Hi guys, it's Rachel and this is my fifth attempt to record just the intro of this podcast

because I don't totally know how to have this conversation but it's important to me to

keep showing up.

So I'm going to ask for your grace in that this will not be the most eloquent conversation

I have ever delivered to you but I have always done this work, writing or teaching or this

podcast from a place of authenticity and honesty and so even if the season is really hard

and even if I don't feel like I have the most eloquent way of explaining it, I do want

to keep showing up for you.

If you haven't heard, my marriage has come to an end and I guess I have to start with

how we got here.

We, Dave and I have worked endlessly, endlessly on our relationship.

I mean if you have listened to the rise together podcast, you have heard hundreds of conversations

about everything from sex to boundaries, to goals, to therapy.

We have worked for years and years to fix the parts of us that don't work and I think

what is so confusing for our friends and our family and maybe you if you follow us is

that everything seems so great or has seemed so great.

The only thing that I can say though it's really difficult to understand from outside is

we are best friends.

Still, we have been best friends since we met, 18 years ago and the part of us that are

best friends, the part that laugh and have so much fun and have inside jokes and love

hanging out with each other has covered for the parts that don't and when things are

really hard, both of us tend to reach for the fun stuff, the friend stuff rather than

...