The Dr. John Delony Show - Should I Tell People He Was Abusive?

Episode Date: January 10, 2024

On this episode, we hear about: - A woman wrongly blamed for her divorce - A man desperate to help his brother with his alcohol addiction - A mother surprised by grief after her daughter’s wedding Let us know what’s going on by leaving a voicemail at 844.693.3291 or visiting johndelony.com/show.  Support Our Sponsors: BetterHelp Hallow Thorne Add products to your cart create an account at checkout Receive 25% off ALL orders Resources: Building a Non-Anxious Life Anxiety Test Own Your Past, Change Your Future Questions for Humans Conversation Cards John’s Free Guided Meditation Listen to all The Ramsey Network podcasts anytime, anywhere in our app. Download at: https://apple.co/3eN8jNq These platforms contain content, including information provided by guests, that is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. The content is not intended to replace or substitute for any professional medical, counseling, therapeutic, financial, legal, or other advice. The Lampo Group, LLC d/b/a Ramsey Solutions as well as its affiliates and subsidiaries (including their respective employees, agents and representatives) make no representations or warranties concerning the content and expressly disclaim any and all liability concerning the content including any treatment or action taken by any person following the information offered or provided within or through this show. If you have specific concerns or a situation in which you require professional advice, you should consult with an appropriately trained and qualified professional expert and specialist. If you are having a health or mental health emergency, please call 9-1-1 immediately. Learn more about your ad choices. https://www.megaphone.fm/adchoices Ramsey Solutions Privacy Policy

Coming up on the Dr. John Deloney Show. Started really early on. It's really strange because while we were dating, he never physically pressured me to do anything. But within a few days of us being married, he was very coercive and controlling and forceful. Even forced himself on me against my will. Okay, we call that rape.

Good morning, good evening, good night. This is the Dr. John Deloney Show, and I'm John. So glad that you are with us. Talking about emotional health, your mental health. Talking about what's going on in your home with your marriage, your dating, kids, whatever is going on. I spent the last two decades walking alongside people and the wheels have fallen off. And what I do on the show is I don't always know the answer,

but I'll sit with you and we will figure out what's the best next right step. If you want to be on this show, give me a buzz at 1-844-693-3291. It's 1-844-693-3291. It's 1-844-693-3291, or go to johndeloney.com slash ask ASK. Love to have you on the show. Hope you're having a happy, happy new year. Let's get right to the calls. Let's go out to Phoenix, Arizona and talk to my, my, my Miranda. What's up, Miranda? Hi, what up? I'm just excited to speak with you today. Thank you for taking the time to talk to me. Of course. I'm grateful that you called. What's up? Well, I have a question. Um,

and I'll just, I'll tell you my question up front. Um, I'm going through the process of a divorce. I'm waiting for it to be finalized. And I'm wondering when it's helpful to speak up about abuse and marriage after divorce. And I'm wondering if I'm just better off living with the truth and peace if I've left an abusive marriage. Hmm. I guess first out of the gate, man. I'm so sorry that you had to live with this. Thanks. Yeah. It's kind of awkward because a lot of people just really don't know. I left earlier this year and I'm trying to focus on rebuilding my life. I've mostly just kept quiet about it, especially from the beginning of our marriage. And I've been really focused on rebuilding my life. I've mostly just kept quiet about it, especially from the beginning of our marriage, and I've been really protective of my ex in a relationship. I thought, I guess I thought that we could work it out privately and like with marriage counseling and no one, no one in his side actually knows what happened or what he's done. And honestly, I feel like there are a lot of things I still don't know.

And I don't want to cause issues or drama. And I really don't want to hurt people because I feel like it could be really hurtful to talk about things. And I'm not sure I'd even be heard or listened to. But the reason I'm asking is because I recently ran into one of his family friends and it went really sour. And I'm just kind of shaken up and wondering if I did the right thing by keeping quiet. I want to reframe that for you. Okay. Is that cool? Yeah. Um, tell me about the abuse and then I'll walk you through this reframe. Well, um, it started really early on. It's really strange because while we were dating, he never physically pressured me to do anything. But within a few days of us being married, he just was very coercive and controlling and forceful. Are you talking about sexually?

Yeah. And at one point, he even forced himself on me against my will. Okay. We call that rape. Yeah. And at one point he even like forced himself on me against my will. Okay. We call that rape. Yeah. Hold on, let me stop you right there. Why does using that word make you so uncomfortable? I think I'm okay with recognizing that internally, but I've really struggled with publicly or with other people using that word because it doesn't reflect the image of what people typically think

of when they think of rape. And I don't want to take away from other people's experiences because I know this sounds bad, but I feel like mine's just not as bad as some other people's. And I don't, maybe that's the wrong response, but that's just how I feel. I don't know. I'm really not going to frame anything you're saying as right or wrong. Okay. I don't want you walking around with that sort of weight. Like I did this wrong. I will tell you that comparing trauma is an exhaustive fool's errand. It doesn't make you feel any better and it doesn't minimize to your body, to your heart, to your soul, the violence that was done to you and having your autonomy stolen from somebody who got up in front of your friends and family and God and says, I do forever is,

um, it can be one of the most unmooring. It just dissolves your sense of self from the inside out. Right. Yeah. But listen, hold on. I want you to hear at least on this phone call. Yes.

Your pain and the hell you've been through is yours and it's real. And I'm not going to do disservice to you by minimizing it, okay? If that helps you get through the day in a regular basis, I honor that. Your body has been trying to keep you safe and alive in whatever ways it's tried to figure out for the last however many years. That's cool. But on this show, I want to honor you enough by saying out loud what happened and calling it by the right names and not saying, yeah, but one time this happened worse to somebody else in a different way. I'm not, I don't play that game. Loss is loss. Rape is rape. Violence is violence. Abuse is abuse. Okay. Thank you. All right. So continue. Go ahead. okay thank you all right so continue go ahead um well i went through all of that and publicly just pretended like everything was great while like crying every day in private and always talking

really wonderfully about him to both our families um my family thought he was like the most wonderful thing um and we were both like away from our families we didn't have our families. My family thought he was like the most wonderful thing. And we were both like away from our families. We didn't have our families around us. And so it's a lot easier to just kind of act like everything's okay. And then we went through like nine or 10 months of counseling, couples counseling, some individual counseling too. Over this incident or just to generally try to improve your marriage? Regarding the abuse. Cause I just couldn't have intimacy again. Cause I couldn't feel safe.

You know? Of course. What did he ever apologize? Say, I'm sorry. I mean, what was his posture this whole time? That's the confusing thing because throughout that process, like eventually one day I broke down, like crying and sobbing about how

much he hurt me and like tried to just shove it away and move on, but I couldn't. And so that's when we went to counseling and we also talked about just in general, our relationship and communication, but specifically regarding what happened and moving past that and developing intimacy again. Um, and he was apologetic at the time. And since then, he's taken it away and tried to say it didn't happen. But yeah, long story short, initially through that process, things seemed good. And then after we stopped counseling, about a little year afterwards, or not a year afterwards, a year and a half ago, I guess. I'm sorry, it's confusing. For a whole year after that, it was just chaos.

It was like, he didn't really care about me anymore. He wouldn't talk to me, mentally, emotionally connect with me. All these really strange behaviors. It was like something else was going on. I didn't know what was happening. I was dealing with a lot of medical issues at the time. And I kind of hit a point in that year where I recognized I didn't feel like I had autonomy and can make decisions for myself. And I don't know if it was necessarily that I felt so much pressure from him, but I just felt like something was off. And I had this strange, almost like spiritual experience where I just felt everything in my body and my mind, like

aware of it and just like go and not even like leave him, just go. Like there's something in your situation that's off, go. And so in the process of trying to evaluate what's going on in my marriage, I, for like short periods of time, would stay with one of my close Christian friends because I just couldn't think clearly and I couldn't process my emotions around him. I just, I don't know why. I think I just didn't feel safe to. And through that process, it just spiraled. It's like the behavior got so toxic and there was like lying and gaslighting and triangulating between me and our families. And like he built up all this chaos and made it just a toxic relationship to even try to stay in, to try to be filled. And I was on the inside,

just like trying to wait for God to change his heart to be able to try to work things out with him because I couldn't reason with him. And it just, it got really bad. It got to the point where like I could see him enjoying seeing me crying. I could see him enjoying hurting me. It got to the point where he convinced me I was like crazy and tried to like diagnose me with like a paranoia disorder. And like, I almost like was thinking about admitting myself because I was like, oh my gosh, there's something really wrong with me. And if it wasn't for my good close Christian friends being like, he's gaslighting you, your concerns are valid. What's going on isn't okay. I probably

would have considered really doing that. Um, and so when, when did you, how long were y'all married? We were married for a little over three years. And when is your divorce final? Uh, it could be any day now. Is the, in your divorce decree, did you disclose the abuse? I didn't. I didn't tell my lawyer about what happened, at least until later in the process. And even then, it was like, she's like, you can either sue him or not bring it up. Because either way, like, one or the other. I don't know why,

but it just didn't seem like it was going to be a helpful thing. And I didn't, I was away from him at that point. So I wasn't going to like file a restraining order because thankfully I was safely away. So are you in contact with him anymore or are you done? Um, mostly just like finalizing uh the separation of things i guess is that in writing yes okay if you have means not everybody does i would hire somebody to do that and are you staying in the home or is he staying in the home? Y'all selling it? What do you, how's this? How y'all splitting up? I'm really fortunate at this point. I'm actually living in a different state from him.

So, so what stuff do you have to go get? I don't have to go get anything else. We've already like separated it all. Good. Okay. Yeah. So,

man, you've just been through it huh that's like just one part of the piece yeah yeah um well i was about to say you've left out a whole bunch yeah yeah yeah and i can tell because you have very circular evasive language that. It's a very particular way of talking that I only hear from people who are in deeply abusive relationships. It was real bad, wasn't it? It's confusing because like— No, hold on, hold on. I'm not going to let you do that.

It was real bad, wasn't it? Yeah, it got real bad. Okay. Yeah. Here's what I need you to know okay you did everything you could to try to make this thing work even to the point that it got so unsafe for you that your body said if you're not going to leave i quit okay yeah you weren't going crazy your body was saying i'm out because you don't get You're not going to leave. I quit. Okay. Yeah. You weren't going crazy. Your body was saying, I'm out because you don't get the message that we're about to get killed here.

We're living with a rapist. We're living with a absolute psychopath. psychopath and because you wanted to fulfill the role that the picture you had in your mind you were so caught off guard because this wasn't who the guy this wasn't the guy you dated because the family things were so nice and they like everybody performed so well at the family get togethers and the friend

get togethers and because you want to fulfill your whatever your faith told you your job was as a married woman, you went into autopilot until your body said, I'm out. Does that sound right? Yeah, I think I didn't see a way out when I was in it. I know. I know. I know.

But here's what I need you to hear me say real directly. Until you tell the truth to yourself, your body's going to continue to not trust you to drive, and it's going to drive for you. Okay. And what that means is you're going to walk into a meeting, and all of a sudden your heart is going to start beating 190 beats a minute, and your stomach's going to drop, and you're going to feel so sick, and and you're going to feel so sick and you're not going to know why and you're not going to be able to sleep you're not going to be able to meet people you see what i'm saying those are all

things that are happening right yeah i really struggle with this association i know that's your body saying oh you're not driving i'm out yeah okay a lot of that starts with telling the truth around language and telling the truth about what actually happened sitting down with somebody you've heard me say it a million times on the show grief demands a witness i gotta sit in front of somebody else and say the words my husband raped me my husband was wildly abusive. I know my husband was cheating on me because of X, Y, and Z. My husband did this and he did this.

And you have to say those things, okay? With a safe and trusted person. Now here's the rub. I don't have a good sense, and we could talk for a while longer but in if we were in a different context but i don't have a sense that family friends or his friends or his family i don't know what benefit there is to bringing all this up the divorce is final you're out of their life they don't get a vote into your life they don't get to speak into your life they don't have anything to do with your life and that lying piece of crap is going to tell them whatever stories he's going to make up about you and about the situation and what a victim he is.

And there's not a story I don't believe that you can tell that they're going to go, we knew it. Is that fair? Probably. Because the way this usually plays out is the world looks at the woman who got victimized and chose to show silence to keep safe it wasn't because you were a coward it's because your body determined you determined the safest thing for me to do right now is to be quiet the outside world says well if it was so bad why didn't you say something why don't you tell us?

Oh, because she's embarrassed. She's just making this up. See what I'm saying? Yeah. And they don't get a vote. They don't get a vote. So I'm asking you, what benefit would, I mean, who would you tell? What benefit would come?

I do see a significant benefit to sitting down with your family. 100%. I haven't spoken with his family, but I've tried to talk to my family. And I think only really my brothers are very supportive. The women in my family have Why? Well, I don't know. It's hard for me to understand, too. But there's history of abuse and enabling abuse in the past. And so to think of me being the one that broke my marriage and left irresponsibly is easier than thinking that I was a victim in a situation for them. So they've been married to abusive people and chosen to stay? No, they've enabled me to be abused in the past. Ah, gotcha.

So they've opted out of your life too? Yeah, my mom basically tried to deny past abuse that happened right in front of her and then told so they've opted out of your life too. Yeah. My mom basically tried to deny past abuse that happened right in front of her and then told me because you said that was abuse. I don't believe you when you tell me other things are abused. Wow. Okay. Are you seeing a professional counselor?

I am. Yeah. Yeah, I am. I'm actually excited to try and start EMDR sometime in the next few months. Good. Hopefully that is an excellent, excellent, excellent modality for you to help deal with this trauma. Here's the deal.

Sitting with a professional counselor, I mean, you got a hard row ahead of you. But pretending or to keep you safe and not have to deal with the reality of some of this by using some what I would call pacifying language or circular language like, yeah, it was really hard. He made me feel uncomfortable versus saying what actually happened, the words. Your body has to know that you are back in control. And the more that you deny it, the more you try to circle around it, the more your body's like, oh, she doesn't get the severity of this thing. And so you sit down in front of somebody, whether it's your attorney, whether it's your therapist,

and you say, this is what he did. And while we're here, this is what my mom did. This is what the man, my stepdad did. And when I brought it up, they made fun of me. Theyed me they said that's not abuse oh my and whatever whatever whatever i'm in i hate this for you so much given the fact that you have experienced abuse before and you told your mom and she didn't believe you, it makes perfect sense that your body thought, oh, this is happening again. We can't tell anybody

because that is not how this problem is solved. This problem is solved through silence and compliance. Let's try that because the last time it cost us our mother. And I need you to hear me say, none of this was your fault. None of this was your fault. I hope you'll sit in the presence of some trusting, quality professionals. And that your brothers, some friends in your new community will be trusted, safe resources for you. Grief demands a witness. I'm sorry, Miranda. We'll be right back. Hey, good folks, let's talk about hallow.

All right, I say this all the time. It's important to get away for times of prayer and meditation by yourself with no one else around. But one thing you might not think about though, is maintaining a sense of community when you pray or meditate. And this is especially if you don't consider yourself religious, if you question things, or if you've been burned by a church experience in the past, it's hard to want to get together with other people. And that's another reason why I love Hallow. You can personalize your prayer

experience with Hallow and they give you three free months to doow. You can personalize your prayer experience with Hallow, and they give you three free months to do it. You can pray or meditate by yourself, or you can connect with friends, with family, a prayer group, or some other community that you choose. And this way, you can share prayers, share meditations. You can even share journal reflections to grow in your faith together with others. And with Hallow, there are other ways you can personalize the app. They have downloadable offline sessions and links ranging from one minute up to an hour, and you can listen where it works for your schedule. You can choose your guide, your background music, you can create your own personal prayer plan, and more. I've made it a

personal point to begin my day every single day with the hallow meditation on the scripture of the day. It's a discipline and it's a practice. And here's what I'm learning. As with anything of importance and meaning, prayer takes intentionality, practice, and showing up even when I don't feel like it and even I don't want to. This is discipline. Sometimes you do this by yourself and sometimes you do this with a group, and Halo helps you with both. Download the number one prayer app on planet Earth, Halo, right now. And listen, viewers and listeners of this show,

get three free months when you go to halo.com slash deloney. It's amazing. Three free months of the app when you go to halo.com slash deloney. Go right now and change your life. All right, we're back. Let's go out to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and talk to Christopher. What's up, Christopher? Hi, Dr. Deloney.

Thank you so much for taking my call. I appreciate it. You got it, man. What's up? So I want to help my brother out. He's fought a long, hard battle with alcohol. And I've just noticed recently in the past several months, it's just gotten worse and worse and worse. And he hasn't hit a rock bottom point yet, but several members of our family have tried to talk to him, and nothing is getting through to him. And I just, I hate seeing this happen to him, and I want to know how I can help him, if I can. Yeah. Man, he's lucky to have you as his brother, man.

It's pretty amazing. Thank you. Do you live in the same community as him? We're two towns apart, but within about, within about a 20, 30 minute drive. Okay, great. What have people tried to do? How, how has that conversation gone? I know my parents have talked to him. I don't know what the conversation was. My, unfortunately my side of the family is not open communicators.

So I know they tried talking to him and tried convincing him. Didn't get anywhere. His wife tried bribing him after, you know, talking to him several times. She tried bribing him by buying him a big present if he stops drinking. And of course, you know, that probably lasted a few days. Yeah. That doesn't work. It doesn't work.

Oh man. Yeah. And every, every time I see him now, he's slurring, stumbling. Yeah. Even in the middle of the day. Okay. So when you see him, he's actively intoxicated? Yeah.

Okay. So here's a couple of rules of thumb when I'm talking to somebody who's struggling like this, okay? Number one, I can't make anyone listen. I can't make anyone do anything. And therefore, I'm not personally responsible for what choices they make. Right. It's one of the scariest, hardest truths to internalize.

Okay? Yep. Hang on one second. Kelly, have I talked on this show about my dad and the SWAT stuff and listening and following? I don't believe so. Okay.

Chris, I'm going to give you what is a very tragic truth, but one that is something I live by. Okay. And it was taught to me by my dad. My dad was a SWAT hostage negotiator. And so one of his jobs, when somebody was way up on a building, on top of a building, they were going to jump. Okay.

He would go up the elevator and let's say it's in a giant hotel he'd go up in the elevator and he would get out of the elevator by himself and he would always take a knee and he would pray and then the question they would ask himself is watch or listen and the reason he would ask himself that is he was prepping for if this person decides to go ahead and jump despite his best efforts. And that simple question provides a little bit of psychological space that lets me operate without knowing that I'm not tethered to this person. Does that make sense? Yeah, put some psychological distance so you can have a more objective view. There you go. Because if every time you see him, you think it's your job to save him,

you're going to end up drowning yourself. So remembering and internalizing, I can't make him hear me. I can't make him hear me. I can't make him do anything. He is making an adult choice. Okay, so that's number one. Number two, there is no conversation to be had when someone's intoxicated, period. Period. The first 20 years of my career, I spent working with intoxicated college students.

And I first would sit there in their rooms with the police officer and we'd have these long, drawn out conversation. By the time I'd been doing it for five, six, seven years, I switched. I would, if they were safe, I'd tell them to go to bed. If they were not safe, they would go to the hospital. If they had broken the law, they'd be arrested. And I would always tell them we will meet tomorrow at 11 a.m. Because you can't, you can't hear a word I'm saying right now. Right. Right. So that's number two. You can tell, y'all can have the most heartfelt, beautiful,

souls connecting conversation. But if they're not sober, that conversation is not getting through. Yeah, short-term memory shot. It's just everything, right? Yeah. So here's what you can do. Oh, here's the third thing. When somebody is struggling this deeply with alcohol,

I don't want to ask the question, why won't you quit drinking? I want to ask the question, what in the world happened in your life and is continuing to happen that this is the best way your body has figured out how to get through a day? Because that answer is where the solution lies. Okay? It humanizes a person in front of you as you're watching them just struggle. Right? So, here's what you can give him. You can give him an environment and a relationship where he is able to listen if he chooses to. So, what does that look like?

If this was my brother, I would do two things. I would write a short and very clear and simple letter that begins with, dear brother, I love you. And what I'm hoping is in a moment when he wakes up and he's sober and his body feels like absolute run over by a truck hell and before he reaches for a bottle he's able to read dear brother i love you okay the next part of that letter would be something along the lines of When you're ready to be well when you're ready to get help I am here and I will go to the ends of the earth. I will run through hell for my brother And it's short and it's sweet and it's very very clear And then I would be about inviting him out. Hey, do you want to come have breakfast with me? I'll only have it if you're sober If you're not sober then i'm not gonna i'm not gonna do it and then I would be about inviting him out. Hey, do you want to come have breakfast with me?

I'll only have it if you're sober. If you're not sober, then I'm not going to do it. So you get to choose, but I really want to go to breakfast with you. I had thought of trying to get him to a neutral place like a coffee shop in the morning when he's hopefully not started yet and have that conversation with him. Do you think it would make sense to deliver the letter at that point? Absolutely. Yes. Okay. And I would tell him, maybe with a smile on your face, I felt like I needed to write my brother a love letter and let you know that I love you. And if you don't say that in your family, it sounds like you have a family that doesn't share their feelings and emotions very often. This might

be super awkward. Yeah, it will be. And I think you plow right through that awkwardness and look him dead in his eyes and say, I'm your brother and I love you. Okay. Okay. Can I throw a wrench in it? Wrench it all up. I've fought the same battle for years. Okay.

Are you sober now? No. Okay. I was for last winter. Okay. I was for last winter. Okay. That fell off the rails over last spring, and I'm ready to jump back on again. Awesome.

So this conversation feels a little bit, you, you know, it faced, you know, not at all. I want to help you while I'm still fighting the same battle. No, man. In fact, in a strange way, it gives you a little bit of empathy and credibility. I'm going to a meeting tomorrow and I'd like to pick you up and take you. And you can look across the table. Cause both of y'all went through it when y'all were little, didn't you?

Yeah, we both started early. Yeah. High school age. That's right. Because you had to. And we don't talk about this enough in the addiction communities, but the alcohol worked.

It kept you two alive, didn't it? In a weird sort of way, I guess. That's right. It worked. And now it's got you. And now it's time to stop. I realized at one point that I had gone from recreation to medication.

And that's when I knew I had to do something about it. When you're drinking as a young kid, and your brother is too, it's always been medication. Just the medication stopped being fun. It's always been medication just the medication stop being fun it's always been medication and for whatever happened dude I'm so sorry that y'all had to live like that and I'm

I'm other planetary proud of you for saying enough is enough I'm done thank you it's hard and good god dude you're doing it in the For saying enough is enough. I'm done. Thank you. It's hard. And good God, dude, you're doing it in the black hole of a Pittsburgh winter for crying out loud.

I'm going to get sober with no sun. Good job, Chris. Good job. But I think there's something powerful about writing your brother a love letter. Here's the other thing. There's something powerful about writing 14 brother a love letter. Here's the other thing. There's something powerful about writing 14 year old Christopher, a love letter too, because that kid's life has been tough.

Had its challenges. That's the most happy. I struggle with addiction thing I've heard all day. I'm happy that I've been blessed that I've never hit rock bottom and nothing serious has ever happened because of my drinking, but I know I've burned relationships and lost time.

I just want it to be in my rear view mirror. We talk a lot about rock bottom, dude. But there is rock bottom. And if you've ever been, have you been to meetings before? Yeah. Yeah, you hear the atomic rock bottoms. That happens.

But dude, I just don't think most people make the transition out of rock bottom. I think for most people, rock bottom is they live underwater in their own life. Their whole life is lived under a mattress. Like Fight Club, it's just a copy of a copy of a copy. Nothing tastes good. Nothing to sleep isn't good. Sex isn't good. Marriage isn't good.

It just is. And you just deserve so much freaking more than that. There's so much beauty in the world and everything doesn't have to be shades of brown and gray. And so there is this big rock bottom. I'm glad you're not in jail. I'm glad you're not dead. I'm glad you didn't wreck a car or kill somebody,

of course, but man, I'm equally heartbroken that you wake up every day and you look at your watch and you think 12 more hours, I can climb back into this bed and call it. It's not quite that bad. I know. But the whole,

you know, every evening, you know, crack the first one open, crack the second one open and continue until, you know, I end up finally falling asleep. It's just, I can't do it anymore. That's right. And I'm proud of you for this moment. I'm proud of you. Now you just got to make the next right step as they say.

But I think there's something powerful about telling your brother hey me too and I love you and I'm going to a meeting tomorrow because I have to be I have to be done and that means I'm going to have to face my demons head on and I'd love you to be sitting right

shoulder to shoulder with me facing him too and if he won't go, just give him the letter and let him know that I'm there when he's ready. Whenever you're ready, I'm here. Yeah. And then you're going to walk the walk, right? Yeah.

Or walk the talk, I guess is what they say. Will you call me in 30 days? Will you get your chip? I will. Yes, I will. If you call me in 30 days and give me a chip, I'm going to make a monetary donation to a local addiction center in my community

with your name on it, okay? That would be awesome. Thank you. And I'll carry that all the way through until you get one year chip. That's my. Thank you. And I'll carry that all the way through until you get one year chip. That's my commitment to you. I appreciate that, Dr. John. Thank you.

You in? Are you in? Yeah, I'm ready. Okay. I'm proud of you, brother. Hang on the line. And Jenna's going to hook you up with a couple of different things. She's going to hook you up with a couple of different things. She's going to hook you up with both of my books.

She's going to hook you up with, I don't know many people who are wrestling with addiction who also have chaotic financial lives and happen to just work at Ramsey Solutions where they help people get out of debt. So I'm going to hook you up with the Financial Peace Series for free and the EveryDollar app that will help you make a budget and begin to get some control back in your life.

There's something about leaving your first 12-step meeting and there's that relief, but then there's that, oh, God, I got to face the music. Well, I want you to have tools in your hand to face the music, okay? So I'm going to hook you up with that stuff as well. So hang on the line here and Jenna will get you taken care of. I'm proud of you today. This is your independence day. This is your day of freedom, where you begin solving and choosing freedom. I'm proud of you, my brother. I look forward to hearing from you in 30 days. We'll be right back. All right, we're back.

Let's go out to dear Marie in Pennsylvania. What's up, Marie? Hi, Dr. Johns. Thank you so much for taking my call today. Of course. Thanks for calling. What's up? Well, I have less of a question and more just asking for help.

I got you. Let's do it. Just needing some help dealing with some feelings I'm having recently. My daughter just got married about a month ago, and we absolutely love our son-in-law, and we're so happy for them. We had a great wedding, a celebration but I'm as soon as the celebration ended I began feeling this immense sense of sadness and grief almost over like a loss and I've just been having a hard time coming to terms

with that and trying to understand why I'm feeling the way I'm feeling man I'm coming to terms with that and trying to understand why I'm feeling the way I'm feeling. Man, I'm smiling right now. And here's why. Because most of the parents I talk to these days have no relationship with their kid. Okay. And you love yours. I do, more than anything. What made your relationship with your daughter special?

Well, I can give you a little bit of background because although all parents think their child is special, mine is special. Here we go, Marie. I'm just kidding. Here we go. Go ahead. Well, just to give you some background, my daughter was born with a set of very rare and complicated heart defects. And 26 years ago when she was born, we were told at that time, you know, there's things that can be done to help her, but there's very good likelihood that she won't survive to her first birthday. So we did all the things that they told us to do, multiple heart surgeries, procedures, therapies, lots of hospital stays.

She made it to the first birthday, and she made it to the second and the third and so on. So over the course of her life, lots of other things have happened. But overall, she's been able to not just survive but really thrive and better than we had ever been told she would be capable of. And we're so grateful by the grace of God that she has had the life that she has had. So, you know, she grew up. She went to college. She graduated with honors, and she's great career in health care right now.

She's back in grad school working to advance her career. And she really has had, you know, what we had always wanted for her, a normal life despite her health condition. She's had some recent challenges on top of her heart disease. She, about three years ago, was diagnosed with a pituitary adenoma. So she's getting treated for that. As a result of her heart condition, she has liver cirrhosis. We're dealing with that. But as I said, she's just had this, you know, God-given life that we're so blessed.

And I should be really happy that, you know, she has gone on to make all of these achievements and have this perfect life and find the man of her dreams. And the week after her wedding, I was cleaning her room and rearranging the furniture because I was so sad. Okay, hold on. You're not sad that she's married. That's not what you're grieving. No.

You lost your job. Some gross, hairy-legged boy took your job. And in doing so, he took your identity. Because you haven't taken a full breath in doing so, he took your identity. Because you haven't taken a full breath in 26 years, have you? I tried to. But you haven't taken a full breath in 26 years, and now you just

passed her over to this boy that says, I'm in. Right. I cannot think of a harder thing for a parent to do other than to bury a child than what you've done so your grief and your sadness that now you're in search of a new identity a new role like a new a new thing because you've been on call for 26 years. Right. Right. I feel that.

I do. So give yourself a minute, okay? Give yourself a minute and your purpose has changed and your role has changed. You're still mom. You'll always be mom. And if anything tragic happens, and let's be honest, she's got a lot of challenges ahead of her, right? Yes, of course. So, um, I want to say it this way and tell me if I'm, if I'm misguided or wrong. Okay. Okay.

Can we, can I just, can I just speak as openly and direct as possible? Is that okay? Absolutely. Okay. You've been through enough that you can just, you can just hear it straight, right? Oh yes, absolutely. Okay. Cirrhosis, edema, heart issues. Like there's a lot of mileage on her sweet body, right? Yeah. A lot of challenge and repair and surgery. Her body's already tired and she's 26 years old, right? Right. For 25.9% of those years, you've dealt with that fragility by hanging on real tight. And you'll beat every single marker that they gave you. And also, you know time is fragile and short right yes i do okay you know that in

your soul and you took your hands off the wheel you had to because she said mom i want him to drive as she should right and so there's that chaotic reckless moment not reckless that's the wrong word there's that chaotic, reckless moment. Not reckless, that's the wrong word. There's this chaotic, terrifying, scary moment where you send your kids out to the wild. And in this case, you know what the wild's going to ultimately, how it's going to ultimately end. Yeah. And so instead of trying to make yourself feel better by holding your hands so tightly around her that she couldn't move,

you did one of the noblest, most amazing things a mom could do in this situation, which is let your daughter make adult choices and go live a wild, reckless love and work a wild job. And I got to rearrange the furniture because I'm just going to weep for a while. Fair? Yeah. Yeah. I, you know, and I always thought, you know, that I wasn't holding on too tight because, you know, that was something I

didn't want for her, her whole life. I didn't want her to be, you know, this weird sick kid all the time. Um, so I always sort of prided myself and being the mom that, you know, let her go and do things that were, were scary and dangerous, um, given her condition, but I wanted her to live life. You know, I always said if her life was going to be short, it was going to be great. Hold on, hold on, hold on. Do you realize how amazing you are? I'm serious. Listen. Oh my gosh.

What an amazing mom you are. Thank you. And that sounds so awesome on Instagram. And that sucks when you're living it out every day, right? It's hard. It's so hard. And that sucks when you're living it out every day, right? It's hard. It's so hard. But here's what you're doing in real time.

And most parents in our current culture cannot do this. I hope you hear me getting all fired up, man. It's bringing me so much joy. Okay. Most parents in our current world, I'll just, it's the current world, in our current culture, use their kids to prop up their own egos. And you are not doing that. You are saying, no, I am going to do what I can to keep you safe and keep you alive so that you can run wild and free. And your run is not going to be as long as the kids you went to college with.

We all know that. But I don't want to have gently walked to the finish line with you, holding your hand the whole way and making sure you didn't stub your toe and we get to the finish line. That's not what I'm doing. I want you to run. Right. And, and I've, I do feel that way. And I always have felt that way. And, and then, and then she got married and now I'm like, okay. Now what do I do? Yes. So here's, I want you to be really specific. You're not grieving her wedding. I don't believe that. I think you're really in your soul so happy.

And I don't know who this boy is, but what an amazing man. What an amazing man. He really is. So I don't think you're grieving the wedding I think you're grieving your role has changed dramatically and that's okay and so I want you to feel permission to spend time

being incredibly sad that's okay I don't want you to use your daughter as a Xanax to make you feel better, though. You're the mom. You're the adult. So it's going to be up to you to go hang out with your friends, go exercise, go on a trip, go do whatever you need to do to stay whole and well, right?

Hopefully it's constructive things, not destructive things. But it's your job to be sad. That's, I mean, that's feel fully full permission to do that. Okay. You're not crazy. There's nothing wrong with you. Okay. Okay. And then at some point, the ultimate healing part of this is as David Kessler says, you're going to go make meaning of it. What does that mean in real life? That sounds all lofty. I'm going to go make meaning.

Here's what that actually means with skin and knuckles on the ground. Here's what this means. It means, why you? Why did the cosmos, the universe, or God, why did they give you this beautiful young girl to raise and protect and send out to the wild? Why you? And what are you going to do with that? Are you going to be a mom that runs a Facebook page

for parents who find out their kids have some really difficult medical needs? Are you going to be a mom that brings kids with special needs from college over to your house over the holidays and serves Thanksgiving dinner long after your daughter has passed?

Are you going to be like, how is the world going to be different because of what you've learned and what you've experienced? That's making meaning. It doesn't have to be a grand gesture, but it can be. Right. Right? But that's not for today.

It's not for today. Most people skip the being sad part. And what they do is they create a kinetic hurricane of, of, of activity. And they help a bunch of people and they are so hollow inside. You can, you know,

they, they blow over with the slightest wind. So unfortunately for you and your husband, you'll have to feel this. Right. I don't think my husband's feeling it the way I am, though. I promise he is. I promise he is.

He doesn't say. He thought I was kind of overreacting over the last couple weeks as I had been sobbing over her Barbie dolls in her bedroom. Oh, you tell him to park it. You're overreacting. Whatever. His moment will come. His moment will come.

But here's the deal. Everybody reacts to this stuff differently. Everybody grieves differently. As David Kessler says, grief is like a fingerprint. Everybody does it differently. But your role has changed. Your purpose has changed.

No, I don't know. Your purpose is I'm going to continue to love my baby girl. Just what that looks like is going to be different now. Because love used to look like staying up all night, making sure that heart monitor was still beating. Love used to look like walking far enough behind her that she felt autonomous, but close enough that you could catch her if she fell.

And for a long time, love looked like singing her way to college, but then keeping up with her, checking on her grades, making sure she was okay. And then love looked like planning a wedding. And now love's going to look different. It's going to look different. and as my favorite poet, Stephen Connell says, love looks like come what come, I'll be right here. And you get to decide what that looks like. And maybe a fun conversation after your daughter gets home from her honeymoon or the smoke clears a little bit,

you take her out and say, honey, I have been trying to keep you alive for so long. How can I love you in this new season? Because you're a grown woman now. You're all married up. Ew. Ew. But you get to be sad, mom. I wish the world had more Marie's in it.

It's such an honor that I got to talk to you today. 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. Kelly, we were just talking off air. So you have a son that you've worked through lots of challenges and special needs.

Right, and he'll be 18. Today's is actually his gotcha day. What's that mean? That's the day he was adopted. Okay, gotcha. So today's his 16th. There you go, see, you just did it. Today's his 16th gotcha day.

But he'll be 18 here in a few weeks. And the fact that one of these days, some other woman's opinion will matter more than me, when he's sick, when he's hurt, when he's happy, sad, he will go to some other woman. It kills me. I can't fathom what that will be like and that I have to be okay with it

because that's what's right. So shortly after we brought him home, I apologized to my mother-in-law because I was like, I don't know how you do it. That all of a sudden one day I won't be the most important anymore. And that's how it's supposed to be, but I'm not okay with it.

And one day he'll have a medical challenge and you'll get the call while he's in route you won't get the first call right it's just i heard it's like cheesy saying to have kids is like having your heart walk outside your body it's so it is so true because it's just devastating. But it's what, I mean, like right now, dad's cooler than me because he's supposed to be learning how to be a man.

This is what's supposed to be happening. But when he's sick, like he was sick not when he had his wisdom teeth out last week, come and lay in mom's lap, lay down with mom. Well, that's because you were sneaking his Percocet. You know, make me soup mom. You know, it's just that mom's like the safe place and, and it's just devastating that that's how it is. I, um, so Josephine and I were out somewhere recently and something happened to where she got behind me and really close and was holding onto my hand behind my back. It was kind of a moment. Nothing went down, but it could have. And she sensed it

before I did. And she got real close and got behind me. And it was right. And I remember thinking in this moment, there is no person on this planet that can come through me to get her, period. And then I got all choked up on the way home while we're listening to Taylor Swift, whatever nonsense she was singing along to in the back. Because I'm going to have to hand that over someday. It's just devastating. Devastating doesn't even say it.

It's not right because it's right. Right. It's just exactly what, I can't be that weird mother-in-law, and I had a fantastic mother-in-law, but it's just so, to one day think, and especially when you have to watch them make bad choices and wrong decisions.

When I think back, I had long hair and a bunch of earrings and I was like, eh, man. How did they pass? I don't know how that happened. It's so hard. Actually, they didn't pass my wife at all. She's a grown woman. She didn't need anybody to pass her. I

I gotta wrap this show up or I'm gonna start crying thinking about Josephine. So there we go. All right. So as we wrap up today's show, we have a follow-up from Darcy in Omaha, Nebraska. The original call, dang Gina, October of 2020. The world was spinning off of its axis during this call right yeah we'd only been doing the

show a couple months at this time and we were right in the middle of covid lockdowns the whole thing so the original call synopsis was left in abusive marriage with two small children her son was very angry at his father and did not want to spend time with them small kid here's what darcy writes i called three years ago shortly after I left my abusive marriage. I had called because my kids were scared to go to their dad's home and I wanted to know what to do.

Wanted to share with John that we are thriving today and it's because of his encouragement. It wasn't because of my encouragement. It's because you made some really difficult, challenging, brave choices. My kids and I are seeking therapy. We're healing. I'm finishing up my master's degree in education.

We're close to not owing anybody any money. And I was recently promoted at my job. My kids are connecting with our community in sports and finding friends at school. It's been a journey, but it's one rooted in hope and faith that God's greater plans for us. Thank you for what you do. I will reiterate what I tell everybody when they say, you did this for me.

I run my mouth on a podcast or YouTube show. I literally don't do a lot. Y'all at home who are deciding,'m gonna talk to my wife in a different way I'm gonna leave this abusive marriage and I don't know where we're going, but i'm worth more than this i'm gonna Endure and head into this difficult season with my kids and we're gonna get this right y'all are doing the work Y'all are doing the work Darcy i'm so freaking proud of you amazing

incredible Everybody else out there who is making changes in their life, keep going. Whether it's your fitness, whether it's your weight, whether it's your marriage, whether it's your getting sober, whatever it is, keep going. So proud of you. Love you guys. Bye.