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Modern Dating Woes & How To Resist Temptation w/ Tilly Dillehay - Hayley Caronia (Ep.109)
00:54:32
In this episode of Nightly Scroll: Author Tilly Dillehay provides biblical solutions for modern dating and marriage woes.
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- [00:00]
Hailey Karenia
Hello everyone and welcome to another edition of Nightly Scroll. I'm Hailey Karenia. Thank you so much for joining me this evening. If you want to join everyone in the chat, just a quick reminder that you have to do it on Rumble. We are Rumble exclusive across silverlock so rumble.com Haley will bring you to the Bongino Report channel. Make sure you're subscribed there so you never miss a show. If you can't watch live at 6pm Eastern Time, I get it. You can watch later on whenever you have time or you can listen on your favorite podcast platform, Apple Podcasts Spotify. It helps out. If you go leave five stars. Leave a nice review. All of that helps me. So I appreciate all of you so much. And let's get into tonight's show because I've got a good show and an even better guest. Modern Dating, Marriage, Parenting Whatever your relationship status is or whatever stage of life you may be in, we all face challenges in communication, expressing our needs, our wants, our goals, and more. The rise in social media and dating apps has given birth to new terminology for relationship communication problems like gaslighting, love bombing, breadcrumbing, micro cheating with Instagram models, just to name a few. It is all very difficult to navigate and nowadays people turn to strangers on the Internet for advice when Christians should be turning to Christ. Modern women are being tempted by the enemy. It pops up in relationships when she nags, yells or emasculates her boyfriend or husband. It materializes in the way she judges her appearance and against celebrities and magazines and more. My next guest was inspired by C.S. lewis's the Screwtape Letters to tackle temptation from the devil, this time from a woman's perspective. It's called My Dear Hemlock and it aims to bring Christian women closer to her creator against the odds of our demonic society. Author Tilly Dillahay joins this episode of Nightly Scroll.
- [01:56]
Tilly Dillahay
Foreign.
- [02:00]
Hailey Karenia
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- [04:52]
Tilly Dillahay
I'm so happy to be here. Thanks for having me on. Of course.
- [04:55]
Hailey Karenia
And I want to talk about your book. We're going to get to that in just a second. But for my audience who might not know you, you're a pastor's wife. How did you meet your husband? How did you find yourself in Christianity? What does your journey look like?
- [05:09]
Tilly Dillahay
Well, I was raised in a Christian home, and I was. I was one of seven siblings. So it was a. It was a really sweet, conservative family that I was raised in. But I. I left the faith as a young adult, just walked completely away and was struggling with a lot of things. In fact, the first chapter of Hemlock is pretty autobiographical. The patient becomes a Christian after she has kind of walked the wild side for a while. And I came out to this little tiny church out here in Middle Tennessee to get some counseling for just depression and other things, and ended up being converted and under that biblical counseling with the man who's now co pastor with my husband. So my husband was actually a pastoral trainee at the time in the church. So it was. It took a year or two of me being out here before, you know, we became friends. And eventually, you know, he asked more than friends. Yeah, that's right. He actually wrote. Wrote me emails before anything else he was asked. He was answering theological questions for a while, and that's kind of how we became close.
- [06:16]
Hailey Karenia
Well, that's a beautiful way to get to know someone and at least you know that they have the right intentions and you have the same morals. Right? That's one of the most important things that you can have that common ground going into a relationship. So you homeschool your four children. So how did you come to that decision? Was that something that was an easy decision for you? Did you always want to homeschool?
- [06:36]
Tilly Dillahay
I did always want to homeschool. I was, I was homeschooled, and I, I really enjoyed it. I. I felt like it was a great education, and it left me as a very curious person, a kind of a lifelong learner, a big reader. Um, and I just, I, yeah, I always planned to homeschool the kids. I think it is. It is a lot nicer homeschooling these days. There's just a. Options for community. So I have a lot of homeschooling friends and, you know, tomorrow afternoon we'll be out at the. At the local hiking place, you know, drawing bugs. So, you know, we're there. There are people to be. To be homeschooling with, and it makes it a lot easier.
- [07:17]
Hailey Karenia
That's so wonderful because I feel like people have this idea of what homeschooling looks like. And, you know, famously in the Mean Girls movie, they said that you're a homeschool jungle freak, right? You must be a freak of nature and you don't have any social skills. But that's not it at all. You have now, so many other families that are homeschooling, this has become very popular. And you have a community. You have essentially classmates you can kind of almost co educate with other families in your community. So it's not like your kids are losing that kind of community that you need to go to a school for.
- [07:55]
Tilly Dillahay
Absolutely. And there's, you know, there's sport opportunity. Like you can go play sports at the local public school if you want to even. There's a lot of, there's a lot of really great resources and online too. I mean, if you're trying to learn how to just on the, on the actual academic side, there's so many resources online for learning. If you're, if you're coming out of. Out of a totally different system, there's so much help out there. And you know, in our little community, I can go over and watch a lady do her homeschooling day and sort of make, you know, take notes and pick things up. And I can ask, you know, we have people who are really great with Shakespeare. They can teach Shakespeare locally, you know, so things like that, it just, it becomes this really wonderful sort of community endeavor. But it definitely, it lands on the shoulders of the parents, you know, first and foremost. And I'm comfortable with that. I like that a lot. So.
- [08:48]
Hailey Karenia
Yeah, I like that too. And it's inspiring to hear you say that you can lean on other people. I think a lot of people think, oh, well, homeschooling, I can't do that because it's all going to be on me and I'm not good at math or I can't teach my children this, that and the other thing. But you can kind of lean on each other and, and put together this whole puzzle piece. So that's really wonderful to hear. I want to get into the relationship stuff because you and your husband work with other couples in your church community to give them guidance. Right. So what are some of the issues that you see pop up most often?
- [09:22]
Tilly Dillahay
Yeah, I mean, I should say we are. We're pretty new to the actual one on one, you know, couples counseling. We. There's the man that I was converted under. He has been doing. He and his wife have been doing probably the lion's share of actual counseling in the church for many, many years. So I just have to say that out. Out front. That being said in a less, I guess, like in a more, in more just relational way, like not, not formally. I think the, the counseling has been going on for years. Obviously you counsel your friends all the time, so. And People counsel us all the time because you're always giving advice. So I think one of the big things that I see among women is just discontentment. I think American women just have a really big issue with being happy in their lives, with knowing that this life is the, it's the life that you have and it's not necessarily the life that you had created in your mind out of rom coms and social media and the best, the best version of all of your friends lives put together into one, you know, one dream that you had kind of created. Like the, the idea that you are living in the one life that God has given you and that every day when you wake up you have a decision about whether to accept the life that he sent you and to love it and to, and to beautify it and to turn back and give a, give a return on the blessings that he has given and recognize them as blessings like just gratitude and, and being comfortable in the life that you've been given, being happy in it. I think it's a real struggle and I don't know if that's the case for women, but I, it's, it's one of the big patterns that I see among women and even, you know, even friends.
- [11:17]
Hailey Karenia
So, so this discontentment that you talk about, how does this pop up in relationships? How does this pop up in maybe fights with their boyfriend or their husband? How does this materialize negatively in those relationships?
- [11:31]
Tilly Dillahay
I see it as kind of the undercurrent beneath a lot of the, that just the couples conflict that you see in a relationship because a woman has these sort of unspoken disappointments in, in her husband, in her life and just in, in where she is and because she has not taken hold of that and understood sort of her role there to, to love what she's been given. I do think we, we kind of pick fights with, with our husbands that we're not even really sure what the fight is about. We're just, we know like we're not happy and if we're not happy, he's got to be doing something wrong, you know, because we, we look at him a little differently than he looks at us. That you know, the man doesn't usually look at us as like she needs to make me happy or else like that's her job is to make my entire life worthwhile. And women do. We're more oriented towards the men and I think because of that we tend to look to them for our whole happiness in. And obviously that is not, that's not something he can do that's not something he was made to do to bring us complete joy and satisfaction independently of whether we're able to. To go and get that from. From the Lord and from what he's, you know, given us.
- [12:51]
Hailey Karenia
So do you think women have a hard time placing blame on themselves or seeing when maybe they've done something wrong? It's just easier to blame their husband. But it's hard to kind of look yourself in the mirror and say, okay, you need to communicate this better.
- [13:07]
Tilly Dillahay
Yes, I think so. And again, I think this is. That's pretty specific in my mind to today's woman. The fact that we are very, very slow. I think we've been, we've been trained. We've been trained by our friends, we've been trained by the culture. We've been trained by these terrible advice, advice accounts online to basically say, like, you make, you demand that he do what you need him to do. By, like, you make a list and you make, you check it twice and you make sure that he is doing everything that he needs to be doing. And if not, you can have a royal stink about it. Like, that's your. It's within your right is to make those demands and then to have a big old pout or leave, you know, if he's not doing those things. And we've just been, we really have been completely brainwashed about the shared responsibility in a relationship. Just common courtesy, like to just treat a person that you live with with courtesy and then also with, with not assuming the worst. You know, love hopes all things, love endures all things and believes all things like love. Love looks at a person and says, maybe he's not trying to ruin my life by leaving his, his pants on the floor. You know, like, maybe he's not doing it specifically to make me miserable, you.
- [14:30]
Hailey Karenia
Know, but if he does it over and over again. And let's say a husband leaves his pants on the floor or his socks on the floor, and his wife has said to him more than once, maybe three times, hey, I'd really like it if you put your clothes, your dirty clothes in the hamper rather than leaving them on the floor right next to the hamper. That really annoys me. So what does that say? If a woman or a wife has said something multiple times and it seems like her husband either might have selective hearing or maybe is it disrespect?
- [15:05]
Tilly Dillahay
I mean, sure, you could say that. You could totally say, oh, it's disrespectful. He hasn't, you know, he's not prioritizing the, the underwear on the floor, the pants on the floor thing. But I. Here's, here's what I would say to, to a woman in that situation who, like, is there nothing in your life that, you know, it would bless his socks off for you to do? Is there anything in your life that, you know for a fact he would love for you to start doing this thing or stop doing this thing, and you just haven't done it because it's like, it just hasn't risen to the very top level? Of course there is, like, of course there is something in your relationship that you do that is irritating to him. And you're. You may keep doing it forever because you may, you may never be mature enough to stop doing. I don't know what it is, but I'm just saying, like, this is basic, just human understanding that people aren't perfect. And, and his. And, and moreover, I would also say that with a man, constantly reminding him to do something is about the least motivating thing that we can do as women. Like, it is. It is. If you want to guarantee, unless he's just like, really been beat up by you so much that he really doesn't want any conflict or he is such a. He's. He's like the godliest man ever in this world. He. He is. If you want to guarantee that he doesn't want to at least pick up his pants off the floor, keep reminding him about it, do it several times a day, if possible. You know, so then what's a better.
- [16:41]
Hailey Karenia
Way to go about that? Just to, you know, just let it go.
- [16:45]
Tilly Dillahay
You know, I think it would be great to let it go. That's my. For something on that level, like, you know, what is. What is it? What is it worth to you, really?
- [16:53]
Hailey Karenia
Right?
- [16:54]
Tilly Dillahay
What is it worth?
- [16:54]
Hailey Karenia
You know, there has to be what is more important things, right? Like, right. Underpants on the floor can't be the most important thing in a marriage. So I tend to agree with that.
- [17:03]
Tilly Dillahay
But you have a choice about whether to sit there and think about that all day or to think about the, you know, 30 things that you could be grateful about in your husband that he did do today. You know, if he went to work and came home, for instance, right? If he got, you know, changed the oil in the car last month. You know, like, there are things you can think about. You choose what you think about. You really do. And as. Why, as women, I think we really don't have a lot of just relational discipline to say, hey, guess what? I can feed myself on this narrative about him all day, but. Or I can choose to feed myself on this narrative about God first and then about my husband that God has, you know, given me. Right. Um, and you have a choice about that. You don't have to think about the. Under, the underpants. I think it went from pants to underpants. Now we've gone into it's, it's now underwear. It's gotten worse.
- [17:53]
Hailey Karenia
Yes, it's.
- [17:54]
Tilly Dillahay
Yeah, it's moved. But you know, do you have, like, how does it take a lot of time for you to just put the, the stuff in the, in the hamper? It really doesn't. Now there are things that I think you can maybe that is a big deal to you. And then there are ways of saying, like, it would bless me so much if you put your underwear in the hamper. And then after that I would say don't say anything about it. Like, don't say anything. There's no reason. He knows.
- [18:23]
Hailey Karenia
I think that's good advice. I think it's good advice because we can't just harp on things. You got to pick and choose your battles. So you have written this book, my dear Hemlock, based on the Screwtape letters, but it's about a woman resisting the devil's temptation. So what, in your opinion are women tempted by the most these days?
- [18:45]
Tilly Dillahay
I think that women are not, they're not seeing how important their day to day thought patterns are. Like, I don't think that they're seeing the, the battleground when it comes to Satan and the spiritual warfare that they're involved in has to do with very small things or things that we would think of as very small. For instance, for instance, the. Am I going to think in circles around the underwear that's on the floor? That's a great example of that. But also, you know, am I going to roll out of breath, out of bed and pray this morning? Am I going to speak kindly to my children today? Like, am I going to go pray with a friend when I'm with a friend? Am I going to pray with her instead of helping her to worry and helping her to complain? You know, it's, it's these very, very small moments in life that if we, if we build good habits in those areas. I think this is, this is one of the main things that Satan is concerned with in our lives. He is concerned with making a woman into a quarrelsome, unhappy woman. Like that is, that is a big part of his goal. And I, I'd say he's doing very well in that, you know, he's. He's definitely having his way, I think, with the American woman.
- [20:02]
Hailey Karenia
Yeah, I would agree with you. And I feel like something that comes up a lot. I spend an inordinate amount of time on my phone, and that's. I do it for my job. But it's bad, too. And I see a lot of relationship advice, good and bad. I see a lot of just discourse. And something that comes up a lot is weaponized incompetence. Women feel like their husbands might do household. Household chores incorrectly so that they're not asked to do them ever again. Is there any truth to that?
- [20:35]
Tilly Dillahay
I mean, I don't know. Maybe if. Even if it's not like he's consciously saying, I'm going to do a bad job so I don't have to do this anymore, um, you know, he could put more time and attention into it, probably, than he does. Um, I guess I would just say, like, why. Why is that? Can we reframe this question a little bit and just ask ourselves, like, first of all, do we have any. Do we have any belief at all that there is a difference between his responsibilities and our responsibilities? Do. Can we back up a little bit and even ask that question? Like, are we trying to literally split all of. All of the responsibilities in our marriage right down the middle? And if that's the case, how is that? I mean, we can do that. We sure can. In fact, many couples do. And yet, does that produce a happier wife? Like, does it actually produce a happier wife? If you say, okay, I'm going to go to work for this amount of time, you're going to go to work for this amount of time. We'll split the bills. We'll split the time with the kids. We'll take turns on who's putting who down at night. We'll take turns on who's cooking and who's cleaning, we make sure that we have absolute overlap in what our skills are and what our responsibilities are. Yeah, it's totally possible to do that math, But I think what it results in is a. A nitpicky couple that is just constantly looking at each other, being like, you are not pulling your half. And I just. I don't think that's how marriages have worked historically. I think there's been way more division of labor. There's been way more of an understanding of, like, he is. He's going to go physically protect. He's going to go out into the world to get, you know, get stuff and bring it back here. And I know that the world is different. We have to live a different way now. It's a different economy. Everything's different. But I really think it should be in our range of, like, we can at least imagine a world in which we have responsibilities as women that we love and learn that are skills, clean. Not the only skill, you know, but it is a skill that we can learn to love some of these homemaking responsibilities again and really lean into them because they're important and because we. We can. We can actually love, you know, that life. So I don't know. I think this is. That's probably pulling things even further afield than someone online who's talking about weaponized incompetence. You know, this may be not what they're wanting to talk about, but I'm just saying it might be what we need to talk about.
- [23:18]
Hailey Karenia
Yeah, well, you brought up a good point about the world being so different now if we talk about relationships. Decades ago, the woman really just. She was expected to stay at home, and she did. And it was. We were biologically wired to be moms, and we are biologically wired to do these things. I want to be a mom. I want to be married. I want to be a mom. I'm working. But, you know, my goal in life is to be a mom. And a lot of my friends, you know, because we were talking or you were mentioning earlier about splitting responsibilities. And the world does look very different now. And I would consider myself a conservative woman. I'm a Christian woman, but I don't look like the traditional Christian woman. I go to work every day. I work very hard. A lot of my friends, they are, you know, they're working, and they feel very burnt out because they're married, they're moms. They're expected to split date nights, split rent, split the mortgage, utilities, other costs. They're also expected to keep the house together, make dinner, raise the children. So what's your advice to women? Because in these 50, 50 relationships that really end up being more like 70, 30, it seems like the responsibilities of the woman has changed, but the responsibilities and the expectations of men have changed less.
- [24:44]
Tilly Dillahay
Yeah. Yeah, I totally agree. Yeah. I mean, I think it really depends on the situation as far as, like, how did they get into this. This place where she's got to. She's got to both pull his weight and also pull her own weight. And. And again, it's like, well, on paper. Well, what we decided is we're just. We're both going to work, and then we're going to split everything. At home, but, like, he's not oriented that. The way that she is. And, and we have to remember that with the. Especially, like, with the weaponized incompetence, like, the fact that we care how the home looks, I think is a really great indicator of. Of our. Of that orientation that, like, we can see things that they can't see, and we, we care about that environment. We were, you know, biologically, we're oriented to care for children, to have this. This beautified and productive home atmosphere where we are actually producing value in the home. And that looks a lot of different ways. But if we try, I think even Christian women, we've. We've. We've decided to ignore that part of us that is oriented towards the home and try to somehow reverse engineer this kind of having it all lifestyle. And I just. I don't think it's not possible to have it all, like, logically, it's not possible to have it all the way that we've been told our whole lives. We watched our moms try to have it all. You know, we. We were latchkey kids and we, we saw the. We. We saw the burnout, but no one ever told us, like, hey, this is not the way it has to be. Like, you could potentially, you could downsize and maybe you could live on one income, you know, or maybe there's a way to do the work that you love in a different season or in a different way, and you don't have to. To go live a man's life and come home and try to live a woman's life in whatever, you know, two hours is left over. It's just. I do think we're reaching for too much, and we're doing a lot of things poorly.
- [26:48]
Hailey Karenia
And I think. I think what's sad is that when women are juggling all of these things, something's gonna give at some point. And you can't let that be your family. You can't let that be your marriage. You can't let that be your kids. So these are things that are so much more important. Like, if you asked a working woman what's more important, your life at home or your. Or your job, most women are going to say, my life at home. I mean, 100% is more important.
- [27:15]
Tilly Dillahay
Oh, yeah.
- [27:16]
Hailey Karenia
But because of the financial state of the world, women feel like. And I think a lot of men, they want to be. Hi.
- [27:26]
Tilly Dillahay
Speaking of, some people got home a little early. Hey, guys. I'm still interviewing. Can you read to her a little bit? She's just joining in.
- [27:36]
Hailey Karenia
See, you can, you can do it.
- [27:37]
Tilly Dillahay
All she got. Right? You can do it. This is a great example of what.
- [27:41]
Hailey Karenia
How something's gotta give. Exactly. And you know what's most important? You being a mom. So this is my point. I think a lot of men, if they want the traditional lifestyle where they're the breadwinner, they can't afford it. Like, I see a lot of conservative men feel like, I want to give that life to my wife, I want to let her stay at home, but we can't. And then, you know.
- [28:06]
Tilly Dillahay
Right.
- [28:07]
Hailey Karenia
We just, we see women burn out.
- [28:09]
Tilly Dillahay
Yeah, right. I appreciate that. And I definitely, I know that there are probably a lot of situations where it's genuinely not possible. Yeah. But that being said, I, you know, I'm in a, I'm in a small town community. I have a lot of good friends out here, and they do live smaller lifestyles in order to accommodate their desire, you know, to, to be home with their kids. And they, I know they're giving things up, you know, they certainly are. They're not going on those vacations. They're not, you know, doing the private school or whatever it is. Like, there are things people give up and, and I see these women just their, their eyes are wide open about it. Like, they know exactly what it is that they've decided. They've chosen this good thing over these other good things and they've made those kinds of decisions. So in some cases, I think resetting our, our expectations for, like, well, what are the, what are the priorities? You know? Right.
- [29:04]
Hailey Karenia
That's really eye opening.
- [29:06]
Tilly Dillahay
Yeah. And it's really beautiful to see, like, when you see a woman who said, like, no, I really chose this life, like, I was educated. I, I'm using that education in making this, this lovely life at home. I mean, it stretches every part of you to keep a home well and to keep, you know, to teach children or just to raise children. It really does. It's challenging in all the best ways. And we've just, I think we, we dumbed the job down quite a bit in the, you know, in the mid 20th century. And then we rejected the job because it was not an interesting job. You know, it was like opening a meal out of a can and sending kids off to school and like, vacuuming in heels or whatever they were doing. So, you know, that's, that's, that doesn't sound interesting to me either, you know.
- [29:51]
Hailey Karenia
Yeah, but it's so much more than that. Yeah, it is.
- [29:54]
Tilly Dillahay
It is so much more than that.
- [29:55]
Hailey Karenia
I want to ask you about marriages that might be on the rocks. I want to ask you if most marriages, if not all marriages, can they be saved? If there was a connection at first or an attraction at first, can you get that spark back, even if you think it's too late? Even if you feel like giving up because you think that your husband or your wife is too far gone and they're never going to come back?
- [30:20]
Tilly Dillahay
I think so. I've seen. I've seen marriages saved that were on the brink. And I don't. I don't share this just everywhere, but my. My own parents actually divorced in 2020 and were remarried a year and a half later in her. And her. My. My husband married my parents in the living room of the family home with kids and grandkids watching.
- [30:40]
Hailey Karenia
That's wonderful. That's like the parent trap.
- [30:42]
Tilly Dillahay
That's the dream. I know, I know, I know. So, you know, you asked me whether reconciliation is possible, and obviously my answer is a resounding yes. But it. It does take a woman or a man. I think a woman can do this alone. A man can do this alone. They can make a lot of headway just in themselves by saying, oh, I'm going to do things a different way. Like, I'm going to approach this a different way by, I think, with a woman by learning what respect actually looks like. I think she can do huge things in her marriage by learning the mechanics of respect. Maybe she's always said that she agreed with the idea of respect in her marriage, but just maybe she didn't know how to actually do it. Yeah, a lot of it is just not saying a lot of things that you think you really have to say, you know, and. And just being a nice person to be around, just a pleasant person. Yeah, it goes so far. It really does. And I'm speaking to myself, too. You know, it's. It's these. These habits can be made really poorly, and they can be remade. Habits can be remade. And I've seen a lot of really amazing growth in marriages that were. That you thought were kind of gone just by a woman or a man saying, like, just going to the Lord and just saying, okay, clearly what I'm doing is not working, and being willing to say something I'm doing is not working. I know this other person sins because all you can see, of course, is the other person you can. All you can see is what they're doing wrong, because of course, they're doing something wrong. Like, this is the way marriages are. But learning to take responsibility for your own sin and in a marriage and say, okay, I am going to do what's right before the Lord. I'm not going to wait for the other person to change before I look for something that I can grow and change in. Right. It's huge. And it, this is, it's just, it's what the Christian life is all about. It, you know, it's about, it's a constant process of learning and repenting and, and growing.
- [32:44]
Hailey Karenia
Yeah. You brought up sin in marriage. And I wanted to ask you, why do you think people cheat in relationships and marriages? What does that stem from? And if you're married and your spouse cheats on you, how do you go about forgiving them and moving forward?
- [33:01]
Tilly Dillahay
Yeah, well, people cheat for a lot of different reasons. You know, people cheat because obviously there's, there are a lot of times you could say that they cheat because they're in a loveless marriage. They're, they're, they're lonely, they're cold. I think I heard a. I don't know how they could get this data, but I heard one time that when men cheat, they usually cheat with women who are less attractive than their actual wives. Just like on a, an empirical level. And, you know, that's not what we would think. We would think, oh, he. Men cheat because they see someone who's younger or more attractive and they decide, I'm going to go for this person. And, and yet that's, that doesn't seem to be the way it tends to go down. So that, to me, that just says it's an emotional thing. Like they, they connect. They, they, maybe they're, you know, they're getting more time with the person or they're getting more, you know, positive interaction or whatever it is. That's one reason Men also, and women, sometimes they just cheat because they are looking for a, they're just looking for a good time and they're looking to go, you know, do a bad thing. And that's, that's, that's the reason. People cheat for that reason. Just because they're like, I'm gonna be wild today and do a good thing in your marriage.
- [34:13]
Hailey Karenia
But then people are going outside to do it with someone else that doesn't care about them. And you don't have this relationship and this history with. It just seems.
- [34:21]
Tilly Dillahay
Yeah.
- [34:22]
Hailey Karenia
Horrible.
- [34:22]
Tilly Dillahay
But to your point, wrecking. It's, it's horrible. But, but people do it for all kinds of different reasons. So that being said, like, I don't know why, I don't know why everybody, anyone cheats, but because it's different. It's different for each person. But I will say that I have seen marriages come back after cheating. I know it is hard. It is. It's a. It's a wrecking kind of a thing. Infidelity is, but it is not. I. I've seen both men and women just basically decide, I still want to be in this. Like, I've been cheated on or I've cheated, but I actually want. I want to go back and figure out what it was that went wrong here and actually move forward and build a new thing. Um, and so it can't. I know it can be done. I know that there are also situations where they have cheated and they've got a foot out the door and they're headed to this other relationship. Like, they are not going to be participating with you in fixing, you know, the relationship. Yeah. But, you know, be creative. Like, the creativity of a woman who has decided to go in and think outside the box in terms of just her relational power and the kind of relational power that a woman has, it's shocking. Like, it's. There's so much creativity involved in a woman who decides to go in and make beautiful something that was ugly. You know, this is true of a living room, but it's also true of, like, a relationship. And I've seen. I've seen and heard some amazing things that women are able to do just by saying, I'm gonna. Look, I'm at this a different way. You know, I'm gonna. I'm gonna just. I'm gonna seduce him. I'm gonna. You know, I'm gonna. Whatever. Like, there's just. There's a lot of. There's a lot of fun, I think, in going in and saying, I'm going to improve this relationship. And that's. Yeah, I'm not. I'm not answering just the question about cheating at this point. I'm just. Yeah, I'm talking about relationships.
- [36:21]
Hailey Karenia
There's a lot of ways to fix this. So do you think. And, you know, I'm. I'm not asking for a friend here. I have done this. Is it ever okay to go through your boyfriend or your spouse's phone without them knowing?
- [36:36]
Tilly Dillahay
I think that's. I don't know. Here's the thing. Here's the thing. I. I can't speak to the boyfriend relationship because I haven't spent much time in that kind of relationship that went on for a long time. I think that by the time you're married, you should have the freedom to go into each Other's funds at will. Like, I think that's just a healthy thing. I think you should have each other's email passwords. You should have each other's bank. Your bank account should be the same bank account. Excuse me. I'm not sure why anyone would think it was a good idea to keep separate accounts unless you're just preparing to get divorced later. I don't know why you would do that. Like, you should have, you should have no secrets in a marriage. And you should, you should not be setting yourself up for secrets. So in my opinion, like, I, yeah, I have my. My husband's email address is basically in my computer. My phone is laying around and he can get at it at any point. Like, we. There's no reason why we shouldn't be able to look each other's stuff. But that's marriage, you know, I'm talking about marriage point boyfriend. I don't know about that. I don't know about that.
- [37:42]
Hailey Karenia
See, I justify it because I found exactly what I suspected was there, right. And he was cheating on me. So therefore I ended it. And I, you know, I, I'm not going to date someone who's going to disrespect me like that. Sure. If we're in a marriage and I've already. We've become one and I've said till death do us part. Okay, let's try to figure this out. But if I'm just dating and you're disrespecting me, then I'm. I'm going to go. But I have.
- [38:08]
Tilly Dillahay
I would have done exactly the same thing. Yeah. And yeah, as far as, like, you think he's cheating, I think it's probably time to look at his phone. Yeah.
- [38:14]
Hailey Karenia
Right. Or maybe in the future, if I ever felt that way and I felt insecure in the relationship in that same way, maybe I would just end it and move on. I wouldn't go, but part of me felt like at the time, well, I can't just end this relationship that is otherwise nice and good then. And to just end it without having evidence. Like, I felt like I needed evidence so I didn't feel crazy. But anyway, that's all said and done. It doesn't matter. But I. There are some modern dating issues that are popping up now, and I think a lot of this is brought on by dating apps and social media. There's this abundance mindset where people scroll through Instagram all day long and they scroll through dating apps all day long and people seem disposable. Because if there's one person, you just swipe on them. You get this 2D version of a person. It's not even who they are. You can't even get a real understanding of what their morals are and what their values are and who they are as a person. You just get a few photos and maybe some prompts and it's really not a good way of seeing who this person is. But we're so quick on the other side of the phone to just say like, yeah, no, yeah, no. And it's all based on looks, so it's very surface level. What would be your advice to a modern single to combat this, this disposable mindset?
- [39:35]
Tilly Dillahay
Well, I think that you should give nice guys, nice, normal, steady guys a shot. Like, I think if there's any. I see men being picky too. I really do. But I do see women basically overestimating their staying power in terms of like the marriage market and just being like, I don't know, they, they look at, they look at all the wrong criteria. I think when they're deciding who to be in a relationship with and, and the, just this description, you, you know, of this, of the scrolling, like, I think you're spot on there. Like, that is. So the problem, the problem is that we think we are consumers and we can go to the store and go to the spouse market and decide, you know, the cup, the color and size and material and you know, pick out a spouse. And people are people. First of all, when you get married, you are going to have to overlook some stuff. Like you are going to have to make some compromises. No matter who you marry, that's going to be the case. But I think for women especially, we have really, really long, we have really long lists of what we need in a man. And I think a lot of the things on those lists are, are nonsense, are just unnecessary things. So I think we should, we should shorten our lists and focus in on the steady guy who's going to do what he says he's going to do. Maybe isn't as flashy and is, you know, is a Christian man who you can trust, you know.
- [41:07]
Hailey Karenia
Yes.
- [41:07]
Tilly Dillahay
And go forward and, and get married.
- [41:10]
Hailey Karenia
So those are some good qualities, right? Someone who's dependable, a Christian man. What are some qualities that you would say would deem someone not marriage material? Someone where this is a red flag, this is a deal breaker, this is someone that you should not go forward with.
- [41:27]
Tilly Dillahay
I would say anyone who's like pushing the limits with you physically, where you've made, you know, You've made, set up some, some standards and parameters. Anyone who's wishy washy about, about the things of the faith or, you know, major theological issues, I think that would be it. The stuff about like how you're going to conduct your household, are you going to do this family unit with this, you know, the stay at home or the, the male kind of lit, male led home, like that stuff is big. You got to decide how you're going to do those things. And I would say a liar, you know, if he's a liar, a liar, cheater, you got to check his phone up. That's probably a no go.
- [42:08]
Hailey Karenia
So that's good advice. It's definitely good advice.
- [42:11]
Tilly Dillahay
Yeah.
- [42:11]
Hailey Karenia
Is initial attraction to a partner important or should people enter into relationships hoping and also knowing that attraction grows?
- [42:22]
Tilly Dillahay
I got into a relationship based after many, many other relationships that were full of attraction and full of all that stuff. I came to a point around the time I was meeting my husband where I realized you are looking at the wrong things and it's leading to bad relationships, you know, that aren't great. And so that the Lord prepared me in the perfect way to see the good in my husband, Justin Dillahay. When I met him, I was not attracted. He was not good at talking to women. He was, he had a plan for his life. Like he was headed in a direction, but he was super awkward with, with ladies, with me even. And you know, that was off putting for a while. Like it was off putting for a good year, year and a half. Like going into the, going into the dating relationship even I was like, okay, I think, I think I can see how this could grow. I think this is the kind of thing you marry on. Like the kind of thing I'm seeing in this man. Yeah. But I am not butterflies and rainbows, excited and you know, in the way that I have been in the past. So to me, there was a moment where I was like, maybe the way that I've been thinking about this has been wrong. And you need to, you need, you can walk into a relationship based on respect, right. And see how, see how that other stuff comes. And, and let me just say, like when you have a dating relationship where it wasn't the most fun thing in the whole world, it's just an uphill climb from there. Like, I mean, it's just everything's up from there. It's all, it's all, it gets better and better. So like the enjoyment, you know, the fun, the laughter, all those things have grown literally year by year. Since our dating relationship. But that was because there were mutual values. And I had to be ready to say, okay, I'm not trying to marry Hugh Grant. I'm trying to marry a Christian man who is. Is one that wants to walk into the kind of life that I'm. I'm envisioning, you know?
- [44:13]
Hailey Karenia
Yeah, that's wonderful.
- [44:14]
Tilly Dillahay
Yeah.
- [44:15]
Hailey Karenia
Are husbands supposed to find their wives or the other way around? I get a lot of dating advice. Some good, some bad, and even men.
- [44:23]
Tilly Dillahay
How hard to go after him?
- [44:25]
Hailey Karenia
I like when a girl makes the first move. But is that how it was intended to be?
- [44:31]
Tilly Dillahay
It depends on what you mean by the first move. I would say, like, if I don't, I don't. I don't think it's a great pattern to set for relationship that you would ask him out, be the person to ask him out. But, you know, a smile from across the room is an invitation. And you could. A man would see that probably as a move, a kind of move. But to me, that's an invitation and.
- [44:52]
Hailey Karenia
I think that's the kind of move I would be comfortable making. Like I could just right, you know, give someone a little look. That's. That's me making the first move.
- [44:58]
Tilly Dillahay
To me. Yeah. And I could see how a man would say, oh, she's making a move. And I guess so. But the kind of move where you're going over and like chatting them up, that's. I don't love that as, as the, as the pattern. But a, an invitation is an invitation for him to take action. And I like that a lot.
- [45:17]
Hailey Karenia
I love that. Okay, Tilly, I have a segment on my show that I call scrolling time. And not every guest gets to stick around for scrolling time, but I wanted to invite you in here because I have some videos on the Internet that I would like your expertise and your wisdom to get through. So this first video is a woman. She is, you know, asking for a friend, but a lot of the commenters are telling her that what she's going through is financial abuse. Watch this.
- [45:50]
Tilly Dillahay
So I'm totally just asking for a friend. Is it normal in a marriage for the stay at home mom to have to ask for money? Money? Like it's like, like anytime she needs anything at all, she has to ask for money. Is that normal and like a, like a 12 year marriage, is it normal to like be made sure that you, you're like never have anything extra?
- [46:27]
Hailey Karenia
Just like I said, I'm just asking.
- [46:28]
Tilly Dillahay
Asking for a friend. Yeah. Let me know your thoughts so I can share them with her.
- [46:43]
Hailey Karenia
What do you think? Is this cute financial abuse?
- [46:47]
Tilly Dillahay
It is impossible. It is impossible to get inside this other person's relationship. But a couple things. Number one, I have definitely seen this kind of conversation. And one of the questions to ask if you're talking. Let's say you're talking to a person you actually do know, not some stranger on the Internet. Has there been any kind of history of you not being able to stick to a budget? Is there a budget? Do you have a budget together that you can both see? I do think a wife should be involved in. In financial management of the home in that she's. She has to be. Yeah. She has to be spending money to get her job done. Yeah. But a woman who's on. Who's willing to cry on TikTok or whatever that was doesn't, you know, doesn't impress me with a great confidence in whatever the financial decisions have been in the past. But that being said, I would say ideal would be a mature woman who knows how to handle money alongside her husband, and they have a plan together that they're both aware of. You're both looking at. I would be very happy for my husband to handle all of the finances in our house, but he has asked me to do the budgeting because I'm better at it. He's just more. He likes me to do it.
- [47:58]
Hailey Karenia
Yeah, you're a team.
- [47:59]
Tilly Dillahay
We're a team. So, yeah, I would say, sure, we're. You're a team. But if. If, you know, if a woman knows, oh, I have trouble overspending or have trouble, you know, just grabbing stuff that we don't need, then it would make sense to me that he might want her to carefully budget everything that she's spending.
- [48:20]
Hailey Karenia
It also says, I don't know what.
- [48:22]
Tilly Dillahay
Asking for money means in that situation.
- [48:24]
Hailey Karenia
Right. Because it's really. You shouldn't have to ask for money if it's your money pooled together. But maybe this is. Maybe they are in a relationship where they have separate accounts or something like that, but. Well, I guess that doesn't really make sense. But this says a lot about her communication style. To our point earlier in the conversation, she's not really coming to her husband.
- [48:45]
Tilly Dillahay
Asking him, hey, and this whole asking for a friend thing, oh, my goodness. So it's so annoying.
- [48:49]
Hailey Karenia
Very immature.
- [48:50]
Tilly Dillahay
So, yeah, right. So you're just like, okay, if this is the level of maturity we're dealing with here, then I have. I already have some questions about whether you're able to handle money well and maybe Your husband does, too.
- [49:01]
Hailey Karenia
All right, so this goodness rushing.
- [49:03]
Tilly Dillahay
Rushing to do the labeling. Like, the labeling is so destructive. Like the online label. The. The need to say, oh, this is weaponized incompetence. Oh, this is emotional abuse. Oh, this is. You know, we just. The labels. We've got to stop with the labels, people. Yeah.
- [49:21]
Hailey Karenia
Oh, I agree with that. So this next one is a video from Hallmark. Well, it's not from Hallmark, but it's at the Hallmark section of the card aisle in, you know, a convenience store where there's all these cards. And, you know, when you go to the card aisle, you might be looking for a happy birthday card or a sympathy card, but these cards are for your work husband and work wife. Watch this. So this girl says, who approved this? For my work wife. For my work husband. I finally found someone to be inappropriate with.
- [49:59]
Tilly Dillahay
Company is on a mission to ruin people's lives this Valentine's Day. That's. That's. That's the only possible explanation. I love it. I love it. I'm here for it, so I can't.
- [50:12]
Hailey Karenia
Oof. This pains me.
- [50:14]
Tilly Dillahay
Oh, man. Okay. Yeah. That is a great idea. That is a great idea. You should formalize your relationship with the person at work that you already are too close to. Clearly, if you found a person who's just as inappropriate as you. Oh, my goodness.
- [50:31]
Hailey Karenia
Yeah. I feel like Hallmark might be normalizing cheating or even micro cheating, because it might not be a physical relationship at work, but if it's an emotional relationship at work, I think their respective spouses would be very rightfully jealous in that situation. Do you think that if you are married, you can have a platonic friendship with the opposite sex?
- [50:57]
Tilly Dillahay
I do not. I'm. I'm one of these people that does not think you should have a friend that is unique to you of the opposite sex, particularly, not that you're close. Close to, you know, but there's. Yeah. I mean, obviously, my husband and I both, we have. We have people of the opposite gender that we appreciate and enjoy and admire. And these are all people, though, that are in our lives together. Like, we are all. We all. We have a life together. And there are people that are inside that orbit. Anyone that he knows, I know. Anyone that I knows, he knows. And did I say what? Did I say yes. Yeah. So basically, there is. There is no, like, oh, I've got this great buddy that I'm texting, you know, or that I would go hang out with, and I would be outraged and mystified if I saw him doing that. So and he would. Yeah.
- [51:51]
Hailey Karenia
I think there are two really good examples that I know of, of famous people. First is Mike Pence, former vice president. He won't take a meeting with another woman alone. So either another man or someone else has to be in the room. But he's not going to be one on one with another woman alone in a room. And I think that's wonderful because people might think that this is crazy, but that shows his respect for his wife. Another one is actor Neil McDonough. He will not sign a contract where he has to kiss or be physical with another woman in a movie. And they're acting as. But he says, I won't even act like I'm in love with another woman. And I think that also displays an immense amount of respect for his wife and his marriage and their relationship because she has nothing to worry about. And I think he does get typecast a lot as like the villain in the movie. The villains never have a girlfriend because.
- [52:45]
Tilly Dillahay
They don't have a love interest. So yeah, I'm amazed that he's able to, to carry on a career that way. But I'm so glad that he does. Um, and yeah, I mean in a pastor, like just the, the waters are very, very deep and dangerous for a pastor who's trying to help women or counsel, you know, if you're, if you do any of that stuff alone, it is, it's a dangerous, dangerous game to be playing. So I agree. Yeah.
- [53:10]
Hailey Karenia
I've got one more video for you and then I'm going to let you plug your book and everything where people can find you. So this is the last one that I have for you. This has almost 6 million views and this video, it was a series of photos. This is a groom who says that his mom, he was excited to get married, but his mom will always be his first love. So let's look at this. Were you excited to get married? Yes, but she will always be my first love. I don't know. Is this a healthy relationship with your mom, your in laws? How does that look like once you become one with your partner, I mean, you kind of have to leave your. The love for your mom. That's a very different love.
- [54:00]
Tilly Dillahay
Right? I mean, I don't mind a guy like affirming his relationship with his mother, but what a weird time and a weird way to talk about that. Yeah, that just seems, that seems like a little leavage and cleavage problem there.
- [54:13]
Hailey Karenia
Yes, I would agree with you on that. So Tilly, thank you so much for being here. I think this was a lot of fun. These are hard conversations to have, hard topics for a lot of people. It's very emotional. But I think you provide so much wisdom, and I'm so excited that your book is available. So tell everyone where they can find it, where they can buy it, and where they can follow you for more.
- [54:34]
Tilly Dillahay
Yeah, it's available anywhere, pretty much that books are sold, my dear Hemlock. And I have a. I have a podcast called Home Fires with another author friend, and that's out there, too, but that's about it. I'm not. I'm not hugely active on social media, so you can buy the book and listen to the podcast, and that's about it.
- [54:54]
Hailey Karenia
This is why you're in a healthy, healthy and happy relationship, because you're not on social media as much as I am.
- [55:00]
Tilly Dillahay
It does help. It does help.
- [55:02]
Hailey Karenia
Tilly, thank you so much for being here on Nightly Spirit Scroll.
- [55:05]
Tilly Dillahay
Thank you for having me.
- [55:06]
Hailey Karenia
Of course. All right. Anywhere books are sold, you could buy My Dear Hemlock by Tilly Dillahay. I think she's wonderful. I aspire to be in a relationship like hers, happy, healthy. I think it's wonderful she has so much wisdom about, you know, even if you are in a healthy relationship, there are still ways that you can improve. And you could lean on your relationship with God to do so and be grateful for the good things in your relationship. Not focus so much on the underwear on the floor, but maybe the good things that your husband or your wife does for you. And I think that's a lesson that everyone can take home with them, even if they are happy and healthy in their relationship. So I love this episode. I hope you did, too. Make sure that you follow along with me at Haley Karania on all platforms or most platforms. As you know, if you want to watch this show live, you got to do so. 6pm Eastern time, Monday through Friday on rumble only. Rumble.com Haley brings you to the Bongino Report Channel. It's the only place you can watch Nightly Scroll. Of course, you can always catch it on your favorite podcast platform and listen. And I'll see you right back here soon. Bye.