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When Your Spouse Travels {Episode 57}
91 Plays5 years ago
If your spouse travels regularly for work then you know a little about the stress and chaos that comes with part-time single parenting! Join Audrey and Bonnie as they share 3 key things to remember and 6 tips for surviving when you're the parent left behind.
These tough times of travel can help us grow personally and assist us in strengthening our families, but only if we're able to face them with courage, patience and perspective. Let's chat traveling spouses!
Recommendations:
Survival Times, Episode 20
Mom Guilt, Episode 9
When you Want to Quit, Episode 3
Live Free Creative Podcast, Episode 73
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Transcript
Introduction to Outnumbered Podcast
00:00:05
Speaker
Hello and welcome to Outnumber the Podcast. I'm Bonnie. And I'm Audrey. We're experienced moms to a combined total of 18 children. Our mission is to help overwhelmed parents find peace in parenting and humor in the chaos. Come join us as we attempt uninterrupted conversation about parenting with joy and intention.
Challenges of Solo Parenting
00:00:32
Speaker
Welcome back, guys. We are thrilled to be talking about today's episode because it's something that Audrey and I need all the time. Right, Audrey? Yeah. So we're talking about when dad or mom will interject when the other spouse travels and you're left home alone. It's a really tricky time. It's incredibly stressful, incredibly overwhelming. So we're excited to share some tips and some takeaways that we have for you today.
00:00:54
Speaker
Okay. First of all, we got a really, really sweet comment on Instagram that we wanted to share. It's from Ms. Birdsall. It says, I so appreciate this podcast. I have been looking for women local to me who have conservative, modest, large families, and who know what to tell us young mamas. Y'all are an answer to prayers in a lot of ways. The water birth podcast had me bawling.
00:01:22
Speaker
Oh, thank you. We really appreciate that sweet comment. You can follow us on Instagram at Outnumbered the Podcast. And that's really, you know, part of what we're trying to do here is build a community where we can share our experience and wisdom maybe and chaos and joy. And what we're trying to do is share with others and build a community. So we really appreciate that comment. Thank you.
00:01:51
Speaker
Yes, that was beautiful. Thanks so much. I love that we have social media now because when I was a younger mom, there was so much loneliness and so much confusion and question about how to best live and how to best parent my kids. So I'm grateful that we have this opportunity to create a community with people all over the world. So thanks for being here. Yeah. Social media and technology can be a double-edged sword, can it?
00:02:14
Speaker
Ain't that the truth? Yep, yep.
Listener Feedback and Community Support
00:02:16
Speaker
Okay, so just to start off, we wanted to share that both Audrey and I have husbands who travel. So before we even get into this, we wanted to say that our hats are off to all of the permanent single parents. It is
00:02:29
Speaker
such a difficult job and not just physically and logistically but emotionally and Mentally, it's just so overwhelming. We can't imagine how you do it full-time because even part-time is just hard And parenting while the other one travels has its own kind of
00:02:45
Speaker
of tricky logistics because you're used to having that spouse around and then they just up and leave and you're like, oh shoot, I gotta, okay, you know, shift, shift, shift. And then they come back, shift again, bring them back in, you know. A quick side note is when I was a teen, my dad worked out of the country for a while.
00:03:01
Speaker
And my mom said it was almost harder to have him home because they'd gotten in such a routine of having him gone that then he'd come back and she's like, Oh, switch everything back up. You know, and then they get into that routine and then he'd leave again, you know? So it's a struggle and we totally feel you if you, if you experienced this as well.
00:03:17
Speaker
Yeah, it is a little bit of a horse of a different color than being a single parent because a single parent never has the other spouse. Whereas with the in and out spouse, because they travel with work, it is a little bit different dynamic. Because like you were saying, you have to shift the kids and yourself to be used to one thing and then another and then back and forth. So it is a little bit different. And we do understand that single parenting is
00:03:46
Speaker
an amazingly difficult experience. All right, so we're going to share three key things to remember when you're parenting solo.
Navigating Emotional Struggles
00:03:54
Speaker
And then we will follow that up with six tips for surviving when the other parent is gone. Okay, we're going to start with the first thing to remember. Temporary single parenting is survival time. Go back and listen to episode 20. You've got to learn how to have grace with yourself and patience with the overwhelmed and
00:04:15
Speaker
Your kids are going to be so out of sorts that you've got to have an extra measure of grace and calm.
00:04:22
Speaker
in yourself to be able to help them. Okay, the second thing to remember is, this might sound silly, but this was really important for me. It's not your spouse's fault that he or she has to travel. I mean, sort of, because they have the job, obviously, but it's still their job. So this has been difficult for me to remember sometimes, because sometimes I resent the fact that my husband is gone, and I resent the places he gets to go, because just for those of you who don't know, my husband works for a travel company.
00:04:50
Speaker
And so his work trips are like Paris and, you know, going to all these amazing churches and museums because he has to figure out where where good places to sell trips to, you know, so it's not like he's cooped up in a stinky motel in Iowa. He's like in these amazing places and I'm stuck at home with all these kids and diapers just cursing his name, you know, or just sleeping alone thing. Oh, how tough it must be for you to sleep by yourself.
00:05:22
Speaker
But on those lines, it's just good to remember that traveling for work is still work and it's still exhausting. It's just work in another place and often with jet lag attached. So it's not necessarily easy for them either. I'm sure there are some people that travel for work and it's amazing, but for most of our spouses, it's not easy and necessarily fun either. So just try not to blame your spouse that life is extra hard when you're gone because then that just creates resentment and anger when you need your spouse back.
00:05:50
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. And it is really difficult for my husband when he travels because it's often to the opposite coast. And so the time zone just throws him off completely. And he's up like at five o'clock in the morning and then by, you know, six, seven o'clock in the evening, he's ready to go to bed and everybody's getting ready to go out to eat. And he's like, uh, I have to go, you know, do a company supper with these guys. And all I want to do is go to bed.
00:06:17
Speaker
So the time zone's difficult for my husband when he travels, but also sleeping in a bed by himself is hard because he's so used to having kids in bed that he says he takes the pillows and stacks them around him and tries to pretend like they're kids. But none of the pillows kick him, so that doesn't help. That's really cute.
00:06:39
Speaker
Um, eating different food and just being on a completely different schedule and all that. It is really hard on my husband when he travels. So I try to keep that in mind too. It's hard, super hard on me when he travels, but it's really hard on him when he travels. Right.
00:06:56
Speaker
All right, a third thing to remember is it's also not your kid's fault that you are overwhelmed and struggling when your spouse is gone. So they don't really identify it as well as we do. Oh, you know, my spouse is gone and so I'm feeling out of sorts. They just know that they're not feeling right because half of their parenting unit is gone.
00:07:20
Speaker
Right. You can try to get them on your side by explaining the situation and how everybody misses daddy and everybody needs to pull together to get through the time when they're gone. Yeah, that's a great point. It took me a long time to figure that out. And to be fair, when your kids are little, they're not really going to understand. But as your kids get old enough to communicate and to empathize, pulling them aside when dad leaves or mom leaves and saying,
00:07:45
Speaker
Remember, this is the time when dad is traveling. It's important for us to all work together. And I've been amazed at how much more considerate my kids are to me and how much more patient they are with each other because they know it's a tricky time, especially for me, and they'll try to do better. And then we can plan in some fun things to make it not so hard for all of us. We'll talk more about that in a minute. Yeah, let's jump into the tips section because this is really what makes it survivable when our spouse is gone.
00:08:15
Speaker
Yes, totally.
Strategies for Solo Parenting
00:08:16
Speaker
Okay. So my number one tip is to be prepared. Um, so occasionally my husband will be traveling a lot and there will be a trip that I just miss. Like I forget that it's happening. It's on the calendar. I don't notice, or I forget to put it on the calendar. And then all of a sudden he's just gone with like half a day's notice, right? And that's really, really hard for me. It's extra hard because I haven't prepared myself either emotionally or logistically to be without a spouse for that week or a few days.
00:08:40
Speaker
So just like you prepare your own family if you need to leave town so for example I'm leaving town tomorrow and I have like a laundry list of all the things that need to be done right some meals prepped some play dates planned a sitter plan etc. You have to also prepare yourself and your kids for when.
00:08:57
Speaker
the other parent leaves. And some of these things can be similar to what you do when you leave. Like you can prep meals ahead of time. You know, maybe when dad's home, you guys can work together on a couple of meals that then just get frozen. So you're not scrambling and stressed out when everybody's hungry and there's no parent to spell you. You can try to get caught up on laundry or housework.
00:09:17
Speaker
Before your spouse leaves so that you can kind of chill a little bit and not be so overwhelmed And then just like I said emotionally prepare yourself as well for a few days like okay Don't take on any extra projects. Don't volunteer for anything because I'm gonna be spouseless for a couple of days just prepare to For a tough time and and it'll be so much easier when you when you know what's coming
00:09:37
Speaker
Yeah, and often the day or two ahead, dad is preparing to go. My husband always has business casual clothes that he wears and he likes to iron them before he goes so that he doesn't have that added thing to do while he's traveling. So we help him iron and then he gets together all his stuff and all his laundry has to be
00:10:00
Speaker
clean so that he can pack it for X number days. And so there is prep involved in getting dad ready to go, too, which is not something I really think about when my husband tells me he's going to travel. Oh, I've got to dedicate, you know, at least a day to helping him get get ready and then to think about, you know, preparing for his absence on my end, too. So, yeah, there is some thought that's required ahead to get everybody ready for the time. All right. Tip number two.
00:10:29
Speaker
Allow yourself to feel whatever you need to feel. Being married to a traveler can create feelings of abandonment, loneliness, frustration, sadness. It's okay to feel those things. And your spouse is going to be feeling those things too. So you make sure your spouse knows how you feel and be open to them expressing how they feel too. So again, takeaway number two, you want to be
00:10:59
Speaker
able to express these things to each other without blame or anger involved, but just be open to maybe a little extra time together. Maybe you can have a date before, you know, just mom and dad together before you leave or before the spouse leaves or after they get back so that you can kind of fill your cup with each other before and afterward
00:11:27
Speaker
Because there is a connectedness between spouses that just, I don't know, it's just like my cup gets poured out so much faster when my husband travels than when he's just gone during the day. You know what I mean? Yes, you nailed it. I think that these hard times that we go through together can really strengthen our marriage and our family if we let it. But if we sit there and build up feelings of resentment and frustration and anger and blame while they're gone or while they're preparing for a trip
00:11:57
Speaker
then it just pits us against our spouse when really they're not doing anything to hurt us. They're just doing their job. We're just frustrated because it makes our job harder, right? So yeah, they can totally be used as these traveling times can be used as times of strengthening a marriage. So my husband and I are pretty devout date nighters. So almost every Friday night we go on a date.
00:12:19
Speaker
Um, and so if he's going to be gone for Friday night, we try to fit it in somewhere else. And sometimes that just means running to Walmart the night before because he, you know, needs a new phone charger for his trip or something. Travel size shampoo containers always. Exactly. But that's okay. Cause it's something we otherwise wouldn't have done together. And we're trying to squeeze that in that little bit of extra time in before he leaves.
00:12:43
Speaker
Okay, so next tip, tip three is to plan something fun while the spouse is gone. So you can plan something fun with the kids. So like sometimes we'll skip our schoolwork for the day and we'll just go to the movies in the middle of the day, just because we can and we feel like it. Or we'll just eat some junk food for dinner. We'll order pizza and eat some popcorn and watch a movie or something. Sometimes we'll invite cousins or friends over. We'll let the kids sleep in a pillow fort, you know, just anything.
00:13:08
Speaker
That is a little bit extra fun to make it seem like a special occasion instead of just well more daily drudgery Only now we get to do it without dad around you know make it a little bit exciting exciting
00:13:21
Speaker
Um, and then also you can plan something fun for yourself. So I like to plan dates, date nights out with friends. Now, obviously some of this requires, um, you know, a babysitter or an older kid to, to watch the littles. But if you can swing it, getting your hair, your nails done, some sort of special occasion, um, self-care or pampering. Um, and sometimes just being alone for a while, I've been known to just go to the library while I have a local teenager sitting with my kids, just so I don't have to be yelled at 24 seven while my husband's gone.
00:13:50
Speaker
I've even taken big road trips while my husband was out of town for like 10 days because I couldn't bear to stay in the house by myself with all these little kids. And while I don't necessarily recommend that, it's a lot of stress. It can also be really fun. We have some great memories of doing that together. So just some ideas. That totally reminds me when my husband and I were newlyweds before we had any kids. And his job was as a customer service rep, the German speaking customer service rep.
00:14:19
Speaker
So he worked for a company in Tennessee on their auto line and they did the automatic seat track things where, you know, you press the button and your seat track moves. Interesting.
00:14:33
Speaker
Yeah, for Mercedes Benz and some other German car companies. So when there was a problem in the line, he would have to go to Austria, Luxembourg and Germany to help sort out these problems. And, you know, with the days traveling there and the days fixing the problem, the days traveling back, he would be gone up to a week.
00:14:55
Speaker
We lived a couple of states away from his family and there was nobody there that I knew. So when he would travel, I would drive back up a couple of states to where his family lived and just hang out with them and kind of switch up my routine and be completely different because, oh man, I hated that so bad. I was completely by myself, which it's hard to
00:15:20
Speaker
your spouse would be gone and you'd be with children, but that was, you know, talk about loneliness and stuff. And he had all the same feelings because, you know, he's leaving his newlywed wife and in a different country and you can't communicate because of the huge time zone. You can't really talk to each other very much.
00:15:40
Speaker
And so he was feeling all the same stuff too, but at least he had the comfort knowing I was hanging out with his family. And they have a health food store, which in it has a restaurant, muffins and coffee and an espresso bar and all that. So he could picture me just kind of hanging with the family and not all by myself, way down out in the middle of nowhere.
00:16:04
Speaker
Oh, that's really cute. In fact, that reminds me of when when my husband traveled and I just had one or two kids.
00:16:11
Speaker
Uh, his brother-in-law, so his sister's husband also was working at the same company and traveling at the same time. So occasionally she would let me come to her house and I would just spend the night with my baby. Um, because we were both husbandless and it was just fun for the little kids to play together and for us to not be alone and scared in our own houses. It was a lot of fun. Yeah. Yeah. That was, you know, I was a lot younger and I, and being in this place, we lived on this place that had 200 acres and the neighbors were a bit, um,
00:16:41
Speaker
wild and I was kind of scared to stay there by myself. So anyway, yeah, that was cool. Okay. Back to tip three, planning something fun. We do this too, but the time with a little bit of a difference, the time that we try to plan something fun is in the evenings because dad's always gone during the day. So they don't really feel it as much then, but when it starts to get dark in the evening and we've had supper, animal chores are done.
00:17:08
Speaker
That's when we really try to plan something fun, just to take up those hours between bedtime and supper, you know, to, so we like we'll play a game or we'll watch something or we'll, you know, have a scavenger hunt. We try to, you know, listen to an audio book and color or play with paper dolls or anything just to fill up those evening hours. We find that's really the hardest time.
00:17:33
Speaker
Yes, that's an excellent point. And that's the loneliest time for mom or the spouse left behind too. Yeah. Yeah.
00:17:40
Speaker
Okay, tip number four is take care of yourself. Do not let yourself go when your spouse is gone because they're gone. You've got to take care of yourself. Just like we talked about in survival times, it may seem impossible to squeeze in a little extra time for yourself, but you've got to do it so that you're in good shape to help your kids get through this time too. So do your best to sleep, shower, get the proper food. Don't binge on chocolate chip cookies all day long.
00:18:10
Speaker
That's one of my coping strategies. Not going to make you feel better. No, it's not. Hire a sitter to come and help you with the basics. Try a kid swap with a friend so you can just get your floor cleaned or take a nap or whatever your needs are. But you've got to take care of yourself so you can be in good condition because you are doing 100% of the parenting and you've got to be in, I don't know, 200% condition. What's the math?
00:18:40
Speaker
Yes, I completely agree with this tip. And sometimes you can kind of cross a line in the self-care realm. And what I mean is like mentioning the chocolate chip cookies. Sometimes I think, well, I'm just going to do whatever makes me feel good. And I forget that the things that appeal to me at the moment are not the things that really make me feel good. You know, like binging on Netflix and eating chocolate chip cookies.
00:19:04
Speaker
It's okay to do a little bit of that because you're feeling sorry for yourself, but it's the exercise and it's the sleep. That's the hardest thing for me. My husband's gone. I'm like, well, nobody's telling me to go to bed, so I'm just going to sew until one in the morning or I'm just going to catch up on this TV show. Then I feel like garbage the next day. That's just a little warning from two moms who have probably made those mistakes multiple times and realized, oh, I can't do that anymore.
00:19:32
Speaker
You know that's my hugest area.
00:19:35
Speaker
where I don't take care of myself either is sleep when my husband travels because I just don't sleep well when he's not in the bed with me. I feel like I have to be the one responsible for, if somebody knocks on the door or my kids nightmares or whatever, I'm responsible at night and somehow it affects my sleep and I just don't sleep well. So I do tend to stay up later sewing or reading or listening to podcasts or whatever.
00:20:03
Speaker
It doesn't help me at all be in good condition the next morning to take care of my kids. But if I am just in bed, even if I'm awake, if I'm in a horizontal position and relaxing, it does help me be more rested the next day, even if I haven't been going through sleep cycles.
00:20:25
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. I was so, so, so bad at this in younger years. I'm getting better simply because I just can't survive all these children all day long if I get to bed. I no longer get to bed past midnight ever because it kills me, but much of that has come from learning the hard way. Miranda Anderson on the Live Free Creative Podcast has a really nice episode on sleep, so we'll link that one in the show notes.
00:20:52
Speaker
Yeah. So I'm glad that you also brought up the responsibility of keeping your family safe because this is something that, you know, society kind of downplays those traditional men, women roles of mom being the nurturer and dad being the protector.
00:21:07
Speaker
But that's still the case in my house and it used to freak me out when my husband would travel because that meant, yeah, anyone could break in. Anyone could try to snatch my kid. Every horrible scenario possible was going through my mind. And so I just wanted to interject that you do whatever it takes to help you feel safe. So if you're normally just the kind that
00:21:28
Speaker
latches the little latch on the kitchen, get a big latch. Get a big deadbolt or whatever it takes to keep you safe. Maybe there is a guy, one of your neighbors or a grandpa or someone in your church congregation who could come check on you in the evening time. I've had that happen before like, oh, I'm just a little bit nervous. I'm hearing some sounds. Can you come swing by the house?
00:21:49
Speaker
and some friends have done that for me. So that's a real concern and don't feel silly if that's one of your concerns. I will share that when my babies were little, little, it used to really bother me, the safety aspect, and I would feel really freaked out. And then as soon as my oldest got to be maybe five or six, it stopped being such an issue. I couldn't figure out why. I think maybe I thought as soon as I could have a conversation with a kid, he'd help protect me or something. I don't know.
00:22:13
Speaker
It's pretty silly, but it's not as big a concern for me now, but I totally understand it if it is a concern for you. So just do whatever it takes to help yourself feel comfortable and safe. Yes. Yes. I definitely, now that my 19-year-old son, a huge son is here, I definitely feel safer when my husband travels. And it's just because
00:22:33
Speaker
If some stranger man shows up, I can send my son out. And it's probably just a mental thing for me, but it really does make a difference, feeling like I've got a man here to protect me. Yes, absolutely.
00:22:49
Speaker
Okay, so tip five, make sure to connect with your spouse while he or she is traveling if at all possible.
Maintaining Connection with Traveling Spouse
00:22:55
Speaker
So like Audrey mentioned, sometimes when it's international travel, it's kind of a logistical nightmare or maybe not even possible at all to catch each other while you're both awake. But sometimes we'll try to plan a time like right before my husband goes to bed or first thing when he wakes up before I go to sleep, etc.
00:23:11
Speaker
So see if there's a way you can do that. And if you can't live, you know, like with a phone call or a FaceTime chat, you can do it via email. When we were dating, we emailed a lot. And I still remember those times as really being fun interactions. So even if they're not live, that can be fun to just shoot each other a text or an email saying you're thinking of them. And then, like we said before, to really reconnect when he or she returns.
00:23:33
Speaker
It's easy to see your husband walk in the door and dump all the unfinished housework and projects and all your woes and emotions on him and then bail. Oh, I'm so glad you're home. See you later. I'm going to the store, but you know, try to be considerate of him. Like you'd want him to be considerate of you. Allow him some time to rest and recuperate and then reconnect like on a date or, or some, someone on one time if possible. So I kind of try to apply that, not dumping everything on him.
00:24:01
Speaker
when we talk on a daily basis. So we usually do FaceTime because it helps the little kids see daddy in person. And I try to be careful if I'm emailing or calling or whatever with my husband FaceTiming not to dump on him all my woes and emotions during that phone call because I have to try to keep in mind going back to the takeaway number two is that
00:24:29
Speaker
It's not easy for them to travel. And when my husband senses distress from me when he travels, when he's on travel, that makes it even harder on him. So I try to be very judicious about what I share with him when he calls and when we're FaceTiming and have a smile on my face and try to be positive and upbeat and save the really bad stuff for when they get back.
00:24:55
Speaker
That's an excellent point. In fact, I've even tried to not do so much of that when my husband always calls me on his way home from work, so we have a chance to chat before kids swarm him. Yeah, mine does too. Ned, that's the first thing I want to do is go, you will not believe what your kid did today. And I try to at least hear about his day first before I do all that.
00:25:13
Speaker
But at least he can come home and help me solve the problem. Whereas if he's in Austria, there's nothing he can do about it except for stress out about it. And so that's not a very kind thing. But sometimes I just need someone to share the stress with me. It's hard, really hard. So then, like I mentioned, when the spouse comes home and you're reconnecting on a date or one-on-one time, then you can talk about how each of you felt. You can talk about those things, like you were mentioning, Audrey, that
00:25:37
Speaker
were really stressful that you wanted to unload on him, but you couldn't. You can talk about how you missed each other, what you want to do better next time, plan more dates in the future. And sometimes if there's been an intense season of travel for my husband, he'll come home and we'll plan a little getaway ourselves, even if it's just a staycation in the neighboring town where we just go for one hotel night so that we can feel like we got a chance to escape and to travel together and it's not just him always leaving me.
00:26:06
Speaker
Yeah, those are excellent ideas. Okay. Tip number six is kind of like tip number three, um, plan something fun, but something I try to do is help the kids adapt by relaxing the rules a little bit when dad's gone. So the house doesn't have to be as clean. Usually, um, I talked about this way back in episode three on our episode about kids in chores. We usually have an afternoon chore time.
00:26:34
Speaker
But we kind of relax that when dad gets home. It's not that we don't clean the house, but it's not this rapid cleaning at four o'clock because dad's on its way home. Maybe we just clean it up before we go to bed or before we do our fun thing in the evening. And the meals, like you said, they don't have to be as formal. You know, when we do a sit down formal meal, when dad's at home, we have a meat and a vegetable and a carb and blah, blah, blah.
00:27:00
Speaker
Well, maybe we just order pizza in or do something a little bit more creative or maybe even a food dad doesn't like when he's gone. It's an opportunity. My husband doesn't really care for sweet potatoes. And so, you know, we, we still have sweet potatoes, but if we make it an event because dad's gone, it just seems more fun.
00:27:21
Speaker
But one caveat is to keep in place sanity savers. Do not relax rules on bedtime because kids, and like we were talking about ourselves, we really need our sleep. And so keep the sanity saver rules in place. Yes, totally. It's funny that you mentioned the thing about
00:27:40
Speaker
foods that dad doesn't like because growing up, my dad disliked breakfast foods for dinner.
Easing Household Stress
00:27:46
Speaker
Sometimes you have pancakes or sausage and eggs. Oh yeah, yeah, that's fun. And so we would always have breakfast foods when we left town. So for us, even though it was sad to miss dad, it was always like, oh, but we get to have pancakes for dinner. So that was kind of a fun thing.
00:27:59
Speaker
And I totally agree on the sanity savers too. I never ever, ever let my kids go to bed late when Luke's gone because then it makes my job 10 times harder. Same with other things during the day that really bother me. Like I don't let them stay in their pajamas all day because that is a, it makes me feel icky. If that's not a big deal to you, do it fine. That's kind of fun. But, um, you know, there are certain things I don't relax because it really bothers me and it makes my life harder. But then the things that are, that can just be kind of fun and
00:28:27
Speaker
make things special, then yeah, try to do those. So a few final thoughts. We recognize that this is a really hard time. Mamas and dads, be really, really gentle with yourselves during this time of being, you know, the part-time solo parenting. Realize that this is a necessity of the job that your spouse has and that your only job during this time is to keep everyone alive and to, you know, be gentle with yourself. Plan something fun, plan something kind for you and for the kids.
00:28:55
Speaker
don't get too stressed out and then reconnect again. So just my favorite tips. Yes, that's very similar to my final thoughts. Travel is hard on everybody. It's hard on my spouse. It's hard on my kids. It's hard on me. And I try to keep in mind that I am so thankful that my husband has such a good income. As a single income family, it allows me to stay home, not just when he travels, but all the time.
00:29:23
Speaker
with the kids and I'm so thankful that he has. We've been blessed with his amazing income. And one final thought is when your spouse travels and you all get back together, it does make us more grateful for each other when we're together. Maybe my husband and I don't gripe at each other about stupid little things like so often or maybe the kids get along better because they want daddy to be pleased with them or like you were talking about.
00:29:53
Speaker
make it easier on moms. So sometimes there's a little bit of silver lining on the cloud of dad traveling that everybody is a little nicer to each other when we're all back together. Yes, that is so beautiful. I could not have put that better
Conclusion and Recommendations
00:30:07
Speaker
myself. So thanks for sharing that. Just to wrap up a few recommendations, Audrey mentioned that episode from Live Free Miranda on sleep, how essential that is. And we have a couple of episodes that will help as well. One is that Survival Times episode. I feel like we
00:30:22
Speaker
refer to that one almost every episode nowadays. That is episode 20 so go back and listen to that one. Another one that could be helpful is episode two when you want to quit because when my husband travels sometimes I just want to walk away. You can fend for yourself kids but that's a good one and or mom guilt number nine. So just some good episodes to refer to if you're struggling with a spouse that travels.
00:30:46
Speaker
Thanks so much for tuning in. Did you know you can help the podcast in several ways? First up we're on Patreon and there are three different levels to support us there. Just head over to patreon.com slash outnumbered.
00:30:59
Speaker
Next up, if you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a written review on iTunes. It helps other moms find the podcast and receive the help that you're enjoying. And finally, you can follow us on Instagram at Outnumbered the Podcast. We're always having fun over there too. As usual, if you have any questions or ideas for future episodes, you can always reach us at Outnumbered the Podcast at gmail.com. Thanks for all your support. We'll talk to you next week.
Humorous Parenting Anecdote
00:31:27
Speaker
My boys got some new plastic swords recently and it's nothing but drama. Somebody hits somebody else and I'm constantly threatening. I'm just going to put them in the garbage if you keep hitting each other. And it's not like play fighting. It's like whacking your little sister with it. So they're in big trouble.