I’ve Married the Same Man 3 Times (Am I Crazy?)

My husband and I, we've been together since high school. We've separated a few times and we've even divorced each other twice. So technically we've been married to each other three times. Can I ever truly forgive him for being unfaithful? Have you ever heard me talk about the Twin Towers falling down? No. When it comes to marriage? Okay, so. What's going on? What's going on? This is John with the Dr. John Deloni Show coming to you from Nashville, Tennessee, talking to real people going through real life challenges. Thank you for joining us. There's a billion podcasts out there and I'm glad that you are sitting with us. Pull up a seat, grab some drinks and some nachos and we're going to figure out what's the next right move. All right, let's go to Dallas, Texas and talk to Stephanie. What's up Stephanie? Hi. How's it going? It's okay. It's just going. That means not good at all. What's up? What's up? So my question is a little bit of a, I guess, 22 years in the making, but I'll give you a little bit of backstory. So my husband and I, we've been together since high school, almost 22 years now. We've separated a few times and we've even divorced each other twice. We've technically been married to each other three times. Over 22 years? Yes. Wow. Okay. Over the course of the years, we've faced a lot of struggles, including me having miscarriages and being unfaithful multiple times, emotional abuse. We've had medical traumas with our children, one of them being carefied at multiple times and being placed on life support at one point. Shortly after that, he was unfaithful again. My husband is a three-time war veteran who also struggles with PTSD. In 2022, he attempted suicide and he was hospitalized for about three months trying to deal with that. But it seems like over the course of the 22 years, it's just been one thing after the other. We now have five kids. Our oldest is almost 20 and our youngest is six months old. She was a complete surprise. Hey, oh. Good gosh. That's what you needed on top of all this was a six-month-old. Yeah, exactly. Wow. But instead of feeling like joy, I feel that sometimes my husband blames me for having another baby, which is also painful. I love him very much and we've worked really hard to make our marriage better. We've done a lot of things to pour into our marriage and I've forgiven him many times, but deep down, I still have so much pain and hurt and anger. I carry a lot of resentment towards him, I guess. My question is, can I ever truly forgive him for being unfaithful despite past hurts and work past all that resentment? Have you ever heard me talk about the Twin Towers falling down? No. When it comes to marriage? Okay. So, it's an analogy that I just love and I actually use it everywhere. The first time I heard it was from the great Esther Perral, the marriage therapist out of New York. But she said, when somebody cheats in a relationship, and I've actually, I think it's much bigger than that. When you have a kid for the first time, when you get a new job or you move or you lose a job, whatever, she described the changes in a marriage like the Twin Towers when they fell, when they were knocked down by terrorists and they fell. You couldn't sweep up all that steel and glass and wood and rebuild those towers using the old materials. You had two choices. You could walk away and let nature take it back over. In the next 100, 200 years, it would, right? Or you can get in some professionals. You can excavate the whole thing and you can rebuild a new marriage. And it sounds like using that analogy over the last 22 years, you guys have had one thing after another, after another, after another. And you've tried to rebuild your marriage a number of times, which is right and good. I've got 20 different marriages. I've been married 23 years. I've got 20 new marriages for various reasons. But you all have tried to rebuild it on top of the existing rubble. And so when you say you're really working on your marriage and you're doing, you're all are working together, what you haven't ever done is excavate the whole thing and start from bedrock, from dirt. And until you do that, until you can honestly have a marriage where you can put your hurts on the table and say the things out loud, because you still can't do that. And he's not, he's not well. Yeah. Right? Definitely not. And I'm not blaming him. He's just not. It's okay. Love him to death, man. And he's been through hell and back, but he's not well in a place where you could say, hey, this is how I feel. This is what's happened. This is reality for me right now to where he could go. I hear that and hold it, right? He can't do that. And you can't do that. And so any work you'll do on your marriage is like trying to build a new building on top of a collapsed infrastructure. Yes. Okay. And so the path forward for you, yes, you could actually dig through and work on resentment, on coming together, on building a new thing. But he would have to be committed to getting well and whole. And you would have to be committed, and both of you will have to be committed to excavating this whole thing out and creating a marriage where we can say the things that are true. And right now, y'all don't have that. You both play defense in your house, right? Yes. You protect him from things that are going on inside your chest. He tries to protect you from the things going on inside his heart and his head. And so he's got coping strategies. You've got coping strategies. And those strategies pull you both further and further apart. Yeah, I do. Instead of we are having challenges and these things bring us closer together. Creating conflict should be a point of connection for couples. And for you guys, because you haven't excavated the whole thing, conflict is a point of separation for y'all. Yeah, that's definitely true. And so the question I have for you is what would it look like if you were to come home and say, hey, we have 500 kids. I've got childcare for them. I want us to go out for half a day and clear the whole calendar. And let's pretend we're building a new marriage from scratch, from zero. How do we want this house to feel every morning when you wake up, when I get home, when you get home? How am I able to say, I don't want to be intimate tonight, my head's full of all kinds of old junk. I'm not okay. How was he able to come home and say, I had a really dark day? It was tough for me to get out of bed. And here's what I would love from you today. What would his response be to that? I think now more than ever he's more open to things like that. I feel like his heart has kind of softened. Our older kids are getting older. We feel that we've done all of this stuff and it's kind of messed them up. And I think that we feel the tug more than anything to make things right. But I guess I don't even know how that would feel because I don't think that we've ever had that. Yeah. Do you think he would entertain it? Yeah, I think that he would. Lately he's been more willing than I have. I've just kind of been very closed off. And so lately he has been, you know, hey, what do you want to do tonight? Let's spend time together. And I'm just like, go away. Well, think about those kind of questions. Those are the Gottman's column bids. That's his bid for connection with you. And for you, that's like slow dancing on top of a collapsed building. Yes. Right? And so you get in this figure eight kind of dance where he pursues you and you're like, look around. And then he feels rejected and then he goes off and then you're like, see, I knew he didn't like me or I'm not enough or it's my fault. We had a baby and then he tries to reconnect and you all just get in this dance. Right? Oh, yeah. And so somebody, if you haven't listened to the show very long, I always say that somebody has to turn the lights on and turn the music off, stop dancing. And it usually takes one person. There's two big things here. Number one, if y'all are up for it and y'all can, I know you got a little baby and it's complex. Valentine's Day weekend this year, I've got a money and marriage conference where we're literally this year going to go through how to rebuild your marriage, whether it's great and you're ready for like, and you've got a kid going off to college or whether it is just an ash because of infidelity or whatever. We're going to walk you through how to do it and you and your husband can be my VIP guest at that event. Okay. Okay. If y'all want to come to Nashville. It's a long weekend. It may not work because you got a toddler and you got a baby, you got an infant. So it may be tougher and y'all may not have the money to fly yourself down here to Nashville or whatever. But if y'all want to come, you can be my guest here. Okay. That's number one. Yeah. And the whole weekend is about coming back together and rebuilding a new thing. Right. The second part underneath this is you trying that out, clearing the deck and you look at him and say, I see a softening in you. I see your heart opening up and I feel myself after 20 years of having to keep this whole thing together. Now that you're holding it, I'm feeling myself just wanting to let go and walk away from the whole thing. Yeah. Right. And if you look at him and you say those things, I see the changes you're trying to make and now I'm struggling. I want to rebuild this thing from the ground up. Are you in? Yeah. And see what he says to that. And if he says, I'm all in, y'all are both going to need to go see somebody together, see a counselor together. And here's more important, you're both going to have to decide what do you want your house to feel like and what must be true for that to happen. Yeah. And when I say, what do you want your house to feel like? I want you to feel like you can say anything that you need to say. Like, hey, we have this six month old kid and neither of us planned this. And by the way, new mom, it's okay to be really upset that you had a fifth kid on accident. It's okay. You're not a bad mom. You're not. You're not. Thank you. It's okay. Because I know you're going to love this kid and you're going to give this kid the world. Yes. And it's okay that this was not in the plan at all. And here we go again. Yeah, definitely. All right. And it's also okay that your four other kids, every time you had a toddler is when your husband felt like he wasn't enough around the house and he went and did something that violated his values, violated Yall's marriage values. And you see this whole thing spinning up again. Oh, yeah. Right? That's definitely true. Yeah. Your body would be failing you if it wasn't sounding every alarm you have right now. It's been through this four other times. Yeah. Okay. That doesn't make you crazy. That makes your body working perfectly. And for him to be like, I have messed up four times in a row and I don't want to do it this time. I'm going to be extra attentive, extra open, extra soft in my spirit. And you being like, dude, I'm nursing a six month old again. Get off of me. Right? All that is normal. Okay. But normal is not going to cut at this time. We got to excavate the whole site and build from the floor up. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So, I want you to ask him if he's all in to rebuild from the floor up. And I want you to be honest about the things that you need, which are food, shelter, right? And water. And what do you want from him? And I want you to be honest with him about you don't have these tools in your toolkit yet. And I want you to commit to getting these things, these tools. And what I mean by tools, how to just sit with a six year old in color for a while without feeling like a failure, which most dads do, how to change a diaper when you don't think you're doing it right. And so you feel like a loser and a failure. And so you go to work and you as being able to hear from your wife who you love, you've been married three times. Y'all keep going around the merry grunt. This is amazing. Yeah. And by the way, at some point, I want y'all to have individual conversations. Y'all in one side of a booth and you're 20 year old, you're 17 year old, you're 15 year old on the other side of the booth. And I want you to be honest. We didn't do a good job. We didn't love each other. We have told our older kids, we have sat them down, especially after getting remarried this last time. Like, hey, this is something that we want to do and we're sorry for all of the hurt. But I feel like then things happen, like we talked about and it just spirals again. So here we are back in that same routine. You caught the spiral though. You caught it. And then y'all commit to, okay, here we go. We're heading down. We're just going to turn the music off. We're going to turn the lights on. We're going to come back to the table. And by the way, it seems like some huge thing and it is excavations huge, but it starts in little tiny steps. So if you think about, we got to excavate, we got to get some big trucks out here and some big front loaders and clean all this up. Okay, that sounds huge, but it happens scoop by scoop. Just piece of concrete by piece of concrete. What does it look like in a marriage? Every Sunday night, no matter what game is on, no matter where I've been, on what hunt I've been on, no matter how stressed we are, whatever, every Sunday night at eight o'clock, we sit down and we go over the calendar from the upcoming week. We go over the budget for the upcoming week and we ask each other, how can I love you this week? It's that small. Just scoop by scoop. Every morning, every single morning, we're both going to go do something that is good for our bodies, which means the other person is going to have to warm up a bottle while you're out walking or going for a walk or going for exercise or going for coffee with a girlfriend. You are going to have to get the other three kids ready while he's off exercising before he comes back home. It is these little bitty steps that add up over time with compound interest that change everything. It's not this huge fall off a cliff and the huge shoot back up the mountain and then fall off the cliff. It is step by step by step by step by step. So here's the deal, Stephanie. I'm going to give you every tool I got in my toolkit to help you guys out. Number one, I'm going to give you a year to the Together app. It's my marriage app. It's just daily challenges that you can do for each other. You can do it by yourself. It's going to give you a daily challenge to give to your spouse or y'all can link up and do it together. I'm going to give it to you for free for a year. Also I'm going to give you my book, Building a Non-Inxious Life. I want y'all to go through that book together and use it as a roadmap to create peace in your house. This could be what y'all use at your breakfast. And I'm going to give y'all every dollar, which is the app to get your money right. Here's what getting your money right as a couple usually does. It forces y'all to have conversations once a week. It forces y'all to have conversations about values, what we're spending our money on, how much things cost, how much we owe, all these things that create stress storms inside of a house. And I'm going to give y'all a couple of VIP tickets to the Money in Marriage or Valentine's Day weekend if y'all are able to get to Nashville. So I'm going to give you every tool I got in my toolkit and it's going to be up to you all, you and your husband, to say, okay, we got married a third time. We're not going back down that road. We're going to stop it before we fall. We start heading downhill. One of y'all has to have the courage to turn the lights on, turn the music off, go to breakfast, clear the deck and say, all right, we're going to build a new marriage from the floor up. Are you in? And hopefully he says, I'm all in. And we're going to talk about hurt. We're going to talk about pain. We're going to talk about loss. And then we're going to go do the next right things to clear this thing out and to build something amazing and new. Thank you so much for the call, sister. I'm here to support you and your husband anytime y'all need. Call me anytime. All right, when we come back, a man wonders how to stop feeling so insecure around his friends and his workplace. This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. The holidays are a time of traditions, both good ones and not so good ones. The holidays can be busy, stressful and for many of us, lonely. And that's why it's a great time to reflect on what the good traditions are during our holiday season and the traditions that aren't so great. And if you need to dig into some of those not so great traditions, therapy can give you space to reflect on the old traditions and create new ones. If you're thinking about therapy, I recommend BetterHelp. They've served over 5 million people globally with an average rating of 4.9 stars out of 5. They're totally online so it's easy to fit into your busy holiday schedule to get started and just answer a few simple questions and they'll connect you with a licensed therapist who fits your needs. 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It's a blizzard. Basically winter. Yeah, man. Those below 80 days are magic days, man. It's awesome. What's up, man? That's right. Yeah, so, man, I feel like I've just been feeling really, trying to deal with insecurity at work and with my friendships. Tell me about insecurity. What does that mean? So, should give you a little context. I guess back in, I was in high school. I was diagnosed with OCD and that has taken many forms over the years and with great therapy and meds. I'm in a really good place now. How extreme is your... Well, when I was first diagnosed, it was really bad. Washing my hands till they were bleeding and it was really, really rough. You had high compulsion. What about thoughts? Yeah, I'm interested in thoughts. It was pretty intense and it was just like kind of feeling out of body like there was another voice in my head. Just kind of telling me things to do that I couldn't really avoid. And once I got one thing under control, it was just like the next thing took over and it left itself onto my face for a while just telling me I wasn't good enough or I wasn't. It kind of took over and one by one I just kind of tackled it through the years and now it's just, man, I'm really grateful. I just feel like I'm in a better head space. I just feel like I have a better understanding of that OCD voice. Can I tell you this? That's one of my diagnostics and from way back in the day. And mine wasn't as extreme as yours. It was different. But there is something about feeling like you can't trust your own body that is underneath all that's terrifying, right? Yeah, it is. Because if you can't trust you, how can the world kind of girlfriend trust you or how can an employer trust you? How can your family trust you if you don't trust you, right? Yeah, I mean, yeah. It's exhausted. That's exactly right. And so I want to tell you I'm proud of you, dude. I'm proud of you for grinding it out slowly but surely. I am. Yeah, I really appreciate that. It is, I mean, yeah, they're probably like that, but that is, that is true. I mean, it is, it's very, it's very exhausting. I mean, I just, I wonder sometimes if someone were to plug my brain to their head. No, dude, you know, nobody, trust me, nobody needs to know the thoughts going on in our heads on a loop. Yeah. Um, what's important is that once you can separate yourself from that voice realizing, oh, that's not me. That's a voice in my mind. That's, that to me is step one of victory, right? Yeah, it's amazing. Absolutely. So, so where are these feelings of insecurity or let me, let me change that question. Take feelings off of the table. Yeah. What is proof of you're not good enough at work? Um, I think at work it's maybe less about what's happening like at work. I feel like I'm doing pretty well on my job. I just, I am fall really quickly into a spirit of comparison with my peers. And just like, you know, we all graduated college, you know, and now we're moving on to this next stage of life where everyone's starting to get like money. And, and it's like, wow, man, like what they're doing at their job is maybe more impressive or more, um, requires more like intellect, you know, than, than maybe what I'm doing. And I, I just feel like maybe I could be doing more. Um, I don't, I don't know. It's less maybe specifically with my job and more with like my friends. Like I have the best friends in the world. I have the best, best guys. I'm getting married actually in March. And so, um, super stoked about that. And these, these guys are all going to be standing next to me. And I mean, I love them like brothers. I have found that I have found that lately the thing that I've been kind of hyper focusing on better for worst is like, we rib each other a lot. Right. I mean, it's just like guys, it's just like our love language. It's just how I, it's just how I connect is just, we're just constantly like joking with each other. And, and I don't want to change the dynamic, but lately it's just, I feel like I have this reputation that's kind of like the idiot. Yeah. It's just, I just think that I'm, I don't, I don't know. It's like maybe all the jokes is like, it's just, I'm sensing a common theme where I'm just constantly saying something dumb or I'm maybe not understanding something that they are. And I'm sure if I told them this, they would all be like, Oh, my bad dude, like we had no idea. I don't know if I want to do that. Like I don't want to change the dynamic cause I want to, I want to be able to give it and take it. Yeah. You know what I mean? Yeah. So I think it's, I don't have two PhDs cause I'm the smartest guy in the room. I have two PhDs cause I've always felt like the dumbest guy in the room. And I was constantly for years desperate for someone to tell me that I was smart. Really desperate. And so I want to tell you whatever you think you're going to go achieve to get that sense. It's you, you can't catch it. And it wasn't until I crossed that, that what third finish line from a master's degree to a doctorate to another. The final I was like, all right, this isn't the problem. The problem is I don't like myself and I am casting my own judgment on myself into the hearts and minds of my closest buddies. Yeah. And in the same way that you would never, cause you probably have one friend that's super anal retentive, right? That's like a nerd, like super list maker. And you got one buddy that's just kind of like dumb as a box of hair, but it's making a ton of money, right? You got that friend too? Yeah. All right. You would never say something with the intent of hurting them. Right, of course. But you would definitely say something to poke and rib it them, right? And my guess is they feel the exact same way about you. The difference is what you go looking for in the world you are sure to find as Brené Brown says. And you are desperate to find people to prove to you that you're as lousy as you look in the mirror and think you are. And so you hear jokes and connection from your guy buddies as truth because it confirms the story that you already have about yourself, which is there's something wrong with you. Somehow you're not enough. Yeah. I want to tell you this, just not true, man. Yeah. Like when I hear you talk, I hear an absolute fighter who's going to be one of the most compassionate coworkers. What business do you work in? I'm a financial consultant. Okay. Oh my gosh. Okay. You are going to be one of the most compassionate people when guys like me show up at your door freaked out about the world in voting. Right? Yeah. You're going to rise through the ranks of that job so fast, not because you're great with math. Hey, I can do that nonsense, but because you know how to sit with exhausted, fried, terrified people because you've been there. Yeah. It usually takes a while for the market to catch up to that sort of relational person. Yeah. Yeah. And so here's what you and I both know. We share this together, that our feelings are very big and very loud and they most often don't tell us the truth, fair? Yeah. Okay. So cool. We have that data point. That's awesome. And so what's important for guys like me and you to do is to go do the next right thing. To ask when our feelings get really loud, to be direct with our questions in a kind way. And three, find places where we can serve other people because that changes the voice and that changes our internal default setting that we are dumb and losers to maybe not the smartest guys in the world, but we can sit with hurting people. We can sit with people who need support and care and love because we've been there. Is that fair? Yeah. No, that's very fair. Would you say, and this could be the OCD voice talking, but would you say that there's merit in me? I feel like I've been overthinking a lot of my conversations now with my friends because I don't want to say stuff to them. That is hurtful. Whether it's before, I would be like, bro, you are actually the dumbest man I've ever met and we would laugh. But now it's like, I don't want to say something like that because I don't want them to take it. I don't know. Where do I draw that line? I mean, that's just you growing up and being wise. And I'm going to tell you, I have shifted over the years from I want to be the guy with the joke pointing out the dumb thing to I want to make sure every... I just got done with a 10-day run with some of my oldest friends in the world. I had speaking events all through taxes and into another state. Every step of the way, I stayed with friends, went to dinner with friends, old friends, went hunting with an old friend. And I needed every one of them to know that I'm so proud of them and I love them and I'm grateful for them. And that's a shift for me. And can I also tell you that one of those guys that I stayed at his house with his family, he still goes by Fat John. That's his name. And he still calls me Hyper John. So that didn't change. Our poking at each other doesn't change. But as you get older and you get wiser, you realize bids for connection don't have to be poke first, show up second. It can be, hey dude, I love you first. And the old nicknames are going to stay. This is just you getting wiser, brother. And so if you feel a sense of I'm still one of the guys, I'm still going to hang out, these guys are still my ride. These guys are going to stand by me in my wedding and hold me accountable for the rest of my life. Amazing. And it's okay to say, hey, before we do this, I want each one of you to know what you mean to me and I'm going to ride it out. I'm going to read it to you. That'd be amazing. So that's where I would start with those relationships and at work. Listen, insecurity, this idea of Kelly, what's it called when you, I just lost it. It is, oh, imposter syndrome. I just lost it. I felt you, you just channeled into my head. So thank you for that. Imposter syndrome, it's simply the fear that other people are judging you as harshly as you're judging yourself. Stop. And if you got OCD, those judgment voices get loud and they get repetitive and they get on a loop. Everybody I know judges themselves way harsher than anybody else judges them. Way harsher. And so the path forward is not to think your way out of this thing, but to take the next right action. Take the next right big step. I'm really feeling myself not wanting to clown on my buddies anymore. I just want to tell them that I love them. Cool. Do that. And if they don't want to hang out with a guy that celebrates them, then that relationship has kind of come to its end. My guess is they'll do the same for you. And if you get tired of people piling up on you and piling up on you, ask one of them. Pull them aside. Go grab a drink, get some coffee and just say, you think I'm stupid? And they'll be like, no, you're the smartest guy I know. That's why we make fun of you. That's why we give you a hard time. Or yeah, dude, you say the dumbest things. That's why we love you. And you can get some of that confirmation one-on-one. In a big group, everyone's going to pile up and be silly, but Sam, I'm hearing an absolute rockstar. I'm hearing a guy that is about to get married, who's nervous about getting married, which he should be, and excited, which he should be. I hear a guy that's transitioning from high school guy to college guy to now a grown-up guy, and you're going to see some friends make a bunch out of the gate and not out of the gate, and you're going to have friends that lose jobs, you'll lose jobs, you'll get jobs. This is just that next stage. And it feels unsettled. And when you get unsettled, your body goes to OCD. Some people's body goes to anxious. Some people's bodies go to, I don't want to get out from one of these blankets. All that's fine. It's about what am I going to do next? What actions am I going to take? And so here's what I want you to do, Sam. I want you to write yourself a letter to one month after you're married to you. And I want you to thank yourself for the things you started doing today. Congratulate yourself. Write yourself a letter on what kind of husband you're going to be, the kind of person you're going to be. Write yourself a letter about the actions you're going to take to be a great friend, great husband, great employee. And then we're going to keep revisiting that. And then I want you to write each one of your groomsmen a short note that you're going to read to them face to face in front of everybody. And you may be the guy that changes that dynamic, but don't lose ribbon. Don't lose laughing. Just talking crap with your buddies. That is a great way to provide levity and joy. It's awesome. Thank you for the call, my brother. All right, we come back. A man asks how to cope with the grief of his child leaving for college. The holiday season is here and it's my favorite time of the year. With everything going on, I want you to ask yourself, who on your list deserves a gift that can help them relax this holiday season and beyond? I want you to get them Cozy Earth's bamboo sheets. These sheets keep you cozy without overheating you and they help you sleep several degrees cooler. Perfect for winter nights and for waking up feeling refreshed. Cozy Earth has something else that's amazing. The bubble cuddle blanket. Yes, it's amazing. This thing is like a giant teddy bear. It's great for family movie night or for cuddling by the fire. Cozy Earth's sheets and blankets are more than gifts. They're a way to help your loved ones get deep sleep, get recharged and feel great. And as always, Cozy Earth products come with a 100 night sleep trial. Try them out and if you don't love them, you can return them hassle free. I am telling you, you will never want to return Cozy Earth's sheets. Head to CozyEarth.com and use code DELONI for up to 40% off. Just be sure to place your order by December 12th for guaranteed delivery by Christmas. That's CozyEarth.com slash DELONI. Use code DELONI. All right, let's go out to Detroit, Rock City. Talk to Dave. What's up, Dave? Hey, Dave. All right, sorry. Hi, John. How you doing? I'm good, brother. How are you, man? You're Dave. I'm John. Yes, I'm sorry. It's all good. What's up? All right, paint you a quick picture. I'm 45 years old. I've been married to my wife for 24 years. We have four kids. They go in 19, 16, 11, and 8. We have absolutely clawed our way to get to where we're at right now in our life. We have tried to do everything intentional. My wife is absolutely my best friend. She is my countershenanigator. We date weekly. Our best friends, we've done everything we can do to get to this point. I am getting now to where I guess as a man, I'm starting to exhale a little bit. There's been several times where her and I have been together and we just said, you know what, we'll pay you. We made it. It's like we're there. You can kind of start to see the fruit of your labor. We both came from nothing. I came from nothing and I've absolutely done everything in my power to get where I'm at. Are you mostly talking about... You said some amazing things about your marriage and your relationship. Are you talking about that is where you're exhaling or are you talking about financially? Like you've scratched and clawed and you've made money or both. All-encompassing. We have... I could have saved more money. I could have done a lot more things to put us in a lot better financial position where I'm at now, but we are in a good position now financially. We live a very, very fulfilling life. We're extremely active in our church. In fact, that's where we met 25 years ago. We have... You name it, we have. We have houses and cars and trucks and RVs and ATVs and all this stuff for lack of better words we're enslaved to. Nevertheless, we and we've taken vacations and we've tried to do everything right and we've been very good at it. Awesome. I say that to say this. Now we're in a position in our life where approximately 18 months ago, my oldest, my daughter, left for college. Gosh, that's the worst, dude. Well, I thought I was prepared. I thought I'm like, yeah, but it's going to be sad. And you know, and like, yeah, I get it, but I want to tell you something. The minute... So we drove her to college. She lives... It's approximately four hours away, so it's not too far, but yet it gives us a separation. It gives her some freedom, but yet she's not so far from home that she can't reach out and we can't be there if she needs us. So 18 months ago, we dropped her off to college and literally as I got in the car and I'm driving home, it hit me. It hit me so hard. And it was like, it was like, it's over. It's over. And it's like, I feel like personally that I missed it, that I was so focused on clawing and scratching and getting there and getting there and the next thing and the next job and the next, I mean, you name it, I did it, whatever it took, I got after it and my wife the same. And I didn't miss anything. Physically, I was in every school play and I was at every birthday. It was very intentional that, but it was like a light switch. And we got home and her bedroom's empty and the spot where she parked her car is empty and that portion of the house is quiet. And I see photos of long time ago when my nucleus was there and I can see photos of myself in the background and I'm like, you idiot, you missed it. And there's nothing I can do about it. And it's not just because of her. Her leaving is what struck me. It's that it's over. And we worked so hard. Hold on, hold on. You keep saying that. What's over? So when I say it's over, I think their childhood, that kind of that nucleus that we formed, that thing that was always there when I came home and then the noise and the chaos. And at the time, and I don't mean to be cliche, but it seemed like a hassle. Yeah, totally. And looking back on it and at the time, and I'm still do this and it's part of my personality is I'm always looking at the next thing. And I just feel like mentally I wasn't there. I didn't, I didn't breathe it in. I didn't realize how great it was because I was too focused on the next thing. I was thinking, well, I do this. It's going to be that much better. And to be honest, that got us to where we're at. So it did bear some fruit. Hold on, hold on. You're exchanging guilt for grief. You're in the effort to... And it feels like in an effort to avoid the fact not that it's all over. And by the way, it is, it is. It goes so fast, dude. So fast. But it's also changing though. And for a guy that's always looking over the court over his shoulder for the next thing, I want to prepare you for your relationship with your daughter has 50 more years to it. 40 more years to it. And it's just going to get more awesome. It's different. And she's not going to be able, you're not going to be able to pick her up anymore. But it's about to get a different kind of awesome. But I want you to not try to like go to guilt. I want you just to exhale and say, dude, I did a good job. I scratched and clawed and yeah, I would do things differently. I got an eight year old, so I'm going to do some things differently. That's amazing. That's what that's what wisdom is, is learning. And for a cautionary tale for young, young guys, you can say like, hey, you think that these four-wheelers are going to bring you joy, they're not. But also you've got some great memories on those four-wheelers with those kids, don't you? Oh, yeah. Yeah. And so underneath all of this, can I just tell you it's OK to just be super sad? Right. A part of your heart just moved out. Right. And dude, I was just I was just in far west Texas with a awesome guy. He is a manufacturing business. He makes a trillion dollars, one of the greatest kindest guys I've ever met. We went on a wild hunting trip together. Awesome guy and his daughter just moved out. And he told me, you think you know how bad this hurts. You have no idea. Right. And I've been I worked in residence life. I worked in colleges for 20 years. I've hugged sobbing dads my entire career in hallways of torments. What you're experiencing is very universal. And it's it's you didn't do anything wrong, brother. Sounds like you changed your family tree. And you'll learn some things along the way. And this is just one of those things that's just hard. Yeah, I I not to cut you up, but you know, I it's not just her. It's the whole it's all it's my whole life. The nucleus just it was I become instantly aware that. Oh, I had it then. And I thought when I got here, I would be it would be more freedom. We're there and I just you thought it would feel. I wish. Yeah. And I and I we're supposed to be happy right now. And it's it's funny because it's you know, I took her to college since she's a sophomore this year. I took her to college just myself and helped her move in. And as I drove away, it was like a reliving it again. Yes, ripping the bandit off again. Yes. And then so I get home and I'm looking at photos and I'm just not just her. Just in general of of, you know, previous baby photos. And I'm in the background and so forth. And I'm like, don't don't remember that. I don't I don't remember it. No, none of us do. You're just something wrong with you. Let me let me let me let me ask you this question. Because this is one of the most common things I hear, especially from men in in very similar situations from you. A you did the next right hard thing, which is my marriage is going to be different than the one I saw growing up. Yeah, 100%. My finances are going to be different. My kids are going to have a different kind of life than the one I had growing up. And you not only felt the pain from your childhood, but you did the next right thing, which is super commendable. And you've been met with a great curse, which is you crossed a finish line financially. You got an amazing young daughter out of the house and into college with a set of values, a set of morals, a set of a great picture of what a dad who loves his wife. Like she's got a picture in her head now. That's going to be hard for any knucklehead a kid at college to live up to because of you. And you went with you. That little kid that's still wondering why is dad gone all the time? That little kid that was wondering, why can't I have shoes like those kids in my class? That kid turned 45. And the only person that can't see the amazing transformation you've given your family is you because you went with you. Whatever success you had, that lingering self doubt, not enough. Why did mom leave? Whatever your story is went with you. Went with you. And when I hear you say I'm in the background of all these pictures, you know what I hear? I hear a guy who's underneath the whole family holding the thing up. So that picture could be taken in the first place. It's noble. It's right. It's good. And so is wisdom saying I'm not working another weekend to buy another boat. I'm going to spend that weekend just coloring with my eight year old. That's awesome. That's just wisdom, brother. But also wisdom is you finally got your family to a safe place. And now finally, I want you to look in the mirror and deal with that guy. And this will probably be the hardest battle you've ever fought because you're going to have to change your inner narrative about yourself because even amongst all of this blessing, you still think you let somebody down. But the real challenge is you sitting down with your 19 year old daughter and saying, hey, you had a ring side seat to a guy that never thought he was enough. I want to tell you about me growing up. How often is your wife said she loves you and you're proud of you and your first thought is, uh-uh, I could lose 10 pounds. I need to go do this. If I... How often does that happen? Yeah, it's every time. She says it a lot. Yeah. She's very intentional with that. She's clearly the saint between the two of us. Well, I think you're a saint too. I think the reason you don't think you're a saint is because that inner voice is so loud and so dark. You've given peace to everyone in your family. The person I want to have peace now is you. And then, brother, this is the pot talking to the kettle here. You went through pretty hellacious times growing up, didn't you? Uh, yeah. Yeah, the family was a mess. Yeah. Yeah. You have dark stuff that you never told anybody? Uh, no. No, she knows everything. Okay. Besides her? Uh, yeah, of course. Besides her. You've told people besides her? Um, yeah, I think so. I, you know, I don't, I don't have like sexual abuse or anything like that. Sure. I had, uh, you know, broken home, parents or alcoholics, I remarried. It was just, it was just a mess. And, and, and I think you know, positive. But listen, that means you have a nine year old inside of your chest that is asking every morning you open your eyes. What was so bad about me that you chose that? And then the next step, because you're a man who has scratched and clawed. I don't ever want a nine year old to feel that way again. So in my house, my kids are going to have everything, have every opportunity. I'm going to make this marriage work. I'm going to find an amazing woman. And I'm not going to believe her when she says I'm worthy of being proud of, but I'm going to keep going. And what I want you to do this evening after that eight year old's gone to bed, I want you to go write a letter to that nine year old self inside your chest to you. Or close your eyes and picture this. I want you to picture your dad pulling out of your childhood driveway and go into the bar. And I want you to picture nine year old you standing at the edge of that driveway, watching him drive off and turning back around. And that nine year old you looking at grown up you and asking, why is daddy leaving again? And I want you to write nine year old you a letter saying, hey, none of that was your fault. None of it. And I want you to let that nine year old, hey, we made it. And you were worth being loved and hug and hung out with and laughed with all the time. You were worth getting driven to college and having a parent being real sad you were gone to. But freedom for you, my brother, will be letting this little nine year old finally go play. Because that nine year old's still protecting you to this day. And you got to hear it from another guy that's about your age in a almost similar life. My son's 15, not 19. I'm so proud of you, dude. So proud of you, man. Thank you. This is what breaking the cycle looks like and breaking the cycle comes with scars too. Hmm. And you have put everybody else ahead of you for all these years. And now I want you to find peace inside your chest. Write that nine year old a letter. If you're a real gangster, you're going to read it to your wife. If you're a real, real gangster, when your 20 year old comes home for Christmas, when your 19 year old comes home for Christmas, I want you to read the letter to her. And in that letter, I don't want you to spare anything. Talk about the time dad was drunk and he hit you too hard. Talk about the time mom didn't come home one night. Put all that in there and let that nine year old finally exhale and say, I'm driving now. I'm 45. I've got it. And then tell your daughter, I miss you more than life itself. And I can't wait for us to finally be able to be friends in a couple more years. Cause we're going to have an amazing next round of relationship together. And you're right, man. Me and my daughter got up the other night. She couldn't sleep. So we drove to the store at like eight or nine o'clock, got a coloring book. We came home and colored for a while. We couldn't find a coloring book. So we had to find, we went to like two stores and we was late dude. And we were dressed ridiculous. Those days for you are over. They are. And coloring with no talking, just playing some old country tunes at the table. That part's over. You're right. But as a guy who's always thinking about what's coming next, which is what you had to do when you were nine to make sure you had food. I want you to think about what's next with a smile on your face. When that daughter brings some guy home and you get to hassle him and you get to see in his eyes that he's going to love her as much as you did. He thinks he is, but he won't. When you get to take her out somewhere to a concert, when you get to hop on a plane and go visit her at college or drive to go see her and y'all go do something fun on a weekend or whatever. Think about those with a smile on your face. Not with regret. You've done an amazing job. And now it's time to let you finally rest too. We'll be right back. This time of year, we are giving our time. We're giving our money. And sometimes without meaning to, we're giving away our personal data. All over, everywhere on the internet. And this is why I love and recommend and use Delete Me. I like a good deal as much as the next guy, but I want you to remember that every email click or every newsletter sign up is you giving another piece of your personal information to somebody else. And that data doesn't just stay with them. Most of the time they're selling it behind your back to shady data brokers who grab it, bundle it and sell it to God knows who else. If you want to take back your privacy and your piece, get Delete Me. Delete Me is like a digital cleaning crew. They find your information on all these secret data broker sites and they get it removed and they keep it gone. Because peace doesn't just come from turning off notifications. It comes from knowing that your data is not for sale. Right now you can get 20% off your annual plan when you go to joindeleteme.com slash Deloni. That's joindeleteme.com slash Deloni. Go protect your digital life. All right, we're back. Kelly wants to read something that she found on the internet. Yes. So this was posted. I saw this on my Instagram and I just thought it was really great. And it talks about some of the things that we talk about on this show. So the woman that posted this, her husband plays in a softball league and one of the men on the league is an 81 year old. Awesome. And I want to be that guy. I seriously, it looks like everyone else based on the picture is in their 30s and 40s. That's so cool. He posted, he sent this to all the guys in the league one night overnight after a game. He says, well guys, just up to do my middle of the night pee. I've been laying here in bed for the past hour thinking about tonight's game and thinking about what a great bunch of guys I'm allowed to play with. I really appreciate the way you guys treat me as an equal and not just an old fart. It's you guys that keep me living. Except for you guys, I would not be playing ball, no daily walks, no lightweights. There would be no reason to do those things. It's all of you who keep me going and give me the reason to get out of bed in the morning. All of you should take pride in knowing that there is some old fart that you keep going every day. I don't know if I will get another league on this or another year in this league or not. I don't even buy green bananas anymore. But I do know that this will be the year of ball play that I will always remember. I will do my best to contribute to the team. Some days are better than others. Now that I get this off my chest, off to La La Land I go again. That just warms my heart. That's the greatest thing I've heard. I wish there was a mandatory softball league service that every United States citizen had to go through. I think there is something transcendent about playing softball leagues. Young people, old people. That guy is amazing. A, for telling his buddies that because that was not an easy text to write. And B, for those youngsters for letting the old man play. Dude, that's awesome. Awesome, I love it. Golly, dude. All right, that cheered me up. This was a heavy show and that was good, Kelly. Well done. Well done. So maybe today only there was some redeeming qualities on the internet. I'll take it. Go join us off ball league and let the old men and women play. Love you guys. Bye.