He Keeps Saying He's Fine. What Now?

Welcome and the new Monday format (0:00)

Drew: Welcome to the Loving Leverage Podcast presented by Valiant Living. I'm Drew Powell, recovery advocate and alumnus of the Valiant Living men's program, and this is a show about what it takes to move from addiction to connection. This is a little different from our usual episode, so let me set it up. Every Monday, Michael Dinneen and I get on a call. Michael's the founder and CEO of Valiant Living. He's a licensed clinical social worker, a certified sex addiction therapist and supervisor, and the creator of the loving leverage framework that this show is named after. This call is supposed to be about business, and it always gets there eventually. But somewhere before the agenda, Michael and I end up in a real conversation about life, recovery, faith, and what loving leverage actually looks like when it's not on a whiteboard. For a long time this conversation has stayed between us. But I started hitting record. So every so often, not every week, we'll drop one of these as a bonus episode on a Monday. We're calling it Mondays with Michael. No script, no guest prep. Just the two of us talking the way we already do. In this one, Michael and I walk through a real case. A man who was stuck, a family that had tried everything they knew how to try, the specific moves that family made with Michael's guidance, the story of how I got involved with them, and how we finally got him through the doors of our program. We've changed names and details. We're never going to expose anybody's story. But the shape of the story is real. And if you've got a man in your life who keeps saying he's fine, I think you're going to recognize it. So here's Mondays with Michael.

The reality of treatment work (1:42)

Michael: It's a great intervention to have to talk about what we're really doing here. It's a nice pivot from business to focus on the good stuff of what we're up to. Recovery and the why.

Drew: I don't know if you're willing to share or not, but we just had a wild weekend, man. We're not going to share names or anything like that, but just kind of the day in the life of a treatment facility owner. It's interesting how it works, whether it's the universe or God or whatever. We go through moments where we hit a lull and we're like, all right, we know the need is great. And then we kind of get on our knees a little bit and say, God, bring us the people you know we can help. And then all of a sudden the floodgates open. What was your weekend like?

Michael: You summed it up really well. I think we're expected to hustle and to stay surrendered. To have a posture of, we only want the people to show up on our phones and in our lives that we can actually help, or that we can connect to the right place. Sometimes I feel like it's a grace that we're in these places where we have to fully surrender. This has been an area, close to my marriage and other things, other addictions I've had, where I've had to get on my knees. We joke around that I've suffered from census affective disorder, which I heard from Bobby Ferguson. We joke about that stuff, but it's real, man. Because it affects morale, it affects the finances, it affects the cohort of the clients. Half of what the clients receive from us is the cohort. That's why we try to keep it in that sweet spot of a man who is suffering from multiple things, intimacy disorder being one of them. Bill W. said in the Twelve and Twelve, and I can hammer this because it's the founder of the twelve step movement who never really got help for his intimacy disorder but was very open, as much as you could be in the 40s, 50s, and 60s, about his afflictions. He said our total inability to form a true partnership with another human being was our main problem. We take two disastrous falls. We try to depend on people far too much, or we try to dominate them. Either way, they push us away eventually. I know these people are out there. I know there are millions of men suffering, millions of women suffering. So why aren't there lines for miles down the street to get into places like ours?

A stuck man and a family who tried everything (5:35)

Michael: I'm so grateful to you for the way you stepped in last week. I didn't think it was even possible that you could hit the ground running like that.

Drew: I was winging it. I kept calling you and saying, hey man, I need some coaching, I'm about to walk into this thing. And you're like, you've got it. Remember what people did for you and do that for someone else.

Michael: It was unbelievable. You had a tough customer, and you sit with that stuff really well.

Drew: I saw a lot of myself in that guy. I was never as type A or aggressive. I cared more what people thought. I was more of a people pleaser than he was. But some of the things he was doing, I just had so much empathy for, because I was like, I know this guy better than he knows himself right now. I remember what this was like. Trying to use people to feel better. Giving ultimatums. Not having any ground to stand on, but still trying to control the narrative. Part of it is empathy, because I see myself in those moments. And I also know how much hope there is for a gentleman like this.

Michael: Real quick, to that story. You're a natural at this, because it's way more complicated than anybody could describe. You're sitting there with a guy who's intelligent, has a little money, a little education, a little status. None of it is that big of a deal, but to him it is. And what a guy like that will do, and this isn't to rail on him at all, is he's a perfect example of what we do as men to slide out. We take people into the weeds. We say things like, you guys just ambushed me. This got dropped on me. What about my own room? Are you going to stick with me? Why am I even doing this? I'm going to take you down ten rabbit holes. But what you did is you gently prepared the loving spouse, who's all over the board. She's angry, she's hurt, she's been betrayed. She loves the guy, she wants to keep the family together. It's not the time to start asking her, can I get some assurances? Can I get a hug? Can I get a parade? The way you coached that, and guarded against the rabbit holes, or guarded when he did go down the rabbit holes. You had everyone prepared. No, we're doing this now, and here's the offer, and we need to act quickly. Because her heart is bleeding out. He needs to show an aggressive move in the right direction, a little bit of amends for the pain she's in.

Drew: Thank you for saying that. A couple of things come to mind. Getting the opportunity to listen in and watch how you work with these guys, I kept reminding myself of what you say all the time. You've got to outmaneuver it. It's the disease, not the guy. And I kept reminding the wife and the daughter: this isn't your husband and dad talking. This is the disease right now, and here's what it's trying to do. Don't let it win. I have her impact letter in front of me. I won't read it. She wrote one, and I said, this is really good. Would you be open to some feedback on how to rework this? So we rewrote it. Because in an impact letter, what I've learned from you and others is that the most powerful ultimatum is not accusing. Well, you did this, and you do that. The addict already knows what he's done. He's already in a shame cycle. It's more: I love you. We love you. Here's what this is doing to us. This is killing us. This is tearing us apart. And she saved the consequence all the way to the end of the letter. It's a full page. You've coined the phrase loving leverage. This spouse sat at a table at a restaurant and read him this letter and just held the ground, man. And I kept telling her before and after, you're saving his life. Whether your marriage stays together or not.

Rewriting the impact letter (10:50)

Drew: And honestly, if he does the work, I wouldn't want him to know this right now, but there's a lot of hope for that marriage and that family. This family sees it as a disease and loves this man deeply. She held the line. At the end of the impact letter, he basically said, well, looks like I either get a divorce and don't have a relationship with my kid and my grandson on the way, or I go to treatment. And she said, yep. Those are your options. Brother, everything you always talk about with loving leverage, I got to see firsthand. Two days later he's on a plane to Denver, because this family, in all of their pain and hurt and trauma, held the line. It was intense, but it was beautiful to see. The crazy part is they live in my hometown. I don't normally work the phones, but this week I started on the phones, and the first call I got was from this daughter, who happens to live in my city. So I was able to meet with them for dinner that night in person. It was a wild experience. I have to give credit not just to you and the coaching and the team at Valiant, but to this family, who did what a lot of families can't do. They're in too much pain. It was emotional to watch. And the last thing I'll say is, it's what a lot of people did for me. I'm sitting there trying to remember my intervention. Remember what other people did for me. This is what they said. How long have you been in pain? Some of the other things people said to me.

Michael: That's really cool. And I don't want to over spiritualize it, but how divine. There had to be a God involved in this.

Drew: I felt like there was some higher power activity going on for sure. That morning, and I don't normally do this, we've got a great census going right now, but candidly on the business side we were looking at who we need to get into the pipeline. I sat down that morning and I just said, God, it would be great if you'd bring someone across our path that we could help. And I think it was not even an hour later that the phone rang. I'm not saying that works every time. I don't know how God works. But I'll be quick to give him credit. Regardless of whether that was his activity or not, he's going to get credit for it.

Michael: Totally. And I always forget this, because my ego wants to jump back in. But when I pray this for real, it's the most powerful thing. It's straight out of the AA Big Book. It says something like, our main objective should be to put ourselves in a position to be of maximum service to God and to his children. To have our head in the clouds with him, but our feet firmly planted on the ground, because that's where his children are. So the prayer is: God, please put me in a position where I can be of most service to you and to your children. And then it could be smiling at the person at the front desk at the gym, or praying for the person who's annoying you in the weight room. It doesn't matter. You can almost rest assured that prayer is going to get answered, because it's a dangerous prayer.

Holding the line with love (14:35)

Michael: If you're like me, an Irish Catholic kid, I'm like, I pray that prayer and I'm going to end up living in a hut in Africa. Bad things are going to start happening if I put myself in maximum service. The truth is it's the opposite. God puts us in the zone. I love what my therapist, Dr. Harv Powers, says. He doesn't use you in spite of you. In spite of all these flaws and traumas you brought into this world and continue to have. He uses you because of who you are, not in spite of it.

Drew: Totally. There's no way four years ago I could have sat down with this guy and been of any real help. I wouldn't have had any idea what to say or do, or how he would have felt. It would have been spiritual bypassing, or honestly I would probably have just been frozen. Which is not the worst thing in the world, you call someone and get help. But for me to be of maximum service to this guy, it's only out of my own pain and my own story that I'm able to do that.

Michael: And I think it's different from a business owner perspective versus the mental health of employees who work in these institutions. People need space. They need to be able to shut the phone off. But for me, I'm so honored, not every minute of every day, but when I'm on those phone calls I tell them, and I mean it, that I feel like it's an honor to enter into their space at the darkest moment of their life. Hey, look, I don't even know what you look like, and I'm sorry that I'm meeting you this way. And trust me, it's ten o'clock at night, and it's not a big deal to me, because I'd be doing this anyway if a sponsee or a friend was calling me. It's almost like I went from talking about sports and stupid stuff, quoting movies, being a kind of mindless walking drunk who didn't have anything to say, to getting bored with superficial talk in recovery. Can we just talk about our five biggest secrets? Because this conversation is killing me. So it's almost an honor to be able to go into someone's life and say, okay, let's go.

Drew: Yeah. It does feel sacred, for sure. And meanwhile, you're in Texas trying to get your daughter moved into college and taking these phone calls. But it's your lifestyle now. It's part of how you roll.

Michael: It's sacred. Samantha deals with it. I was on the phone talking to some lawyer, and they were like, oh, he's in so much trouble, and I hear Samantha say, only our lives.

Drew: Your kids have a lot of stories. You're giving them a very full, rich childhood experience. But it's part of it, and there are sacrifices you have to make and the kids make. It is sacred to enter into their stories and see them get help. Especially at the beginning. And then you meet someone a few weeks later after they've been in treatment for a while, and it's almost like meeting a different person. Total surrender starts to happen. I'm excited for these guys to see where they land.

Defusing demands without enabling (18:40)

Michael: Dialing it back to loving leverage. I liked what you said on the website and in some posts you've been putting out. You didn't cause it. There's nothing you've done to try to help this situation that you should blame yourself for. We have to de-shame each other. But think about the empowerment you gave this daughter and this wife. Even though this is the beginning of a new journey, you inserted yourself in a place where you gave them power they didn't realize they had in their lives. You gave it back to them. Because he could have said no. I'm going to opt out of the grandkids and a relationship with my daughters and a marriage. As crazy as it sounds, that's actually a possibility for a lot of addicts, because of our level of pride and insanity in that moment. That immaturity. We're stunted emotionally, so there's sometimes an adolescent response. You can't take yourself out of the situation and do what a mature adult would do. You get in your feelings, you get attacked by your feelings, your narcissism gets triggered, these sore spots, and you react out of an emotion that could burn the whole house down. I'm not saying every outcome is perfect. But if it's done with enough love. You seem to have been able to slow the process down and help them craft a letter that has more love than accusation. It doesn't lead with consequences. The consequence came at the end. It looks like I'm either going to treatment or this. And she was able to look him in the eye and say, indeed, that's what we're looking at. The consequence is the cherry on top. The love is actually the defining factor.

Drew: You're spot on. Originally, because there's so much hurt and pain, understandably, the letter had so much accusation and such intense ultimatum right at the beginning. To slow it down. In some ways what you're asking families to do is almost impossible. You've got to zoom out of your own pain and hurt in the moment. That's why you need guides and people to help you see through this. They waited until the very last paragraph. She said, and now the hardest part, which I'm telling you not as a threat but because you deserve the truth about where we are. We've decided that if you refuse treatment, and she goes on. And then: we're saying it because we cannot keep living inside the addiction with you, because we believe pretending otherwise would help the addiction win. Even that line. This isn't about you. We together are confronting this disease. The word confront literally means with your front. This is not husband versus wife or dad versus daughter. This is family versus the disease, and we're going to attack it that way. And the last line was, we want you. We love you. We need our father back, and I need my husband back. It was powerful. And to your point, this is why we exist and why we do what we do. It's almost impossible, when you're in that much pain, to see the forest for the trees. You almost have to have someone holding your hand and guiding you through the loving leverage. I just kept telling her, you're saving his life. You know what you're doing. The courage. And then for the next two days, he would call and make demands.

Why addicts fight for control (23:20)

Drew: I need this. You've got to come to my house. You've got to whatever. And she just had one line. We love you, we want you to get help. She would not listen to one of his demands. And then he'd bluff. Well, then I'm not going. I'm going to move to a cabin in the woods. Just going off. And she just let him go. And eventually he got on the plane. It was a beautiful thing. That's what I'd want the families to hear who are listening or watching this. Our goal is to walk alongside these families. Sometimes you have to borrow faith. You have to borrow courage. Sometimes you don't have that. I think about the scripture of the guys who lowered the man down to Jesus to get healed, and Jesus said it was because of their faith that he was healed. Sometimes it's because of someone else's faith or courage that the healing happens, when you don't have it in you yet. That's what the Valiant team does. We lend our courage and faith and hope until you have it. Because you probably don't have it right now.

Michael: So true. A few thoughts. Everything you said was gold. First, she's a hero. How does a woman dig that deep and find that kind of strength? Number two, I don't know if she knows this, but that's the best thing you could ever do for an addicted person who's trying to manipulate you. And whether they know it or not, it's a hundred percent manipulation when they're in that savage negotiation. When you're in that place, the broken record technique, being assertive rather than aggressive or passive, is classic. I read a book maybe 35 years ago by a Jesuit named Powell about the levels of communication. One of the techniques is what she did. Broken record. Same line. We wish you the best. We're rooting for you. I hope you get on that plane. We wish you the best. And he's like, what's going on here? I heard one guy say once, every time my wife goes to one of those meetings, meaning Al-Anon or a support group or our betrayed spouse group like we do here, it takes me like two weeks to get her back to normal.

Drew: The codependency wore off for a couple of weeks.

Michael: It's like, I've got to put on my best gaslighting shoes for two weeks just to get her back on track. They don't realize that they actually want a healthy wife. Deep down, when they're in their highest and best self, they want that person. They want the sickness when they're in the sickness. I want you to be normal. I want you to go back to your enabling or controlling behavior so I can blame you, I can get resentful at you that you treat me like a child, I can get angry and go act out. But when she's actually in herself, when she's grounded and she's doing those techniques, and those weren't techniques, those were coming from her heart, there's no outmaneuvering that. Eventually he will thank her for that. In the moment, he's not happy.

Drew: No. As addicts, we're grasping onto whatever last little bit of control we can possibly muster. It got almost comical, and it's not, because it's super sad. But even before he was getting on the plane, he was like, I'll turn around and walk off this plane right now if you don't, and then fill in the blank. Still making demands. Trying to get this last little bit of control. Your world's falling apart. You're literally on a plane to rehab because that's how unmanageable it's gotten. But there's still something in us. I'd love to hear what that is. What is in us as an addict that's still saying, I'm not going to let go completely, I'm going to try to control this last tiny bit of power I have?

Michael: I think it goes back to the emotional immaturity of the addicted person. It starts with trauma and some mental health, and then you find the addiction.

Codependency and self energy in practice (28:05)

Michael: We used to think, when I started drinking at 14, that's where I stopped growing. Well, it was actually before that. It's when I was trying to get everyone to love me when I couldn't stand myself, and couldn't stand what was going on inside my body, and couldn't read because of my dyslexia. It doesn't matter what the formula is, but it starts even before the addiction. The addiction is there to help, for a time period, to ease the pain of what I'm experiencing. I think that's why I gave that guy Saturday. It was Thursday when you guys closed in on him. I was going to body slam him for Friday. But the wife was so strong that I said, I'll give this to him. He said, all right, I'll come out Saturday, and then he switched the flight to later, and I rolled with it, because I was sensing the wife was holding strong. If I didn't feel like the wife could hold strong, I was going to body slam him in. I wanted to give him the illusion of power right at the end. It's what they do with kids. You give them choices. You can do this or that. But they're both good choices. You can get on a plane Friday or you can get on a plane Saturday, but you're not getting on a plane Sunday.

Drew: Exactly. It was tough over Friday to hold the line. But giving him a little agency over those choices helped diffuse the situation. It was so interesting how the family couldn't exhale until the door shut on the plane and there was liftoff. And of course, all the codependent tendencies. We don't use that word a whole lot at Valiant with families early on, because really it's trauma responses and betrayal trauma. Sometimes codependent is weaponized to make families feel shame. It might be what it is, but it's not a helpful word, especially in the beginning. But the truth is there are cycles of behaviors and patterns this family had established that they were having to actively break on that Friday. Of course they've been caretaking this addict for years. So it felt like, we've got to care for him, we've got to help him, he's spiraling. No. Let him go. He'll be fine. He's a big boy. He's got people. He's got you, he's got me. We were both talking with him. Sometimes, and we're happy to play this role, I had to be the bad cop. I think he hung up on me a total of three times. I can be that guy. Let me be that guy for the family, so you don't have to be. Let us tell him something hard that's coming from our clinical team. I don't care if he's mad at me today. He can be mad all he wants. He's safe and in treatment. That's what matters.

Michael: A couple of thoughts. I love this. We dealt with three situations this weekend, but we're only talking about one. I actually think this is going to be more helpful to people, because people don't want to hear theory. They want to hear reality. When I use the word codependency, I actually think it's a word for being human. I'm taking my self esteem from what I think my boss, my wife, the world thinks, or what I perceive they feel about me. We're all kind of addicted in that way. The addict is addicted to their addiction and themselves. The people around them, if there's an addiction, it's to saving them or controlling them. They're on my mind all the time. The addict's thinking about the drug, and the person who loves the addict is thinking about the addict and their behavior and how to stop it. It's all the same stuff. If you scratch a little bit underneath the addict, you're going to find codependency.

Drew: Not to interrupt, but I learned I was way more codependent than my wife was. I viewed the codependent as the more passive one, but it turns out I was the more controlling one, and I was codependently trying to manage more. A hundred percent true in my story. My codependency ran a lot deeper. It just looked different.

Michael: It just looks different. For me it's more like I take my self esteem from how I think you feel about me.

Performance wounds and fear of abandonment (33:20)

Michael: Where another codependent would be like, how helpful I am to this person, how indispensable I am to them. It takes on different forms. The other thing that came up, and your comments are profound, is when he got mad at you and hung up on you three times. It's so beautiful. I wish I had found IFS, Internal Family Systems, 25 or 35 years ago when I got into recovery. Of course I'm just pedaling my tricycle as fast as I can. It wasn't that long ago that I blew my top coming back from China. I have my moments. But when we're able to, as men, see that this is just a part of somebody. This person's acting crazy right now. It doesn't have anything to do with me. This is just a part of him that's hanging up on me, and it has nothing to do with my humanity. And there's a part of me that feels hurt, a part of me that's irritated, a part of me that really loves this guy, and a part of me that's actually a little bit humored by the whole thing. If we can harness that energy, what Schwartz would call tapping into the self, self energy, we can actually show up and love people the way they need to be loved. Because it's not about how they're treating us. It's about how we feel about them. We can handle whatever they throw at us if we don't take it personally. It's about our self energy, not about how they behave.

Drew: That's exactly how I was able to survive it this week. First, understanding that's not him, that's the disease talking. When he's healthy and whole, I bet he doesn't act that way. And I remembered the night I almost fought one of my best friends trying to break out of his basement because I wanted to leave. I was a crazed animal backed into a corner. It wasn't that long ago. I know what this feels like. He's hurting right now. This is not him. I kept telling him, I won't use his name, hey, you're presenting really angry right now, but I don't think you're angry. I think you're in a lot of pain. I think you're hurting, and I think you're really sad, but anger feels more accessible. And he's like, yeah, you're right. All three times he came back to apologize. And I think the biggest thing that surprised him was that I wasn't leaving him. It wasn't, well, you need to come repair this with me. Each time I was like, buddy, I get it. This is hard. This hurts. This is really painful. When you're done with this and you move back to my city, we're going to be golf buddies. I'm not going anywhere. I'm going to walk with you through this. That's one thing I know about addicts, especially those of us who've struggled with performance addiction and people pleasing, and especially the guys we deal with a lot who are really well put together and have made their identity out of success. We've bought into this lie that we have to perform well or people will leave us. That's how we get our acceptance. And then when we realize we can be a total jackass, but there are certain people who aren't going anywhere because they see you at a deeper level, it's your sickness, not you. That messes with the whole way you frame and see the world.

Michael: You just summed up what I've identified as my deepest wound. That God's just going to get sick of me and leave me due to my poor performance. When I'm on a roll and I'm out hustling and doing some good, walking into Walmart and slapping my credit card down for 15 people, paying for their groceries. I love that kind of stuff. But there's definitely a little Catholic boy in me who feels like, I'm in the zone right now, I'm doing some good. And there's another part of me that's almost unsatisfied unless I can prove to myself that there's something wrong with me. When that happens, there's a crawl back. And the crawl back is to God. I don't know where I learned this, but it's always, when is he going to finally just be done? And that's leaving. If I could really speak to why I got into this field, why I'm doing this trauma work and living the life I'm living, it's to heal those unconscious and deeply embedded beliefs that aren't real. You were there. You ignored whatever he was throwing out. The Spirit is probably thinking the same thing about us. There he goes again, spinning out like a little maniac. I used to just rub my son's back and get some water and some Doritos and feed him some corn chips, and ten minutes later he was like, I'm sorry, Dad. I told you I hated you. I didn't take any of it seriously. This little boy is losing it. I think it's probably the same thing with us. We're allowed to mess up and lose it and throw accusations out there, and then there's a little back rub and some water and a couple of corn chips. I think we need to start looking at ourselves that way, because we'll rebound so much quicker.

Drew: I can't believe you're saying this. I've got goosebumps.

Shame spirals and repair at home (39:55)

Drew: Because exactly that happened with me this weekend. I'm experiencing healing even in this conversation. I had this amazing week. Pretty exhausted, pretty tired by Saturday. You even sent me a text like, hey man, check out, I don't want you burning out. I appreciated that. Went to a football game, and after the football game, I lost my cool with my youngest daughter. Not a good scenario. And man, I went into all day yesterday in a shame spiral. Just toxic shame. It honestly wasn't until the end of the day, when I was able to check it in with my wife, that I started climbing out of it. All day I was in it. But it's like what you just said. It's part of being human. I messed up. I was wrong. I apologized and I repaired. But then the shame stuff. What's wrong with you, Drew? What kind of dad does that? That kind of thing sets in. That's part of the human experience. But connection. We say it all the time. Connection. Getting it out of our body. Not living in that headspace. Checking it in with someone else. You've got to work this process to dig yourself out of it. So I take comfort hearing a guy like you who's checking that in. We're living it.

Michael: Thank you for saying that. Same exact thing. I wasn't going to share this unless you shared yours. We go down to this sketchy part of Austin yesterday. Samantha wants to bring us to this super cool church, Christ Church. Anglican service. Good hearted people. We leave there and we're walking through complete mayhem. Not just homelessness. Mental illness on steroids. Hundreds of people. And the girls were scared. Of course, I'm self righteous. I'm like, hey guys, this is where Jesus would be hanging out. Don't be leaving church and going, ooh. But remember, I'm a man. I'm not scared. Something goes wrong, I'm knocking the dude out. My wife and my daughter can't do that. I don't want to go weird gender roles, but we also have to remember, when we lose our cool or raise our voice, it's a lot more frightening for a female than it is for another male. That guy's yelling at you on the phone, hangs up on you, you're not thinking anything of it. If he does that to his wife, she's shattered. Oh my gosh, this guy is dangerous. Then a car almost runs me over, and both girls grab me. And I have all this trauma from fights in my youth in New York. If you mess with my face or push me, there's this immediate schoolyard thing. I got loud for a second. And it sent me into a shame cycle. We're walking in silence. Finally my daughter said something, and we had a great lunch. But that could have gone horribly wrong. I could have been like, guys, you never touch a man who's been traumatized. Pride about why I raised my voice. Instead I was able to say, okay, I don't understand what's going on for them, walking through a crowd of people who are using. Because I'm not scared. So I had to empathize with where they were at instead of trying to get them to empathize with where I was at.

Drew: Totally.

Michael: And I think as providers, we want people to feel safe in our presence. Guys, I will always protect you. I will die before anybody in this whole area comes even close to you. And then, what is it you guys don't trust about me? Something about men and shame comes up. Whoa, whoa. They're not feeling that. They're not going, this guy's not a good protector, I wish my dad was a better fighter.

Sideways emotions and decompression (44:50)

Michael: I'm trying to give grace to all sides. That's St. Francis. To understand rather than be understood. To love rather than be loved. We have to do that. It kills me. Rather than being understood, we have to understand.

Drew: That's right. You nailed it. For me, getting loud, and my wife bringing to my attention that my daughter didn't feel safe. Hey, you don't realize when you get big that it's scary. But part of it, too, is digging deeper and asking, what's actually going on? What's really bothering me? There were a couple of other things from the weekend. These are sideways emotions. Things coming out sideways. It's not actually what happened with my daughter that's the reason I blew up. It's these other things I'm not addressing in my life right now. I'm not talking about this thing that hurt me, or this thing that made me sad. And then boom. Blow up for no reason. Shame. And none of it is even about the thing that's really going on.

Michael: You are in it. I always thought I was immune. Like I was an emergency room doctor, this is just my life, I'm a little twisted, I can handle this stuff. Here's the truth. We can't. If we go into people's lives and into their darkness, you'd better believe you need some decompression. You need to give yourself some grace. I remember one time I was helping a buddy of mine whose wife had passed away. You know him. Beautiful man. I was helping him clean out his house. And I remember being at dinner and getting so angry with my wife and son that I left and went to a meeting. My son just said, I don't know what's wrong, just come home. It was a hundred percent that I'd been cleaning that house all day and it was bugging me out. I was in this depressive darkness all day, because she had left in a way that was traumatizing for him. I was holding all of that. And they hadn't done anything wrong.

Drew: It's just sideways emotions. When we don't deal with it. A lot of the guys we see in treatment show up angry, and you're like, that's not what you're angry about. That could be a 40 year old trauma you haven't dealt with. That's what we're helping guys do. Get beneath the thing. You say it all the time. Whether you show up for sex addiction or gambling or substances, there are nuanced differences, but underneath all those things, we look a lot more similar than different. It's shame. It's fear. It's trauma. We just happened to be exposed to a certain unhealthy escape that numbs us out. One guy's is heroin, one guy's is sex, the next guy's is gambling. But we're all numbing. We're all medicating. It's all medicine we're using to try not to feel. It's the art of dissociation.

Michael: It's such a skill to learn how to dissociate as a child. That you could go somewhere. I was watching that movie, Michael, on the plane. It's amazing how so few people impact our lives in such a profound way. The whole world could love you. You could be the biggest superstar in the world, and still be tormented by one relationship. That sets you on a difficult trajectory. And it's amazing, without that knowledge, how much power all of that has over us.

Drew: I have a friend who always says everyone makes more sense in light of their story. Once you hear someone's story, it makes a lot more sense.

Takeaways and how to reach us (49:35)

Drew: All right, so that's it. A little look inside our Monday conversation, and that's what it's going to be. Like I said at the top, these will show up every so often, whenever the conversation before the business is worth sharing. If you like this format, let me know. It helps us decide how often to hit record. But if you heard your own family somewhere in that story, I want you to know that what that family did is learnable. We walk you through it. It's not about being harsh. It's not about being a doormat. It's about loving someone enough to stop making it easy for him to stay stuck. That's what loving leverage is, and that's what we help families do every day. Head to valiantliving.com to learn more, or if you're ready to talk with someone today, call us at 720-669-1285. That's the admissions line for our men's program, and a real person picks up. And if you're the one making the call for someone you love, you're not betraying him. You might be the reason he gets his life back. If this episode helped you, share it with the man who needs to hear it, or with the person who loves him, and subscribe so you don't miss what's coming next. I'm Drew Powell. You've been listening to Mondays with Michael on the Loving Leverage Podcast. We'll see you next time.