Midlife Cry, Sis (Formerly known as The Bettys Podcast)

079 - Feeling Unwanted? 5 Ways to Help Rejection Sting a Little Less

Hello, friends. We’re back to recording new podcast episodes after all the craziness of the end of summer, so Mary and Alexis are trying to remember how to talk to each other without talking over each other. Thanks for your patience! Lexy’s children are extremely photogenic, and Mary kinda resurrected her photography side-hustle to do a family photo shoot recently, at Photopia Studios in Cottonwood Heights, Utah (highly recommend!). If you’re interested in participating in a Bettys get-together to do some headshots, please let us know! We’d love to meet you!
Do you love summer? Our sister Rachael does, Lexy usually does, and Mary doesn’t quite as much, but it seems like this summer has sent a lot of people ‘off their rockers.’ There has been a lot of chaos, but hopefully we’re getting back into our fall and school routines!
One thing we liked to do when our kids were little is to go to Bear Lake every year. Now that they are getting older (and we all seem to be getting busier), it’s a lot harder to get everyone together. Mary tried to plan for a day, and even brought the Cooler o’Fun, but no one showed up that day (not even Lex). Good thing Mary brought her book with her (again, HIGHLY recommending Tom Lake by Ann Patchett; get it at Costco, a small bookstore if you can, or here on Amazon).
Everyone has to deal with rejection sometimes, and Mary came up with five ways to make it sting a little bit less:
Remember that being rejected is a story you are telling yourself. There are a lot of reasons why people may not show up. Be generous in your assumptions–we’re all doing our best.
Get used to rejection. You might want to try a sales job (or missionary service) where you might be turned down frequently. It’s completely unscientific, but Mary thinks that ⅓ of people are not going to like you, ⅓ of people will be neutral toward you, and ⅓ of people will like you. You cannot control what other people think about you, so focus on your people. 
Be curious, not judgemental (watch the dart scene from Ted Lasso here). There’s always more to the story.
Some rejections hurt more than others. Give it some time, and get some sleep.
Find a good distraction–get out of your head. Read a good book, go to a movie, go take a walk, do something creative that you’ve been putting off, etc. 
Please get in touch! Send us an email at thebettyspodcast@gmail.com, and please follow us on Instagram @thebettyspodcast, on Facebook as The Bettys Podcast, and on TikTok as TheBettysPodcast.
We want to hear from you! Your comments and messages really help us know what you want to hear and how we can improve. If this show resonates with you, please make sure to share & subscribe, and give us a rating & review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Thank you for listening, Betty. Rejection may be hard and uncomfortable, but if you don’t place your music into everyone’s iTunes, and remember that we all have to deal with it, we think you’ll be okay. We’re so grateful for you, and we hope you’ll remember that we love you more.
 

078 - Betty Byte: Core Memories at Bear Lake

Happy Friday, friends! In the last episode, Alexis mentioned that her phone was still in a bag of rice . . . so here’s the story behind that! Make sure you watch the sky (and keep track of your inflatables, your kids, and your phone) when you are at Bear Lake! Apparently something about the lake beckons skinny dipping, so also keep track of your swimsuit. “Be careful with those things!” 
 
Please get in touch! Send us an email at thebettyspodcast@gmail.com, and please follow us on Instagram @thebettyspodcast, on Facebook as The Bettys Podcast, on TikTok as TheBettysPodcast and on Twitter @bettys_podcast. 
 
We want to hear from you! Your comments and messages really help us know what you want to hear and how we can improve. If this show resonates with you, please make sure to share & subscribe, and give us a rating & review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
 
Thank you for listening today! Welcome to Lexy’s Midlife Crisis. Grab your popcorn, grab your swimsuit, and we’ll see you on Monday. We are making core memories, and we hope you are too. And please remember that we love you more.
 

077 - Barbies and Boxes: Living in the Real World

Hello, Bettys and Jacks! We told you we’d be talking about Barbie eventually, and here we are! We’ve had some technology issues (“always and forever . . .”), including Lexy’s phone ending up in rice, but we are here. *whew!* Mary took Benji and her nieces Phoebe and Sabrina on a road trip to the Real World (i.e., through the midwestern United States), and ended up seeing the movie in Madison, Wisconsin. It took Lexy a little while longer to see it, but it was very validating for her as well.  
 
Alexis refers to this article on theverygirl.com for some life lessons and takeaways from the Barbie movie, especially this one: “It is not women’s burden to fix men who do not yet know themselves.” We are finding ourselves in our “Barbie Eras,” and Lexy is in her transition into the Real World, because she lost herself in her “Barbie World.” It took her a while to realize that creating and living in your own Barbie world is not sustainable.
 
We talk a little about handling emotions, and how difficult it is for many people, especially men. “I’m Just Ken” (the song performed by Ryan Gosling) is a tribute to figuring out who you are and what you want out of your life and relationships. We hope we don’t try to put each other into boxes! 
 
Our Better Betty Challenge for today is to think about what “box” you might be in, and to ask yourself if it is making you happy. Did you put yourself there? Did you accept it? Does it still fit you, do you need a bigger box, or do you need to NOT be in a box right now? 
 
Please get in touch! Send us an email at thebettyspodcast@gmail.com, and please follow us on Instagram @thebettyspodcast, on Facebook as The Bettys Podcast, on TikTok as TheBettysPodcast and on Twitter @bettys_podcast. 
 
We want to hear from you! Your comments and messages really help us know what you want to hear and how we can improve. If this show resonates with you, please make sure to share & subscribe, and give us a rating & review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
 
Thank you for listening today! We love that you are here with us in the Real World, and even if you need to go through a ‘Weird Barbie’ phase, we still adore you. You are amazing, and we love you more.
 

076 - Betty Byte: How We Can Follow Jesus by Defying Expectations (Manuals)

Hello, Bettys and Jacks. Mary and Alexis continue their discussion about manuals (you might want to go back to Episode 15 and Episode 75 of The Bettys Podcast) by talking about another ‘leading man’ . . . Jesus. The Old Testament was literally a manual on how to worship, and when Jesus of Nazareth showed up, He did not look the way the elders expected Him to. He did things differently, and He ruffled a lot of feathers.
 
Are we so focused on the checklists and the details of our manuals that we don’t see the big picture? Mary was reminded of this scene from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, where Cameron stares at the painting (“A Sunday on La Grande Jatte” by Georges Seurat) and gets more and more focused on the tiny brush strokes on the canvas than on the whole work of art.
 
We believe that “by their fruits ye shall know them” (Matt 7:20). When you choose to live according to a certain manual (a religion, a dogma, etc.), we should know that we’re not going to do it perfectly. We all make mistakes, and we are free to try out different manuals, to find what fits. And if we don’t find a new one that we like better, we can always come back to what we know, and rewrite or update our own.
 
Please get in touch! Send us an email at thebettyspodcast@gmail.com, and please follow us on Instagram @thebettyspodcast, on Facebook as The Bettys Podcast, on TikTok as TheBettysPodcast and on Twitter @bettys_podcast. 
 
We want to hear from you! Your comments and messages really help us know what you want to hear and how we can improve. If this show resonates with you, please make sure to share & subscribe, and give us a rating & review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
 
Thank you for listening today! We hope you will seek out the good word–wherever you may find it, and write (or update!) your own manuals. You are amazing, and we love you more.

075 - Are Your Manuals For Others Making You Miserable? (Mission: Impossible)

Hello, Bettys and Jacks. Mary and Alexis are talking a little about movies today. No, we’re not discussing Barbie yet (We will! We promise!!!). There’s some discussion about horror movies (check out the short horror-comedy Finley on YouTube, and Insidious, directed by Mary’s boyfriend Patrick Wilson, if you’re really brave). But we do reference the Mission: Impossible series, and the newest installment, Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One. 
 
Now, we love a good action movie, if it has a good story (unlike the Fast & Furious series), and as we know, every good action movie has a car chase. Be aware: there are some minor spoilers in this episode about the car chase in Dead Reckoning–it’s really hilarious.
 
Mary wanted to revisit the concept of manuals (check out Episode 15 of the Bettys Podcast and Episode 11 of The Life Coach School Podcast with Brooke Castillo, where this idea originated). A major source of our disappointments in people, children, leaders, and even institutions, comes from our belief that they should act according to the manual we have written for them. We discuss religion, particularly how the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has changed many of their manuals (like this one) to leave them more open for interpretation and inspiration.
 
Like the ‘manuals’ for M:I movies, we often create manuals for other people, and are disappointed when they don’t live up to them. Mary learned this first-hand when her sister decided to enforce some boundaries, and Mary was angry about it (she later realized that she, indeed, was the a-hole in this situation). After all–Kim’s gonna Kim. 
 
We offer three ways to minimize our suffering when it comes to the whole ‘manual’ situation, and not letting manuals ruin your life:
 
Allow others to change. Institutions evolve, and time keeps on slippin’ into the future. We may have our opinions about what kind of movies Tom Cruise should make, but Tom’s gonna Tom. Trying to control people only works for dictators.
Accept that sometimes you are the a-hole. When you are angry about something, let that feeling teach you about the situation and your role in it. And remember that feelings are not facts–YOU are the one feeling the feeling. You’ve gotta ask yourself why you’re feeling this way, and be prepared for an answer you may not want to hear.
Step back. Or “STEP OFF!” Sometimes you need a different perspective. Do something (like going to a movie, exercise, get into nature, etc.) to get yourself out of your head, out of your pain, and out of your disappointment, and realize that we don’t have to have manuals for other people.
Please get in touch! Send us an email at thebettyspodcast@gmail.com, and please follow us on Instagram @thebettyspodcast, on Facebook as The Bettys Podcast, on TikTok as TheBettysPodcast and on Twitter @bettys_podcast. 
 
We want to hear from you! Your comments and messages really help us know what you want to hear and how we can improve. If this show resonates with you, please make sure to share & subscribe, and give us a rating & review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
 
Thank you for listening today! Remember that “nobody knows Jack.” There’s always more to the story, and our manuals for others only lead to our suffering from unmet expectations. We’re so happy that your manual for yourself includes listening to our ramblings–we really appreciate it and hope it helps you in some way. You’re the best, and please remember that we love you more.
 

074 - Betty Byte: More Helps for Setting Boundaries

Hello, Bettys and Jacks. It’s time for another Betty Byte: a little taste of something helpful. And this short episode packs a pretty good punch.
 
Lexy continues her list of ways to set healthy boundaries, reading from this Instagram post by Dr. Atina Manvelian. Here are all of the steps (and some of Mary's and Lexy’s commentary) for setting healthy boundaries with difficult people:
Be mindful of how you feel around them
Identify when your boundaries get crossed. Crossing boundaries = disrespect
Pause. Decide the best way to respond. In general, responses are not well-received when they are given in anger.
Be prepared for them to react strongly, because you’re going against their expectations. Setting a boundary is breaking a chain of patterns.
Set your boundary by telling them what you need, and responding in a way that protects YOU
Expect an increase in their bad behavior, but don’t give in! Maintain your boundaries to teach them that they cannot treat you poorly
Soothe yourself. Remind yourself why you’re maintaining these boundaries. Your feelings are important, too. Your safety, your well-being, and your mental health matters.
Seek support and encouragement. This can be scary, because you’re going to have to start talking and being vulnerable
Celebrate every small win.
 
Lexy also quotes The Holistic Psychologist and Josie’s Writing.
 
Please get in touch! Send us an email at thebettyspodcast@gmail.com, and please follow us on Instagram @thebettyspodcast, on Facebook as The Bettys Podcast, on TikTok as TheBettysPodcast and on Twitter @bettys_podcast. 
 
We want to hear from you! Your comments and messages really help us know what you want to hear and how we can improve. If this show resonates with you, please make sure to share & subscribe, and give us a rating & review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
 
Thank you for listening today. We hope this episode can help you understand why and how we all need to be better about setting and observing boundaries. We’re so grateful for you, and remember that we love you more.
 

073 - Struggling with Difficult People? 5 Steps for Creating Healthy Boundaries (Glass Castle)

Greetings, friends. On this episode of the Bettys Podcast, Mary and Alexis spend a few minutes talking about kids and their underdeveloped taste buds. We also talk a little about chickens and pigs, but this episode is actually about boundaries: how to create them and when we might need them. 
 
Lexy discusses the memoir “The Glass Castle” by Jeannette Walls. Lexy read this quote from the book: “Mom, you have to leave Dad,” I said. She stopped doing her toe touches. “I can’t believe you would say that,” she said. “I can’t believe that you, of all people, would turn on your father.” I was Dad’s last defender, she continued, the only one who pretended to believe all his excuses and tales, and to have faith in his plans for the future. “He loves you so much,” Mom said. “How can you do this to him?” “I don’t blame Dad,” I said. And I didn’t. But Dad seemed hell-bent on destroying himself, and I was afraid he was going to pull us all down with him. “We’ve got to get away.”
 
Lexy talks about Nedra Tawwab, Ed Mylett, and Michell C. Clark, who says, “I forgive you, but my price went up.” Mary attempts to quote Brené Brown, but the actual quote about boundaries is from Prentiss Hemphill, and it says: “Boundaries are the distance at which I can love you and me simultaneously.”
 
Lexy shares five steps to setting healthy boundaries with difficult people (thanks to Dr. Atina Manvelian for this helpful post):
Be mindful of how you feel around them
Identify when your boundaries get crossed. Crossing boundaries = disrespect
Pause. Decide the best way to respond. In general, responses are not well-received when they are given in anger.
Be prepared for them to react strongly, because you’re going against their expectations. Setting a boundary is breaking a chain of patterns.
Set your boundary by telling them what you need, and responding in a way that protects YOU
 
Please get in touch! Send us an email at thebettyspodcast@gmail.com, and please follow us on Instagram @thebettyspodcast, on Facebook as The Bettys Podcast, on TikTok as TheBettysPodcast and on Twitter @bettys_podcast. 
 
We want to hear from you! Your comments and messages really help us know what you want to hear and how we can improve. If this show resonates with you, please make sure to share & subscribe, and give us a rating & review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Thank you for listening, Betty. We hope this episode can help you be better about setting your own boundaries and respecting those of others. And remember that we love you more.
 

072 - What Price Are You Willing to Pay For Friendship? Four Questions To See If It’s Worth It

A little warning today, Bettys and Jacks–Mary is in a MOOD. . . enough for a lil’ swear warning. We hope you’re not too offended. Mary talks about friendship, and how she and Allen are spouses, but aren’t very good friends. 
 
Mary talks a little about her mother-in-law, who lived with her for several years. While they have a good relationship, there was a price. Mary had some unhealthy patterns and work relationships in her ‘escapist era.’ Some of that stemmed from feeling like she didn’t belong and wasn’t needed in her home.
 
Do you allow people to get close to you? Do you allow yourself to get attached to people, especially those who are going to leave?
 
We reference The Lazy Genius Podcast with Kendra Adachi. Check out Episode 170: How To Lazy Genius Anything and a bonus episode from October 2022, titled “How To Find A New Relationship Rhythm. The four questions we ask are:
 
What matters most?
What are we willing to pay for a friendship?
What are your boundaries, and what price does someone need to pay to have access to you?
What if you are too expensive?
 
One of Gretchen Rubin’s secrets of adulthood: “Something that can be done at anytime is often done at no time.”
 
Our Better Betty Challenge for today is to think about what price you are willing to pay for a friendship. Also, if you find that you don’t have many friends, consider how much it might be costing others to get close to you.
 
Please get in touch! Send us an email at thebettyspodcast@gmail.com, and please follow us on Instagram @thebettyspodcast, on Facebook as The Bettys Podcast, on TikTok as TheBettysPodcast and on Twitter @bettys_podcast. 
 
We want to hear from you! Your comments and messages really help us know what you want to hear and how we can improve. If this show resonates with you, please make sure to share & subscribe, and give us a rating & review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
 
Please support our sponsor, Get It Done services.
 
Thank you for listening, Betty. Maybe your price has gone up, or maybe your price is too high. Wherever you may find yourself–at Tiffany or at Goodwill, you are a treasure to us. So please remember that we love you more.
 

071 - Feeling Like You Want to Escape Your Life? 3 Tips on How to Belong to Yourself

Good morning, Bettys and Jacks! A quick PSA: please don’t light fireworks under your sensitive areas. (This may or may not be among the things we don’t imagine having to explain to our children). We are having a weird summer holiday season; why do we have to be so responsible?!
 
Mary talks a little about her mother-in-law, who lived with her for several years. While they have a good relationship, there was a price. Mary had some unhealthy patterns and work relationships in her ‘escapist era.’ Some of that stemmed from feeling like she didn’t belong and wasn’t needed in her home.
 
So what does it mean to belong to yourself? Brené Brown says that “in the absence of love and belonging, there will always be suffering.” She also says that “we have to belong to ourselves as much as we need to belong to others. Any belonging that asks us to betray ourselves is not true belonging.” And one of the greatest examples of belonging to himself is Mary’s son Benji, who is on the autism spectrum.
 
Alexis talks a bit about belonging in early child development, and Mary thinks that intellectually we know we need to belong, but we don’t think we deserve it. One of the hardest things to accept is that you DO belong somewhere. In her book Atlas of the Heart, Brené talks about the difference between belonging and fitting in.
 
Listen in for some great discussion about our Better Betty Challenge: Brené’s three tips on belonging to yourself and belonging at home: 
 
Be here. Stop trying to escape, or wishing it away.
Be you. Accept who you are, and make your own place.
Belong. Be okay with yourself and where you are in life.
 
You deserve to be okay. You deserve to be happy. As Lexy said, “if it makes you happy and fires you up, and it’s good and wholesome, then it’s probably helping you belong to yourself.”
 
Please get in touch! Send us an email at thebettyspodcast@gmail.com, and please follow us on Instagram @thebettyspodcast, on Facebook as The Bettys Podcast, on TikTok as TheBettysPodcast and on Twitter @bettys_podcast. 
 
We want to hear from you! Your comments and messages really help us know what you want to hear and how we can improve. If this show resonates with you, please make sure to share & subscribe, and give us a rating & review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
 
Please support our sponsor, Get It Done services.
 
Thank you for listening, Betty. In your home and in your family, you are IRREPLACEABLE. And it’s okay to have boundaries–your opinions matter as much as anyone else’s. And please remember that we love you more.
 

070 - Betty Byte: What Your Heavy Emotions Can Teach You About YOU

Howdy ho, Bettys and Jacks! Are we a little bit country? Not really, but this Luke Combs cover of the Tracy Chapman classic is SO GOOD. Mary grew up in Southern Utah, where her family tried (unsuccessfully) to fit in by getting into Country music, but this checkout girl will always love her Casey Kasem Top 40.
 
Lexy talks about how to objectively see your problems instead of getting lost in them. We’re adding a little bit to our conversation from Episode 69, and a big part of our problems is that we don’t love how the “Monkey Chatter” (the constant narration in your brain), or whatever problem that we have makes us feel. Heavy emotions come with our problems, but it’s what we DO with those emotions and problems that help us define and deal with them. It’s easy to walk in circles in our problems, but when we can objectively see where we want to go, we don’t have to get lost in them.
 
Emotions have frequencies, and when we’re stuck in low-frequency emotions like shame and sadness, we can’t really think straight. It’s okay to ask why you may be feeling these emotions, but don’t get stuck in them. Lexy talks a little about ART (Accelerated Resolution Therapy) and EMDR (Eye-Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing). Read more about these modalities here. 
 
Our Better Betty Quick Tip (BBQT) is to sit and think about what your biggest problem is this week. Ask yourself how you can objectively look at this problem, and how this problem is triggering to you. What are the problems telling you about you? 
 
Please get in touch! Send us an email at thebettyspodcast@gmail.com, and please follow us on Instagram @thebettyspodcast, on Facebook as The Bettys Podcast, on TikTok as TheBettysPodcast and on Twitter @bettys_podcast. 
 
We want to hear from you! Your comments and messages really help us know what you want to hear and how we can improve. If this show resonates with you, please make sure to share & subscribe, and give us a rating & review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
 
Please support our sponsor, Get It Done services.
 
Thank you for listening, Betty. Mastering your thoughts takes time, discomfort, and a lot of effort. But you’re worth it. And please remember that we love you more.