Lorissa: (00:45) Alright. So kidding on the side, he’s like being tortured, but I know he’s gonna get into this. We’re gonna have fun. This is Valentine’s Week when this episode airs. It’s gonna be Valentine’s Week of 2023. And so Johnny, I thought we could just have some fun here. Talk a little bit about love and marriage, our relationship, and just the ways in which God has really been working. I mean, here we are. This Valentine’s Day is our 20th Valentine’s together and Wow. , we’re about to celebrate our twentie year anniversary in May. Can you believe it?

Johnny: (01:23) It’s a dream. It really is a dream. And I feel like, although 20 years sounds like a long time, it also seems just like the blink of an eye. And there we were. And I was seeing you for the first time.

Lorissa: (01:37) Yeah. It has. Mm-Hmm. , it has been a dream and it has gone fast. Like people always say, like, it just flies by. And here we are, seven kids later this life that we’re living

Johnny: (01:51) One is about ready to graduate from high school.

Lorissa: (01:53) Yes.

Johnny: (01:54) Go to college.

Lorissa: (01:55) Yes. We literally have an adult in our home, an adult child, about to go off to college. We still have our four year old who’s about to turn five this week. And we have all these just memories and moments, definitely moments of a lot of growth in our, in our relationship. Kind of overcoming adversities and difficulties, but also just having so many moments of, of fun and joy and gr just learning about each other and, and growing together and growing closer to, to God together. So anyways, I wanted to start off kind of lighthearted with this episode. I have some questions that I wanna ask you.

Johnny: (02:39) Here we go.

Lorissa: (02:40) Here we go. And what, so these are just kind of fun questions, and then I’ve already like, and I’ve, I’ve guessed what I think your answer is gonna be. Mm-Hmm. And then you can answer what you think my answer is gonna be. Okay. We’re gonna just play this game. Okay. It’ll make sense. Okay. So first question. If you were given an all expense trip to anywhere in the world for like a week, just any like dream vacation, dream trip, all expenses paid, where would you want to go and why?

Johnny: (03:15) Ooh. I would say any, anywhere in the world. Outside of the United States or even in the United States?

Lorissa: (03:21) Yeah.

Johnny: (03:22) Anywhere. Okay. Well, I would say it would be nice to go to Hawaii.

Lorissa: (03:29) Ah, yeah.

Johnny: (03:29) Because that would be nice and warm. And we’re living in the cold right now, and it would be wonderful to go there with you.

Lorissa: (03:36) Okay. I love that. I would love to go to Hawaii with you too. That is not the answer, I guess

Johnny: (03:42) That you would say. Let me guess the answer that you probably guessed that I would say. Yeah, probably Rome.

Lorissa: (03:49) Oh, well, no, but that’s a good one too.

Johnny: (03:52) Okay. probably McCall don’t know.

Lorissa: (03:58) Would not

Johnny: (03:59) No, I would not say McCall. Would

Lorissa: (04:00) Not say McCall. That would be like one of my places. No, I said I put Ireland.

Johnny: (04:04) Oh, okay. Yeah, I wouldn’t have put Ireland. See everyone. You can be married for 20 years.

Lorissa: (04:11) I thought Ireland was like

Johnny: (04:13) Uhuh

Lorissa: (04:14) St. Patrick. I thought Ireland was like one of your dream

Johnny: (04:17) Destinations. Yeah, I would like to go see Ireland someday, but I guess it’s just cold here. And, and I’m thinking warm.

Lorissa: (04:23) You’re thinking warm, tropical.

Johnny: (04:26) Yes.

Lorissa: (04:26) Sunshine, beaches. I like, I like that you’re thinking that. Yeah.

Johnny: (04:30) So let’s, let’s go, let’s, let’s

Lorissa: (04:32) Go . Let’s plan a trip. Okay. Okay. So where do you think I would pick if I could just like an all expense trip to anywhere in the world? It

Johnny: (04:40) Sounds like Ireland to me. I just, I have a feeling it’s Ireland. No. I would say probably somewhere warm. Am I right? Am I, am I, am I warm? Am I getting warmer? Am

Lorissa: (04:53) I Yeah.

Johnny: (04:54) I would say Cabo

Lorissa: (04:59) That’s good, okay. So that’s not the answer I put, but I I totally think you would’ve guessed that because this is the thing I’ve, I’m always telling Johnny, like, one of my dream places that I wanna go is Cabo, because Peep, that’s like the hotspot place right now that everybody’s going. We don’t have passports yet. So , we’re working on that. We’re working on it. But Cabo is my second place, but my top place.

Johnny: (05:22) Your top place. Okay. Hawaii.

Lorissa: (05:25) No

Johnny: (05:26) Wow.

Lorissa: (05:28) We’re striking out here.

Johnny: (05:30) We’re really good.

Lorissa: (05:31) No, tear it up here. Okay. So Greece.

Johnny: (05:33) Oh, okay. Because you’re Greek.

Lorissa: (05:36) Because I’m Greek. Yeah. That’s, I’m part Greek. That’s true. And I’ve never been to Greece. My parents go and there’s this little island that they go to called Mykonos, and it’s tropical and beachy and kind of a dream destination for me. Like, that’s like, if, if we seriously like, had an all expense paid trip to anywhere in the world, that’s where I would want to go. I’ve just never been. It’s part of my heritage. Okay, I’m gonna write that down. All right. So now, you know mm-hmm. , but Cabo Cabo would be great too. Mm-Hmm. . All right. Let’s see it. When you grew, when you were a child, not like a teenager or a young adult, but when you were a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?

Johnny: (06:16) Oh boy. I mean, I think every little boy in my school, in my class, on the playground always wanted to be an NFL football player, probably, you know, like back in the day Joe Montana or Jerry Rice, you know, those, those types of players or those were the kind of heroes? Yeah. Yeah. I’d say an NFL football player, probably when I was a kid, when I was a child.

Lorissa: (06:40) Nice. I should have guessed that. Well, my answer is kind of, I couldn’t think actually. Like when I, I didn’t know if like he wanted to be a firefighter or a police officer, but I just put superhero. I know that’s not really real.

Johnny: (06:53) I mean, that, that is something that I am , so like that’s in the heart of every young boy. So Yeah, for sure. Superhero. But I mean, as far as a job Yeah. The NFL football player would’ve been what I would have chosen.

Lorissa: (07:10) Okay, good. Yeah.

Johnny: (07:13) Okay. And what about you?

Lorissa: (07:15) You

Johnny: (07:15) Had to guess. I have to guess that when you were a child, probably playing with your stuffed animals, you would’ve been teaching them things like you were a school teacher. So I would’ve said school teacher.

Lorissa: (07:31) Yes. 100% high five. Look at you. You got that one. Nice. All right. Yes. I always, from the time I was little, little, my first memories, all I wanted to do was be a teacher. So. Cool. Okay. Okay. My next question, this kind of has to do with superheroes, and I know that like, deep down inside, you still, even as an adult, like to believe you’re a superhero, which I love that. But if there was a superhero quality, or what is superhero power mm-hmm. that you could have mm-hmm. , what would it be?

Johnny: (08:02) Oh, I mean, I’ve had dreams that I could fly.

Lorissa: (08:08) Yeah.

Johnny: (08:09) I, I would say, you know, look, Superman’s like the most amazing superhero, one of the most amazing superheroes to me. And I mean, I, I would, I would love to be able to fly.

Lorissa: (08:21) All

Johnny: (08:21) Right. That would be cool.

Lorissa: (08:21) That’s totally what I said. I knew that would be your answer. Mm-Hmm. , because you have these dreams where you’re flying. Mm-Hmm. We’ve talked about that. . ,

Johnny: (08:29) What do you and I, and I tell her like all the things that I hover over and, and look at in the neighborhood. It’s really interesting. I don’t know

Lorissa: (08:39) Why? That’s interesting. Yeah. Okay. So what about me? What do you think? What my superhero would be? My superpower?

Johnny: (08:47) Your superpower hero would probably have something to do with being able to stop time. And that way you could have more time.

Lorissa: (08:59) Oh my gosh, . Seriously? That’s it. Oh, that is it. Yeah. If I could stop time, and I’m sure there’s like many women listening to this right now, they’re like, yes, totally.

Johnny: (09:10) There’s probably people thinking that I looked at her notes or something on that, and I did not .

Lorissa: (09:15) No, you are

Johnny: (09:16) You are late. Yeah.

Lorissa: (09:16) High five. High five. You’re like two for three. That’s good. Okay. So yes, I wish I could stop time and then like, just get things done while time is I

Johnny: (09:25) Could turn back time. Right.

Lorissa: (09:28) Yeah. So that would be one of my, I also, I don’t know if this is a possible superhero power, but I could like, you know, remember like, be a witch, she would like to wrinkle her nose and the house would be clean.

Johnny: (09:40) Yes. That would be awesome. Superpower

Lorissa: (09:43) Especially with laundry. Yeah. Like, if you could just like crinkle

Johnny: (09:46) You see. I do that with the kids. I just, I just ask them. I say, Hey, could you guys clean this? And boom, that’s, it just happens. It

Lorissa: (09:54) Just happens. Yeah.

Johnny: (09:56) Just kidding.

Lorissa: (09:57) In your dreams where you’re flying over people. All right. Last question. And then we’re gonna go into some rapid fire questions. But this question, I, I thought was a fascinating question. Would you rather be in jail for five years or be in a coma for 10 years?

Johnny: (10:18) Oh, wow. Would you rather be in jail for five or a coma for 10?

Lorissa: (10:23) Yeah. Ladies, this is a question you can ask your husbands like, tonight, , I was like, I saw this question. I’m like, oh, what would it be?

Johnny: (10:33) I would probably say I’d rather be in jail than in a coma.

Lorissa: (10:39) Yeah. Why?

Johnny: (10:41) Why? Because I would still be coherent. I would still have my, you know, I could still communicate. You could still talk to your family. Yeah. And stuff. I mean, they say that you can do that anyway. Like they, if you’re in a coma, people can talk to you, but you can’t necessarily talk back. So I, I mean, I guess I would rather be able to communicate with everybody. So I would rather be in jail. No, I would rather be in jail if not for something that I did like, yeah. Wrong or bad or sinful. But maybe I, if I had to choose between those two, I would rather be in jail. That’s

Lorissa: (11:20) A good point. Yeah, that’s a good point. I, I would What do you think I would pick

Johnny: (11:27) You would pick a coma, , because you’d be like, this is,

Lorissa: (11:32) This is relaxing.

Johnny: (11:33) This is great. Yeah, I, I would say coma. Do you

Lorissa: (11:38) Really, do you think that

Lorissa: (11:40) That you would pick? No. You said no? No. Okay. Actually, I, I would not wanna be ever, I hope I will never be in a coma, but no, I would not. I would, I would pick jail, honestly. Because similar, for similar, similar reasons for you to be able to communicate. But I think, you know, just opportunities to help people, to serve people. Even in jail, people

Johnny: (12:07) In jail.

Lorissa: (12:07) Yeah. I mean, there’s this guy that I follow sometimes, and he got put in jail for a while and he helped all these inmates and they changed their lives and they came to know God and, you know, all of that. But yeah. Plus it’s five years versus 10 years. Mm-Hmm. . So, yes. Okay. Quick RapidFire questions. You, the, you see these sometimes like on Instagram or on reels or whatever, like these funny, like couples questions. So between you and I, who is more serious?

Johnny: (12:39) You are

Lorissa: (12:39) Me for sure. Who does more of the cooking in our family.

Johnny: (12:45) I

Lorissa: (12:45) Do you. Yeah, for sure. You’re a good cook, by the way. Oh, thank you. And I’m really grateful for you in that regard. Who would you say is more responsible between the two of us? ?

Johnny: (12:59) You

Lorissa: (12:59) Me? Yeah. Yeah. Probably. But you’re pretty responsible. Who is more clean and organized.

Johnny: (13:08) We really need the kids to stand here and do this. This is the way that I’ve seen these done before. Were the kids, you asked the question and the kids point to their answer.

Lorissa: (13:16) Oh, that would be a good one. Yeah. Yeah. That we could

Johnny: (13:18) Get really odd, more organized. Oh boy. Ty . I, yeah. Maybe a slight edge. What’d you say?

Lorissa: (13:28) You, I said, I always said we’re both about the same. It would give me the edge. Yeah. But,

Johnny: (13:33) Okay.

Lorissa: (13:35) I think we’re both pretty disorganized.

Johnny: (13:37) You should do this with the kids. This would be really good.

Lorissa: (13:39) Who spends more money?

Johnny: (13:42) Oh, let me think about that. You .

Lorissa: (13:47) Yeah. All right. Those are fun. Okay. So as we just, okay. So, that’s a little bit about us. Some fun questions to talk about when I was looking up these questions, by the way, this is gonna be fun. I’m gonna just print off a bunch of these and then we can talk about ’em more tonight . Cause there’s some really great questions. And I’m just saying this to all of you that are married. You should print off these fun questions and

Johnny: (14:08) Maybe we’ll record ourselves with the kids behind us.

Lorissa: (14:12) Yeah, we can do that. Let’s do that. Can you

Johnny: (14:14) Put it out?

Lorissa: (14:15) Sure. So anyways, I wanted to ask you though, maybe on a little bit more serious note, I’m putting you on the spot here. I’ve actually had a little bit of time to think about this. But what is a quality or a characteristic about me that you value, that you love about me?

Johnny: (14:37) Oh, wow. There’s many. I love your kindness. I think you are one of the kindest people I have ever met in my entire life. And I think that is one of the most incredible qualities that you possess with your faith. And those, to me, go hand in hand. So you are an incredibly faithful person and incredibly kind to people, even people that sometimes aren’t kind back. So I think that is a beautiful quality of yours.

Lorissa: (15:09) Thank you. Thank you for, for me, for you about, there’s kind of two, I mean, number one, your faithfulness as well. Your strong love for God, his church, your prayer life and the fact that you’ve always really worked so hard to be the spiritual leader in our family. That is the one of the qualities that I love and I’m, and most grateful for you. And then also your sense of humor. You make us laugh and you bring a lightness to my seriousness because I can get really serious and focused. And you bring a lightness to that. And I just wanted to talk for a moment about the fact that you are a very strong spiritual leader for our family and, and how grateful I am for that. But there are also a lot of women, and there might be some women that are listening to this whose husbands aren’t necessarily the spiritual leader and maybe as the, as the wife or the mother, they feel like they are more of that spiritual leader for their family. And I was wondering, I know you have kind of experienced growing up in your own family with this that I was hoping you could talk about for a moment.

Johnny: (16:19) Yeah, for sure. I, my, my dad was a convert to the, to the faith. So a lot of the Catholic prayers and, and traditions in a Catholic family weren’t really well known to him. So my mom was the main one that was many times leading us in, in prayer before bed. And although my dad would always do prayer meal prayers, he was very, and so, so would his father. So that was something that was obviously seen and done. But although my dad wasn’t really well versed in those prayers, he would still be supportive mm-hmm. of my, my, my mother in doing that. And certainly in, in taking and going to mass. So and then in, and then just seemed like as my mom continued and on, on the path of prayer with us as children and us as a family, and, and that was continually important to her.

Johnny: (17:21) Then he started to come along more in the, in the, you know, in the, in the later years of, of my, you know, going into high school and things. And, and I think that that was a pretty powerful example for me is that he was brought deeper into the faith through, through my mom, my wife who helped him grow and learn, learn, learn the prayers, and learn the different things. And, and then, you know, my dad would say, you know, things in the later years like, Hey, let’s pray the St. Joseph Novena or the Divine Mercy Chaplain, which in, in my earlier years, you would’ve never heard. So yeah, I think that a husband can be very well brought about by his wife.

Lorissa: (18:15) Yeah. It’s powerful for me. I know your mom throughout her life or, I mean, she’s still alive and, and she’s always had a strong devotion to our blessed mother and really probably spent many years praying not only for you guys as kids, but also for your dad. And it’s really neat because when I first met you and started to get to know your family and your parents, that was obviously after your dad had really grown in his faith. And I saw him very much as a spiritual leader for your family. But I know that your mom was that for a really long time and for anyone that might be listening to this, I just wanted to give that hope of the fact that we’re in this together. And, you know, one of the things that you and I talk about a lot is that we’re trying to help each other get to heaven.

Lorissa: (19:06) And that is our role as, as a couple, first and foremost, that we’re praying for each other, helping each other, loving each other, sacrificing for each other with the hope of helping the other get to, to heaven and to know Christ and to know his love. And so, I don’t know, I just wanted to ask you about that recently. So my husband Johnny, and our brother-in-law Travis, are part of a committee of, of doing a men’s conference every year at Catholic Men’s Conference this year. Our Idaho Catholic Men’s Conference took place last weekend. And you were obviously a part of that. We had,

Johnny: (19:48) Yeah, we had about a thousand guys in attendance. It was an amazing day. We had former major league baseball player, Mike Sweeney who was who blessed us with his, his talks for the day. And then we also had the incredible monsignor James Shea from, he’s the president of the University of Mary, and he has written a book called From Christendom to Apostolic Mission. And he talked about that and just about how we need to strive to be saints. And it was one of the most incredible talks I think I’ve ever heard in my life.

Lorissa: (20:31) Yeah. So I wanted to ask to kind of bring that up. Monsignor, she is amazing, and Mike Sweeney. And one of the things that you came home, and you, one of the questions you asked me when you got home was, Hey, Larissa, if you were to rank our marriage on a scale of one to 10, what would it be? And so I want you to give some context to that question, because I know that was a question that Mike Sweeney had brought up. Mm-Hmm.

Johnny: (20:54) I was shocked when you said 15. I was like, wow , I’m doing pretty good. No , I’m just kidding. So Mike Sweeney went on a retreat many, many, few years ago, and the priest gave him, after his confession, gave him the penance of going home and asking his wife, on a scale of one to 10, what do you rate our marriage? And he was thinking he was gonna be total, total 10, because he had written his wife, I think, a, a, a letter. Even, even that morning. They had, they had been, a little bit of a rift he’d said but anyway, he wrote her a letter. Well, when he got home, he asked her that question, and to his surprise, she said it too. And he was pretty like, oh my, you know, that’s, that’s not good. What, you know, what’s going on?

Johnny: (21:47) And she said, you know that yes, you’ve done some of these things, but really what it comes down to is, you spent so much time and that time they were going through this lawsuit thing and with their financial advisor. And he was being so consumed with that, that he wasn’t spending a lot of time with his spouse. He said, and that she said, I, I don’t really even see you. We’ve never, we haven’t even been on a date. And I can’t even remember when. And he was like, whoa, okay. And so his question to the men was, ask your spouse that question, on a scale of one to 10 where do you rate our marriage? And if it’s anything under a 10, you would simply say, okay, how, how can we make it a 10? What, what do I need to do to get to a 10?

Johnny: (22:39) So I of course, came home and asked Larissa that question, and it wasn’t a 10 , but it was, we were, yeah, we were close-ish. But even so, there’s always room for improvement, cuz I think that if you just get complacent or just get kind of like in the routine of life, you can kind of forget, okay. Or even, even routine of life, including children, because you know, your children shouldn’t take place even over your spouse. So I think that at times in, in married life married couples can tend to put their kids and other things in front of their relationship with their spouse. And so anyway, that was good, good to talk to you about and to, you know, see what we can do to, to raise it up to a 10.

Lorissa: (23:37) Yeah. I mean, I think if, you know, kind of asking me that, I think I, I said to you maybe like, I, I think we’re probably, if I were to rate it maybe maybe like seven or an eight, what would you, what would you rate our marriage?

Johnny: (23:48) Probably eight.

Lorissa: (23:49) Eight? Yeah. Okay. So, but it’s fascinating because I can, I mean, we can look back at our marriage and there were definitely times that if we would’ve asked that question, it would’ve been a two or a three. And it’s powerful to see how God got us through those moments, those really difficult moments and how we grew and how we’ve grown. And then also, like, you’re right, the question, the next question becomes, well, how do we get it to a 10? And not that it’s ever gonna be perfect, the goal isn’t for perfection, but I think the goal is how can we continue to grow? How can we continue to lay down our lives for each other, and how can we continue to love each other in a powerful way? I know earlier this summer, Johnny and I were asked to be a mentor couple for a, for a young couple getting married.

Lorissa: (24:37) It was pretty cool because this couple we’ve known for a long time we’re good family friends with their parents. They went to high school together, they were in our youth group together, got confirmed together. So it was really special to be their mentor couple, but they would come over, I think they came over to our house five or six weeks in a row, and we would go over these different topics with them. And it was really powerful because even though of course now after 20 years, Johnny and I have some wisdom and some insights that we certainly can share. The thing that was so powerful is that after that couple, that engaged couple would leave, Johnny and I would actually have some pretty powerful conversations mm-hmm. about

Johnny: (25:16) The questions.

Lorissa: (25:17) The questions. Yeah. Like, these questions are on finances and intimacy and children and faith and all of those questions. And I remember thinking, gosh, this is so helpful mm-hmm. to really dive into each of these topics mm-hmm. and to talk about how we are doing in these areas mm-hmm. and what can we be doing better at? So kind of celebrating what we’ve learned, how we’ve grown, but then also how can we do better?

Johnny: (25:43) Absolutely. Yeah. And I think that the key to continuing to have a good marriage is definitely checking in. That’s why dating, I think trying to, trying to consistently have a date night each week or every other week with your spouse is important and ask some of these questions with your spouse and, and even to be able to just get a little bit of time away from the noise of, of, of the kids in the house. And you know, there’s been times where we’ve gone to adoration, just quiet adoration together, which is awesome. Or even, you know, obviously go to dinner and have some conversation around these topics. These topics have been helpful. So I think that’s the key is never allowing yourself to get complacent and to continue to grow in your relationship and your marriage together by checking in with one another and saying, Hey, how are you, you doing, like because we would do that when we were dating.

Johnny: (26:46) Right? Right. Like, so it’s like, why would we stop doing that? You know? I think the reason probably couples stop doing that is because you get into the routine of life and you think I’m good. And I think Mike Sweeney thought, oh yeah, I’m, I’m good. We’re, we’re at least an eight. And he was pretty shocked when he checked in with his spouse and found out that that wasn’t the case. So it definitely gave them room. And he said, praise God. We were able to really talk through this and go. And, you know, that’s the beauty of doing the men’s conference that I’ve been blessed to be a part of for almost 10 years here now, is that we get letters from wives , and we got a letter from a couple wives of men who didn’t want to go to the men’s conference and came home and, and asked them that question, what, what would you rate our marriage on a scale of one to 10? And what can I do to get it to attend? And they, the women that wrote in said, just, they were just really thankful and amazed and, and blessed that their husbands were able to come home with that exercise and, and ask ’em that because it opened the door for communication to really kind of help them out in their marriage. So

Lorissa: (28:05) I think that is really the key. So much for marriage, we talk about that a lot. Communication. I’m blessed because Johnny, he was a communications major, , whatever that is in college, whatever that is. But, he’s a really good communicator. And even between the two of us, he’s far better than I am, especially when it comes to having difficult conversations. But I would say, when I look back at our marriage, when, when we were really struggling in different times, and of course we had five kids in five years, and just going through all of, you know, just real life issues of trying to juggle life and figure things out. I would say the areas and the times that we were, that that number was probably the lowest was when we were struggling to communicate, particularly to communicate our needs and communicate our desires, and to be able to really help the other one to understand themselves. Does that make sense? Did I say that right? Yeah. I don’t know if I said that right. And I know that this has been a big area for me because I would say that for the first probably 10 to 12 years of our marriage, I really struggled to really tell you what I wanted mm-hmm. to be like, I, I, there’s a vulnerability to that. There’s this, there’s honesty. And I,

Johnny: (29:29) You kind of thought more that I would read your mind. Yeah. I think that happens in both, both the man and the woman at times. But I think sometimes when you agree, maybe that happens more with,

Lorissa: (29:43) With women,

Johnny: (29:43) With women

Lorissa: (29:45) Probably. I think women have so many thoughts going on in their minds. We obviously talk about that a lot on our podcast, like all these things. And I know for me, myself, I think there were a lot of times, even a lot of years, that I wanted you to be able to read my mind to know exactly what I needed, what I wanted. And I think just in growing together, working through the hard times, trusting each other, building that trust we’ve gotten to the point where it’s just a lot easier. I, I think there’s still times I, I want you to read my mind

Johnny: (30:21) Yeah, same with me. . It’s definitely nice. Yeah. I think it’s, it’s definitely true with both. But the thing that I guess that you start to understand as you continue forward in, in marriage in the sacrament, is that it’s okay to just say like, okay, I know I might want you to get me a hot tub for, you know, my birthday or whatever it is. Like, right. Like, I’m just saying that I actually don’t want, like, I wasn’t saying that like, my birthday’s in July, why would I want a hot tub in

Lorissa: (30:53) July? What

Johnny: (30:54) Right now would be nice right

Lorissa: (30:55) Now would be nice to have

Johnny: (30:56) A hot tub. It’s cool, but no you could just say that .

Lorissa: (31:01) Yes, I know. So even, I mean, whether it’s like more superficial things, like the types of gifts you want for your birthday or Christmas, it’s just so helpful just to be like really honest and upfront. I mean, there has definitely been some Christmases where I was trying to give you subliminal messaging that you didn’t quite pick up on. And

Johnny: (31:22) Don’t share that story

Lorissa: (31:23) That led to like,

Johnny: (31:25) Don’t share that on this podcast

Lorissa: (31:27) But anyways, then

Johnny: (31:30) There’s, I just got her, we’ll just say this. I got her one specific gift. No, I got her a bunch of that one specific gift and I was like, so excited and she was like, okay, this is not what I wanted at all.

Lorissa: (31:42) Right. We’ll just say what it was. He got me lingerie. That was all I got for Christmas was lingerie 

Johnny: (31:51) I thought that’s what you

Lorissa: (31:52) Wanted. You thought that’s what I wanted. No . No, I wanted a purse. That’s what I really wanted.

Johnny: (31:58) But did you say that

Lorissa: (31:59) I, you know, I don’t know. I think I did, but I might have just said it in my head.

Johnny: (32:03) And there’s definitely a possibility I could have missed that. Cause I was so focused on the first time that I ever bought a linger in a store. It was like, ugh,

Lorissa: (32:13) So anyways but no, but that, I mean, those are kind of more, you know, superficial things, but when it comes to like, really the deeper things of sharing your fears and insecurities and your deepest desires and what you’re longing for, and I mean, that takes an enormous amount of vulnerability. And I’m just really grateful that we’ve gotten to a place in our marriage where I, I, I can feel really safe and secure in, in talking to you about those things. And I think that’s the beauty of marriage, and it is the beauty, and we talk about this so much that the sacramental grace in our marriage helps us through those really difficult times and continues to, to give us the grace that we need to stay on track and continue to move forward even through difficult times.

Johnny: (33:07) Yes, absolutely. The, you know, the thing is too is I, I love what you said about grace in the sacrament because that’s, that is the key is we are participating in a sacramental marriage and it is promised to us that we have that grace from, from the sacrament as tangible grace as as all the sacraments because it is a sacrament and therefore you have the ability to get through things. Not that it’s just gonna be perfect and easy, but there’s been times where I’m like, okay, God, you know that, that grace that you promised in the sacrament right now, that would be helpful. Like reign that down right now and help me with this conversation. And so I know that like, so we’re talking about us and I know that there’s many couples that you might be thinking, well, okay, my husband just doesn’t talk.

Johnny: (34:06) He’s more private. Cuz I’ve heard that quite a bit. And I think that that is true or could be vice versa, right? Like it could be that the guy is more talkative than the woman. But at the same time, I think the beauty of the sacrament is again, and that grace, and it doesn’t make it magical, but it makes it, it, it, it does give you the ability to have a hard conversation. Like you could, like, you, you could even just say to the other one, look, I know we don’t talk about these things often, but here’s, here’s, you know, what I need to bring up or talk about. Does that make sense? Yeah. And I think it goes on Mike Sweeney’s one to 10 conversation is like, where would you rate our marriage on a scale of one to 10? If it’s not a 10, how can we get there? I think that’s just a nice way of getting into conversation if you haven’t been communicating, you know, well, or if one spouse is more of an introvert and one’s an extrovert, we’re kind of weird because we’re both more on the introvert spectrum, believe it or not.

Lorissa: (35:14) Right? Yeah. And so we kind of have to sometimes help each other get it out like, we have to kind of dig a little bit sometimes, like, what’s going on mm-hmm. . And why are you so quiet right now? What’s, what’s really going on in your mind, in your heart? You know, one of the things that we have started to do about six months ago, we started praying to St. Bridget’s, it’s a 12 year prayer mm-hmm. to St. Bridget. This is a prayer that Johnny had known about or heard about, and we started to pray it. And there, so we pray every day. You’re supposed to pray for 12 years. There’s grace and promises attached to it, but there’s seven prayers that you pray each day with your father to Hail Mary. It doesn’t take very long, just a couple minutes, but for us specifically, there’s seven prayers that we have seven kids.

Lorissa: (36:08) And so what we decided to do was we would say a prayer for each child, and we would pray for them, and we would pray specifically for their vocation and for their future spouse. And so we just thought, gosh, what a gift we could give to our children right now to be praying for them every single day, praying for their vocations, their future spouse, whether it’s the church, whether it’s a person whatever God has planned for their vocations. And I think that that is an incredible gift that we can give to them and in helping them prepare for whatever their vocation happens to be. But I have been thinking about this too in regards to helping our children by helping to set them up for their vocations, particularly for our children who are called to marriage. And if this is how it is like, I do believe that we have a really good marriage.

Lorissa: (36:59) As I mentioned before, we’ve had, we’ve gone through our struggles, we’ve had our crosses, and I’m sure we will continue to have those in our marriage. But the question I’ve been thinking about lately is how do we get to that 10, even though it can’t be perfect, we’re not going for perfection. We’re just going for how do we get better, but how do we have an extraordinary marriage and how can we, what are some things that we can do to work in this so that our children see us as their parents loving each other and also striving to grow and to be better. Because I know that hopefully if our children get married, that hopefully they’ll wanna have extraordinary marriages and that they’ll be working and fighting for their marriages and their vocations. And so I guess to kind of wrap this up, what do you think, if we were to just talk about what are some things that we could do in our own marriage to go, you know, to, to improve it? What, what in general can couples do to improve their marriages? What ideas do you have?

Johnny: (38:05) Well, I think in a Catholic marriage, I think it’s really important to, number one, have a prayer time together. I think it’s important. Like, and, and that’s why I, we, I had us start those prayers from St. Bridget is that I think it’s important to pray with the family, of course praying with our family. I don’t know about you guys out there, , but our fam it’s, it’s a challenge to get everybody, you know, from all the different age groups all together to pray. But I think that it’s important to do that for sure, right? No matter what it looks like. Continue to do that, but I think it’s really important to be able to have some just one-on-one prayer time together with each other.

Lorissa: (38:57) Yes, I do. I agree with that. We do, we pray usually in the evenings, at least with our kids, but since doing this St Bridget prayer, we do that after everybody’s in bed, you and I are together mm-hmm. , and we just do that together. That’s kind of our own mm-hmm. personal prayer. And even though we’re praying for our kids and their vocations, I do believe that God is helping us even grow closer together spiritually through those prayers and through that time together. Mm-Hmm. , what else? Any other ideas?

Johnny: (39:28) I think having fun, like just doing things that you remember, you know, and not that, you know, you gotta go back in the past because I don’t even think that’s the best thing. But going forward, obviously we don’t, we don’t live in the past. We live in the present. So it, it’s, but having fun, like I think that’s, that’s something that is beneficial to us and to me, you know, and to our relationship and our marriage is being able to have fun together. Right. Do things that you both think, oh, this is fun. Yeah. You know, lighthearted, not so serious. ,

Lorissa: (40:01) I know this is an area for us, so this is probably one of the biggest areas we could work on. Mm-Hmm. , because I am, I’m more serious, not super spontaneous. And this is something that we like a lot of times, even in our master’s program, talking to women, we just got done doing the fit and holy challenge and one of the weeks in that fit and holy challenge was just to have fun. And this is an area that I think women particularly like we struggle with at different stages in our lives because what is fun now mm-hmm. , like you said, you can’t go back in the past. What you might have thought was fun in your twenties mm-hmm. Is not going to be the same, you know, as you get older. And yet it’s important, it’s important to do that for Johnny. And I like, we’re both very, like, we have very similar personalities.

Lorissa: (40:48) We’re both kind of introverts. We both literally have very similar personality types. And so, although that’s very beneficial in some cases, like we usually see eye to eye on major important things. Mm-Hmm. a lot of times we’re so similar that we don’t really push each other out of our comfort zone. So we’re like, oh, we’ll just kind of do the same things. We get into the same routines, go on the same, you know, to the same places on our date nights and stuff like that. So I think that’s an area that you and I could work on. Yeah, absolutely. Is just getting more creative mm-hmm. trying some new things

Johnny: (41:23)Like bungee jumping or something. I hear people do that.

Lorissa: (41:26) Let’s go bungee jumping. Mm-Hmm. . All right. Anything else you can think of as we wrap up?

Johnny: (41:32) I mean, you know, obviously to be on the same page with intimacy I think is important and to continue to communicate those needs and those desires to each other and realize that that is a beautiful and holy gift in marriage and also dispenses grace and renews the sacrament. You know, like, so I think that that’s, that’s

Lorissa: (42:05) Yeah, that’s an area. And that’s, it’s interesting cuz you said to be on the same page with that because we haven’t always been on the same page with that mm-hmm. and I think a lot of couples, this is an area where they really struggle to be on the same page. Men and women have different needs in regards to intimacy and stuff, but this is an area I think in our own marriage where I’ve been really grateful because you have been willing to be honest and to really share with me your needs. And we’ve talked through things and we’ve, you know, we’ve worked through that mm-hmm. , but I think that you have helped me, I think this because men and women can oftentimes be so different in this area, that really you’ve helped me to understand how important physical intimacy is for men, for, for you as a man that your honesty and your vulnerability in really sharing with me your needs in this area has been helpful. And I know that this, this for us in our own marriage has been one of those areas that we just keep working at. We keep trying, we keep talking. Mm-Hmm. We keep failing at times, but we’re just not willing to ever stop trying to be better.

Johnny: (43:23) Mm-Hmm. . Yeah. Totally agree. And I appreciate your openness in that area as well.

Lorissa: (43:28) Yes. And so I think this might be a really powerful topic for us to dive into deeper. Maybe on another podcast. Could I like get you

Johnny: (43:37) Oh boy

Lorissa: (43:39) Get you to come on. We can even dive into this topic specifically on intimacy in marriage and the struggles and the blessings and the joys that come with all of that. So stay tuned. Maybe we’ll do a follow up episode maybe in maybe another hundred 20 episodes. But truly thank you for coming on this episode with me. I love you so much. My

Johnny: (44:04) My pleasure. I love you

Lorissa: (44:04) And to all of you, I hope you know mamas out there that you are loved deeply by God and that you are made for greatness. Have a great week. God bless.