Pod Insights The Dr. John Delony Show My Fiancé Hid $100K in Debt from Me About this episode On today’s episode, we hear about:
A woman grappling with her fiancé’s financial secret
A young woman wanting to break her addiction to social media
A wife struggling to gain her family’s forgiveness after an affair
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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 So I recently got engaged this summer. We've been living together for a couple of years before this. And every time I've asked him to sit down with the budget, he just kind of brushes me off like, no, we're fine. We're good. We're good.
0:18 Dr. John Delony? How bad is it? How much does he owe?
0:19 Speaker 00 It's well over a hundred thousand dollars.
0:21 Dr. John Delony? Okay.
0:22 Speaker 00 Well over.
0:29 Dr. John Delony? What's going on? What's going on? This is John with the Dr. John Deloney Show.
0:35 Dr. John Delony? So glad that you're with us. Pull up a seat, grab some nachos, grab something to eat. And we're going to figure out what's the next right move? When it comes to your marriage, to your relationships, to your friendships, to holiday travels, to your mental and emotional health, whatever you've got going on in your life. For two decades, I've been sitting with hurting people, trying to figure out what's the next right move? And that's what we're going to do today.
0:58 Dr. John Delony? All right, let's talk about your marriage. Right now, we have February and October weekends on sale for the Money in Marriage Getaway. It's the best marriage retreat on the planet. Tickets start at 749 bucks a couple. Get yours at RamseySolutions.com/getaway. Let's go out to Bismarck, North Dakota, and talk to Renee. Hey Renee, what's going on?
1:24 Speaker 00 Hi.
1:26 Dr. John Delony? How are you?
1:27 Speaker 00 Um, so I recently got engaged this summer. We've been living together for a couple of years before this. And every time I've asked him to sit down with the budget, he just kind of brushes me off like, no, we're fine. We're good. We're good.
1:48 Speaker 00 We have a couple of credit cards that I am a co-signer on. And I started noticing my credit score dip.
2:01 Speaker 00 Um, and
2:02 Dr. John Delony? Let me, let me, let me pause right there. Let me back all the way out of this. So some people are, a lot of people listening to the show don't know that I also co-host another show, The Ramsey Show, where it's a finance show. We're talking about money.
2:14 Speaker 00 Right.
2:15 Dr. John Delony? And so you're, you're, you're asking questions about, let's, let's get beneath the budget part. You've been living with a guy for two years.
2:22 Speaker 00 Yeah.
2:22 Dr. John Delony? And you've been asking him money questions, which are really safety questions, provider questions.
2:29 Speaker 00 Yeah.
2:29 Dr. John Delony? Like, are we on the same team questions, right?
2:32 Speaker 00 Yes.
2:32 Dr. John Delony? Okay. And y'all took out a couple of credit cards that together, so you, in, in a couple of instances, you've combined finances.
2:39 Speaker 00 Yes.
2:39 Dr. John Delony? But after living together for two years, he won't tell you what he makes?
2:44 Speaker 00 No, I know what he makes.
2:45 Dr. John Delony? Okay.
2:45 Speaker 00 Um, I don't know what he owes. Yeah.
2:48 Dr. John Delony? Okay. Okay. All right. So can I ask you a, a hard question?
2:54 Speaker 00 Yes.
2:55 Dr. John Delony? Why has it taken two years for you to trust yourself?
2:59 Speaker 00 Trust myself? Um, I am actually in trauma therapy.
3:05 Dr. John Delony? Okay.
3:06 Speaker 00 Um, not a good life.
3:09 Dr. John Delony? Okay.
3:10 Speaker 00 Lot of, lot of, um, bad situations. Recently, within like the last 10, 11 years, um, I've been working on myself. Um, I have three daughters from a previous relationship. Um, I,
3:27 Speaker 00 um,
3:28 Dr. John Delony? How bad?
3:28 Speaker 00 Started a business.
3:29 Dr. John Delony? How bad is it? How much does he owe?
3:33 Speaker 00 It's, it's well over a hundred thousand dollars.
3:37 Dr. John Delony? Okay.
3:39 Speaker 00 Well over.
3:41 Dr. John Delony? And what's the spending? Is it student loans or is it addictive stuff? Is it gambling?
3:45 Speaker 00 Oh, I'm, I am very sure it's addictive stuff. Um, he gets packages at the house all the time, you know, from different stores, you know, new clothes, golf stuff, um, soccer stuff.
4:00 Dr. John Delony? So spending addictions?
4:02 Speaker 00 Yes.
4:03 Dr. John Delony? Okay.
4:05 Speaker 00 Yes, he tried to frame it as giving us the life that he thinks that we deserve, you know, because he really wants to be there, to step up and be there for me and my, my children. Um, he has two other children of his own that live with their mom and, um, which is great. I'm, I'm really happy that that's how he feels, but I can't accept that as an answer because I, I know that that's not the, the deep reason.
4:33 Dr. John Delony? Okay.
4:34 Speaker 00 That he is in debt.
4:35 Dr. John Delony? Well, let's do this. I want you to, to, part of trauma recovery is owning what I'm gonna do next.
4:46 Speaker 00 Yes.
4:46 Dr. John Delony? Right? And so I wanna own in this particular situation, um, I have let it go on for two years. And I'm not going to let it go on any longer.
5:00 Speaker 00 Yes.
5:00 Dr. John Delony? The, the deception and the dishonesty and the fantasy life, which is, we're just gonna ignore the realities of math and I'm gonna continue just to borrow money, buy money, I mean, buy whatever I want, or whatever I think's gonna make one of these kids feel good in the moment and regardless of whether I have that money or not.
5:18 Speaker 00 Yes.
5:19 Dr. John Delony? But I also hear in your question, let me say it this way, rarely does someone who is completely avoiding reality in one area of their life, not doing that in other areas of their life. So where are there deeper issues of trust fracture in this relationship?
5:39 Speaker 00 Um, he is an alcoholic.
5:43 Dr. John Delony? Okay.
5:44 Speaker 00 Um, he recently went to treatment, um, and he's, I mean, he has been working on himself as far as that goes, but I don't think that he's getting to the deep, deep reasons of why he feels the need to do, he's, he's a people pleaser, 100% a people pleaser. He wants to make sure people feel good all the time. And this is something that I have asked him to work on in therapy so that, you know, like I've said, be selfish, be, you know, work on you. You don't have to worry about the rest of us. We'll take care of us. You need to work on you so you're the best possible version of yourself for us.
6:27 Speaker 00 But I just don't think that he's getting it.
6:29 Dr. John Delony? Well, and I, I think this is one of the cancers of the, well, I would call a great landmark. I'm a part of this community, the mental health awareness that has happened over the last 25 to 50 years.
6:46 Speaker 00 Yeah.
6:46 Dr. John Delony? I think it's awesome, but this is one of the cancers, which is going to figure out why I'm a people pleaser, going to figure out why I'm so desperate that everybody around me be happy, doesn't excuse the fact that he's lied to your face for two years.
7:04 Speaker 00 Yes, I agree with that.
7:05 Dr. John Delony? It doesn't excuse the fact that he has, he is spending your family into a quagmire that will take a decade or more to get out of.
7:16 Speaker 00 Yep.
7:17 Dr. John Delony? And so I would add, it needs you to go get to the bottom of some of your mental and emotional health challenges. It may or may not be a quote unquote addictive, an addiction of some sort or some sort of addictive disorder. But as for this house, we don't borrow money.
7:34 Dr. John Delony? As for this house, I want to pull all the credit reports, all three of mine, all three of yours, all of my three kids to make sure you haven't pulled anything else up because I do not trust you.
7:45 Speaker 00 Yeah.
7:46 Dr. John Delony? And by association, I lost trust in myself, in my own gut feeling, and I'm not doing that anymore. That's part of my trauma recovery is I'm going to begin to trust my body when it says, hey, there's a problem over here.
7:58 Speaker 00 Yeah, absolutely.
7:59 Dr. John Delony? Is that fair?
8:01 Speaker 00 Yeah.
8:01 Dr. John Delony? And you, you have to make, not make peace, but you have to traffic in the reality that he might leave.
8:13 Speaker 00 I think it might be me leaving before him.
8:16 Dr. John Delony? Okay, you, you might be like, oh, that'd be awesome. Like, man, if he left, that'd make my life easier.
8:21 Speaker 00 At this point, um, he knows he has a lot of work to do. He knows he has a lot of work to do. I just don't know if he knows how to do it.
8:30 Dr. John Delony? Okay, that can't be your job because.
8:32 Speaker 00 That's okay.
8:34 Dr. John Delony? But what your job is, is making a very clear roadmap to trust and giving it to him.
8:42 Speaker 00 Okay.
8:44 Dr. John Delony? And he gets to decide whether he's going to follow it.
8:49 Speaker 00 Okay.
8:50 Dr. John Delony? And if he doesn't, then he's, behavior's a language. He's saying, I don't want to be a part of this relationship.
8:59 Speaker 00 Okay.
9:00 Dr. John Delony? But you have to be clear about, here's what, and I don't, I don't even want to say need. Here's what I want for my house, for me, for my, any future relationship I'm going to be in, any future marriage I'm going to be a part of, here's what I want.
9:19 Dr. John Delony? I want to be with somebody who understands the realities of math, however uncomfortable they may be.
9:27 Dr. John Delony? I want to be with somebody who, if there's an expense over a hundred dollars or five hundred dollars, that we run it by each other first.
9:34 Dr. John Delony? That we have a budget for our money, so we have control. Some sort of boundaries that we both agree to live within. Because a budget just sets the priorities of what you think is important in your lives.
9:51 Speaker 00 Okay.
9:53 Speaker 00 I like that.
9:54 Dr. John Delony? Does that fit? It, it should be the most terrifying and the most empowering exercise you've been a part of.
10:08 Dr. John Delony? You, for the first time, looking in the mirror and saying, this is what I want. And as for me and my house, this is what this is going to look like. I hope you'll be a part of it with me.
10:16 Speaker 00 I think he'll be really receptive to that as well.
10:18 Dr. John Delony? Okay. It, because, because here's what I can also imagine in his world. You, doing a lot of trauma work, which is both cathartic and scary and terrifying, right? It's raw.
10:29 Speaker 00 Yes.
10:31 Dr. John Delony? And
10:33 Dr. John Delony? you saying things like, you need to do your work, and you've got a lot of work to do, and you need to go talk to a therapist about this, and I think you're an addict, and I think you're, and that might be you just yelling at him in Spanish for all, he doesn't know what that means.
10:49 Speaker 00 Right.
10:51 Dr. John Delony? And so you giving him a map that says, regardless of how uncomfortable you feel, regardless of how tired you are.
10:59 Dr. John Delony? We will sit down on Sunday nights and go over the budget together for the upcoming week and a calendar. If you come home to this house and you've been drinking, you can't stay here.
11:09 Speaker 00 Uh huh.
11:12 Dr. John Delony? Like you set those, you set those boundaries up. He's the one who violated the trust. In my world, I call it financial infidelity.
11:20 Speaker 00 Yes, I agree with that.
11:21 Dr. John Delony? He cheated on you with money and he severed your attachment to safety.
11:26 Dr. John Delony? And let's take ownership. You allowed it to happen for two years.
11:30 Speaker 00 Yes.
11:31 Dr. John Delony? And so cool. I allowed this. And that's often a great way to enter into these conversations by using an I statement first. I allowed this. I asked you for budget numbers and you said it was all fine and I didn't follow up. That's on me. I'm taking 100% responsibility and that stops today.
11:55 Dr. John Delony? How's that sound?
11:56 Speaker 00 I like it. It sounds good.
11:59 Dr. John Delony? The first thing I want you to do is have everybody pull a credit report.
12:06 Speaker 00 Okay.
12:06 Dr. John Delony? And you can pull all three of them. I want you to have some confidence into how bad this thing really is.
12:16 Dr. John Delony? Why does that scare you?
12:19 Speaker 00 Just because what if there's more?
12:21 Dr. John Delony? Okay, almost every time these kind of conversations come out in spurts. So has the number grown the more you've dug in?
12:29 Speaker 00 Um, yeah, since the first conversation, you know, it was just, he gave me a little bit and then the next conversation, I was like, wait a minute, you have this out though too. And then he, you know, I know that he had another credit card out and you know, so it was, it's just little by little. It just kind of opened up.
12:54 Speaker 00 I don't know if there is any more, but I almost wouldn't be surprised.
12:59 Dr. John Delony? Right. And that, that's what I want to solve. Your body's not going to feel safe until it, it knows.
13:05 Speaker 00 Okay.
13:06 Dr. John Delony? So cool. Let's pull all three credit reports. Let's look at it and circle it and we're going to get out a yellow pad and we're going to add it all up or an Excel sheet. We're going to add it all up.
13:18 Dr. John Delony? And are you able to see his direct deposit?
13:21 Speaker 00 No.
13:22 Dr. John Delony? Okay, then you don't know how much money he makes.
13:26 Speaker 00 I haven't, um, he's shown me a couple of pay stubs here and there. I know what job he has and I kinda know what's coming in.
13:34 Dr. John Delony? Okay, I wanna transition from kinda.
13:37 Speaker 00 Okay.
13:38 Dr. John Delony? To I know.
13:41 Dr. John Delony? And the day y'all are married, if you decide to do that, y'all are gonna have one checking account, so we're both working from the same place. But please don't do that if you're not married. It makes untangling that a nightmare.
13:53 Speaker 00 Yeah.
13:54 Dr. John Delony? And the last thing I'm gonna tell you, can I tell you one more thing?
13:57 Speaker 00 Yes.
13:57 Dr. John Delony? If you're done, have the courage to leave.
14:03 Speaker 00 Yes.
14:06 Speaker 00 And that is something I'm working in in therapy is how I'm feeling about things and trusting my gut.
14:12 Dr. John Delony? Okay, if you're done, be done.
14:21 Dr. John Delony? If part of you healing is having been done, or at the least, say that the relationship we had is officially over, I'm willing to build a new one if you are, and here's what I want that architectural and design to look like on this new building, this new marriage, this new relationship.
14:37 Speaker 00 Right.
14:39 Dr. John Delony? And we're gonna build it from the floor up and we'll try to work through it that way. But it's just, I don't want you to go through this experience, have somebody start to work through this roadmap of trust that you've created and begin ticking things off, growing, and the whole time you're like, "Yeah, but I'm still out, I'm still out, I'm still out." If you're out, have the courage to be out. There's no judgment either way, it's just you taking ownership of that. And again, I always wanna point back to, trauma therapy does a couple of things. One, it allows your body to remember what happened, and not have your body take off and try to solve it as though it's happening in the present, right? But also, trauma recovery is about trusting yourself and being scared and going anyway
15:21 Dr. John Delony? in terms of making new relationships, romantic intimate relationships, friendships. And it's also about autonomy, being able to say the things, "Here's what I want and here's what I'm gonna demand because this is my life." And asking somebody that you're gonna marry, what do you demand? Can we sit down and put all these things on the table and create a secret world together? Right? And that's a long-term relationship, but appreciate the call. I wish you the best. It's terrifying finding out your gut was right all along. It's terrifying to find out I ignored myself. It's terrifying to find out, hey, you owe 50 grand, you owe 100 grand, you owe 150,000. Phew, that's scary.
16:01 Dr. John Delony? And so I'm gonna turn all the lights on, turn the music off. We're gonna pull credit reports. We're gonna sit down and we're gonna get some assurances here. And then we're gonna choose to start trafficking from that reality. And that can be a great place and that can be a scary place. Thanks for the call, Renee. When we come back, a woman asks how to break free from her social media addiction.
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19:20 Dr. John Delony? Hey, take two seconds and hit the subscribe button and go into the Apple Store and download the Together app. It's my new app for married couples. It's awesome. Daily practices, one tiny step every single day. Behaviors of language, what's one thing I can do to begin to love you more and more and more? And I just left a big, long meeting about the things they're adding into this app. It's amazing, and it's gonna be a long-term thing that grows with you over the course of your marriage and gets to know you better and better. It's awesome. It's called Together by Dr. John Deloney. Go check it out. Android folks, relax, we're coming. We're just not there yet. All right, let's go out to Tampa and talk to Nicole. Hey, Nicole, what's up?
20:03 Speaker 02 Hi, Dr. John, thanks for taking my call.
20:05 Dr. John Delony? Of course, what's going on?
20:07 Speaker 02 Well, uh, I apologize, I'm nervous.
20:12 Dr. John Delony? Bring it.
20:15 Speaker 02 I'm a Gen Z and I recently listened to your podcast with Carlos Whitaker and I just read The Anxious Generation and my question is, how do I break free from a social media addiction when so much of my life and skill set revolves around technology?
20:31 Dr. John Delony? Oh, great question. So you use the word addiction. Tell me about the word addiction.
20:40 Speaker 02 Yeah, it's probably something I probably wouldn't have considered before, but recently I've, I just kinda had a moment of, I don't even know how much time I've wasted just scrolling on social media and just, it's been interfering with my everyday life.
21:08 Dr. John Delony? There you go.
21:09 Speaker 02 Even, even to the point like at work and I've, and I brought up to my employer that, hey, I, I need help.
21:17 Dr. John Delony? Okay. So if I was to say, delete all your accounts today and buy a flip phone by the end of the evening, what panic sets off inside your chest?
21:31 Speaker 02 Um, funny because it, that is something I've considered getting for the last year, but it's, I think what's coming from that is I just, I think I just would feel like I would get left behind.
21:45 Dr. John Delony? Okay. What would you get left behind?
21:50 Speaker 02 Um, just, I think a lot of it's community and just with, like with my job, like I, I do social media as well with, with what I do and I just feel like I probably won't be able to keep up and.
22:10 Dr. John Delony? All right, let me, let me break in there on two things. One, if, so I like to, when someone is struggling with any sort of addictive behavior, I like to start from a place, it's not always true, but I like to start from a place of what if this addictive behavior works? What if it's actually helping you?
24:56 Speaker 02 Yeah.
24:58 Speaker 02 And it's hard for me to say, um,
25:01 Dr. John Delony? I know.
25:01 Speaker 02 To admit that I am lonely.
25:04 Speaker 02 Yeah.
25:05 Dr. John Delony? I know. It's a scary, frustrating thing to be. Can I ask you a hard question about loneliness?
25:12 Speaker 02 Yeah.
25:13 Dr. John Delony? Do you think you're worth being friends with?
25:18 Speaker 02 Not really.
25:19 Dr. John Delony? Hmm.
25:23 Dr. John Delony? Romantically, do you think you're worth somebody just watching you walk into a room and think, "Oh, my good God, she's beautiful," and grabbing you by the face and kissing you?
25:34 Speaker 02 I have that, thankfully. I have a husband.
25:37 Dr. John Delony? Okay. Does he, do you catch him side-eyeing you sometimes because he can't believe how lucky he is?
25:43 Speaker 02 Yes.
25:46 Dr. John Delony? So there's a deeper layer then, and I've been there too. Tell me about feeling lonely at a table with a guy that you know loves you.
25:58 Speaker 02 It's hard.
25:58 Dr. John Delony? Yeah.
25:59 Speaker 02 Because he, he does a lot to show his, like, um, he'll ask me, "How can I best serve you today?" And "How can I love you?" And he shows up in really incredible ways and...
26:12 Dr. John Delony? But you don't think you're worth being served?
26:15 Speaker 02 No.
26:15 Dr. John Delony? Where does that story come from?
26:23 Speaker 02 I think, in some ways, uh, just going back to growing up, um, like, I have three siblings and, uh, I saw how, um, like drugs and alcohol and different lifestyles, uh, how they chose those things, and I chose social media and video games and things, and that was my way to escape in some ways, but I,
26:57 Speaker 02 I, um,
27:00 Speaker 02 I just always felt like the awkward kid.
27:03 Dr. John Delony? Yeah.
27:04 Speaker 02 And in some ways, I still feel awkward and don't really, I don't, it, it just, it's, I just, I struggle with feeling like I fit in, in different environments.
27:17 Dr. John Delony? Okay.
27:20 Dr. John Delony? So I'll tell you the simple path forward.
27:24 Dr. John Delony? It's what I have. Here's the deal, I can't control it. I had a, I was up till 1 a.m. last night. I'm exhausted. I've been hunting a lot, which means I'm getting up really early and staying up really late. I'm traveling all over the country. And I've got like a weird thing where I'm toggling. I'm toggling between a leadership conference that I'm speaking multiple times, that a marriage book that I'm working on, live events that I'm doing out, big travel. Like, so I've got a lot. And last night I had a spin out. And the way I describe a spin out is I fell asleep on the couch like at 8 o'clock. My wife got up and went to bed. My son got up and went to bed. I woke up about 10 and I just melted my soul on social media for 90 minutes.
28:10 Dr. John Delony? I felt like crap. Slept like crap, I just did. And I woke up this morning knowing I had to pay the piper, right? I still gotta get up, I gotta be present with my kids. I gotta go to work and it's up to me to set boundaries today. And I carry the shame of, I can't believe I didn't just go to bed last night. My body could have used a sleep. I didn't, so here I am today. The only thing I can affect is what I'm gonna do today. And so I know those men and women who make the apps are better than me. They're better than me.
28:41 Dr. John Delony? Social media is a drug and I'm an addict. Fine. So I have a choice to make. So I have it on two separate phones. I have my personal phone and I have social media on a phone that stays in my work bag.
28:53 Dr. John Delony? And you can make that choice today.
28:57 Dr. John Delony? The second thing is, is what Anna Limkey, who's one of the greatest writers of our generation. She wrote a book called Dopamine Nation that I think everybody should read. But I want you to go check that book out.
29:10 Dr. John Delony? But take, commit to a 30 day fast.
29:16 Speaker 02 Okay. How do you, um, everyone want to do a fast? Um, how do you do a fast when, like during, during the workday? It's still something that's required.
29:31 Dr. John Delony? It's, it's thinking of it as a hammer or a drill.
29:34 Speaker 02 Okay.
29:34 Dr. John Delony? Not as a portal to connection, because it's not.
29:37 Speaker 02 Got it, got it.
29:37 Dr. John Delony? It's a, it's a drill. I, I build stuff in the mornings or in the afternoons. Great. The other thing is catching yourself when you grab it when you're bored, when you grab it when you're lonely, you grab it when your boss is ranting and raving and you're trying to avoid a Zoom meeting with your team. Like you're going to catch yourself doing it and it's not beating yourself up and, ah, I'm the worst. It's like, oh man, I did it again and I'm going to click it back off. And here's the thing that most people don't get about addiction. The reason AA, it's got detractors, fine, but the reason people find so much success in it is it's not just telling somebody to not drink, but it's addressing one of the core issues,
30:21 Dr. John Delony? which is isolation, loneliness, and nobody sees me or knows me. And so if you do this fast, your body's going to be faced with the reality that you're profoundly lonely. And so the way to be successful during this fast, you can white knuckle your way through it. You're tough and strong and you've got a great husband, you've got great support, you can do it. But you're going to gra- it's like not me not eating gummy candies for Lent. Dude, the day of Easter, I go into a diabetic coma, I go bananas, right? Because I'm not dealing with the core issue. So for you, the path is I'm going to put something on the calendar every week where I leave my house. I'm going to put something on the calendar every week for, for four weeks, for 30 days,
31:05 Dr. John Delony? where people come to my house. Because that's the real problem. And when they walk in the door, I'm going to have a basket and say, everybody's got to put their phone in here. We're all going to play Candy Land. What? Or we're going to play some silly childhood game and we're going to be silly doing it.
31:22 Dr. John Delony? And I'll provide the tacos, you provide the drinks and the whatever. We're just gonna have a nuts and bolts thing. And two people may show up, five people may show up, nobody may show up. But I'm going to backfill the core issue and practice being awkward without this drug.
31:40 Speaker 02 I kind of a silly follow up question on that.
31:46 Speaker 02 Like, we recently moved cross country, moved back to his hometown. And I'm still working on building friends and community here.
31:57 Dr. John Delony? Are you, are you working on building it or are you thinking about it?
32:01 Speaker 02 I've been working on it, it just, I haven't, I guess, found my people yet.
32:06 Dr. John Delony? Cool.
32:11 Speaker 02 But, uh, what would you suggest? That just the same, just invite anyone?
32:17 Dr. John Delony? Go first and be weird.
32:19 Speaker 02 Okay.
32:20 Dr. John Delony? Those are the guiding things. Go first and be weird. You'll never find your people unless you surround yourself with a bunch of people and filter out not your people and your people.
32:31 Dr. John Delony? Here's the thing in my house, this just happened. I have a neighbor, his name's Craig, he's awesome, he's the best neighbor you could ever have in your life. He texted me a picture of a Halloween, a front yard Halloween party for Halloween night. And I was like, oh, that's cool. You wanna hear something awesome? I snapped that picture, I screenshot it and sent it to my wife and said, hey, let's go to this thing in the neighborhood. My wife is the one who sent it.
32:58 Dr. John Delony? I didn't know I was having a Halloween front yard party at my own house, right? So it's, we're gonna go first and we're gonna be weird. And my wife, I guess, printed off flyers and sent the kids around and they put them on people's doors.
33:11 Dr. John Delony? And that's, I can tell you already, that makes me feel awkward and exposed and I'm feeling it. And I'm gonna go do it anyway, cause I know it's gonna be awesome. And at least one of my neighbors was super hyped about it.
33:25 Dr. John Delony? Hear me say you're worth being friends with.
33:31 Dr. John Delony? And in those moments when you don't feel lovable, look over at that great husband you have and at least choose to trust him over the story that you're telling yourself. Let him carry some of that weight sometimes because that's what he signed up to do. Till death do you part. I don't feel lovable. That guy loves me and he doesn't lie to me. I'm gonna trust him over my body that's sounding the alarms trying to keep me safe. And if I get to a point where I continually loop back to, I don't feel lovable, I don't feel worth being friends with, I'm gonna go see a counselor, I'm gonna go see a professional therapist, I'm gonna work through that because I need to change that story because it's not true.
34:10 Dr. John Delony? And I'm gonna get radical and take a 30 day fast from social media, period. And I'm gonna feel all those uncomfortable feelings, I'm gonna journal about it, I'm gonna write them down. If I feel like I'm missing something, I'm gonna write it down. I feel like I'm missing, and I want you to say, I feel like I'm missing what? I feel like I'm missing what? And then I'm gonna backfill that with actual, real people, with game night with my husband, with, hey husband buckle up, we're gonna be making out a lot because I don't have anything else to do, I'm gonna be scrolling the night away. I'm actually gonna get sleep, I'm gonna put a bedtime on here, I'm gonna try to go to bed, I might start exercising, I'm gonna fill this, this gap up of time I've been scrolling
34:53 Dr. John Delony? away with positive things. And by the way, if you, anyone else feeling shame, especially 25 year olds, 35 year olds, I want you to know this, your school, the adults in your life when you were children failed you. They failed you. They gave you drugs in middle school, they gave you drugs in high school, they gave you drugs in college, and they called them educational technology, they called them learning devices, they called them mobile learning initiatives, they called them connectivity. They gave you drugs. And now you're 25 and realized, I was high most of my childhood and I missed out on how to make friends. Okay, cool, now it's time to get sober.
35:38 Dr. John Delony? You can't do anything about what they did, but you can choose to not keep using this drug, which is called social media, and I'm gonna start doing real things with real people in the real world.
35:50 Dr. John Delony? It's your move, sister. Thank you for calling. I'm proud of you. At the end of this 30 day fast, I would love for you to call me back and let me know how it went, the good, the bad, and the ugly. That'd be a great follow-up call, Nicole. When we come back, a woman wonders how to handle a family relationship when that family member won't forgive her for having an affair.
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37:30 Dr. John Delony? All right, Atlanta, Georgia. Let's talk to Jennifer. What's up, Jennifer?
37:34 Speaker 03 Hi, Dr. John. How's it going?
37:37 Dr. John Delony? Yes, dandy. What's up?
37:39 Speaker 03 Good.
37:40 Dr. John Delony? I don't ever say the word dandy. I don't even know why I said that. That was dumb. I'm doing great. How are you?
37:44 Speaker 03 Good. Thanks for taking my call. I really appreciate it.
37:48 Dr. John Delony? What you got? What's up?
37:49 Speaker 03 So I'm basically calling because I need some advice on how to handle a family relationship with my brother-in-law's wife. I had an affair a couple of years ago and my husband and I have reconciled. We've stayed together and I've made amends with most of the family and we're actually on really great terms. She's the only one who, there's still a strain.
38:17 Dr. John Delony? Let it go, let it go.
38:19 Speaker 03 Oh, it's so hard because she acts like I don't exist and she ignores me.
38:23 Dr. John Delony? Then let her. Here's the thing, the only person, the only, and I sound like I'm making it simple. It's hard, but it's simple. The only person you can control is you. That's it. And so, choose to be a person who treats everybody with dignity and respect regardless of if they give it back or not.
38:46 Speaker 03 Right.
38:47 Dr. John Delony? And if she doesn't want, if she wants to be a child and take her ball and go home, if she wants to every family, every family get together, she wants to drag an elephant and sit it right in the middle of the living room, that's fine. I'm still gonna ask you, hey, do you want anything to drink when I'm going to the kitchen? No? Okay. That's, I'm, because all I can, all I can, only thing I can do is just be the best, the best sister-in-law I can be. I can't make you like me. I can't make you tell the truth about me. I can't make you do anything.
39:20 Speaker 03 Yeah, I guess the practicality of it is the part that I'm struggling with because it definitely triggers my past, like, rejection issues and like my people-pleasing issues.
39:35 Dr. John Delony? Why does she get a vote?
39:37 Speaker 03 I guess because we, the family gets together often.
39:43 Dr. John Delony? I know, but she has looked at you and said, I do, I do not want a relationship with you. I'm gonna use a past indiscretion on your part to every day make myself feel better.
40:02 Dr. John Delony? Like, I don't know, like if there's a person like that in the world, that's great. Knock your lights out. You're, you don't want to be friends with me. I'm not, I'm not going to spend energy.
40:13 Speaker 03 Right. I guess where I struggle is when we are in the same household and usually it's for multiple days because it's at, um, big events. Like I struggle personally with either completely ignoring them because I feel awkward or maybe trying too hard. So I don't know how to like practically interact with her when we're in the same room.
40:37 Dr. John Delony? All right. Can I be, can I ask hard, hard questions?
40:40 Speaker 03 Yes.
40:41 Dr. John Delony? Take me back to your affair. Cause I think there's a trend line here. Take me back to it. What happened?
40:49 Speaker 03 So, um, I have a history of stepping out sexually to meet my like deep needs and trauma. Um, there was a lot of unprocessed things I didn't deal with and I brought it into the marriage. Um, and I fully take responsibility, but I know that there were things in the marriage that triggered those things and I didn't deal with it in a healthy way. So I decided to have the affair. Um, but the biggest thing was just a deep lack of like emotional connection with my husband. Um, and so I was seeking that elsewhere.
41:27 Dr. John Delony? Define, hold on, define for me emotional connection.
41:32 Speaker 03 Uh, it's that deep feeling of like being known and being, um, disconnected, like on an intimate level. Um, he unfortunately, he's a great guy, like he really is, but he struggles with deep, being deep and being past surface level just because of his own trauma.
41:54 Dr. John Delony? And, and, and, and as a fellow trauma survivor.
42:00 Speaker 03 Yeah.
42:00 Dr. John Delony? We are terrible with allowing ourselves to be seen and known. Cause we did once and it got us hurt.
42:10 Dr. John Delony? Fair.
42:12 Speaker 03 Yeah.
42:13 Dr. John Delony? Okay.
42:16 Dr. John Delony? And so, almost always, no, that's not true. I overstated that. Often,
42:25 Dr. John Delony? there's a sense of,
42:28 Dr. John Delony? um,
42:30 Dr. John Delony? I need somebody out there to make me feel okay inside of here.
42:36 Speaker 03 Hmm, yes, I can relate to that.
42:39 Dr. John Delony? I need somebody to make me feel alive. I need somebody to get my heart rate up. I need somebody to, to pretend for nine minutes that you see me and know me.
42:53 Speaker 03 Hmm.
42:53 Dr. John Delony? Okay, so I'm gonna assume that you've worked on that kind of stuff. You've worked on-
43:00 Speaker 03 I did a, yeah, I did a program. I've been going to a therapist. So it's been a lot of hard, hard work.
43:07 Dr. John Delony? Yeah. Alright, so now I want to take that similar trend line and bring it into your in-laws' house over Thanksgiving.
43:19 Speaker 03 Mm-hmm.
43:20 Dr. John Delony? Strangely, you're walking into that door,
43:25 Dr. John Delony? trying to make all these people make you feel okay on the inside of your skin.
43:32 Dr. John Delony? And my suggestion to you is, that's not their job.
43:36 Speaker 03 Hmm.
43:39 Dr. John Delony? It's you asking, not the need question, because I think that can be overdramatized sometimes. I think you asking, what do I want?
43:51 Dr. John Delony? And often, the deeper question here is, I don't want to be around those people either.
43:58 Dr. John Delony? And that leads to a harder conversation with your husband, which is, is there a possibility we could do Thanksgiving differently this year?
44:06 Speaker 03 Hmm.
44:09 Dr. John Delony? I want to, for one year at least, have a Thanksgiving or a Christmas or I cannot wait to walk in the front door of wherever it is we're going.
44:19 Dr. John Delony? Not, I want to walk in hoping that I can sing and dance and that everybody will like me. Oh gosh, I don't think that person just cut their eyes. Oh gosh, they're not, and I feel weird. Everybody's thinking about the affair, the affair, the affair. They're not, they're thinking about the mashed potatoes and whatever, but there's one person that doesn't like you and decides to act like I'm a four-year-old about it and ignores you, right? You see what I'm saying?
44:40 Speaker 03 Mm-hmm.
44:41 Dr. John Delony? It's this outsourcing of responsibility to somebody else to make me feel a little bit more alive and okay and at peace in my own skin.
44:49 Speaker 03 So, what is your suggestion for continually growing in, like, the worst aspects of it?
44:58 Dr. John Delony? You write that woman who was about to go for the very first affair, write her a letter as she was getting into the car to go meet with somebody and her husband was at home. And that woman whose heart was racing 100 miles an hour and kind of, didn't blackout, but it was pretty intentional, but like, I'm gonna go do this thing. Like, who made that choice? Write her a letter and tell her that you still love her. And tell her I know how much you're hurting, and if I could do anything, I'd go back and hug you and say, "Don't do this. This is gonna blow up a good man's life. This is gonna blow up my life, and this isn't the path. This isn't the solution to the hurt we have
45:41 Dr. John Delony? or to the emptiness that we feel."
45:44 Speaker 03 Mm-hmm.
45:45 Dr. John Delony? Let her go, because you're dragging her around everywhere, saying, "See, look what you did. See, look what you did. That woman over there in the other corner of the room, my brother-in-law's wife, see what you did? You ruined Christmas three years later, four years later, five years later."
46:06 Speaker 03 Hmm. Oh, no, that's definitely good. I mean, because it's the, I think that's the hardest part, is the shame, you know?
46:19 Dr. John Delony? But, but you get, and you've heard me say this, but you get the difference between guilt and shame, right?
46:23 Speaker 03 Yeah.
46:24 Dr. John Delony? Guilt is, "I screwed up. I did. I cheated on a good man." Shame is, "I'm a cheater. I'm not worth even coming over to this Christmas party. I'm the worst person here, and this woman at every turn confirms the story you've made up about yourself about how unlovable you are."
46:48 Speaker 03 Yeah, it sounds right.
46:50 Dr. John Delony? The path back from shame is a new story, which is, I'm a person of fidelity. I'm a person who never cheats on my husband. Which means I gotta come up with a whole bunch of strategies on when I start feeling like I wanna step out, when I start feeling bored in my own skin, or I start feeling less than, that we have a path. We meet every week to talk about our calendar and our budget and our sex life for the week. We go on long walks on Saturday mornings together. We don't have to look each other in the eye, but we're eyeball to eyeball. Whatever the things are, that we have a thing that's already in motion. It's a way of being for us, where we talk about hard things.
47:29 Dr. John Delony? That you don't wait till that, you shake up that two-liter bottle until it just is so full of disrupted air that the top shoots off.
47:42 Dr. John Delony? That you have the ability to say, "I need some adventure in our sex life this week."
47:52 Dr. John Delony? Instead of saying, "I need you to go deeper with me in conversation," to say, "I'm gonna send them to you, the Questions for Humans intimacy deck cards and the Questions for Humans Couples cards. I'm gonna send them to you for free. I wanna ask you seven questions."
48:12 Dr. John Delony? And I wanna sit in the bathtub with a hot bath, and we're gonna have candles in there, and you just sit on the floor next to me, and we're gonna go back and forth with these questions.
48:21 Dr. John Delony? Which might be one of the most strangely intimate nights you've had in ages.
48:25 Speaker 03 Yeah. It sounds nice, though.
48:28 Dr. John Delony? I know. You hear what I'm saying? But it's like, you have the responsibility to say out loud, "Here's what I want."
48:36 Dr. John Delony? And then here's an option. And then if he looks at you and says, "I don't wanna answer questions. I don't wanna do that." I don't wanna sit in the bathroom and talk about these, get to know you better. I'd rather just watch a football game. But then you all need to address that issue.
48:51 Speaker 03 Yeah.
48:52 Dr. John Delony? Right?
48:53 Speaker 03 Yeah. That makes sense. That sounds good. I wanna definitely try that.
48:58 Dr. John Delony? The letter I want you to write, I want you to write that letter to her. And let her go. Don't let her off the hook. She messed up, but I wanna contextualize it. That was a hurting young woman.
49:10 Dr. John Delony? Who constantly sought to feel less pain by going and getting her heart rate up and doing something wild. Except this time is with my husband and I blew up our life. The second letter I want you to write is to five years from now you. And it says, Dear Jennifer, we are a person who always tells the truth. We're a person who has messed up in the past. We violated our own values in the past and we will never do that again. Which means we're a person who always puts our challenges on the table.
49:51 Dr. John Delony? And has the courage to say, here's what I want this week. Jennifer is the kind of person who loves everybody and treats everybody with respect, even when there's annoying family members that snub their nose at me. It's deciding who am I going to be? And then just backfilling that with the actions that will get you to that place. Otherwise, you walk into every room asking yourself, am I lovable? Because you don't believe you are. And then you, your mind goes looking for what it wants. Like, it's like, it goes looking for what you think to be true. And every glance, every time somebody walks out of the room, every time somebody covers up their wine glass, it's confirmation of the story you've already told yourself, which
50:36 Dr. John Delony? is, I'm not worth being in this room. I'm unlovable. And that story's not true.
50:46 Speaker 03 Yeah, I'd say that's probably the hardest inner dialogue that I've battled with. And, you know, that's just from my upbringing. I've constantly feeling unloved and rejected, so.
50:59 Dr. John Delony? And then some guy's going to give you the illusion of love for five, 10, 15, 20 minutes.
51:04 Speaker 03 Yeah.
51:13 Dr. John Delony? Love can be boring.
51:16 Dr. John Delony? And love is a choice made over and over and over again. And sometimes it's got a cool fireworks show to it, but most of the time it doesn't. Most of the time it's yard work. Most of the time it's emptying the dishwasher. Most of the time it's washing little whiskers out of the sink.
51:32 Dr. John Delony? Love is a bunch of little choices made over and over and over. It's saying, "I'm sorry." It's saying, "I don't know how we got sideways, but here's a cup of coffee I just made for you."
51:45 Dr. John Delony? It is just picking up the underwear and putting it in the basket and going on about your day. Not telling yourself a story that he's doing that because he doesn't care about you and doesn't love you. "I'm just gonna pick up underwear, dude, and get on about my day."
51:56 Dr. John Delony? But those things take practice. They're uncomfortable. They're boring. They're annoying.
52:04 Dr. John Delony? It's just watering the roots and watering the roots. And one day you realize we have a gigantic sturdy tree. And that's a pretty amazing thing. Thanks for calling, sister.
52:15 Dr. John Delony? Go to Christmas with your head held high. Because you're worth being in that room. We'll be right back.
52:22 Dr. John Delony? All right, I got three dogs at my house. And they were outside dogs, and now they're inside dogs. And I love them, but it's a lot of stress. And I know and you know how stressful it can be during the holidays when you are traveling and you've got pets, either at home or shoved into some pet carrier with you. And this is gonna happen to you. You're gonna be on the road this holiday season away from your regular vet, and you're gonna need pet care right away. Dutch has your back. Dutch is the leading telehealth service for pets, and it gives you 24/7 access to licensed vets. Dutch is amazing. They can treat over 150 common pet conditions, and you can get expert care in minutes.
53:07 Dr. John Delony? Just a 10-minute call from wherever you are, and you've got a treatment plan ready to go. A Dutch membership covers up to five pets, plus unlimited visits and unlimited follow-ups and prescriptions shipped.
53:21 Dr. John Delony? For free with my code, it's less than seven bucks a month. That pays for itself fast because you spend that much just to see a vet in an office one time. The average pet owner using Dutch saves over 800 bucks a year. Go to dutch.com slash Deloney and use code Deloney to get 50 bucks off a year of vet care. That's Dutch, D U T C H, dutch.com slash Deloney and use code Deloney. All right, Kelly, something cool happened. What is it?
53:52 Speaker 04 Yes, so earlier this year, we had a guy named Phil that called in and was talking about his wife was pregnant and she had a son from a previous marriage that he adored. And he was nervous that he was going to favor his biological child over his stepson. So he writes in, "I called earlier this year for advice on how to make sure I didn't love my stepson any less after having a biological child. Just wanted to give an update. My wife gave birth to a healthy baby girl back in August and we are all over the moon. I made a point to take my son to breakfast at least once a month before work and school and had a couple of dudes weekends to get some one-on-one time.
54:32 Speaker 04 Your advice on using your baby and your sister rather than just saying the baby seemed to work and it seemed to give him a sense of upcoming responsibility. Now that she has arisen, my son has been very helpful, attentive and loving to his new sister. While things are sticky, stinky and loud in the house right now, we still have our breakfast lunch dates. Thanks for the advice and the wisdom."
54:55 Dr. John Delony? That's fantastic. Hey Ben, that's the name of our new band, Sticky, Stinky and Loud. Ship it. That's a great band name.
55:02 Speaker 04 That is by far the most accurate description of y'all's band I've ever heard. So it works.
55:08 Dr. John Delony? Dude, that's so fantastic. I love these follow-up stories. If you've ever been on the show before and you're muddling through and figuring out the next right move and you want to write in, I'd love to hear from you. So if you've got that, that'd be great, but I appreciate him writing in. That's super cool. I was, um, two cool things happened this morning. I went to breakfast with my wife. I'm about to be on the road for a while, so we went. And there was a dad having a very awkward breakfast with his son. And his son was little and they were, it was awkward and like I could tell they didn't really know what to say to each other. And I stopped by to say, dude, this is so cool. Like this looks awesome. And that was cool. And then the second one is as I was leaving, another grown man said, hey, I never, I'm in Nashville.
55:53 Dr. John Delony? There's always people coming in and out of restaurants and stuff. I never stop them, but I needed to stop you and tell you. This is my friend. It's an old frat brother of mine. And these are guys that are probably 10 years older than me. This old frat brother of mine, and you keep telling us that we gotta get together and have friends. And so we're catching up. And he said, we've got through all the lies and then we got through all the old stories. And now we're talking about stuff that matters. And it was just a cool, like, very, very cool. Just in a random breakfast restaurant here in town. So that's all those stories make me, they make all this show worth it. It makes every day of my life just staring at Kelly and her Dallas Cowboy t-shirt. It makes it all worth it. Yes, all of it. Stinky, what was it?
56:34 Speaker 04 Stinky, sticky and loud.
56:37 Dr. John Delony? That might be the name of our live.
56:38 Speaker 00 We could win that way with that name.
56:40 Dr. John Delony? We can never win, but that might be the name of our live album. Sticky, stinky and loud.
56:46 Speaker 00 I like it.
56:47 Dr. John Delony? Dude, I'm in. Love you guys. Bye.
Previous Could This Secret End My Marriage Before It Starts? Next My Husband Never Has Time for Me or the Kids Page updated October 31, 2026 · transcript and summary are machine-generated