Hello everyone and welcome back to that Jim couple podcast hosted by Kyle and Lucy. This week we're going to be doing something slightly different. We're going to be discussing relationships. Yeah, we're going to talk a little bit about communication, why it's so important. Maybe how to communicate when you have different communication styles. We're going to touch on love languages and the sort of communication that we like ourselves. As well as a couple of dilemmas that you guys have sent into us. And then a question from one of our listeners as well. Yeah, let's get into it. Good afternoon. Well, I mean, it might be evening or morning, whenever they're listening. So I'm talking to you. Oh, good morning, good afternoon, good evening to wherever you are. Sorry, I'm a bit delusional. I just came back from a deep, deep tissue massage. I've currently got an ice pack on my lower back because, whoa, Lord, I felt like I've just been beaten up. Yeah, we kind of have. Yeah, although he's so good. I basically pulled my groin in a run last week and I kind of like, I was in pain. So I did skip Thursday's run, we did Sunday's run and I've kind of just carried on as normal this week, but my lower back is kind of gone from my groin into my lower back because it's all pulling on the wrong muscles. And yeah, I've just been in a lot of pain and just sort of pushing through. So I actually managed to get him for a massage today and he was like, yeah, you've done that proper and good. Well done. You've, you have completely, he did use the word ruptured, but I feel like that's quite extreme. The, uh, whatever the muscle was called in my lower back. So yeah, that's not fun. No, but, you know, I found something in also found something learnt, something interesting. So, you know, I'm hypermobile. Yeah. He was like massaging my hamstrings and he was like, oh, you've got a big old bruise there on the back of your leg. How did you do that? And I was like, I've not got a clue. I couldn't tell you I've got bruises all over my body and I don't know where they're from. I was like, I bruise like a peach because I do bruise like a peach. And he was like, ah, that's the hypermobility because you've got something to do with the, um, is it? I don't know if it's the collagen or something in my, in my skin. It's like the, the blood comes to the surface more than it would. I don't really know. I, I, to be honest, I wasn't so much paid. I couldn't really hear what he was saying, but it's something to do with that. Interesting. Just why I bruise so easily. Yeah, that's pretty interesting. Anyway, that's my summary for the week. How are you? I'm very well. Yeah. Um, it's been quite, uh, yeah, it's been, it's been a day after day, haven't you? Yeah. Midweek day off, which is, um, unusual, but it's nice to have you at home though. I'm normally lonely, MacLoni soon. Yeah. Um, no, it's been nice. It's just, uh, yeah, it's just been got, we've both got a lot on at the moment. So it's, it's trying to wrap our heads around that and, um, but like we've been quite stressed. I don't feel like I'm in that like chilled summer vibes. Like feels like autumn because it's like quite rainy. Do you know what I was thinking before we put press record? I was like, I wonder if Lucy will go through one episode without mentoring the weather once. I mean, fortunately, we're like three minutes in. So sorry. Yeah. But that just shows how shh, shh, the UK weather is. Were you trying to like, I was like, can I swear? She just made it longer. Yeah, it's, uh, yeah, I think we had a conversation yesterday. We're like, kind of ready for autumn now. Yeah. I know I've got my arms out for the wardrobe and I just teased myself with them. As long as it's nice and, uh, you know, yeah, I don't know. I don't know. It does feel like awesome, which is fine, but I think we both just feel a little bit stressed out with sort of whether we're coming or going with our jobs, our, you know, pursuing our careers and Instagram, social media. It's like just a bit stressful. Yeah. We're just getting our own heads, I think a little bit. Yeah, but we've got a lot to look forward to as well coming up. Yeah, 100%. Like we're, we're all good. It's just, we want to be the best that we can be. And it's, you put pressure on yourself to do that. We'll both do. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I'm sure a lot of people do. Um, anyway, do you have anything else? Do you want to update our listeners on? I don't think so. We booked a trip to Lake Como this week. We did. Yeah. Actually, that was last week. But I don't feel like we mentioned that. No, I think it was after last week's podcast. I'm very, very excited about that. Yeah, you've always wanted to go over and you. I have. It was a, we were looking at Greece and then we were like, Greece, Greece would be really nice, but. Greece has just got so expensive. And then we were looking at the Amalfi Coast. And we were like, that's even more expensive. I feel like Lake Como was just as expensive, but we. As soon as I mentioned it, you were like, Oh, my God. No, I mentioned it. When we were in Poland, I got up the shower and I was like, what about Lake Como? And you were like, yeah, okay. And then we just got sat on that. I feel like I mentioned it, but even though I feel like we probably could have done with a holiday, where we actually just do nothing in Lake Como, we'll be sort of exploring quite a lot, won't we? Well, we're just beating loads of pasta and. Yeah, I can't wait there and pizza. Gelato wine, no sangria sponge, yeah. Anything Italian, yeah, give it to me. Anyway, that's our exciting news. Hope you guys are all well. As we said in our little instruction, we thought we'd do something a little bit different today. Kind of take a pause on the fitness chat and talk a little bit more about relationships. We actually get quite a lot of messages about our relationship, because I guess we post it quite a lot on social media. We look quite invested in our relationship. So we hope this isn't boring. If you're not interested to catch us on the next one, we'll probably be talking about it. Or just give it a try and give it a listen. You might learn something and enjoy something. Yeah. So let's touch on love languages first. Because I feel like that kind of leads into communicating. It's just like squeaked and it went right down way. Fantastic. Let's touch on love languages first, because I feel like that leads into. Kind of the communication side of things. Yeah, definitely. I think love language is quite a relevant thing right now, isn't it? A lot of people are talking about love languages, which I don't think. I don't remember that ever being a thing before. Until probably two years ago, because I remember like my ex boyfriend mentioned it towards the end of our relationship. But before then, I never knew what a love language was. Yeah, I didn't, yeah, probably about two, three years ago. Yeah, but I think it's really important. And I think it's an important part of a relationship. Because as you said, it does tie into communication, but it also ties into understanding your partner better and then being able to, I don't want to say, give them what they need. But yeah, yeah, that does make sense. It's not a case of it's not a compatibility thing. I mean, it can be in terms of how you, how your love language is match up. And you can feel sometimes you're not getting the what you need from it. But you're gone, but it's not necessarily an incompatibility. It's just that's how that person or how you prefer to show your love or receive love from someone else. Yeah, that's exactly what I was just about to say. We should probably say what a love language is if you haven't heard of it before. So I've just googled it to get like a like simple definition. It says the term love language, love language refers to the way that a person prefers to express love to and receive it from a partner. The term is now often generally used to refer to many different methods of expressing love, but the concept blah, blah, blah, blah. But yeah, so there's six on there. There's six there might be like this five or six. No, this is one says there's five. Men is five. There's only five. Yeah, yeah, possibly. Why is it not just giving me like a list? OK, so quality time, yeah, acts of service. Yeah, so like cleaning the house, doing the food shopping, things like that. Physical touch, words of affirmation and gifts. That's not another one. I feel like gifts is like because there's two kind of within gifts. It's gift giving and gift receiving. Yeah, let me actually Google what are the love languages. This is harder than you think. So this one says five as well. Maybe there was only five. That was four, wasn't it? No, that was five acts of service. Physical touch, words of affirmation, receiving gifts. Yeah, that's five. Yeah. So words of affirmation, you encourage, you affirm, you appreciate, you empathize and you listen actively. That's very much one of Lucy's top ones. Physical touch, obviously, doesn't really need an explanation, but you use your body language to express love. Also one of Lucy's receiving gifts. Thoughtfulness, make your spouse a priority, speak purposefully. Thankfully, not so much one of Lucy's. Don't know about that. Quality time, uninterrupted and focused conversation one-to-one time is critical. One of mine. Yeah. Acts of service, use action phrases like, "I'll help." They want to know you're with them, partnered with them. Do chores, breakfast and bed. Go out of your way to help alleviate their daily workload. So what's interesting is like most people will have some aspect of all of them. But some more than others. So for me, what's mine? Um, yours is physical touch. Yeah. Definitely. Definitely not receiving gifts, you hate that. Yeah. I don't think you really care about words of affirmation, even though I always tell you how handsome you look and everything. Acts of service, I don't feel like it's yours either. So I'd probably say physical touch and quality time. Yeah, probably one of those two. Do you know that quality time is one of yours? No, I do. I do. I do. But then that's weird because I've never been with someone where I think cars are exactly the same. Yeah. You're a little bit more of all of them. Like, acts of service is definitely one of yours. You like doing things for me. You like doing things? That's one that I like to give, not. Yeah, that's what I mean. It's like, you like to do things for me in terms of, you know, I'll come home from work and you've cleaned the whole house. I genuinely think that's just PTSD from my ex-boyfriend. Or, you know, you'll go out of your way to. But I only do that because I think, I don't do that because I know that that's what you like. I know that you don't really care. I just do that because I think he's had a really long day at work. It'd be quite nice for him to come home to a tidy house. No, I appreciate that. I very much appreciate that. I don't actually enjoy doing it or think that I have to. The other one of yours is definitely words of affirmation. And it's something that I've had to work on, for instance, to try and express my love in that way for you. And it's something that you then... It's a really funny one, though, because you express your love very well, just generally. Like, I know how much you love me. I don't need you to tell me. But then I guess most women, I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, do just like to hear nice words, even though we know that that doesn't really confirm. You know, actions speak louder than well, and your actions show everything I need. But yeah, I think I give you words of affirmation all the time, and you don't really need them. Yeah, yeah. But then I guess maybe that's the case of you, then you give me words of affirmation because maybe that's what you want back. Yeah. But physical touch is probably our main one, isn't it? Yeah, yeah. We're very like holding hands and cuddles. We're always touching wherever we are. Yeah. This feels like we're miles apart right now. I know. I'm trying not to be like PDA. Yeah. But also it's just like hot in here. But that's really interesting because we also weren't going to detail about like ex-relationships. But we're very open about our ex-relationships that we talk about everything. But I think when you can run into issues when you have completely different love languages, and maybe the other person isn't actually capable of showing the love the way that you need it. Yeah. Like I've had relationships where physical touches was definitely not on the card. So it was like, you know, if someone's upset, if Lucy's upset, for instance, my first thought is to go and give you a hug and comfort you in that way. And I've had past relationships where that's just not been a thing, and they've been like, get off of it. They've been received well. I don't want that like go away from me like I need to. So that's very hard for me because then I feel very almost useless in that situation because I'm like, okay, right, how can I help this situation? How can I comfort this person that means a lot to me, but I'm not able to do that in the way that I know that... And it's funny because it's the way that comes naturally to you. Yeah. And it's also what I want. Yeah. So that works really well. Yeah, exactly. And same for you. But yeah, I think understanding each other's love languages can be such a game-changer to a relationship. But going back to, yeah, like you said, that one for you, that relationship didn't work out, not necessarily just because of that. But that was a struggle in past relationships that I've had. The main love language is acts of service. Like, the house needs to be tidy all of the time. This needs to be put away. That can't stay out. And for me, I find that really difficult to keep up with. Like, that's a standard that I can't quite live up to. Like, that's exhausting. So that didn't work either because I couldn't get up to where they wanted me to be. And then just clashed. Yeah. So I think it holds a lot in a relationship. Yeah, massively. And I think if you can recognise yours and your partners' love languages, there's ways you can try and not change for them. But try and compromise a little bit more in certain situations, which ultimately is so important. Yeah. And as it bottles down to communication, that you should be able to, hopefully, you can sit down with your partner and say, "And if something's not working, you know, you can sit down and go, "Something's not working. I'm not happy. OK, why are you not happy?" Well, because I don't feel like you find me attractive. You never touch me or I don't feel like you fancy me. You never tell me that I'm beautiful, OK? So there you're lacking physical touch and words of affirmation. I mean, compromise is massive in terms of a relationship. A good friend of ours had his 20th wedding anniversary the other day, and something to hand it, whatever it is. Yeah, something like that. And I asked him, I was like, "What's the secret?" And he said, "A lot of compromise on my behalf." And... Just say yes, always. Yeah. You're always wrong. Don't push back. Yeah. But absolutely, like, there should be compromise on both sides. There should be a relationship, and there should never be one person... I mean, you look at some relationships work that way, when one person has the, sort of, the control almost. And the other one is happy to just kind of go by. But a lot of relationships, people want that shared control. And it's almost like a scale, like, when one person's got the control, then the other one's got the control. It balances nicely with the relationship. I don't think control should be seen as necessarily a bad thing. A controlling relationship can be... Yeah, I feel like control can be... That word "control" could be misconstrued yet, so... But that's what I'm saying. It's not necessarily a bad thing. Controller relationship doesn't necessarily mean they're stopping you from doing things you want to do, but they're, sort of, leading the way at that point in time. Do you mean, like, kind of making decisions? And they're, you know, they're the one who's... But that can be quite exhausting as well. Absolutely. Absolutely. For one person to always be making the decision. But some people find that easier. So things like a date night or something like that, they're the one coming up with the idea. But the next week, it might be the other one who's taking control of that situation. And it should be. I don't think... That's where I mean it's a scale. And, you know, it needs to have that balance in some respects. As I said, some people do find it easier to just go through a relationship and... I guess if it comes naturally to one person more than the other, then it might just... But yeah, I think we're quite good at compromising. Like, look, we took absolutely none of your furniture into the new place. A couple of house plants. That was a great compromise. Yeah, house plants was a fight as well. Now I'm joking. You're not. No, I'm not. No, we're not perfect. We don't have a perfect relationship, but we're still learning. But I think, like, it's just communication is so important. Yeah, there was one thing we said when we first started dating was as long as we communicate well. And we communicate our issues, when they are our issues. - Yeah. - Not afterwards. Yeah. We don't let things boil over, like, if we have an issue, you talk about it. Yeah. And, you know, try not to take things too seriously. I know, like, if you come to me and you're like, look, I need you to stop doing this. Like, I'm going to listen to you because I owe respect to you and I respect your opinion. It also gives me a chance to then go, OK, right, why is this annoying her? And is it really that important that I don't do that? Different relationships will struggle with different things. I'll be like the day to day things, like the taking the bins out, doing the washing up and loading the dishwasher, like, things like that. And then there's other, you know, if there's like deep fundamental issues in a relationship. But I guess both are just as important to communicate because you don't want either to boil over. Trivial things are still an issue for a reason. Like, if someone's got a problem with something, there's usually a bigger reason to it. And it's more, you know, if it's an inconvenience or if it's frustrating them or, you know, completely understand. Like, we're both bad at doing certain things. And, you know, neither is it good at putting washing away after it's been hung up and folded up. And, but, you know, I think both our parents would probably be listening to this laughing right now. But, but it's something that we can do together and we are, when we're on top of it, together, we're better at it. Yeah, I think relationships are really hard, to be honest. Like, our relationship, I find pretty easy. But when you sit down and actually talk about a relationship, trying to, like, coexist with another person who does things differently. Like, you're never gonna be with someone who's identical to you. No. Like, we're similar in ways, but also we're also different ways. But, even just that, like... I think we're similar in ways that our love language is, sort of coincide with one another and they, they, they work well together. By the way, if you're watching on YouTube, like, keep fidgeting, I'm really sorry, but because... Because, like, I just have my massage. And it's just, I'm really uncomfortable. Like, I can't, I can't get comfortable 'cause I'm just in a lot of pains. Sorry, if I'm fidgeting a lot. Anyway, sorry, you're saying. Oh, I forgot what I was gonna say, never. Yeah, people are just different, aren't they? And, as you said, our love languages may be similar, but we're not identity, we're not the same person. So, as you said, it is about compromise and talking any issues out. Yeah, absolutely. Okay, well, I have a dilemma, which is quite fun, 'cause we've not done anything like this before, but it came at quite a good time, as you have to. Came at a good time considering the episode that we're doing. So, I've not read this all the way through, by the way, I've glanced at it. So, you ready? Yeah. Me and my partner have been in a committed relationship for three years and living together for the past year. We've been talking about our future, including marriage and starting a family. We have both in our late 20s, but we're also very set on building successful careers. I recently received an amazing job offer in a different city, five hours away from where we currently live. The position as a dream come true for me, a significant promotion, better pay, and a rare opportunity in my field. However, my partner is deeply rooted in the current city we live in. Here's a stable job that he loves, close ties to his family, a community of friends that he's also grown up with. I'm really excited about this job, but I'm also so torn. I don't want to give up the opportunity of a lifetime, but the thought of a long-distance relationship or asking my partner to uproot his life is daunting. Should I take the job and move, potentially risking the relationship, or should I decline the offer and stay, even if it means sacrificing a significant career opportunity? That's a really tough one, and I think a lot of people have been in that position before where they've had opportunities to go move away and risk a relationship as such. - Congratulations on the job offer. - Yeah. - I... - Yeah, you go, you go, you go. - So, I have a little bit of experience in this. I lived with my ex-partner in Bath, and we up and rooted our lives to Nottingham, which is about a three-hour drive for a job that he got offered. Now, I'll be honest, it wasn't a dream job. It wasn't like she's explaining that it was like a promotion this, that like once in a lifetime opportunity, this was just a job. And I don't really know why I just went. Like, I didn't, I did not want to go. My family around the corner, I'm so close with my family, but I guess I wasn't, I was committed to the relationship, so I went for him. And I don't regret that. Like, we went and made loads of friends, we had a great time. It was only for a year, and then we ended up moving back. I personally feel like you could potentially run the risk of presenting your partner for the rest of your life, if you stay. 'Cause you will always wonder what if? What would have happened if I took that opportunity? You're also in a position where you don't have kids, you're not married yet. If there's ever a time to move and just experience it, maybe you decide that it's not for you, when you move back again, that city will always be there. Those friends, the family will always be there, but to spend your life wondering what if, and to potentially resent your partner, it could create quite a big barrier tension in your relationship. - Yeah. How long were they together? - I don't think she said specifically. Oh, three years and living together for a year. - Three years, late twenties. So, from my perspective, it comes down to two things. The first being, how important is your career to you? And how important is your relationship to you? As harsh as it sounds, job opportunities will come up again. Relationships will also come up again. So, you've got two sides to it. You've also got to consider the age you're at. If you're in your late twenties, what do you want within the next five years in terms of career development? What do you want in terms of relationship? If you're thinking, okay, well, we've been together for three years, within the next two, or like, let's say they're 28. By the time I'm 30, like I'd like to be married, I'd like to be considering setting down, having kids and stuff like that. To go and move for a career, move away for a career is risky, because yes, you'll risk that relationship, but also you're probably hindering-- - He has to go with you. - Of course, but there's a good chance you're hindering that opportunity. And I think the point is, he's unlikely to go or wants to go. - I don't know. - And he might resent-- - He might. - He might. - He might. - That's the other side of it. - And I did experience a little bit of that. - He might resent. - I used to call my mum sobbing, because I missed her so much, but you're so right. I think if you are like, I want to have kids in the next year or so, probably not the best time to take on a new career and move away from everything you know and your friends and family. If you want to have kids soon, you're going to want your family around. If, actually, you're like, that could probably wait a few more years, I want to really pursue this career. You have to take the job. But first and foremost, before any of that-- - Have a conversation with him. - Have a conversation, yeah. It sounds like you haven't actually spoken about it. So sit down, have a conversation, and see what he says. - Yeah. - He might say, oh my God, you have to take this. We're going. - We're going to go there. - Let's go. - You never know where someone's mindset is if they don't talk to you about these sort of things as well. They might not be enjoying their life. Like, yes, they've got their friends and family and stuff around them, and they might have a career that they're quite happy with at the moment, but maybe they're just feeling like, I'm lacking like a certain something. - Maybe this is the shakeup you need or maybe it's the shakeup you don't even know that you need. - And ultimately, whatever the decision is, you've just got to stick with it. You know, you can't look back and think, you can't look back and think, Wyeth, because if you're questioning your own decisions based on things that you wanted at the time, then what's the point of making these decisions in the first place? - And what's that quote? You only regret the things you didn't do. So, and also, as sinister as it stands, and I'm all for love and more for great relationships, as I said, I've moved for a relationship before, and like we ended up breaking up, and it doesn't matter because we had a great time when we moved, it would never have been long-term, but you have to also think, am I gonna put my life on hold for someone that, do you think you're gonna marry him? If you are gonna marry him, great, make this work, move together, or make the long-distance work and commit to it, or talk to the job about staying where you are and being remote, there's options, but don't make a decision for someone else, make it for you, really think hard about it, because as I said, I do not wanna be negative, I'm not saying this is gonna happen, but imagine if you didn't take this opportunity, and then in a few months, the relationship doesn't work out anyway. Like, obviously, I hope that doesn't happen, but I really do think you have to remember that it's your life, you haven't got kids to think about at this stage, so do what's right for you, and if he loves you, I'm sure he'll come with you, and you'll have a great time. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. - Is that good advice? - Yeah, I assume so. - I think so, okay, I have another one for you, I hope that does help. Me and my partner have been dating for two years, and we are deeply in love. That's what we like there. We share many common interests, have similar life goals, and we've always enjoyed a strong emotional connection. However, recently, we have encountered a significant issue regarding our sexual relationship. I would say I have a higher sex drive than my boyfriend, and I value recent, sorry, I value frequent physical intimacy as an important aspect of our connection. I feel that regular sex strengthens our bond and makes me feel more loved and desired. My boyfriend, however, has a lower sex drive and is often content with less sex. I know that he loves me, and we have tried to discuss the issue but the conversations often end in frustration. I worry that his lack of interest might mean he's not as attracted to me. We both want to find a solution, but we're unsure how. - So I don't think it comes down to a lack of attraction. If he is sex drive, such a weird thing. - It's get boy's perspective here. - Sex drive, such a weird thing, because for most people, it goes up and down, up and down, up and down, so. Yeah, I think, I wouldn't say it's necessary that he's not attracted to you or feels less attracted to you. A lot of guys, they get quite comfortable in relationships, and to a lot of women, it's kind of like they just stop trying with certain things. And I feel like a lot of people might be like, a lot of girls might be like, yeah, we never go out on a date night anymore or we never do this, so we used to do this all the time. But it's almost like for a guy, he's got what he needs. He's got, most guys are happy just being around their partner. That is quality time. A lot of girls feel like they're kind of, I'm spitballing here, obviously, completely. That's okay, I'll give it from the other angle. Yeah, I know. They're completely, like, they want a little bit more, they want to keep that excitement alive and stuff. Very much alive, yeah. But the guys for a lot of guys, I feel like they're quite happy just being happy. That's great, but if the girls are not happy. No, of course. You can't just, okay, he's happy, cool. But if you're not happy, like. No, I'm not saying that like, it's okay for one person to be unhappy to be happy like, I'm just saying that it's not that they're, like, they're just content. They're like, they don't, it's almost like they, you don't feel like the need to have to show as much affection as you did at the start because you've always got the girl. And also for guys, you've got to remember, like for a lot of girls, there's a lot of guys out there trying to pursue them. So when you're single, you've probably got a lot of suitors, a lot more than guys have. Oh, my God. Yeah, you've got a lot more opportunities to meet guys than guys do girls, I feel. There's a lot of guys out there who are very much single and have been single for a long time. And it's not because they necessarily don't get the opportunity to sort to girls. They're just not as sort of- Fourth coming. No, not even that. Like, they're just not as attractive in terms of like the whole package necessarily. It's very difficult. Like again, like I am- Make sure you're about the sex drive, that's what you're about. Yeah, yeah, of course. So, guys have to like perform a lot more in the initial stages of relationship across the board. You know, you've got to pull out all the stops, you've got to be more romantic. And it should never really stop because it's almost like, oh yeah, like I'm showing you an image of myself and then- That's not why I'm really like- That's not actually what I'm really like. No, I sort of know what anyone is like really. No, of course, and everyone does that in some aspects at the beginning of a relationship. But, you know, you're trying that call and stuff on your first date and then, yeah, you let your- Yeah, it's really cool that you don't meet them a cup of tea. You let them beat you a- Mini girl, sure, yeah. And yeah, so when it comes to sex driving stuff, I don't know, maybe it could be a number of issues. It could be a medical issue. Yeah. It could be low testosterone and things like that. Like that can severely affect a man's sex drive. It could be- Mental? Stress, yeah. It could be stress-related, again, very much a sex drive killer. Mm-hmm. Like a sleep that there's many things it could be. Diet's another one. Whether it's exercising as well. Yeah, yeah. So there's things that can help and you can look into that and potentially go see a doctor or something who can have those conversations. But- I don't think- I don't think- There needs to be- You know, they've had conversations and it always gets a bit- There's probably a bit of guilt and shame on his side. Oh, yeah. I would imagine- It would imagine he's probably quite embarrassed about it also. But let's just be real, if he didn't find you attractive, he wouldn't be with you. Yeah. Like, people typically don't just stay in a relationship if they don't fancy you anymore. He fancy you. And, you know, she even said it herself or- It was her, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, she knows he loves her, like she knows that he loves her. And then I do get what she means, like, you know someone loves you, but that's one side of the relationship. The other side is- Of course, yeah. I know. Absolutely. But that's what I'm saying. Like, it's not like- It's not like, you know, it's not like she knows that there's no love there still. So, like, of course, he's still into the relationship. Yeah. But I- But sometimes things just need shaking up. And maybe the sex that you're having or the sex you have been having is- I was going to say stale, but I don't know, like maybe you've tried things. It's very difficult. Like, you can spice things up in the bedroom a bit if you need to, you know, have conversations. You don't even have to do it face to face. There's like quizzes and stuff now. Yeah. What was that app? There's an app where you can- Paired. Paired. God, the one that I pay for a year's subscription for. You don't know why you did that. Accidentally. Yeah, there's like apps you can get. So if you feel like it's an awkward conversation to have and it's ending in frustration, maybe find an app or maybe take it one step further, go to therapy. Maybe you don't go to that extreme app, but that's not an extreme app. Go to couples therapy. Yeah, yeah. Go on in the middle who can mediate and not make it get awkward, but also I think the more pressure you put on it, the more you probably don't want to do it because then there's like this pressure for him to perform and then it might not go the way you both want and then that gets even more awkward and then you think, "Oh my God, that was so awkward. Let's just not bother." So then you don't try again and then it just becomes this like vicious cycle. So I think you've got to just like get all those- you've been together a while. Two years, get the barriers down, there's no guilt, no shame, just talk about it. And I also think it's a really interesting dilemma because I think a lot of people assume that the man is always the one with the high sex drive. Men are always thinking about sex, that's all they want to do, and actually the reality is that it's not always like that. Especially I think in a relationship. Yeah, and you're right, it differs for different people at different times of the month, especially women, like hormones are up and down all the time. It comes back down to communication though, doesn't it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely. It's more about having that idea of what the other person is going through. And there's ways you can communicate, as Lucy said, through apps, through therapy and things like that, that can help deal with the issues at hand without having like a, you know, every time you bring it up and you have a conversation about it and ends up getting a bit head-to-heads and people are getting a bit frustrated because it's going to end up getting involved. Of course, yeah, yeah. She's coming at it from perspective of what am I supposed to do? Like, do you just not fancy me anymore? Like, am I not attracted? And then he's obviously frustrated because he's going, of course I'll still fancy you, it's not that. Like, I don't know. She's like, I just can't, I don't believe you. He might genuinely not know what the answer is. He might genuinely... I think he should really, if it, if it, he really doesn't know, he should go to the doctor because it may well just be that he's lacking testosterone and they can give you testosterone replacement therapy if I think... Yeah, if you're older than that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely. As Callum said, it could be so many things that have absolutely nothing to do with you. I know that's hard to kind of understand because you, you think it's always about you but not you specifically but like, of course you're going to take that personally but try to not take it personally and discuss it properly and I don't think the relationship is doomed at all. I think... Yeah. You can come back from this. Yeah. The intimate doesn't have to be sex, like go on a nice romantic date night or, I don't know, loads of things that you could do that might even just relax you a bit, that might naturally lead to that. Yeah. Have a nice date night at home, get a bottle of wine. One thing leads to another. Tried and tested, apparently. Oh, no. I want this to be stressed. Okay. I hope, again, the answer is that I love these star letters. Yeah, they look quite good. I see. Okay. So I guess the final little segment, I'm going to wrap it back round to the fitness side of things. I did have a question coming from... I have a question too. I'll do you. Is your fitness related? Yeah. Oh, sweet. Do you want to go first or...? You can go first. Cool. How can I adjust my nutrition and training to help recover from sort of intense workouts and prevent burnouts? Protein, carbs, just food is fuel. How can they adjust it? They've just it. I don't know what they're doing now, but I guess we could just say what's probably the optimal way to cure your body. Yeah. Especially, so on a training day, I think the best way of doing it would be eating around your training. So let's say you like to train after work in the afternoon. So you've got your breakfast, you have your lunch, a pre-workout snack, roughly about 20 grams of carbs, a post-workout snack, probably about the same, maybe some protein in there as well. Or you could just have a protein shake, I suppose that's quite a good one. Sometimes I'm protein usually, and then your dinner, and you potentially have some calories left over for something after that, but like a small evening snack. I guess I kind of get hard if you're in a strict calorie deficit. You just have to kind of take it a little bit easier if you don't have the calories there to do that. But you'd still have the calories to do that, it's just a case of, you know, if you're training a new calorie deficit, eating around your meals is so much more, eating around your training is so much more important than it is. You don't want to get injured or you need the energy for your sessions. You got to think of it like that is the peak of your day, the peak of your sort of activity that day. So you need to make sure that what you're consuming in terms of your nutrients is supplementing that, it's giving you the energy without causing you to be sort of fatigued and potentially into yourself on the flip side of it. You got to remember that carbs literally are like glucose that get turned into ATP, a molecule that is energy for the body. So people that are like afraid of carbs, they literally are your energy source. So get your carbs in, drink water, electrolytes as well. You can take supplements as well for recovery, if you're worried about recovery, obviously take your rest days as well. That's really important. I think that's probably the main things. Or, you know, DMS for more information. Yeah. Or come on board with our online coaching and we can structure it all out for you. Okay. I had a quick question that came into my DMS literally today. Have you found you've lost strength up in your cardio at all? So I guess she's obviously seen that we're running more. Just curious as I'm also wanting to find a good balance between two. Food is fuel of course, but is there anything else I can do? So she's basically saying she's worried about losing strength with increased cardio. Do you know what I haven't personally, I don't think I've lost strength. I've lost energy in terms of doing, you know, I feel more fatigued and stuff now, but when I'm actually in the gym training, I don't feel like I've lost strength per se. Some aspects I do, like my legs are definitely more fatigued than my upper body from running. And I think it depends on the cardio that you're doing. So most of it's going to be leg based. So yeah, some of your leg exercises might feel a little bit heavier, a little bit harder. You might feel more sluggish when you're training there, but ultimately, I think as long as you keep, I can't remember the exact amount of sets. As a graph, it's basically like the amount of sets per body part or per muscle group that you need to keep in a week to keep strength and hypertrophy there. And for some of them, it's so minimal, glutes to keep your glute strength. It's something like two to three sets a week. That's all you need to maintain strength and hypertrophy. Yeah, I think also you've got to remember like I'm feeling very fatigued, I'm feeling very tired, very low in energy because of the running. So I was actually talking to this about my, talking about this with my osteopath earlier, because I do feel like I've lost a lot of strength, but the strength is always going to be there. It doesn't just disappear. I know it will come back. It's just I am tired. I don't have the mental energy to lift what I normally lift. And my muscles are getting fatigued quicker because I'm asking a lot more of it recently. Like the running is taking three runs a week is a lot. So yeah, it's, it's difficult, but I, I think you've got to manage your own expectations and also like not expect so much of your body. If you can go into the gym and give 100% whilst doing more cardio, great, go for it. But you also have to remember that are you in a calorie deficit? Are you in a calorie surplus? Are you eating maintenance? You need to make sure you're eating enough food for one. You also, it's okay, like to drop the weight a little bit, like for me at the moment, I'm dropping the weight a little bit until the half marathon is done. And then I'm going to focus solely on strength and building muscle, but during this time, I need to just accept that my body can't lift what it once could. And I probably shouldn't be lifting what I once could because I might injure myself. And then I might not be able to run for my training day, but I think you've got to take the ego out of it. And if you have to lift a little bit lighter and do higher reps, that's still hypertrophy and you're still going to get results. Just take the ego out and it's annoying not having to lift as heavy, but yeah. Sorry, I was just, I was looking at the, I was looking at for the thing. So it actually said there was a recent study which looked at, I mean, it's specifically male. So, you know, take it with a pinch of salt, but it discovered that only one set per muscle group with more for back and legs was enough to maintain muscle mass. So obviously your strength might change. Food too though. Yeah, no, of course, but like they would have been on it, they would have, they were on a sort of structured maintenance diet. So it, but you know, if you're eating at maintenance calories, then they, you know, they're not trying to put muscle mass on or lose muscle mass. But at the same time, you know, you've got to take into account how much energy you are expanding, doing your cardio sessions. So if you are running three times a week like we are, you know, two sort of mid distance runs in a long run on a weekend, like it's a lot of volume. It's an awful lot of volume. And you can quickly, even if you're eating at maintenance, you can quickly find that actually you're in a calorie deficit just from that, that activity. So it's finding a balance that works for you in terms of your, your nutrition, your training. But once again, you know, if you don't already, then, then potentially sign up with an online coach and see if it can, if it can help you structure it a little bit better. And it takes all that planning out of you, like out from away from you. So someone else does it for you. And outside perspective is definitely useful. 100%. Yeah. Well, this episode was meant to be quite quick, but it's gone on. So I think that's probably the end of the episode. Yeah. Thank you so much for sending in your dilemmas and your questions. We love how you guys participate in the episode. So keep sending them in. Don't forget to like and share this episode with anyone you think might enjoy it. And we'll catch you on the next one. See you in the next one. Ciao. Bye.
