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Coming up on the Dr. John Deloney Show. My wife and I have been married coming up on seven years. She has fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, and all sorts of stuff. I feel like I'm in an uneven marriage where I'm putting in 100% and she just uses her health as the trump card for everything. I thought that marriage was supposed to be an equal partnership.
What in the world is going on? This is John with the Dr. John Deloney Show, and I'm so grateful that you have joined us. Your most precious resource in the world, your time, and you're sharing it with us. I'm super grateful. On this show, we talk about mental health, emotional health, relationships, whatever you got going on in your world. And if you want to be on this show,
It's real people going through real challenges. Give me a buzz at 1-844-693-3291. It's 1-844-693-3291 or go to johndeloney.com slash ask A-S-K and fill out the little box. Type in what's going on in your world and we'll see about getting you on the show. Let's go out to Pensacola, Florida and talk to M-A-T-T. What's up, Matt? How we doing, man?
I'm blessed and highly favored, Dr. John, just not adequately caffeinated. How about yourself? I am overly caffeinated, not so blessed, and I'm pretty blessed, not highly favored. I just got Kelly staring at me right now. So my favor is less than, but it's all good. What's up, man?
whole thing really is, you know, my wife and I have been married for coming up on seven years in September. And so she has fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue and, you know, all sorts of stuff, which is also kind of led to infertility and whatnot. But the big thing is I'm trying to figure out how do I love her through it? How do I not feel resentful for, I
I guess you could say having to at times be the one that feels like I'm standing in the gap more. You just try to do your best to not say anything like of anything of depth or substance so that you did a great job. Like you just were a plane that flew over the beach with a banner behind it. Let's get beneath the banner. Like, what are you actually talking about? So, uh,
The only way this works, dude, is you just got to let it rip, man. You got to let it rip. Tell me what's going on. So on my end, there's been a lot of resentment about it because I feel like I'm in an uneven marriage where I'm putting in 100%.
And she just uses her health as the trump card for everything. And I'm just I'm not happy in my marriage when, you know, I'm the one that, you know, by God's grace, you know, got sober two and a half years ago, has been trying to, you know, in the words of the poet Rob Bailey, you know, wreck his life to resurrect it. And I feel like I'm the only one paddling. OK, that's fair.
Did she paddle a long time before you got sober? She claims that, you know, she claims that she did, but, you know, financially speaking, I've always been the one. And then the last year or so, I've had to really focus on my mental health, which ultimately led me to you because I had a whole bunch of, you know,
episodes with a lot of anxiety and a lot of depression and whatnot that I've been getting counseling for and whatnot. And
it's, it's been a rough year. And as a result, she's had to step up and I've been getting my, you know, emotionally getting my, my brains beat in over it with just how our dynamic has especially been in the last six months. Okay. Um, how honest are you willing to be with me? Completely. You have somebody else? No, not even emotionally. Okay.
No. Okay. What led to this phone call? I'm angry and I'm tired of trying and I'm tired of being, I'm tired of being the one that has to bear the brunt of everything. When I, I thought that marriage, when I got married was supposed to be an equal partnership. Yeah, but it wasn't when you weren't sober for five years, but also like, right. So it wasn't, but also, um, there's something deeper than that.
Can I tell you what I'm hearing? Go for it. And tell me I'm wrong. I'm hearing you don't believe your wife. And I'm not saying you have to. This is what I'm hearing. That you don't believe her. That every time that something hard comes up, she puts this, like as you call it, the trump card down. She says, I'm too tired or I'm in chronic pain. And you've got to a point where you don't believe her anymore. And it's different when you're supporting a spouse who's,
Like I talked to a caller on a previous show, like the spouse had bone cancer and he was, they had had a sexless marriage for years and he was struggling with how much he loved her, but also he's, he's dying from a lack of touch. Right. And so there's that there's I'm in full support of this, of, of my partner who's struggling. And then there's a different here. Like, I don't think my partner's actually struggling. I think I'm making all the changes. I'm doing all the work and they're doing nothing.
And underneath that, I feel like you're out. You're trying to talk yourself into going all the way with it and that you're done, done. And you don't want me to give you permission or you're just trying to talk yourself out, uh, out of staying. Am I wrong? I'm trying to figure out the right way to go because, you know, I'm a deeply flawed individual. We all are. We all are. But, you know, the,
I've been that person my whole life. My existence is synonymous with defiance, and I don't want to be a quitter. I've always been that person where the guy who I actually owe my sobriety to says, we're under pressure.
And that's what I'm trying to do. And I want to be synonymous with doing the right thing. Okay. Good deal. And I honor that. Okay. And did the person who walked you through sobriety over two and a half years tell you that it's maybe one of those things that you, like, you know, intellectually you understand, but as you're experiencing it, it's very difficult that when you get sober, it blows up everything. Mm-hmm.
Because it just rattles the dynamic of every relationship you have with your wife, with your kids, with your coworkers, with your friends, and not always in good ways. Yeah. Well, I had, you know...
I mean, I had worries, sure, but this whole, you know, depression and anxiety that I had after the fact, this is uncharted territory for me, which is why I've been working on talking to a counselor on the regular. Good for you. Well, besides just talking, are you making some life changes? I'm in the gym four to five days a week is the average goal. And once I get my schedule nailed down, because I just started a new job and everything. Awesome.
I did 75 hard last year successfully on my first attempt, and I'm going to probably do that again. That's awesome. So what I'm hearing you tell me is, well, let me back it up. You using for however long you used, it played a role in your life. It did something. It protected you.
And when you remove that, now your body is feeling what it's been trying to tell you all along, right? The anxiousness and the riding low, all those, your body's trying to get your attention for some things and those things are going to surface. And your AA sponsor was right on, man. That, you got to go right into the ugly and that's hard. And it's uncomfortable. I didn't do AA, I went full on cold turkey. Oh, well, there you go.
Okay, so that means, oh, geez, that's a whole other conversation. Not that everybody has to do AA, but what you did was you've been using crutches for a long time, and you just hacked them up with a hatchet and threw them in a campfire. And you're like, I'm going to start walking. And your body was like, oh, really? That's how we're going to do this? Right? And so, yeah, there's a price to pay, man. Do you have a community? Do you have people that you hang out with? I mean, I work in the...
I work in the automotive sales world, but I keep my circle very, very narrow. I've got a friend who's probably the closest thing as far as a relationship I have. I could have to a brother that lives five minutes from me, but by and large, I go to work, I go to the gym, I call my folks, work, sleep, workout, whatever.
And your body's going to keep being anxious and keep running really hot and really low until you get a community of friends that you can relax. Your body would be failing you if it let you sleep all night after working and working out and having a really electrified marriage, not in a good way, but you have nobody to call in the middle of the night. And as a salesman, you know, as well as I do, every moment of that job is transactional, even with your fellow salesman.
Everything always has a smile and an angle and a handshake to it. There's no shoulder dropping in those relationships. And that to me is the most beautiful part of a program of AA of some sort. And I'm not saying that's for everybody. And I know people have been hurt by it and all that. But it gives you a built-in system of looking around and going, okay, these are people just like me. I'm going to be all right. And here's why I'm telling you that. You are white knuckling everything.
and you're good at white knuckling, I just want to tell you there's a cliff of a shelf life to white knuckling. You're going to have to make peace with your body. You're going to have to make peace with your past decisions. You're going to have to make peace with relationships because if not, you're just going to trade one series of addictions for another. And then what happens is you start spinning and spinning and spinning. You just look for the closest person to dump all this on. And I'm not saying your wife is blameless here, not even a little bit, but she's not on the phone with me.
Who do you have that you talk to on a regular basis that you drop your shoulders and you're like, man, I'm really hurting. I miss my wife. Probably my best friend that I moved down here to be closer to. Okay. Y'all get together once a week? Y'all get together some regularity?
We have that relationship where, you know, we text each other every day. But as far as, you know, in-person contact, it's probably once every two and a half or three weeks because he, between the, the ones that live out of state and whatnot, he's got, you know, nine kids and I'm a workaholic. Okay. So,
And you just said it. So you're transferring one addiction to another, right? And this one's admittedly healthier for the time being. And most of my early sitting with people who had burned everything to the ground were workaholics. Okay. Let's back all the way out with your wife. Here's what I got to tell you. Let me ask you, is she refusing to go meet with a counselor or a psychiatrist or a psychologist to deal with fibromyalgia, to deal with chronic pain, to deal with some of these things?
she has a counselor that she's talking to. And then I have somebody I'm talking to who also does our couples counseling as well. So how's, tell me what couples counseling is like. How's that going? Dread it every single time. But at the same time, it's like scratching off dead skin. I think it's the best way to put it where it's like, it needs to be done and you feel better after the fact, but it, the whole time I feel like I'm,
I'm the one in the hot seat because she's the one that's been pushing for it. Have you said your needs and wants out loud? Yes. I've told her, you know, this is where I'm at mentally and this is why I'm frustrated. And then health, trump card, standard, you know, operational programming, you know, rinse and repeat.
And your couples counselor, your therapist doesn't push on her to ask her what she's doing to get well and to get to deal with some of the challenges with how she's experiencing the world? I don't know about her personal counselor, but usually the counseling is related to our dynamic as a couple and communication because that's something we've been working on as opposed to as opposed to just, you know, her specifically.
What is she not doing that she needs to be doing? Or in your head, what work does she need to be doing so that she would be pulling equal weight in your eyes? I don't want to deal with complaining when you're the one that has to stand in the gap. Specifically, whether it's financially and having to do it that way or... Dude, I need you to be specific. What do you mean? Is she complaining that you don't have enough money but she's not getting a job?
She's working. She sells, you know, cars as well, just like I do. And when I was having three consecutive horrible months, it was just continuous browbeating about, you know, when are you going to get your act together? When are you going to start selling well again? So that way I don't have to work so hard because I shouldn't be doing this. Okay. And
So for whatever reason, you had 90 days of a bad string that all salespeople go through. And she beats you up about it. And at any point you say, hey, we're on the same team.
And I'm doing the best I can and I'm sorry? I said, I'm doing the best I can with the cards I've been given, the customers I've been dealt. And then she immediately pulls out a fibromyalgia card? She uses that constantly to basically try to restate her position and say, I shouldn't have to do this because I'm sick and you don't understand that and proceeds to consistently browbeat me about it.
I guess, bro, I feel like I'm at a loss in how I can help. Tell me how I can help. A, how do I love her through it? B, how do I do this as a man who is trying to reinvigorate his life? I just, I can't keep going on like I am. I wish I had an idea. It just feels like I'm a rat on a wheel, Dr. John. I'm just going to tell you what I would tell you if you were my best buddy or if I found myself in your position. I'd look in the mirror.
I would tell you to hang up the phone with me and to Google the nearest, the next AA meeting and show up and say, I can't do it anymore. Because you haven't dealt with the core challenges of the reason your body was drinking in the first place. You did stop and your ability to just stop is staggering. It's pretty amazing. But the no, no Navy SEAL would go into battle all by themselves. They've got a team.
And you launched out to do a really noble, powerful thing for you, for your marriage, for everybody. And, but you went by yourself and you've taught yourself that you've got incredible willpower and grit. There is something going on in your marriage that bro, we can't, I don't even know how to begin to unpack it. She's not even on the phone with us. I don't know how to unwind it. Um,
And I don't know if she's trying to make you pay penance for the years y'all were together before you got sober. I don't, who dude, who knows what's going on, but I know trying to deal with that right. The second you're not, well, you have to deal with why your body was utilizing whatever you were using just to get through the day. And again, like I said, you just set your crutches on fire and then you just started running, started running without ever dealing with the root of the pain. And so again,
That's what I would tell you to do, man. Because you're talking to a counselor, you're sitting there with a marriage therapist who either doesn't have a spine to call both of you out. And as the great Terrence Real said, a good marriage therapist will take sides as needed. And they won't. They're just the communication loop-de-loop. You're seeing a counselor talking about how you feel and you're starting to do some really incredible things.
But man, I know better than anybody, just like you, man, I can work out. I can try to get 1% better every day. I can listen to audio books and read books and go get another degree and another degree and get another job. And I could do all that stuff. But if I can't look in the mirror and be okay with a guy that I see, if I don't have a gang, a tribe, a group of people that I can drop my shoulders and exhale and do life with, I'm not well.
And I'm not showing up for myself, for my clients, for my people, for my wife, for my kids. And so you've got all the surface stuff and you are moving on the surface. But if you don't deal with the spiritual stuff, and I don't just mean going to church, I mean the spiritual stuff like, who are you and who do you want to become? And why are we doing all this work in the first place? You don't deal with that.
man, you said it best. You're right on the wheel. Just go into the next book. All right. Go to the next workout. Okay. Making one more sale. Okay. And it's, that's that hollow. That's that Instagram change your life-ish stuff. It's the hollowness that is pervasive in our culture these days. I'm doing all the right things. I'm going, going, going, going. Dude, I'm as empty as I've ever been. And maybe it's as simple as sitting down with your wife and saying, I don't know. I, I, I don't
know how to show you that I love you, but I do. Can we build something new? Maybe she says no. Maybe she says no. I don't know. And if I know this as a man, every time you're something doesn't go right, you don't have as good a month as you had. If you've got a wife who's beating you up and brow beating you and calling you a loser and telling you that I shouldn't be, man, you can't live like that. That's not right. She shouldn't be doing that either. So yeah, man, if I'm you, that's the first thing I'm doing is I'm getting off the phone. I'm going to go to a meeting.
And I'm going to walk in and say, all right, two and a half years of white knuckle dip. I'm just starting to move from one addiction to another. And I can't do this by myself anymore. Will y'all help? That's where I would start, man. I know it's not great advice, but that's what I would do. Thanks for the call. Good man. We'll be right back.
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All of it. Invest in yourself with Organifi. All right, we are back. Let's go out to H-Town, home of the Astros, and talk to Sam. Hey, Sam, what's up?
Hey, Dr. John. I'm stoked to talk to you, man. This is surreal. I'll jump right into my question and we can dig into it. Well, hold on. It's surreal. I don't get to talk to Houstonians very often. I got to talk to these Nashvillians. It's good to talk to you. Oh, yeah. I'm very excited. I've listened to your show for, gosh, I found it in like December and I've listened to everything for the last year and a half. And just to hear your voice, it's so surreal. Well, it's an honor to talk to you. So what's up?
So my question today is how do I best love and support a good friend who came out as being transgender? So a little bit of backstory on it. We grew up, so she's transitioning from a female to a man. We grew up in church together. We played on the same hockey team. Youth group did all that.
And I'm struggling with how to, I guess, best accept her decision first off. And then how do I support and love her?
her, I don't even know if it's politically correct to say her or him, uh, her, as she goes through this, this transition, because I've gone through and talked to people who I value their opinion. And they kind of look at me with tears and headlights and I've never been through a situation like this before. And it's, it's uncomfortable. And I just want to be there. Yeah. Um, uh, what name is your friend going by?
Joey. Okay. So I'm going to call Joey, Joey. Have you asked Joey, what's the best way I can love and honor you through this transition? No. That's where I would start. Okay. And having been in your exact situation, I would also...
hope that your friendship is strong enough. And I'm a, I'm a pretty much, I just, I'm pretty open. And my friends sometimes have shaken their heads over the years and be like, Oh, John, please don't say that ever again like that. But they know me and they love me. I would say, Hey, I'm going to get some of this wrong. And I'm going to ask that as you're going through this really tough time, know that I love you. I'm going to do the best I can to say the right things and to speak the right things. And this is weird for me too. And allowing that person to go, of course, absolutely.
And then be able to walk along. And if the friend says, if you say it wrong, I'll know what you really believe. Then they are moving away from your friendship. Okay. You get what I'm saying? Yeah. Yeah. And so I think anytime, anytime. So transgender, I mean, it's, it's not as third rail as it was just, you know, a year ago, but let's, let's remove transgender from the conversation and let's make it something a little like more benign. Um,
I don't, let's just take a traditional vanilla husband and wife. Okay. If you listen to this show, you hear me say this all the time. Like, Hey, how do I love my wife? Or how do I love my husband? I don't know. Ask them what's the best way I can love you today. And so I think that we often try to, we think love looks like showing up and saying the right thing and doing the exact right thing and always being right on the right thing. But,
And I think love is, is before that. I think love is a, I'm not going anywhere. I'm your friend. I love you. And love is, um, Hey, I'm going to screw this thing up. This is a big change, a big transition, no pun intended. Like this is big. And, um, I'm going to accidentally call you your previous name. I'm not going to mean to, but I'm going to, I'm going to, we've got a long history together. Like I love you. And we're going to figure this thing out. Um,
And also, how can I best love and support you? And then you have to decide, Sam, do any of those requests for love and support violate your values? Okay. You see what I'm saying?
Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And I think I probably got one of you used this saying a lot where like what you had before is over and you need to make something new. Yeah. I've kind of tried to think, think about it that way to where, hey, this isn't the same as what it was, but I want to build something new, which usually say that in marriage relationships, but. But
But Sam, you are right on. That happens at work. That happens in our friendships. That happens with our kids. Rebuilding something new happens everywhere all the time. And I love that application. So unfortunately, we live in a world where if you ask a question,
you're somehow demeaning. And I think questions are the most honoring thing. It's the most honoring way to show hospitality. Tell me your story. Tell me about you. What's the right way to say this, right? And when I was working with college groups, man, I had close, close friends that had different political beliefs that were gay, straight, transgender. And I would ask like, hey, what's the right way to say this? I'm gonna go speak to the student group. And they were so honoring. They would be like, hey, say it like this, like this, not like this.
And then I remember having one friend and she would say, oh, hey, it changed. Don't say that. Say that. Right. That was such a gift. And I was trying to be hospitable. I wasn't running through the world like a bull in a china shop. Like, it's going to be my way. And this is right. So I think everybody's got a right to safety and right to love. And these kind of things are messy and hard. How long have you all been friends?
About 20 years. Okay. So I'm 25 and she's 25 too. Okay. So it's like your best bud from childhood and it's so different. Yeah, it's so different. And can I give you permission? It's okay to grieve what was. It's different now. It's just different. And also give you permission to explore what this new friendship is going to be like, but it's going to be different.
What are the things you're most nervous about? Well, I don't want to... I feel like she's been ostracized by her family. And she's a teacher. So she's gotten a lot of backlash from children's parents who they're like, I don't want to be in his class. I don't want that being an example for my kid. And...
I just know how prevalent mental health and suicide has the potential to be, especially in the LGBT community and the adverse challenges they face more so than myself. And I just want to make sure she's okay. And I think that your, your willingness to love a friend going through a tough time, like, so again, let's take transgender off the table because,
Somebody goes to work and all of the students' kids say, we don't want that person. Not around my kid. Like just all humanity, put yourself in that boat. Like that would feel hollow, especially if you're a teacher and you're decided to like make your entire living making less money. Like all that, it's a hard time. And so your choice to say, hey, I don't know what you're going through. And even go this far. I don't even, like from the outside, I don't think this is the right decision for you. That's not my decision to make.
You're close friends. You're 25. I mean, you're 20 year friends. You only get a few chances in life to have 20 year friends. So you get to have opinions about your friends, right? For a friend like that. And I've got opinions about my friends and they got opinions about me. But your choice to say, hey, you are never alone. And I'm going to sit here with you. I can agree with you all the time, but you're never going to go through life unloved. I'll tell you that right now.
And if you are worried about that person's, about Joey's safety, you let them know. I'm not calling 911 every single time. Every time. Because you're my 20-year friend. You're not dying on my watch. And I'm going to continue showing up. And I'm going to continue showing up, especially when it's hard. And nothing about Joey's path moving forward is going to be easy. Zero percent. None. And I think you're right. Like families ostracize you, work ostracize. It's tough. It's a tough, it's a tough, tough road.
And so just being a friend that says, Hey, I'm going to check in on you. I'm going to text you. It's tough, but I'm going to be that friend. Does that feel, does that feel, and again, that doesn't mean you have to subscribe to every belief. That doesn't mean you have to, I mean, you don't have to go along with things you don't feel comfortable going along with all that, but you can be there. Does that feel like something you can do? Are you concerned that you don't want to be there either?
Well, I think the advice that I had been given is more kind of the relationships ran its course. And to me, that felt like that was something that contradicted my value. Yeah, that language is stupid. I don't believe that relationships quote unquote run their course. People opt out. People opt out. And...
If somebody did something that you find morally reprehensible and you choose to not be their friend anymore, that relationship didn't run its course. One person made a choice and so the other person made a choice. But that's a decision grownups make to end relationships and run their course. I just don't like that language because it makes things seem inevitable and few things are inevitable. Adults make choices. Adults put up boundaries. Adults make value decisions and value judgments.
So yeah, I mean, that just ran its course. That's a way for people to not have to make hard decisions about staying with people saying, hey, I can't be a part of this decision you're making. And so I wish you the best and I love you, but I'm often out. Like just ran its course. That's a way to shirk responsibility. Yeah. And can I just say, I know this isn't PC or politically, whatever you say it these days, you're allowed just to be sad that
your life was going one way and then now it's going to be different. I think grieving is a, is a piece of it too, where I need to kind of sit in it too and feel like I lost what we had. Um, because she was like, she was a beautiful, like girl, awesome in every way. Um, so there was a little bit of like attraction there, if that makes sense. Like we never dated or anything, but it,
It's like, Oh, Sam, you just do a wrinkle band. Were you going to, I'm sorry, dude, you got to lead with that next time. Well, it's, it's a lot. Yeah. It's more, more, it's a wrinkle. Um, have you told Joey how you feel? No. Yeah. I think that's a vulnerability that I don't think I ever can, can do. Not after 20 years of friendship.
Not after this change. She's opted out on that. I'm not trying to use the run its course, but she opted out of that opportunity or that development. And I think that's partly why I needed to open it up a little bit more and feel comfortable to say that. Because it's hard. And it's not what I had planned.
I don't, I don't hope it would be. There we go. And grief is the gap between what we wanted or hoped and what actually happened. And I'll tell you, my hope for you is at some point, um, secrets will kill a 20 year friendship. This time it doesn't have to be a big reveal, but I don't know. I, I, I don't know. I have to think on that one. I have to think on that one, but you get to make whatever choice you want to make. Sam, obviously you're, you're an adult. You can make whatever choice you want to make. Um,
But to circle all the way back to your beginning question, I think anybody who's making changes, but especially somebody who's making changes that's costing them potentially their job, their family, their friends, is to ask, man, how can I, how can I love you today? How can I show up? And if you ever think all this is too much, please call me.
Okay. And I think that's a great step. And I kind of was looking past the first easy action item is just asking like, and part of being uncomfortable is sitting there and not knowing what to say. But if I just put the ball in her court and say, Hey, how can I show up for you? What do you need? Um, how can I support you? Things like that to where it's,
it's clearing the air to a certain extent to where I'm putting, I'm showing up as a friend. Well, and Sam, um, part of this is calling out, like I mentioned earlier, part of it, it's calling out the future awkwardness, which is put on the table, right? Like, so if a friend of mine who I'd known for 20 years was married and that friend suddenly calls and says, Hey, I'm getting divorced.
What I had known my friend of 20 years was as an entity, right? And they're getting divorced now. And I would tell them, hey, I'm going to call your new girlfriend the wrong name. Just expect that. Like, I'm not going to do it on purpose and I'm going to do my best, but I'm going to mess that up. Like, I'm just going to put it on the table and I'm going to say, hey, I'm asking for pre-grace right now. I'm going to say this the wrong way and I might think this is funny and it's not, or I might not think something's funny and it's, like, I am...
learning at square zero, but I don't want you to doubt my love for you. I want, I want you to be okay. I want you to be better than okay. I want you to be well. And I know the path for you moving forward is very hard. And so there's just something about putting everything on the table and all the awkward, all the, Hey, I'm not going anywhere. Or if you are Sam, you got to be honest. If you say, Hey, I can't ride, I can't ride with you any further.
This is as far as I can go. You owe it to the person in your life, not to be fake because everyone's going to be fake. If you're going to make a value judgment, you're going to have to own that value judgment and you can't default to something like, well, just, just kind of ran this court. No, I'm opting out, but everybody is worth telling the truth and everybody's worth integrity and everybody's worth kindness and safety. I just believe that in my guts.
And everybody deserves to put all the awkward on the table and say, hey, this is going to be awkward. And everybody deserves grace, especially during big changes and transitions. And I just want to tell you, Sam, I appreciate the question. I appreciate you asking, hey, how do I navigate moving forward correctly? And if you find that your feelings for who this person used to be are too strong, put that on the table and say, hey, this is a barrier between us. And put it on the table.
But I'm really grateful that you called and said, how can I best love somebody who's making such a big, big change? The easy thing to do is just to write people off and walk away. It's hard to sit down and say, I don't know how to love you, but I want to. Will you teach me? That's scary and that's hard. I'm really grateful for the call, Sam. Thank you so, so much. And call anytime if I can ever be of service. Take care. We'll be right back.
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So I guess my question is, how do I deal with the stress and anxiety from a very busy and demanding job that's also a family business? Ooh.
Oh man. Tell me, tell me more about that. Okay. So like currently I'm on a bit of a leave from work, I guess had a bit of a panic attack kind of breakdown and just ended up with talking to my dad, just kind of deciding it's best. I take some time away and just try and get a little more clear. I had started an anxiety medication, but that ended up with a lot of dark thoughts and stuff.
So I recently switched medications and I seem to be doing better now. What were you taking? Yeah, it's just, I don't remember. It was a common one. It was like, I guess it's an antidepressant. I guess it's one they typically use, they said. I think now I'm on something else, which seems to be okay. So tell me, so have you heard me talk about anxiety?
Yes, I've actually started reading your book a little bit. Excellent. Okay, so this will just be a refresher, but anxiety is just simply your body trying to get your attention that things aren't okay. So my question to you is, globally speaking, what's not okay in Mark's life? I'm just dealing with everybody else's problems, I guess, and making them my own.
Why do you do that? Have you been cast to that role or have your parents given you that responsibility? Or if you don't do it, the whole thing falls over. Like, why are you taking on everybody else's world to the point that your body is saying, hey, quit, I'm out? I guess I don't want to fail, I guess. Maybe in some ways, like I am given a lot of responsibility. I don't say no very often, but I try and perform as best I can, I guess. Are you allowed to say no?
Yeah, well, I had to. I guess three weeks ago I had to, and then my dad took a bunch off my plate, and it just didn't seem to be enough, I guess. And then after that, my body just hadn't enough. What's the business? We're a commercial landscaping company. So we do commercial landscaping. We do playground installs and dirt work, equipment work, stuff like that. Do you like that job?
I do. I definitely do. Like when things are going well and everybody's happy, my customers are happy, it's some of the most fun I've ever had. Yeah, dude. When everything in my life is going great and my job's awesome, I love that. The question for your work is, are you still energized to show up, especially when things are hard? We're getting pretty hard at the end there. Tell me about it.
What was hard? Just Mondays, I guess, were pretty difficult. Just having to be happy to our employees because we try to treat our employees very well and just trying to show up and give my best to them so that they can have a good day as well. Yeah, but you can't give what you don't have. Who's pouring into you? Yeah, I guess not a lot of people, I guess. Only my dad does. He helps wherever I ask and stuff.
Man, I got to tell you, I think there's something else going on. What is it? I don't know. I haven't thought about that that much. I'm not sure. I don't know. Yeah, I'm not sure. So you're telling me I got a job that I love. It's got a lot of pressure, but I love it. I love taking care of the employees. My dad is supportive. And if I tell him, hey, this is too much, he takes it from me. So what is your body finding in your environment that's not safe?
I don't know. I've been trying to think of that myself. Are you broke? I don't know. No, no. On that part, we're all good. Are you using? No, no. Do you sleep? Do you exercise? I don't exercise, but I sleep fairly good. We've got two kids, but we still find the time to sleep. How's your marriage? Marriage is good. Definitely very good.
I think, thinking about it, I think just not wanting to fail my dad, I guess. I wonder if that is the hardest thing. But what makes you think you're going to fail your dad? Messing something up at work. Have you ever messed anything up? Oh, yeah. Mm-hmm.
Tell me about it. Well, I'll just say it's like, what's something here? Ordered the wrong product, I guess, for a project. Did it ruin something? Did your dad fly off the handle and scream at you, threaten to fire you? No.
No, no, not at all. So I ended up fixing the problem and there wasn't a problem. But just like, yeah, I guess just, yeah, just doing, screwing up when I know I could have done better, I guess. I guess what I'm getting at is, is this an imaginary scenario that you are...
You are choosing to ruminate over, over and over and over and over so much that your body's gone to fight or flight on an imaginary situation? Or has this actually happened in the past and your body has put a GPS pin in it and it's doing everything it can to never allow this to happen again?
Like nothing has happened that traumatic. So I almost wonder if it's just my body going over and over again. Cause it's like, I guess what will happen throughout the day, even, even something past that's happened, even if it's a small screw up, um, that thought will come back to me days and weeks after. And then I'll just freak out a little bit and think about it and then just try and make that thought go away.
Was growing up really stressful or were your parents pretty amazing? They're pretty good. They did get divorced about five or six years ago. Tell me about that. I mean, I was, I guess, 18 or 19 at the time, so I was old enough to, I don't know, deal with it if that's the right answer. Yeah, but that divorce started years before that when you all lived in the same house together. Mm-hmm.
Tell me about the chaos in your house growing up. I guess they argued a little bit here and there, or a lot, I guess, depending on what it was. What did an argument look like? It's been a while since I've thought about this. I guess just raising voices, I guess, and...
Breaking things, slamming cabinets and doors? No, nothing like that, no. Just yelling and screaming? Yeah, I guess pretty much, yeah. Any infidelity in the home? Nope. Nope. Was your job to be a peacekeeper or was your job to disappear? I guess maybe peacekeeper. Maybe disappear, I'm not sure. Okay, well...
I mean, I'm just buzzing through just the thoughts as they pop into my head here, man. And so I don't have a magic solution for you other than a couple of things. Okay. Number one, how old are your young kids? Yep, we got two of them. How old? One's two and a half or almost two and a half. The other one's six months. Okay. There's a possibility you sit down with your dad and say, hey, dad,
Can I ask you some questions about when I was two? Like, what was our home life? What was it like?
and see if he can tell you some stories. Because here's what I wonder, and again, I'm just, dude, I'm just peeling through layers real fast. But there may have been some challenges that happened really early on that you don't even remember that your body put a GPS pin in that said this is not okay. And now you got a two-year-old, you got a three-year-old, you got a four-year-old, and your body's going to start sounding alarms, and you're looking around like, where's the fire, where's the fire? And your body's like, it's right here, and it can't even see it. It may be...
that like many young people, especially early to late adolescence, you were able to squash the amount of electricity in your home. The fighting may have been way more intense than you're letting on right now. And if that's the case, your body learned in real time
It's my job. It's imaginary thinking, right? It's the sense of power that a child will try to take over their environment because the people that were supposed to stabilize the environment are not. They're yelling at each other. They're screaming. They're walking out. They are doing silent treatments or whatever. But they will take on an imaginary ownership of a home. If I just get straight A's, everything's okay.
If I just sing and dance like the class clown in front of my family and I get made fun of whatever, everybody, nobody gets hit. Nobody's everybody's safe, but I want you to go back and be honest, maybe sit down and write 13 year old Mark or 14 year old Mark a letter and see if you can dig into some of that stuff. But ask yourself, what was my job? Because something in your body has identified any sort of failure as catastrophic as end of time.
And the goal is to teach your body that, hey, maybe at one point that was true. It's not anymore. Or maybe you're still hanging on to 16, 17, 18 year old Mark. It was your job to keep your parents together and they got divorced and whoo. Or maybe, are you 24, 25? How old are you? 25. Okay. Maybe just two kids and getting up more and more leadership response. Maybe it's just a lot of weight on the bar too soon. And that's okay.
Maybe you just need to, you went out really fast on your mile pace and you got to just slow it down a little bit. Your body's trying to tell you, hey, we'll get there someday, but that's too much weight right now. That's cool. But the question for you is, what is my body identifying in this world, in this environment that is just sending it off the rails like this? Yeah. And you have any guesses at all?
I don't know, I don't, it does make sense, I guess, but I don't know where as a kid I would have failed so bad that it would have caused. - No, it's little things when you're a kid. Little things when you're a kid feel humongous, and then when you're an adult and you look at them in your rear view mirror, it's easy to dismiss them. But sometimes kids get those looks from their parents of just disgust, like ugh,
Or your dad tells you to pick up your shoes five times and you're 13 and you forget and he just picks them up for you and he looks at you across the room like you're just unbelievable. And your body just crumbles on the inside because all you want more than anything in the world is your old man to be proud of you, to find joy in you. And he just found disgust. It doesn't have to be huge. Sometimes it's huge, but sometimes it's not. Okay. But that is a, what's the right word?
That's not the main crux. The main crux is you making a choice in real time. Whenever your body starts spinning out, you start having that thought. I think I just ordered the wrong thing. I just think I just ordered the wrong thing. I think I just ordered the wrong thing. I want you to carry a journal with you. I have one with me right now. I want you to carry something with you. And when you get hit with those, I want you to stop what you're doing and write it down. And as you're writing it down, I want you to think to yourself, I'm getting this out of my body and onto this paper.
Okay. And when you get it onto the paper, and by the way, this can be a pain in the butt. You're going to do it at restaurants. You're going to do it at church. You're going to do it at stop signs. You're going to do this for a while. And I want you to challenge that thought. Is this true? And if it is, I did forget to make the order. I'm going to accept it. I'm going to make a plan to fix it. And then I'm going to be really quick. Be like, all right, how did I, how did I make that move? I didn't double check from now on. I'm going to double check.
But here's what I want you to see. It's a posture of curiosity, not a posture of judgment, not a posture of anger or frustration. It's a posture of curiosity. Man, what's my body trying to protect me from right now? Right. Otherwise, and I know you're already there, you start getting anxious about getting anxious again. Mm-hmm. And then you don't want to go to work on Monday because work on Monday is anxious. And then you start getting anxious about going to work because you're going to get anxious. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Does that sound fair?
Oh yeah. Yeah. Just thinking about it is tough. All right. So continue to see a doctor, continue to, um, if you haven't already, please go see a counselor. Doctors can help on the front end, especially, but please go see a doctor. I mean, I have to go see a therapist, go sit down with somebody and talk to them.
And be honest and open with them, which is tough to do. 25, new dad, two kids. Marriage is all messy because you got two kids, two years and younger. You're moving up in responsibility in a family business. You got pressure there too. And all of that. And your body just says, yeah, I'm out. And sit down with a counselor on the regular for a season and begin to talk through, why is my body going to war? That man loves me. My dad loves me.
My mom's safe. My wife's, my marriage is good. It's messy. It's chaotic, but my marriage is good. Let's, let's go there. And in the meantime, I want you to carry something with you. And every time you start to spin out, I want you to get that thought out of your head and say, is this true? And if it's not true, you have to start saying to yourself, all right, I'm done thinking about this now.
I think about it, think about it, think about it, think about it. Nope, not having this conversation, but I will think about how much I love my two-year-old. I will have a memory ready to plug into that gap. I'm going to focus on the time my wife and I had our first kiss and it was amazing. Or I botched it. I went to kiss her and I missed and it was weird. Or like wonder years. I kissed her eye, right? Whatever the thing is. But I want you to have a memory to plug into that spot. And that's the basis. That's how we stop ruminating and ruminating and ruminating and ruminating.
Every time I start to have one of those ruminating thoughts, I'm going to write it down. I'm going to challenge it. Is it true? Is it not true? And then I'm going to write one of my employees just a quick note to tell them that I'm really grateful for them. I'm going to shift into a moment of gratitude. It's going to be proactive. You're going to have to practice it and you're going to feel nuts for a while. How do I know? I've been there on a couple of different occasions and I'm on the other side of it. There's peace on the other side, absolute peace on the other side of it.
I want you to go see a therapist. Keep seeing a doctor and go see somebody. This is now your body's begun shutting itself down on you. And it's time for you to go sit with a professional. Just like I did on multiple occasions. Proud of you for making the call, Mark. Thank you so, so much for reaching out. I'm grateful for you. We'll be right back.
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All right, we're back. Kelly, what did I put on social media this time? All right, I lost. Hold on, I see you smiling. And the baton has officially been passed. You're going to get me all choked up. Every year for the past four years, my son and I race a mile. This year, for the first time, he beat me. And I'm so, so proud. I pushed as hard as I could go, and I thought I had him at the end. But he's strong and has a touch of the Deloney madness. That's a real thing, y'all. Just FYI.
Watching him respond with strength and tenacity when he hit the hammer, sorry, when I hit the hammer and having him grid it out and defeat me at the end was most excellent. I got a tad bit older today and I'm so full of joy. I'm already planning for next year. Dude, I'm going to race him again in like two weeks. I'm calling it.
Yeah. So every year, I think this is embarrassing for me. I think it was in fifth grade, but maybe it was in sixth grade, but we just started racing a mile and I ran track in college. Like I've been running my whole life and I just rolled them up and smoked him like an old joint. It was awesome. And then in seventh grade, we raced again and again, it wasn't close. And then last year,
in eighth grade and he's a cross country runner. He's really good. And last year in eighth grade, halfway through the race, I remember hitting a hundred mark and thinking to myself, Oh, this is the last year I beat him. And by the way, it cost me like two weeks of my life last year. Like it was that dad's strength that you just have to like, you know, that one, you get mad and you start the mower with one pull. It was that I had to go there.
And it was so awful the next week. I couldn't walk. I couldn't move. I was in a bad mood. And so then today, actually, I kind of cheated. I'm not going to lie. Like he was doing a long four mile run. And so I said, and I can't run with him for four miles. He's too fast. But I said, I'm going to go out the first mile with you. I'm going to walk and I'll catch you on the mile back. And I took him out so hard on that first mile. He kept saying, dad, slow down. I got four. And I was like, no, we're doing this.
And then finally he, he, he's, I could feel it. Him being like, all right, if we're doing this. And I was like, yes, most track athletes don't know how fat, how it feels to run that fast. And when they feel it, they're like, oh, I can do this. It's the worst, but I can do it. So, and I used to coach track too, by the way. So I sound like a nerd, but we, we,
took him out and i ended up running further with him and then i met him further and so then we ran back and i counted it down i was like 800 meters dude we're going to race this last mile and i i'm just telling you i went as hard as i could go i could not move my body faster and god thought i had him and then at the very end he beat me and i was so elated i had to lay down in the street i was laying out in the road i was so tired
But my wife was there and she was, I could just see her smiling from ear to ear. But it was like this cool moment. Like I was so proud of him. And the trash talking on that last mile was, it was, it was world-class. It was awesome. But Ryan Nichola wrote in on a comment section there on social media. And he said, our kids are so excited when they beat us. And what they don't know is that
That's the thing we want most is to have that moment when they pass it and we're like, all right, here you go, man. And I will say this just in my own defense, as I was leaving, my son was going back to bed and I was like, what are you doing? He's like that. I'm tired. I'm like, oh, that we're doing here. But I was defeated and I could not be happier. It's awesome. So way to go, Hank. Wait till next week. I'm coming for you.
