The Dr. John Delony Show - My In-Laws Verbally Assaulted Me and My Husband Did Nothing

Episode Date: October 18, 2023

On today’s show, we hear about: - A husband unsure of how to validate his wife’s feelings during arguments - A couple trying out a separation after a broken engagement - A wife wondering how to be vulnerable with her husband after emotional abuse To order John's new book Building a Non-Anxious Life click here. Lyrics of the Day: "Stupid Boy" - Keith Urban 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: 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. How do I make sure that my wife feels validated during disagreements, especially when I'm pretty sure I'm right? There is a small pattern emerging. You took your husbandy husband protractor out and measured it. It's a very small rift. What up, what up? This is John with the Dr. John Deloney show. Man, I'm so glad that you're with us. Whether you're vacuuming the house, you're driving around the neighborhood, you're at work,

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and trying to figure out what to do next to save your marriage, to leave your relationship, trying to figure out what to do next to save your marriage, to leave your relationship, to be a better parent, be a better friend, to deal with anxiety, and ADHD, and OCD, and whatever else you got going on. If you want to be on this show, give me a buzz at 1-844-693-3291. It's 1-844-693-3291, or go to johndeloney.com slash ask. And don't forget that building a non anxious life is out into the wild. And hopefully by the time it says come out, it's the number one bestseller. I think we're almost, I think we're on the path, but go pick it up. Building a non anxious life. And don't forget, it makes a huge, huge, huge deal difference, huge deal, huge

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So, let's run out to the Ute, Salt Lake City, the SLC, and talk to Eric. Good morning, Eric. What's up, man? Hey, John. Thanks for having me on the show. Of course, dude. Thanks for calling. What's happening? So I have been married for a few years now. I had a question regarding disagreements with my spouse. How do I make sure that my wife feels validated during disagreements or, uh, especially when I'm pretty sure I'm right.

Awesome. It's, it's important to me that she feels like she's been heard and listened to. And I try really hard to, you know, and I feel like I'm pretty good listener and I'm able to articulate her position and, and I try and I don't talk down to her. At least I don't think I do, but she seems to leave a lot of these disagreements in a position where she feels like she hasn't been heard or, or, or she feels sometimes she even

feels kind of dumb and that's not what I want for her yes i'm trying to figure out where i'm where where am i going wrong um you are bringing a grenade launcher to a game of uno and um because you said i i really like i want her to be heard i want her to feel heard and then i was going to interrupt you and say but not as bad as I want to make sure that she knows that here's the right facts of what we're discussing. And so that becomes a hard thing to deal with. So you're calling for a reason. Give me the context for what happened, this has happened more than once, of course, but it's, no, I can't put it on the spot. There is a small pattern emerging to where. Hold on, dude, just go away. If she was on the phone right now, she would be like, I can't breathe. And you're like, there's a small glitch in the matrix. I love it, dude.

Because you know why? You took your husband protractor out and measured it. It's a very small rift. I've measured it. It's a small fracture in our marriage. And she's like, it's so wide. Anyway, okay. What's the small rift emerging? This is so great. I was thinking really hard before the call. to think, what did we actually argue about? And as I'm thinking back, most of the disagreements and arguments we have tend to be, at least from my perspective, when she's feeling very strongly about something or she's feeling – she can lash out sometimes towards me when she's feeling emotional about something. Give me an example. Uh, well, we, well, just to make it that much more complicated, we have a four month old baby.

Okay. So nothing counts right now because your house is sighted. No, nothing counts. But, but give me a thing she's very passionate about. Uh, well, she, she, she's tired a lot. And so she, you know, she, she is, when she is feeling extra tired, she tends to, you know, she'll raise her voice or she'll, she'll. Uh, about what? About what? Give me an example of a thing. Well, for example, a few nights ago, I, I got up in the middle of the night to, you know, to go use the restroom the restroom and then let the dog out. And in the middle of the night, came back and she kind of let loose on me saying,

why are you making so much noise? You're keeping me awake. I'm already so short in sleep. And she's kind of unleashes a barrage and all'll attempt to, to listen. I don't, I don't raise my voice or anything, but it feels like I'm suddenly being assaulted for a very normal nightly thing. And, you know, I'm tiptoeing the best I can. I'm not sure what I can do better. And so I, my, my response would be, I get where you're coming from. Why are you, why are you, why are you yelling at me right now? Why am I being assaulted with,

you know, with assaulted with yelling? And my guess is you immediately default, like all of us would, to a measurement of the amount of volume you just expended. I literally just tiptoed. I opened the back door. I went to the bathroom. I didn't even flush because I wanted to be quiet, which is gnarly, but it's better than waking you up. And yet, right?

And so for you, it's a matter of data. It's a matter of facts. And what you – let me say it like this. First and foremost, during the disagreement, it's never a good time. At 2 a.m. with an exhausted postpartum wife who shows up in the daytime and feels so much shame that she's exhausted, yet feels so frustrated that she's exhausted and wants to be a good mom, yet is being told by every voice on planet earth that she's not doing it right. She should be more organic or less organic or be vaccinating or how dare you vaccinate, whatever's going on. And she really misses the

old y'all, but there's a new y'all. All that stuff is playing in. And then the fact that she's got three hours of sleep a night for the last four months. And so I don't want to equate that to a toddler, okay? But think of it this way. Because your wife is not a toddler, but I'm going to use this similarly. If my toddler was to walk in, let's say my daughter was four, and she came in and said, Daddy, I'm really sick.

I'm really sick. I don't feel good. And then she barfed all over me. I could get frustrated that my daughter threw up on me. But if I step back for 0.1 second, I'll realize that my little girl went to the one place that she knew to be safe when she didn't feel good. And that was me.

And she barfed all over me, which is disgusting. I can argue with her in that moment about the right place to go barf. And next time you need to be, that's what she's coming for me is, dad, can you help me? Do you love me? And so in the middle of the night with an exhausted postpartum wife, and when she rolls over half out of her mind and says,

why are you making so much noise? Why are you, whatever. The correct answer in the middle of the night is, I'm so sorry, baby. And then next week when y'all having breakfast together and the sun is out then it's hey i i really don't want to wake you up in the middle of the night are there some nights it'd be best if i slept in the guest room because i want you when you have those precious hours of sleep, let's get those hours of sleep in. And the challenge that a lot of, is this your first kid? Oh, yeah. Okay.

A challenge a lot of new, especially fathers feel, husbands and fathers, is their whole life gets taken from them. And they take it very personally. I did. I remember weeping that my four-month-old, five-month-old, six-month-old son couldn't care less that I existed. And his mom, the love of my life, my wife, I lost her romantically. I lost her in person. I'm trying to have a conversation and she's half asleep. She's having to get up every two hours to feed this creature that keeps eating and eating. And she's changing 5,000 diapers a day. I felt like I lost everything. And it's changing 5,000 diapers a day.

Like, I felt like I lost everything. And it wasn't until things slowly came back, but I took my son's response to me personally. I took my wife's response to me personally. And going back to my daughter, throwing up, that's not a personal attack. If she was 19 and got drunk and then came into my room and stuck her finger down her throat

and barfed in my face, then now we got another problem, right? But it's a different, it's a whole different situation. And so I think there's a time to express, hey, how do we solve this problem? It's almost never, even if she wasn't pregnant

and y'all had two like teenage kids, it's never in the fight. It's always after the fight. Cause here's the deal. When somebody's feeling something during a disagreement They may be feeling something while you know something different What does that mean? Yes You should have changed the oil. That's a fact

and she's feeling Yes, i'm stupid. That's a fact and you might say, I told you to change the oil. That's a fact. And she might be feeling you are an ass. That's a fact, right? And what y'all are doing is y'all are both, all the things y'all are thinking and feeling are facts, but you're not talking to each other. You're talking past each other because your bodies are trying to survive. You survive with facts. She survives with feelings. And that's okay.

It's just not the moment to say, okay, how can we create a world where you're going to change the oil in the car? See what I'm saying? Yes. So the feelings are often disconnected from reality, from facts, from data, and that's okay. Feelings' job is not to tell the truth or to keep you safe. So when your wife rolls over half asleep, half out of her mind, because she's trying to take care of this baby, and she's like, I think nine plus nine is 48, you can go.

Good night, baby. I love you. We'll talk in the morning. Right? Sure, sure. Tell me, as a new dad, how are you feeling that lost in space? Kind of taking a personal kind of, this all kind of is awesome, but all kind of sucks. You know,

for the first few weeks. Yes. But I've, I, I'm based to your show. I've heard you talk to other dads and it's actually helped dramatically. I'm in a much better spot now. Oh,

good for you, man. It took me a long time to get out of that, man. That was a disaster. What about me? No, man, my wife is a rock star and the baby's amazing and I'm just making it up as I go. And so I know I'm making mistakes

but I'm grateful to have the family I do. I couldn't be happier. Do you have two? Yeah, but here's the deal. You can have both at the same time. You can be just like profoundly universally grateful for your family. You can watch your wife in action and it's something to behold. And you can watch this little baby slowly start to make faces and recognize you and snuggle in. I mean, all that can be true. And you can miss your old days and you can miss just making out whenever y'all wanted to

and you can miss just going to bed and going to sleep you can miss all that all that can be true at the same time do you have a couple of guys that the first time i didn't have this and i watched my wife have it and it saved me the second time having a couple of guys that you literally ask hey guys y'all have three, seven kids down the road for me. I don't really know what's going on. I'm going to text y'all and I'm going to text y'all 24, seven, three 65. I need some right spot on wisdom. Whenever I text, do you have that? You know, up until recently, I've not had much of a, a, a, you know, a posse at all. Uh, I've been really working hard on changing that. And recently,

I've been developing a few new friendships, but I don't have anything really deep-rooted yet. But I suspect that if I were to ask these guys, they'd probably be cool with that. I think I can think of nothing cooler than one of my buddies to reach out and say, hey, you're going to be on my list of three that I'm going to text at 10 o'clock at night when I can't get this baby to sleep. And I think, or there's a weird three that I'm going to text at, um, 10 o'clock at night when I can't get this baby to sleep. And I think, or there's a weird rash. I'm going to text you guys.

And, um, or when I think my wife's crazy, I think my family's crazy and I'm running for the Hills. I'm going to text you guys. And probably three out of three of your close buddies. If you texted them in the middle of the night, the other night and said,

my wife's all mad that I'm making too much noise. They would be like, bro, just go in the guest room and go to sleep. Like this is not the moment to take your stand. Right. And I think there's something powerful about sitting down in front of your wife and saying, honey, I want to be the best husband I can be. And I know you're so tired. I don't ever, ever want you to feel like I'm waking you up in the middle of the night. What if on those rare nights I slept in the guest room? Or if I do have to get up, I'm going to go back to bed in the other room or I'm going to go back to bed on the couch because those hours for you are precious and few and far between. Probably what she's going to say

is, you're not waking me up. I'm so sorry. And then y'all can navigate what happens there. Or she might say, good sucker, go to the couch. And then, hey, you've got your answer, right? You've got your answer. I think the meta here is this. Don't try to solve disagreements that aren't about safety. If there's one about safety, like we got to get out of this building now.

I don't think so. Like, okay, we're going to fight right now because we have to get out of here because there's a safety issue. But if it's a matter of you should have changed the oil and suddenly she's overwashed in shame and feels stupid. And here comes her husband telling her the facts again. And the only way she has to defend herself is to call you stupid and you're overbearing. That's not the moment for, you know, every 3,000 miles, except for unless you're using synthetic. And you can be 6,000. That's not the moment for, you know, every 3,000 miles,

except for unless you're using synthetic and you can be six, it's not the moment for that. In the middle of the night with an exhausted, exhausted mother, who's just amazing, just trying to hold her sanity together with duct tape and string and a few rocks and pine needles she found out the sidewalk. Yes. She's just going to get upset with you in the middle of the night if you even breathe wrong. And so cool. Let's solve that problem when the sun's up, when we're on the same team and we're both having a cup of coffee in a shared moment, that beautiful shared moment that you can have. Hey, I don't want to wake you up. And again, the solution is about you. It's not about, Hey, you keep getting mad at me in the middle of the

night when I wake up. Nah, no, no, no, no. Cause now she's got to fight you. Cause you just, you just threw a first punch, but instead it's, I don't want, me in the middle of the night when I wake up. No, no, no, no, no. Because now she's got to fight you because you just threw a first punch. But instead it's, I don't want to hurt you. I don't want to wake you up in the middle of the night. And also I got to pee like bad. And so does the dog. And so what if? And then come up with a solution or two and let's see how that works out.

The cool thing is it sounds like she's amazing. The cooler thing is it sounds like you're a dad that wants to really be plugged in and do this thing right and you want to come up with a new language. Let's do facts when the world is calm and let's do feelings during the disagreement and always be the first person unplugged when feelings get too hot because nobody's learning, nobody's solving anything. It's just war.

And at 2.30 in the morning with an exhausted mom or an exhausted husband, that's never a good time. You're awesome, Eric. Hey, I'm going to send you a copy of Building an Unanxious Life for you and your new family. Congratulations on having this new beautiful baby. I wish you guys all the best. Holler if I can ever walk alongside you. 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

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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 of the app when you go to hallow.com slash Deloney. Go right now and change your life. All right, let's go out to Portland, Oregon and talk to the great Maggie. What's up, Maggie? Hey, John. How are you? Partying. Dude, it's not even awake time yet in Portland. Good morning to you. It's like 7.45. What's up? Yeah. Yeah. So I wanted to first say thank you for having me on the show. I watch your content like crazy, especially during this time in my life. And it's been really, it's been really comforting.

So if anyone's ever said you're like pretty much like dad for all of us and helping us through all this stuff. I mean, anyways. Well, I appreciate that. I think most people watch and go, dude, that guy's life is a train wreck. I'm not near that. Not near that bad. We're doing great, honey. Yeah. Well, thank you for being in our

gang. So what's up? How can I help? Yeah. So my question is, how do I establish boundaries during a trial separation? Keep in mind, my partner and I were together for about 15 months. We were engaged six months into the relationship, so we weren't married um we were due to be married august 28th of this year and we decided to separate august 16th oh yikes what happened you have a kid uh no kids we definitely did the no-no of naming our kids before we had them. And so, um, what, what, um, what happened? Yeah. So there's a multitude of things. Um, one of, or a few of which to which I've owned is it took some time and therapy outside of this to figure out, uh, for me, there's some insecurities of emotional infidelity. There's jealousy on my end where his attention was going. He would use social media and applications heavily.

On his end, there's a lack of regulation of anger. We'd be chalked up to, this is how I express my feelings. He'd yell at me, calling names. And then we constantly did this thing of making up, breaking up. We both were guilty of it. Name calling on his end, anxiety on both of our end after all the responses and trauma have pretty much accumulated. So it sounds like you're married to a really, really immature, I mean, you're not married, you were dating a really immature guy. You're dating a child in a man's body.

Yeah. Why a trial separation? Primarily, if I'm being honest with you, John, I think a lot of the stuff that he would say that his rationale was I needed space. I mean, we got a house together and everything, and I moved out of the house. And his rationale is I need to get back to the things that made me happy because I just, we both did kind of the, what is it? The Venn diagram, right? Our circles were right over each other. And so we had an unhealthy, like we weren't ourselves basically.

And he wanted to get back to his life or his, you know. What does that mean? More phone and more apps and more disconnection from reality? Well, it's sounding like it because as soon as we started to separate a bunch of TikToks being sent my way and I actually found out

we told each other we were deleting our Instagrams and I found out through my friend that he actually re-downloaded his he's done with you, Maggie. Yeah. He's done.

And I don't want to be a jerk about it. I just want to be as direct and honest as I can. I think he's out. Yeah. Because there can be an— He wouldn't do that if he actually cared. Well, I mean, there can be an unhealthy overlap of that Venn diagram to use your picture you were drawing. There can be like, hey, we've got, I mean, we've been together a year. We're just being gross. We're all Dawson's creaked out, right? It's all like we're in love and it's

gross and we're just like, I don't want to wait. Like that's part of the first year, especially y'all crammed the first year of dating plus engagement plus we're about to get married right in the first 15 months or so that's a lot but man things get out of whack everything is about each other and that's kind of awesome right and then there's a return to reality like i gotta go work and i also really love playing guitar and you think my guitar playing is terrible and so like and i like to paint and it's like, I don't want you to paint me like one of your French girls. So life happens and you kind of come back that way.

But I don't have to leave you. Right. You see what I'm saying? Yeah, and I think that's what's really messing with my head right now. And I would ask him, and I owned, it's my insecurity, but I really feel like it was an intuition of, well, then why are we still, why are you still saying you want to have kids with me? You still want to be with me and all these buzzwords because he understood the emotional hook that he had in me. And this has nothing to do with your insecurity.

You love this guy. And he's dragging you behind his car. Yeah. And then occasionally he pulls up to a stoplight and you stand up and wipe the scrapes and mud and rocks off of your body and he kisses you out the window and it feels so good to be seen and loved

and then he hits the gas again and starts dragging you again. You love this guy. There's nothing wrong with you you don't have a bunch of things to fix he can't put down other women on his phone he can't put down his phone he has he wants to have this his quote-unquote old life where he sits on the couch and eats potato chips and smokes weed and plays with his cell phone and not do the grownup thing, which is, I love you. Let's build a life together. You get a vote. I get a vote. Let's make something amazing. He's not ready for it, but in his defense, you keep showing up. Yeah. And for some reason you think so little of yourself that you keep putting up with this. Right.

My rules for a quote-unquote trial separation are informed by the great Terry Real. And they have to be very specific. We are separating for a season for the following. And there has to be regular check-in time. And it has to be, there has to be some rules. Like, we're not going to hook up. We're not going to date. Whatever y'all's rules happen to be regular check-in time. And it has to be, there has to be some rules. Like we're not going to hook up. We're not going to date. We're not, whatever y'all's rules happen to be for this separation.

But there's got to be an explanation. Why are we doing this? And for how long? And I'm going to return on date X. And it's non-negotiable. I'm going to walk out the door, right? When you start calling me names again, when you start, right? But the way you just rattled it off, he takes his rage and anger out on you he is verbally abusive he may tell you he's

not hooking up with other people but he's sure engaging with him in a sexual manner on social media you've told him hey you're constantly having your face buried in these screens. It makes me feel isolated and alone on the same couch with you. And he's like, I don't care. Yeah. Tell me I'm wrong. So what I'm doing is I'm pushing really hard on the other side of the teeter-totter, hoping you'll push back, and you're not. So am I closer to reality?

Am I closer to truth? Or am I missing something here? Yeah, I mean, you're pretty close with the whole social media thing. Because, I mean, I found out a lot of stuff. And I'll own that. And I owned that in couples therapy when we took it. You own what? What do you have to own?

I own, well, to his thing is I went through his phone. And I found out a lot of stuff that if I didn't go to and there's that, you know, confirmation bias there, if I didn't go through it, then I wouldn't have known all the things that I know now. That's not confirmation bias.

Yeah. That is, I was being lied to for so long and I trusted my gut. Was it cool to go through his phone? Probably not. But I did and i found out a whole bunch of stuff that's not confirmation bias okay confirmation bias is you so badly wanting him to

be the guy you marry that you overlook all of this negative crap the fact that he's left you behavior is a language he's told you very clearly i I'm done with this. I want my life. If you want to weasel into little parts of my life, I'll have you because I like making out with you. And I like it when you pick up the dinner tab. But when it comes to billing, confirmation bias is you throw all that away and you just think of the one day a month when he's really sweet to you and you're like, see, he's loving. Right. Right?

That is confirming this one thing that you want so badly to be true. You're so biased towards he's a good guy and I want to marry him that you throw away all the bad stuff. That's confirmation bias. Going through his phone and finding out he's cheating on you is not confirmation bias. That's reality. And that sucks. You have nothing to own, nothing to own other than I shouldn't know. I should, I should have told you, I don't trust you. I don't know.

I want, I want to see your phone. Right. And he should have, cause he's engaged to you and be like, I don't care. Here's my code. Right. Yeah. That definitely didn't happen. I mean, he gave me his code, but it was like a trust of like, you know, I'm not going to go through your phone, kind of an assumption. You're not going to go through my phone, but we're going to have each other's passcode. This is a whole other call, but I'm super weirded out by that. Yeah.

I don't know. So now it's like I... Yeah, it just seems like I was being strung along. You are right now. Did you all both put your name on the mortgage? So he did a buyout, and I took him completely out of that whole situation. And right now I made it clear to him,

I'm like, I feel like this is kind of being strung along and he would give me timelines, right? Like at the first of the year, I'd be willing to do- Hold on, okay, we're done with him. Here's what we're gonna do. You create the boundaries. Right.

So today, I want you to text him, not call, text him and say, from this point forward, I am creating the boundaries in this relationship or what's left of it. We will talk again in 30 days and we'll talk in person only. Right. And I'm going to block and block him.

And you're off social media and you know,'s gonna be for the next 30 days eerily quiet devastatingly quiet heartbreaking silence because you made plans with this dude yeah and he's a child and he treated you like crap and i wouldn't say that if he had just broken up with you and just said, Hey, like this is all moving so fast. I am reconsidering. You're not the person that I want to spend the rest of my life with. That's devastating and hard,

but at least he looked at you in the eye like a grown man and told you the truth. Right. But he's not, he's a coward and he's hiding behind a cell phone. Right. And I'm sorry that you're enduring that. And I'm sorry that this whole thing is so lit up with gaslights that you have somehow figured

out a way to make this your fault yeah you're not being insecure you're being a woman who loves a man who told her I want to spend the rest of my life with you I want to make babies with you here's their names let's buy a home together and then he was like

I want my old life back never mind that's not insecurity. That's heartbreak. Yeah. And you knew something was wrong and off because you're a woman who trusts her intuition. And so, yes,

you violated his trust. You went through his phone, which if you're engaged to, I mean, why wouldn't you share each other's phones? What are y'all hiding from each other? If you're going to spend the rest of your life together and make humans together,

you can't see my text messages. What kind of weird things are going on? That's a whole other call. But you didn't have confirmation bias. You don't have some psychological misnomer. You don't have some psychological issue. You found out he's cheating on you. And that's devastating.

And it sucks. And it hurts. Here's the path forward. I want you to call two girlfriends today And I want you to say we're going out tonight tonight And I want you to say out loud all the things you just told me in person with him sitting there I want you to ask him I'm thinking about this thing being completely over because i'm taking back control of my life

I'm taking back agency because i'm freaking maggie from portland and i'm worth that And i'm not going to pick up little breadcrumbs of love and little breadcrumbs of physical affection And try to create a loaf of bread out of that i'm worth way more than that There's a guy out there that would love to cook something nice for me. And he's going to respect me and completely show up. And maybe he was into his phone, and maybe he was into his video games or whatever stuff. And now we're together, he's going to be into me.

Sorry you're going through it. I hate that for you. I hate that for you. But don't ever forget this phrase. I'm worth more than this because you are, Maggie. We'll be right back. All right, we're back. Let's roll out to Columbus, Ohio, and talk to the great Sarah with an H. What's up, Sarah?

Hi, Dr. John. How are you? We're partying. What's up, Sarah? Hi, Dr. John. How are you? We're partying. What are you up to? Oh, sitting in a closet hiding from my children. I may have done that too recently. Oh, it's so like quiet and dark in there. It's nice.

It's nice. So nice. All right. So what's up besides the fact that you're hiding from your children in a closet. So my question is, how can I learn to be more vulnerable with my husband after a month of emotional abuse? Not very easily. No, it's not very easy. I can give you a little bit of background.

Yeah. Tell me about the emotional abuse. So my husband and I, we've been fighting on and off really nonstop since February. About what? Anything and everything. It seems like anything can become an issue. Just to give you like an example, there was a work get together for him, um, where originally he thought it was going to be like a spouse get together. And then it wasn't. Um, and I told him, you know, so go, like you

should go to your work thing. And then he was convinced, oh, you must be angry because now you can't go. Um, and I was like, well, I'm disappointed. It would have been fun, but it's fine. You go, it's fine. And long story short, it ended up blowing up into some huge big thing where he says that I'm lying to him, even though I'm not. And somehow it blew up to even,

he called his parents over. They entered the fight. This was like way long ago, back in April. He called his mommy? Yes, he did. And his daddy. Oh my, good gosh. And then I was ganged up on by the three of them.

It included his mom aggressively grabbing me and his dad screaming inches from my face. Sarah, Sarah. It's been bad. Hey, this isn't okay. I know. I think you know that intellectually. I don't think you've allowed yourself to know that, what this really means. You can't be a part of this. Yeah. Well, we did set up boundaries with his parents. Eventually, we put them in a big long order. They will never come into your house again until they show up at your front door, both on one knee, saying, I'm so sorry.

Forgive us for belittling you and abusing you and acting like children. Period. Yeah. so sorry. Forgive us for belittling you and abusing you and acting like children, period. Yeah. The best apology that I've gotten from his dad was me requesting an apology and him saying, his dad was saying, oh, well, I don't remember. I don't remember. And I said, well, that's not an apology. And he said, fine, I'm sorry. And like yelled at me again what a coward what a coward what a spineless spineless spineless man wow very much and your husband is he defending you um eventually he did um that's kind of one of the things that i struggle with is sometimes when you, his parents haven't been coming around. Cause like I said, that was back in April. Um, and I have insecurities,

like, are you angry with me that your parents aren't coming around? Cause it used to be, it was like a weekly thing coming over all the time. And then, you know, he just kind of shuts down when we talk about his parents and I'm like well I don't want you to hate me like I still want you to have a relationship but they need to treat me well and he just is like I just don't want to talk about it I just don't want to talk about it and I'm like that's really invalidating to me well it's not invalidating I mean that sounds kind of like like I don't know. That sounds like 21st century blog language. Like, it's bigger than that.

He got his cowardice from his dad. Yeah. Because it may be super clear. I love my mom and dad to the moon and back. They're amazing. And if my father got inches from my wife's face and was screaming, whoo, baby. And if my father got inches from my wife's face and was screaming, who baby? Yeah.

He sat in a chair and watched it all happen. My mom, I'm just, I'm almost borderline laughing. If it wasn't so heartbreaking, trying to picture my mom grabbing my wife. Well, and it was after I had just, um, expressed, I forget how it even came up.

One of the issues that we have had is me not wanting physical intimacy. And somehow that came up in it. And I was saying, the reason why I don't always want it is because I've been a victim of sexual abuse. And right after I say that is when his mom grabs me and I'm like, what did I just say? What did she grab you? What is she trying to, was she reaching to give you a hug? No, she claimed that she grabbed my arm because I was like three feet from her and I was talking with my hands and she said that she was afraid I was going to hit her. So she very aggressively grabbed my arm. And I mean, I didn't raise my hand or anything. I was just like, the whole thing should have been set up. So this sounds like a mess. So ask me your original question again, because I

don't think it's the right question, but ask me again. How can I learn to be more vulnerable with my husband after months of emotional abuse? We've been going to therapy and then it, I mean, even more forms of emotional abuse have come out of it. Him using therapy against me, talking calmly to each other is a thing that we've been working on. And he'll come to me and ask me, like the other day, I had a complete day off. The kids went to the sitter. So I was home alone, ran errands, did some laundry, things like that. Well, there were still dishes in the sink.

So he comes home and he asked me, um, I need to ask you something calmly. Can you promise not to get mad? And I said, okay. And he asked me, well, what did you do all day? This guy sucks, man. Hey, will you have him call me? Yeah. Love to hear that. He actually listens to your show. So, um, he can't listen to my show because he would, well, Well I mean I guess he can He can do whatever he wants But He does

He does Okay here's the deal He's not on the phone And your in-laws are not on the phone You are And so Can we have some like hard Honest

Truthful conversation That you're not going to feel like I'm invalidating you I'm sitting right here with you But I want to just tell the truth Yes Okay Truth number one, if you desire closeness with your husband and you desire intimacy, yet your body is paralyzed from historical sexual abuse, it becomes your adventure to seek healing. Is that fair? Yeah. Okay. If your husband calls his mommy and

daddy, you knew that that wasn't going to end well. And so at some level, there's a responsibility that you have to get you and your children and put them in a car and leave and go get a hotel room. Is that fair? Yeah. At some level, and you and I could probably pull the string all the way back, you've internalized that this is what your life is worth. This is just part of being Sarah. Taking this crap from people, and you've probably taken it from people your whole life that's very accurate and so the the path forward is not hoping that the people that you your body

continues to invite into your life right and you've heard this saying that you marry your unfinished business if somebody constantly um was putting demands on you that were unreasonable and then holding you accountable and being abusive in some shape, form or fashion because you didn't meet these obnoxious standards, in a weird way, your body's gonna find somebody to marry who's just like that because your body wants to fix that because it constantly is asking, what did I do wrong?

What did I do wrong? Why am I so unlovable? And the only way out of that cycle is not to meet the needs because if you had cleaned the sink, your husband would have asked you something else about what you didn't do right. You've had a whole day off and we can't just, you won't play dress up with me and have crazy sex night. He would have, the benchmark keeps moving, right? And so the only path out is for you to go seek healing for Sarah

so that you can stand up on two feet and knowingly look in the mirror and say, I'm worth more than this, period. I will not be part of a marriage where my husband outsources a disagreement to his mommy and daddy. And one of his parents puts their hands on me in an act of aggression. And the other parent screams in my face, in my home. Sarah, it's your home too, right? Oh, believe me, I screamed that back.

Okay, well, that doesn't help either, right? That doesn't help either. No, it didn't, but. But they're not welcome there. Yeah. And the fact that your husband won't talk to you is a way that he is still owning power over you. You quote unquote won

because mom and dad don't get to come around anymore. So the way he's going to get power back is by, he used to get power by puffing his chest up. And when he needed backup, he called mommy and daddy. You took that away. Good for you. You put a firm boundary. Good for you.

And so now he's going to grab power by grabbing the rope and swimming underwater he's still going to drag the boat around with i don't want to talk about it's too hard right yeah yeah and now he used to have power by being loud and abusive and um pretty ugly and now he's got power by woe is me and guilt and sadness. And oh my gosh. And that's the big thing I keep telling him. I'm like, clearly, if that was the household that he grew up in and that's where he learned things,

then I keep telling him, you know, you need to go to therapy. Yeah, but hold on. When you do that, he has to wall up on you because his mom and dad have been beating him up his whole life. Yeah. And he married his unfinished business too yeah right and so this is uncomfortable to say out loud but you could probably see shadows of yourself in them fair yeah that sucks doesn't it it's so mean to say but his body's trying to figure out

why did my dad scream in my face my whole childhood? Why was my mom, would she do things and then blame me for them? And then here he's got a wife standing toe to toe with him screaming, this is my house too. And he's like, ah, there it is. But how do I, like, do I give him time to walk away? And you tell him I'm worth having a conversation with you that is not

belittling and it's not abusive and it's not screaming. And so when you scream, you're asking me to leave yeah when you um and it may be let's be honest it may be that um you know the great bernie brown says whatever you go looking for in the world you're sure to find it may be that he got home and was like hey what'd you do today and you were so so highly attuned to him asking in a way like asking a question that you immediately went to. Oh my God. Right. Maybe, maybe not.

Maybe not. Maybe he came in. It was a total jerk. I think it's the latter. Okay. Right. But that's where we have a disagreement, but here's the deal.

Yeah. Like you haven't called it, but you're done. And you're done with what was. How about that? You're done with the marriage that you had. I don't know that you're done with, would you build something new if he was into? I want to.

I know. And that's the big struggle is like he had his very first individual therapy appointment. And he's been very kind, very loving like the past week. So I really want to believe that he's going to turn a corner. It's not how it goes. You can't pick up a basketball for the first time and start shooting free throws and be like, I really want to be the best free throw shooter in the world. It's going to turn a corner. It's not how it goes. You can't pick up a basketball for the first time and start shooting free throws and be like, I really want to be the best free throw shooter in the world. It's going to take years of practicing every day.

Yeah. And so you had a good first week. That's awesome. That's a huge win. It's a huge win. He's having to completely change his nervous system, as are you. Yeah. Y'. He's having to completely change his nervous system, as are you. Yeah.

Y'all are both having to learn completely new skills in how to interact with people because your interactions with the people who are supposed to love you were hell, and so were his. And so we're not like, I just want to go all in. We are,

but we're going all in by practicing like crazy. And we're going to celebrate the good moments and we're going to call out the rough moments, the tough ones. Yeah. So when you first called and I said, how do you rebuild trust? Takes a long time.

It's hard. It's very hard. Yeah. And I want to be the wife that he wants and needs because that's all he keeps telling me. You know, his love language is physical affection. And I want to, I really want to be able to give it to him. But I just, especially with my history, it's so hard.

It's so hard. So two things. Number one, I think history is a part of it. But I think the bigger part of it is you have to be honest about your lack of attraction to a man that sat by and watched his parents come after you. It's easier to point back to historical trauma than it is to look at the man that you married right across from you that you've got kids together with and say, you were such a coward. You let me take it on my own. That's harder to deal with, I think. Because there's trauma counseling there's processes there's plans for how to work through historical trauma they suck

i've been there i've had my own they're awful but man i'm on the other side of it and it's it's amazing yeah it's hard to look at that dragon though in the bed next to you and say i'm not attracted to you because you're a child you're a coward and he can say all day long i've been too scared i know i know i know it's hard but i i i think it's because you see how y'all are in this this this and i just call it the dance i wish i had a better language from it i took that from Estep Perel. It was just a dance. It was just a dance and a dance and a dance.

And the dance is, I would be braver if you slept with me more. And I would be able to stand taller if you would say you're proud of me and you respected me. And you just surprised me by taking your shirt off in the middle of the day. Like, I want all these things. And you say, I may want to take my shirt off if you middle of the day. Like I want all these things. And you say, I may want to take my shirt off if you weren't such a coward and you were more brave and you see how I did. And you just end up in this merry-go-round where you can never catch each other.

Yeah. And both of you have to say, Hey, what we're doing is not working. And that means you have to be very clear about what you need. And that's hard because he might look at you and say, I'm not doing that. And vice versa.

But I think him continuing to blame his parents, you continuing to blame the past, both of those blames have validity. They're both real. They're super real. But the main issue is he's looking at you and saying, I need something from you that you're unwilling to give me. And you're looking at him saying, I need you to be something that you're unwilling to be. And that's an ugly, hard truth. But we've got to start there. Yeah.

Is that fair? Yeah. If I asked you just to rattle off a list of five or ten things that make it very hard to desire him, could you do that? Yeah. Yeah. Have y'all talked about that in couples therapy? Yeah. I've talked about how I want to feel safe with him.

I want to feel... Yeah, but that's all like super big lofty counseling language. I just want to feel safe with him. I want to feel... Yeah, but that's all like super big, lofty, counseling language. I just want to feel safe with you. What does that mean? That means when you walk in the door, you put your phone in your bag and you don't take it out

and you look me in the eye and you hug me. Like, you see what I'm saying? Like, there's a level of clarity because his picture of what safe means, I'll just say it in my house. What safety meant for me was that I'm gone all the time And that I make as much money as I possibly can

That's how I thought my wife wanted to feel safe And it wasn't until we were on the brink that she said safety means walk in the door put your phone away Don't get your laptop out and just Let me know that I have value to you and I was like oh, crap, I don't know how to do that. So I had to learn a new set of skills real quick. Yeah. But when you're in counseling and you just have that lofty language, you see what I'm saying?

Like, I just want to feel desired. No, what does that mean? You see what I'm saying? Yeah. I mean, I've told them, you know, I don't want you to yell at me. Don't yell at the kids. Don't slam doors in anger. Don't punch walls. So I want you to flip it around. I want you to flip at me. Don't yell at the kids. Don't slam doors in anger. Don't punch walls. So I want you to flip it around. I want you to flip it around. I want you to take ownership.

If you raise your voice, I am leaving. If you punch a wall in this home, I call the police every single time. This is not about what he's doing. This is about what you're going to do. Yeah. You see what I'm saying? Yeah. He's a grown man acting like a toddler.

I don't care who you are. You don't punch holes through a wall with your wife and your kids there. You don't care who you are. You don't punch holes through a wall with your wife and your kids there. You don't. Right. And if it happens that one time, you go to hell and back to make sure it never happens again. Yeah.

But also, was he a guy that was shamed so bad that he can't even see straight by those two parents of his? He was. Yeah. Very strict religious household. Pulled out of sex class in public schools or sex ed because they didn't want him teaching the wrong thing. So he's got that, he's got that, that nuclear reactor of rage in that ball right beneath his chest, right beneath his rib cage.

And it's pulsing and pulsing. And he looked at you in the eye and said, I do. And he made babies with you. That is his job. You can't make that nuclear reactor go away. No matter what you do, no matter how much sex you give him, no matter how clean your house is, you can't make that go away.

His kids aren't going to be able to score enough soccer goals. His kids aren't going to be able to get enough straight A's for that nuclear reactor to go away. He has to go deal with that. And I know this because I did. He's got to go deal with that. And I know this because I did. He's got to go deal with it. And there's something magic about a husband who has dealt with that inner rage, said out loud in front of other people, whether a therapist, whether a couple of friends, whether a men's group, whether a minister, what, I don't care, but somebody who's going to give you good counsel and wisdom and listen to

you. There's something about a husband coming back into their home with that nuclear reactor disassembled and off. And the whole house goes, oh, that guy's safe because he's under control. He can handle business if things get sideways, but they're not sideways here because this home is warm. And then suddenly, weirdly, you're attracted to them again. It's a vicious, vicious cycle that at the end of the day, you've got to take ownership of and say, I can't make you not hit the hole in the wall, but I will leave you because me and my kids' safety are worth more than that. I can't make you be disgusted by your parents. They're not welcome in my home.

Because they put their hands on me. And they're too cowardly to say they're sorry. I think it's time for you all to sit down in front of a counselor. Together. A neutral third party. And stop using counselor-y language. And be very specific and clear. I need this. And I need and clear. I need this.

And I need this. And I need this. This is not you have to, and you have to, this is, this is what I need. And he gets to do the same. And then you'll have to make a hard,

challenging grownup decision by looking at each other and say, I'm willing to commit to trying to make that happen. I'm going to practice it over time. Are you still in? That's where y'all are. The scary, scary moment in your marriage. I do 1000% think y'all can turn the corner. I've just seen it happen too often. I think you can. I think you've got to be very, very real. You have to choose reality in a stark way right now. And you'll have proven to yourself that y you all don't have the skills to do it together. So you need to get on your own. So you need to get somebody else to mediate.

Tough season. Call anytime. Anytime. And if your husband wants to call and provide the other side of the story, which there always is one, I'd love to hear it. I'd love to hear it. We'll be right back. 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're back. It looks like today's show was terrible husband or struggling husband depreciation hour.

Jeez Louise, my guys. I feel weird. I'm not perfect. Not by a thousand miles. By a hundred thousand miles. But man, we got to do better. You know, I say that that first husband was really busting it. I know that guy's working hard.

He's working really hard. He was, he was trying. He was just new parent. Middle of the night. Whoa. Whoa. This wasn't meant for him. No.

The song I picked was not meant for him. It was meant for the second two. Good on you. That song, it's by the great Keith Urban, our neighbor here in Nashville. Song's called Stupid Boy. It goes like this.

Well, she was precious like a flower. She grew wild, wild but innocent. A perfect prayer in a desperate hour. She was everything beautiful and different. Stupid boy, you can't fence that in. Stupid boy, it's like holding back the wind. She laid her heart and soul right in your hands, and you stole her every dream, and you crushed her plans.

She never even knew she had a choice and that's what happens when the only voice she hears is telling her she can't, stupid boy. Guys, if you don't know what to do next, call somebody. Don't punch holes through walls. Don't scream. Don't call your mommy and daddy. Reach out and say, I'm at the end of what I'm able to do. And she doesn't deserve this. And they don't deserve this.

And I don't either. Reach out. Masculinity is not knowing everything and then crushing it. It's doing the next right thing. And if you need a new tool, go get a new tool. I love you guys. We'll see you soon.