What happens when you find your better half, work with them, fall in love, and then suddenly a bomb strikes? That's what happened to one of our co-hosts, Debbie Phillips. In this episode, Debbie shares her journey of finding, working with, loving, and losing her better half with co-hosts Dan Mulhern and Markos Kounalakis. We invite you to share our podcast, click "follow" so you don't miss an episode, and follow us on social media. For more information about our hosts and this podcast, visit www.SecretsoftheBetterHalves.com
What happens when you find your better half, work with them, fall in love, and then suddenly a bomb strikes? That's what happened to one of our co-hosts, Debbie Phillips. In this episode, Debbie shares her journey of finding, working with, loving, and losing her better half with co-hosts Dan Mulhern and Markos Kounalakis.
We invite you to share our podcast, click "follow" so you don't miss an episode, and follow us on social media. For more information about our hosts and this podcast, visit www.SecretsoftheBetterHalves.com
Markos Kounalakis 00:00
This is Secrets of the Better Halves and this is your out of context soundbite.
Debbie Phillips 00:05
I remember saying to the doctor, oh, I want to join a stomach cancer support group. And the doctor said there aren't any. And I was like, oh, there aren't any because not a lot of people survive this.
Dan Mulhern 00:19
I'm Dan Mulhern.
Debbie Phillips 00:20
I'm Debbie Phillips.
Markos Kounalakis 00:21
And I'm Marcos Kounalakis. Welcome to Secrets of the Better Halves. The podcast where partners explore how they handle the power and the pressure of their dynamic relationships. Our of context soundbite is from today's episode with our full partner on the better halves podcast, Debbie Phillips. Debbie's a former press secretary and reporter and founder and CEO of "Women on Fire." So Debbie, Dan and I have been thinking an awful lot about you.
Dan Mulhern 00:51
Yes, we have.
Debbie Phillips 00:52
You have? I love when men think about me.
Markos Kounalakis 00:55
We have been thinking about you because we know that you were in such an engaged partnership with your husband and I use the past tense because he passed away. Mortality is something we all have to reckon with when it comes to our futures and the future of our better halves, whether we're thinking about who we leave behind, or if we're the ones who have been left behind. And you in fact, were the one who experienced your husband's passing.
Debbie Phillips 01:23
And being left behind.
Markos Kounalakis 01:24
And being left behind. And Debbie, if you don't mind, can you take us to the moment when you actually found out that Rob was dying?
Debbie Phillips 01:33
Rob and I were in the height of our career, the height of our partnership, we really had things working when he started losing weight. And he was very, very athletic, really knew his body. And I was curious, like he was losing weight. And he had little pains in his stomach. And he's like, Oh, it's fine. It's fine. It's fine. And I said, What is it about men that don't want to go to the doctor? And he was like, because it's mission creep. You go for one thing, and then there's another and another and another. I'm totally fine. He was 57, which is crazy. You know, the average widow in this country is 55. That's the average age of a woman who's lost her partner, is 55. I didn't think it was going to happen to me because Rob was so healthy. And after a series literally two or three months of trying to figure out does he have gallstones? Does he have an ulcer? What's wrong with him? Because of course he functions every day, even though he wasn't feeling well, even though he continued to lose weight. And we ended up at a hospital in Boston, frustrated to try to get to the bottom of why is he so ill, and he had an endoscopy. So we thought it was just a routine endoscopy to find these gallstones or ulcer. After the procedure, the doctor came in, I was sitting by Rob's bed, and the doctor came in, full of emotion, full of upset and said, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. And we're like, what? And he hands us pictures of a gory, awful inside and said, he has stomach cancer. And I just remember looking at my husband, holding his hand, trying to be brave for him. He was trying to take in the news. And I started to pass out. There was no chair in the room. And I told the doctor, can you please slow down, we're just trying to take in this information. And he said, afterward don't worry, I want you to come over to my office and I'll give you something for it. When all I really wanted was that doctor to hold our hands and say, I think this is a very serious diagnosis. I'm sorry to have to share it. Instead, the doctor was full of his own upset which I feel bad for him. But it was a very, very traumatizing moment. We thought we were there for gallstones or an ulcer, not stomach cancer, that never ever crossed our minds that Rob had something as serious as stomach cancer.
Markos Kounalakis 04:10
And so here you are Rob, you know, vibrant in his professional life, you and he have this great relationship, and there's something serious we're going to have to contend with and it's unclear how much longer he has to live.
Debbie Phillips 04:25
And that's what happens when you get a serious diagnosis. It's an unfolding of one thing after another. At first we had hope and he had treatment. But each day there's some loss or there's some new awareness. I remember saying to the doctor, oh, I want to join a stomach cancer support group. And the doctor said there aren't any. And I was like, oh, there aren't any because not a lot of people survive this.
Dan Mulhern 04:55
Debbie, you and I've talked many times, about being a part from your partner and a part of your partner. And I wonder in that first instance of this diagnosis, how were you a part o f him and apart from him and vice versa?
Debbie Phillips 05:12
There are just no words, when you get a diagnosis like this, and for us, I remember we just held hands, we were in Boston, we lived on Martha's Vineyard, we had to make the trip back home to Martha's Vineyard, we were on the ferry boat, and we ran into people we knew. And that was my first taste of I'm now in a new world, I'm not part of their world anymore. Rob and I are in a bubble, I felt very much apart. He and I were in this bubble together. But the rest of the world started to fade away because our life as we knew it began to change rapidly.
Markos Kounalakis 05:49
So suddenly, your relationship has become even more intense than it was previously.
Debbie Phillips 05:56
This was a second marriage for both of us. And when we got together, we were both coaches, we cared about how other people lived their lives, and were able to be successful. So that's what brought us together. And Rob and I for everything, we use ourselves as guinea pigs to try to figure out how do you stay in a marriage. So this was us from the beginning, from day one, even before we really, really admitted how deeply we loved each other, we created a vision that we're in this world together, to help other people express their gifts, strengths and talents. So that's clients, that's our family, that's our friends. That's why we were together as a couple and we both had skills and gifts to help people move forward in their lives. So that's how we came together. And even in the toughest times, our vision held us together. And I remember times, like getting upset with Rob and I never threatened to leave him. But I was like, I don't like this. But I love our vision. So I'm staying.
Dan Mulhern 06:57
Did you guys write it, was it somewhere?
Debbie Phillips 06:59
We wrote it down and it was always our vision for 20 years, it never changed.
Dan Mulhern 07:04
Wow.
Debbie Phillips 07:05
I remember Rob said, Okay, we're going to do what we always do. We're going to create a plan, we're going to create a theme, and we're going to make this an adventure. And I remember just both laughing and crying. I'm like, Oh my God, you never stop and thank God, because, okay, we're gonna make this an adventure.
Dan Mulhern 07:23
If I heard adventure like that, I would think like, adventure, what kind of adventure is this? Like, this is like, a mountain and the thing falls apart, you know, or a trip and the bear frickin eats you? I mean, did you have that kind of feeling? Or how did the two of you think of it as an adventure?
Markos Kounalakis 07:43
The other thing is just so calm about the whole thing saying, Okay, this is our reality. Let's move this forward. But that's incredible.
Debbie Phillips 07:51
You know, it really was incredible. And of course, I owe it so much to him, because he's the one with the devastating illness. We moved to Boston, and we got a fabulous apartment across the street from Fenway. So that was part of the adventure that we gave ourselves that. He walked to treatments, every single treatment, we always walked, it was the dead of winter, we had to buy all new gear. And we made that an adventure going to the store and buying big hoodies. And we walked Boston, every single day, Rob was able to eat for most of this time, even though he had stomach cancer. One of the things we did, we're like, Okay, let's get five new really great restaurants. We would just turn every day into some sort of an adventure. We also have never watched television, we never had a television in our bedroom. But in our apartment, there were televisions everywhere. And so we started watching television together. And we're like, oh my God, we've been missing out on so much all these years.
Dan Mulhern 08:49
It sounds like you weren't thinking of the end of the journey, I guess. Or were you? I would think like, God, it would just be so tempting in the worst sort of way to keep going to the end of the journey. How did you think of the end?
Debbie Phillips 09:06
There's this really great quote, it says there are two things you can't look at for long with the naked eye, the sun and death. And I really kept that quote with me because I was like, I don't want to turn and look at death. But I also don't want to be foolish, and not miss this moment. So in some ways, I think both Rob and I were more alive than we've ever been alive. And toward the end of Rob's life, we did talk about how it was actually hard to admit but Rob's 15 months from diagnosis to death, were the sum of if not the best times of our life. Because everything was real. Everything that didn't matter fell away. And we just lived our plan, which was do what we could do, treat each other with for deep love. As sick as Rob was, there wasn't a day that went by that he didn't say, Honey, how's your heart today? And I was always like, Oh my God, he's the one dying and he is asking me how my heart is. That called me to the place of really getting real with myself and I would cry and sob as if my heart was broken, which, of course it was every day. But somehow we just we made it through every day, and we just didn't take life for granted.
Dan Mulhern 10:31
Markos I want to ask you like, what does it make you think about, as in my case, Jen, in your case Eleni, you know, every day, how is your heart? What comes up for who you Markos?
Markos Kounalakis 10:43
Well, the thing that's sort of striking me is, even though I have a very strong relationship with Eleni on a daily basis, both professionally and personally, what I'm hearing is that, that relationship intensifies and that interdependency really becomes much stronger in the face of clear mortality, as opposed to our daily lives where we maybe not fritter our time away. But certainly don't calculate it in the same way because there's not this clear endpoint that is imminent, we just sort of tend to push it off, as you say, Debbie, you know, don't look at the sun, don't look at death. But I do think about mortality occasionally. But if it's present in such an intensive form, then, as I say Dan, that's what happens, that's what I imagine is that, that intensity of the relationship and that intensity of our interdependency becomes stronger.
Dan Mulhern 11:39
It strikes me Markos and Debbie, that we talk about deaths in life, you know, you get fired, you gets sick, something terrible happens to one of your kids. In the political life that Markos and I share, and Debbie we'll get to the fact that you also lived very deeply in that political life. You lose elections, your friends lose elections, their scandals, they write things about you in the paper. And I guess I want to come back to you, Debbie, you had the ultimate challenge out there. My leadership friends who co-authored a book, say only challenge produces the opportunity for greatness. And it seems like to hear you and Rob it's like, wow, that is greatness of better halves. You told us vision was important and not looking at death. Tell us what else you did, and maybe a little bit about what each of you did, because you're better halves, and you're different. What can we learn from that for our daily life and our little deaths, our little sicknesses?
Debbie Phillips 12:36
I think, keeping in mind that this precious relationship you have, if you're so fortunate to be in one, no matter how good or what the challenges are, but to keep in mind that it will end. Long before Rob was sick, I kept a picture of him in the third grade in front of me on my desk. So no matter what life's daily irritations were, whatever conflicts we were having, or whatever frustrations, which is normal in life with a couple, even a couple who loves each other greatly, I would go back to that little picture. And I did think someday we won't be together. Now, I didn't think it was going to happen as soon as it did. But I think for couples listening, it's worth the practice for a time, like what Rob and I went through, you're going to die. And indeed it was 15 months later. So that's what I would say. But also, Dan, I want to just to go back, you know, Markos answered that question so beautifully about how this is affecting you. But I want to hear from you too, like, what is this raise for you when you think about Jen and your relationship?
Dan Mulhern 13:44
I know I would be like a puddle of tears and emotion. I'm a very different, better half than Jen. And listening to you is deeply humbling. To think, how do you Dan, show up and where do you appreciate your spouse, especially? When you said, when you're lucky to have a spouse, I think we're lucky to have lots of partners. I have two incredible business partners. And there are times I should have their picture of them in second grade and remember when you know when they're frustrating me or when I know I'm being a pain to them. And honestly, when Markos and I talked about having a third half, you know, three halves is kind of good, like if two is good, why not three halves? My first thought was like, I don't know if I've ever talked to anybody who talks about their marriage the way Debbie talks about Rob. What was it like for you to be asked to be on a show with two guys who are better halves right now, you know, we both been married for many years and and are working at it. Wuhat was it like when we asked you to be our third half or third wheel, our best half?
Debbie Phillips 14:52
It was deeply touching. First of all, because I've been leading "Women on Fire" for almost the last 20 years and work a lot with women. It was so refreshing and wonderful to work with men again, and the two of you in particular. And it was interesting, because I had a lot going on, as you know, Dan, at the moment that you talked to me about being on this show, and I confided in a mentor Chip Conley. And he said, I have only one question for you. How do you feel about those two guys, Dan, and Marcos, and I go, I love them. And then Chip said, it's done, go do the podcast and have fun. I missed the day to day interaction. And I so love working with the two of you, because you're in it with your better halves, and you're trying to be better, and you're learning and you're exploring. And that's what's made this so delicious and delightful for me. Because that is my life's work. I want to help people express their full potential in the world.
Dan Mulhern 15:54
You're in a situation that more and more people find themselves in where they're married to their business partner. And I wonder, maybe you can tell us a story which came first? And do you advise it? Do you say to people who are business partners, Yeah, go ahead and get married? I guess you can't stop that. But do you say to people who are married, Yeah, good idea, go be a partner with your spouse.
Debbie Phillips 16:17
Never. Never Creep very, very carefully into that one. Yeah, yeah. Yes, I cannot imagine, nobody should be husband and wife or partners in life and business partners and not have support, whether that's coaching, therapy, whatever, it is just too darn hard. Rob and I actually became business partners first. And it was so delightful and fun. And then we became romantic partners. And that's actually where things, we were so in love with each other. But that's where worlds started to collide. You know, we talk about here trying to figure out the power dynamics of better haves and couples. And that's where the rubber met the road for us, because there were a lot of struggles with the power dynamics of both a romantic relationship and a business relationship. We had to learn to set some real boundaries. Rob was actually better at doing that than me. But we helped each other grow in that way.
Markos Kounalakis 17:15
So you're starting out business partners, and you're managing whatever power relationship exists there, but also support structure. And in business was one dominant or the other? I'm expecting that it'll complicate itself once you become full on romantic part. But in the in business first, how was that relationship?
Debbie Phillips 17:32
In business we were equal partners.
Dan Mulhern 17:35
But how did you do it decision wise, and emotionally? I mean, surely there were times Rob said, we need to go left. And you said no way. We're going right. How did that work out?
Debbie Phillips 17:45
You guys aren't going to believe this. I'm trying to think of a time that that happened. It didn't.
Markos Kounalakis 17:51
So you were really aligned.
Debbie Phillips 17:53
We were so aligned on business. It's when we threw in the romantic. I wanted to live in Martha's Vineyard. He wanted to live in Woodstock, New York, you know, like, things started to collide once we became romantic. And the funny thing was, he was literally on his deathbed and I had some business issue and I was hesitant to go raise it with him. And then I did, and he's lying in bed. And we just answered it like butter together, and we bumped fist and go, we still got it. We had good coaching. We had good therapy around that. And once we also set up what I was saying, the boundaries because we would work 24/7 if we didn't have boundaries with our work life, and that's what I counsel couples who are in love with each other and work together. You have to have boundaries, a plan, a vision, kind of all kinds of contingencies.
Dan Mulhern 18:50
You shared that vision with us and that might have been before we really focused on the fact that you were business partners. That vision came out of your business, right?
Debbie Phillips 18:59
Yes. Our vision together was that we're in the world to help people express their gifts, strengths and talents.
Dan Mulhern 19:07
It seems like that would just flow right into marriage. Right?
Debbie Phillips 19:10
It seems like it. You get two people living together, you know, and we were adults. Rob was four years younger than I was so he was 38, I was 42 when we got together and we both had households we put together and you know we had these things like perpetual issues that you know, John and Julie Gottman talk about so much and saved our marriage.
Dan Mulhern 19:31
Who we're gonna have very soon on an episode, the Gottman's. What was a perpetual issue for you and Rob?
Debbie Phillips 19:37
Rob was a neatnik, I am more free flowing. And I would have piles, piles of books, piles of papers, because I'm gonna read them all and I'm gonna get to them. And they were in my office, which was separate from Rob's office. But Rob, he would come in my office and he would say, you really need to clean up your files. And I'd be like, wait a minute, this is my office. My piles aren't over on your side of things. So we went on and on with this for a couple of years. And then finally we like looked at each other and just started laughing. And one of us is like, we need to take this issue to therapy. And you know, much like the work of the Gottman's, dig under, why is he so undone about my piles? Why do I even have piles, and we got under it. His life as a little boy was very, very chaotic. So he needed organization. And so even seeing my piles in my own office really triggered him. Once I knew that, I then had my piles in the closet.
Dan Mulhern 20:37
I knew it. You hid the piles, I knew that's what you did.
Debbie Phillips 20:41
You know me so well, Dan Mulhern. But my heart then melted, I understood and I, I didn't want to have piles around anymore, that he would see, I got it.
Markos Kounalakis 20:53
So you guys figured out how to live with each other, and in fact, enhance each other's lives. But you know, as with all of us, that wasn't the only better half relationship you had. Before Rob, you were a better half to political leaders, and really having to channel them and enhance them and do things for them. And with them, that was going to help them achieve their mission, which actually aligned quite well with your mission, which was to do good things for other people. And by politicos, I mean, the former Governor of Ohio,
Debbie Phillips 21:29
So I worked for the former Governor of Ohio, Dick Celeste, a really very, very talented guy, I learned so much from him. And before that I worked for John Glenn in the 1984 presidential race. I was at his side as things unfolded in Iowa and New Hampshire, in the South for Super Tuesday before he dropped out. And so Markos that's so astute of you. And I love this idea, we can all be better halves. And I realized after Rob's death, I became a better half, I had time to focus on my best friend, my niece and nephews, I feel like I became a better half. And I love that, we can all be better halves to each other. So good point, and I did have great training ground because that's right. When you work for a politician like that, or you work for a CEO of a company or you work in any sort of a place where you have a very big mission, everybody's got to be better half to each other in order to succeed.
Dan Mulhern 22:28
You were a press secretary to Governor Celeste, one of the absolute key positions, because you're helping to channel that incredibly important interface with media and with voters. What was that like? Were you equals, in your mind? You know, how did you navigate being a key better half for him?
Debbie Phillips 22:51
No, I did not think of myself as an equal. I saw him having extremely important work in the world to make change, and that I was there to support that and help that in any way. And I was there to learn. You know, I was 20 years younger than he was. So in many ways, he was quite a mentor to me, and I feel grateful to have learned at his feet as well as Senator Glenn's feet. I mean, what an opportunity that was.
Dan Mulhern 23:18
What about when you thought he was wrong, though?
Debbie Phillips 23:20
When that happened, it was actually very scary. For the number two or somebody that wasn't the equal. I saw the risks coming. And I remember having to say things to him, which he was a very magnanimous guy, you know, later on he might thank me or say, wow, you know, that was a good catch. In the moment, there were a couple times he did not like it at all.
Markos Kounalakis 23:42
Can I just jump in here because both you and Debbie have been partners and business partners, you, you Dan were a political consultant, you understood politics, and you're married to a woman who became Governor. I feel somewhat distant from Eleni's profession in state government, because I'm a foreign policy guy. And that really doesn't intersect on a daily basis. But you, you ran campaigns, and you ran her campaign. You both in that regard, were partners and so how was it for you, when you were dealing with the very same questions you're asking Debbie about, being smarter, knowing better?
Dan Mulhern 24:20
You know, there were circumstances where I felt my wife or her team were going in the wrong direction. And I was in stretches extremely involved. I was in policy discussions. And I was at the table. That was not so hard professionally, Markos because I could say my point. There was a time when my wife was Governor of Michigan in 2008, depths of the Great Recession, things were terrible and they were worse in Michigan than anywhere. And I was saying to her, in your state of the state speech, I think you have to say to people, you guys gotta rise up. You gotta go back to school. The factory jobs aren't going to be there the way they have been. You can do this, you can reinvent yourself and a young Debbie Phillips, she was a communications person. And she said, I don't think people come to the state of the state to hear what the Governor thinks they should do. They want to know what she's going to do for them. Oh, well, my head was just echoing with JFK. Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country. I felt like she should challenge people. I lost that battle. And she didn't say the things I would have had her to say. That was easy politically. I was like Debbie, I was a subordinate. I wasn't her equal. It wasn't my call to make. And there were smarter people at the table. But you know what, personally that was really hard Markos, it was hard to have a spouse who is so much bigger than me in real life. And I accepted that and lived with that in political life. And then not to have that come into the relationship, to sort of almost like overcompensate, I didn't want to just say, Okay, you win, you win, you win, whatever you want to do. I didn't want her to be my Governor, you know, I want her to be my wife. I think that's hard. And I think it's hard for men, especially is my guess. I mean, there are so many women who are ascending now, not as fast as they should. So it's hard to be a man and have some sort of deep socialization that you're supposed to be the man. We even have that ridiculous line, be the man. I wonder, Debbie, do you think your age changed things, the fact that you were older than Rob, did that balance out for some gender equality in the business even, that you were older than him?
Debbie Phillips 26:30
I think if I were significantly older, or there was a significant gap, but four years, we felt very much of the same generation. He's also a very wise soul. And so in many times, I'd have to pinch myself thinking that he was actually younger than I was. But I wanted to go back, you know, with both of you, what you just raised about this whole. be a man thing, as a better half, both of you now have these incredible women who are doing important things. Where are you today, each of you in feeling like you're either an equal partner or not?
Markos Kounalakis 27:07
I'd say that professionally, I feel perfectly competent and independent in that I have my own work and it doesn't intersect that much with her work, although there are times when we actually do join each other on the international stuff, because she's in state government, which she's head of International Trade Relations for the state of California. So we actually can talk about it at a fairly dispassionate way, in a very professional way.
Debbie Phillips 27:34
Does that add to your relationship or take away from it?
Markos Kounalakis 27:38
I think it adds to it. It's grown, in part because we now get to travel together for the work. I'm constantly dealing with international relations, and it's only part of her job. So I'm constantly thinking about it, reading up on it, writing about it and conferencing on it. And so when she has head of state or someone who's coming into California to meet with her, I'm able to brief her on sort of larger contextual issues. And so we actually enhance each other in that front. I think all of this, Debbie, really what you brought out in this episode, is this question of how do you deal with better half whether they're a professional, better half, or a personal better half? And secondarily, what happens if they're both. And I think that's something I hadn't really thought about to the same degree, I've only thought about better halves, on my personal level, and not in the professional level in the same degree.
Dan Mulhern 28:31
I think the richness of this show, and future episodes really, we're living in a time, that's very different than our parents. In their world, work and home life were separate. And the man took care of work outside the home, and the woman took care of work inside the home and relationships. Now they're blending in so many ways. And I think we'll explore that in so many ways, it's so fascinating. Debbie, we need to wrap this incredible episode. And so I want to ask you in closing, what pops for you, as you reflect now on the way you have been a better half, strive to be a better half, try to help others be a better half? And in the unique situation that you've so graciously and openly shared with us about your relationship with your amazing husband.
Debbie Phillips 29:21
Well, first I want to thank you for just wanting to know me and getting to know me as we have been doing for a while now. And I feel so safe and comfortable with you as my better halves. And I really consider you guys like companions through the darkness with me. And that's part of what's sustained me in losing my better half, is to create these better half partnerships with other people. Even four years after Rob's death, I'm still in that space of just needing the companionship of people who care to know enough about my life. So that can't be 29,000 people you know, it's just like a rich handful of people of which you two are part up. So thank you for just listening to my story. Thank you for pulling it out of me, it just feels really, really good.
Dan Mulhern 30:13
What a great pleasure to have you on this time and to share it with Markos and with our listeners. Our conversation doesn't end here. If you're curious about what we've learned from this and how we're processing this, as we're curious about you, join us for the after show, we're going to exhale together and share our thoughts. You can find it in your podcast feed right now. We'll see you there.
Narrator 30:40
We hope you enjoyed Secrets of the Better Halves. We invite you to go to Apple Podcasts and leave an honest five star rating and write a positive review. On Spotify, click the three dots and rate the show. It'll help more people like you find us. And wherever you're listening, click the follow button, so you never miss an episode.