392 - She Deserves Better w/ Sheila Wray Gregoire

Foreign.

Hello there, good listener. I am your host, Nick Stumbo, and you are listening to the Pure Desire podcast, your biblically based and clinically informed approach to healing from betrayal and breaking free from compulsive sexual behavior. Today is episode 392 on the podcast. And joining me today is our associate director of marketing and communications. My co host is Heather Kolb. Heather. Heather. Can't say your name today for some reason. Heather, welcome back to the podcast.

Happy to be here.

I think when this podcast comes out, we're going to be at the beginning of the new year or somewhere in January. You got any big plans for 2025?

Be less busy. That's my plan.

Wow. How do you do that?

I have no idea.

I need advice. The challenge is we're recording this several months before 2025. So you do have a couple of months to think about how to be less busy.

Yes, definitely.

Now, is that so you can be less busy so you have more time with grandkids? Because I know you've got a new one of those, right?

Yep. Two grandkids. Yes. They take up a lot of time, but it's so worth it, I bet.

I find myself in an interesting place where I'm now as a dad, you know, I'm clearly. I mean, you never know what's going to happen in life, but I'm clearly closer to grandchildren than to having little kids of my own. And that shift, I'm feeling it more now. I have a daughter in college and she's seriously dating. I'm not, you know, no prep or, please, honey, don't feel like we're in no hurry for you to have a baby or get married, even do it in your own time. But just you see that and you're like, oh, my goodness, like, that could happen, you know, marriage, kids, family, like, could be close for them. And it does. It kind of impacts how you see your world a little bit, which leads into our conversation today. This month, we're going to be focusing in on parents and teens and kids and this whole environment of healthy sexuality with raising kids that have a biblical worldview and a healthy way of approaching their sexuality. And that's not easy. It's not easy for us as parents, maybe, especially if we've had some of our own story and brokenness and we're trying to think through, like, how does that enter into how I raise my kids and what parts should I share and not share? And we're going to try to unpack a lot of that this month. But today we Got to have one of our, I think she's one of our favorite guests back on, and that's Sheila Rae Gregoire. And we talked with her today about her new book, she Deserves Better. So tell us a little bit about what listeners can expect today. Heather.

You know, I really love her and love her wisdom and insights when it comes to topics like this. She was able to not only talk about what does the book cover, which again is based on some surveys that they did of over 7,000 women talking about, you know, their experience not only of being raised during purity culture, but also what kind of other, what, what was really the impact of those experiences. And she does a good job too, of giving us specific examples because all of the chapters are called she Deserves Something. And so we talked about what does it mean that she deserves respect? Or what does it mean that when you talk about we need to teach our daughters how to have boundaries, what does that look like practically? What are some examples that she gives in the book? And so not only was it about the data, but it really was, I think, practical in the impact that it has for a lot of women.

And I really appreciate that she does have a lot of data that she's not just sitting there saying, well, here's what I think and here's what we should do different or better. They really are, she and her team are looking at what impact have some of these teachings had on women, what are the long term effects on their health, their relationships, their emotional well being. And I feel like we need to take that seriously because it's not just a person's opinion, it's an analysis of what's happening in the church. And so I know for some of our listeners, she may at a few points, press in a little bit on things that you believe or learn growing up, or it's a paradigm that you've never really thought through and that can feel a little intimidating or challenging. And we're like, oh, she's kind of getting into my business. I don't know how I feel, but I would encourage you just to take the opportunity to listen, to hear her heart. She's a believer in the church and the value of what we do to raise people. But, but having a willingness to say, where have we maybe not helped our young people in ways that we could? And I think if we're open to it, it can shift some paradigms. As our friend Rodney Wright likes to say, how many know sometimes it's good, get kicked in the paradigm and, and think a little differently, that we really could improve how we create a worldview for our young men and women on sexuality and how that can be deeply biblical as they grow and learn.

Mm.

I know. Even listening to her, and she's bringing up some of the things that were taught during purity culture, like being modest. You know, all the girls in youth group are taught that you have to be modest or you're gonna cause, you know, a boy to stumble and feeling even a little bit triggered thinking, oh, my gosh, I was taught that. And over and over and over. And just being able to sit and listen and discover some of the correlations of the impact of those kind of messages, not just for women, but also for men as well, I think is so insightful.

Yeah. So I think this episode has a lot, whether you're raising teens, working with teens, or just processing your own story, because we were all teens at some point. And it's helpful to think through, what did I learn and what then do I maybe need to unlearn so that I can build something better? I think you're going to really enjoy this, and Sheila Rae is great. And even if you feel like, well, I didn't teach any of those things or I never believed any of those things, we mentioned this in the episode that many other people did. And I think it's helpful for all of us to get some perspective on what might have happened in some of the teachings of the church that are creating some of the problems that we're seeing today. Because when we see the reality of it, then we can all work together to create a better future.

Absolutely.

Sheila Rae Gregoire is a speaker, a best selling author of the Great Sex Rescue. She is a blogger and the host of the Bear Marriage podcast. In addition to that, she is a wife and a mom and so much more. And so here now is our conversation with Sheila Rae Gregoire on she deserves better. Shela. Ray Gregoire, welcome back to the program. It's so good to have you again.

Thanks. It's great to be here. I feel like family. I'm here so often, but.

Well, we love getting your insights and we love the way you are challenging us all to think, you know, think biblically, but think in a way that truly honors how God created male and female and the beauty of that and, you know, not operating out of places of fear or traditionalism. Sometimes the answers we've always given aren't the best answers. And I think you've really helped us think through some of that, which is what we're here to do today is talk a little bit about your newest book. But before we jump into that, for those of you that might have missed previous podcasts with you or they're not real familiar with your work, could you just tell us a little bit about yourself and what you do?

Yeah. So I've been blogging about sex and marriage since around 2008. So I have several master's degrees. But I stayed home with my kids and I was writing and trying to build a platform. And the more I talked about sex, the more my traffic grew. So I kind of morphed into the Christian sex lady, which is weird. Like, nobody grows up thinking, exactly, I want to be the Christian sex lady when I'm. When I'm all big. But that's what I became. And I, I talked about sex fairly openly for about 10 years. But then in 2019, everything took a big turn for me because I started reading other best selling books in evangelicalism about sex and marriage. I had always assumed, you know, they love Jesus, I love Jesus, we're all saying the same thing. But I realized we actually weren't. And I was quite concerned with some of the things I saw. So our team has decided to just do huge research projects. And we have now done the biggest research projects that have ever been done on evangelical women's marital and sexual satisfaction. And we've also surveyed men now and surveyed couples and really looking at how our messaging is either helping or harming, because we take Jason at his word that a bad tree can't bear good fruit and a good tree can't bear bad fruit. So we need to judge by the fruit.

I think that's what connected us to you and particularly the. The Great Sex Rescue and people having a chance to think through what are the paradigms that I've inherited and are they helping or hurting? And you present a great case for that. So many of us, we know you or have encountered you because we've read one of your books, maybe like the Great Sex Rescue or the Good Girl's Guide to Great Sex, or the book you and your husband did together, the Good Guys Guide to Great Sex, which we had you guys on the podcast to talk about. So listeners, you can go back and find that one. But your most recent book is she Deserves Better, which you co authored again with Rebecca Gregoire Lindebach and Joanna Sawatzki. Can you tell us a little bit about this book and why you wrote it?

Yeah. So after we wrote the Great Sex Rescue, we had so many people coming to us saying, okay, I feel free. I've recognized that What I believed a lot of the time were really toxic messages, and I've gotten rid of them, and that's wonderful. But now I have absolutely no idea what to say to my kids because I don't want to just tell them, yeah, you're 11. You can do whatever you want. But I also don't want to go to the other extreme and pass on toxic messages inadvertently. We thought it was time to do a big survey and find out how messages that we give girls as teenagers affects them long term. So we surveyed 7,000 women for our book, she Deserves Better Better. And we were looking specifically at their experiences in church, the messages they heard, and their experiences with their parents, too.

Yeah, we're looking forward to unpacking that, I think, because that's the era I grew up in. And for many of our listeners, and there is, I think, a lot about some of those messages that seems like, oh, yeah, that's good, that's healthy. It's what we need to do. But we maybe missed some of the inadvertent messages or the, the baggage that came along with the message we were giving. And I know we're going to dive into a whole lot of that. So I don't, I don't want to say too much. I'm, I'm often guilty of answering the questions before we get to them. So I'll just stop and let us get, get into the questions.

Okay, so for this book, you said that you surveyed 7,000 women and you were really looking at their experience growing up in a faith community, or what we often refer to as the, the purity culture. And so in your book, you describe an overarching belief that can keep young women from setting healthy boundaries. And so can you describe what, what this means?

And so I don't know if you ever grew up in Sunday school and you, you, you heard that song Joy, you know, Jesus first, other second, you last. There was a little song that went along with it, and it's quite a common phrase that it's good for us to come last. But the problem with that and a lot of the messaging that we've given to girls is that everybody else has to come before you. And that can lead to girls leading very boundaryless lives and feeling like they're just not able to stand up for themselves. And when you combine that with other messages that we often get in the church, like the girls talk too much. And over half of women believe that as teenagers and were taught that as teenagers, that girls shouldn't be using their voices, we really See a lot of harm long term in terms of the marriages that they get into, the people that choose to marry, and just their general happiness level.

So I'm curious, how were you able to, like, what kind of questions do you ask to help a woman see if, if she is. Because there's, there's some truth, as we've already been talking about truth behind some of that message of we are called to love one another and to consider, you know, others as better than yourself or before yourself. So there, there's a healthy side of that. But what I just heard you say is if everybody's needs comes before mine and almost my needs are ignored or diminished, how do you get at that mindset? Is that just asking, like, do you believe this statement? Or how did that kind of come out in the questions? And what you heard from this is.

The complicated one to answer because it gets into survey design. So what we generally do is, is we use, we use what's called previously validated question sets. So we go to other surveys that have already done work and we, we, so we use like, I'm not the survey designer, so I don't know the names of all of them. But, but we have, we have several different question sets that we use and then we present that have already been validated. So we know this one measures self esteem really well. We know this one measures boundaries. We know this one measures trust in relationships. We know this one measures sexual satisfaction. You know, so you put these different measures in and then women, hey, have you ever believed this? Were you ever taught this? And we, we give a variety of teachings, some of which are good and some of which are bad, you know, so we don't ask them, like, how do you think this belief affected you? Or did you like this belief? We just said, did you ever believe it? And were you ever taught it at two different points in time? And so we were able to then make some correlations between beliefs and outcomes, which was super interesting. But let me give you an example of, of what I mean by boundary lists. And this one came from, from my daughter, actually from a youth group experience she had where there was a guy coming to youth group and he was 17 or 18, super creepy guy. All the girls thought he was creepy. He'd actually been convicted of sexual assault in his high school, so super, super creepy. And he made the girls in the youth group feel really uncomfortable. My daughter, I believe, was about 15 at the time. And it was one of these youth group events, you know, where you stay overnight and then you play all these stupid games in the dark. And the girls were really, really nervous about this. And my daughter went to the youth leader and said that she was nervous. And the response that the youth leader got was that she was being judgmental and she was putting a stumbling block between this boy and him coming to know Jesus. And didn't my daughter know that the gospel mattered more than anything now? Thankfully, the boys in the youth group had more sense than the youth leader. And so each boy sort of buddied up with a girl all night so that she would never be alone in the church and so the girls would be protected. But this was the kind of message that was often given to girls. If they, if they expressed any kind of like, I don't feel safe, it's, well, don't you know that someone needs to come to Christ?

Yeah, that's a great example and I think far too common in some of our stories of making allowance. I mean, that's even a biblical idea, like, you know, making allowance for one another's faults. But if we're doing it at the peril of someone else's well being or their safety, that's, that's not wisdom. I mean, there's many other Bible verses we would quote say. That's, I don't think that's what was intended by that teaching in scripture.

And I think sometimes when, especially for, you know, high school age young women, I don't even think that they recognize how this specific event is going to create something in their brain that they're going to then carry into adulthood. And so being able to, like you were saying, to create correlation between this belief and this is how it's affected my adult years was probably really insightful for them as well.

Yeah, I think there are far too many times in a group, you know, as I'm leading men through group and through their journey towards freedom, that part of their trauma or pain story will involve, well, I was at a summer youth camp or I was on a youth group trip or I was at a youth lock in or I was. It's like, man, those should not be part of our traumatic experiences because we were left vulnerable or unprotected or something occurred behind the youth leader's back. It just something we got to consider.

So 20% of the, of the girls in our survey or the women in our survey, sorry. Reported that they were being sexually assaulted or harassed in church as teens.

That's 20%. It's a lot.

And half of those were by adults, by youth pastors, youth volunteers.

Yeah, well, and so sadly, we're seeing that. I mean, it feels like every day in the news, this pastor, that leader and things often. And it's not like they were going outside the church, like as part of their ministry. They're being caught up in something. And it's not only derailing that person's career, but more importantly, the impact that has on a community, a church, a culture. Like, it's devastating. And so I love that we're having the conversation to say, hey, we, we really can do better. I mean, she deserves better. And we can do better because we have the tools to be safe people, to be honest people, to confront unhealthy behavior in love. But some of that involves thinking through maybe the ways we're not currently doing that. So your research shows a strong correlation between a high school girl believing common evangelical teachings about and marriage and a lower self esteem in her adult years. And that might surprise some people because we would think, oh, if you grew up in the church, you hear so much about God's creation and that you're God's child. And yet our teachings have actually for some, left them in a place with lower self esteem. So talk a little bit more about this. Why does that happen?

Yeah. So one of the most destructive beliefs that we measured in our book, she Deserves Better, was what we call the obligation sex message. So when women get married believing a wife is obligated to give her husband sex when he wants it, we found that orgasm rates plummeted, libido plummeted. But most interestingly, for us as researchers, it largely explained why evangelical women suffer from sexual pain at such high rates. So we're at about two to two and a half times the rate of the general population. And the obligation sex message was heavily implicated in that because women's bodies interpret obligation as trauma because it's erasing her as a person. Well, we found another belief that behaved very similarly. When we tell girls any form of the modesty message, and we measured four different iterations of it, long term, that leads to much higher rates of sexual pain disorders, 52% higher rates and 67% higher chance of marrying an abuser. And girls who go to churches that preach the modesty message are more likely to be sexually assaulted or harassed in their church. And it's a very, very common teaching. You know, we measured it, like I said, in four ways. Let me see if I can remember them all. Boys are visual in a way that girls will never understand. A girl who dresses immodestly is worse than a girl who Doesn't a girl has a responsibility to dress in such a way so that she doesn't cause her brother to stumble? And a boy can't help but lust if a girl is dressed like she' trying to incite it? And these are really common messages in youth groups. You know, when. When we give justification for why girls can't wear two piece bathing suits, but nothing is said to the boys. Right. Or just the way that we talk about clothing in general. And modesty is one of the worst outperforming messages that we see long term.

Why? Just to follow up on that, like, and I know we don't want to, like, try to manipulate data to say something, but I'm curious, more for your takeaway on why does that happen? Is it teaching? Is it a young girl, like, becoming fearful of her body or thinking her body is something to be ashamed of or is dangerous or what? What is the message that a modesty culture might create that really lowers self esteem? Do you have thoughts on that?

Yeah. Let me give you an example. Dana Gresh wrote a number of books at the height of purity culture. And one of them was called Secret Keeper Girl. And it was a curriculum for girls ages 8 to 12. There was also an event that went all across the United States. I think about half a million girls went to it. She is now rebranded it as True Girl, but a lot of the material is the same. But in Secret Keeper Girl, which I actually used with my girls, I bought it. We did the first lesson, and then I was like, this is weird. And we never finished it, thank goodness. But in one of the lessons, she was talking to girls about how to choose what they wear. And she told girls to do the raise and praise test. So you're supposed to put your arms up in the air and if any belly shows, that's bad. And the explanation was because bellies are intoxicating. She went on to explain, or have mothers explain to their daughters what intoxicating means. It's like when you're under anesthetic or when you're drunk and you get out of control. And God meant for our bodies to be intoxicating, but they're only meant to intoxicate one man, our husbands. And so we have to make sure not to intoxicate other men. So she literally told girls as young as eight that the sight of their bellies has the ability to make an adult man out of control. And this was done over and over and over again in our resources to girls. And so that puts so much shame on girls. It puts so much fear on girls now. Body can literally put me in danger. And when girls grow up believing there's their libido tanks all kinds of stuff tank. But the other interesting thing that happens is if you are taught, you know, that boys can't help but lust, this is just the way boys are made. Then when you're dating someone who objectifies you, who dehumanizes you, who's heavily into pornography, you're not necessarily going to see that as a red flag because you were taught this is just what all boys do. And we think that's one of the reasons why we see such a higher rate of marrying an abuser among girls who did believe these things.

Yeah. Because their, their radar isn't attuned to that. To say, oh that's, that's not healthy. That's not a good relationship. That's not how I should be treated. It's more of, well, they can't help it. That's just the way all boys are. Yeah, that's. Well, that's powerful to think about. The implication of that message and what we're putting on an eight year old.

Message was also often paired with the idea and this goes along with consent as well and in other issues, but that girls are sin management tools for boys. So God created girls to be sin management tools. So, so girls need to be the gatekeepers, we're the brakes in a relationship. He's. He can get sexually excited in a way that you won't. And so you need to stay aware and make sure you don't go too far. Girls were told that as well. And then you need to watch what you wear so that men don't lust after you because you need to stop him from sinning. And then once you're married, you have to have tons of sex so that he doesn't lust. So, so girls, bodies are in, in this vein of thought are created in such a way to stop men from lusting. And it's our responsibility to do that instead of the responsibility, responsibility being put back on boys. So we need to make sure they don't sexually assault us. We need to make sure they don't go too far. We need to make sure they don't lust. And that's just a really toxic combination.

Yeah, yeah. It's like we're really putting the emphasis or the message in the wrong place and, and the wrong person in terms of the, the responsibility on the other side. And I know, you know, I would just say for me personally, I, without even thinking about that As a teenage boy, that was kind of my mindset. I dated a couple of girls in high school, and I think physically there was this sense of, well, they will know what's too far and they will tell me. Which in a weird, unhealthy way, almost gave me permission of, like, well, until they say no, it's probably okay. And there was a part of my nature that, like, wanted. That, like, wanted to go as far as a girl would allow without thinking, no. What. What are my standards? What are my boundaries? What. What am I choosing to say? This is what I'm comfortable with in a relationship as a teenage boy. And there just hadn't been. I mean, I had convictions that sex was, you know, like you talk about a lot in the books, that sex outside of marriage was wrong. But outside of that, like, that was the one line I really knew. Sex outside of marriage is wrong. But everything up until then was kind of like, well, it's up to the girl. And as I look back, I think, man, that really was an unhealthy mindset for me as I'm, you know, one on one on a girl with a date, that I'm thinking, well, unless she says no, it's a yes. And that. That just, again, I'm seeing that clarity of all of the pressure was on her and in an unhealthy way, gave me permission that I should have never been given myself. I should have been asking myself those questions.

Yeah. Yeah. I remember growing up in the church and hearing those messages, especially about modesty. And I remember even my parents, who, you know, parents only do what they think that they're supposed to do. But my dad's saying, you know, when we're about ready to walk out the door, my dad's saying, you might want to rethink that. You know, and then it's like, oh, my gosh. And he wasn't meaning it in any intent, you know, or for it to be negative, but it's because it came from that. That message that if I go out of the house dressed this way, I'm responsible for everything that happens to me and around me and other people's behaviors as well. And so I need to rethink this so that I'm safe. And I just think that that's very sad, a very sad message to come from the church. But also the amount of pressure that it puts on young women is. Is horrible and absurd.

And there's ways to talk about how to dress wisely and respectfully without it making it about lust at all. And we do, we do take mothers through exercises like that you can do with your daughter. And she deserves better. So I'm not, I'm not saying, hey, it's okay, we can all wear whatever.

We want, dress however you want.

Obviously, you know, you gotta be appropriate. We gotta figure out what appropriate is for the occasion and for our culture and all that. But you can have those conversations without ever mentioning because otherwise you might cause someone to stand against you.

So important. So in she Deserves Better, which is a great title, by the way, there is a chapter titled she Deserves to be Respected, and it talks about helping girls have healthy boundaries. And so in for this, could you give us a few examples and the type of boundaries that you discuss in this chapter?

Yeah, so, and I talk about it throughout a bunch of the chapters, but in this one, we were really looking at how to have boundaries when it comes to friendships and when it comes to relationships. You know, how to learn to speak up. You know, so many of our daughters, like 13, 14, 15 years old, they have friends who are going through all kinds of difficult things. And today with texting, those friends could be texting your kid at all hours of the evening. They may be constantly just trying to chat, even when your daughter's trying to get homework done or trying to get a, eat a meal with her family. And learning how to say, you know, I care for you, but you just can't text me all the time is a difficult thing when you're 13 or 14, but it's a skill increasingly that kids have to have. It was different growing up in my generation and probably in yours too, because our parents kind of controlled the phone. So if someone phones at the wrong time, your parents could answer and say, no, she can't talk. But with, with, you know, messaging apps, it's, it's really all encompassing and kids are really struggling with this. What do you do if you have a friend who's severely depressed? You know, what do you do if you have a friend who's suicidal and you're only 14? How do you handle that? And so let's talk about how to have those boundaries and when to know how to bring in a trust of adults and things like that.

That's so good.

And what are those? You know, I'm curious, as a, a dad now, my girls are a little older, so we've had a lot of the conversations. They're 20 and 17. What, what are the. Do you have examples specifically related to dating that how can you communicate, like, hey, this is not your spouse yet, and you're young and you're trying to figure out what that looks like. Let's, let's think through your dating boundaries without creating shame or that responsibility. What are a few of those in terms of, of girls and dating that, that are healthy ways to have that conversation?

Because we do that. We have, so we also have chapters on dating, we have chapters on consent, we have chapters on trying to figure this all out. And one of the interesting things we were trying to measure is like, is dating harmful? Because in purity culture dating was all wrong.

Right.

Like you're supposed to court.

Right. Well, purity culture led to I kiss dating goodbye. Yeah.

So we wanted to find out, you know, what works best. And interestingly, nothing works best. There isn't a one size fits all thing which is going to bear good fruit in every measure that we used, every outcome variable that we used. And maybe that's because there isn't supposed to be a rule. You know, I think God tends to work in terms of wisdom rather than rules because the best outcome on most levels was being allowed to date, but choosing not to. So if your parents let you date but you yourself chose not to, you were far less likely to marry an abuser. You were more likely to have a good marriage if you got married to a better sex life. If you got married, higher self esteem, you were just simply slightly less likely to get married overall than if you did date in high school. So there's not one thing that has, that has all good outcomes. But, but dating is a tricky thing, you know. So how do you decide whether you're going to date? And if you do date? Yeah. How do you decide your sexual boundaries, how far to go? And so learning how to speak up about those things is really important. And understanding that boundaries are something which the other person should respect. And it is not on you to get someone to respect your boundaries, it is on them. And if they don't respect them, that's a red flag. And I think that's a message that that's been largely missing. To give you another example, Shaunti Feldon's book for young women Only, I'm going to give you a stat. And this stat is not accurate because she asked, asked a really bad question and she gave people really bad options to answer it. And then she grouped those options in strange ways. And so this isn't true, but what she concluded from the questions that she asked is that 82% of boys feel little ability or little responsibility to stop in a make out situation. And so the conclusion that she tells Girls, they should think about is that if you want to stop, it is safest to not even start. And that's a really harmful message to say that 82% of boys feel little ability or little responsibility to stop. Because to be clear, 100% of boys have the ability to stop. And 100% of boys have the responsibility to stop if they are asked. But girls were not told that. And so girls were really taught, hey, if you get. If you're a victim of date rape, it was probably your fault in some way.

Yeah. Should have never started to begin with.

Yeah. Wow. And so giving girls just the. The understanding that if someone doesn't respect your boundaries, that's a huge red flag that this relationship isn't okay. I think is really, really important. And for boys too, by the way, because girls can push boys boundaries. And I don't think we talk about that enough either. But it isn't always the boy who wants to go further than the girl. Often it can be the other way as well.

Yeah.

And so we need to teach all of our kids, girls or boys, that their boundaries deserve to be respected.

Yeah. So good. And what I hear you saying, Sheila, is that sometimes it's a question between rules and relationship. And with our kids, sometimes as parents, we gravitate to rules because they're easy. I shouldn't say easy. They're clear. It's like, okay, when you date, don't do this, don't do this, don't do this, don't do this. Here's all my rules for you. And I want you to make rules versus what I hear you saying. It's far better to have relationship with your child where you're talking about them and the world and their expectations, their desires. Because maybe, you know, I've got four kids and they're all different. And maybe for one kid, dating in high school would be a really bad idea. And for another kid, it would be totally fine because of their personality and their perspective on it. But I'm not going to know that if I just lay a set of, well, here's mom and dad's 20 dating rules for you kids. And we don't ever talk about it, then I've created a situation for them where dating is just about mom and dad's rules and not understanding why and having conversations. And that does take more time. It takes more vulnerability. It takes a willingness to maybe enter into some of your own fears or insecurities about how you did dating or how you're parenting. But I feel like in what you're saying that's far more profitable to our kids to have us engaged in their life, to develop their understanding of the world and sexuality versus just trying to tell them, here's the rules, go follow the rules.

Yeah, absolutely. And I think the fear is a big thing to remember. I also have a lot of sympathy for a lot of parents who did parent during purity culture and had those rules because many of those parents, like me, grew up in the 80s. And I think we forget how bad the 70s and 80s were. There's a misconception of that. Things are always getting worse, but actually on many measures, things were far worse in the 70s or 80s. Teen pregnancy rates were worse. The rate of sexual activity among teenagers was worse. Alcohol use was worse. Like these things were worse in the 80s, and they're actually a lot better today. Now. There's other things that are worse, you know, porn use, other areas, mental illness, social media, et cetera, but it's not universally worse. And so you had these parents who grew up in the 70s and 80s who went through often pretty bad stuff and who wanted to save their kids from that. And so they were looking for a guarantee and they, they just latched on to this idea of don't date, you know, don't even kiss till the wedding. If you can wait, like, you know, let, let's just guarantee that our kids will do this. Right. And the guarantees didn't work. They often led to a lot lower self esteem. They led to often parents not giving proper sex ed. And that was highly correlated with lower self esteem later too. And lower self esteem is correlated with marrying abusers and having worse marriages and worse sex lives, et cetera. But I think it came out of this fear that things were so bad and we want to protect our kids from that, but you can't protect by just clamping down and not letting them do anything. You know, the way that you protect is actually by nurturing relationships and keeping communication open and teaching wisdom. Because there isn't always a one size fits all approach to any of this stuff.

Yeah. So good.

Yeah. Well, and it seems like even with everything that we've been talking about already, that whether it's, you know, boundaries or the messages that we hear or even in dating, that these are the kind of conversations that we need to be having, you know, a long time before they even start dating, that we're teaching them that having boundaries is okay. It's okay for you to be able to say no to things and teaching them what it looks like to be safe and you know, all these different things, it seems like that's not a conversation that you just start having with them in high school, so.

Right. And it's also something where if your child is not allowed to have boundaries with you, they're certainly not going to have them with anyone else. So how are we parenting? Do we let our child disagree with us? Us disagree with us? Respectfully, yes. But do we let them disagree with us? You know, do we let them choose things sometimes as opposed to, well, I'm the parent, I'm going to choose how much voice do we let them have in their own lives? And so just challenging yourself with those questions as well is important.

Yeah, yeah, I know. It was incredibly eye opening for me when I went through my first experience with pure desire in counseling with my wife and walking through some of our material that shows, you know, kind of the family of origin grid that moves from disengaged to enmeshed and from rigid to chaotic. And I think for a lot of evangelical families, or just depending on the culture you grew up in, some things to you were normal. So for me, much more being an enmeshed family where my voice didn't really matter outside the family, you just did what the family wanted. There wasn't a lot of development of my identity separate from the family until kind of going to college. But I looked at an enmeshed family. It was kind of shown as like, well, that's what families are. And then you look back and go, oh, no. Actually there were some unhealthy messages there where I didn't know. Like, I. I struggled with conflict early in my marriage because I didn't actually know how to do conflict. My parents never, if they had conflict, they went to their bedroom, and if we had conflict, it was treated like, don't just, you know, I'm mom or I'm the dad. We make the rules and you're the kids. You obey them. And it was kind of like. And you did see, like, well, if you just obey the rules, everybody gets along. And if you step out of the rules, you get punished. But that, that didn't allow you to learn how to have boundaries or disagree respectfully to have to have a conversation. Like, I found I was fearful of heated conversations because anyone starts to raise their voice like, oh, this is like, I just. I didn't even know you could actually care about something and go back and forth with someone in a way that would be acceptable. So we've got to be willing to enter into those, I think. So our kids learn Healthy conflict skills. The ability, like you said, the ability to set boundaries, to say no and be able to provide a reasoning why without just being sent to their room. And creating that in our kids is far better than just getting them to fall in line. So, Sheila, we've talked about this a little bit, but I'd love to have you kind of help parents think through. You know, a lot of our listeners are parents or they're youth leaders, they're counselors, they're pastors, they work with young people. How do we balance a world of hyper sexualized social media? I mean, we're in a very, very sexualized culture. As we all know, porn is a multi billion dollar industry. It's not passive, it's aggressively going after teen culture. And that's kind of the world that we're in. And then maybe the unhealth of what was purity culture. So what are some ideas that you have, and I don't know if they're in the book or just from yourself, of raising kids between those two polar extremes, crazy hypersexualized culture, or maybe the past methodology of purity culture? What does that new road look like for parents?

The problem with purity culture was that it placed especially a girl's worth because it was far more aimed at girls than it was at boys, but it placed a girl's worth in whether or not she was a virgin. So the way that she expressed her faith was by maintaining her virginity, which is so problematic for all kinds of reasons, let alone that she could be sexually assaulted. But, you know, but, but, but our Christianity was really seen in terms of how we live out our sex life. The problem with the world's hypersexualized is that they're saying your worth isn't how sexy you are. So in both cases, your worth is related to sex.

Wow. Wow.

And, and what we can do instead is to show kids that, hey, you're allowed to matter for who you are. You matter because you're made in the image of God and you are precious to Him. And no matter what you do, that is not going to change. You are still in the image of God and you are still precious to Him. And when we root our message in love and in dignity and in respect for who they are, then we help them step into that identity as well. And I think that the way that we fight the hypersexualized culture is by saying, hey, that's not treating girls or guys with respect. That's not treating you guys as image bearers of God. That's treating you like all you are is an object to be used, and that all you want is to use other people. You don't want to use other people. You know, you don't want to be used. You want deep relationships, and that's not the way you are. That's not what God created you for. And I think if we keep speaking into that instead, I think we do a lot better.

Yeah. To see the ways that. I think you're so spot on. Both extremes have created an overly focused approach on our sexuality and connected to our identity versus the opportunity to help people develop identity in Christ and as a human being and someone made in his image, where our sexuality is a byproduct of. Of a healthy identity and relationship with Christ and others versus being. I mean, I think you're seeing it too, where people do identify by, well, I'm. I'm straight, I'm gay, I'm. Whatever this is. And that they're not just saying, that's my preference. It's like, no, that's who I am. And it's like, boy, when did my sexuality become my identity? Like, it. It's. It's deeply. And I think what people are speaking to is how deeply connected sexuality is to our sense of personhood. But I think that underscores why we've really got to help our young men and young women understand who they are apart from their sexual desires or urges or ideas, you know, whatever those are. Like, what comes first is your identity. And then those pieces are made sense of through lens of healthy identity.

I think the other thing that purity culture did was it framed things in terms of sin. So everything was either, is this a sin or is this not? And I would much rather frame things in terms of wisdom and respect, you know, And I'm not saying sin doesn't play a part, but I'm saying that the way that we talked about it didn't really help the conversation and didn't help people develop character very much. But when youth groups are addressing things like the hypersexualized culture, instead of talking about how sinful the culture is, I would so much rather that they talked about what is the main message about the value of girls, that this is giving. What is the main message about what is in the heart of a boy that this message is giving? Like, let's talk in terms of objectification and dehumanization, because it does. The hypersexualized culture does objectify and dehumanize both boys and girls, often in different ways. Yeah, but it does dehumanize and objectify. And if we encourage kids to see that, say, I don't want to be part of that. I don't want to be treated that way. That is not a true message of who I am. I think that that could be powerful.

Yeah.

Yeah. I think that's hard though, sometimes. I know I've been invited to speak at, you know, Youth Things and, or, you know, talk with a high school group. And, you know, somebody asks a question that says, you know, that explains a behavior and says, is this sin or is it not sin? And my approach is always, you know, well, I would rather tell you what it's doing to your brain and your body and how it's going to affect relationships rather than addressing it as sin or not sin. But then a lot of times, you know, the other people who are there, they're not happy with that answer. They want students to know that, absolutely, this is sin and if you do it, you're sinning. Which I'm the same way as thinking that. I don't think that's as helpful of a message. I would rather give them, tell them and give them information. This is what it's doing to you. This is how it's going to affect you. This is, you know, and not make it a sin issue. But I get pushback from that.

Yeah. And that is hard. But you're saying exactly the right thing. Like that is what you should be saying. Thank you. You should be talking about how arousal works, how, you know, is this a wise thing to do? Is this really what you want to do? But instead, you know, we've taught, we've given all these messages about soul ties which, which are very harmful in, in the long run. We give mess. We give fear based messages. And what we found is that fear and shame based messages around sex have negative outcomes.

Shocking. Right?

But inspirational messages don't. So if you say something like, you know, God intended for sex to be something sacred in marriage, that is not a harmful message. You know, inspirational, sacred messages are fine. But as soon as you say, if you have sex before you're married, you'll never be able to experience the intimacy that God wants for you in marriage or you've marred it in some way, now you've got negative outcomes. And so we can give good messages that are not shame and fear based.

Yeah, yeah.

So good. What I was thinking too, as you guys discussed sin, there's an opportunity there to really ask, well, what is sin? And sometimes we want to just make sin evil. There's good and Bad, wrong, or right. But I think there's an invitation to ask a deeper question of why do we define something as bad or evil? And it may be because it's unhealthy, it's unwise, it's foolish, it leads to damage down the road. And now we might be able to call that sin because it's missing God's heart for us. You know, that's what many have pointed out, how the original Hebrew for sin is that idea of, like, missing the mark. And it's. It's missing the mark of God's best for us and for his children. And even if it's just a little bit off, if it misses the mark, we might then call it sin not because it's 100% evil, but because maybe it's 99% okay, but 1% evil, it's still missing the mark. But if we only think in these extreme categories, it's either right or wrong. And just tell people, don't do the wrong things, do the right things, but don't let them ask why. And that's where I feel like I was limited in my upbringing of man. I knew what the sins were. You know, I grew up in the culture of we don't. We don't dance, drink, or chew or go with girls who do. I mean, I literally heard that phrase. And even though my parents would say it kind of jokingly, that was the culture. We don't. We don't play with playing cards because that leads to gambling. We don't, you know, drink alcohol because that leads to drunkenness. We don't, we don't, we don't. But no one helped me ask the question why. It's like, well, it's just, those are bad, but why are they bad? Why might they be in the deeper conversation? Unwise, unhelpful, lead to the kind of outcomes we don't want in our lives. And then let's say, oh, that's why we might call that sin because it misses the mark. So.

So I have another question. How can youth pastors or leaders and even parents help teach a biblical perspective about healthy sexuality in a way that is positive and life giving for young women?

I think, again, just make it into something positive, right? Like this is something wonderful that God created. He meant it for marriage. He meant it for you. Sex is just as much for girls, it is for guys. Make sure that you stress that talking about how God made men to be physical and women to be emotional is. Is first of all untrue, but also does a lot of harm. So ditch a lot of the time stereotypes and remember that girls are sexual beings as well. But especially I think, and this is, this is hard for youth pastors because a lot of them are young. They haven't necessarily raised teenagers themselves. They may want to do the right thing, but they've often grown up in these highly evangelical bubbles and they may not understand that some of these messages are harmful. And so let me just, just give you a warning, which is that on the whole, here's the good news first, church is a good thing. So going to church leads to good outcomes. You've got higher self esteem, better marriages, like on the whole. And it isn't just our survey that found this. This is a pretty universal finding when people, when psychologists look into religion. So that's good, church is good. But there's a huge caveat there because as soon as a girl goes to a church that is really doubling down on a lot of the toxic messages around modesty, around consent, around girls talking too much, etc. And she internalizes those beliefs, she actually would have been better off not going to church at all if you look at the long term impacts. So it actually matters a lot what youth pastors teach. And a lot of people could be at very healthy churches on the whole. But the youth group isn't healthy because it's in the youth group that sex is most often talked about. It's not in the congregation, it's not from the pulpit. It's just that youth groups tend to focus on sex so much and so often parents don't even realize some of the messages that their kids are getting. Which is why I highly recommend getting involved. Volunteer at your kids youth group and find out. Get to know the youth pastor. Have them over for dinner. Really, really get to know what kind of resources the youth pastor likes, what they're recommending, et cetera. Because often what is taught in youth group is very different from what's taught in the rest of the church. So I would just encourage youth pastors to think hard about the messages that they are giving and if they're giving really gendered ones, because a lot of youth groups, groups give very gendered ones. You know that, that girls are the gatekeepers, boys are the ones who want to go too far. And so boys need all the messages about sex and girls don't. Girls need all the messages about modesty. And the truth is that there's a reason thirst traps are a thing on Instagram and TikTok for girls, because girls like thirst traps as well. And pretending that girls don't have a sex drive is not. Not a winning combination when you are raising teen girls. So don't get away from a lot of the gendered messages and just focus on, hey, how can we treat each other with respect? How can we help kids grow into the dignity and respect that they have in Jesus and worth? And how can we create that kind of a culture instead of a culture based on fear and shame and strange gendered message messages?

Yeah, I like that.

Yeah, that was. I read that story in the book Sheila and I thought that was so great. The example of the boys all go to one room and it's all about lust and pornography and the dangers of that, and then the girls go to another room and it's all about modesty and boundaries and. And you're sitting there thinking, I'd kind of like to hear that other talk, or maybe it was one of your co authors. And I just thought, man, that is so true. Like, we. We treat. I mean, really, both groups need both messages. Boys need to think about boundaries and how I'm behaving, and am I a flirt? Am I. Am I inadvertently creating relationship with a girl who thinks I like her, but I'm just having, like, boys need to think boundaries. Boys need to think healthy relationships, and girls need to be able to think about lust and pornography. And if we treat them as only needing one or the other, then for the places they do struggle, as we so often find, there's kind of a double shame. Because not only do I maybe feel shame about a behavior I've engaged in or something I've done, but I also feel shame that that was supposed to be what boys did, or vice versa. Boys who feel shame over being emotional or being too, you know, relationally driven, like, oh, I thought that's what girls were like, but that seems to be my issue. And we actually create more shame by treating them like they're different. And there are, you know, I think we would all agree there, there are differences between the male gender and female gender, but there's far more that we have in common than what makes us different. And I think if churches address that as, hey, this is a people problem for boys and girls, we would go a long ways towards teaching a healthier form of biblical sexuality.

Yeah. And can I tell you the one thing that I wish more parents and youth pastors would teach their kids? I think this is probably one of the most important messages, and that is arousal non concordance. If people understood that, it would make such a huge difference so arousal non concordance is simply the fact that your body and your mind can experience arousal in different ways. So your body might be actually really turned on while your mind is completely grossed out or not wanting this at all. And the problem is that when we don't understand that phenomenon, we can think that because I became aroused, I must have wanted it.

Yeah.

And so a lot of kids feel very guilty and feel like they participated if they were date raped or assaulted in some other way because they feel like, well, I got aroused, so I must have consented.

Wow.

When that is not the case. And that's especially true for boys because a lot of sexual acts can't happen unless he has an erection. And so he feels like, well, I must have done this or I must have wanted it in some way. And I think that plays into porn as well. Because a lot of kids, you know, 11, 12, 13, they're seeing porn, they're getting aroused, but at the same time they're grossed out by it. But then they think, well, I guess I must like this. I must really be a pervert because I thought this was. I like this. And so then they feel a lot of shame, but they also feel curiosity, and they turn back to it to try to figure this out. And then they can end up forming a habit they didn't want to have in the first place. And so if we can just tell kids, hey, you know what? It is normal for porn to arouse you. It doesn't mean you liked it. It doesn't mean that you're addicted. It doesn't mean that you have to watch it again. It doesn't mean that you've done anything wrong because you were turned on by it. But let's just talk about how that's not a healthy thing to do and why it's not healthy. And let's figure out how we cannot make this a habit for you.

Yeah, yeah.

That's powerful.

It is.

And a message. You're spot on. We need to have our kids hear that. Some adults need to hear that and get to go back into their own story and go, oh, that didn't mean I was gay. Or that didn't mean I was attracted. Or that fetish is there was arousal because God made the body for arousal. And something happened that aroused me, but it didn't need to become my identity. That's really good, Sheila. As a follow up to that question about what we need to teach our teenage girls, I would like to ask, in light of all you learn from these women, as you ask Them these questions about the impact of to purity culture. What changes do we need to make in our messages to our young men? How do we train our teenage boys for healthy sexuality in light of what you learned from this survey?

Well, some of them we've already talked about and they're very important. You know, you need boundaries too. You need to abide by the boundaries of the person that you're with, you need to respect her, etc. Etc. But I'll tell you the one big message that I think will make the biggest difference and will bring the most freedom. We need to teach our kids from a very young age that noticing is not the same thing as lusting. Because I think that lie has done and that confusion has done so much damage. Because when we don't properly explain what lust is, it's assumed that lust is simply feeling sexual attraction or noticing that someone is pretty and having a reaction to that. And so when you're 11, 12, 13, 14, and you're starting to have sexual feelings for the first time, you're noticing that someone's suddenly wearing a bra and you feel a reaction to that, you now think, oh my gosh, I have sinned and God is angry at me, but how can I stop doing this? And so you feel like God created you and told you you weren't allowed to do this, but you can't physically stop doing it. And so you're in an impossible situation with God. And that makes so many guys feel trapped. I think it's one of the reasons that so many people get trapped in pornography, et cetera. And so teaching what lust is and how lust is not about attraction. Lust is about using someone for your own gratification. It's dehumanizing, it's objectifying and teaching kids more. That definition, I think, would bring a lot of freedom because many teen boys think that they were created to lust and think that God has just set them up with something they could never fulfill. And that's a horrible feeling.

And believe me, I hear that from men in groups. The question of why did God make me this way if this is going to cause so much pain in my marriage or lead me into such horrible outcomes, why did God? And it's like, man, we've really missed this training of who God made us to be and then what sin or fallenness or, you know, a fallen world does to us. And I think that idea, if every sexual thought I have is sinful, then my conclusion is my sexuality is sinful, sinful. And we see that problem in marriages Then, too, because it's like, you got married, and now everything that's been no and sinful is now okay with that person. But I've been living for years with that mindset of all my sexual thoughts are sinful. How do I just now flip a switch, be like, oh, now all my sexual thoughts are okay with. With this other. We just. We haven't trained people to think as sexual beings who are also made by God as sexual beings, and to see that in a way that is healthy and good so that then marriage fits into a place in our teaching that's healthy and good versus it's all wrong. It's all sinful. And, yeah, I think the way you said that was just so good.

Yeah. So helpful. And I have three adult sons, and so. But even raising them from the time they were little and from the time that they had an erection and even asked me about it, why does my body do this? We started having those conversations. But I can see how easy it is for parents to not address things in a way that is helpful for their kids and also helps them to understand not only their body, but the way that God made their body. And so I just think. I completely agree that sometimes I think as parents, we miss the mark.

Yeah, we just. We don't do sexual discipleship really very well at all. So we need to get better at that. And I hope she deserves better as part of that, especially for our girls.

Yeah, absolutely. So as parents, how do we begin shifting our language and our narrative to support and encourage a healthy perspective towards sex, sexuality, and marriage?

The biggest change that we can make, whether we're talking to teenagers or adults, is just that women matter, too. That's the missing thing with so many of our harmful messages is we frame women as either the solution or the problem to men's lusts or men's issues. And we don't see women as existing in their own right. So. And that has repercussions for both genders. You know, so let's. Let's stop framing sex as a man's issue. Let's start seeing it as people issue. Let's start including our girls in the conversation, and let's make sure that everybody knows that girls matter, because that hasn't always been the case in the church.

Well, and it occurs to me that that's the reverse of what you've talked about so much. The obligation sex message. Is the obligation sex message coming? If, in my opinion, a lot of it comes out of First Corinthians 7. And I think the teaching there is really putting the needs of your spouse ahead of your own. And if both people went into marriage with a healthy view on sexuality, not obligation or I just my needs don't matter, but a loving self giving of in my love for you, I'm putting you first as you put me first. And there's a selflessness in that that comes out of health versus obligation. And if we're rooted in that way of thinking that I matter, I know who I am, I know what I'm entering into in a relationship. And in that I'm going to practice not a selfish self serving love, but a self giving love. And that men equally and young men equally hear that message as the young woman, you know, then it's kind of that question of like how can we outdo one another in loving the other better? And almost this competition. No, I'm, I'm loving you better by putting your, well, I'm putting your needs first. And now it can be this fun dance of how are we both engaging in a selfless love that honors God versus I'm getting my needs met and it's your obligation to meet it. And so if, if we can make that shift, I think we can see what scripture is actually trying to teach us in the narrative of who Jesus was. And then the kind of love Jesus was leading us into that did not ever abuse or manipulate or take advantage of another person, but, but taught us to love like he loved. And there's a lot of work we could do as parents to just help our kids think about that and process their sexuality through that lens.

I am curious about. Your book is kind of written for moms to have these conversations with daughters. But would you find value in like pastors or youth leaders? Anybody else, male and female, just reading this for their own, you know, education and, and practical ways to make changes among the youth group?

Yeah, I think what, what makes our book different is the charts. Like we. I cannot express how many charts and numbers and, and research and evidence there is in this book. So if you're a youth pastor, please get. She deserves better because you need to understand what's been taught to the girls in your youth group. You need to understand what is in the culture and the effects of those things long term. If we don't challenge directly those messages and pastors as well need to know what, what was taught during purity culture. What are some of the, the thought forming books that really hurt and, and did harm and, and so just look at it, look at the charts, please. What I was Surprised at was how many men have been reading it because they wanted to understand their wives better, because a lot of the women who grew up in purity culture are now moms themselves and are trying to process this. And we've had so many women read it who don't have kids, but it's like this is what little 16 year old me needed to know. And it feels very freeing. And I think as men read it, they'll understand that, you know, while a lot of guys went through a lot of trauma as teens with their porn problems and porn struggles, understanding what girls went through too is really important if we're going to build that intimacy.

Nice.

I like that. Yeah. So even if we say, well, I don't believe those things or I don't teach those things, I believe we still need the book because many people around us were taught those things or do believe those things. And so if we're in leadership, if we're helping teens, if we're helping men and women in recovery like I, there are so many valuable insights. And yeah, the charts are good, they're clear and they're eye opening. Somewhere Sheila. And I don't know where I saw this, but I think I heard you say, so correct me if I'm wrong, but I think I heard you say that the desire for she deserves better is that if we would apply and live out the principles of that book, we wouldn't actually need the Great Sex Rescue.

Yes, exactly. We feel that way about all of our books. You know, Good Girls Guide to Great Sex, Good Guys Guide to Great Sex are premaritals. And if, if couples read those, and if we read these as we're raising our teenage daughter, then it's our prayer that in 10 years no one needs.

The Great Sex Rescue, which we're still a long ways away from that. So get the Great Sex Rescue. I've said on this podcast it was one of the most impactful books I've read because it, it just helped for me some ideas that I, I knew weren't aligning with what I was learning in health and recovery. Your book put language to it. And I was like, oh, that's, that's where I had a teaching that wasn't helping me. That was a perspective in my marriage that I had never named but that we've been working to correct, and you just gave language to it. So I want to recommend to our listeners both books, if you haven't read the Great Sex Rescue and you're married, you need to read it. And all of us should pick up. She deserves better. So, Sheila, in addition to those two great books, how could listeners keep up with you? How could they learn more about what you're doing? And tell us a little bit if you've got any new projects coming up that we should be aware of.

Sure. So we're@bearmarriage.com and we have the Bare Marriage podcast every Thursday. So Great Sex Rescue was based on our survey of 20,000 women. Good guys Guide to Great Sex was based on our survey of men. She Deserves Better was based on our survey of women about their experiences as teens. But what we've done recently is we've surveyed matched pair couples, so we were able to match the husbands and wives, which gave us a ton of data for our new marriage book that that's coming out in the spring. The marriage you want. And that's awesome. It's different. I'm not trying to tear down toxic teachings. We're just trying to say, hey, if we were going to build a good marriage from the ground up, what would it look like? And here's what our data says.

No pressure here. But when that book comes out, can we have you and Keith back on to talk about it?

Absolutely. We would love that.

All right. We're putting it on the list because we always benefit from conversations with you. So, Sheila, thank you again for being a voice that holds, you know, holds to the truth of scripture, loves the church, and wants to see us grow into healthier versions of ourselves and how God designed us. So thank you for your work and your time with us today. We just love having you on the podcast.

Yeah, thank you. It's been great to be here.

And if you are a fan of today's show, if you like what you're hearing, please subscribe. Share this with somebody else. Write us a review. These all help people encounter this message and might lead them into a place of greater hope, freedom, and healing. And if you would like more information about pure desire, groups, resources, or counseling, you can Visit us@puredesire.org Journey on my friends, you are not alone.