The Dr. John Delony Show - Greatest Hits Vol. 3: John’s Favorite Calls of 2024

Episode Date: December 25, 2024

On today’s episode, we revisit John’s favorite calls of the year, including: ·      A husband hoping to rebuild his marriage after a one-night stand  ·      A wife who found out her husband is the sole owner of their business  ·      An interview with Dr. Arthur Brooks about why sex isn’t enough for a happy marriage 🇺🇸 Watch United States of Anxiety Exclusively on the Free Ramsey Network App! 📱Early Access: Watch Episodes of The Dr. John Delony Show #1 Week Early—Download the App Today! Next Steps: 📞 Ask John a question! Call 844-693-3291 or send us a message. 📚 Building a Non-Anxious Life 📝 Anxiety Test 📚 Own Your Past, Change Your Future ❓ Questions for Humans Conversation Cards 💭 John's Free Guided Meditation 🤘🏼 The Dr. John Delony Show T-Shirts   Connect With Our Sponsors:  🌱 Get 10% off your first month of BetterHelp 🌿 Get up to 40% off at Cozy Earth with code DELONY 🔒 Get 20% off when you join DeleteMe 😇 Go to Hallow for a 90-day free trial 💤 Visit Helix Sleep for special offers! 🏥 10% off select packages at Marek Health with code DELONY  💪 Get 25% off your order at Thorne  🥤20% off at Organifi with code DELONY  ·      🏔️ Use code DELONY at Poncho Outdoors   Listen to More From Ramsey Network: 🎙️ The Ramsey Show 💸 The Ramsey Show Highlights  🍸 Smart Money Happy Hour 💡 The Rachel Cruze Show 💰 George Kamel[LM1]  💼 The Ken Coleman Show 📈 EntreLeadership   Ramsey Solutions Privacy Policy https://www.ramseysolutions.com/company/policies/privacy-policy  [LM1]Is it okay that this links to George’s YouTube channel? Sometimes I’ve seen the podcast show notes link to a podcast platform.

Oh Ho-ho is a special best of my favorite calls everyone's favorite I had a one-night stand with my wife stepmom. Oh, yeah, that's the one where stepmom's top just fell off He didn't have a choice off. He didn't have a choice. What up? Ho ho ho. It's Christmas day and if you were listening to this episode, you're probably having one of those Christmas days. I'm so glad you're here. I'm kind of hoping you're not listening today and you're with your family and the snowflakes are falling and there's chestnuts on fires or whatever, but I'm so glad you're with us.

This is a special best of, my favorite calls from this past year, 2024. Kelly, Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas to you, John. And also with you. All right. So we've got these calls here. Was that like a Catholic Christmas and also with you? Yeah.

I don't think they say that anymore, but... And with your spirit. Yeah. And with your spirit. That's what they say now. Oh, dude, that's kind of a Catholic flex bin. Way to go. Well, like John, was it John Mulaney said, because that's what needed to be changed in

the Catholic church. So we have the best calls of the year, right? Or not the best, but... Was it John Mulaney said because that's what needed to be changed in the Catholic Church so We have are the best calls of the year Right or my not the best, but these are your faves. This is what you picked Yes, all right. And so give us a rundown of a couple of them. So we have everyone's favorite I had a one-night stand with my wife stepmom. Oh, yeah, that's what we're stepmom's top just fell off He didn't have a choice. I where stepmom's top just fell off.

He didn't have a choice. Who's the real victim here, John? I don't know how to say this gently. I think that most, one of the greatest engineering feats in human history is the- The bikini top? The bra strap, yeah. Okay. The bikini top the bra strap. Yeah, okay. I just think many many bridges have been built using similar technology, right? They don't just fall off is what I'm trying to say no, no, no

Fascinating call. What else we got a woman who feels completely betrayed by her husband I thought you're gonna say by her co-worker and I was gonna flip it around and be like I know that feels I thought you're gonna say by her co-worker and I was gonna flip it around and be like I know that feels No by her husband. So we'll have to listen and figure out why and then we we touch on the great Arthur Brooks, right? Because everybody loved the Arthur Brooks interview. So in this one, he's gonna talk about why marriages fall apart. That's so good Alright, so if you're listening on Christmas Day, we're glad that you're with us. I Totally get it man glad that you're with us. I totally get it, man. Glad that you're with us. Go for a walk down the street.

Tell everybody you're doing something really, really important and check out my favorite calls of 2024 and Merry Merry Christmas. Let's go out to Jacksonville, Florida and talk to C.A.M. What's up, Cam? Hi, how's it going, Dr. John? I'm good, brother. What's up Cam? Hi, how's it going Dr. John? I'm good brother, what's up man? I guess I will just cannonball right on into this one. The question is how do me and my wife rebuild our marriage after I had a one night stand

or like a hookup I guess with her stepmother? Eric, let's just as they say, back that thing up. Say what? Yeah, really, it's a wild situation. They can all see this and it's like, what happened? We were all drinking together. We all killed a bottle of tequila, the three of us within the hour. And then it was just me and her stepmom in the, in her apartment. My wife

went downstairs with the kids and all that good stuff and they were swimming and basically she was asleep and I was on the couch just waiting for, I was going to wake her up for her work call. She was like supervising or whatever and had to and Like send a closing email so I was staying there making sure she woke up to do that and when she woke up her top fell off she was wearing a bikini her top fell off and put it back on and then I kind of like pursued after that and So your your your marriage is over. You're not going to rebuild this?

Yeah. I mean I can't think of a more egregious violation man. I can. Kids. And beyond kids this. Yeah it's definitely... You've blown it up. I think the integrist thing to do is to

treat your wife with dignity and respect as y'all make I mean I can't think of a murder like just dishonoring thing you could do to somebody man I agree it was the most biggest dumbest decision I've ever made and my biggest regret and I just. How long you been married? This year would be five years. Those kids yours?

It was her, one of them is and she was with my, her little brother and sister as well. Okay, so your wife has two kids by somebody else? No, she, there's three down there, one it was just one that was our daughter. That's the only kid we have. And then the other kids were her stepmom's kids. Okay.

Um, her brother and sister. So obviously, you know, this, this is just like insanely sensational and it's going to make for good YouTube clips and all that. And you also know that what you did is like, it's just the lowest thing you could do to somebody. But so I'm not going to kick you while you're down anymore. Like what's the world been like since then? I've just been trying to figure everything out. Um, been really really hard. Um, I mean I've, you know, I've been trying hard to forgive myself and just to,

you know, just work on myself is all I can do at this point. I mean, I, me and my wife are cohabitating right now. We're still in the same room and stuff. We've been able to go and do things together and they've been civil and then, you know, nothing, nothing crazy. Our marriage wasn't perfect before this by any means, obviously, or this wouldn't have even been close to happening, but.

Is your wife gonna stay married to you? She's in limbo right now. I mean. What's the limbo? We just need to work on our, I mean we've been attached at the hip since we were 17 and really lost ourselves in our relationship. We just got, you know just got together real quick and moved

out of state after that real quick and then had a baby by 18. And so our whole life was just each other and baby. And then that's not a bad thing. And that's not a reason why you hook up with somebody's mom. Not at all. There's never a reason why that it should not have happened. There's no, I'm not trying to make any excuse. I've tried to take accountability from them, you know. Sure. I'm saying like, I'm saying like the, there's like this just annoying cultural narrative

like you got to go find yourself. No, I mean you don't. You make a commitment with somebody and you'll figure it out. Right? You'll say we're going to build something together. Um, so what do you want to do next? I want my family more than anything. And I don't understand it. I've blown that up and I'm just trying to,

I just can't think of not coming home to my daughter every night and not come home to my wife every night like it just doesn't life doesn't seem like there's it obviously there's more to go and there's I mean I'm I'm 23 about to be 24 so there's there's more to go you're a quarter way you're a quarter the way done done. First quarter's over. I just can't see life without them. I really can't. Because you'll have a child together,

unless you're going to abandon this child, you will be in each other's lives forever. Right. So that's a given. I don't know unless you'all have some sort of defining, the only word I can think of right now, and this isn't accurate, this isn't right, but this is the word that's in my head.

Y'all have to have some sort of line. Like I'm thinking of the word funeral keeps coming to mind. You have to have a funeral for what was. What we had is over. And as you described it, the stumbling from 17 into 18 to, oh my gosh, we're parents, to trying to make it all work, to I got really wasted and hooked up with her mom. Like that is all over. And you got a dropped into a coal plunge

like you're an adult, right? And when you're 18, 19, 20 and you have a little one, it's easy to kind of still be a kid but also be a parent you know what I mean? Like you're a grown up adult who may have just blown up his whole life. Definitely blew up his whole life.

Right? So there has to be some sort of line drawn. This was and now this is. And that might be you sitting down saying, okay, I have blown up our life. What we had is over. Both of us have to be adults and sit at this table and decide what we're going to do next.

Do you want to be married to me? And she's probably going to say, I don't know, because the thought of answering that question is, she knows her life is different now, is blown up, but I don't know that she's metabolized it. Right? Yeah, it's definitely taken some time. It's only two months ago on the eighth.

And the fact that the knife that cut her is still sleeping in the same bed, it's just really close. So it might mean you go and saying I'm gonna take 30 days for you and I'm gonna go live with my mom with a friend with whatever and let the smoke clear. Right and we we did that for about two weeks I would say, and then my, staying at my mom's,

and she lives off of a dirt road though, and a bunch of storms came through and made it pretty inaccessible to get through, especially with my car. And so then went to the couch, and then kind of went, from there went back into the bed and whatnot. And it doesn't sound like she's ready for you to be back yet. Yeah, harsh.

I mean, it's. Does she work? Not as of now. She's been at home with her daughter. She's going, I think she's starting today to get her GED. She's going to the local schools out here and doing the testing and stuff like that. Okay. She didn't get it.

So she's taking the GED today? Yeah, sure. She's starting the class and I think she's taking the pre-quizzes and pre-tests and all that stuff to see where she's at. So I want to challenge you. Okay? I know that the life of your daughter will be different without a dad in the home. Okay, I know that.

I also know that a wife living in terror of her marriage will negatively impact your daughter as well. And so I can imagine your 22 or 23 year old wife hearing the most insane news ever and having to stay in the same lion's den of the lion who just mauled her present and her future because she has no money. She has nowhere to go. Right. And so part of me thinks it would be of high integrity to you for you to say, honey, I you're trapped. And I know that. Is she still flinching around you?

Um, there are good days and bad days. Um, we've been able to go to the movies and we were just able to, you know, this last week I went to the escape room together and went to dinner and, and now we're still doing things like that and able to laugh together. And, you know, I've been able to be intimate and hug and kiss her. And then, and then other days it's not going like that, which I completely understand. I want to challenge you to sit down with your wife and say, you've heard me say this before, but I want you to hear me say it again, I blew our lives to smithereens. And my ultimate dream is that you will rebuild something new with me.

But I also know that you need time to breathe. So for 30 days, I'm going to go live here and I'm going to take care of all the bills at this house. You're not going to worry about anything. I want you to be able to breathe. And I'm going to write you a letter every day and put it in the mailbox. I would love for you to write. Maybe you present her with a nice journal, like something you go somewhere and buy a nice one today and Put it on the on the I want you to get this stuff out of your body and write down Because I know hurt your ad

But if you keep hovering And she is legitimately trapped as a 22 year old with with a high school diploma. Does she even graduate high school? No, sir. Okay, she's got nothing and A high school diploma? Does she even graduate high school? No sir. Okay, she's got nothing. And she has to tread water. You've heard of fight or flight, right? Right. There's another one called fawn where you have to nuzzle up next to the person who just tried to kill you

or just blew up everything because you got nowhere to go. It's the safest place for you. That's her. Okay. Do the next dignified right thing and give her a chance to breathe and make sure she's got no worries when it comes to money for the next month Okay, and if I have a kind of a wimpier question for you based off of that then um, I Just feel

Like we've both like established that we're both just codependent on each other and that you know, I don't know, it's just hard for me to like... You don't even know what that means dude. That's a couple of 23 year olds Googling what that term means. Very true. You don't even know what that means. So don't try to give any diagnostic excuses. You got to be a grown man.

You're 23. You just blew your family up. You have to say, okay, I'm going to do the next right thing, which is to let my wife stand back up on her own two feet because I knocked her down. And then we're going to come to the table and I'm going to say, I'll do anything it takes. What does rebuilding trust look like? And after 30 days of the smoke clearing her catching her breath, she may look across the

table and say, nothing, you slept with my mom. Right. her catching her breath she may look across the table and say nothing you slept with my mom right or she might say here's what it's gonna take I'm gonna need this this and this and this and then you as a grown man have to make a choice that is that makes sense it does and I'm not trying to minimize the situation or make an excuse but I didn't fully sleep with her mom it doesn't matter that matter that matter that matter that matter that matter that They didn't fully sleep with her mom. It doesn't matter Doesn't matter it happened and it's Try to take accountability from the beginning and I know I know

I thought she didn't find out or anything I'd like sat her down and told her which also doesn't make a difference But right I mean it is what it is what it is and you need to understand from her perspective she lost her mom too yeah like she's lost everything and then this past trauma from her stepmother as well I would I would imagine so I would imagine so and so I think that we're doing the next compassionate right thing which is you're gonna have groceries the rents taken care of the bills are taken care of, you're going to be able to breathe. Even if you want to go one step further, which I think you should, I'm going to help with childcare, whatever you got to do.

And maybe 30 days and then at the end of 30 days, I want us to go eat breakfast at such and such place. And I want us to ask the question, are we going to stay married? And I want you to tell the question are we gonna stay married and I want you to tell her I hope we can And I understand we got to rebuild everything Okay, but I want y'all to have a date on the calendar when you're gonna come back together Right that makes sense and say text me if you need me to come get our little girl, but we're not sleeping together We're not hugging and kissing. We're not we're just taking a break Is that cool

It's gonna suck but if that's what's needed I'll do absolutely thing to To move on from this even if it's not in the direction that I'm hoping for okay The thing you can do next you can undo what happened the thing you can do next, you can't undo what happened. The thing you can do next is be a person of high integrity and honor moving forward. And that's just been eaten me alive too, because I've, you know, it's thrown my moral compass so off because I've always told myself I wasn't that person.

I would never be able to do that. And, you know, I've looked down on others that have done that and they're like, okay, well they can do that to the person they say that they valid everything to they can do that to me. That's right. That's right. And so you are now have to reestablish trust with you.

Right. And that means you have to do the next right thing. You can't will it or you can't think it into being you just have to act it. You have to do the next trustworthy thing. I've often found trust rebuilding. have to act it, you have to do the next trustworthy thing. I've often found trust rebuilding, if you have other people in your life that you've wronged, it'd be a good time to get on the phone and call them and say you're sorry.

It's doing the next right thing with your wife and with your kid. It is going to do some acts of service, so twice a week I want you to go to a food kitchen. I want you to go do the next right thing that's bigger than you so that you can reestablish trust with yourself. If you go to a local church,

why don't you go sit with a pastor and say, hey, here's what I did, man. I blew up everything. I was one of the very first things I did. Good. Went there, talked with them. With the therapy immediately, we've done couples therapy. We've done, tried, we've done,

try to do that stuff and couples therapy didn't really seem to help that she didn't really give any, you know, tools to use or any kind of plan of action. Yeah, sometimes going to couples therapy right after something this big is like trying to go to PT instead of into surgery. It's like being in a car wreck and going straight to the physical therapist. It's not time yet, man.

You still gotta reset the bones and stitch somebody up and take out all the bad tissue, let those wounds heal, and then you can start going to physical therapy. It's just a matter of going too fast, man. Yeah, I think you can do the next right thing, man. And I hope more than anything that your daughter doesn't grow up without a dad. And so if your wife decides, hey, I just can't move past this such a horrific violation of our marriage covenant. I hope you will honor her and say, I get it.

And I'm going to be the best dad and co-parent I can be. I'm going to be an adult. I'm going to be a grown up, even though I'm sad and heartbroken. And I hope you will do the things you got to do to rebuild trust in yourself. And maybe by God's grace, she comes around and says, okay, okay I'm gonna go slowly but surely and we're gonna rebuild this marriage and here's what trust is gonna look like. Reestablishing trust. You can't drink. I want to see your phone etc etc etc and you're gonna say cool I'm a hundred percent in because I believe in you and I believe in us and I believe in being a good dad. This is a big one

man. It's a big one. Go slow, go slow. You will not fix this in two months, three months, six months, one year. It's gonna take a long time to rebuild this. Constantly focus on doing the next right thing. For you, for your daughter, for your wife, for your marriage. Make sure to call brother. We'll be right back. Ayo! I'm a founding member of the Get Off the Internet and Go Outside Club. I think I'm the only member. And yet, I like all of you find myself at work and in my personal life pretty much living

entirely on the internets. And as a society, we're creating more and more online accounts all of the time. We're signing up for promos and giving away our emails and personal numbers and buying everything with our phones. I get hundreds of emails to my personal account, my business account. Every business wants to survey me and become my friend now. And everyone everywhere is trying to sell me all kinds of stuff.

And it drives me nuts. And with all of our online activity, do we really know where our data is and who has it? Chances are high that data broker websites have your information and they're selling it to scammers, spammers, and other shady people. But when you use Delete Me, Delete Me will find and remove your data from hundreds of sites and they will send reports to you throughout the year to show you exactly what they've removed and from where.

As of now, I'm getting fewer and fewer of those spammy texts and phone calls, which allow me to let my guard down just a little and feel some peace on the internets. This holiday season, share the peace by giving a Delete Me subscription to someone you love. Individual Delete Me plans start as low as $9 a month. Go to JoinDeleteMe.com slash Deloney today for 20% off.

That's JoinDeleteMe.com slash Deloney. Christmas time is here. There's parties, there's buying last minute gifts, there's being sad that nobody bought you anything, there's traveling, traveling running around all of it and there's so much going on that we can forget to set aside time for what's truly Important and the good news is that hallow is here to keep your spiritual priorities in check with you this holiday season Hallow is the world's number one prayer and meditation app I use haow every single day, I love it. And right now their Advent Pray 25 challenge

called For God So Loved the World is in full effect. Plus, Hallow has great book studies led by Bear Grylls and Jonathan Rumi. They've got prayer guides, a Bible study on the book of Ephesians going on, kids, Advent programming, and more. And if that's not enough, you can join Hallow's 12 Days of Christmas music right now.

Listen, this season can be an amazing time of chaos and an amazing time to encounter God's love and find the true joy of Christmas. And Hallow wants to help you experience all of this for three months for free right now when you sign up at hallow.com slash deloney. You can enjoy all of this for three months for free at hello that's H a L L o w dot com slash

deloni what's up Heather yes hi dr. John thank you for taking my call thank you beautiful what's up well I have been married for many, many years. How many is many? You said that perfectly. 50. Congratulations. Yeah. Oh, maybe.

Maybe not. Here we go. Okay. I retract my congratulations. Of course. My husband and I, we started a business about 30 years ago. Okay. We were in the same business.

We were in the same business. We were in the same business. We were in the same business. We were in the same business. We were in the same business. We were in the same business. We were in the same business. We were in the same business. We were in the same business. back to my congratulations. Of course, of course. My husband and I, we started a business about 30 years ago. I left the job that I had to help start the business. And as you know, over a 30 year time period, we had our ups, we had our downs.

We came very close to bankruptcy twice. We came very close to bankruptcy twice. I took my pension out of my job that I had for the company. I used inheritance that I had for the company. And fast forward to today, the company is doing fabulous. Awesome. Just fabulous. Our daughter came in and she's been helping us and we've been doing really great.

And in the process of us doing really great, we're kind of thinking about, you know, selling the company or giving it to the daughter to carry it on. So we're not sure what direction that's gonna go. But the reason I'm calling is, my husband gave me a document as to how things were gonna go when we sell the business.

He had- Whoa, whoa, whoa, what? Yeah, yeah. we sell the business. He had, he had, he had money, he had money divided into trust and, um, he, he, he never, he never spoke to me about what was going to happen. In fact, the way he told me was that he was the only one on the corporate papers and I had no say. Your name's not on the business? No. Oh, sweet Heather.

Oh man, what a mess. Why did he suddenly start flexing on you this long? Has he always run like this or is this new behavior? No, this is this is the way he runs I'm instantly thinking of a woman I sat with Who is married to a man who's a bit older than her? He had vast wealth was very wealthy a good I knew him, he's a friend of mine. He's an older guy. He passed away and he actually left everything to his wife.

She couldn't afford to buy groceries because of the process of unwinding everything. Like it wasn't in her name. And even though she was a beneficiary, I remember sitting with her saying, she's saying, I don't even want to check in. And so that naming became really important because it allows you to maneuver, it allows you to make decisions. He dropped dead today. And man, you've got a business that's not yours. Your name's not on it. Now, technically it would be yours and it'd get all probated out and it'd be a big old mess. And that's assuming your daughter didn't suddenly have a flip of switch, which I've seen happen a jillion times. But why in the world is your name not on the business? Well I think when we started we had really no money and we just got a like a boilerplate

form. Sure. And he put his name on everything and didn't put mine on it and I didn't really think about it. I don't blame you. Although I did have a friend who knew my husband 30 years ago and said, you better get your name on that paper. And I pushed that under the rug.

She was absolutely right. So you're here. How can I help you? Well I am dealing with a sense of betrayal. I am dealing with a sense of dishonor. And I am trying to navigate how I go forward to deal with someone who has totally dishonored me. Yeah.

You don't navigate that. You head directly through the middle of it. And if y'all been together 50 years, you're probably gonna have to get an attorney or possibly your daughter walks with you. You have to be prepared for him, for this to go caustic is basically what I'm saying. And I don't know what kind of guy he is.

Meaning... Well, she... Go ahead. What did your daughter say? I was going to say the daughter's going with him because he's leaving a big percentage of the business to her. But it's not his to leave, it's y'all's to leave. But that's not what he's saying.

What are you supposed to do in retirement when he drops dead? Which statistically speaking, he will long before you. Well, he's going to have a trust. He has a trust set up and I would. Oh, cute. He's going to continue to pay you an allowance out of your business? Yes. Yes.

That's madness. Yes. I hate that it's taken 50 years. We could sit together for a long time and unpack this one. Is this one of those situations where this is devastating and not surprising? Correct. Yeah. So I think the question you have to ask yourself is are you going to go to war or not?

I'm a little too old for that. I don't, I'm worried about you. I'm worried about you. Because this is 50% your business. But that's not what he's saying. I'm telling you what is legally accurate. I don't care what he's saying. He's proven his character.

I'm just shocked by it, to be honest with you. It just doesn't make any sense to me how people run like this. But I guess you could sit across the table from him and say, hey, you gave me this piece like this. I think that's what I'm going to have to do. And your daughter's going along with it? She is she cool with cutting you out? Yes. Yes, because the way it's written, she's going to benefit from it, from the way he's

planned it. Oh man. Because my hope in this situation is she would call time out and say, this isn't right. No. Man. And I have other children. What are they saying? They are, they're not even talking to them right now.

Okay. I'm never a fan of doing things behind another spouse's back. It goes against 99.9% of just the way I roll. But I think you need to call an attorney and figure out what the next right step for you is. I think you need to set up that consultation and pay that fee and walk through it. And if you have your tax returns from the last few years, I would take them in and just explain your situation.

Here's what this business is worth Because they're gonna run a net present value on the business and say okay, it's worth about this if you were to sell it and Here's the path here's your legal path in this state For sitting down with your husband saying actually this is what's gonna happen next And I can't give you legal advice. I don't know enough. I'm not that smart. What I can tell you is your feeling of betrayal is real and it's right. Your feeling of dishonoring is right. Your feeling of that my husband and my daughter's hanging me out to dry here is right.

The idea that you've put your entire life, including your inheritance, your money, for a thing you all built to find out you're going to get an allowance from your daughter when it's all sitting done? No way, dude. No way. No way. That's how he has it set up. Yeah, no way.

What does he say to you? Why does he think so little of you? Well, because he believes that he's the one in charge and he doesn't think that I would be able to run the business without him there and that the daughter needs to be running the business. And I believe she should run the business because he's been training her for years. And I think that's great.

But to totally take away, you know, any stock or any ownership at all, everything he's giving everything to her. And she knows how I feel about it. So it's not like she doesn't know. She does know. Yeah. I mean, I, I just know about homes.

I don't know about businesses in, in, in Michigan, but I can see a scenario where it gets down to, um, a forced sale of this business and that might cost you marriage. Uh huh. a forced sale of this business and that might cost you marriage. Uh huh. That's the dilemma I have. Yeah. What's the business worth? About 25 million.

Yeah. So it might cost you your marriage, but you might be sitting on the sidelines with 12.5 million dollars. I can't tell you what to do here. I can just sit with you heartbroken. Well, you've confirmed what I thought I'd have to do and I do appreciate your time. Yeah. I'm heartbroken with you, my friend. I wish 50-year marriages were honored, not worked around.

I work here at Ramsey Solutions and I listen to Dave Ramsey's been on the air forever. here at Ramsey Solutions and I listen to Dave Ramsey's been on the air forever and he's fond of saying Sharon Ramsey hasn't worked a day of her life outside of the home. She's worked like a madhouse for 40 years inside the home. I just can't imagine that playing out that way. Like there's a lot wrong with this picture, but it starts with dishonoring of you. You're right. I'm sorry. I appreciate your call and your advice.

I would call somebody today. I would not go out to that by myself either. If you have another child that would go with you, preferably a girlfriend that would go with you, but I would not go to that meeting by yourself because you're going to hear different things and you're going to have a mix of anger and rage and heartbreak and you want somebody else that's going to be able to be present, fully present there with you, taking notes as well. So don't go to that meeting by yourself, but do make that call. And yuck, I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. Hey, this time of year, most of us just want to stay in and get super cozy. My perfect cozy night at home is something that me and my family call bed pile. And that's when my whole family gets under some blankets around the fire. And we either read some books out loud, like a bunch of nerds, or we watch a movie together. For a lot of people though,

it's hard to get cozy around the holidays because they're battling loneliness. They're battling grief. They're battling lost memories. If that's you, I wanna encourage you to reach out to a therapist today. Therapy can be a safe place to settle in and work through scary, hard, and painful emotions

and replenish your energy and take care of yourself. I recommend BetterHelp to help you find comfort during the chaos and stress that can be attached to the holidays. BetterHelp is 100% online therapy and you can talk with your therapist when it works for your schedule. Just fill out a short online survey

to get matched with a licensed therapist and you can switch therapists at any time for no extra cost. Find comfort this holiday season with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash deloney to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash Deloney. You meet somebody and you're taken by them and they're clearly taken by you.

Walk us through the brain chemistry from there to, oh no. Yeah, yeah, so typically, 59% of these relationships are starting online now. 59%, it's eating the world. So that's how it's happening. But still between 15 and 20% of relationships that end in marriage start to work. So these are kind of in person.

You know, these are not media. You're probably not falling in love with somebody on the Zoom screen. It's still when you're going to a place and you meet somebody and you're both available, or ideally you're both available because most affairs actually start to work too. We can actually talk about why that happens neurochemically.

So okay, so the way that it starts is the ignition of relationships of romantic relationships is it has to do, it's hormonal. And so it's testosterone and estrogen and you know, the sex hormones are the ignition of attraction, basic attraction. And so we're uncomfortable with that because what does that mean? That seems sort of unseemly. No, that's natural, that's biology. I see you and I'm attracted to you.

Yeah, you're attracted to another person, right? Now, if that's all it is, then you're gonna end up in relationships that people regret, that are not healthy, et cetera, et cetera. Generally speaking, when you're attracted to each other and get to know each other a little bit, then the second stage happens really, really quickly, just within days, ordinarily,

that involves two different neuromodulators, which is dopamine and norepinephrine. Those are two neuromodulators that govern euphoria when you see somebody and anticipation. Anticipation, euphoria. Everybody who's listening to us, watching us right now, has fallen in love, almost everybody. And it's like,

can't wait, can't wait, can't wait. It's like, I just got it, the text just came in. I think that's that person, you see the person from afar, you have that weird feeling of euphoria and anticipation. I didn't know adrenaline is in on this. Yeah, yeah, norepinephrine, not epinephrine, norepinephrine, which is related, of course, it's all from the adrenal glands, it's highly related.

I didn't know that I was part of the game. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, so that's you gotta get that's gas Yeah, that's gas and what that's doing is is taking you then to step three Which ordinarily will start happening a couple of weeks in once you're dating and know each other, okay Then what happens is this crazy thing where there's another you implicate another? Neuromodulator, but it doesn't increase, it plummets. It falls off a map. That's serotonin. So now everybody knows at this point,

they think they know that clinical depression implicates serotonin. So serotonin levels are too low in the synapse of the brain. And for, you know, blah, blah, blah, gobbledygook, what's going on is when people take antidepressant drugs, like Prozac, that's supposed to increase the amount of serotonin in the bloodstream that's in the synapse.

And so what, and why? Because there's all this evidence that when serotonin levels are low, you're going to feel sadness. You're going to feel rumination, ruminative sadness. Now that, a part of the brain that that's implicating is a thing called the ventrolateral prefrontal cortex. There's literally a structure in your brain

dedicated to rumination. Arr, I'm so stupid, I can't believe I did that, my life has been a mistake, et cetera, et cetera. What's the, for lack of better terms, what's, evolutionarily, that would preserve us, that would keep us in the tribe? Yeah, well, not necessarily. What it does is it makes you learn from your mistakes. When you ruminate on something that happened in the tribe. Yeah, well, not necessarily. What it does is it makes you learn from your mistakes.

When you ruminate on something that happened in the past, you learn from something that didn't go right so you don't do it again in the future. But it has other functions as well. That ventral, lateral, prefrontal cortex, it's ignited when serotonin levels fall. Another thing that it does is it involves creativity. Creativity is rumination.

So you're thinking about a business plan. You're thinking about writing a poem, a symphony, right? Wrrr, it's the same structure in the brain. Rumination. So sad, I'm so mad, she broke my heart. Or it's just like, I can't stop thinking about it. I can't stop thinking about it. And when you're falling in love.

This is step three. So serotonin level falls, the ventral lateral prefrontal cortex lights up like a Christmas tree and you ruminate on the other person because you're bonding on the other person. You're bonding to the other person. Now, it makes you do the insane things. Like I just sent a hundred text messages to that person

and I humiliated myself in the last hour because I was so freaked out about the fact that she didn't answer me, that he didn't say anything to me, or that he didn't sound right in that last call. He didn't sound right in that last call. So I said- But nowadays, the text message didn't look right.

It didn't look right, whatever it is, because we have a million ways to ascertain what's going on. And the reason that ordinarily you'd be like, I don't know, whatever, I'll figure it out, which you would in ordinary life, you can't do that because you're ruminating so much because your ventral lateral prefrontal cortex is turned on so high,

because your serotonin levels have fallen, because you're bonding to the, you're imprinting on the other person. That's what's going on. You're writing a symphony in your brain about the other person. Right, and your brain looks like you're clinically depressed in step three, right?

That's the reason that people are like, it's so wonderful, it's so terrible. That's why. It hurts. It's misery. And if you stayed there for the rest of your life, you'd want to die. You would literally want to die.

What you're trying to get to is the step four, where you have other hormones and neuropeptides, for example, oxytocin, which is a bonding hormone that says this is a member of my tribe. This is my kin. So that's when you're low, it's met. Yeah, well that's when, what will happen is you start to recognize somebody as your partner.

After a while, you have to go through these steps, but step four is the bonding that actually is involved in the production of oxytocin. So that's what you're trying to get to. That's what you wanna get to. One, two, three, four. It's wonderful, it's terrible, it's frightening, it's exciting, that's the whole thing.

But again, remember, you and I know, because this is our world, psychology is biology. It just is. And you're doing all this stuff, you're not an idiot. You're falling in love is the way that this works. If you understand this, you can manage it better. Now here's the- Do you want to though?

Cause I feel like that's what eHarmony does. Yeah, well eHarmony doesn't do this necessarily because it doesn't actually take us through the steps. Right, it drops you off. Right, it drops you off. But I remember, I skipped a final to go get coffee with my wife. And I literally rationed, like I'll talk talk to professor, we'll figure this out.

And that makes a fun, if my son was like, dad, I met this girl, I'm going to go get coffee. I would say, please, please go take your final. But also, I threw away a full, a full hundred percent track scholarship to university because I met a girl at a summer camp. And you know what I mean? I'm so bad. I'm so bad.

I threw it all away. I quit a job and moved to Spain. It made perfect sense. And I have my life because of it. And it's completely irrational. It's insanity. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I get it.

No, no. And for sure, I mean, you can manage it to a certain extent. The real problem, by the way, is when two people are falling in love but they're at different speeds going through the neurochemical cascade. Yeah, that was my Dean of Students job. Like, hey, this guy keeps texting me and I don't want him to text me. What's happening, there's a whole, there's a syndrome actually that's identifiable in the literature called hemophilia, not hemophilia, it's not a blood disorder.

No, it's my hemophilia. Emoculomancyphilia. No, it's my local romance, philia. Yeah, with, yeah, exactly. What it means is that you fall in love too quickly and there's a non-trivial number of women who suffer from this and they just go one, two, three, four. Off the, yeah. And the guy's like, we just met.

Oh, okay. And so the result is they get into relationships with what we call dark triad personalities. They're men who have high levels of narcissism, Machiavellianism and psychopathy. The red pill boys. They have psychopathic traits and they feed on this. For women who go right through the scale.

And so a lot of what I'm doing is I'm saying, if you've got this thing, you need to manage yourself because you need to understand yourself. Gotcha. And you need to understand the people who are gonna prey on you. Cause they will. You'll be a magnet for dark triads And be like every boyfriend I have is a psychopath, but it's literally true. Yeah

Not because you have bad luck, but because you're blinking light That says psychopaths welcome and here's here's the I Feel like 95% of the show has become un-Hollywoodizing everything. It is not sexy every morning. I would eat my body weight and gummy candy every day. It's a problem. And I have to decide, am I going to do that or not?

There is no Hollywood movie that I know of that's worth watching that somebody says, hey, I need to consciously and intentionally limit myself to three text messages a day to this person. That just doesn't exist. The question is always how do you feel, how do you feel, how do you feel? And I feel like in our culture we chase feeling off a cliff. Because that same feeling shows up this way, but that same feeling showed up for me 10 years in when I didn't feel it anymore.

And then your colleagues are like, well then. I guess it's not a soulmate. Or they say what I think is the most insane statement these days is that relationship just ran its course. They don't just stop, people quit. That's fine if you don't quit. But this idea that there's just a natural lifespan to some of this, it circles back to, you have to know what you're talking about

to then say, okay, oh gosh, that's me. And I'm not insane or broken or crazy, but I have to be intentional about this. For sure, I mean, that's why emotional self-management is so critically important. That starts with knowledge. That's why I do the science. I don't do the science

because it's whiz bang super cool. It is. I do it because it's in the public interest. And we get a better world when people fall in love and stay in love. That's it. But we have to call it that we have a body built for scarcity when it comes to food.

That's not our environment anymore. We have bodies designed for, there's two suitable mates in this tribe and dad and his dad's gonna pick them. And that's not our world anymore. We have bodies designed for, there's two suitable mates in this tribe and dad and his dad's gonna pick them. And that's not our world anymore. So we have to build structures. That's right. The thing that you're talking about that's really important that I talk about with a lot of my students, a lot of people, because I'm on the road all the time talking about these things with young people and not so young people, because everybody

wants love. People my age can fall in love just like a kid, because the brain is the brain. So the thing that I talk about is what's the realistic expectation as you've gone through this neurochemical cascade and you want a relationship to endure as opposed to simply be established. You establish a relationship, what do you want it to be?

What's the goal? And the answer is generally between two and five years after the initiation of the relationship, you don't want passionate love, you want companionate love, which sounds, my kids have heard me say this, they're like, dad, that's not hot. Wah, exactly.

Wah, wah. Companionate love has tons of passion in it. But companionate love is based on best friendship. That's what it's based on. The foundation is friendship. The foundation of enduring love, enduring romantic love best friendship. That's what it's based on. The foundation is friendship. The foundation of enduring love, enduring romantic love is friendship. Here's the reason that people will fall in love

and then will break up and realize they hate each other. They don't just like whatever, they hate each other. The reason is because they're disappointed about the fact that they actually were incompatible as friends and they've slept together. They've traveled together, they've done all this stuff, they told each other their secrets and they're not as friends. And they've slept together. They've traveled together. They've done all this stuff. They told each other their secrets.

And they're not even friends. They don't even like each other. And the other side is, I talk to couples and y'all sleep together, how many, like, three times a year? And they're like, dude, this is my best friend. This is my best friend. And we've figured out what works for us. And that sounds awful, dude, this is my best friend. This is my best friend. And like we figured out what works for us.

Yeah, and that sounds awful. Yeah, yeah. You know what's more awful? Is not being able to stay in love. That's right. Not being able to actually have a best friend. Not having the person who truly understands you at a deep level.

Now, it's better. I mean, marriages tend to be happier when they're based on best friendship and where they're still sleeping together. Of course, of course. Of course, but the truth Of course, of course. But the truth of the matter is that you can't make the enemy the perfect enemy, the good.

That's right. Right, when we're talking about these things. So there's all sorts of ways to organize your life, but a marriage cannot be organized over the long term around something that's not deep friendship. That's a constant. That is so counter-cultural. Totally, totally, totally.

I mean, this guy, you know. That's madness. That's not Disney. That's not Disney. That is so countercultural. Totally, totally, totally. I mean, it's like, you know. That's madness. That's not Disney. That's not Disney. It's my best friend. I mean, that's not the end of the film. It's my best friend. It's like, dude, I don't know.

That's not happily ever after in the movies, but that is happily ever after in real life. I've got a few best friends. We've been friends for 30 years. Right. We still get together a couple times a year and we live all over the country. We've all done stupid stuff to each other, said stupid things, that's not funny man, but like... But we have a couple of non-negotiables that have emerged that like

you can raise kids, you can bury parents, you can go through cancer together, but if this singular thing happens, I guess none of it, right? It, it, it, everything feels so disposable. But I keep looping back to as you're talking, you just keep looping back to how does this feel? And where's the passion? Where's the passion? Instead of where's the foundation?

We're going to figure this out. Right? We're going to work through it. And maybe what we had is over. We're going to build something else. Of course. Because we said we would. Right. Yeah. And that does not seem to be having lived that.

Yeah. I get it. It's one of the hardest things for me to try to distill down and explain in a simple way. Yeah, it is. And this is one of the reasons that couples that are formed in religious communities, they tend to do quite well. Right. Because they have this supernatural basis for the relationship, as opposed to the feelings basis

for the relationship. If your assumption is that my emotions are everything, woe be unto you. Because that depends on what you're digesting. That's a life of hell. It's terrible, it's terrible. By the way, this is not just about marriage, this is not just about relationships.

Everything, everything, everything. Look, emotions are produced by the limbic system of the brain, a structure of tissue evolved between two and 40 million years ago. It's designed to take signals that come from the outside below your level of consciousness and translate them into a language that says either you should approach or avoid a thing.

Don't die. That's what emotions are for. Emotions are for two things, to keep you alive and get your calories and find mates so that you can survive and pass on your genes. That's what emotions are for. Biologically, that's what emotions are for, but we've built them up into this cosmic thing.

No, no, no, man. Their job's not to tell you the truth. The job is all it is to keep you not dead. And so the whole point is you have a prefrontal cortex in your brain. The tissue right behind the bumper, right behind a brain, 30% of your brain by weight. That's what makes you human is the prefrontal cortex

as opposed to being a squirrel or something right behind your forehead. You want the emotional information to get to your prefrontal cortex. So you can decide what do these emotions mean? Where they come from? What am I gonna do? And should I disregard them?

But if you're living according to your emotions, man, you're the squirrel. You know, it's like, gotta get a nut. Sleep with them, sleep with them, sleep with them. No, we just met, right? Yeah, yeah, and it's like, I'm not feeling it today. That's okay. That's okay, go work it out.

Go work it out, or what do I wanna be tomorrow? I don't feel like it today. Put your phone down and look at your kids in the eye. Yeah, yeah. And one of the things that your prefrontal cortex can do that your limbic system can't is when you have, and by the way, this is one of the great secrets of the most, the marriages with the greatest longevity, right? When you feel avoidance, you practice approach. That's what great marriages have in common.

And that's pure prefrontal cortex. Your limbic system says, avoid, avoid, you're annoyed. She bums me out, she's irritating me, she's on my case. There's dishes in the sink, there's this. I'm just gonna go down to the man cave and watch a game. That's it. Right, no, no, no, no. That's when you say, bring it in.

I'm gonna go hug. I'm gonna, I love you. That's when you say, you say, I love you most when you feel it the least. It's like there's a, you can get one, I have one touch flower ordering on my phone, right? And I touch a button on my phone and flowers go to my house, my house, right?

And I do it not when I'm feeling the greatest warmth from my wife, but when I'm feeling the iciest, right, for Esther. Like I've been married almost 33 years at this point, so I got a lot of tricks under my belt. It's like click, it's like I'm not feeling it, click, right, and because I want to practice approach when I'm feeling avoidance. Unfortunately, Esther's figured it out. Like what's wrong?

I got flowers. Well, but but so I was like what's wrong? I was traveling I was traveling and This I just I just flew in this morning. I was traveling and You know those traveling phone calls you get a little short. Yeah, and I was short and I didn't like it I don't have I don't know how these phones work. And so the guy who travels with me I was like hey, do you have that thing where you can order food and send it? Well, you send ice cream to my house? And he's like, okay, I century do And so anyway, I got a message later that was just all hearts and it was like a hey, thanks is awesome and

But it was that I can stew. I'm on the road. I don't have to see anybody. I can just be all dramatic But that's anxiety right that is every I don't want to work out I don't if you head into it, it's always on the other side of it. It's never the other it's never avoidant, right? Yeah, and this is this is how you know, the the master of your brain is governing the emissary You know when the prefrontal cortex is mastering the limbic system of the brain, like you need emotions. You'd be dead without them. You'd be dead every week without them, right? I mean, and people who want to live without so-called bad feelings, they don't understand

emotions. But these are physiological responses to the outside world. You need to govern them using your full capabilities, your full capacities. That's what it means to be fully alive. That's what it means to be a human, right? And when you're watching the movies that say, go with your feelings, you're gonna screw this up and you're gonna be unhappy. What's up, what's up?

Hey, Dr. John Delaney here. I am stoked to be coming to you live with my friend Dave Ramsey on the Money in Relationships Tour. You, the audience, are gonna get to vote right from your seat live and tell Dave and I what you want us to talk about. You can pick from topics that impact your life the most, like boundaries, raising emotionally smart kids, money anxiety, and so much more.

We're getting real about real life, and we're not holding anything back. It's all going down April through May 2025. We'll be in Louisville, Durham, Atlanta, Phoenix, Fort Worth, and Kansas City. Prices are the lowest they'll ever be right now, so grab your tickets today at ramsysolutions.com slash tour. That's ramsysolutions.com slash tour. All right, pa rum pum pum. No! Listen, if you stay with us this long on Christmas day, I'm

so glad you did. You listened all the way through. Can we all just agree that wherever we happen to find ourselves over the next day, two days, three days, when the little drummer boy comes on in protest, we're going to walk out of the room. Okay, hold on. I have a question. So, if you don't like, we know what your least favorite Christmas song is. What is your favorite Christmas song? What's one that just fills your heart with holiday joy? Up on the housetop, rain, like that song, I don't know why, but it's in my soul.

Out jumps good old Santa Claus. That is not in any way what I expected. Well, I used to lay in bed and wait for the clip clops. And my dad used to be like, hey man, if you listen real quiet, you can hear the deer hooves on the roof. And I used to try until I just went to sleep. And I just that song like, up on the house top. Ah, it just gets in my soul. That's my jam, dude. That's my jam. Not perumpa pum.

And by the way, listen, we just cleared this up. There's nobody still listening, but there's six or seven of you who are having a rough Christmas day. You're still with us. Listen, listen. I know there are various pop versions and rock versions and metal versions or whatever of Parumpa Pum Pum, little drummer boy. You can armor all, you can shine up, you can rap a dog turd in the nicest leather.

It's still a dog turd. You can have the greatest... Parumpa Pum Pum! The song still sucks! It's still a dog not it's not if One day some of my favorite punk and metal bands decide to do up on the housetop reindeer But anyway, hey love you guys Merry Merry Christmas Seriously, take your headphones out, turn this off, and go be with people or the woods.

Go for a walk, do something. Love you guys, bye.