Today we are going to be talking about marriage. Specifically how one woman convinced her ex to take her back and eventually propose to her.

I talk to to Loan Pham who not only went through the program to get her ex back but she actually just got back from her honeymoon.

So, whether you’re struggling with your ex or you are just interested in her story you are definitely going to get something powerful from this one on one interview with one of our best success stories.

The Interview Transcript

Chris Seiter:
And it’s begin. Okay. So, today we’re going to be talking to someone really, really special, Loan, who not only got her ex back but is now currently married to him and just got back from her honeymoon where she was telling me she went to all of these different places from the Philippines to Japan for a month straight. So, she’s a little jet-lagged, but she’s been living the life lately. How are you doing Loan?

Loan Pham:
I’m doing great. A little tired, but great.

Chris Seiter:
So, let’s just start by talking about your situation and you were telling me a really interesting story before we started the recording about your ex before the EBR or ERP, however, you’re denouncing that ex that you got back and are now married to. Why don’t you just start from the beginning and tell us sort of the whirlwind romance that led to this marriage?

Loan Pham:
Well, when I met I guess my EBR ex, it wasn’t anything new because every guy that I’d met before, I’ve always been right, pretty honest from the get-go that I was living next door to my ex before that. And so, it was a little bit of an awkward arrangement, but he kind of stuck around because I guess he felt that I was worth it, and he was chasing me. And so, I was pretty cautious being that it took me a very, very long time to get away from my previous guy. I don’t know, It was five years, I believe it was somewhere around there, and we were together for seven years previous to that. So, I’m not really sure where you want me to go with this.

Chris Seiter:
Oh, well, so basically your EBR ex is chasing you, knowing that you’re living next to your ex ex and how did it unfold to the point where you gave him a chance and you started dating to when you guys broke up and what were some of the reasons behind the breakup?

Loan Pham:
Well, he chased for a while and then I finally just gave in and said, “You know what? Let’s just give it a try and see what happens.” Because when I initially met him, believe it or not, we met off of Tinder and-

Chris Seiter:
Much more common these days than you’d realize.

Loan Pham:
Yeah, now it is. But I guess it’s been almost five years since I’ve known him now and the Tinder thing back then was pretty new still.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah. That’s true.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. And so, we did our Starbucks meet up and then apparently my understanding was that he had never been in a relationship before. So, there was a girl before him, and he labeled her the trial girlfriend. And we’re a lot older in age. At the time when I met him, he was 30. I want to say 33, and very inexperienced when it came to relationships because he was a player pretty much before.

Chris Seiter:
Okay. Got it.

Loan Pham:
And so, when he started chasing me, I was just kind of like, “I don’t know. I’m not looking for anything like that. I’m looking for something serious.” And he said that he was ready to try and settle down. He was done with the playing around and such, and he really wanted to know what it was like to have a girlfriend hence the trial girlfriend before me.

Chris Seiter:
The trial girlfriend.

Loan Pham:
He labeled her the trial girlfriend, and they were together for, I think he said it was like somewhere on an off for… I don’t know, seven months or something like that. He was pretty honest with me. He told me everything, right? He didn’t really treat her very well either, and so I kind of was upset with him about not treating her well.

Chris Seiter:
It makes you a little bit leery about even giving them a chance.

Loan Pham:
Exactly. But at that point I was like, “you know what, I’ve learned not to chase, so let’s see what happens. If he keeps chasing me it means that you know, he’s interested and maybe to keep his attention, I will just keep letting him chase me.” And he told me later on, he goes, I was probably the most difficult girl that he’s ever met to try to get. I was like… Because I guess later on I found out from his friends that they labeled him the closer, I don’t know if you understand what that means.

Chris Seiter:
No. I got it. I got it.

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Loan Pham:
But I didn’t, but I kind of figured that out afterwards so to say.

Chris Seiter:
Did you have to ask your girlfriends what does this mean or did you ask him directly?

Loan Pham:
I asked him. He was really embarrassed when his friend Ashley brought it up in front of us because we were having dinner with a group of his friends, and then they called him the closer. And I looked at him like, “what does that mean?” And then he’s looking at his friend, he’s like, “Shut up.” I don’t know why he’s starting to turn beat red, right? And so, I guess that’s kind of when I really knew that he actually genuinely liked me because he’s getting embarrassed about it.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. And so, I gave him a chance. And he put up with a lot with the ex next door and the drama that was being created between the two of us.

Chris Seiter:
In a weird way, it might’ve kept him honest.

Loan Pham:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yeah. Well, we were really open and honest from the very beginning and that was just something that I had set in place because I’m not really the jealous type. So, I was fine with listening to his stories about the exes and stuff and just kind of understanding everything because my take on the whole situation is you are a byproduct of your experiences. So, listening to it and understanding why he is the way he is from his previous experiences with other girls and whatnot, kind of made me understand him more. And I felt like if he could hear me and listen to me talk about the ex and talk about my experiences and stuff like that, he has accepted me for who I am. So, I guess it just started like that.

Chris Seiter:
So, you’re dating and how long do you date before basically this breakup occurs?

Loan Pham:
We were together for a little over two years.

Chris Seiter:
So, pretty long time.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. I think leading up to the breakup, we had been fighting for probably about six months on and off.

Chris Seiter:
Was the fighting about the ex next door or other trivial matters?

Loan Pham:
Partly, it was the ex next door, but I think he was just frustrated because there were certain things that I didn’t want to do to upset my ex and because I had to live next door to him, I had to deal with it when he wasn’t around. But it also had to do with a lot of him not really understanding what a relationship was because he had in his mind what the perfect relationship should be. And because we were fighting, he started to, I guess in his mind he was building up to all the excuses leading up to the breakup.

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Loan Pham:
So, he’s like, “Oh, okay. Well, she’s like this. Oh, she’s like that. She won’t listen to this, or we’re fighting about this,” and that sort of thing. And he’s just kept like a bank of all this stuff and it just kind of added up into the breakup. And I think after we celebrated our second year anniversary, and then I was fighting with him because I wasn’t getting enough of quality time with him because we were so busy. When I met him, I had actually just started my master’s degree, and I think three months after I met him, I quit my job. It was just one of those things where I had been with the company for over eight years and I decided that I needed a change, and I was going back to school, so I was getting really stressed out. And so, I wanted to focus on school. And then during that time I also got diagnosed with a medical condition. So, between hospital visits, and my health being compromised, and the stress of school, and the ex, everything, it just kind of added up.

Loan Pham:
And I was under a lot of pressure and a lot of stress, and I was acting out. And he didn’t understand that I needed his support because he wasn’t giving it to me. Instead, he was kind of like, “Oh, well, you’re being antisocial. You never want to go out,” and all this other stuff. And I was trying to explain to him that it’s not that I don’t want to go out, it’s just I’m always tired because of my medical condition. We’re going through therapy and all this other stuff trying to figure out the proper treatments for me, and in the meantime, I’m suffering and then I’m dealing with school full time and all those other things, all those factors, work.

Chris Seiter:
So, it’s just like building up all of this stuff.

Loan Pham:
It was building up.

Chris Seiter:
You know they say when it rains, it pours. I’ve found that to be true.

Loan Pham:
And he didn’t understand any of that. And so, he was being really selfish and saying, “You need to come out with me more. You need to hang out with my friends. You need to talk to my friends. You can’t keep going home or falling asleep.” And eventually, we figured out that due to my condition, I became really low iron, so I was sleeping 16-hour days and still not being able to function.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah, that’s pretty rough.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. So, I was having a really, really hard time. And I guess he kind of gave up on us because he didn’t realize that this was where I needed him most. And so, our last straw was I said to him, I go, “We really need quality time for each other.” So, after we celebrated our second year anniversary and my birthday, he broke up with me. I think it was a week after my birthday, and we had gone away for the weekend for my birthday, just to try to have some quality time.

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Chris Seiter:
Did things seem good when you went away or was it a little stressed?

Loan Pham:
I can’t say that it was perfect, but I felt like we were getting somewhere and then somewhere out of the blue. I don’t know what happened. Came back and I can’t remember exactly what happened, but I think we got into a tiny little argument over something really stupid. And then the next thing I know he, messages me from work, and he’s just like, “Oh, we need to talk.” Right? And then he came over to my place and walked through the door and basically just said, “We need to break up.” And he goes, “I’ve made up my decision. I don’t feel the way I should about you anymore. I don’t think that we could ever be together ever again. I just don’t feel that love for you anymore.”

Chris Seiter:
Does he say like there’s no chance we’ll ever get back together again?

Loan Pham:
Yeah.

Chris Seiter:
Something like that.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. He did. He says, “I fallen out of love with you. I don’t think I’ll ever fall back into love with you.” He goes, “I really care about you still. I want us to be friends, but we can’t be together anymore. There’s no chance for us down the road.”

Chris Seiter:
Now, here’s what I find fascinating is after he says this to you, do you take it at face value or do you kind of be like BS?

Loan Pham:
For me, I was kind of expecting that we would probably end up having a break because I really needed the break from the stress of everything. And when he said that I just took it for what it was. I didn’t really fight with him. I just basically said, “Well, you’ve made up your decision, there’s really no point in me trying to beg you back or change your mind because you’ve already made up your mind. So, if we have nothing else to say then you might as well just go.” And so, he left and that was it.

Chris Seiter:
So, this is where it gets interesting. What is the immediate reaction that you have after this? Like it seems to me initially when this happens, you’re kind of like, “Well, okay. Fine, go. I could use the break.” But at what point do you even start considering like, “Maybe I should try to fight for this?”

Loan Pham:
Well, after he left, I had a good cry. I actually-

Chris Seiter:
Oh, okay. So, you’re not as immune as… Okay.

Loan Pham:
And I thought about it and then I got really upset, and I was just like, “This is stupid. Well, I need-

Chris Seiter:
Was it like an instant thing where you’re jumping online and looking for answers or did it take a few days before you actually do something like that?

Loan Pham:
I kind of just let it simmer and that night I was just like, “Oh, shoot. What do I do? Is it really over?” And then at the same time, I had my thesis that I was working on and it was due soon, so I was really stressed out. I really couldn’t really think about the relationship too much. But I think it wasn’t until probably two, three days later that it actually hit me.

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. And at that point, when he left-

Chris Seiter:
Did he contact you at all during those two or three days or was it just stony silence?

Loan Pham:
It was silent, but I did text him the next day just to tell him that I understood where he was coming from, and if that’s what he wanted then we’ll just leave it at that. And we didn’t talk again for probably a week or so I guess. And it was just like a quick message basically. And then I don’t know what happened during that time, it’s been a little while now because that break up was probably about two and a half years ago I think.

Chris Seiter:
Right.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. And I just remember kind of sort of going nuts. Feeling like this is so dumb. Why’d he break up, why’d he give up on us? It shouldn’t be over. We could have worked through all this stuff because it was all trivial. Everything that he was talking about was all trivial stuff that we could’ve gotten through together. It wasn’t worth it for a breakup. And so, his mom actually reached out to me probably about two weeks after the breakup. And I thought it was the oddest thing because her and I, we didn’t really have a relationship, but we talked. And she reached out wanting to meet up, and I was just like, “Is this a good idea? Does your son know?” And apparently I found out later that both his mom and dad were kind of on my side about the whole situation thinking he kind of jumped the gun and left.

Chris Seiter:
Wow. That’s rare.

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Loan Pham:
Yeah. So, we talked about it and his mom and dad actually sat down with him and had a chat with him about it telling him relationships are not always perfect and it’s how you two deal with it and run with it. And if you really think you’re worth it for each other, then you work through everything. And I think before he broke up with me, I found out later from his mom was that he actually did sit down with his parents to tell his parents that he was going to break up with me.

Chris Seiter:
So, he holds his parents at a very high esteem to do something like that.

Loan Pham:
I guess.

Chris Seiter:
Like he-

Loan Pham:
I mean, he’s never brought a girl home before. I’m the first girl he’s ever brought home.

Chris Seiter:
Okay. Okay. All good signs.

Loan Pham:
Yeah.

Chris Seiter:
Okay. So, you’re going through the breakup and eventually at some point you come across probably ex-boyfriend recovery, I’m guessing is what you came across.

Loan Pham:
Yeah.

Chris Seiter:
How did that occur? Do you reach the boiling point to where you’re just going online and searching for answers?

Loan Pham:
Yeah, that’s what I did. I was just like, “This is ridiculous. It doesn’t make any sense.” So, in between doing my schooling and everything, anytime to fill a void, I was online searching because I didn’t feel like it was over. I felt like he jumped the gun.

Chris Seiter:
So, you’re searching every key phrase you could possibly imagine.

Loan Pham:
Everything. Yeah. And then when I came across it, I was reading everything that popped up with EBR and you guys kept popping up on all my searches.

Chris Seiter:
That’s good. That’s what we want.

Loan Pham:
And so, I’m like, “You know what? I’m going to give this a try.” So, I started downloading everything and reading everything over and I’m just like, “Huh.” And so-

Chris Seiter:
And eventually you get into the Facebook group. I’m sure of that.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. The Facebook group was probably during my first no contact stage after I read about the no contact. So, what happened was I didn’t speak to him for about seven weeks.

Chris Seiter:
Okay. That’s a very open period of no contact.

Loan Pham:
Not seven weeks, sorry. I did two no contacts with him each for 21 days. Sorry.

Chris Seiter:
Okay. So, 42 days.

Loan Pham:
Yes. So, the first three weeks… It was 21 days, right?

Chris Seiter:
Right.

Loan Pham:
So, what I did was during that time when I read about the no contact, I applied it right away. Because it made more sense because when I was reading all the content, I was sitting here going, “My God, I was such an idiot with the previous guy. I’m not ruining it for this one.” So, I went into no contact and then after about 21 days I reached out to him. And at that point, he decided that maybe we should meet up and talk. So, we met up to talk and it didn’t turn out very well because the whole conversation was him blaming me for everything and making up excuses for everything as to why the breakup happened.

Chris Seiter:
So, there was no rapport building, no kind of warming him back up, it was just immediately from zero to 60 you’re seeing him in person and essentially it goes with him blaming you for the breakup?

Loan Pham:
Yeah. Everything.

Chris Seiter:
Which is fascinating because I’ve found continuously with exes, they always paint themselves as the victims even when they’re the ones who broke up with you. And it’s just like it never fails. And then maybe this is just an example of that and obviously I’m sure you have a really unique perspective because you actually got him back and you’re married to him now, so maybe you even asked him about his mentality a little bit, and we can dive into that later but you’re at this dinner or was it during the day or during the night?

Loan Pham:
It was in the afternoon. He had just came from his parents, I think it was lunch or something. So, we just met out in the open along a trail near my place. It was just out in the open public. And the kicker was he said that he had read somewhere online after he broke up with me about no contact. So, he applied it on me.

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Loan Pham:
That’s the reason why we didn’t talk for like a [inaudible 00:18:30].

Chris Seiter:
All right. So, you got two periods of no contact going. Okay. So, that’s interesting.

Loan Pham:
So, the first no contact was him applying no contact on me while I was doing no contact on him.

Chris Seiter:
But do you even quiz him about the fact that maybe that’s even an admission, that he’s trying to get you back because that’s usually what no contacts used for. I mean, I guess someone who’s trying to get over an ex can do that but did you even quiz him on that or did you even think of it?

Loan Pham:
I just asked him why he thought that he needed to do that on me. He read it somewhere that it would be good for me.

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. And so, I said to him, I go, “Are you sure you read that right? Because that’s not really what… Well, yeah. It’s good for me, but it’s good for me to have no contact with you, not for you to apply it on me.” So, after that, I just lost it on him and basically said, “You’re blaming me for everything and yet you’re not willing to take responsibility for any of your actions.” And I kind of threw a lot of things back in his face and then after that, he’s just like, “Well, I really care about you, and I want us to be friends, and I want you in my life.” And I go, “You can’t have it both ways.”

Loan Pham:
And so, I said, “We can’t. I can’t have anything to do with you. This is still really fresh and raw and I need to be focusing on my school and everything else and you’ve missed out on a lot already as is, and we’re just going to leave it at that.” At the same time, he also had a lot of people around him that were also influencing him because like I said, his parents were on my side. One of my really good girlfriends worked with him, so every day she would just be like, “You’re an idiot.”

Chris Seiter:
Also, she’s like the ultimate spy telling you everything he’s doing.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. She was telling me this and that. And I never really pressed her for any information really. But whenever I talked to her she would say, “Oh he’s such a dumb-ass for breaking up with you.” She’s like, “What’s wrong with him?” And apparently he buried himself in his sports because it was summertime, so he’s playing baseball and slow pitch. So, he’s on three different teams. So, he’d just-

Chris Seiter:
He’s like the softball type… Coed, softball, underhand. Yeah

Loan Pham:
Yeah. He was on three different teams, so he kept himself busy all summer.

Chris Seiter:
Okay. Distraction. Got it.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. And then in the meantime, I’m keeping busy because I was trying to-

Chris Seiter:
Of your schoolwork.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. I guess I was going through all my medical therapy and stuff, and I was starting to feel a lot better and I had a lot more energy. So, then I decided, you know what, I’m just going to focus on myself, which I should have done from the very beginning and not lose myself. Because I used to be a marathon runner-

Chris Seiter:
Nice.

Loan Pham:
…So, I thought I got back into running again and I ran my first race. He missed out on that.I graduated.

Chris Seiter:
Did you post it on social media?

Loan Pham:
I did. I did. And then my girlfriend that worked with him also told him about it. And I said to her, “What was his reaction? And she’s like, “He kind of looked pretty sad that he missed out on it.” So, that was a good win.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah.

Loan Pham:
And so, what happened? And so after that talk, the initial meeting, I did another no contact on him, so that was the second no contact. And that again lasted another three weeks.

Chris Seiter:
So, 21 days. And are you also kind of going through the Facebook group and taking their temperature on that?

Loan Pham:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yeah. I posted it because it got to a point where I started cleaning up the house, and he’s a red head, so he burns easily.

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Loan Pham:
I had bought like a whole ton of, I guess bulk sunscreen, and I had a bunch sitting around, and I am that girl-

Chris Seiter:
So, obviously, the first thing you think of is him.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. And so, I didn’t reach out to him for 21 days and then I decided to send him an email. I probably shouldn’t have poured my heart out in an email, but I just felt it was just something I had to do. And obviously, I think it was probably wrong for the most part because it was a lot to pour onto him, but at the same time, it got a reaction out of him, and he actually contacted me. And so, I don’t know what happened, but he didn’t really know how to respond. But he just said thank you because I sent him a copy of my thesis for him to read and just to show him what that last year has been like for me trying to get this thing together. It wasn’t like I was ignoring him or anything like that. It’s just it was my schooling. That’s a lot of money I put into school. I can’t just drop out.

Loan Pham:
And then I guess he sent me a text or something to say thank you for the email and whatnot. And then out of the blue I just sent him a text., I said, “Hey. I know you’re playing. You have all your baseball and softball stuff and all the stuff going on this summer, I found a couple bottles of sunscreen. Do you want it?” And I go, “Just let me know when you can pop by. I’ll leave it outside for you.” So, I wasn’t intending to meet up with him at all to give it to him. I was just going to leave it there, and he can grab it whenever he wanted. And this was around Kennedy and July the fourth. Because Kennedy’s on the first, so it was just like the first to the 4th of July there.

Loan Pham:
And I guess he was busy, out partying or whatever with his friends, so he never got back to me. And then the next thing you know, I get this text message from him and that day I was working a double shift, so I left my house at like six in the morning and I didn’t get home until almost midnight. And he had been texting me all day long saying he wanted to pop by. But I said to him, I go, “You never let me know when, so I didn’t leave it out.” Right? And I never responded for the whole day. And so, I actually posted that onto the Facebook group and everyone was telling me that he was fishing. Nobody goes out of their way to get sunscreen. You can go buy it, it’s that cheap.

Chris Seiter:
Yes.

Loan Pham:
And so, I get home and I’m just like, “You know what? I’m not going to respond to him. I’m going to shower and do my thing, and he’s probably in bed already.” And then I got another text message from him or around midnight, “Are you up? Can we talk? I can’t sleep.”

Chris Seiter:
Ooh.

Loan Pham:
And so, I was just kind of like… Oh. Before that, his text message was, “If you’re ignoring me, I get it.”

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Loan Pham:
Or something like that to that. Yeah. So, I think he kind of knew that I was ignoring him, but at the same time, I was working and I didn’t really want to respond anyway. So, I ended up calling him after I got out of the shower. We are ended up talking for a couple hours into the night, and then he really wanted to meet up. And so, we met up for dinner. I think it was like a day or two later. And from that point it just kind of went forward.

Chris Seiter:
So, was it pretty quick when things started to click?

Loan Pham:
Yeah. It was almost like… He said, “You know what? During this time apart, I kept busy with working with my sports and stuff. I tried going on a date again. It just didn’t work out.” And I think he started to understand that he wasn’t really there supporting me when I needed him the most. He felt bad about missing out on everything, like my achievements while he was gone because I bought a new car when he was away. I showed it to his parents because I still had a relationship with them. I met up with them and, they’re like, “Check out my car and everything.” So, they were telling him all these things. And I think with that, was it the sphere of influence or the circumference?

Chris Seiter:
Yep.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. So, I think that really helped a lot because like I said, majority of our family and friends felt like he jumped the gun.

Chris Seiter:
Well, you also have many assets that most people don’t I feel like because most people when they’re ex breaks up with them, the parents of the ex aren’t usually on the person’s side. They’re on their kid’s side. And I mean I think that really helps a lot. But what I’m actually kind of curious about is when things start to kind go swimmingly, who asks who first if they want to give us another try, essentially?

Loan Pham:
I think he always knew that I wanted to get back together because the first meeting and the second meeting, I was always the one who initiated the contacting.

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Loan Pham:
But at the same time I also said to him… I think he wanted to get back together. He initiated it and then I said to him, I go, “Well, I don’t want to have to go through this fighting and stuff again. We really need to lay all our cards on the table and discuss this openly.” And if we ever had issues with each other that we’d talk about it right away and not let it simmer and pester and build up. And so, we had always established an open communication, but I think at some point he kind of lost that. So, we started off slow.

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Loan Pham:
I guess when we were initially together, we didn’t really see each other very often anyways because we were so busy. I would either come and stay over at his place once or twice a week, and he would come over and hang out with me and go home because I’d always send him home. I did it out of respect for my ex. And I think he hated that.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah, I would too if I was him.

Loan Pham:
Eventually, I was just like, “Screw the ex. He can stay.” And so, I’m like, “Yeah. You can stay if you want.” And then I think it was… We were both invited to his cousin’s wedding.

Chris Seiter:
Weddings are such a great place to get back together, aren’t they?

Loan Pham:
Yeah. And so, what happened was we were invited before the breakup, and so when the breakup happened, I had sent his aunt just letting her know that to touch base with him on the guest list because I don’t think I’d be coming anymore.

Chris Seiter:
Right.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. And so, some of the family by that point they knew that we had broken up. And so, I said to him because I was really uncomfortable about going to the wedding because we had just gotten back together, and we hadn’t made it official with his family yet. And so, I said to him, I go, “Well, let’s just give this a try and see how things go.” And I said to him, I go, “When do you want to make this official with your parents at least, so they’re in the know.” So, he kind of said then, “Well, let’s give it a few weeks and see how it goes.” And then I guess after we started dating again for a couple of weeks. He one day just said to me, “I’m going to let my parents know next week.”

Chris Seiter:
Wow.

Loan Pham:
I’m like, “Okay.”

Chris Seiter:
So, it was sort of like this secret type thing and I guess it became official when he tells his parents.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. Yeah.

Chris Seiter:
Well, that’s a really interesting sort of outcome. Now when you kind of get back together, and you’re not sort of technically official but are technically official, did you ever quiz him on his frame of mind and why he did some of the things he did or said some of the things he said and what did he have to say about that?

Loan Pham:
I still bug him to this day actually.

Chris Seiter:
Ooh. Good.

Loan Pham:
I just bothered him about it this morning. I told him that I was going on this interview with you and he’s like, “Really?” I’m like, “Yeah, I think it’s actually something that’s really good that came out of this. You should be happy about it, right.” And I go, “Who knows, maybe he might ask if he wants to talk to you.” And he’s like, “No, no, I can’t.” We’re really goofy, and like I said, I know I don’t hide anything from him, right? I’m pretty open about it all. And I think that’s one of the qualities that he likes about me is that I-

Chris Seiter:
I think that’s a good quality actually because you’d be surprised at how many women are so scared to tell their exes that they got help to get them back. I can’t tell you how many success stories I’ve interviewed that do not tell their ex.

Loan Pham:
Oh, he knows all about it.

Chris Seiter:
Well, I think that’s a great quality. I really do. I think that sets you up for success long-term, but share the details. What’s going on in his mind? What was he thinking? What is his explanations? Because I think a lot of women are probably wondering.

Loan Pham:
I don’t even know sometimes because when I ask he’s just like, “Oh, why are you asking me about this? I don’t know. I don’t know.”I’m like, “You do know. Oh, you just don’t want to tell me.”

Chris Seiter:
You do know.

Loan Pham:
You do know you just don’t want to tell me. I think he just sort of realized that he didn’t give me a fair chance, and he had told me in the past that it was easier on him to break up with me because he had already known that he was going to do it for a while. And it was a complete surprise to me, so he knew that he needed to give me time to sort of process everything. And then I ask him all the time, I go, “We are married now. Did you ever think this was going to happen? The time that we were apart and whatnot. Are you glad to be back?”

Chris Seiter:
You don’t want to… Yeah.

Loan Pham:
And his explanation is that he’s the type of person that takes a while to make a decision, and when he makes his final decision, he commits to it but it takes him a while. It’s a process for him. That’s mostly the answer I get from him. He doesn’t like to tell me much because he… I don’t know. He keeps everything in, right? But he tells me when I push him enough he will. But he’ll always say, “I don’t know. I don’t know what I was thinking.” And so, for the breakup part, he has acknowledged that he was scared, and he ran

Chris Seiter:
Okay. So, maybe scared of what specifically? Have you probed him for that?

Loan Pham:
His feelings. He was scared of his feelings.

Chris Seiter:
So, was it just getting too real or it’s getting too serious or?

Loan Pham:
Yeah. He didn’t know how to process it because he’s never been in a real relationship before.

Chris Seiter:
Okay. So, maybe he’s got no baseline other than the trial seven-month period girl-

Loan Pham:
Yes.

Chris Seiter:
…of what like a successful rate relationship looks like. And sometimes it’s not easy. Sometimes you have to actually put work in like his parents were telling him.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. Exactly. He didn’t have a baseline, so it was really hard for him to figure things out. And so, for him, he felt like he just needed to step away from it and process it. And when he realized that he made a big mistake, and he actually admitted that he made a big mistake.

Chris Seiter:
In what context did he admit that?

Loan Pham:
He basically said leaving was the wrong choice. He should’ve stayed and worked things through with me because a lot of things we fought about were things that could have been easily fixed.

Chris Seiter:
So, tell me the details of how this engagement goes down. How did he propose? How long did it take for him to propose?

Loan Pham:
Okay. This is where you’re probably going to laugh because the proposal never really happened.

Chris Seiter:
Oh? I don’t think I’ll laugh. I’ll just that it’s more curious.

Loan Pham:
So, we just started talking about getting married, and we’re like, “Okay. Well, we need to set a date.” So, we worked backwards.

Chris Seiter:
So, it’s a mature proposal, kind of like just assumed.

Loan Pham:
What happened was we went through the whole motions of planning the wedding in secret because there was no proposal and yet. He didn’t propose yet. And so, we went and had the rings designed and I started planning the destination, so only the people who were coming to the destination wedding knew.

Chris Seiter:
Okay. How did you tell the people?

Loan Pham:
We just said we’re getting married.

Chris Seiter:
I’m assuming it’s like his parents and your parents probably.

Loan Pham:
Well, my mom actually passed away six months ago, so…

Chris Seiter:
Oh. I’m so sorry.

Loan Pham:
Oh, that’s okay. It was a sad moment, but we just had to move on. I don’t really have a relationship with my father, so he wasn’t really involved anyway. [inaudible 00:35:05].

Chris Seiter:
Okay. So, his parents are showing up though, I’m hoping.

Loan Pham:
Oh, yeah. Yeah. So, we just invited the people that were coming for the destination. Because we wanted a small gathering only, and we’re actually holding a big reception here in the next few months, so I’m still planning. And so, we just kind of told everybody, but I didn’t announce any engagement or anything, so people knew we were having wedding, but everyone was like, “Oh, so when’s he going to ask you? When’s he going to ask you?” And they were like, “You guys are so funny. You’re planning this whole wedding thing and you haven’t even had a proposal.”

Chris Seiter:
Were you wearing the engagement ring at all? So, no, no,. Did you at least make him try to propose?

Loan Pham:
Well, he got the ring. We went and had the ring designed in December 2018, and everything was ready to go. He had the ring hiding in the house from April 2019 and-

Chris Seiter:
Be honest. Did you go fishing for it?

Loan Pham:
No, I didn’t.

Chris Seiter:
Oh, man.

Loan Pham:
I literally did not. I had all the say in the design of the ring, so-

Chris Seiter:
Oh, okay. So, essentially you knew everything about it.

Loan Pham:
I knew, but I didn’t know the final piece.

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Loan Pham:
I didn’t see the final piece. And so, it had been hiding and I said to him, I go, Shawn, we really need to sort of announce the engagement at some point because we got to get our engagement photos done. We had to do our invites for the reception, like something’s got to happen soon. And so, I think it was August. I had just come home from work and every day I come home from work, he lets our dog out to come greet me at the car, and so she comes running out, and she’s got the ring box on her collar.

Chris Seiter:
Oh, that is pretty clever.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. So, that was pretty much the proposal. My dog asked me on his behalf.

Chris Seiter:
Got it. So, he didn’t get down on one knee?

Loan Pham:
Nope. He still hasn’t asked to this day.

Chris Seiter:
Well, let me tell you from someone who has had to get down on one knee, it is so nerve-wracking. I was even so cowardly, I couldn’t do it in public, so I set up this really, really elaborate thing throughout the house or the apartment we had. And still to this day, it makes me nervous getting down on one knee. It’s just kind of a nerve-wracking feeling. But I wish I had went with the dog thing. That’s pretty genius.

Loan Pham:
Well, the thing is, like I said, I’m short, so even if he was on a knee, he’d still be taller than me.

Chris Seiter:
No, that’s not true.

Loan Pham:
Oh, I’m really short. I don’t exaggerate about that. I’m 4’8.

Chris Seiter:
That is pretty short. My wife’s 5’2, so.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. So, it’s just kind of that ongoing joke. So, I’m like, “To this day, you haven’t actually proposed and I haven’t given you an answer.”

Chris Seiter:
But you’re married.

Loan Pham:
Yeah, I’m married. Yeah. So, we just laugh about it all the time. But like I said, we had our rings designed and ready to go by… It was all ready in April. It wasn’t that, I guess we would call that the official engagement happened in August of this year or last year. 2019. It’s the new year now, isn’t it?

Chris Seiter:
And you went on like some sort of super honeymoon after you guys got married. You were telling me you went from like the Philippines all the way to Japan and lasted for a month. That sounds amazing.

Loan Pham:
Close to it, yeah. We got married in the Philippines, and then we traveled through to, was it Malaysia, Cambodia, Vietnam, Taiwan, and Japan.

Chris Seiter:
That’s just so good.

Loan Pham:
It was a lot of traveling and it was a lot of planning because the first part of the trip, we traveled with my two best girlfriends who were the bridesmaids.

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Loan Pham:
So, that was actually pretty fun. We went with them from the Philippines right up to Vietnam, and then we split off from there. We visited my brother in Taiwan. So, when we think about it, the only time we actually were alone for our trip was Japan. We were there for seven days in Japan, I would probably call that the official honeymoon, I guess.

Chris Seiter:
Well, I think our honeymoon was in the Florida Keys and it was only about 10 or 11 days. And to this day, I wish it had been longer. It was so fun.

Loan Pham:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). For me, it was really stressful because we had to prep everything before we left.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah. There’s a bit of that. We also got married in the Florida keys, so.

Loan Pham:
Oh, yeah. Okay. And packing everything for the wedding was not fun and making sure I had people taking stuff back for me because we were continuing on.

Chris Seiter:
Weddings can be extremely stressful when you’re planning it.

Loan Pham:
It was very stressful. Well, to this day we’re still talking about the whole story. I met up with my girlfriends last night, and they were like we should meet the producers, or what was it? The Hangover?

Chris Seiter:
Oh, yeah. The Hangover.

Loan Pham:
And you’ve been a real life story that they could base it on and call it Destination Wedding.

Chris Seiter:
Destination Wedding.

Loan Pham:
Because you have no idea what happened. Before we left, there was a typhoon that hit the Philippines.

Chris Seiter:
When did you get married? What month?

Loan Pham:
December 2nd.

Chris Seiter:
Okay. So, the only reason I say that is because I have a video editor that works out of the Philippines. And he literally just messaged me like a couple of weeks ago saying that he’s real sorry. That he went on vacation but then there was like this category four typhoon that hit.

Loan Pham:
Yep.

Chris Seiter:
And living in Florida, there was almost a category five hurricane that hit us this year but then it hit Puerto Rico and destroyed them instead.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. The typhoon happened. They canceled our flight.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah.

Loan Pham:
And we had only a four day window for the destination, and so there was a lot of stuff going on trying to get us there. We arrived a day late.

Chris Seiter:
How did you get there? Did you just wait until the tickets opened up?

Loan Pham:
No. What happened was they had canceled our connecting flight, and then they changed our flight from here to Manila to connect, and so we ended up missing our connecting flight. So, we ended up staying a night in Manila when we should’ve been at the resort. Half of my wedding party was already at the resort because the Vancouver crew, there was a group of 11 of us that was coming, so we all got delayed. Luckily, the typhoon was more North. On the island and that we were going to was further South, but it had just missed Manila but the Manila Airport actually closed down for 24 hours.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah. They do that.

Loan Pham:
So, there was a lot of drama getting there and a lot of drama that came with getting there and there.

Chris Seiter:
Weddings are stressful.

Loan Pham:
Well, I could go on about the wedding itself because there’s things that happened that you wouldn’t even think would happen. His sister’s girlfriend got kicked off the flight for fighting in the airport.

Chris Seiter:
Seriously?

Loan Pham:
Yep. My older brother got thrown in jail in the Philippines for fighting.

Chris Seiter:
Jeez.

Loan Pham:
He got so drunk, he was in a stupor the night before the wedding. My younger brother almost killed himself drinking. It just kept going on, and I’m sitting here going, “Oh, my God. Oh, my God.”

Chris Seiter:
Just make it to the day.

Loan Pham:
Well, the thing was, because we arrived late, we couldn’t do our bachelor and bachelorette with that day in between for us to rest.

Chris Seiter:
Ah.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. So, a lot of stuff happened, but at the end of the day, we got married. It all worked out. Very stressful, no sleep, and we just kind of continued on there. But just the stories, we laugh about it now, but when it happened we were just like, “Oh, my goodness.”

Chris Seiter:
They’re great stories to laugh about but it’s not so fun when you’re like in the midst of it.

Loan Pham:
The typhoon was the one that scared me the most because that’s forever.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah, because there’s nothing you can do about that.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. So, we were lucky that we made it, but if the typhoon hit further South, we would have had to cancel the wedding altogether.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah.

Loan Pham:
Right.

Chris Seiter:
But it didn’t and you’re married.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. And I said to him this morning, I go, “So…” Because I call him Shobby just because his first initial is S and, hobbies, I just added the S to it to call Shobby.

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. So, I’m like, “So, how’s it feel? Has it finally kicked in that we’re married.” He’s like, “No. Not really.”

Chris Seiter:
It will. Don’t worry.

Loan Pham:
Well, the thing is, we still have to have our reception here.

Chris Seiter:
Wait until you have kids.

Loan Pham:
Yeah. We still have our reception here to deal with, so that’s happening in two months. So, there’s still a lot of planning going on. So, the wedding is still going. T.

Chris Seiter:
The stress is not completely gone then.

Loan Pham:
Nope. Nope. I’m chasing people down for RSVPing right now.

Chris Seiter:
All right. So, that was a really great interview and I want to end by just asking you a simple question. Throughout this entire process, what do you think was the most impactful direction or action that you took that made a difference on getting him to come back?

Loan Pham:
Honestly, I think it was the no contact.

Chris Seiter:
The no contact rule. [inaudible 00:44:49].

Loan Pham:
Yeah. I wish I had done that before with the previous because giving yourself that space to process your emotions and giving him the space to process his emotions, it’s such a huge, huge benefit for both of you. Because when you say things you’re saying it in the moment, right? And you take it to heart. But I’m like, “Well, that’s just how you felt in the moment. Feelings change.” Right? Sometimes, you say it because you felt it at that exact moment. That doesn’t mean you’ll feel it later. And when he said that he didn’t think that… He basically said there’s no chance that we will ever get back together because there’s no way he would ever feel that way about me ever again.

Chris Seiter:
Pretty devastating to hear but-

Loan Pham:
Yeah.

Chris Seiter:
…reality’s a bit different isn’t it?

Loan Pham:
It is. And I think that how I responded when he did break up with me was probably in my favor because I just let him say what he had to say and then I just let him go. I didn’t argue with him. I didn’t fight with him. I just like, there’s no point in me convincing you otherwise. You’ve already made it your mind.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah. You’d be surprised at how just staying calm in the moment makes a difference because it’s like they’re expecting you to have the freak out and when you don’t have it, it’s different than they thought. It’s like when they think they know you. They know how you’re going to react and you don’t react that way, it confuses them.

Loan Pham:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yeah. And even with after our first meeting, after the first initial no contact, him blaming me for everything, it made me see another side of him and what he was processing and how he was feeling because I never really heard any of this from him. And it also gave me a chance to sort of defend myself at the same time and let him know where I was coming from when I was in those moments where I felt the way I did or I did things the way I did them. And I think that was the hardest part was him not understanding that it was all one side on his part, and he wasn’t willing to listen to my side. It was just like, “It was mine. She did this, I don’t like it. This happens all the time. I don’t like it. It’s not going to work.” And also made him realize that a lot of things that I did and me sleeping all the time, it was out of my control.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah.

Loan Pham:
It was my health. I didn’t have control. The meds, everything I was on, the therapy and all this stuff, it just took its toll on me. I’m glad that we were able to work things through, and I think the breakup for us was actually a good thing because it made us realize that if we could get through that, we could probably get through more. And being able to have the open communication now, I mean, we still fight. We fight, we bicker a lot, and we fight, but at the end of the day, we don’t go to bed pissed off at each other.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah.

Loan Pham:
Right? We talk it through. And if I don’t want to talk, he’ll be like, “No. We have to talk about this.” And now he’s like, “You know what? Give me an hour. I need to calm down.” And then we talk about it.

Chris Seiter:
That’s good advice.

Loan Pham:
I think that’s very helpful for both of us going through all of this and realizing that if we could make it through that then we’ve got a good fighting chance down the road.

Chris Seiter:
Well, it seems like you’ve done really great so far, even despite the crazy wedding, and the typhoon, and reception still to be planned. Seems like you’re doing really great, actually.

Loan Pham:
I hope so. I mean, we still have our moments and our days and whatnot, but I think roll with the punches. When it happens, we’ll cross the bridge. We’ll deal with it.

Chris Seiter:
Well, I think that’s going to do it. Here, I’ll stop the recording.