The Dr. John Delony Show - Is It Too Late to Save My Marriage?

Episode Date: February 12, 2025

On today’s episode, we hear about: ·      A man hoping to reconcile his marriage before divorce is official ·      A mother struggling with feelings of disappointment following a gender reveal ·      A wife seeking advice on how to process a traumatic event Next Steps: 📞 Ask John a question! Call 844-693-3291 or send us a message. 📚 Building a Non-Anxious Life 📝 Anxiety Test  📚 Own Your Past, Change Your Future  ❓ Questions for Humans Conversation Cards  💭 John's Free Guided Meditation  🤘🏼 The Dr. John Delony Show Merch Connect With Our Sponsors:  🌱 Get 10% off your first month of BetterHelp. 🔴 Get 15% off with code DELONY at BON CHARGE. 🌿 Get up to 40% off with code DELONY at Cozy Earth.  🔒 Get 20% off when you join DeleteMe. 😇 Go to Hallow for a 90-day free trial. 💤 Visit Helix Sleep for special offers! 🥤 Get 20% off with code DELONY at Organifi.  💪 Get 25% off your order at Thorne.   🏋️ Go to Trainwell to get started! Listen to More From Ramsey Network: 🎙️ The Ramsey Show 💸 The Ramsey Show Highlights   🍸 Smart Money Happy Hour 💡 The Rachel Cruze Show 💰 George Kamel 🪑 Front Row Seat with Ken Coleman 📈 EntreLeadership   Ramsey Solutions Privacy Policy https://www.ramseysolutions.com/company/policies/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Money and marriage getaway, the greatest marriage retreat on the planet is back this fall. I want you to spend 3 days laughing, connecting, and growing with your spouse with me and Rachel Cruz in Nashville, Tennessee on November 6th through the 8th. Get your tickets at ramsysolutions.com slash events. How can I reconcile with my wife? After revealing my gambling addiction, I revealed how much money I lost, which was a six figure amount. It was pretty much a volcano rate to erupt as you know with addictions. In the last year or so, it was just absolute hell.

I mean it sounds like for a year, I can be out of line here. You may be through with the past, but the past is not through with you. What up? What's going on? It's 2025. Welcome back to the Dr. John Delaney show. I'm John. I'm a dad. I'm a husband. I'm trying to figure it out right alongside each and every one of you. Some of you aren't dads. Some of you are moms. Some of you are just brothers, sisters, just dudes. Some of you aren't dads, some of you are moms, some of you are just brothers, sisters, just dudes. Some of you are Ben, the guy, I don't know,

Ben, you just look like a awesome guy making it happen. Thanks. And can we shout out Sarah, the editor of the show, had the first case of natural triplets I've ever heard of. She had them, and I say natural, she just didn't have IVF like right Yeah, I'm pregnant and it was like or any kind of you're gonna have three Yeah, but I think what's important to call out is she had all three babies on my birthday

Which I think shows incredible team dedication one of them is named Benjamin After me, obviously she didn't I didn't even check she didn't go with the John. No, there's no John But does that make you feel? She had him on your birthday though. I mean, yeah, it's kind of a flex, but she clearly doesn't value her job. She didn't name one of them, she had three of them. Did she name the daughter Kelly? No, Adeline.

That's way prettier. Both names are beautiful. Let's go out to San Francisco. Okay, wait, Uh-uh. We can't just blow past by what happened over the holidays. What happened? We hit a million. Oh, we got a million.

We did it. Our listeners are amazing. We did it. Yes, yes, yes. We did it. Sorry, man. There's a lot that happened. It was a wild holiday in the Delaney house.

I was like, oh no, what does she know? What does she know? What does she know? No, it's, yeah, dude, we hit a million. It was so great. And 1000% of this is because of you, the listener. Thank you all so much for being in our gang. And one of my favorite things in the world

is being all across the country, meeting somebody, and them shaking my hand and saying, I'm one of the OG 17. And that makes my heart feel so cool. That means you've been with us for a long time, but man, we hit the million mark and we're just getting rolling, which is awesome. As the great Limp Bizkit once said, we're just rolling, rolling, rolling. Now can we go out to San Francisco?

You may. Awesome. Let's talk to Jim. What's up, J.I.M. in San Francisco. Hi, good morning. Happy New Year. You too, man. Happy New Year. What's talk to Jim. What's up, J.I.M. in San Francisco? Hi, good morning. Happy New Year. You too, man. Happy New Year. What's going on? Yeah. Yeah. Well, I just wanted to say I've been listening to your show for about a month, and I really appreciate how perceptive you are and your empathy,

and congratulations on the one million mark. I just heard that right now. Well, thank you, brother. I appreciate it. And welcome to our cult, and we'll send you a jug of Kool-Aid here. You get off the phone. What's up brother? How can I help man? Yeah so I'll start the question and we'll dig a little deeper. So the question is how can I reconcile with my wife after revealing my gambling addiction which was back in December of 2023 and working recovery for over a year now. Tell me about it. Yeah, so we'll start with the 30,000 foot view. So I'm 47 years old. I was a compulsive gambler

from 2017 to 2023. So about seven years, which I hit for my wife. Sports gambling was the game of choice. Uh, I've been a casual gambler for, um, a good portion of my life price since middle school, uh, there's small amounts of like office pools, fancy sports, side bets, marks madness, stuff like that, occasional trips to Vegas. Um, I revealed the addiction to my wife. Um, in December of 2023, as I already mentioned, uh, a letter came from one of my personal lenders and she was questioned about it. And so I, it was, it was pretty much as a volcano rate to erupt as you know, with addictions like the last year or so just with absolute hell, uh, with

all these things coming in the mail and I was like hiding and making up all these stories. Um, I, I revealed how much money I lost, which was a six figure amount, um, or some other financial misgivings. We have three small children. They're ages eight, five and two, boy, girl, girl. My wife has not worked in 10 years, so I pretty much work two jobs. I work as an educator down in the Bay Area,

but my family lives up in Sacramento, so I can explain that situation in a little bit as we dig deeper. My wife is an amazing stay at home mother. She runs a phenomenal household. But again, she's not worked in nearly a decade. She was devastated when I revealed all this to her. I lied to her often. I was not present as a father. And she actually did question me about this back in February, 2022. So I kind of made some stories and said, okay, well, yeah, I was

gambling, but I broke even and, you know, just, you know, you lie as you do when you're in addiction and then, well, the survival mode for quite some time. And then of course, you know, the anxiety, all those things to start building up in you. But yeah, and again, we've been married for a little over 10 years, but we didn't separated for the past year. Um, I've been going to GA. Um, I went to GA right after I revealed the addiction to her in December of last of, uh, 2023.

Why, why are you separated? So, um, so she filed for divorce, um, in January 21 to 2024. So after a few weeks, after I revealed, um, the gambling addiction to her, um, she initially said that we were going to work as a team. Um, but I guess just after a few days when she saw just all the stuff had done and all the debts and the lies, um, she just, um, and there were some previous ruptures in the marriage. I was going to say, there's almost always in this case, for whatever reason, I mean, I can guess some reasons, I can speculate, but gambling addiction revelations have, there's

often the spouse responds differently than like multiple affairs or even drug or alcohol addiction. So that tells me there was probably, maybe not, but probably other things going on in your marriage for a long time. There was. And as anyone who struggles with addiction for seven years of any kind, like when you reveal that, right, then your wife almost like, like I think of like you ever seen Star Wars 1 Yes, you're from the Bay Area. You probably all watch that show. That was a very generalized statement

I just made about all the tech guys, but they all watched But uh there's that scene at the very end when the when the when the TIE fighters go down to get the Death Star and everything goes and get the Death Star and everything just goes and when somebody's with somebody in addiction and I always imagine that scene like as all these lights just go by in their last seven years go in reverse and they're like, oh my gosh, like everything becomes clear in that moment. You get what I'm saying?

And there has to have been other stuff going on. Were you abusive? No, no, not all. No, no physical abuse, no verbal abuse. I'm like probably the nicest guy I'll ever meet. But I do have an issue with avoidance. I do keep things to myself. Just, you know, there was other, I mean, kind of tell you some other things. Like I would unilaterally make financial decisions without consulting my wife. There were other financial issues like involving my parents that didn't tell my wife that created some hardship for us when we

had to buy a house. I can get into more of those details we want to but there were yeah I mean she didn't feel she was an equal as a partner with other financial decisions. I think it's I think it's way deeper than that. I mean, it's one of those moments that she knows something's not right for a long, long time. And when you put on the table, it's like, oh my gosh, this is not, he's not who I thought he was, right? And then, so she filed for divorce, but I guess y'all didn't go through with it. I guess she held. Well, so she hired an attorney, um, around this time last year. And then, um, and she told me she wanted to have this meeting with her father and her sister was on a Sunday afternoon. And then, uh,

I just thought we were talking about finances and then she hits me with, um, divorce. And then, uh, and then of course I was like begging and pleading and then she's like, yeah, but it's not just the gambling. It's all the other things that, you know, you, um, yeah, you never been honest with me. Um, well not never, but there's, you know, many times not been honest with me. Um, you've, um, um, you know, storm walled me, um, black communication, lack of transparency, um, emotional insecurity. Those are a lot of some of the other deeper things that have been going on.

Um, but yeah, then a few days later I I got served papers and then, um, we've been kind of going through the process, but, um, you know, we're now in a nesting arrangement with our kids. So as I said, I work down in the Bay area, but they live up in Sacramento. So I'm down here four or five days a week. Uh, I stay with my parents. Um, then I go back to my house on Friday night, and then my wife leaves and she stays with her,

her family lives up there. She stays at either her parents or sister's house. And I'm with the kids on Saturdays, and then she comes back Sunday, then we just kind of do it all over again. That's kind of the hamster wheel we've been on. And you know, she has, obviously, when you go through the process,

there's financial disclosures, all these things. So I gave her everything back in the summer. She's had a few months to look at it. And then, you know, there's a lot of stuff, right? I mean, it's many years of financial documents to look through, and I guess they can't make sense of it. So her attorney reached out to my attorney and said like, hey, can we have a settlement hearing?

Our settlement hearing, interestingly, is on January 21st of this year. So exactly a year after. We have a settlement hearing, our settlement hearing, interestingly, is on January 21st of this year, so exactly a year after. We have a settlement hearing coming up. Your original question. My original question, yes. How can I reconcile with my wife? Bro, she's divorced you.

You're the tail end of a proceeding. We're the tail end of a proceeding, yes. So it's, I mean, it sounds like for a year, and man, I hate to link these, okay? And I can be out of line here. Sure, go ahead, please. But one of the, one of the telltale signs of someone who is falling off a cliff into gambling addiction is an inability to recognize a loss in progress. And I feel like you're experiencing this in real time. I mean, do you have any indication on planet Earth at all that your wife is doing anything

other than progressing at somewhat rapid clip these days with how long divorces take for a settlement hearing. One calendar year, that's not super slow. No. So man, it feels like you're spending a lot of energy trying to figure out how to solve this thing and the thing has a period At the end of it as far as she's concerned as far as her attorney as far as your turn I mean everybody's got a period at the end of it, but you and it sounds like you're not living in that reality yet

Am I off? um Kind of I mean I will say I Have experienced I mean it dear 2024 was it, the year 2024 was obviously a challenging year, but a good year in the sense that I did experience a lot of character change by going to, you know, I attend three or four meetings per week. It's amazing. I'm super proud of you, by the way.

That's awesome. It's awesome. And I got a sponsor a few months ago. I read literature. I'm a more present dad than I was before where I'd like not pay attention my kids would be on my phone Looking at you know sports stats or things like that incomes gone up by 32 percent. That's gone down I've been my wife and we do work well together with the finances with the house with the kids with the education So we've been communicating well with that and we're in the house at the same time many times because you know we are in the messy arrangements and you know again like

it's just have you taken her to coffee and said do you want to still be my wife I've not done that no okay anything other than that is you creating a fantasy and really trying to hang on to it tightly right and short of that hard conversation because here's the other deal, you might get the terrifying clarity that you've been trying to avoid for a year. Probably. Yeah, you're right. But you maybe she's like, Yeah, I've been waiting for you to ask. I don't know another thing to do. Y'all are being civil. You're acting like adults, which I'm super proud of you. You're working your butt off to change who you are I'm like from the

inside out man to heal that's amazing and there's still this humongous blind spot there's that old it's one of the most haunting movie lines I can ever remember it's from the movie Magnolia Paul Thomas Anderson movie and it just repeats throughout the film you may be the past, but the past is not through with you. Oh, I like that. You may be a radically different man on the road to transforming everything, and yet seven years plus the dating relationship

you had with your wife, the consequence of that may go with you. So I think the bigger challenge is That you not become one of these guys in recovery who are only doing it for some other outcome Because you know that you know those guys and it doesn't work Right, right. I see a lot of people relapse and I have to do this for myself I get down like it's been all about my personal growth Because you know

I have to be a better version myself. If I do want to be a better father, a better partner to either my wife or someone else down the road, I have to be, it has to start with me and I have to want it. I am extremely motivated. But listen, Jim, those two things are external. And if you've listened to this show for five seconds, you know, I'm pretty obsessive about people being good parents, about people being good marriage partners, but you have to go through this process because you deserve peace. Right. Not so that you can be a better dad and be a better this. Those are

external metrics. You've got to do this for your spirit, for your soul, for your chest, for your... Otherwise you're just getting on another treadmill and another treadmill and another treadmill. No, I agree. I mean, it's, I will say I was riddled with anxiety the last year and a half after my wife had some questions about it about two years prior to the revelation of how bad it really was. This is back in February 2022.

That timeframe till December 2023. Yeah, no, it was hell. And I am more at peace. You know, to have that serenity prayer, you know, when you go to the meetings or where they talk about the serenity accepted things you cannot change, the courage to change things you can, was no difference. And that really sticks with me because I do feel less anxious now. But you're less anxious because you had your catharsis. You lance the boil, right?

You got you open the infection up so it could it could drain. And that always feels better. But my fear is you're you had done all this work and you're like, look, look, look, look, look, look, look, assuming or expecting that she's going to go you're right. True. Yeah, I would agree. And so I think you've got to make space in your sobriety for staying sober when she says, I'm buying you out of this house.

My dad's writing you a check. You're not welcome here anymore. When she says, I've met somebody else. You've got to have a space for sobriety there because there's nothing in your story that tells me anything other than y'all are heading for a mediation on the 21st, a settlement, and your attorney is going to recommend you write her a check and everybody move on. Do you hear what I'm saying? Yeah. No, I mean, no, that's the harsh reality. Do you hear what I'm saying?

Yeah, no, I mean, no, that's the harsh reality. So I mean, if I'm you, there's that, it's one of my favorite quotes ever. It is conflict deferred is conflict amplified. Hard conversations put off simply create way more, way bigger explosions. And so man, I can't recommend enough that you say, hey, can we go grab coffee? And I've always been doing that right. Yeah, that's what I was considering doing. And you should feel real anxious, you should feel real nervous, and I want you to practice with a sober mind, head directly into that anxiety. And call your sponsor before, call

your sponsor right after, but head directly through it, brother, and sit down and say, I still want to be your husband. We're heading towards the settlement. Do you still want, is there any chance you still want to be my wife? I will say I did approach the topic of reconciliation in March of last year, like only after two months of recovery. And she was like, you're crazy. And then she just unloaded on all these previous ruptures, which I wasn't quite present to, which was great to hear.

But she was just like, yeah, you're just nuts. And then of course then we, all the crap that comes with the divorce stuff, which is really not great, you know, like the custody that comes with the divorce stuff, which is really not great. You know, like the custody mediation and the attorneys midway through because she wasn't happy with the first attorney and then all those and then you know, then balls in the court and now this is what she wants. They said, okay, well we have to sit down and talk. I want you to like with fervor chase reality solve for reality right now what is actually true and I might have to practice being sober in that reality and that's gonna be really

hard and I thought meetings have been hard for the last year but they weren't as hard because I was working towards getting back what was. What was is gone. Even if she comes back to you, your marriage is completely new because she knows you as somebody who lied to her face for seven years and hid things and put her and her kids at financial and like emotional risk, significant risk. And so there's going to be years of trust rebuilding even if she says yes I'm interested in being your wife again, but nothing you're telling you suggest that at all

In fact the opposite you know, I'm moving towards the closure here. And so man for your sake Having a direct conversation with a loving spirit and a gentle spirit and she might look at you and say no don't ask again please that's the best path best path forward otherwise you are just trying to solve for fiction for a fantasy it's not real and if she says yeah then call me back dude because then there's gonna be some some pretty rad steps y'all take together towards reconciliation, towards coming back together, towards rebuilding something completely new. I can walk alongside you there, but y'all aren't there yet.

Right now you're at, do I need to accept the reality that it's just coming towards me like a speeding train, or is there a possibility that she's going to change her mind to last minute? I hope so, man. I'm a romantic, good hearted dude. I really hope that's what happens, but I don't see any indication here, man. Thanks for the call, my brother. Call me back anytime. We'll be right back. Okay, good folks. Lent is just a few weeks away. And if you haven't heard of Lent,

it's a practice that goes back centuries. And it's when Christians all over the world get ready for Good Friday and Easter through different kinds of prayer, meditation and fasting. It's about getting rid of the things or habits in your life that get in the way of knowing God and of living a full joyful life. So whether you grew up in the Christian tradition and want to experience Lent in a whole new way,

or you think all of this sounds crazy and you just wanna learn more, check out Hallow's Lent Pray 40 Challenge. The Lent Pray 40 Challenge walks you through great stories and guided prayers. Last year, more than a million people around the world prayed with Hallow every day during Lent, and this year will be even bigger and better.

Plus, right now you can get three months of Hallow, the number one prayer app in the world for free when you sign up at Hallow.com slash Deloney. That means your trial will last all through Lent. When you join you can check out over 10,000 of their guided prayers and meditations. So download the app and sign up at Hallow.com slash Deloney to get notified when the Lent Pray 40 Challenge begins. That's hallow, H-A-L-L-O-W dot com slash deloney

for three months of hallow absolutely free. Good folks, the modern world exposes us to things that were unheard of until just a few decades ago. And I don't mean endless streams of cat videos or AI influencers. I'm talking about screens in our homes and offices, fluorescent lights, EMFs, these things that can affect our mood, our sleep, our anxiety, and more. And that's why I'm so excited to partner with Bond Charge, a world leader in red light therapy

and EMF blocking gear. I use Bond Charge products all of the time, literally every single day, and I love them. And here's why you'll love them too. Studies show red light therapy can help boost your mood, reduce stress, and help with sleep. It can help your recovery from aches and pains, transform your skin, and even help with cellulite and stretch marks. My red light therapy panels, the infrared sauna blanket, the EMF mat, and more have become a cornerstone of my health and wellness routine.

Like I said, I use them every day. You can also check out BondCharge's other amazing products like blue light glasses, EMF protection products, infrared sauna blankets and 100% blackout sleep masks. Go to BondCharge.com slash Deloney and use coupon code DelELONI to save 15%. That's B-O-N-C-H-A-R-G-E bondcharge.com slash DELONI and use coupon code DELONI to save 15%. All right, we're back. Let's go to Augusta, Georgia and talk to Eleanor. Hey Eleanor, what's up?

Hey there. Ultimately my question for you, Dr. John, is I find myself pregnant for a third time with a third baby girl. So I currently have two girls and then the third one's on the way. And ultimately, that's been a harsh reality to accept. I wouldn't even say accept is fully in my vocabulary yet. In a preface discussion, I did want to say I recognize just how lucky I am to be struggling

with this exact situation, because I know so many are not, would be kind of their lucky stars to be in my exact situation. Yeah, but that doesn't minimize your pain. Yeah, and that's what I have to tell people. That's okay. Tell me why such a heavy heart over having a third baby girl?

I'm going to apologize because I'm going to be teary-eyed. You're okay? KVC, we're just talking on the phone, so you can tell how teary you are. You're going to hear it, I'm going to be teary-eyed. You're okay. KVC, we're just talking on the phone, so he can tell it's here as you want. You're going to hear it, I'm sure. I don't have easy pregnancies and we have really, really challenging newborn phases. All of my children so far and projected by professionals will be born with something called severe infantile reflux, which is just, you know, acid reflux for you and me can be deadly in an infant.

Um, and so first baby was almost admitted to the NICU is like a four month old to have a feeding tube and the choice to have another child comes with an incredible weight of six months of just really intense colic medical appointments you know and it's something they'll grow out of, but it's a very, very intense newborn period, um, as it is with anybody, but just an extra layer of it. And so I think the disappointment is that I had even, you know, told my husband years ago, it's like, I want two children and I'm done. And we didn't even find out the gender of our second child until she was born. Um, because I was so dead set on having to, and there was just a deep

gut wrenching though, is I'm not done yet. My family's not done yet. And this hope of, you know, please let us have a chance to have a boy. Oh, so that's, so you, you, in your head, the picture of your family included a little boy? Always, yes. Okay. So when you found out you're having a third girl, y'all, y'all made a decision, hey, we're going to go through hell again. We know, and y'all aren't like first year, first time parents where it's like a lot of

like Googling and a lot of like people telling you horror stories at the water cooler at the office. Y'all know this is awful. Yeah. And then did again. Yeah, the newborn period that God had for us was way worse than anybody could have ever described. Sure.

But they grow through it. Thank God they grow through it. Thank God they grow through it. You have a very real, it's like you've been in two rounds with Mike Tyson and you're not knocked out. And so like, I know what's about to happen in round three. Here we go. Right? Yeah, basically. And I just felt like I'm a very faithful person. I felt like, um, my prayers are, God, if I take this, this chance again, please let, you know, let our family grow to what we have pictured. And I also have just the most wonderful husband. Um, I could, I pray that any young woman that's searching finds, you know, a guy like mine one day. I'm so freaking lucky and to not see him get the chance to pass that on

to his own little boy cripples me. And I think that's just. So what I would tell you is you've got permission to be sad. You have permission that you had a picture that's not... And you did all the things in your power to manifest this thing, right? You prayed for it. You like wished for it really hard. You went again. Like, you know you're going to put your body through tough times and often with with this kind of severe

When your baby's in pain and you've got two other little ones, you know, the postpartum risk is higher Have you experienced that in the past too? Yeah. Yeah, so like I Think being sad is okay And if for nothing else have that permission and what I will tell you is okay. And if for nothing else, have that permission. And what I will tell you is I haven't met anybody. I'm sure they exist. I'm confident that some people are going to blow up the comments of this thing.

Fine. By the way, will you make me a promise not to read the comments on this particular call? Yeah. Yeah. I know people are going to be, no, this poor child gets born into a family where they're not one. That's not the case. No, I know not the case at all. And you're going to want this baby and you're going to be a't matter. They don't get I'll get born into a family where they're not what that's not No, I know not the case at all and you're gonna want this baby. You're gonna be a great mom Also this this heartache that I can't I have found And this is through my PPDs of you know, my postpartum depression

experience was The more I pretend everything's okay the harder it becomes for it to not be okay and to actually heal through it. So this is the first time I'm actually taking a socially unacceptable thing to say. It's like, I'm not excited about having another baby girl. I'm not. So let me tell you, there's millions of mothers who have that same, or husbands, dads who have that same, ugh.

That was not in my picture. And it doesn't mean you're broken or wrong. If the baby's born and you reject this kid, yeah, then you got a problem. That's not going to be you, right? Your disappointment is okay. It's what happens what you if you choose to meditate on that disappointment. If every every discomfort you have every kick you have in your in your tummy every doctor appointment you have if if you begin to hate and rage, that's when you need to go sit down with somebody and

and take some professional precautions there, okay? Okay. Because right now, just being sad, like, oh my gosh, it was supposed to be this picture. That's the same as, I mean, I don't want to minimize it. The story of being a parent is I have a picture for what my family's going to look like, and that picture almost is never realized. Yeah.

Right? realized. Yeah. Right. And so you find grief, which is right. And what we often don't feel in society, especially tells us it will never come, is that there's healing on the other side of this. You'll laugh again. Yeah. This third little girl will be chaos and a mess and super fun, or she'll be quiet and reserved and oh thank god. Yeah. Right? And for whatever it's worth, last night I had dinner with one of my closest friends, it was a couple friends, and all three of their kids came over. He is the most avid sports fan I know. The most avid sports fan.

And all three of his young daughters showed up. And he loves them and they are so fun and so brilliant. And so, these things that I thought I wanted, I think the key to life is keep being open-handed about what you get, what we get. Yeah. Right? And so your grief's okay. Do you have, I'm gonna ask you a really hard question.

Do you already have a name? No, and that's part of, I have- Did you already have a name for that little boy? Yeah. What was the name? I don't wanna say it, cause I don't wanna have to keep crying that I don't get to use it.

Well here's what I want you to do, I want you to write him a letter. I want you to write him a letter. I want you to write him a letter. I said, I thought you were coming to our house. You went to somebody else's house. And we're going to miss you. We know you're going to have a great, great, great life. And you better not marry my daughter. Because here's the deal, you're grieving it as a loss.

You already have a name, you had a face. That's something that happens. I don't know if your wife experienced this. Each of my pregnancies, I had very vivid dreams of the gender of baby I was holding. I could see their face and it felt so real. And that's, I'm actually, I was convinced I was pregnant with a boy. And I think that's another layer of all this. It just feels like I have lost the person because it was so clear. You lost a dream.

Yeah. And I'm a believer in grieving lost dreams too. Oh gosh. Believer in and grieving lost dreams, too Okay But listen if you don't let if you don't let this picture you have If you don't let this person if you don't let this this experiences picture this this dream metabolize Yeah My fear is you hand it to this sweet amazing amazing new daughter you're about to have for her to carry and it's not hers to carry.

Yeah. And that's, I think that's ultimately why I called you is that I knew that the weight of what I'm feeling is too heavy for the phase of, I don't know, the propensity to postpartum depression. It's like I can't be wrestling with all this. That's this they have a biochemistry that's about to come sure so let's do this and let's do this you have an amazing husband do you have girlfriends a Couple okay, I want that to be the the chief focus of the next two to three months for you Getting other women in your life that you can text,

call, talk to, chit chat with, whatever. Okay? Yeah. And I want you to honor them. We rob people when we don't ask for help because it's one of the greatest gifts in the world we can receive is when somebody says, hey, can you help me? That's a great gift. Not so great when they ask you to help them move but any other requests I want you to find a couple of women that you say hey I'm gonna text you crazy hours of the night will you hear you this is this is my hesitation towards what you're asking me and there's other people that probably in the same shoe that you hear your answer. Um, I have psychologically have been through a battlefield in the last year.

Um, the, if I were to ask for support from friends in that way, um, What ends up happening is the minefield that I open up, uh, chases people away because it's just too heavy. Yeah. And, but hold on. Yeah. Your friends aren't to throw grenades to. Okay. It's chased a few people away that were my support, which is why I'm hesitant to answer that question. Um question because the French newspaper changed recently. It has changed, but did your burdens chase people away? The things that you're challenged with chase them away or was it your lack of willingness

to go head into these challenges, to go meet with a therapist, to go meet with a doctor? The burden, yeah. You get what I'm saying? I do, because I was doing those things that you're saying and I was reaching out in these friendships. And so now I'm at this weird place where I have to be very trepidatious about what I share. That's not true, that's not true, but you have to be willing to deal with it when it gets heavy here's what I mean

Okay, if you have somebody you say I'm having an anxious attack because an anxiety attack and I'm pregnant again I got two knuckleheads running around. Ah And one of your friends texts you and says thank you so much for sharing. Have you gone for a walk? text you and says thank you so much for sharing have you gone for a walk and you say I can't right or I'm thinking about hurting myself okay cool I'm calling the doctor no no you can't call a doctor if you're really my friend you can't call a doctor so if you're putting heavy heavy burdens on people and they're willing to walk with you but you won't go do the next thing which is I need to go talk to a physician and you talk to a psychiatrist I need to talk to my OGOA in right now.

I need to go for a walk. Then people begin to back out. Because they've reached the end of what they can do to help you. Do you get what I'm saying? Yeah. What I don't want you to do is to look at the next six months as an automation. Like this is just, I'm on a boat, on a river that I've been down before and there's an inevitability to what's about to happen.

Okay. What I would love for you to do is say, okay, I got in that same boat the first two times. I'm going to try a different boat this time. Doctor, I want an exercise routine and I want somebody to call when I start having tough thoughts. I'm gonna be silly about sleep. I'm gonna call a high school kid to come over and play with my little ones while I can take a nap. Like I don't know what I don't know what must be true in your world for what to be well but I what if you what if you flipped it and said these are gonna be non-negotiables because I negotiated on them last time

and I saw that end result. Yeah. Because I hear in your voice like a like a I think I've tried everything I know to do. Okay. It's, we're, sorry, let me back it up. We're an ex-military family. So we're new-ish to an area. And when you don't have deep roots somewhere, those connections to just be able to call somebody and pull that trigger to get the help. It's not always an easy thing. That's right. It's tough.

And it's not that I'm unwilling. I'm absolutely willing. Sure. When's the last time you went and talked to a professional licensed counselor? Oh, last week. I'm not kidding. It's been a minefield. I'm on all the, you know, check all the boxes on the programs. I'm with you. I want you to go. I'm doing everything I can but my life can only, you know, it just doesn't exist. It doesn't exist. I got you. But here's what I want you to do. I want you to sit with your counselor and I want you to tell your therapist that I had some friendships that I blew up over the last year that they didn't seem able to

hold my friendship the needs I have and I want to work on that I need to find out I need to parse through with you and should help me look at this from a different angle was it me was it my friends was it was I not doing like what was it because maybe your friends are jerks they're like I don't deal your drama and they left fine let them go or it was man we keep we keep wanting to walk alongside you but you're not willing to take another step you just want us to you just want to like dump your trash in our yard and we're not gonna do that but talk with your counselor about it work through those things individually. Work through them.

I think that's fantastic. And I guess, yeah, it is so easy for me on this side of this to say that. I know that. But when I know I've experienced something once and I've experienced something twice, maybe it's a personality thing, I don't want to just give into the inevitability. Then I'll do it all different next time. I'm going to do all of it different next time. Just see. Because I already know what's going to happen here. Maybe I can get lucky with the other side of it. And that's not an indictment on you not doing any work. I know you've been working your butt off for the last year.

Millions and millions and millions and millions of people have been working so hard. But sometimes it's just a realization, all right, that way didn't work. That way's not working, so I'm gonna try this way. And you have an amazing husband, which is awesome. And there's gonna come a moment when you guys continue to lean in. Here's your two letters. I want both of you and your husband

to write a letter to this little boy. You'll have a name, you had it picked out. And cheer this little boy. You'll have a name, you had it picked out. And cheer this little boy on wherever this little boy happens to be in the cosmos. And then I want you to write a letter to this little girl. Your new baby that's coming. How much you're gonna love her, what kind of life she's gonna have,

how amazing her child is gonna be. And begin to prep yourselves for, we're gonna be super girl dads, super girl moms, girls everywhere in the house. And when that baby's born, she's gonna be ready to rock and roll into a house that cannot wait for her to be there. But right now, it's okay to be sad. She's gonna be bummed out.

Picture was different. Thanks for the call. Call anytime. We'll be right back. All right. So I've done some soul searching recently and I've come to the realization that I actually love the internet. Just kidding.

It's the worst. It's amazing, but it's the worst. But it doesn't matter if I think it's the worst. Everything in my life takes place over the internet. My work, my personal messages and communications, I buy most things on the internet now, it's where I live and it's where you live too. And because so much of our lives take place on the internet now, it's become normal to give away our email addresses to random companies who then turn them around and sell them to

other companies, or it's become normal to create all sorts of accounts for banking and shopping and social media. We even order our food and schedule our garbage pickup online now. Listen, whether you like it or not, your personal information is everywhere across the world wide web. And this is why I'm happy to use and recommend Delete Me. With all of that online activity, who knows where our data is and who has access to it? Chances are high that data brokers buy everything about you and they watch every move you make on the internets and they're selling it

to bad guys. But my friends at Delete Me will find and remove your personal data from hundreds of scammy data broker sites and they'll send you detailed reports throughout the year showing exactly what they removed and where from. So while we can't really avoid the internet, we can make our personal data personal again with Delete Me. Individual Delete Me plans start as low as $9 a month. So go to joindeleteeme.com slash deloney today

and get 20% off. That's J-O-I-N, JoinDeleteMe.com slash Deloney. All right, we are back. Check this out, big announcement. Money and Marriage Getaway, my favorite event that I'm a part of, is happening again this fall with me and Rachel Cruz. Every marriage needs intentional time away

to disconnect from life's busyness, to reconnect, talk about sex, intimacy, how to, how to, communication, fighting, all of it. I think, I'm kind of biased, it's the best marriage conference on the planet. You're all going to come to Nashville, you and your spouse are going to come for three days of laughter, hard conversations, some tears, intentional time together, and lots of practical teaching. And we set this thing up, we limit the number of people who can come, we could sell a jillion tickets and just, I don't know, download all this into you.

That's not the point of this thing. We want everyone to get every question they have answered. So there's tons of access to me and Rachel Cruz, lots of times for question and answers. Early bird tickets start at 749 bucks. Every time we launch this event, tickets sell out ASAP, so you gotta hurry. November 6th through 8th, 2025. November 6th through 8th, 2025.

749 bucks, that's for the whole couple. All you gotta do is get yourself to Nashville, you're gonna stay here for a couple of nights, and we let you go Saturday at noon-ish in the afternoon so then you can go hang out in downtown Nashville together make it a long weekend. November 6 through 8. Get your tickets at ramsysolutions.com events or click the link in the description if you're listening on YouTube or podcast. These will sell out. They always do. Get them ASAP. Alright let, let's go to Tucson, Arizona and talk to McCall. What's up, McCall?

Hi, Dr. John. I feel so grateful to be talking to you today. I feel grateful to talk to you. What's up? I am calling because I cannot seem to move past the anxiety I feel after witnessing my neighbor take his own life. Oh, McCall, you're not supposed to see that.

No. Tell me about it. Um, so it was, it was a weird situation. So it was a weird situation. My family was packing up to go to an outdoor movie that our town was putting on at the time and we had just moved there. And so I didn't even know him, but I had run inside to get a blanket and as I was inside I heard some commotions and yelling and a pop and I immediately knew it was a gunshot and I ran outside and my little boy had actually seen the whole thing.

He said that guy shot him, that guy shot him and so I had just seen a man laying on the ground and I didn't even bother to close the front door. We all just hopped in the car and left. And so for about 15 minutes, I thought it was a murder. And the police came with no sirens, the ambulance came with no sirens and I was so confused. And they let me know that it was actually a suicide situation. And so I got myself and my son into therapy right after that. My other kids didn't really see it, but they didn't

think that they needed therapy and they're doing fine. But my son has since graduated therapy, but I can't seem to get past it. Yeah I um I think you just need to remove the phrase get past it from your from your psyche. Okay. This won't be something you quote unquote get past. This is something that you'll grow around and grow through. But get past suggest this thing just is in the road and you just go on down the road and this is a part of you. It's a thing you saw.

You saw something that people might see on a TV show or they can imagine. But there is a there's a visceral reality when you hear it when you start using your senses when you see it. And they burn themselves into your mind and body because your body has a protective mechanism. It doesn't want that to ever happen to you. So it puts a GPS pin in that see don't ever let that happen. And for you that was your home. That was your home.

That was your neighbor. Yeah, yeah. And so it electrifies the skin you live in, right? It's not like it happened in an alley and so you don't go to dark alleys anymore. It happened at a relative's house. You don't go to that relative's house. This happened in your yard.

Yeah. Right? And so I think it is, the anxiety is right in that it's just trying to let you know, hey, you're not safe. Cause a crazy thing happened to you, happened to your neighbor, but you saw a crazy thing. You experienced it.

And you want to add another layer of anxiousness onto that? Your kids saw it. Yeah. You experienced it and you want to add another layer of anxiousness onto that your kids saw it Yeah So can I unwind a few things for you? Yes, please your kids seeing that's not your fault Yeah, you forgetting the blanket inside and having to go back It's not your fault. Your kids seeing really scary, scary things is not your fault.

Open your hands and let that nonsense go, okay? Okay. I want to flip it around and thank God Almighty that you have two little kids who have got a mother and is dad in the picture? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Have a mom and a dad that love them so much that immediately got them out of harm's way

because you didn't know what was up or what was down. You got them into the correct professional help as soon as possible and kids are astonishingly resilient especially when they're anchored into Connective caregivers The old saying in counseling is trauma kids Can experience all kind of trauma. They just can't experience it alone. That's when it becomes traumatic over time Your kids didn't they had you they had they had a husband, they had professionals. So amen to you for being a good mom and a good dad throughout this thing.

Okay? Thank you. Thank you. I want you to let the fault part go. And every time that story enters into your head, I want you to do something that's going to look, make you look crazy. Okay. I want you to comically abruptly stop that story. Nope. When you're in your shower and your mind kicks off to where you should have. Nope. Nope. Nope. And what I promise you, what you will do over time is you will begin to shift this thing.

You'll shift your default setting to, I should have to, thank God I was able to. Fill in the blank. Okay. Okay. Here's number two. What was the name of that man? Are you allowed to say? Um, his name was Jeremy.

Okay. I want you and your husband name was Jeremy. Okay. I want you and your husband to write Jeremy a letter. Okay. You're never going to give it to him. But this is walking your body through it. It's to help you metabolize what happened. And it doesn't have to be a nice letter.

Hey man, you scared our family to death. And I'm sorry that you were struggling so much with whatever was going on I want you to mean I haven't fully written him a letter but I have found forgiveness he was living with his parents and so we actually have become friends with his parents and like They're like second grandparents to us. So I've like kind of gotten over that anger that I felt towards him, but it's just that. Yeah, but the fear part is still there.

Yeah. And so what you do is you have a lot of imaginary conversations with him or about him. And your body doesn't know the difference when you're it's in your head. So it spins up the fight or flight as though this whole thing's kicking off again. And then it goes right back to the gurgling sounds. It goes right back to the awkward way somebody's neck cranks to like a really unnatural angle or somebody's ankle rolls over. Like all those little those little micro nuances are stuck in your soul and when you start doing that imaginary conversation game your body goes right back there. Yeah.

And so we're gonna metabolize it. We're gonna let him go. Jeremy's a sweet kid. Had a lot of demons, man. And for whatever reason that no one will ever know, what happened happened. But he no longer gets to live inside your head and your heart and your mind in your family's home

and so we're gonna do is gonna write him a letter and you are gonna read yours to your husband your husband's gonna read his to you you're gonna say it out loud as David Kessler who was recently on my show said grief demands a witness we're gonna say it out loud to each other and you have to be honest in the letter hey you scared me I'm scared to come to man's a witness, we're going to say it out loud to each other. And you have to be honest in the letter, hey, you scared me. I'm scared to come to my own house now. Every loud noise, I jump.

But I want you to feel comfortable giving Jeremy the responsibility in this particular situation. Write it out. Okay? And then we destroy the letters and we move on. Okay. Okay. Here's another thing I want you to metabolize, okay? That young man is no longer hurting right now.

Okay? Yeah. He's not in pain. It's over. in pain. It's over. And it's easy for us to flinch up like when one of our kids gets a bad cut, one of our kids bangs our head, our bodies clinch, right, real tight. And when you think about him, you think about it's easy to draw a connection to your own kids, it's easy to draw a connection to yourself and how much pain that must have been, how scary that must have been, that all that all he's not in pain anymore yeah

sorry sorry don't be sorry you saw some things you should never have seen. I'm so sorry. Thank you. I feel like every coping mechanism I've been given is just kind of not getting me far enough. Yeah, I know. And so it's like these like the five four three two one stuff is just like... Those are band-aids.

Yeah. We're not doing band-aids. We're going right through it. We're going to go talk to Jeremy via letter. Okay. I'm not avoiding the conversation anymore. I'm going to abruptly stop my mind when it heads down these tracks and let my mind know I'm driving.

I'm okay. You don't have to automate and protect me. Okay. Okay. Yes. As you move a little further down the road, you're going to quickly be able to scale through it's an old CBT technique, but it's like, is that true? Every loud noise, boom, my chest gets real tight. Is that a gunshot? No. I'm unconsciously exhale. You're not there yet,

but we're going to work through those things. And here's the biggest challenge that most people who've experienced what you've experienced go through is they go to war with their body. They want their body to stop trying to keep them safe and that's nuts. I want my body to be... Yeah, your body's working perfectly. Given your biology, your genetics, your this wild situation, your body's cranking along. What we want to do is teach our body I wasn't safe then I am safe now. And most of the time, not always.

That's what great physicians are for and great psychiatrists for. Often your body goes, okay, cool. We're back. Tell me about your friendship circle there in your home. In your hometown. You have friends, you have connection. How's your marriage? We just, my marriage is great. We just moved.

We move a lot. And so, I mean, I have friends all over the country at this point. Just not here. Do you get to see and touch? Okay. Yeah. It's easier said than done, but you've got to find human beings that you can be in proximity to.

It's one of the great fallacies of digital communication, these long text threads of old friends that are hilarious. They still send funny memes. We still check in with each other, still get happy birthday, all that's great and good, but your body is regulated by real people in time and space. Yeah. So you have to have somebody that you sit across the table from. You have to have a couple people you have into your home for coffee.

And for you, someone who moves a lot for whatever reason, that's probably a whole other phone call, that's a nightmare to get up and do it again and then you make new friends again and make new friends again. That's your lot in life. I wish there was another way around it, right? It's like telling somebody like, when you look at their budget, like, hey, you got to go make more money. Like, I don't know, you got to go get a job. Like, I hate to say that, but so your job right now is you got to go once again, new town, new home, new community, whatever. Having people back in, having people back in

that I can be present with, that I can drop my shoulders with, that I don't have to perform with. And I know for almost everybody listening to the show right now, I read the data on loneliness. That sounds like a pipe dream. It sounds like a fantasy. It's like not real.

I get that. And it doesn't exclude the fact that we have to have it. So that means we have to fight through the fantasy, put down the video game controllers, put down our lives and I mean, the distractions in our lives and head into life with other people. So what we gotta do.

There's not another way around it. And McCall, if you write this young man a letter, and here's the gold letter, I'm gonna let you go. I'm so sorry you're hurting this bad. I'll never know what was going on in your heart and mind. And by the way, you scared my family to death. I'm gonna let him go. I'm gonna let him go. I'm gonna let him go with my husband. I'm gonna be open there. He's gonna be open back. I'm gonna have some friends over to the house.

I'm gonna check in with my kids. I'm gonna check in with myself. I'm gonna begin to journal just to keep a gratitude journal. What's three or four things I'm grateful for every morning when I wake up? I'm gonna begin to stop those conversations, those loops in my head. When that image of him on the ground pops into my head, I'm going to immediately, you can't stop that lightning bolt. Those pictures, those images pop in our heads.

That happens. You can't immediately replace it with another picture. Nope. I got to focus on that one. Got to focus on this one. And over time, your body will go, Oh, she's driving. I don't need to keep reminding her of this. Most of the time, our bodies are just trying to keep us safe. And they're working as

as our particular bodies and experiences and biology program to all good. My job is not to avoid to teach. We're safe. Now we weren't teach. We're safe now. We weren't safe then, we're safe now. Thank you so much for the call, my call. Call me back anytime. I can walk alongside you. I want you to grab a book called Finding Meaning by the great David Kessler.

It's the best book on grief I've ever read, ever. Check it out and maybe you and your husband can work through that together as well. Thank you for the call. We'll be right back. All right, before we get back to the show, let's talk about Organifi. Everybody hear this. Health and wellness is not a destination. It's a journey. It's an adventure. And it's a journey that is never a straight line. It's got starts and stops and ups and downs and victories and setbacks. This is something that I've personally struggled with for years, and I recently made some significant commitments to myself

and my family to get back on the path yet again. And one way I've learned to make the health and wellness journey easier is making consistently healthy choices about what I eat and what I drink. And this is why I love Organifi. Their whole food blends contain only the highest quality ingredients and they make it super easy to get the benefits.

Just mix Organifi with water or your favorite healthy beverage. The green juice is great in the morning and it's packed with super foods that help boost your energy, calm your mind and support you throughout the entire day. And their red juice is loaded with antioxidants to help with focus, stamina, and recovery.

And right now, Organifi is offering the Organifi Starter Kit with seven days of green juice travel packs, seven days of red juice travel packs, and magnesium capsules for strong bones and healthy muscles. And why not? You also get a branded Organifi shaker bottle. So make Organifi part of your health and wellness journey.

Go to organifi.com slash deloney right now to save 20% off with code deloney. That's organifi, O-R-G-A-N-I-F-I dot com slash deloney and use code deloney for 20% off. All right, we're back. Kelly, am I the problem? Go for it. All right, we're back. Kelly, am I the problem? Go for it. All right, this is from Jennifer. She says, for Thanksgiving, we had plans with my daughter, her fiance, and their new baby to go see my parents in California.

We had everything planned to help her feel less anxious with the drive with the new baby. She's a very anxious first time mom. She texts, doesn't call, but texts me three days before we are to leave to tell me they can't go to a big project that he has due after the holiday and if he fails it he probably won't graduate. By the way, she just dropped out in her senior year to have the baby. I'm so upset because her parents are getting older and both have dementia. They've never met the new baby or her fiance. I feel like they should

have planned better when he knew this project was due from the beginning of the semester. She doesn't really seem to care how anyone else feels about this. Yet, she is upset with me for going to Texas for Christmas for two weeks to see my son's family and my other daughter. She said that I ruined her baby's first Christmas. Who's right here? I'm sick of fighting about this. She's 22 and knows everything That's so great Here's the thing she's 22 and she knows everything so if there's somebody I

must even stay away from fault language here, but You're the one that, they made their decision. I mean, not to be rude, but you don't get a vote. They don't really care what you have to say. They didn't call and ask and say, is this okay? They just did what they were going to do. And so what you've chosen since Thanksgiving is just to wake up and be angry and miserable every day.

They made a choice. They made a call. They're going to live with those consequences. Does it stink that the parents aren aren't gonna get... Is this her sister? Is that who that is? Is it her daughter? Okay, yeah. Yeah, your daughter made a selfish call. Is what it is, right? And 22 year olds in college didn't plan well for finals. Ta-da! That's not a big shocker, right? That just is. And so would it have been awesome?

Yep. I get a hint of she doesn't like this whole thing. She doesn't like that, oh, my 22-year-old daughter just dropped out of college, she had this baby. Like, there seems to be a lot more layers here. And so what mom wants is, oh, she had a baby with fiance, she dropped out of college, she's doing these things that I don't like, that's not the way I would have drawn it up, but you're going to do these things. And 22 year olds like, no, I'm not going to do those either. So it sounds like a mother losing control of all of it.

And so what I would say is, let go. 22 years old, what you don't want to do is cash in and this 22 year old daughter of yours doesn't want you as a grandparent. I don't want to lose that. Right? So I can be disappointed and then I'm going to go on about my day. I don't know. What do you think? I agree. I think that the 22 year old is, is a 22 year old, but they're 22. And again, you have no control over that decision. You can be disappointed about it. And I understand her disappointment because she wants her parents to be the grandbaby. Of course she does. I totally understand that.

But- Going to war with a 22 year old first time mom who disrupts out of college? Is ridiculous. Yeah. You're not going to win. You're going to lose that every time. And, but also, you know, with the 22 year old being mad now because you went to see them over Christmas, tough crap.

She didn't get a vote either. She's 22. Exactly. Right? Yeah. I'm not going to let you. No. Sorry you feel that way.

Yeah, exactly. Move along. And this is one of those like, I'll implore all parents and adult kids, if somebody texts you something big like that, call them. Pick up the phone and call. Pick up the phone and call. If there's a text message, you're like, man, that sounds hard. Pick up the phone and call. It's astonishing to me over my holiday break, the conversations I had when first with several people that were like, oh, we got the text and we understood. Like, what

did you understand? Why didn't you call me? Like well, you know, we... No, no, no, no. What did you... You know what I mean? Like just make that extra phone call. My god. Right? If something comes across weird, especially with your kids, especially when it's with adult relationships, man. Be adults, right? And yes, 22 year olds are gonna be 22. I'm personally not gonna cash in that relationship over time, over, you ruined my baby's first Christmas. I didn't. I'm going to move on in my life.

I don't know. Ben, did you ruin somebody's first Christmas this year? I don't think so. I mean, actually the opposite because my one year old nephew gave us all stomach flu. Oh. So he wrecked my Christmas. Let's put him on blast. Nobody listens to this show anyway. What's his name? Where does he live? I'm just kidding, don't say that. All right, thank you guys so much for checking this out and we will see you soon right here on the Dr. John Deloney show. Love you guys. Stay in school,

learn your drugs. Bye.