The Freq Show

35. What impact do unspoken expectations have in relationships?

• Sam Thurmond & Jaclyn Steele Thurmond • Season 1 • Episode 35

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In this episode of The Freq Show, Jaclyn and Sam candidly discuss the challenges that arise from time management in their relationship, particularly regarding something Sam did that encroached on precious family time. Initially annoyed, Jaclyn reflects on Sam's pure intentions to create financial security for their family, leading her to choose a more mature response. They delve into the subconscious scorekeeping that often occurs in their partnership regarding household responsibilities and parenting. Additionally, they explore the dynamics that emerge when their nanny is unavailable and the conflicts that can arise from uncommunicated expectations. They leave listeners with a thought-provoking question: What impact do unspoken expectations have in relationships?


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Jaclyn:

Welcome to the Freq Show. I got a place, nobody knows... Alright. So welcome to the Freq Show. That was a song that I wish we could use as the intro, by Ingrid Michaelson.

Sam:

Are we going to get flagged?

Jaclyn:

We don't have the rights. No, we're not going to get flagged if I just sang one bar of it, Okay. But today we are going to talk about what impact unspoken expectations have in relationships. This is episode 35. What impact do unspoken expectations have in relationships, Sam?

Sam:

Plenty, they have plenty.

Jaclyn:

Yeah, so I'll just give a little scenario of something that happened last week and then we can break it down.

Sam:

Okay.

Jaclyn:

Because I think we can both take ownership in this.

Sam:

I'll tell you how your perspective is off, so go ahead.

Jaclyn:

You are so annoying sometimes. Okay, last week I was annoyed with Sam because I felt like he managed his time a little bit poorly One of the days last week he is applying to get some VA benefits from being in the military for all of those years and at the end of the day of the working day he was like, hey, I got to go to UPS and I I gotta go get ink for our copier and blah, blah, blah and um, I was like it's about to be family time, it's about to be dinner time, like roman is running around like a chicken with his head cut off and you're just leaving I'm just living it up, going and buying printer, ink and filling out VA forms.

Jaclyn:

Yeah, but in my mind I was like why couldn't he have done this a couple of hours ago.

Sam:

While we were out looking at properties.

Jaclyn:

I don't remember what we did that day.

Sam:

I'm sure, obviously you don't,

Jaclyn:

Sam, you still need to manage your time better.

Sam:

ou obviously haven't resolved this issue.

Jaclyn:

Well, I'll say this I'm not annoyed about it anymore and here was my point in bringing this up at all is that my unspoken expectation there was you would just get the work that you need to done within working hours so it doesn't cut into our family time. But if I take a step back and look at it from your perspective, you're applying to get these VA benefits to benefit our family and you're trying to do it in a very fast manner so that it will benefit our family. So if I can get out of that very short-term mindset of just being annoyed with the time management that day and shift into a long-term mindset, where I go, his intention for all of this is the absolute best. I feel like you are about to say something funny, like you are just like choking on it, like a fart right now.

Sam:

Choking on it like a fart.

Jaclyn:

Or you're just holding it in.

Jaclyn:

You're sitting there with like a smirk on your face, Like you're about to say something funny. But okay, no, go for it. What are you going to say?

Sam:

You really set me up. I don't really have anything.

Jaclyn:

You were looking at me like, I'm about to say it. I'm about to say it. I'm about to say it.

Sam:

No, no, all I was going to say was I could feel the heat. I could feel the heat coming from you, um, but I had a doctor's appointment and my exam first thing in the morning and there's like there were like 10 forms that I needed to to uh print off and have before I went in there, because if you've gone through the VA process, you know that it's a pain in the ass and it's complicated. So I was just trying to get everything-

Jaclyn:

You waited until the night before.

Sam:

Because, no.

Jaclyn:

Yes!

Sam:

Jackie, I, I-

Jaclyn:

You waited until the night before the appointment.

Sam:

Because I figured out what I needed to do, then set the appointment the next day and then I had to print-

Jaclyn:

Welcome listeners to the innards of our relationship.

Sam:

Excuse me for setting the appointment as quickly as I possibly could

Jaclyn:

I'm honestly, I'm not mad about it at all right now I was just annoyed that day because I was so tired.

Sam:

Yeah, yeah, but this is what's funny is because your perspective is like you should have done this all day instead of working on our main business and you shouldn't have waited until the night you shouldn't have waited until the night before the appointment, even though I set that appointment that day so I could get in as quickly as possible. It's like no come on right?

Jaclyn:

I understand all of that now. I didn't know all of that at the time.

Sam:

I don't know how.

Jaclyn:

Well, I don't, honey. You come to me to keep our schedule. I don't ever go to you and go hey, keep the schedule. So it wasn't on my calendar. I didn't know.

Sam:

Because I scheduled it that day, so we're kind of going down the rabbit hole. Obviously some unresolved issues.

Jaclyn:

Honestly, I don't feel mad about that at all. I really don't.

Sam:

Well, I feel some kind of way because I feel like you had no reason to be, annoyed in the first place. So this is what we're talking about today, expectations, unspoken expectations. So your expectations for me were to-

Jaclyn:

That you are clear during family hours.

Sam:

Bend space and time and create more hours in the day.

Jaclyn:

No, my expectation is that once our nanny leaves for the day, we have family time with Roman. I think that is my unspoken expectation, but I also understand that things come up and in that particular case you were trying to be very timely about getting all these forms filled out and getting everything in for the benefit of our family. So I do truly understand. But my unspoken expectation for evenings is like once we are out of business hours, once we're out of nanny hours, it's family time.

Sam:

Yeah.

Jaclyn:

And I think you have that pretty much that same expectation with me too.

Sam:

Well, I think for the most part.

Jaclyn:

Or should we speak about it?

Sam:

Yeah, we need to have a talk. For the most part. But I mean, I think that goes into the next thing where the shoe is on the other foot and if you have like, sometimes you'll have you know you'll go out to dinner with the ladies or have a seven-hour hair appointment on Saturday.

Jaclyn:

I never want them to be seven hours. They I just have a lot of hair.

Sam:

Yeah, To where um.

Jaclyn:

I hate getting my hair done.

Sam:

Yeah, to where, but that that ends up. You know I'm taking care of Roman, I'm watching, I'm on full-time daddy duty versus splitting, uh, splitting it with you. So I definitely keep track, keep score. Not that I don't love my son, not that I don't want to hang out with him, um, as much as possible. But you know, every now and then it's nice to to get some free time, uh, to yourself. So-

Jaclyn:

And if you had lots of friends, you could go out.

Sam:

It's fair, I don't really have any friends at this at this point in life.

Jaclyn:

You do, you do. They're just spread out all over the country.

Sam:

I have friends who are just not yeah we're just not hanging out.

Sam:

I haven't put the effort in here to make friends.

Jaclyn:

To make friends, yeah. And so what happened was I got irritated with him let's say it was on a Wednesday. Then that Saturday he got irritated with me, or maybe it was like Friday. You got irritated with me because our nanny was gone for the day. You took him, I think, to Sky Zone and you jumped for several hours and then you came back and I was working during that time. You took him so that I could work and get a bunch of stuff done, which I did. And then you got home, you were understandably exhausted. Roman was still ready to go like 85 miles per hour and I made dinner and was cleaning up and doing all those things and I was like, hey, it would be nice if you would help all of those things. And I was like, hey, it would be nice if you would help me in the kitchen. And you were like I just took care of our son all day. And I was like, but I worked all day, it's not like I was just hanging out.

Sam:

What's more tired?

Jaclyn:

I mean look he's-

Sam:

And it wasn't just that-

Jaclyn:

He's the best thing that has ever happened to us, but he is exhausting.

Sam:

Yeah, for sure. So I feel like I don't know how we're coming off. But whatever.

Jaclyn:

Well, I think we're being super honest that we split. We have from my perspective, we have a very even partnership. We both work, we both take care of our son, we both change poopy diapers, we both clean the kitchen, we both cook, we both are in our lives together.

Jaclyn:

And so I think it's easy, when I go out to dinner with my girlfriends or you go do your VA stuff, whatever, whatever time is spent outside of our little bubble, to go oh hey, I've got some time in the bank, so are you going to give me a little relief so I can just go have some time to myself?

Jaclyn:

And I think, no matter how we're coming off, I feel like that is a very human dynamic in a partnership and that's why unspoken expectations need to be spoken about, so that we're not scorekeeping and we're not holding the other one accountable for something that is just like. It's just this stage of life, it's this season of life. Our son, again, is the best thing that has ever happened to us, but he is, like my mom says, like three kids in one. He's just ready to go from sunup to sundown, and it can be challenging when we're taking on so many other things too.

Sam:

Yeah, I think it's always funny in retrospect, like envisioning how everything went down in your mind yeah, um, and how I like, uh, you got home. I don't remember who got home, maybe you got home and you started making dinner and everything and I just went straight back to the bedroom and started watching TV and then, after you had made dinner, you were. You were like, uh, you're going to give me some.

Jaclyn:

Yeah, if you would help me a little bit.

Sam:

And I was like you should make dinner. You should make dinner on your own.

Jaclyn:

You were pretty on your high horse about it and I was like you know, I just worked all day right. It's not like I was hanging out. But here's the thing. We can laugh about it now because we see the silliness from both sides. It was immature of me to be annoyed with you that you went to do the VA stuff, and it was a little immature of you to be like, hey, no, now it's your responsibility to make dinner because I took our son for the afternoon.

Sam:

I don't know if I fully agree with that.

Jaclyn:

Again, welcome to the innards of our relationship.

Sam:

I think the error is assuming-

Jaclyn:

That you were so obvious about it?

Sam:

Assuming that you would not feel-

Jaclyn:

Like I needed to pay you back?

Sam:

To pay responsibility-

Jaclyn:

Oh my god, this is scorekeeping though.

Sam:

It is. Well, look, it's yeah, and I don't know that it's completely wrong. I'm serious.

Jaclyn:

Well, I think in some I don't okay At at from the outside looking in, I think scorekeeping is wrong, but I think it is good and just respectful to relieve your partner after they have taken on a tough responsibility Because I want the same treatment.

Sam:

But the topic is unspoken expectations, so the breakdown is me not just saying hey, are you good to do dinner, since I just had Roman all day?

Jaclyn:

That should have been what was said,

Sam:

And then we could have an argument right there.

Sam:

And get it out of the way.

Jaclyn:

Really, I think that's, I think that is.

Sam:

Well, that was the point I was, that was the point I was making. I'm not I'm. I don't think that, like I in general, like you said. I think scorekeeping is wrong, but also being aware of being aware when there maybe is an imbalance is not wrong.

Jaclyn:

But you do have to have a balance and if I were going out with my friends every night and then expecting you to take care of him all the time and there wasn't- You're just out clubbing every night. Could you imagine? The funny part about that statement is that I didn't even go clubbing when it was like and when you go out to dinner.

Sam:

You go out to dinner at like five o'clock yeah.

Jaclyn:

With my friends too. All my friends are like we're all in our thirties and we like to have an earlier dinner and then get home and like be able to do whatever we want.

Sam:

Go to sleep.

Jaclyn:

Yeah, go to sleep, hang out. Well for me. I'd like to be able to be here with you and Roman and still have an evening with you guys, cause I have FOMO, like and maybe one day I'll have friends and I'll be able to feel that as well.

Jaclyn:

So, anyways, our point here is unspoken expectations most likely lead to conflict. That can be negative, but if you are open with your communication and open with how you're feeling, you are open with your communication and open with how you're feeling. Like if he came home that day and said I am so beat, I'm so tired, would you mind taking the lead on dinner and just giving me a break, I would have been like oh, I completely understand, I got you, but you also know, at the end of the day, you also in the room and shut the doors.

Jaclyn:

I was like this little bish wants me to do everything, but the point I'm making here is open communication is. I think usually we're pretty open communicators. I think this is kind of our weak point, where we do score keep a little bit when it comes to like household duties and taking care of taking care of the duties yeah, yeah, all right um so I don't know what the takeaway is, but this is how it works with us.

Sam:

The core takeaway is have an expectation party.

Jaclyn:

my mom used to say this have an expectation party and lay everything on the line, and the clearer your communication is and your expectations are, the better your relationship will be. And I think that one thing that has led to our relationship lasting as long as it has, which is now 16 years, is that we don't always have an expectation party, but we do have clear communication. So if we feel like resentment is building, building up, we do bring it up and we talk about it as it comes up yeah, yeah, rarely does anything really linger, linger between us.

Sam:

I can't really think of anything no, we don't let things linger.

Jaclyn:

We hash it out and sometimes we'll have a knockdown, drag out fight, but at the end of it I know that I love you and like we're in it to win it I feel like we should get a painting of us when we had our like when we had our stare down.

Sam:

That was hilarious. A long time ago we got in an argument and we ended up like bowing up to each other obviously never was going to get physical, but we kind of got in each other's face.

Jaclyn:

I took a like I'm a tough, tough, bish sort of stance and I was looking at you just straight in the eyes and it bugs me sometimes that I'm a lot shorter than you, but I just stood in front of you like I was a rock.

Sam:

You are a great self-promoter, but we were, we were, we were like it looked like a.

Jaclyn:

It looked like a, like an MMA fight poster, Like we were just like yeah, but like a real fighter facing off with a seven year old.

Sam:

Your head was like only the top of your head's in the picture.

Jaclyn:

But that was funny because we were facing off and we were like looking down our noses at each other. And then I just started cracking up because of the absurdity of the situation and you looked at me and you like smirked a little bit but then you were like, why are you laughing? And I was like because look at what we're doing. We look like idiots, idiots. Yeah we did.

Jaclyn:

We did look like idiots, so yeah, the whole takeaway of this episode is if you have an expectation, make it known, not just in your intimate relationship with your partner, with your life partner, but with your family members too. Say your expectations. My dad was going to a family reunion recently and he expressed how he was a little nervous about how a couple of things were going to go. And I was like have an expectation party when you get there, when everybody's sitting down to dinner saying, guys, I'm so excited to be here, this is my intention for this weekend and I would love to know everyone else's intention. And that creates a safe space for everybody to say what they need to say, and then it also gives you an understanding of what everybody else is expecting and then everybody can act accordingly.

Sam:

Yeah, Doesn't always work out like that I was going to say. Depending on the family, they might.

Jaclyn:

Yeah, it doesn't always work according to the plan, but I find that when there is that expectation party, things generally do go a lot better. I'll add one more thing before we leave everybody with a question, and it's this I read an article years and years and years ago and it was about two new parents and was talking about how the dad was taking over, watching the child, and the mom was being really nitpicky about how the dad was doing everything, because her expectation was the dad needs to do everything. That the way, everything the way, the same way as the mom does. And in the article it talked about hey, if the kid is still alive, if the kid is fine and safe and happy, it doesn't matter how the dad does things. Let them do it how they want to do it and you do it how you want to do it.

Jaclyn:

And I think the beauty of sharing expectations and communicating with your partner is that you can avoid so much conflict. And if you go into a situation going, hey, as long as the job gets done, he gets to do it however he wants to do it, and as long as the job gets done, she gets to do it however she wants to do it, then there's a lot of freedom in that relationship as well. Do you know what I'm saying? Like you get to be your own autonomous person, I want that for you, and I also want you to give me the freedom to be my own autonomous person.

Jaclyn:

And I feel very much that you do and I think that's also something that in our relationship has been so great for both of our personalities, because we both have strong personalities.

Sam:

Yes.

Jaclyn:

Yes, okay, so anything to add, or are you ready to leave the audience with a question?

Sam:

I'm all good. Let's end with a question what impact do unspoken expectations have in your relationships?

Jaclyn:

All right. Thank you everyone for listening. Live on purpose. Live on frequency Thank you so much for listening to the Freq Show with Sam Thurmond and me, Jaclyn Steele Thurmond. We would love to connect with you via our website, beckonlivingcom, and on social media. You can find us on Instagram and TikTok at.

Sam:

Beckon Living and you can join our email. We would love to connect with you via our website, beckonlivingcom, and on social media. You can find us on Instagram and TikTok at Beckon Living and you can join our email list to receive uplifting messages, podcast and business updates and discounts on high frequency products just for our Freq community. Cheers to high frequency living.