The Dr. John Delony Show - Sex Conversations With My Wife Are Uncomfortable

Episode Date: March 22, 2024

On this episode, we hear about: -       A man unsure of how to tell his wife about his desire to be more adventurous in bed -       A mom who just learned her 15-year-old is sexually active -       A husband struggling to forgive his wife for being unfaithful Offers From Today's Sponsors 10% off your first month of Therapy at Better Help!   3 Free Months of Hallow  25% Off Thorne Orders  15% off the Apollo Wearables Up to $400 in savings on an Eight Sleep bundle!  20% off Organifi with code: DELONY Next Steps 📞 Ask John a Question!  click here! 📚 Get Building a Non-Anxious Life 📝 Take the Anxiety Test  📚Own Your Past, Change Your Future  ❓Questions for Humans Conversation Cards  💭John's Free Guided Meditation ❤️ Money & Marriage Event: http://ramseysolutions.com/getaway Listen to More From Ramsey Network 🎙️ The Ramsey Show 🍸 Smart Money Happy Hour 💡 The Rachel Cruze Show 💸 The Ramsey Show Highlights 💰 George Kamel 💼 The Ken Coleman Show 📈 EntreLeadership    Ramsey Solutions Privacy Policy https://www.ramseysolutions.com/company/policies/privacy-policy

Coming up on the Dr. John Deloney Show. We found out that they have been sexually active. Her cell phone has been taken away. No longer has a bedroom door. And she cannot participate in any after school activities. It sounds like two adults got really embarrassed that they missed something right across their hallway. And they just used all of their power. What up, what up, what up, what up? This is John of the Dr. John Deloney Show. I'm so grateful that you're here. Talking about your mental and emotional health, your marriage.

My promise is I'm going to sit with you in the mess and we're going to figure it out. Whatever the next right step is, I'm here and we're going to walk alongside each other and try to talk it out in a few minutes and then figure out what's the next thing we can do. Sometimes we can solve it all and sometimes we can just light a candle and let each other know, like it's going to be a long, long hard path but we'll give you a first steps here if you want to be on this show talking to real people who are going through real challenges um give me a buzz 1-844-693-3291 it's 1-844-693-3291 or go to johndeloney.com slash ask ask and listen to this is important Dr. John Deloney Show listener survey is now

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Thank you so much. Survey to 33789. Text that in or click the link in the show notes if you're listening on podcast or on the YouTubes. Let's go out to my hometown, H-Town, and talk to Michael. Hey, Michael, what up? Hey, John. Thanks for taking my call.

Of course, brother. What's up, man? Hey, so here's my question. I'm a recovering pornography and masturbation addict, and I am trying to find the right way to express sexual desire with my wife when, when really all of my education, if you will, came from pornography. And that's a hard thing to, um, talk to my wife about. That's a pretty, that's a, that's a fascinating conversation, man.

All right. So can I give you some background? I'd love that, yeah. Talk me through it. What does addict mean? Yeah, so I, I mean, ever since my teenage years, I've been addicted to pornography. Like daily, hourly, sneaking off into the bathroom at work, masturbating four, five, six, ten times a day. Like, when you say addict, what do you mean? Yeah, weekly. Maybe not every day, multiple times a day, but I haven't been able to stop for about 15 years. Okay.

And you're saying you look at it once a week and the compulsion builds over the course of a week and then you just have this urge, this urge, this urge. Yeah, I've always known it's wrong. I've always tried to urge, this urge, this urge. Yeah, I've always known it's wrong. I've always tried to avoid, abstain, but I always end up going back to it for whatever reason. Let me fast forward. Okay, okay, go for it.

I realized this was quite the problem in 2020 during COVID when I was working from home. And I fessed up to my wife. I realized I needed, I was working from home. And I fessed up to my wife. I realized I was an addict. And I started to attend recovery groups. And since then, I've made a lot of progress. And I'm not perfect by any means, but I'm very grateful for 12-step programs. And I am grateful for the progress I've made as a recovering addict. But, um, my wife and I have been married for nine years. Uh, we've got a couple of kids and we were both, uh, virgins when we got married, you know, relatively innocent, if you will, especially her. And, and as we progress

into marriage, I I'd like to, uh, you know, be a little bit more, not experimental, but adventurous in the bedroom. And she's all good with kind of the vanilla, black and white. And I have a hard time expressing my wants or desires when I know that most of what I learned and most of the things that I'm interested in, I guess, can be related to fantasy, related to my addiction. Okay. Man, what you're talking about is really important. So I'm glad that you're having this conversation and it's happening to marriages all over across the country, secular, faith-based, like it's happened to everybody. Just porn has become so ubiquitous in our culture, right? It's become a part of things.

So I'm going to unpack this as quickly as I can, but I'm going to be pretty direct with you and I want you to stop me anywhere. Normally, I would want to get to know you, get to know your background and learn about your kids and stuff like that, but you've laid a couple of grenades on the ground and I want to make sure I jump on them before they blow up for everybody. Is that fair? Yes. All right.

First thing, you have referred to yourself as an addict. I can't even count the time. I tried to count and then I've lost count. What is that? What is referring to yourself as an addict? What is that getting you? Because it feels like it's an important part of your identity. I have tried to stop since I began behavior,

and I haven't been able to until I engaged with the 12-step recovery program and admitted that I'm powerless, and I had to turn to God and my support group for help. And only then was I able to start making progress. And for that reason, I know I'm an addict. It's not me. It's not like me to engage in something that I understand to be so wrong. And I just can't seem to quit until the last few years when I've made some pretty significant progress.

And when you say you've made progress, well, let me just cut to the chase. I understand that addiction is on a spectrum. Okay. And I've sat kneecap to kneecap with guys who have blown their lives up because they've wrecked their car they're looking at pornography on the phone while they're driving right and i want to minimize where you are here's what i'm trying to get you to to maybe expand a little bit sometimes we have we struggle with addiction sometimes a body and a brain screaming for some sort of connection will get what it needs from us, even when our well-intentioned, well-meaning part of our brain is trying to talk us out of it. And so my question to you, the things you are

mentioning, because then we go on to, hey, you've been married to this woman for nine to 10 years. You have two kids. You all have made humans together. And so I'm wondering, what about your relationship? Yeah, one person's going to be more into adventure. One person's going to be more into adventure. One person's going to be more into stability. One person is going to be more. That's common. What's concerning to me is after 10 years, y'all are not at a place where you can say, I want to do something adventurous. I want to do something that feels a little forbidden, or I want to do something that feels a little bit just like naughty and with you.

And it's us in this bounded we're right or die together and that he or she might go that sounds crazy all right or walk me through this like why like it feels it feels it feels a little bit wrong but it's with you and it feels and that is cultivating mystery and that's cultivating adventure and it's cultivating desire, right? The forbidden, right? The thing that I can't have that I could have. And now that you guys have practiced safety, you're a husband that shows up. You're a husband that works on himself because he wants to be a better version of himself.

But now there's this practicing desire and that seems to be missing. And so I'm connecting the dots and tell me if I'm wrong. I'm connecting the dots on you're a lonely, lonely man in your marriage. Not because you have a wife that doesn't want to try X, Y, and Z sex act, but because you have a relationship where y'all can't laugh and kind of poke at each other or put something on the table. Like, I want to try this and have her be like, I don't know how that's possible. But, okay. Like, let's talk through it. Or why in the world do you want to try that?

You see what I'm saying? I do. I appreciate that point of view. I think we do have a good relationship. We spend a lot of time together. We've got a good marriage. But she doesn't know you, brother. I can have fun.

She doesn't know you. Well, I guess, here's my point. My question is, she has no desire for it. She'll do whatever. She'll, you know, play along, if you will. But I would really like to do these things to make her smile bigger. And that's just not the work for her she she has no desire for it and i think part of it is a mental block on her side

because she knows oh well michael learned that from you know looking at pornography do you know that do you know that to be the case or Yeah, we talked about this. Okay. So she has taken a list of things, of acts, if you will, off the table because of where you picked them up. Yeah. And she has a hard time. And I don't want to put this all on her. It's not her fault, of course. I got you.

You're a good man, dude. I'm not hearing a bad thing I'm hearing a I'm hearing a flyby yeah I appreciate that who love each other who are very lonely yeah uh yeah she just uh doesn't want to experiment because that that takes her back to when I first opened up to her about addiction. And those are some of the most trying times of our lives. Okay. If you... There's a way to talk about yourself. And... and I'm an addict.

I'm an addict. I'm an addict. Hi, my name is John. I'm an addict. I'm an addict. And now I'm getting help from this addiction. And then I go home. Let's say it's alcohol.

Or let's say it's food. Let's say food's easier because it's less reactive. I'm an addict. I sit down with my wife and say, I'm an addict. I can't stop eating gummy candies. I've tried. I can't.

I don't want to. And I find myself buying bags of junk food. I can't stop. I can't stop. I'm an addict. I'm an addict. And then I go to meetings. I introduce myself to strangers. And the first four or five

things I say about myself is I'm an addict, I'm an addict, I'm an addict, I'm an addict. This is my core identity. I'm a man who cannot trust himself and cannot be controlled. I cannot control himself. That is my announcement to the world is who I am. And then I go to my wife and we go to a really fancy restaurant for an anniversary. And I say, I really want you to try this dessert. It's amazing. It's a five-star chef. It's so great. There's no way my wife can enjoy that dessert because she knows that she will be complicit and walking a razor's edge with her husband who announces to the world that he is less than, that he is somehow this thing.

Versus, here's the other way to tell that story. I'm somebody who was so desperate for connection. I ended up doing some dumb things trying to get pseudo-connected. I ate too much. I drank. I looked at pornography all the time. I didn't want to. I felt terrible when I ate like that.

I felt awful the next morning and anxious. Alcohol made me anxious and not sleep. I woke up this way. And I realized I'm powerless, man. And so I went and met with a group. And what AA gives you, it does give you some steps, but I think the magic in groups is it gives you connection, the thing that your brain is trying to compensate for.

And when you come back home to your home, yeah, man, now my wife knows, right? Like I struggle with food, but she knows I'm, I am connected as the day is long. I've got great friends. My marriage is whole. My relationship with my kids is golden. And so if I come in with a bag of candy, now she'll say, what happened today? Not what happened to you. You see the difference there? I do do there's a context in your home that makes sex this very very dangerous thing instead of this very connective wonderful unifying thing full of mystery and laughter and fun and eroticism, all this stuff. So do you believe that the key for me moving forward is,

A, distance from my addictive behaviors, which will help, but B, and probably more importantly, stop referring to myself as an addict and just move on with life in a way that we can build something new. I would love to hear you say, hey, I'm a guy that used to really struggle with connection. And now I got a gang. And you're even hearing in the language, like when you talk to somebody who struggles with alcohol, the language used to be you're an alcoholic.

This is who you are. Versus let me hear your story, and I want to know what happened in your day that this was the only way your body figured out how to cope? Because that's where the story is. That's where the magic is. That's where the story is. That's where the magic is. That's where the freedom is. And so my question to you is,

what happened in your life that this was the way that you felt alive? Because as a kid growing up, trying to always do the right thing, the perfect thing, the good thing, the not naughty thing, you created a world that was so pressure cooker

that your brain found a way and then the world handed you an iPhone or an iPad or a computer and said here's the world wide web I'll make it easy for you see what I'm saying in that context

I don't think you're a bad guy I think you struggle with pornography no question about it and more importantly you are doing a thing that you didn't want to be participating in and that is the more important question to me yeah

go ahead growing up you know I've always been very active in my church. And my dad was a leader in the church, just a service position. But people always complimented me on my behavior and how well-rounded I was and the attributes and skills and everything that I had. And people always said, oh, you'll be the next, you know, so-and-so in the church. You're a performer. That's right. And I always felt like I was a great kid, but I had this one dirty little secret. And I feel like now that I'm 31, I, uh, I, maybe I missed out on a lot of potential.

You did. I wasted a lot of time. Here's why. Here's why. Yep. Because the ticker tape running underneath the story that was your life was I'm a piece of crap. These people only love me for how I can sing and dance. These people love me for who I could be one day. And inside, there's a little kid screaming at you, what about me?

And that's a body that is desperate for connection. And that's a body that gets into pornography. That's a body that gets into alcohol. That's a body that gets into alcohol. That's a body that gets into food disorders, screaming for connection. That's a body that gets addicted to social media because it's just like crack for a disconnected brain. Yeah. And so what I would tell you, are you a social media guy? Not at all. No. Good for you.

What I would say, the quote-unquote, did I waste time? I would never say that because it brought you here. Okay? That's a fool's errand. But what I would tell you is you spent a lot of energy thinking you weren't a very good person, and I disagree. Well, I appreciate that. Okay. Here's the reset that has to happen in your house. Y'all have to, you probably should take your wife out. And when

you've heard me say, build something new, build something new, build something new. The conversation is, I'm going to stop referring to myself as an addict. I'm a guy who struggled with connection. We have two kids. We've been married almost a decade. We have a couple of what I would call yellow flashing lights. It's the seven to 10 year mark is one of the yellow flashing lights. A couple of young kids is one of the yellow flashing lights.

A mismatch in sexual energy is one of the yellow flashing lights. And now you're having all of them in a marriage, right? So everything's kind of starting to pulse a little bit. And what usually happens is she will double down on being a great mom. You'll double down on being a great employee because that's the way you both feel like you can help this unit because the unit is disconnected. And that's when you end up, like I say all the time, six inches apart on the couch and 6,000 miles away from each other. And you can still laugh, you can still play, you can still

have a good time, but she doesn't know you and you don't know her. And so I think somebody has to sit down at the table and hopefully it's going to be you. And you're going to say, I want to control alt delete. I want to reboot what sex means to our marriage. And if it has been over the last nine or ten years, you trying to get her to do things, that's pornography. That's using her as an object for you to get off, for you to get what you want. That's different than I want to go with you hand in hand on an adventure.

I want to try something forbidden with you because we signed up to ride or die and we can do forbidden things because we're in the same gang. Right. A way I've seen this successful, and I said it once a couple of years ago as a joke, and it kind of took off, right? And I hear about it all from all over the place,

is the Deloney Erotic Envelope System. Have you heard me talk about that? Oh, yeah. We've tried that. Okay. How did it work? I guess it didn't work very well for you guys. How did it go?

Yeah, that's right. I wrote down all sorts of things, right? That's who I am. And hers were very basic. Okay. And at the end of the day, she just had a really hard time pulling one of my suggestions at random because she was scared of pulling some of them.

That right there is what you'll have to talk about. And if she can't or she won't make peace with her past, with your past, with her past, with y'all's past, and then come to now, then y'all have to deal with that. Because she stayed with you. Oh yeah, we're ride or die. We're all in together. Except you're not. Because she won't even

have that conversation with you. That's not ride or die. That is ride or we'll ride with you, but you be quiet over there. It's not ride or die. That is ride or, well, I'll ride with you, but you be quiet over there. It's not ride or die. See what I'm saying? I know that's hard to hear, but there's parts of you that she won't even discuss. Yeah. So she has been a part of her own spouse recovery group and that's been very helpful and it's been a work in progress for years but i think this is going to help us move in the right direction i appreciate that i i dude i'm a mental health guy that's my world i think you are using some

i don't want to i'm trying to say this the right way i would love to see y'all step away from over-therapizing all of this not to minimize it not to say it wasn't evil not to say that anybody's feelings aren't valid not to say that what you what what what buried you for 15 years wasn't real of course it was and her feelings and her betrayal and all that wasn't real of course it was but you are both walking through this identity that you've given each other i'm a recovering wife and i'm a recovering addict i'm an addict i'll always be an addict dude it is really hard to move forward with those chains. I think we sit down and say, all right, 10 years in, two kids, we love each other. We're here.

We got to talk about sex, what it means to us, what it's meant to us, what it's going to mean to us in the future. There's some things about my life that I can't even put on the table because they shut you down and I need you to stay present with me. And after 10 years, what are the things that even when you think about them, you continue to shut you down. We need to put all that on the table and we might need to see a counselor with that. Okay. Cause it might be that we don't have the tools to talk to each other there. But as far as I'm concerned, that's where the challenge lies That we can't put these things on the table. Because then when it's all out there and then our bodies respond and we're like, no, no, I'm still going to be here.

I'm safe. I'm not doing this. I'm not doing this. I don't desire doing this particular sex act just to do it. I desire you. I want to make you laugh. I want to have adventures. I want you to participate in X, Y, and Z.

All right, now maybe we can get on to that and maybe she'll give herself permission to begin to dream to fantasize to have some adventures of her own in her mind and then obviously with you because it's not this laden addict addict addict addict addict hopefully that helps brother i would love to hear back after y'all have that conversation um maybe you uh flip it maybe the John Deloney erotic envelope system which cannot be bought you just go to Walgreens it's like 99 cents

get some envelopes um maybe you start completely over and begin to court your wife gonna hold your hand. We made French kiss. We're just going to snuggle for a while. And we're going to rebuild safety and trust intimately, sexually that way. Sorry, my brother.

This is a tough one. We'll be right back. Hey, good folks. Let's talk about hallow. All right. I say this all the time. It's important to get away for times of prayer and meditation by yourself with no one else around. But one thing you might not think about though, is maintaining a sense of community when you pray or meditate. And this is especially if you don't consider yourself religious, if you question things, or if you've been burned by a church experience in the past, it's hard to want to get together with other people. And that's

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All right, let's go out to Grand Rapids, Michigan and talk to Lori. What's up, Lori? Hi, Dr. John. Thanks for taking my call. I really appreciate your time and your guidance. Of course. What's up, Lori? Hi, Dr. John. Thanks for taking my call. I appreciate your time and your guidance. Of course. What's up? So a couple of weeks ago, my husband and I discovered that our 15-year-old daughter

was sneaking her boyfriend into our home in the middle of the night through her bedroom window. Oh, man. And as the story unraveled that weekend, we found out that this isn't the first time and that they have been sexually active in her bedroom across the hall from our room on multiple occasions. So my husband and I are obviously dealing with this a little bit differently. We've doled out the consequences for her actions. What are those consequences? What did y'all do? Did y'all go scorched earth?

Well, we didn't burn the bed yet. So she was five days away from turning 16. Obviously, driving privileges have not been given to her. So she is riding the big yellow school bus to and from school. Her cell phone has been taken away. She no longer has a bedroom door. She has a bedroom, but no door. And she cannot participate in any after-school extracurricular activities for the rest of the year. Big, big consequences, yes. And of course she doesn't feel,

she feels those are too extreme. So let me ask you this, just, this is just adult to adult. You're a parent of a daughter. I'm a parent of a daughter. Taking away her cell phone, taking away, taking her door off, taking away her privacy, taking away any afterschool connection with kids, taking away her ability to be with her friends. What is that? Draw me, connect that to underage sexual activity.

We made those consequences before we found out that she had been sexually active. And I think the majority of the reason for those consequences is because throughout the weekend, we got different iterations of lies. So we tried to at least open up a space so that she could just kind of tell us what was happening. When we found out this was happening, we woke up one morning to a fresh Michigan snow and saw footprints down our sidewalk all the way down the driveway. Oh, man.

That's like a horror movie. This is how we found this out. Okay. Can I cut to the chases? And I'm going to say something direct, and I'm saying this to my friend, not at you. Okay? I'm just with you on this one. When I used to work with college students all the time,

I would call them in and say, hey, you've been accused of sexual assault. You have been accused of cheating. I have a whole bunch of texts where you threatened to kill somebody. That was my job. I did that all day, every day. And every time somebody would leave,

I would always tell them, whether they were an 18-year-old or they were a 29-year-old, whether they were my grad students or they were a freshman in college i would always tell them whether they were an 18 year old or they were 29 year old whether i'm on a grad student so they were a freshman in college i would tell them you have 24 sometimes 48 hours to come back and change your story and i'm going to allow it to be as though that's the first thing you told me because i know the terror that is coursing through your veins right now. And when we get scared, we have default. We just, we just react. Yeah. Right. And so you get to come back after 48 hours, 24 hours, 48 hours, depending on what the issue was, then you're going to get

in more trouble for being a person who lacks integrity than for whatever it is you did. Okay. But I'm telling you that to tell you, it sounds like some of these are in totality. It sounds like two adults got really embarrassed that they missed something right across their hallway and they got really pissed off and they just used all of their power like a Marvel character.

Yeah. And the thing that a 15 year old girl that's sneaking a boy into her room and then is sexually active at 15 is a body that is screaming for connection and it's as though it's like in the old days when um uh i forgot what it is. They used to – I'll have to think it up. They used to give – the cure for diarrhea used to be back in the 1800s was to dehydrate the body, make it worse, right? Okay. And so for a brain, a tiny little adolescent brain that is screaming for connection so much so they're going to risk everything.

That the solution can't be less connection. And my guess is, with this type of response, my guess is, and tell me, dude, you can say, you're an idiot, Deloney. You're wrong on this one. And I would love to be wrong on behalf of your daughter here. But your husband didn't take her out and hold her and say, I'm so, so sorry. Tell me, like, okay. My guess is this is a temper tantrum, dad. My guess is you haven't taken her out and said, there are some things about your mom you didn't know. I'm going to tell you about when I was in high school. I'm going to tell you about when I was in college

because 15 year old sexual activity is not safe. They're a child, right? And so I'm going to say about when I was in college. Because 15-year-old sexual activity is not safe. They're a child, right? And so I'm not saying they should be allowed to do this at all. I'm all about consequences. I'm all about accountability, okay? I don't care if you're a person of faith. If you're a secular 15 years old, it's too early to be having sex, period. End of story.

Conversation's over, okay? Yep. And so I'm with you on that but the move has to be to increase connection not take it away and that has to be done

not through a I've got this huge power in this like these lightning bolts I'm gonna fire across the hall into your room and into your life

this is a dad that says as punishment you have to have dinner with me twice a week, just us two. And I don't have time for that. You don't have time not to, because now this cat's out of the bag. What I would tell you is I've never, ever, ever in all my years of working with adolescents, I've never seen scorched earth be a be a response that wins in the long term I just never have seen it

I also Can't imagine my teenager sneaking Somebody in their room across the hall from me, right? I mean, I like I I can get raged out just thinking about it But it's my job as the adult to remain the adult, not to revert back to being a kid. Yeah. Has your husband just lost his mind? His weapon of choice is the silent treatment.

Nightmare, dude. That's a nightmare for a 15-year-old girl. Yeah. Hasn't spoken to her since it happened. And she and I have had lots of conversations. So my conversation with her and that's partly due to listening to you is because I've been able to take those tools and go to her and say, what you did, what your actions were, were wrong. You're not bad. I love you no matter what. I did stupid things too when I was a kid, you know. And so we've had those conversations.

We're talking. We're doing all those good things. Yeah, but he just completely pulled back. And I think because he read the text on her phone that kind of told us the story of what had been going on. He's hurt that he did this so young and that there was, you know, kind of vulgarity. I mean, you don't think of your children at 15 as being, you know, that promiscuous. And I think it's the realization for him that that's what happened. And he just feels so disgusted as what he told me this weekend when I tried to talk to him. So, you know, I don't know how much... Does he not remember being 15?

Well, I think he remembers how he was when he was 15. So he's trying to protect his girls from being that. And then he handed him a smartphone with access to the planet? Exactly. Or worse, the planet? Exactly, yeah. Or worse, the planet. My buddy Sean Ryan said this the other day. You're not giving your kid access to the world. You're giving your world access to your kid. True, yeah, yeah.

And learns everything. And you see what I'm saying? So you have a disconnected dad. Let me just say it this way. And this doesn't always play through with the literature, but it's something i live by my daughter and my son but i'm just talking daughters here because that's what we're talking my daughter will get connected deep affection from a man that will be me well that will be some boy that says i love you can you believe your dad did that and whatever the thing i did is i made her come in on time

i gave her a curfew i didn't let her have social whatever thing is she will get that connection period and so it sounds like based on his reaction and his i'm just it's not about him it's about his baby girl you know what i'm saying yeah yeah i'm just i'm really i'm trying to think through that because i like every other parent you feel like you know what weren't we giving to her that we thought we were? That's kind of where I'm at right now. I get that. I get that. But what you're doing is you're taking a 15-year-old girl screaming for,

will somebody just love me? And you all have made it about yourself. What did we do? What can we do? It's not about y'all right now. It's about this girl who has lost not only her boyfriend, not only been super embarrassed not only lost she's lost her everybody she's lost her parents her mom and dad you'll have siblings

does she have siblings two older sisters are they helping or making this worse one well no they haven't really talked to her about it good gosh why well they're not they're in the military so they're not local to her and since she doesn't have a phone anymore there's been no connection to her i mean when we've talked about it as a family they've their response has been well we can't believe how dumb she was. Yes. This is very dumb. Yeah. And if we can all count on 15 year olds to do one thing, it's dumb things, right? Because they're 15. That's why they need us. That's why they need us. I can't tell you how important it is for your husband. How do I get, how do I get him to that point? You tell him you're going to lose your daughter forever.

Tell him to call me. Yeah. And I think if I say that to him, like you said, temper tantrums, parenting, I think he'll just be like, whatever. She doesn't respect me. She didn't respect our house. He doesn't respect her. I want those things. Yeah. This is a 15-year-old that is going looking for somebody to say I have value.

Yeah. Because my dad only gives me value when I sing and dance the right way. And my bed's made up. My mom only gives me value if I don't do bad things or good. I don't know y'all's relationship, but this is the time that he, I'm going to give you a roadmap. He's not going to do this. And the person who will suffer is your 15 year old, but I'm going to give you and everybody listen to roadmap. He gets home from work today and he picks her up from school instead of the bus. And he takes her out

for some kind of quasi nice meal, even though it's only 3.30 or 4.30 when you get out of school. Maybe ice cream. And he says, I am so sorry. I totally blew this. I screwed this up for years and I'm asking you to forgive me. And that's how this has

to start. And I know there are millions of parents listening to this call right now going, are you freaking kidding me? She snuck a boy in. Listen, we'll get to that. You can't do that. You can't. But there's a context to that behavior. There's a desperation to that behavior. Yeah. Now, just because she has a connected relationship with her mom and dad doesn't mean she's not going to want to hook up with somebody. They're experimental.

They're 15, they're 16, they're 17. That's where they need parents to play defense, to be preventative. Right. That's why I'm so adamant about kids not having access to the whole planet. And my son had a friend last night

who was going through a tough time on a school night. I let him go out and he was on the phone so, so late. And I let him because it was right. He was learning some lessons. And so I'm not a robot i'm not i'm not soulless but she's gonna go looking for that connection somewhere yeah here's what she needs from her mom sex at 15 is dangerous it's not safe it's not wise it's not smart for 50 different reasons and if you have any wisdom to pass along,

this is the time now. Not mom did some dumb things. It's time to get a little more specific because y'all read some text messages and things got really specific. And I am asking you for your safety, for your future, to not be sexually active.

And I have to ask you if you're being safe when you are. Yeah. Both and, right? Yep. Yep. One, the people that I talk to on a regular basis that are all faith-based, the answer is no, it's period. And we move on. And then my friends and community who are not, um,

faith-based are all just be safe about it. And both are incomplete conversations. It has to be. You can't, you can't, you can't, you can't, you can't,

but my God, if you do, don't be stupid. Don't add stupid on top of stupid. You get what I'm saying? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

We, we, we immediately went to our family physician. I know you did. Help me with this. Yes. I know. I know. I just can imagine.

You only done the playbook. We're getting STD testing and pregnancy testing and we're taking your door off. No phone. Right? Yeah. totally get the impulse about safety if if she chooses to you know go down that road again right totally get that but let's figure out ways she can connect with her sisters let's figure out ways that dad if dad's going to continue to act like a child and his response is very childish and i would tell him that if he was on the phone here i don't like to talk like this about somebody's partner when they're not on the

phone but this i it i i have lived it's been my responsibility to take care of these kids when they come to college for almost 20 years and it breaks my heart because they get to school and they are squashed and they are completely unplugged from any sort of family system of values, of love, of connection, of safety. And they go to college and they are just sitting ducks. You know what I mean? Yeah. Yep. Cause there's a whole bunch of different people, different ideologies,

different, all kinds of different people that will say, I, I believe in you and it's a nightmare. Yeah. Conversation with the, you know, we've been married 29 years and this isn't the first time that has,

you know, he's responded like this is his behavior I mean he got upset with our middle daughter because she used purple color dye on the bottoms of her hair and I don't think he spoke to her for months so at this stage in my life I'm less accepting of his parenting. So there's struggle between him and I, and we're trying to resolve this. I get that. With a daughter, it's a lot.

I know. That little girl needs her dad in a bad way right now. In a real bad way. Yeah. And I appreciate you trying to be an advocate on her behalf. Right, yeah. Is there something that I can counsel her to start the conversation since he wants her to be the adult?

It's not her job. It will never be her job. Yeah. Do you have an uncle or a grandparent or a brother that can reach out to her and say the words, your dad is acting like a child right now and I'm sorry. I love you and I see you and I'm safe. Yeah, we have no family connection.

He has no strong male relationship. Older sisters that can call and say, hey, we did this with dad too. He acts like a two-year-old with his temper tantrums and gives us the silent treatment. You're not evil. You're not bad. You're dumb. You did something stupid, right? But you're still loved.

You're still in our gang. You're still our sister. Yeah. Yeah, I can definitely. She can't sit in a room completely unplugged from planet Earth and having the most important relationship walk by and act like she does not exist. I mean, I can't express enough. That is throwing her at some other dude to say, take care of my daughter because I won't do it. Yeah.

That's what that behavior is doing. That's my childhood, so I think that's why I watch this happen. And let me say, that right there, I should have been more clear. I'm not suggesting you sit down and tell your daughter about all the men you've been with or haven't been with. I'm not telling your daughter about the time you let a guy sneak into your dorm room or into your bedroom. I am suggesting you sit down and say, let me tell you about granddad. This is hard for me to say, but I got in trouble when I was a kid and he ignored me for months and I'm so sorry.

I'm working with your dad because this isn't right. Because at some point, some adult that cares about her has to call out this behavior. Yeah. Thank you for saying that. If it's not him, it's got to be you.

Yeah. Yeah. I agree. And I'll say this. He is choosing to not be on team family. And so he's going to blame you and say, why are you talking about this? You're going against me He has opted out of this family system because he's choosing silence He's out. He opted out. He put his dad card down and said i'm gonna go over here because

um, my little ego is is more important than wading into this and putting my 15-year-old daughter's head on my chest and holding her tightly and letting her know she's loved. Because we're about to go to hell. The accountability on the back end is going to be rough. But she needs to know that I love her. And then really, it's a whole separate call.

And I guess we can do this call another day. It's a whole separate call on what's the appropriate response. Like what is appropriate disconnection, right? What is appropriate accountability? When you find out your teenager is sexually active. Scorched earth doesn't work. Just letting it ride is a terrible option. So what do you do?

How do you wade into it? It's hard. That's going to be for another call. Lori, thank you so much for the call. If your husband wants to call me, man, I'll be happy to talk to him. That little girl needs her mom and dad and her sisters real, real quick. We'll be right back. This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. October is the season for wearing costumes. And if you haven't started planning your costume, seriously, get on it. I'm pretty

sure I'm going to go as Brad Pitt because we have the same upper body, but whatever. Look, it's costume season. And if we're being honest, a lot of us hide our true selves behind masks and costumes more often than we want to. We do this at work. We do this in social settings. We do this around our own 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 behind costumes and masks, 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 be honest with yourself, and where you can take off the mask and the costumes and learn to live an honest, authentic 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 just about any schedule. You just get online and you fill out a short survey and you'll be matched with a licensed therapist and 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 Pittsburgh and talk to Jeff. Hey, Jeff, what's up, man? Hi, Dr. John. What's up, dude? How are you? Good, man. I'm just looking through the notes that I wrote down to make sure I don't miss much here. I'm a very detail-oriented person. I like to lay things out before I do stuff like anything like this. Well, I had a coworker call me a, and I quote, hot mess this morning. So I need some order in my life. So go for it,

man. Read it, read it out to me. Um, so this time last year, my wife asked me for an open relationship and I can see that she was struggling really bad and had been for a while. Um, and I felt like I didn't want to just say no to her. So basically I said, I'll give you a month, not do anything, nothing physical. I said, I'll let you collect information, give me some data, tell me a reason why you think this would help us. She was already with somebody, wasn't she? She had been already a year and a half before that for a year. Yep. Almost every time.

And she already had a plan. Like we laid out all these ground rules, what would happen if we got there. And she was with somebody like almost right away, somebody different than this other person. And both of them were from work. And then, uh, so I, I am struggling with this cause I, I just, it wasn't after the first month, I was like, this is not something I want to have anything to do with, which I knew before I even agreed to any of it. Right. I thought I would admit it to myself, but then, um, it all, like I asked her to stop and she said no.

And even though she told me she hadn't been with anyone, there was nothing there. Um, she was still sleeping with me. And then I find out later that she wasn't using protection with these people. Um, have you ever heard, have you ever heard the analogy about the, uh, rattlesnake in the paper bag? I think so, but you might have to refresh my memory. So a guy is walking down the street, and he stumbles on a plastic bag, and he opens it up, and there's a rattlesnake inside, buzzing. And that rattlesnake says, hey, will you help me get out of this bag? I'm stuck in here. I can't get out. And the guy goes, dude, I'm not going to pick you up. You're a rattlesnake says hey will you help me get out of this bag i'm stuck in here i can't get out and the guy goes dude i'm not gonna pick you up you're a rattlesnake you'll bite me

and the rattlesnake goes no i'm not i need help like i'm not gonna bite you this time i need you to help me and the guy's like okay and he sticks his hand in and the rattlesnake just bites the crap out of him and the guy goes why'd you do that you said you weren't going to and he's like i'm a rattlesnake. That's what I do. And then he goes, will you help me, though? Help me out of this bag. And he goes, no, you just bit me. And he goes, I know.

I had to get that out of my system. I'm a rattlesnake. It's hard for me not to. I won't do it again. The guy's like, no, you bit me. And he goes, oh, come on. And he goes, all right. So he puts his hand back in the bag to grab the snake, and the snake bites him again.

That's you. Okay. Your wife was cheating on you for a year and a half. My, how long have y'all been married? We've been married for six years, but we've been together since we were teenagers. So we've been together for almost 16 years.

Okay. It's been happening before that. Statistically speaking, it's happened before that. Hold on. She's cheating on you. Then she came up with a plan to get you to go along with it. And when somebody's cheating on you for over a year, that means she didn't just have a one night stand or a weekend fling or a two or three

week like, ah, what am I doing? She was with somebody for a year. And so that marriage disconnection you felt that even entertained the idea that I know will make my marriage better. My wife goes and knocks around with some other dude. That'll help. The fact that you even entertained that was not because your marriage is falling apart because of something you were doing. It's because your wife is already in relationship with somebody else. Okay. And then you set up ground rules and you're stunned that she goes and sleeps

with somebody else right away. Yeah. She broke every rule the first time. She's not a person of integrity. And I'm only telling you that because I love you, man. She's a person that lies and cheats to her husband of, and her ride or die for 16 years. I would like to say that since,

so we went on a family vacation and she, she on this vacation, we were driving through the middle of the night cause we have young children and I wanted them to sleep and her phone was still lit up cause everything was locked on. Obviously it was still lit up. So I grabbed it and I found a bunch of stuff. She was sending videos and pictures found a bunch of stuff.

She was sending videos and pictures and all sorts of stuff to many, many people. And from that day, we started working to try to fix this. And then I found out everything, maybe a month and a half after that, in July. And since the day that she has come clean and told me everything, she has done every single thing I've asked. She has gone to counseling. I've gone to counseling. We're about to start couples therapy. We've taken trips together. We've really tried to reconnect on all levels and become better parents and just do things together. And to be honest, I've found nothing since then that says there was more. And trust me, I became a person who was searching phone logs and doing all this stuff that I had never done over the first 15 years. I'd never even been through it.

You find yourself like Liam Neeson real fast. Like, yeah, it was wild. Yeah. You just, you just like become one of those murder podcast people for sure. I got to solve this. So what's your question? Let's get right to it. What's your question? Um, I cannot stop thinking about her with these other people. That's right. I, um, I, I, I start visualizing and then I ruminate and then I spiral and then I make up scenarios in my head and I, I make everything even worse than it probably was.

And then I ask her about it and then I can see the guilt is crushing her because now that she's in a healthier place and knows what she is doing to me currently, like, and I, for us, for my children, for her, I need to start feeling better and not being so crushed day to day and not having these two or three day spans

where I just cannot function because the weight of this killing me. And I just am not sure how to move forward with it. Often what happens in these situations is you are so empowered. Empowered's not the right word. You're so brought back to life. You're enlivened. That's not really, I don't know if that's the right word. You're so brought back to life. You're enlivened. I don't know if that's the right word. You're just given life again by seeing your partner try to connect with you. By seeing her do the

things that you wish had been happening for 15 years. And it injects some life, some light back into a dark, dark, dark room. And what often happens is what you're running into right now. So I want you to know you're not crazy. You're not nuts. You're not alone. You're not on an island by yourself.

This happens all the time, okay? That's exactly how it feels. I know it does. It's super isolating. And you start to feel crazy. Because she's doing all these things. That seems that she's all in. It really feels that way. I know it does.

You're not crazy. Okay? What you haven't done is a couple of things. You have not grieved this yet. I don't know that you fully metabolized what actually happened. You've been too busy searching and playing Matlock

and trying to solve this thing and then trying to get her to not wreck this whole car because it's flying down the highway and it's got kids in it and it's a thing and it's my marriage. And you haven't sat on the back porch by yourself

and stared off at the sunset and said out loud, my wife was cheating on me for years. My wife was sleeping with other guys. My wife was sending nude videos and photos of herself all over the place. People have my wife's naked body on their phones. Who knows? Who knows how many? Who knows who they've shared that with uploaded it to and the only way and i'm being really direct with you because the only way to heal it's the same as if i'm looking at somebody and i'm holding both of their hands and i look them in the eye and say your husband was in a car wreck and he has died there is something about you have to facts are your friends have to be told this is what happened and you have to sit in that and own it.

And what you're going to find is that you've been trying to keep your marriage together. Brother, the marriage you had is over. Yeah, I can definitely feel that. Y'all can. No question about it decide to build something new and we have I think that's where we're at right now

if I could move forward I think she's starting to do you see how this is turned on you and you're making yourself the bad guy yeah I'm good at that I know it's one of your spiritual gifts stop

quit it quit it it doesn't help the situation Yeah, I'm good at that. I know. It's one of your spiritual gifts. Stop. Quit it. Quit it. It doesn't help the situation. The reality is the person who is the mother of your kids didn't stab you in the back. She stabbed you right in the face. And then tried to concoct a plan to get you to go along with doing it in the future. And you being a guy that always goes to the mirror and is convinced that you're the biggest piece of crap on planet Earth

and you can't believe a woman like her would even be with you in the first place, much less have kids and be your wife, went along with it. Yeah, that's a hard thing to face. I know it is. I know. Here's what she really needs. She needs you to stand up on two feet tall. Put your shoulders back. Y'all are keeping the car going. You are. But you have to ask yourself a question you haven't asked yet. What do you want moving forward? I want to make it work with her for our children

and for me and for her. And I don't think it was ever about leaving me or any of that. These are both married men. I gave one of them 24 hours to tell his wife he lived locally, and then I made sure she knew the details. The other one wouldn't even mention knowing her, so I got his wife's phone number, and I made sure she had all the details. And did that make you feel any better? No.

Not really. I was angry at the time. It's pure anger and rage. I had nowhere to take it but to my, basically what you called like the Sherlock Holmes thing. Like I was just searching and I was digging and I couldn't stop and I felt like that's what needed to be done. And I would golf clap if I was here. And I would ruin multiple lives. She wasn't trying to destroy your marriage because she thought she was bigger than the whole thing. She did though.

She destroyed what y'all had. And you went along with it for a while. So, both of you have to look at the parts of your marriage that you love and want to hang on to, and you both have to look at the pieces that have to be gone. Okay. Then you have to decide, will you be a part of this new thing?

And then, to answer your question, at some point, you are going to have to do the hard work of deciding, I trust her enough to tell myself to stop ruminating. And I'm going to practice that. And it's going to take about a year or two, if not longer. And then 10 years from now, you're going to have a lightning bolt image pop into your head of your wife with somebody else, and you're going to have to say out loud, stop it, or no, or not today. You're going to have to have some sort of mantra.

Yeah, they kill me. Here's when it kills you, and this is when you have a choice. You don't have a choice right now because you haven't grieved this thing, and your body is taking over because it knows you're not driving. What it's trying to do is to keep you safe. And this woman who destroyed you and your marriage and your family unit, and you went along with it, is still living in your home, and y'all are having good moments

and your brain is screaming at you, Jeff, going, she's the bear. She's the tiger that just tried to kill us. And so it has taken over. What grief allows you to do is to own what happened, feel it, write the letters you need to write have the conversations you need to

have slowly begin to come out of this thing begin exercising begin moving begin standing up on your own two feet building something new and then your body will stop trying to drive for you sort of but it will still man it'll still drop some lightning bolts in there. That's when you have a choice. When those lightning bolts come, you can't stop those. You can't predict those. They just happen. It happens if you see your kid and you're in a tragic car wreck and your kid passes away and you get that image in your mind. Or if you are at a funeral and a loved one, a husband, a wife, a child is in a casket in that picture. Or if there's so many cheats on you, right?

Those images flash into your mind and it's your brain's way of trying to protect you. You have a choice after that from the second after that. Am I going to sit here and worship that image? Am I going to ruminate on it? Am I going to create stories about it? Am I going to let it fill my body? Am I going to ruminate on it? Am I going to create stories about it? Am I going to let it fill my body? Am I going to feel it? Or am I going to stop it? Nope, I will not. And here's the magic. You have to have a couple of pictures in your mind ready to replace it. That's a good idea. So get two or three photos of you and your wife together laughing. And if you don't have those photos, go get them taken.

Cracking up, doing something funny. Back when y'all were in high school together at a concert you loved together. And when that picture of her with some other dude pops into your head, you say out loud, no. And then you close your eyes and you concentrate on that photo. I can tell you were definitely right. She was, there was stuff before all this too. It was mostly all emotional, but concentrate on that photo. I can tell you you're definitely right. There was stuff before all this too. It was mostly all emotional but I found that too

and it just kills your whole memories so I can see where you're coming from. My memories for the last 15 years feel destroyed. Yes. Because the tiger is still in your home. So what you have to teach your body is that tiger tried to kill us before but I believe she's not going to try to kill us again. Okay. And give yourself some grace. You not crazy you're not nuts you're just going from one thing to the next thing to the next thing to the next thing to the next

thing and it sounds a lot my brother like you're getting dragged you got dragged into this idea that uh man maybe if my wife just hooks up with other dudes, then things in my marriage will get some spark back. Madness. Maybe I'll do a whole thing on open marriages. My God. But geez, I'm all distracted. Or now we're going to go to this. Now we're going to go to this. It sounds like you're getting dragged through this recovery Your recovery is something that you have to own you have to take the leadership on Okay, it's got to be you. It's got to be you. It's got to be you Call back anytime my brother, uh, hang on the line I'm going to send you a copy of own your past change your future

I have a whole section where I talk about rumination and that actually i'm going to send you building an on anxious life, too I'm going to send you both talk about rumination and that actually I'm gonna send you Building an Unanxious Life too. I'm gonna send you both of them, both the books that I wrote, my gift to you. And I talk a lot about some very concrete strategies for dealing with rumination, especially those flash images. Also pick up a book by the great David Kessler called Finding Meaning, which talks a lot about those flash memories as well.

Sorry, my man. I. Sorry, my man. I'm sorry, my man. Let's spend some time sitting in the grief on this one. And don't do that alone. We'll be right back. Hey, what's up? Deloney here. Listen, you and me and everybody else on the planet has felt anxious or burned out or chronically stressed at some point.

In my new book, Building a Non-Anxious Life, you'll learn the six daily choices that you can make to get rid of your anxious feelings and be able to better respond to whatever life throws at you so you can build a more peaceful, non-anxious life. Get your copy today at johndeloney.com. All right, we're back with a cool crap that happened. What's up, Kelly? All right. This is from Abby in Montgomery, Alabama. I started using the carbon diet coach at the beginning of the year, and I love it. I have never felt better about balancing what I eat. I don't feel like I'm missing out on life. Hello to the Milky Way I had for lunch yesterday. And I'm losing weight. 10 pounds down.

Wow. I have learned so much about what I am putting into my body. Peanut butter is not high in protein. And the coaches are top notch at answering all of my questions. Thank you so much for the recommendation for expanding my knowledge base to your network of amazing people. Wow, that's pretty cool, man. Carbon app. I don't get a penny off of it. Not a penny. Zero. It's just an app that works. And I know the guy who made it and he's a trustworthy guy who knows exactly what he's talking about. That's amazing. That's super cool, man. I love being able

to give people tools that they can then use on their own. Because again, these relationships, I've talked to people for nine minutes, 10 minutes, 15 minutes, and that's it. And then they go on. Y'all get off the phone and you head out back into the wild. And so having tools to go with you is so important. And I especially love it when I stumble on a tool that one of my buddies is using or that one of my buddies has created that is just a game changer. So that's awesome. Very cool, Kelly. Thanks for sharing. We'll clip this and send it over to Lane, to Dr. Norton, and let him know it's another life changed, man. That's fantastic. Well, hey, thanks for staying with us today. Man, this is one of those get you in trouble kind of episodes, man.

Leave your comments below. Direct them directly to Kelly. Because that's where most of today's advice came from. Love you guys. Bye.