conversations come, you can actually take some of that out and use it to have a hard conversation In a healthy way. Yes, Now, within a lot of Christian circles let me just say this in a lot of Christian circles and some secular, it’s not considered Christian or nice to have hard conversations. 

 

0:08:17 – Kayla

But even Jesus did that. He modeled it for us in the Bible. 

 

0:08:21 – Brian

Yes, and let me say this the only way the gospel can be good news is if there’s bad news, that’s right. So you have to understand the bad news, which is we are sinners, we are separated from God. We were born this way. We are bent away from him, we are selfish, we want our own desires, and then Jesus comes to rescue us because we can’t earn our way to God. There’s no way. So he comes. The bad news is you can’t get there on your own. The bad news is you are condemned. 

 

0:08:51 – Kayla

What is the good news? The good news is grace. Yes, he came, so you’ve got to have that hard conversation in order to get to the good stuff? Amen. Why do we, as humans, struggle to have hard conversations? What are some of the things that you and I have observed? 

 

0:09:09 – Brian

We don’t want to hurt people’s feelings. 

 

0:09:11 – Kayla

We don’t want them to not like us. 

 

0:09:19 – Brian

For me. I don’t want to be rejected or I don’t want to be not accepted. I don’t want to be unlovable or seen as unlovable. 

 

0:09:23 – Kayla

We don’t want to have the conversation used against us later on, huh I never thought about that. 

 

0:09:29 – Brian

That’s how selfish I am. 

 

0:09:31 – Kayla

I’ve never thought I’ve we we’re averse to conflict. We talked about that a minute ago. Maybe we don’t want to have that hard conversation because we don’t want to. What’s the expression? Upset the apple cart. We don’t want to have drama or we don’t want to have someone who’s not happy. 

 

0:09:50 – Brian

Some people will say well, you know you should avoid that, because a fruit of the spirit is peace. Well, you might need to have a hard conversation so you can get to peace. 

 

0:10:00 – Kayla

But if you’re living in a toxic space where both people are just practicing like silent anger or passive aggressiveness, is that really peace? Because when you don’t have hard conversations that’s sometimes what it looks like is, well, I’m just going to sit over here and ice you out, or I’m going to pout, or I’m going to sit here and just stew over what happened, whereas a 10-minute conversation, it gives you the opportunity to practice kindness in choosing your words. You can practice forgiveness if you’re the one that’s having to receive the hard words. There’s just there’s so many layers to it. But I’m not a fan and this is from being married to you for 31 years, because I’ll be the first to admit you know this. 

 

When we first married, I did not do hard conversations. I would clam up anytime you tried to have a conversation with me and you finally said we got to about our third year of marriage and you said there is something you have to do for me. You have to stop putting up a wall when we need to have a conversation about something, and so I committed to that. It was hard, still is sometimes. 

 

0:11:22 – Brian

Yes. 

 

0:11:22 – Kayla

Especially when I think I’m right and I don’t want to hear it, which you normally are right. 

 

0:11:28 – Brian

Let’s just go on the record and say that. 

 

0:11:30 – Kayla

So what are we really saying to the other person when we lean into a hard conversation? 

 

0:11:35 – Brian

I think I’m saying to them I love you, I care about you, I care about you. I care about this relationship. 

 

0:11:40 – Kayla

Yes. 

 

0:11:41 – Brian

Yeah, let me say this we’re not saying that a hard conversation is you can be a jerk Not at all. That’s not what we’re saying. What we’re saying is that you have to be kind and clear, caring. You don’t have to raise your voice, you don’t go after the person. 

 

0:11:59 – Kayla

Oh, you go after the issue Go after the issue yes, and if the person is the issue, then find kind ways to express that issue. You don’t have to tear them down in the process, Because you and I have both we’ve been on the receiving end of that before and nothing good comes from that. But and I’m sure that we’ve not perfectly executed our conversations with others but but what is it that we want to say when we’re having a hard conversation to that person? 

 

0:12:31 – Brian

That I want to address this issue so I can save the relationship. 

 

0:12:36 – Kayla

Yes. 

 

0:12:36 – Brian

Or I want to address this issue so I can make the relationship better, I can make things better between us, I can make the process better. Yeah, that’s what I’m trying to do, and it’s to either restore something or improve something. Yes. 

 

0:12:52 – Kayla

That’s got to be the goal of it, and it’s to communicate. I love you enough, whoever this person is, I love you enough, whoever this person is, I love you enough. I value you that I’m not just going to write you off. We’re going to work through this. 

 

0:13:06 – Brian

I would say if you can use some humor, yeah, but get to the point. And let me say this: Please don’t talk in riddles, oh no, get to the point, be honest. 

 

0:13:18 – Kayla

Yeah. 

 

0:13:18 – Brian

And be clear and communicate that you love that person. 

 

0:13:23 – Kayla

There’s another tenant to this that I always practice when I’m having a really hard conversation with someone. 

 

If it hits a point in the conversation, perhaps we’ve had to rumble a little bit and it’s gotten a little uncomfortable, perhaps we’ve had to rumble a little bit and it’s gotten a little uncomfortable, or maybe the person or myself is feeling kind of threatened. Then what I will do is I will say we’re going to pause this, but we’re going to come back to this at this time and I will commit to coming back to it, hopefully that day. If it’s a situation where I know, okay, we’re going to pause this, we’re going to go get done what we need to get done, but then we’re going to come back together and we’re going to revisit this. It may look like you need to give the person a couple of days if it was a really contentious conversation, but it has to be something that when you start you’re committed to finishing it, that you’re not just going to get halfway and go okay, we’ll find we’ll walk away from this, because then nothing’s been accomplished. 

 

0:14:27 – Brian

You need to get to where what I call tie the shoe, because there’s nothing worse than walk around with your shoes untied. You could trip over it. That’s like an unfinished conversation. You need to be able to finish it. Land the plane Now. Y’all may not end up agreeing okay, but you’ll need to find a framework in which you can move forward together. 

 

0:14:48 – Kayla

With mutual respect. 

 

0:14:49 – Brian

Yes. 

 

0:14:49 – Kayla

Yeah, that’s the end game. 

 

0:14:51 – Brian

Yeah Well, do these conversations ever get easier? Meh Well, do these conversations ever get easier? Let me say this it’s according as to the size of the issue. 

 

0:15:04 – Kayla

Yeah. 

 

0:15:05 – Brian

As to the seriousness of the issue. Some of those conversations, they flow well. Some conversations are not going to flow so well because people can feel attacked, they can feel that you are coming against them personally, and I would just make that clear up front. This is not about you personally. Yeah, this is about what this is happening over here. 

 

0:15:28 – Kayla

They hopefully get easier in one respect. That is, that the more you embrace them, the less terrified you are of having a hard conversation and the less of your own value you tie to them, and what I mean by that is the more we are willing to say. Let’s sit in this space together and let’s talk this out. You’re not fretting over the fact that, ok, if I do this, this person’s going to hate me for the rest of my life, because, truthfully, that’s a whole nother topic for another day. 

 

0:16:05 – Brian

Hard conversations will make you and your relationships better. Yeah, know that, but you have to build the trust with the person before you can have them and you cannot let emotion rule the day. Exactly. So just know that Now, as Miss Kayla said, we have not perfected this. 

 

0:16:23 – Kayla

No, I bumble them. From time to time I have to go back and say can we revisit this or can I clarify that, or is there anything that you would want to say? And that’s the other part of this is the conversation has to be two-sided. A hard conversation is not just something that you like pour out, it’s something that you have to let filter in as well. So anytime a hard conversation is entered into, it’s got to be two-way. It’s got to be listening as well as speaking. 

 

0:16:54 – Brian

If it’s not, you’re just wasting your time. That’s right. So be brave, but also be kind. 

 

0:17:00 – Kayla

Yes. 

 

0:17:01 – Brian

Have those conversations. 

 

0:17:02 – Kayla

And the last thing I would say is this sounds trite to some people, but before you go into any hard conversation, pray. And ask the spirit to give you the right things to say. Sometimes he will literally put a guard over your mouth to keep you from saying things. 

 

0:17:20 – Brian

Well, I’m pretty strong. I’ve beaten that guard down a few times, but you’re exactly right. You’re 100% right. 

 

0:17:28 – Kayla

But you can do this, yes. 

 

0:17:33 – Brian

Living the dream baby. 

 

0:17:35 – Kayla

We were and we are. Oh baby, we were and we are, oh yeah. Okay, there’s just a few things that we were thinking through our last. I mean almost 31 years now. 

 

0:17:45 – Brian

I’m getting old. 

 

0:17:47 – Kayla

I mean we’ve known each other almost 32 years. Oh my gosh, here we are and here you’ve stuck with me. So there’s just a few things that you know as you think back over your time with someone. I’m going to say with your person, because for us that’s each other. Our financial status, for example, it has changed in the last 31-ish years, but our values toward each other have not. My dad always said money’s gained and lost every single day. You can always make more money, but the most precious commodity we have is each other. 

 

0:18:24 – Brian

That’s exactly right To the point that I’ve tried to embrace. This is that I can replace stuff. I can always earn more money. Yeah, I can’t replace you, yep. So as we look back over these 31 years, you know taking care of you has been my greatest delight, that’s very sweet, because jobs come and go. Why are you being so nice today? 

 

0:18:49 – Kayla

I had popcorn. 

 

0:18:53 – Brian

I set you up for a great sentimental moment. I had popcorn. She’s so proud of herself right now. What I was going to say. What I was going to say is we have worked so hard to get certain things and I look back and it isn’t the thing that made the memory. It’s working with you. 

 

0:19:19 – Kayla

Yeah. 

 

0:19:20 – Brian

It was through the struggle, it was doing those things together. 

 

0:19:23 – Kayla

The things pale in comparison. Yes, yeah. 

 

0:19:27 – Brian

I would also say this looking back, you aren’t meant to have it all immediately. 

 

0:19:32 – Kayla

No. 

 

0:19:33 – Brian

And maybe you never should. So there’s two things here. One you aren’t meant to have it all to me. You should have to work hard, you should have to learn some lessons, you should have to. 

 

0:19:43 – Kayla

And lean into each other. For that. 

 

0:19:45 – Brian

At the same time, there might be some things that you’ll never have enough money for, Like I’ll never have enough money to buy an autographed letter by Abraham Lincoln no-transcript. 

 

0:20:05 – Kayla

But in all seriousness, we could have spent the entire last 31 years chasing after all the things. When do you get to enjoy what you already have, if that’s your mindset? 

 

0:20:19 – Brian

I enjoy. This is going to sound really stupid. I enjoy a simple life. When we leave here every day from the offices we go home, I’m going to be serious. We do not live a big, exciting life. I mean being serious.

 

0:20:31 – Kayla

And most people don’t. 

 

0:20:32 – Brian

Most people don’t. I mean, we go home and I’ll plop down and I’ll watch the news for a little while. 

 

0:20:38 – Kayla

I’ll cook dinner. 

 

0:20:40 – Brian

We’ll cook dinner We’ll watch an episode of West Wing or something. 

 

0:20:45 – Kayla

Or read. Some nights the TV doesn’t even go on. 

 

0:20:51 – Brian

I’m usually asleep in the recliner by about 815. But that’s our simple life, and if there’s a topic we need to talk about, we’ll do it. 

 

0:20:59 – Kayla

But for me, here’s what I’ll say this might sound ooey and gooey, but living the dream for me has been doing all these moments with you. Yeah, it’s in the mundane that a life is built, so to build on that, we started out together with a gifted couch, a gifted chair and a gifted bed. And what we can tell you now, 31 years in, is memories aren’t made around the stuff. It’s made around the day-to-day. The memories we have are about us. We can’t tell you what we were wearing when those memories were made. 

 

0:21:38 – Brian

It’s about the doing, it’s about the living, it’s about the decisions. It’s about being there together, facing the hardships. 

 

0:21:45 – Kayla

It’s about the shared experiences, not the stuff. It’s not the life you build with stuff, it’s the life you build with each other. And so, yeah, Friday night, date night. It always has been and it always will be. 

 

0:22:00 – Brian

We lived in New Orleans, we’d go to Texas Steakhouse Roadhouse, something. 

 

0:22:06 – Kayla

Texas Steakhouse. I think Texas Steakhouse we’d go to and we’d get a little meal yeah, and we’d go to a little. 

 

0:22:12 – Brian

I think we went to Walmart probably and then we’d come home. That was our date night and very, very rarely. 

 

0:22:20 – Kayla

If we had been gifted some money, we would do our bi-weekly dinner. We could not afford to go out every Friday night. We would go out every other Friday night and then we would go to a movie if we had been gifted some money. Otherwise it was game nights or watching a show or a movie at home. And yeah, I mean it was a very date nights now are. 

 

0:22:48 – Brian

we’ll go out to dinner and we might hit up a bookstore or go to Target or something. 

 

0:22:55 – Kayla

Come home, we’ll watch or we might go to a movie in the afternoon. Yeah, if we have a Friday afternoon. Sometimes we’ll go to a movie, but yeah, but it’s about the carving out space for each other. 

 

0:23:11 – Brian

I’m gonna say something here you have to enjoy the person before you enjoy the experience, because you need to be more in love with who you’re spending time with than being in love with what you’re trying to do, because that’s not where life is built. Yeah, so that was pretty good. You is smart. Stop. You need to carve out some sacred time for each other. Now. We spend a great deal of time together, so that’s not an issue for us, but now Friday nights are a sacred time for us. Yeah. 

 

0:23:47 – Kayla

There’s some eye rolling happening right now. I feel it. There’s some really, but you’re not chasing kids around and you’re not doing this and you’re not doing that. I get that, I do, but there were many years and there are many seasons where we are very, very busy, and yet it’s what we’ve prioritized. We have made sure that Friday night is sacred. We have often said no to things. 

 

Because that’s date night Because it’s date night and it’s not because we don’t love other people. It’s because we love each other. And there’s value in figuring out. How do you make this almost a habit at first and then it becomes something that you hate to miss it. 

 

0:24:34 – Brian

There’s a lot of truth to the statement that marriages work. Yeah, it’s a choice to love that person more than yourself, to lay down your own selfishness, to prioritize them over all the world’s demands, to place boundaries with others who don’t honor what you have. You’ve got to do that. So marriage is work. It doesn’t come easy. 

 

0:24:54 – Kayla

No. 

 

0:24:54 – Brian

But if you put the work in you know relationship does find a rhythm that works and brings joy. 

 

0:25:01 – Kayla

Yeah. 

 

So, and it really is. It is a daily dying to yourself because I love me, some me. But if you love that person, you want what they want. If you love that person, then you are willing to prioritize their needs over your own and that becomes almost second nature in some ways. There are things that it’s just if you’re happy, I’m happy, and when you get to that place it doesn’t feel like as much work. I’m speaking to those of you who are fresh into marriage or fresh into a relationship. Yeah, it’s going to take some work and sometimes you’re going to feel like you’re giving a whole lot more than you’re getting. 

 

0:25:51 – Brian

But the end result is that if you really love that person and you want what’s best for them, then you’re not worried about what you get out of it, exactly right, and you’re going to make them a priority and you’re going to push some other things out of the way so you can spend time with that person. 

 

0:26:09 – Kayla

I think the last one we would share is dream together. 

 

0:26:14 – Brian

Dream on, dream on. Oh dear, just saying. 

 

0:26:26 – Kayla

And we’ve always made time for dreaming like places we want to go, things we want to accomplish and then chase as many of those dreams as you can. 

 

0:26:32 – Brian

Yes, miss Kayla has a dream of when we retire at some point we will have two labs, and she has a vision that one will be hers, one will be mine. I want to tell you right now they’ll both be hers. Okay, they will both be hers. 

 

0:26:44 – Kayla

Man. 

 

0:26:44 – Brian

I’ll let you pet them, but you need to figure out what you share in common as a dream and then go for it yeah. And yeah, you’re going to be afraid, yeah, things are going to go haywire, but keep pushing after it and that dream will actually draw you closer together. 

 

0:27:00 – Kayla

Yeah, and some of you are sitting there going. Well, that’s kind of contradictory to what you just said five minutes ago about keeping it simple. 

 

0:27:07 – Brian

Honey, we’re all full of contradictions. 

 

0:27:09 – Kayla

But the truth is it’s okay to have things that you aspire to, it’s okay to have trips that you want to take and memories are made on those trips, and it’s okay to have things that you want to enjoy in your journey. Don’t be ruled by them is what we were saying. But yeah, we have a dream to one day have a place on a lake, have two labs brother, sister maybe, I don’t know. 

 

0:27:38 – Brian

One of the rooms has to be a library. Yes, like to have a dark paneled room with a library that has a couple of leather chairs, some lamps that’s just a dream, but that’s something we look forward to down the road. 

 

0:27:50 – Kayla

Yeah, again, our whole point in sharing all this is where did you come from and where are you going? And, as we’re looking forward to our 32nd year, there’s just so much more to look forward to, and we hope that for all of you, yes, in your relationships. 

 

0:28:10 – Brian

Take the time to make it a priority. Yeah, say that. Hey, thanks for listening. We appreciate you tuning in this week. Share this episode with a friend or two. We’d appreciate that. 

 

0:28:20 – Kayla

Anybody want to get mugged? 

 

0:28:22 – Brian

No. Not that kind of mug? Oh, coffee mug, that kind of mug, yes, first of mug, oh, coffee mug, that kind of mug, yes. First of all, our friend Michelle won a coffee mug and a pack of stickers. And thank you, Michelle, from South Carolina, for listening. Yeah, but hey, you can win a coffee mug and a pack of stickers. All you have to do go to our website. 

 

0:28:44 – Kayla

Yep, it’s the peasandcarrotspodcast.com. If you’ll there, click the trivia button and then we always have like a random question. 

 

0:28:53 – Brian

This week’s question is what are you looking forward to this month? 

 

0:28:57 – Kayla

It’s getting a little warmer Spring is coming. I promise it’s coming. 

 

0:29:02 – Brian

Snowed here today. 

 

0:29:03 – Kayla

I know? Well, actually it snowed, then it sleeted, then the sunshine, then it snowed, then it sleeted, then the sunshine, then it snowed again, then it sleeted, and now it looks like I don’t know what it’s going to do. South Florida, yeah. 

 

0:29:13 – Brian

So, hey, you can win yourself a coffee mug and a pack of stickers. You go to peasandcarrotspodcast.com, you click the trivia button and when you get there, you answer this question. 

 

0:29:22 – Kayla

What are you looking forward to this month? You can search the Search the Peas and Carrots Podcast wherever you get your podcasts, or visit our website. Again, that’s peasandcarrotspodcast.com. When you do, don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast. 

 

0:29:35 – Brian

Also find us on Facebook and Instagram, Just search for the Peas and Carrots Podcast. 

 

0:29:40 – Announcer

For more about the Peas and Carrots Podcast and to reach out to Brian and Kayla, visit peasandcarrotspodcast.com. Growing through the challenges we face and finding hope along the way. That’s the Jesus Fix It Podcast with Jess. Check out jesusfixit.com or search Jesus Fix It wherever you listen to podcasts.

 

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