The Dr. John Delony Show - Is My Partner Emotionally Abusive or Am I the Problem?

Episode Date: November 8, 2023

On today’s show, we hear about: - A woman unsure if she’s the problem in her rocky relationship - A man wondering how to make friends at work - Teaching kids self-regulation with Dr. Caroline Leaf Lyrics of the Day: "Landslide" - Fleetwood Mac 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 Hallow Thorne Add products to your cart create an account at checkout Receive 25% off ALL orders Resources: Building a Non-Anxious Life Anxiety Test Own Your Past, Change Your Future Questions for Humans Conversation Cards 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. I was just sitting at home doing chores. He wanted me to list out exactly all the things that I was doing. My gut tells me there's something very wrong here. Am I in an emotionally abusive and controlling relationship, or is this all just a misunderstanding and I'm actually the problem? What is going on? This is John with the Dr. John Deloney Show.

One of the top 500 greatest mental health and marriage and parenting and emotional and mental health podcasts ever. And mental health. And we also discuss mental health on this show. I'm going to keep saying it. Dude, I'm so glad that you've joined us. Over the last six months, the show has been on such a skyrocket. We've got a whole bunch of new people with us. And I'm so grateful that you're here. I'm so grateful that you are giving us your most precious resource, your time. This show is real people going through real hard stuff, trying to figure out what to do in their marriages,

with their kids, with their kids' schools, with their mental and emotional health. And I'm so grateful that you've joined us. If you want to be on this show, talk to a neutral third party. I may not have the answer, but I promise I'll sit with you and we'll figure out what's going on. Go to johndeloney.com, D-E-L- promise I'll sit with you and we'll figure out what's going on. Go to johndeloney.com, D-E-L-O-N-Y,

johndeloney.com slash ask, A-S-K, or give me a buzz at 1-844-693-3291. Leave a message and we'll get back to you. And if Jenna selects the call, she'll give you a shout. We'll put it on the show and we will rock it on until the break of dawn. Don't forget, it's almost Thanksgiving.

Go to johndeloney.com. Get your questions for humans right now. I'm going to save your Thanksgiving. I'm going to save your Christmas. There's decks for couples. There's decks for kids. There's specific decks for Thanksgiving and Christmas and new this year. Well, Thanksgiving and Christmas are new, but we also have grandparents and grandkids.

So look, go to Thanksgiving and go on a date for the first time in months and leave your kids with your grandparents and know they're not going to get their heads pumped full of conspiracy theories or some political lunacy, I gotcha. They can just go through these cards. They're going to have a great time. Your kids are going to learn about your parents and probably learn some things that you don't even know and vice versa. Go to johndeloney.com. Pick up Questions for Humans. They're the bestseller out of the store,

and they're going to change your relationships for the better. All right, let's go out to Bend, Oregon. Not bend over, but Bend, Oregon and talk to Elise. What's up, Elise? Hi, Dr. John. Can you hear me doing good? I can. Yeah, I can hear you great. Okay. So I appreciate you taking my call. I've been really stressed for the past year, it seems like. What's going on? My question is, am I in an emotionally abusive relationship and controlling relationship, or is this all just a misunderstanding and I'm actually the problem? Okay, hold on.

Before you ask, I want to know what you think. Actually, not even what you think Actually Not even what you think Like put your hand on your Belly right now on your tummy What does your gut tell you Um my gut tells me There's something very wrong here But I keep holding on

To maybe not Maybe I just Don't know what a good relationship should be like. Ah, okay. So before you tell me what's going on, have you ever had reason to doubt you? Yeah, in relationships, absolutely. Okay. So your self-doubt is well-earned.

You've made mistakes in the past, and you don't think you're very trustworthy right now? Just maybe my level of maturity or how I react to situations might be my biggest issue that I need to work on. Okay. That's super fair, man. That's very self-aware of you. That's super fair, man. That's very self-aware of you. That's awesome. All right. So what's going on that you're wondering, am I the problem? So I've been with my boyfriend for a year and a half. He's very, very attentive, which is one of the things that drew me to him. I don't think guys are usually that attentive as he is. Um, so I felt for the lucky, as the luckiest girl alive, um, for a while. Um, but a little bit

into dating. Um, he, I, I guess I wouldn't communicate with him enough. And by that, I mean, I would wake up in the morning and go to work sometimes and I wouldn't say good morning right away. I would say good morning at 9am instead of eight or instead of at seven when I woke up. And, um, are y'all living together or you were just in your own apartment and you would just go to work? Yeah, just in my own apartment. And I would go to work, you know, just going about normal life things. And, um, he needs to be in constant, constant communication, constant communication. Like the moment I wake up, I need to talk to him. And, um, uh, early on in our relationship, he almost broke up with me because he said he felt like an afterthought. And to me, that was wild

because he's the only person that I would spend any time with. We would see each other almost every day. I would communicate with him, you know, daily, constantly. And so when he told me that, and he was about to break up with me because he felt like an afterthought, I tripled down on the amount of attention that I would give him, you know, and I just made sure that I was in constant communication. I mean, every five to 10 minutes, I kid you not. To me, it seems excessive, but I thought, okay, maybe if I do this, he'll feel a little bit more secure in the relationship. He's been burned before. He's been cheated on, yada, yada. So I want to make him feel secure and see that I'm all in, that I'm all about him and he doesn't have to worry. But after a while...

He moved the finish line, right? I'm sorry? He just moved the finish line. Yes, yeah. After a while, I noticed that it just, no matter how much effort I would put in, he would still be really suspicious of me, of everything that I would do. And even if he knew I was at home, just sitting at home doing chores or whatever, he wanted me to list out exactly all the things that I was doing. Elise, run, run, run, run. And I hate to say that to you because I know that you like this person

and I know that you're invested in this person. I wish you could see the eyes of the women that are looking at me right now. They look like saucers, like wide-eyed. That's what everybody tells me. Yes. And here's what I want to Here's the most important thing About what you're What you're Walking through And it has absolutely nothing to do with him

Okay I want to take him completely out of it Especially in the first six months You really liked this guy, didn't you? Yeah, absolutely Like you grew to this guy, didn't you? Yeah, absolutely. Like you grew to really... I used to be the one. Yeah, you started making plans with this guy, like secretly, right?

You had like, you started developing pictures of, oh, this is going to be like, right? Yeah. And you expressed that in a way that was whole and good for you. You really fell for somebody. And they looked at you and said, you're not enough. The way you feel whole and good is not enough for me. You have to be more. Yeah. And I'm talking about, um, this could be text messages. You have to text me 15 times a day. I text you five times a day. I text nobody in my life, nobody. And I text you five. Right. And it's like, no, he'll question it. That's right. And that can be sexual. That can be financial. That can be questioning every second of you, like everything about you.

And the reason, like when you said I tripled down and I kind of held my breath because I was almost positive what was going to happen. If it had been you. Now, here's like the pushback I'm going to get from people listening is this. When I got married to my wife, I didn't know certain things. I didn't know you have to wash your sheets once a month. Good grief. Are we crazy? Right? I didn't know. And my wife told me like, hey, in my house, we're going to wash our sheets every week because you're gross And I was like, okay. Awesome and I came Towards right? There was a finish line there. This is what we're gonna do and I was like awesome. I'm in it

When you said you tripled down He moved the finish line on you All right, fine. I'm gonna to text you 15 times a day. And then within a week or two, 15 times isn't enough. Now I want to see your texts. I want to GPS locate you on my phone. I want, because what he's trying to do is use you to fill some sort of void he's got.

You are a drug. You're a Xanax for him And he's got to keep taking more and more and more and more and he doesn't care if it kills you in the process That's what it feels like definitely it is And I could hear you talking as you don't talk about this enough out loud with your friends Because I could as you were talking, it was finally all starting to come out a little bit, right? Yeah, I started hiding it from people, the extent of it. Please don't. Please don't. Can I ask you why?

Like, let's say you call them today and break up. And there's that deep grief. What's scary about that moment for you? Cause it's deeper than just a breakup for you. Um, I, I don't know. Just, I was just really holding onto the idea that I could have something good with him. But sometimes I think if we were to break up, I would be a lot, I would be hurting for a while, but I'd ultimately be doing a lot better. Do you believe that? Because I think you're worth a lot better. Whatever that looks like.

Yeah. And I'm telling you to run. I'm not in the business of breaking up relationships. And so if you want to stay, here's your only path forward. A sit-down conversation where you say, I love you. We've been together for a year and a half. And A, you've got to go do your own work because I can't be responsible for making you feel better.

It's not my job. Number two, I will text you three times a day, period. And if that's not good enough for you, then we're done. Then you are choosing to not be in a relationship with me. I will tell you where I'm like when I'm headed out with my friends, you're not going to geolocate me on your phone. You're not going to come by my house in the middle of the night and check on my car. You're not going to go through my texts, and you're not going to go through my receipts. And if that's not okay, if you need that to be whole,

then you're choosing to not be in a relationship with me because I can't live like this. Because you're like being, you're like being like your, your dating relationship is like a, I was watching Homeland last week when I was sick. Like it's, it's like a CIA investigation all the time. 24 seven, 365. Those are exhausting, right? Yeah. I'm under scrutiny.

Have you cheated on him, Elise? No, no. Are you hiding money from him? Absolutely not. I don't believe you. Of course you're not, right? And you should not have to spend every second of your life as though you are. You get to decide whether I'm staying or going.

I'm going to ask you with all my heart. I'm not going to beg you, but I'm going to get really close. You know you're in an unsafe relationship, whether it's physical, whether it's sexually unsafe, or whether it is psychologically or emotionally unsafe. When you start hiding parts of it from your closest friends, when you stop telling the truth to the people who you know have your best interest at heart, when you have that little flash of, I think everything in my

life would be better. It would suck for a while, but everything in my life would be better if this was gone. I want you to put your hand on your belly and feel that and believe it. Because I think you're right. I think you're right. And if you choose to stay, I want you to be really honest about what you need. Not the triple down version plus the triple down times two times eight. Not that version. I want you to be really firm about what you believe and what you need to be whole. And I want you to put that on the table and say, this is who you're with. This is what I'm worth. And this is what I need.

I can't keep living under an investigation under a microscope. And maybe he'll go, oh my gosh, you're right. I'm going to go to counseling and I'm going to get better. But I think you and I both know, probably not. Make a call, but I want you and I both know probably not. Make a call, but I want you to make the call knowing this. You're worth something better than what you're experiencing right now. And I hope for the first time in a long time, you'll listen to that voice way down deep trying to keep Elise safe. Reach out to your friends and start telling them the truth.

Hey guys, this isn't getting better. It's actually getting worse. I need somebody to hold my hand through this process because I think it's going to be kind of rocky. But you're worth being loved and that means you're worth being whole. And you're worth telling the truth. We'll be right back.

All right, let's go out to Fort Worth, Texas, home of the Rangers, and talk to Christopher. What's up, Christopher? Hello, John. Can you hear me? I can. What's up, man? Hey, this is my first time on the show. Been a long time listening. Pretty nervous, but we'll see how this goes.

Hey, I specifically told the team no calls from the Dallas-Fort Worth area this week because you guys just knocked out my Astros out of the World Series. But they said this one was important, so here we go. What's up, man? Yeah, so this question is in regards to just, I'm not sure, just like a personality issue or just something I'm overthinking. As an adult, I was inspired by one of your calls in the past week stating that it's hard to make friends as an adult, which is true. It's the worst, man. Yeah, tell me about it. Just to give you a quick story, I just recently started a job and I want to be more outgoing,

more friendly and stuff like that. Good for you, man. So I want to meet coworkers. So I want to meet coworkers, just expand my network. But honestly, it's so hard. It's so hard to network, to make conversation in the workplace. And, you know, it's just really difficult. Honestly, I really, honestly I really I have possibly like one or two friends

but then again when I call them they always seem to be busy so honestly I don't I wouldn't say that I have like a close circle of friends so it's pretty hard to just get out there and just expand myself and expand my network so I don't want to see in work perspective how can I overcome this

obstacle. Man that's a great question, dude. A couple of thoughts here. So how long have you been working at this new place? Yeah, I just recently started about a month in. I will say it makes it more difficult

because honestly, my department is mostly for middle-aged to older women. And I'm a young male. Oh, yeah, Christopher. Oh, yeah. I'm just kidding.

I'm just kidding. So, honestly, I'm not sure what to bring up in a conversation when they're talking about family, stuff like this. I'm not sure what to go on from there. I'm probably just the one employee or coworker that just sits back and laughs. And then if I have, like, an opinion or something, then I state from there. I just, I just, I'm probably just the one employee or coworker that just sits back and laugh. And then if I have like a opinion or something, then I stay my opinion, but I want to be more,

more out there, more, more connections, more, more conversations and stuff like that. I love that. So a couple of different things circling in my mind here. Okay.

When it comes to making new friends as an adult, the only two things I can think of, and I actually, it's funny you mentioned this. I, um, I just, I got like an obnoxious amount of journal articles, like nerd scientific research articles. I want to figure out like everything about friendship because I don't know how it works. And so I'm with you, like I'm trying to figure this out and I'm going to go down a rabbit hole for a while. I'm figuring it out for the next several months. I just want to learn everything about it because I'm so perplexed by it. But the only thing I've got for you right now, when it comes to

just globally speaking about making new friends as an adult is three things. Number one, go first. Number two, just make peace with being weird. Number three, be hospitable. And so if you sit back and wait, it's going to always, it's going to feel like it never comes. And then if it does, if it does come, you're on somebody else's terms. So you work in an office with four or five or 10 or 15 middle-aged women. Cool. Announce, Hey, I want to go to lunch

with four or five of y'all. And I want you to teach me your secrets. I'm buying. That's the hospitality part. And it's going to be expensive the first time, but I want you to take them out. And here's the magic thing. So it's be weird. Go first, be hospitable. Hospital mean, hey, I'm having a Halloween get together at my house. I'd love to have y'all come. In your particular situation, that might not work. That might be kind of weird, right? It might work at your local church. It might work at your local, like, I don't know what hobbies you're into. And you might be like, I don't have any hobbies. Well, it might be time to like, go take jujitsu or go take a welding

class or go do some things that are going to put you with other people in your age demographic, et cetera. Okay. But when it comes to work, when it comes to meeting new people, go first, be weird and be hospitable. Just have them over. Well, I got a little bitty apartment. It's kind of weird. Have them over anyway. The only time I would say don't have them over is if you still live at your mom's house. Okay. That could be super weird, right? In your situation, I have found one of the greatest gifts we can give another person is to ask about their life and to listen to them. And so when they're talking about family and you're just sitting back cracking up, you're laughing. Instead of trying to think of the right thing to add to the conversation,

the right thing to say, when somebody's talking about their ding-dong husband did this again, I can't believe that. A great gift you could give them is to say, hey, I'm young. Are you single? Yes, yes, I am. Okay, perfect.

Hey, I'm young and single. How did that guy get somebody as beautiful and awesome as you? I want to hear your story. And just let it go. And what you're doing is giving somebody an opportunity to tell their story. And they might smile the whole time

because they're going to remember back to when she actually liked her husband or their romance story. Or she's going to get choked up because the marriage is over. The guy passed away. Here was the story from the past. But you are letting them, you are providing them an opportunity to get in touch with some important feelings in their life,

and that makes you a really valuable human being. Okay. And whenever they talk, instead of leaning back, which you probably do, I want you to consciously lean forward on one elbow just a little bit. And it's going to feel awkward, but I want you to lean towards them a little bit because that tells their body,

this guy's safe and he's listening. Okay. Okay. Think to ask more questions than think what's the right thing to say here. Okay, yeah, and also to add, yeah, that's great advice. Yeah, I try so hard to just search up articles, YouTube videos, and stuff like that, but honestly, I'm not sure. I'm just trying to find what to say and what's a good conversation starter.

Everybody likes to talk about themselves. Okay. Everybody. Okay. And also to add, I also want to expand, as I mentioned, my department mostly consists of ladies.

I also want to expand to other departments, but I'm not sure since I'm not in their department and I'm not in the part in their department and, uh, I really don't understand what, what they do for work. Um, I'm not sure how to go with it. Like I said, yeah, I do want. That's it. That's your question. Hey, can I take you to coffee and just learn about what y'all do? Uh, what? Hey, I'm over in department X. I'm surrounded by like 35 middle--aged women I want to learn about what you guys are doing over here

In this part of the company Can I buy you coffee? And what you're doing is not like Hey man, will you come be my friend? Because that's weird, right? That would make you weird Or hey, you want to go talk about chicks? I don't know what weird thing You're going to get on the internet

I guess this is going on the internet So that might be a weird thing But sitting down and asking somebody Dude,, so tell me like, what do y'all do over here in this, in this part of the company and letting them talk and then say, are you married? Well, yeah. How'd that happen, man? You got kids? Yeah. I got two kids, dude. What's the best part of being a dad? Like I'm not a dad yet. What's the scariest part of being a dad? And you're going to look up and you're going to have spent an hour and that person has mostly talked about themselves and you've given them such a gift to clarify what they love about their job

or to be honest about what they don't like about their job, to talk about possibly their favorite thing, which is their wife or their kids, or to clarify some things they're struggling with at home, which might be their wife and their kids. But it's going in there to ask questions. And the question you just asked, I don't know who told you, bro, that your questions aren't good, but you just told me like, I don't even know what they do over there. Awesome. Go ask them.

They would love to tell you. And if they don't, if they're like, yeah, I'm not going to coffee with you, minion, you do not want to spend two seconds with them. They're not worth your time. Okay. All right. And let me leave you with this. I don't know who in your life told you that you're weird and aren't good at having friends.

But if you woke up, how old are you right now? I'm currently 25. Okay. you woke up, how old are you right now? I'm currently 25. Okay. You woke up and you're 25 and you're looking around and you don't have a ton of friends. It's not because you're weird or broken. It's because we've created a world where friendships are so hard to come by and they're so hard to keep.

They're impossible, right? Yeah. There's nothing wrong with you, brother. hard to keep. They're impossible, right? There's nothing wrong with you, brother. You're not somehow broken and you need to get on the internet and figure out some things. You got to be weird. You got to go first. You got to be hospitable

and you got to say, dude, tell me about you. Then eventually they're going to ask you, how did you come here? And you can tell your story. And now y'all are having a conversation. Okay, sounds good. Yeah, like I said, I mean, just in the workplace, you know, it's difficult. But then even in the outside world, it's pretty scary, honestly. Like I said, I really don't got much friends.

And you always talk about having a close circle around you. Honestly, I feel like I don't have that at all. Yeah. But, yeah, I guess I've got to be... You've got to put yourself in that position. Yeah. You've got to put yourself in that world, whether that's again, signing up for some classes,

joining a running club, taking jiu-jitsu, taking a woodworking class, taking a drone flying... I'm just making stuff up, but you've got to put yourself in a position to where you're going to run into other people. You can't just go to work at 25 and then go home. Scott Galloway, who has got some great messages, he tells young people, be at home as little as

possible. You're 25 years old, be at home as little as possible. Continue to put yourself in situations, whether at your local church, joining a softball league, soccer team, whatever. Put yourself in situations. Just go, if you're going to sit at home and read, go do it in a Starbucks. You're going to run into people and someone's going to say, hey, can I borrow that chair? And you're like, yeah, you can sit down here, man. Where do you work? And now you're off to the races. But I don't want you to overthink it and overthink it and overthink it and over the races. But I don't want you to overthink it and overthink it and overthink it and overthink it. But I do want you to start putting yourself out there.

And the best way to put yourself out there is to ask, tell me about you. Tell me about you. And I think you're going to find people love talking about themselves and you're going to give them a great gift, which is to feel things they haven't felt in a long time. Because they've been sitting all by themselves too.

You're awesome, my brother. I want you to try this out for like a month or two and then holler back girl at me. I ain't no holler back girl. Holler back and let me know how it's going. I bet you the tide will begin to turn. You're awesome, man. Talk to you soon.

We'll be right back. Hey, good folks. Let's talk about hallow. All right. I say this all the time. It's important to get away for times of prayer and meditation by yourself with no one else around. But one thing you might not think about though is maintaining a sense of community

when you pray or meditate. And this is especially if you don't consider yourself religious, if you question things, or if you've been burned by a church experience in the past, it's hard to want to get together with other people. And that's another reason why I love Hallow. You can personalize your prayer experience with Hallow, and they give you three free months to do it. You can pray or meditate by yourself, or you can connect with

friends, with family, a prayer group, or some other community that you choose. And this way, you can share prayers, share meditations. You can even share journal reflections to grow in your faith together with others. And with Hallow, there are other ways you can personalize the app. They have downloadable offline sessions and links ranging from one minute up to an hour.

And you can listen where it works for your schedule. You can choose your guide, your background music. You can create your own personal prayer plan and more. I've made it a personal point to begin my day every single day with the hallow meditation on the scripture of the day. It's a discipline and it's a practice. And here's what I'm learning.

As with anything of importance and meaning, prayer takes intentionality, practice, and showing up even when I don't feel like it and even I don't want to. This is discipline. Sometimes you do this by yourself and sometimes you do this with a group and Halo helps you with both.

Download the number one prayer app on planet earth, Halo, right now. And listen, viewers and listeners of this show get three free months when you go to halo.com slash Deloney. It's amazing. Three free months when you go to hallow.com slash Deloney. It's amazing. Three free months of the app when you go to hallow.com slash Deloney. Go right now and change your life. All right, we are back. Hey, I'm excited about this. I recently sat down for an

interview with my good friend, Dr. Caroline Leaf. She is brilliant, brilliant, brilliant, beyond all brilliant. And she's done some extraordinary research. If you're not following Dr. Leaf, you should on the Insta TikToks, on the, what do you call them, the Snapgrams? Social media. Social media, yes. You should follow her on that.

And pick up her books as well. But we had a long, long conversation together. And so we'll release it over the coming year. But this particular segment was important. I asked her for some explanation and some strategies for teaching kids self-regulation. Something that's increasingly important to me because I got two kids in my house, but also I'm continually talking to parents about working with their kids is how do we teach kids what they're feeling and then what to do next?

Because we have a whole generation, just look in Congress. We have a whole generation of adults who don't know how to do this. How do we stop that madness and teach this to kids? Here's what I'm feeling. Here's what your body's doing. And then here's what to do next. So here is a segment from my conversation with the great Dr. Caroline Leaf on teaching kids self-regulation. Check it out. The most common question I get, bar none, which is, what about my kids? Kids are told by teachers, you have this. Kids are sent out of their classroom because they're a seven-year-old little boy that we're told,

you need to sit in that chair and sit still for eight hours doing these worksheets. And when they can't, we tell them they're dysfunctional or we have these young girls who just, you know, cause ADHD is expressed differently in young women and they check out and we pat them on the back and say, way to go. You sat quietly through class, right? We take these kids and we stick them in these very artificial environments. And then if they roll outside of the bell curve, we blame them for them. And then we have well-meaning, heartbroken parents saying, what do I do now, right? Or we have, I would say, moderately informed parents that say, this doesn't feel right.

I know in my gut, this isn't right, but I don't know what to do. And so I've begun saying, hey, you got to take some of this education into your own hands. And then I pick up your book, and it's got sections. I'd love to talk about teaching kids self-regulation. I mean, then you're teaching a kid what a feeling is and what an emotion is, and you're teaching them that mindful gap between stimulus and response. If you, if we could teach kids that you're talking like a global life,

a world that is a different world, right? Doesn't have politicians popping off at them. You know how it gets like, we can get sideways on that, but let's talk about how a single mom with two kids, how a truck driver who just wants to be a better, a more present father, how do they teach their kids self-regulation? Well, I love how you framed that question and that whole background that you gave there because one of the main reasons I wrote this book was because we need to be able to help parents to be able to do this. The single most important way of helping our children do this or helping a parent to help our children is for a parent to know how to regulate themselves. So it begins with, if we

have to start addressing the mental health crisis in both adults and children, but let's talk about children first, is we have to be able to help a parent help themselves because the stress of the parent will go through to the child. Oh, say that again. Say that again because we're going to preach for a second. Say that one more time. The anxiety or stress that a parent feels is picked up directly by the child. It goes straight to the child. So priority number one and biggest mental health support is to educate parents in helping them to say messy parenting is so normal. You don't have to curate your life like we see on the influencer sort of world that we live in now. We have to recognize that we've got our own baggage.

We've been parented by parents that have their baggage. We have the right to honor our own trauma from our own parenting that may have been good and bad. Everyone comes through. Every parent, no matter how well intentional, you're going to mess your kids up in some way. You're going to be messed up in some way. That is just the reality. And for some, it's obviously way worse than others, you know, in extreme situations.

But we need to, you know, there's certain things that we've got to deal with that we haven't, and it comes through to our kids. So that's a reality, and we're going to make those mistakes. So if we can accept that up front and give ourselves compassion and kindness and realize, all right, I have to honor my story. Not that I'm dishonoring my parents, because they're someone else's daughter and son. You know, so thereforeoring my parents because they're someone else's daughter and son.

You know, so therefore, you know, they're someone else's daughter or son, whatever. So therefore, we have to look at two things. We have to honor our story of the impact of our parenting on us as parents. And that does recognize that we need to honor our parents' stories. And that a lot of what we experienced that has affected us, they also had to deal with it. Does that make sense? Absolutely. So it doesn't mean that if you say, okay, this has come through

from my own nurturing, you're not just honoring your parent. You are honoring them because they also went through their stuff, but you also have the right to work on your stuff. So that's very important because parent guilt is a massive, massive issue. And this thing that we've got to be perfect parents is absolute nonsense because parenting is not going to be perfect all the time, as we all know. Okay. So that means that I need to be able to know how to deal with my own stuff. So when I'm reactive to my kids, for example, as a truck driver, that example you gave was just wanting to be a good

parent and help their child or mom and mom dad family big family life things happening maybe your child's going through something and there's a pattern happening and this child's very reactive or crying a lot and you find yourself reacting to their reactivity and then you feel guilty because you say things and then you try and suppress it so you're worried so there's this thing going on where the child sees the mom or dad or both being very anxious and but not saying anything. So they don't understand the parent's reaction, and they can see because they can read body language better than an adult.

So us not being authentic with what we're experiencing, pretending, oh, everything's fine when it's not fine, is terrible for a child because they think that there's something they've done because they can see you're not fine. So bottom line, be authentic about how you are feeling obviously age-appropriate level so if you're having a bad day and you come in and you and you're really worried about what the teacher phoned you about when you were driving home and the patterns of behavior that you're seeing in your child plus the pressure of work and pressure of life and finances or whatever

and you walk in the door and you're actually very irritable, reactive, defensive as a parent, and you just don't do that first connection with your kids as you come back very well, and there's maybe an argument, and you say things you wish you didn't say, or you just, whatever, you just, this, and you feel guilty, and you're going to be, let's say that that's happening. You need to first work on yourself. And the first thing is to say, okay, I've had, and you're walking around, you're yelling at your kids. The first thing is to say to your kids, okay, I'm sorry.

I am feeling emotion signal. You describe your signals. You go through as a process. And I'll explain what that is after I've explained the process. I'm going to demonstrate it first. You say to your kids, I'm so sorry. I am so frustrated today. I'm so worried.

And I'm so frustrated. I'm so frustrated because I just can't seem to fix this issue that's going on with you. I'm trying to help you, but I don't know how to do it. And I'm really worried about you. And I'm also very tired because work's been very demanding the last few days. So I'd say how I'm feeling. Then I say, it made me, kind of in that sentence, let's analyze. I talked about emotions.

I talked about the fact that I'm snappy, whatever, because I snapped at the kids or whatever. I'm giving this example, behaviors. My body was very tense. So when I spoke to you, I did this and I was scary and my face was scary. That's my body reacting to how I'm feeling and, you know, what I said. And my outlook, my perspective, how I'm seeing the situation, how I'm looking at life today is that I really don't know what to do. Now, you've identified and you've outlined for the child or children and for yourself, you've done the most phenomenal things.

You've authentically helped the child understand that adults also battle. You've been honest and authentic. You've made them feel better because they think, oh, it's not me. It's mom. So you've activated empathy or it's dad or whatever. They're going through something. It's okay. It's okay to be messy.

So you've given them permission to be messy because life is messy. They don't have to suppress their feelings. I love it. And I want to point out something you said that's really, I think, super critical. That parent that you described, that exhausted mom coming in the door, didn't immediately say, you kids, y'all are doing this

and you're doing this and you're doing this. The language you used was very specific, which is I'm feeling this and I'm feeling that. And one of the things I think we do is we often cast the emotional regulation of the adults in the house onto our kids. It's your job to make sure I'm not mad. It's your job to make sure I'm not upset. And kids can't carry that weight. And so there's something powerful about saying, I'm worrying because I can't solve this problem. Not that

you're making me worried or that you're making me mad or you're hurting my feelings. You're a kid. You don't have that kind of power. I'm not going to give you that kind of power in my life, but I'm struggling because I can't solve this. And I think that's such a powerful switch for parents to flip if they will take ownership of how they feel and how they experience their own homes. Hey, what's up? Deloney here. Listen, you and me and everybody else on the planet has felt anxious or burned out or chronically stressed at some point. In my new book, Building a Non-Anxious Life, you'll learn the six daily choices that you can make to get rid of your anxious feelings and be able to better respond

to whatever life throws at you so you can build a more peaceful, non-anxious life. Get your copy today at johndeloney.com. All right, we are back. Thanks for sticking around. After my conversation with Dr. Leaf, don't forget, save your holidays. Go to johndeloney.com and pick up questions for humans,

the Thanksgiving deck, the Christmas deck and the grandparents and kids, not to mention all the ones with couples and dating and teenagers, all of them, wherever you happen to be in life. I got you. I got you. Don't do holidays by yourself this year. And

especially with a bunch of news channels and screens everywhere. Turn it off. Remember why you like your family or be crystal clear as to why you don't. Right. All right. As we wrap up today's show, it's one of the, one of the greatest songs ever written by the great Fleetwood Mac. The song's called Landslide, and it goes like this. I took my love and I took it down. I climbed a mountain and I turned around. And I saw my reflection in the snow-covered hills till landslide brought me down. Mirror in the sky, what's love?

Can the child within my heart rise above? Can I sail through these changing ocean tides? Can I handle the season of my life? Well, I've been afraid of changing because I've built my life around you. But time makes you bolder. Even children get older. And like Kelly, I'm getting older too. Much, much older.

I love you guys. Make good choices. See you soon.