Coming up on the Dr. John Deloney Show.

I don't feel like I'm good at my job. And the thing is, is all the stuff I'm telling, I know it's all. I'm getting ready to take over a company, and I need to get past this because I can't run a business.

Hold on, hold on, hold on. Option number one that you presented is, I got to get over this right now. Option number two is you just scrapped the whole thing. Here's option three. You exhale for a minute. What's up? This is John with Dr. John Deloney Show. Man, I hope you're doing well. Of all the gajillions of podcast, you chose this one. All the gajillions of YouTube channels you could be watching, you chose this one. I'm super grateful to have you with us talking with real people about real stuff going on in their life. Talking about your relationships, your mental health, your emotional health, whatever you got going on in your life. I'm going to sit with you and we're going to figure out what's the next right What can we do next? If you want to be on this show, I'd love to have you. Give me a buzz at 1-844-693-3291, or go to JohnDaloney. Com/ask. Fill out the online questionnaire. It goes into Kelly's secret email box, and she crafts this show. She probably judges you a little bit, but it's okay. It's all right. I don't. I do too. It's cool. None of us are judging anybody.

We're all one day happy, F-A-M-I-L-Y. Kelly, I went to two punk shows last night, started at this little place called Exit In, a legendary club here in Nashville, and saw a band called Homefront. Dude, I don't know anything about them. Hopefully, their lyrics aren't terrible or whatever like that. They saw late. I was telling you guys, that singer, there was maybe 200 people in that room. He was singing in his mind to 80,000 people. It must have been like what it was like to see Freddie Mercury in a tiny little club. I know that's a huge statement. I just made. This guy's incredible. Then I quickly hopped in my car and I drove over to the Ryman to sit with some friends, not sit, we didn't sit once, and scream my head off to the Some 41's final show here in Nashville. Dude, I'm a bunch of smiley pants today. I don't know how you're functioning today. What time did you get home? My Organify Happy Drop is number one. I got home this morning, and I've had a smile on my face ever since I woke up, man. It was awesome this morning. My daughter I got up late, too, and I got up late.

My wife had already left to take my son to school, and we just stared at each other. We both walked in half-conscious, my daughter and I, and we stared at each other. Then she just turned and walked the other way. It was so great. It wasn't mean. It doesn't mean it was just we love each other enough to not speak. But it's cool. I'm all smiley pants, and my voice is a little horse because I don't want to waste my... All right, let's go out to San Antonio, some of the greatest food on planet Earth, and talk to Jacob. Hey, Jacob, what's up, man?

Oh, not much, Dr. John.

How are you doing? Doing all right, brother. What's going on in your world, man?

Oh, I wish it was better, but I talked to you about a year and a half ago. Sorry, I'm super nervous.

You're good, man. Talked to me about a year and a half ago. Things are still going tough?

Yeah, I was having a problem with drinking or beginning to, really, and things It's got a little better, but I've since they haven't been better. A lot of it has to do with real bad anxiety and stress and just feeling like I'm not enough overall. I'm just tired, man.

I know you are.

Thanks for calling me back.

I don't know what to do. Sorry.

You do exactly what you're doing right now. You call somebody that you trust and you say, I'm not all right. That's it. This is the phone call. Hey, listen, brother, this is the phone call that millions of millions of millions of people need to make, and you're setting an example for them. I'm grateful for you. I know you didn't wake up today with that being your job. It's not your job, but you did it, and I'm proud of you, and I'm grateful for you.

Thank you. Okay.

Remind me about yourself a little bit. Are you married? You got kids? Is it just you by yourself?

I'm married. It'll be 23 years this October. Okay.

How old are you?

I am 44. I'll be 45 in September.

Okay.

I got three kids. Had the first one when I was 18. He's 26 and married. Got a 21-year-old and a 15-year-old.

Okay, man.

Yeah, I'm still in it.

Yeah, you are. You're winding it down. You got three years left.

Yeah, I know. A buddy of mine just same age, has a 15-year-old, and his wife's pregnant right now. I said, You're nuts.

Yeah, I've got a decade left, man. Good on you. Here's the thing about alcohol, dude. It works. It works. Until it kills you, right? Until it messes stuff up.

It does. I don't want it. I don't want it to be the reason.

I know. Here's why I'm saying it works. Because you're doing what you got to do to survive, and at the same time, you're recognizing that's not a long term option. It's not wise long term. It's not wise today, right? So what's happened in the last year and a half, man? Why when you look in the mirror, you're disgusted by this dude that you see?

I don't know. It's been the last 20 plus years. I don't feel like I'm good at my job. And the thing is, is all the stuff I'm telling, I know it's called false.

Right. There you go.

But in my head, I still, I don't... If I screw up at work, if I screw something up at work. Even if a minor thing, I just beat myself down. It's like the end of the world. And the next day, I'm the only one that noticed that I screwed something up. Right. And I do that daily. I'm getting ready to take over a company, and I need to get past this because I can't run a business with that.

Hold on, hold on, hold on. Or here's a third option, okay? Option number one that you presented is, I got to get over this right now. Option number two is you just scrapped the whole thing. Here's option three. You exhale for a minute. Tell me about this company you're about to take over.

Instruction Company. I've been with them for 22 and a half years.

And they looked you in the eye and said, You're the guy to run this thing. We trust you and believe in you.

Yeah. I started from working out in the field as a trash picker upper, and I'm in the office now, and now I'm second in command.

How long is the owner? How long has this been brewing?

Which part?

The part where they started saying, Hey, we want you to come into the office. We see something special in you. We want you to make some bigger decisions.

That's been the last seven... I went into the office about 2014, about 10 years ago. It's really ramped up the last three years.

Okay. Can we just stop for a second?

Mm-hmm.

What did your dad do for a living?

He He worked for a credit company. He did credit reports and stuff for banks and whatnot.

What did your mom do?

She was a special Ed teacher for 23 years.

I'm going to ask you to do me a huge favor. Think of your 15-year-old, a son or daughter.

Daughter.

Okay. We're going to call her Jen.

Okay.

Your daughter, Jen, is about to do something she's never, ever done or seen done before by anybody she knows and loves. And she says, Dad, I'm scared. What would you tell her?

That it'll be she's okay, that your mom and I are here with you. You can lean on us if you need anything.

Would you put Jen in a position that you knew she was going to fail just so you could poke fingers at her and say, I told you you weren't good enough?

No, no, never.

Yeah. And I know this isn't father-daughter, but the owners of this company wouldn't put Jacob in charge.

No, it's family.

Okay.

It is family. It's extended family, but it's family. No, they wouldn't.

They wouldn't pick you?

No.

So here's all I'm going to ask you to do for right this second. I want you to be as kind as Jacob as you are to your daughter, Jen. Okay?

Sure.

Three years ago, when you started feeling the weight of that squat rack, that squat bar, and they started adding more weight to it, they're like, No, it's about to be yours. Your body has no roadmap for that. It's never even seen it done inside your house. Your dad ran credit reports. Good honorable job, and you got the job done. You probably paid the bills. Your mom was an amazing teacher. She didn't run a school. It's all new. And alcohol took that edge off that burn, right?

Oh, yeah.

Did your drinking ramp up the last three years?

It did. And then I ramped it down because I saw a problem. I go to the doctor regularly, and they don't see anything, but I know it shouldn't matter. I know it's a ticking time bomb.

Okay, but we also know this, okay? Can we just be real honest with each other? Yeah. When you get anxious, you don't see a reality for how it truly is. Fair?

Fair.

Because emotions and feelings are not designed to tell us the truth. That's not their job. Their job is to freak us out and keep us alive. You know that, objectively, nobody sees these mistakes that you just crucify your sofa. You know that your 26-year-old, you'd go back, if you could, and do things differently because you were a dad at 18. But you got a 26-year-old young man who's married, who's off making his own life, and you're pretty improud of him, aren't you?

Oh, yeah. Yeah, sorry.

You got a 15-year-old girl that you love to the moon and back, don't you?

Yes. Okay.

We're going to exhale. We're going to be kind to ourselves. We know that we don't see the world as it truly is, and that's okay. That means we got to go sit across from somebody and say, I need help seeing the world and feeling and experiencing the world as it truly is, because right now I can't. And I haven't been able to for a long time. What I have to have you agree to is just because you took some steps backwards when it comes to drinking doesn't mean you failed. You didn't crash and burn. You're just not driving 85 miles an hour right now. You had to slow down. You got stuck in traffic for a bit. It's okay. You're still going in the right direction. Have you quit on yourself?

I haven't. I'm concerned because I make dumb decisions now because of it, and my income is about to be extremely more than it is. And I'm afraid I'm going to magnify those. That's why I need to get it under control before my magnifying glass gets really big.

Have you been able to get it under control up until now? Not really. Okay. And stop trying to do it by yourself.

I try, and I just...

You can't?

Cool. Yeah. It makes it worse. That's right.

You get more anxious, and it gets more heavy. And you either have a drink and you feel overwhelmed with shame, or you just white-knuckled and white-knuckled it, and your 15-year-old daughter gets it taken out on her or somebody else at the office is, right? Stop, stop, stop. Stop trying to do this by yourself. You can go to a meeting tonight or tomorrow, and nobody in your family will know. Nobody will know.

Okay.

Okay? Tell your wife, I'm going to get this thing under control. And let me tell you, I grew up the son of a cop. Okay? I know about not having a lot. And then I know about having two number one best selling books and a radio show, a podcast, YouTube show that's launched out. And so here's what I had to do. I had to call an old friend who does money for a living. I had to call a tax guy. I had to call an attorney and sit down and say, I'm in a whole new world and my dad doesn't have a map for this. No one in my family has a map for this. I need someone to walk alongside me. They said, Sweet, I got you. I'd ask for help. When the weight of this thing, I hate to say this, but when the Fame part of this got big, some old demons resurface, man. I had to go sit with a therapist here in town. It's the best thing I've ever done. But I couldn't do it by myself. I just couldn't, man. And I do this for a living. I couldn't do it by myself.

And you can't either.

Yeah, my wife's feeling it, too. She tells me.

I know she is. She loves you. And she both wants that new paycheck that's going to come. She bought low, right? She bought in at 18.

Oh, yeah. I mean, we were married, and we did all backwards, but here we are. Here you are, man. Three years later.

Because you're a person who just makes it work, dude. You never give up. She bought stock real low in you, and now it's about to cash in, and that's awesome. And she loves you for the whole...

She sees me falling apart.

I know, and she loves you. She loves you. It's not her job to carry you and fix you either. Okay?

No. I'm sorry.

I'm trying not to dump it on her. I know, but you end up carrying it all yourself, and you can't do that. I need you to promise me this.

Okay.

Promise me you'll get off this call, and with your phone, you'll Google a meeting, and you will go to a meeting tonight or in the morning.

Okay.

In San Antonio. You'll do that?

Yes, I will do that.

Second thing is, do you promise when you go to this meeting, you'll tell the truth?

Yes. Okay. I promise.

This promotion is huge, and your family's counting on you, and they've been building this, yada, yada. If you get to If you're in a place where you can't bear the weight of this thing by yourself, you have to speak up. You'll destroy the whole thing. Okay?

I can do that.

If you can't, you can't. And if you can't right now, you can't right now, but you might be able to later. And you might be able to get some people around you. I'm going to hook you up. I want you to stay on the line. I'm going to hook you up with a smart investor pro, okay?

Okay.

We'll get you some names of some people in your area. Actually, I'm going to do one better. I work at Ramsey Solutions here. I'm I'm going to hook you up with a free coaching session with one of our financial coaches, okay? Okay. They're going to walk you through making a budget when your income quadruples. And I know people listening like, Oh, it must be nice. It's tough. Okay? I got you.

Yeah, it ain't easy. No. I sounded good a few years ago.

It does. It's heavy. And here's what you're figuring out. You're about to run the show and you went with you. That same guy that was insecure and was nervous, he's insecure and nervous. Just everybody's looking at him now.

Yeah.

Right? Yeah. Now you're starting to realize, oh, that's why the head honcho makes so much money because they got to carry the whole company. It's heavy.

Yeah.

Right? Yeah, exactly. This coach is going to hook you up. They're going to get you connected with some smart investor pros, a tax person in your area, and they're going to get you the right people, but they can't make those calls for you. You got to do that. You got to go sit down and talk to people. Okay. All right. It will give you peace. Nice.

That's what I'm looking for.

All right. Here's the last thing I want you to do. You're what? 44, you say? About to be 45? Yeah. All right. I want you to write a letter tonight by yourself to 50 Jacob and your wife. You all will be empty nesters. You'll have a grand kid or two or three. You'll be the President of a construction company that's still booming in San Antonio. If the The state of Texas hasn't melted by then. It's pretty hot. Yeah.

Right? Yeah. It's actually not too bad today. There you go.

I want you to write a letter to 50-year-old Jacob and talk about the things you decided to do on your 45th birthday that made the life you have at 50 possible. You started going to meetings. You got all the alcohol out of your house. You sat down and had the hard conversations with your wife you've been needing to have. You started exercising again. You told everybody on your leadership team, Hey, I'm taking an hour. I'm knocking off an hour early to go see a therapist. What? You can't see a therapist? I am. If you all need to, I got you to take an hour and go do that. I want you to remember this sentence, Secrets will kill you. All right. They'll kill you. And not everybody needs to know everything about everything, especially when you're the president of a company, right?

Yeah.

I don't think you're broken, dude. I think your body is prepping to hold the entire company up, and it's been running and chasing, running, running, running for a long time. Do you love Jacob?

I want to.

Okay.

I want to.

Does your wife love Jacob? She does. Does your three kids love Jacob?

Oh, yeah.

All right. I do, too. A whole bunch of people do. When you can't hold your arms up, I want you to lean on those other people that are holding it for you right now, okay?

I want to be able to do the thing you talk about with your hand on your chest. I can't do it yet.

You can. You can by yourself.

I try it, and I just start sobbing like a baby.

It's good. That's the path. That's the path. Do it right now. Put your hand in your chest and say the words, I love this guy.

I love this guy.

Say it loud from your guts.

I love this guy.

And it's time I start taking care of him.

And it's time I start taking care of him.

Amen. This is the day, right?

It is, man.

All right, brother. Get online and make that phone call, dude. Anything you ever need from me, you call. And you've got our back channel emails. If you need something, holler at us, okay? And hang on the line. We're going to get you hooked up with that financial counselor, and we'll get you some like Logistical support for money, for taxes, that stuff as you enter into this new world. But you got to go make the call to go to a meeting tonight, an AA meeting. You got to make that call. If you and your wife need to go see a counselor, go see a counselor. Write that letter to 50-year-old Jacob and decide today, you're 50-year-old me, and you're proud of... You're living the life because 45-year-old Jacob did a bunch of hard work. You're welcome. I love you, good man. We'll be right I love my Helix mattresses. I ordered a Helix for every bedroom in my house, for my bedroom, my kids, our guest room. And unlike other mattress companies I've used before, the shipping came so quickly. It was delivered right to my door. And yes, the mattresses are incredible. Helix has been awarded the number one mattress, picked by GQ and Wired magazine and more.

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With Helix, better sleep starts right now. All right, let's go out to Kansas City, Kansas, home of the Chiefs, Pema Homes, and talk to the great and powerful Shelby. Hey, Shelby, what's up?

Hey, how's it going? It's going good.

Excellent. What's up?

Okay. Two years ago, my husband and I found out that we were having twins, and we had I think he was 16 months old at the time, 18 months old. We freaking out a little bit because having three under two was a little overwhelming.

That's against the law of physics. It's not supposed to ever happen.

No, it's not. Congratulations. No, it's not. No, thank you.

Hey, at least when you have three kids in college at the same time, that would be cheap. That's super not helpful, I know, shall we?

Yeah, we won't think I don't know about that yet.

Yeah, that's a problem for future Shelby. Yes. Okay, so what's up?

Yeah, exactly. We decided to move closer to my parents, and we actually ended up moving across the street from them.

Oh, good. I'll call you Ray Ramone.

I don't know who that is.

It's not Ramone, it's Ramano. Ray Ramono. That's it. Everybody loves Raymond. Everybody loves Raymond. Yeah, there you go.

Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

All right. You live across the street from your... Here's the deal. You had three kids, ages two and younger, and you looked at your husband, you're like, Hey, you want to make our insane life even more insane? And he was like, Oh, yeah. And you all moved across the street from your parents. It's awesome. Yes. Okay.

Yes. I mean, life is crazy. If I could get some sleep, that'd be great. My husband does shift work, so he is gone for 48 hours at the time. We actually moved further from his work. He has a two and a half hour commute to work.

Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. That becomes not shift work. That means that's the work that you just take the F out. All right.

Yeah.

He's commuting two and a half hours a No, no, no, no.

It's every two days. Then he gets four days off and then eight days off every couple of months. His schedule is unusual. Is he a fireman? Yes, he is.

Okay, okay. All right. Okay, so- We joke that he goes to work to get sleep. Of course he does. Jeez Louise.

He gets better sleep at work than he does at home. We made that move because there was a job that we were hoping would be… It was available before we moved, but technicalities, he wasn't eligible. But now it did open up recently, and he was eligible, and he applied, and he was accepted. However, there's some technicalities that we were like, This isn't a good fit for our family. So he ended up turning it down. That's the reason we were willing to move further from his work was because we thought we had a backup, and the backup failed. It was worth it to move across from my parents, if that makes sense. That was complicated.

Okay, hold on. You all moved because you had an opportunity to be a fireman closer to your family. You were going to use your parents living across the street to help with 111 kids under the age of two.

Yes.

Then he got an opportunity to do the job. We turned it down. You all thought that whatever technicalities, as you called them, that was going to happen with this job was less of a burden on your family than a five-hour commute every week?

Yeah. Wow. Yes. Okay. Because it had to do with his pension and his position and moving forward. We didn't know all of that before we moved. But now we're thinking about moving again.

Yes. Whatever you're about to say, the answer is yes. Move today.

Yes, exactly. Yeah, because he's made that sacrifice. We're wanting to move- I take it your parents' situation is not working out like you had dreamed it would work out. Yes. Yes.

Tell me about that.

Okay. When we moved, we had this expectation that we would spend a lot of time with him, relational, not just help with the babies, because at the beginning, it was insane. I don't even know how I did it once my husband went back to work. I don't know how I did nights by myself. It's a blur. We thought that we would get more dates, We have this expectation that we would have more dinners with my family. I'm not saying that they're not involved. They've helped exponentially. But as of recently, it feels like their involvement, they have some excuse or my mom's been really busy helping my brother with some things that are pretty… I don't know how to say it. She's the reason he's alive. Okay.

He's got some big struggles going on.

Yes. He definitely needs her. Yeah, he needs help.

Hold on. These expectations that you had, did you also talk about them, or did you and your husband just dream it up and then move across the street?

No. I mean, yes, both. My mom was saying, We can go on walks together, and we can spend all this time together. I had envisioned it in my head. A lot of it was unspoken, but a lot of it was still mutual, if that makes sense.

Have you heard me talk about pictures and words?

Yes, but you can remind me.

Okay. We speak in words, but we think in pictures. When your mom said, Yeah, we'll be able to help a lot, the picture in your head was weekly date nights and weekly you and your husband work out together, and you all go for walks together. Mom's over there being so great and doing the dishes and cleaning the bottles and showing up at 2:00 AM helping you sleep. Her picture was once a month, you can go to the grocery store. Yeah. Right? So you all spoke the same words. We'll always be able to hang out. We'll go for walks together. Your picture was every day. Your picture was this big, awesome. You probably created a picture of your mom that doesn't exist in reality.

Right, right.

And then you're mad. So you cast her in a movie she didn't even know she was in, and now you're just upset that she doesn't know the lines.

Right. Yeah.

I hate that for you. I've done that a million times myself.

Yeah, it's not comfortable. No. For sure.

Then you start judging her for things she's not doing. She feels judged, and she gets mad, and then your brother has some challenges, and it's just an easy off-ramp. Okay, so now where is everybody?

Okay, so we had a conflict, I should call it. I don't It was a- You speak around the Bush too much.

Just go straight into it. Okay. You had a conflict. What happened?

Yes. Okay. We decided we need to move. We got to get closer to work. Yes. We hired a realtor. My mom was a realtor, apparently still is, but she's not with a broker. So we didn't go with her because she's been helping like crazy busy with my brother. We didn't talk to her, and she thought it was resentment because of her lack of involvement. Because we had been, we've been so sick and just time after time. I had 103 fever. The kids all had fevers. My husband ended up driving home to come help because my mom couldn't help. Okay.

So you got a realtor? And your mom's a realtor, and you didn't use her, and she's got her feelings hurt now.

Yes. It exploded into something it shouldn't have. It just completely blew out of proportion. She was accusing us that we were resentful, and that's why we She didn't choose her. But she's been so busy that we don't even talk because of how busy she's been. I've been accepting that and working on myself to be like, Okay, my expectations are my responsibility, not on her. My husband and I made that decision, and she was offended by it and ended up calling my husband, and she was getting worked up. He said, It's your choice if you want to be effing offended. She got even more upset. And then he was like, I need to go. And then he hung up. And so then she was texting me, your husband cussed me out, hung up on me. He did? Yes.

And so- He did? Yeah. All right. So bring me to right here. Bring it home. How can I help?

How do we navigate this? How do I manage my expectations? How do I manage the relationship with my parents and it not turning into something as big as it did because now she- You can't.

Well, number one, don't cuss at your mom. Don't hang up on your mom, right? That's easy. I'm in this space Your jaw may drop. I'm in mom's camp on this one in that she was at least worth a phone call. Yeah. Hey, I know you're super busy. I know brothers got a lot of stuff going on. We're going to move closer to work. This It wasn't what we all... It just is, and we love you guys. We don't want this to burn a hole through our relationship down the road. We got to get closer to work. This five-hour commute is not working. We've got this realtor who's plugged into a big machine and you're going to get this house sold, especially in this crazy market. I would have thought that's... Let me say it this way. My mom is an English professor, one of the greatest editorial minds when it comes to writing in writing editing. For my first book, I sent her a draft, and she went through it. The second one, the deadlines were very tight. Because the first book was so successful, we were able to... I had an editor that worked alongside me so that we could edit in real-time.

I reached out to my mom and told her. If I'm her, I would have thought after two dissertations, after two books, suddenly the third, I would have immediately thought, Uh-oh, something happened. Because that's what she does, right? That's the craft that she has worked for 30-something years to perfect. She's helped me get through a number of some of the biggest projects in my life. I reached out and said, Hey, they're hiring an editor to walk alongside me so we can do this in real-time, have a ping-pong match. She was like, Oh, that sounds amazing. But I got out of the way. It wasn't a big surprise. I think that was worth the call. Here's the deal. Your husband's also right. Your mom's got a son who's really struggling. She had a picture of daughter with three babies across the street. It didn't work out. She's grieving that. I'm going to give my mom the benefit of the doubt on the grief. She's not going to handle it well, and that's okay. Okay. I've got to take care of me and my home.

Yeah.

If she chooses to have her feelings heard, she gets to make that choice. She might be choosing to not hang out with you guys.

Yeah.

If you were to go across the street today and find somebody to watch the kids for an hour and just sit down with your dad and mom and say, I just want to start all the way over. I'm sorry. This whole thing got sideways. I don't want it to be. I love you guys. I had this picture. Three kids. It's crazy. It's chaotic. Brother husband's five hours away. All this stuff. I don't want to lose you guys. I'm sorry. Would that be a net positive or would they just blow up on you?

I don't think that. I mean, they already blew up. We had told my I had told my mom that we were moving. We did tell her, and I did tell her we had another realtor. We did all those things.

Is this all a text message or are you going across the street doing this in person?

It was Partial on the phone and partial on text.

Okay, stop texting. No more texting. Tell your mom, We're not texting anymore. I don't want to get any confusion or anything. I love you, and I want to do all these things face-to-face in worst-case scenario by phone.

Okay.

Yeah, I can do that. Say, You can text me and say, Hey, I need to give you a quick call, but we're going to start talking.

Okay. We did talk for an hour on the phone, but she was saying that she was concerned for my marriage, and it turned into She didn't like how my husband said that to her. She was like, I'm concerned for you and the kids. Sure. I didn't appreciate it being turned on my marriage necessarily.

But also, your mom's hurting.

Mm-hmm.

Your husband dropped F-bombs on her and then hung up on her. Was she out of her mind? Probably. Was she super angry? Probably. Is he trained to be emotionally unreactive as a firefighter? Yes.

Yeah. Unless it's- Yeah. Here's the deal.

Somebody at some point needs to step up and be the adult here. Everybody's in their emotions and in their feelings. You're moving three of her grandkids away while her son is struggling and not living into the picture that she'd created for him, too. Mom's great pictures. That's what they do. Dad's do, too. If my daughter's husband is F-bombing my wife, hanging up on her, yeah, dude, everybody's going to hear from me. Everybody's going to hear from me. I wish mom wouldn't make those calls. She did. Here's the deal. The only thing I could see, the only path forward is just to reset the whole thing. I'm sorry. If your husband could call and say, I'm sorry, I shouldn't swear like that at you. That's on me. I'm sorry. This job is demanding. It's a lot, and I'm sorry. He can do that great. If he can't, it's embarrassing, but so be it. Everybody does their own thing. But somebody's got to be the adult here and then make some real concrete plans. Then mom gets to choose if she wants to use the last two months, five months, six months, however long you'll live there as a way to rebuild bridges and to get reconnected.

Cool. Or if she wants to sit across the street and look at the blinds at you and judge, she gets to pick that. I just wouldn't play that game anymore, man. Life's too short. Life's too stinking short. You got three kids under, oh, two now, or three kids under three or however long. Man, let your energy be there. Let your energy be in keeping your marriage whole and strong while your husband's hours and hours away, and you all find a new place to go. Lots of emotions, lots of emotions, lots of emotions. Let's set those aside best we can. Let's make some adult decisions and go from there. Thank you so much for the call, Shelby. We'll be right back. It is one of my most sincere honors to be partnering with an amazing supplement company. I'm talking about Thorn. Thorn is a world-class, personalized and science-back supplement and health testing company used by elite athletes, thinkers, doers, and world changers all over the globe. I've been taking Thorn for years, long before I was a YouTuber and a podcaster. It's where I get my creatine, my Super EPA Omega Fish Oil and more. My kids take it, my wife takes it.

Thorne is a staple in the Deloney household. Thorne is pure third-party tested, and they are redefining what it means to live longer and healthier. For Deloney's show For our listeners, Thorn is providing 25% off everything in their entire lineup. Go to thorn. Com/deleteru/deloney to open up your digital dispensary, and the discount will be taken at checkout. That's thorn, T-H-O-R-N-E. Com/theletteru/deloney. All right, let's roll out and go up to Rochester, New York, and talk to the Mighty Douglas. Hey, Douglas, what's up, man?

Dr. John, how's it going? Rocking, dude.

What about you?

Doing good. Excellent. What's up? You're great. Got a dad question for you.

Dad it up, dude.

All right. I'm a single dad. I got a great eight-year-old daughter, and I work hard at being a dad. I've been divorced for the last seven years, and my kids getting older, asking questions about relationships, mom, dad, all that stuff. For me, I look at how I learned about relationships, and it's mostly through observation. But I'm not sure I'm ready to start dating yet. So trying to see what I can do to teach her about healthy relationships without being in one.

That's a great question, man. Look at you signing up for dad of the year. It's awesome, man. What happened with your first marriage?

Okay, I guess we can unpack that. It was a good marriage for the most part. Then there was an affair. It ended pretty quick.

Yours or hers?

Hers. Okay. Yeah.

Bro, hold on. Dude, that hurt is still right up near your surface. Have you worked through that?

I have. I go to counseling and have since then. It's just a tricky situation. It's like a good marriage for seven years and then a couple months of really bad. Overall, things were pretty good there and still have an amicable relationship.

You all are good co-parents? What's that? You all are good co-parents?

Yes, we are. Good. Yeah.

What has your story been with your eight-year-old so far as to why you and mom don't live in the same house?

There really hasn't been a story yet. Try to keep it light and not really get into any details. It's just we're a different type of family. We work together. We just don't live together. A lot of her questions come from what she sees from her friends at school and other parents and things like that.

Eight-year-olds are real smart. I have one.

Yeah.

They know way, way more than most parents give them credit for. I do this for a living, and I'm constantly stunned at the stuff my daughter's picking up.

Yeah.

Does your wife have the, I would call it the strength of character. Just sit down with her eight-year-old and say, Mom, I made some bad choices. We'll tell you about them when you get older, Mom, I made some bad choices. Would she be willing to do that or No.

No, I don't think so.

I hate that for your daughter, dude. Yeah. I hate that. I hate that because your daughter is going to start asking herself what she could do to get you all back together. Is your mom remarried?

No, she is dating, but not remarried.

Jeez, man. I hate that. All right, so you're stuck in that awful space of you can't really tell your daughter the truth at eight. One day you can. By the way, one day you can. 15, 16, 17, one day you can. We're not going to run down mom. She's a terrible mom. Mom made some decisions that hurt dad real bad. Yeah, that's just telling the truth. It's not running people down, et cetera, et To answer your question, you're right. A really important day-by-day, minute-by-minute model for what relationships and love look like is a kid watching two parents. You don't have that.

Yeah.

That's okay. The next best proxy is how you treat her and how you treat every other woman you interact with, whether it's a waitress, whether it's your ex-wife, whether it is the woman at the Southwest counter, any other person that your daughter, it radiates from you that you honor and respect and treat women with dignity. That's as little Little things like when you and your daughter go out for breakfast or for lunch and you ask, Hey, what are two or three of your favorite things about that woman who was bringing us our dinner? Let your daughter just talk about it and then say, Here's how much the meal cost. Let's leave her a tip. What's a tip, dad? Well, a tip is a way we can honor her extra. This money goes directly into her pocket. Let's make the tip wild.

Yeah.

Right? Those are ways that she gets to see in real time with real numbers, you choosing to honor people.

See what I'm saying? Yeah.

Another thing you can do is a tangible... Adults talk at kids a lot, and they absorb it. But if you kept a spiral that you put on her bed, that she then writes in and puts on your bed, she can read it and then reread it and then reread it. If you use map colors or crayons or something silly, it might take you 10 minutes, 5 minutes. But if you do that on a regular basis, one of the greatest gifts we can give our kids is time. It will eventually sink in the amount of dedicated time, even those 5 minutes, 10 minutes that dad spent on daughter that will lift her up. This is what this looks like.

See what I'm saying?

I do.

I do.

So it's these small things. Do not start dating if you're not ready, just so you can try to show her what dating looks like. Don't do that.

Yeah. Okay.

Let her feel from every single day of her life how much dad is invested. And by the way, this doesn't mean that you never miss a game, you never miss a recital, you never miss a whatever. That's not what that mean. I mean that when you all are together, there's a laser between the two of you. Okay. There's not a phone, there's not a digital babysitter, there's not an iPad. There is a laser beam from dad.

Yeah.

And she will know when she meets somebody, My dad loved me way more than you do. Idiot, right? You're right. My dad paid way more attention. My dad even wrote me notes every night. How can you not, stupid boyfriend, who wants to date? You'll create a bedrock of safety for her that another man will have a hard time matching and good. That's what we want, right?

That's exactly right.

Yeah. Again, not going to lie to you. It'd be better if you and mom are still in the same house and she could watch you do that. I watched my daughter the other day. My wife and I were smooching in the kitchen, and my daughter was going, eeuw, gross. She was making this. She's eight, too. But I caught her. She was covering up her eyes and going, Gross. But I saw her look at through her fingers. Yeah. She wanted to see it, right? Yeah. She's just absorbing it and absorbing it. She sees me walk in the front door, completely ignore my daughter, and go straight for my wife. She's learning like, Oh, that woman is the most important thing in my dad's life, which is awesome. You don't have that. We're going to do the next best thing, which good on you for even asking the question, man. Where did you even come up with that idea to ask that question?

Just a lot of time thinking. I'm getting questions from her.

What questions?

How come you and mom don't live in the same house? How come you don't kiss? Are you going to live in the same house again? Things like that. And then I realized I have a defense mechanism put up. Everything I do is to make sure I have this safe bubble around the both of us. So I would say even my family doesn't live in state. So I have a handful of close friends, so I don't have a lot of relationships. And as I'm getting those questions, I'm thinking about, what can I do here, given the situation that I'm in? Yeah.

And again, this is geographically I found. But some of the greatest parenting wisdom I got was from a buddy, SJ Dahlstrom. He's a children's author. And he's worked at children's homes for years. And one of the things he told me early on when my son was born was, take your son everywhere you can possibly take him. And that's happened with my son and my daughter. But he gets to watch me interact with other adults. So he gets to see it. My daughter gets to see it. I try to take her everywhere I possibly can. And so I think at eight years old, I'm going to start bringing her. Now, you can't take her to a bar. If you're going to be out till midnight, you can't do that stuff. But if you're going to the grocery store, you're coming with me. If we're going over to a friend's house for dinner, she's coming to. Even if it's awkward, even if she has to take a coloring book and we're going to try to curate that world, right? And, dude, kids can feel the effort you are putting in to keeping the world a mirage.

Yeah.

At some point, you have to say, me and mommy, we're married. As adults, we made a decision to not be married anymore. We still respect each other. Mommy and I don't do romantic love together anymore, but we both are together and united in making make sure you have a great life. Why? What happened? Those are adult things. When you get older, we'll talk about them. But those are adult conversations.

Okay.

So trying to pretend like, Oh, we're just married. We just don't live in the same house, and we don't have any affection, and she dates other guys. That's going to blow your daughter's mind way more than just saying, No, we decided together that we were not going to be married anymore. Yeah. We both wish it had been different, but it wasn't. When you get older, we'll tell you more about it.

Yeah.

Does that make sense?

Yeah, it does. It does. It's super helpful.

You can ask her, and you can even do this. What are 10 questions you want to ask about me and mommy? Or 10 questions. You get 10 questions to ask dad anything. I don't know, dad. Anything. You might only be able to answer four of them. You can say, These other six I'm writing down in this little journal here, and these are for when you get older. You're not there yet, but one day. Oh, come on. No, these are grown up questions, but I'll answer them Okay. Same as she can't have a grown-up drink, or same as she can't watch this TV show because she's a kid, or same as she can't have ice cream for breakfast. It's going to go into that bucket. But here's the meta that she's going to pick up, the meta message. Dad's in control. Dad's not hiding. When dad's trying to prop up a bubble like, Oh, it's all cool. It's cool, she can feel dad hiding.

Yeah.

I'm not going to answer that question. You're too young, but that's a good question, and I'll answer it one day. I know that's important to That shows dad's in control.

Yeah.

Good on you for being a good dad that wants to honor this young girl. Good for you, man.

Yeah. Yeah, she's my world. Dude.

And you're hers, right? I'm proud of you. I'm really proud of you, man. You give me hope for dads raising daughters all across the country. And dads, this is it. If you're facing facing a situation with your kid and you want to do better, ask some people. Find some people you trust. Reach out. This is not something you can be like, I don't know how to do that. No, no, no. It's your job to figure it out. Ask hard questions. Go see a counselor. Go see a child. Do something. Do a bunch of things, but be the best dad you can be. Show up, whatever, regardless of your situation. Good on you, Douglas. I'm proud of you, man. All right, everybody. We'll be right back. Hey, what's What's up? Deloney here. Listen, you and me and everybody else on the planet has felt anxious or burned out or chronically stressed at some point. In my new book, Building a Non-Anxious Life, you'll learn the six daily choices that you can make to get rid of your anxious feelings and be able to better respond to whatever life throws at you so you can build a more peaceful, non-anxious life.

Get your copy today at JohnDaloney. Com. All right, we're back. Kelly, what I do on social media now? All right. I'm going to read this one. I like this one. I don't follow it all the time. Is it one that says, be kind to your coworkers? No. Okay. Please love yourself enough to get 7-9 hours of sleep as often as you possibly can. Arrested you is an optimal you. Plan for it, demand it, do it. This was a note I wrote to myself because I don't do it very often. I I don't think you did it last night. I did not. But I did rock on till the break of dawn, literally, and it was awesome. Again, it's a balanced life. But yeah, it's just a note like, Deloney love yourself enough to go to sleep, right? That's me sitting at 9:45 or 9:30, and I'm tired, my body's starting to fade, and then I just grab my phone, and then now we're off to the races, or I just go sit down and start reading a book or something, and My wife's like, Why don't you just go to sleep? I could see it on you.

I'm like, Well, you know. I just got to sleep. It's just everybody. If you love yourself enough to get seven, nine hours of sleep, just go to bed. Just go to bed. That new series is not worth it. Punk Rock shows, 100% worth it. Band Practice, 100% worth it. Kelly, her tattoo appointments, super worth it. Her geriatric meetings that she goes to, definitely don't want to miss those. But on the whole, dude, go to bed. Just go to bed. Go to bed. I saw Mark Manson posted something the other day, and he was like, When I was 18 or 21 or something, I swore I'd never be the guy that went to bed at 9:30, didn't drink, and whatever. He said, Now that I'm in my 40s, the only question I can ask is, What took me so long? All right? What a great life. What a great life. All right, go to bed, everybody. Go to bed. Love you guys. Stay in school. Don't do drugs. And age gracefully like Kelly. See you soon.