The Dr. John Delony Show - I Want Better Sex in Our Marriage

Episode Date: November 22, 2021

The Dr. John Delony Show is a caller-driven show that offers real people a chance to be heard as they struggle with relationship issues and mental health challenges. John will give you practical advice on how to connect with people, how to take the next right step when you feel frozen, and how to cut through the depression and anxiety that can feel so overwhelming. You are not alone in this battle. You are worth being well—and it starts by focusing on what you can control. Let us know what’s going on by leaving a voicemail at 844.693.3291 or visiting johndelony.com/show. We want to talk to YOU!   Show Notes for this Episode What does "practicing desire" mean and how do we do it? Come As You Are - Emily Nagoski Trying to balance time between our newborn in the NICU & our 6yo at home I'm high-functioning autistic & my parents don't think I can be a mom Lyrics of the Day: "Haven't Been Doing So Well" - Frank Turner   As heard on this episode:  BetterHelp dreamcloudsleep.com/delony Conversation Starters Redefining Anxiety John's Free Guided Meditation Ramsey+   tags: sexuality/intimacy, marriage, parenting, kids, sickness/illness, special needs, boundaries, disagreement/conflict   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.

On today's show, we talk about sex and intimacy and how to practice desire. After we've been married for 10, 15 years, we talk about how to raise kids in the middle of a traumatic situation. We talk about having babies when our in-laws don't want us to. Stay tuned. What is happening? This is John with the Dr. John Deloney Show. Man,

I'm so glad you're here. Talking about mental health, relationships, wellness, all of it, everything. Getting right into it today. If you want to be on the show, give us a shout, 888-825. That is Dave Ramsey's number. So here's the thing, America, and by America, I mean the 17 of y'all listening to this. I host a couple of different shows, and this is one of them. The one with my name and face on it, don't know that number, 1-844-693-3291. But I also host the Ramsey Show with Dave Ramsey, a couple of my friends. That one's on this old thing. It's so rad, called the radio. It was the best. And that number is 888-825-5225.

So if you want to call about your mutual funds, give that a shout later on. Kelly will also answer that phone. But if you want to be on this show, call 844-693-3291. God, Lee, this is what I get for working two jobs, James. I just need to have one job. It's probably better that you said that number on this show than the other way around. That would have been more embarrassing. That would have been weird because I'm not great with the old mutual fund situation or the baby steps out of debt.

But here we are. So glad that you're with us. James, listen, this happened. And you know this happened because you texted me about it and Kelly. I was at an event in Florida the other day. I think there's about 750 people at the event. These top business leaders are from across the country. And then I walked straight off stage

and do this 30 minute live stream to however many bajillions of other people who are watching from the at home on the internets and the Courtney who's our friend she was interviewing me and she says on the live stream in front of everybody in the club who are not getting tipsy she says um you talk about threats and trauma and walk us through like how our brains respond to which I said our brain is always registering threats in this modern world that we live in

it used to be like oh gosh there's a bear or a cave or some guys in a neighboring community wants to kill us and then it would respond but now it's all the time but what I said was we're always surrounded by cliques and dings. The challenge is, that's not what I said at all. What I actually said was, on a live stream with my friend Courtney as the host, I've got like makeup, artists, cameras everywhere. I said, well, Courtney, I'm surrounded by dicks and clings. Dicks and clings, James.

That's what I said. And I immediately thought I should probably call out. I just said that, but I looked at Courtney's face and it said, carry on. So I just took a dive. I made no jokes. I just restated it. No dicks and clings, just clicks and dings. But thankfully we got the show where I give out the wrong stupid phone number. All right, let's go to Mary in Seattle. Mary, what's up? How are we doing? Hey, that sounds way embarrassing, so hopefully I don't fudge it that much on this. Listen, it was super embarrassing.

And I'm not even a guy that gets embarrassed. And even I was like, yeah, I probably shouldn't have said it like that. I didn't mean to, but it just happened. It is what it is. What are you going to do, right? It just is. Hey, what's up? How can I help?

Okay, so I love listening to your show. It's been a great way for me to work through some past issues and stuff. Well, thank you so much. Yeah, no, it's awesome. I love it. You're constantly talking about practicing desire in sexual relationships, and I wanted to know what you mean by that. Like, what does that mean exactly? Ah, very cool. Okay. So practicing desire, it's, I got the language from Esther Perel,

who I think is just an extraordinary relationship expert. She talks about desire is transitioning from this, this path in relationships that we find ourselves on, which often is shrouded in shoulds and have-tos and need-tos versus what do I actually want to do? And so what happens is you get, like, let's say me and my wife, we get on a track, which is I need to go do this thing. I have to do this thing. I need to, I have to, I have to. I should have done this thing. I have to do this thing. I need to, I have to, I have to, I should have,

I should have done this thing. And then suddenly I never asked myself the question, like, what do I actually want here? And so what does that look like in a relationship? So tell me about your relationship. Do you want to practice desire? Is that the root of this question? Yeah, I feel like, so my husband and I have been married 15 years and I think, I would say we're probably, I don't think we're like in the worst spot ever sexually, but we have been at different times in our marriage. Sure. like having just this awesome sex life. I feel like that's what I want. I don't know how to get there. I feel like we're kind of mediocre. Like we're not struggling, but we're not like awesome. Like I want to lean more toward like,

Hey, this is a serious strength in our marriage where we're just like totally madly in love. I mean, we love each other and I think we have a great relationship in general, but just wanting to develop that more to where it's like a stronger part, part of our relationship. I love that. Thank you for, for welcoming me through that. So would you be a guinea pig for me on the show?

Sure. I guess that's why I called, right? Okay. So you painted a couple of pictures here. And these often get mushed together. And so I want to make sure that they're all separate pictures. You said you want to have, you've got a, your sex life is fine. Your marriage is fine. It's good. Things are good. But you have this dream of it being wheels off, right?

And then you also mushed into there, I want to be madly in love and other expectations on top of that. And so I want to parse out madly in love, which is a Hollywood thing, with a good marriage and a really killer sex life. And there's seasons where I'm madly in love, but man,

I'm so exhausted and tired. I'm in a crazy work season, or we've got young kids, or fill in the blank. And so we're madly in love, and madly in love looks like I got to help wash the bottles out, and I'm helping with the sheets. And the last thing we're doing, we're just wiping poop off ourselves at night when we go to bed from our kids, not from us, sheets. And the last thing we're doing, we're just wiping poop off ourselves at night when we go to bed from our kids, not from us, hopefully. And we're going to bed, and like Madly in Love looks like we're doing what we can to survive.

And then other seasons of Madly in Love looks like wheels are off, and like, man, we are clicking on all sexual cylinders, right? So what do you, paint me a picture, not an overly graphic one, like I painted before the show started. Paint me a picture of, what would it look like? Give me a day. Of like the dream or what? What's your dream? I think for me, like a lot of times I get into the rut of like coulds and shoulds. And so for me, it would just be like this easy, like, yes, I totally want you to put the moves on me.

I'm loving this instead of like, please just let me go to sleep. Like, I'm just tired. Today was a day. So this is more about your response to him as opposed to he's not performing well or he's not the guy you want him to be. Right. Okay. No, no, no. I feel like it's probably more me just feeling like, I mean, so we have a bunch of little kids. And there's times where I've felt, I don't feel it as much lately because we've been talking more openly. I mean, we've always talked openly, but I think even more so lately where I just have felt like, okay, all day long I have people hanging on my legs and wiping snot on me and begging me for this and that.

And at the end of the day, I just don't want to be a need for anyone else. Yes, you don't want somebody else coming home and hanging all over you. And like needing me. Yes. That sounds, I don't know. It's just like, so we go in these cycles where I'm just like, I just don't want to be needed. Right. And then where I'm like, no, I love this.

And when I can finally wrap my head around mentally, like actually I do want this. I really enjoy when we are sexually intimate. Like, I actually really enjoy it. But getting to that mental state of like, okay, yeah, I'm happy with this. There's been a lot of times where I've just felt like I am so tired. Why do I not get to be in charge of when I get to go to sleep? Or like, it's been kind of, um, I don't know. That's been like years ago when we had, like when I was pregnant and had little tiny babies,

it was just like, ah, please leave me alone. Um, and now I feel like we're kind of coming off of having little babies and finding ourselves in like the same holding pattern just because it's been what it's been for most of our marriage and i want to i want to figure out how to flip that to where i'm not just like oh please don't need me i like i want to enjoy that more yes okay so i hear this a lot from especially from women and i don't want to over gender it but i hear it a lot from women, I'm not super into it until we start getting into it. And then I remember, oh, I really like this. Or I heard it said once, I don't think about sex a lot, but when it starts, I really like it. And the more I have it, the more I think about it, and the more I think about it, the more I want to have it. And it kind of, it's

self-fulfilling prophecy on one side, and then it rolls off the other side. But I want to push on something you just said. I cannot imagine, like my daughter plays this game called the sticker game where she grabs your leg and you have to just walk around the house and she's attached to your leg. And it's hilarious for like eight seconds. And then it's super not funny at all. And she won't stop. I can't imagine having little kids all over me all day long just because they have to eat and be carried. I can't imagine that. And then, can I tell you this? One of my favorite things in the world.

Just totally rat on your husband here. I work with big, tough guys, big, fancy CEOs, people who make a jillion bucks. Like, they think they're gangsters. And they are. They are. But one of my favorite questions to ask them is, how do you initiate sex at your house?

You come home. You've been initiating, like, boardroom stuff. Here's how we're going to do this on my company. We're going to do this. And you sell that. And you're fired and all that. And they get home. And they look at their wives.

And they're so insecure. And they say things like, so maybe sexy time tonight? Right? They don't have like a thing. Like there's no way, like how does your husband initiate sex? So... Or does he give you like that look and you're like,

ugh, gross, stop. Like how does he get into it? Now, um, recently we've been trying to schedule it, which I think has actually been good for me. Absolutely. Like, I was really into that idea for a long time, and finally I was like, all right, we'll try it. And I think it's been good for me to, like, kind of alleviate some of the pressure that I would be like, oh, is he wanting to be intimate? Or can we just go to bed?

Yes. And, like, am I going to feel guilty and all that? So that's been like really great. And you think about it all day. Don't lose that. Yeah, it's true. When it's like, oh, we're doing this tonight. You can kind of like, oh, we're doing this tonight.

But then you think about it and then you kind of go, what's that going to be like? And then what kind of sex are we going to have? And then what is right. So you start going down that path anyway, which is kind of awesome. But go ahead. Yeah. So I think that's been really good. But other times, if we're just like cuddling in bed, he'll just put his hands, you know, like moving his hands on my body.

I think we've we had some times where it was like I felt like the only time we would ever be physically intimate at all was like, if we were going to have sex. And that was a few years ago. I think we need to just hug more and hold hands more and just kiss, just to kiss. And that's been really good too. But sometimes I feel like,

Oh, is this loaded? And it like scares me, which sounds dumb. I'm not afraid of my husband, but like, it doesn't. So here's what's just hard to get into.

No, here's what's so important. Here's what's so important. So you, you said it so beautifully and I'm going to flip it around you and I want you to flip it around on you. And I want you to take this with you. You said, I just don't want to be needed anymore at the end of the day. So get that. The question I want you to start asking yourself is what do you need and how do you need it? And what would you actually want? Because you spend all day responding to other people, to your kids. I don't know if you work, but to work stuff. And then you feel like you're playing defense against your husband. Like what, what, what, like, what are we doing? Do I have time? I'm tired, but can I fit this in? And at the bottom of all that that's being sacrificed is, what does Mary want? What

does desire look like for Mary? What would it look like for Mary to say, hey, tonight is a hug night. I need lots of hugs. Tonight is a sex night, but it starts at 8 a.m. I need some help in the kitchen. So here's what I want you to have in your head. Number one, can sex become, and this is where the practice comes in, can sex become a place that you escape to, not escape from? And so at the end of an exhausting day, at the end of a hard work week, can it be a place where all of the expectations roll off, all of the, what you just laid out so perfectly, the, I don't know, is it going to be this? I just want to hold hands. Can we just kiss and just go to bed? And if I kiss him, then it's going to turn into this.

And then now I'm doing it. I don't want to, I'm tired. Can you get rid of all that stuff and start being super clear with one another? Can you say- So is that like at the beginning of the day, like when would you, like how would you actually put that into practice? Like, I feel like we've been trying to get more clear when we decided, okay, let's start scheduling this so that it's more clear. And that has been super helpful.

But at the same time, my husband's like, well, that's lame if it's like the only time we can ever be intimate is if we schedule it. Like, can we never be spontaneous? And I'm like, I don't know if I'm there yet. I'm trying. And I want to be there. Like, I want to be like, oh sure, it wasn't on the schedule, but you know what? I actually desire you too. And so. So, so you're, you're beating yourself up. You're beating yourself up because

we're not in a movie and I want you to free yourself from that. The simple solution to that, to what you, the question you just asked me is you go ahead and put an extra one put an extra two on your calendar for the week. And you surprise him. And that way you both win. It's on your calendar. You know it's coming. You can plan for it all day.

And he doesn't know it's coming. And you can say, what would it look like for me to totally get after him. And then you start to feel what would that power feel like? What about him meeting my needs for once? What does that look like? And I'm going to wear what I want to wear and do this, how I want to do this, where I want to do this. And I'm going to stick the kids in front of a stupid TV screen because I don't even care. Does that make sense?

It's about you moving to offense. And so that thing you just said is simply about I'm not at a place where I just think about it at 4 o'clock in the afternoon when he walks in the door, but I'm going to already have it on my calendar. Or I'm going to text him and I'm going to have him meet me in the garage. I don't know. Whatever works for you guys, man. Right?

I want you to focus on not what is but what could be. And you begin to practice how do I get myself there. And it may be that you've got two. Let's say you all put two on the calendar each week. Two days, we're going to sleep together two days this week. And you go ahead and put two other ones just for you. You don't tell them about them. And one's in the morning and one's like on the afternoon sometime or in the evening, whenever. One is, hey, I'm in the middle of cooking dinner.

Can you come help me in the bedroom real quick? And then all of a sudden he's like, what is happening? And it's game on. My hunch is you thinking about that, planning that, will get the train going down the track for you. And if it doesn't, he doesn't know. So you haven't let him down. It's one of your special stars, if that makes sense. Right. The second thing I want you all to do is I want you to get

Emily Nagotsky's book, Come As You Are. I'll link to it in the show notes. It's the single best book on sex I've ever read in my life. It's written for women about their bodies, and they were just left out of the conversation. Most women were. It's a phenomenal book, but it's also really important for men to read too. And it talks this whole idea about a sex drive is nonsense. It's a series of brakes and gas pedals. And it just, hear me say this, it's about how do

I turn more of the ons on and more of the offs off? And those things happen 24 hours a day, 365. They're not about the 45 minutes we've put on our calendar for having sex or for not having sex. It's about how do I create a world that my wife feels free and has space to let her mind go bananas with me at the end of that fantasy? How do I create a world where my husband feels connected and safe and loved here at home or whatever words he needs to where he is ready to party when the time comes? And so it's about creating an entire new ecosystem around a married couple, especially folks who've been married for a while. And here's the last thing I want to pass along to you. You guys are going to reinvent things now.

And so what we often try to do, and you may have heard me say this, we often try to drag our past. Remember we were dating and it just was like this? And then it's like, remember we were just newlyweds and we had no kids. We were having sex at four in the afternoon on a Wednesday on the kitchen table.

Like, where are those days? And what I'll tell you is we take those days and we compare them to what we have now. And we say, oh, we're lacking something. We used to have passion and now we're just old and boring. Or we used to be reckless and rambunctious. And now, blah, I've got to pay the light bill. And let's just watch The Office and go to sleep. And so what I want to tell you is you can't compare your now to then.

Different worlds, different people, different experiences. You've got kids everywhere. You've got expectations. You all look different. Everything's different. And you get to create what next looks like. And for some people, after year 15, that's when they're like,

hey, we're going to start doing dress-up week or we're going to start, what's your craziest fantasies? Here's a fun one. Here's an envelope system. It's called the John Deloney Erotic Envelope System. It's not for sale.

It's for free. There are 10 envelopes out of like a drawer you have at your house. You take five and he takes five. You each write down one crazy thing you want to try, or it may be boring. I want boring married person sex, or I just want a French kiss for 45 minutes and that's it. Hands behind your back,

sucker. Or maybe it's fill in the blank, whatever it is. And once a month, once a week, you commit to, we're going to draw a random envelope and no matter what we're doing, what's in that envelope or I'll, I don't, I may not fully understand what you're asking here or how this is even physically possible, but I will give it my, the best shot, like whatever it is. And it adds some mystery all day. You're like, I wonder what's in that stupid envelope. And he's gonna be like, oh, I hope she picks this one envelope. And you're gonna be like,

oh gosh, I hope he just picks this envelope. And you're gonna get there and you're both gonna be into it and it's gonna be awkward and you're gonna be laughing and it's gonna be weird. And you know what you're gonna feel like? Newlyweds again.

You're gonna feel like you're dating again. It's gonna feel weird and a little bit, ah, what are you doing? And that's going to be how you reclaim and practice intimacy. And you may not even be able to get through them. It may be a disaster and you'll laugh and just go back to married old, boring person, boring old person, married sex, right? But little things like that, that you get to recreate what this thing looks like. And so what I want you to hear me say is

the trapped feeling you have is a thousand percent valid and real. And it's a thousand percent in your head. And it's a thousand percent something you can correct for. And let me leave you with this last thing. I said I only had one more thing. I got one more thing. Commit to each other to being curious, not judgmental. Be curious. When you find one of

that random Tuesday at two in the afternoon and you think, if my husband was here, I would rip every shred of clothing he has off his body in the yard. I don't even care. Be curious about that moment. What about that moment that day? What about him? What about you? What is going on that might be something you can build into your life? On days he comes home and he's like, hey, is it time for sexy time? And you're like, how about I stab you in the face with like a fork I'm holding in my hand.

Take inventory of that. Don't judge yourself. Don't beat yourself up. Don't beat him up. Ask yourself, be curious. Why do I feel like I want to stop this guy that I love in the eyeball? And I like sleeping with him. It's not normal. Why do I feel like that? Be curious about it. And then you can begin to reverse engineer the world that you actually want versus the one that you're experiencing. Does that make sense? Yeah, no, I think that sounds great. I feel like just listening to you and giving, it's like giving me hope

that like, hey, we can do better. We can get past the fact that we've had all these babies and like been tired for a lot of years. And it's like, we can do something different. And I want to, so I'm glad for your advice. Thank you. Yes.

So get that book. We'll link to it in the show notes. Read it together. And there's going to be parts where you're like, whoa. And there's going to be other parts where you're like, I don't really get that. Read it together. Don't agree with all of it. That's great. But it's going to give you all something to work towards. And then go to John Deloney Erotic Envelope System.

It's free and it's amazing and it will change everything. Mary, man, you make me happy for mankind and womankind. You're awesome. We'll be right back on the Dr. John Deloney Show. All right, we are back, Jack. Let's go to John in Saginaw. What's up, John? Hey, hi.

What's up, dude? Sorry, I kind of bombed you there. You doing all right? You're fine, yeah. So I have, we have a son who was born just over three weeks ago, and he was born at 33 weeks, so he's still in the NICU. Yeah. How's everybody, how's he doing?

He's doing great. He is above where they thought he would be weight-wise, and he's really coming around to learning how to feed. So we're looking at him. Very cool. Hey, congratulations, man. That's awesome. Thank you.

Thank you. On top of that, we also have a six-year-old daughter. Of course you do, because why not, right? Why not? Awesome. Right. And so we are really struggling with how to balance our time and focus and attention and, you know, be the best parents we can be for both of them. Excellent.

So is one of y'all staying in, I always call it NICU and I know it's NICU. Is one of y'all staying there 24-7? How's that working right now? No. So what we do typically is my wife goes during the day while our daughter's in school. Okay. And then after I get out of work, I will go home for dinner most of the time. And then we will both together go up shortly after my daughter's bedtime. And we'll both go up and see him that way.

Excellent. Has your daughter been able to go visit? No. So they're not letting children in hospitals right now. We've FaceTimed and we show her pictures almost every day. That makes me bonkers. Okay. Yeah, that would be an important milestone, and that would be really helpful.

But it's not happening, so I can't control it, so I'm going to move on to things I can't control. So, man, number one, I'm so grateful that your baby is coming along. And do they have a projected come-home date? Not yet. They told us to expect our due date, which is right around Thanksgiving. Oh, very cool, man. So what a Thanksgiving. What a holiday season.

And hopefully it snows where you are. Of course it will. And then y'all can just have some time just to breathe. Y'all probably haven't taken a deep breath in a long time. No, it's been a long two years. Yes, yes, yes. Whew, so here's, um, I'm going to give you a couple. Number one, your six-year-old is lucky to have you. This new baby is lucky to have you and your wife.

And good for you guys. Good for you guys. I'm going to give you a couple of pieces of advice that a, one of them is what a former professor gave to me, and it worked magic in my home. And then talk a little bit about grief and walking through what this will look like for your kid. Okay.

So I had Hank, my son, I think he was five or six when Josephine was coming along and my professor, she gave me one sentence to tell to my son while my daughter was in utero. And that was to always refer to the baby as his baby, as his sister. And she said that children, she's super right, children crave ownership and they crave participation. They crave purpose. Actually, we all do as grownups, but it kind of gets sucked out of us as we just get dead-eyed jobs and we just clock in and out for the rest of our lives. So I would love for you to start referring to this little boy as her baby when you talk about it, or her brother, and what an important role she's going play and how she's gonna read books. And I want you to color pictures

and I want you to, you say it out loud and I'll write down the letter because she's probably working on her letters right now. She can dictate a letter that you can take to the baby and maybe video you reading it to the baby. But I want her to start getting some ownership of this. And here's where that's important. She's not going to be able to go to the hospital and visit, but she's going to be incredibly invested in this little boy. She's going to be invested in

her role as a big sister and not as a caretaker, but as a participant in the life of the blood of this family. That's really important. So just saying things like, you wanna see some pictures of your baby? You wanna see some pictures of your brother? You wanna see some pictures of, let's write baby, let's draw baby a picture and you sit down and color with her.

And you color a book and she can color a book and y'all take the pictures and just take a picture of the baby in the NICU with her pictures next to it. Does that make sense? Yeah, absolutely. Okay. So we're going for ownership and participation there. The second thing, and this is such a gift you can give your child, is to teach her firsthand about fear, about grief, about sadness, about if you're a people of faith, about what prayer looks like in real time. And so what that will look like is you saying things like,

Daddy's really been scared that little brother was so sick. And little brother decided to come into the world really early. And so the doctors and hospital people have really been taking good care. But that makes daddy scared. Because daddy wants you two to be safe. Daddy wants you two to be healthy. And right now, daddy's scared. And so what your daughter gets a ringside seat is to see her dad be a human, be vulnerable,

be real, and to still be breathing and eating and holding her hand while you say these things. And you and I, brother, we were trained to hide those kinds of things from little people, from little kids, to hide those things from our spouses, to hide those kinds of things from little people, from little kids, to hide those things from our spouses, to hide those things from our workplaces and just be robots. And what it does is when your daughter feels scared or sad, it makes her feel crazy because nobody in her world

ever models what that looks like. And so you have an opportunity in a real life situation, your wife does too, but she's not here, so I'm just talking to you, to model what being honest and open looks like. I'm really scared. You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to say a prayer. I'm really scared right now. So I'm going to write little baby a note. Do you want to write a note with me? You see where I'm going with that? Yeah. And here's the final thing that I'll, I mean, there's a million things we could talk about, man. I'd love just to hug you, dude.

I know those are long, long nights and they add up to long, long weeks and long, long months. And one of the great curses of our time, brother, is that we have made our children the circle, I mean, the center of our homes. And they were not designed to carry the weight of our homes. And so what I want to free you from is there's going to be a couple of months, a couple of more weeks when your daughter's just going to have to deal

because you're going to go be at the hospital with her little brother and you're going to feel like you're abandoning her. You're not. You're going to, your wife is going to feel like, well, what about her? What about her? You've got an emergency on your hand and y'all are doing the right thing. And what your daughter's going to realize is over time, now she's six. And so she's going to say, what about me? Because she's six. And so she's going to say, what about me? Because she's six. That's what six-year-olds do.

But over time, she's going to realize, whoa, my parents' love runs deep. And they will sleep at hospitals. They will stay up late. They will get up early. They will spend all day with me, with each other,

with brother, when crap hits the fan. That's the kind of parents my parents are. And so your daughter is not designed to carry the weight of that family. She needs to know early on. She's learning it right now. Man, when there's an emergency, mom and dad, they run in. And sometimes that means I'm left outside for a bit with grandparents

or with friends or whoever. And it's going to feel like she's missing out, but it's also going to be a gift to her that the whole family doesn't revolve around her. I want you and your wife to be at peace. You know, I'm doing a good job, my brother. Thank you. Can you be honest with me? Is this a scary time? Are you starting to be able to breathe a little bit?

A little bit, yeah. To be honest, one of the biggest things we're running into now is that, like, our daughter is starting to act out more. Yeah. And so, like, it's, we're running into, you know, okay, how do we, like, how do we stop, like, how do we help her through like the fits and things that are happening? How do we kind of let her know, like, Hey, it's not okay to freak out and hit your parents. But at the same time, like, I, I can't imagine life, like what she's going through at her age as well. You know what I mean? Absolutely. And, and yeah, she's six. And so her body is just screaming for connection and you guys have been busy. And when you're's six. And so her body is just screaming for connection.

And you guys have been busy. And when you are home, you're probably not present. There's probably one foot in the hospital at all times, which is normal. Or one foot staring at a computer screen trying to figure out the bills and the medical stuff they just took, all that. So yeah, you got a little kid screaming for connection. That's where, I hate to say you can double dip, but when you sit down with coloring books and you bring it to her and say, let's color a picture together. You're talking 20 minutes of focus time. And her whole body goes, or getting, you may have heard me talk about this, getting a, go to Michael's or go to Hobby Lobby or something

and get a small little canvas. And on that canvas, get some paints and write down, here's our family values. Here's our family values. We love each other, even when it's hard. We treat each other with respect. We say, thank you. We say, I love you. We do those kind of things. And then when she throws a fit, you point back to that and say, oh my goodness, I'm so sad that, I'm so sorry that you opted out because we don't throw fits

because remember, this is who we are. So you've chosen to step away for a few minutes. And man, as soon as you're ready to treat each other with dignity and respect, we don't hit in this family. We all wrote it down here together and bring her into this conversation, but let her know. And then when you're gone, you can point to it when you're heading to the hospital and you can say, remember, we care for one another in the good days and the bad days. This is where we're headed off to. And she'll go, yeah, because that's who we are. That's who we are. But yes, meeting those connection things upstream, that's you going to her, hey, let's make a video and a movie. Hey, let's let me and you, it's Saturday morning, we're going to go to have breakfast date, just me and you. And let's get dressed up. You can put a button on shirt up shirt and tuck it in, tuck your shirt in and she can put on some

fancy clothes and you take her to Cracker Barrel or do something like that and spend that time. It may be an hour, it may be 30 minutes, it may be an hour and a half, a couple of times a week. That may be all you can squeeze into. Man, those focused moments are so, so important. And yes, you're right. There's a balance. When she does throw a temper tantrum, when she does start, you know, things start rattling, man, that's part of it.

Some of that's just hard, hard season right now. Yeah, it's really challenging. But also remember, also remember, yeah, that six-year-old little body is just saying, I need to be connected, I need to be connected, I need to be connected. She can't hit, but there's a context for that. Thank you so, so much, my brother. Y'all are good folks. We'll be right back on the Dr. John Delaney Show.

It seems like everybody's talking about how crazy the housing market is right now and how powerless homebuyers feel. Mix that with the stress of moving and life change and job change, and you've got a tornado of anxiety fueling one of the biggest purchases you'll ever make. This is not a good idea. So if you're a new homebuyer right now, my advice to you is to focus on what you can control, like the people you choose to help you in the homebuying process. You need folks like my friends at Churchill Mortgage. Churchill is a Ramsey-trusted provider that's been helping people with their home mortgages for decades.

And their Home Buyer Edge program will help you skip a bunch of the stress. Here's how it works. Apply to become a Churchill-certified home buyer and cap your interest rate for 90 days. Then you'll get a $5,000 seller guarantee to help your offer stand out. So go ahead, take a deep breath because Churchill has your back. Check them out at churchillmortgage.com slash Deloney and get the home buyer edge today. What up? We are back. Let's go to Kathy in Austin. Hey, Kathy, what you doing? Hi, how are you? I am outstanding. And how about you?

Better than I deserve. Oh, well played. I like what you did there. So what's up? How can I help? Hi. So I'm 28 years old and my husband and I, we just got married last year. Uh, both of us, uh, we have our college degrees and we actually both became debt free a month before our wedding. Very cool. We're very proud about that. You should be. Congratulations. What's your degree in? Uh, my degree is in finance and his is in business. Excellent. Excellent. Very cool. So how can I help? Yes. So we have our own plan. We would love to travel for a bit. We want to do a couple of things just the two of us. So travel, you know,

buy a house, buy a new car. And then eventually we live up to have children down the line. What's been kind of been a speed bump with my family in particular, this is really hard. I've never really said this out loud to so many people. Both of us actually were diagnosed with high-functioning autism, a.k.a. Asperger's. We were both very young kids. And my parents have it in their heads that because of that,

I am not capable of being a mother. Oh, my gosh. And I want to know, I would like to know how boundaries can be set with that. And I also worry of how my parents, it should Reggie and I choose to have children, how they are going to treat my kids and how they're going to question my

parenting skills. Yeah. Just the way you said that hit me right in my guts. And I can't wrap my head around what it would be like, what it would feel like. Not to think, but what it would feel like in my body. If my mom was to say, I don't think you'll be a good mom. I don't think you'll be a good father. It's been hurting me for a while.

Yeah. Well, that hurt is legit, man. And I'm sorry that someone looked you in the eye and said that. That's hard. So you say high functioning. You guys are kicking butt, doing great. Tell me, articulate for the listener and for me, what does that look like on a day-to-day basis? What are some things that you feel like are different from you, for you and your husband,

than is for a neurotypical person? Well, at this point in our adult lives, I think the only thing that I think a normal person, you know, might see is that maybe... Don't say normal, you're normal. You're just like us. Yeah, yeah, because everybody's got something, right? Everybody's got a bunch of somethings. Right. Well, I guess it's maybe we tend to be on the shy side just because we want to show a good face when we meet new people. And just sometimes we have quirky personalities. And I think in my life, every other person has something quirky about them. But otherwise, nowadays, should anybody find out whether I tell them or not, they just didn't know that either one of us was on the spectrum.

Gotcha. And so your mom... Yeah, both my mom and my dad. Does she say that? Does your mom and dad say that you would not be a good mom because of your diagnosis or because there are things that you present to the world that concerns them? Well, I'm the oldest of four children. All of my siblings are grown up now. And my dad at one

point has said to me that he has asked each of his kids, you know, just as a grownup, when you start to get into a relationship or whether you're in a relationship or not, just look at your life and see what things could be like, whether you have children or whether you decide to not have children and just to look at it evenly, like same timeframe in which, you know, at one point before I met my husband, I did consider that because I didn't think, you know, any man was going to love me for who I was just because I felt that my diagnosis was going to hold me back or somebody was not going to be able to handle it. And at some point I actually just stopped telling people because they're either going to love you for who you are, or when they find out they're either going to take advantage

of it or they're not going to know what to do and run away. So I just, at one point, just stopped telling people that putting that to the side, I realized with parenting, I'm not a parent yet. And I understand that you're not supposed to just see parenting as rainbows and butterflies and seeing it through rose-colored glasses. I realize that. Is there something that, are you unable to, and I'm going to ask some probing questions, okay? These aren't accusations. These are just facts. Are you unable to connect with somebody else?

No. You are able to connect? Absolutely. Do you feel your feelings? I do. Are you able to interact with somebody else when they're hurting? Are you able to lean into that? Yes, I can.

And same as my husband. Yeah. I think there's a lot of preconceived notions from people. Absolutely, 100%. That don't understand. And that's what I'm asking. Is your mom, is she sensing that stuff? I just can't imagine why she would say that.

So let me get to this, because we could spend all day on this, and I don't want to why she would say that. And so let me get to this, because we could spend all day on this and I don't want to speak ill of your mom. That would be ugly of me. Right. So most important, be honest about your connections. Kids need radical connection. I want to always go back to that word.

That's the most important thing. Just from my conversation with you, again, you and I have never hung out. I don't know you and your husband. I mean, you just sound like a wonderful, extraordinary human being. And I assure you, I've got, if you line up the quirk, the quirk-o-meter, I've probably got you beat 10x, okay? I'm a weird person. So they tell me. So if you can provide radical

connection and if you can demonstrate and model love and you can make sure people are fed, including yourselves and take care of all those things, it sounds like you're doing. I don't see an issue at all. What I would suggest is having people walk alongside you. And so I think you got that? Yes, I have my wonderful, wonderful aunt who's also my godmother. She's like a second mother to me. Awesome.

And my grandparents as well. And with that, I know that, you know, being on the spectrum, it might be a little bit more difficult, but I've been babysitting since I was 13 years old. And I took upon myself to do some part-time babysitting since this summer. And I've always been CPR and first aid certified. And I just enjoy being around children. That's awesome. And so, so to answer your, your boundaries question, this isn't just an autism, not autism thing. Um, let me back up. When I said have someone to walk alongside with you, obviously having a great family member, a good, like some family connections,

some good friend connections is great. I would love you and your husband to sit down with a marriage counselor, not because there's anything wrong, but to walk alongside as a neutral third party. And I've done this for couples where you ask the questions, what is the picture of a Saturday morning with an eight month old? What does that look like? Whenever one of us gets overloaded and we need to disconnect or unplug, what does that look like? Because you can't always do that with a baby. What does taking a step back and communicating well, what needs are,

right, is asking all those questions and begin to map some of those things out. The challenge that, like being around children is awesome. Babysitting is awesome. The difference there is kids never go home. And so there's something about, I can plug in and babysit for a couple of hours all day and go all in.

And then I can go home and just stare off into space. Sure. When you've got babies, they're just still sitting there screaming about something and pooping on everything. And so they don't ever go home. And so being able to map those out

with somebody, just a neutral third party, I think would be so valuable. And it will give you and your husband some clear expectations that y'all can write down and you can point back to

and say, this is who we are, this is who we said. I'm having one of my Saturday mornings where I need to disconnect and unplug for a bit. I need you to step into this gap, or we've got somebody on call. We've got aunt on call, whatever that looks like for us. But backing up even further, again, this is not an autism question. This is just a parent's boundary question. Unfortunately, you can't make your parents accept you

you can't make your parents love their grandbaby I think they will it's not a matter of loving my child it's the fact that one they will always be fearful of my child's

safety and concern 24 7 because they have that little faith in us taking care of a child long-term. And B, my mom has it in her head that a social worker has to be assigned to us specifically. So here's what I want you to do. I did the research, and that's not the case. Yeah, I want you to actually reach out to a social worker, you and your husband. I did, actually. Oh, you did? Okay.

And then did they walk you through? They did. Okay. They said regardless if somebody is on the spectrum, ADHD, bipolar, whatever it is, the most they could honestly do is just go to the parent's house, make sure it's safe, make sure the baby's happy and safe. And anybody who's tried to put a false claim that we're best parents, we can file a harassment case against that person. Yes. So here's what I want you to do.

There's somebody who knows you well, and she may be misguided. She may have her own challenges. She may be struggling with her own stuff, but there's somebody who knows you well being your mom, somebody who knows you well being your dad. And they have done an unimaginable thing in my mind and they've stared at their child and said, you are not qualified or good enough to be a parent. That's a huge accusation.

And my first response is, well, screw you then. But I also always want to get some data. So I would, if I'm you, I would go talk to a professional. I would get my husband and we would go sit with a

marriage counselor and we would say, we want to have kids. And my parents think that's a terrible idea. They want us out of this deal. And we think we are ready for this. And that counselor can walk y'all through together. And if ultimately in their, in y'all's opinion, in the professional's opinion, dude, we are going to be great parents. Every parent's got their challenges. We know how we're gonna work together to overcome these things. We're gonna have the right support around us.

That's when you go to your mom and dad and say, this is happening. Y'all can choose to opt in and love us and support us and love this grandbaby, or y'all can opt out. That's y'all's grownup decision that y'all can make on your own. I'm not going to

make it for you. We hope you'll join us, but you're not going to second guess everything that we do. You're not going to Monday morning quarterback our lives. And by the way, this happens for people who aren't autistic too, over-involved in-laws. And it may be that they are just, they think they are doing the best thing for this baby and for y'all. What a mess. I can't tell you whether having a child is a great idea for you too, because I don't know y'all. And there's something bizarre about either your mom has got some major issues or there's a glaring blind spot in y'all's world that you're not seeing. And so I want you to get a second opinion. Whether a professional is going to look you guys in the eye, walk alongside you for a season and say, man, we are ready to rock and roll.

It's going to be great. It's going to be great. Or in my professional opinion, I don't think this is a wonderful idea. And then y'all are going to have some peace and then you get to start drawing boundaries you get to start drawing boundaries and like your social worker said people are making false claims against you yeah you report that nonsense

hopefully your mother and dad will see the writing on the wall this is going to happen and we're going to need you we're going to want you in the life of our baby and our lives and we hope you'll walk alongside us and gonna want you in the life of our baby and our lives. And we hope you'll walk alongside us and be our biggest cheerleaders. But if you're gonna throw grenades,

bye, Felicia. Life's too short. Thank you so much for that call, Kathy. Reach out to somebody and man, best of luck to you. I love, love, love your heart. All right, as we wrap up today's show, man, Frank Turner's got a new record coming out in February, and he released his new single. This is a few months ago now, and it's so good. It's

off his upcoming Frank Turner hardcore album, and he's an acoustic artist, and I love the fact that he's, anyway, insider baseball, but the song is called Haven't Been Doing So Well, and it goes like this. It's a day with a why in it. So obviously I'm over it. And I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired. I've tried not to worry. And I've tried being sorry for being born in the wrong place at the wrong time. Because I've been messed up, stressed out, talking to myself again,

locked up, left out, terrified of everything, wound up, found out, waiting around for something to give. Don't you ever wake up and suspect that you were simply never cut out to be the kind of person they'd expect, the kind of person you intended to be. And I keep it all in with my idiot grin. I'm doing my best, but there's very little left.

So cut me some slack if I crawl back into my shell. I haven't been doing so well. Frank, none of us have been doing so well, but we're getting better every day right here on the Dr. John Deloney Show.