One of the responsibilities of being a parent is putting your kids first. However, that is not the case for host, Jennifer Hurvitz. Contrary to popular belief, Jennifer believes that putting your kids second is very important and one of the secrets to a successful relationship. Giving her marriage hacks, she talks about the importance of prioritizing intentional one-on-one time with your partner and why this is beneficial not only to your married life but also to your children. Uncover the truth of this hack and learn why it’s not enough to only spend time with your partner once the kids are in bed.
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Hurvitz’s Marriage Hacks
I’m excited because I’m doing a solo episode. I’m going to be doing a couple of solo episodes because my kids are coming home. They’re going to be with me before school starts. Jonah has been in Alaska and Zach has been at camp. I want to mush them up and spend some good quality time with them. I’m going to do a couple of back-to-back solo episodes so that I can spend some good, yummy time with my boys. I’ve got some good stuff I’d like to share and some good topics. Hopefully, you enjoy and I love some feedback in you. Let me know what you think.
I have some good guests coming up and to look forward to. I’m not going to tell you. They’re going to be a surprise, but there is some good stuff coming on. I hope everyone will enjoy this and I’m excited. Let me do some business first. First of all, I want to say thank you to everybody who is walking around wearing my Peace, Love and Truth merch. Whether it’s a tank top, a hat or a t-shirt, you rock. Thanks for posting all over social media. Thanks for doing your thing and supporting me and also giving back to the Charlotte community and The Isabella Santos Foundation. The 10% goes to that awesome foundation to help cure pediatric cancers. It’s cool and that’s awesome that you guys are helping out and giving back. It’s cool to see all my Hurvitz merch all over social media. Every time you guys post, put your pictures up and #PeaceLoveTtuth everywhere, it’s cool and I love it. It’s all over Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn and Pinterest. Thank you for that. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate that and all of your support.
Second, thank you for everybody who came to Temple Israel over in Detroit, Michigan, who came out to my big Secret of A Successful Relationship speech or talk. What do I call it? I guess it’s Jennifer Hurvitz Live and Uncensored. It’s what I’m calling it now as I go on my tour. We’ll be all over the United States. If you want me to come to your hometown, give me a ring and give my publisher at Warren Publishing a shout out or just call me directly. You can find me all over Facebook and I have a website, JenniferHurvitz.com. You can contact me and I’ll give you all the details and stuff on where you can find me and how I can come to you. I fly all over the country. I show up, I do my thing and it’s fun. I have a big interactive show and I have a little piece of it up on Facebook and LinkedIn if you want to check it out.
Being in love is a choice. You’ve got to choose it every day. That will make you a better partner. Click To Tweet
If you want me to come to your town, I’m excited and I would love to do that. I also do book clubs and girls’ nights. I can make a party for you. However you want to do it, we can make it. Thanks to Detroit, Michigan for coming out and having me. Also, I was in Ann Arbor, Michigan. I won’t say, “Go Blue,” because I went to Michigan State, but for my girls, “Go Blue.” That’s for you. I had a nice group of about twenty girls over in Ann Arbor, Michigan. My girlfriend hosted me there. That was a fun night and more intimate. That was awesome. I loved it. I’ll be in Arizona. I’m going to be hopping on over to Baltimore and all this fun stuff. If you want me, I’m yours. I’m excited about that.
Speaking of speaking engagements, during my show called the Secret to a Successful Relationship, I talked about something that always blows my audience away. In my book, I talked about the three S’s, the three parts of a successful relationship. If you read my book, you’ll see the three S’s. One is sex and intimacy. Two is silence, which you can read about. I won’t go into it. The third is smile. I talk about that in all my interviews, but I added one for my special Live and Uncensored book tour. I’m going to talk about it because it always ruffles feathers. Every time I talk about it, the audience goes, “I can’t believe she just said that. How could she say that? How could she talk about that?”
I thought that I’d do it as a podcast topic with you and see what you think. I’d love your feedback. I love to hear what you guys have to say. Sometimes, when I’m sitting here talking to myself, I don’t know what you think. I do know about this because when I was speaking in Detroit, I put my slide up and it said what I’m about to tell you. People are like, “I can’t believe she just said that.” You will agree with me when I tell you that this part of my secret is most definitely a must. The title of my number four S part of The Secret to a Successful Relationship is putting your kids second. We always say, “Put your kids first.” It’s ingrained. We grow up and the mind says, “You’ve always got to put your kids first.” I say, “No, you need to put your kids second.”
Marriage Hacks: If you don’t have that kidless conversations and date nights with your partner, then your children will not grow up in a home where they see what it’s like to be in a loving relationship.
Let me explain what I’m saying about that. In this podcast, I’m going to talk to you about how important it is if you want to have a successful marriage, a successful second marriage or a successful relationship, whatever you want to do and however you want it to look. If you have children, how important is it to make your relationship with your spouse or your partner come first? The reason I said that and I’ll give you a couple of examples, is when I was younger, I was taught at an early age that when I grew up and had kids, they come first. My mom put us first. I’m not badmouthing her because she’s an amazing woman. She was an amazing mother and I learned from her to be an amazing mother.
I was the best mother in the world and I still am. I will tell you that I was a crappy wife. My ex-husband will tell you he was a crappy husband. He won’t tell you that I was a crappy wife, but he probably does think that I was. I knew that I was a crappy wife. I didn’t cultivate a relationship with my husband because I put my children first at any cost, at all costs. I thought it was the most important. I should be an amazing mom and I forgot about putting my spouse first. I’m not saying that it’s not important to remember to be a good mom. Don’t send me hate mail, but I am saying that it’s important to have kidless conversations. It’s important to go on kidless date nights. It’s important to take kidless vacations. It’s important to say to your children, “Mom and dad need a minute.” If you don’t do those things, I promise you, your children will not grow up in a home that they see what it’s like to be in a loving relationship because you’re going to be a great team.
We were the best team, the four of us, but Mark and I were not a good pair. When we got divorced, that’s what I said to my kids. I said, “We’re a great team. We play like a basketball team. We’re the best team ever, but mommy and daddy were not a great twosome. We’re not a good pair,” because we didn’t know how to be together and have intimacy. When you have intimacy and when the two of you love each other up, you make love and you cultivate that relationship, oxytocin is released and you get that cuddle hormone. You love each other, you’re happier, your stress levels are down, your dopamine is up and everything around is better. It’s interesting to me all these studies about how important intimacy is. That’s why intimacy is important, that bond you have with your husband, your spouse or your partner. It’s super important that you do make it a point to cultivate that relationship.
Couples should try to be the best partners they can so that you can give your kids the best parents and team. Not as separate units. Click To Tweet
It’s funny because I’ve done all kinds of research on this. There’s a novelist, Peter De Vries and I love him. He’s awesome and he has a quote. It says, “The value of marriage is not that adults produce children, but that children produce adults.” Think about that for a couple of minutes. Let’s set in right there and I’ll tell you a story. I love to tell stories. I had a friend way back in the day when my kids were babies and we were at lunch one day. We were talking about putting our kids first and she goes, “Rarely would I put my kids first before my husband.” I looked at her and I was like, “That’s ballsy.” She was like, “No, seriously. I would put my husband first any day of the week. The truth of the matter is that I can always have another kid, but I can never have another ex,” and she named her husband. I was like, “Oh my God.” I lost respect for her when she said that to me. I was like, “That’s crazy,” because I would throw myself in front of a train for my children. Mark, not so much. He’s my husband. I’m thinking that he’s not my blood. My kids are my babies. They came out of my vagina. It was like, “Yeah, my friendship is done.”
Now, I owe her an apology. Clearly 25 years later, she’s still married and has a wonderful marriage. I’m divorced talking about loveless and sexless marriages to the country. Maybe I’m a little drastic and crazy, but she has a point. I’m not saying that you don’t love your kids. I’m not saying she didn’t love her kids. What I’m saying is that you should try to be the best partner you can so that you can be your best self. You needed to be happy and you needed to be loved. You need to feel sexy and wanted. You need to cultivate your relationships so that you can give your kids the best parents, the best mom and the best dad as a team that you can give them, not as separate units.
You’ve got to go on those date nights and when you go on those date nights, you need to talk about other things besides the kids. I thought I was the best ever. I grew up and I babysat every Saturday night for this amazing couple. I’m going to tell you another story. I babysat for a bunch of couples, different families and they would go out every Saturday night. I grew up knowing that that’s what you do. I’m going to get a babysitter every Saturday night and I’m going to go out with my husband because I grew up babysitting for families that did that. I watched these families leave their kids at home. I would go over at 5:00 and I’d play with the kids. They would get dressed, go out for dinner or whatever, and they’d come home. They were happy because they had every Saturday night without their kids.
Woulda. Coulda. Shoulda.: A divorce coach’s guide to staying married
I was going to make it a point to do that in my marriage. I thought I was the greatest wife ever. Guess what I did? Instead of going out on Saturday nights and talking about kidless things, Mark and I would talk about the kids. What is that? You have to be smart enough to know that that is not okay. You’ve got to have time to be adults. It’s a choice you have to make. It’s a choice to put your kids second. It’s okay to do that. You can’t feel guilty about giving yourself time away from those kids. You have to go on kidless vacations. My wasband and I went to Mexico once and I called to see if I could get a flight home early because I felt like I needed to be with my boys. Come on, that’s craziness. It’s the choices we make. It’s like picking your underwear or picking your bra, you choose to be in love. You choose to be happy. You choose to do what needs to be done to keep your marriage surviving.
I feel like sometimes, it’s funny that people come to me and they’re like, “I’m not in love anymore. I don’t love him. I don’t know if it’s love.” Do you know what I’m saying? I want to be like, “Being in love is a choice. You’ve got to choose it every day. That will make you a better partner.” There are all these studies that say that it’s super difficult to say definitively if children contribute to marital breakdowns. I’m not saying not to have kids. I’m not saying that your kids are the root of the ruckus here. Based on all this research, it is possible to make a tentative generalization that out of what married parents are saying, parents with kids, that if you are in a strong marriage, children enhance your marriage.
If you’re in a crappy marriage, things are struggling and you’re having a tough time, sometimes having kids makes it more difficult. I’m just telling you what the research says. That’s what I’m saying. I was the best mom ever, but I was a crappy wife. Owning that and knowing that in my past relationship has made me a better partner now. At least I try to be a better partner now and I try to be as intimate and loving as I can. I know Jim, my boyfriend, and I fight a lot. We fight about external things that are not like the stuff that Mark and I fought about because clearly, we’re not married. You guys are probably throwing rocks at the thing, screaming, yelling and saying, “I’m nuts.” I’ve done this research and I think you’ve got to. My kids are teenagers and it’s different. If you’re married and you have young kids, make time for yourselves and make time for your partner.
I know I’m preaching to the choir and a lot of you are like, “I do it. We watch Game of Thrones every Sunday.” That’s not enough. It’s not enough to be together when the kids go to sleep. You’re exhausted. At the end of the day, when he’s been working or you’ve been working all day, you have both been at work or she’s been at work or whatever your situation is, that’s not enough. Even if you go for a walk, even if you put the kids with a babysitter, go for a twenty-minute walk or go and do something over ice cream. Go for a spa day. I don’t care what you do. Find time to be alone together. I almost feel like I’m rambling, but I feel like this is important. It’s an S that I added to my Secret to a Successful Relationship. It’s my fourth S, put your kids second. I believe it. If I would’ve put my kids second, they would’ve automatically become first.
They would’ve seen a loving and beautiful relationship between me and my wasband because we would have been more intimate, happier and we would have stopped resenting each other for not having the intimacy that we both desperately needed. Woulda. Coulda. Shoulda., if you haven’t read my book, that’s what it’s all about. My book is not regretting that I left, he left or we got divorced. Woulda. Coulda. Shoulda. is owning up to the mistakes we made so that I can help others and this is what I do. I hope that you enjoyed this podcast and I hope that it made sense to you. I hope that you don’t hate me for saying what I’m saying, but I’m trying to help. If I can help anybody, give me a call. I do coach sessions for people that are married, contemplating divorce and maybe need a little help.
I also do coach sessions for people who are going through a divorce and need help with co-parenting and how to do it right. I’ve got you all and I’ve got you both. I’ve got the doing divorce right and I’ve got how to stay married, both sides of the coin here. Take a deep breath and don’t jump too quickly into anything. Don’t jump too quickly into divorce and making horrible choices when you’re co-parenting and that thing. Breathe it out. You know where to find me, www.JenniferHurvitz.com. If you want the peace, love, truth hat, shirt, a tank or something like that, reach out to me. You can PM me on Facebook and you can DM me on Instagram. I’m all around. Like me, love me, give me a review and give me a shout out. I love what I do and I hope that you guys can feel that when I’m talking to you. I’m going to love up my kids and give them hugs because I can’t even tell how much I miss them. I get to see Jonah on Friday and Zach is home. He’s around here somewhere. Have a fabulous day. Peace, love and truth.
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About Jennifer Hurvitz
With a degree in Family and Child Ecology, a minor in Human Sexuality from Michigan State University, and her training and knowledge gained as Certified Divorce Specialist (CDS)™ she is both empathetic and understanding.
Jen also has two fantastic (and well-adjusted) teen-aged boys who will tell you she’s got this “divorce thing” down pat! Jennifer knows how to “do divorce right” and co-parenting is her specialty, even ask OprahMagazine. com. She has been quoted as an expert in the field.
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