The Dr. John Delony Show - Should I Try To Make My Marriage Work?

Episode Date: February 6, 2023

Today, we hear from: - A wife who moved back in with her husband who’s clearly moved on - A man looking for advice on how to support his sister as she grieves her late husband - A woman who tried to repair a rocky relationship with her family Lyrics of the Day: "Anti-Hero" - Taylor Swift Let us know what’s going on by leaving a voicemail at 844.693.3291 or visiting johndelony.com/show.  Support Our Sponsors: BetterHelp DreamCloud Churchill Mortgage Thorne Add products to your cart create an account at checkout Receive 25% off ALL orders Resources: Own Your Past, Change Your Future Questions for Humans Conversation Cards Redefining Anxiety Quick Read 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. How do I improve the relationship with my family? What'd you do? My boyfriend, who's now my husband, physically hurt me. What did he do? Well, drug-induced, like, psychosis hit me and broke my arm. What up, what up, what up? This is John with the Dr. John Maloney Show.

Greatest mental health and marriage and parenting podcast that's ever been recorded and put on the internet. Ever. In like 20 years of internet existence, which is in a long time. But listen, we're coming along. So glad that you're with us. If you want to be on this show, I'm going to talk about what's going on in your life, what things are happening to you,

what things you've been a part of that you did and you're trying to figure out the next step. Give me a buzz, 1-844-693-3291. It's 1-844-693-3291. Or go to johndeloney.com slash ask fill out the form it's ask and we'll get it going hey listen i'm recording this before the uh one of these episodes launches okay so what i'm saying is by the time you hear this the episode will be out and the YouTube comments and all the mean comments and insights and all that will be out. So I want to preface this now because it's going to maybe feel, you'll say after you listen to that show, you'll stay with us. A dad calls an awesome guy and he

has a young kid and he's really struggling with sleep training. Sleep training was the presenting issue, but that wasn't the issue. The bigger issue was, is I have a dad here who felt incredibly powerless. He was failing in his job as a dad because he was trying to teach this two-year-old what to do and how to do it and when to do it and why to do it. And the kid wouldn't go to sleep, just wanted playtime, just wanted to have time with mom and dad and be up and around or whatever. And so I gave him some wisdom, some advice. It was not great sleep training advice. And so if he had been a client of mine, basically what you heard on the show is me condensing two, three, four sessions

into six or seven minutes. Had he come back to my office or given me a call, or we just went out for another drink and some pizza and just hung out, I would have said, hey, there's a whole sleep training process. Your kid does need some sleep training and some regulation. But the reason I'm telling you this is sometimes when somebody calls the show and says, hey, I cheated on my husband and I don't know what... Cheating on your husband is one thing. The underlying issue is a much bigger thing. And I don't think it's wise to go fix the roof when the foundation of a house isn't stable. And so often I will try to make the foundation, help somebody see

the foundation, how to make that stable. And then we'll deal with the roof later. And so I did tell the dad in this particular video, if I remember correctly, I just remember getting off the call and being like, man, internet's going to get on me for this one. I told him, just get up and play with your kid. Get up and be with your kid. Get up and relax. And if the kid wakes up at two, get up at two, go play with the kid. That's not a great long-term strategy. But when I'm trying to teach a dad, hey man, when you feel out of control, if you grip the wheel even tighter, you cause more internal angst in yourself, more internal electricity in your home and your kids based on their genetics and their experiences,

they start ping-ponging all over the place. Let's try another option because that one's not working. When things feel like you are powerless, loosen your grip a little bit, lean in a little bit. And then, yes, there's some very clear sleep training strategies that would have been for a follow-up call. So for all of you who are going to point out and say, I did not teach good sleep training, I know that wasn't the point of the call.

And for those of you who say I gave bad sleep training advice, you are correct. I did not. I did not give great sleep training advice. I was trying to go one layer deeper and to give a great father who's trying to do the best he can with his first kid, some peace and a global way of looking at dealing with your kids, loving and being in relationship and connection with your kids. And then on top of that, we'll figure out the strategies later. So just wanted to put that out there on the internets. And thank you so much. All right, let's go to, dude, let's go, man. Yeah, let's go to Jen in Perth, Australia.

Gosh, I want to say good day, mate. Jen's so bad, but I'm not going to because I don't know if I'm allowed to do that anymore. So good morning, Jen. Good day, mate. Yes. I'll say it. Thank you. You're allowed to do that.

I'm not. So that's awesome. Hey, what time is it where you are? Oh, it's 1236 a.m. And I did get out of bed for this. Oh, I feel so honored. I feel so honored. I don't think I would get out of bed at 1230 a.m. for a fire.

So thank you. So what's up? No, thank you. You guys have been very patient with me in taking this call. It's been a bit hard to line up. But I'll just get right to my question, which is how do I let go of things my husband did while we were separated?

The back story there is we were separated for 18 months. It wasn't the first separation. When we separated, I'm from North America and so I went back to North America and about three months into the separation, I asked him if he wanted to give it another go and he said no. And I was devastated, but I accepted that. And I was over there and he was here and my son, our teenage son

stayed here with him. And I just carried on. But then it came to a realization that I needed to come back to Australia. It was during the pandemic and I was, you know, kind of told by the universe to get back to Australia. So I did that. And, you know, we were always very friendly. Like, it was, you know, a mutual separation, what I thought. And anyway, I came back, and it was decided well before I came back that, you know, I would move back into the house, and he would help me get on my feet until I found a job and my own place and all that. But when I got back the very first day, I found out by my own doing that he was seeing somebody and not just seeing somebody, she was living in the house. Whoa.

Welcome home, Jen. Welcome home, Jen. Welcome home. Yeah. I mean, he had obviously asked her to leave before I came back, but that had been going on. He had met her four months prior, and he never told me. He put my son in a position where he had to keep secrets from me. Why did you get separated?

Well, that's a can of worms. Give me two or three at the time. Was there abuse? Was there just not working out? Was there people cheating on each other? What was it? Bottom line, absolute um bottom line absolute lack of communication no communication and I never felt I never felt cherished

by this man did you ever and he's not on the phone so I can't talk to him so I'll just talk to you did you ever give him very clear understanding or a road map to what cherished would feel like for you? And here's why I say that. Some men, myself included, absent a roadmap, think I'm annoying.

The greatest gift I could give my wife would be to go make a bunch of money and never come home. And the greatest gift I could give my wife would be to let her go do whatever she wants whenever she like, that's how I'll cherish her. And it wasn't until well into my marriage that my wife sat me down or we sat each other down. We had a hard conversation at a crossroads in our marriage and said, hey, this is what it looks like. This is what I need. And I was like, man, I was way off. And I've got to own that. And my wife owned her part. I haven't made very clear to you. I value you over your money. I'd rather you make way less money be around here. So I tell you that I'd rather

you help me with the dishes than start lighting candles first. Whatever the thing is, did you give them a very clear understanding of here's how you can best cherish me? Yeah, probably not. We don't communicate very well. I want to stop in this phone call, stop using the we. I want you to take ownership of the things that you,

there you go. Like I didn't communicate very well. He may be awful at communication. If he was on the phone phone i'd be letting him have it but he's not here and so instead of dumping it all into the we bucket and the we bucket and the we bucket like man i didn't communicate well and so we ended up on a break i feel like this is like a friend's episode right like we were on a break um you're back in you're back in the home um kind of the next, the next layer here. Have you given him very clear understanding of if we're going to do this and go all in,

here's what I need. I need to see your phone. You cannot DM any woman who's not me. You can't, I want to see bank accounts. Have you been very clear on a roadmap back? Or have you just stewed in your anger? No. No, look, this is part of my problem is ever since.

We just kind of, I think we got caught up in a moment. What moment? And we got back together. Okay. All right. That, that moment of, okay.

So I found out about the girl. I, I ended up staying in the house for a couple months and then, and I, I had to witness him going out on dates and, and all that. And it was, it's a very very complicated story

it is complicated but it's actually oh hold on it is complicated but it's i don't want to hide behind the complexity it's pretty simple oh y'all broke up y'all broke up and you chose to stay there and by choosing to stay there you got he rubbed your nose in all of his other choices it's not super complex if you had chosen to leave and have some self-dignity and respect and say i'm out and i know there's i'm making it sound easier than it is because i know you got a kid in the mix here at least one um it's not that complex the complexity is you wanted him to be something he was not going to be you wanted him to be something he was not going to be. You wanted him to do something he doesn't want to do, and you wanted to live in that house.

Is that fair? Yes, absolutely. Okay. So it is complex. It's messy. It's ugly, and it's kind of simple too. So what's your next move? So we got back together, and we set absolutely new boundaries.

We just kind of, okay, let's do this. And he said, I'm not going to change. And I said, fine, I'm not going to change either. And that's where it kind of laid. I'll show you. Yeah. Yeah. And now you're here.

So neither one of us has changed and nothing's changed. Right. And now you're here. Nothing's changed. Right. Well, very little. To be honest, overall, I guess the day-to-day relationship is pretty good. But I'm the one still reliving all this stuff in my head. Anytime anything little pops up, like, I don't know, anything annoying, or he doesn't text me when he's away, he's away a lot, and stuff like that, then I'm like, what am I doing here? I'm always questioning, is this where I'm supposed to be?

You should be. You absolutely should be you have a completely untethered existence you have you have a roommate and y'all are both decent human beings y'all aren't rude or ugly or mean or narcissistic lunatics so you're kind to each other and i bet if a stranger just a stranger off the street moved into your house y'all would treat them the same way you treat each other, like with kindness and, hey, do you need any sugar in your tea? I mean, y'all would just be kind. That doesn't make for a committed romantic relationship over the long haul. Yeah.

Well, I brought up the other day about how, because I told him recently that we need to talk. I need to, you know, we need to sit down and have a chat. And I had written out all the topics that we need to cover. And there was about probably eight things on this list. And I said, look, I know you don't have time right now, but just look at the list of what we're going to have to discuss. And on the list was roommate, the word roommate. And he's like, well, what does that mean? And I said, well, it feels like we're just roommates.

And because that's what it does feel. And he said, oh, well, you know, that's all part of it, isn't it? And well, I didn't think marriage was part of being just roommates. It's not, but you are sitting in a math class holding an algebra book. And you've never opened the book. You've never talked to the teacher. And you're getting incredibly frustrated that you don't know algebra. And so you are expecting things of this marriage that simply can't be

because y'all are not addressing them head on. And from just the short part of your story I've been able to hear, I think you understand what happens if you set these boundaries. He will open the door and say, have a great life. I'm out.

Possibly because he's a real lie by the seat of his pants. Yes. What is keeping you from respecting yourself like you need to be respected? Why don't you demand more from the universe for you?

I don't want him to be mad at me. Really? I know. Yeah, and I don't... Hold on. He's going to be mad at at you because he's got a he co-created a kid with somebody who has no backbone he's getting you're creating a context where he can't do anything but not like you

hmm and so you're getting the world you're creating for yourself and then if you have boundaries he's not going to hate you he's just going to move on it's you maybe yeah you don't like jen why this is not about him. This is about you. Oh, gosh. I don't know. I don't know. Well, you know, like everybody that calls into your show, they've got a history of trauma. Yep.

That's the healing. So you've got the immediate stuff that you've to figure out in this in your marriage okay you got a kid here and i i would i would go to the ends of the earth to not be separated from my children i get that that's chaotic and it might mean that you draw some boundaries then all of a sudden you get shipped out of australia and now you've got you can't see your kid. I mean, I get there's some international complexities to your situation. I get that. Okay. I don't, I don't have any expertise in that area at all. So I can't even direct you there other than to say what you're providing for your teen right now is this is what marriage looks like. This is how you honor and love and respect a woman. This is how a wife honors and respects and communicates with her husband.

And your son's worth more than that. Also, and equally, if not more importantly, I'd have to weigh that on a scale and figure that out. You deserve so much more than you're allowing yourself to have. You deserve to be cherished, yes. But I mean, the way you're presenting that sounds like it's out of a magazine. You deserve to have somebody ask you, what do you think? And what do you need? And to wake up every day trying to help meet your needs.

And you waking up every day to try to help meet their needs. And probably in your past, helping meet people's needs got you burned. every day to try to help meet their needs and probably in your past helping meet people's needs got you burned or got you taken advantage of and so none of this moves forward unless you do some trauma healing learning how to set boundaries learning that your boundaries matter that your voice matters that who you are matters. There's so much more love out there than you're allowing yourself to have. My hope is today you call a counselor there in Australia. And you start the healing journey back from when all this mess started when you were young.

And then you say, I want to develop boundaries. Because I've got a husband who is a serial cheater and I allow it and I just take it and I want something more from me, from my son and my wife. And maybe that ends up being with him. Probably not, but maybe it does. But all of this starts with your healing. And hear me say this, Jen, you are worth the healing. Thank you so much for the call. 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

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Visit betterhelp.com slash Deloney to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P.com slash Deloney. All right, Jack, we're back. Let's go to Tim in Boston, Massachusetts. What's up, Tim? How we doing? Hey, how we doing, Dr. John Deloney? Thanks for having me on the show. You got it, my brother. What's happening? Wanted to give you a call, get your advice. Recently had a life sort of situation occur that I don't have too much experience with. Um, I recently lost my brother-in-law to suicide. Ah, how old was he? Yeah. Um, uh, he was four years old.

How old? 40, 40. What was his name? Um, if you don't want to say that's fine that's fine yeah i'd rather not okay you got it that's fine um man is this a surprise to everybody or has he been ill for a while yeah i think it was sudden it was a surprise yeah but i wanted to give you a call because um obviously my sister along with a lot of other people you you know, currently in a moment of grief, grieving. And this is, by the way, this isn't a moment of grief. This won't be a moment of grief. This will ricochet through the rest of everybody's life. Okay.

Yeah, I agree. Yeah. Man, I'm so sorry. Thanks. I am too. And very, very sad situation. And I just want to make sure I'm there for my sister. I know her and I are very close and during this hard time.

You know, I don't, obviously I said previously on the call, I don't have a lot of experience with this. And I just want to make sure, you know, I'm doing my part and everything. I can support my sister. She's going through this really hard time. And, you know, I've never been married before. I don't have kids. And there's another, you know, case that is a little bit more complex. At the time of his death, they were currently going through a divorce. So I know she's dealing with all of those emotions as well.

And, yeah, I'm just looking for, you know, I've read a couple articles online on how to deal with, you know, losing family members to suicide and certain things to say to somebody when they're grieving or certain things you shouldn't say. Just trying to open up my mind and educate myself as much as I can. You're a good brother, Tim. Yeah, you're a good brother, man. She's blessed to have you.

Does she live in the same community as you? Yes. Okay, all right. So I'm going to kind of give you a rundown of um what i've told people for years showing up in this exact situation okay and then stop me at any point and ask further deeper questions here um because there's going to be people listening to the show and saying yeah but what, so feel free to stop me. I can talk too much and too fast in these moments, so stop me and say, what about this, okay? And then when we get to the end, I'll leave you with a little bit of wisdom that I've learned the hard way. First is basic body stuff.

You have to eat. You have to sleep. You've got to move. Okay. Often in grief, we just shut the system down or really our system pulls us underwater for survival. And it's really important to have people around you that are saying, hey, have you eaten today? Or better yet, just send food. And so it also is caretakers that you got to make sure you're taking care of yourself.

Some people, when they get in this moment, like really hard workouts feel good. I'm not one of those people. When I'm grieving, I have a tendency to sit in a 60-minute hard blow-it-all-out workout actually drags me down. But I do need to go for long, long walks a couple of times a day. So whatever works for you, take care of your body, even if you've got to set up some accountability. Someone's going to call you and check on you. You got that? Yeah. Okay.

She's going to need that too and if that's you if that is a friend of hers i don't know who has the closest connection to her but somebody who will call and make sure there's food at that house at all times somebody who's showing up saying i'm showing up for us to go for a walk and there may be days you show up to go for a walk and she's not getting out of bed that's fine that happens but on the whole somebody's going to keep showing up for us to go for a walk and there may be days you show up to go for a walk and she's not getting out of bed that's fine that happens but on the whole somebody's going to keep showing up okay you got that one yep okay the second one is she cannot be responsible for your well-being okay i can't i can't overexpress this enough. People who get cancer, people who lose a parent, people who have somebody who passes away suddenly.

Suddenly, their friends and family are calling them all the time, crying, can't breathe, what do I do? And they find themselves having to take care of everybody else. See what I'm saying? Yep. So don't – if you ever feel like your needs are being met by her, that's a burden that I wouldn't – I don't want her to carry right now. Okay? She can't be your tool for recovery. And so here's another example.

You calling every day saying, hey, do you need me to come mow your yard? Do you need me to come do this? Do you need me to come do this? Eventually that can become a way for you to avoid grieving by just trying to be busy by just trying to do stuff And it puts her in the position to have to make a bunch of decisions. Don't do that. Just show up and mow the yard Okay, just show up and mow the yard and show up with food make cookies and just bring them over Um do those things without putting the burden of should I do you want me to? What can I what else can I I? It's so disorienting. Okay, so that's that's uh, number two Number three you my brother have to grieve and if you've never done that before here's a couple of easy steps into that

One, um, I want you to write this dude a letter Probably a couple maybe one that tells you how mad you are And it might be you were mad way before He passed away It might have been mad the way he treated your sister that he was getting a divorce that he cheated on or whatever the things were Okay This feels weird because when somebody dies, we often don't want to think or say anything negative, and we bury that part. That part still

is fully alive and functional. So just duct taping over, wallpapering over the bad stuff isn't helpful during grief. You got to own it all. So write a letter, tell him how mad you are. Write a letter that you're mad that he hurt your sister. Even though you know he was sick, you're mad that he hurt your sister. Write him a letter and tell him how much you miss him and you like to laugh with him. And remember that one time. Write him a letter and tell him, I'm going to take care of your wife, my sister.

I'm going to honor your memory. Let him know what the future is going to look like. And what you're doing for your body is you're letting your body cycle all this stuff through. This is a physiological experiment. I mean, experience. This is a spiritual experience. This is a psychological experience, okay?

These things are exhausting and they're annoying. Sometimes there'll be tears. Sometimes you'll just be angry. Sometimes they'll just be like, I have no feeling at all. And write that down. I have, when I think about you, I have no feeling at all. And write that down. When I think about you, I have no feeling at all. We're just getting back in touch with our bodies.

Okay. Does that make sense? Yeah, makes sense. And mind if I interject? Absolutely. I think there's your point too there. So in terms of the whole being responsible for my well-being, that's one of the things I'm currently struggling with. I'm her younger brother.

So I feel like sometimes between siblings, there can be that dynamic of like, oh, you know, always protecting the younger one if you're the older sibling. And I feel like that's showing up already within the first week here. And I have trouble, like I don't want to tell her what she should and shouldn't be doing. But for Um, and I have trouble, like, I don't want to tell her what

she should and shouldn't be doing. But for example, if, if I'm upset, um, and I've been through a couple of moments with her in the first week so far, where I was there when certain, uh, emotional things were, were happening in live time. And I, I was there visiting with her to make sure she was okay. Um, just, you know, dealing with the, everything that's going on right now, not to name specifics, but, um, so in other words, when she sees me upset, she, she's always comforting me. In other words, I got to try to, I'm right now, I'm trying to not be upset around her. No, no, no, no. Don't take that from her.

Let her, let her take care of you. Don't force that from her. Let her take care of you. Yeah. Don't force it. Okay? Yeah. If you're with her and you start weeping and she gets up to make you tea

and and chicken noodle soup, whatever her thing is, let her do that. That's part of her healing and grieving process. She doesn't need to just sit

and be and feel like she has no utility. That she's not useful in any way what you don't want to do is show up and throw a bunch of burdens on her and i realize i may be talking out of both sides of my mouth but let her direct the healing that comes don't put the extra responsibility on her does that make sense and don't go over there and act like a robot because at some point she'll feel crazy that her life still feels like the bottom fell out and everyone else is just laughing and hanging out and it's just kind of moved on um there's it's disorienting and so if you're sad tell her you're

sad if you're heartbroken tell her you're heart. Just don't give her the job to fix it. If she chooses to lean in, great. And you might have to say at some point, hey, stop. Sit down, right? Let me take care of you for a while. That may be a conversation you all have. And, I mean, you're not going to get this right all the time, and that's fine. That's fine. There is the brother-sister roles, man, and the birth order roles.

I mean, that just happens, right? That leads me though to the next thing. By the way, these letters you write, she's going to need to do this too. And maybe I'll read them to each other if y'all are super close. Or if y'all have got other brothers and sisters and y'all are super close, y'all get together and y'all all write a letter to this guy and you read it it out loud. And you grieve together. That's grief. That's an incredible way to do it. It's cathartic and healing most of the time.

Not all the time, but most of the time. You're right on with the last thing I would tell you. And that is, dude, just show up. Just show up. Say way, way, way less than you think okay you don't need answers you don't need solutions you don't need cheap nonsense stuff that people stitch into pillows about how god need an extra angel or bullcrap like that when she starts crying or screaming or weeping or saying it's my fault it's my fault it's my fault or whatever

often the greatest thing you can do is reach over and grab her hand and pull her close to you okay yeah and man we want to solve these problems with our words so bad. And we just start talking and saying the stupidest things. Have you done that? I'm the worst. The worst about that. No, I haven't done that just yet. But, you know, there's definitely been, yeah, I've been around it while it's been happening. But I haven't done anything to like, yeah, I'm a pretty quiet person in general.

So good for you. You've got a lot to in general. Good for you. You've got a lot to teach me. Good for you. It may be that you play the role of protector. When somebody else starts, like a well-meaning mother or aunt is like, well, you know, you can say, hey, let's not right now. And it can be awkward and it can be weird, but play some defense for your sister. She doesn't need to hear that. She doesn't need to hear other people run in their mouths to try to make themselves feel better at her expense.

Right. It can be a, hey, not right now. Not right now. Right now is just hugging time. Right now is just hand-holding time. We have a casket to select. We've got songs to select. We've got health insurance policies to deal with and life insurance policies to deal with and mortgage and car notes. We've got all this crap to deal with. Lawyer bills. Not right Hope I'm being clear. Just show up and mow the yard.

Or hire somebody. Show up and bring a casserole over. Grab a burger and grab a second one and bring it over. And say no words. And she might, that burger may sit on the counter and she won't eat it. That's fine. She'll remember my brother kept showing up. And my brother kept showing up.

And my brother kept showing up, and my brother kept showing up, and my brother kept showing up. And eventually, you become – this is going to sound woo-woo and all gooey and gross. You become part of her nervous system, somebody she can rest into. Her body can begin to relax finally because she knows she's got a tribe. She's got a gang. She's got people that keep showing up. How does that sound? Yeah. Yeah, sounds good.

Great advice. Appreciate it. And maybe if you can show up and just go for a walk with her and just walk next to her or walk her dog with her or hold her hand or whatever your relationship is together.

This is a long haul. And especially in a divorce, I can imagine the guilt will be 10X. Like she played some kind of role in this. I don't know who knows what's in some sort of letter. This is just a messy, messy, messy time. Show up, show up, show up. Say less than you think.

Take care of your body. Don't use her to make yourself feel better. And you make sure you're taking care of your grief. You might have to see a counselor. You might have to go hang out with your body. Don't use her to make yourself feel better. And you make sure you're taking care of your grief. You might have to see a counselor. You might have to go hang out with your parents. You might have to call a couple of your buddies. You may have to write some letters to him who's passed away. Whatever it is, you're going to have to sit in the discomfort for a season. My promise to you is it will pass. It won't go away. You're always going to miss this, dude. You're always going to remember this time, but it won't feel like your body's on fire. For her, it's going to be painful for a long,

long, long time. And hey, this is important. In about a month, when the adrenaline's worn off and the calls stop coming and the Facebook messages stop coming and the flowers stop coming. Your sister's home is going to feel like a cave. It's going to feel like a hole is swallowing up that home. And those are the moments when all the cheering has gone away and all the lights have gone away and all the community has left and gone back to their lives. And your sister's looking around her room trying to clean up the ash, that's when little brother can show up. Again, some nachos, burger,

a lawnmower, no words, no little special Tony Robbins sayings or anything, just showing up, hands outstretched. I'm here and I love you and I'm not going anywhere. She's lucky to have you, my brother. We'll be right back. All right, we're going out to Kay in New Orleans, Louisiana. Okay, Kay, what's up, Kay? That was a terrible, what accent was that? Hi, Dr. John. Dude, I just shamed my family. I was kind of like, if Louisville, Louisville, and nevermind, I need to stop.

Listen, I'm sorry, Kay, for badgering the, what's up? How can I help? Thanks for taking my call. Of course, and embarrassing myself what's up what an abomination um my question is how do i improve the relationship with my family when some members are trying to make them choose between me or them what'd you do? Well, uh, I was just fishing there, but I guess you did. What'd you do? I did. I did. So throughout high school and college, I struggled, uh, with alcohol, drug abuse and relationship issues. Um, and then about five years ago, my boyfriend at the time, who's now my husband,

uh, physically hurt me and it was pretty bad. I ended up needing emergency surgery. Um, what did he do? Uh, well, drug, like, psychosis hit me and broke my arm. My gosh. Okay. Yeah. So my parents stepped in. I was 21 at the time. And they stepped in and they made me move home, put me on house arrest and sent me to like an outpatient rehab.

Was that a good move? The rehab was, yeah, I got sober. Really, really changed my life, honestly. But them putting me like on house arrest and treating me like a child again, really kind of was not so good. Because shortly after I started talking to my boyfriend again and my dad lost it and basically cut off all communication with me and kicked me out and stopped speaking to me. So do you under like, so I want to let me, let me, I know we're just getting to the story, but let me butt in here. Okay.

Sure. I like hearing what just transpired I both think yeah I'd probably handle it differently and I 1000% understand yeah I'm sweep nobody out there is taking care of my

daughter I'm going all in and man I went too far I made too many whatever I'm going all in and then when I find out my daughter has like is going back to this guy that put her in the hospital that beat her up that's like an unsafe drug using um maniac she's going back like at some point. I can see your father saying I can't have this Like I i've got to i've got to protect me and my wife now Now we can sit I can armchair quarterback that and be like you never give up on your daughter all those things that I would Say, but I also want to say man. I have a little seven-year-old girl and let me tell you k

I'd go to the ends of the earth right yeah so here we are um your dad says get out you do get out and then you go right back to abusive boyfriend yes okay and then y'all decide you know what things are already crazy hold our our beer. We're going to get married. Yeah. So it kind of, it was, it was crazy. Cause I mean, he got sober and clean too. And I didn't, I ended up moving in with his parents. Um, and really both of us kind of like turned our lives around. Okay. You didn't cheat on him, did you? No. Okay. All right, good. I thought that's where you're headed. All right, good.

No, no, no, no. All right. So what happened? What happened? We got married a year later. Okay. And so it was good. And I was kind of had kind of written off my family because it just, I mean, I had spoken with my dad and he'd be like, well, I just kind of had wished that you would have just failed and needed to come back to me. And I didn't. And it kind of,

you know, I get his side of it. I really do. But it sounds like a crazy story. But it was just that one time thing that nobody really understands unless they're living in it, I guess. But now, after we've been married a couple years, my dad sees us and wants to start talking to us again. So we've been trying to build that relationship. However, I have one aunt who won't let me come to any family events or anything if she or her kids are going to be there. So like this is Christmas, this is Father's Day with my dad, and this is anything. And it's my dad and my stepmom really kind of take her side in it. And I just don't know what to do at this point.

Like I've tried, I've sat with my dad, I've sat with my stepmom, I've said, I'm sorry, let me make amends. My husband and I have sat with them and I've tried with my aunt and she just won't let me. So I just don't know where to go. Oh, man. So I also, can I say one more thing about your dad

before I move on? Sure. It would be very odd, not unheard of, but out there a little bit. If there weren't challenges in your childhood, your whole life, with being heard or listened to or connected with, is that fair? Yeah, my mom passed away when I was a kid, and my dad and I just have had an awful relationship. Yes. And you've been trying to figure out how.

That can be a whole other call. I want to honor you too, okay? There's a reason your body said, hey, being high is better than what I've got to deal with at home. Checking out is safer than this. This guy is safer than this. Okay. And so I want to honor your body too,

trying to take care of you as well in the middle of a chaotic situation. Losing your mom is wild. Always asking dad, why are you as wild? Trying to be the token of his, like trying to heal his depression and all the grief and all that.

That's all you've been through a lot, right? Yeah. Yeah. And so now I hear somebody who's gone to hell and back several times, pretty scarred and beat up, but the light is on and you and this guy, man,

he's screwed up, but it sounds like he has worked his butt off to get clean and to make his life right and to never ever ever put his hands on you again ever and y'all are making a life for yourself and there's some people that want to hang on to the past correct yeah okay here's what i want you to. I want you to take, which hand are you right with, right or left? My right. Okay. I want you to squeeze it as tight as you possibly can and hold it for a count of five. Squeeze it super hard. One, two, three, four, five. Now let it go. Open it all the way up. Okay. now let it go open it all the way up that's the feeling

if aunt doesn't want to come aunt's not going to come if your dad chooses when he wants to have a relationship with you he wants to lean back in after kicking you out after a pretty rocky

rotten childhood he wants back in great but when it comes down to it he's going to side with his sister yeah you have to let that go you can no longer try to be the person who solves all your dad's problems you've been doing that your whole freaking

life yeah right and that means you have to make peace with your dad would rather make sure his sister is happy than like the prodigal son's father

go running out to meet his daughter. Yeah. And that is going to hurt like bloody hell, right? Mm-hmm. Yeah.

I'm sorry. My dream is this has a happy ending and that he is like what am i doing this is my only daughter i've already lost my first wife this is my daughter and he sprints down the driveway down the street and meets you before you even get home and right now it sounds like he's talking to his sister, Karen to make sure she's okay with the arrangements before. Right. Yeah. Yeah. I mean,

is there anything that I do? This isn't on you. You could, you can reach out. Yeah. I've reached out like three times. I had a face-to-face meeting with her and she just screamed and left yeah she's she listen she's acting like a child not like an adult even even

and i'm not saying the ending would be the same an adult may sit down and say listen i i see that y'all or have made a go it. I see that y'all got married. I cannot take the risk with my family, my little kids, that that guy doesn't show up here high and hit somebody else and put him in the hospital again. I lived through that. I refuse to live through it again, period. I might disagree with that outcome.

I might totally agree with that outcome, but that would be an adult way to handle it. Just screaming and hollering. Yeah, come on. She's a seven year old. And when a seven year old starts doing a temper tantrum, I'm not going to give you the attention.

I'm going to, as Jay-Z says, brush my shoulders off. I'm going to walk out. Right? The alternative is you are going to spend another decade running around like a squirrel in a backyard trying to solve all of the discomforts of the adults in your life. And that's just simply not your job. Your job is to be an honorable, great wife, a good partner, to be a great citizen, at some point a great mother if that's the route

y'all choose to take to continue your sobriety and your healing to lean into those relationships that lean back into you you see what I'm saying yeah and it's real common for somebody who loses their mom whose mom dies whose dad dies

to go to the ends of the earth to try to keep the family duct-taped and stitched together. Yeah. The hard work is great. Yeah. Feels like what? It feels like I'm the only one that's really trying to. Let go. Open your hands. I do.

Yeah. Create the greatest Thanksgiving and Christmas. That may be something you've never done is sit down with your husband and do it in June. Hey, what do we want Christmas

not to look like? What do we want it to feel like? Yeah. We want it to have lots of laughter and we want it to have silly gifts and we want it to have lots of laughter, and we want it to have silly gifs, and we want it to have old movies. That might mean no families involved.

That might mean a couple of friends because our families don't laugh. They're too serious. They get all uptight. They want to complain about the way you're by other people who will never be satisfied. And I think globally, we're all realizing, I don't want you to use me as a way to make you feel better. Yeah. And so, I appreciate you and I love you. I'm going to treat you with dignity and kindness and I'm heading off. You have a great week and you're going to have to deal with,

maybe you write a letter to her that you will never send. Maybe you write a letter to your dad that you will never send, but you process this, you sit in it for a minute and then you begin the could be, it's going to be hard but it could be really fun uh task of deciding like what do we want our life to look like because we can do anything fair yeah it's fair it's just kind of like i'd still i don't know i'm i just go don't talk to them anymore or just like talk to them on their terms or... I think you put one day on your calendar once a month that you reach out. Okay. And if they say, oh, you're just going to not talk to us anymore, you are happy to, just like you would with a high school boyfriend, say, the phone works both ways.

Yeah. And maybe you quit calling you start writing letters and you just put it on your calendar i'm gonna write once a month and this i'm gonna communicate because this is the only way the children and adults bodies and clothes are able to for me to communicate with them. Otherwise, our communication becomes a way for them to lecture us and to complain to us and to try to solve all of our problems and to let us know what they think of our decisions. That's cool, man. And I will say this.

You said it's a one-time thing, and you can only know it if you were living in it. I want to challenge that. The one thing I do know is that when I'm emotional, when I'm really head over heels for somebody or something, or I'm really raged out, or I'm terrified and scared because somebody's hurting me or trying to hurt me, I know that my body goes directly into fight or flight. There's also fight or flight or freeze, and there's also a less common, less talked about fight, flight, freeze, or fawn when I'm going to nuzzle up to the person that keeps hurting me in an attempt to try to woo them and to stop hurting me and people who suffer from abuse often say things like you just don't understand and it's just one

time and it's kind of like when the way holyfield beat tyson was he kept getting real close real real close and it feels insane except that people can't fully extend a punch when you're one inch away from them That's the fun. I'm gonna just gonna i'm gonna love you And I know that when I get emotional I have to have people in my life that I trust that I outsource that to I gotta have this truck. I gotta have this truck, dude. Don't buy a truck you idiot Okay, thanks to. I got to have this truck. I got to have this truck. Dude, don't buy a truck, you idiot. Okay, thanks. My wife's the worst. My wife... Dude, your wife's pretty awesome. You're actually the moron right now. You got to have other people in your life speak into it. And if somebody is

willing to burn your relationship down in order to save your life, when all the smoke and fog clear, sometimes it's good to exhale and say, thank you. I didn't like how that felt or how you did that, but thank you. This is a messy, messy, messy situation, Kay. I want you to always go back to you and your husband saying, hey, what do we want our life to look like? How do we want our life to feel? What do we want this thing to look like in three to five years? And most importantly, what of this can we control? Let's set off down that road together and brush those shoulders off.

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, as we wrap up today's show, this one's for Jenna. Song of the day is from the great and all-powerful Taylor Swift. And the song is Antihero. And it goes like this.

I have this thing where I get older, but just never wiser. Midnights become at my afternoons when my depression works the graveyard shift. All the people I've ghosted stand there in the room i should not be left to my own devices they cut they come with prices and vices i end up in crisis tale as old as time and i wake up screaming from dreaming one day i'll watch as you're leaving because you get tired of my scheming for the last time it's me hi i'm the problem it's me ke, I can see why you picked this song, and I agree. You are. Just kidding. And you're brilliant. See you soon.