The Dr. John Delony Show - Co-Parenting Challenges in Blended Families

Episode Date: October 7, 2022

On today’s show, we hear from: - A woman who can’t stand co-parenting with her husband’s ex - A man hoping to rebuild his relationship with his wife after a traumatic season Then, Delony answers your spicy questions on relationships in a lighting round. Lyrics of the Day: "Saturday Night's Alright For Fighting" - Elton John  Let us know what’s going on by leaving a voicemail at 844.693.3291 or visiting johndelony.com/show.  Support Our Sponsors: BetterHelp DreamCloud Churchill Mortgage Thorne Add products to your cart create an account at checkout Receive 25% off ALL orders Learn more about your ad choices. https://www.megaphone.fm/adchoices Ramsey Solutions Privacy Policy Resources: Own Your Past, Change Your Future Questions for Humans Conversation Cards Redefining Anxiety Quick Read John’s Free Guided Meditation Listen to all The Ramsey Network podcasts anytime, anywhere in our app. Download at: https://apple.co/3eN8jNq These platforms contain content, including information provided by guests, that is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. The content is not intended to replace or substitute for any professional medical, counseling, therapeutic, financial, legal, or other advice. The Lampo Group, LLC d/b/a Ramsey Solutions as well as its affiliates and subsidiaries (including their respective employees, agents and representatives) make no representations or warranties concerning the content and expressly disclaim any and all liability concerning the content including any treatment or action taken by any person following the information offered or provided within or through this show. If you have specific concerns or a situation in which you require professional advice, you should consult with an appropriately trained and qualified professional expert and specialist. If you are having a health or mental health emergency, please call 9-1-1 immediately.

Coming up on the Dr. John Deloney Show. I think this is a good question that a lot of couples have. And by a lot, you mean you and your husband. Go ahead. How many times a week should a couple have sex? 10? 11? I'm just kidding. You're welcome, gentlemen. You're welcome. What's up? This is John with the Dr. John Deloney Show.

Greatest mental health and marriage and relationship and parenting podcast show ever. So glad that you joined us. If you want to be on the show, give me a buzz at 1-844-693-3291. And here's my promise. I'll always tell you the truth. Even when I don't know, I'll tell you, I don't know. And I'm not going to talk at you. I'm going to talk with you. Just you and me sitting at a bar trying to figure this out. You and me having some nachos, sitting down, sharing some chips and quesos saying, all right, what are we going to do next? Here's what I would do next. Right? So if you want to be on the show,

give me a call or go to johndeloney.com slash ask and we'll figure out what to do next. Let's go to Nikki in Chi-town in Chicago. What up, Nikki?

Hi. What's up? Not much. I'm excited to get to talk to you and get your perspective on some situations that i'm going with right now very cool thanks for your trust i'm grateful for you what's up thanks um so i am dealing with a little bit of uh animosity and resentment towards my new husband's ex-wife and i was kind of hoping to get your perspective on how to just cope with that.

Wow. Okay. Tell me about it. So my husband and I have been together for two years and married for two months and between the two of us, we have five daughters. So we are in a- Five daughters? Yeah. yeah. Hey, have your husband call the show. I just want to hug him. Just want to hug him.

Yeah, he's amazing. Actually, he met you a few years back during the Entree Leadership Summit. So he told me to tell his old friend, John, hi. Hello. And he didn't lead with, old friend, John, hi. Hello. And he didn't lead with, hey, there's six women in my house. At least get him a boy dog or something. All right. We have a boy dog.

He insists that the animals are male. So he's crying. I support that, man. I support that. All right. So he's got an ex-wife. Y'all been married just a couple of months. Tell me about it.

Five daughters. Yeah, five daughters. So a couple years ago when I came into the situation, him and his ex-wife were co-parenting, I think, a little too well. They were still doing, like, family things together. And so when I came in, I was like, yeah, that's going to change. I don't, I'm not comfortable with like Christmas at your ex-wife's house. So things have slowly kind of.

Why? Why are you uncomfortable with that? I'm not saying you shouldn't be i just why you know i think the issue for me was his co-parenting situation was polar opposite of my co-parenting situation um my ex-husband's bipolar and it's it's really hard to manage. And I've been on my own. Even when we were married, since the kids were born, I was basically a married single mom. And so coming from that situation into his situation where they still do like pumpkin patch picking together. But she's in a relationship and he's in a relationship.

It was just uncomfortable. So you landed there. I'm so glad you got there. It sounds like they have figured out a way to be divorced and move on with their lives and still be adults for their kids. Yes. Yes. And possibly,

possibly a mesh possibly is still too weird. That's that, that would be a whole other conversation with them too just to listen to how they've arrived at where they've arrived but the number of people i talk to across the country who cannot or in your most people end up in your situation i cannot get my spouse to do my ex to do anything remotely like an adult or they're struggling with mental health issues or they just disappeared or whatever. What is it?

Are you jealous of her? And it's okay if you are. Just be honest. Are you jealous of her? Are you jealous of their former relationship? Or do you love her, him? And you're like, there's that weird gnawing feeling that he had a thing with her once. Like, what is it?

There's definitely jealousy underlying there. Um, but where we're, where we're landed at today is the relationship has dissolved and there's no more co-parenting and it's very her side, our side. And, um, she's starting to be very childish and being friends with the kids instead of being a team with us. And I think I would assume on her part that is because, you know, there are issues there with me. Well, you broke up their team. You said this team can't play like this anymore, not with me in the picture. And so the team she's going to feel like,

he decided that their co-parenting arrangement was no good. And he picked you over her. Yeah. And part of the jealousy issue was because when we first met, he told me early on that two months before he met me, she was, she wanted him back and he had said no. Okay. So then I was increasingly more uncomfortable, you know, doing anything with her. So let's clear this up. They are linked forever. Right. And by marrying him, you have to deal with her. Yeah. And so you can fight that forever or you can make peace in your soul.

And here's the deal. If he goes back to her one day, let's say that happened. It's not going to, but let's say it did your paranoia and frustration and jealousy and anger and i don't like that none of that will help that it will only accelerate it i think that's where we've landed is the things that she has done from the beginning are wrong and offensive and I have every right to be mad, but where I'm kind of realizing is that- Tell me like what? Like what? Like when we first got together, she did a background check on me and-

Absolutely. I would do the same thing. I would do the same thing. I want to know who's in the lives of my kids. Absolutely. I don't think that's weird at all. If she hid it from you and lied about it, okay. But you have to understand, you're like, you know what I mean? Would you trust some strange woman with your kids? Like, you'd want to know, right? Yes, but I don't think she, like, I don't think she needed to share my debt. Like, that was her digging because she knows he's big into Dave Ramsey and big on debt.

That's fine. That's fine. Okay. So she was, she was, she handled that immaturely. Yeah. But why are you giving her rent free space in your head?

Yeah. That's what my husband gives up. He says like, I don't understand how you could be so stuck on something that happened two years ago. And it's like, well, because she's kind of like a trigger at this point.

And you're allowing her to. Why? Why are you giving her this power? What is it about her? Is she beautiful? Is she rich? Is she wonderful? I mean, what is it?

When you when you hold her up, you see yourself as less than why? I don't necessarily see myself as less than why um i don't necessarily see myself as less than i i just feel like there's things in the situation that i can't control yes and you can't control her deciding to be friends with her kids no and i can't control her like teaching the kid like we're to a point where the children see every single thing their mom does is correct and every single thing their dad does is wrong great yeah that's a season and that will shift and then one day it will be everything dad does is the best ever and you're their best friend and mom's the worst like it's not a competition at this point we're trying to raise well kids who have grown up in trauma and um have a very confusing childhood between whatever

one two three years led to a divorce and then weird, we're still kind of a family, but not really. And then mom's with somebody else. And then, oh, suddenly dad's with somebody else. Like that's trauma for kids. Right. And so if they connect with a parent, that's normal. They're going to do that. Trying to fight that or be frustrated by that is you comparing yourself.

Why don't they like me as much as her? Why don't they like us as our rules are but man that's just that's that's just throwing angst into an already angsty situation situation can't control it if she's abusing them or if she's um not following the court orders or she is making putting them in situations where they're not safe yeah man i'm all in on that but if she just feeds the mcdonald's every time it's frustrating and maddening and there's going to be a re-entry point every time they come back to your house right or like mom doesn't make us do that i know but i do yeah it's not necessarily that bad it's it's things that we can't control like like her sense of humor with

them in my opinion is abusive like she calls them a failure and thinks that's funny and you know if they don't perform well at soccer she's like the mom that's the loudest one they are going you're not getting any dinner tonight and it's just like they know they missed the goal they you know like they know these things what can you do about that nothing that's that's so where my struggle is you can keep holding tighter and tighter or you can let go how you got to practice that and the first thing you got to practice it but before that actually that's the second thing the first thing is you have to decide to let go and my guess is growing is being in love with somebody and being connected

to somebody and making kids to somebody who had bipolar disorder meant you had to drive everywhere for everything because you couldn't depend on anybody but yourself. And you were every bit his mother as you were his lover. And that probably started way back when you were a little kid. And the control that kept you alive in that relationship and the control that you had to exert over your life when you were a kid is what's choking the life out of your current marriage. Is that fair? Yeah. So what we're doing is we have to say okay Justin Verlander was pitching

and he throws a million miles an hour so I'm going to have to swing really fast and I'm going to have to make up my decision quick as he goes into his windup

and then another pitcher is going to come up there and throw a bunch of curveballs Greg Maddox is going to come up and pitch and he throws very slow but he throws all

like all this curve stuff so I got to be a little more patient. It's a different, I got to approach this thing differently. And right now, control for you, giving that up, letting go with that, um, feels like you're going to, you're exposing yourself to more hurt. Is that fair? Yeah. And what I want you just to step back and look at the picture is it's the control right now that's killing you yeah I took your ASIS score

and I'm a 7 and my husband's a 1 yeah so he doesn't get it nope your childhood sucked didn't it mhm I'm sorry

he can't get it unless you talk to him about it. Have you talked to him about it? Yeah, a lot. Okay. Yeah. Okay. He's great. So here's your practice. Over time, it's feeling your body start to try to grab control of situations that you can't control and holding your breath for about four or five seconds as deep as you can and exhaling and intentionally dropping your shoulders pulling them down and opening your hands up saying can't control this one and this hurts here's what i can't control this one. And this hurts. Here's what I can control. And we're going to go that route. And what we're going to do is just practice this.

Is that something you're interested in? I don't think you believe that you're worth a peaceful life. It's not that I don't believe it. It's just that I just haven't experienced it. So, like, when my husband and I first got together I and we would have conflict I would like feel my body tensing and like my fist in the air almost like metaphorically because I was preparing for that fight yeah and it never came so I've slowly like I don't have those kind of conflicts with him.

We really never fight. When we do, it is always about his ex-wife. I would suggest, Nikki, you're always at war. Always. He might not know he's fighting. You do. Yeah, that's pretty fair.

Because an ace of score of one is going to go through life pretty go lucky yeah and ah well that stinks let's do this yeah and i don't know if you're familiar with like enneagram personalities um he's a nine he's a peacekeeper and i'm an eight i'm a fighter it's always so amazing how y'all find each other it's so good so he has this like uncanny ability to like let things roll off his back and i like keep score well you've had to okay you had to um one of the things i i have argued with some of the great leaders in the enneagram world I don't believe that

those things are innate that we're just wired for that I think there's a combination of wiring and and experience you've had to fight because if you don't fight with an ACE score of a 7 you and I aren't talking right

you're strung out somewhere or you're in jail or you're you're strung out somewhere or you're you're in jail or you're in a you're dead right right you've had to fight you haven't been able to recognize that the fighting that kept you alive is blowing things up right now here here's the the way through it and for somebody with an asa score of seven if you haven't had trauma counseling, you're probably going to need it. Um, I recommend anybody over a four go do that. Um, but the only way through it, I mean, the only way to heal is to go directly through it. That's the only path forward. You want to do something crazy, call his ex-wife and say, you want to go to breakfast?

I've suggested that. And that was actually one of our arguments because early on I was like, why don't we just go to dinner and like have a sit down and kind of map this thing out with the four adults, you know, in the room. And he was like, no, no, no, no, no. And then his ex-wife suggested it. And he's like, I think we should do this. Okay.

Hold on, hold on. Oh, geez. So the way you just said that, clearly he listens to her more than you. He's still in love with her more than you. I can't, I'm just his, I'm just B team. And the way I hear that is when you suggested it, he was like, oh honey, I'm not taking you to war.

I don't want to fight. And then when she said she was into it, he was like, okay, maybe this would work out. But I hear that as a husband trying to protect his new wife, who's a little bit anarchist and realizing that we could we could probably make this thing happen. I don't think you should go with him the first time. I think you should go just you two, you two grown women, and you start the whole conversation with I have completely screwed this up. Try there. And the silence is deafening right now. It's so good because you're like, to hell with that. I ain't saying that to that crazy. Listen,

if you walked in and said, I screwed this up, I'm jealous of your marriage. I come from abuse. I was married to somebody with bipolar disorder. I've just been in chaotic relationships and I just started trying to control everything. And I recognize I love him and I love those girls. And by loving him and loving those girls, that means I'm going to be a part of your life forever. And so I want to restart. If you went in with that attitude, she would probably have to pick her jaw up off the floor.

And you pay for the meal. And you also, with that attitude, she would probably have to pick her jaw up off the floor. And you pay for the meal? And you also, by the way, have your shoulders down the whole time. You're just like consciously pulling them down. And you're just kind. The word for that is the Brene Brown special. It's vulnerable. She could roast you. She could burn a hole through

you with that sort of vulnerability she admitted it she admitted she's the one who's been screwing up she could or y'all could get to some relational ground that y'all are never going to get to unless one of you acts like an adult and just takes a knee and yeah that's kind of where I'm struggling Why? What has worked over the last two years? Nothing It's just getting worse Isn't it? It is So stop fighting

That's clearly not working It's not working If you were a doctor you would have fired yourself Because this medicine isn't working. Would you just try it and see what happens? Yeah. Oh, yeah. I definitely want more than anything to just have inner peace and stop being at conflict with the whole situation.

You got to get a counselor. Here's why. Your body is going to have to practice peace because it's never had it. It's a unicorn right now. It's like a mythological place. You've never experienced it. And you want it, but you don't even know what it is. You don't even know what it feels like.

And you're going to have to practice it. And you're going to have to get somebody to walk with you. And when those girls, when did your abuse start? Even as a child or with my marriage? As a child. It's just, it's never been from day one. Like, it's never been great. Okay.

You're surrounded by five girls your body's alarm systems are going to ring off the freaking hook right yeah because it remembers that story of what happens when you're a little girl and so your job as the adult as the parent of five little girls

is to go do the work to heal those alarms and redirect them because you don't want to pass that trauma to them. You want them to be aware and smart and bright and able to read a room and able to keep themselves safe. All those things are good, but you can't do those things when your body's under threat because it just says, get out of here. Right. And I don't want them to feel like they have to choose. That's right.

So that healing isn't something you, you tell them it's something you do for you and they absorb it. They feel it. Right. Is that it. Right. Is that fair? Yeah. The only thing in this whole situation you can, the only person you can change is you.

That's it. And it's just asking yourself, is this working? And you and I both, it's not, it's not. No. It's not.

And so I'm just suggesting try something completely different if you take her to breakfast and it goes it just goes off the rails just off the rails um you'll have learned something right right you can say I tried that

that didn't work that was not good i called some podcaster and he's an idiot i'll hey i will announce to everyone who listens uh nikki called me back and said um she went on that breakfast and her husband's ex was it just ruined everything it was a disaster i will i will i'll put that out to the world that's fair i don't think that will happen maybe it will but i don't think it will and i'm not saying y'all gonna be best friends you're not y'all aren't gonna be best friends you're not gonna call each other and be like do you wanna go get pedicures you're not that's not

gonna happen i'm not gonna go hang out at tj max. Do people shop Kelly at TJ Maxx? I don't know. No. Kelly's more of a Carhartt gal. I don't know where people go shopping. I'm just saying, you're not going to be shopping partners, but you are going to have to learn how to do life together. You're not going to have to figure this out.

And it's just being an adult. It's putting away the immediate, putting away the hard stuff for the things that are right. The things that are best long-term. Um, hang on the line here, Nikki, I'm going to send you a copy of my book. I want you to read it from start to finish. It's about dealing with trauma. It's a call on your past, change your future. Hang on the line here. I'm going to send you a free copy. Um reach out to a counselor in your community and say, I'm ready. Had a rough go of it. I've got a marriage worth hanging on to now. I've met a guy that's good. I've got five kids that I'm wrestling with. I've got a blended family that I've now entered into. I don't want to do this right. And I deserve to be

well. I deserve peace. I deserve. I'm going to start there. Thank you for being brave, Nikki. I'm grateful for you. Let me know how that breakfast goes. We'll be right back. All right, we're back. Let's go to Mark in Savannah, Georgia. What's up, Mark? Hey, Dr. John, I'm partying. How are you? Party you do. Good to hear it, man. What's up? Well, hey, so a couple months ago, you had an episode where a woman called in and she and her husband had bought a farm and were in the process of fixing it or just trying to make the farm life work. And I actually listened to that as we were doing some work on our farm to close on it because we were in the same boat and kind of working on escaping from it. And we're out of that now. We're in a new whole situation, new life, which is much better. I guess I'm just kind of wondering how to move forward and kind of fix

some of the issues that came up from all that, everything we went through within that. What issues came up? So the kind of situation was we bought this old rundown farm. The house needed fixed up. The whole property needed a lot of work. So it was just a lot of time and energy going into that. Okay, hold on. That means before that, did y'all have a dream?

Yeah, so it had been our dream for a long time to have a farm and raise our kids with animals and have it be a peaceful, quiet farm life that we kind of imagined. Have you ever been on a farm? It's all death and sex and poop. That's basically a farm. Yeah. That's a good point. That's a good point.

But yeah, that was our dream going into it okay how long have y'all been married uh 10 years okay so that's a long time of watching hgtv videos and youtube videos and like going through zillow over and over again like right yep yes okay so you got this farm you're gonna fix it up you're gonna learn you can just youtube everything and it just it's a nightmare right yeah here's why i'm laughing that worked before but here's why i'm laughing i live on a similar situation and my wife grew up that way and so i I had the luxury of being like, here's what we're going to do. And she's like, you're an idiot.

That's not how that's going to work at all. And anyway, I was just on the phone with the guy. Just before this call, I was on the phone before the show started with the guys who came out to service my well and something in our spring. I literally have no idea what they're talking about, but I nodded and I was like, yeah, that sounds great.

So good for you. Okay, so disaster, you'll have this dream. You'll think about it. You plan together, you, you dream together. It's just going to be this blissful thing where animals just peacefully die so you can eat them and crops just grow themselves and it always rains. Okay. So here you are. Then what? So, yeah, we got into it. We started doing the house, which I had some background doing that work as well. So it wasn't quite as naive, I guess, maybe as you may not to be. Well, it's not that. People know how to hang drywall and fix joists. They don't know how to do that and be married at the same time. Sure.

That's the danger. And on top of that, I was starting a new marketing company, which is my main job that I do. Why not? Why, why wouldn't we do that? That sounds fantastic. Excellent. Good job. And we have three kids that are under seven. Why not? It was just everything piling on, you know, as, as you're pointing out there. And I, as you can imagine, you know, we got to the point where we were just going to implode if we didn't change something. And, and we kind of powered through all of it. Obviously it was stressful basically from day one and we kind of powered through, um, I find myself, I found myself kind of having the dynamic of, I'm going to be the strong one and put on a bold face and not, you know, show that I'm struggling with this. And my wife was kind of the opposite and

struggling a lot through it all and going along with it, just to kind of make me happy or make, try and, you know, make the dream continue to work and whatnot. Um, but it was slowly just going to a really bad place. And we finally got to that breaking point and said, and it was kind of more her telling me, you know, I can't continue this or I have to get out of the situation because everything feels so unhealthy that we got to get away from it. So good for her. We finally did. And, and, and yeah, you know, we feel so much better being away from it, but it's just, we going through all that, put us in such a weird place. And I feel like now we were almost, we know that there was some trauma and a lot of hurt from that. It's just hard to identify what it even is or talk about it. I feel like a lot of times it's hard for us to even just talk and we'll just

watch something or look at our phones to kind of build the silence. It's hard to even know, you know, where to begin thinking through all this stuff as well. So did anything happen that caused a rift? Did you cheat on her? No. Did she, did you say something to her did she hit you i mean is there anything like of that nature that there's these unspoken elephants in the room that we got to address no nothing i know not an unspoken thing the only thing is you know she got to the point where she said if we you know i was kind of continuing to try and build my my new business and make the dream work like i, I was kind of putting on the brave face and

she was more the one kind of saying this isn't working. And she got to the point where she said, you know, if, if you're going to keep pursuing this, I have to leave and I will divorce you. Okay. And that's, and that was kind of like, that really was a breaking point for me. I was thinking, okay, it's either the dream or my marriage and I'm happily going to choose my marriage. So we got that. Are you happy about that choice? Yes, 100%. Okay.

When a guy tells me he's putting on a brave face, what I hear in my mind is I'm leaving my wife. I am unplugging from her and I am surrounding myself in a sheet of iron so that I can just plow ahead. And when I do that, she is unplugged. She's untethered. I've left her. I might sleep in her same bed. I might eat at her same table, but I have left her in pursuit of. And so what she was identifying was, you've left me. I'm just going to make it formal. Is that fair? Yeah, absolutely. And most of the time, I don't think guys want to do that.

I think y'all got in a dance, right? I've got to keep this thing going. She's like, I got to keep this thing going. And both of y'all were waiting for the other person to say, I'm out, right? And so she was just going to formalize it. Often. So here's a couple of things. When you think of trauma, you failed at a thing and that's okay.

Have you ever failed at anything before? Did you ever get an F in school or get fired from a job? Yeah, a few times. Okay. job yeah a few times okay so this is uh uh my boss dave says um all success is built on a pile of failures and so it's setting back and saying okay we had this dream we were and it's the death of a dream it's the death of a picture of who y'all were gonna be right yeah and so you have to acknowledge you gotta grieve it here's what we wanted and that's not going to happen. And until you do that, most people skip that step and then go, okay, well, then we're going to live a suburban life and do this.

And you're going to find yourself with two 2024 Tahos that you can't afford and a big house you can't afford. And you're going to be trying to start another business, right? You're going to be running and chasing. Instead of saying, we both really wanted this life. And it wasn't what we thought it was cracked up to be. And we both realized we don't talk as well as we thought. And we both realized. And she gets to say, here's what she realized.

Here's what she learned about her husband. And you get to say, here's what I learned about my wife. And here's our new reality. We got to own that, and then we get to decide what is it going to look like next. And you're going to be tenuous to – I mean, it's going to feel awkward to build a new dream because y'all built one, and it imploded on you. Yeah. Is that fair? Yeah, yeah.

And so here's another thing. You've probably heard me talk about pictures and words a lot. The reason I think reading is so powerful, and my wife was a literacy scholar. The reason I think reading is so important because it allows every reader to read something and they concoct the picture in their mind. And when we watch something on TV, it says it looks like that. It gives the spoon feeds us the picture. Here's where that's important. You said we wanted this peaceful life where we were all together and you started creating sentiment behind a picture, but HGTV told you what that had to look like. Sure.

And instead of that, I would rather you go back to the values, the principles, the feelings that you thought you were going to get by having this life and try to build that wherever you are. So we want a peaceful life. We want an off-grid life. We want an accomplished life where we do things together. You see what I'm getting at? You could do that in a three-bedroom, two-bath house in the middle of some rando suburb. Sure. You can get off the grid and get solar panels and turn your backyard and your front yard into – my friend Pete did that. He just plowed up his whole front yard and planted food there.

My friend Alex did that in his backyard it's just awesome so you can create that life wherever you are but hgtv isn't the one responsible for what that ends up looking like you and your wife are right does that make sense and so it's going back and saying okay how do we rebuild this thing let's start with what we want this to feel like and look like and let's go from there sure yeah i know that that totally makes sense i think that's something we've kind of started rebuild this thing. Let's start with what we want this to feel like and look like. And let's go from there. Sure. Yeah. I know that that totally makes sense. I think that's something we've kind of started looking at and discussing and yeah, trying to figure out what's at the core behind why we wanted that and how can

we achieve that? So I think that definitely makes sense. Where can I be super honest with you? Yeah. I feel like you're not telling me something. What is it? She's she, she almost walked out.

Why? What was at the core of that? I think you hit it when you talked about what it means to put on a brave face. The main issue that came up is she's just saying, I need more communication. I wasn't communicating with her because a lot of what I would tell her is, hey, this one project didn't go as smooth as I hoped it would, or this is going to cost more money, or this is worse than we thought it was. Did you hear how that translates to, my husband's lying to me? Yeah. See what I'm saying?

Yeah. And that untethers relationships. There's a few things that make somebody feel unsafe when they know somebody's keeping secrets from them right because we usually don't keep secrets of great stuff going on yeah have you sat down and said i wasn't honest with you and i'm sorry and i'm healing from that i tried to hide stuff from you and i shouldn't have done that have y'all had that conversation? Not, I mean, not directly, you know, some of that stuff came to head and then I kind of had to say, oh, well, here's what, you know, here's how this actually, what I didn't quite tell you all of it necessarily. And, and we kind of talked through, you know, I, I told her, you know, the reason I

did it was to try and, you know, save you the stress of having to worry about it. But I, maybe we haven't necessarily claimed it as what it was. Well, that's, I mean, again, I want you to hear that how she hears it. I'm the grown-up here and you're the child. I'm going to protect you from it. You don't worry, you're a pretty little head. And she's probably pretty dang smart, right? Yeah, oh yeah.

And she probably considers herself an equal. So here's where all this hits. I would love for you to sit down and write an honest letter to her. We are now, how long has it been since you moved? Three months now, I think. Okay. So we are three months out, 90 days ago.

We finally got out of a mess. And we dreamed about this mess. And we dreamed about this life that we were going to have. And now that particular dream is over. Period. Here's what I realized I did over that time

trying to keep that dream alive. I didn't tell you the truth. I left you. I was absent. I got more focused on trying to save the business than I did trying to connect with my wife

and my kids and all the things. And then I want y'all to go out and I want you to read that to her. And the end of that letter is something along the lines of, I'm ready to start building something new when you're ready. Because you don't want her to feel pressure to get up and start creating a new thing when she's still wrestling with the last time I created something. I was told I was a child and I was left in the dark and i almost lost everything that makes sense

yeah that does it's that magic i just just we talked about the last call this is vulnerability this is you saying i'm sorry and i'm ready to get back in the game when you are and not pressuring her or this i mean you're all in a good situation right now, job wise, home wise, all that. Yeah, we are. Yeah, absolutely. Much better. Okay. There's not a rush. Maybe six months, a year of just kind of being and then discovering what comes next. Yeah. Can you wait that long? I think so. I think we kind of got burned out on going for it as hard as we did.

So we're kind of at a, we're kind of a point where, yeah, the relaxing and taking it easy sounds good for a little while. And here's, here's, um, I'm trying to think of, so this will happen again. One or both of you will fail at something in the future. We're not trying to live a failure-free life. That's not a goal. That's not something I'm going to... I mean, I want to minimize failure. I want to be smart about it, but it's going to happen. I'm going to do all... Some baseball... I mean, some football coaches call the exact right play the right... Statistically speaking, the right... The momentum, everything's right, and it

just doesn't work the play doesn't work the guy falls down somebody doesn't guard just right whatever happens you're gonna fail the goal is okay what can we do different next time so that we don't get caught in this dance that we end up way in debt we end up way in a hole we end up having to lie to each other and one of you ends up saying, I'm out. So here's an example. I'm going to be very 30,000 feet here because I want to honor my – I don't want to just air my dirty laundry out. of me like doing the silent treatment of me like and then her responding to the silent treatment with going very introspective trying to do we went to dinner and like in 45 minutes we figured it out because i stopped it way up i said hey here's how i'm feeling right now and i'm being vulnerable putting this out on the table and it makes me feel awkward and weird because i'm a grown man

from texas i don't like talking about this stuff but here's how i feel right now and she said oh gosh a i'm sorry you feel like that way b i 100 get where you're coming from and now let's figure out what we do next and it literally was 45 minutes so yeah that's not the issues the issues were big deal they were a big deal it was. It was the strategy and the skill set heading into that that just made it a pretty relatively – it's going to sound super weird. It was an intimacy-forming conversation. It's one of those that you got done with and were like, I'm glad we did that. I'm glad we had that conversation. Now I feel even better about our relationship instead of it being a three-month ordeal.

Oh, she's's gonna leave me All that stupid stuff. See what i'm saying? Yeah, so what are the skills y'all can walk away with I think that's where we're heading into this thing and Maybe you when you in this letter you tell her i'm gonna commit from this point forward I will never keep a secret from you again I will always commit to telling you when things are great and I will commit to telling you when things are tough I'll also commit to telling you when things are great, and I will commit to telling you when things are tough. I'll also commit to listening, and I'll always commit to keeping you informed.

Here's what it's going to look like. I would propose once a week we're going to have a budget meeting and a calendar meeting and a check-in. How are you doing? How are things going? And ask her, what would be a good gift to you in this season? And by the way, those gifts will change. The seasons will change. But right now, what's the best way we could plug back in? And let her speak into it and commit not to doing your own thing to fix it,

but to listening to her and helping meet her needs as y'all figure this thing out moving forward. Congratulations. I'm proud of you, man. Y'all went for it. You got in the ring and you saw the biggest dude there and you swung as hard as you could. You just, he just hit you back. Right. And that happens. That's life. I've got a man. I've got a trail of failures in my life. Um, that's

part of it. It's part of it. And you got a wife that's smart enough and loves you enough to say, to turn all the lights on, turn the music off and say, what are we doing? Because I'm about to leave this party. You are lucky. You married well, my friend. Now it's just a fun question of what do we do now? Can't wait to hear what y'all do. We'll be right back. This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. October is the season for wearing costumes. And if you haven't started planning your costume, seriously, get on it. I'm pretty sure I'm going to go as Brad Pitt because we have the same upper body, but whatever. Look, it's costume season. And if we're being honest, a lot of us hide our true selves behind masks and

costumes more often than we want to. We do this at work. We do this in social settings. We do this around our own families. We even do this with ourselves. I have been there multiple times in my life, and it's the worst. If you feel like you're stuck hiding your true self behind costumes and masks, I want you to consider talking with a therapist.

Therapy is a place where you can learn to accept all the parts of yourself, where you can be honest with yourself, and where you can take off the mask and the costumes and learn to live an honest, authentic life. Costumes and masks should be for Halloween parties, not for our emotions and our true selves. If you're considering therapy, I want you to call my friends at BetterHelp. BetterHelp is 100% online therapy.

You can talk with your therapist anywhere so it's convenient for just about any schedule. You just get online and you fill out a short survey and you'll be matched with a licensed therapist. And you can switch therapists at any time for no additional cost. Take off the costumes and take off the masks with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash Diloni to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash deloney. All right, we are back, and it's time for, drumroll please, a lightning round. Another lightning round.

Look at that. Way to go. Way to go, Ben, with the jamming tunes. It's lightning round. Y'all loved it the last time we did it, so we're doing it again. As a reminder, Kelly cuts me off. Do I get a minute? Roughly.

Roughly, until Kelly gets tired of listening to me. And I have no idea, zero. I've got no idea what these questions are, where they're coming from. Who's asking, Jenna or Kelly? Me. Okay, and they're about what? These are all about relationships.

Thematically? Yes. Ugh. Are you going to ask me about what happens when a producer takes over a show and they're just mean? Are you going to ask me that question? No, I know how that relationship ends.

Yeah, I don't know how to handle that. That wouldn't be good. These are all pretty much about marital relationships, marital dating, that kind of thing. Okay. That's all I'm giving you. And I wish y'all could see, she's got a smile on her face because she knows she's going to lob grenades in here and I can't do anything about it. And I only get a minute and I talk too long anyway. Okay, let's do this. I'm ready. All right. Question one. What advice would you give to a young single male looking for a relationship?

Make yourself the best version of you you can be. Quit trying to figure out, fighting other people to make you feel good about yourself. Go exercise. Go get a great job. Go get a couple of mentors. Go do big things. Go out swinging. Go join an MMA gym.

Go do stuff. Go join a violin class or a guitar class or a salsa dancing or a knitting class. I don't care what you do. Go make yourself the best version of you you can be so that when you run into somebody, they don't look at you as a project. They look at you as a, yes, please. Look at you. 30 seconds left.

Really? Yeah. That's the first time I've ever. Alright, next question. Is that a good answer? What do you think about that? Actually, I think that was fantastic. Worry about you, not about getting in the relationship. I think that's a fantastic answer. Yes.

All right, what do you do when one spouse is ready to have kids or adopt and the other isn't? Leave them. Divorce, probably. I'm just kidding. That's the only way. That's the only way. And that's the last time we do this. No, don't do that. Okay, what's the question again?

What do you do when one spouse is ready to leave or to have kids or adopt and the other one isn't? I think the decision to have kids or not have kids is one of the core challenges that all marriage relationships face. And I think it's getting to the core of that. Underneath it, I'm put on earth to be a mom. I really want to be a dad. My life isn't full without, what are you afraid of? I think getting to those things and really being very, very specific. What are the core fears? One of you who doesn't want to have kids,

what are the core fears? What are the core pros? Like, you who doesn't want to have kids, what are the core fears? What are the core pros? Like here's what I really want to have children and getting to the core of that stuff. And then at some point, and it sounds awful, you got to negotiate. I need six months and let's figure it out. All right. What are y'all doing back there? Ben just really wanted to do that.

It's the timers. All right. How do you, the next question, how do you fight fair in relationships? Here's my rule for fighting. You don't fight when you're mad and you don't fight in the heat of. You have, I don't even, honestly, I'm going to be serious. I don't like the word fighting. There's passionate disagreements. I just fighting. I fight when I'm gonna be I don't like the word fighting. Um, there's passionate disagreements. I just fighting I fight when i'm trying to protect somebody Um, I fight when with the intention of hurting somebody and that's not how you engage in relationship disagreements

So my rule is I don't fight when i'm mad. I don't disagree when i'm mad. I walk away I literally walk away. Sometimes it's for 30 minutes. Sometimes it's for 30 days I'm, not ready to have this conversation yet. I will come away. Sometimes it's for 30 minutes. Sometimes it's for 30 days. I'm not ready to have this conversation yet. I will come back and I'll be plugged in. And then when I come back in, I'm very specific. I don't use words like, I'm very I-centric. I feel I'm experiencing not you did. And it's all about, here's what I'm bringing to the table. And then I ask my wife to bring that back. Is that fair? That's great. Okay. Awesome. You fight when you're mad. I am learning not to. Really? Yeah.

Way to go. Because I'm, I'm, as my husband lovingly calls me a bit of a bulldozer. I've never experienced that. Yeah. And so I just lied to you America, but he needs to walk away. And I usually am, you know, chased right after him, but I am learning to let him walk away, we'll talk, think about it, and then come back. And it's always more productive. Okay, can I ask you this question? Sure. I have heard it said that when somebody has the maturity to walk away, sometimes they say this isn't a good conversation. That that in and of itself is like dumping gasoline on a fire.

Like, oh, you're Mr. Mature, and it just makes it worse. It can be, definitely. If, in my case, where I'm like, oh, okay, well, you don't want to talk about this, you know, blah, blah. But to me, that was clear that I needed to do more work than on me because that person probably, and you know later, you're like, yeah, that was the mature choice. So it was, no, I need to back up.

I'm willing to be wrong here. I don't, I, I just don't have an experience in my life where fighting with somebody I love solved anything. No, no, it doesn't because things you don't want to say come out and yeah.

Yeah. You know, accusations and this, that, and the other. So it never works. Yeah. I'll leave it at that.

All right, cool cool this is not from me this is somebody else but i'm just going to read the question sure 100 from tell me about your marriage kelly no my dad cheated on my mom multiple times and now i'm married i'm afraid my husband will cheat on me can you chief cheat proof of marriage. Can you cheat proof of marriage? I don't know that that's the goal. The goal is to love deeply. If you play a game to not lose, you're going to play timid. You're going to be constricted.

I want to play the game to win. So number one, her body is going to think he's going to cheat, and that's okay. What she's got to do is be open about that and be honest about it and say, hey, in this season when I'm learning how to trust and not just learning intellectually but learning like my body, learning how to trust you, here's what I need. And he's got to understand where she came from, where her, what the world she comes from and say, okay, I love you enough that I'm going to, I'm going to go a little bit further than it makes sense. Even you can look at my texts. You can check out my Netflix account. I don't care. I'm a wide open book. I'm going to be a part of teaching her body that she's safe. And man, have a regular check-in, take care of yourselves, take care of each other and make it your life's mission to meet the other person's needs. And if they make it their life mission, man, it's really tough.

You're done. To go find love somewhere else. You don't need to. All right. Near, near. What was that sound? Oh, I got to tell you, that near, near story is pretty funny. Okay.

It's not for today, but it's awesome. How do you keep DIY home projects from taking over your marriage? Oh, geez. Don't ever do them. Don't do them. Just stop. You know how many unfinished projects are at my house? 158.

They're everywhere. They're the worst. A, don't. Don't. B, if you're going to have a clear budget, a clear, I'm starting this, I'm going to finish it when, a timeline, have enough people that can help you get this thing started and finish it. And you cannot start any new project until this one's finished. Period. End of story. and this is the pot talking to the kettle, this is the single most hypocritical thing I've ever said on the show, don't start anything until

it's, the other thing's finished, and if you're like, but I gotta do this, cool, sucks to be you, you gotta finish the other thing first, that's just the way it's gotta be, and you can't pull up all the hardwood floors, and then be like, I think I'm gonna build a garden, and then get halfway through the garden, and be like, you know what? I need a pool and just start shoveling in the backyard. You can't do it. Can't do it. That may be my favorite thing you've ever said. Cause you just discussed my husband.

You just, yeah. If you haven't got this, by the way, America, this is just the Kelly S questions about her, her marriage. The amount of unfinished projects. Anywho. Does he consider you an unfinished project? Probably. He's working.

He's working hard. I don't know if it's going anywhere though. All right. So how do you know when a relationship is worth fighting for? You make the choice. Keep fighting for it. When you and the other person are both all in. If one person is partly in and the other person is all in,

it's not going to work. When you are doing things because you need this, you're codependent. When somebody is an addict and they are trying to keep themselves alive over here with unhealthy behaviors and you're tagging along, it's not going to work. So it's worth fighting for when both of you say and not just say but both do, I'm all in. I've got to learn new stuff and it's going to take a long time. I've got to learn how to trust again.

I've got to learn how to fill in the blank. I've got to learn how to handle money. I've got to learn how stuff and it's going to take a long time. I got to learn how to trust again. I got to learn how to fill in the blank. I got to learn how to handle money. I got to learn how to not lie. I got to learn how to not drink when I get upset or not overeat when I get upset. I got to learn new things, but I promise I'm all in if you are. Awesome. All right. Next question. How do you maintain intimacy when you have small kids at home. You don't. You don't. If you have two kids, five and under, it's a sex-free zone for a long time. Just kidding.

It's not. Here's how you, number one, you have to do the seemingly unsexy thing, but it's absolutely not, is you have to plan intimacy. And intimacy, by the way, isn't just doing it. Intimacy is also, we're just, I want you to sit by me and hold me while we watch a show. I want to hold hands under the covers and fall asleep together while we're watching The Office. Intimacy is, I just want to sit on the front porch and have coffee together. Intimacy might be bananas wild sex with all your weird fantasy. That's fine. Let's figure this thing out. I'll get off the rails tonight.

Like whatever that looks like. But here's the key. You got to be intentional about it. You got to map it out and you have to talk. And so guys, if you're like, I lost my wife, shut up. You're fine. But speak out loud. And ladies, if women, if you're like, intimacy means something different to me in this season, I don't like all these people pawing all over, whatever that is, great.

Speak it out loud. And then be very clear about what comes next. Awesome. All right. My husband has been hinting that he might like to go to therapy. Should I encourage him? Yes. Yes. Yes.

I will tell you, my wife has, quote unquote, encouraged me. There's been a couple of times in our 20-year marriage that she reached out to my friends and said, John's not okay. And these aren't just buddies that I work with. These are guys that are as close as brothers. And so she's reached out to a few guys in my life over the years and they've reached out and said, Hey, you're not doing all right. What actions are you going to take?

And they've been strongly encouraging. Now, right now, I'm in a season in my marriage with my wife. Actually, she told me the other day, I think you need to call that guy. And she's right. I need to call that guy. So now we're in a season where she just encourages me and I could hear it. There was seasons when I couldn't hear it. And if she had told me to go to counseling, I would have blown up and been like, you need to go to counseling. You're the crazy person. And so it just, yes, absolutely. You should encourage him, but encourage him in a way that he can hear it. Not in a way that makes you feel better or feel like I said, so that's not, that's not helpful. Um, I am, I have not been invited or included by the wives of my husband's friend group. How do I handle that? I don't know. Are you weird?

I, this is a question to you, Kelly, because I know you just asked that question. Um, here's how you handle it. Um, you got rejected or you're getting rejected. You're in the act of getting rejection. One of the hardest things for married couples, especially newly married couples is the expectation that you're just going to be friends with their friend's spouse. And that works for a season for a short season. Occasionally you get to be pretty tight, but most of the time, you have to, over time, develop a couple of friends, new people that you hang out with and do life with. So, if you realize that your husband has some guy friends and their wives are all buddy-buddy and they don't like you, that stinks. It hurts.

It's a knife in your soul, and more importantly, it's a knife in the picture of, we're just going to keep this party going. We were in college together, and then we all get married, and now we're going to have kids together. we're just going to keep this party going. We're in college together and then we all get married and now we're going to have kids together. All going to play little league together. They're not, I know I'm still talking. They're not going to do that. You're going to have to create new community, new friends. So you're going to have to be honest with your husband and he's going to be like, no, it's not true. I don't, they like you. They just, you have to be honest about it. And you've got to do the hard work of finding other couple friends and going out with them. And that stinks, and it's not fun. It's the worst thing in the world is being an adult making friends, especially couple friends.

God help us. But they are out there, and it's awesome. Just take some work. Can I add to that? Of course. Also, because I have my group of girlfriends, and then most of the husbands are friends as well because we all met working in the same industry. And my husband is not a very social person. He's more of an introvert.

And so he has expressed that same thing at times. And I said, well, the first few times they asked you to do anything, you didn't. So they quit asking. So at some point you may have to reach out and say, hey, you want to go grab coffee? So you may have to reach out individually or with a couple of them also. That's a good point. It may be instead of doing like a couples thing, you reach out and ask those wives, hey, let's all go out. And I got three tickets to the XYZ.

Let's all go. And you just foot the bill. Let's all take them out. Let's go do this. But that's a great idea. All right, last one. Hold on. You're smiling before you even asked this. I can see this. I don't know what's coming. I think this is a good question that a lot of couples have.

And by a lot, you mean you and your husband. Go ahead. How many times a week should a couple have sex? 10, 11. I'm just kidding. You're welcome, gentlemen. You're welcome. Man, okay. So I get that question a lot. How often should a couple have sex? It's a couple different things. Number one, some people, the barometer for connectivity in their relationship is sex. That brings peace to their body physiologically. That grounds them. For some people, it's recreation. For some people, it's a way to unplug. And it's like watching Lord of the Rings. I can go be somebody else, do something else over here. We can become a different couple over here. Because over here, I wear a suit and I go to work and I'm a dork and I'm a mom, I'm a dad. Over here, I can get off the rails. So sex means different things to different people and there's different seasons. In some seasons, I'm writing a book and I'm really

busy. In other seasons, man, things are just cooking. In other seasons, we have a two-year-old and a five-year-old and then I'm pregnant. So here's the thing. How many times should you have sex? As many times as both of you can honestly and fully commit to one another to doing it over the course of one week, two weeks, three weeks, four weeks. I think kind of like weighing yourself every day, it's not really a helpful metric. Over time, a trend is helpful. So if you get to the end of a week and you're like, we only did it once this week, we're falling apart. You're not. If you get to the end of three months and we've had sex two or three times and man, I really am missing my wife or I'm really missing my husband. What's going on? That is a trend, right? Let's have that conversation.

But I think it's what both people agree on. It's just that, Kelly, most people agree on it. They lie to each other. I'm cool. I'm fine. Or no, no, it's good. Be honest about your needs and figure it out that way. Is that sound fair?

Yeah, I think that's great. Okay. Because I don't think there's a, there's? Yeah, I think that's great. Okay. Because I don't think there's a, there's not a numerical answer. It's different for every couple. And I actually, there is like a statistically, most couples have sex this often.

I'm actually, don't give that out because every couple's different and every couple is in a different season. The same as people are like, what foods should you eat? Man, that's a, that's a, depends on what your goals are and what you're doing. It's got so many factors to it. So similar to that question, the key is be honest and intentional about it.

Here we go. You survived it. That was it. That was it. I like those. Those are fun. Thanks for setting that up. Thanks for doing it. All right. We'll be right back. Hey, what's up? Deloney here. Listen, you and me and everybody else on the planet has felt anxious or burned out or chronically stressed at some point. In my new book, Building a Non-Anxious Life, you'll learn the six daily choices that you can make to get rid of your anxious feelings and be able to better respond to whatever life throws at you

so you can build a more peaceful, non-anxious life. Get your copy today at johndeloney.com. All right, we are back. Thanks for joining us today on the Dr. John Deloney Show. Again, if you want to be on the show, reach out to us. You can email us at johndeloney.com slash ask. And don't forget to pick up Own Your Past, Change Your Future, number one bestselling book. It's good. I'm proud of it.

Pick it up. Give it a shot. All right. Today's song of the day is from the great Elton John. And the song is Saturday Night's All Right for Fighting. It's getting late. Have you seen my mates? Ma, tell me when the boys get here.

It's 7 o'clock and I want to rock. Want to get a belly full of beer? Ooh, this sounds like a song Kelly wrote. My old man's drunker than a barrel full of monkeys. And my old lady, she don't care. My sister looks cute in her braces and boots. I got a handful of grease in her hair. Yeah, right?

Don't give us none of your aggravation. We had it with your discipline. Saturday nights, alright for fighting. Get a little action in. Get about as oiled as a diesel train. Gonna set this dance alight, cause Saturday night's the night I like. Saturday nights, alright, alright, alright.

We'll see you soon.