The Dr. John Delony Show - My Wife Wants to Divorce After My Affair

Episode Date: July 14, 2025

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Big news! New dates for money and marriage getaway just dropped for Valentine's Day weekend 2026. Get tickets at ramsysolutions.com slash events to get away with your spouse in Nashville, Tennessee. I had an emotional affair with a coworker in 2022 when my wife found out it was pretty traumatic. And so I'm sitting in this at 50 just trying to figure out like, how do I start over? And what do I do? One of her big questions is why?

And I don't know how to answer that. What's up? What's up? This is John with the Dr. John Delaney Show. There's 11 trillion podcasts you can be listening to and you picked this one. I'm super grateful that you're with us. If you're watching this on the YouTubes, there's about a billion years worth of information out there and you're watching us here. I'm so glad that you are with us. If you

want to be on this show go to JohnDelaney.com slash ask. This is real people with real challenges and here's my promise I'll sit with you and we'll try to figure out what's your next right move. Sometimes we don't know what to do. Sometimes we have to stop, grieve it, lick our wounds, check in with somebody and then go do the next right thing, take the next right step. Let's go out to Columbus, Ohio and talk to Jason. What's up Jason? Hey Dr. John, how are you? I'm alright brother, how about you man? I'm okay, thanks for taking my call today. Of course, of course. What's up man? So I

am, I'm gonna try to get through this without getting too emotional. Hey, feel free to get as emotional as you can, man. There's not a lot of space for men to get emotional anymore. And so this is that space for you. It's just you and me and a couple of million people listening. Thanks. What's up? So I am 50 years old.

I have been married for what would be 15 years this year. And going through divorce proceedings now, still trying to convince my wife to pause the proceedings or at least put them off. I had an emotional affair with a coworker in 2022. When my wife found out it was pretty traumatic, caused a lot of trauma and turmoil in my family. And so I'm, I'm sitting in this at 50, just trying to figure out like, how do I start over and what do I do? We have three kids 18, 12 and 10. Kind of been putting it off telling them about the divorce proceedings. We just told them last Friday. And it was it was rough.

So so why now? I think why now the divorce. Like if if if you had emotional fear back in 2022. I mean, we're three plus. 23 was, my wife had a really hard time dealing with all of it. Okay. And without going into too much detail, it was just 23 was a really, really rough year. Okay. And so, starting in about October of 23, we started trying to figure out what our next move was.

I quit the job that I was working at, shortly after, as soon as I could find another job. I didn't want to up and leave a job, still needed to provide for the family. But the work environment was just bad. didn't want to up and leave a job, still needed to provide for the family. Sure. But the, but the work environment was just bad. And so left the job, found another job and trying to just start over. One of her big questions is why? And I don't like, I don't know how to answer that because I look back at it and I don't even know how it happened. Yeah So like 23 was rough

23 was rough. We started over trying to trying to rebuild in October of 23 went to some counseling for a little while, um, uh, went through 24. We ended up selling our house, um, trying to downsize. Um, and then it's just, um, the, the mental part of it is too much for her to deal with. She worries about it constantly, worries about if I'm talking to somebody or texting somebody or we've put stuff in place. I have text messages going to a tablet at our house so that everything is visible. But she keeps asking me the question about why and I don't know how to explain that.

So there's a lot here. I really wish she was on the phone because I want to hear her story because I guess here's what I would say. Her telling you, I just can't get over the fact that you had emotional feelings for somebody else. It's not true. And so at some level, she's choosing to stay in this and choosing to stay in this and choosing to stay in this. And so I would wanna know what she's, what this is accomplishing for her, where she's trying to go with this,

but she's not on the phone, so I can only talk to you. So back me up to 2020, we're coming out of COVID. I mean, we're in the middle of COVID. It's a chaotic nightmare, depending on where you live and you're up North and so I'm assuming it was pretty rough. And then you're in 2021 and people are just trying to figure out what day it is. And some people are in 2021. And people are just trying to figure out what day it is. And some people are in it, some people are out of it. It's chaotic. It's a post election.

It's just a madhouse. And then 2022. Walk me through what happened with a co worker. So it just, it started as just, I worked in a like a manufacturing environment, where there was a ton of people and it just started with a, you know, hey, really appreciate your help. You do a great job. This sort of thing. And then as the text messages progressed, they just progressed and turned into like,

oh man, I love being around you. I love talking to you. It's like, man, I love being around you. I love talking to you. It's like, Oh, I love you too. And it, it just escalated into this emotional thing. And it was never, never became a physical thing. We never saw each other outside of work. It was, I was always at work. There was always people around.

It was never a, it was never a physical affair. It was, honestly, like if I'm being honest, it almost like it just fed my ego. Of course it did, yeah, it felt good. Right, yeah. Did y'all ever send each other naked pictures or anything like that? No.

Okay. Nope, nothing like that. So back me all the way. And things were rough, right? I worked in an environment where I worked, I literally worked six to seven days, 12 to 15 hour days. Right, so that's where we're gonna get to the context here because this often happens, like the way you described it was perfect, in that it almost always happens. This isn't a thousand percent, I mean, 100% of the time,

but it almost always what you're talking about occurs from two people at home that have gotten in the rut of life and they've stopped doing what I call the small attenuating behaviors. The gentle touches on the arm, the checking in once a day or twice a day or three times a day, people stop sleeping together,

people just get into, and this is very common coming out of COVID, people became very good co-managers of their house. You do this task, I'll do this task. Yes. And you had two little ones, right? So you had what, a six-year-old and a nine-year-old or something, plus a teenager trying to navigate homeschool. Your wife was probably running up and down

a task list every day. You were going to work six or seven hours a day, wearing a mask, not wearing a mask, trying to fight, trying to do this. And suddenly one degree of separation, I'll do this set of tasks, you do this set of tasks, turn into, we're roommates and we're co-managers and we're just trying to survive this chaos.

One person's on their phone, the other person's on their phone and then somebody at work says, man, you're hilarious. Or one person at work just gives you a very human, I see you and I appreciate you and it feels good. Yeah. Right? It feels good. And then you start having conversations there that either she doesn't want to have at home or you don't want to have at home or this is a weird thing to say out loud, but you

get to a place where you're co-managing the house, but you don't know how to even go back to or start over, how to have those, hey, checking in, how are you? Because it just becomes a taskless rundown. You're just managing the place, right? Yes. And then somebody says, hey, this feels good. So I want to say this. I get emotional affairs are heavy and wrong

and blah, blah, blah. But you're not crazy. And you aren't the only person this happened to. What I'm, what I'm... There was, there was was other there's other so I was There were other flirtatious text messages, of course well with other people. Okay, and so that piles on top of it I wasn't in an environment where I could always be available to talk. So there were times where I would get calls at work and I would go look I can't deal with this right now

You're gonna have to manage that at home because I don't have the time to do it right now And so all of that replace right it replaced everything from the last 11 years that I worked at the place Because it was just it was chaos well, I mean is this a serial thing you've been doing for like, basically hiding from your home at work six to seven days a week and getting your, all of your emotional, like your productivity, your intentionality, and now your emotionals, is that all being met somewhere not in your home?

So yes. So it, it, I stayed at that job. She begged me to not beg me, but she asked me to quit the job And I'm like, how do you want me to quit the job? We have it's I've got to provide and I like I thought that was my job I thought my role was I've got to go I got to make this amount of money so that we can do these vacations and we can afford this house and we can afford these cars sure and like I Look back at it now and none of it mattered. Not one bit of it.

But at the time, it was just, I got to go to work. I got to do it. Was going to work a way to not be at home? No, I loved being at home. Like I loved being at home with my wife and kids. It just was, the money was fantastic. And so, yeah. So take me to right now, what have you done differently?

So I am, I'm at a job now where I'm, I work four, basically four and a half days. I work Monday through Thursday, 10 hour days, eight hour day on Friday, I'm out at 2.30. And so I'm home, don't work any weekends. I'm present and doing stuff with the kids. I basically missed out on like a lot of my kids' childhood and especially my oldest, right, who's now 18.

Him and I had a horrible relationship and it's now like we're doing stuff together, right? Took him out to lunch a few months ago. He's graduated high school, trying to help him be an adult because he's 18, so he's still a kid. Yeah. Checking in with the wife, it's just...

Take me to it, take me to right this second. Why did she file for divorce? She told me she filed because of what happened and that she can't deal with the drama. So I, like back all the way up to the beginning of our marriage, I was the one that put in place, like, hey, we don't ride in cars with people of opposite sex. We set these boundaries. We don't have these conversations.

This is how we do it. And then, and I wouldn't have violated every single one. Sure. Right. I got you. And so she's got other past trauma too, but this has been really, really difficult. Do you have any idea what she thinks she is going to accomplish by separating the family up? I think she thinks she won't have to worry about what I'm doing. I think for her if the divorce is, if the divorce is is final then she doesn't have to worry about what I'm doing or who I'm talking to

Hmm and I've tried to say like the divorce is just a piece of paper that says we're not married anymore Like because I still care. I love my wife very much and I can hear out I'll do whatever it takes I know I can hear that so she do whatever it takes. I know I can hear that. So she is she through working on it? And I know she's filed but I don't I don't think so I like I still have hope and I think there's a part of her because we still cohabit we still live together we still live in the same house.

And so I think she wants to she just doesn't know how and can't get the answers that she's looking for. Yeah. And I don't know how to give them to her because like I said, I look back at it and I don't know how I got to that point. It doesn't matter how you got there, but if you sat down and said, I was a shell of a person and instead of coming home for emotional security and emotional safety and emotional interactions, I felt good to get it from someone else and I went down a rabbit hole and I screwed up.

Yes. Okay. So what else is she asking for? She wants to know why. I mean, you've told her why. And I can't. Yeah. So here's what that tells me.

What that tells me is she's searching for a feeling that won't come. The feeling that she's searching for will only come on the other end of action. Both of y'all working together. And unfortunately, I'm afraid she's going to try to get that feeling on the other side of this, this separation, the other side of this divorce, this finality, and it's not going to be there either. It's going to be worse. Right.

Um, and here's, here's the deal. You've heard my show. If you've listened to my show before, you know I'm pretty rough on men. Because I feel like I'm one, right? And I can speak from that experience. I hear it in your voice, man. I hear repentance in your voice and I hear trying to make it right and trying to build something new and I also hear she is hoping for a feeling, a sense of this ah, and that's not gonna come without a ton of work sense of this, ah,

and that's not gonna come without a ton of work on her end too. Right. And so, yeah, that's tough. What she's gonna have to do is exhale and say, I am going to choose to potentially get hurt again. And I'm gonna choose to redate this man and re fall in love with this man who he is now, not who he was.

And there's a lot of hurt in the past. And let's be honest, she contributed to an environment too, fair? Yes, that's fair. Okay, I know you don't wanna say that kind of stuff, but she's gotta take ownership too. No, I know you don't want to say that kind of stuff, but she's got to take ownership too. No, because I want to honor her through all this.

I know, I know. That's what I'm saying. That's not, that's not a place for you to call out. This is the wrong time for you to be like, yeah, well you did that. You're doing a very right thing, which still own all of it. But the only way she can heal is to own her part too. Okay. The only way she can heal is to own her part too. Okay. And this is sounds, I know it sounds strange for me

and people like to bash me on the internet for how rough I am on men. They don't hear this side of the conversation that I have privately. I wanna commend you for taking ownership of messing up and for taking two or three years of walking it back. And you're living in the grief of, oh my gosh, I traded money for my kids' time.

I traded a feel good relationship with somebody at work for the consistency and love and the vulnerable conversations to tell my wife what I need at home too. I traded that and I you sounds like you get it man. Yeah I did and it's going through that grieving now. I know I know I know but that's the path you're doing what you need to do brother and at the end of day, she's got a choice to make. And my hope is that she doesn't assume that everything's going to be better on the other side of a divorce. Because now you're going to be...

I mean, you think I'm not going to have to worry about him anymore or her anymore. Sheesh, man. Now you're going to... just going to escalate. I mean, it's just going to be a mess. So, man, I appreciate the call, my brother. If you guys both want to call me back on the same call or have her call me, I would love to talk to you. We come back, a woman wonders how her husband can be a healthy role model for their daughters.

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slash deloney to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp.com slash deloney. Nashville, Tennessee, right down the street. Let's talk to Breanne. Hey, Breanne, what's up? Hey, Dr. John, how are you? I'm doing all right. How are you? I'm doing good, thanks.

What's up? So I was calling today to talk about my husband, who's a wonderful, wonderful man, but for some reason, he just doesn't seem happy. He doesn't see his own value and his own worth. And as his wife, I want to support him. And so I wonder where my responsibility to helping him find that value and that happiness ends and where his responsibility begins.

Tell me, tell me what you mean by he doesn't seem happy anymore. Um, he, one of the main contributors, I think is body dysmorphia. He, he has this image in his mind of the younger him where he grew up he was pretty morbidly obese and he was able to you know fight that demon and and he's in wonderful wonderful shape but for whatever reason he still finds himself looking at himself in the mirror thinking that he's too large or he's just simply uncomfortable in his skin and he makes a lot of comments about it, especially like in front of our daughters.

And it makes me very nervous for the inner dialogue that our daughters are creating for themselves. And I mean, that's only one contributor. He just, he doesn't seem happy at all. He's not happy with where we live. He's not happy with where we live. He's not happy with our house. He's not happy with his job sometimes. He's not happy with all of these things.

And I feel personally that it's so much coming from his intrinsic value that's just sort of being projected. Yeah. There's a sense that something out there will make me feel better inside. Exactly. Yeah. How long have you all been married? We've been married for about four years and we've been together for 11.

How old are you? 35. 35. How old are your babies? Seven and nine. 35. How old are your babies? Seven and nine. As a guy who has also struggled with body dysmorphia, I was never morbidly obese, but in fact, I was the opposite.

I was just so skinny. I can tell you the two things that worked in my life. One was my wife contacted a close friend of mine that sat down and said, you gotta go talk to somebody. And again, body dysmorphia is a symptom, right? It's a light on the dashboard of there's something external, whether it's a mirror image, whether it's a dollar amount,

whether it's a size of a neighborhood, whether it's a house, whatever it is. But it's a sign of something missing inside. The second thing is my wife has been very direct in you're not gonna say those things in front of my children. And when she took that type of ownership for me, it's like a, I'm trying to think of the right word, but it was like a lightning bolt for me.

Like basically she came to a point where she said, you can think this about yourself, it is not true. It's a lie, but I can't get inside your head, but you will not say these things about your body in front of those kids. Right. And that was a lightning bolt for me. Yeah, I've definitely, I've taken that stance of-

Good. It's basically protecting your kids, right? Exactly. This is an environment that our children are growing up in, and I don't want them to think anything but beautiful thoughts about themselves. And I've also, I think, sort of the first point that you hit on about talking to somebody else to talk to him

is a big one for us, because early in our relationship, he wasn't the most stand up guy. He wasn't, you know, he wasn't, you know, the man that he is today. And for that reason, a lot of his friends, like his friend group, I mean, naturally as a young adult, your friends sort of go off in different directions, but his friends really dropped him. And in the last, however many years since, he hasn't really gained a foundation or a support group of men in his life,

like I would like for him to. And I can only think of maybe one or two people who are really close to him friend-wise, and honestly, I don't completely trust them. I don't see that they have the values inside of them that I would even feel comfortable calling to say, hey, you need to talk to him. Because I have asked him directly,

hey, how can I support you? Would you be interested in talking to somebody in therapy? And he immediately boxed at that. I, you know, would you like to explore religion? And he boxed at that. Um, you know, whether it's solo, whether it be as a family, whether it's a men's Bible study group, and it just feels like all of the options that I have at my feet just aren't good enough.

And that unhappiness, you know, it permeates our household and in ways like he doesn't want to go do things or, you know, even if he does it, it very much feels like he's doing it to satisfy us and isn't truly there in the moment with us. Okay. But I want you to be careful about a couple of things, okay? And I'll give you a couple of options. But if he does go do the things and you begin to try to get inside his head and begin to judge his motives

or his feelings about doing the things, then what happens is it's this weird recursive loop-de-loop, but he comes to understand that he lives in a failure factory. Got it. And if he can't rest in the right way, or he can't go play with his daughters in the right way, or even going out with the family

for ice cream or to a baseball. I don't know what y'all do, but to go fishing, I'm just making up stuff. If he can't do that because even then you're like, well, you don't even want to be here. Then that's a recipe for a man that just cashes out in his own life. Instead of at the end of the night, even if he felt grumpy, even if he felt like he was distant and a good, you've been with him for over a decade, you know when he's present, when he's not, even like emotionally his body can be somewhere, but his mind somewhere else. Right.

There is something incredibly powerful about you putting your hand on his forearm on the drive home and at a stoplight saying, hey, look me in the eyes. And he looks at you and say, I'm really glad that you came tonight. This is more fun with you here. That's different than you don't even seem like you want to be here. You get what I'm saying? And so he's got to have some places where he gets tiny little wins.

And unfortunately, not unfortunately, thank God, you're the person that can help him with those tiny little wins. Because right now his ability to see them in and of himself, that sensor doesn't work, it's busted. And it probably got broken when he was a kid. Right. The next thing you can do is if he doesn't wanna go, or others don't feel it I'm going to go anyway.

And there was years of my life that I went begrudgingly because I didn't want to be the husband who stayed at home when my wife took the kids out somewhere. Right, no, and I did go through that. I did go through the, you know, we're going to go and you're totally invited and we'd love for you to come stage. Okay. And he's definitely moved through that. I did go through the, you know, we're gonna go and you're totally invited and we'd love for you to come stage. Okay.

And he's definitely moved past that. Like, no, I'm gonna be there. And I can't understate the amount. Like he is a wonderful husband. He is a present parent. Like I just, I don't understand how he doesn't see himself the way that I do. Yeah.

It may be that his mom and his dad didn't either. Yes. And my guess is that you feel powerless and you feel like you're somehow deficient because you can't make him see something. And I don't want you to project your feeling of failure, which by the way, you're something. And I don't want you to project your feeling of failure, which by the way, you're not failing. I don't want you to project that on him and make him carry that too.

You're absolutely right. So for me, this is me just being as honest as I can, probably more honest than I've ever been on the show. I don't know that I will ever be able to see myself in a mirror in a way that is accurate. But I'll be damned if my kids won't see their beauty. Right. And so I gently ask my wife sometimes, Hey, is this T-shirt?

Can I wear this T-shirt? And she knows what that means. And she'll say, you look hot. Or she'll say, let's not do that one today. And I've chosen to not let that spiral me out. I've chosen to like let her be honest with me, right? And I make sure I tell my daughter every single day of her life,

even though she rolls her eyes out the back of her head that I think she's beautiful. And I make sure with my son that I hug him every single day of my life. I'd like to hug my daughter, but that's a whole thing. But we have a special hug. It's not really a hug, but it's as close as I'm gonna get for a while.

But I'm gonna make sure that they know without a shadow of a doubt that they're beautiful, that they're handsome. Yeah. And so I don't know that you can fix what's inside of him with that, I mean, my sensor's just busted, it just is. And I've just made peace with it because I got tired of hating.

I got tired of hating how I looked and then I got tired of hating that I hated how I looked. Right, you know what I'm saying? So I just declared a cease I got tired of hating that I hated how I looked. Right? You know what I'm saying? So I just declared a ceasefire with my own self. It is what it is. And I exercise so I feel good.

And I try to wear clothes that fit most of the time. And I'm going to make sure my kids know I freaking love them. Yeah. I think the part that you said about like me projecting my feelings of failure like it's my responsibility to help him remedy that feeling or fix that picture in the mirror or whatever it may be. It hits the nail on the head, especially when, like I said, this discontent feels like it bleeds into other things like when he's like, you no, I wish that our house was a little bit bigger.

I wish that I could have this country club membership. I wish, and I think all of those things continue that narrative in my head of like, I'm failing him somehow. Like I didn't get us a larger house. Like I didn't get us a country club membership. Like I didn't, you know, whatever X may be. Here's the solution to that. The first thing is tonight when the kids are in bed,

tell them I want 30 minutes just with you and me. And you can tell them you're not getting lucky tonight, buddy. I just need to talk to you for a minute. And you can laugh about it, whatever, but hold his hands and look him in the eye and say, this is going to be awkward, but I'm doing this anyway. And say, you're the guy that I met 11 years ago or 12 years ago that I've been with for 11 years.

I've been married to for four years. We made two beautiful kids. kids, I think you're effing awesome. And I think you're, I think you're super attractive. And I know that for whatever reason, you don't always see that, but I've been, I've been trying to take ownership of that and I'm not going to anymore. I'm just going to tell you that I love you. And I'm going to stop nagging you about it and hassling you about it. And I see the man you're becoming about it and hassling you about it. And I see the man you're becoming. I see the dad you are.

It's amazing. And I project my own insecurities onto you and I'm sorry. And the next step will be, I want you to take all of those things, a little bit bigger house, country club membership. I want you to write it down on a piece of paper. And once a month, you and I, when we do our family calendar and our family budget,

we'll look at them and see are any of these still important or not. And once you get them out of your head and on a piece of paper, what, when I started doing that, I'm telling you just some of the stuff just falls away cause it looks, it's dumb. But when it's in my head, it's another brick in the mental load wheelbarrow

that I carry around with me all the time. Writing it down at the end of the day is like, dude, country club, what a waste of money. That's just stupid. You know? But when it just feels like another thing I don't have or another thing I don't have, and then it feels like there's a hundred things I don't have,

just commit to writing them down and tell him, I'm going to write down my things. And y'all can look at them and you can laugh and you can circle them. And the next month you can roll them up and the next month you can roll up. And at the end of this year, if y'all save up some money and y'all want to spend it on something,

then look on that list and see what you want to spend it on. Yeah. But begin to just get that crap out of your body and out of your spirit and out of your head and put on a piece of paper. I can do that. But here's what I'm saying, be in it with him. And tell him, dude, it makes me feel a little bit small that I can't give you a bigger house. And he's probably gonna say, it's my job to get a bigger house. And you might say, well, I make more money than you. I don't know y'all's financial situation, but

y'all can talk about it. Or what my wife says 100% of the time is when I say, man, I wish we had, she goes, I love this house. I love it. And it's just an exhale like she loves our life. I do. And I hear that from her over and over, and I'm telling you, it is a tall glass of cold water in the desert for me.

As a guy who just feels like I'm never providing enough, my goodness, just hearing that over and over is such a gift. And I'm sure she gets tired of saying it, but it's just pretty awesome. Yeah. And the last thing I'll tell you is, at some point, if you want to tell him, hey, I want to love you better.

I want to find ways that I can love you better. And I don't feel like I'm doing a great job. And he'll probably say, you do a great job. You can go see somebody here in Nashville and just tell them, I would love for you to come with me, but I'm going to go because I want to learn to love you better. And he sounds like the kind of guy that will let you go once, let you go twice and be like, okay, I'll go.

And that's okay. And if he sits there with his arm folded in the first one or two sessions and he hears you tell a third party, I just want to love this man. And he doesn't see what value I see in him and how amazing I think he is. And I want to do a better job of connecting with him. That might be the path to him opening up for the first time. When we come back, a woman asks if her husband should fight for his daughter's custody.

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I travel with it, I take it home, and I want you to give Organifi a try too. Go to organifi.com slash deloney and use code deloney to save 20%. That's 20% off your entire order with code deloney at organifi.com slash deloney. Alright, Sandra in Baltimore. What's up, Sandra? Hi. How are you? I'm pretty good. How are you? I'm doing okay.

How can I help? Hi. So, my question is if, you know, if my husband should proceed with fighting for custody of his biological daughter. So seven years ago, we had bought a house and we were moving out of the neighborhood and he had an affair with the cousin of our neighbors who was at the time living in her basement. And she was married, she had a kid

and she ended up pregnant with my husband. And so when we, when I, I didn't find out until four years later and when I find out, um, there was a process of healing and obviously, um, before that I wanted to like bring everything out and try to figure out what we were going to do because she was very adamant that she wanted her daughter to be part of my husband's life. And so I had to sit down with my family. Everyone knew at the time, even my then seven-year-old boy, no, nine-year-old boy had to know about it because if she was gonna be part of it she had to know about her and so

It was hard for me because obviously how do you tell a kid? Oh this happened? and so to me was crazy at the time, but I put on my big girl pants and like We I tried to like make friends with her and pants and like we I tried to like make friends with her and Figure out how we could go about it. I'll just pause right there Mm-hmm That's that's next level Yeah, it was it was a hard time yeah, how long ago is this

About three to four years ago that I found out. Okay Mm-hmm. How's your marriage right now? Um, it's got it's gotten better We're still working on our relationship Is he working on it? He's trying there's times where I don't see the effort But we have people around us that are keeping him keeping him accountable and so that has helped So tell me about the situation right now

With the daughter with the custody Yeah, we we don't have any contact with them. I mean, I have tried to text the mom and like try to see where she's at with things. But the last conversation she was saying how, yeah, no, I'm not sure that just that's what I want for her anymore. So, yes, your husband needs to go to war for his custody of his daughter or at least half custody. Yeah. Well, he, the only time that he tried, um, he was advised not to, they told him he was

going to lose and he was just going to be chaotic. And because of this phase where we were at with our relationship, he chose not to pursue anything. Is his name on the birth certificate? No. Why not? Because since she was married at the time, her husband took in the baby girl as his. So his name is on the certificate?

Yeah. So his name is on the certificate? Yeah. And some, geez. You know what? I don't know the laws of Maryland. In some places that's fraud. I don't know the laws of Maryland. Here's all I know. I know at some point that little girl will find out. And what I would want, I don't care how messy it is. I don't care how expensive it is. I don't care any of that crap. I want there to be a record

for my little girl, even when she's 25, that your dad never stopped fighting to be in your life. And I don't care what bad stuff other people said about me. I don't care about what bad stuff your stepdad or your birth mom said about me. Here's the track record. Here's the box of letters I sent you. They got returned via mail. I kept coming for you.

I kept coming for you. And so, I mean, I'd probably get with an attorney before the day's over, but that's me. I don't do well not being around my daughter for three days. I can't imagine having a daughter out there that I didn't get to see. I just can't, I can't do well not being around my daughter for three days. I can't imagine having a daughter out there that I didn't get to see I Just can't I can't I can't psychologically wrap my head around it And my guess is you're asking this question because at some point you lose respect for your husband because he's not fighting for his daughter

Somewhat yes Respect for him because I know how much he loves his kids and but it it just hurts me to see him not do anything when I can tell that it bothers him. He doesn't express it. He doesn't talk about it. It's a it's a subject that he kind of leaves out. Yeah, he's got a huge hole in his chest, but he's not going forward. It might be I don't know what you can do in this situation other than to sit down and

say, I know how you love our kids. I know you love that little girl and I don't care what kind of advice we got. I'm giving you full permission to go fight for that, for custody of that, of that little girl, even if it's visitation on the weekends Yeah But yeah, he's going to become a shell of himself because he's got half of himself running around in this little beautiful girl And her life is is is based on a lie Yeah And the day will come, she'll find out.

Technology is too good. It just is. Yeah. And that's what I'm afraid of. Like I wouldn't want to be in her shoes and no, nothing was done. And by the way, that guy, her step-parent or the whole thing sounds like a mess. By the way, how do you even know that that's his kid? Did y'all get a paternity test? Yeah.

So they had just done a paternity test when I found out about the whole situation. She was four years old at the time, I believe. Because that was my first reaction, like, how do you know that she's yours? Sure. And so yeah, that's... Yeah, I would be on the phone with an attorney by the end of the day. Otherwise, here's what's going to happen. You're going to watch your husband wither away.

You're going to lose respect in him and you're going to begin to question why you stuck around in this marriage to begin with. And there's going to be a little girl out there that turns into a teenager, that turns into a young woman who's going to find out she has a different parent that her mom and her dad lied to her and I mean, her mom and her stepdad lied to her and her birth father never came and fought for her. And by the way, the world's got too many of those kids running around now.

They call my show and they find out at 27 or they find out at 33 or they find out at 41 and their whole life, just the foundation of their life turns to ash underneath them. Don't do that. Don't do that. Even if it's weekends,

even if it is every other week, I don't care, dude. I don't know. I just tell you right now, I'm coming for my daughter 100% of the time. 100% of the time. Thanks for the call, Sandra. Grab your husband's hands tonight and just say, husband, we're going to get that girl. And get on the phone with the lawyer and go figure out what's the next right move.

Thank you for the call. We'll be right back. Poncho is back as a supporter of this show and I'm stoked about it. If you have seen me speaking on stages across the country, if you watch this show, or if you recently ran into me when I was fishing with my son out at Gulf Shores in Alabama, or if you've even seen me mowing my acres out here in Nashville, I'm almost always wearing poncho shirts, inside and outside. Poncho makes the absolute best outdoor performance shirts for men, period. Whether they are sponsoring the show or not, you're going to almost always see me wearing poncho. And of course, I love their denims and their insanely soft flannels,

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Just sign up with your email. Go to ponchooutdoors.com slash deloney and trust me, poncho ultralight shirts will turn into your summer essentials too. All right, Kelly 2.0, something cool happened. What's up? Something really cool happened and I'm going to try to not even get emotional. I didn't know you had those. I know. Well. Dang. All right. Let's do it.

Here we go. All right. So Hannah that we had on the show last week that presented the thoughts that she was having around suicide and how we called the authorities. She just texted me. Wow. Okay. What'd she say?

Yeah. She said, can you please tell John and whoever that sent the authorities to my house, thank you. I voluntarily went to an inpatient care facility and just got out. It was a weird experience, but I was safe for a few days. But thank you guys so much for all that you do. Wow. Yeah.

Dang, and you were the ones on the phone making all those calls and everything. So what was your experience like doing that? It was really heavy. Yeah. It was really heavy. Yeah. It was really heavy. And just knowing that like, she could be really angry with us,

but like at the end of the day, like that's what is best for her and her care. And I'm just so grateful that she was receptive to it and that we had the information that we needed to get her the help that she needed. Yeah, and get on the authorities for showing up and doing wellness check. And some of those folks that show up on those wellness checks are highly trained to encourage people to just go get the help they need.

And it's tough when you're an adult because you can say, no, I'm going to stay in my house. And man, good for Hannah for being brave and going. That's awesome. Dude, good. Kelly, I'm really grateful that you made that call. And I know I've been on that phone call too many times. And it's easy for me to say like, we're going to call the authorities,

but you're the one that actually made that call. And that's hard. And it's just surreal, right? Going through all the information on that. So thank you for doing that. That made a big difference in that woman's life. She may still be here because you made that phone call. That's awesome. Good on you. Good because you made that phone call. That's awesome.

Good on you. Good on you. And everybody listening to the show, it doesn't always work out in the end, but this is one of those awesome moments that it did and make the phone call. Be the friend that shows up and talks to your buddy and says, hey brother, I don't think you're doing well.

Be the woman who shows up with her girlfriend and says, hey brother, I don't think you're doing well. Be the woman who shows up with her girlfriend and says, hey, I'm just worried about you. Be the dad that fights for his daughter. Be the neighbor that calls and says, hey authorities, I need you to do a wellness check on my neighbor, she's not looking great. I love you guys.

This country will turn around neighbor by neighbor, front door by front door. Love you guys, bye.