# When a Spouse Needs Rest: A Real Talk on Marriage and Exhaustion Pastor Adam Mesa and his wife, Ashley, talk about a viral video of a husband in his car, why exhaustion looks different for each spouse, and a late dinner that ended in disagreement. Source: Pray.com — https://www.pray.com/articles/when-a-spouse-needs-rest-a-real-talk-on-marriage-and-exhaustion Author: Adam Mesa Category: Love & Relationships Published: 2026-10-22 Last revised: 2026-10-22 --- ## Key takeaways - **Name your expectations.** Adam says a trip with kids will not feel like rest if rest is what you expected from it. - **Decide what matters before you spend.** Adam and Ashley chose a few big family experiences over frequent smaller outings. - **Everyone needs a moment.** Ashley argues that husbands should be as free as wives to say they are overstimulated. - **Exhaustion takes different forms.** Physical, mental and emotional tiredness are all real, and none of them needs to be ranked. - **Marriage is not always tidy.** Adam and Ashley disagreed about a late dinner and left the question open, with plenty of laughter. ## A vacation with the kids is not a rest Adam and Ashley opened this episode of Beyond I Do fresh from a trip to Japan with their boys. They noticed a joke that circles online: if your kids come along, you are not on vacation, you are just living in a different place. Pastor Adam Mesa pushed back on that. He pointed out that work culture labels all time off as vacation, so we expect every break to be restful. For his family, rest is a separate thing they plan on its own. The Japan trip was something else. As he put it, "I viewed it more so as formation for our children." He described what the boys took in: a design and technology exhibit called TeamLabs, streets where people walk everywhere and rarely wear headphones, and public spaces so quiet that the children had to learn to be still and respectful. Adam added that he and Ashley are in a seminary class on biblical culture and customs right now, so seeing a different culture up close felt connected to that. His advice to parents was to be clear about what you want from a trip before you leave. If you want rest and bring small children, he suggested, the frustration may come from the expectation and not from the kids. ## Deciding what is worth the money Adam was careful to say that families spend differently, and that he and Ashley spent most of their marriage pinching pennies and working with travel points. They still use points today. These days they skip a lot of weekend entertainment, partly because Adam works weekends. They keep Disney passes and go about once every four months. They plan roughly two bigger trips a year, and the rest of the time the boys are at home, at sports and at school. Adam said they sat down and asked what was important to their family, then chose to spend on experiences where the kids can explore and learn. He connected this to his own childhood. He went to Disney World once, at 13, because someone sponsored his dad, a preacher without much money. Andy, who was in the studio that day, took his first two flights at 20. Adam's point was that exposure to the wider world is easy to take for granted when you have had it, and worth giving a new generation if you can. ## The man in the car Adam then played a video that went viral. A wife finds her husband asleep in his car outside their home. She asks why he will not come inside, he says he needs peace and quiet, and he locks the door while she keeps talking to him. The couple were quick to say they cannot know what is happening in that marriage. The wife may have been joking, or she may have meant it as a message to other women. The husband may have a great sense of humor with her. Adam and Ashley both pointed out that the answer depends on how a couple communicates. Ashley made the case that we give women room to say they need a moment and often do not give men the same. She thinks a man can feel the weight of providing for a household and then walk in the door to be a dad and a husband. Saying "I need a moment" does not make a man soft, she said, but more vulnerable with his wife. She also mentioned a video of a wife hiding behind the kitchen counter with ice cream while her husband tells the kids she is probably upstairs. Her point was that a good spouse notices when the other person needs space. ## Everyone gets tired in a different way Drawing on years of marriage counseling with Ashley, Adam said that more often than not he sees wives who do not fully grasp the burden their husbands carry. He added that there is context for everything and that every household is different. He described the physical toll of jobs like construction and trucking, where a lunch break is short and pay is tied to production. He was just as clear that his own work wears him down in another way. He mentioned days of dealing with a death, a couple heading toward divorce, and letting a staff member go because they were not living out biblical values. That kind of weight, he said, is mostly mental. His conclusion applied to everyone in the house: "Everybody should be allowed to be exhausted in their own way," instead of counting hours against each other. He also described a difference in how spouses talk about tired days. Women often connect by relating, so a wife may answer "I had a long day" with "so did I," and a husband can hear that as dismissal. Between men, he said, a friend who shares a rough week just wants a simple response: "That's all a guy wants." Ashley shared how this plays out at home. Because she sits in on executive meetings at their church, she can now sense when Adam is carrying something heavy. She cannot take the work off him, so she looks for what she can ease at home, such as errands, groceries or keeping the boys occupied. She credited Adam for making that possible: "that's because you let me in." ## Why are you pressing me? The second half of the episode turned personal. Adam had a dinner on the calendar for over a month with friends Jeff Osborne, Will Chung and Sammy, for Sammy's birthday. It was an early reservation at a Korean barbecue place, and with the drive to and from LA, the evening was always going to run long. Ashley had understood "early dinner" to mean he would be home by 7 or 7:30. She had made her own plans with her mom and her sister, and when 9:30 came she texted to ask when he was coming home. Adam answered that she was pressing him. He got home around 10:30. Each of them told the story their own way. Ashley said the text was out of character for her, that she asked only once, and that she felt a husband does owe his wife a time. Adam said he did not think he owed an exact hour unless she asked, and that friends he sees only every few months do not set a limit on a meal. In his words, "There's not a timer for dinner." He also pointed out that Ashley can easily spend three hours on coffee with women from church. Ashley added that the night before, Adam had also been out for a friend's birthday. Two evenings in a row, she said, left her home with the kids both times, and that was the real sting. Adam answered that the earlier dinner had come together at the last minute after service. Neither one conceded, and the argument slid into jokes about the boys, Tokyo weather and who sends clothes to the dry cleaner. They signed off by saying that being saved does not make a marriage perfect. Ashley, they joked, is the work in progress that Adam prays about, and Adam, she answered, is annoying too. ## What this means for your marriage You do not need a couple who has it all figured out to learn from this conversation. Adam and Ashley were honest that they irritate each other, and they still returned to the same habits: telling the truth about what they need, and giving each other room. Here are a few ways to use that this week. These are our own suggestions, not something Adam and Ashley taught. - Before your next trip or night out, say plainly what you expect from it, including when you plan to be home. - Ask your spouse what kind of tired they are today, and let them answer without comparing. - Offer a few minutes of quiet before the evening begins, and say what you will do to cover the kids or the house. Lord, thank You for the people who share our homes. Teach us to notice when someone we love is worn out, to say what we need without blame, and to give grace the way You give it to us. Amen.