The Dr. John Delony Show - My Son & Daughter-in-Law Make Porn for a Living

Episode Date: June 25, 2021

The Dr. John Delony Show is a caller-driven show that offers real people a chance to be heard as they struggle with relationship issues and mental health challenges. John will give you practical advice on how to connect with people, how to take the next right step when you feel frozen, and how to cut through the depression and anxiety that can feel so overwhelming. You are not alone in this battle. You are worth being well—and it starts by focusing on what you can control. Let us know what’s going on by leaving a voicemail at 844.693.3291 or visiting johndelony.com/show. We want to talk to YOU!   Show Notes for this Episode   My wife is a brain cancer survivor but she is very different now and I'm struggling to communicate. My husband is struggling to find his footing after almost dying last year. My son and daughter-in-law have started making money by creating online porn and I don't know what to do. Lyrics of the Day: "Smells Like Teen Spirit" - Nirvana   As heard on this episode:  BetterHelp Redefining Anxiety John's Free Guided Meditation Ramsey+   tags: fitness/physical health, family, boundaries, sexuality/intimacy, kids, parenting, disagreement/conflict, anger/resentment/bitterness   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 about how couples can rebuild their life after life-altering transitions. We also talk to an awesome mom of adult children who's really frustrated by their decisions and choices. Stay tuned. Hey, what's up? Welcome, everybody, to the Dr. John Deloney Show. I am John, and when I say welcome, everybody, you 22 people know who you are.

Sitting, probably most of y'all are in a circle, just looking at each other because y'all are doing some form of community service and the judge in your community thought it'd be hilarious to make you have to listen to this show as part of your criminal punishment we're glad you're here and you can tell for those you've been with us for a long time we have moved up from 17 to 22 we gained four or five new followers we're excited we are doing somersaults here in the studio hey a couple of things before we get going on the show number one if you're new to us we're so glad you're here it's awesome and i keep saying we it's just me here um actually it's not it's zach and kelly james who's also at funruiner.com.net slash org if you want to go check out his website.

And, hey, we talk about mental health. We talk about relationships. We talk about the things that you're struggling with, that you're walking through. And we take real calls, live calls from you. I'll walk alongside you, and we will help figure this thing out together. Before we get going, though, I do want to talk about this. Y'all know I hate selling stuff. It's just part of the deal. But a few months ago, I came out with a book. It's a really thin book. It's like 80 pages and it's called

Redefining Anxiety. Man, I just kept having, so many people kept calling about it. I got anxiety, I got anxiety, I got anxiety. And one day I popped off in a meeting, hey, anxiety is not the issue. And everyone around me said, huh? And so we wrote a quick book on it. It has taken off a life of its own. We all were scratching our head when it made the bestseller list. And now I'm starting to get these really remarkable emails with entire police department leadership teams holding a copy of the book of counseling centers and medical centers buying these things by the case to pass out to their clients this book's 10 bucks it's it costs it's it's low cost it's easy to read and it really just cuts through all the nonsense it doesn't it's not a-inch book on all the neuroscience and mumbo-jumbo and theoretical blah, but it just gets right to it. And so if you know somebody who's struggling with anxiety,

it's good. It's helping a lot of folks. I'm grateful for everybody. If this book has meant something to you, if it's helped you out, if it's helped you be able to communicate better with someone that you love, man, let me know. Because, man, I do this show and then I go home and I live out in the woods and I don't pay attention to a lot of stuff. And so it means a lot to me when you say, hey, this little $10 investment helped me and my wife talk better. It helped me understand my kids. It helped me in my workplace get along better. It's awesome. So that's it. $10, JohnDeloney.com. You can get a copy of this book. All right, let's go to the phones. Let's take the first call from Kyle in Paducah, Kentucky.

Kyle, what is up? Well, it's an interesting day. It's like the damn book list, and everything has come my direction all at once. But that's not why I'm calling. Hey, why not? Hey, let's talk about it. It's happening. No, no, no, no. You got my real name and my real city, so we can't discuss all that.

Hey, Kyle, I'll lie if you want to. That's part of the fun here. My name's on the show. It's cool. I know it is. But, you know, I'm hoping people hear this that know me. All right. It might help somebody. Okay, so let's bring it on man what's going on i have um an ongoing challenge having discussions uh meaningful discussions with my wife okay our

conversations who is a who is currently walking out in her 11th year of brain cancer. Okay. So did she have a surgery back in the day that altered her cognitive capacity? In 2010, she had a seizure in the middle of the night and found out it was a brain tumor on her right temporal lobe. It was more of a mass. It wasn't a root stall. It turned out to be anaplastic astral cytoma. It had a craniotomy followed by radiation, chemo, the whole nine yards. She came out with memory intact.

Physical stuff's fine. Motor skills are pretty good she, I mean that was trauma to the whole body beyond any of my imagination and it has just changed things

I'm 11 years into this and it makes it for some challenging days so let me get to let me ask a few more questions just physiological questions did did the surgery alter her personality in any way did it alter the way she sees the world or is this more a trauma response she lives an anxious life a fearful life or the way, it's just wheels off now. Now we are going to sprint to the end here because she got to peer over the edge. Tell me about these changes.

Okay, so this was in our fourth year of marriage. We dated for about a year beforehand. So I have been trying to nail down what some drastic changes have been, but because of my limited amount of time knowing her beforehand, I've known her a lot longer post-craniotomy. Okay, but don't get... I talked to her friend yesterday, a friend that's known her longer than me, and I asked her, and this might have been the first time I asked her this, and she said she used to be a go-getter. Okay. And now she's not. So, hey, Kyle, Kyle, I don't want, don't go back and try to recreate a puzzle that you didn't experience.

Tell me what you experienced. You knew her for four years or five years or six years, and then you got, and then you've known her since. So what happened before you met her doesn't matter very much to me. What have you experienced? And why is it, what did you there she is very cautionary um uh fear um anything anything um it's hard for me to discuss things in the future like my dreams my aspirations with her because she begins to see herself as a burden and the anchor that keeps me from going that route and um uh we didn't have we didn't experience that beforehand so what in the last before what in the last decade has communicated to her that she's some sort of a burden?

The fact that she has not, she went on disability after it and got on just lickety split. And then they denied her. And because we have a daughter and it was more, we'd already gotten that rhythm of her being a stay-at-home mom. When she lost disability, my income was enough to cover and take care of all the needs and stuff like that. She didn't have to go to work. She wanted, if she wanted to, which I think she was fearful at it. She was kind of hesitant, but there was not the need. It would have created more headaches. For who?

She just wanted to go back into, for all of us, because she was wanting to go back into retail at the mall, which would be crazy schedules and everything else. We just got stuck, not stuck, we got uncomfortable in that rhythm of her being at home. It sounds like you got comfortable with her being at home. Okay. Is that fair or not fair? Yeah. Oh, that's very fair. Because I'm trying to drill down. Here's the thing it's really common when somebody has

a life altering moment a brain tumor is one of those things brain cancer is one of those things a traumatic brain injury is one of those things and there are a million different versions of that the first time you have a heart attack the first time you have an anxiety attack

any of those things, somebody you love dies in a car wreck we have these moments that I call before and after moments. I was this way up until here. Gotcha. And the challenge when you have a before and after moment and you're married and you got kids or you've got close family is everybody around you often wants to go back to the way things were. And you've had this giant lightning bolt experience. You're different now.

And everyone around you says, well, now that you're up and walking, now that you're up and running around, now that you're out of the hospital, fill in the blank, now we can go back to what was. And what I often tell folks who experience a trauma, especially when it's acute, right? Like we're right in the middle of it or just coming out of it is everything is different now. Even if it looks the same, even if you drive home in the same car you went to the hospital in, everything's different. And so you have to excavate what was and rebuild something completely new. And so what I'm trying to drill down here is this is a decade ago, and something along the way has communicated to her, and I'm not blaming you for it.

I'm asking you may be a part of it. I'm guessing you are, not that you're a bad guy. It's just part of it. Something has communicated to her over time that what she wants, what her vision of the future is, what y'all's vision of the future is, she's weighing you, she's slowing you down. Right. Right?

And my guess is your kid's 10, I mean, not my guess is is but your kid's 10 years older now the whatever the things that she wanted to do are now just i'm so sorry or it's just a thing and when you can't fight and you can't you can't fight brain cancer right you got to go through chemo and do those things but once you're done you can't have a fistfight with it. You can't run from it because it's in your body. And so what's the other thing when you're under attack and you can't flee and you can't fistfight it? Your body just goes into neutral. That's right. It just shuts down.

It freezes. Right? It tries to not be detected by the world. And another word for frozen is an anchor. Right? And another word for frozen is an anchor, right? So what I'm asking you is, what about you? Have you not, how have you contributed to her feeling like she is of value? Her dreams are your dreams and your dreams are her dreams. Or have you contributed to a narrative that she just needs to get on board?

Hey, you'll take care of it. Your vision's important and she can come along for the ride. Probably both of those. Okay. A lot of, I mean, I'm a dreamer. Yeah. And I might have a different ambition in life every year, and I've got to be grounded because I am just, I'm a card carrying ADD, um,

full blown. So I've got a shed full of previous hobbies that I'm not ever going to touch again. Most likely. So I, um, so that's a context, not an excuse. Yeah, I'm not helpful in that. Okay. So here's what I'm asking. There is no cognitive impairment, meaning my oldest friend on planet Earth, the oldest friend I have is a traumatic brain injury survivor, has very little ability to develop new short-term memories, and often collapses spaces of up to 20 years.

And so sometimes out of nowhere, I'll get an email about, hey, here's something that happened the other night, and it happened 20-something years ago. He's got legitimate cognitive impairment, and he's working his butt off in an extraordinary way to continue to work towards it. So that's one thing sounds to me like your wife is suffering from a long-term compression of who she has become post-surgery. She doesn't have any cognitive impairment. She's just been living underwater for a decade. Learning new skills.

I see when I observe her trying to learn something new, if she is, if, if it, if it presents itself jump in there and be like, okay, we can push through this. But there's another part of me that says, no, I've got to let her push through this and wait until she asks me for help. Okay. And then back away again. I want to present you a third option. I want to present you a third option. Okay. One of those is to jump in and solve it.

Right. Right. And I think your impulse there, like that's my of those is to jump in and solve it. Right. Right. And I think your impulse there, like that's my impulse. Whenever I see my wife struggling with something or my kids, somebody that I love struggling with something, I want to jump in and solve it. Then I've also learned that me solving things is not helpful most of the time. Right. It makes me be able to get in the car faster, but it doesn't help my kids grow up. It short-circuits

my wife's development, right? All those things. The third option is I can create an environment where I am stable, where she can be so anchored in that she can try and get frustrated and repel off the side, and she knows I'm not going anywhere. She knows I'm not going to spend money that we don't have, that I'm not going to fly by night something else. And the moment she gets her foot grounded, I'm off to the next thing and the next thing and the next thing, creating a world where she just quits repelling off the side because I'm not even a stable, I'm not a stable rock anymore.

Right? Not saying that the guy's got to be the rock. I'm saying both people have to do it to each other. Right? For each other. Okay. And so the third option is just to create a universe that she is a part of. Co-create a universe is a better way to say that.

Or man, you can rappel off the edge and try your crazy schemes. And they're balanced and stable enough where she can try hard things, fail, be frustrated, get up again tomorrow, try them again. Right. Does that make sense? Is that, you see a whole third option here? It's not an either or thing. That actually took place this summer. Well, because of my procrastination and lack of want to do it, she decided, well, yeah, she decided and got tired of waiting for me to paint the living room and she painted it and it was excellent and it feels like a victory for her awesome i am like i have applauded her and praised her since that happened awesome um so what would be awesome is if you could create

a world where she doesn't have to violate core values of hers to to be able to accomplish something that an accomplishment for her isn't also an act of rebellion an act of throwing up her hands and say i can't count on this guy i'm gonna have to go do it right okay because that ends up that that is her cutting that cord and just saying i'm gonna fly to the bottom and i hope i land and this time she landed she landed great but that does not tell me that the ecosystem is healthy there right so yeah backing out at ultimately how do you communicate with your wife who's experienced this before and after thing you're looking at a decade now, right? Yes. My guess is y'all are both exhausted. And on the back end of exhaustion becomes high frustration,

and high frustration leads to people creating alt-universes that don't include each other, right? Yes, and I have experienced that. Okay. I went through a phase of that, so yes. And then on the other end of that is resentment. And very few relationships come back from resentment. Because that fancy word for resentment is an anchor, which is what she's describing.

I'm out. Whatever you want, dude. It's cool. Does that make sense? Yes. That got me into recovery back in 2014. Awesome. And I have loved recovery. It is. And so because of that, um, I have dove into recovery. And so anytime that I try to bring that up, it is received as trying to fix, and that's not the intention of it. So I'm kind of in that weird place of, I don't know.

I just, I don't know what to do. Have you had that conversation? In my mind, yes. Not in my mind. With her face to face, I think I have. Your mind is a dark, sad, scary place, right?

Yeah, you're right there. It is that. So listen. I think I have attempted to, and I think every time it has turned out to go awry. And so I have just gotten gun shy to even bring it up. Okay. So here's what you got to do. Is that fair enough?

Yeah, that's super fair enough. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. So here's what you got to do. Is that fair enough? Yeah, that's super fair enough. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. So here's what I'll tell you. You are on a bullet train towards forcing each other into an either or conversation here the next few years. Okay. Okay. And that's not a place that you want to end up. It doesn't sound like, it sounds like you really love your wife. You've been through recovery now and you want the same healing for your whole household that you're experiencing and, and, and. Is that fair?

Yes, very much so. All right. So it's awesome that you want to stay married to this woman, that you love this woman. And now you're saying, all right, I'm out of tools. I'm out of, I don't know what the next move is. And whenever you don't know what the next move is with someone that you really love and care about,

the next move is saying out loud with them, I don't know what the next move is, but I'm all in. And that vulnerability, think of yourself as a porcupine running through life. And that's the moment that porcupine rolls over and exposes his belly and says, you can hurt me. But I know that my approach isn't working. And I'm too invested in you. I'm too invested in us to take one more step in a wrong direction. So I'm just going to stop. Okay.

Right? And that cannot come, brother, on the back of a fight. It can't come at the back end of a disagreement. It's got to be a planned conversation that she knows is coming, that you know is coming, that everybody can come in with all the guards down. Because when somebody challenges us, all guards up, we go back to our old routines. I'm protecting me, you're protecting you, I'm good. And my guess is you try to solve stuff because you've got lots of answers and you've got lots of experiences, and she just goes into neutral and you've got lots of experiences and she

just goes into neutral and says, whatever, dude. And pulls a car over on the side of the road. So, do this. Here's the step. I want you to take her out, let her know, hey, I want to talk, I want to have a dreaming conversation about the future where I don't talk,

I listen. And, you know what? Even better, Kyle, even better. Because my guess is at this point, a decade after brain cancer, when you start talking, I bet your wife checks out. You sound like a guy who's, I mean, you said you've got a garage full of projects. You've got a lot of words and a lot of explanations, and I recognize this because I'm you, brother. So I want you to write your wife a letter. Write her a letter and leave it on her pillow, and the letter will say something like, I love you more than anything. And I'm committed to you above all else.

I also know that I'm not helpful. I'm hard to be around. I've tried to solve lots of stuff that hasn't been mine to solve. And I've tried to create a future for our family that often doesn't include you. It includes you, but you riding co-pilot to wherever I'm taking us

instead of us both sharing driving responsibilities into this vision of the future. And so I want to go out to breakfast one morning, one Saturday morning, we'll get a babysitter, go out to breakfast one Saturday morning, and I just want to listen. I want to listen to you. I want you to tell me your story. I want you to tell me how you felt the last 10 years. I want you to talk to me, be vulnerable, be open, and commit in that breakfast to not saying a lot of answers. It's doing a lot of listening. And what you'll probably find out is after a decade, you had a before and after too. You almost lost your wife. And you went into solution mode, and you went into addiction mode, and then you went into recovery mode,

and probably both of you haven't healed from that initial incident, and then you've just taken a Y, and now you find yourself two inches apart on a couch from each other, but you're 2,000 miles away. You're living separate lives. You're roommates, right? And you're probably going to need to get a marriage counselor, which is tough for a respectable, tough guy from

Paducah, Kentucky. It is. But you're going to go first. You're going to tell your wife, hey, I want to do this because I want to be in the long run with you in the long run on this deal. And I'm out of tools. We got to get somebody that's going to teach us some new tools, teach me some new tools, teach me how to listen, teach you how to get that car out of neutral, get back into drive, and me not trying to reach over and grab your wheel while you're driving all the time. But it's, brother, it all comes back to you being vulnerable and you going first and saying the road that we're on, we know where this is going to lead. We're not being successful.

We're not. And I want to step back and recreate this whole house. And that starts with me saying, I'm sorry. Let's try it again. Let's go do this. And Kyle, if you do that, man, she may say, I don't even know who you are, brother. What'd you do with my Kyle? I want him back.

Or she may just say, I don't have anything to say. Everything's fine. It's all good. And if that happens, then Kyle, you say, well, I appreciate you. I'm going to go counseling. I'm going to go learn some new tools. I'd love it if you join me. Because at the end of the day, all you can do is take care of you. But it starts with you being brave. And Kyle, let's just be honest. You making this call was brave. I appreciate you. Not a lot of guys in Paducah, Kentucky are going to say, hey,

I love this lady. I love my life. I want to honor her the best way I can, and I'm out of options. I'm out of tools. You're a brave guy. Now you've got to go look that one woman that you love, you committed to, in the eye and say, whew, let's start healing from the flow, Rob. And I'm going first. All right, we'll be right back. This is 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 Deloney to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp, H-E-L-P.com slash Deloney. All right, let's go to Sarah in Saratoga Springs, New York. What's up, Sarah? How are you? Hi, John. How are you? So good. What's going on? Good. I have a question for you. Last year

in April, my husband and I are both 31 years old. Last year in April, my husband almost died from an undiagnosed heart condition whoa um and we are sort of a year out from that and my husband is struggling with the lifestyle changes that come with that um so i just needed some advice to how to help him through that oh that's so hard sarah that's so hard okay so tell me about so hard. Okay. So tell me about what happened. Y'all were just putting along and then all of a sudden, whoa. I was in my office one morning, it was early morning around seven o'clock and I heard what sounded like snoring in our bedroom. So I thought, cause my husband snores and I was like, oh, okay. But it was getting louder and I walked in and he couldn't breathe. Yeah. Suffocating. Yeah. That's a terrifying sound when someone's,

it was a congestive heart failure almost. Uh, yeah. His, um, when I was on the phone with the paramedics, he actually, um, his heart stopped. Um, and he like turned purple and his face was like, you know, not in a human form. And he, like, stopped moving. And then what I can only be described as a miracle from God is he, like, sat straight up and woke right back up. Wow. And they thought it might've been a seizure, but then they figured out it was an issue with his heart. And he was in the cardiac ICU for two weeks and he had a failed surgery that he almost died from. And then his heart stopped five other times and they had to

jump him. And they finally figured out that it was a medication that he had been put on for depression that kicked, like he had this heart problem, but the medication basically like kicked it into gear. So he has an ICD in him now to help if anything else happens. Have you had, you have to go through regular checkups for that. Has there been any, has it caught anything or is everything working fine now? Everything seems to be working fine. His doctors told him he has to really change the way he eats and he's drinking and smoking

and all that kind of stuff. And they see him, he has two cardiac doctors and they smoking and all that kind of stuff. And they see him. He has two cardiac doctors and they see him every three months. Okay. So before we get to him, before we get to you living with somebody who won't make behavioral changes, which is a nightmare, talking to you, Sarah. I knew you were going to do that. Hey, listen, I've heard that sound before and outside of the

scream of a young person that is a sound that is like no other it's that sound that sounds like snoring but it's a yeah i've heard it called the death rattle. It is a very particular noise that when you're with other emergency personnel, everybody kicks up because they know what that means. That is a trauma for you. Have you worked through this? Have you been able to talk to somebody to experience this? Or have you just been running full tilt since this moment? I have talked to two different, I've been going to therapy since I was 14 so I've been in consistent therapy throughout it okay um and with one of my therapists we worked through like we did the thing of like what if he had died and we like worked through that of like

how would I be and stuff like that but i've never i guess delved into the moment when it happened i've not heard of that therapy yeah it was it it was that seems almost as traumatizing wow okay well whatever to each his own maybe maybe one day i'll call your therapist just to have a conversation that sounds fascinating it's like ah man near death near death experience let's totally experience that right wow okay to each his own right um yeah so here's the thing so So you know this. You've been in therapy. Less therapeutic, more you having a friend to sit with and just be able to weep openly. You've been holding that. Your body's probably been holding its breath for a year. Yes, you are correct.

And every time I walk into the bedroom. Yep. Every time you hear a sound. Yep. Every time you hear a sound. Yep. Every time you walk out and you're doing something and you hear a weird whatever or in the middle of the night you wake up and hear him snoring. And you reach out to put your hand on his chest. That is your body in fight or flight. Okay.

And until you let that cycle through your body and you completely go, whew, that was then and this is now. Yeah. You are intentionally not changing your behaviors. Okay. And that's a mean way to put a trauma response. But I just think a lot of us live with trauma and we just assume that's just the way that's going to be. And it's not, but until you process that,

not by imagining what happened if he had just been dead, that's a weird way to experience trauma. But you got to let the cycle run through. Okay. Meaning there's going to come a moment when you're going to have to reckon with those feelings. The fact that you can't control whether he stays alive or not, whether you can't control, whether you control very, very little in your life is basically what handling that trauma response, letting it work itself all the way through, and you can finally exhale. You can finally sleep through the night. Whatever that looks like for you, I just want to highly, highly, highly recommend that for you.

Okay? Okay. Otherwise, you're living an electrified life, and that shortens your lifespan too. Yeah. Right? you can't fully sit into joy you can't fully laugh all the way into your guts you can't fully enjoy sexual intimacy you can't fully get into life because your body is still waiting for the other shoe to drop right right and as you can see i've heard that noise and it sets me off right and very few things sarah set me off and that noise does it's terrifying right well i was gonna say no one's ever talked to me

about the noise yes or like commiserated with me over the noise and that's and that's it like like if i hear something that sounds like that noise i like like get out of my chair and I like go around the corner. And like my cat scratching on something, but like I think something's happening. And so your body now has to think of it as an emergency response team. And it created a new unit that all it does 24-7, 365 is scan your environment for sleep. I mean, for that noise. And it will sleep less because it's looking for that noise. And it will not pay attention to your work and your writing and to the movie and to sex and all those things because it's scanning the environment for the noise.

Until you can go in and process that trauma and tell that unit of your brain, I'm good. I'm good. I'm good. So do I process that with a friend or with a therapist or? Both and. Everyone does it differently. Some people take a journal out to the mountains and they come back all better. And some people have to go through a seeking safety program where they work through the actual event and relive it and they've got some way they learn ways to breathe through challenges so when those when it shows up how you can work through it and then you become it becomes almost instantaneous it's learning a new set of skills right that's what it is um and everybody does that differently but it's you

knowing i am consciously seeking this new set of skills so that when this thing happens, I'm good, and then I'm moving on. Yeah. Right? And then when you process that, then you're going to have to deal with, you're going to be driving your car someday, and the picture of him sitting up in bed, that terrifying look on his face, will flash back in your head,

and then you're going to learn to control your thoughts and say, nope, I'm not choosing to focus on that. And you're going to have some backup thoughts that you go to directly. And then you're going to realize, well, I can control my thoughts most of the time. I can't control the lightning bolts, but I can control whether I meditate on that and let my body set off on an entire fear response based on something that's not going to happen again. Right?

And then you got to make peace with it could all happen again, which leads to the nightmare of living next to somebody who's received a terminal behavior change who just won't change. Right? Right. Meaning if you don't stop doing X, Y, and Z, you're going to die. And they go, got it. And they go home and jump right back into X, Y, and Z, you're going to die. And they go, got it. And they go home and jump right back into X, Y, or Z.

Right. So tell me about your side of that. Like what he's doing or how I'm dealing with it. Both. Well, he has definitely changed his diet, and he lost 40 pounds. Wow. Very cool. Yeah, he's very, like, healthy, I would say, in his body, but I notice when stress comes up, he goes back to his old eating habits of, like, you know, the greasy stuff, like all the stuff you don't want to eat.

I know, but Sarah, listen, cheeseburgers make sadness go away for a minute. It's delicious, I know. It just shoves all of my sad feelings down, right? Yes, it does. So good. And then after a while, a few hours, they start coming back up, more cheeseburgers. Yes. Yes.

Awesome. Yep. So he's trading one thing for another huh yes okay um and then they told him his doctor told him you can have a drink at your 50th wedding anniversary you can have a drink at your daughter's wedding but other than that you should never drink again and he i would say he was like a pretty social drinker. He was not an alcoholic by any means, but like he would have a couple of beers out with friends. He enjoyed a good whiskey and it was very social for him. So the thought of not having that, he can't process.

And we got to the year mark and we decided at a year we would talk about it. And at a year I said, you know, I feel comfortable with you having one drink or two drinks a month, but I don't know if I'll be comfortable with anything more than that. Because the doctor said... What's he comfortable with? He is comfortable with what he feels like is right so he won't tell me he he says you know i'm not going to get as drunk as i used to but i also don't want to be stuck to one or two drinks a month so here's the nightmare that is

all of our lives we fall head over heels in love with somebody. We get up in front of our friends and family, some rando pastor somewhere. And our grandparents show up, the ones who are still alive. And if we're religious, we get in front of God and say, I'm ride or die with this one. And then you go home and realize I can't control them. And then you got kids and it gets even worse. And so what I will tell you right now is any sort of behavior change predicated on that's balancing on what you're going to allow for him will not work.

Mm-hmm. And that's heartbreaking. Yeah. And it, something tells me that there is a, basically he's been told, you got to change your whole life. Your friends. Right. Your community, the way you engage with the world.

All has to be different or you're going to be dead. And as his wife, the person looking in, it's easy. Fix it, right? Because your decisions are going to affect me. but there is an unconscious decision when faced with a major life change of change all of your life or be dead. There is an unconscious. I'll play the dead card. I don't believe it happens to other people.

Yeah. That we'll deal with it later. That's a problem for, you know, future husband. It's not worth the immediacy of, I need to see my friends today. I miss a dark, smoky room. I, I, I.

Which means when you're living out of a, you can't do these things, that's always a fail. That's why restrictive diets fail 100% of the time. They just fail. Right? Right. Versus, hey, me and you have to go create an entire new universe. What we're about, who we are, more importantly, where we're going, why we're going there, and what that picture is going to look like. And you have to be as equal co-creator, a co-author, a co-painter of that picture as he is.

As long as you're on the outside of this thing, barking orders at him, directing him, then you become his mom. And nobody wants to be married to their mom, right? And nobody wants to be married to their son. It becomes, hey, we got to just redo the whole thing. So you're there in New York. The analogy I use all the time, usually it's when infant, like after infidelity,

you may have heard me say this on this show. You cannot take, this is a before and after moment, just like the last caller. Everything was okay until his heart said, I'm out. Right. Till you heard the man of your,

of your life almost to be dead. And you're in the bed that you sleep in. Okay? And I'm being intentionally direct here, okay? Yeah. You've got to go back and look at 9-11 with the Twin Towers. You could never sweep up all that glass and twisted steel and metal and recreate those towers with those same ingredients. You can't the only thing you can do is take two years excavate the

whole thing clean it all up completely wipe that slate clean and then get some great architects build something new design and build something new and now that new tower is strong it's powerful it's beautiful it's a monument to what was and it's a arrow pointing to the future right that's what y'all have to do the last data i looked at and i think this is back in 2013 so it's been a while was faced with a terminal decision men adult men two out of seven made the behavioral shift wow which is dreadful numbers. So number one, don't hold me to that data. That's the last I remembered.

And it could have shifted up by then. Number two, that tells me that the behavior, the this or that isn't the issue. The issue is the ecosystem, the relationships, the what that means. That's what matters. And so what y'all have to do is the hard work of saying, all right, we're starting from square one, square zero, I mean, except we're already in it together. And I'm going to heal, you're going to heal, but we got to reinvent this thing from the floor up. Okay. And here's where that really is a risk for you, Sarah.

He could say, I don't want to. Okay. And here's where that really is a risk for you, Sarah. He could say, I don't want to. Yeah. He said that the other day. Okay. So what do you say? Tell me about that. Um, I spoke to him about how I was talking to my therapist about what I'm comfortable with, with the drinking and stuff like that. And he said, you know, I don't know if I'm willing to do that. And you're probably going to leave me anyway, because I don't think I'm willing to do that. And then later that night, he said, you know, we probably have a good 10 or 20 years left, but then you're going to leave me. And here's what happened. And again, I'm not blaming. I'm walking alongside you. You promise you get me on that? Okay. Oh, of course. Yeah.

When it becomes a, I'm not comfortable with this, that creates a you versus me. Okay. That becomes a right side and a wrong side. And him saying, oh, well, I mean, if you drew a line, yeah, eventually I'm going to screw this up. And since it's you versus me, you're just going to leave. And that's where an excavation process is, nope, we're doing this together. This is us. And so similar to the last caller, what you got to do is you got to take him out somewhere and say, I set this whole dynamic up wrong. I said, I'm going to let you do some behaviors that I'm comfortable with. And I said that wrong and I shouldn't have drawn that boundary between us.

I should draw boundaries around us, but not between us. And so what I, what we have to do together is reimagine tomorrow completely new from the floor. It means we may have to get new friends. I don't think so. I think our friends will make adjustments with us. We may have to move towns. We have to get new jobs. We may have to look at everything from the floor up

because I'm not living my life without you. I don't want to. I want you in it. Not, you can't, you can't. And I don't know a lot of people that walk away from that conversation because that's different than if you don't then i'm gonna that's different than hey i'm in it i'm in it i'm in it and then you got a hold on the other side man that's a risk that you're taking because he can look at you and say hey you know what i what? I'm out. I'm not doing that. I'm out.

Let's deal with that when we get there. My guess is that's not going to happen. My guess is when he hears your heart, your willingness to go with him and y'all go to a new therapist, it's not making you do these weird thought experiments about pretending your husband's dead, but that is about, all right, let's clear the deck and build something incredible and new. We're going to paint pictures together. We're going to live into those things. Man, this is our moment to dream about what we were going to do and what we should have been doing. Let's do it now.

Let's move to Kansas. You don't have to move to Kansas. But whatever that's going to look like, now we're all in. You're a stud, Sarah. He's lucky to have you. And let's back this thing up and start all over again. All right, let's go to one more call. Let's go to Carol in Omaha. Carol, what's going on? Well, I'm glad to be talking to you. That last call was pretty close to home, but on a different subject. But anyway, I am a widow. I've got four grown children, a past of all grandkids.

And until recently, I kind of thought I had raised all my children, especially with really solid values. Okay. And I'd always felt like those 25 years of being mostly a stay-at-home mom were, you know, me living my true purpose in life. And through the years, I've, you know, they, as they were growing and declaring themselves adults,

I have been given many lessons on how to let my grown children and then my young adult grandchildren make their own decisions as adults. It's not easy, but one new development is just really kind of just breaking my heart on a lot of levels. So here goes. One of my sons and his wife have recently discovered a lucrative way of making a living that involves gathering fans of her online photos.

Oh, fans only? Only fans? Yeah, okay. I have no idea. I'm not asking those questions. I don't know. They just told me they were probably not the kinds of photos that I need to see, and I don't want to put them in an album and show them to my mom and say, here, brag on your grandchildren. Why did they tell you this? How'd this come up over pancakes? Like, hey, mom, by the way, I opened a, so OnlyFans is a site that stay-at-home moms

or anybody can use. But yeah, it's – I wouldn't even tell people what it is in case they look it up and like it. Well, I mean it's common knowledge for those younger than you and me. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Anyway, it came up because she was able to – I mean she's earning a lot of money, she's earning a lot of money. They are earning a lot of money. And he's in, you know, I mean, they are in it together.

They're making it their business. And she quit her job. That's how it came up. And they were suddenly not pinched for money. And so anyway, okay. So there's a lot of- I still don't think I would... Hey, mom, guess what?

I still brought... I don't know. That's beside the point. Yeah, well, we can go back to that if we need to. No, I'm good on that. So how can I help? Okay, so you're always talking about people needing relationships and community and stuff. And this one has me, how do I build a community of friends when this is part of what I really need

to need friendships for? This one's it's, I mean, I was really proud of raising my kids. I was really proud of myself as a mom, probably too proud. Hey, Carol, Carol, Carol, Carol, Carol, you didn't fail. Raising my kids. I was really proud of myself as a mom. Probably too proud. Hey, Carol.

Carol, Carol, Carol. Carol. You didn't fail. Oh, yeah? Carol. Carol. You didn't screw up. You didn't fail.

That one's... Carol. You didn't fail. Well, I can't really say I feel like I succeeded. Carol, you didn't fail. Success of raising your kids is not hinged on the fact that they're going to make only great decisions for the rest of their lives. Your time at home with them wasn't wasted. You stepping in the gap when your husband passed away. All of that energy and tears and exhaustion and late nights was not wasted.

You didn't fail. They're making decisions that you don't like, but you didn't blow it. There's not something you could have gone back and altered or twisted or changed that would have shifted this outcome. So you've got to exhale and drop your shoulders on that one. changed that would have shifted this outcome. So you've got to exhale and drop your shoulders on that one. When you go back and blame yourself, what that does is it allows you an illusion of control that you had any control over the way your son or daughter or daughter-in-law chooses to live their life in the first place.

And sometimes that lack of control is scarier than blaming myself for failing. And so I need, if nothing else, I'll give you my thoughts on your daughter-in-law and your son, but nothing else. You didn't fail. You loved the crap out of that kid. All four of them. That is very true. And I still do love them. Of course you do.

I love my grandkids. I love, you know, I love my in-laws. And listen, because you're your son and daughter-in-law, let's just stick with your son, okay? Because your son is making different value choices than you, yeah, moral choices than you, doesn't mean you didn't raise him with values. That's not what that means. It doesn't mean any of this is an indictment on you. At all. So then you fast forward and say,

I don't like the idea of my son and his wife running a pornography business out of their house. That makes me as their mom a little bit weirded out. I'm uncomfortable with that. That makes me angry. That makes me frustrated. That makes me want to go hit my son upside the head with a fly swatter, whatever the thing is, right?

So when I get faced with those moments, number one, I always go back to, like you mentioned, relationship. Who can I sit down and say, this really stinks? Who can I say that with? And it sounds like you're embarrassed to tell your friends that your son's doing this. And here's the thing. If you have friendships that you are embarrassed to be fully you in, they're not real friendships. They're pretendships. I just made that word up. I should, I should, I should coin that. I just made that up. It's a pretendship. It's not real. It's got a, it's got a ring to it. I like it.

I'm going to make a t-shirt. If you can't call your friend and say, Hey, I, and I'm, I'm saying the universal now. Oh my gosh, I cheated on my husband. We got to talk now. If you can't call your friend up and tell them that, they're not your friend. And that doesn't mean your friend's going to sit down and go, what are you doing? You're an idiot. You moron.

That's what friends should be doing, holding each other accountable. But you got to be able to tell your friends the good stuff and the bad stuff, not just the pretend stuff. And my guess is you've got friends that would hear this and weep with you and be sad with you and be brokenhearted with you. And then would tell you, oh yeah, well, my son did X. My son-in-law, I mean, my daughter-in-law did Y. You'd probably find

some community you didn't even know you had. And then the other thing is, have you sat down and talked to your son and said, this breaks my heart? I've talked to him some, but I haven't actually been that straightforward with him. So there's a moment where you're going to have to decide the or what. Right. So let's pretend that your son comes and y'all have a conversation and you say honey i just need you to know this breaks my heart that you and your wife have chosen this is the way y'all are gonna make money this breaks my heart um i raised you to keep your sexuality private between you and and your spouse and y'all are putting it out for the world to see.

And again, I'm assuming that's what's going on here, right? Yeah. And it breaks my heart. And then here's the or what. So is it going to be, so until y'all take that sight down, you're not welcome at my home. I don't want you at family gatherings. I don't want you at Thanksgiving. I don't want you at Christmas. I don't want you at Christmas.

I don't want to see her face. Is that the or what? Or is the or what? This breaks my heart. And I don't want to talk about it anymore. And if I ever look sad, it's because of that. But I love you guys. It's y'all's life to live.

And I'll be here now when y'all are making a bunch of money. And I'll be here now when this thing goes off the rails someday. Like, those are the two or what, right? And it helps to know up front, because what I see parents do is they get in these conversations, and it gets loud, and it gets emotional, and it gets vulnerable, and then they say something they can't take back. Yeah. No, I mean, I mean, we've

been through enough conversations that I didn't like to have that it definitely is the latter of the two. I mean, it's one of my questions, you know, is how do you talk to the grandkids?

I mean, they've got two little kids, preschoolers. You don't? That's not your story to tell? Okay. I mean, that's, yeah, I agree. If those kids, I mean, you talk to your parents, right?

Think about something more benign. Like, you don't, well, that could be equally, that's just not your story to tell. Your job is to love those kids sideways and forwards and ups and downs. Like you spoil the snot out of those kids, right? That's your job. Yeah. Okay. And if they ask you hard questions, like, hey, we walked in and there's a photography studio.

I wonder what's happening. That's, you tell your son, hey, you're, you're, my grandkids are asking questions. You probably need to have some hard conversations about what mommy does for a living. And if your son called me, I would tell him, do not lie to your kids. Right. And so that's, I mean, he wants to call me. He's welcome to, but that's not, that's not your job. Okay. That helps. Yeah. All right. What else? wants to call me he's welcome too but that's not that's not your job okay that helps yeah

all right what else well i appreciate this what else how about this carol i i have to know what is your or what um can you can you call both of them and just and have a face-to-face with them? Yeah. And just say, I love you guys. Y'all are always welcome in my home. And if you're a real gangster grandma, you could say, and I'm going to make fun of y'all all the time. That's how I handle sadness. I like that one.

That's how I handle sadness. I was wondering if I could push, you know, like having some family counseling on the issue. I mean, we've never been a family that really goes to counseling that much, but, well, hardly ever. Again, if they don't see this as a family problem to solve, you're inviting them into your boundaries. You're inviting them into your heartbreak. They're not heartbroken. They called their mom and told them. Right? Now, if you want to be super gangster, go to the site.

Go to the site and be like, yeah, those pictures aren't great. I mean, you know what I mean? Carol, don't do that. That would be awful for everybody. Don't do that. But, you know what I'm saying? I don't want to have that in my head. You're a wise, wise't do that. That would be awful for everybody. Don't do that. But you know what I'm saying? I don't want to have that in my head. You're a wise, wise, wise woman.

But here's the thing. You can't control it. And so what that means is you need to get a friend or two in your life you can be honest with, invite them over, make it a whole thing, and just say, I don't need you to fix nothing. I just need you to tell you I'm heartbroken because my son and his wife are making some decisions that break my heart. Okay.

And you're going to feel powerless and you have solved every problem known to man for the last 20 years and you can't solve this one. Yeah. That's part of what you learn to live with that's right that's right and then yeah that hey that's the best noise right and you got to make that noise in the presence of somebody else who will still love you right and i want to say it again, and I'll say it again, and I'll say it again. This is not your fault. They made choices, adult grown-up choices. They got two little kids, and they're making adult grown-up choices.

And then now you get to make adult grown-up choices. Be thoughtful. Understand what your or what is going to be control what you can control get around people that care about you to let you be fully you and that will still love you that will be fully you

and will laugh with you and cry with you and be angry with you and make that noise with you and then love the snot out of those grandkids. And you let their moms and dads have those hard conversations. That's not your job. But I think you need to have a open, direct conversation with them

because it's going to haunt you until you do. And one out of love, one out of not resignation and anger, but one that just says, man, you're an awesome Carol. Thank you for being a mom that stepped in the gap. anger and thought, but one that just says, whew. Man, you're an awesome Carol. Thank you for being a mom that stepped in the gap. Being a single mom is so, God almighty. You raised four good ones.

Whew. It's tough. Alright, so as we wrap up today's show, thanks for that call, Carol. So, I remember back when I was a kid Early 90s It was the bridge Between hair metal And

What I would call real metal Metallica and Pantera and those guys Set the world on fire There was these three kids From the Northwest and they came out with this loud, loud song and nobody knew what they were saying. Ladies and gentlemen, I'm here to tell you

the song that changed the world, the greatest song ever written off the 1991 Nevermind record, the one that brought us from then till now. Nirvana. Smells like teen spirit. Check out this. Poetic lyrics, good folks.

Load up on guns. Bring your friends. It's fun to lose and to pretend. She's overboard and self-assured. Oh no. I know. A dirty word. Hello. Hello. Hello. How low?

Hello. With the lights out, it's less dangerous. Here we are now. Entertain us. I feel stupid and contagious. Here we are now. Entertain us. A mulatto? An albino? A mosquito? My libido? Yeah. Hey. Hello. Hello. Hello. I feel like my mind is blown. This has been the Dr. John Deloney Show. you