My Husband Refuses to Let Things Go

He's got memories attached to things, he sees some sort of utility or possibly trying

to solve a future problem with a current thing, right?

What does declutter mean to you?

What's up?

This is John with the Dr. John DeLonus Show coming to you from National Tennessee, taking

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out a way to get you on.

Let's go to Detroit Rock City and talk to Kimberly, what's up Kimberly?

Dr. John, I'm doing great, it's 46 degrees of Michigan and I'm a male carrier, so I can't

complain.

How do we decode our home together when we don't see eye to eye on it, but for the sake

of our children is where I feel nervous in the future if we don't do something about

it now.

Okay, tell me what's going on, what's the thing beneath the thing?

I guess I sound like a hoarder saying that, but we're not, it's just we have so much clutter

in our homes and things that we have collected from years of just of life and decodering

for him seems way more difficult than this for me.

I'm willing to throw out anything, donate, get rid of it if I haven't used it, I want

it gone and for him, it's not the same way.

He has a reason why we have to keep everything.

Gotcha.

How old are you guys?

I'm 33 and he's 38.

How long have you all been married?

Three years.

Okay, is this the first marriage for both of you?

Yes.

Okay, so you all had independent lives before you all got married, right, which meant

you all had independent stuff and independent way of doing things in independent ways of

coping with various anxieties and stressors and whatever.

Right.

Okay.

Okay.

Backing out even further than the clutter, we'll get to the clutter because I got some

pretty, pretty concrete thoughts and some database based thoughts on clutter.

Where are other places, give me an example of another place where a 27 year old maries

of 35 year old and y'all have struggled and does have to be a bad struggle, right?

But where y'all are trying to combine lives.

I don't, honestly, I don't think in other areas we struggled at all.

It was everything combining, even when we talked about childhoods, we were so, everything

was so similar.

We met so well and so perfectly and I still think we do accept getting rid of clutter

seems to be an issue.

So tell me about this clutter.

Is he a collector?

Is he a bunch of like Pokemon cards?

Is he a prepper?

No, is he like me?

He's got stuff.

Well, I, okay, so I'd say he's more of a prepper, more of a, we might need this type

of thing.

Okay.

So give me an example of some of the clutter.

Okay, so like the other week, I bought a whole new set of pots and pans, because all

the other ones are bad.

And instead of getting rid of all of the other ones, we have to keep a future.

You know, it's like, no, no, no, why would we do that?

But so then in our garage, we have a shelf with all these things that we're going to touch,

but it takes up space.

So it's nothing like extreme of like, well, there's a whole room full of this busy collect

space.

It's just like letting go of something fully seems hard for him.

Okay.

Um, and when you've talked to him about it, what does he say?

So when I talk to him about it, he's open-minded and we, um, we're both on the same page.

And I'm not great at organizing it, and that's part of the problem here, um, but when

it comes down to executing rid of things, it's like the space still isn't empty, and

we don't have, it's like we're not decluttering the way he thinks we are, or at least to my

expectations, I guess.

So let's, let's reverse this.

So he doesn't want to get rid of stuff.

He's got memories attached to things.

He sees some sort of utility or possible.

He's trying to solve a future problem with a current thing, right?

What does declutter mean to you?

I feel like we, it would make cleaning the house way easier.

Nope.

Not what I'm asking.

Not what I'm asking.

Oh.

I want you to give him.

And so I want you to give me, but you're actually talking to him.

What does a finish line?

When would he be able to drop his shoulders and say we are officially decluttered?

I guess when we have empty spaces so that we have room for our young family to continue

growing in the house, like actual, like a closet doesn't have to be packed just because

we're living there right now.

There can be empty shelves because our kids are young.

They're only going to bring more stuff in.

I feel like as of now, we don't have space to do that.

So what if you're both trying to solve future problems in the present?

Yeah, that might be happening.

You with the idea of an empty shelf and him with the idea of full closets just in case.

Yeah.

That's what's happening, huh?

Because if you get to, because when people say they want to declutter, and this is

me too, this is why Joshua Fields Millburn and the Minimalist gang are close friends of

mine, Don Madsen of Minimal Mom, she's a close friend, like what they do for people like

me who have a natural bent towards handling anxiety, future problems dragging them into

the present.

And I try to do that with stuff with being prepared, right?

They help me unwind like you need this many shirts, this many pants, this like they help

me have a definition because sometimes people want to declutter because they just have

too many clothes in the closet and I got it's it's unmanageable for me.

It's anxiety inducing every morning trying to just sift through.

Does this fit?

Does this not?

Do I still like this?

Whatever.

But some people want to declutter and the finish line just keeps moving, right?

Because we've never tried to, we've never established what we're trying to get to.

Right.

I guess it's there because we've never actually established that or talked about that.

It's always just like let's get rid of things and it's probably overwhelming for him.

It's I would suggest I may be wrong, but I would say because he's not on the phone, but

your idea of let's just get rid of all of it and he's like for what though and you're

like for an empty shelf.

Right.

That might be as anxiety inducing as why are we keeping two of these pots and he's like

just in case and you're going for what?

And right.

Like so when it comes to your kids, here's what I want to be very careful of.

I'm assuming your kids are really young.

Yeah.

Two and nine months.

Okay.

Please do me this huge favor.

Actually, you're not doing me a favor at all.

Do you, your husband and your children this favor, okay?

Okay.

Don't make them the reason for addressing hard things that you and your husband need

to work through.

We've always talked about decluttering since we've been together and now that the kids

are here and young, they are the reason I keep pushing this and I keep talking about

it.

So bring, bring back that fear into the middle of your chest where you as the adult have

the strength to carry it.

Okay.

And ask yourself, have we created two people who love each other, who are all game on?

We, it sounds like you like this guy, which is awesome.

Yeah.

No, he's great.

Okay.

He likes you.

Right?

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's amazing.

Okay.

So you got two awesome people here who are still like, we're just three years in to unpacking

like the old lives that we had that were stable and good and whatever and now we're trying

to combine them.

We've accidentally created an anxious house.

And that could be everything from money to secrets to fitness and health to any, it's

a work stress, any number of things and it gets, and it shows up over here and what most

people spend their lives doing is playing whack a mole with symptoms.

I want to hang on to this.

I want to empty shelf.

I want to empty shelf.

I want to hang on to this when really the core issue is.

How do we anchor in deeply and create a very non-anxious house, which gives everybody

the margin to say, you know what, I really think we're going to need those pants someday,

but fine.

Throw them away.

Right.

And, or I really would like just there to be nothing on that shelf, but there's some

books and we're all going to live.

Right.

Right.

Because by the way, your young kids, they can only bring into the house what you allow them

to bring in.

Right.

No, that's totally fair.

That makes sense.

Because that's the first thing he brought up when we were talking about it was there's

so many toys.

The toys don't bother me because they're just going to be everywhere right now.

It's like the spaces that make for me cleaning the house feels way harder when it doesn't

seem like everything has a home because the classes are full of things that we don't

even use.

Old sheets from Gam Gam who made them years ago that we're still holding on to.

Listen, Gam Gam sheets are really nice kids.

All right.

So, but what I just, and that's something that I'm like, are you kidding?

And then one day this was years ago, even he begged those up and took them to his mom's

house, which is fine.

They're not in my house.

But what are they going to do there?

Just collect dust.

I know.

And, but I've also been through the exercise.

I've talked about on the show before where I just kept my granddad who's one of my heroes

who gave me an old tweed jacket when he, when I was working at the university, he gave

me an old jacket.

He was like, this looks like it, I, it never fit from the moment he handed it to me.

And I think I moved that to like seven different houses or five different houses before I went

through like it, and it was a psychological unwinding.

I literally had to say out loud to myself, my grandfather's not in this jacket.

Right.

Right.

And that was hard.

Right.

No, I could only do that when I was getting well and being honest about other things.

So what I heard you just say is actually the thing beneath the thing beneath the thing

kind of leaked out.

Oh, God.

What was it?

Do you think you live in a messy, in a, in a gross house?

No, I don't think it's gross.

Okay.

I think it's very clean.

It's just not organized and that bothers me because I'm, you should, the primary person

cleaning.

Okay.

Any of this about shared responsibilities at your house?

No.

No.

Okay.

Awesome.

I don't think so.

Mm-hmm.

Is any of this about this pervasive sense that there's something that I haven't cleaned

yet?

Probably that, I mean, that bothers me because yeah, yeah, it just feels like there's so much.

It's like, it gives me anxiety to know how much stuff we have that we don't even use.

And what's the root of that anxiety?

Is it that you have too much and there's needy people out there?

Is it that you're not being good stewards of your money?

Like what, what is the root of that anxiety?

I mean, maybe that's part of it being good stewards of their money because I feel like

even the stuff we hold on to, they're like, oh, we might need this one day.

When that day comes, we can't really, you don't know where you put it.

You don't know what's box is in in the basement.

Okay.

So you're just buying something.

You know what I mean?

It's like, you're not even using what you're holding on to because you're in a box and

you're going to cause it and now it's just sitting there in storage and I feel like if

we're putting it away or saving it or holding on to it, we should just get rid of it.

Don't make it because there's no reason to hold on to something, don't sit at what

it's at there.

Okay.

So hanging on to things excessively to the point that they begin to pile up and over time,

like you mentioned, hoarding is kind of the worst all the way down the, you know, outside

the bell curve, right?

We're not hoarders by any means.

No, I know, I know.

So if his mom is, or if his dad is or his sister is, you can see where this is heading,

right?

You've got this thing on his mom's house is like empty.

She doesn't, and maybe that's, maybe that's it, right?

Yeah.

Maybe that's it.

I was thinking about that the other day.

Like she, I mean, she has a living room that's literally empty when my granddad passed

away.

We found old coffee cans that he had saved full of nails that he had straightened.

Why?

Because he was born and raised during the Great Depression.

Right.

Right.

And so I can look at him and say, that's crazy.

But his nervous system said, there, we might run out of nails, right?

And so if your husband grew up in a home where we have nothing, right?

It makes sense.

It doesn't make it right.

But it gives me a context that says, man, he's hanging on to stuff because he has been

a kid who said, we have nothing.

And I don't ever want my kids to feel that again.

Right.

You may have grown up in a home where cleanliness, if you're not clean, you're something wrong

with you.

I'm making something up, right?

But you might have this, there was stuff, my dad had deer heads and posters and whatever

on the wall.

I want nothing on the wall.

I need everything.

Right.

Here's what I'm getting at, fighting about the clean shelf or it's the not clean shelf

and you aren't fighting.

I know.

But you'll have discussions.

That ends up being a proxy war for.

Here's what peace feels like for me.

And tell me what peace feels like for you.

And it might be that you say, I would feel loved, a way you can love me is give me to completely

empty closets.

You could tell you that most of the closets already mine.

Well, I know you would, but we're getting, like, and for my wife, John, I know you have

tons of guitar stuff and you have your old punk rock memorabilia and you've got all your

hunting gear and your weird camo outfits, that's what she calls them, my outfits.

But they all stay in one place and she says, I don't really go in there.

And again, some of that's just like, that's how we make peace.

But it is us getting to the core thing, which is my wife really craves order and I love

her enough that I want to give her what she craves.

Right.

And my wife knows she married a guy who's always looking over the next hill to make sure

his family's okay.

And sometimes he looks over 19 hills ahead and he makes up stories and tries to, but I love

him.

And so let's, let's come to that place.

Right.

Right.

But if she was always saying, it's too cluttered to get rid of it, get rid of it.

We just need to get rid of it.

I would, my impulse would be to grab and hold.

Hmm.

I guess that makes sense because she would be enacting the exact fear I have.

Right.

Right.

Yeah, that makes sense.

And so here's the question I want you to ask each other.

Right.

Right.

Okay.

We've talked about clutter.

We've talked about decluttering.

We disagree on how we, how we do it.

All that's fine, well and good.

By the way, check out the minimalists.

They have a 30 day decluttering program.

The minimalist mom, Don Mats and she has programs for decluttering.

They're amazing and they, they go in small steps.

So they're palatable for most folks.

If you're struggling with hoarding disorder, then it's a whole other thing.

But those are the two resources that I use in my house, okay?

But get to the, this question, when it comes to decluttering, how can I best love you

while we donate and sell things to folks who will need them?

And then answer him, here's how you can love me when it comes to creating a little more

order, a little more clarity in our home.

Too much clutter does create anxiety.

And sometimes anxiety is the pathway towards accumulation and clutter, which turns into

pathological down the road.

So there is a relationship between lots of clutter and feeling anxious all the time.

And it's recursive.

Sometimes it starts one way and ends the other and sometimes it starts one way and ends

yet another.

But let's get to the thing beneath the thing beneath the thing.

We both agree.

We got to declutter.

We're not agreeing on how we can do it.

Let's wipe the table and say, okay, we got a bunch of stuff here.

I don't feel safe in a house with 72 pots and pans.

It's too much.

It's overwhelms me.

And the thought of getting rid of all of them overwhelms you, okay?

So what's a path forward for both of us?

How can I love you and how can you love me?

And my hope is, you know, I both awesome people that that means I'm going to be uncomfortable

and I'm going to give away a bunch of these pots and pans.

And also, you know what?

I've got these two closets that are completely clean.

I'm going to give him the stinkin' basement.

Fill it up, brother.

Fill it up.

As long as everybody's safe and there's no rats down there, whatever.

You know what?

Keep your box full of shenanigans, right?

It's finding that thing beneath the thing beneath the thing.

I think you all on the right track.

I think it's just part of joining families.

And I also think this is a great example of two people who love each other, both kind

of want the same thing and they don't know how to get there.

And suddenly that becomes the fight when really where I want y'all to connect is, how

can I best love you in this moment?

And loving you is going to cause me some internal discomfort and that's okay.

Because you, our marriage, are more important than me feeling all the time, both end.

You're awesome.

Thank you so much for the call.

Back a widowed woman asks if she should start dating or wait until her teenage daughter

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All right, it's got to Los Angeles, California.

And talk to Christine.

What's up, Christine?

Hi, Dr. John.

How are you?

I'm good.

How are you?

I'm good.

I have one of those questions that seems simple, but if you ask like five different people,

you'll get five different answers, right?

Yes.

But I wanted your input on it.

So I am 45 years old.

I'm a widow.

My husband was killed by a drunk driver in 2021.

Hi, good.

This gracious.

Yeah, it was, I mean, that will just pick your whole world upside down and just shake

it for years.

Yeah.

Will.

Was he awesome?

Yeah, yeah, he was.

And I miss him every day.

Yeah.

Do you all have kids?

Yeah, we have one daughter.

She was eight at the time and she'll be 13 soon.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And nightmarish last five years, huh?

Yeah, it was, it's been challenging.

I mean, I don't know how much to tell you want or not, but like the first year, we were

just basically in shock.

And then, you know, the second year, I focused on my daughter in like helping her process

the grief and everything.

And then, you know, year three, we were kind of like, um, the year three is when I sort

of like, when she was getting better, that's when I sort of allowed myself to fall apart

a little bit and process my own grief, you know, with the help of therapists and all

of that.

And then year four was kind of like finding a new normal.

And then this past year, year five, we've sort of been, you know, like coming into our

own.

So.

Can I just applaud you?

Is that okay?

Oh, yeah.

Thank you.

I appreciate that.

Like, that's the most beautiful picture of an awful situation.

I think I've heard somebody paint in a long, long time.

Oh, thank you.

Well, you know, it's easy to, you know, when you look back on it, yeah, I mean, you

here to describe it.

Yeah.

It's a numbing zombie like nightmare.

Yeah.

But you look back and you can kind of see some order to it.

And you have handled this so amazing as a mom and as a, as a friend and as a widow.

My God.

Like awesome.

Well, thank you so much.

I really appreciate that.

Amazing.

Amazing.

So my question is, you know, we're both in a good place right now.

Like, she's got a good group of friends.

She's doing well in school and, you know, I've got a good social support network.

And I found some balance in my life and we kind of like, you know, we sort of sunk

into a new normal.

And so my question is, should I wait until she is grown to start dating?

Because in today's society, you have to date with intention.

And so it kind of feels like, you know, going to look for a job in some ways.

And I don't want to take, I don't want to mess up what we have, you know what I mean?

Like, I don't want to open Pandora's box.

Yeah.

On the other hand, Carpe Diem, and then there's like this idea of maybe she needs, you

know, a male figure in her life as an example.

So I just kind of wanted your thoughts on that.

You won't like my answer.

Is that okay?

Is that okay?

Okay.

Okay.

Yeah.

Let's hear it.

Um, I got two things you won't like.

One, one you might roll your eyes at and that's totally okay.

Okay.

And it's easy for me to say because as of this moment, I'm not dating, right?

I'm like you, I'm one car ride away from my whole life changing, right?

Right.

Right.

Right.

Right now, I'm not dating.

So it's easy for me to say what I'm about to say.

Okay.

I reject wholeheartedly what the umbrella culture is telling us about dating.

Okay.

So I want you to join me in rejecting job application, ask LinkedIn profile, ask type of meeting

people.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, I did, I did sort of dip my toes on the water last year.

I wasn't really ready, but I tried the dating apps and got all money.

No, they're worthless.

They're, they're totally worthless.

They're not, by the way, once you, when you turn 45, the woman, all of a sudden, the

cute guys completely disappeared.

Just get out of that madness.

Yes.

Yes.

I'm out.

I'm done.

Yes.

No more of that.

Yeah.

Okay.

Very, very strong.

What do you do for a living?

I'm a tenured faculty.

Okay.

Yes.

You're very smart.

And also, you know how to like follow insane people's protocols to get with you.

Like, let me say this way, you're a catch.

Okay.

Oh, thank you.

I appreciate that.

So don't get on, you're not applying for nothing.

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah.

That helps.

By flipping that around and saying, I'm worth having fun.

And I'm worth having fun with.

And I am not going to outsource my belief in myself to stupid algorithms.

I'm not going to outsource.

I'm not going to sell.

I'm not going to change how I interact with the world because this is what quote unquote

culture is telling me culture is insane right now.

Yes.

So they don't get to tell me anything.

Yes.

Right.

I'm going to solve for peace.

Right now, solving for peace might be feeling like you're 14 again.

Like does he like me?

And do I like him?

And am I ready?

And all those like feelings come back?

Right.

That's so scary.

It's terrifying.

Yeah.

And you know this.

What's your field of study?

Anthropology.

Okay.

Okay.

You especially know this.

Yeah.

The only good stuff is on the other side of those feelings.

Yeah.

That's true.

Right.

You know that.

So here's the second thing you're going to really hate.

Do not, and this is going to sound like an accusation.

It kind of is, but same team, right?

Don't please don't cast your anxious anxiousness on her.

Oh, no.

Yeah.

What she needs is a regulated, sturdy, joyful mom who also has real human emotions.

The good stuff, the bad stuff, the whatever.

And so you're not going to mess her up just because you started dating.

If you compromise your values, if you're not honest with her, if you hide stuff from her,

that will mess her up.

Okay.

Okay.

But and how old is she?

She's almost 13.

Okay.

So we can just expect for the next five years, she will judge everything you do or don't

do.

She'll make up stories.

And her stories will be largely inaccurate, but that's because she's 13, not because

she's a survivor of, right?

Okay.

Yeah.

It will intensify those feelings.

It will intensify those judgments.

But having a mom who has paused her life for the next five years is also a meta lesson

that she will absorb.

Oh, yeah.

That's now that you put it like that.

I see your point.

Yeah.

She's 15 and you sit down with her and you're sobbing and she's like, what happened?

And you say, I just got dumped.

That might be the greatest gift you ever give her.

Moving forward.

Yeah.

That's a good point.

Right.

Yeah.

I just had, I've heard so many horror stories and, you know, how it can go wrong for single

moms and, you know, there's some real creeps out there, but I do think that I at least

hope have the ability to detect them before they, you know, are allowed in my personal

space.

Sure.

So I feel like what you're saying is really helpful because I feel like I'm sort of standing

on the line.

And if I were, if it was just me, I would take the next step.

But it's because I'm a mom first above all else.

Yep.

That's what the, the hesitation is where that's coming from.

You know,

Well, I think that hesitation is right and good and anybody you meet that would be interested

in pursuing a relationship with you should be a honorable steward of that of the order

of things.

Yeah.

Right.

Yeah.

And so like you're a data nerd like me, we both know that bringing in non-biological

men in the presence of teenage daughters increases a risk factor significantly, right?

We both know that.

Yeah.

Yeah.

We're going to be extra conscious you and I would be extra, extra conscious of that

risk.

Right.

Right.

Right.

But it's still a risk worth taking, not just for myself, but like you said, for her, I

mean, in the end, like that's what I mean, you know, that's my overarching.

I want to, I want to be the best mom.

I can be, you know, not that I'm perfected by any means.

But I want to try to get things as right as much as I can, you know, so.

And so the greatest gift you can give your, your daughter who's had her whole life carved

in half.

Yeah.

Right.

Is here is what a strong, confident woman does next.

Yeah.

And that doesn't mean getting it right all the time.

It means saying, well, I messed that up and I made a mistake here and I learned here.

And that is it.

That is the metagift that parents can pass along to their kids and you're not doing things

that violate your values.

Yeah.

Right.

And you not asking a 13 year old for their permission because a 13 year old can't bear

that weight.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

Right.

But also holding her when she finds out you're going on a third day with a guy and she

says, he'll never be dead and you're just giving up a holding her and saying, knowing

in your, in your guts, that's not accurate.

But your feelings are very real and I'm not, I'm not scared of your feelings and I'll

wait through them and hold you because you're my daughter.

Yeah.

Cool.

Well, thank you so much.

That all makes for a lot of sense.

Can I ask one more personal question?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Go ahead.

What's his name?

Will.

No, not him.

Oh.

You got your eyes on somebody.

Who is it?

Oh.

Not right now.

I don't come on.

Christine.

I really did.

I really did for a while.

I put my, you know, as they say in friends, like I grabbed several spoons, right?

And I tried, you know, I tried like meeting people in the real world, which is super awkward

and I tried, I sort of tried a couple of dating apps and I went on a couple of dates

and it, but I wasn't ready.

So I, and so I really did just, you know, turn it all off and stop and just take time

to fully process and, you know, this last year, I sort of, what I did actually was I,

I made an agreement with myself to go out, like take myself out in a date once a month.

So you know, I would go to like a local, you know, Broadway show or check out a local band

or something like that.

And if a friend wanted to go with me, that's fine, but otherwise I would just go by myself.

And so I took that time to have adult time outside of the house and to intentionally just

sort of be single for a while and not really, and sort of like show the concept of dating.

And so now I'm starting to, now I feel like I, like maybe I'm going to pick it back up.

But like I said, I was hesitating because I'm like, maybe, because I do have friends that,

you know, they'll say, yes, you should definitely wait.

Don't even think about bringing a man.

And I've got other friends who are like, oh, yeah, sleep with his many men or date as many

men as you want, but just pretend like you're not doing it, like just act like you're not

doing it.

Okay.

So both of those sets of friends are idiots never listening in for anything, for anything.

Right.

Well, you know, people give advice based on their personal experiences and their experiences.

They give their advice based on their, on their social media profile, like just on their

algorithm feed.

So both of those advices are so stupid, right?

Yeah.

Okay.

But like the path you're taking is awesome.

Here's where grief will set in in a heavy way.

Okay.

Okay.

And you're like, I've already had enough, but there's still more to come.

Grief number one, path one might be, you realize I'm married my guy and he's gone.

Yeah.

And so I go on some dates, I even flirt with getting serious, I'm with a couple of

them and they can't compete that which means I'm going to grieve because my right or

die is gone and I'm going to put a period at the end of that sentence.

Yeah.

And that will be, that will be heavy, right?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Or you meet somebody else who lights you up like a Christmas tree.

You start having fun and then you get all those crazy things like I never would have met

you if, right?

And how am I allowed to have fun here when this happened over here, right?

And all of that is completely normal and you grieve it and you just keep going forward

anyway.

And so I guess I'll tell you that because not a right path forward, the only wrong path

is if your daughter knows you or she is your entire world, that weight will crush her.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And I believe her and goes to concerts and mom has friends and over time, sitting down

and saying, hey, it's been five years or six years, I'm dating somebody.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I would not tell my 13 year old on first date number one, I wouldn't do that.

Yeah.

But I wouldn't lie if they asked.

Yeah.

Is that fair?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Absolutely.

100%.

I recently read this, the greatest place for somebody in what I would call middle age

to meet somebody, just get silly about asking your friends to hook you up with somebody

awesome.

I've done that and I always get the answer like, oh, my friends are a single or single

for a reason.

That's the first time I've always here.

Well, keep it that and maybe they're single for one reason but not, I don't know, dude.

But I, I think we all forgot that most of us had our first boyfriend or girlfriend

and we were younger, especially those of us in our 40s or like in our 80s, like Kelly,

like because someone's like, dude, I know someone who likes you or I have a friend who

and we've just kind of given that up for the res, like you said, the resume and the dating

app world.

And it's like, no, dude, you're my closest friends.

You know me, if you think there's somebody that I might be interested in or might have

a good time with, dude, give me their number.

And again, it feels like we're 15 all over again.

But and we forget how nervous that racking all that was, but here we are, right?

You're awesome.

And I'll just tell you again, I'm how you've navigated this over the last five years.

Awesome.

Shout out to Will for being a great husband and a great father and leaving a great legacy.

And shout out to you, Christine, for saying, okay, I've still got half my life left.

What's that going to look like?

I get to choose it.

That looks like I'm going to take intentional steps into that.

That's awesome.

And to your friends who give you bad advice, stop talking, right?

Thank you so much for the call, sister.

We come back.

A woman asks how to help her husband understand her postpartum depression.

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All right.

Let's go out to the skogies and how do I say that?

I'm just a skogie from Ms. Skogie.

What's that song?

An Oki from Ms. Skogie.

Oki from Ms. Skogie.

I blew that one.

Well, she's from Oklahoma City, so not any of that.

Let's go out to Oklahoma City and talk to Elise, what's up, Elise?

Hi, how are you?

I'm doing all right.

How about you?

I'm okay.

What's going on?

I kind of just need help in how to talk to my husband about my postpartum struggles.

I was diagnosed with postpartum depression when I was about a month postpartum.

Oh, man.

How long ago was that?

Well, my son just turned six months, so about five months ago, I think I was struggling

well before that, though, because I had a pretty traumatic pregnancy and delivery, so it

was all just really hard, but when I would go to talk to my husband about it, all I would

forget was, I don't know what you want me to say, you know, try some medication, so on

and so forth.

And I've been struggling with trying to get him to understand the last five months, and

our marriage is really kind of at a point where either he, you know, offers some support

and tries to understand, or I'm not sure where we go from here.

Okay.

I'm sorry you've been going through this.

Thank you.

Being, feeling like you're being betrayed by your own body is terrifying, huh?

It is.

It's awful.

Yeah.

And then feeling like your right or die isn't helping or isn't being supportive is even

more nightmares, right?

Yeah.

That is.

Yeah.

So take away.

I've got some ideas on how y'all can move forward when it comes to the particular question

you ask me, but I want to ask a broader question.

Okay.

What else are y'all not connecting or where else are y'all missing each other?

Um, I would say intimacy is really hard for me right now, like just it's overwhelming.

Um, and for him, like, that's what he wants, that's what he needs to connect to me.

And like, I don't want that right now.

And it's been really hard to try to push through that for him.

I think especially because I've felt neglected, you know, pretty much since we got home

from the hospital.

Yeah.

Um, pushing through ends today.

Okay.

Okay.

Okay.

We're not going to do guilt sex, we're not going to do coerced sex, we're not going

to do, or he's going to leave me sex.

Okay.

Okay.

Same team.

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah.

Yeah.

He wants sex, I get that, he wants to be with you, I get that, but there's a level of

compassion.

There's just basic human kindness, right?

Missing here, right?

Right.

Um, I'm going to tell you, I'm going to give you a path, but it's not going to be the

one you want to hear.

Is that okay?

Yeah.

Okay.

Here's what I want you to at least give him a chance with.

Okay.

Okay.

It's easy for me where I'm sitting to say he's failing you.

Right.

I'll also admit that when my wife was struggling, I did not know what to do, and I also

didn't know what to do, except I knew that when I try to fix her or fix things in her

life, that's not the right answer either.

And so I remember the powerless feeling.

Okay.

Right.

I'm not giving him a pass at all in any way, shape or fashion, but I do want to give you

a context.

Okay.

Okay.

The question I would have for you is give me a few examples, a few things that he could

do starting today that would make you feel loved and seen and known and begin to reestablish

safety underneath your feet.

Oh, gosh.

The loaded question.

Just start ripping them off.

Oh, I want to shower without having to ask for permission.

That'd be one.

Who do you have to ask permission to shower from?

Pretty much him.

What?

What about that?

Well, you know, if I go to shower, not even five minutes later, the baby will start

screaming and he'll bring him in and basically be like, I can't handle it.

Here he is.

And I'll be either in the middle of my shower and, you know, I'm working mom.

I work two jobs and I'm a student as well.

So, you know, at the end of the day when I come home and I've been at work all day long

and I come home and, you know, our son is teething, so that's a lot and I want 20 minutes

to myself in the shower, you know, so like lately, I've had to be like very stern of please

don't bother me or have to lock the door.

That's been really hard to try to convey to him like, can I have 20 minutes to myself?

But I'm not being crawled on.

I'm not being touched.

Right.

Nobody needs me.

Yeah.

But it's always at the point like, I know that 20 minutes is going to end and then it's

all going to start up again, you know, give me another example of a way he can love you.

He used to do really small gestures for me.

I mean, like he would bring me a drink when he come home from work or he would bring

me flowers and then I don't really remember the last time I got flowers or anything like

that.

Bids for your affection.

Little tiny signals that showed he cares about you.

Yeah.

Okay.

What else?

Um, I don't think that we've had any like dates since we've had our son.

I don't even think that we had a date while I was pregnant.

Okay.

What else?

I don't know.

I don't know.

Maybe just take over a little bit more with the kids, so it's not all on me.

Okay.

So here's what I want you to do, and this is very unholy wood.

This is very un-sexy, this is very un-all of those things.

Being angry with him and being pissed off at him, and by the way, I'm angry at him right

now just so you know, okay, which is unfair because he's not on the phone.

Yeah.

Um, but I'm also trying to remember holding a toddler who was screaming and I didn't

know what to do.

And I thought I was doing something wrong, and I was so scared of hurting my kid, of

messing something up, that I didn't know what to do.

I didn't know what to do.

I remember that feeling.

It's, again, not a con, not an excuse, but being clear with yourself on.

Here's what I need, and here's more importantly, here's what I want, right where that gets

very vulnerable is, you saying, when I get home, I want to give you a hug for 30 seconds,

and then I'm going to go take a shower, and I'm going to be out of sight out of pocket

for 40 minutes.

You're on your own with the kid, you're a good dad, you all have fun, make it work, and

if he screams, he screams, if he cries, he cries, that's part of being a parent.

All right.

I want to want you again, and so here's what must be true.

I refuse to be coerced into sex anymore, because that's not loving, and it makes me feel

used.

Yeah.

And not even you used to, I would like you to send me text messages throughout the day

that tell me you're thinking about me.

I would like you to plan one day to week, and I'll come home and take my 40-minute shower,

but this one will be 30 minutes.

I'll even set up the babysitter, but I want you to set up a date, and I want us to go

on a date.

Yeah.

Okay.

I want you to give him as clear a road map as possible, and I know it's cool and invoked

to beat up on guys, but they should just know you're right, but we don't.

Right.

Right.

Right.

Right.

So part of me feels like he doesn't know how to handle it, so he just chooses not to

in a way.

There's a very fair, very fair.

And you've probably seen him figure out how to fix the mower, how to figure out how to

do other stuff, and it's like, we'll just figure out how to do this.

I get that.

Right.

And you're right.

Exactly.

You're exactly right.

And here we are.

It goes back to the, like, it's a thing I've been preaching for several years, which is,

he can be frustrated that things aren't the way they should be, or we can choose reality

and march on from here.

Yeah.

Yeah, that makes sense.

I think some of my frustration comes from, I feel like he's being very selfish right

now, whereas I'm having to be very selfless in everything that I do.

Yes.

I mean, my career being a mom, putting all my other free time into being a student.

Is he working?

Yeah, he works.

Okay.

So we were both under a firm on his stress, but I'm not using it as an excuse to, you

know, not do anything, but he did make a comment to me the other day.

He's like, I just want my wife back into me that felt very selfish because, I mean,

I want, I want me back too, but this has been hard.

It's been very hard.

And I would have advised him to not say that in that way, but you can also hear that as

he loves you and he doesn't know how to connect with you anymore, and he used to know

how to do that.

And so I, again, wrong way to say it, but let me put it this way.

We get to make up whatever story we want about what he said.

We can make up the story.

You don't have the same body you used to have, you're too busy for me now.

You can make up that story and it might be true or we can make up the story.

This guy still loves me and he doesn't know, he doesn't know how to connect with me

now that both of our lives are completely different.

One of those stories has at least an opportunity to work out in y'all's favor.

The other story ends in scorekeeping and contempt and resentment and then it's over.

Yeah.

And you're really hard to not keep the score.

Yeah, you're well, I mean, it's so hard to not keep score.

Plus, especially when it's 1,000 to zero, right?

And so you've probably heard me say this over and over again.

When you have a child, especially your first child, the marriage you had is over.

It doesn't exist anymore.

And the exercise is, all right, now we get to choose to build a new marriage.

Are you in?

I felt like maybe I was the only one that understood that things would end our marriage

at least would change a bit.

Yes.

And maybe he didn't understand or maybe still not understanding that, you know, it probably

won't go back to the way it was before we had kids.

It will never go back.

We could do what we wanted.

Yeah, so we didn't work this much.

Y'all can have sex and everything you wanted.

Y'all can go out whenever you wanted.

Y'all had money to spare.

Like you had everything.

You had energy.

Right.

Yeah, that is over.

And here's what's awesome.

Y'all get to choose with a new set of variables, what your life looks like moving forward

inside of a new context.

And it's a different kind of awesome.

Yeah, that's very true.

Right.

But there's an intentionality to it.

And if he was on the phone with me, trust me, let him have it.

You know, I would.

But what I'm more concerned about with you is the clearer you can get on how you would

like to be loved in the next two weeks, and then we're going to revisit it again.

Okay.

The clearer you can be for yourself, which is hard when you're struggling with postpartum,

right?

Mm-hmm.

Everything feels like everything, right?

Is that fair?

Yeah, that's fair.

What's the manifestations of your postpartum?

A lot of anger, no sleeping.

I had really bad anxiety at the beginning, but I think that's at least getting better.

Okay.

Was it physical or was it thoughts or was it both?

More physical.

Okay.

Yeah.

Okay.

So.

But I have a newfound appreciation for all the women in the world who've had basic.

Oh, yeah.

I mean, it's, it's wild.

Sure.

It's wild.

Yeah.

And it prepares you for it, for sure.

And sitting down with him and saying, you have been very selfish lately.

He will feel that in his guts right or wrong as a declaration of war, as yet another

way he's failing.

Yeah.

His wife doesn't like him anymore, he can't make his own baby stop crying.

He feels useless in his own house.

It's a failure factory.

Yeah.

Or you can say, hey, we've got a brand new marriage now.

The marriage we had is over, we get to choose what everyone we want it to look like.

I've got a road map for how you can best love me over the next two weeks.

And because of the pace of change, we're both students, we're both working a bunch of

jobs, our kid is going to be a different human in the next six months.

This will change.

Here's how you can reconnect with me.

And then that's vulnerable because he might look at you and say, I'm not doing that.

And now we have to deal with that.

Yeah.

But that's a, that's a, that's a more honest path than creating stories, judging those

stories and finding yourself, I'm about to leave this guy, which is how this calls started.

Right.

Oh, that's fair.

And it's none of this is a pass on him.

But it's just trafficking in reality.

Yeah.

I think it's hard to see things from an outside perspective when you feel like you're

drowning.

And especially when the person who's supposed to reach out and pull you out of the water

isn't helping.

Yeah.

Totally.

Totally.

Yeah.

That's fair.

Well, I appreciate that.

Thank you very much.

I hate that you're feeling so alone right now.

I hate that he's acting like this.

Oh.

It might be too.

But.

Yeah.

Okay.

But that contempt that's going to, I mean, it's going to melt y'all, right?

Yeah.

Well, his actions are going to melt your response to the actions.

I mean, it just creates this, this downward spiral.

It's really hard to dig out of unless somebody just calls it and says, Hey, we're going

to start new today.

Here is a road map to me.

Will you walk this road?

There.

Okay.

I mean, that's great because so far, I feel like it's just been a melting pot of emotions.

Yeah.

Well, and there's been no way out so far.

Yeah.

And it's hard to describe to somebody like, Hey, every one of my emotions feels like

they're on fire right now, right?

And he said this, he asked us in a very unhelpful, insensitive way.

But what do you want me to do about it?

Yeah.

I would have popped up like, dude, don't say that.

What's the matter with you?

And also, I remember feeling so helpless.

Yeah.

I remember getting to the place where I thought the greatest gift I can give my wife

and my new child is to not be at this house.

Yeah.

And I know that he probably feels that way.

I mean, he works 24 hour shifts and he's told me, you know, I can feel like you enjoy

it when I'm at work.

And you can say, I do because the house has peace, right?

And so let's decide how we want this house to feel when we both walk in.

What must be true?

Right.

If he walks in the door, arms wide open, ready to help, but he just support and love

you, ready to give you your 45 minutes of no one's like just you, right?

Mm-hmm.

Then you suddenly have a little bit more space, a little bit more margin.

Yeah.

Right.

And then holding his hand is a place of safety.

It's not a, oh God, here we go.

Yeah.

That's what it felt like a lot lately.

Right.

When I don't want a marriage to feel like a obligation, you know?

Yeah.

I get that, but there is, there are obligations in a marriage.

There are for sure.

Right.

There's responsibilities.

There's things you do for a person so that you see them and know them and celebrate

the crap out of them.

And yes, challenge them sometimes.

Man, I, a, a, I, man, my heart is split open for anyone going through postpartum right

now.

It's just a nightmare being betrayed by your own body.

I mean, I can't even, I can't even wrap my head around with that must be like, and my

heart goes out to husbands who literally are wide eyed, I don't know what to do next.

And so creating a map, here's a road where you follow it is a scary, vulnerable thing.

But he just might follow it.

And then if he gives you a map, you might be able to have some space to then say, okay,

I can walk down that road too.

And suddenly you'll have a path back to each other.

And that's my hope for every marriage, every marriage.

Thank you for the call, sister.

We'll be right back.

This show is sponsored by Better Health.

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All right, we're back.

Hey, go to the app store and download the together app by Dr. John Deloney.

If you're married, it will transform your marriage with microhabits, daily actions that

can change everything in your marriage.

Go download it, Android folks, we're coming, we've got some guys working on it.

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The together app.

Go check it out.

All right, Kelly, am I the problem?

Go for it.

So this is from Brianna in Raleigh, North Carolina, and she writes, I recently found a tattoo

that I decided I would like to get for my daughter who's two years old, so not getting it for

the daughter.

Right.

Let's make sure we're clear on that.

She's getting it in on her off.

It's a personalized tattoo.

My mother kindly offered to pay for it as a gift to me.

She later informed me that she was also going to get the same tattoo.

Am I the problem for not wanting her to?

I didn't hear what you said.

It was into that.

That's the, you know what, that's the best hold my beer ever.

She just said I'm out of the problem for not wanting her to get the same tattoo.

No, that's weird.

And also, what a way to get your kid to not get a tattoo.

To be like, oh, that's awesome.

I'm going to get the exact same one.

But what if she's not doing it for that reason?

What if she's legit?

I mean, that's why I took it as just been like, oh my god, I love that idea.

I want to get the same one.

So there's either is she being manipulative or is she just being oblivious?

Yeah.

If she's being either way, I would say, mom, like I want you to come up with your own

design.

I want you, us to get tattoos together, I think that's awesome.

But I want this to be special between me and my daughter.

I want you to make up a designer, get a design that's good for you too.

And if she says no, I'm getting that exact one, I literally wouldn't get that tattoo.

I had never thought of that before.

But that's going in my arsenal.

When my son comes home and goes, dude, I'm going to go get this tattoo or I just got this

tattoo.

I'm going to go get the exact same one.

I think that's hilarious, unless it's like a limp biscuit tattoo or something and I'll

probably hold out.

But you know what?

I might get that one just because I think that's, I think that's such a great move.

If your kid's like, dude, I want to get which tattoos.

Sweet.

I'll get the exact ones.

That's so good.

Hank's tattoo would be some 90s country artist.

Oh, I do.

I'd be like a Garthburg tattoo.

Hank Williams with like, yes, exactly.

Yeah.

He thinks tattoos are obnoxious and ridiculous.

He's pretty judgmental of his father and he's sadly right about a lot of them, but

alas.

Alas.

Now, my daughter on the other hand, I think she's going to be sleeved up.

Love you guys.

Bye.