Caller: “I Refuse to Date Women My Age”

I'm currently DJing and touring and traveling for work and most of my social circle date younger women. How do I boy getting stuck in this like Leonardo DiCaprio cycle? How do I build a relationship where my traction grows and evolves instead of feeling like after start over once she turns 25? What's going on? What's going on? This is John with the Dr. John Deloni Show. Glad you're here. Glad you're here. Talking about your mental and emotional health. Your family, your kids, your spouse, whatever you got going on in your life, I'd love to have you on the show. Click the link in the show notes and we'll get you on. Let's go out to Los Angeles, California and talk to Kenal. What's up, Kenal? Hey, what's up, Dr. John? I'm good brother. How are you, man? I'm 34 years old and I'm currently DJing and touring and traveling for work. Most of my social circle, DJ friends, nightlife guys and entertainers and being an Los Angeles date younger women for several different factors in regards to, I'm 34, I want kids when I'm around 40 and stuff, so in around 60 or so. And I have dated girls my age, it's hard to, they want kids right away or marriage, which I understand due to biological timing and their flexibility and marriage and timeline, how they envision it. During the touring and being a musician, there's another reason why I call it because I know you are a musician as well, so you would have a different input. But dating younger women kind of fits in my lifestyle because of the more openness and flexibility in regards to marriage, adventure and living in the moment, appreciation for maturity, ambition, and opportunities to build a life together instead of already combining two established lives already. So yeah, and also my parents have a 15 year age gap. And also I know my names can all, but I'm not actually Indian, I'm Latino and in our Latino culture, it's fairly common to see kind of that age gap. Yeah, yeah. What's your last name? Can you say it? Am I last name? Okay, okay, never mind. Don't say it. Don't say it. Yeah, yeah. I was going to tell. I don't know. It's my only last name. Awesome. We'll play it. We'll play. All right. I hear you tell me like 20 different things just then. What's your like real question? Yeah. So what I've noticed and like kind of the music industry and stuff and a lot of these guys, they seem to go through a pattern. Well, they'll have like a girlfriend for a few years and the tour and everything kind of gets in the way and stuff. And then they'll start dating someone new. So my question is, how do I avoid getting stuck in this Leonardo DiCaprio cycle? And is it a genuine preference or simply a product of my culture of bringing up lifestyle? And I do want to start a life with a lifetime partner. So how do I build a relationship where my traction grows and evolves over time instead of feeling like I have to start over once she turns 25? The one thing you talked around it, but can we also just say you're attracted to young women. Like a aesthetic matter. See fair? Yeah. I mean, that's one of the reasons, but it's mainly because also with my current travel schedule and everything and me wanting to settle down and get married in around six years when I'm 40 and I have tried dating girls my age and they want that like within two years. Sure. Sure. So here's, I want to clear the deck for you and you can go with me on this or not. Is that cool? Yeah. I'll just tell you down the road from you by a little more than a decade and I'll say it this way. I'm right. You get to choose what you do next, period. And if I have one recurring theme that I've heard from my musician buddies, from my comic buddies, from actor friends of mine, from people in the industry, in the entertainment industry is this one resounding statement over and over and over again. I can't believe I thought that was life. I can't believe I thought I was living life to the fullest. And they say that after they have their first or second kit, there is no crowd. There is no like this many streams. You know, you get that email, you get a text from your manager like you got this many streams. There is no email that compares to your daughter running in and going dad's home. It doesn't, it doesn't compute. And so like my, my question for you would be what is it you think is going to happen in the next six years that would put off feeling anchored with a rider die till death do you part. And that's exactly I have heard that when you have your first born child and that's exactly because I do kind of zoom out and I do see like DJs that are like further ahead and older and I feel like I don't want to end up like that. You know what I mean? So you got to make a choice now. Exactly. Yeah. And let me say this. I still run around at, I still run around at night. I'm probably in the comedy club two or three nights a week. And I'm on the road a lot right like I'm still out. But dude, last night I, I drove over to my tattoo artist house to her and her husband's house and my daughter was with me last night and it was about a 30 minute drive that way in a 30 minute drive home. I had to sign some papers over there for something. My daughter and I laughed so hard in that car ride there. And on the way back we were talking so much trash. I, I wouldn't trade that hour I had with her for a the best comedy set of my career. I wouldn't. It was so, it was, it was, I just, when I went to bed last night, I was like, dude, that was, that's life. And I know on this side of the equation where you are, that sounds so dumb. I totally get it, dude. I get it. And no, no, I love, I like hanging out in green rooms. I like talking trash with other creatives. Like, that's one of my favorite things on the planet to do in the world. And having a kid is boring. So dude, it's so boring, you can't even wrap your head around how boring it is sometimes. But it's, it's real. And even forget the kid part for a second. My wife and my son have been out on, they're doing like a hiking trip right now with a, with a group in Colorado. And they don't have cell phone access. This is the longest I've gone without even texting my wife. It may be in a decade, maybe longer. What I would tell you is having an anchor point with a ride or die spouse, I, I, I can't not describe to you what an anchoring moment it is. You think you're good at DJing now? Wait till you have somebody that loves you even when you're set sucks. Even when your label drops you, even when the big contract falls through. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? No. Yeah. No, I totally get that. And like, I've always kind of like envisioned a skate plan. Like, I know you're saying do the thing now, which makes sense because I've always been like, okay, like once I hit 40, then I'll like instantly like drop everything. But I know it's easier said than done. And also I was like, kind of just like go like whole turkey and just cut everything off once I hit that certain age, but you don't have to, but I know it doesn't, yeah. You don't have to. That's what it's good to hear your point of view because you're still saying that you still go out and you still, you know, are going in green rooms and, you know, doing your comic shows and traveling and touring and stuff. So you can have that balance and get that fulfillment with, you know, your firstborn child. And yeah, it, and it's awesome. You know, you were able to find that like life partner. And I've, you know, been searching as well because, you know, I'm currently dating someone right now. She's 19 and she works remotely as well as studies online. 19. How old are you? You're 36. No. No, I'm 34. Don't date teenagers. I want you to fix your, I want you to consider different language for a second. Yeah. I, we talk about love like you fall into it like it's a whole, right? Like it's a wheelbarrow you trip into. And we talk about long term partners. We talk about spouses as though you find it. As though it's hidden somewhere, the cosmos hit it, God hit it, whatever you believe in hit it. And your whole life is like moving and like moving furniture and looking. under leaves and rocks. Here's the thing. I dated my wife for five years. We broke up a bunch, we both dated people in between. At some point, both of us had to say, I pick you. I pick you over weight gain, I pick you over frustrations, I pick you over different passions, whatever stupid word that is. I pick you and I'm going to choose every morning for the rest of my life to pick you again. And so it's less about finding. There is something right about picking right that is important. Like, who you choose matters. But at some point, it is, if my wife came home from this camp, from this hiking trip, she's on with my son and said, hey, I can't do public life anymore. Then I'm out homey because she matters more than all of us. And I also know that she wouldn't put me in that position unless it really was important. Because there's been parts of this job when people have come after me or worse, they've come after her when I knew it was killing her and I backed way off. And she said, no, no, no, it's not time. I just need, I need to get some new, some new skills. I need to draw some new boundaries, etc. And so it's, there's more of an effort than I just found it. I, my challenge for you is you've got this pretty red life plan that's awesome. But I tell you what, man, I was one of them. My wife and I decided we were going to have kids after we both got out of graduate school, after we both got established in our careers. And it was three plus years of infertility that we didn't see coming. And then we had my son and then we had three miscarriages over the next couple of years. Didn't see that coming either, right? So my challenge for you is, all right, 40, I'm going to start slowing the slowing down. And then I'm going to start, I'm going to open my eyes. Man, you may be looking at 45, 50. Yeah. And the challenge for you is, man, if you found somebody begging and asking what must be true? Yeah. No, I definitely want like what you resonated with or what you mentioned, not begging like, I have to make that decision now. That's it. Yeah. And you get to pick what your life looks like together. Yeah. And if she is somebody who says, I don't like other people cheering for you, then she might not be your person. Yeah. But I'll tell you this, all the data I've looked at, the single greatest thing you could do for your, and I'm going to make it gross for a second, and I don't mean to turn it into a transaction. Okay. Because I do believe marriage is like sacred in a cosmic way. It's a big deal. But the greatest thing you can do for your financial wealth, for your physical health, for your sex life is all, I mean, I can keep going on and on on these metrics is they're all, they all ROI in a wild way if you have a good or a great marriage. It has appeared in that sentence. You want to be 70 and said and say, I had the most and best sex of like, I could have in my life get married to somebody and do that really well. You want to say, hey, we give ourselves the best opportunity to build wealth together, get married to somebody. And y'all do life together. Have one checking account and say, we're going to do this thing together, right? I'm going to build something rad. Yeah. I definitely want that and my parents have been together, you know, basically their whole lives based. So I just want that and that's what I've always trying to, but I've always kind of put it off. But I do need to make that decision now. And yeah, because I do feel that void, a void still that hasn't been filled. Like I played in front of the thousands and like still at the very end of that, like I still feel empty. That's right. And my current partner has been very supportive and always like giving me that peace and tranquility and that, you know, I feel like I need. But yeah, like here's a reverse. Can you, can you choose a liveness with her instead of having an outsourced aliveness to a nameless audience? Yeah. Yeah, I definitely want to trust me. I want like, you know the music industry, it's tell and like I want like peace, tranquility, get married, have kids. But I need to make, yeah, that decision now. I think the days of, and I think this is with work, I think this is with industries, whatever you want to say, the days of, and if you look on a long enough timeline, for all of human history, people got married to not die, right? We had like, I'm going to marry you, you're going to get all my cousins, I'll get all your cousins and aunts and uncles and parents and grandparents. And together, we're going to all work together so that we don't die, right? That was the thing. And then a couple hundred years ago, we started solving for food and water and things like that. And what it, in a weird way, our identities shifted from, we have to stay alive to what's the best version of myself, right? And so we started marrying for love and we started marrying for these things that ultimately can't hold. Yeah. Passion can't hold. Attraction will fade. I'll, I'll go ahead and spoil our alert you. The person you marry, if you choose to write or die till death do you part, she's going to get wrinkles. Yeah. She's going to gain weight. She's going to age and you will too. Yeah. And I'm, I'm in a, gosh, was in a month, I'll celebrate 24 years of being married. That's all I'm telling you right now. It just doesn't, it doesn't matter. Do I, you know, I'm saying my wife's pretty. She's just going to be my beautiful lady for like forever. That just is. Yeah. And I, I can't describe it on this side of it other than to say it just is. No, I believe you, you should have had to start. You're right. So I'm thinking, and I watched it. I am hoping, I am hoping I get, because this is one of the girl lines you always say, because I know I'm going to get a lot of hate in the comments. No, dude, don't look at the comments. You're in the industry. I know, I don't look at the comments, but I know, I know, but I was hoping I get this. You're not crazy line. Well, here's the thing. You're not crazy. And I want to, I want to shout you out for being a man who calls this show and who's actually honest. Yeah. Because most men aren't honest about, I really want to establish myself in this career. I want to have what I've been told, my whole life is all of the fun. And as a DJ, there's an extra level of, of fun. Yeah. And if you're not in the DJ world, you don't know what I mean, but you know what I mean, right? There's it's a lot, right? But there's adrenaline and there's energy and all that's real and true. There's a liveliness. Totally get that. I, I feel like I'm insane when I say this because I feel like 24 year old me would hit me in the face for saying what I'm about to say. But the funnest thing I've done all week is take an hour trip to the other side of town with my 10 year old daughter. And it sounds nuts to say that, but it's true. We, I think you're working for it for sure. And I have a lot of friends that also have had a child and they say like that's their happiest moment. And I'll even go deeper, like I said, having that time with her is amazing. But I got a woman that I share that with. And that's even more amazing. Yeah. And dude, me and my life over, we've been together a long time. We've stared over the edge of, are we done, right? So it's not perfect. By a long shot, we've almost broken up multiple time. Like it's hard. It's hard. And but so is, so is trying to get the gig, get all your stuff set up and then your laptop doesn't work right before the lights go, you know, you've been there. Everything you do worth value is hard. But I just got to go back to that original thing I said earlier, almost to a person, the folks who have quote unquote made it, who have successful careers will come back and say, I can't believe that those old dogs told me this was life, closing down bars, stay up till 4 a.m. Waking up at 1 p.m. Half hungover, half mullied out, like whatever. And then I y'all told me that was life. And now I'm sitting on the couch holding my daughter sitting next to my wife, sitting next to my husband. And that door is locked. And this is our secret world in here. Dude, this is living. Yeah. But all of this, every bit of it is a choice you get to make. And you can be beholden to well, here's what the guys are doing. And here's this. And I just kind of have a thing for young, like you can keep saying all those things at the end of the day, I want you to take a 100% ownership of what happens next. Yeah. You get to pick that. So I wish you the best, my brother, congratulations. If this, if this young woman is your forever person, dude, haul her back at us, and we'll celebrate you on the air. And if she's not, great, cool. But I tell you, man, Chase a writer/die partner over chasing crowds every single time. We come back. A man asks if temporarily leaving his house is the best path towards healing his relationship. This show is sponsored by Better Health. Summers of time when people escape, whether it's relaxing going on vacation, we've all been sold this lie that if we could just get away from it all, everything will magically work itself out when we return. Here's the thing. A vacation won't fix what you won't face. If you're anxious, burned out, or struggling, these problems will be waiting for you when you get home. And this is why I recommend Better Health. Better Health is an online therapy platform that fits into your life. You can talk with a licensed therapist by phone, video, or messaging from anywhere. No commuting, no sitting in a waiting room, just a safe place to process what's actually going on in your life. And all of Better Helps Therapists follow a strict code of conduct. You can message your therapist in schedule sessions right in the app. If it's not the right fit, you can switch anytime for no extra cost. This summer, don't ignore what's come into the surface. Sometimes the strongest thing you can do is stop running from it and start dealing with it. Go to BetterHelp.com/Deloney to get 10% off. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash Deloney. All right, let's go to Richmond, Virginia and talk to Jack. What's up, Jack? What's going on, John? Doing good, man. How about you? Oh, it's a beautiful day on the East Coast. Excellent. Excellent. What's up? My wife is asking for a temporary therapeutic separation. Okay. Tell me about it. Two, yeah, two months ago, we had a big falling out and it seems that she's bringing up everything that I have done to her wrong from the past 12 years and it feels like it's being embellished. She's accusing me of raping her, which I have not done. She's upset at the pornography that I have brought into the marriage. We've had a lot of issues with sex drive and whether or not she should have to be there for me or if I'm allowed to release myself. I have put steps in play to fix a lot of this stuff. I have joined a recovery group. I have gone to a personal counselor. I have gone to my pastor. I have gone to couples therapy and she's now asking me to leave the house for a temporary time. What led up to this separation here? We had a disagreement on sex tempo and that was the big problem. Sex tempo, like having sex or like libido, you want it more often than she does. Yes. Okay. Therapeutic separations can be very helpful. There's a couple of really important rules to put in place with them. They can be very helpful. Based on what you've just told me, this doesn't sound like a therapeutic separation as much as it sounds like step one towards ending a marriage. I am fearful of that. She is ensuring me that it's not that she still has hope for the marriage. She's telling me that her nervous system is screaming to be around me. We have put almost everything in place to have separation except for me how I can describe it as a band in my family. She still wants me around the kids. She still wants me to help her on the house but she's asking me to leave but still be involved with the kids. What we're doing that right now except for I sleep in the basement. For a separation to be successful there's two big important things. One, there has to be a path back. What do you want to have happen here while there's a separation? There has to be work that's done. Right. The second thing is there's got to be a come together date already on the calendar. Even if it gets extended but we have to have the restaurant already, the therapist office already on the calendar in one week and two weeks and 30 days we will come back together and we'll reassess. If it's not those two things it will just keep getting drawn out. She's going to feel a big exhale and she'll begin to go this is what I want to feel and I can only feel this when he's not here and you will start to get resentful that you're still playing husband but you can't even be in your own house. You already feel that way now because you're sleeping in the basement of your house and so it just accelerates the separation here. If you're having to ask permission like already the dynamic the way your communicate is already so messy. Yes. It's unhealthy. I guess it's the better way to say it. You're about to say something. Go ahead. Two weeks ago we sat down with my pastor and they proposed a separation. I took six days to put my heart before the Lord and pray about it. Okay. It was very unopened. There was no schedule. There was no path back. There was no coming together date. It was are you willing to leave? We sat down last night again with our pastor. She asked again for me to leave and I'm struggling with how with did I get my answer or do I need to pray again now as a actual defying definition before it was just will you leave? I'm stuck on this point of I hear people like you other therapists say that separation can be healthy and can bring people back together. I'm also struggling with my prayer life with the feeling of this is abandoning my family and leaving them vulnerable without protection. I don't have the right words but just my spirit told me no and it's hard for me to go back and pray again about it even when she has a path back together. I'll use an example of let me take some I'm going to give you an example that has nothing to do with marriage or relationships. If you talk to trainers of high level professional athletes. What they'll tell you is when you get to a certain level of a certain caliber the hardest thing they have to do is get their athletes to rest to stop because they're always they're so primed they have such an appetite for for wanting to be the best that they see rest. They see sitting down. They see just prop in their feet up and let their bodies recover as time wasted when I could have been doing another set of this or doing another wrap of that and so often the greatest thing you can do to protect your wife is to protect your space protect your nervous system. If her body is identified you as the tiger is you as the bear then the most protective thing you can do is let her exhale and if she's throwing around words like rape and she's throwing words around like you're not safe I want to get some do some a do some real soul search in there and be if there's truth to that we've got to put that on the table my man and if there's not truth to that we got to put that type of accusation on the table those aren't benign accusations no right those are that's a big big deal and my my personal bent after doing sexual assault investigations for most of my career is unask her like hey you said this you brought this up we got to have that conversation right because I might have a high sex drive I might be a knucklehead I might be annoying to be around but I'm not a rapist or if you if you did violate your wife's honor in that way there's some accountability to be had in a major major way right right yes but couples disagree on libido all the time yes it doesn't end here like this with with the same frequency right so if you if you had to just pause for a second back all the way out and let's put sex as the proxy war here where do you feel out of control in your own skin inside your own house me yeah - Yeah, you. - Out of skin, out of my skin, I ended my house. - Wait, hold on, I tension her out. - Where do you feel angry inside your own body? What pisses you off? Where are you frustrated all the time? - Our marriage has been rocky. - Tell me about that. - Is that pisses me off? - I would have said up until two months ago, it's the normal stupid stuff. Communication, expectations, obviously we've talked about the libido. I don't feel like I ever do enough or I am enough for her. I always feel there's always a critique or no thank you. - Okay, so when you walk in the front door of your house, does your home feel like a failure factory to you? - No. I just don't feel over the years that I'm acknowledged for doing well. - Okay. - What else? - I have a high drive for personal fitness and that goal, you never reach that goal. There's always another minute to shave off a mile or another two and a half pounds of set. I'll know the side of the barbell. - Where did that story come from? - Which one? - If I can just be fast enough, if I can just be strong enough then, dot, dot, dot. - I don't think it's enough. I personally believe that as a man, I'm called to be strong. - Yeah, but your past's strong. - It's hard. - Okay. - Define strong for me. - Yeah. - Give me a finish line. - I think I'll always be chasing it, to be honest. - Okay, that's what I'm asking you. Who are you running from? - Who am I running from? Probably internal dialogue. I don't think there's not a person. I don't think I'm running from. - Yeah, but internal dialogue started as somebody else's voices. - I would say that I had very strong father figures, whether it was my grandpa's or my dad, that they always strove for, you know, the next thing that had a very strong drive. - Were you a part of that drive? - A part of it? - What do you mean about part of it? - Were you a casualty of that drive? - No, I was propelled to. - Okay, that's what I mean. - That's what I mean. - No, I was propelled to a high standard. - It doesn't sound like you were propelled to a high standard, it sounds like you were propelled to an endless standard that never stops moving. - Okay. - Is that fair? - I see your point. - There's, let me put it this way. If you're running from the guy sitting inside your chest, there is no external metric that's gonna make him go, all right, we're good now. - Okay. - You're gonna always be starting wars, always. And you're gonna blame everybody in your life for the carnage. - Okay. - I work out every day of my life. - Yeah. - Except the days that I don't and I have breakfast with my daughter. Why? Because I'm not solving for fitness. I'm solving for peace in my home. And peace in my home means another take care of myself. Peace in my home means I know how to love well. Both things are true. - Yes. - There will never be enough sex to make you feel worth being loved. There's never gonna be enough money that you're like, "All right, my family's safe now." Let me just ask you this big question, brother. What do you want, man? - Oh, I've been married. - That's what I want. - You want to be married? - Yeah. - Oh, yeah, well over. - Are you willing to sacrifice all this nonsense for your marriage? - Yes. And that's what I'm struggling with is that I prayed about it. And I feel like I got an answer. But I feel like that answer almost feels like will lead to more destruction in the marriage. - Okay, then. - I believe her once used it, yeah. - Then consider that you might have heard it wrong. - Okay. - Or consider that your feelings might be so hot right now that you're not hearing in the message right. - Okay. - Is that fair? - Yeah, it's very emotional. I've lost 20 pounds. And yeah, not sleeping well. - Okay. - And nobody makes good choices when they haven't slept? - No. - Nope. - So yes, I think a separation could be really good right now. You sound hot and I don't mean that in a bad way. I mean, you're a man who feels like he's losing control and you're scrambling. And that makes everything else more electric, which to somebody who's saying my nervous system is not safer on you makes them feel even heightened and more scared. - I can see that. - And the greatest gift you can give your family is emotional regulation right now. If you were my brother, if you were one of my close friends and you called and you came over to my house and asked me the exact question you asked me, I would say, I wanna get back in touch with my wife and say, I absolutely more than anything in the world I want you to feel safe in your own home. And I'm sorry that I haven't given you that. We'll solve the communication stuff. Those are skills. We'll solve the libido differences. Those are skills. We'll solve those things. But right now, I wanna protect your heart. So, absolutely, I'll give you some space. What I'm gonna ask of you is, can we have a timeline? Where you and I will get back together and I will open handedly say, how are you feeling? How can I love you in this upcoming week? And ask, will you give me a road map before the work? You would like to see me do. So we can come back together. And by the way, you get to give her a road map. I remember feeling humiliated when I told my wife, I just want you to say the words I'm proud of you. And she said, my gosh, I'm sorry, I didn't know. So you saying, hey, this is a way I can feel loved. Beyond just sex, sex, sex, sex. What does celebration look like in your house? But yeah, I think a thing separation would be good for y'all right now, it's got to have some boundaries to it. Bro, call me anytime, I'll walk with you. When we come back, a woman asks how to handle being left out of her boyfriend's friend group without becoming resentful, we'll be right back. All right, so the other day, I went into a local corner store. I just wanted to buy a few things. At checkout, I handed them my debit card and they wanted my address and my phone number, photos of my family members, my social security card, my passport, all right, they didn't want all that stuff. But they wanted a lot of extra information and I just wanted some paper plates and some cups. 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That's joindeleteme.com/deloney. All right, let's go down the street to chat a new good Tennessee and talk to Taylor. Hey Taylor, what's up? - Hey Dr. John, how's it going? - Doing great, how about you? - Good. - What's up? So, I think you just heard my question. How do I handle a feeling left out of my boyfriend's existing friend group without feeling any sort of resentment towards anyone in the group or him? I've never had a relationship before with a guy who had a relationship with him. has a friend group that I've wanted to join. But you're the girlfriend. You don't go in that group. Tell me about it. Well, it's like-- it's guys and girls, right? So it's not just all guys. I don't want any part of those guys' shots. I don't know what they talk about. I don't need to know what they talk about. But it's like when the guys are planning stuff with their wives, or probably more so the wife's planning stuff with their husbands, I want to be a part of that. I want to be a part of celebrating their wins with them. I want to be a part of sitting with them during their losses. If they've had a bad day, if they've had a great day, I just really want to be a part of that, and I don't feel like I'm a part of that currently. So this is a strange question, but are your feelings right? There's a truth to them. And I don't know if they are wrong because I haven't done enough, or I don't know if they're wrong because they actually-- they don't want another person in their group. It feels like they very much have what I've been around longer, so I'm more important than you attitude. But again, I don't know if that's me projecting or if that's actually true. I don't know if you'll ever know the answer to that. The only thing I can tell you to do is to do the next right thing. And that sounds so cliche and cheesy. Here's what I mean, in real terms. How long have you been with your boyfriend? At a little over a year. OK. And how long have this gang that you want to be a part of? How long have they been together? You said they're married, so they've been together for years, huh? Yes. OK. Has your boyfriend brought around other girlfriends in the past? Not my knowledge. I think he's had casual relationships that have been around. But nothing serious. Our favorite little bit to play is that there was never a girlfriend before me. That seems healthy. So if he was on the phone, I would ask him, why doesn't he invite you to group stuff? So he does, but I'm never involved in the planning of the thing. He's like, hey, this is what I'm doing, do I come with? OK, so why don't you put something together with him and invite them over? I'm just thinking of what you can control here. And if there's a group of friends, and let's take all the boys out for a second, if there's a group of women who've been friends for years, and they just have a rhythm of doing things in a certain way, and you're their husband's buddy's girlfriend. Sure, it would be awesome if they included you in, but they have a way of doing things for a long time. And the one resounding piece of wisdom I give everybody who's trying to establish new friend groups is go first and be weird. So what is going first and being weird look like for you? You tell your boyfriend, hey, I want to plan something over our house to invite everybody over. And you text the other guys, the other women in those in a group and say, hey, I'm having people over, I'm bringing this to see if anybody want to bring drinks and whatever. I'm just going to go first. I totally get feeling left out. I mean, you're not crazy. I totally get that. Right. But I guess you can sit on the sideline and say, I'm going to resent y'all because y'all don't include me, you friends who've been together for years and years, or I'm going to go first. I'm going to invite y'all in. Control. I can control here. And if they say we don't want to come over to your house, we don't like you, we don't want to be around your boyfriend, whatever, then yeah, I'm going to, I'm going to grieve that. I'm going to be sad. How old is your boyfriend? 38. 38. How old are you? 31. 31. So there may be years and years and years and years. Is there a relationship already established, is that fair? Yeah. They're for sure is. Okay. I think it's just going to take time. Yeah. And if he's 38, there's for sure been girlfriends before you. Maybe. Yeah. Like I said, I'm so lost because I've like, I've, I've been in a relationship before, but it's never been like, for a lot of other words, my previous relationships were losers and they didn't have funds. So it's just like, what do I, is the solution just to go first and be weird? Is it just like wait for the invite? Is it, I don't, I don't want to wait on my life to happen to me. Yeah. I want to be in the driver's seat of my own life whenever I can. And if you were, I, I honestly, this is, I mean, I'm not saying this to be mean at all. I thought you were like 22 or 23, like you're in your 30s. Go first. Yeah. It's not even weird. Go first. Yeah. You're a 30 year old woman. Do you see a future with this dude? For sure. Gross. Okay. So just y'all go first together because what, I mean, literally, what's the alternative? Just sit on the sideline and be mad all the time? Um, which is not what anyone wants. No. I just, I want you to be in the driver's seat of your own life. I don't want your life to happen to you. I want you to go, go make it happen. Do you have your own friends? I do. So do you invite him to that gang? Um, it's yes and no. There's kind of a couple of separate groups, um, the all-girl group, obviously not, um, but the group where it's larger and more couples involved, yes. Because I don't know if you know this, but your boyfriend called me earlier today and was like, why can't I get in with the other? I'm just kidding. He didn't call me. Who knows? Who knows? I mean, the only thing I can tell you is go first. Yeah. Just go first. And if you're talking with 38 year old, 40 year old women who've been friends for years and years, and do they have kids? Um, a couple of them. So I mean, you're talking like totally different life stages. Do you have kids? I do not. Okay. I am the only one of my friends who don't. Okay. But do you have a, like a, a, if you pan back, is there a broader, I feel left out just a, a lot of people's lives right now? Um, I don't think so right now. I think like growing up, growing up, I didn't know my parents didn't really teach me how to create relationships with people and how to actually like create close connection with people. That wasn't something that I learned until I was in like my early 20s. And so I, like my adult friendships have always been great, but like I don't have childhood friendships or like people that I'm still friends with from high school or anything like that. Sure. And I count myself one of the lucky few who still, who has 30 and 40 year old friendships. And I've had to do the work to go make adult friends too because I live in a different state than those friends, right? Yeah. Yeah, create the world you want to create. And by the way, several of those women have young kids. They're married. They've got their own jobs. They're not going to have time to just hang out. And so if they say no, or if it's a thing that has to be added to a family calendar, just be able to practice not, you're going to have your, whatever feeling you have, you're going to have your feelings. You can't really control those, but practice what comes after that feeling, which is exhaling and saying, oh, that's about them, not me. They're protecting the schedule. They're not rejecting me. Yeah. Yeah. That's thanks, but it's cool. It makes sense. I get it. I get it. Yeah, go first. Go first. Make a plan with your boyfriend that you're all going to have a thing every week in your apartment, in your house, wherever you live, out of the restaurant. You're going to go first and steal yourself from people say, we can't make it out this weekend. We're not going to make it. We got kids. We got this. We got soccer. We got whatever. That's a bummer. Cool. And this is also a natural time when groups just start kind of that have been really tight through 20s and 30s. They start splintering off because kids and special needs and schools and your kids in a soccer and my kid likes basketball, just things begin to do that. And so the work is in your 30s and 40s, I got to go make new new friends, new gangs, new groups. And I see the old group once every three or four months instead of once a week. It's heartbreaking and that's a dull life. But thanks for the call. You're not crazy. You're not crazy. Just control what you can control and go first. Thanks for the call, sister. We'll be right back. I talk to people every day who are anxious and overwhelmed and one of the things that can send people straight into panic mode is identity theft. When your identity gets stolen, it's not just a financial problem. It messes with your entire sense of safety. 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Identity theft protection from Zander is about knowing someone has your back when life goes sideways. Go to zander.com or call 1-800-356-4282 and protect your family with identity theft protection today. That's zanderwithaz.com. All right. We're back. What's up, Kelly? All right. I have a cool crap that happened. Okay. This is from Alex in. I'm going to say Lewis Bergsworth, Carolina. I don't know if they-- It's Luburg. Yeah. I'm not sure. But I apologize. Don't say Lewis ever. I apologize to everyone in the city. Oh, it's Lewis Bergs. Lewis Bergs. So, actually, it might be Lewis Bergs because it's L.O.U. I.S. regardless. He's in North Carolina. Let's just go with that. That almost sounded racist, but go ahead. Whatever. Anyway, he writes, "You lie, Dr. D." Continue. You said that scheduling sex is boring and super unsexy. It's been one of the greatest things my wife and I have done in the past year that has really helped us communicate better. We keep the same schedule, and there in this way, there is never any wondering or guessing or confused mixed-up signals. We even added in a veto option so that if it comes to the day, and one of us just isn't feeling it, we can say one word in that speaks volumes. Seriously. What's the word? Do they say it? No, they didn't say what. Never. Seriously, taking the one-to-have-sex tonight, or we never have sex conversation out of it, has allowed us to communicate better in all other aspects and has reignited our physical relationship and more. Thank you, brother. Yeah, you. Dude, that's being an adult and solving for the actual problem, which is we want to have more sex. Not, I want to win this exchange or unit. Yes. Good, good, good. Awesome. What's that dude's name? Alex. Shout out, brother. Way to go. And if I was wrong on that one, good for you. Good for you. Good for everybody. Love you guys. Bye.