Pod Insights The Dr. John Delony Show I Left My Fiancé for Another Man About this episode On today’s episode, we hear about:
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A man wondering how to move forward after discovering his wife’s secret
A woman healing from her ex-husband’s crimes
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Transcript Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.
0:05 Speaker 00 I ended up leaving my fiance.
0:08 Dr. John Delony? Did you meet somebody new?
0:09 Speaker 00 I did and regretted it almost immediately. I don't know, no relationship is perfect and no person is gonna be like your perfect person, but there was just like things that I felt were lacking.
0:20 Dr. John Delony? Did you put him on the table and say, "I want to be loved like this"?
0:28 Dr. John Delony? What's going on? What's going on? This is John with the Dr. John Deloney Show. Pulling up a seat next to hurting people all over the planet, whether you're struggling with what to do with your kids, what you're to do with a partner, husband, wife, what's going on in your kids' schools, your like whatever you got, your mental and emotional health, whatever it is, I'm gonna pull up a seat and we're gonna sit down and we're gonna figure out what's the next right move. And in a world that just feels like everyone's throwing everything up on social media, that everybody's feeling this sense of doom and isolation, I'm gonna hold it for you. I'll hold it with you. We'll sit down at the table, put on the table, and we're gonna figure out what's the next right move. All right, Concord, New Hampshire. Let's talk to Ashley. What's up, Ashley? How we doing?
1:12 Speaker 00 Hi, I'm doing okay. How are you?
1:14 Dr. John Delony? I'm doing good. Thanks for hopping on the call. What's up?
1:17 Speaker 00 Um, yes, thank you for having me. Um, I don't know, I just kind of went through something recently. I, um, ended up leaving my fiance, um...
1:32 Dr. John Delony? How come?
1:34 Speaker 00 How come?
1:34 Dr. John Delony? Yeah.
1:36 Speaker 00 I don't know, that's the thing.
1:38 Dr. John Delony? Did you meet somebody new?
1:40 Speaker 00 I did, I did. It was somebody that lived in the area and I got curious about who this person was and I took it too far and I acted on it and then, yeah, ended up leaving my fiance and regretted it almost immediately.
2:01 Speaker 00 And I actually just left that other relationship that I was in.
2:08 Speaker 00 Um, and I think I want to repair things with my ex-fiance and I think he does too, but we just, I don't know where to start.
2:21 Dr. John Delony? How do you know you want to repair it?
2:27 Speaker 00 Because, I mean, he was my best friend. I mean, we were together for seven years, engaged for a year and a half.
2:43 Speaker 00 And I don't know, I just can't, I don't know, I can't imagine like, you know, meeting someone else.
2:52 Dr. John Delony? You already have, you've already done that.
2:56 Speaker 00 I know, but like trying to like build a life with someone else because the life that we had built was like everything that I could have wanted. I just didn't see it in the time.
3:08 Dr. John Delony? I'm wondering if you're not just in a cloud of guilt and loneliness.
3:19 Speaker 00 That's the thing, I just, I don't know. I mean.
3:22 Dr. John Delony? Then I would pause on trying to run back and fix this thing.
3:31 Dr. John Delony? Cause I'm afraid it's gonna happen, I'm afraid it's gonna happen again.
3:36 Speaker 00 I know, that's my worry too, and I don't want it to happen again. And that's why like I'm taking the steps to try and figure out why I did what I did. And I just started therapy last week.
3:46 Dr. John Delony? I know, but the, the bigger thing is, is you're making an ironclad commitment. I'm never gonna do that again. And I haven't heard you say that.
3:59 Dr. John Delony? Like figuring out why, that's, that's, that's good. That's part of the puzzle.
4:08 Dr. John Delony? But there's that line saying, I won't do this.
4:12 Dr. John Delony? Or let me put it this way. He can't anchor in and trust you again until you trust you. And you don't trust you right now.
4:22 Speaker 00 No, but I want to trust me. Like I want to be a better person.
4:25 Dr. John Delony? I totally get that. But you can't ask him to anchor into you until you are trustworthy to yourself.
4:33 Speaker 00 So how do I do that?
4:37 Dr. John Delony? You've got to begin to make some ironclad commitments to yourself and then act upon those things. I'm the kind of person who.
4:48 Dr. John Delony? Here's what that looks like. I'm the kind of person that has zero social media. I'm the kind of person that does not text anybody that I might be attracted to, or not, like, whatever.
5:01 Speaker 00 Mm-hmm.
5:02 Dr. John Delony? I'm the kind of person who, you gotta fill that gap in, not through thoughts, and I'm wondering why this, ironclad actions. I'm a person who doesn't do any of those things.
5:16 Speaker 00 Okay.
5:18 Dr. John Delony? And if you say, "I'm the kind of person that he's on my, like, I'm gonna give my social media access and all my DMs and all my text messages to my fiance, this person who I said is my best friend, but I blew his life to smithereens, I'm gonna do all those things."
5:34 Dr. John Delony? That's the kind of person I am. Otherwise, here's what's gonna happen. You're gonna go back and you're gonna grovel. He's gonna have this upper hand, you're gonna feel it, and you're gonna want that safety of that friendship you had, of that comfort that you had.
5:50 Speaker 00 Right.
5:51 Dr. John Delony? And the moment it gets comfortable, you're gonna start feeling dead in your own skin again. And somebody at work's gonna say, "God, I love that shirt you're wearing." And now we're back to the races again.
6:04 Speaker 00 Exactly.
6:09 Dr. John Delony? So the question from me inside out is, what is it about the life you co-created that you did not feel good inside of?
6:21 Speaker 00 I don't know. It was just, I guess, seeking, you know, validation elsewhere that made me feel good. And then, once I started to get it, it was just...
6:32 Dr. John Delony? Oh, it's intoxicating. It's the best drug in the world.
6:36 Speaker 00 Right.
6:37 Dr. John Delony? But my deeper question is, what was it about this person that you trusted and were planning on building a life with, that you were with for eight years or so, that you couldn't say, "I want to be loved like this"?
6:55 Speaker 00 I guess there was just, you know,
6:59 Speaker 00 I don't know, no relationship is perfect and no person is gonna be like your perfect person, but there was just like things that I felt were lacking.
7:07 Dr. John Delony? Did you put him on the table and say, "I want to be loved like this"?
7:16 Speaker 00 No.
7:16 Dr. John Delony? Okay.
7:18 Speaker 00 But that's the thing, he treated me so well.
7:21 Dr. John Delony? I know, but he didn't treat you in the way that you wanted.
7:28 Dr. John Delony? And you didn't have the courage to tell him.
7:31 Speaker 00 Right.
7:32 Dr. John Delony? And Hollywood called.
7:36 Dr. John Delony? And Hollywood is an amazing drug.
7:40 Speaker 00 Mm-hmm.
7:46 Speaker 00 So,
7:49 Speaker 00 I guess one of the, the main things is like, we struggled like with intimacy. And it was definitely more like...
7:59 Dr. John Delony? What does that mean?
8:00 Speaker 00 From my, my side.
8:00 Dr. John Delony? It was boring, you didn't wanna sleep with him, you...
8:04 Speaker 00 Yeah, it was just like, it was boring and it was just, for me, it was more like a chore. And I just like, didn't like it anymore, but I know that he didn't feel that way. And that just created like a, a disconnect between us.
8:18 Dr. John Delony? And so, um, I'm thinking of a couple of my buddies that are my best friends, okay? My closest friends on the planet.
8:26 Speaker 00 Mm-hmm.
8:26 Dr. John Delony? If they're doing a thing that I don't like, I'm taking sex off the table, right? These are just my, like, guys, right? My buddies.
8:31 Speaker 00 Mm-hmm.
8:32 Dr. John Delony? I'm gonna say, "Hey dude, don't do that anymore.
8:38 Dr. John Delony? Do this."
8:42 Dr. John Delony? And they're like, "All right, cool."
8:46 Dr. John Delony? What was it about this person that you call your best friend that you spent so much time with that you didn't have the courage to say, "I wanna spice this up.
8:56 Dr. John Delony? I'm feeling like this is a chore.
9:00 Dr. John Delony? I feel like I am just somebody that gets you off, that's not somebody that we're creating a fun, exciting life together."
9:12 Speaker 00 Right, and that's the thing that I can't figure out because, I mean, he was all about that. I just like was not, I don't know, I just couldn't bring myself to do it. But then it's like I meet someone else and it's like I had no issues, but...
9:25 Dr. John Delony? Because, you know why? Because there's nothing at stake there.
9:31 Dr. John Delony? It's easy.
9:33 Speaker 00 Right.
9:37 Dr. John Delony? When you build a comfortable, safe
9:41 Dr. John Delony? time together, it can be hard to say, "Hey, by the way, right now, this is me. Do you still love me?"
9:53 Dr. John Delony? Because there's so much more at stake.
9:55 Speaker 00 Right.
10:00 Dr. John Delony? I mean, here's the thing. To answer your question, the path back in something like this is you ask him,
10:09 Dr. John Delony? "I would like a roadmap to rebuild trust with you, because I blew your life up. I blew my life up, I blew your life up.
10:17 Dr. John Delony? I need a roadmap to trust."
10:24 Dr. John Delony? I'm personally telling you right now, I've just sat with enough couples over the years, enough individuals over the years, you're gonna get comfortable again and you're gonna get bored again. And until you deal with those skills,
10:36 Dr. John Delony? how do you practice desire inside of a very safe relationship?
10:48 Dr. John Delony? What made you bored with this other guy?
10:51 Speaker 00 You mean the one that I left my fiance for?
10:54 Dr. John Delony? Yep.
10:56 Speaker 00 Um, I wasn't necessarily bored with him. I... He was just like a little bit... I mean, he was emotionally and mentally abusive and controlling and manipulative and it just like got to the point where...
11:15 Dr. John Delony? But there was a part of that that drew you to him. What was it?
11:22 Speaker 00 That drew me to like him.
11:24 Dr. John Delony? Yeah, there was a little bit of the recklessness and the chaos and the...
11:31 Speaker 00 Yeah, it just felt like, you know, it was like exciting and like...
11:35 Dr. John Delony? That's it.
11:36 Speaker 00 I don't know.
11:38 Dr. John Delony? It got your heart rate back up.
11:40 Speaker 00 Yeah.
11:42 Dr. John Delony? And if you're gonna be in a long-term relationship, you'll have to decide, we're gonna create environments through mystery, through fun, through play, through excitement, where we can get each other's heart rates up.
11:54 Speaker 00 Right.
11:56 Dr. John Delony? And that is not Hollywood.
12:04 Dr. John Delony? It's putting sex on a calendar. It's saying, "This Friday, we're gonna fill in the blank." And it loses some of its movie appeal, but it's right and it's deep and it's trusting.
12:18 Speaker 00 Right, okay.
12:22 Dr. John Delony? And I guess if that's not for you, if you're not there yet, don't drag this guy back through it.
12:28 Speaker 00 Right. Well, and the other thing is that, um, like he knew the situation that I was in with this other person, how it was like abusive and my ex was just worried that it was going to turn physical. And, um, so he allowed me to come back into our old house. Well, it's technically his house, but, um, it was our house, you know, that we built together, um, and stay in the spare room until I find an apartment or we like figure out what we wanna do. And so I've been here for like a week now, just in the spare room. And I mean, it's just like a roommate friend,
13:11 Speaker 00 you know, thing that we have going on and it's working fine so far.
13:16 Dr. John Delony? I know, but it's imaginary. Cause your body trusts this guy, cause he's safe.
13:22 Speaker 00 Right.
13:23 Dr. John Delony? And he's reliable. And he's loyal.
13:27 Speaker 00 Mm-hmm.
13:29 Dr. John Delony? And so you're right to feel those words like, "I'm at home now. Ah."
13:34 Speaker 00 Right.
13:35 Dr. John Delony? Until you can look him in the eye and make the ironclad commitment, "I will never, no, come hell or high water."
13:42 Dr. John Delony? "I will never cheat on you again."
13:44 Speaker 00 Mm-hmm.
13:47 Dr. John Delony? Until you can do that...
13:51 Dr. John Delony? It's unfair for you to take your need for, to not feel so guilty for blowing the life up,
13:59 Speaker 00 Mm-hmm.
14:00 Dr. John Delony? To not, to take your need of, "I ran from a guy that was exciting and also abusive."
14:07 Dr. John Delony? And running back into the arms of somebody that you know is always gonna be there for you, because you all have been together for, what, half your life, a quarter of your life?
14:16 Speaker 00 Mm-hmm.
14:18 Dr. John Delony? Until you can look him in the eye and say, "Till death do us part, come hell or high water," that will never happen again. Until you can do that and actually mean it, I'm gonna tell you to, if you care enough about this guy, don't drag him back through it.
14:33 Speaker 00 Right.
14:37 Dr. John Delony? Have the courage to go get your own apartment and be a grown up.
14:49 Speaker 00 Okay.
14:51 Dr. John Delony? You get what I'm saying?
14:52 Speaker 00 I do, I do. Um...
14:58 Speaker 00 Yeah, I know you're right, and I just, I really think he wants to try and repair things because I'm looking at a couple apartments this week and they're all like year leases, and he was like, "Well, don't do a year lease."
15:11 Speaker 00 You know, because I just think that he's like hopeful that...
15:14 Dr. John Delony? I know, but here's the thing, I think you want him to not feel bad more than you want to go all in back with him.
15:26 Dr. John Delony? And if you get back with him so that he doesn't feel bad, this 100% will happen again.
15:34 Speaker 00 Right.
15:36 Dr. John Delony? If you realize, "Oh my goodness, I blew up the life of my best, most loyal friend in the world. I realized I lost everything and that will never happen again. Will you please have me back?"
15:58 Dr. John Delony? Then you all have a chance to rebuild something.
16:04 Speaker 00 Okay.
16:05 Dr. John Delony? Because listen to me, like, listen. His hands are gonna feel the same.
16:11 Dr. John Delony? And his kisses are gonna feel the same.
16:13 Speaker 00 Mm-hmm.
16:15 Dr. John Delony? And his smells are gonna be the same.
16:21 Dr. John Delony? And if that doesn't bring you deep comfort
16:25 Dr. John Delony? and a big exhale.
16:27 Speaker 00 Mm-hmm.
16:29 Dr. John Delony? Don't track him back through this.
16:35 Speaker 00 Okay, you're right.
16:40 Speaker 00 So you would suggest just...
16:42 Dr. John Delony? I would suggest you asking yourself, what is true here? Not what is easy and what is comfortable? And what is going to cause the least short-term pain for this person I've been with forever?
16:56 Dr. John Delony? But you to say, "I want to spend the rest of my life with this person. And I'm committed to talking about it when I feel bored. I'm committed to going to counseling so that I can figure out why I co-create a world that I feel dead inside of. Why I
17:15 Dr. John Delony? jump ship with a rambunctious neighbor that turned out to be both
17:21 Dr. John Delony? dangerous and sexy and also dangerous, literally.
17:29 Dr. John Delony? I can't tell you what to do next. I can just ask you, don't be cruel.
17:35 Dr. John Delony? And don't do the next easy, comfortable thing.
17:40 Dr. John Delony? Because you'll be right back here in a few years. He'll just have this guy who obviously cares about you. And I think you care about him in a... I don't think you hate him.
17:53 Dr. John Delony? But he'll have deep, deep scars.
17:57 Dr. John Delony? And if you're not ready to go all back in, don't. If you are, and you're literally taking a knee and saying, "I did wrong. I blew up everything. I'm sorry." And the world we co-created has to be different this time. And here's what that looks like for me. What does it look like for you? Then y'all can rebuild something, and it can be amazing.
18:16 Dr. John Delony? But I'm just hearing in your voice, you feel like you're safe now. And he's comfortable. And you don't want to hurt a guy that you like.
18:29 Dr. John Delony? And that's not a reason to go all back in. Unless you're really all back in. All right, when we come back, a man asks how to move forward after finding out his wife has a sexually transmitted infection.
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21:32 Dr. John Delony? All right, let's go out to Dallas and talk to Joe. What up, Joe? How we doing, brother?
21:37 Speaker 02 I'm doing pretty good, man. How are you?
21:38 Dr. John Delony? Doing all right, man. What's up?
21:41 Speaker 02 Um, well, first of all, it's great talking to you.
21:45 Dr. John Delony? You too, man.
21:47 Speaker 02 Well, basically, I've been with my wife for five years.
21:54 Speaker 02 We have been married for two years. And I just found out about a week and a half ago that she has genital herpes.
22:08 Dr. John Delony? Never knew before now?
22:11 Speaker 02 I never knew.
22:12 Dr. John Delony? Have you gone and got tested?
22:16 Speaker 02 I have not. I haven't had any outbreak.
22:19 Dr. John Delony? You need to go do that today.
22:22 Dr. John Delony? Cause that's going to be driving you crazy.
22:25 Speaker 02 Yes.
22:26 Dr. John Delony? Okay.
22:29 Dr. John Delony? Go get tested today. Okay, go to a local clinic in Dallas and if you can't do it today, make an appointment and go tomorrow. Take a day off of work.
22:41 Speaker 02 Okay.
22:41 Dr. John Delony? You're gonna have to solve the major trust issue in your marriage and the lying and the deception and all of that and the fact that your wife put you at physical like because she lied to you and kept secrets from you, she put you at great risk, but beneath that you're gonna have a body that is screaming at you, "Are we safe? Are we safe? Are we safe?" And you gotta get some confirmation on that, okay?
23:06 Speaker 02 Okay, yeah, cuz I'm actually pretty terrified about that.
23:11 Dr. John Delony? I know. That is step one. You cannot heal your marriage until you know you're safe or not, cuz everything is hypothetical.
23:22 Dr. John Delony? Okay?
23:25 Speaker 02 Okay, um, well, what if, what happens, like, I mean, I don't, if I go and I, and I do find out that I am positive?
23:37 Dr. John Delony? Then you get a treatment protocol. We're gonna take care of physical health first.
23:44 Speaker 02 Okay.
23:44 Dr. John Delony? Okay? And depending on what, like, there's so many factors here. And I would be out over my skis if I told you, um, it's been, it's been years since I was able to rattle off the health protocols and I imagine that they've, they've got some different treatment options now, since the last time I looked at these. I used to work with college students seven or five years ago, six years ago, so I used to know every, here's what happens with chlamydia, herpes, syphilis, all of them. And it's just been years since I looked at that data, okay? Or the, the medical interventions. So you need to sit down with the doctor and say, "What do I do next?"
24:25 Speaker 02 Okay.
24:28 Speaker 02 Okay, yeah, the whole thing, and you kinda touched on it too, that I'm actually struggling with even more is, is the trust thing. Now I feel like, you know, she's really betrayed my trust.
24:44 Dr. John Delony? In a, in a seismic way.
24:50 Dr. John Delony? Let me put it this way, brother. You're not crazy, okay?
24:56 Dr. John Delony? Because she didn't just not tell you about an old boyfriend. She didn't tell you that she hooked up with somebody while y'all were dating. She had a sexually transmitted infection that she hid from you. I'm assuming she knew about this for a long time?
25:11 Speaker 02 She did. Uh, she's had it for about 15 years.
25:19 Dr. John Delony? Yeah, that's a tough one, brother.
25:25 Dr. John Delony? I can't make this one. I, I, I mean, I can't make your situation not hurt as bad as it does.
25:33 Dr. John Delony? The only way I can say this to you in a way that's like super clear is the marriage you had, the life you had is now over. And you have to decide what I'm gonna do next. Okay?
25:48 Speaker 02 Okay.
25:49 Dr. John Delony? Because this type of deception is, is...
25:59 Dr. John Delony? Cause it's not just about an emotional pain, which is big and real and scary. This is she put you in physical harms way.
26:08 Speaker 02 Right.
26:09 Dr. John Delony? Right?
26:11 Dr. John Delony? So hear me say, you're not crazy.
26:16 Dr. John Delony? And I actually know people who are married with herpes. And their marriage is great, but they're open with each other and they're honest with each other.
26:28 Dr. John Delony? And chances are five, how long, how long have you been dating? How long have you known her, been with her?
26:34 Speaker 02 For five years.
26:35 Dr. John Delony? Okay. Chances are five years ago, if she'd said, hey, what's up? We've been having a good time before intimate. I need to let you know this. You may have said, I'm gonna go my separate ways. Or you may have said, I don't care. What does that mean? Tell me about that. What's, and you may have looked like, you would have taken different steps five years ago. You wouldn't have built a house on, on a lack of information, on a lack of trust.
26:59 Dr. John Delony? What else has she been dishonest with you about?
27:05 Speaker 02 Well, I mean, as far as I'm aware of, this is the only thing. Um, we've, we have great communication.
27:13 Dr. John Delony? You don't. You don't.
27:17 Speaker 02 Right. Well, I thought we did.
27:18 Dr. John Delony? There you go.
27:19 Speaker 02 And, you know, that, that also is part of what circles in my head now is just if she has been able to lie and be dishonest about this huge thing, I mean, what else has there been?
27:33 Dr. John Delony? Correct. And that's what I'm telling you. Everything in your relationship is different.
27:40 Dr. John Delony? That doesn't mean you have to run to the courthouse and get divorced. That doesn't mean that everything's over. That means if y'all are gonna stay together, y'all are building a new marriage from ash, from the ground up.
27:56 Speaker 02 Okay. She's, uh, she's taken some steps, you know, finally to make me feel better, which should have been done five years ago. You know, and kinda like what you said too, you were 100% correct is, um, you know, I probably, if she came to me with some science, I probably would have been fine and continued.
28:16 Dr. John Delony? I don't want her coming to you with science. I don't want her coming to you with some YouTuber who's like filming it in the back of his truck and like, hey, I've got the new, use essential oils. I don't want that crap. I want y'all two going to a doctor, together.
28:31 Speaker 02 Mm-hmm.
28:33 Dr. John Delony? The medical degree, went to college. Who specializes in STIs.
28:43 Speaker 02 Okay.
28:44 Dr. John Delony? You hear what I'm saying?
28:45 Speaker 02 With her, she was, yeah, yeah, and she was, I feel like she's been kind of in her own form of denial, um, ever since she was diagnosed with it. Cause even in the conversations that we've had, you know, she was like, well, the doctor says that everybody has it and it's not that big of a deal.
29:06 Dr. John Delony? I don't.
29:06 Speaker 02 And, but exactly.
29:10 Dr. John Delony? My wife doesn't.
29:16 Dr. John Delony? My friends don't. You didn't, right? Yeah.
29:24 Dr. John Delony? This is how it gets passed around is that people lie to themselves and they lie to their partners.
29:34 Dr. John Delony? I just got, I mean, I'm just like,
29:37 Dr. John Delony? I don't have anything to say other than I'm sorry, man.
29:44 Dr. John Delony? It's, it's strange to come home and your house is burned down, right?
29:50 Dr. John Delony? It's like an out of body experience. You're just plugging along, doing life together and all of a sudden it's like, oh, by the way, how'd you find out?
29:58 Speaker 02 Uh, I saw it.
29:59 Dr. John Delony? Okay.
30:02 Dr. John Delony? You're like, hey, what's that? And she's like, oh, BT Dubs?
30:06 Speaker 02 Uh, kind of. So right now we're a little long distance. I'm taking some classes. Um, but, uh, it's been like that over the last eight years. I mean, uh, eight months. And I go and see her, you know, every three months. Um, this previous time she came here. And, um, that's, that's when I found out. That's how I saw it.
30:36 Speaker 02 And my first thought was, well, we've been together for five years.
30:42 Speaker 02 And I've never seen this. Um, it's never been mentioned. Like, when did you get this? Are you cheating on me?
30:55 Dr. John Delony? Which is a question you should for sure ask.
31:01 Dr. John Delony? And here's the thing.
31:02 Speaker 02 And I did.
31:03 Dr. John Delony? Uh, but here's the thing, because there was such blatant over the top dishonesty.
31:11 Dr. John Delony? If I'm you, I, my assumption is you're cheating on me since I'm, I'm, we're at long distance now.
31:18 Speaker 02 Right.
31:20 Dr. John Delony? And here's, here's the thing. You get to decide what a path to trust looks like.
31:30 Dr. John Delony? I want to see your credit report. I want to see all your text messages. I want to see all the deleted messages.
31:37 Dr. John Delony? I want to see all your DMs. You get to decide what is it going to take for me to trust you again? If that's a path you even want to take.
31:47 Dr. John Delony? And then she gets to decide whether I want to be with you or not.
31:50 Speaker 02 Uh huh.
31:53 Speaker 02 Yeah, it definitely is. Uh, I do want to rebuild the trust. Um, and she has taken steps, like she actually called her ex from, you know, however many years ago. I gave it to her.
32:10 Dr. John Delony? How do you know?
32:11 Speaker 02 That she did have it.
32:13 Dr. John Delony? How do you know?
32:15 Speaker 02 Oh, I heard the conversation and, and even in the conversation, she said, you know, if, if, if he wants to call you and talk to you, is, is, is that okay? And that guy was like, yeah, I mean, it's a little weird, but I understand.
32:27 Dr. John Delony? Yeah, that's super weird.
32:28 Speaker 02 Uh, yeah.
32:31 Speaker 02 But, I mean, I heard their conversation.
32:37 Dr. John Delony? Okay. I want you to be honest with yourself about what rebuilding trust looks like.
32:42 Speaker 02 Okay.
32:44 Dr. John Delony? And I'm just going to tell you from, from sitting with so many college students over the years, that path to trust will be rooted in, are you okay?
33:02 Dr. John Delony? Do you have genital herpes? Do you have HPV? There's any number of things. I'm going to go get tested for it. I want the whole battery. Okay?
33:12 Speaker 02 Okay.
33:15 Dr. John Delony? And once you can exhale,
33:20 Dr. John Delony? then you can begin to say, okay, what happens next? Or you find out, no, you're positive. Here's your health protocol.
33:29 Dr. John Delony? You're going to have this for the rest of your life, but here's how to manage it.
33:34 Dr. John Delony? Then that helps establish what does a path back look like? What does grief look like?
33:47 Speaker 02 Yeah, that's the thing. I feel like if I do continue to move forward and I do have it, I'm gonna be very angry.
33:54 Dr. John Delony? And your anger will be justified.
33:57 Speaker 02 In my head, I was just like, well, I guess I'll just see if I have an outbreak because from what I understand, it actually is really hard to, to know if, if you do have HSB2 as opposed to one, if you're not having an active outbreak.
34:13 Dr. John Delony? I think you're, I think you're right, but dude, I'm not going to chat GPT and I'm not going to Google Docs on this one. I'm gonna go sit with a physician. Okay, brother?
34:22 Speaker 02 Okay.
34:23 Dr. John Delony? And I, I, I, I know it's really cool to hate on modern medicine right now, but the doctors I know that I'm friends with that are working hard every day, they care about people a lot and they, they, they're good. Who sit down with the doctor and say, this is embarrassing. I just found this out. And I need to get the full battery of testing.
34:46 Dr. John Delony? And then I'm gonna start from there. I gotta make sure I'm okay. And they might tell you, I can test for this, but this other one, I'm just gonna wait till there's an outbreak. And I hope you're good.
34:57 Dr. John Delony? Hope that's not the case. Um.
35:01 Dr. John Delony? And hopefully everything's, hopefully you're safe and your body's healthy and then y'all can begin to rebuild or not together. Um, out of that, but you're right to question everything. If your wife is willing to keep a secret that's going to negatively impact your personal health.
35:25 Dr. John Delony? Then what other secrets are, is she holding? That's a fair question. That's a right question.
35:35 Dr. John Delony? And also, if you choose to stay in this and rebuild, holding her hostage isn't fair either. So she deserves a path. If you're gonna stay, you wanna rebuild, she deserves a path back to trust. You just have to be honest about what that path is.
35:51 Dr. John Delony? Man, I'm sorry, brother.
35:55 Dr. John Delony? Thanks for the call. You're not crazy.
35:59 Dr. John Delony? You're not crazy.
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37:33 Dr. John Delony? Let's go out to Billings, Montana and talk to Molly. What's up, Molly?
37:37 Speaker 03 Hi, I'm so sorry you're gonna hear a train for a second.
37:41 Dr. John Delony? No, I love trains. I love trains.
37:44 Speaker 03 So do I. It's actually why I live here, but most people don't necessarily find it so fantastic.
37:49 Dr. John Delony? You're not on the tracks, are you?
37:52 Speaker 03 Um, no, they're about a mile away.
37:55 Dr. John Delony? Okay, good. All right, all right, good.
37:57 Speaker 03 We're in a valley, so the sound bounces off the...
38:00 Dr. John Delony? Well, that's cool. That'll add some color. Chris Williamson has all these cool backdrops. We'll have cool audio drops. This is gonna be awesome. We'll just have a train go by. That's cool. All right, so what's up?
38:10 Speaker 03 So, um, last year, uh, honestly, it's been a year, just a couple of weeks short of a year. I discovered that my partner was selling child pornography on the internet.
38:26 Dr. John Delony? God almighty.
38:27 Speaker 03 And I turned him in.
38:29 Dr. John Delony? All right, let's sit on that for a second. Husband, boyfriend?
38:35 Speaker 03 It's complicated. Um, he was my first husband.
38:41 Dr. John Delony? Okay.
38:42 Speaker 03 And I divorced him, um, we'd been together for about three years, um, and I divorced him because he'd been cheating on me basically every second of it.
38:52 Dr. John Delony? Okay.
38:53 Speaker 03 And I couldn't take it anymore, so I left him. And then even after the divorce, we were still involved and I needed to get away from that, so I literally packed what I could into a couple of hockey bags, got on a plane and moved 5,000 miles away.
39:08 Dr. John Delony? How'd you find out?
39:10 Speaker 03 Um, about the child pornography.
39:14 Dr. John Delony? Yeah.
39:15 Speaker 03 Oh, I had, in our long history of on again, off again, over the course of more than 25 years, um, I had pretty much discovered that if he wasn't a full-blown narcissist, he was real close. And I had some situation in my life that made it so that I didn't really have anywhere to go. And my family kind of dumped me off on him. But he was, you know, the beginning stages again, right? Everything was all love and roses and everything's fantastic. But then about a year and a half in, things start kind of cooling down a little bit and
39:57 Speaker 03 I'm trying a little harder and I'm like, you know, just make it work until you can figure something out and you can go elsewhere. But things started to get worse. He started triangulating me with another individual and I needed to know how much time I had. And so I did something I've never done before and part of me kind of wishes I had never done it at all, but I went into his phone.
40:24 Speaker 03 And when I was doing that, a couple of notifications popped up for messages on X. And I saw the preview for what the messages were, and I was like, what the is this? And at that point in time is when I discovered the text thread message in that particular conversation, he was talking about having had a sexual relationship with one of his nieces.
40:52 Dr. John Delony? God.
40:53 Speaker 03 Now, he was asleep at the time, but I heard him like wrestling around and I was like, is he waking up? And so I turned everything off and shut it all down. And then I spent like a week or so going, okay, what are you gonna do? What are you gonna do? What are you gonna do? What are you gonna do? And finally, I decided what I was gonna do was gather whatever proof I needed, send that proof off to both his sister, both of his brothers, and the woman that he was using as the third in this little triangle that he had created in his brain. So that everyone was aware of the situation, and then I was just gonna work on getting out as quickly as I could. But then about a week later is
41:38 Speaker 03 when I got an opportunity to get back into his phone, and then I, when I went looking for that conversation, I couldn't find it. But what I did find were conversations in a lot of groups on X, on Reddit, on Telegram, on Kik, all of them listed in groups under, listed under consensual incest, where he was encouraging people-
42:05 Dr. John Delony? Hold on, take a breath, take a breath, take a breath, take a breath. You're getting on a train yourself. You're heading on down track. Take a breath, okay?
42:10 Speaker 03 Yeah.
42:12 Dr. John Delony? Listen to me. You're going right back to that moment when you're holding that phone, and that moment's over and you're sitting with me right now, okay?
42:19 Speaker 03 Yeah.
42:21 Dr. John Delony? You're good now.
42:26 Dr. John Delony? Okay.
42:27 Speaker 03 Okay.
42:28 Dr. John Delony? Exhale, you're good.
42:32 Speaker 03 Yeah, so essentially, they were initially just conversations just where he was kind of encouraging people to act on impulses with family members, whether younger or older, until in one conversation, the person asked, "Do you have child porn that you would be willing to share with me?" And his response was, "I do, but not here and not for free."
43:07 Speaker 03 And at the time, I was using my phone to record the screen of his phone as I was going through everything. Like, I started on his conversation with her to kind of prove that this was his phone, that I wasn't making it up, and then kind of went through the rest of it. But once I got to that, I just kind of froze.
43:30 Dr. John Delony? Yeah.
43:32 Speaker 03 And freaked out for a second. And I remember looking over at him and thinking, "I could kill you right now, and I would feel no regret."
43:45 Speaker 03 And then I just shut down.
43:47 Dr. John Delony? Did you call the police?
43:49 Speaker 03 Yeah, actually, that afternoon, I left to go to the grocery store, and it was on a Sunday. And I called the non-emergency number, and I asked to make an appointment with a detective, because I believed that I had evidence that my partner was selling child porn online. And they asked me if I thought I was safe, and I said, "I'm safe as long as he doesn't know I have this." And they said, "Then wait until you have time and just walk into the office. We will leave your information at the desk. Just walk in, they will have someone ready for you."
44:23 Speaker 03 And I said, "Okay." So, the next day that he went to work, which was the following Tuesday, as soon as he left, I got dressed, and I immediately went to the police department.
44:36 Dr. John Delony? Can I just stop right there and tell you?
44:41 Dr. John Delony? I'm a dad with a nine-year-old little girl.
44:45 Dr. John Delony? And I want to say thank you.
44:51 Speaker 03 There is nothing on this earth more innocent than the soul of a child.
44:55 Dr. John Delony? I agree.
44:57 Speaker 03 And the idea of people destroying that on purpose.
45:01 Dr. John Delony? I'm with you. And also,
45:06 Dr. John Delony? this is only allowed to continue the way it does because people won't report their boyfriends and their husbands and their sons. And you did, and I want to tell you, I'm proud of you and I'm from the bottom of my heart, I'm grateful.
45:19 Speaker 03 Thank you.
45:22 Speaker 03 Honestly, it floors me that there would be people who wouldn't.
45:25 Dr. John Delony? I know, I know. But I'm not going to spend one ounce of energy on them right this second.
45:33 Dr. John Delony? I'm just going to spend a moment in gratitude to you. Okay?
45:39 Speaker 03 Yeah.
45:40 Dr. John Delony? And I'm getting the sense that's not even why you called. What's the, what's the, what's the thing beneath that thing?
45:45 Speaker 03 Um, well, I mean, he died in jail 60 days later. He had stage four colon cancer and he didn't know. Well, I suspected he refused to go to see a doctor. Doesn't matter.
45:57 Dr. John Delony? Right.
45:57 Speaker 03 He's gone. He can't ever hurt anybody again. But I just feel
46:06 Speaker 03 dirty.
46:07 Dr. John Delony? Yeah.
46:08 Speaker 03 Like there's this darkness in me that every time somebody touches me, it rubs off on them and they're carrying that evil that was mine. And I can't get past it. I am.
46:26 Speaker 03 It's not like I don't have two therapists. I do. One who specializes in EMDR and one who just does talk therapy. And everybody tells me the same thing that I did the right thing, that his crime is not mine.
46:41 Dr. John Delony? That's not the thing.
46:43 Dr. John Delony? Can I tell you what I think the thing is?
46:47 Speaker 03 What?
46:51 Dr. John Delony? I'm gonna say this as someone who is grateful for you, okay?
46:56 Speaker 03 Yeah.
46:57 Dr. John Delony? You were with this guy for 25 years, is that right?
47:01 Speaker 03 Pretty much, off an autonomy. We both married other people in the meantime. We went 10 years without talking at one point in time, just, yeah.
47:09 Dr. John Delony? But there's the single greatest, the single most profound loss of trust in this whole thing is you. You don't trust you.
47:18 Speaker 03 Oh no, I haven't trusted me for a long time.
47:20 Dr. John Delony? Cause either you're asking yourself, "How do you miss this?
47:27 Dr. John Delony? How did I go to bed? How did I remarry a guy like this? Or there was some inkling in your spirit for 25 years that this guy's not right.
47:40 Dr. John Delony? And either you saw this text thread and puzzle pieces started coming together and you wanted to vomit? Or you were so stunned that this happened underneath your nose that you wanted to vomit? Either way,
47:55 Dr. John Delony? the reason you feel gross is because you're untethered to yourself.
48:02 Speaker 03 Yeah.
48:06 Speaker 03 Definitely feel that.
48:09 Dr. John Delony? The path forward is re-establishing trust with you.
48:16 Dr. John Delony? Not in trying to forget or unwind him. But the first person you have to forgive here is not him, it's you.
48:28 Dr. John Delony? You don't like you.
48:32 Speaker 03 Not particularly.
48:37 Dr. John Delony? And maybe you've made a whole bunch of mistakes in your life and you've had a whole bunch of things that you want to go back and solve and wish you could do over again. I want to tell you, again, as the father of a nine-year-old girl, you did right. Thank you.
48:55 Speaker 03 I had never doubted I did the right thing. Honestly, I had a moment because when I initially reached out to his sister and his third wife, the other person involved in the triangle, to let them know that he had been arrested, I did not initially admit that I was the one who had turned him in.
49:16 Dr. John Delony? That's okay. There's not a playbook. Listen.
49:20 Speaker 03 And everyone was like, super supportive. And then the minute his sister found out that I was the one who turned him in, she turned on me like a viper.
49:29 Dr. John Delony? Good. She lost her vote in your life.
49:33 Speaker 03 Oh, yeah, I blocked her. I mean, the night he died, she messaged me on Facebook, said, "He died at such and such a time. Karma will come." And I said, "It already did." And I blocked her.
49:44 Dr. John Delony? It already did come. You know what you're getting now? Peace. It's not there yet, but it's coming.
49:50 Speaker 03 No, I mean, I felt, initially, I was just relieved because I didn't have to be afraid that they would release him and he would kill me.
50:00 Dr. John Delony? Right.
50:02 Speaker 03 But then it just became so much because nobody wanted to deal with everything else that he had left behind.
50:14 Dr. John Delony? That's right.
50:15 Speaker 03 Nobody wanted to deal with the mess. The news called me out. So everyone knew. It took two months to find a job because nobody wanted to hire the girl who lived with the pedophile.
50:28 Dr. John Delony? Of course. There's a, there's a radius blast to this. Those girls that he abused, their lives are forever altered.
50:40 Dr. John Delony? You, his family, his sister, his parents, everybody's life is different because they were touched by evil.
50:50 Speaker 03 I know.
50:52 Dr. John Delony? And listen to me. You've packed up and moved 5,000 miles away before. And I'm not saying that's what you have to do. I'm saying you have proven to yourself in moments of desperation, in moments of great need, that you can advocate for yourself.
51:14 Dr. John Delony? You have to believe you're worth advocating for again.
51:20 Dr. John Delony? And that's hard when you've been in multiple abusive marriages, when you've settled to be the girlfriend of your ex ex ex husband and his wife, his third wife.
51:33 Dr. John Delony? You've settled for all of these things and you've made choices that you look back and would never recommend 19 year old you make, and yet here you are, right?
51:42 Speaker 03 Yeah.
51:43 Dr. John Delony? And so the question before you is not what happened, what its sister do, what it family do, what it employers, none of that, none of that can, you can affect here. The only you can affect is, will you stand up today and love Molly enough to do the next right thing for her?
52:01 Dr. John Delony? Nobody else is going to.
52:05 Speaker 03 Yeah.
52:07 Dr. John Delony? That's it.
52:12 Dr. John Delony? And you're gonna have to grieve this deeply. I want you to pick up a copy of David Kessler's book, Finding Meaning. It's about losing somebody. But the person you lost here is you.
52:27 Speaker 03 Yeah.
52:28 Dr. John Delony? And how do I grieve this? And more importantly, who am I going to become now?
52:33 Dr. John Delony? You want to learn how to reestablish trust in little micro ways? I want you to start recklessly tipping people when you go out to eat.
52:42 Dr. John Delony? Comically so.
52:44 Dr. John Delony? Okay?
52:45 Speaker 03 Yeah.
52:46 Dr. John Delony? Once a week, I want you to get a trash sack and some rubber gloves and I want you to walk, go for an hour walk by yourself or 30 minute walk, whatever your health will allow. I don't want you to pick up trash in your neighborhood.
53:01 Dr. John Delony? I want you to knock on the door of a local church and say, I'm not well. Can I come in?
53:07 Speaker 03 Oh, I did that right after he was arrested.
53:09 Dr. John Delony? Okay. And some churches will say, we don't want you here. And then you dust your sandals off and you go to the next one. Here's what I'm saying. You can't sit at home and just look out at the world and say, why aren't they, look what they're doing. You have to say, I'm going to become a person that I can trust. And that means you have to have a backlog of trustworthy actions. And you don't trust yourself because of the actions you've taken in the past. And so, we're going to create a path forward. I'm a person that gets up and doesn't look at their phone right away. I have a cup of coffee and I watch the sunrise.
53:43 Dr. John Delony? I'm a person who goes and gets a dumb little dog or a great little dog, and I'm going to take care of it.
53:50 Speaker 03 I got a beautiful kitty.
53:52 Dr. John Delony? If you're, oh, God, you didn't have to say you're a cat person. That changes the whole thing. Just kidding. That's great.
53:57 Speaker 03 I am, I am an animal person.
53:59 Dr. John Delony? There you go.
53:59 Speaker 03 I have, but my current space is relatively small.
54:03 Dr. John Delony? No, I'm playing with you.
54:04 Speaker 03 And having a dog was...
54:05 Dr. John Delony? I'm just messing with you. I'm messing with you. But like, I'm gonna take care of the thing.
54:08 Speaker 03 I got the kitty by accident, but she's the sweetest thing ever, and she's definitely helped.
54:13 Dr. John Delony? There's no such thing as a sweet cat, but I'm gonna let that one go. I'm just kidding. Totally kidding. Totally kidding. Just trying to start some internet drama. But here's the thing. I'm gonna create a series of actions, very small steps. Once a day, I am gonna write down three things I'm grateful for. Once a day, I'm gonna find somebody at work, at the restaurant that I go to, the little diner I frequent, the trash guys that drive by. I'm gonna write a thank you note to somebody. I'm gonna hand it to them, maybe once a week. I'm gonna begin doing a whole bunch of little bitty things to begin to prove to myself that I am trustworthy to myself.
54:56 Dr. John Delony? And you're gonna wake up, and it's gonna feel like a chore. I don't want to do this stuff. And you're gonna wake up in six months and have six months of proof that I'm the kind of woman who takes care of the waitress. I'm the kind of woman that gets up and takes care of this cat. I'm the kind of woman who sees people and I say, "Thank you." I'm the kind of woman who's willing to blow up my whole life to protect innocent children.
55:21 Dr. John Delony? And that's how people change. That's how they begin to trust themselves.
55:28 Dr. John Delony? The person you gotta forgive here is you.
55:32 Dr. John Delony? And for all the mistakes you've made,
55:36 Dr. John Delony? you did a really big, good and great thing. You are not tainted by his shadow, although it is cast long over you. In three months, in five months, that we might talk about, are we gonna move out of this community and get a fresh start somewhere?
55:52 Dr. John Delony? Or maybe the smoke clears on this thing? And if people wanna blow you off, they wanna talk crap about you, that's, they get to carry those bricks. I'm not carrying them for you. You're not carrying them for them.
56:04 Dr. John Delony? You did the next right, scary hard thing, and it cost you everything. It cost you your family, your friends, your partner, it cost you everything. And you did the right thing.
56:16 Dr. John Delony? I'm gonna ask you, don't give up on Molly.
56:20 Dr. John Delony? Reinvest in Molly.
56:24 Dr. John Delony? Cause Molly's the kinda person that keeps kids like my kids safe.
56:30 Dr. John Delony? Thank you for being you. Today's day one in building,
56:36 Dr. John Delony? building trust. Thank you, Molly.
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58:18 Dr. John Delony? All right, we're back. I got a money and marriage question. These are anonymous questions that people, individuals and couples leave at the money marriage retreat. The November money marriage is all sold out, but we have one Valentine's Day weekend. It's a great Christmas present and Valentine's Day present wrapped in one. Come spend a couple of days here in Nashville with me and my friend Rachel Cruz. It's the greatest marriage retreat on the planet. And we have a bunch of rad surprises this year. Different than any other year. We've got some cool guests that are gonna make some guest appearances. It's gonna be rad, rad, rad. Can't wait. All right, here's a question that somebody left at last year's money marriage. My wife has a big mean streak. She's quick to anger and quick to belittle
59:01 Dr. John Delony? me. She will usually apologize after the fact and acknowledge that she was rude or disrespectful, but doesn't implement any changes and the behavior continues. How do I learn to live with this without losing my patience with her and snapping back? All right, um, this is unpopular, what I'm about to say, but this is the path you have. You have a, the roads diverged in a wood and you get to take one or the other. Path number one is you just suck it up and say, my wife is a complete jerk. She's disrespectful. She's rude. She's mean. And that's who I'm married and I'm not gonna ever complain about
59:43 Dr. John Delony? it again, because this is what I'm actively choosing on a day in and day out basis. Period. That's one. Or number two is you draw a line in the sand that says, I'm a grown man. I'm your husband. I love you.
1:00:03 Dr. John Delony? And I am not going to be in an unsafe relationship any longer.
1:00:09 Dr. John Delony? And that means you have to go do the work to figure out why you're so angry all the time.
1:00:18 Dr. John Delony? Why you belittle, why it feels good for you in a moment to belittle me. Not going to be a punching back. And that's you coming up with an "or what" statement. If this happens again, you are choosing to not be married to me anymore.
1:00:38 Dr. John Delony? The other choice you have, here's a third option.
1:00:43 Dr. John Delony? You can choose that she for a season does not get a vote. I'm not going to, um, cash in my character because of somebody else's behavior. So what I mean by that? How do I learn to live with this without losing my patience and snapping back? She doesn't get that anymore. For a season, you're out of the "you get a vote" box in my life.
1:01:14 Dr. John Delony? I'm not going to lose my patience because I'm not giving that to you.
1:01:19 Dr. John Delony? I'm not going to snap back because I'm not a guy who repays evil with evil. I'm not a guy who belittles my wife.
1:01:30 Dr. John Delony? And that means sometimes I'm gonna, when you get going, I'm gonna say, "I'm gonna stop you. I'm gonna head out. I'm gonna go have dinner by myself this evening. I'll be back later."
1:01:41 Dr. John Delony? Because I'm a guy that doesn't ever disrespect or belittle his wife, even when she's doing it to me. Because I'm a grown man and I'm in control of my feelings, my actions, and my emotions, period.
1:01:55 Dr. John Delony? We've got to, as married couples, get out of this, "Well, he made me, and if she doesn't, then I have to." All of that is bull crap. You get to choose what you do next. Every time. And if you can't choose, you get to choose to extract yourself from a situation.
1:02:13 Dr. John Delony? So that you can exhale.
1:02:19 Dr. John Delony? If you find yourself about to snap back, leave. Walk out the door. If you find yourself losing your patience, call her on the way home, or if she can't have that, text her on the way home and say, "My patience is thin, and I'm a guy who honors his wife, so I'm gonna stop off and go to the gym.
1:02:39 Dr. John Delony? I'm gonna stop off and play music with my buddies."
1:02:44 Dr. John Delony? But at some point, you either accept, "This is the life I signed up for, and she gets to run all over me," or I'm gonna have an "or what?" statement and draw a line in the ground. Line in the sand. Your choice.
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