The Dr. John Delony Show - My Boyfriend Wants Me To Lose Weight So I’m More Attractive

Episode Date: February 7, 2022

Today, we’re talking to a college-age son whose mom is in denial about her abusive marriage, a mom at a loss of what to do for her suicidal teenage son, and a woman whose boyfriend wants her to lose weight so she’s more attractive.  Mom is in an abusive marriage. How can I help her? My teenage son is suicidal and we don’t know how to help him My boyfriend wants me to lose weight so I’m more attractive "I So Hate Consequences" - Relient K Let us know what’s going on by leaving a voicemail at 844.693.3291 or visiting johndelony.com/show.  Support Our Sponsors: BetterHelp DreamCloud Churchill Mortgage Greensbury Resources: Own Your Past, Change Your Future Questions for Humans Conversation Cards Redefining Anxiety Quick Read John’s Free Guided Meditation Listen to all The Ramsey Network podcasts anytime, anywhere in our app. Download at: https://apple.co/3eN8jNq These platforms contain content, including information provided by guests, that is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. The content is not intended to replace or substitute for any professional medical, counseling, therapeutic, financial, legal, or other advice. The Lampo Group, LLC d/b/a Ramsey Solutions as well as its affiliates and subsidiaries (including their respective employees, agents and representatives) make no representations or warranties concerning the content and expressly disclaim any and all liability concerning the content including any treatment or action taken by any person following the information offered or provided within or through this show. If you have specific concerns or a situation in which you require professional advice, you should consult with an appropriately trained and qualified professional expert and specialist. If you are having a health or mental health emergency, please call 9-1-1 immediately.

On today's show, we talk to a young man whose younger sister is in an abusive home and he doesn't know what to do. We talk to a mom whose son is experiencing significant mental health challenges. And we talk to a woman whose boyfriend told her she should lose weight for him. Stay tuned. Yo, what up, what up? This is John with the Dr. John Deloney Show. And we're so glad you are here. Talking about mental health, relationships, and it's a big day today because we're announcing

presale begins for my new book, Own Your Past, Change Your Future, A Not-So-Complicated Approach to Relationships, Mental Health, and Wellness. This is the book that's going to send shockwaves. I don't think it's going to send shockwaves through anything, really. But it's a great, great book. The pre-reading buzz on it has been incredible. I'm excited about it. I worked real hard on this. And if you've bought one, we sold so many tens and tens and so many more books of redefining

anxiety than we ever imagined. This is a full-size book. This is a big book. This is, man, it's about, I've told stories in this book I've never told anywhere publicly. This is my treaties on what's going on in the world and why people are struggling so much. And more importantly, how we can get our head screwed back on straight, get our relationships back in order. So, hey, check this out. In this book, I'm going to walk you through a common sense approach to mental health and wellness. As you listen to the show, you know, I think we've overcomplicated everything. Everything. We've created a world that our bodies are like, what are we doing? And we've pathologized everything andcomplicated everything. Everything. We've created a world that our bodies are like,

what are we doing? And we've pathologized everything and dramatized everything and made everything about this and that. But this book is going to be about the steps on how to get connected, change your thoughts, change your actions, and move you closer to who you want to be and towards the relationships you want to have. You want to discover why you feel so exhausted, why you're lonely, why you keep doing the things you don't want to have. You want to discover why you feel so exhausted, why you're lonely, why you keep doing the things you don't want to do over and over and over. You are not broken.

You are not hopeless. You are enough. And you got a lot of work to do. You're worth being well. So here's the deal. Pre-order today. For only 20 bucks, you're gonna get a ton of free bonus items,

including one month of free counseling from BetterHelp. They stepped up big time to support this book. They're offering a free month of counseling. That's a lot. Free copy of the audio book, free copy of the ebook and more. It's a lot. Free copy of the audio book, free copy of the e-book, and more. It's 20 bucks. Go to johndeloney.com

and pre-order the book today. Let's get this thing out, out, out. I'm so excited to have it out. Ben, you can read now, right? Yeah, you can read now. Yeah, I've always been able to. Oh, my bad. I was thinking of Austin.

That's my bad. We have a whole new crew in there. James is in there playing Minecraft, and we got Ben running the boards. Austin's there, the bearded Kelly. So good, man. I'm excited to get this thing out. Thank you guys for riding with me for the last year.

Well, it's kind of crazy working this job and then riding at night. I'm excited. I'm excited. All right. Hey, let's go to Jack in Charlotte, North Carolina. Jack is back. What's up, Jack? How are we doing? Your promo for that book made me want to run through a wall, so I appreciate that. Hey, listen, don't do that. Just buy it. Don't run through

anything. We need you. Just kidding. Good for you, man. I'm excited. I'm excited. I'm excited. How are you, man? I'm doing all right. I've been fighting a bit of a cold, so I'm sorry if my voice isn't exactly pleasant. It's all good. And sure, it's a cold, as they call it. Way to go. Sure, Jack. So what's up, dude? So I just have a question about my mom. I don't know exactly how to go about encouraging her

to get away from an abusive relationship she's in with my stepdad. Um, so I'll just give some background. She's been married to him for five years now. Um, back then I was in high school. I would stay weekends with her. Um, and he would just, he would shout, he would curse in her face, call her names, threaten her physically. It was bad enough for me that, I mean, I basically hid from her. I stopped doing our visitation. And we really had, after that, no contact for a year and a half or so. He ended up in jail and she filed for divorce from him.

This is your biological dad or a stepdad? This is my stepdad. Okay, all right. Is this your biological dad or a stepdad? This is my stepdad. Okay, all right. Where's your biological dad? My biological dad is still in town. Okay. And so I ended up, after I stopped seeing my mom for that period of time,

I pretty much spent all of my time with my biological dad, who's great, by the way. Awesome. Okay, cool. All right, so then your stepdad goes to jail. He's a scumbag. And then what? So she and I started to rebuild our relationship

over the next, after the months that followed. And while he was in prison, he basically sweet-talked her, found Jesus in jail, and she let him back in. After six or seven months of prison, he came back. So he had kind of turned it around a little bit. But in the meantime, I left for college, and my little sister has started to—that was about three or so years ago. And over that time, my little sister started to tell me, hey, he's kind of picking up on his old patterns.

So some of the things that he's called my mom, he's saying again, he's shouting at him, he's scaring him. What really scared me the most and the reason I guess I called you in the first place was one night she, she called me and she told me, Hey, we had to basically hide in our own home from this guy. We had locked the door cause he was shouting, name calling, going on one of the things again. And so I was like, When you say go on one of his things and I don't mean to interrupt you. This is important. Going on one of his things again. What that mean like be very specific what does that mean um so he'll get going he's smashing things is he hitting people is he getting in people's faces throwing things

abusing like what's he doing what's that mean uh it's slamming objects. It's shouting. It's cursing, calling people, I guess, cursing. I don't know about the words I can use on the show, I guess. But basically, he called my mom and my little sister a piece of shit. Yeah. And when she told me that he was on this rant, that he was hitting things, that he was yelling, and I said, hey, maybe I should come back and talk to y'all about this. She was like, well, I kind of wish I hadn't told you now because I think mom's going to be mad at me for telling you. Oh, God, dude. Yeah, that's a classic.

That's a classic statement of somebody who's in an abusive situation that feels responsible to make sure mom's okay because dad's insane. Oh, man. So what are you going to do? I don't don't know. I just, I want to have this conversation with her. I do remember the last time we had a talk like this that preceded, you know, the 18 or so months that we really didn't talk to each other much. I don't want to damage our relationship. And I feel like she knows. She has to know. How old are you, Jack? I am 21.

Okay. I need you to, like, I want you to tighten your fists, both of them as tight as they'll go. Okay? Okay. And I want you to hold your breath.

Take a deep as breath as you possibly can and hold it. One, two, and then let it all out. And then relax your hands. Okay? I want you to hear me directly. Anything that happens from this point forward

is not going to be on you. It will be because you. There's a huge difference. Because you're going to act, a beautiful little girl is going to be safe. Because you're going to act, maybe, but probably not, your mom will understand she's worth more than yet another abusive relationship. Your mom and your relationship did not go sideways because you spoke up. Your mom and your relationship went sideways because she chose an abusive man over you. You hear me say that? Yes, sir.

And I don't like talking about somebody's mom, but I'm being direct and honest with you, right? Yes. And that sucks and it hurts and it shouldn't be that way. And then when he went to jail, she came around and realized, what am I doing? And I know your mom's got her own story

and so I'm not going to sit here and just bash your mom, but that's the reality of what happened. She chose him. That was not your fault. your mom, but that's the reality of what happened. She chose him. That was not your fault. And you cannot spend the rest of your life trying to

build a bridge back towards your mom because you're not the one that broke the original bridge. She is. Okay? Right. and that sucks and it's hard and

you've got to let your mom know I will call CPS I'll call the police I will call whoever my sister will not be in this situation period how old is this girl?

she's 16 brother she doesn't deserve that and you know it right? yeah and that's why you're calling me and is this your did you cause any of this? not a second of it

but now it's in your lap it's a 21 year old and your mom knows is that fair? yeah man my heart's broken for you brother for your sister Is that fair? Yeah. Man. My heart's broken for you, brother. For your sister, for your mom, for the whole situation.

So let's practice this. What's it look like? Be honest. What's it look like? You set up and tell your mom, hey, we need to meet for breakfast. We need to have coffee. I'm coming into town. Will she meet with you?

Oh, absolutely. Okay. So I'm going to tell you something that I tell folks when, like I worked with a group of executives the other day on firing, how to let somebody go with dignity. And one of the things that often happens when people are going to fire somebody is it gets, it's hard to take somebody's livelihood away unless you're a sociopath, right? Firing somebody always is, it sucks. I've had to do it a bunch. It's not fun. And you end up talking too much and you're like, well, you know, thinking about and, and, and you hem-haw around and it tortures people. The most gifted, um, fire I've ever, I don't know if that's the right way to call that, was a guy that taught me how to do it the right way, which is you walk in and you sit down and say, the decision's been made.

You will no longer be working here, period. Or I am terminating your employment here effective immediately. This decision has been made and it is final. From that point forward, nobody's listening to you, right? So they have gone full limbic. They're not listening to you. They're in defense mode. What I do, what happened, I'm scared, all that.

What you have to do is sit down with your mom and have the very similar conversation. I love you and so I'm going to be direct. I've been talking to my sister and she's in the same mess that I was in and I will not stand for my sister to be in this mess.

Period. You have 20 days or two weeks or one week to get her out of there or I'm going to call every official I know, tell my story,

tell her story and then I'm going to, it's going to, you're going to deal with the authorities. Okay. I don't see another way around it, do you? I don't.

Are you out of college? Can she move in with you? I mean, I guess that's another option. No, I'm still in college. She couldn't move in with me. And the thing is, she lived alone, obviously, while he was out in jail. No, no, no, I'm not talking about your mom. I'm talking about your little sister. Oh, obviously, while he was out in jail. No, no, no. I'm not talking about your mom.

I'm talking about your little sister. Oh, no. She can't move in with me. Why not? You said that all like, nah, bro. Nah, I got beardy. Well, no, no. I guess the more practical option would be she would go and live with my dad.

Okay. Okay. And I see what you're saying now about it not being my fault, it being because of me. My thought is like I don't want to be the guy who takes her away from my mom. That would break my heart as much as I love my mom. Okay, so let me tell you this. You will be the guy that saves her from your mom. And she needs an adult in her life to save her right now because she's a child.

She's 16. She's a child. She's 16. She's probably beautiful. She's probably mature. Growing up in that crap, she's probably real mature. But she's a child. And she needs some adult in her life to care and love about her. Have you sat down and told your dad about this? He knows about it.

He knows about it because she will talk to him about it. Uh-huh. I haven't. I guess he probably doesn't know the full extent of it. Okay. As much as my sister has told me and obviously, like I said, backtracked and been like, oh, maybe I shouldn't have told you that. I feel like she's hiding more from me. I hadn't thought about that. I may have screwed that up.

I may call your dad and say, here's the deal. I'm going to sit down and have a hard conversation with mom. Sister's in an abusive situation with stepdad with that piece of crap. And she needs a place to go. It's got to be your house, dad. And I'm going to sit down and tell mom that she's got a week to make this whole thing happen. Or I'm going to call the police and whoever. And let your dad know, I'm about to step in here and be the adult because no one seems to want to.

And hopefully he will say, oh my God, this is my daughter. I'll get involved. He might not. That's my hope. I know for a fact he will. Okay, then good. And here's a hard thing.

This is another hard conversation that you have to have. And I'd have it with your sister and it's gonna feel hard now, but it will be less hard one year down the road, three years down the road and 10 years down the road. Okay, just trust me on this. You're gonna have to let her know, you told me some things

and I said I wouldn't tell anybody, but I have to and I'm sorry. Then I'm gonna violate your trust. But I can't allow you to be in an abusive household anymore. You're my baby sister. I love you too much. And she may get mad and say, I can never trust you again. I'm never going to tell you anything. And you will be saving her life. Okay. You will not be taking her from her mom. You will be saving her from her mom. You'll be taking her from her mom. You won't be taking her from a family. You'll be saving her. What a gift

that she's got you as an older brother. And I don't know how you, your dad must be amazing. The fact that you've been able to come out of this thing with character and strength and resilience

is a testament to you and those who love you. Not to the mess and crap you came up. Man, I'm proud of you. Proud of you. This is the mess and crap you came up. Man, I'm proud of you. Proud of you. This is grown-up stuff, right? Sure is.

It's hard. Have you seen somebody yet? I have not. You have to. You trust me? You got to. Absolutely. I see it.

I know, as you would say, it's a whole other call, but I've seen it crop up in my own relationship. That's right. Hey, this is what you know. You're a child of divorce. You're a child of separation. You're a child of abuse. You're a child of parent abandonment and neglect. When it comes to the ACEs score, the Adverse Childhood Experiences, you can Google that.

Just Google ACEs score and take that test. It's about 10 questions. My guess is— Yeah, let's say a four. You're at a four? Okay. You know what that means, right? Yes.

You're at an elevated risk for all sorts of stuff unless you deal with it, man, because your body's dealing with it every minute of every day. And you're going to replay the scripts that were rolled out in front of you. You're going to replay these stories that you got from your original parents, from your step. You're going to replay that stuff over and over and over. And it may not look exactly the same, but man, I can already hear you want to protect your mom. You want to protect, because that's what you had to do between her and that idiot. You want to love your dad, talk about how great he is? He might be, right? You want to be the guy

who makes sure everybody's okay? Dude, that's an exhausting job. Not your job. That's your mom and dad's job, brother. And I hate they didn't do that for you. So, do I have your word you're going to make a call? You're going to talk to your old man

soon, today, tomorrow? I will do it today. Okay, I'm proud of you. And then you're going to make a call? You're going to talk to your old man soon, today, tomorrow? I will do it today. Okay. I'm proud of you. And then you're going to talk to your sister? I will. Okay. And your dad may try to talk you out of it.

Let him know. I'm grown up now. Grown up Jack. I'm 21-year-old Jack. I can buy beer and guns and I can protect my sister not necessarily in that order or with those tools, right?

It's a grown up conversation. It's a different one than y'all have ever had before probably, right? Absolutely. Yes. Hey, I'm proud of you. Call me and let me know how that conversation goes or write me a note and let me know how that conversation goes, okay? It's going to be messy and it's going to be hard and you're going to feel isolated. You're going to feel alone. I want you to call somebody and make sure you've got some people in your corner too. Cool? Thank you, Dr. D. I appreciate it. I'm super proud of you, my brother. Super proud of you, man. We'll be right back on the Dr. John Deloney Show. This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. All right, October is the season for wearing costumes and masks. And if you haven't started planning your costume yet, get on it.

I'm pretty sure I'm going as Brad Pitt in Fight Club era because, I mean, we pretty much have the same upper body, but whatever. All right, look, it's costume season. And let's be honest, a lot of us hide our true selves behind costumes and masks more often than we want to. We do this at work.

We do this in social setting. We do this around our families. We even do this with ourselves. I have been there multiple times in my life and it's the worst. If you feel like you're stuck hiding your true self, I want you to consider talking with a therapist. Therapy is a place where you can learn to accept all the parts of yourself, where you can learn to be honest with yourself, and you can take off the mask and the costumes and learn to live an honest, authentic, direct life. Costumes and masks should be for Halloween parties, not for our emotions and our true selves. If you're

considering therapy, I want you to call my friends at BetterHelp. BetterHelp is 100% online therapy. You can talk with your therapist anywhere so it's convenient for your schedule. You just fill out a short online survey and you get matched with a licensed therapist. Plus, you can switch therapists at any time for no additional cost. Take off the costumes and take off the masks with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash Diloni

to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash Diloni. And we are back. All right, so they just dropped some wisdom on me. During the break earlier, I just looked up, and the first person I saw was Ben, and I thought, I'll take a cheap shot at Ben and ask Ben if he could read. Turns out he has a master's degree in creative writing, and he's a novelist. So that's what I get.

What a jerk. It's okay, man. I have low self-esteem. That's why I lash out. I'm sorry. I'm working on man. I have low self-esteem. That's why I lash out. I'm sorry. I'm working on it. I'm not, but I talk,

I say that I'm working on it. Good, dude. What are you writing about? Is it wizard fiction? Please say yes. Weirdly, yes. Yes! All right.

I'm going to just give you the elevator pitch. Okay, pitch it. Imagine Harry Potter was drafted into a modern-day war in the Middle East. So it's military drama with fantasy elements.

I literally am not going to be able to sleep until this thing is written and comes out. I'm 100,000 words deep. 100,000. Hey, if you publish it here, they'll edit it down to 50.

Good God. There's a whole other book that they took away. Rumor has it, listeners and watchers, that I talk too much. And so I think I submitted like, I submitted a lot of words that they took away. Rumor has it, listeners and watchers, that I talk too much. And so I think I submitted a lot of words. Good for you. Keep going.

Don't let the haters get you down or whatever that means. Thank you. Does the winner win at the end? I can't spoil. Yeah, I love it. All right, let's go to Kathleen in Detroit, Rock City. What's up, Kathleen? Hi, John. Thanks for taking my call.

Thank you so much for calling. Well, I never dreamed I'd be calling you about this, but about a month ago, my 16-year-old was in a psychiatric unit in lockdown because he had a plan to commit suicide. And so he was there for 10 days and then in an outpatient program for three weeks. So we are blindsided. We didn't see, you know, that this was coming. We knew he was down and the pandemic's been hard on everybody, but, um, he went back to school last week. So things are stable. Um,

but we're scared. I mean, we don't know, you know, what this disease is. We don't have any experience with the psychiatric field. So it's all new to us and we're kind of trying to navigate. And they're kind of overextended themselves because there's so many teenagers that need help right now. And I just don't know how to, yeah, we have no experience. We don't know why or what causes this, but it's been diagnosed as a disease, really, a bipolar 1 with psychosis. So he does have a diagnosis of bipolar 1 with psychosis? That's the preliminary diagnosis. And at this point, we hope that's all it is. We don't know because it might be schizophrenia

I mean we don't know they need timing this is the first time they've seen him so they don't know we don't get a whole lot of information from the psychiatrist unless we really are forceful and ask so it's been tough for us. We just don't know how to navigate it. Yeah. Number one, thank you for your trust. This is scary. I've had this conversation, unfortunately, probably 150, 200 times in my career. I've had this conversation a lot. So it's heartbreaking and it's scary. And thank you for your trust. Okay. Yeah. Wow. More than 100. God, I've had this. Yeah. Okay. The first thing here. Okay. And this is me. I'm going to rattle these off top of my head. And, and so

hang in here with me as we go through them. Okay. And you don't have to write all this down. You can just keep this clip and go back and look at it and listen to it, but you can't write it down if you'd like. Okay. Okay. First and foremost, you and your husband got to be on the same page. And where this gets hard for everybody is one person thinks he's faking it, or this is not a big deal, or the doctors are crazy. And the other person wants to wrap your boy in bubble tape and both sides are understandable, but both sides point to a new fissure, a new crack in a relationship. And you need each other in this season, okay?

And often I'll recommend, you've heard me recommend on this show before a million times and i'll do it a million more times i recommend you and your husband getting out when maybe during school take a day off of work both of you go somewhere and sit and exhale take a pad and a pen and just breathe and then you got to grieve this thing because it hurts and it's scary and it came out of nowhere and you're blindsided and all of those words, you got to hear each other talk about them. David Kessler says grief demands a witness. Y'all got to get in front of each other and say, whoa, what just happened?

Okay. Okay. Is that possible? Are y'all in a position to do that? Yeah. I think we're on the same page. We're both still kind of in shock. Yes.

And we're kind of in the bubble wrap, both of us. That's right. That's right. And that's where I'd be if my son, I mean, I'd be right there. Okay. I'd be right there. But get out and have the conversation about what do you think of mental health and what do you think of it? And what do we think about medication?

Like, have those conversations just so they're said. And the goal here is this, we're gonna walk away and we want to say, we are going to both agree that we need to get a second opinion, a second diagnostic. We both agree that this doctor seemed credible. We trusted him.

He looked us in the eye or she looked us in the eye, invited us in to be a part of this, our son's healing. And we trust him. And so we're just gonna do what they say because we're not experts, right? And sometimes I hear this and you'll get this a lot.

Well, aren't you doing your own research? And my response is, all right, dude, if we're Googling over med school, then we all have a problem, right? You know what I mean? And that brings me to number two. How old is your son? 16.

16. So depending on what state you're in, which is most states, you are technically the client. You have access to all of the records because the kid's a minor. And I would, there's a bit like a, like a white coat, like, oh, this is just us. And we don't, you know, dude, knock the doors down. This is my son. I want to know all the stuff he's seeing, saying, experience, all of these things. We need to know what he's experiencing and what y'all diagnosed him with, why you diagnosed him with that. I demand a meeting with y'all. And sometimes they'll have a social worker that helps mediate those. Most psychiatric inpatients do because the doctors are just going person to person to person. How'd the social worker reach out? How was that?

That was good. It was good, but again, it's not like a medical diagnosis where they can tell you, you got cancer, we're going to treat it. It's sort of a floating diagnosis. They don't really know. Right, which is disorienting. What kind of meds did they put him on? A mood stabilizer and an antidepressant. So he's quite...

I imagine he's pretty low. Zombie-like is the word, but yeah, he's pretty low. It takes a lot longer for the antidepressant, I think, to come to effect. The problem that they have with him, though, is he's in general, he's very shut down, and they feel he's an extremely good student, and none of his grades suffered, which we can't believe. Even with all the psychosis, he had over a 4.0. He wants his driving privileges back and he wants to see his friends again. He's got friends. I mean, he has a normal life.

He wants to do his activities and we just don't know how. He is stable, but we don't know if we should let him drive. Sure. And because these are all questions that somebody's going to have to tell me, human contact and interaction with friends and community and loved ones is not a good idea for me to take that off the table. Someone's going to have to tell me your kid cannot do physical activity because I know connection and physical activity are really important for working through and healing from depression. Bipolar is a different story. There's a whole range of that. I'm not going to get into all that right now, but someone's going to have to sit down and tell me, don't do those things for me to take those away. And there's also, son, you almost died, and you have to know in our world that that has, and you being vulnerable back to him is an important number three, letting him know. And there's some of this fear

that we don't wanna say it out loud because we don't know how it's gonna affect him. What he's gonna feel is the secret, is the gap. You get what I'm saying? And so there's got to be some sort of, hey, we love you, you scared us,

do you want to talk to us? Will he talk to you? How's those conversations been? A little bit more, a little bit better every day, but not, he's very shut down. We can't,

my instinct is to kind of talk, talk, talk and impress him, but he doesn't, they told us not to press him. Sure. And I think that's right. I think that's wise. Yeah. He is in therapy as a counselor? Yeah. Twice a week. Yeah. Good. Would he go on a walk with you or your husband? A little bit more with my husband, but my husband doesn't press him to talk. So that's probably why I'm trying not to, it's just my way. Yeah.

But, um, I don't think they say much on their walks. Hey, that's okay. Cause they're saying everything. Okay. One thing you might. That's what I'm struggling with. I want him to talk, but he won't talk. Yeah.

And right now he's trying to get, he's trying to re, his body is what doesn'm struggling with. I want him to talk, but he won't talk. Yeah. And right now, he's trying to re... His body is what doesn't feel safe. And he may even buy the fact... Let's say he's truly suicidal. Or when he was suicidal, he had a plan. He truly was ready to go. Yeah. And he goes through inpatient for a week or 10 days,

and then he goes through outpatient for three weeks, he may come to believe this feeling I have that I want to go is not a trustworthy feeling. It's wrong. I trust you that I actually want to be here even though my body's telling me it's time to go. That's less, he's got to learn to feel safe in his body again. And to get to know his new body, especially one that's heavily medicated.

And if he's got bipolar one with, he's hallucinating too, right? Yep. With psychotic episodes, then he will probably be on medication for the rest of his life. And that's okay. That's completely okay. It's not ideal. We don't want that, but thank God we live in an era when that's possible. Okay. If he's got, has epilepsy or has brain lesions or has any number of other things, He grows out of this. You know what I mean? So that's where getting a relationship with that doctor is so, so, so important. And you are the parents of a minor and you'll have access to that and you can demand it. And if they won't

give it to you, somebody will. Okay. And I would be in same with the counselor. I want to know how my kid is doing. And I think a beautiful thing for you to sit down and say, hey, listen, I solve all my problems by just talking and talking and talking. And I know that doesn't help. Would you take a silent walk with me just once a day and let your old mom hold your hand, please? Try that.

Yeah, that sounds good. Try that. Yeah, that sounds good. Try that. I've started silent walks with my son. Like, hey, we're just going to go. And they're never silent because when there's no pressure, when I'm not going to grill him on math, homework, whatever, he feels at peace. And then when he's at peace, he feels free just to start talk, talk, talk, talk, talking. And then I get back and I've learned more about dinosaurs. I don't even know what we're talking about anymore, right?

You remember those days. And again, all of this is practicing, reestablishing connection and safety in his body. Um, you have to, have to, have to have a good partnership with the counselor and a doctor moving forward.

And I hate that they didn't give it to you. Yeah. I think they're overwhelmed right now. I know they are. I know they are. And I'm not going to talk bad about them because I know they're getting crushed. The teens are, we've just, I mean, they're just melting. It's just, we're just absolutely stone melting.

It's heartbreaking. Absolutely heartbreaking. Does he have brothers and sisters? He has a sister, yeah. How old is she? Yeah, 18. 18. And she's a senior in high school.

She's going to be leaving for college. He wants to go away too. He just brought that up the other day out of the blue. I thought, well, I don't know if you're going away or not. All of that is up in the air. I think a great answer to that is no way.

That goes into the, see, I told you I shouldn't be here. It should be, oh my goodness, let's say his name's Ben. Come on, Ben, that's a next month decision. Today we're about connecting and getting

well. We'll make plans down the road. Or you work, we'll work that out with your counselor as we all heal. And letting him know we're all healing we're all in this together he's a part of this unit this unit doesn't operate without him we need him one of the things that really was a light bulb moment for me was reading things thomas joiner's work he's one of the preeminent suicide i just had so many of these as a college dean of students. I just kept dealing over and over and over. And one of the things that was a light bulb moment for me was he writes about this feeling of perceived burdensomeness.

Not only do I not have a group, but when I'm around people, their life is less good because I'm in it. And this is rarely, it's almost never a fact. It's just this sense. And so that's why you see people who look like they've got tons of friends and they're happy. Something inside of them tells them that other people's lives are less good

when they're around. And so that's what part of the healing journey is. But that's one of those quiet, we're all healing. We're all gonna go do a thing. And I know you want to go, but I think asking your counselor, I'm talking a million different directions here, talking to the counselor, asking some very direct questions. Can he go hang out with his friends at night? Should we limit video games or cut them off completely? One thing I think would be great for you and your husband and him is to have a

journal that y'all pass back and forth on each other's beds and the only requirement is he's got to write in it he's got to respond to you too and you write in it after he goes to school says i'm thinking about you today i want you to know that you're loved we love having you here whatever you want to say to him and you put on his bed and then he's got to respond to it and put on your bed before he goes to school and And it might just be, he writes, thank you. It might just be, today was a good day. Today was not a good day. Whatever it is, great. But we're just opening a dialogue that has never been there. Okay. And get creative on those things. Silent walks, holding hands, touch, watching dumb movies, whatever it happens to be.

I listened to Garth Brooks on the way to work today. That's the kind of connection I'm trying to make with my kid, right? I'm just trying. He loves 90s country, and I'm trying. I'm trying. And the songs are good. I'm working on it. But whatever we can do to start leaning into connection.

And here's the final, final thing I need you to hear me say. Okay? Not your fault. Okay? Uh-huh. Not your fault. Okay? Okay. You're going to mine everything you've ever said and ever done and wonder what you did, what you did, what you did, what you did. Right.

Right, that's true. Okay? Okay. Don't do that to yourself. Don't do that to your relationships. Don't do that to yourself. Don't do that to your relationships. Don't do that to him. It's hard. I know that.

But we're here now. And how do we make tomorrow a little bit better, a little bit more connected? But I want you to hear me say, if nothing else, I've thrown a lot at you and I'm talking 90 miles an hour. Nothing else. You have to have a good relationship with his doctor, with the psychiatrist and with his ongoing counselor. They've got to have a back and forth connection. And there may be some things that he says, I don't want to talk to them about. And you tell the counselor, that's okay. I trust y'all. I want y'all to have some privacy between the two of you,

some confidentiality between the two of you. Just know that if he ever says I'm going to hurt myself, they have ethical responsibilities to go do something about it. So they're not just going to sit on something, right? But I want you to be— No, they didn't. They didn't. They let us know when that came up. Good. Good, good, good, good.

That's great. But ask as many questions as you can and don't let them brush you off and be like well actually this is how our policy is I don't care your policies that's my son that's my son and I want him to still be here next year and the year after that and the year after that and after that and so on and so forth

healing is going to be for the whole family one more thing one more thing on top of the one more thing take your daughter out for breakfast and ask her how she's processing all of this. Yeah. Okay. It'll probably be good for both of you.

You can tell her, hey, I'm scared. Caught me blindsided. She may have some insight that you don't know about. Often older sisters are brilliant and really observant. And it will be a great opportunity for her to get a ringside seat into what vulnerability looks like. And you have a chance to be honest and direct and say, I'm scared too. This scared me to death. This is hard on me and your dad.

And she'll go, oh, this is what being an adult looks like. And it'll be a great gift for her. Okay. Cool? Yes. Thank you. All right. Kathleen, we'll be thinking about you.

Please let me know how these things continue as they continue on. This is so hard. So, so, so, so hard. So, so, so, so hard, hard, hard. Young people, if you're listening to this, if you're thinking about hurting yourself, don't. Call somebody.

Right now. Call somebody. Moms and dads, if you even have an inkling that your kid's not doing okay, it's worth more than any meeting you have to go to, any show you're in the middle of watching, any turn stuff off and go in your kid's room and sit on their bed and say, what's going on? And they may tell you to shut up and get out of here. I'm doing this, whatever. And you say, what's going on? And they may tell you to shut up and get out of here. I'm doing this, whatever. And you say, you're my son. You're my daughter. How are you?

You're not okay. And it may mean you miss out on a lot. It may mean you've got to change. I'm here for you. And moms and dads, if you're not doing okay, you can't do life by yourself, call somebody. I'll be right back with the Dr. John Delaney Show. For too long, we've avoided the hard conversations about mental health, relationships, and the food we eat.

And I don't want it to be true either, but it is the quality and quantity of the food that we put into our body, it matters. And oftentimes we're forced to decide between cheap food that's good for our budget or expensive food that's good for our family. But there's a company that solved the problem. Greensberry is a family-owned meat provider working with farmers and fishermen all over the country. They sell organic grass-fed beef, free-range poultry, pork, lamb, bison, and sustainable seafood.

Their meat is less expensive than what I can get at the grocery store right down the street, and they deliver it to my door. Now listen, I'm a lunatic about meat quality, and this is the stuff I feed my family. So go to greensbury.com slash deloney, and you'll get 10% off your first purchase. Check it out today.

Your nutrition is worth it. Greensberry.com. That's G-R-E-E-N-S-B-U-R-Y.com. All right, we are back. And let's go to Seattle, home of the grunge. Alice in Chains, the Pearl Jams, even The Soundgarden. Chris Cornell, the greatest singer of all time. And talk to Rose.

What's going on, Rose? Hi. How are you? I'm good, and you? You don't sound good. I'm great. I'm sitting in a bunch of snow here in Nashville. How are you?

You're not doing okay? Yeah, I'm just tired. All right. So what's up? How can I help? Well, I was just wondering to what level you should change for a partner or how much you should compromise? Ooh, this is a loaded question.

So unpack that for me. So, well, my boyfriend has been telling me that he wants me to lose weight for him because he wants me to be the best for him as he says it. And he needs to, in order for him to find me more attractive, he wants me to lose the weight. And I don't feel like I should be doing that. But then if I'm asking him to change, like do things without me having to tell him constantly or just put in a little more effort into the relationship. I don't know if it's a double standard asking him to change and me not changing.

So a couple of things. One, I'm just, I'm rarely speechless, Rose, and you made me speechless. So well done. I want to give you a high five on that. That's a brazen man that will look at his wife. Are y'all married? Girlfriend? Girlfriend. Girlfriend. Look at his girlfriend and say, you need to be the best for me. And you're overweight. You're not attractive. Fix it.

It's a brazen man. Brazen man. Like where I'm from, you get murdered kind of man. And on the other hand, you ask an interesting question. So you want him to be more emotionally present. And what else? Just be able to do things without me constantly having to tell him to do them. So be invested in the relationship at all. Yeah.

Okay. And so are, man, you're asking a great question. So here's what first pops in. Oh, I'm not even going to go there. That was just, I was just going to muddy the waters. All right. So here's, here's the way I think you can think about this. If somebody, let's say my wife, let's say my wife came to me and said,

hey, I need you to lose weight. And I would say, why? And she'd say, well, I've known you for 25 years. And when you get to be this size, whether it's because, you know, you're not working out or you're not eating right or you're lifting a lot, you just get big. I snore or my sleep score goes down or I get a little grumpier. She'll notice things like I say, oh, my knees or my back or whatever. My neck hurts, whatever.

And she'll say, hey, it's time. And you get back on a plan. And she's not saying that because she has suddenly found me unattractive, which is really hard because I'm a smoke show, let's be honest. She's saying, for your health and well-being, I love you and care about you so much. I want you to be your best self. And you've given me permission to speak into your life. And I see patterns because I've known you for 25 years.

One of your patterns is XYZ, ABC. I think it's time. That's different than I don't think you're pretty and I deserve pretty, so fix it. Do you see how those are the same thing, but different? Yeah. Okay. So one of these is I want you to lose weight because I want you to feel better. Not I want you to be the best for me, but I want you to be the best for you. I want you to feel good. And that's different than I need you to be hotter. And so the differences with what you're saying, I love your question, but here's where it's different. Let's look at you and let's look at him and then let's make a triangle with the relationship.

Okay? So you have the relationship that's separate from both of y'all. When you get married, you both agree that we are now becoming a single unit. We are becoming this new thing together. We're fusing together. And this gets lost in all of our cultural talk of marriage. Everybody's screwed this thing up. When you're in, you're in. And when you do that, you say, what is the things that are going to better serve this relationship? He is saying, you be hot, not for the relationship, but for me.

You are saying, hey, would you engage into this relationship for us? So this whole unit operates seamlessly together with one. Do you see what I'm saying? Yeah. The spirit there is so, so different. And so I get that, yes, you're asking him to change. He's asking you to change. But y'all are coming at it for two very different reasons. One is incredibly selfish and demeaning. And the other is trying to find common connection. How do we build an ecosystem where we're both loved

and we're both in this thing? Does that make sense? Yeah, it does. How long have you been with this guy? A little over two years. When did this kind of talk start? I would say about six to eight months. Into the relationship or six or eight months ago?

Ago. Have you become unhealthy during the pandemic? No, I'm the exact same way I was when we met so what else is going on beneath these two stories your relationship is on the rocks what else is going on I just feel like I'm not good enough well he tells you that

you know what I mean yeah that's why you feel that way because you got somebody that says they love you, and then they tell you, you're not good enough for me. It's just confusing, because he says he wants to be with me, but I don't understand. I tell him it's not. You don't want to be with me. You want to be with a different version of me and I just don't know

what to do. Hold on. Can I say something hard, Rose? Yeah. You do know what to do. You also know that it's going to hurt like bloody hell, right? Mm-hmm. You do exactly

know what to do. I'm heartbroken for you. You can never do something sustainable over time for somebody else. You got to do it for you. Yeah. And if you need to lose weight, that's a whole other call. But do it for you. Because you want to lose weight, that's a whole other call, but do it for you because you want to feel good, and you want to live a long, fun, adventurous life,

and when you're 65, you want to roll around on the ground with your green kids. You don't want to be tied up to tubes and machines and pills your whole adult life, and you want to feel good in whatever you want to wear. I mean, there's a hundred million reasons why you lose weight for you. But you don't do it to please somebody else because you know why? That kind of pleasing is about power. That kind of pleasing is going to move. So let's say you lost a hundred pounds, it would move on to something else. You need to be this way in bed.

You need to start doing this. You need to actually start doing that. It will just move because it's not about this one thing. What's something you want to change? What's something you want to get better at this year 2022 Not what somebody's told you What's something you want to grow towards Get better at my job

What's your job I work in construction Okay are you a baller dude A what I bet you're a boss baller, huh? What do you do in construction? I just started. My goal is just to become more confident.

What do you do out on the site? I work with concrete. So I pour concrete slabs. Yes, dude. I told you, you're a gangster, man. So are you going to get better this year? How are you going to get better? Um, work more and I just need to be more confident and standing up for what I know I should be doing. So yeah. Confidence comes from when you, when you are able to, we, we, we live in a culture that says, you just need to be confident.

No, dude, our bodies know and we're not telling the truth. I can get up in front of a bunch of people and say, I'm gonna dive off this high dive and do a triple double flip. I just need to be confident. My body knows we're about to splat. Confidence comes from a series of little

and increasingly bigger wins. I'm confident enough I played that whole song in my basement. Now I'm confident enough to play it in front of my kids. And then I'm confident enough I played that whole song in my basement. Now I'm confident enough to play it in front of my kids. And then I'm confident enough to play it at practice. And now I'm confident enough

to play that song on stage. And you're exactly right. Work more. I wish there was another way around it, but you're exactly right. You got to practice concrete work over and over. And you're going to screw stuff up

and people are going to go like, what are you doing? No girls allowed. And you're going to be like, I people are going to go like, what are you doing? No girls allowed. And you're going to be like, I'm freaking Rose, the concrete sorcerer. And you're going to, I don't even know if that's a thing. Is there something as a concrete sorcerer?

Probably not. But you're going to crush it. And can I tell you something that kind of breaks my heart and kind of fills my heart at the same time? What? I want you to go back and listen to this audio when the show comes out Talking about this guy who has beat you down and told you that you're not good enough for him

Your voice has a particular tone a weight to it heft to it a sadness to it And when you started talking about concrete work you cheered up You've got joy in your heart about that. And that's awesome. That's awesome. You are worth being loved, Rose. Do you believe that? I'm trying to.

I never lie to somebody on the show. Never going to lie to you. You are worth being loved. You're also worth feeling good. You're also worth having great physical health, okay? But you're worth being loved for you. Now,

if he comes to you and says, hey, I was a complete idiot. I said this wrong. I screwed up. I don't know what's going on. COVID mess got me nuts. I've been locked down for two years here in Seattle. Listen, I'm sorry. I want you to feel so good. And our relationship will grow. If I feel good, if you feel good, if we're both working towards goals that we both, that's a whole different conversation about weight. Right?

Yeah. So I'm not going to make you say it out loud on the radio. You've got a series of hard choices ahead of you, right? Yeah. Do you all live together? We do. Okay. You got a hard series of decisions to make.

Do you have a girlfriend that you can sit down and talk to that walks alongside you through this? Yeah, I do. Good. What do they tell you? Basically the same thing. You know why? Because they love you. Because you're worth being well.

And you're worth being loved. Okay? Yeah. I'm grateful for you, Rose. I know this is a hard call. Oh, man. We'll be right back on the Dr. John Deloney Show. 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. Hey, listen, reminder,

my book, Presale, has launched launched Own your past, own your future Go to johndeloney.com There is a ton If you order on Presale It's 20 bucks and you get so much stuff alongside it Free month of counseling You get audio You get all kind of shenanigans, dude

johndeloney.com Buy 40 of them For you and your friends and your family For strangers, 40 is probably a lot That's kind of weird I'm so grateful for your support And I really want to get this message out About how we can change our lives

Alright, as we wrap up today's show Ben Wizard, Ben the Wizard, the Middle Eastern wizard, passed along his favorite song of all time, Reliant K's, I So Hate Consequences, and it goes like this. And I'm good, good, good to go. I got to get away, get away from all my mistakes. And I'm good, good, good to go, get away from all my mistakes.

So here I sit looking at the traffic lights. The red extinguishes the hope that the green ignites. I want to run away. I want to ditch my life because all my mistakes keep me awake at night. Man, this sounds like my life sometimes. But if my heart says I'm sorry, can we leave it at that? Because I just want for all this to end. I so hate consequences. We all do, but we all got them right here on the Dr. John Deloney Show.