The Dr. John Delony Show - Relationships w/ Exes, Abusing Prescription Meds, & Grieving a Son

Episode Date: February 1, 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 How do I navigate a difficult relationship with my ex-husband? I just learned my new wife is taking medication that I didn’t know about. She has a history of drug abuse. How do I handle this and set boundaries? Teaching Segment: The Importance of reading fiction My son died 3 years ago from drug overdose and I am struggling with the grief process. Lyrics of the Day: "It's Not Easy Bein' Green" - Kermit the Frog tag: abuse, parenting, divorce, boundaries, addiction, anxiety, marriage, grief, addiction, family 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.

Hey, what's up? On today's show, we're going to talk to a mom of a few kids who has a really challenging relationship with her ex-husband, and she wants to know what to do next. We're going to talk to a husband whose new wife has a history of drug abuse, and she is starting down a road of sneaking prescription medication. And we're also going to talk to a beautiful soul, a wonderful mother, whose son, dad, and younger brother all passed away a few years ago, and she wants to know some tools and some tactics on how to properly grieve her son. This is a good one. Stay tuned. Hey, good folks. what's up? It's Deloney with the Dr. John Deloney Show.

A show where we take real calls from real people that I've never met. And we are connecting for the first time on this show to talk through whatever's going on in their life. Whether it's relationship challenges, marriage issues, education questions, parenting challenges, whatever. We talk about all things, everything on this show. And here's the thing. It's not scripted. It's not preimagined. It is about your life. And here's the most important thing is that folks call me every day, call after call after

call. And they feel like they are in this isolated bubble that these things that they are thinking and experiencing and wondering about and trying to figure out are only happening to them. And the beauty of this show is that everybody listening, my mom and her 10 friends at the, at the home, she's not in a home, that just sounds cool, they're the only ones listening, and my wife didn't even listen to the show, but those few folks that are listening get to realize we are not alone in this deal. I'm not crazy. I'm not losing my mind.

I'm going through something that so many other people are going through. We're all in this together, and I love doing this show. I learned from this show. I learned from you good folks, and it's just an honor to walk alongside you. So whatever's going on in your life, relational IQ, parenting, addiction, marriage, somebody cheated on somebody, whatever it is, give me a call at 1-844-693-3291. That's 1-844-693-3291. That's 1-844-693-3291. Or go to johndeloney.com slash show. Fill out the form.

It goes to Kelly and her crack squad of people. I don't think she has a squad. I think it's just her, but that sounded way cooler. And she puts the shows together and see if we can get you on the show. Before we go any further, it's important to note this. You know, we talk about all kinds of things on the show. And occasionally I talk about something that's driving me crazy. Can we not just admit the food situation in this country a thousand different ways to Sunday is a wreck.

And we could talk about this for 50 shows in a row. But here's the big one. If I go to one more store, one more aisle in a store, I don't care what store it is, if it's a Bouged Out like Whole Foods or if it's a gas station grocery store, and I go in to buy something particularly fruit or vegetable related. And let's say I'm going to get something with apples in it. And it's called Apple something and then there's a sticker on it and it says made with real apples

as though that's a selling feature as they're like, whoa, this apple thing actually has apples in it and we all go, whoo, I'm going to pay double for it and the apples were from a real tree? No way, no way no way good folks when the actual product that's being advertised is then further advertised as actually being in the product as a special feature we've run aground we're all psychotic we're idiots right let's start demanding

more from our food from our food labels and we're going to talk about labels for the next five years because even the labels themselves are shenanigans and tomfoolery but listen made with real whatever is in it especially if it's in the name not a selling feature fruit juice made with real fruit no way vegetable juice made with real vegetables. Woo! I call it grandma on that one, good folks. That one's a big one. It's ridiculous.

People, if it's not vegetable juice, you have to call it not vegetable juice or fake bull crap in a jar. That's what you should call it unless it's actually got the product in it. It's ridiculous. Okay, so I'm getting my blood pressure up, James. We haven't even started the show yet. I'm telling you, I saw that again on something we bought and it's driving me crazy. All right, now I'm going to breathe. I'm going to control what I can control, so the pot to the kettle here. That was super lame. We're going to go to Carol in Dallas and start off there. Carol, what's going on? How are you? Hi, Dr. Deloney.

Thank you for taking my call, and thank you for your show. You've helped me a great deal recently. Hey, thank you for being kind and for saying nice things about me. That makes my heart feel good. Do you have anything in your pantry or your fridge that has a special label on it that has labeled the food for what's actually in it? Oh, I'm pretty sure that my nine-month-old does. Oh, for sure, for sure.

Baby foods. Okay, good for you. It's mashed sweet potatoes, and then there's going to be a sticker on it that says, Contains real sweet potatoes. Oh, Carol. Yes. All right. So, hey, that's not even why you called me to talk about food.

So how in the world can I help you? Okay, my question is, when dealing with a very contentious ex-husband, how can I best protect and respect my children who have very differing points of view about their dad and minimize the continuing emotional and verbal abuse towards me? Ugh, gross. I hate that for you. All right, give me a little bit of data here. How many kids? dad and minimize the continuing emotional and verbal abuse towards me. Gross. I hate that for you. All right. Give me a little bit of data here.

How many kids? So we have two kids. One of them is going to be 14 on Saturday. She has autism, ADHD, and epilepsy. And my second one is going to be 18 in about three weeks. And she struggles with ADHD, depression, anxiety, and a dose of stupid. That's one of the gifts of being 18. So it sounds like as you rattle off those diagnosis, those kids have grown up in a somewhat chaotic, unconnected environment.

Is that fair? Yes. We were married for 15 years and um the marriage was filled with emotional verbal financial and occasional physical abuse mostly towards me but also my 18 year old received a dose of very bad verbal emotional abuse from him. Man, I hate that. And I know you said it's both girls. Is that right?

Yes, they're both girls. Both girls. Okay. So they not only were direct recipients of it, but they lived inside of a, like a, like a vibrating cage where... So the challenge is that my 14- 14 year old doesn't receive any of it she is the perfect child that could do nothing wrong and because she has multiple diagnoses according to her father she can do no wrong and he doesn't want her disciplined he doesn't want

anything happening to her whatsoever and he treats her like a princess. So, Carol, make no mistake, she is definitely, definitely absorbing this. No question. She is, and not in a good way. That's exactly right. Yeah, there's no question she's a part of this. Recently, he and her had a discussion regarding, I guess she overheard my new husband and I talking about some of the physical abuse or something. And certainly it's not something I

talk about to my kids, but she went to her dad to talk to them or talk to him about why he did it. He told her that it was all my fault and that i had started it all okay so she's confused of course she is yeah she's 14 and here's the thing a 14 year old that's already wrestling with so many connection challenges trying to put those puzzle pieces together and make sense of the math in her head. Because right now she's got a guy that she saw and experienced and felt and absorbed, treat her mom one way for her entire childhood. And she has a guy who also is telling her that he loves her, will do anything, go to the ends of the earth for her.

And while she thinks that feels good, while that makes sense in her head, her brain can't put that math together because the math doesn't work. And you are seeing that play out in all kinds of behavior disorders and connection issues and abilities to process and be still and on and on and on and on. So all of that is there. What's your question? How can I help in this situation? It's just messy. So how do I deal with all the craziness that I'm getting from him? So if there's a 18-year-old, but with an 18-year-old as well,

I get up to 100 texts in a row. And I'm trying to navigate, you know, I have one child that idolizes another child that hates Dad and would be happy if he never came back again. Sure. And so then they're kind of arguing back and forth, well, dad's this, dad's that. And then I'm trying to do the right thing and respect both of them and both of their opinions. And I feel very caught in the middle, and I can't even cut off the craziness that I get from him. So, yeah, a couple things here. Number one, you have a right and a responsibility to both yourself and demonstrating this for your girls, what boundaries look like, what firm, strong boundaries. And so, someone is not going to send me a hundred text messages in a row, especially if they are

abusive or they are negative or accusing or in any way going to hurt or set my children up for failure. And so I'm going to have boundaries like, hey, we will communicate on this day between this time. Please don't send me 100 text messages ever again. Like, let me know what you need to let me know, and then we're going to move on from there. If it's more than one or two text messages, then you need to have a phone conversation or send me an email, but don't do that to my cell phone again. And you have a right and permission to draw those boundaries, and it's going to be healthy for them to see you do that. The second thing is your daughters have – this is their dad, and so more important than what you're going to say about him is what you're going to model for them. And so, if you model for them as hard as it's going to be, that they're going to be respectful and not talk negative. Now, your 18-year-old's an adult. She's a grown-up. So, at some point soon, you all need to go out and have that

conversation. You're a grown-up young woman. You get to make your own decisions and that you're going to support her in the ways that you can, especially if she's making healthy decisions and wise decisions. But your 14-year-old's 14, and the last thing you want to do is set yourself up to where you are talking bad about their dad, however hard that may be, unless it gets into their psychological and physical safety. At that point, then, you don't go to them with those concerns. You go to the authorities. You go back to your original divorce decree and you work through that system there. But you want to model what respect and dignity looks like even when it's

hard. And now you're playing a long game. You're not trying to win the affection of a 14-year-old. You're trying to model boundaries, strength, respect, dignity, a powerful, brilliant, strong woman, which is what you are. That's what you're modeling to your 14-year-old. You're not trying to make her like you right now. You're playing a 10-year, 5-year, 15-year game. And someday she will go, oh, my mom's incredible. And she put up with this, mom, why didn't you ever say that? Why didn't you ever? And that's when you can be more demonstrative and open about those, why you did what you did.

Your 18-year-old man, she's an adult. Why won't your 18-year-old cut off dad if he's being ugly to her and she doesn't want anything to do with him? She does to some extent. She blocks him frequently. Unfortunately, I then get the text messages from him saying that I'm a horrible mother for letting her do that and yada, yada, yada. And so again, right there, right there, you're going to tell him, I will not, hold on, hold

on. That's when you're going to tell him, I will not receive messages from you that are disparaging to me. We're done with that. Okay. Okay. And feel free to hold your boundary. And when he does, then just respond back and say, I'm blocking you until tomorrow because I've asked you to speak with me, to me with respect, and you're not upholding that. And so we're done talking for the day.

And then we'll talk the next day and if it continues if it escalates that's when you call your your lawyer back but your 18 year old is a grown-up she's an adult right is she still receiving money from him like for school or for clothes or phone or anything like that she periodically goes to him and asks him for money but um for the most part what usually happens in that situation is he'll say that he's going to do it and then he'll either send it to her and then demand it back for one reason or another or say that she's disrespected him like for christmas he was supposed to give her a gift, and he said then that she had disrespected him, so he was only going to get the one child a gift and not the other. Wow. Okay. through it to sit down with their daughter and talk about when you accept money, when you accept gifts, when you accept fill in the blank, you are then, when you are going

to call, then you are opening yourself up to all sorts of other A, B, C, and Ds, right? And I think it's an important thing you can teach her about boundaries. Even if you lead with how being vulnerable and letting her know you haven't always been great at setting boundaries you've had a hard time because you loved this guy y'all y'all had two kids together there was some good stuff there was some really rough stuff life is hard and you were still learning how to set boundaries and you're going to start practicing this stuff and if she wants to not be around someone that's going to be manipulative

and gaslighting and display these just heartbreaking behaviors when dads manipulate their kids like that, it just breaks my heart. I think be open with your adult daughter and let her know every time you call back, every time you block them and say, I'm done with this nonsense, but then you call them back in a few weeks and ask for 40 bucks for the cell phone bill, you are just inviting all this thing back over again. And that's when you can teach her about dignity, working her butt off, setting herself up financially to be successful, all those things in a row, right? That's when you can really, really begin to make a difference in their life. But what I'm going to ask you to do is don't,

don't, don't, don't take the low road and bad mouth dad. Don't take the, unless again, unless it's a safety issue, don't take the low road. Don't bad mouth dad. Don't run him under the ground to lift yourself up, to try to make your daughters feel better. Your 18 year old's an adult now, as young as I know she probably feels to you, and your 14-year-old is going to watch everything you do. So model the high road, model the high road, model the high road, protect those kids, be honest when you have to, and be vulnerable, and demonstrate boundaries. And now you're talking about systemic change so these young girls don't end up in hard situations in the future, and they learn how to walk on firm footing on a firm sidewalk. And, man, that's legacy changing stuff there. So thank you so much for the call.

Let's go to Jordan in Raleigh, North Carolina. Jordan, what's up? Hey, what's up, Dr. D? How you doing? I'm all right, brother. How we doing? Doing okay. Hey, I wrote my question down.

So if I sound like a robot, it's because I'm reading it. Hey, I don't write down. So if I sound like a robot, it's because I'm reading it. Hey, I don't write anything down, and I sound like a robot. So, dude, it's all good, man. How can I help? Cool. Cool, man. So, hey, I married my wife about a year ago. She is a full-time paramedic and is in PA school.

Over the past few months, she's been taking unprescribed Xanax on and off. Where's she getting it from? This is the first time I had some. I get like crazy anxiety from flying. So I have taken Xanax three times in my life for the past three flights I've been on. I had a couple in a sock drawer, basically. That was the first time she took them. And then the times after that, she found a drug dealer and has been going to him. Okay.

So what makes it a little bit... What's that? Go ahead, man. I'll get on you later. Well, go ahead. I want to keep interrupting. You're good. You're good.

Yeah, you're good. What makes this a little more scary is that she struggled with heroin addiction in the past. So I guess my question is, how do I continue to love and support her at the same time, not start to build up resentment and are boundaries an option.

So the first thing is to stop giving your former heroin addict wife drugs. That's number one. Oh, yeah, yeah. I did not give them to her whatsoever. Did she steal them from you? Yeah, she took them from me. She did. They were not given to her.

I would never in a million years do that ever. I'm sorry if that's what it sounded like. I did not give them to her. So how did that conversation go when you found out she had stolen your prescription medication? because I pull them out when I go on flights, and I don't fly very often. So I never would have known. Honestly, I don't plan on going anywhere anytime soon. So she told me the very next day she took them. There were three in there, and she took all three. We woke up the next morning, and first thing in the morning, she said, Hey, there's something I got to tell you.

Your Xanax, I took xanax i took them and i i took them all and you know she apologized everything okay so that was the first yeah so is she now getting these prescribed to her by a doctor no no she's um she's finding them uh you know she's calling a drug dealer and meeting okay with them to to get them yeah so i was gonna be like i have a a psychiatric uh i have a part of my will which is a psychiatric power of attorney meaning if i ever disassociate and I have to be institutionalized, what do I want them to do to me while I'm there? What do I not want them to do while I'm there?

And the addictive properties of Xanax and other benzos, benzodiazepines, is so bad, I have in my psychiatric power of attorney that if I'm institutionalized, they are not allowed to give me that drug. Wow. That's how much I hate that drug. Yeah. And it should never be given as a one-off, right, as a tic-tac, as a feel-good, right? Yeah. And so I've got a problem with whatever doctor gave them to you that way right

and right the second is yeah if you've got an active addict in the home having prescription medications is man that's not wise the second the second thing is she's a paramedic dude she other people's lives count on her being fully present and not high. And so this is a marriage issue, obviously, one year in. This is an addiction issue one year in. And this is also a professional ethics issue. She's going to kill somebody, man. Yeah.

You know what I mean? Right. Now, I do know for a fact she's not taking these on the job. Hey, listen, brother. Listen, I know, but you know too. right yeah yeah no i am i don't want to be in the business of running your wife down okay i'm trying to get you to realize how serious this is okay right and i know you know that it's serious but um so at the end of the day if your wife has a heroin addiction in her past and she is back to – I'm as concerned about the actual narcotic as I am about the behavior. The sneaking, the off script, the lying, the then circling back, and I'm sorry it won't happen again, and then

I'm going to a dealer now. All the while, I'm in a really, really high stress, emotionally high strung job, and by the way, I'm going to go ahead and get a graduate degree too on top of that. That's probably why you called, but brother, that is a recipe for a train wreck, right? Right, right, yeah. So when you sit down and have this hard conversation with her, how does it go? What does she say? Well, we didn't have the hard conversation up until a couple days ago.

Okay. Because after this has happened on and off for about three months, and in between those three months it's only happened about where she has come to me to tell me that she's, you know, taken a Xanax. It's only happened just a handful of times. So I do, I guarantee you, you take that number and double it, right? Yeah. If not triple it. You're right. But the way we handle it from there is, first of all, thank you for telling me. I know you're going through a lot. What's kind of leading to this? Where are you at mentally or emotionally when you take one? And can we find ways to fill that hole another way, she likes fitness and she likes to journal and read, you know, so just trying to find, you know, ways to cope other than, you know, Xanax, because I know her job is ridiculous. Um, so this last time we, we had a fight and it kind of was me

getting to a point of like, okay, I've said, sorry, I've gotten over it and pressed on. And now I'm in a selfish way, I guess now I want some answers, you know? Yeah. I think, I think that's fair. I think that's super fair. Yeah. Um, and it, yeah, the con basically the conversation was, you know, let's, uh, um, basically what, you know, show me what you you know, show me what you're doing. Tell me what you're doing, you know, to fill this hole. Let's, you know, come up with a, I guess it doesn't sound any different than it's always been. Right, exactly.

And hey, here's what's going to happen. But then I called you. No, and man, I'm grateful for you. And I know that you are trying to love your wife the best way you know how. Okay, so I'm not drinking the Haterade on that one at all. I know you're trying to love her the best you can. What's going to end up happening is that constricting pressure, those old demons that are coming out that surfaced with whatever trauma led to the heroin addiction, right? And the things that happened before that. And I bet you and I could talk for a long time about her heroin history, right? And her pre-heroin history, right?

Am I right on that? Absolutely. Okay. So she comes here, whatever stressors are going on in her life, and those demons start calling, the tendency that you're going to have is compassion first, right? Just like, hey, what's going on? How can we help? Hey, there's just some other things we can do. And really quick, you are going to get lump You want to see these behaviors. You want to see these things change. The same as the paramedic job, the same as the grad school homework, and a partridge in a pear tree. And pretty soon she's already practicing deceiving you, right?

And pretty soon, if it's not already, that's just going to be common. That's just going to be a routine in your home. And so I don't want to sound any alarms unnecessarily, but this is, this relationship's on real shaky, shaky ground. And I'm worried about the health and heart of your wife. Okay. Is she working with a professional at all with a counselor? How did she, how did she kick her heroin habit? Rehab. Okay. And then she, she did some some na uh she's done that a couple times uh she's been rehab a couple times in the past and um she kicked heroin before we met uh was sober for a long time then um left the program and uh just would do a glass of wine every, you know, every other day or

something, maybe it kind of empowered her in a way that she was like, you know, wow, I used to not be able to even finish up. Like I used to, I'm healed, right? Yeah. I'm all good now. Yeah. Okay. Right. Um, and then it's just kind of led to where we are now. So, but to answer your question, uh, she does have a therapist. Um, she meets, um, over zoom, uh, maybe once a month. So here's, here's your next move. Uh, and, and I'm, I'm telling you this, this is what I would do if I was in the same situation with the woman I love, the woman that I really want to be well, and I see her on a path to destruction, right? I would tell her that I, and I would do this while I'm holding her hands, right?

So she feels you. I would let her know that you are real, you're terrified. That's the best word I can tell you, that you're terrified and you're scared for her and about her, and she's going to try to make you feel better. She's going to go into paramedic mode. She's good at that. That's what she does. She goes into people's hardest moments and brings the noise level down and helps them there. And then I want you to ask her for permission to join her in her next session, her next counseling session, because you are worried about the Xanax and the sneaky behavior and the hiding behavior.

And here's what you can do in a beautiful, vulnerable way that is also truthful and honoring to her. You can tell her that you are struggling with hearing her stories as true. That you are having concerns and doubts and fears. So you're not going to call her a liar, but you're going to let her know, hey, I'm starting to struggle with these doubts and I don't want, we're a year in, I don't want our relationship to get any more cracks in the foundation than it needs to. I want to join you with your counselor. I want to let your counselor know what's going on. I want us to be on the same page together.

I'm not helping you by giving you a bunch of new rules and a bunch of new behaviors that you've got to start showing me. I'm not helping, but I don't have the tools to do this on my own. I want to join you. And that's when you are going to ask, if she lets you do this, then you're going to talk openly and candidly with the counselor. And the counselor is going to give you some very real and direct strategies and tools. And if the counselor doesn't and says something dumb like, well, what do you think? Then I want you to find another counselor or find a marriage counselor on Zoom,

and then you both are going to go do that. You're going to be vulnerable here on two different counts. Number one, you're going to ask her for something that you need and she might tell you no and if she says you cannot join my counseling session i refuse then every alarm bell you have should go off about the status and safety of your relationship and the second thing is this man she's been through the ringer before and she understands the trajectory she's on cognitively. It's just that spiritual part. That addiction demon man is mean, mean, mean, right?

Gnarly. And hopefully your counselor, y'all's counselor, her counselor will walk you through a series of really hard boundaries that you're going to hold hard, hard, hard, and is going to give you some tools on how to hold your wife with a lot, a lot, a lot of grace. Okay? So I don't want to, again, be an alarmist. Your situation is real rough right now, brother. And your wife's situation is rough and scary. And she's headed not in a good direction. And again, if you're listening to this and you're like, dude, she took three Xanax.

Chill out. She got like 10 Xanax, chill out. She got like 10 Xanax from some dude at work. What is your problem? When you have a history of addiction, when you are in a helping profession on top of a graduate school, a challenging graduate school program at that, man, those demons come calling. And it starts with one, and it starts with two, and three come calling and it starts with one and it starts with two and three and then it starts with the, I'm just going to steal these from my husband and I'll tell him about it later and see how I'm going to test the water there. Oh, he was kind of cool. He forgave me. Cool. I'm going to have another one. I'm going to tell him about this one,

but I'm only going to tell him about every fifth one. And now we're setting up new rhythms to our day. We are lying as a regular part of life and the stress never gets dealt with. The pain never gets dealt with. The connection starts to fracture and fissure with the dishonesty and suddenly, man, you are full blown over your head again. The only way through addiction is through connection with other people and that's what makes addiction so evil is there's so many barriers to keep you from having to connect and it just loops on itself. And so, hey, Jordan,

I want you to have that hard conversation with her. I want you to ask if you can join her and speak openly with her counselor on her behalf, on your behalf. And then I want you to call me back and let me know how that goes. And I'm happy to receive a call from her if she wants to call me.

If she says I'm full of crap, tell her to give me a shout. Or if she's getting scared, tell her to give me a shout. And if you want to call me back, I'd love to receive a call from her if she wants to call me. If she says I'm full of crap, tell her to give me a shout. Or if she's getting scared, tell her to give me a shout. And if you want to call me back, I'd love to talk to you too. Thank you for that call. These are hard, hard times, man. If you've got somebody in your life that has struggled with addiction in the past, man, be smart and open and intelligent.

And those are all three different things. Be smart and intelligent about having. And those are all three different things. Be smart and intelligent about having prescription medication in the house. Be really weary of benzos, man. Talk hard with your doctor and your psychiatrist. There was a season where they were just passing those suckers out like Tic Tacs and they've reined them in the last couple of years just because they are so stinking addictive. But they are just passed out like bubble gums in certain pockets still. I stay away from those with every ounce of my being. And those are tough, tough, tough. Man, Brother Jordan, my heart's out for you, man. All right. So I get this question a

lot. And this is kind of a quick detour left turn and then we'll get back to a call i get this email a lot um this is just an example of one this email comes from marcus he said you recently and i think talking about the ama article uh ama podcast gave your thoughts on the importance of reading fiction especially before bed why is that a good idea? All right, so here's the deal with reading fiction. I hear this a lot, a lot, especially in the science communities and the nerd communities. My buddies who are researchers, they constantly are saying, I don't have time to read fiction. I don't have time for that. I can read bedtime stories, dude. You know how many articles I need to be reading? There's so many great nonfiction books and science books and research things I can be reading. I don't have time to even read all of that. Here's the thing. If you talk to mental health professionals, folks who are not just,

dude, I just got my degree and just have a warm candle and take some you time. If you talk to actual seasoned mental health researchers, to a person, if you say, hey, give me 10 books I need to read, a chunk of them are always fiction. Here's why. There's two big, big reasons why. And then I'll give you my personal reason why I don't read science at bedtime. Important reason number one is there's some psychological science, some neurological science about reading fiction and how it helps you get in the heart and head of another person, if you will, of a character, of what they're going through, of their body type, of their environment, of whatever character arc the author has set them on. And it teaches you empathy and you get to practice this empathy and experience this empathy through the eyes of another character.

Your different parts of your brain take on fiction. Then they take on science literature, nonfiction. So you're actually exercising a different part of you. And it lights up in different places. And so think of reading fiction as a journey in empathy. As a character study. As a way to learn about people, and as a way just to get absorbed into a story, right? There's one study out of the

University of Toronto that also talks about reading fiction increases creativity. You get to think about different options. Remember those little choose your own adventure books that, for those of us who were old, old people that we had when we were kids and you get to think through, I don't like that ending. I'm going to go to this ending and then go to that ending. You get to start seeing here's the ripple effect, the domino effect of each decision in my life and your brain takes it on. And so it's different than just learning a piece of science, applying science and applying. You get to see the world through somebody's eyes, experience it, experience ramifications of their decisions, and your body and your mind begin to own those things.

You get to turn off the analytical side, the quote unquote, I'm reading this because, and this sounds like I'm talking out of both sides of my mouth. Number one, you get to practice empathy, but number two, you get to turn off the why, off the, I've got to be productive with every second of my time because if I'm not growing, I'm dying. Stop, dude. Sometimes your body just needs to go. Sometimes you just need to experience being in the eyes and hearts of another character. It relieves stress. If you haven't just sat and read through the Harry Potter books, if you haven't sat and read through the Hunger Games series, that's not super cheery, but they're excellent, right? If you haven't sat through and just read through good fiction after good fiction,

those are both young adult fiction, which I love, give yourself permission to give it a shot. Give it a shot. And not like Kelly, who just picks up nonfiction about more murderers and serial killers and more death and destruction and evil and all that stuff. Hunger Games is kind of, but it's just awesome. But find a series, just trust me, practice it and try it. And so one other reason, one other thing that I live by is I don't read science at bedtime. When I get home from work, unless I'm in

the middle of working on a book or a talk, I don't read science books in the evening. I don't read nonfiction in the evening. I read fiction, even hard, weird fiction, wacky stuff I love. But I read it because it lets my brain unplug from the day. And so much of us are always cramming another podcast, another, you should listen to this podcast, but are trying to cram another podcast, another book, another book, another science book, another this, and man, our bodies and our heads are like, dude, enough, because then you got work on top of that

and you got relationships on top, enough. Give your heart and mind a break. Start to see the world through somebody else's eyes, another culture's eyes, another group's eyes. Experience the weight of their decisions, what happens, what you would have done differently. Live those things. Get lost in a good fiction book.

Give it a shot. And if it was a waste of your time, then so be it. Kelly will actually buy the book back from you. You can just email her directly and she'll Venmo you the money. She won't do that, but that was just funny to say. All right, let's take one more call. Let's go to Sandra in Chicago. Sandra, what's up? Hi, Dr. Deloney. Thanks for taking some time with me today. Hey, thank you for calling. Is it Sandra or Sandra? It's Sandra. Sandra, yes. Okay. Often I miss. All right. So it's so good to talk to you.

Is it freezing or regular there in Chicago? It is, well, it's regularly freezing. So we are bombing 23 degrees today. 23? Yeah, that was a high. Wow, that's incredible. Good for you, Sandra. All right, so what's going on and how can I help? I was hoping that you could help me with some grief tactics or methods, perhaps.

So in 2018, my family had a pretty lousy year starting. Oh, this will be bad for me. Hold on one second. Hey, you're good. You're good. So starting with my sons, my adult sons, heroin overdose.

Oh, man. I'm so sorry. Yeah. And then I lost my dad to advanced dementia in May. And then my younger brother in December died suddenly. suddenly. But really, I struggle the most with the situation with my son. Tell me about him. Well, he had a difficult life. So he, as a heroin addict, he would often make bad decisions and spent a lot of

time in and out of jail. So my process, I feel like I've been grieving for, or maybe well, 15 years at least. So he, you know, it's things like every holiday. Yeah. Even while he was alive, of course, it's like, well, he's in jail, so he's not experiencing this. So I just surround myself with guilt. Yeah. And you beat yourself up for who he was as a young boy and the situations that happened in his life.

Yep. And then the missed dinners that turned into the missed holidays that turned into the jail time, which turned into the ultimate price. So first and foremost, I'm heartbroken for you. People aren't supposed to have years like 2018. And I know that's probably insulting to you to hear all the people whining about 2020, myself included, right? And I know for you, you can think, you guys want me to tell you about a bad year, right? That's a lot.

You lost what I would be willing to wager is the three most important men in your entire life, right? Yeah. What did grieving look like with him? What did the funeral look like? What did the circumstances surrounding that look like? Well, probably the start of a bad process, I would say. As you can imagine, I don't deal with these things very well based on this conversation.

You're doing great. Oh, thanks. Well, so we did a private service with just the immediate family. Yeah. And, you know, I don't, I didn't want, first of all, I don't know friends. I mean, I don't know people, I didn't know people to contact and things like that for him. And then for us, you know, our outside circle of friends and associates and things, I just couldn't do a day of standing. It was hard to, you didn't want to answer questions and have to do the reception line.

Yep, exactly. So it was just immediate family. So, Sandra, this is going to be easier said than done. Yeah, exactly. So it was just immediate family. So, Sandra, this is going to be easier said than done. But you've got to stop judging yourself. You've got to stop being ashamed of the person your son was. Yeah. Right? And I know every single mom, the moment they hold that little baby boy, they have, man, I've listened to my wife fast forward in year one.

I hope I like his wife. And I'm just like, what? And I think we're going to have the wedding. And you're like, we got to slow the roll. I know that every mom holds that little baby and just a narrative unfolds, right? A story unfolds. And it is really hard when every morning you wake up. Here we are two years, three years later, and that story is not going to happen, right?

It's not going to come true. The more you avoid putting a period at the end of that story, the more you continue to carry those bricks of, I failed as a mom, my son was a failure as a guy. As long as you hold that shame, that identity as a grieving mom, it's going to beat you up spiritually and psychologically. Your health is going to suffer from that. And I want you to know you're worth more than that oh thank you you don't believe that but i'm telling you and i want you just to get on youtube or listen to this podcast over and over and just hit refresh refresh on that you are worth grieving this you're worth holding your head high and you are worth living the rest of the years that you've got left boldly and unapologetically and with a new spirit of meaning about it.

Okay? Thank you for saying that. No, you bet. You bet. And do all of us wish we could take things back from our kid's childhood? Yep. Right? And so those things that may have happened that you think

through that pop into your head, here's what I want you to do. I want you to consciously, whether you've got to say out loud, and I have to do this to myself sometimes, when that thing, that conversation that you had when you were a kid or that thing that happened when he was young and you wish you could have done it differently, your husband said this one thing and you should, I want you just to, if you have to, yell it, but just say stop, right? Say it out loud, nope, because at this point moving forward, I want you to consider those intrusive thoughts, those shameful moments, those, well, it's you'd only thoughts. I want you to say no. I want you to listen to the, I mean, I want you to know those are now decisions from this point forward. And focusing on those won't help your son. Focusing on those won't help heal

your heart. They're just going to keep you chained to the shame and chained to the past, right? Yeah. So you said something earlier that I really want to lean on, and I want you to listen to me closely, okay? Okay. There is no such thing as an incorrect way to grieve something other than not grieving it at all. And this is three years, two and a half years. You're getting up, right?

You're about a month and a half away, two months away. You're getting up on the third anniversary, and those little anxiety bells are going to start ringing louder and louder, remember, remember, right? And then you're going to enter what I would probably assume is going to be a dark season, when your body remembers 2018, right? One loss after another loss after another loss. There is not an incorrect way to grieve that other than to shove it down and act like it's not happening, right? One loss after another loss after another loss. There is not an incorrect way to

grieve that other than to shove it down and act like it's not happening. Okay? So here's a couple of things that I've walked alongside folks that they found helpful in the past that I've found helpful in the past. Number one, you cannot, cannot under any circumstances, Sandra, grieve by yourself. Okay? So this is the time, and I know it's super annoying and hard with COVID, especially in the city like Chicago. You've got to find somebody, a small group, an individual, a counselor, somebody that you can say out loud, I'm not going to be ashamed of my son anymore.

I'm going to choose to remember the great good stuff about him. He probably had a sweet, sweet soul. I'm going to remember the joy and fun that we had when he was younger. I'm just not going to focus on the negative stuff because it doesn't do anybody any good. And I want you to experience that vulnerability and that shame letting. You've got to do that with somebody else. Okay. That's going to be vulnerable moment number one for you. Vulnerable moment number two is I want you to write him a letter that tells him about what in the crap's going on in 2021 and that you miss him like crazy. I want you to write him a second letter, possibly with this person, right? And I want you, maybe you read it to this person. If you're super hardcore and vulnerable and tough, I want you to write him a second letter

and tell him that you're heartbroken that he left you. Okay? Because it's okay to be angry with him. It's okay to be frustrated with him. It's okay to be really, really pissed off at him. And then the third letter, I want you to write him and tell him who you're becoming. But I want you to write it as though you want him to know how proud of you he should be because you're going to be the mom who now you're going to go take dance lessons once the lockdown is over.

And you're going to learn Spanish and you're going to start delivering Meals on Wheels, you are going to start living this shame-free, this unfettered life that's not going to be a forgetting of him, not going to be forgetting your dad, not going to be forgetting your brother, but it's going to be in celebration of. It's going to be meaning-making of. And when you get a group and you spend some hard, hard minutes writing these letters to them, to your son, and they don't have to be all the same day, especially shouldn't be on the same day. When you do this, what's going to start to happen is you're going to start to smile. You're going to start to heal a little bit.

You're going to have good days. You're going to have real bad days. And on the bad days, I want you to go, well, that's my body trying to take care of me again. I want you to smile at those days and then get back under the covers if you need to. And if you got to go to work, you got to get up. And that's where you're going to reach out to your buddies and to your friends because you can't do this alone. And over time, you're going to begin to make meaning here. And what making meaning looks like is different for everybody. It may be you joining a group to

go talk to young boys who are getting into drugs. It may be you writing letters to young addicts in jail and letting them know that, hey, their mama loves them and that you will be there when they get out. It may be that you're going to help knit and crochet. I don't know what you do. You may build machine guns there. I don't know what you do, but you're going to be making meaning for the rest of your life. Yeah, sounds like a good idea. But here's the, all of this is under one giant shell, which is this. You have to decide, I'm not going to wear the identity. I'm not going to consider myself a failed mom.

I'm not going to consider myself somebody who's just grieving for the rest of their life. Is the ache of the loss of your son always going to be there? Dang right it is. He was your baby boy. But that's not going to define you. You're going to have to let that go, and letting that go is going to feel like you're letting him go. Yeah.

Okay? And you are going to have to have a moment where you let him go. And that's when you get to live in those joyful, however few they are, however many they are. That's when you get to live in those joyful, joyful moments. So I wouldn't wish 2018 that you experienced on anybody, even people I can't stand being around. That's heavy and hard, heavy and hard. I'm sorry you experienced that. If you want to be real brave, Sandra, when you get a chance, when you write one of those letters, I'd love for you to call it in

and read it out on the show. I think that would be healing for millions of people who are experiencing disconnection from their kids, who are heartbroken over children who've made choices that they don't agree with, that are locked them up, all those struggles. I think that'd be a beautiful, beautiful moment. That's hard though. That's really hard. You don't have to do that, but man, it would be a blessing. Thank you so much for that call, Sandra. We love you and we care about you Alright so We're going to end the show on a totally 180 degree positive note I'm going to leave us out here with a smile on our face Actually it's kind of a depressing song

But I mean it in a positive way So I'm going to take us all back to my childhood Small little green puppet In love with a pig. The frog was doing everything he could to win this pig's affection. The pig said, no. Pig said, no. The pig said, no.

And the frog said, it's not easy being green. And he wrote a little song and it goes like this. It's not easy being green, having to spend each day the color of the leaves when I think it could be nicer being red or yellow or gold or something much more colorful like that. It's not easy being green. It seems you blend in with so many other ordinary things and people tend to pass you over because you're not standing out like flashy sparkles in the water, or stars in the sky, right? But green's the color of spring, and green can be cool and friendly-like, and green can be big like the ocean, or important like a mountain, or tall like a tree.

When green is all there is to be, it could make you wonder why, but why wonder? Why wonder? I'm green, and it'll do just fine. It's beautiful, and I think it's what I want to be. And I really want that pig to love me. This has been the Dr. John Deloney Show.