My Husband Is a Sex Addict
01:01:48 Share

Coming up on The Dr. John Deloney Show. I found out that my husband was texting escorts. He does have an addiction to porn. It was something we thought we can fix, but that failed. I don't want to focus on healing him. I want to heal myself because I feel re-victimized, and I just don't want to live with these secrets anymore.

Woo! What's up? This is John with the Dr. John Deloney Show. A show about your relationships and your marriage and your mental health and your kids and a partridge in a pear tree. Whatever you got going on in your life. 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.

Leave a message after the beep. And if you don't know what that means, you are not old enough. Or go to johndeloney.com slash ask, A-S-K. Fill out the form. Is it a jot form? You know what a jot form is? I don't. That just sounds like something from the old days. You can print it out on the docs.matrixprinter and mail it in to us. Or write it on a piece of papyrus. Is that a thing?

We had 17 listeners and we were down to 14 and I haven't even started the show yet. Gosh, I'm terrible at this. Hey, look, this is awesome. So, um, I don't know, like a year ago when the book was coming out, we made some punk rock t-shirts because I still like to go to punk rock shows and I'm still getting in line and buy punk rock t-shirts. I love them. And so we made some Deloney shirts and then they made their way out into the wild and

And then I started getting all sorts of cards and letters and internet stuff about, hey, how do I get these shirts? How do I get these shirts? And so we made them limited run. We did not make a bunch of them. I don't want to have boxes and boxes of shirts that are just Deloney shirts because there's still a strong possibility this whole thing crashes and burns. So here's what we got. Multiple colors and some dope designs. So the first one is straight up shirt.

If you're watching on the YouTubes, it just says Deloney on it. It's like the old Johnny Cash shirt that says Cash, except not. And it's in black. Look, I see the great Ben wearing it with his huge muscles. And we have another shirt. This is the... Looks like ACDC, except it says J. Lightning Bolt D. Also in black. And we got the...

What do you call these, Kelly? They're not devil horns, but people write us mean letters and say, why do you have devil horns? Rock and roll symbol. It's the universal sign of... Yeah. It's time to start mosh pitting. And it's how you tell...

the lead singer of the metal band you're seeing, I approve of what you're doing. It's just like that. Or if you're like me and you take a lot of photos and you're super awkward and you don't know what to do with your hands, you just do this sign. Otherwise, you have to do the hang loose sign. And I don't know how to surf. And I've never been to San Diego. So you just have to do this. So anyway, we got that shirt too. Go to ramsaysolutions.com slash store. And when these shirts are gone, they are gone. And there's not a bunch of them. They said, right?

No, it's a fairly limited run of each design. And then we'll just see where it goes from there. Okay. And it's all the sizes are in there? Yep. We ordered them in all of them. All the sizes. Let's go out to New York and talk to Shailene. Hey, Shailene, what's up? Hi, Dr. John. How are you? I'm good. How are you? I've been better. Hoping you can help with that. Or I wouldn't be calling you, Deloney. Hey, guys, what happened? What's up?

So I'll just give a little bit of background if that's okay. Yeah, do me a huge favor. Talk directly into your phone. Yes. Okay. Is this better? So good. And I know this is whatever you're about to say is probably pretty wild. Yeah. Just fully own it. Okay. Definitely. All right. I'm going to try. So I apologize if I'm nervous. Shailene. I'm just going to say it out. No apologizing on this show.

Okay. Go full New York Shailene. Go for it. Will do. All right. So my husband and I have been together for about 10 years, married six. It's been ups and downs like most people. However, this year has been so far a lot of downs. About two and a half months ago, I found out that my husband was

He was making fun of me to a friend. Not a mutual friend, but just a friend that he had. And not in a physical sense, but more of things that you would share with your person that shouldn't be shared elsewhere and poking fun at it. Like what? So...

He would tell this friend some personal issues within our marriage. Shailene, rip the band-aid off. Just say it. Just say it. Okay. I'll give an example. One thing that was said was, well, we struggle with infertility. This friend felt comfortable enough to say to my husband that I use my nephews as proxy children because I can't have any of my own.

My husband, for some reason, not only did not defend me or stop that friend, but laughed at it. And this is all a text message and said that he wasn't even going to open those can of worms. So things along that line where this maybe didn't come directly out of my husband's mouth, but this friend felt comfortable enough to say these things about me. And my husband did not stop it, defend me and sometimes laughed at it.

That's one thing. And then about a few weeks ago, I found out that my husband was texting escorts. And this has been an issue for a lot of our marriage. He does have an addiction to porn. And

We didn't, as the years have gone by, really acknowledge it as an addiction. It was something we thought we can fix. Obviously, we're not professionals, so that failed. But this time around, to get to my question, I don't want to focus on healing him. I want to heal myself because I feel re-victimized and I just don't want to live with these secrets anymore. I want to focus on my healing, but I don't know how to do it.

I don't, I, I'm in therapy, but like, it's just, um, I'm overwhelmed. I'm overwhelmed and I don't know how to, um, how to come back from this time around. Oh man. So there's, there's a lot here. This is like, um, like I'm as confused as you are, I guess is what I would say. Yeah. Um, a, my wife and I went through a period of infertility and I used my friend's kids as proxies.

So that's not, that to me isn't an insult. See what I'm saying? Like I wanted to hold a baby. So my buddy had two young, young kids and those were like, I couldn't wait to go to the house. Right. And in fact, there's a bunch of dudes and we got together every Monday night. Um, and we always let his like, like eight month old little boy come. Cause it was like, I just wanted to hold a baby. And so, um,

That in and of itself, unless you and your husband have talked about, hey, this is super sensitive. I don't have this conversation. So here's what I'm wondering. Right. Sometimes we get to a place relationally with people where we're done. Right. We're done either. We don't want to be in relationship with them at all or the way we've been in relationship with them for a period of time has ended. And when we get there.

we can interpret everything they say and do, every emoji they send through that lens of, I'm out of relationship with you. And because other times it may just be hilarious, right? Or it may just be funny, or maybe it's just off color, or maybe it's like, that wasn't that funny. But if we have the lens, if we have the pair of glasses on that, I'm done in this relationship, I'm done. Then we're going to interpret everything. We're going to attach stories to everything.

Right. Right. And so, so here's what I'm saying in a healthy, um, ride or die marriage, finding some text messages from one of your husband's buddies that are off color, insensitive, and he didn't respond to the way you wish he would have responded. Hey, hey dude, that was super uncool what your friend said. And my hope is that you would defend me.

Yes. And we're going to have that conversation. And he might look at you and say, I think you do like hold on to our nephew. Your nephew's really tight because we don't have any kids. And I'm glad that you do. And you could say, I don't think I'm doing it right. You'll have that conversation, that debate, that discussion, that argument. Right. But you interpreted that exchange between them as yet another brick in the wall of my husband sucks.

Does that make sense? It makes sense. Not so much as that he sucks, but just another instance of not defending me, of not sticking up for me or what is being said in private as opposed to to my face. Let's get beneath that. Your husband's with ex-escorts. Let's deal with that. Yeah. Your husband has nuked the foundation of your marriage.

So what was no longer exists. Yes. And so I want you to sit in the seriousness of that, not play whack-a-mole with a bunch of texts and exchanges and this. Your husband was communicating. Was he with them? No, no. How do you know?

I don't know. So just to be safe, I get myself tested, even though he swears up and down, he did not. But at this point, where's the trust? So I tried to do right by myself first. Okay. So let me ask you the most terrifying question I can ask somebody. What do you want?

I don't know why I wasn't expecting that. You're going, you're trying to fix stuff. And let me put it this way. You're trying to do a puzzle and you don't even know what the picture is. And all of the puzzle pieces are blank. And until you can begin to like have an image of what you're trying to build,

it's going to feel lost and chaotic. And some people, when they feel that kind of lost and chaotic, they listen to a jillion podcasts and read a bunch of books. You know what really that is? It's a Xanax. It's a way to not feel that disorientation and that loss. Or they get really angry at everybody and they see evil everywhere. Or they withdraw and hide from the world and just sleep a lot. Or they work 500 hours a week. Oh my God.

So what do you want? I want, I want what we promised each other. Nope. Not a we. What do you want? I want to be happy. Okay. What does that mean? Cause that's a feeling. That's a fleeting state. That's a cup of water on the way to finishing your marathon. What do you want? Can I give you a couple of examples?

Yes, please. Okay. And I said earlier, this is the hardest question I can ask somebody because it's terrifying. I want a home that is filled with peace and laughter. Yeah. And so here's how I had to go get that. In my house, I can't have peace if I owe somebody money. Makes me insane. So that means I drive crappier cars.

That means for almost our entire marriage until a few months ago, we didn't live in super big, nice, whatever houses. We lived in safe. I mean, they were nice houses, but I didn't want to be happy. I wanted peace. Happy would be driving around in a 2024 Tundra that's all doped up and it's like, but that wouldn't have given me peace, which means in the long haul would not have been happy over time.

I want to feel safe in my marriage. What does that mean? That means I have to trust. That means I got to be able to tell her anything and expect that she's going to tell me that in return. Right. I want, here's something I want. I want to never worry that my body's going to fail me. Well, that means crap. I got to exercise every day. That means I got to sleep. It means I got to go to counseling.

That means I got to do weird mobility exercises, which I hate doing. I'm never happy when I'm doing it. But man, when my eight-year-old daughter comes in and she's like, hey, dad, you want to wrestle? And I'm like, bring it on. And we roll out the mat in the living room and we get on the floor and get after it. I'm not worried about my knee going out or my back going out. Right. So I think the ultimate question, and we won't solve it here, okay?

The question I think you have to ask yourself is what do you want? And if it is, I want to not be married to a guy who feels so dead in his current life. And by the way, he's choosing this to feel dead in his current life. Right. That he can only get excitement. He can only feel life through unknown people on the internet doing crazy sex stuff. And when that ceases to help him feel alive, he's,

He then calls professional sex workers. He didn't do anything with them yet. He just texts them. He just calls them because that gets his heart rate up again. And you and I both know the next step because this drug will wear off too. Yeah. Right? So you're there. And so maybe what you want is I want to feel alive in my own home. I want to feel alive in my own marriage. I don't want my husband outsourcing life to professional sex workers. Right. I'm worth more than that.

And Shailene, if you didn't know that, I'm telling you right now, you are. And he is too. Wow. You just hit like a big...

A big point there that's like a thing in therapy that I'm working on is, you know, like, why do I allow these things? No, like, it's a, it'll make me feel like not worthy, like, that I don't feel worthy of. I want to challenge you. Defending myself. Can I challenge you? Yes, please. And I'm going to say this with, with love in my heart and with a smile on my face. Okay. Yes. I don't care how you feel.

Okay. I care what you know. Okay. Feelings come and go. I often don't feel like working out, but I do it anyway because I know what it gives me at the end of the day. I don't feel like doing the dishes 95% of the time, but I know it gives my wife peace. I know you don't feel worthy of being loved, but you are, period. And so in those moments when you grab something to pay your Amazon thing online and your husband didn't clear the search history,

And that feeling in your guts just drops and you go to delete it for him because you don't feel like fighting it. You don't feel like dealing with it. Or you instantly go, God, I need to go to the gym because I don't feel as beautiful as this woman who just popped up. I don't care how you feel. I care that you know you're worth more than that.

Okay. And one of the challenges with modern therapy is there's a lot of discussion on the feeling side of things. And feelings are really, really, really important. They just don't tell us the truth. Right. Okay. That's not their job. Their job is to keep us alive.

And so I need you to hear me say, I've never even met you, and I know this as a fact, you're worth being loved. And you're worth being loved by somebody who doesn't outsource part of his aliveness to sex workers. Right. And you're worth looking at a guy and saying, okay, you got weird fantasies? Tell me about them. Let's go get a glass of wine and talk about them. What? Yeah, tell me. I'm not scared of you. I'm not scared of you. That is so right. That's what I...

I feel, I will, let me scratch the feeling. I know. That's what I know. There you go. Now we got it. I know we've had these discussions. I have prompted these discussions, not just now, but for years. And it's been a lot of, oh, I don't know. I don't know. And so at this point when it happened, I was like, listen, what is it? What is it that you need that...

Is it like a sexual thing or whatever? And it was none of those things. And now he's in his own therapy. And I get that. That's going to take a lot of work. And I told him this time around that.

I can't do the work for you. Amen. Amen. And I need to do it for myself though. You don't believe that. I do. Okay. I do. I said, I'm not going to do it. Yes, I promise. I told him and I have not, I have not done it. It's been like a month and a half. I said, no, you're going to do it yourself. Awesome. He has to. And here's the deal. Hold on. He's going to do his work and you're going to do your work. Right. And if you choose and he chooses, y'all are going to build a new thing together.

Yes, that's the goal. But the I want, the I want, what do you want? I want to be ride or die with somebody who will tell me the truth. Yes. I want someone who is willing to seek aliveness and play and desire and eroticism with me, that we co-create this together. That's not such a coward that he won't even tell the woman he said I do that

With the crazy thoughts he has in his head. Not that we're going to ever do any of this stuff, but I'm going to say it out loud. That I'm going to outsource that to professional sex workers. You're worth more than that. So is he. Right. Right? Absolutely. And so he's got to do his work that you can't do for him. And you are in counseling. Cool. I really want you to start...

I mean, stay in counseling, obviously, but I want you to start practicing these things. And the practice comes from the action steps to answer the question, what do you want? I want to feel good in my own body. Cool. Then you got to exercise. You got to have friends. Right. You got to sleep. You have to have, you have to have human connection. I want to feel safe in my marriage. Cool. If you look at pornography again, you are choosing to leave this home because I deserve to feel safe.

Yes. I deserve to feel safe in this relationship. So every single day you will show me your text messages and your phone and you can Google the way to go get the deleted text messages that happened right after you delete them. Those still exist. Way ahead of you, Dr. John. I know you are. Okay. You see what I'm saying? Like it's, it's, we can sit in these rooms and talk about it and talk about it and feel about it. Great. All that's really important, but also we have to go do different things.

And those things that we do, those action steps often stem from what's the next right move? Because often we can't answer the question, what do you want? I don't know. I don't know. Everything's too chaotic and wild. Okay, what's the next right thing? I'm not going to drink. What's the next right thing? I'm going to get some sleep today. What's the next right thing? I'm going to go exercise. I'm going to call a friend. I'm going to tell this guy I'm sorry. I'm going to show up at work and do excellent work. Whatever the next right thing is. Over time, we have to answer the question, what do you want? Because that gives us the direction of the action steps where we're going to go.

But when we ask that question, what do we want? That often means we have to answer the question, what do we don't want? What we're not going to put up with, what we think we're worth. And we often feel I'm not worthy of, and we often feel that I'm not. I get that, but it's not true. You are. You are. It's been the honor of my day to talk to you, Shailene, and I'm proud of you for the work you're doing. You cannot carry his bricks anymore.

You can say, here's what I want and here's what I'm worth. And here, if you are choosing to be in this marriage with me, here's what this is going to look like. And by the way, I want to hear what yours are. You've got a long road ahead of you, Shailene, but I think it is a road that's filled with hope and optimism. Keep doing the work. Keep taking the next right step. Call me any time. We'll be right back. This show is sponsored by BetterHelp.

So my wife and I were meeting the other day about the back-to-school madness that is about to be on us. We've got my travel schedule, her work schedule, our daughter's new school and clothes and forms to fill out and all these online portals and my son's sports schedule and he's got to have shoes every two weeks because his feet won't stop growing and how are we going to pay for all this and on and on and on.

And when we step back and look at our schedule, it's so packed and we haven't even put in the things like exercise, date nights, counseling appointments, church and holiday trips and big home projects. And these are the things that make life worth living. And I listened to y'all. This is your life too. And here's what I've learned. When it comes to taking care of me, my family and my work, I have to begin with the things that matter most and the things that keep me well and whole so I can wade into the chaos and be sturdy and present and strong.

you too. So as you're planning your upcoming end of summer and fall plans, make sure you don't skip date nights, don't skip regular exercise, and don't skip your regular therapy appointments. Yes, therapy can be hard work, but it can also help make the rest of your life possible.

When it comes to therapy, I want you to consider calling the team at BetterHelp. BetterHelp is 100% online therapy staffed with licensed therapists. It's convenient, it's flexible, and it's suited to fit your schedule.

With a good therapist, you can learn things like positive coping skills, how to set boundaries, how to deal with all the chaos going on in your life, and how to be the best version of yourself. In this upcoming season, make sure you put on your oxygen mask first. Never skip therapy day. Call my friends at BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash deloney today to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash deloney.

All right, let's go out to Houston H-Tone and talk to Dakota. Hey, Dakota, what's up? Not much. How are you, Dr. John? Awesome. What's going on in your life? Well, that's a great question. So my question is, how can I find fulfillment and manage severe trauma triggers without relapsing? Ruh-roh. So what's going on? Mm-hmm.

Well, I checked myself into... Actually, let me start with this. Thank you. I'm getting emotional. I don't know that I could have made the change in my life if I didn't find your show. Wow. Well, thank you. What change did you make? Well, I went to rehab. I stopped drinking. I did a whole lot of work. I...

Took the PCL-5 when I got there. What was your score? I saw my problem, 70. Golly. I'm laughing with you, not at you. Wow. That's what I said. I went, oh, cool. Yeah, no, hold on. Decidedly not cool. Super not cool. Yeah. So I did a lot, a lot, like seven to 10 sessions a week of CPT treatment. Okay. Yeah.

And I'm happier than I've ever been. I mean, I had my first drink when I was nine. I didn't know life without it. And now I'm so happy. But like in my IOP, they are talking about like triggers for drinking. And I don't I don't miss it.

Except for when I get triggered. And it doesn't seem fair that my drinking triggers are just my PTSD triggers. You know what I mean? Oh, that's what drinking is for. That's what it's for. Yeah. It's the bridge over troubled waters. Yeah. I'm just, I'm really struggling in those moments when I do have an episode. It's the only time that my body wants to drink. Sure.

And you realize your body's working perfectly in that moment, right? Yes. I have watched a lot of your show. It's doing just what it wants to do, which is get you out of that moment and get you over the raging river to calm land. And the best way since you were nine years old, it can get you to calm land is just to turn the system off with alcohol. Exactly right. So it's working. What are some of your trauma triggers? Are they thoughts that flash into your mind? Are they memories? Are they shadows of people? Are they phone calls? What are they?

A little bit of all of it. Okay. A little, like the most innocent thing, for instance, my partner, once I was like, oh, I'm going to need a ride to work in the morning. What was said to me was, well, you know, like what was said was, you know, most people say, please. It was joking. It was, it would make me feel appreciated if you would say please. But what I heard was,

They please or there will be consequences. They please right now. Okay. And what has CBT taught you? Well, my ABC worksheets have taught me a lot. I do them. Hold on. But real quick, it is, okay, my body's taking off on me. Is that true? Logically, no. Okay. So how long have you been out of rehab? I'm going on almost two months. Okay. Okay.

I want you, okay, listen to me real carefully, okay? Super carefully. I am a goofball on a podcast. I'm a dude on YouTube Reels. You are so incredibly strong. You are doing like wild. You're growing new parts of your brain, Dakota. Thank you. I am a podcaster. You're a brain grower, okay? Okay.

We are, there's levels to this game and you are at a different league than me. Okay. Thank you. So I don't want you to say this is your changes are because of me. Your changes. I did do that. Didn't I? You did, but listen, it's okay. But your changes are because you got sick and tired of being sick and tired. Exactly. At some point you looked in the mirror and you said, I'm worth more than this. Yeah. Okay. So listen, um, can I give you a real callous example? It's going to get me in trouble on the internets, but I don't care.

Of course you can. All right. I didn't take that. I'm trying to think what my score would be. It would not be close to a 70, okay? From what I understand, that was very severe. Well, but I had some pretty gnarly childhood stuff, okay? Mm-hmm. And so in perspective, I'm just going to change lanes here. I had about 35 or 40 pounds to lose, okay? Okay. You had 125 pounds to lose.

Yeah. You're not going to lose it in two months. And so I want you to hear how I can't even put into words how proud of you I am. Thank you. And I'm going to be honest with you because I love you. This is frustrating. I'm about to say, but you got a long ways to go. So be patient with Dakota. Like you have 125 pounds to lose. You lost like 40 pounds already, but you had 165 to lose. You got 125 to go.

Right. And now you're walking by, you keep going, you keep going to the gym, you keep doing the work, the weight's still coming off, but you're still frustrated. It's like, God, you know what I mean? So this is that settling into the grind. That is, I'm going to keep changing. I'm going to keep changing. Now it's going to be, I don't even feel like it, but I'm going to keep doing it because I know how good it feels. Right. And you've heard me say this a lot. It's one of my favorite sayings. Don't forget to remember. And because you're not going to lose 10 pounds a day, you're going to lose half a pound a day.

half a pound a day, half a pound a day. Yeah. And then what's going to happen is you are going to say to your partner, I need a ride out of nowhere. And they're going to say, I'm not doing anything for you until you say, please. And you're going to laugh. Yeah. And you're going to go, please. And then you're going to go, no way. That's how that will happen.

You've got to keep catching yourself when you have the triggers, and you have to when your body takes off on you. Write it down and ask yourself, is this true? Yeah. And when I was first healing, I put my hand on my chest. For some reason, that stabilized me. I put my hand on my chest, and I would look at the piece of paper, and I'd say, is this true? Yeah, and that's what the ABC worksheets are so good at. Yeah. That's why I really enjoy them. And if you still need the worksheets, use the worksheets.

Because they work. There's no shame in that. No. Are you? No. No. I don't know. I just feel like I should be further. Nope. I can't believe how far you've come in two months. Thank you. It's astounding. Is your partner, are you deeply loved to where you know it? Oh my gosh, yeah. Okay. Because outside of that, I wouldn't know how you're doing this. I have a great support system. Okay. Amazing. And you have the courage to use it.

So give me a specific trigger that sets you off and let's come up with a plan for that one. Okay. Um, like somebody asked you your favorite song. You suddenly can't remember one. That's okay. Um, so for instance, I not exactly a trigger. I find myself now that I'm kind of relearning life. Um,

Like difficulties in managing my emotions or like somebody saying something, for instance, that somebody said to me in the past. Even if it's well-intentioned, it really sends me back to that really dark, scary place. Do you have an example? I guess we can use the one from the other day. It was a completely innocent comment, but it was a threat to me. Yeah. Who left you growing up? My dad wasn't around super often. Okay.

And when mom was around, was she present with you or was she there in body but not in spirit? She was with me. She's a great mom. Okay. But yeah, my dad, he's a card. He's a troubled guy. Yeah. That's probably the understatement of the year, wasn't it? Yeah. He's a troubled guy. I'll leave it. All right. So was that a troubled man or was that evil?

He was, he got there. Okay. All right. So a cornerstone of getting well is you be getting slowly over time to tell yourself more and more of the truth. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Trouble is a palatable way of saying scary, which is a palatable way of saying dangerous, which is a palatable way of saying I grew up surrounded by evil. Right. And you'll get there and that's okay.

And there will come a season, if you haven't got there already, where you will just spend a lot of time angry. And your mom's a great mom. And there will come a time when you're mad at her for not getting you out of that. And grateful that she's shielded. It's just this weird both and all the time. Right? Right. And so the quick catch for me has been, and the people I've sat with, is, well, you could say, please, here it all comes. Uh-huh.

Like you feel it in your body and you either feel yourself starting to lash out or you withdraw. You feel yourself like almost getting like sucked down a tunnel, right? Uh-huh, exactly. I'm an isolator through and through. Okay. That's when you have to say, from this point forward, am I going to choose to step forward or backwards? And that's your choice. And to choose to step forward is something your body doesn't know how to do. And so you got to practice it. It's like shooting free throws.

Seriously, I should keep doing my worksheets. Or occasionally practice it without the worksheet. And your partner loves you deeply. Say, I'm practicing this. I'm going to do this wrong. And so when you see me withdraw, just gently say, come back. And y'all two can come up with some codes together that would say, you just left me. That's our code in our house. You just left. And it's real gentle. Let me know when you're back. And man, then I'm out. I've got to come back. And I come back.

Yeah, that's great advice. I'm not going anywhere. What just happened? But here's the deal. Every home is going to look different. Every relationship is going to look different. With your boss, it's going to look different. With me and Kelly here, it looks different. With me and my wife, it looks different. It's just a negotiated back and forth together. And Kelly has a couple of hand motions that she does off camera you can't even see. And it's just to direct me. And it's great. Yeah. You know what I mean? And I'm practicing.

As long as you keep that word practice, that you're not broken, there's nothing wrong with you. I just have never shot free throws. You've never dealt with hard stuff without alcohol. All right, cool. We've gotten off the chemical dependency part, and now we're into the next. And the next part is scary. Nobody tells you that. It's terrible. Actually, everyone does. In rehab, everybody tells you that. Yeah, but it's like saying, yeah, when you jump out of a plane, it's kind of scary. Yeah, that's scary.

It's not like they get ready to jump out of the plane and your whole body's like, no, right? It's, it's, you can talk about it all day long. It's not until you feel it. That's where I love pre-negotiating things in your trauma recovery with people that you love and that you care about and let everybody coming up with a plan for when it happens.

Because kind of like a recovery plan, do it before it hits you. That's exactly right. Because in my marriage for the first 10 or 15 years, I withdrew, which sent my wife withdrawing, which then set off my abandonment issues. Right. And now we're off to the races. And so now that we've discussed it, when I leave, she gently just puts her hand on my leg or my hand or on the table and says, come back. And it's like, oh, we're back. And I'll say the same thing. Hey, you just left. Swing back.

And it's not an accusation. It's not a, it's not a mean thing. It's just a, I love you. And we already talked about it. And sometimes occasionally I'll say, Hey, I need to be done with this right now. It's all back here and I just need to be done. And cool. Let's reset. Let's reset. And we'll do it tomorrow. We'll have this conversation tomorrow, or we'll have this interaction tomorrow. And it's all well and good because I know she's not going anywhere and she knows I'm not going anywhere. And similar with you. That's why trauma recovery has to be done with deep, powerful relationships because

because you have to be anchored in. And Dakota, I'll say it again. Two months out, you are on the right path. You are way ahead, way ahead. And I'll sit with you and acknowledge, man, you were hoping in 60 days you'd be done. You are regrowing your brain. You're practicing skills you've never done before. And I cannot describe to you how proud of you I am. Here's my promise to you. I'll be with you every step of the way. Call anytime, anytime.

And I got you. We'll put you on the show and we'll talk about whatever you're going through. And you're going to cycle up. You're going to cycle down. You'll have seasons of anger, seasons of great joy, seasons of peace, seasons of I miss the old chaos, seasons of, okay, I need to numb out, but I can't use alcohol. What do I do? You'll have all kinds of seasons and I'll be with you. And as a bonus, call me when the Astros win the World Series this year. We will celebrate as fellow Houstonians. Dakota, I'm super proud of you. Thanks for the call. We'll be right back.

All right, I want to talk about Halo. It's an app that I use just about every single day. So we're here at the end of summer trying to fit in that last minute vacation, trying to figure out where all of our money went and trying to plan for the start of school. And it's chaos. It's chaos. It's chaos in your life and it's chaos in mine.

And it's this season when it's super important to make sure you double and triple down on your exercise practices, your counseling, your relationships, and your spiritual health. And if you're a person of faith or if you're just curious and you don't know anything about this faith, prayer, whatever stuff, don't let your daily prayer or your meditation practices or your questions go unanswered or by the wayside. Don't let your still time with God go.

As things ramp up and get more and more chaotic, we have to choose to slow down and focus on the things that really, really matter.

And in addition to my conversations with my friends and my personal reading and journaling time, Hallow helps me stay on point with my spiritual practices. Hallow is an app that's easy to download right to your phone and it is packed with daily prayers, lecture series, meditations, music, stories, nighttime sleep programs, and more. Hallow is the number one prayer app in the world. And it's simple, it's super high quality, and you can personalize it based on wherever you happen to be in your spiritual life.

I use it on my drive to work, when I'm sitting in front of my red light, sometimes when I'm out walking my dogs, and I even listen to some of the music when I'm writing. Hallow has a journaling feature for your own personal reflection. I could go on and on. It's got everything. Here's what's really cool. This month, Hallow has special guests each week walking us through the lives of some incredible historical saints, learning more about their life, their faith, their story, and ultimately, their surrender to God's call on their life.

Hallow's Saints in Seven Days series dives deeper into the lives of these prominent saints, exploring their journey to sainthood and how it relates to our own lives. Here's the deal. My friends at Hallow are giving you three free months to try all of this right now. That's 90 days to experience the joy and peace that this experience can help bring to your life. It's totally free to try it out. Go try it. It can change everything.

Go to hallo.com slash Deloney today for three free months. That's hallo, H-A-L-L-O-W dot com slash Deloney. All right, let's roll out to Louisville, or as they say, Kentucky, and talk to B-Money Brandon. Hey, Brandon, what's up, man? Hey, I'm doing all right. How are you doing today? I'm good, man. What's going on?

- Well, pretty much just been struggling with a couple things with my wife and hoping you could help me kind of work through parts of it. - All right, go for it man, what's going on? - I have my question kind of written down and basically how do I come to terms with my wife's lack of effort to find a new job?

Encourage her to find something that she can enjoy, love, and go on. Pretty much December, things came to an end at her previous job. She really had been hating it for quite a while and then ended up quitting, which I was supportive of her leaving it. But my one problem with it was not having a next step of what to go to and so on.

So the last, man, six, seven, eight months, you just been hanging out? I mean, she's done a few things. Like she's also been in the National Guard. So, I mean, she would do that on the weekends. But, I mean, that's... Bro, that's a thing, right? Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. No, no. Yeah, yeah. No, no. It's certainly a thing. I mean, that's been over for a few months now. Okay. Like, her six years was up there. So now it's really to the point where there's, like, nothing, nothing there. It's like, she was also, she did a few extra classes in school while she was working.

working to get enough credits where she wanted to go for a CPA, they had that credit where she could do that. But the follow-up of actually going for that or having an actual idea of something that will persist more than a few more months is...

not quite there. It's really my problem is the kind of future looking part of it. It's like today is okay, but what about another few months down the road? Does she struggle with depression? Or years? You know, I don't know if I would say exactly that when she first quit her job, but

It's certainly possible the last few months. I guess I wouldn't say we, but she ended up having a miscarriage the last few months. So that's possible there. Nothing like diagnosed and such. She hasn't talked to anyone about it, but

I mean, it's reasonable she has been super upset, even just random times. Today, last week, last month are just pretty much random times. And so, I mean, it certainly could be part of it. How's your marriage, man? I mean, I don't really know exactly how to answer that. I would say the day-to-day were pretty good, but...

I think we have been struggling a little bit recently with a lot of things. I think things have just been kind of gloom for that. It's been sort of difficult as well because pretty much all that has been contained, she hasn't been comfortable to really share that with anyone. Are you a safe person for her to share with?

No, I mean, she's sharing it with me. I'm talking about it's just us with that. So it's like everything is, I mean, and that's fair. I'm not sharing that with anyone because I'm trying to respect X. I mean, obviously she is the main person that experienced that, but it's pretty much just been us going through that. And I want to respect that. It's like her family and stuff. Are you talking about pregnancy loss?

Oh, yes, yes. Sorry. I thought you got that. No. All right. So basically just— I need you to hear me very carefully, okay? Like as intently as you've listened to anybody, both of y'all lost this pregnancy. And you're struggling with how to feel because you don't feel it as deeply and as heavily. And she knows that and she feels that. And—

She's already on an island and she probably feels as lonely as she's ever felt. And I know this because brother, I was you. I did not understand the weight of what my wife was carrying after miscarriage one or miscarriage two. And I missed it. So if you get nothing else for this call, we can talk about the job stuff, dude. If we can get nothing else for this call today, when you get home,

I want you to shut the door and I want you to ask your wife, hey, will you listen directly to me for a minute? Just direct. I want to tell you something vulnerable and straight. And hopefully she'll say, sure. And I want you to hold her face in your hands and look her in the eyes and say, I love you. And I'm so sorry that we lost this baby. And she'll probably get stone rigid and just begin to melt. And I want you to say, and I'm sorry that I missed it.

You've been all alone in this, and I'm sorry. Will you do that for me? Yeah, I'll do that. Okay. And that's fair. I think, yeah, probably. Many, many, many, many men try to solve miscarriages with information, and that's not how you sit with a hurting person. Okay? And I'm just telling you, dude, because this isn't something I learned in grad school. It is, but I've done this myself. I screwed this up in my own home. Okay? Okay.

Okay. Yeah, that's fair. I will do that. And I want to back all the way up. I, without talking to her, I don't know why she quit her job seven months ago and hasn't found a new job. That usually tells me there's something else going on inside your home. Now you mentioned she is no longer a part of her military community. She's out of that. Yeah. Told me she's experienced a pregnancy loss. I'm telling you that even though you're probably a good man and a good husband, you're not

She has completely folded in on herself inside her own home because she recognizes she's all by herself. And as a newlywed, that is utterly terrifying. In the same way you're asking yourself, good gosh, is she just going to sit here for the rest of our marriage and just not work? She's asking herself, did I just sign up for 50 years of being completely and utterly alone in my grief and my sadness and in my hurt and in my pain and in my loneliness?

Now, I don't know if that has anything to do with the job part, and maybe you called asking for the job, but there's much bigger issues going on here. When you ask her about the job part, what does she say? I mean, she brings up her past full-time jobs, bad experiences with it, and wants to make sure that she gets a job that she really likes, enjoys, loves, and so on. What do you say to that? I'll...

Yeah, the problem that I have with that is, to my knowledge at least, there's no actually looking for that job she loves, enjoys, go on. Whether that's right next to her home, working from home. So what does she do all day? I mean, she's at home. She'll...

play games, playing her phone. She'll cook and clean and such. I mean, she's doing that now. She was here. I was certainly doing my part when she was in the house, but I work from home. So during the day, that's what I'll be working and such. She'll be doing things in the other part of the house. Do you all need the money? No, no, that is not the problem. So what's the problem? Get me to the core problem because there's something beneath this job.

I mean, it's more of just her having something to do, something to occupy some time. Will you be honest with me? Her having some kind of purpose and such, I guess. I just see... Brandon, I'm going to ask you a hard question. Will you tell me the truth on it? Yeah. Okay. Are you losing respect for her? Because she just sits around all day, month after month after month.

I mean, I would say a little, possibly. And I think part of when it got back to December and such was when she was going to quit that job, and I was in support of her leaving there. My problem was not having somewhere to go. I don't know. I didn't have anything to back it up, but I sort of suspected that it would be kind of a struggle to get back.

Another job after that, like more of just on her part. I don't have any real reason. It was just like a suspicion. Okay. My part. Here's the, I mean, I can help your wife get a job. I work with a guy named Ken and Coleman. He can take care of those kinds of things. That doesn't seem to be the issue here. There's deeper things going. The river is much deeper here.

And so my guess is I'm just going to put this out in the universe. Tell me if I'm wrong. But over the last seven months, you've approached this conversation with what jobs are you applying for? What are you thinking about doing? Or what do you think your life will look like in three years or five years or seven years or whatever? And for whatever reason, she's experiencing those conversations as accusations and as you pick in a fight. So I want you to change trajectory completely. Okay.

I want you to sit down with her tonight after you apologize and you ask her, how can I love you in this season of loss? Maybe ask her, will you just tell me the story? What happened? Until I won't say anything. I just want to hear you. Let her tell the story. And then if tonight's the right night, cool. It probably won't be. So maybe in a night or two, I want you to tell her, I am at a loss for how I can best love you.

Because you tell me that you want to be working, yet you're not looking for a job. And I don't know how to say it. I don't know how I can best love you in this time. Can you teach me that? And what you're doing is you're offering her an invitation to help you. You're not forcing her to respond to an accusation. Like, you're not applying for jobs. You're not getting a job. You're not doing anything. Do you see the difference? Yeah, I see that one's more accusational. One's more supportive. One's more invitational.

You're inviting her in to help you because you clearly are not communicating in a way that says, hey, I love you and I care about you. And just sitting at home and doing nothing for the rest of your life, playing video games on your phone is a recipe for emotional and psychological and physical catastrophe. And I love you enough to tell you, like, I miss you. I want you full. I want you whole. I want you present. I want you all those things.

But I'm not doing a good job of communicating that. Can you teach me? And maybe she'll open up with you. And if she won't open up with you, if she says, no, it's fine. Just the employers suck out there. It's hard to get a job or whatever.

Then I want you to let her know that you're going to go start seeing a counselor, a therapist, because you need to learn some new skills because you're not doing a good job of communicating. And she'll say, you're doing a fine job. It's okay. Now I'm not doing a good job because I want to love you and I want to walk alongside you as you find your purpose, whether that's in being a mom, a stay-at-home mom, or whether that's being a homemaker, or whether that's being a full-time employee or a mixture of all three of those. I'm just not doing a good job.

Because I'm watching the woman I love just slowly wither away after the last seven months. And I haven't done a good job with the grief after the miscarriage. And we haven't done a great job going to find new community after you left the military. And on and on and on, I need some more skills. And that's really the chance you have. Because for the last seven months, you've been asking her, when are you getting a job? What are you going to do? Why did you do all day? Why aren't you doing this? And it's not working. It just doesn't work. I'm almost positive something deeper is going on in her heart and her mind or in your home.

And I think until you find that, the job is just going to, like finding a job is going to be playing whack-a-mole with the bigger real issues. And maybe that sense of loneliness is just frozen and you reaching across the aisle and saying, I'm still here and I haven't done a good job, but I love you. And I want to make this right. How can I love you right now? Maybe that's a path. That's turning the light on in the distance. Maybe. Maybe.

Maybe she'll go see a marriage counselor with you. But I can tell you this, as her husband, you're watching her in pain and you're watching her hurt. I want to challenge you to be vulnerable. Go first. Tell her that you're sorry and that you love her and that you're ready to listen and that you're ready to do things differently. And maybe she'll respond to your invitation. You haven't done anything wrong. You're not a bad guy. But we got to heal this thing. Somebody's got to go first. Let's let that be you, my friend. Thanks for the call, brother. We'll be right back.

I cannot shut up about my Helix mattresses. My sister is staying with me this week, and she came down looking this morning like she just woke up from a coma. And her first question was, what in the world is that mattress? And I sang it to her. Hey.

I got a Helix for every bedroom in my house. I sleep on a Helix mattress every single night, and I love it. My family loves it. Our sleep is getting better and better and better. As soon as you can, I want you to get online and take the Helix Sleep course.

quiz and you're going to find your perfect mattress in under like two minutes. And there's a mattress for every fit, softer firmness level, mattresses for side sleepers and back sleepers and stomach sleepers and mattresses for every shape and size of person. And they also have a bunch of mattresses at a bunch of different price points. Whatever you order, you can try it out for 100 days risk-free and they're going to deliver it right to your home and in no time, you'll be sleeping your best sleep. Helix

Nailed it just for you. The perfect combination of comfort and support. And right now, it's time for the Labor Day Early Access Sale. Up to 20% off all the mattresses plus two free pillows. And when you buy Helix, please make sure you tell them you're a Dr. John Deloney Show listener. It helps you out, helps me out, helps all of us out.

Go to helixsleep.com slash Delaunay. That's helixsleep, H-E-L-I-X-S-L-E-E-P dot com slash Delaunay. This offer won't last long, so go right now. Because with Helix Sleep, better sleep starts now. All right, we are back with, am I the problem? Go for it, Kelly. This is cool crap that happened. This is cool crap that happened. Yes, it is. Wow, you're producing the heck out of this show, Kelly. Well, I am.

One of us is not hosting the heck out of it. See, she's mean back. She's mean back. And you're brilliant and tough and beautiful. The trifecta. Trifecta. All right. Anyway, from Sarah. It is weird seeing you with both a tattoo of my name and a shirt with my name on it. People, just so you know, if I had a tattoo, which I don't, it would not be of John's name. It's on her neck. Just so you're aware. All right.

This is not a vacation. That's a trip. Yeah. All right. It was completely the opposite. The four of us had a lovely unplugged time just relaxing and hanging out at the beach.

My childhood was complete chaos, knowing that my growing children choose to be with me made me feel like an awesome mom. I truly see that together we have built something solid. It's a trip my husband and I will always cherish. Oh, and on our way back, we took a detour to check out Ramsey Solutions, where we were treated like rock stars. So, nice job, Sarah. Way to go, Sarah. Being a great mom.

Yeah, dude. Because trust me, 16 and 17-year-olds won't hang out with you if they don't like you. They're pretty clear on that. I mean, they're not worried about your feelings. Nope. Neither, incidentally, are show producers. Don't care about your feelings either. I don't get paid to care about your feelings. Here we go. Here we go. That's awesome, dude. Hey, those are those cool moments when, like, I'm not good at being a parent. I'm not good at being a parent. I'm not good at being a parent. And then your kid just

Takes your hand while you're walking. And I'm not going to be an apparent. I'm not going to be an apparent. And your kid's like, no, we want to hang out with you guys. And you just exhale. Like, that's awesome. Good celebration. Way to go, Kelly. I didn't do it. Sarah did. Oh, yeah. Your kids for sure would not. Just kidding. Nate, your kids love you. I have a good relationship with mine. My son's getting his senior pictures taken right now. A little. That's why you're taking shots the whole show. I can see you at the corner of my eye. Put them away. And we know what comes after shots. More tattooed.

Hey, thank you guys. Appreciate y'all. Stay in school. Don't do drugs. Bye.