The Dr. John Delony Show - Having a Baby Boy and We’re Disappointed (Is That OK?)

Episode Date: May 16, 2022

Today, we’re talking to an expecting parent who’s disappointed their second child isn’t going to be a girl, a mom struggling to move forward since her daughter hates her boyfriend, and a mom who just discovered her brother has been molesting her 5-year-old for three months. Lyrics of the Day: "Rain" - The Teskey Brothers 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 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. So, yeah, thanks for talking with us. So we found out a few weeks ago that a extended relative has been sexually molesting our six-year-old daughter. We involved the authorities at that point. And there has been some negative feedback from other family members on that. Yeah, well, screw them. They don't get a vote. What up, what up? This is John with the Dr. John Deloney Show.

So happy that you are with us. Talking about mental health, relationships, I don't know, education, school, whatever's going on in your life that involves people. That's what we're going to talk about. If you want to be on the show, give me a shout, 1-844-693-3291. It's 1-844-693-3291, or you can go to johndeloney.com slash ask. Two big deals today.

Number one, James is out, and Will Rudder, the guru, is driving. And here's the thing. So James is an incredible guitarist, and he mostly plays Fenders. Here's the thing. James and I were in one of the greatest metal bands of all time for one show, and he played a Gibson the whole show, and it made everything. I mean, it was incredible. It changed him. Now he doesn't shave at all.

He bathes rarely. It's a whole thing. He wears leather pants around the office. It changed him. Now he doesn't shave at all. He bathes rarely. It's a whole thing. He wears leather pants around the office. It's awesome. And then there's Will. There's Will. Will is a better guitar player than me by like 1,000%. Can't even hold a candle. Here's the problem.

Will loves Creed. And he plays a Paul Reed Smith. And if that's inside baseball for you folks who don't play guitar, just Google it. In fact, don't. Don't. You don't want that in your search engine because you'll start getting things like ads for, I don't know, weird shoes and Hyundai's and stuff like that. It's a whole underworld. Just don't become a Paul Reed Smith person.

And I also say that out of jealousy because Will is just better than me. I have to just own that. Here's the second thing. So, Kelly, so great. Yesterday, I'm minding my own dad business, sitting in my own dad chair. Sheila, we got chairs, and it's awesome. I said that, so we got like chairs that are comfortable to sit in, not just like wooden chairs.

We've never had those in our house. And Josephine comes in, my daughter's six, and here's a direct quote. Dad, mind you, like sunshine's out. It's's like 5 30 or 6 o'clock in the evening She just sticks her head out of my bedroom Dad, have you ever seen mom naked? And I thought to myself, I guess we're doing this now and I was like, yes I have To which she her face looks like I just grew 11 heads and a couple of arms.

It was stunning. And the only natural question that she could follow up with was, has she seen you naked? I was like, oh, man. No, your mom actually closes her eyes. No, I did. I was like, yeah, she has. And to see the confusion slash dismay

slash cackling, giggling that went on, it wasn't giggling. It was like, it was like the Joker when she was a child, if he was a woman and was a child.

The dismay and the, so then she just closed the door and I thought, yes, because I knew my wife was in there and she was going to finish the rest of that and I thought, yes, because I knew my wife was in there and she was going to finish the rest of that train of thought with her, which was super awesome.

Didn't see that one coming. That's all I have to say about that. Let's go to Jenny in Oregon. What's up, Jenny? Hey, John. How's it going? I'm recovering. And you?

Sounds like it. Oh, I haven't had those questions yet Mine's only nine months old So I'll get there Listen it's so great I wish you'd seen it In our house we talk about that all the time

I guess she just never Put five and five together And anyway The follow up question was Do y'all just stare at each other She just went down the rabbit hole for a minute So anyway good luck with that. Enjoy these silent years while you have them.

Right. So what's up? Well, my question for you today, my husband and I are actually expecting our second in October. Congrats. Thank you. And we're both struggling with a little bit of gender disappointment. We both were really hoping for a little girl,

and while we are excited, we are having another little boy, and so I'm trying to really figure out how to navigate that. Both my husband and I, unfortunately, he's at work right now, so I'm kind of speaking for the both of us as far as that goes, but we're needing some help is we're really kind of struggling emotionally. So, um, this sounds deeper than just traditional disappointment or just bummed out. So it sounds like there's another layer to this. Talk to me about that. Oh, I'm sure there probably is. Um, so we found out last,

let's see, last Monday, we found out we were having a little boy and I slept on it and I did, I'm actually better with it. And I'm really starting to lean more towards excitement and the idea that our kids are going to be 15 months apart. So they'll have, you know, they'll be a little brothers. They'll be able to wrestle together, play that kind of thing. And there's going to be pee everywhere. There is. Everywhere. You know.

Fantastic. That's right. Okay. So you, you, so what you, you just described a perfect, we're disappointed, our hearts kind of dropped. And at the same time, no, it's going to be amazing. Right? So, and then you've begun to actually create a new picture of what this is going to look

like. Right. So I have, and I'm starting to, but the disappointment for me personally creeps back up a little bit when I'm doing some grocery shopping or I see something that's more specific to a little girl moment that at least I know with this second little, we're not going to get. The original plan was to hard stop at two and be done. Have seven. Have seven. Yeah.

Yeah. Let's go with a no on that one. Okay. So two in, is your husband taking this hard? He is, and I'm a little more concerned on his end of things than I probably should be just because I love him and I want him to open up and I want him to feel like he has a safe space to discuss things. If he wants to, I tried to have a conversation with him, or rather I tried to open the door to have the conversation with him about this gender disappointment

because he actually admitted to me that he was going to be disappointed. Before we knew what the gender was, he admitted to me that he was going to be disappointed if it was a little boy. We went on a road trip this past weekend and my first question to him was, do you have the capacity to discuss gender disappointment on this trip?

He said he hadn't really even had a chance to process it yet. My husband's really good at kind of just pushing it back and not processing it. And it's, I mean, I do it too, by all means. I've just learned over the past couple of years through my counseling how to process it a little sooner and go from there. And I'm a little concerned that he's not going to be able to process it the way that he needs to. And I just don't want him to hold on to that disappointment. And I don't want it to sneak up on me either every time I see a cute little pink dress. All right.

So a couple of things here. One is he's lucky to have you. And I would, well, let me back out. So ultimately here, you guys created a picture that,

picture is the positive way I can say this, okay? And then I'll give you the negative in a second. You created a picture of a life that had a little boy and a little girl in it. Right.

And suddenly you start to dress that picture up figuratively and literally, right? You put clothes on that picture. You put little adventures on that picture. You put hugs on that picture, all those things. And then if you're like me, you can, I can fast forward 20 years real fast. Right. Like me, I'm going to sweat the guy out at prom and I'm going to, all those things like that happen, right?

I can go way down the road there. Oh yeah, husband was picturing cleaning the guns on the first date. Yeah, all that fun stuff, right? So we can do that. The not nice way to say that is y'all created a fantasy that wasn't real. And now what you have permission to do, if permission granting is something I can

do on a podcast, you're allowed to be sad about it. Just be sad about it. Like we thought this was going to look like this and it's not. And we're actually, it's going to sound like a harsh word. We're going to grieve it. We're going to openly state outside, state out loud. We wanted this to be the case and it's not. If you don't, your body will continue to try to solve for that picture, that original picture that you painted together. And the person who will bear the weight of that will be your new baby boy, your son, right? And that's what I'm worried about. So here's a couple of things. The plans were a fantasy, but they were plans nonetheless. So what I want you all to do is this idea like, well, I haven't really processed it yet.

You're not going to unless you start speaking about it. You've heard me say a million times, grief demands a witness. You got to say it out loud in front of somebody else. And so I would love for you to, and this is going to sound ridiculous. This isn't a funeral, but I would love for you all to have some sort of marker ceremony where you speak out loud. Even if it starts with you telling him, hey, I talked to this guy and he said, we're allowed to be sad for a minute. We're allowed to be bummed out about it. And by the way, you might be 25, your son might be 25 and you walk and see a girl in a cute dress and you're like i never had a daughter that might always be there it's not a bad thing you don't need to avoid that by trying

to avoid it you're going to end up cutting yourself off from your friends that have little girls you're going to end up being annoyed when your son brings home a little girl and wondering why right so acknowledge it yeah man that would've been awesome. I don't have that. And then be on about your day. You hear what I'm saying? I would love for you to have some sort of ceremony that says, all right, we're going to go on a road trip together. We're going to get some time together.

We're going to sit down and be honest with each other about how we feel. This thing hurts. This is hard. I had a picture of this. And then in short order, and this is important, y'all have to be about making a new picture with this little boy in it like you're doing. And you got to do that together.

Okay. And I would push him on this, your husband, until he tells you the words, I can't handle this right now, please stop. I would say, I want to have this conversation. And you go first setting the rules. We're allowed to say that we're sad. We're allowed to say we're pissed off. We're allowed to say we're pissed off.

We're allowed to say we're frustrated. We're allowed to be upset at our little boy for not being what we wanted. We were allowed to do that. And then we're going to put a period at the end of that sentence, and then we're going to start writing something new. Is that fair? Yeah, absolutely.

Cool. One other thing. I would stop using the phrase gender disappointment. Here's why. Okay. It sounds really close to some sort of diagnostic. Like I've got anxiety. I've got depression.

We are together. We have gender disappointment. As though this thing is happening to you. Does that make sense? Yeah. I would rather it be less of a thing, like less of a pinstagram or pinstagram, an Instagram or Pinterest-y kind of word. I'd rather just be, yeah, we're super bummed out. And when you say we're super bummed out, we're choosing to be sad for

a season. Your body takes ownership of that. You take ownership of that. And it's not some thing that's descending upon you. Like I have a thing. Nah, you don't. You're just sad, man. I'm bummed out. I wanted to have a daughter and I have a son now. And I wanted my kids in the order, like I had drew it up that way and I got lucky. But I will tell you, my heart was beaten when we went to the first sonogram with my son. Like, is this good? Right? So I'd kind of built it up and I was like, and it worked out for me. It ended up that we rolled the dice

and it worked out well. And sometimes it doesn't. So I think it's just owning that and then saying, okay, here's what comes next. But if you, please, please do me one favor. Don't feel guilty about being sad.

Is that cool? Yeah, absolutely. Have you felt that? I have. It's more of, I'm assuming it ends up being the same, but it's more of, I'm afraid that I'm going to treat this pregnancy differently or the, you know, the outcome differently because I secretly wanted, or not so secretly wanted a girl versus a boy. And I know that that's not fair to my unborn son. I want to give him every opportunity that my first son, Charlie, has and had. Yeah. And I think you will. I think the important thing

is to shift the disappointment towards the fantasy, towards the picture y'all had, not towards the kid. And that's the marker there. So we had this picture. It's not going to happen. I'm going to be bummed out about that. And now we're going to create something new. And I'm going to look at this little knucklehead and just be completely in love with this ball of chaos that's coming our way. But again, all that starts with being honest with yourself, saying it out loud, owning it, and then being able to say, okay, what comes next? What are we going to do next?

But man, Jenny, for whatever it's worth, you're right where you need to be. And you're both little boys are going to be lucky to have you and your husband's lucky to have you. Let me know when he's born. Send us a photo. Can't wait to cheer you on, man. We'll be right back.

All right, let's go to, let's see, Nicole in Kansas City. What's up, Nicole? Hi, Dr. John. How we doing? Just started listening. I just started listening to your book this weekend. It's amazing. It's awesome.

You think so, really? That makes me happy. Yes. Hey, and- It's making me happy. When it's right when this call is over, if you will just DM me your Venmo, and I'll send you some cash for saying that. me happy. Yes. Hey, and- It's making me happy. When it's right when this call is over, if you will just DM me your Venmo and I'll send you some cash for saying that.

I'm really grateful. Oh my gosh, that's so nice. You don't need to do that, but I appreciate it. I don't even know how Venmo works. I really can't do that, but I'd send it cool to someone. So hey, what's up? How can I help? All right.

So I'm a divorced mom of two awesome kids. My nine-year-old daughter has been diagnosed with ADHD. She's also been diagnosed with oppositional defiant disorder, which I know is controversial, but the fact is that she actively defies me. The default answer is no on everything. And she rejects anything that's important to me. So if it's something that I like or I want to do, it's important to me, you know? So, you know, if, if it's something that I, I like, or I want to do, it's going to be a no automatically. Um, give me an example. Um, so, you know, even just like, let's go to the zoo today. No, I don't want to go to the zoo today. I mean, it's just, everything is a default. But my question, this brings me to my question. So I am in a relationship now.

I'm dating someone. Well, I shouldn't say dating. I'm in a relationship. We've been together for some time now. Y'all need to have the DTR. You need to define this relationship. Yeah, well, it is defined. We're in a relationship.

And, you know, I introduced my kids early on in the relationship. I introduced my kids to this man and they, you know, I didn't introduce him as a boyfriend right away. You know, just, we just kind of hung out in a park a couple of times and, you know, went to like steak and shake. But, you know, at the time, my very, very jealous ex-husband freaked out and so it sort of set me into a spiral of you know this is too early I should be doing this you know and then COVID came and the truth is you know it's been about 18 months now I'm still in this relationship and my daughter I've now told her that I have a boyfriend and she is angry, you know, and she, um, tells me all the time. It's now becoming like a part of what she brings up when she's upset.

So, you know, if I make her mad in some way, if I give, if I place a boundary or use some, some discipline, you know, the, the line is, you know, I hate you. You shouldn't be with this boyfriend. You know, I don't like you. I don't like him. And, you know, I don't ever want to be around him. And it's really holding me back from, I feel like I'm living two lives in a lot of ways where I have this life where I'm in a relationship and it's very good and it's very solid. And then I have a separate life when I'm with my kids and I'm feeling really stuck. And so I would love some advice on how to move forward. You got it, man. Thank you so much for so clearly laying this all out. That's really helpful. All right so I'm going to... We could have a whole show just pulling this one call apart, okay?

You've got several things here. So I'm going to throw a lot at you. You stop me if you want me to dig into things, okay? And I was just feverishly taking notes while you were talking here. Okay, so I want to back out to ODD, yeah, you know me, and ADHD, okay?

The most compelling argument I've read, both physiologically and psychologically, is that those two disorders, if you will, if you want to call them that, are a combination of genetics and a combination of experience, whatever. It's a body's response to chaos, okay? Yeah. So you see that a lot in divorced families. It's kids, because there was something leading up to the divorce too, right? I mean, there was a season leading up to this.

That's the thing. It's like this has been her way of being her whole life, you know, long before the divorce. Right, right, right. So I hear that. I hear that. So I don't want you to go in the mirror and be like, I ruined my kid and all that's not going to help anybody. Okay. It's just saying, okay, I'm, I'm going to let ADHD and ODD and whatever other labels, somebody wants to throw at your kid. That's fine. That's a context, not an excuse for how we're going to treat one another, how we're going to live in this house, how we're going to do life together. Okay. And so the way I explain it to my son, and I'm a guy whose, my ADHD is comical. It's off the chart. It's ridiculous. So what does that mean? That means I have to set up systems so that it doesn't give me a pass on showing up to work on time,

on treating people with respect, on being kind, being prepared. I don't get a pass on that. I just have to do more work than the average person to get ready for some stuff. I got to set alarms when I sit down to talk to my kids in the morning so that I don't miss, like when I need to leave so that I can be on time for my recording, right? Or to be on air or whatever the thing is. And so I just have to create a new life and that's fine. Everyone's got their stuff.

But often when we have young kids, especially kids of divorce that are really acting out hard or they're really struggling with focus and attention or they just sit in the back of a room and they disappear, we tend to lean into they've already had enough. They've been through enough. Like, let's just let this thing pass or this pass. And here's what a kid is screaming for.

A couple of things. Number one, one of the most common child fantasies is that my mom and dad are going to get back together. If I can just get them to see me in the right way. Some kids double down on making straight A's. They become the perfect kid. They're trying to, they think they were the problem. Other kids say, can you see me?

Can you see me? Can you see me? And that looks like I'm screaming, I'm yelling, I'm banging my head against the wall. Ultimately, there's this fantasy of we're getting back together. If it was possible, which it might not be, I would love a conversation now that your daughter's nine with you and your ex-husband and her to say we still respect each other. I'm dating somebody.

Is your husband, is your ex dating somebody? Yeah. Okay. We are. We still respect each other. You're still our baby girl. You're still the number one in our lives when it comes to our kid. I mean, you're still our baby girl. You're still the number one in our lives. When it comes to our kid, I mean, you're still so important.

Let her know there's a period at the end of y'all's relationship sentence, right? We're moving on here. That may not be possible. Not all ex are that mature and that grown up, but that would be a gift to your child. It'll hurt and it'll be a mess and it will cause kicking and screaming or whatever, but it will allow her to begin to toggle out of, if I just do something, they'll get back together. And that leads me to you, mom, are giving way too much power to this nine-year-old. Yeah. That's what my therapist says too. Listen, it's not only when I say you're giving her too much power, you are, but that's not about you.

She can't handle the weight of what she's trying to carry around because she's not. And she's heartbroken. And her brain is firing all over the place, right? She's got some true neurological struggles right now or psychological struggles or both. And so I would begin to, in short order, really reclaim the ownership of your home. What does that look like when your child says, I wrote this down here, I hate you. Number one, she doesn't. She doesn't have words for, my body reacts when you come in the room because I feel like I screwed something up. I broke up my family. I'm nine and they didn't

love me enough to stay together. All those things are overwhelming her nine-year-old little brain. And it comes out, I hate you. That's the only language she has. A response to that is, I'm so grateful that you felt brave enough to share that with me.

We don't use the word hate in this home, but you are welcome to not like me right now. And you're allowed to do that. So thank you for sharing that. And here's what she's finding. She is not responsible for mom's emotional regulation. And if she can get you off kilter, then she has the power in your home. And if you flip that on its head, she feels responsible for how mom is doing, how mom feels. And she cannot carry that weight. It's too much.

Yeah. And so taking the sting out of, I hate you. You just know this. Just hear me say it. She doesn't hate you. She loves you. She just doesn't know what's happening in her body. So cool.

And does she weaponize it? Does she all over dad? Like he's the best. He's the greatest. The whatever. Yes. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

She loves dad. She loves dad's new girlfriend. Oh, the best. She's awesome. She talks about the new girlfriend all the time, you know, and then it's like, she hates, hates me, hates my boyfriend. You are not living your life for the approval of a nine-year-old. Oof. Yeah. Okay. You are using your wisdom and your strength and your grief to parent this young child through a really tough situation. Some kids won't talk. I've continued to get messages back that are really, they fill me up. They're awesome. Of parents whose kids wouldn't talk to them.

Either they were annoying or they were like, shut up, mom. I don't talk to you, whatever. And they started doing the journal on the bed. I write a note to my kid and then they write me back. And the feedback I'm getting is it's phenomenal. Like it's such a comically easy tool that parents didn't know about.

Kids won't say things sometimes, but they'll write them down. And it may be, I hate you, I hate you, I hate you. You're an idiot, I hate your boyfriend. The response is, thank you so much for sharing that with me. He's a really great guy. And I look forward to the day that you feel safe around him and leaving it at that. And it's going to slowly take the sting out of that stuff. And she's going to realize this isn't working and mom still loves me. And I can't punish my mom because my mom's a grownup and it's not allowing me a

nine-year-old to punish her. Right. And you just, you know, this, it's just going to be a, y'all have a road to home, man. You're going to have a young daughter that's going to be constantly asking herself what she did wrong. And it's going to take some really wise parenting, co-parenting on you and your ex to let her know she didn't do anything wrong. She's a lovely, wonderful young girl. Yeah. And then, man, at some point you got to bring your, if this guy's going to be part of your life going forward, your daughter feels that gap.

She feels that there's two moms too. Yeah. A mom that's getting dressed to go out, who's excited to let the burden of this whiny nine-year-old and this chaos of a house go so I can just go out to eat and be with another grownup who actually likes me. She feels that.

And so there's gotta be some sort of, hey, he's gonna come. You are welcome to join us for dinner. You don't have to say anything. And after dinner, then you can go watch something or whatever, go play some games or whatever. But I'm gonna set the boundaries here.

And here's one quick trick with a kid who struggles with oppositional defiant disorder. It's just funny. I may have talked about this on the show or not. My wife was talking with a, we were at a parent-teacher conference, and my son doesn't have that, but we were talking about discipline. And I think it's called conscious discipline, if I remember. It's an educational technique.

Okay. But they were discussing it with each other. So it was my wife who's the scholar and was sitting down with a teacher. And they were talking about how they do discipline. And I was listening to them explain it back and forth. And finally I stopped and I looked at my wife and said, you do this to me.

And she smiled real big and was like, yeah, I do. So here it is. It is giving this child a framed sense of ownership. So instead of saying, hey, we're going to the zoo today. Is that going to be great? Then no, you suck. I hate you. We're not going to the zoo.

Zoo's the worst. It is, here's three options. And one of the options can be ridiculous. We can sit outside in the yard and do nothing. That can be one of them. Or we can go to a movie or we can go to the zoo. You get to pick. I'll give you 15 minutes and I'll put on your favorite music while you decide.

And then there's this sense of, well, that's what I'm talking about. I'll tell you what we're going to do today, right? And there's a sense of ownership, and really you framed the whole thing up. Yeah, that makes sense. Although it does lose my other child in the mix, but I mean, that's a whole other conversation. Or this time you get to pick,

next time your other child gets to pick, or y'all get to work on this together, and if y'all don't come up with something in 15 minutes, I'm picking, and I'm going to pick that we're just going to go eat broccoli at a local restaurant, right? I'm going to pick something ridiculous, but we're going to let that nine-year-old choose, let those kids own it. And then you win because what you want is great, fun time with your kids and you'll get that. And they will go with their head, heads held high and their chest puffed out a little bit. There may be some, you can't make, I'm not doing any of this stuff. You can't make me do any of it. And then you can say,

yeah, we are. You're coming with us because you're nine and I'm just bigger than you, right? And you don't ever want to resort to that sort of power, but sometimes you have to with, geez, always with nine-year-olds. But here's what we're having. We're just going to take that weight off of your kid. She's not running the show anymore. And maybe you even sit down with your nine-year-old, depending on how articulate and how much she can understand, take her out to breakfast and say, it's been a hard few years

and you've had to own a lot of what's going on in here. So I'm gonna start, I'm gonna take ownership back of the house. You're my little girl and you have a special place in my house. This house doesn't work without you. I love you so much. And so I'm going to start picking up some of the slack that I've let you have.

And here's a couple of the rules. We're not going to say hate in this house. If you say the word hate, then you're choosing to fill in the blank consequence. And I hate that. I don't. Oh, actually, I just said hate. I don't like that. I don't want you to choose

those things because I want you with us and I want you fully involved. Right. Um, but those, those annoying things, we're not going to say bad words in the house. Um, that's just not how we talk to one another here. We treat each other with dignity, respect. You can be sad and frustrated all you want. That's great. Um, but you're not going to use ugly words. You're not going to say bad words in the house and, and so on and so forth, right? All I have to say is it's a mess. Growing up and dating and making secondary families and kids, the whole thing's a mess. Retain that ownership of that home and let your daughter know, I see you and I hear you and you are allowed to have your feelings.

They're okay. 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.

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That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P.com slash Deloney. All right, we are back. And for this third call, I just want to let everybody know this is a tough one. This is a tough one. Kelly let me know about this call coming so I could sit down and

meet with an expert just to make sure. Unfortunately, I've had too many of these conversations. I want to make sure I hit the nail on the head on this one. This one's too important and too hard. So I'm going to turn it over to Tom in Chicago. He can walk us through

what's been going on. Hey, Tom, what's up, man? Oh, we're hanging in there. Good deal. So Kelly sent me a note ahead of time on this call so I could sit down with an expert, which I spent some time with to make sure that I was able to serve you guys the best we can.

But I want to hear your story just, um, as, as much as you feel that you can share with us and we'll go from there. Sure. Um, so yeah, thanks for talking with us. So we found out a few weeks ago that a extended relative has been sexually molesting our six-year-old daughter. Um, that person has now been arrested. So our question for you is, what does the next days, weeks, months, years look like for our daughter and how can we best help her?

Oh, man. So welcoming back, how'd y'all figure, number one, I mean, this is every parent's worst nightmare, right? And I guess as the father of a six-year-old girl, my heart's broken for you. And I'd hug you if you were sitting here.

So just from your city to my city, know that I love you and I'm sorry this happened. Jeez. So how did y'all, what with you, how you found out? What's happened since then? Yeah, the short version was my wife observed it in action and our observable was happening. We found out it's been going on for several months and then we involved the authorities at that point. And then good for you. Thank you.

Good for you, man. So, yeah, there's been there has been some negative feedback from other family members on that. Yeah, well, screw them. They don't get a vote. Yeah, forget them. If you ever don't get a vote. Yeah. Forget them. If you ever doubt that once, just call me and I'll just say, screw them. They don't get a vote.

Thank you. The worst. Absolute the worst. Unbelievable. Disgusting. And hey, I hate the fact I hate everything about this, man. So, did y'all. So your wife witnesses this. Obviously, I'm assuming she flew into a rage and stopped everything. Not a rage.

She pulled the kids out of the situation because our younger son was there at the time. It was probably a fairly typical of these sort of situations where they were sitting on a chair and watching a perfectly fine video. And the person put his hands down inside her pants. So she separated them, started talking to people. And our daughter, after a little bit, did say, you know, this has been happening. It had been going on for a while. And then my wife talked to the person who, after lying, did say, yes, it did happen. At that point, my wife moved everyone from the home, the family member's home. And then we came home, or she came home.

We talked about it, and we involved the authorities at that point. Gotcha. home we talked about and we called involved involved the authorities at that point gotcha well and i am so proud of y'all for listening to your daughter and believing your daughter obviously your wife saw this and for calling the police um that already is step one towards healing okay um did y'all go through the rigmarole, the forensic interview, the nurse examination? Did y'all go through all that? Yes. Yeah, that happened within a few days afterward, and then there was nothing else. Physically, she's fine. Okay. For people who don't know, when you call the police, they'll normally go to a forensic interview where somebody, some sort of psychologist or sometimes a detective will walk through an interview. Sometimes it's done in play therapy, sometimes it's done in a really not great way, just in an office with big fluorescent lights.

And it's really scary and intimidating for a six-year-old, but that's when they really dig in and get to the bottom of what happened. And then there's often a nurse's examination, which is a really invasive but very important physical examination to see if there's any tearing, any sort of physical issues here, right? And here's what I'll tell you. That feels like you can exhale a tiny bit when those things are over. I don't want you to underestimate what a huge shapeshifter impact that was for your daughter. Okay. Those things sometimes come up 15 or 20 years later when she breaks her arm and needs to go to the doctor and she won't go. Or when she's struggling with anxiety and won't go talk to a counselor because the whole process feels like it's all

wrapped up into this one thing you know what i'm saying right okay so what has been the next steps have you all called somebody have you all start talking to somebody what's been the next steps or has it just kind of been a freeze moment um a little bit initially it was the freeze moment. Um, we, you know, just kind of, we had to, uh, yeah, freeze from that point. And then we started talking, we've talked to our pastor and his wife, who've been very helpful, some other close friends. And then we have talked to a couple of different counselors who have been very helpful from, you know, their different points of views. The real thing we've been dialing down on, which our pastor gave us as advice, is really just work on connecting with our kids. You know, not specifically our daughter, but both of them. Yeah. All right. I'm going to be real straightforward here, okay?

Mm-hmm. And I'm assuming you're a pastor, so you're a person of faith? Yes. All right. So I'm speaking as somebody on your team so you're a person of faith? Yes. All right, so I'm speaking as somebody on your team. I'm a person of faith too, okay? A big chunk of our listeners aren't. That's fine.

I want you to hear that I'm not coming at you, but I'm saying this sitting on the pew next to you, okay? I'm actually not going to give you the ins and outs of what to do with your daughter. Here's why. This is not a moment for armchair quarterback in this thing. This isn't a moment for Googling. This is not a moment for pastors. This is not a moment for guidance counselors. This isn't a moment for asking people their quote-unquote wisdom.

This is a stop the presses, find a trauma focused cognitive behavioral therapist, a TFCBT therapist in your community and work a plan. And there's plans called seeking safety. There's some really extraordinary processes with a trained professional. What I don't want you to do is to think we can just do some things and then it will be cool. And we'll just keep checking in with such and such. Your pastor actually gave you some great advice, which is rarely the case these days, unfortunately.

You got some great advice. Connection's important, but that's at the periphery, okay? That is like, if you think of somebody who's scuba diving and they need oxygen and then they need the tank and then they need the boat, your pastor just told you to put gas in the boat, right? It's peripheral to the person

at the bottom of the ocean right now, okay? Your daughter over time with a therapist is gonna, here's what she's gonna relearn. She's gonna relearn what good touch is, what safety feels like, that a despicable evil thing happened to her, but she's not despicable or evil. That somebody committed a great shameful evil act against her, but she's not shameful. Her body's not shameful her body's not shameful sexual intimacy when she's married and down the road is not shameful and somebody's gonna have to walk her through this and she is six okay here's what that looks like they're gonna teach her body to

not spin up on her when somebody begins to invade her space. And there's just a process to that. What I'll tell you is on the back end of the process, the healing rate is really extraordinary. It's actually unbelievable if you get with the right person. Teaching a six-year-old how to reclaim autonomy of their body after someone has taken it from them, particularly somebody that they trusted. It's just hard. It's hard. And so I don't want to badmouth preachers. I don't want to badmouth people. I'm not doing that. I'm just saying this is one of those moments. You don't try to change the oil in your driveway on this one. You go to the dealer mechanic on this one and get the right work done. Okay. here's the, some people will say, I don't have people in my area.

I don't have whatever. Then you drive, you figure it out. Um, somebody works, goes to part-time for a year or six months and we drive or we get hotel and we figure this thing out. This is really hard. Okay. Um, here's the second or third or I don't even know what number we're on here. Inside your house, when your kid talks about this, has she brought it up ever? Has it come up? No. No, not really. She's talked about the person who did it.

Not in a negative context, but more like, hey, I'd like to go do this with this person or they used to do this with me. Yes. Okay, I'm going to tell you some really hard stuff right now, okay? One of the great evils of sexual abuse with children is being able to toggle apart, to pull apart, that felt good. With this was wrong. You know what I mean? The first time I heard an eight-year-old say, explain to me how she liked what was happening,

that was one of the only times I've ever felt close to physically vomiting in a conversation with a kid. It's brutal. And so yes, there's going to be this weird, hey, can I go back and see? Because I don't fully grasp the depth of what has happened to me. And so here's an important thing I need you to put in your back pocket and your wife and anybody else you trust and love with your kid. Conversations will come up over time. And anything other, you don't, this is not for fixing your kid. You can't fix anything here. What we're looking for is I want you to say, I see you.

I hear you. So when it comes up, did you know that this happened to me? Do you remember when so-and-so did X and Y and Z? The response is not a list of things we've Googled or that we've got from somebody. This, it is, I'm so, so sorry that happened to you. That should not have happened to you and I love you. That's the answer, right?

So we're always going with, I see you and I hear you, and your feelings are valid, and what you remember is valid. I believe you. Not, I'm going to fix this right now in this conversation. Because what she's doing now is she's repracticing safety. Who's safe? And the person who tries to dump a bunch of info on her, a bunch of facts and this and this and this into that 6-year-old, seven-year-old, nine-year-old, 15-year-old little brain is not safe, okay? Safe is I see you, okay?

And here's another heavy one that I see a lot. If you or your wife or your family members break down when this conversation comes up, which it will, or when she says, hey, I want to go see so-and-so, I want to go see uncle whoever or whoever. And you go, either you break down crying or you fly off into rage or whatever that over emotion is. What she's going to quickly learn to do is to help you emotionally regulate yourself. And that's not her job. Okay?

So there is feeling sad and there's feeling heartbroken and there's letting her know, I choose to be angry about this because that shouldn't have happened to you or what happened to you was wrong and that shouldn't happen. You are too precious and too wonderful and too important and too brilliant and too beautiful and too strong. It should never have happened to you. There's a difference between that and just a fit of weeping and rage. And you might have the rage, you might have the weeping, I sure would. I'm going to have my extreme moments with my counselor, okay? I'm going to have my extreme moments with my group of guys that I meet with on a regular basis. Those guys can handle the weight

of my friendship in those moments, a six and nine-year-old can't what i don't want a nine-year-old doing is is saying if i talk about this it makes daddy really sad and so i'm just not going to talk about it because i love daddy and i don't want to be the one making him sad you see how that math works for a kid and so it's that balance of you don't want to be a robot you want them to know no this made me sad and i'm choosing to have my heart broken here all those things and i'm still in control of my body. I'm still in control of my feelings and emotion in this house. Here's the last thing I'll ask you without getting in detail about the family member.

How are you, man? Like somebody in your family hurt your kid. Like that's a hard thing to make peace with yeah I don't I didn't really have any I had more of the sadness emotion just the weight of the situation not any of the anger or rage

it will come be ready for it because it will come in waves okay have you had a chance is this your family member or your wife's family member my wife have you had a chance? Is this your family member or your wife's family member? My wife. Have you had a chance to talk to the person?

I had a short conversation with them an hour or two before they were arrested when they were asking me not to call the police. Okay. That's been it. I would recommend Of all the things I've just told you Besides seeing your kid The second most important recommendation is I would make sure you are constantly writing things down That you feel, that you want to say That come to mind I wish I could have this phone call

And they'll come more and more over time And When you are about to go to sentencing And when your daughter gets put on a witness stand, which she probably will, all those kind of things, make sure you've got a legacy of writing this stuff out. Here's why. And your wife too. If you don't, I call it leakage. That's a gross counseling word, but it will find its way out.

And it usually finds its way out in a real inopportune time that sometimes makes you look foolish or you look like an idiot. Like you look like the problem when you're not, you're a dad who is beside himself because somebody hurt your baby. You know what I'm saying? So this is constant. I would really recommend you and your wife get somebody to talk to because there's going to be the guilt and it was your family and I can't believe I missed this. All those things are part of the healing process that the whole family is going to undergo here and having a person that would walk through that with you

would be really important. Okay, so I just threw a lot at you. Here's what the next few months is going to look like. You ready? Drum roll. I have no idea. I have no idea. Sure.

I know that if you get your daughter into some sort of TFCBT treatment program with a therapist that you trust, that's good. And you and your wife give her, see her and give her space and you are connected with her. And you let her have her feelings out loud that the chances that she grows up to be well and whole are very, very, very good. Okay. And this will raise hell in her for years and years and years to come. It's the evil of sexual abuse and trauma. Okay. It's holding both of those things very loosely, right?

Anybody who tries to tell you, well, the next two months is going to be like this is just selling you something. Get away from that person. Okay? Don't take any outside counsel or information

and try to impose a framework on how your daughter should be healing right now, how she should be feeling. Her grief is hers and she doesn't even know she's grieving yet. She misses special time

with uncle so-and-so. And that's so disgusting to even say out loud, but that's the reality of a six-year-old, right? Okay. How's your marriage right now, brother? As good as it's ever been. This is not creating any sort of stress between us, thankfully. It's awesome. It's been good. Awesome. This is not creating any sort of stress between us, thankfully.

It's awesome. It's been good. Awesome. The temptation will be, y'all have been really tight and having a lot of great conversations and probably going on walks and having moments of, what do we do now? And all those kind of things that can bring a couple together. Please make sure you put a star on a day on the calendar and y'all continue having these at regular intervals. How are you?

How are we? How are we doing? How's things going? Are we going to go out on a date tonight? Are we going to continue to do life? Okay. Please make sure y'all continue that thing moving forward. And again, I don't, it's not going to help you. I just need to say it out loud, man. I'm sorry this happened. I'm sorry, man. And by the way, call me anytime you need to tell me You need me to tell you To screw them

Any family member There should be a race To the police department I'm gonna call them No no no I'm calling them Let's call them together That's the race Anybody who tells you

I just don't think we should press charges Or are we sure Anybody who says that is done Got it And that might be really hard It might be your wife's parents That might be her other siblings And they are opting out of your life

If they make those suggestions Okay Okay I've got no quarter for that Nonsense out of your life if they make those suggestions. Okay. Okay? I've got no quarter for that. Nonsense. It should be a group of people rallying around a hurting six-year-old little girl, not trying to protect a scumbag.

Gosh, man, somebody who's got a lot of challenges. Anything I can help you else with, brother? I feel like I talked at you a lot. Anything I can help with, man, somebody who's got a lot of challenges. Anything I can help you else with, brother? I feel like I talked at you a lot. Anything I can help with, man? No, I think that has been very helpful to give a pathway to what we should be doing and in touch with the right counselors. Okay. If you need something, man, please, I'll walk with you through this.

Holler at me if you need anything. And just for the general public, we are talking about creating some training for pastors and what they say when someone drops us on because they just don't have that training. And what would we say to people who are just helpful friends and neighbors and go-to folks in communities? What do you do? What do you say when a child drops us on you, when a parent comes to you? What do you say or do when somebody in your family comes to you and says, hey, I think one of our family members is abusing children. What do you do at that point? So we may come out with some trainings there. If you have interest in that,

holler at me because I think we're going to need to get on that. There's just too much hurt going on and too many people hurting kids and then people, the follow-up, the care that happens right after that's just a mess, man. Thank you so much, Tom, for being brave and for having the hard conversation. And big shout-out to you and your wife for staying connected during the season and for loving that six-year-old little girl. 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. I think I'm just going to wrap the show up here. This is a hard one. Don't hurt kids. Don't hurt kids. Love your babies. Love hurt kids. Don't hurt kids. Love your babies. Love your kids.

If your kid's struggling, give them the help they need. Don't hurt kids. That's kind of all I got to say about that. So as we wrap up today's show, man, Kelly is a fangirl of Australian boy band pop. Hashtag didn't know that was a thing.

And it's what? It's not boy band pop. It's like blues. They don't trust me on this one. I'm trusting Kelly on this one. It's not boy band pop. It's blues. It's the Teske Brothers.

Is that who it is? I'm gonna rock them when it's over. It's the Teske Brothers and their song called Rain. And it goes like this. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. It's reading the lyrics, yo. Mm-hmm. Yeah, is that rain?

Or are you crying again? That's a good line. Would it be the same if I could hold you, my friend? I know it's hard to be alone. A soul with no face, it's a lonely embrace, but I know it's hard. I know it's hard to be alone. Yeah.

Now there's clouds between us all and the road ain't so clear, but we can still walk or crawl, but I know it's hard to be alone. It's hard to be alone. Luckily for you, you're not alone. We'll see you soon. Coming up on the next episode. Number one book in the nation.

Built non-fiction. We crushed it. I've never been number one at anything. We all have that one friend, though, that would prefer to listen to the man with 17 YouTube followers out of the trunk of his car with a mobile microphone going, guess what, everybody?

I figured it out. Listen to this. We all have that friend. My friend happens to be Rachel Cruz. Okay, let me say this. I love conspiracy theories, okay? Yes. I'm not like, I haven't written books.

Like, I'm not all, like, what's in my head. And the reason she doesn't write them down? Because then they'll know. That's why.