I’m Not Attracted to My Overweight Husband

How do I possibly tell my husband that his weight gain is starting to become a turtle?

Hey, what's going on, what's going on?

“This is John with Dr. John Deloni Show, so glad that you're here.”

Taking your calls from all over the planet and whatever is going on in your life. The last two decades have sat with people who the wheels have fallen off in their life. Trying to figure out what's the next right move. You're mental, emotional health, your kids, your marriage, your dating life, whatever you got going on. My promise is I'll sit with you and we'll figure out what's the next right move for you.

Let's go out to Tulsa, Oklahoma and talk to Nicole. Hey Nicole, what's up? Hi, Dr. John, how are you? I'm doing great. How are you?

I'm good. Thanks for taking my call. Of course. What's going on? Question is, how do I possibly tell my husband that his weight gain is starting to become

a turtle? Oh. It's my personality is to be a bull. Tell me more.

So we have a baby last April and I've always been a health freak.

I've been going to the gym for several years. When we got together, he was heavier, but it wasn't really an issue for me. And then here recently our daughter actually just turned one on Sunday. I've just been noticing probably about the last six months that I just feel like he's started gaining weight more noticeably.

And I feel like the eating habits have increased and it's just bothers me. What is it?

“When you said the eating habits have increased, what does that mean?”

I can't keep snacks in the house or we go through them with before they end of the week.

And you like to make his sandwiches at work and I'm basically buying a whole tube of

marical whip and a whole box of sliced cheese almost every week to every other week. Okay. So while you may be not attracted to his weight gain, purely aesthetically. All right, I hear you say you're becoming not attracted or less attracted to him as a person. Or let me, I don't want to read too much into what you said, but he's beginning to gross you

out and who he is. Is that right or is that too much? Um, I'd say maybe a little bit, maybe this soft control aspect is becoming an egg. Okay.

“Where else is, are you discovering there's a distance between you?”

Um, are you telling more about that? Um, we, I am growing, we both grew up in Christian households and he went to the same church since the moment he was born and I kind of followed him into that when we got together and we're dating, but I just felt like I was officially growing. And it was a really my religion, so I spread often went to the church that I kind of grew

up in and the same religion and he actually followed me there, which was a huge step. But I'm trying to pour into that community and kind of start becoming more faithful and I'm doing devotions and worshiping and actively talking about the Lord and he just doesn't care. He won't be active in any of that stuff with me and I've asked him about it and he just

like, no I'm good. What else? Um, if you had to pinpoint some places where y'all have grown apart, he doesn't show any

Can he? I've asked.

I know you've asked in your words, but if your actions are language, is he allowed to show

emotion?

“See a lot of show frustration, disappointment, sadness, is he allowed to just be low?”

Or is the way you do things, the way things need to be done, whether it's fitness and which you call yourself a freak, is it fitness, is it sexuality, is it? What we eat and how we eat and where we worship and how much we do it and how much we talk about it. Has he just learned all right, I'm out and I'm not, I'm not making accusations, I'm just

asking. Yeah, because the way you're talking about him is very much the way a mom talks about her son, that she's frustrated with and that may be because he acts like a kid and it may be that he's trying to find pockets of safety and he's eating his feelings right now because that's the only place for them to go is shoved down, because I live in her house and worship

at her church and raise our kid the way she wants it to be done and ultimately my home

“is a failure factory, is that sound right or is it in my way all?”

No, very accurate. Okay, so the, you won't like my answer if that helps, okay? There's not a gentle way to tell somebody you're not attracted to them anymore, okay? There is an honest way and a helpful way and there's hurtful ways to do that. But to me, the bigger conversation here is, how long are you all married before you had

a kid?

Oh, we got pregnant two months after we were married.

Okay, so, and your kid's about to turn one, you said? She just turned one there. Okay, so how much of this is you are opening your eyes to this is your life now and you don't like it. I feel like I, I love my life and I love being a mom.

Okay. I'm nervous that it's just settling. You, what does that mean? I'm just, I don't, I'm trying to gather my thoughts. His family is all very obese and I'm just don't want that to be us.

Okay. I'm nervous that he'll be like his dad and check out and not want to play with our kids. And I can tell you, your husband feels every nook and cranny of the laser beam that is your judgment on his every move. And if you truly value him and you value you else marriage and you value your kid growing

up in a stable home, then turning the laser of judgment off. And turning on what I would call like the gentle dome light of I see and know that there's a different person in my home that I'm going to co-create a life with. Because right now you're only seeing your world and he is impacting your world negatively

“and what you're not recognizing is that it's his world too and man, there is an important”

multiple important conversations to be had around, I'm worried about your health, I'm worried about your involvement here at home and there's also a really important conversation to be said for it, we're a year into this thing and I've made your home really inhospitable and I'm sorry because it's been about my way, my thing, I'm right, I'm this, I'm that

Or let me give you another example, this morning, just today, this is fresh, right?

I got into a, as, as heated of a discussion with my son as I've had in maybe years about him leaving his clothes everywhere, he gets home from school, home from track and he undoes,

“he opens up his backpack and there's just stuff everywhere, okay?”

So we got into it this morning and I don't know what it was about this particular morning, I'm working on a big project right now and I have a room above my garage where I go right and it's got all my hunting gear and all my guitars and all my stuff in there. I walked up the small half staircase into that room and I just saw it for what it was.

It's a crazy disturbing mess.

I have piles of clothes everywhere, I've got guitars laying all over the place, I haven't cleaned up after the last hunting season, I just got, like, I'm right in the book, I got books everywhere, papers everywhere to mess and I felt so ashamed, so much so that I wrote my son along note that said, I'm a hypocrite and I'm sorry, I've been challenging you on your cleanliness and your, you know, you're a bit your routines and here I am living like this, I'm sorry.

And my solution with my son this morning was I have to make some changes around here and I want to invite you in to be a part of some of those changes. And that's the only path forward right now because I was not being a person of integrity because I was blaming him for stuff that I was participating in. And so you can't blame your husband for not sharing emotions if you're not a person you can

share emotions with and you can't blame your husband for eating his feelings if that's the only place to let him go. And you can't blame him from coming from an obese family but you can talk to him about, hey, I also have problems with my body, I just go the other way with it. And what does health look like for us and what does togetherness look like for us and what does

“connectivity with our kid look like? Do you understand?”

And part of that conversation will be I'm losing interaction to you and I'm going to own that. But if you, yeah, if you just come and drop that grenade on him, there's no where for that blast to go except inside his soul and spirit. If it's a part of a larger context which says, hey, I've brought some really big challenges to this thing and I realize I've been pretty laser focused in what's my life look like and what is this

is different and I didn't expect to get pregnant. Now I've got this and I've got this. Instead of, hey, we've got this and we get to decide what this looks like. Yeah. How does that resonate? Was that resonate as BS? Does that resonate as like no, make no, I feel like that. I'm impressed. Yeah, that's, I just didn't. I'm not trying to say like, oh, this is my fault, which it is probably my fault, but I just didn't get that way, but it

“all is very accurate. Let's take fault off off the table right now, okay?”

Because if we want to go down fault, it's his fault that he puts that food in his mouth, right? It is that's a choice he makes every bite. And it's a fault that you judge him through a lens of his parents and through your lens of embarrassment. And I want to be seen with a guy that looks like this out and like, we can go down the fault thing. It's not helpful. Because fault ends up becoming we're score keeping and I'm winning or I'm losing. Let's take fault off the table for a bit

and let's take this to sound so cheesy. I'm rolling my eyes at myself as I say this, but let's take

co-creation. We've co-created a marriage in our first year where we were just surviving and you

survived by barking orders and he survived by eating his feelings. Period. What if and I know I just made that way simple? There's way more complexity to that. I know that. What if we co-created a world where we both feel healthy and happy in a piece? What does that look like? What do we want to house to feel like when we both walk in? What is sharing responsibilities and roles and new identities now? What does that look like? What does that feel like? What does a pattern that when he

hears you ordering him around as though he's a seven-year-old kid that he has a way to say?

with him and you're like, yes, yes, because I'm going to change his pattern over time. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, I do. But this isn't about I'm just going to take all the fault and woes me. That's not what I'm saying. This is saying I'm going to go first and we've both tried to survive this first year and we did. We survived. We're still married. Our kid's healthy. I love being a mom. Awesome.

I want us to knock down the tower that was our old marriage because it got built kind of wonky just out of the gate because we needed a lean two shelter to live in during this first year. And let's build the thing we actually want. The one where we both have peace, when we both have laughter, where we have fitness, we take care of ourselves. We're good stewards of our bodies, where you can put your fears on the table and not say you're being like

your dad because that's never a good thing to say, but have more to it about.

I love you enough to tell you. I'm concerned about your health. I want you to be here for her high school graduation. I want her to have some hilarious memories of her dad rolling around on the floor with her, not sitting on a couch drinking a deco. And then being able to say, okay, what, what do you see in me? Where's my blind spots?

“And the only way this works is if one of you goes first and you called, so I'm going to challenge”

you to go first to put on the table and say, I'm sorry. I messed this up out of the gate. I was doing the best I could with what I had, and not masking, not for it to do over,

but can we rebuild something new and amazing? Let's start from there.

Thanks to a call sister, your bravery is impressive, and your ability to be reflective really quick is impressive as well. Thank you so, so, so much for the call. We come back, a woman asks how to face her fear of becoming a mom now that she is pregnant. Y'all, my house rules. It's filled with so much cool stuff, like my music gear, and my hunting stuff, and all of my family is into art projects, and there are more band

t-shirts in my house that I know what to do with. But my house is also filled with cozy earth gear, loads of it. Their sheets, pajamas, blankets, towels. My family has it all because it's amazing. I got this cozy earth comforter, and it's big, but somehow it's not hotter heavy. It's like a cloud. It's amazing. It helps regulate temperature so I can stay comfortable throughout the night

“and sleep better and wake up feeling restored. And I am right now wearing cozy earth essential”

socks. The cozy earth essential socks come in four links. They're all super comfortable. They

are amazing. And don't forget, cozy earth offers a hundred night sleep trial on all of their bedding and a tinier warranty on everything else. So let's know, risk. Try cozy earth for yourself. Go to cozy earth.com/deloney and use code deloney, and you'll save up to 20% off your entire order. That's cozy. COZY. Cozier.com/deloney and use code deloney. And if you get a post purchase survey, tell them you heard about cozy earth's amazing gear, bedding, bath stuff, even the socks.

Tell them you heard about it right here. Trust me, you're going to love cozy earth taking over your home just like it's taken over mine. Some of my favorite days in the spring are being out on the water with my son and my daughter and even occasionally my wife fishing as a family. And if you fish, you know this, glare on the water can be brutal. You're trying to see where the fish are. You're trying to not have your eyes get burned out. And at the end of the day, your eyes get cooked.

“And that's why we all wear shady, raised, fishing sunglasses. I got mine right here. Dude,”

I look so cool. They're polarized, which means they actually cut the glare and they actually let you see into the water. Not just the surface under the water. It makes a huge difference. They protect your eyes. They're durable. They're built for real life. And just let me say, I've lost and broken more sunglasses than I could possibly count. And in another reason I love shady rays is they have lost and broken protection. And that means if something happens,

they will replace them. This means I'm not stressed about wearing them in the middle of a lake, on a creek, on a long hike. I don't mind wearing them anywhere. They look great and they're not insanely stupid, expensive. Like sunglasses suddenly seem to be. If you fish, if you like being outside, get sunglasses that are made for fishing or check out their entire collection. Head to shadyraise.com and use code Deloni for 40% off two or more polarized sunglasses.

Like these right here, that shadyraise.com use code Deloni.

Thanks. So, I just have a quick question. How can I overcome and face my fears and anxieties

about motherhood so that I can be a resilient and peaceful mom? And I'm currently 11 weeks in five days pregnant with their first kid. Oh, so you're right there, huh? Have you all

“been announced to your friends and family yet? Are you a holden type for a few more days?”

I know. I did. I kind of regretted it. I should have probably waited, but I was just too excited. So, yeah, I told that. So, hey, can I tell you congratulations? Thank you. Yeah. Is that cool? Tell me your your relationship status? Oh, I'm married. Yeah, we've been married for four years. Okay, you like him? Oh, man. Yeah, he's amazing. Okay, all right. So, whenever somebody

tells me they have a fear about something or they have anxiety about something. I always want to

know and as detailed as you could get, okay? Because fears and anxieties tend to be really did you see strange or things? I can't. Okay, you don't like scary movies. Okay. So, okay, so it can be really shadowy and kind of like ethereal. It's hard to wrap your head around and or it's hard to point a finger to it. And so one of the ways to disempower fear and anxieties is to be really specific about them. Okay. So, what is it about being a mom? And I want to get to

the place you want to be? What is it about this side of motherhood that makes you concerned that you're not going to be a peaceful mother? Yeah, I'm really scared that I'm not going to be able to handle the responsibilities, the emotional, physical, mental taxation that women go through and they have a baby. Where does that fear originate? Have you failed yourself a number of times or is this part of the American mother guilt complex? Oh, yeah, I think it's probably both, but yeah,

I have failed. I haven't failed myself, but there's been moments in my life that that I've went through some pretty significant pain because of choices I've made. Tell me about that. Yeah, so I guess when... Let me tell you this. I noticed that A, only tell me what you're

“comfortable telling, okay? And B is vague as you feel like you need to be, okay? And B, I'm not”

just fishing. I'm actually going somewhere with this, okay? Yeah, no, I believe you. I just don't want to give you too many details and waste your time, you know? Oh, you're not wasting my time. I'm honored that you're on the phone with me. Thanks. Okay, so when I was really young, I made the choice to run away with a guy barely knew and that turned out to be a really horrible decision. Okay, how old were you? I had just turned 18. Okay, how old was he? Um, he was 40. Okay. And how long

until you uncoupled from that? Last year. Oh, last year. Oh, wait, I'm sorry. What do you mean by that question? How long until you all broke up and you find yourself kind of in the wasteland of being 22 or 23 or 25, looking around? No, it's actually a really cool story because it was two days later. I was in a different state than the state I grew up in. And I just had a crazy encounter with God. Okay, so it was two days later and you had a spiritual awakening. Yeah, it is for me.

“God just totally saved me from it. And so you went home right after that?”

No, I stayed with my brother for a couple of months and then I went back to my hometown. Okay. And what was re-entry into your home town like? Yeah, it was really hard. And I went back to live with my parents again and you know, they did the best, but they could, but everything just

picked up like normal. And I never really had time to process what had happened. And then

and that eventually, I just, you know, I really just pushed things down and shoved them these downsides and then eventually that led me to like my next really big emotional breakdown of I was in the middle of nursing school a year and a half ago and I had a bunch of triggers

And my body just started screaming at me. And yeah, how old are you now? I'm 29. Yeah, 29. Okay. Tell me how your mom loved you. Supported you cared for you. Walk alongside you. We'll be expecting that question, sorry. She showed me how to work really hard. That's the most compassionate, politically correct answer of all time. That was awesome. Yeah, I don't know. I'm not asking you to badmouth your mom, but I'm asking you to, if you were

“to objectively back out of the situation. And I know that's an almost impossible thing to do, right?”

Yeah. But if you were to imagine yourself watching your mother walk alongside you, if she did it all. Yeah. What would that look like? See, I'm sorry. I just, I'm having a hard time. She, she didn't.

Okay. Oh, just sit on that for a second. She did.

Yeah, and I guess I just, I'm looking for a road map of how I could be better for my kid. There you go. How's your dad walk alongside you? Yeah. My dad, um, I, he had a really severe and undiagnosed at the time PTSD and major

“aggressive disorder and that. All right. Those are clinical terms. Tell me about the”

lived experience of nine year old you, a 14 year old you, a 17 year old you. Um, anger, rage, volume. Yeah. Yeah. Like the only emotion if I ever saw his anger. And he wasn't abusive or anything like that, but he, um, just couldn't be there for me in the way that I needed. Okay. So let me say this as clearly as I can. Okay. Abuse does not require intent. And by the way, this is not to blow up your parents in any way. This is to give context to your body

right now. Okay. Yeah. Abuse doesn't require intent. I can be abusive without meaning to be. Okay. The second thing is, is trauma can happen as a thing that happens to you or a thing that should have happened to you that did it. Okay. And we often look back at our past and we're like, well, they didn't do this and they didn't do that when we, and we're thinking of physical abuse

or sexual abuse. They never, like, I never did a little hospital because they hit me so hard or

whatever. But we failed to look at the other side, which is, at 18, I found a father figure but at least cared enough to look me in the eyes. Yeah. Somebody finally told me I was beautiful.

“Right? Right. And so when, when you, when I said, what are some ways you failed yourself?”

Can you do me a huge favor? Yeah. Can you let 18 year old you off the hook, finally? How do I do that? I want you to write her a letter tonight. And I want you to forgive her for being 18. And I want you to forgive her for trying to run away from a household where she felt completely alone and in charge of the adults emotions in her home. Yeah. Forgive that poor girl.

Because she's haunting you right now and she's just trying to tell you, dude, I just sort of sort of I was trying to survive.

Okay. I can do that. And here's what I'm, here's what I want to do. They took a circle back and

answer your full question. The first thing I want you to do is to be honest about what it consider, like you may have heard me say this before, but consider you've got a backpack on full of sender blocks. How many of these sender blocks? I don't have to work through them all,

into this new season of my life? You have a lived experience of a mom who was at you not with you.

“Let's just let's acknowledge that's in our backpack. It's heavy. Yeah, for sure.”

And let's stop blaming 29-year-old ourselves for being tired, for having panic attacks, for we're in nursing school and we have to do something that's life or death. And we have that voice of our mom saying, "You screwed up. You didn't do this. I can't believe you didn't." Like, let's give ourselves some grace. And I just write myself a letter. That's so great. We're going to write 18-year-old self

that letter. That's a different one. Okay. We're going to write mom and dad a letter saying,

here's what I'm grateful for. Here's what I'm real in. This is part of one therapist told me

once we're going to blame fairly. Yeah, yeah. You and I got mom, I got an incredible work ethic. You know what I got, dad? I got an insanely compassionate way of helping people. It makes me an amazing nurse because I've been taking care of people since I was five. The next section is I should have never had to take care of you because I was a kid. Yeah. And mom, I know you were trying to survive and said you're on marriage with a husband who was at a whole bunch of untreated mental

health issues, but it wasn't my job to carry that way for you. Yeah.

“And then here's the important part of that last letter, the last part of that letter, the important”

part. Here's who I'm going to be now. And when we say things like I just want to be a peaceful mom,

that becomes a finish line of a race that never ends because you don't have a lived experience

of what peace even feels like. And so here's what we're going to do. We're going to put some really specific things down on paper. And I would advise you, the way you swooned over your husband, gross, but it sounds like he's he is going to walk alongside you as you transform your family trees. I fear. Oh, yeah. For sure. Okay. So what if we co-created some things together? I want my daughter to know that no matter what, I'm in charge. And no matter what, I'll sit with her through her big

“feelings or his big feelings. I want my son to know no matter what. Mama loves him to the end of time.”

Yeah. And then as we go along and you find yourself getting impatient, we're going to we're going to feel that. And we're going to get the help we need along the way. So let me say this, your fear, your anxiety. It's right. You're not crazy. Yeah. And the path through it is directly through it. Yeah. Yeah. Right. And the the path through it is as clear as possible. And this is going to sound nutty at short of time horizons as possible. What does that mean? That means you have a picture

of wanting to treat your son or daughter a certain way when they turn 18. That's two decades from now. Yeah. Let's do week three. All right. Your fear is right and your fear is good. And I'm like overwhelmed with how proud of you I am. The challenge you have before you is, you're doing a lot of work to get well. You're doing a lot of work to be to build a great marriage. And you're doing it with all these old center blocks still in your backpack. Yeah. I've just set them down. Yeah.

And writing a letter is a start. That's not going to be like some magic cure. Right. But it will slowly begin to distance yourself from that person that was just surviving. I've had to go back and write myself multiple letters in multiple years. Because once I cleared 18 year old me, then I'll sudden 16 year old me popped up and then 13 year old me popped up. I had to go back and let different versions of childhood me off the hook because

they were still fighting my daily battles as an adult. It's not their job. Okay, I can do that. Game on. Game on. How do you face a fear of becoming a mom?

proud of you. And your husband, both of you. It's awesome. Right track. Right track.

“Hey, it's been a high, high honor. That I got to talk to you today. Thank you so so much for”

the call. We come back. A woman asks how to support her husband through a big career change. It is fishing season and turkey season. In my son and I are still using our mountain and I've company knives all the time. Why? Because mountain and I've companies rule their design tested and built right here in the United States by real hunters, by real fishermen and women. And by great chefs. We get back home, my whole family, my wife, my son, even my daughter.

Now is using mountain and I've company knives in the kitchen to prepare all the amazing food we

catch. Why? Their knives are the best. Their razor sharp right out of the box. They're tough enough

“to be used every day. They're just amazing. But here's what really sells me. Montana and”

I've company stands behind their work for life. When your knife needs sharpening or anything ever happens to need to be repaired, you just send them to Montana and I've company and they'll take care of the rest. These are the kind of knives that your grandkids will fight over some day. Your wife will love them. Your kids will use them. If you're looking for knives that are built to work and built to last, go to montiananifecompany.com and see what's available right now.

They're amazing. That's montiananifecompany.com.

Go down, love it together, App. It's incredible. It is crushing right now. It's in the Apple App Store. They call it the kids call it these days. The kids do call it these days. You can also go to the show notes below the description and click on it. Click on it in the show notes. Did you know I don't think I've ever looked at a show note in my life? I wouldn't know how to find a show note. Anyway, you couldn't find a show note with a flashlight and what's

funny is I would look for it with a flashlight. Oh, geez. All right. It's got to Philadelphia. Pennsylvania and talk to Sarah with an H. What's up Sarah? Hello. What's going on? Thanks for hopping on here. How are we doing? I'm pretty good. I'm very happy. I apologize in advance. Oh, Sarah. There is no one on more awkward on this call than me. I assure you. We can be awkward together. It's good. Okay. So what's up? So my husband is fairly certain. He's about to make

very large career change or job change. I'm hoping look for ways to best support him in this change. So tell me about the change. Key is looking to begin work with two family members on like a business that they have. Yeah. So that's okay. Let me let me back out of this question. Are you in support of this career change? Are you do not like this career change? I'm nervous about it. Tell me why you're nervous.

It'll be less money. He recently just got an increase in pay where he is right now.

“And it's kind of like half of that pay. Like I think it'll be doable. Like we can do it.”

We'll be okay. But why is he making this change? Exactly. He's just doing the job of a lot of people at the moment and it's really stressful. He's about to go to work with two family members. He's going to be doing 50 jobs at once. He doesn't see it that way. It is a tall order for a spouse to be supportive of a husband. Again, this may make me unpopular to say it this bluntly. But hey, honey, I want to bring home half the income because

I'm tired of working so hard. I feel bad because I also don't want to miserable because when when he gets home, he's in a miserable mood. He has gotten better. He's the one that showed me your podcast and he'll be listening to this and laughing at how awkward I am. You're not being

job transitions, especially huge ones, where someone isn't going towards something, but they're

“running away from something. Right. And where is that now is trying to fix like they're trying”

to hire someone else to lessen his load at work, but even like thinking about having to train that person for the next however long is a lot for him to process and think about kind of. Have you all said down and made a real honest budget with Hey, we're about to bring home half the income we've had? Well, the income is new, like his increase in income is new. So it kind of be where we've been at, but it's nice to like not have to worry so much about money. Like right now we're

at a spot where we can, you know, think about putting it toward the mortgage and cause we're on baby steps four or five and six or, you know, having extra money to put aside and do things.

“So it's kind of nice to have that little cushion, I guess. You keep minimizing what you're”

saying like it's kind of nice, it's it's about how like it's kind of half I'll aid to begin to take full ownership of the feelings inside your chest. Besides just nervous. Yeah, because because the nervous is amorphous. Right. Like I can be fully prepared Thursday night. I'm going at a

town to do a headlining bit at a comedy club I've never been into. Never walked into. I will be nervous.

I speak to, to audiences all over the United States, all over the place, big audiences, small audiences all over. I have a full hour and probably 30 minutes of an act I can do. I'm fully prepared. Right. And I'll still be nervous, nervous is just a physiological reaction. It's good because that means there's a risk involved. Right. That's right. That's not I am.

“I don't like that's what you're feeling. Yeah. Tell me more. You're hesitant. Tell me more of the”

feelings besides nervous. I've heard you talk a lot about like business with family members. And that was another part that I was hesitant about. Do you trust, would you let your family members these particular family members keep your kids? They're not like dangerous. I think that's not what I said. Would you want your kids around them a lot? Yeah. Okay. At least one of them. Okay.

Okay. So here's the thing. One of them for sure. You all are creating a world you're

telling the soil for a field of resentment because you'll have a lot of unspoken things going on. And so when I left my 20-year career as a senior leader at universities to become a podcaster in a YouTuber for God's sakes, my wife was very nervous about that. I'll go further to say she was uncomfortable with it. And so we walked through our finances change pretty dramatically, especially early on. Now they've changed completely the

other way. But early on, there was a path here of nerve of I'm uncomfortable with this. I'm uncomfortable with this. And most of her discomfort was John, you're an introvert. John, I see you when people say I hate you or you're an idiot and it melts you and you're walking into an ecosystem where that's where a lot of people are going to throw grenades at you. Right. Right. And she knows I like to take time with people and I'm overly compassionate and the ecosystem that I live in

rewards really quick sensational points that lack nuance. Right. Like all that stuff, she was like you're walking into a new room where I'm uncomfortable for you. And we had to sit down and be pragmatic about a budget. And we had to find a place to live because I lived in university houses. Like we had all these very practical things to sit down and discuss. And it didn't make the conversations easy, but it did give us a plan. Right. Right. And so what you're doing with a plan, Arthur Brooks

talks about this so well, you're taking away the uncertainty. There's still a risk. This will think it falls, but I'm going to take uncertainty off the table. And so as much as I possibly can. On certainty, it'll make you crazy. Risk is exciting, but risk shouldn't end you. Right.

I'm afraid you're going to take this job and in four months you're going to realize you went with you and you're going to come home grumpy for that job just at half the salary. Yeah. Or do you think you're going to go work less? You're not. And if this business works, you're going to all be working way more. Right. And is there going to work? It's kind of not not as big at the moment. I also post like what if they go bankrupt. But that's the part

that excites my husband because he is looking to go in and help them make it better, which we were at the marriage retreat. And the career won the job one, I asked him, like, what do you hoping to do? Or are you hoping to help? And he said, like, that's the part that excites him is having being able to help people. Okay. Is his family members that he's going to go work

“for and with? Are they going to allow him to come in and transform their business?”

I'm sorry. What was that? His family members that he's coming to join forces with, are they going to allow him to walk in and transform the business? I'm not positive. He said it sounds like one, you know, one definitely is all for, you know, being able to change

and stuff the second one. I'm just not sure, you know. Okay. I want you to be able to, like,

let me say this way in a healthy marriage. But one where you see and know him and you celebrate him regularly, he knows he's loved. Then I want you to say, I want to have a, I want to put a bunch of challenges on the table. My fears about you making this transition and I want to work through them. Are you in? Okay. Okay. And I want you to be able to get all of your questions and concerns answered. And some of those are going to be very tactical. Are we willing to postpone paying our house off?

Are we willing to postpone funding the kids' college fund because you're tired at work? Right. Right. Yeah. Am I going to struggle with respecting you because you're working, you think you work too much and that makes you an abad mood? Or are you in an abusive work situation? Were there just taking advantage of you and beating you over the head of the stick and I want you to get out? I don't care what it costs us. Right. And I've had this. I had a situation like that

in my life where she's like, I don't care what it's going to cost us. Get out of that place you're working. I've had that too. She was going to, she was going to defend me the other way. Right. But I want you,

“here's the thing, I want you to be clear about what your concerns and fears are and I want you to”

set up a conversation with him where y'all can work through those. Okay. Because either y'all will get clarity on what a success look like in this job. How long are we going to tolerate making half the money? Is there, is this job going to grow us somewhere? Are we going to aim for someplace? Or are we resettling our entire life? Which, by the way, isn't bad either? We are resettling our entire life because we're going to shift our priorities now.

We're going to consciously become a Corolla family and we are consciously going to be renters or consciously going to live in a very small house and have our mortgage out because we value peace in these other parts of our life. If that is great, that's amazing. But I want everybody on the same page with that because if you still want to live a Tahoe life and he is making a shift to a Corolla life y'all are going to go to war together. You're going to resent each other. Right.

And if he comes up the first day, he comes home and complains about something. You're going to, you're going to come unglude. Because that's the reason we took half the income

because you said, right, you're going to, it's going to be you said and I told you and we never,

it's going to end up in that wild, keeping score type language. You know what I'm saying? Right. And so let's put all of this stuff on the table because what you've also told me is he loves his boss. Yeah. There about to hire somebody and it's going to suck for us using him while he has to train him. But man, it could clear up the whole deck for everybody.

Right. Right. Versus, he's going to come in. He's got one person. He really trusts one person. It's a wild card. He's going to make half the money. Hope it works out. Right. Maybe. And so it's just putting all that on the table. It doesn't mean don't do it.

“I just want both of y'all clear as to what we're doing. And the best way you can support him through”

this is by being honest and open. And then when you agree to something, when y'all spit shake and shake hands and hire five and say, okay, till death through his part, we're in on staying. And

here's what needs to change around our home. Here's what needs to change around our life or

we're going to make this big shift together. I'm not going to throw this in your face if it doesn't

this way. And then we're going to have markers along the way that say, hey, it's time for us to

“get out of this race and go find something else. Okay. We're just looking for clarity and clarity”

requires often radical honesty. Is that making nervous? A little bit. Okay, because he can't hear it or because he's going to throw it in your face or why is that making nervous? I'm just not very good with confrontational talks or like any kind of talks like that. My brain kind of just shuts down. Okay. My challenge to you is, is to write it down. Okay. I do the same. I get all jumbled up when I get emotional about something. So I've learned over the years. I write it all down. Okay.

And can I challenge you with one more thing? You started this call by saying how awkward you are. You're not awkward at all. Zero. Wow. You mentioned several ways in which you're quote-unquote deficient. I haven't experienced that one little bit. Well, that's good. And so I want you to change some of your internal language towards I'm a writer-die spouse. I'm a supportive wife and I'm also, I love my husband enough to challenge him before he makes a mistake or so that I can be fully

both feet in the boat and we're both going to row like crazy towards this new direction. Okay. Okay. But that is not you walking on your head down. Like I'm awkward. I'm weird. I get jumbled up. It is. Yeah. I say the wrong thing sometimes. Big deal. I get overwhelmed. Cool. I wrote it down. We're heading in. I'm right here. I'm right next to you. You have me versus a world homie. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. This is helpful at odd. I don't feel like I was

helpful one bit. Yeah. Yeah. That was helpful. Are you going to do any of what I said? Probably not. Yeah. That's a great thing. Thanks. All right. Good. How about this? Let me know how this conversation goes. And if your husband wants to be on the show, I'd love to talk to him about it.

I always want somebody on a big career change to go towards something not away from something,

unless they just have to. Because it's super abusive because it is unmanageable because it is taking advantage of you, taking your soul from you. But sometimes working a lot is the season we're in. Sometimes working two or three people's jobs is the season we're in because we have a family to support and it is what it is. And we have to be honest with our spouse about, okay, this is something we can't change right this season. Or we're not willing to change this season.

Or we're not going to change this season. So what can we create here at home? So that I walk in and we both smile because I'm home. Thanks for calling sister. We'll be right back.

Finally winter is over and spring is here. And that means it's time to rotate the old

closet. The poncho flannels and denoms are going to the back of the closet and the poncho originals in ultra lights are moving forward. That's right. No matter what time of year it is, I'm still wearing my poncho shirts. I've been wearing them for years. Why? Because they rule. They're the best. The original is that go anywhere performance shirt. It's the lightweight. It's breathable. It's quick drying and it's built for every part of your life. And the ultra light

“has that same great fit with an even lighter feel. That's why they call it the ultra light.”

And when it's hot, like it gets here in Tennessee, how light assured is matters. Poncho shirts also have great stretch. They move with you. Not against you. They're light, they're soft and somehow how they pull this off. They're super, super durable and tough. And they look sharp enough to even wear to dinner and they're comfortable enough to wear all day. If warmer weather has you ready to reshuffle your closet, I want you to go to ponchooutdoors.com/deloney

and check out all of their styles. Get 10 bucks off your first purchase. Just sign up with your email.

That's ponchooutdoors.com/deloney. Kelly, rocking the super super super deep vegan. What's up? All right. Something cool happened. What is it? Yes. So this is from Levi. I like how you don't even respond anymore. I'm not gonna. You know contempt is one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse.

“And I rolling is a key feature of contempt.”

Well, I'll let you read into that what you wish.

Levi and Lynchburg. Right. I was at the Valentine's Week in Money and Marriage Getaway in 2025.

“I told everyone about how I betrayed my wife, my family, but specifically my wife by having an affair.”

I was struggling with trying to figure out how to be a good man again for her and for our son.

You and the other personalities and everyone else at the getaway was very supportive and encouraged

“me to just keep doing the next right thing. As of today, my 30th birthday, I am 600 in seven days”

sober and want to thank you and Rachel and everyone else for their continued part in my healing and

my family. From the deepest deepest part of my heart and on behalf of my family, thank you.

“Dude, that's awesome. Shout out to Brother here for staying sober and for rebuilding his marriage”

one brick at a time. That's awesome. Well played my man. Love you guys. Hey, thank you for listening. See you next time on the Dr. John Deloni show.