The Dr. John Delony Show - I’m Struggling With Infertility and I Don’t Think It’s Fair

Episode Date: November 28, 2022

On this episode, we hear from: - A woman struggling with anger over her family’s dysfunction and her infertility - A man who doesn’t want to engage with his in-laws over the holidays after an ugly fight - Dr. John on why you should choose guilt over resentment Lyrics of the Day: "Jesus Take The Wheel" - Carrie Underwood Let us know what’s going on by leaving a voicemail at 844.693.3291 or visiting johndelony.com/show.  Support Our Sponsors: BetterHelp DreamCloud Churchill Mortgage Thorne Add products to your cart create an account at checkout Receive 25% off ALL orders 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. Learn more about your ad choices. https://www.megaphone.fm/adchoices Ramsey Solutions Privacy Policy

Coming up on the Dr. John Deloney Show. My parents have always been sure my basic needs were met, but growing up, I felt like I was a referee in their relationship. Unfortunately, I was given the diagnosis of block two, and with this diagnosis, I feel like this is just a slap in the face that I yet again have to do another hard thing, and it feels really lonely. Woo! What's up? This is John with the Dr. John Deloney Show. And I guess I'm going through puberty because I think my voice just cracked.

My dad said it was going to happen at some point, and looky here, kids. I'm in my 40s, and finally turned man so good hey um this is the greatest mental health and marriage and parenting podcast ever just want you to have good relationships man good interactions with real humans in the real world so we set this show up to just sit with one another walk alongside each other during the mess that is it is our lives and figure out the next right thing to do. And so I'm so grateful for everybody who trusts us and who calls in and my promises. I'm going to tell you the truth and I'm going to be here with you. So give us a buzz

1-844-693-3291. That's 1-844-693-3291 or go to johndeloney.com slash ask. And we'll do our best to figure out what comes next. Hey, before we get going, Ben, you are now on a very short list, a list of one of friends of mine. Actually, you're number two. Number two, my friend Katie one time. You are my second friend who had an interaction with a semi and you lived to tell the tale it was a bad interaction too it wasn't it wasn't like we're getting coffee like this is a jesus take the wheel yeah what happened so uh i was just minding my own

business driving on 65 as a guy in a small compact uh on the civic hybrid hybrid would do there you go yeah uh this 18 wheeler merges into my lane without looking or telling that I'm in the lane currently. So he just clipped me with his bumper. I went spinning about three times, landed in the ditch, and walked away. It spun you right round record right round. Yeah. And then you just got up, danced, shook it off. Jesus took the wheel for real.

I mean, honestly. And our Texas listeners are like, well, told you. That's took the wheel for real. I mean, honestly. And our Texas listeners are like, well, told you that's what you get for driving a hybrid. You get a bigger trip. Hey, I'm glad you're all right. That's good. That would have been sad. It would have been.

But I'm not going to lie. And this goes for everybody working on the show. If one of y'all has a run-in with a semi and you don't win, I will use it in some sort of talk in some meaningful moment and I'll make a career out of it. So just know, stay alive for the show. Stay alive for the show.

No, I'm happy that you're well, man. It's good. Hey, y'all have had a... Y'all have had it this month, huh? It's time for this year to be over for the Hill family. Yes. A lot of stuff going on.

Yeah, dude. 23 is going to be your year and the year of the dump button. Yes. Yes. of stuff going on. Yeah, dude. 23 is going to be your year. And the year of the dump button. Yes. Yes. Alright, let's go to... Inside joke. Let's go to Chrissy and... We're all inside and y'all still don't get it. Ha ha. Let's go to Chrissy in Boston. What's up, Chrissy? Hi, how are you?

Good, how are you? I'm good. I can't believe I'm talking to you. I was just thinking I can't believe I'm talking to you. I was just thinking, I can't believe I'm talking to you. That's so good. So what's up? My first one is say thank you for all that you do. I listen to your show regularly and it's really helped me. You are. Thank you for being kind. It's so easy for me to get off the air and I don't really talk to anybody. I'm like staring at a camera right now, just pretending I'm looking at you.

And it's often easy to wonder like, what am I doing with my life? And so thank you so much for your kindness. I'm grateful. Awesome. So my question in short is how do I forgive my parents? Um, to give you some context, um, it's like, I'm going to set this grenade on the coffee table and I'm going to pull it and they're all going to sit down and watch it. Yeah. So what does that mean? Tell me what that means.

Yeah. So me and my husband wanted to start to grow our family. And unfortunately, I was given the diagnosis of block two. Y'all starting IVF? Yeah, we're starting our IVF journey. So sorry if I have tears. And I'm so thankful for science, but I'm really angry. But this is another thing that I have to do by myself in life.

My parents have always been sure my basic needs were met. But growing up, I felt like I was a referee in their relationship with their arguments, which most of them were about my mother being irresponsible with money or my dad being drunk. I've worked really hard to have a good self-esteem and confidence about myself. I'm really good with money. I think before I speak, I'm a good listener. And lastly, if you need a friend, I try to be the person who others can call on. I don't ask for much in life, but I've always wanted to be a mom. And with this diagnosis, I feel like this is just a slap in the face that after being such a

caregiver during my childhood, that I yet again have to do another hard thing. And it feels so, it feels really lonely. Yeah. I'm sorry Thank you Who's walking with you in this season? Who's walking with me? Who have you told what you just told me? Who have you already told that to besides your husband? My therapist Okay, so you got to rent a friend

who's like a person in your life I have friends hold on hold on who have you told what you just told me I told friends I'm going through IVF but not all the I guess all of those things there you go

so you have said like it just I want you to go back and hit like the 15 second back button a few times when you first hear this call in the very in your opening sentences you said things like I feel and I think

and I've tried. That is the language of somebody who was the responsible adult in our household. That is the language of somebody who grew up with an addict, an erratic parent, somebody who grew up in chaos. And the reason that's the language of somebody who grew up in chaos is you don't know what it even feels like to be whole or more importantly, to trust yourself. And let me change your language for you because I can tell you within 30 seconds of hearing from you, you did. And you are not, you think, and you feel. Not you think and you feel.

You are a world-class friend. You're a world-class daughter. And you're going to be an incredible mom. Okay? Yeah. All of that starts with you trusting yourself. And that's something you're going to have to practice because you've never been able to do it. The trust you had in yourself was that you could make sure everybody was okay so you could play the game so you could survive.

Fair? Yeah. Yeah. And you shouldn't have to be going through this alone, but at this point, this is hard language, I know. You have to choose to not be lonely anymore, which means you have to open yourself up to potentially being hurt really bad again by telling your friends, I'm heartbroken and I'm sad and I'm scared. And one of them is going to say something stupid. And one of them is going to hurt your feelings And one of them is going to say something stupid. And one of them is going to hurt your feelings. One of them is going to say something dumb.

One of them is going to be like, oh yeah, well, my journey was, and you're going to be like, how about you take your journey and shove it up? Right. It doesn't matter. And they're going to screw it up and you're going to have to continue to be vulnerable and choose to not be lonely. Is that fair? Yeah, no, that's,, no, that's definitely fair. I definitely struggle with, I always feel like when I'm talking with friends with something going on with my life,

it feels like I'm overly asserting myself or putting my problems onto others. That's because the people who were by design supposed to teach you how to carry problems gave you theirs. Yeah. And as a young kid, you've heard my bricks in the backpack. Instead of parents walking alongside their children and holding their bricks with them and teaching them the weight and how heavy things are age appropriately, your parents handed you all their cinder blocks and said, here, kid, you carry this.

And so now basic, I need help. Basic, will you just cry with me? Basic, hey, will you bring chips and queso over? Because I don't want to get out of bed. That feels like a burden. Yeah. Instead of just life. Yeah.

You know what I mean? No, yeah, no, that makes perfect sense. Can I say something provocative? Yeah. I don't think you're mad at your parents. I think you're mad at your body. That too. I think they're the easy target because they were so, they did such a bad job with you.

And it's okay to be really mad at your body. The one thing, man. Can I just have this one thing? God, can I just have one thing? Yeah. It feels like I was going to get something. I feel like I've been a good person. I don't know.

I feel like I've done a lot of hard stuff in my life, and I just want it. The one thing I've always wanted to be easy, and it's not. Oh, and you see every family member getting somebody knocked up and you see every 16 year old with unwanted right you see it all over the place right oh yeah and it just yeah it puts gasoline on that fire yeah and it just feels like why me yeah And so let me tell you the question, why me, is a question that doesn't have an answer.

But it's an invitation to all sorts of mental and spiritual and physical dysregulation. Yeah. Okay. I'll tell people all day long. I'll tell you, day long I'll tell you Be super pissed at your body Be upset I have a friend who really really struggled with infertility

And she was like I didn't have a period every month of my freaking life Since I was 11 until now To not be She was cracking me up And we were both like laughing crying together Be upset That's the whole thing

You have been living in a world where you oh man i'm gonna say it this way you've been living in a world where you woke up and the score was already a hundred to, and you were losing. Right? And so you thought, I can put 500 points in this bucket and it will balance out cosmically. And there's few things more terrifying than realizing that nature and the world don't work that way. That instead of stacking the deck with kindness and generosity and well-being and peacemaking, not peacekeeping, peacemaking,

because it's just right and because it gives us a simpler day-to-day present, it's easy to start stacking the deck thinking that there's going to be an ROI on it for us. It's going to pay us back someday. Right? And it's just not how it works us. It's going to pay us back someday. Yeah. Right? And it's just not how it works. And that's devastating when we realize that. So what I would tell you is don't spend the energy.

The one thing I'm going to tell you, feel your feelings, man. Be upset. Be raged out. Be angry. Be frustrated. Weep bitterly. Yeah. Put to bed the question, why me?

And instead say, why me? Or not why me, instead ask yourself, what am I going to do next? What am I going to do next? Because it is. I shouldn't even, like, I guess I'm just so upset with my hair. Because it is. I'm starting this journey that these feelings about my parents have like risen to the top. Like it's keeping me up at night. Like just thinking about the chaos that I was raised in and how. Because it's not fair.

It's not fair. Yeah. Because you want this so badly. And you know what kind of parent you're going to be. And they just got it. It fell from the sky for them. And they were flippant about it. And they abused it.

Yeah. It fell from the sky for them and they were flippant about it and they abused it. Yeah. And every second you spend thinking about them is a choice to be less joyful in your present. They're not worth your time. They're not worth the space in your soul. They're not worth even considering in the same thought pattern as this future baby you're going to hold one day. Yeah. It's not.

And here's the deal. Your body's trying to keep you safe because you weren't for a long time. So when things got scary and things got hard and things got frightening, we went back to the old ways, the old lessons that we had learned. And you've been a parent since you were very very young yeah and now it's time to let the little kid off the hook she needs to be done being a parent now right okay yeah yeah so you hear me say this all the time it's one of the most most therapeutic exercises in the science literature bears it out. But more importantly, just the people that I interact with on a daily basis. Have you sat down and written that letter to your parents yet that you'll never give them?

No. You need to do that. And it's probably going to be three different letters. And one of them will be how dare you i can't believe what happened the second one will be it's not all bad here's what also what you gave me because of you here's who i am today and the third one is here's what you missed. And here's what you're going to miss. Because me, Chrissy from Boston freaking Massachusetts, spending some time at some Harvard bars, right?

Of course, best city, hey. It's a close second to Houston. But Chrissy from Boston, drinking a lager. Listen. Our sports teams do always win, though, just saying. I mean, y'all finished last place in the Astros in the World Series right now, but it's cool. We can talk about that later. Okay, that's fair.

That's fair. Hey, the Astros beat the Yankees. Can we all agree on that? That was good. That was good. Okay, for now. But, hey, we're moving on. Now you got a new journey.

Now it's about, okay, cool. My body didn't line up how I thought. I'm going to grieve it. I thought this picture was going to look like this and it didn't. I'm going to be heartbroken for a season. And then I'm going to take care of myself because I'm a person who takes care of my body and I'm going to eat right. And I'm going to exercise. And my husband and I are going to have tons of fun practicing this thing that we're doing because it's awesome. And I'm going to trust my doctors. And can I give you one piece of wisdom on the IVF journey?

Of course. Have a finish line in mind before you go down that road. Yes. Here's how much money we're going to spend. We're going to try this many times. There's so many eggs we're going to fertilize this is this is our plan and we don't go past it without several months of hard thinking and prayer time if you're a person of faith and wisdom seeking because it can become its own nightmarish journey and you're going to wake up and be 200 grand in the hole and it's going to be a mess yes okay yeah um and if the day comes one of the ways I keep myself well is

I always am out on the optimistic side of things, things could turn out really really great and I always hold very loosely they might not they might not and so make peace in your heart, make peace inside, make peace with your

husband, make peace with your friends and your community. That motherhood may look different. May look different. I don't think it is. I think the IVF is going to work. I do. I don't know why. Maybe I'm just putting it out in the universe, but I think it's going to work.

But if it doesn't, it won't be because you did something wrong or didn't do enough good to balance out the other side of the ledger. And it won't be because your parents were extra, extra, extra mean. Sometimes things just are. Sometimes things just are. Then we own what is, we acknowledge reality, and then we ask ourselves that terrifying question, what are we going to do next? Hang on the line, my friend. I'm gonna send you a couple of things. Number one, I'm gonna send you Own Your Past, Change Your Future.

Read that book. It's talking about healing from trauma and it's got some ways it's gonna walk you through the letter writing. And I'm gonna send you Questions for Humans, Couples Edition. Want you and your husband to stay connected during your IVF journey. Don't let the metrics and the numbers and the holding your breath pull y'all apart. Y'all

stay connected as you can. Okay. Thank you so much for being brave and for walking through your journey with us. When you get pregnant, let us know. Let us be the second to know, and we'll tell the world. We'll be right back. 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.

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because Churchill has your back. Check them out at churchillmortgage.com slash D'Loni and get the home buyer edge today. All right, we're back. Let's go to Andrew in Atlanta, Georgia, home of the Braves that lost. What's up, Andrew? Hey, Andrew, John, how are you doing?

Just taking my digs in before the Astros. They're not looking great right now. So what's up, man? Well, I got a weird one. So back in September. Hey, you called the right show. You called the right show. Right.

So back in September, we went on a Disney trip with the whole family. It was a paid for thing by my mother-in-law. Oh, gosh. I'll give you a couple red flags. We were all staying in the same Airbnb. Hold on. You all have kids? Yes.

Okay. There were two who were mine and my wife's, and the other two are my sister-in-law's. And they're all between the ages of four and seven. What could possibly go wrong? Awesome. Everything. The other part of the trip was they wanted us all to ride together down,

which my wife refused. She's like, no, we're driving separate. Hey, you married well. Okay, continue. Yeah, she's pretty refused. She's like, no, we're driving separate. Hey, you married well. Okay. Continue. Yeah. She's pretty smart. Um, so we get down there and everything's kind of going okay. Um, and then we have an issue one night. Um, my sister-in-law loves to go from zero to a hundred for nothing. Like absolutely nothing. I've watched her scream at my mother-in-law over stupid stuff at Christmas.

You know, we're trying to have a nice time and we're getting screamed at because the potatoesin-law over stupid stuff at Christmas. You know, we're trying to have a nice time and we're getting screamed at because the potatoes weren't the way she wanted or whatever. Right. It's just a normal thing to watch. And it's, you know, I've kept my mouth shut. Been married for eight years. Kept my mouth shut. Right. Um, my wife and her go back and forth over a toy of all things, which my wife was just trying to say, we need to find, you know, our son's version of this.

Cause he had, you know, her son's version of that. And she was like screaming, buddy, murder. Kids were done. They wanted to go home. My wife was done. She wanted to go home. I told myself, let's just wait. Let's calm down.

High tension, right? Trying to be the optimist. High tension. Let's just calm down. If she does it again, let me handle it. Like she's calm down. High tension, right? Trying to be the optimist. High tension. Let's just calm down. If she does it again, let me handle it. She's a bully. She won't let you say anything when you're trying to express whatever it is you're trying to say in the moment. Let me deal with it.

I've been dealing with those my whole life. I've got this. Well, the next evening, she starts it again, but she's starting to bad mouth my wife in front of my kids while we're at the pool. Like we're in the pool, there's a pool in the back of the Airbnb. We're all sitting on the patio and, um, she started saying something. So I just looked at her and I said, I wouldn't say anything. And she just looked across the patio at me and she was like, excuse me. And I was like, I wouldn't, I wouldn't say anything. You know, I'm just telling you, I wouldn't start. She's like, I wouldn't start?

I was like, do you want to do this right now? She said, yeah, I want to do this right now. So I called her a bully. And she lost it. She absolutely lost it. Screaming out there, all kinds of obscenities, freaking the freak out. The kids are all stunned. They're all in the pool.

They're all stunned. And, you know, she storms in. And I'm just like, okay, that was a interesting reaction. Well, her six foot four, 350 to 400 pound boyfriend steps out of the house. Oh yeah. Yeah. So I'm sitting in the corner of the patio. Um, there's a table in front of me and now he is pulling up a chair right in front of me. Dude, this is when you sweep the leg. Did you not watch karate kid one? Well, he was sitting, he was in a chair. I was in a chair. That's fair. I'm all about deescalating, you know? And, but he comes up, he gets right in my face and he says, you want to see a bully? And I burst out laughing. I burst out laughing. I look over at my mother-in-law and I'm like,

is this guy kidding? Like, are we serious? Uh, by now my wife had reentered, you know, the patio and, um, she was coming to get the kids after she heard screaming and she saw what was going on. She tried to, um, you know, put herself between me and him and kind of push him back. And he stood up and she's telling him, get out of the way. You know, we're not scared of you. We're leaving, get out of the way. We're not scared of you. We're leaving. Get out of our way. She pushes the table out of the way. And when she does that, he reaches out and pulls the chair out from under me. I stand up, but he puts me in a headlock. So I'm still sitting there trying to deescalate. I'm waiting to see what happens. It's not a tight headlock, so I don't feel scared or intimidated or anything at the moment yet. And finally, he lets me go.

We pack all of our stuff. We go get our own hotel. We leave the house. Okay, you fast forward me to right now. How can I help you right now? So right now, so after that happens, the in-laws sent my wife this crazy text about how she needs to deal with her hatred and her heart. And they never even got a thank you for the trip and all this stuff. sent my wife this crazy text about how she needs to deal with her hatred and her heart. And they never even got a thank you for the trip and all this stuff.

This is the night that this all happened and we got in the hotel. Sure. Um, and, um, bring me to right now. How can I help you right now? So, you know,

we have not communicated with them since this happened. Absolutely. Um, they, they've opted out. Everybody's opted out. Right. They, they chose the other side. They went to Disney and had fun the next day with this guy that handled their son

in law. Um, so going into the holidays, my, you know, a, we already know that's not happening. Um, so a, how do we communicate to our kids? Like when they start asking, Hey, when are we going to their house and stuff like, Hey, that's, that's not happening. And B, what's our best foot forward? And I mean, they've opted out, but should we say something like, hey, you were wrong for this or should we just let it go? No, I mean, okay. So number one, I mean, the way you told the the story you had some bravado you waltzed in i've been handling this my whole life I got this and then you didn't And so part of me you invited it in You entered into a conflict that wasn't yours between two sisters

And it ended poorly Okay, and so I think there's something to be learned about if you're going to say you better recognize, then you might get recognized. Right. And then the second thing is it went sideways and you all left. You should have left. And it's devastating when we can't you can't talk something out. Right. It's devastating when parents don't say, hey, that is unacceptable.

Your in-laws are clearly trying to prop up a picture of a happy family, and they're willing to put thousands and thousands of dollars towards this picture. It's a myth. It's a fantasy for whatever reason. My guess is they know what a train wreck your sister-in-law is. They probably have problems with you and they're trying to recreate a Norman Rockwell painting in real life and it's not real. And so when somebody walks out of the picture, regardless of why they left, they are the bad guy because they left the picture. And so the next day, everybody woke up, the sun came up and y'all were the ones that were gone. So y'all are the easy bad guys. Okay. Here's why that doesn't matter. Y'all left.

You did the right thing. I would not have talked to them since then. I would have let them, if they choose to re-engage us, great. But we put our boundaries up and we're out. And when the kids ask, you say, remember aunt so-and-so when she was screaming and yelling? Remember when her big boyfriend put his hands on dad? We only go places where it's safe for the whole family. And so we're not going to go there. That's it. That is it. And we're not going to, we don't have to have a bunch of other conversations. My promise to you is the kids are going to think way less of this than y'all are. And my also promises for your wife, this isn't, this is the world she grew up in. And so she's probably been going back and saying she's sorry and fixing the family dysregulation

for a long time. And it's easy to walk out in the heat of a moment, but as time goes on, it's like, well, you know, and dad was and mom was and sister was really. And so that's probably been her whole life.

And so y'all are gonna have to decide to hold firm on this and choose safety and choose joy and choose laughter, right? Holidays are too short, man. They're too precious I I guess here's what i'm struggling with one I mean you stepped into it and it happened two, I don't know

I don't know what you're Lamenting or sad about or did did you, did you, you took a stand and nobody stood with you, I guess is the challenge here, but I don't know what you're upset about. It seems like it's all played out perfectly. You don't have to be around these in-laws who aren't seeing the world clearly. And you don't have to be around an unsafe sister-in-law and her boyfriend. Like, I don't know what you're upset about. Well, you know, there's the, you know, reconciliation and the, you know there's the you know reconciliation and you know like you can't right i'm not you cannot reconcile with people who don't want to be reconciled with

so we should wait for them to come around and realize they were kind of being stupid in the in the moment rather than point out to them don't. What, last time you pointed out things, how did that end? It ended with you in the armpit of a 400 pound man. Right? Yeah. Like,

they have no interest in seeing anything other than their perspective. Yes, you pointing this things out will not help the situation at all.

You choosing to not carry their bricks around. You choosing to find joy. You choosing to not carry their bricks around, you choosing to find joy, you choosing to make the best of a holiday season, maybe the first one in eight years that's gonna be one of peace and not anger and not accelerated heart rates

and you dancing around and trying not to set off sister-in-law and trying to make sure your wife is, maybe for the first time, y'all just get a hotel with a pool and let your kids remember the time Santa showed up at the hotel and just have a good three-day weekend. And you know what I mean? Reimagine the whole thing and have that be something beautiful and fun, not lamenting. Got it.

Does that make sense? Yeah. It is an utter waste of your time to try to come up with the right word. I mean, literally think through this through. Is there something you're going to say? Your sister-in-law is going to be like, no way. I listen, when you call my girlfriend a bully, you're right. She's rude. And we're going to counsel. Is that going to happen? No, it's not going to happen. He did what boyfriends do, right?

And so on down the line, here's what it feels disorienting because you feel powerless. You can't solve this problem. And as you said at the very beginning of the call, you have a history of solving these type of problems, of wading in, being the calm person in the storm, saying the right thing, and everyone's like, you're right. And this is one you can't solve. And so that means you have to dust your sandals off, or as the great Jay-Z says, brush your shoulders off and walk on, man.

Right? You don't sound like you believe me. Well, no, it's a, so I just, the other thing to, you know, my wife, my wife sees a therapist every week and, uh, has been unpacking this too. And, you know, there's a codependent relationship there that she recognizes and she's with her mom and she's, you know, then dissecting that. But, you know, the part, part of the hard thing too, is like, you too is she feels sometimes when she leaves work, she wants to call her mom. She wants to.

It's not out of, hey, I have joy in this. It's out of that relationship they have. Codependency in its root form is an addiction. It's a love addiction, as the great P.M. Melody says. She's addicted to the chemicals she

gets when she creates a fantasy and tries to uphold her side of it and occasionally her mom is really kind and occasionally her mom is funny and tells her a hilarious story and then she falls under the illusion that's my real mom there she is I just need to do more of this so that real mom stays out more. And then real mom actually shows up and real mom is dysfunctional and real mom is predatory and real mom uses your wife as a prop in her play. All the while your daughter's asking herself the same question she's been asking since she was a little girl. What's so bad about me? What's wrong with me that mommy won't fully connect with me? And that's not a question kids need to ask. That's the adult question. And so, yes, it's totally natural for your wife to just want to pick up the phone and call her mom Totally natural. It's totally natural for your wife to be heartbroken and weep over the holidays season this year Totally normal a screaf the gap between what we wanted and what we hoped for and what reality gave us

That's where y'all are and then you have ask yourself, like many callers on this show, like I have to ask myself, what are we going to do next? Are we just going to sit and wallow in this? Or are we going to choose joy? Are we going to construct something new that's going to be fun and we're going to give our kids a wild, great time?

We get to pick. We get to pick. And one, like for me, in my house, we're going to choose joy. Every single time. Sorry, man. Brush your shoulders off, brother. Move on to the next. 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 gonna go as Brad Pitt because we have the same upper body, but whatever. Look, it's costume season. And if we're being honest, a lot of us hide our true selves behind masks and costumes

more often than we want to. We do this at work. We do this in social settings. We do this around our own families. We even do this with ourselves. I have been there multiple times in my life and it's the worst. If you feel like you're stuck hiding your true self behind costumes and masks, I want you to consider talking with a therapist. Therapy is a place where you can learn to accept all the parts of yourself, where you can be honest with yourself and where you can take off the mask and the costumes and learn to live an honest, authentic life. Costumes and masks should be for Halloween parties,

not for our emotions and our true selves. If you're considering therapy, I want you to call my friends at BetterHelp. BetterHelp is 100% online therapy. You can talk with your therapist anywhere so it's convenient for just about any schedule. You just get online, and you fill out a short survey, and you'll be matched with a licensed therapist, and you can switch therapists at any time for no additional cost. Take off the costumes and take off the masks with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash Deloney to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P.com slash Deloney. All right, we are back in... Is there like, do we have some theme music? The new Facts Are Your Friends segment. It's a couple of days after Thanksgiving, and some of you are still sitting there in shock that you just experienced the holiday season that you experienced

the uh, thanksgiving at your in-law's house or at your parents house Or you just stared at your significant other And thought this is my life. This is this is my life or your kids said that thing At thanksgiving dinner and you thought well i'm gonna go bury myself in the backyard This is my life. Or your kid said that thing at Thanksgiving dinner. And you thought, well, I'm going to go bury myself in the backyard. Or you were at your grandma's house. And your son came out and you asked him, hey, did you change your underwear after you just took your shower? And he said something like, I haven't changed it in four days.

Why would I change it now? And you think, I don't like the holidays. Here we are. Now, today's facts of your friends is going to be around a segment. I mean, around something I get asked all the time, direct messages, people email into the show. It's the idea of choosing guilt over resentment. You just left Thanksgiving. And let's be honest, for many of you, for millions of you, it was awesome. It was a great time with friends. It was a great time with family. It was good. Some of you just took a dive. And when somebody started talking politics, did you vote? Who'd you vote for? You were just like, all right, I'm going to just, Jesus, take the wheel. And others of you had a rough go of it.

It was a long ride in the car on the way there. It was a long ride on the way back. You didn't sleep. You can't go to the bathroom in other people's homes, whatever the thing was, right? And now you're already making plans for what Christmas is gonna look like, the Christmas holidays, the New Year's holidays.

Are we gonna go somewhere? Are we gonna not go anywhere? Who's coming to our house? What are we gonna buy? Grandma already buys all this stuff. Mom and dad buy it. Sister's going to buy. What are we going to do? We're going to choose guilt over resentment. All right. So on today's fact to your friends, guilt over resentment. Here's what it looks like. All right. Guilt. I took some notes here. Guilt is the frustration or anger that I feel when I violate my own core values. Even if my core values are wrong, if they're dumb, like one of my core values used to be, I will make sure everybody else is okay

before me. And what that often meant was I ended up agreeing to conversations about stupid stuff that I didn't care about or that I abjectly disagreed with. One of my core values used to be nobody's going to disrespect me. And so I spent a whole bunch of useless energy trying to make sure everybody else recognized how important I was and how good I was and how smart I was and how accomplished I was. Complete and utter waste of time. And if I didn't get my, hey, did you hear that I got another degree? Did you hear I won this leadership award? Did you hear I got into Harvard? Whatever the thing was, I'd feel guilty about it. I should have told him. I shouldn't have said that. I said too much. Oh my goodness.

Guilt, guilt, guilt, guilt, guilt. Guilt can also be a value that's really important. I stole something and I feel guilty about it. I swore at my kid and I, or I yelled at my kid and I feel guilty about that. That's not who I want to be. It's not who I am. And I did that thing. I snapped at my wife. I showed up late to work again. Like I feel guilty. It violates a core value here, right? So guilt is when you do something that violates your core value feel guilty about it One of your core values Resentment on the other hand is the jealousy I feel when someone has power over me that i've either conceded, I gave it away to them,

or they took it from me because they're in a position of power. They've got bigger muscles than me. They're stronger than me. I'm staying in their house. They're paying my car insurance. They helped out with my down payment on my house. They've been holding over my head for 10 years, whatever the thing is, right? Resentment is about jealousy. Brene Brown has an incredible discussion about this. If you want to go further down the rabbit hole in this, that we all thought resentment was about rage, was about anger. And actually it's about jealousy, that you have that kind of power over me. And here's the deal. Guilt is healthy. I think guilt is healthy. I think it's an evolutionary emotion, right? It's important for our bodies to feel guilty

when we violate core values. They're gonna ultimately separate us from our gang, from our people, from our tribe, from our community, from our spouses, from our kids. It's important that our body has a reaction to that so we stop the behavior. And then we do the necessary things. We ask for forgiveness.

We say we're sorry. We bridge the gap or we put up boundaries, whatever we got to do to become right with ourselves and right with our community again. Guilt, I think on the whole is good. When you put guilt in your backpack and you choose to carry it, you go from, I did a dumb thing to, I am a dumb thing, right? That's shame. Guilt in and of itself is good. Resentment is not. Resentment is the death of almost every relationship. Resentment is ash after a fire, right?

Choosing guilt over resentment is a powerful way to reclaim your life. When somebody challenges your boundaries, you're going to be uncomfortable. You're going to get frustrated. You're going to get annoyed. I said we're not spending more than $100 on all of Christmas gifts. And you went and bought a $500 Xbox for one kid and Nike shoes for another kid. Man, somebody challenged your boundaries. They ran right over them to see

if they were true, if they're going to hold. And you take the gifts and you put them back in the package and you set them on the counter and say, we are not taking these gifts. Thank you for loving our kids, but we all agreed we're not doing this for our kids. They've got enough stuff at the house. And we agreed on that. You're going to feel so guilty and they're going to make you feel guilty. They're going to make you feel guilty. That's okay. The alternative is resentment, taking them the whole way home, seething. They got more power over my kids than I do. They've got more influence and sway because I said nothing. I just gave it away Or I had to take this because I wasn't safe

It's resentment It's ash And so here let's bring this home really close let's take husbands and wives Husband comes in and says hey every christ every Christmas we're going to grandma's house. And you spouse, wife, you know that at grandma's house, you always end up in the kitchen with the four other women. And they're always talking about how much their husbands are lame.

And you actually like yours. And one year you spoke up and it's like, I actually like him. And everybody laughed at you, rolled their eyes. Somebody asked you why your jeans were so small. They made fun of your shirt. They asked you, oh, did you start going to Great Clips for your hair again? They just, you're tired of it. They ask you why you let your kids talk that way, why they don't have such some app on their phone. And you say, we don't do phones. They're

like, oh, well, I got your kid the new iPhone. You're just done. You're done. And here's what you can do. You can sit down with your husband well in advance and say, listen, this year, I don't want to miss the holidays again. I show up in body, but I miss them in spirit. I'm not the mom I want to be. I'm not the wife I them in spirit. I'm not the mom I want to be. I'm not the wife I want to be. I'm not the me I want to be. And so I'm asking you to join me in recreating a new holiday memory. And we let our families know that this year we're not going to travel. This year we're going to do things, Christmas at home. And the moment you say those words, you're going to feel guilty because you know your husband likes going home because he

gets to go hunt with the guys. They all go out, they all hang out and have a good time, whatever. And he's not stuck at home doing bedtimes, doing morning times, listening to all the reasons he's a failure. You're going to feel guilty. And that's better than yet again, getting in the car, seething the whole week before, seething the whole way there, snapping at the whole way there snapping at your little ones being cold Being frustrated turning the music up a little bit louder turning your headphones up a little bit louder And when he reaches over to connect with you you rip one of the headphones out you go what what it's not about him That's you

That's the jealousy Somebody else has control over your life So this year Jealousy. Somebody else has control over your life. So this year, whenever you start to think, I don't want to do this. I don't want to go. I don't want to be a part of this. Think about choosing guilt over resentment. Choose feeling guilty and having boundaries.

Choose feeling guilty and having peace. Choose feeling guilty over resentment, anger, rage, jealousy, frustration. Because your kids are going to look back and remember not what you said, but how you made them feel as the old quote goes. And they're going to remember whether the holidays were a season of warmth, a season of laughter and joy, or a season of great tension. And they are going to make up their own stories as to why it was tense. And most kids, most of the time, put them at the center of that story that they were doing something wrong. Husbands and wives do it to each other too. So let's choose honesty. Let's choose openness. Let's choose boundaries. Let's choose, what if we designed the perfect Christmas and we reverse engineered it and said, how close can we get to that?

Not, we have to go do these five things. We have to spend this much money. We have to travel this far. What if we didn't do that this time? What if we said, here's what would be the best holidays for us this season. Let's reverse engineer and build that. And it might include family and it might not this year.

And that's okay. You still love them. Still love them. But not this year. This year, we're going to lay low. We're going to hang out. We're going to do us stuff. We're going to go just play in a hotel pool.

Kids will think it's more fun than Xbox anyway. Choose guilt over resentment. Kelly, does that cover it? Sounds good. Love it. All right, good. That's Facts Are Your Friends, volume 111. We'll be right back.

Hey, what's up? Deloney here. Listen, you and me and everybody else on the planet We'll be right back. 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 as we wrap up today's show. Hey, start planning now for what Christmas is gonna look like.

You got about a month. Don't just let it show up and hit you in the mouth. Plan for it, all of it. And the song of the day. Listen, new Dr. John Deloney show tradition. If somebody gets in a car wreck and nearly dies, the song of the day is Carrie Underwood's Jesus Take the Wheel. Ben, we're glad you're still with us.

Everybody else in the booth. No more wrecks. No more wrecks. Drive carefully, especially those with hybrids. Be safe. She was driving last Friday on the way to Cincinnati on a snow white Christmas Eve, going home to see her mama and her daddy with her baby in the backseat. 50 miles to go and she was running low on faith and gasoline. My car doesn't run on faith. I think that's the new hybrid. It'd be a law. It's been a long, hard year.

She had a lot on her mind and she didn't pay attention. She was going way too fast before she knew it. She was spinning on a thin black sheet of glass or in Ben's case, because of emerging semi. She saw both their lives flash before her eyes. She didn't even have time to cry. She was so scared. She threw her hands up in the air and she didn't wave them around like she just didn't care. She said, Jesus, take the wheel. Take it from my hands because I can't do this on my own. I'm letting go. Jesus, take the wheel.

We'll see you soon.