Should I Adopt My Wife’s Son?
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Coming up on the Dr. John Deloney Show. When we got together, I had told my wife that I wanted to adopt her oldest because of the struggles with my marriage. It's making me extremely hesitant to kind of go through that process. And I just, I don't know, I'm reaching out and need some help with that. I appreciate you reaching out, man.

What's up, what's up, what's up? This is John with the Dr. John Deloney Show. I'm so glad that you're here. Talking about your marriage, your emotional health, your relationships.

Kids, whatever you got going on in your world, your mental health, whatever you got going on in your world, I'm here. I'm going to sit with you and we're going to figure out what's the next right thing to do. You want to be on the show, it's real people going to do real stuff, man. So we don't talk about hypotheticals on here. We talk about real people's lives. If you want to be on the show, give me a buzz at 1-844-693-3291. It's 1-844-693-3291 or go to johndeloney.com slash ask, A-S-K.

Let's roll out to Denver CEO and talk to James. What up, James? Hey, Dr. John. How you doing? I'm good, brother. How are you, man? You know, I'm hanging in there. Excellent. What's up? Yeah. So I'm just going to read what I wrote into the show. And it's kind of all of my thoughts kind of combined together and just kind of want to go from there, if that's all right. Let's do it, man. All right. So...

Currently 33. Um, I was previously married and I met a wonderful woman, um, after, after my divorce and, you know, the divorce has been challenging. Um, in between that time I had kind of got caught up in the red pill movement and it just kind of sucked me in. And, you know, that's, um,

It's provided a lot of struggles for our marriage. The woman that I'm with now, my wife, she had two boys from previous relationships. Shortly after we got together, we found out we were pregnant. We had my wonderful daughter. We got married right before that happened. We just had another girl about three months ago.

Originally, when we got together, I had told my wife that I wanted to adopt her oldest. He's currently five. And because of the struggles with my marriage, because of the difficulties with that, we have a lot of baggage from our childhood as well. It's making me extremely hesitant to kind of go through that process and

I just, I don't know. I'm reaching out and need some help with that. I appreciate you reaching out, man. Um, it's not easy to reach out, is it? No, it's, it's really not. Yeah. So, um, normally in this situation, I can feel it in my own body. Like my desire, like, um, and this is me just being honest with you. Okay. I feel like coming at you. And I also feel that's not the right move here. I actually think you're trying hard and I appreciate that. Okay.

Yeah. Tell me about this red pill movement. Well, I, you know, I was previously married. It was an extremely difficult marriage. I learned a lot. I grew a lot. What's the red pill movement? Don't avoid it. Just go right through it. Yeah. Sorry about that. So the red pill movement is just kind of a reaction to, as they determine, somebody

And so it kind of sprung out of the men's rights movement, kind of started back in the 90s. And so it's very masculine. It's very... They determine...

Value, it seems, based on almost kind of a money type system. So if you don't bring certain market value to a relationship, then you're not valuable. It kind of downplays women. Again, it's a very dominant kind of thing.

And so... So why are you allowing this nonsense to, A, destroy...

Because I can tell you don't believe it. I can tell it's comforting, but you don't believe it. And it's just so stupid on its face, right? It's almost not even worth talking about except it's destroying young men and young marriages and by proxy those little kids, right? But you know that, yet there's something about it that's enticing you that's worth in a weird way. It's worth this marriage, right?

Are you finding yourself falling deeper for this woman and you're scared you're going to get hurt again? And this acts as a buffer. Like what, what, what, what is this obsession with wealth and with money and with your rights and you putting her down? What, what is, what's, what is that that's worth this woman that you love?

So, growing up, I, you know, when I was younger, my dad was, he was always there. And then when I became a teenager, he kind of walked out on us. Okay. And so, it just is. Hang on a second. Hang on a second. Hang on a second. You're good. You're good. Why did he leave? Why did he leave? So, um...

My mom gave him a decision to either change or get divorced, and he decided to kind of continue in his ways. What did she want him to change? So he had been unfaithful to her multiple times. Okay. And you realize that you're taking his roadmap and you're recreating it just play by play. Yeah, and that's... He's an original red pillar. Right. That's the worst part about it is... I know, I know. You know... I know.

I know. That's why I'm not yelling at you, but I'm just putting it out on the table. You're doing like he wants to do what he wants to do when he wants to do it. He's going to have his utility. That's going to be his identity, who he sleeps in the wake of hurt in his path, whether it's his wife or his children. He could give two craps about. Right. How old are you when he left? So they separated when I was 13. How long was it bad before that?

Uh, you know, honestly, my parents kept it from my sister and I, and so I'm not entirely, they didn't, I promise you. Well, it's, I might've been oblivious to it, but it didn't, it, everything seemed to be okay. Um, I know a couple of months before that there, I could tell there was something different. Um,

But other than that, they pretty much set us down. Well, my dad set my sister and I down when I was 13 and said, hey, you know, things aren't working. We're going to have to separate. Here's what he should have said. I don't care about you. I care about sleeping around and running around on your mother. I don't care about covenant. I don't care about my vows. I don't care about integrity. And I especially don't care about you and your sister. Yeah. It's rude for me to flip you guys off, but that's what I'm going to do.

Screw you two. Y'all are on your own. I'm out. That's what he should have said because that would have been the honest path. And his final act before he left was to be a coward and lie to you. We just need to go our separate ways. No, we don't. I quit on you and your mom. And I hate that for you because now you got a 13-year-old little boy that is scratching and clawing for a picture of what masculinity looks like.

And here comes a bunch of jerk offs on, on the internet to say, well, here's a picture of that. And it's just not. And then accidentally, and I do it too, man. Accidentally, we follow the same path that we're trying to, that we want so desperately to be bad. I mean, be different in the world. We just get right in on that same set of train tracks. And suddenly we're like, oh my gosh, how do we end up here? And you are about to blow up a second marriage over this stuff. Right.

You're about to walk out on a five-year-old little boy that knows you as dad. I haven't given up on him. I know. It has nothing to do with him, my friend. This has to do with James, with you. Yeah, I know. You're about to give up on you just like your dad gave up on him. Don't do it. You're stronger than that. And this isn't an internet meme. And this isn't flashy cars and dudes walking around with a bunch of other dudes without shirts on doing kickboxing videos.

It's way, way harder to stay plugged in with a five-year-old and to find desire and sexual intimacy and romance with four kids, five and under. Way harder to do that than it is to walk around without your shirt on, like doing internet, like, uh...

Dogecoin trades and lifting weights. That is so jokingly, comically easy compared to being a husband who stays plugged in with his kids. Stays plugged in with his wife. It's way harder. So take the hard path. Don't take the coward path. Take the hard path. Is that fair? Yeah, no, that's... So why is your marriage struggling right now? We... Well, part of it...

My wife and I had a conversation the other day, and she had told me she feels that our marriages, it's fine that couples fight. They have challenges. They have difficulties. But it's not abnormal to go through and face challenges.

And from my perspective, I just look at the history of our relationship and just how challenging and how rocky it's been. I don't know if that's necessarily me projecting, you know, my past failures and insecurities on relationships or, you know, there, there, there's probably a better balance in there, but it's probably, it's probably both. And it's probably both. And, um, my guess is that your body has put a GPS pin in marriage and any relationship

Any slight perceived crack in the foundation, your body's like, let's get out of here. Let's run. Let's run. Absolutely. And she's exactly right. If you care about something, you disagree with it. You lean into it. Right. You fight. You push back and forth. Fight is a dramatic word. I don't like that word. But there's conflict. I want it this way. She wants it that way. And then we navigate this thing that we're building together, right? That's part of every relationship. And did she grow up in a chaotic home?

Uh, absolutely. Absolutely. Her, uh, so her dad was always there. Wonderful man. Um, her mom has, she's been diagnosed with, um, schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. All right, there you go. That's all I need to know. So, yeah, that's in your wife's nervous system. Love looks like chaos and loud.

You know, it's – to some extent I kind of laugh because she's always wanting to watch the Kardashians, and I'm like, why do you want to introduce that to – why would you want to sit there and watch that? It's just chaos, and then I just kind of have to remind myself that's comfort for her to what she's used to. Right, but that doesn't make it healthy.

No. And what both of you are going to have to choose. Here's the thing I want you to keep in mind. Okay. And we'll get to the, we'll get to the adopting this, this young little boy here in a second. What y'all are going to have to both decide and keep in mind is everything that happens next. Y'all get to choose everything to walk away, to scream and yell and kick and punch. And instead of learning and practicing what peace feels like,

And I want you to tell your wife this. When I met my, after I'd been seeing my counselor for months and months and months and months, she asked me how I was feeling. And I said, I know this isn't the case intellectually or psychologically, but I feel depressed and I'm not. I'm as happy as I could be. And she started laughing and she goes, yeah, this is normal. You've never felt that.

And I started laughing. And I've been having to practice running a little bit lower because my engine was running so hot for so long. And my parents aren't schizophrenic, right? Yeah. And so your wife's going to have to practice peace. And it's going to be jittery and hard. You are going to have to practice not withdrawing and running. Because here's the loop you get into. I can almost guarantee it. She gets hot about something. You withdraw. Your body goes... And either...

She gets louder to come find you and catch you and make sure you're still present, which sends you running even further. Or when you go hide, your little red pill cartoon comes up to protect you. And you'll get in this loop-de-loop-de-loop-de-loop until you both run out of gas or maybe you'll have sex again or one of you storms off and then you come back and you'll watch TV and it goes into a state of numbness until the whole cycle kicks back up again. Does that sound familiar?

That's mostly it. It's the only slight difference is she has told me that she wants to leave me multiple times. That's, that's kind of the only difference. Okay. I think she's testing you. That's fair. I think she is reaching out to say, please don't let me go. And she can feel your body is already one and a half feet out of the boat. You just have your heel still in the boat. She can feel it. Yeah.

And if you walk up close to her and you put your hand gently on the back of her neck underneath her hair and you look at her in the eyes and you hold her other hand and you say, I will never leave you. You are not strong enough to push me away. You can walk away, but I will never leave you.

Yeah. I, so I haven't done it in that way, but I've told her, you know, we're, we're in this to, I, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. When you say that we're in this, we made a pro no, not about we right now. It's about me. My dad left. I left my first marriage. I will not leave you.

I will not leave these kids. You cannot push me away. And I will keep showing up. And when she gets loud and smashes stuff, because that's what she knows, I'm not saying she has permission to be abusive, nothing like that. And you can say, I can't be here when you're yelling and screaming, when you're ready to talk. You know that I'm never going anywhere.

And you can go out on the front porch. You can walk around outside. You can go for a walk without quote unquote leaving. Right. Yeah. But what I'm saying is when things get hot, you stay present. Be the calm in the storm. You can look at her and say, I love you. I'm not going anywhere. I'm going to ask you to stop talking to me like that. I'm going to ask you to stop yelling. It's not safe for these kids and it's not safe for us. And here's the deal, brother. She could leave you. That could happen. Yeah.

But you trying to not risk that is cutting off the oxygen supply to the whole relationship. Okay? Yeah, it feels like that's kind of the...

the circle that I keep finding myself in. I want to break it. It's just... Good. So here's how you break it. You head straight into it. With calmness and peace, drop your shoulders. Sometimes it's as simple as, can we hug right now? Can we have a 30-second hug? And we'll complete this conversation. And let her feel how slow your heart rate is. If you need to take a knee and hold both of her hands...

And say how I've talked to you and how I've treated you, how I've acted like I was above you. I've stupid crap. I got off the internet. I'm sorry. I let you down. Those days are over. If you have to cancel your YouTube account and start over to get that nonsense out of your feed, do that. She's worth that. Those little kids y'all created together are worth that. And then when it gets to this little boy, this isn't about him. This is about you. This is about your marriage. If y'all are going to stay married. Yeah, I'm a huge support of you.

Bringing this whole family together legally, right? 100% confident in that. But you have to decide my feet are in concrete. I will never leave. I made a covenant. I made a blood oath. I'm in this till death do us part.

And then we get to choose every moment that comes next. Every moment of yelling, every moment of peace, every moment of chaos, every moment of desire, every moment of picking up my phone and scrolling and turning on the Kardashians versus holding hands and making out. I get to choose every single thing that comes next. And the question I'll ask you, James, is what are you going to choose?

The hard path, the path of being a dad to four kids under the age of five and trying to figure out intimacy and sex and romance and connection in a hurricane because that's what your house is right now. Are you going to take the coward's path? The red pill path. Take your shirt off and do Kung Fu videos and lift weights and snort protein powder. Yeah. And trade Bitcoin or or sell essential oils, which is the same pyramid scheme.

You get to pick, man. And I'm going to pick the hard path every single time. Every time. And it sounds like you're done taking the coward's easy path. I'm proud of you. Hang on the line. I'm going to send you a copy of Building a Non-Anxious Life. And I want you and your wife to use it to create and practice peace in your home. Appreciate the call, brother. We'll be right back.

Let's talk about Organifi. I just got home from a week in the woods with family and friends and a few hundred high school kids at a summer camp. And as you can imagine, I ate camp food for a week, I didn't sleep great, and high schoolers aren't the most hygienic creatures in the world. And now that I'm home...

And now that you're home for whatever you've been doing this summer, and we're both beginning to settle back into the rhythms of the end of summer, start of school, it's critical that both you and me get back into our wellness routines. And for me, Organifi is a cornerstone of my wellness routine.

I blend the red and green powders together almost every morning, and I keep talking about them. I love my happy drops, and I've revolutionized my sleep with Harmony and Gold Juice Medley. I blend them together and drink them down right before bed, and I sleep like a baby. Organifi helps me with energy and gut health with my sleep and with my mood.

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All of it. Invest in yourself with Organifi. All right, let's go out to Baton Rouge. Not Moulin Rouge, Ben, but Baton Rouge and talk to Haley. What's up, Haley? Hi, Dr. John. Thanks for taking my call. Thank you for calling. What are you doing? I'm sitting at work right now. I love those kind of jobs. Yeah, my boss is pretty cool.

So I wanted to ask, I'm turning 26 in a couple weeks, and this is kind of a question that I'm sure everybody has figured out in their life but me. I just received my undergrad. I'm going to get a master's degree in the fall, and I'm working full-time. What are you getting a master's in? What are you getting a master's in? Landscape architecture. Good for you. You're going to make the world a more beautiful place? Yeah.

Yeah, hopefully with a bunch of plants. Excellent. Listen, whenever you get to it and you have to do one of your practicum projects, I've got a big place that I need some help with. Okay? Oh, yeah. So we can... We'll...

You've got my email address. You can email when it's practicum time. That'd be fun. All right. So landscape architect master's degree. Yeah. Incredible. Okay. And you're working full time. So you're busy. You're going to ask me the question that everybody's got figured out, but you, what is it? Yeah. Um, how do you find time to organize and clean your house and, um, keep everything up?

Because it just feels like there's not enough time in the day from working full time and then studying and then cooking dinner. I don't feel like cleaning my house. I mean, I keep normal things up like...

dishes or like clothes. My clothes are kind of behind, but I at least keep them washed. Um, but I don't feel like vacuuming all the time. I don't feel like dusting all the time on the weekends when I do have time, it's either I'm studying or I want to do something that I enjoy. I just don't have the motivation to do necessary things. Man, you want to go down the rabbit hole? Sure. Are you the first person to get a master's degree in your family? Yeah. Why'd you decide to get a graduate degree? Um,

Money, I think. Tell me about that. So my first degree was in visual art and it's what I enjoy doing. I like painting. But while I was doing that, I got a job at an engineering firm drawing AutoCAD for them.

So there's a bunch of things that I want later in life, like more property, horses, cows, stuff like this. It's a bunch of stuff that I grew up with. But with the economy today to afford something like that, you really need quite a lot of money. And I'm living with my boyfriend. He works full time. You know, he's doing good. He has his own place, but we need more land. We need more things. So I enjoy working with entrepreneurs.

with architects and engineers, and I don't mind it at all. That's why I decided to go get a master's degree in landscape architecture so I can get the salary that I want to afford the things that I want. Your parents do well growing up? Yeah. They divorced when I was in high school, but my dad was mostly the breadwinner. My mom worked a little bit too, but financially they were okay, middle class. What was your dad most proud of you?

Like when he, when you can think back to moments when he was like, way to go, Haley. What were those moments? What were the, what was the thing that you had done? Probably the most recent would be the one that I think he was most proud of, which was getting my first degree. Okay. Yeah. What about your mom? What was she most proud of you when she was like, Haley, I'm so proud of you for, what was it? Deciding to probably go get my master's. Okay. Two things at play here.

And if we were just sitting down one-on-one having nachos, I would take a little bit longer to get there. There is an insane, unmanageable amount of weight on this academic degree. And I would be willing to bet that grades were the way you were seen through your parents' dysfunctional marriage chaos growing up.

Yeah, or sports. I played a lot of sports too. Performance. Success in either one of them, yeah. Yeah, performance. And there is an incredible amount of pressure on this degree. Yeah. But it's not about time, though. For some reason, you're holding a failure card in your back pocket in case this doesn't work. And I think you're holding it for yourself. Mm-hmm.

And so we're going to live in chaos. We're going to live in like, I don't even like coming home and we're going to study and we're going to work really hard. And if one of these things doesn't work out, I'm going to have this like, oh, it's because of this. Right. The second thing is, is you're living with your boyfriend. Where is he in all this? When my wife was in grad school, I got to do a lot more chores because I was part of a team.

Um, I would say he, he does do chores, but no, he doesn't. No, he doesn't. He, uh, he doesn't do stuff like the deep cleaning kind of things. I don't know. I don't know. I kind of wish that we, we both make decent money. So I would kind of wish that I could pay somebody to do it, but he also doesn't want to spend the money to pay somebody else to do it. Haley.

This is not about cleaning and you know that. For me, it is. No, it's not. What is it? I'm really stressed. There's a lot going on. I just, I don't, I want to relax. I think he gets to relax all the time. We're getting closer.

And I just, I want like Saturday and Sunday when I don't have homework or don't have anything to do, I want to be able to relax and enjoy the things that I want to do too while he also, you know, does the things that he enjoys. Yeah, you're creating a life with a partner who is not interested in how you feel. And you're creating life with a partner who is not interested in the things that bring you peace.

And you know that and I know that. You're making a life with a partner who is very much interested in whatever the crap he wants to do. And the story he tells himself is you're allowed to do whatever you want to do because he's such an evolved, modern male. And in the two or three years while you're going to school to become a landscape architect, his sacrifice is that he's letting you do that and that you're not going to be around as much.

Not that he's got to participate fully in this house. And I think you know that. Okay. Am I wrong? No, you're not. You're not wrong at all. Why are you putting up with this?

Um, he's really, he's very sweet. He considers things that I say maybe other than cleaning, but, um. Hold on. I went through school with a Basset hound named Molly and she was my ride or die. The joke always was, but it wasn't a joke that she was in my bed long before my wife came along. Mm-hmm.

And you know the word I would describe her besides stubborn because she was a hound dog is very, very sweet. The question you have to ask yourself here is why are you settling in this one place, this one area of your life that you're not like that is killing you? Have you sat down and said, here's what I need? Either we got to hire somebody or I need you to participate in this more fully. I need you to take up more of your share here because I'm carrying so much more over here.

No, I don't think I've really sat down and been serious about it. Why are you scared to do that? How come? I don't know. I just don't know if he does a lot of other things. I don't know if he also wants to do it either. Because you don't want to interrupt his disc golf game or whatever he does on Saturdays and Sundays. He does actually enjoy it. Good God. Are you dating a disc golfer? Jeez Louise. He plays a lot of video games too.

Haley. Look, he's got a lot of good traits, I promise. I know he does. He's got a lot of good traits. He pays all the bills. He takes care of me in every single way. He's really a great guy. That's absolutely not true. Well, maybe not the cleaning. You know as well as I do, Haley, this cleaning is at the surface. What's beneath it is you work full time.

You're going to graduate school and you come home and the house is disgusting and he's on the couch playing video games. Or you wake up on Saturday and you just want to spend a little bit of time with him and he's out the door playing disc golf and the house is disgusting and your body just goes into, let's just shut the thing down because we're tired. But that tired is a proxy for lonely. That tired is a proxy for settling. It's that feeling.

And the language you're using is similar to no, no, no, no. He's really sweet. He only has cheated on me like five times, but he pays all this. He does all this or he's only gotten mad and punched a hole through the sheetrock a few times, but he pays for everything and he does it. I don't care. What I care about is have you all sat down at the table and said, this is what we need during this season. Will you show up?

And yes, I'm going to ask you to put down your precious video game controller and pick up a duster or put down the precious video game controller and pick up a vacuum. I've even made you a chart. Once a month, here's the baseboards. Once a month, here's the bathroom. Once a month, here's the vacuuming. It'll take two hours. That's it. And if we just rotate these things through, that's it. While I'm in grad school and then Saturdays and Sundays, we can just spend time together. I'm not doing that. Well, now you've got your answer.

I have no doubt that he treats you fine. I have no doubt that he's not kind or whatever. I get that. The broader picture I'm trying to paint is you got to be honest with him and give him the chance to show up for you. Or more than likely, you're not being honest with him because you know he's going to choose video games. Or for God's sake, then hire somebody. But you'll have to come to terms with that. Y'all got to do that together. And this goes back to a bigger picture about playing house.

It's like we're just gonna all move in together and it's gonna be all cool and we end up in these kind of situations where one person is really working for a future together and the other person when you're playing house is just working for got a cool roommate that he gets to sleep with. Those are two different trajectories. So it sounds like there's a reckoning, a getting on the same page together and the cleanliness will be a part of that but you're not happy sweetheart and I know you're not and you know you're not. I want you to have peace.

Thanks for the call, Haley. We'll be right back. I cannot shut up about my Helix mattresses. My sister is staying with me this week, and she came down looking this morning like she just woke up from a coma. And her first question was, what in the world is that mattress? And I sang it to her, Helix.

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All right, let's go out to West Palm Beach, Florida and talk to Carrie. Carrie, why are you bugging? What's up, Carrie? Hey, Dr. John. Thanks for taking my call. Appreciate it. Of course. What's up? Hey, okay. So looking for some help with figuring out the next right step for my husband and I here. So-

I love the way you put him first. This is going to be fantastic. Because I can tell already you're calling about something that's wrong with him. I can't wait. Go for it. Oh, gosh. Okay. So we've been struggling with this decision. We have kids. We. I love how we are. All right, go for it. Yes. So we've been struggling with this decision about family. So we don't have kids yet. We're struggling if we want to.

decide if we want to have them, what to do when the time comes. We had your infamous needs conversation surrounding this. And I actually talked to you about this a couple of years ago on a call. And you helped me find a little bit of clarity here. You kind of helped me just spit it out that I'm like, you know what? I think I do want a kid. I just am struggling, you know,

Moving forward, I kind of only want to under certain circumstances, basically. And this is where the needs conversation comes in. I told my husband I need him to have a $100,000 salary to live on comfortably before having a kid. I love it. So good. So good. Right now, he makes $70,000. I make $170,000. It would be a big adjustment to go down $400,000. Stop. Stop. This has nothing to do with money. You know that. Yeah.

We are baby steps four and six. Things are good. You know what I mean? But I just want to stay home. And I know that that's a choice I'm making. That's my need, right? And I think, quite frankly, it may be the kids' need as well that I stay home. Because I think, you know, and since our call, I've done a lot of research on this. I've learned a lot about this subject. But babies are vulnerable. You know, from what I've learned, they need a stable caregiver, ideally their mom, you know, in the first three years. And you had said on the call that

you know, I know kids in daycare, they're fine. Basically saying to me, you know, have the kid, do whatever you need to do. But to me, I'm looking at this going like, I just feel like everybody's out here popping out babies and going, oh, we'll figure it out. And then 10 years down the line, they're burnt out. Their kids are struggling, have anxiety. You know, from what I learned,

Kids who are not with their parents or a primary caregiver in these first three years are, you know, a lot of times you're setting them up to struggle sometimes. And you may not see it right away. Maybe it shows up when they're a teenager.

Maybe you do see it right away when they're in school and they're acting out or whatever. But I feel like a lot of the advice out there is just, you know, do what's best for you, mama. You know, society isn't actually thinking about what's best for the baby. And I feel like I've learned enough to go, okay, I feel like what's best for me if I were to do this would be to stay home. Does that make sense? A hundred percent. But you, this still is not about money. It has nothing to do with money.

And what do you do for a living? I'm in sales. My favorite thing about this is to make 170 grand in sales, you have to be really good at it. And you have to be so good at reading people really fast. And my favorite thing about all of this is that it's like this huge neon sign flashing in front of you and you can't see it. All right, keep going though, but your story's fantastic. Keep going.

I think I want to see him take this action towards like stepping up to the plate, being like, yes, let's go do this. Let's go make a family. Let me go make that a hundred K. Let me, let me just step up to the plate and do this. He doesn't have biology knocking at his door. Like I do. You know what I mean? We're about biology. You're close. You're, you're, you're getting there. Let's just cut to it. Carrie, you don't respect him. Period. Oh, you make a hundred. You make 170 K. You love him and you like him and he's your best friend.

But you don't respect him in that way. Fair? I don't know. That makes me sad to hear that. I know it does. I feel like I love him to death and he's my best friend. He is. He's all those things. Yeah. I don't think money is everything, you know? I know. That's why I keep telling you it's nothing to do with money. Because in your mind, you have this standard of living and you have this picture of what life is going to look like.

And you are a grade A badass and you get what you want when you want it. You always have. You're good. And you also have come to terms with the role of motherhood is a role of service. It's a hard season. And you've dug in and you've come to your, you have etched your values in. And I love that. Whether anybody on planet earth agrees with it or not, it doesn't matter. You have done the work and this is where you have landed. I think it's beautiful.

But he hasn't rolled up and been like, game on, sister. I'm going to give you the world. Because that's never been his job in your relationship. His job has been to keep things fun and light while the whirling dervish that is Carrie goes blazing through the world. And y'all make a quarter of a million dollars together. Y'all can do whatever you want whenever you want. And he's been a fun, stable part of that trip. I think you're afraid to have a kid with him. Am I wrong?

I don't think I'm afraid to have a kid with him. I just think I'm afraid to live in struggle or I'm afraid to give up on, you know, investing for retirement. And you say you talk about money and I think it, I think I see where your point is though. I mean, I get where you're coming from. I just think he works in an industry that's, he's serving the environment. He's doing a great thing. And I love that. And I love seeing his passion for it. And I love seeing what he's doing. And, um,

But I think sometimes you can separate, you know, career from passion. And I think you can, if he wants to, he says he wants a family. He says he wants all this, you know. And I just want to see him take that step and go, okay, well, you know what? Make a career change. Pivot. Figure it out so we can do things the way we want to do it. But you just added something. It's not the way y'all want to do it.

Because I think he would, having worked his butt off with you in partnership, y'all don't owe anybody any money. You're your own bank, right? You have a fully funded emergency fund. You're working on paying off your house. How much is your house worth right now in West Palm Beach? We got it real cheap and it's worth about $450,000 and we only owe, you know, all very much on it anymore, about $50,000. You owe $50,000 on it. So you almost have a paid for house, a half a million dollar house. How old are you?

30. He won. Okay. So y'all have made a quarter million dollars a year. You got about 50 grand left on your house payment. So even if you got pregnant tomorrow, you're going to have no house payment by the time this baby comes. You owe nobody. You'll owe nobody anything on the planet. And you're telling me you can't live off 70,000 bucks and a husband who is actively engaged in loving the environment and taking care of his community? Bullcrap. It's not true. Did you grow up poor?

I, we struggled a little bit financially and I did grow up in some chaos, but I mean, so does everybody. No, not true. I'm not special. Not true. Did you grow up struggling? Yeah, somewhat. Yeah. Tell me about it. Not super bad. I just, um, I just had a kind of a chaotic home. You know, I had parents that yelled a lot and they're together to this day and they've apologized to me. I've done therapy for it. I think I've come a really long way. Tell me about money though. Money. Um, it just never was super stable.

Uh, my dad started his own business and it were all over. You're a saleswoman, a great one. Don't do that to me. Tell me about how the money was in your house. You don't have to wallpaper it over. I don't know. It was, it was not always great. It was just kind of like, how bad was it? Yeah, I guess it was hard. So yeah. Okay. What does that mean?

Every month is different. We couldn't afford a lot of things everyone else could afford. I bought my own deodorant in high school sometimes. Was it like that? Could be sometimes. Mostly not, but not really. Mostly it was okay. I mean, mostly it was. But everybody in the house knew it was electric, right? Oh, yeah. Yeah. And if you're like me, the path to peace was always going to be money. Oh, yeah. I see that.

Money solved all of my problems in my life to this point, honestly. Except this one. Except I think it does. Well, you can't. Money has given you flexibility and the ability to turn potential mountains into speed bumps. Money can't buy a mom and her baby's love. Money can't buy safety inside of a home.

When it comes to a husband and a wife and a new baby, they just blew up everything that we knew. And I see safety as, you know, having enough where I can breathe and I can, I don't have to look at each bill and be caring about it. And, you know, super, you know, just hype about it. Like, I think that a hundred K is like, you know what? It's, it's, it's a made up number in your head. You have a paid off house. You have, you owe nobody anything. You've got paid off cars.

Like you're, you've just made up a number. And I think six, six figures is like a, is a, is a standard bearer. My man needs to make six figures. I just think that I need to be, Oh, the other thing is I don't want it to be draining our house. Like I think having one parent whose job is to be the parent, just to be a parent for, you know, a few years, that's what's going to hold marriage together. That's what's, you know, I agree. And you're going to have to give on something.

And maybe it is, maybe you're right. Maybe the a hundred K number is just an arbitrary number. I thought doing the math on it caught. Okay. I thought this was comfortable. You know, the average family makes 74 K a year, but normal broke. I don't want to be that. Yeah. But normal also has a thousand bucks a month going out in credit cards and car payments. And normal also has a mortgage that people can barely breathe on. You're going to have a half a million dollar house paid off in a very desirable place. You have no money.

even if for two or three years you just pay bills. Y'all are great. You don't owe anybody any money. No. Yeah, I get that. I just worry. Like you guys always say in the Ramsey show too. Don't, if you're saving for a house, don't put off investing for too long. This is where I'm like, I can still invest to a level that I feel very comfortable and we can still like, you know, go out to eat or don't have to think about every single detail. The other, the thing is, is like, it's,

I think I just, you're anxious about having a kid and listen, it's going to blow up everything. It is the life you've cultivated and curated as a, as a, as a wall against your childhood will come down. It will come down. I've done a lot of work on it. I know you have. I feel like I'm at a good place. I know you have. And it's easier. You're right. When you're at a good place with somebody that you love, somebody that loves you back. And when you have a quarter million dollars of disposable income,

It's harder when you create somebody and you're holding all of your fears and your worst anxieties and your worst insecurities and she's looking right back at you or little boy's looking right back at you saying, mommy, will you always love me? There is no dollar amount that makes that fear go away. I promise you. So yeah, what do I do then? I mean, I'm not going to leave my husband. I'm not going to- Good. He sounds like he's great. Yeah. You decide if $30,000 is worth transforming your life by creating a family.

You have to make that call or telling your husband, I need you to get a new job. Yeah. I don't want to have a baby until you have a new job. And I'd rather you, I'd rather you just go put your passion aside. Like you told me, I'd rather you go put your passion aside and go make some fricking money so that I can stay home and go out to eat when I want to not worry about things. Tell him that. Yeah, I have. Okay. That's nonsense.

That's nonsense. I did tell him. I swear to God. No, no, no. I'm saying your needs are nonsense. Okay. You know what I mean? Like, I need you to stop being a present loving together husband because I don't want to worry about going out to eat when I want to go out to eat. That's insane.

That's a mess. Okay. Okay. Okay. What you have to decide is what are we comfortable with being anxious about together as we bring a human into this world? And you know firsthand in your nervous system of growing up in chaos is like, you know that. Your parents, you know what screaming and yelling and not have enough money feels like.

And that's not your story anymore. You've worked so hard. Yet you keep replaying that story over and over and over again. I've talked about on the show when my wife confronted me in the garage and she's like, John, we have enough. And I had to go learn what this, what I didn't have a psychological understanding of the word enough. I didn't even, I didn't even consider that word before. And this is like a year ago. It's just a long time ago, Carrie. I'm still working through this. Mm-hmm.

I can't think of a greater gift to a home than a husband who can pay the bills, who's working really hard. If his wife wants to stay home, they can do that because they've put in the work for the last decade. Who's passionate about his work and is going to contribute, is on a daily basis contributing to making the world a better place. I'll trade 30,000 bucks for that all day long, unless you're making 30 grand and that's just not enough to eat.

Yeah, I just feel like how do I then, I mean, I guess I got to go do more work on this myself and just get myself to a place where I'm like not going to be anxious when he's bringing home 75 or you know what I mean? Like where it will cover the bills. We will be able to eat. You will be investing by the way. Everything will be okay. You're going to have to have a budget. You're going to have to knock out to eat all the time. No. Yeah. And if you're saying I want to be the person who stays at home and does all the home stuff. Okay. Then you have to make peace with that. Yeah.

And that's hard. That's hard. Yeah, it's a big lifestyle shift. I understand that. No, it's not a lifestyle shift as much as it's an identity shift. Because you know who you are? You're the girl who makes $175,000. You're the woman who can do whatever she wants whenever she wants. You're the woman who's so good at sales, you can get people to buy things. You make it happen.

And you're trading that for... Right? Yeah. It is cashing in everything. Yeah. At least for a season. Yeah, a season. That's kind of what I keep in my head is like...

you know what, I'm doing this for, to pay off. So I have a, you know, a 10 year old that I love. You know what I mean? Cause I don't look forward to the baby stage. I'm not, I'm not looking, I'm kind of dreading this. Like as I come up on, you know, I'm in my thirties, all my friends are having kids and everybody's asking, you know, and it's like, I'm kind of dreading this ship. Like where it's like, boom, shoot my carrier in the foot. Boom. Stay home for a while. But it's, I think it would pay off, you know, down the line, 20 years from now, these few years. This isn't a mutual fund, Carrie.

It's not a mutual thing. And you have created some either ors that are so firm in your mind. Sure. In fact, you've done a great sales job on you and you have a bunch of really firm either ors, have tos, musts, and those are okay, but a kid's going to blow up all of those things. Sure. Yeah. But I'm going to try my, you know, darkness to, I know you are. I know you are. I know you are. I want you to check out on Instagram. Um, Nia,

Ruck. N-E-H-A-R-U-C-H. Hope I pronounced her name right. And her Instagram handle is motheruntitled. Okay. But she posts a ton of amazing articles, ideas, and she's created a community of people who, moms who are

business women who are stepping out. She calls it the gray zone, or gray area, which I think is just awesome. I was this, and now I'm kind of this. It's a place for that messiness.

Okay. Where identity gets all messed up. And I followed her for a while and I like a lot of articles she posts and she seems to be a good place. So check her out. N-E-H-A-R-U-C-H. We'll link to her in the show notes there. But I want you to check that out too. Again, just, and I'm sure there's a bunch of other resources there, but just as a resource for that hard, messy step. And here's the deal. I'm not going to lie to you. I can't, I can't be that person because I've never had to make that transition.

Right. I have felt the squat bar get heavier, like weight get added as I feel the responsibility of a household. Right. And as we had another kid and another kid and then another property, like I feel that weight getting heavier, but I've never had to transition from like my wife did from Dr. Deloney to Hey Miss to can I have a snack? Can I have a snack? Right. I've never had to make that transition.

Right. And there's just a lot of messiness. And you can go check out my 500th episode where I interviewed my wife on the show. She's got a lot of, she talks a lot about it. She gets pretty choked up about that transition. It is hard. It's hard. And like you, I think there's a lot of value in it. But again, I can't put all that on the table because I haven't had to walk in those shoes. I've only sat with folks. And I haven't met somebody that's regretted the trip.

Sure. I haven't met that person. I'm sure they're out there. I've not met that person. But you escaped chaos with your intellect and your ability to pretzel people up with your words. You're so good at it. And you have escaped your chaotic childhood and what that meant to a little girl by making a whole bunch of money and marrying really well, thoughtful, like stable guy. He doesn't yell, does he? No, never. He just goes and makes the world a little bit better place every day.

Yep. And all of that goes out the window. I mean, not his kindness, but all that goes away when you're sitting there staring at a little baby and you're like, uh, what do I do now? Scary. Yeah. But when it comes to the math, you don't owe anybody any money, do you? And in a few months, you're going to have no house payment, right? Right. Okay. We've paid for a house. You don't owe anybody anything. Y'all can survive on $70,000 a year or 75 grand a year.

Or even if he mows lawns two Saturdays a month on $80,000, y'all are going to be fine. The bigger picture will be, is this the world that we want for ourselves? Right? Is this the world? Thanks for the call, Carrie. You're amazing. You're amazing. Thank you. Thank you for your time. Call me again soon. We'll keep having fun. And everybody, get some people to walk with you. We'll be right back.

Hey, what's up? Deloney here. Listen, you and me and everybody else on the planet has felt anxious or burned out or chronically stressed at some point. In my new book, Building a Non-Anxious Life, you'll learn the six daily choices that you can make to get rid of your anxious feelings and be able to better respond to whatever life throws at you so you can build a more peaceful, non-anxious life. Get your copy today at johndeloney.com.

All right, we're back. Am I the problem, Kelly? Let her rip. All right, this is from David in Lubbock, your old stomping grounds. All right. Sweet. So he says, my wife sleeps in every Saturday and Sunday morning, every time for our entire lives. I don't mind getting up with our seven-year-old daughter, but it makes me really angry that she prioritizes staying up late over spending time with our daughter.

I really hate, I'm really concerned by the example she's setting, and I hate having to be the wife's dad and drag her out of bed. It's not fair to my daughter or to me. Am I the problem? Okay, with the way he's framed this, yes. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. No, no, I'm wrong. Wrong, wrong. Slap it, flip that, reverse it. With the way he's framed it, no. His wife is being just completely detached from the family, right? The way he's framed this.

Now, if he's never around Monday through Thursday and mom is on 20 hour days with baby with seven year old and working full time and works the night shift and then collapses when she gets home Friday at midnight.

Yeah, she's going to sleep in on Saturday and Sunday. That's going to be part of their life. And so we don't have that part of the story. But assuming she's just dropping daughter off at school as a seven-year-old and then picking her up and then choosing to sleep till noon on Saturdays and Sundays, yeah, that's super uncool. What do you think?

I agree. I mean, if she's staying up until 1 or 2 a.m. every Friday and Saturday night and then sleeping in. And if she's staying up to watch movies or whatever, there's a deeper thing that he misses his wife. Right. And he wants to be with her, and she wants to watch TV or play video games or whatever she's doing until 2 a.m. So clearly there's something else going on that we're not getting the picture. Right. But like you said, if everything is exactly as he says, no, he's not in the wrong. No. Sorry, Dee.

806 represent for life. Like go get them loving. Hey, thanks for listening. Everybody. Talk to you soon. Bye.