(upbeat music) - Brought to you by my friends at Churchill Mortgage. If you're looking to buy or refinance, check them out. I've used Churchill and they are great. Go to Churchill Mortgage.com. - How do I support my girlfriend through one of the roughest times in her life it seems while kind of navigating my own well-being to starting to lose like the face that she'll get better. - And I think the solutions I came up with, she has not been a fan of some of them thus far. - Like what? (upbeat music) What up, what up, what up? This is John, Dr. John Deloni's show. Did I miss getting right into it? Check this out. Brand new book, "Building the Marriage You Want" is now available for pre-sale. If you're watching this on the YouTube's, I got it. I'm holding, actually I'm holding another book wrapped in the cover of my book because the book I wrote is twice this long. It's really long but this is building the marriage you want two and a half years of me down the deepest darkest rabbit holes trying to answer two questions. Is marriage in the 21st century still worth it? And if it is, how are you supposed to do it? And so here's what I've landed. Whether it's roommate syndrome, whether it's struggling with communication or conflict or sex or being married with kids, aging parents, your spouse and money, all of it. It's everything I know about marriage right here in one big home. That's it man. And so if you pre-order this now, the numbers of pre-sale help inform so many things behind the scenes in the book selling industry, right? And so pre-sale signals to the market, hey people are gonna be interested in this book. So if you're gonna buy it anyway, it's a real blessing to me if you do it now. And here's a couple of things I'm gonna do. I'm gonna send you like a hundred bucks in free gifts, like the audiobook, the e-book, and a talk I gave at the money marriage event, the marriage of treats that I put on every year. And I'm gonna send you like a postcard and you could take that postcard and put it in a stocking, you can wrap it for this holiday season. And then the book ships January 26th, it'll be in your mailbox and they'll have forgotten about it by then. And then you'll get credit for a second present. So that's super awesome. And this book is for folks who are engaged, thinking about being married. These are for folks, if you wanna hand this off to somebody who's like marriage is stupid, there's no reason to do it. I address that question in this book. And if you've been married 10 years, 20 years, 30 years, 50 years, and you've been married 50 years, and you want the fourth quarter of your life in your marriage to be whatever you want to be, to be amazing, this book is for everyone. This is the last marriage book you're ever gonna need. I know there's a billion out on the market. This is, I tried to write this as the last word on marriage. It's everything I know about it. Me sitting at your table with you and your spouse saying, all right, let's figure out the next right step. So go to johndaloney.com, pre-order this ASAP. It will really help me out. 2499, get it now, and we will have it in your mailbox January 26th. Thank you so, so much for riding with us. And I'm so grateful you're here on this show. - All right, it's got to Minneapolis, Minnesota, and talk to Nick. Hey, brother Nick, what's up, man? - John, it's crazy and good to talk to your brother. - You too, my man, appreciate you. - Yeah. - What's up? - Yeah, well, so my question is basically, how do I support my girlfriend through one of the roughest times in her life, it seems, and she's dealing with some pretty serious insomnia and some pretty acute stressors in her life, while kind of navigating my own well-dealing being, and having that cup full enough to pour into her, and it's kind of complicated by the nature of my job being really performance-based, and that's really the only way I get paid. - So what's good on her? - So she has struggled with chronic insomnia since she was a late teen, so she's been on Travodone for six years. And yeah, she's really had a hard time, but she was actually like weaning herself off of it slowly, only on like 25 milligrams for the past few months, and like still sleeping and doing great. Then she caught one of those nights, she catches every once in a while, where she feels like she just got absolutely zero sleep, like she just feels like, oh, I just didn't sleep, even though I looked it up and maybe technically, she's getting little micro moments or whatever, but she feels like she got no sleep. We've been to the ER several times, she's been prescribed so many different medications by her psychiatrist that just haven't worked, and she's like starting to lose hope, she's starting to lose like faith that she'll get better. And I mean, I'm sure you know what insomnia does to the brain over weeks and weeks and weeks. - Dude, I was on Ambien for like seven years. Yes, I know exactly. - Yeah. - Yeah. - It melts your brain. - It does. - It really does, and how old is she? She is 25. - Okay. - And she's your girlfriend, so they all lived together, how are you wrapped up in this? - Yeah, so we do live together, we moved in in October, and I'm saving up for that ring, I promise I'm going as fast as I can to get down that road. But yeah, we do, we do live together right now. - Okay. So tell me about you wanting to take care of you. - Yeah, it's just been hard, because so my job is fully commissioned based. It's the first time, I moved out of my parents' place and we moved in in October, and it's the first time I'm fully on my own, paying my own bills, keeping up with everything, but it's a fully commissioned based job, and so it's a sales position. If I don't make a sale, then I don't make money, and I can't pay rent, you know? And so on nights where she's waking up in the middle of the night, hysterically crying, and just, you know, really having a tough time, obviously that makes me not be able to sleep, and then I wake up, and I feel like just extra irritable, or just not fully cognitively there, I'm making like, silly paperwork mistakes, because there's a lot of money online with these bills, and you know, I make a silly paper mistake, and then it can be really detrimental. And I'm trying to draw a line between wanting to be there for her and support her as much as I can, but like wake up feeling fully rested myself, so I can show up in my job, and for her, and I think the solutions I've came up with, she has not been a fan of some of them thus far. - Like what? - One of them being going to my parents' place and getting sleep in the guest room. - And her kind of feeling on that is like, you know, well listen, like we want to get married, like I don't want you to run off to your mom and dad's place whenever we have these types of problems. - That's fair. - Which is fair. - Just fair, yeah, it's more of like a desperate move on my part, I feel like, you know, that's kind of a fault of mine as I'm a little, like I'm independent to a fault at times a little bit, and so I don't feel the, I guess the strain of separation as much as her, and then also I'm like in my head, I'm just like, well I need sleep, like I can't take this anymore, but yeah, now that's not representative to her situation. - So it's, I'm gonna say this and it's gonna sound mean, okay? And I'm not trying to be mean at all, but y'all are playing house, and you don't want to hold the responsibility of a shared life together. And here's what I mean by that, I don't talk about it very much on the show, it's still a pretty painful part of my life, I went stone mad for not sleeping for years. And it was my job to make sure I did not impact my wife as much as possible. And so the nights I would wake up sobbing 'cause I just wanted to sleep and it had been five days, and I couldn't see straight, it was my job to make sure I went somewhere in the house or in our apartment that let her sleep all night. That was my job. And on the other side, when she woke up and knew I'd had a really bad one, she signed up for better or worse too, and she knew three or four things that we had already talked about that she could do instantly to just bring the temperature down a little bit. And then some of it was both of us being adults like having to go to work. And I'll tell you, I ultimately had to change jobs and change universities and change careers. - Wow. - Right? And so your girlfriend has a hard, like if the work she's doing and the life she's choosing is costing her
one of the basic human things, which is sleep. Yeah, then she's got to ask herself bigger picture of things, right? And I do know, I know folks who have struggled with it forever have mined every, like trauma, every, everything, and they still struggle with it. That may just be the lot she has. Yeah, right? Yeah. Yeah, he dude, I loved what I did. I loved running around all hours of the night. I love being on call 24/7 showing up to really wild situations to be supportive. I loved that. And I couldn't keep it going much less with kids, right? And so here's the thing. Y'all are trying to have the best of both worlds, which is we want to live together. We want to try this thing out, but if it gets hard, I'm going to go sleep at mom's house. Or I want to have the best of both worlds here. And when it gets really hard, I'm not doing this, but I'm waking you up too. It's your job to 24, right? And so it's, it's, you can't make her sleep. She's got to make a choice too. I'm going to continue to, and I get the losing bro, trust me. I get the losing hope. I get it. I get it. And I'll tell you on this side of therapy and getting off medications and a season of new medications. And then now, bro, I can't, I think I was asleep in four minutes last night. I got home from the comedy club, talked to my wife for a few minutes and I was out, right? I didn't believe this life was possible. It is. But it wasn't work. My wife had to do is work. I had to go to you. She was supportive. She was right there with me. You know, there have been several nights where we woken up in the, twice now, where we woke up. And she was literally the second time she expressed thoughts of just like hurting herself. So I, we had to bring her to the ER. And of course, you know, she checked in and then, you know, I'm the way home. I literally was robbing and I called the crisis line. It's not because I had done to hurting myself, but I was just like, I was such at a loss. I was like, I don't know. I was losing hope. You know, I was like, I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do. I don't know how to make her sleep. She's been on different types of water days. You can't, you can't make her sleep. You can be a sturdy presence. Right. And so y'all sitting down together and saying, okay, here's the world we live in right now. You've been struggling with sleep since you were 18, 17 years old. They don't transit on for a bunch of. And by the way, if transit don't work, then don't taper off of it. But if you haven't slept in a long time or don't, especially don't taper off without the help of a psychiatrist. But that's a truth. I love you. And I want to marry you. And you don't sleep well. And another truth is, one of us has to be clearheaded. I remember when my wife got pregnant when she first had her son. And I was going to be one of those trooper dads. And I was like, if you're up feeding the baby, I'm up feeding the baby. And she was like, are you crazy? One of us needs to sleep. Go to bed. Right. And that was her saying, I need one clear head in this house right now. And so, like, there's, and you have to say, I got to sleep so I can show up for work. And so how do we build a world together? Where both of those things are truths. It's not an, it's not an uns. And by the way, neither of you will be super comfortable with either of those things. But that's part of doing life together. But discomfort together is different than misery or abandonment. Or, you know what I'm saying? Yeah, yeah, I, I, I want to build a life with her. And, you know, I, I've been single for so many years. I guess I have the, you know, I don't, it's not in my, I don't want to say it's not in my nature. But like, it's not in my habit system. To like, when things get really hard, like, yeah, I've just like, go, go back into myself. And I'm like, okay, well, I need to build a life with somebody. Your habit system does not exist anymore. Yeah, you all come up with a habit system together. Right. That's part of doing life together. Which is why all the data says, like, living together first usually doesn't work, not usually. Living together first doesn't guarantee that we're going to try this thing out and practice together until we decide to make the plunge. No, for sure. I'm putting a ring on it. As I get the money, I just, you know, that's, it's really just financial, a financial thing. I would have married her. I know, but she's, she's right to wonder if things get hard for me. So you're going to go sleep at mommy. So that's a good, I mean, it's a good call out on her part. Yeah. Right. Definitely, it definitely is. Yeah, I had to, when she said that, I was like, oh, dang. And sometimes if y'all were married and y'all were living together and she was going through intense, like, sleep deprived psychosis to the point of potentially being suicidal. Yeah, bro, you got to, I mean, I hate to say it like this, but you got to suck it up. There's part of like, I will be there for you. Yeah. And then I'll have extra coffee or whatever in the morning, but like, that's way more important than my dumb job. Yeah. Yeah. No, for sure it is. Absolutely it is. And so some of it is like, you got to decide am I in this thing with her? And if I'm in this thing with her, I got to reprioritize my little habit schedule, my comfort of mommy's bed, my commission based job. I got to reprioritize my life. Number one comes her. Number two comes everything else. And hopefully she does the same thing. Number one comes him. And the best way I can love him is being a service to myself. First, I got to make sure I got, I got to, I got to cross every tea and dot every eye trying to get well. And if that means taking fewer hours, you know what I'm saying? Yeah, I want to ask you this thing because like, that's a difficult dynamic I guess in my head of like having that conversation of telling her like, hey, like, you can't wake me up in the middle of the night when you, I don't know how to phrase that in a way that sounds like lead. It doesn't sound like, leave me alone. You know what I mean? Like, I don't know how to have that like tender type of conversation where it's like, that's not tender homie. You can't do this. Yeah. Right. I just don't want to make her feel like, because she does feel like a burden on me and I don't want to make that feeling worse for her. But at the same time, I like, I want to explain to her like, like, kind of like what you're saying of, we need at least one clear head in this house, you know. I know, man, this calls taking a different turn than I thought I was going to, which isn't a bad thing. It's just different. See how she's absorbed the message that she has a burden? Yeah. I can see that. You doing what I'm saying? Yeah. You took her to the hospital a few times and then you're like, dude, I got to go somewhere else. You're on your own. Yeah. Oh god. I don't want to make her feel like that at all. Here's the path forward. It's it's it's in my mind. It's simple. If you've never done it before, it might feel insurmountable. It's not. It's you sitting down with her in the middle of the day or middle of the afternoon or in the early evening before the nighttime. Because now she's in that loop where she's scared. She's not going to sleep. Yeah. Yeah. So then she gets fully completely goes to war inside her own body, which is the last thing you need to do before sleep, right? And so before she gets to that point in the evening, you all sit down and you say, I've told you one thing, but I can totally see how I've let you down. And I'm sorry. You come before work, you become before everything. I don't have the money yet, but I want you to be my wife. And I'm never going to abandon you again. And I want us to talk about now how we can love each other when things get hard. How do I love you well when you're not sleeping well, but you're not at the acute crisis point. And here's some ways I would love it. I want you to love me when you're just having one of those nights and it's 2 a.m. But I need to get some sleep. And if you ever think about hurting yourself, you wake me up 10 times in a 10 nights in a row, 100 nights in a row. I'll be there for you. It's about a compromise and more about a negotiation. And compromise, people lose stuff. And negotiation is how do we both win on this deal? And yes, if you want to be like dig into it, yes, people are not going to get everything that they want.
We're gonna negotiate how we both become the best versions of ourselves, given some really hard constraints we have, one of which, the main one being her health challenges right now. But that's priority number one, man. Thank you for the call, brother. Appreciate you being open and thinking through it with me. And if she wants to call in, I don't have a lot of help and support. It's just a tough, tough thing, but I'm happy to talk to her if she wants to call in also. Appreciate you, my man. We come back, a man asks how he and his wife can make their relationship work when they feel like complete opposites. We'll be right back. Here's something most people don't think about. You wake up a little stiff, a little tired, and you figure, that's just how sleep is nowadays. But the truth is, you've gotten so used to the mattress you've been sleeping on for the last 10 or 15 or 20 years that you don't even realize how bad your mattress actually is and it may be while you're not sleeping well. And I got to say this too, old mattresses get gross. Now's the time to finally get a new mattress and switch to Helix. Sleeping on a Helix mattress will help you sleep better and better sleep affects everything else, including your attitude, your emotional regulation, and your health. With more than 20 different mattress models, Helix has a mattress designed just for you, whether you're a side sleeper, a back sleeper, whether you sleep hot or you and your partner have different needs, you need Helix. Get online and take their sleep quiz. It takes like two minutes and Helix will match you with a mattress built around how you actually sleep. I sleep on a Helix mattress every night. It's the mattress I have in every room of my house and it's the mattress I recommend to all my friends in all of my family. You don't know what you've been putting up with when it comes to your mattress until you finally make the switch and wake up feeling rested and restored. Go to helixsleep.com/delony to save 20% off site wide this month. That's helix, H-E-L-I-X, helixsleep.com/delony, or click the link in the description. With helix better sleep, starts right now. This episode is brought to you by Better Health. Every year, you tell yourself you're going to handle this year's holidays differently. You're going to stay calmer. You're going to feel more peace. But then the same old patterns show up. The same family tensions. The same challenges you have to keeping healthy boundaries and you find yourself cranky and tired and even snapping at people that you love. Listen, this year can be different. You still have time to get ahead of all of the chaos and understand what's behind your reactions. And you can develop a plan for moving through the holidays with peace. Therapy can help you build this healthier plan before you actually need it. When you're ready to have that conversation, check out Better Help. Better Help is an online therapy platform with more than 30,000 licensed therapists across its network. This means you can find someone who can help you feel more peaceful this holiday season, help you develop a plan, or help you with whatever your needs and goals are. If the first therapist isn't the right fit, you can switch at any time for no extra cost. If you've thought about trying therapy with Better Help, insurance options may now be available nationwide through participating providers. And eligible members have an average copay of just 23 bucks a session. Listen, you know what's coming. This year, you have time to keep calm ahead of all of the holiday chaos by preparing differently. Go to betterhelp.com/deloney to check out your payment options. That's
[email protected]/deloney or click the link in the description. It's got a Beton Rouge, Louisiana, and talk to Mark. Hey, Mark, what's up, man? What's happening? How are you doing? Not too shabby. It's a beautiful, muggy day in Louisiana. Excellent, man. Excellent. One of my favorite places in the country. I love Louisiana. See, I'm born right here, but I honestly believe it's a place to visit and not to live. Well, I've only visited, so I'll have to trust you on that one. Yeah. So what's up, man? How can I help? So me and my wife truly do love each other. We get a long, great marriage. I think we could both agree on that. We've had, you know, rough-spotted marriage, you know? But we have a recurrent issue where-- so I'm artistic, and I don't really fully understand the way that people speak sometimes. And there are a few times I've even had to listen to your show, or a couple of times over just to kind of really fully grasp stuff. But she, surprisingly enough, works with special education kids. And so for her, sometimes it's really like difficult to like, conversate with me in a way in which I can understand, because she's used to working with children. And so when it comes to-- she's like this concept of like, OK, you're grown now. You should be able to communicate with people. And even though that's not particularly always true, it causes the situation where we are constantly coming across certain subjects and things in our life that we realize we are two very different people. I mean, even down to Array, she's like, I'm white. She comes from a rich family. I come from a poor family. She went to college. I went from got my GED, like, everything in our life are like some music and movies and shows, whatever. Everything is just opposite. And so it creates these-- not really issues, but just reoccurrent like, arguments, words. She's trying to explain to me why she thinks and feels certain ways about certain things. And then I don't comprehend that. To me, the reasoning logic, the math doesn't add up. And so for my mind, it's like, OK, I can't go off of emotion. I can't go off of those things. And so it's hard for us to communicate to where we can always, I guess, with the word that I'm trying to find-- Connect. Yeah, like connect in a way that is outside of just like, I love you. You love me. When you're happy together, that's it. We have new other areas of connection and of like-- OK, let me jump in here. So you gave me three distinct challenges. So I'm going to pull them apart real quick. Challenge number one, I've worked in and around mental health for years and years and years and years. The last thing on Earth I can do is walk home and try to counsel my wife, even counsel my kids. The trade that I am engaged in, my dad was a homicide detective. And he told me repeatedly that he was trained. The thing that makes you good at being a homicide detective will really disrupt your family. And so issue number one, I'm hearing, is your wife needs to stop treating you like an elementary school kid. She needs to-- That's actually a conversation we've actually recently had where I was like, you know, I understand that this is your day job. But you're a husband? Yeah, I'm not a patient or a student. Correct. I'm a husband. And so like, I need, even if you don't understand my thought process and where I'm coming from or how I'm coming from, like, I need you to still trust me that scenarios, the thought process, it's all there. I'm not-- And that's how it's not going through the thought process. Right. And that leads me to the second thing. All those differences you labeled, you-- I mean, black and white, money, no money, education, no education. All of that could be like to make it Louisiana a recipe for the greatest gumbo on planet earth. Oh, and that's the way that I see it. So that happens the whole-- Hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on, here's the problem. If your wife comes from education and money and works with kids with special needs, and she looks down on you as though you are less than, those issues that you brought up, those differences, will not be all mixed in the same pot. It'll be two different pots, where one is judging the other one. And that's somehow, or some kind of fuels. And I'll explain that to her, like, and she has-- so it's been obviously a learning curve for the both of us and marriage. And so that's one of the things that we have discussed. And she's getting better at time as progress. So we actually just made our three-year marriage industry up in May. So like, it's a learning curve still. OK, here's the third thing. Let me tell you the third thing, OK? And then we'll talk about all of them, OK?
third thing out. Third thing. Just because you can't plug into whatever feelings or emotions she has doesn't mean you have to approach her with an algorithm and doesn't mean you have to approach her feelings computationally and doesn't mean you can't just sit there and hold her hand and say thank you so much for telling me that. And so just because you can't match emotion for emotion or feeling for feeling I don't have autism brother and I can't match my wife feeling for feeling emotion for emotion for different people and she can't match me. What we can do with each other is not be scared of those big feelings or little feelings or emotions and sit there with each other. You get what I'm saying? Yeah. So if you're able to when she's telling you a thing that she's feeling this is going on at work I had this client I had these parents I have this issue with my mom and dad or whatever you can hold her hand and put your hand on the small of her back and just say man that sucks thanks for telling me that. and not try to fix or solve or compute what she's saying you get what I'm saying you get you get you get you get the drift. Yeah so there's this scene in parks and recreation that always has kind of like played back in my mind in that situation which is um Anna's pregnant the guy I forgot his name mom Andy Chris Pratt. He's trying to fix everything and somebody tells him like just tell her it sucks yes stop trying to fix it and just tell her it sucks just be there for it and it's the same thing. Yes and that's that's kind of what I've had to teach myself to do because of that the correct situation there was perfect um actually a situation just happened last weekend um we've kind of struggled with having kids and um or so far and somebody had asked her like when you all plan on having kids and she took that kind of part and I don't see the emotional side of it I'm like okay she just asked a question like you know I feel like that's a very basic normal question and but for her it was like more emotional because a little more personally attached and you know so on and so that's basically what I had to do was just okay you're right you're right we're like I'll just sit here with you like that's right obviously that that kind of bothered you and hit you the wrong way so yeah and and giving your wife space to feel and knowing you're not going anywhere and you're not going to try to solve it and knowing the next time somebody y'all are out as a couple and somebody says are you gonna have kids you hop in and answer that's something we really want to talk about right now that's right that's like or we're working on it or maybe one day and you take that from her is is is not a fist fight but it's you stepping in front of her and saying I got this even if you don't understand the impact of that question on her or the feeling of that question right yeah that that's you showing up for her as as her husband yeah I don't remember what was the second the second point the second one is I'll just say this as bluntly as I can she's not better than you because she went to college and she's not more right than you because her parents had money and yours didn't or whatever yeah that that's also something that we we've been working on as like so that's the thing is like I listen to you all the time she listens to you most of the time not all time it was most of the time and she she would have been on with me but as I said she the teacher so she can't like get out of class so like sure what do you what do you do for a living mark so I'm actually a welder okay it's awesome are you are you employed full-time you working your butt off yeah we're gonna like 50 60 hour each from standing outstanding so part of this brother is y'all have multiple cultural strands you're trying to weave together to make this one amazing life together you'll have the challenge of you want to have kids and it hasn't happened yet you'll have the challenge of um an intellectual exceptionality in you you you both process the world and feel it differently and you started this whole call off with I love my wife deeply and she loves me so can I give you like if if you hear anything from me like she's got to learn to take off her teacher hat when she walks in the door and put on friend hat wife hat ride or die hat honestly I think y'all I think being a little and again I know I'm talking to somebody who you told me you have autism I spent my career working with with brilliant smart kind hardworking folks with autism so I'm telling you this from a place of love feel the analytics rising up and then the next logical thing is to not be logical the next logical thing is I'm gonna grab your hand and sit here and say thanks for telling me that I hate that for you okay yeah that's true and if you you can have the conversation not if you can I know you can have the conversation when you come home and through the door here is two ways you could love me number one don't have your phone out number two I'm gonna turn the music on I just one dance with you and begin to have the conversation about hey I don't I don't need a teacher when I get here um I experience the world differently than you and that's what makes our particular gumbo so amazing and let's don't have like me like brother me and my wife don't argue about politics because we don't talk about them very much at all because we just kind of we've kind of straight out of that conversation so look dude you're three years in it took me like 20 years to figure that out so good for you you're you're ahead you're ahead of the curve man but yeah when it all feels like it's one big problem see if you can pull them apart you don't need somebody coming home and lecturing you you don't need somebody who thinks they're better than you or you're better than them there doesn't have to be a right or a wrong when you talking about deep philosophical issues and you're not gonna understand or compute every feeling or motion she has but you can compute that your wife needs her husband just to lean in just sit there hold her hand be that man thanks for the call brother appreciate you appreciate you reach him out get back to welding my man we come back a man asks how to let a 17 year old son make mistakes without letting him ruin his future when I'm cooking at home chopping up vegetables trimming a vinescent or t-bone steak or when I'm feeling a little bit extra dramatic and cutting up a nice fruit tray I want to know the knives I'm using will actually do what they're supposed to do cut well this is why I bought my wife the culinary kitchen knives from Montana knife company and it's why I use them as much as she does Montana knife company knives are razor sharp right out of the box they're balanced and they do what they're supposed to do over and over again their knives perfected Montana knife company makes their knives right here in the United States in years of experience going to every blade they come with a free lifetime sharpening guarantee which I've used I've sent them off and got all my knives right back razor sharp again and these knives will still be sharp when my great green kids are cooking with them head to mkc dot com to see what's available right now and one thing you should know Montana knife company knives sell out fast sign up for email and text alerts so you can be among the first to know of new releases that's mkc dot com all right mil walk you with constant let's talk to shame about ray what's up ray hey dr john thanks for having the time to talk to me today you got him a brother what's up so it's probably a little dramatic but you met me I'm pretty dramatic you're good I promise you how do I let my 17 year old make mistakes without ruining his life or are you ruining his future oh that feels like a lot of pressure on the word mistake tell me what you're talking about well I guess I guess uh I guess more of a better question is how do I know when to step in and step back uh good question well you know what he wrestling with well some of the decisions he's made you know and some of the statements he's made like you know for an instance he dyed his hair color he dyed his hair a color I definitely put it not of choose what color and it's going to blue yes okay cool punk rock hit it hard good good for him all right but yeah you wouldn't pick that for him I wouldn't pick and I guess my my question was to him is you know he's he's looking at future you know future careers future jobs he's going on applicant you know he's going on interviews and things like that and you know I ask him you know what do you think what do you think what do you think they're going to think when they see you you you know um and and I guess that's my that's where I mess up where I'm like
Do I let him just be, be himself and let him choose decisions like that or, I mean, not even just that, just, you know, I mean, he does have a part-time job right now because he's in his stone school, but, you know, certain positions that he's looking at, like there's better route this way or there's a better, just, you know, look further down the line, where is this going to lead you? And sometimes he's, he's okay with my advice and then sometimes he's like, okay, you're full of it, but, you know, I guess that makes everyone 17, right? Right, right. I, I, I, I think there's always attention and anyone who tells you otherwise is lying to you. There's always attention of, how do I help my kids? I have a 16-year-old son. I'm right there with you. He hasn't died his hair blue, but he has a very particular haircut that he loves that I just can't wrap my head around, which I had this epiphany the other day. I was like, oh yeah, that makes me an old man now. Like, I totally get it, right? Right. How do I help him be the best version of himself? And also, give him wisdom. And I can only tell you the rule of thumb, I've given parents over the years and that I'm living by now is I want to let you climb up whatever tree you want to climb up, but if I think you're going to fall and that fall is going to be permanently damaging to you, I'm going to get involved. Right. Right. And so here's, here's a, an easy thing, less talking about the haircut situation or the hair color situation or whatever. We're going to look at character. Right. We're going to look at, does he work hard at school? And he's got a part time job. And is he respectful to us to you and to his siblings and to his mom? Is he show up for a stuff at home? Then I'm going to let him go learn natural consequences when he applies for 25 jobs and gets zero of them. And also, I'm going to have a, hey, if you're going to stay here after you're 18, you got to pay rent. Right. Or I'm going to let, I'm going to help you go to college in this kind of way, or I'll help you at trade school in this kind of way, with this much money or this kind of school or whatever. I'm going to be real clear about the, the impending concrete barrier, which is the real world, right? And then he gets, he gets to make, you know what I mean? He gets to make for a season, my son really wanted to be a game warden. He loves being outside. And my first thought for six months was, that's not going to pay enough. It's not going to pay enough. And then I realized I'm imposing my values on a kid who wants to go spend his whole life serving. Shame on me. And now, like, now he's got different ideas about what he wants to do. But I can't run him back my life or the one I can't Uncle Rico his life. I wish of, I should have, I could have. And also he's got to learn some real consequences to, like, you want to have blue hair? You probably not going to get that job. Maybe you will. And maybe he at 17 is figured out, I don't want to work for somebody who cares that much about appearance. I want someone who is going to care about my character and work ethic. And then you might want to go, well, it's kind of awesome. Right? Right. Right. Exactly. I guess I'm, I'm worried about the consequences. You know, that's, that's my, I guess, in the back of my head. What consequences are you worried about? Well, if he doesn't, you know, when he finally graduates, and if he's still got this mindset of, I am who I am, and this is what I'm going to do. And then he falls on his face. He will. And that's not, you know, being that you always want your kid to succeed. Obviously, but yeah, but success is a trend line. It's not a stock market. It's not a, it's not a ticker. It goes up and down, up and down. And you hope it goes up over time. And success means different things as a financial success. Is it, is he going to be the best husband of all time? Is he going to be a good contributor to, you know what I mean? Like that means a lot of different things. Got it. And so painting him a picture of the man you hope he becomes. And when he does fail, I'll be right here. I'll be sitting right by you. Right. Right. Yeah. I just, it's, that's, that's the hard part for me to swallow. I guess. Yeah. Is this. But I mean, you, you, I'm telling you, I've spent a career with 18 to 28 year olds whose parents had come in and done all of the weightlifting for them. And they had never failed. They had never stumbled. They had never just eaten it. They had never been rejected. And they didn't have a psychology for it. They didn't have the neural wiring for it. And they imploded. Gotcha. And so there's some, there's something powerful about not getting what you want. And having dad right next to you saying, I, I still love you, man. Right. I mean, I, he, you know, I mean, me and his mom have sat down several times telling him we're, we're here no matter what, you know, but now you want to do something really wild. Go dye your hair blue. I would love to. I respect, but I don't know if my boss would like that. Go talk to your boss and say, I want to, I want to make a point to my 17 year old for a week, I'm going to dye my hair crazy. Is that cool? Definitely, definitely possibility. I could go do that. Like if, and really I, I could wear a hat anyway. So I guess that wouldn't cover that up. If it wasn't, I guess. Invite your son to do it with you. Tell him to like, oh, you're going to dye my hair blue too. You know what I mean, good idea. I'm right there with you then. So it becomes kind of a bluff call. I've had a lot of conversations with my son about this, in this thing. And my daughter's 10. So we're, we're slowly, slowly having these conversations. She wouldn't fully metabolize them yet, which is here is the uncomfortable truth about the world. The world desperately needs you to be fully you. And do the things that only you can do and part of life is playing the game. And also, I have a 13 year old daughter too. So when I make decisions or, or I'll, you know, talk to my son, she's going to pick up and she's watching. So I want to make sure that, you know, I do, I do it right. Well, and I told both of my kids, hey, I'm your dad. I get to make fun of your hair. That's my job. And it doesn't impact how much I love you. And I can say nice hair. And I love you. Those are just words. Do I hug him every time I see him? Right. Do I hold my son's face and tell him I'm so glad I get to be his dad? Or the sappy text I just sent him a few hours ago, right before I started recording these shows, like, like, they're going to get my behavior way more than my words. Right. And I'm not, I get to be dad. I get to be, say dumb jokes and I get to be silly and I get to step over the line too far. And my wife throws something like I get to have access to my house, right? Like, right. It's part of it. And also, you're not going to do anything that's going to keep me from loving you. Right. And sometimes you just cut your hair and get the job and the health insurance so that you can get to the place you want to be, which is sounds like a hundred years from now, 35. And you don't owe anybody any money and you could do whatever you want in the world. Right. Right. And that's hard. It's hard to teach that. And sometimes pointing out to your son, this is me playing the game, bud. I do that all the time with my son. If I'm going to a speaking gig and I have to, like, wear a suit jacket, dad, what are you wearing? Because them seeing me to suit jacket is very rare. And I tell them it's part of the game, son. This is a way I can honor this, these group of people that's paying for your, your college education and for our light bill. And if this is what it takes to honor them, what a small thing it is. Right. But I call it out, right in the house. I want to teach him. There's sometimes you play the game. And sometimes you stand up for yourself. And you got to, you got to live and die with those consequences. But yeah, he needs to fail. He needs to fall and he needs to know my dad's still right here with me. Right. And yeah, that's just something I have to swallow. Well, listen, it's so, trust me, it's so much easier to tell you this than it is to live it at my house. I promise you, man. I'm dying right now. I'm dying. I'm dying. I've made a commitment to my son. Because his buddies listen to the show, like, I'm not going to, I'll never talk about stuff is going on. It's for real at our house. But I'm right here with you. Okay. It's way easier for me to lecture you about it than to experience it in my own chest. It's hard. I'm good. I'm not the only one, I guess. No, if you're a pair of a 17 year old and you're not experiencing this, you probably should go see somebody right now, right? It's hard. It's hard, hard, hard. Letting your kids fail is the worst. It's the worst. And it's absolutely the best thing for them.
It proves to them I can get up and go again and go again and go again. All right, and that's the nature of life. You're a good, you're a good dad. If you, if you have the courage, if you have the guts to also dye your hair blue, send a photo and we'll post it because you'll become a legend to fathers everywhere. That'll be amazing. That'll be super red. If you're a kid, by the way, if you're listening, your kid cuts their hair in a mohawk, get a mohawk. If they want to get one of those mallet things, get a mallet thing. They want to, they want to dance, then say, I'll dance too and bring them along with you. Bring them along with you. Life is about deciding when am I going to draw the line, when am I just going to play the game to get the life that I want for me and for those I love. That's a hard tricky balance that I don't know you ever fully get until you're 90 years old looking in the rear view mirror, but kids got to learn to fail and got to know they're still loved when they do fail. You're a good man, dude. Thanks for calling right. We'll be right back. All right. You've heard me talking about it for a month and it's official. My brand new book, Building the Marriage You Want, is available for pre-order. Picture me sitting at the table with you and your spouse helping you both take the next right step in your marriage. That's what this book is. Me sitting at the table with you both walking you through what to do in your marriage. I get into all of it. Why marriage is so hard in the 21st century. Why I think marriage still matters and I'll give you a playbook for the stuff that trips most couples up communication, conflict, sex, money being married with kids. All of it. Nothing is off the table. If you like this show, you're going to love this book pre-order building the marriage you want today for $24.99 and get over $100 and pre-order bonus items. Go to johndalone.com. All right, Kelly, something awesome happened. What is it? Yes, this is from Bailey in Fort Collins, Colorado. And she writes, I've been telling my three daughters, I'm so glad God chose me to be your mom after hearing you share about saying this to your kids intentionally. They do the eye rolls and sometimes ignore me, but I say it regularly. The other day, my four-year-old and seven-year-old were making up after a disagreement and I looked over and saw my four-year-old make direct eye contact with their sister and said, I'm so glad God chose me to be your sister. My eyes definitely filled with tears. Thank you, Dr. John, for all you do and for the practical tips to encourage a kind and loving home. Excellent. Well done. That's awesome. And it would have been more awesome if the seven-year-old had just smacked the four-year-old and said, ah, shut up. But good. That's awesome. I'm glad that makes me happy. Good call. Hey, it's the little things you all are doing in your homes that are changing it for everybody. Thank you all. Keep doing it and I'm grateful for you. See you soon. Bye. (upbeat music)
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