DSO Reacts: Esther Perel and That God-Awful Couple Are Back!

Okay, if you're a frequent listener of the Dad Starting Over podcast and you find yourself saying, "Yeah, that sounds like me," well, you don't need another podcast episode. What you need is support. The Help for Men Brotherhood is where men go when they're done pretending that they got it all handled. You know, your dead bedrooms, your divorce, your loneliness, your rebuilding life. We have private forums, frequent live Zoom meetings, one-on-one coaching, courses, all my books at no additional charge. And yes, we get together in person. Real men and real conversations. So stop doing this alone and join the Help for Men Brotherhood today at help4men.com/join. I look forward to seeing you in the next member meeting. Hello everyone, DSO here from dadstartingover.com, and this is gonna be a good one today. For those that don't know, I did a series of like 2 or 3, um, what I call DSO Reacts videos or podcast videos if you watch on YouTube. Um, basically I would listen to a podcast or video and give my commentary on it, my running commentary as we watch it. Well, probably the most popular one I did as far as generating emails and downloads were concerned was, uh, the reaction to a podcast episode by Esther Perel. Esther Perel is a psychotherapist, very, very popular. She sold bazillions of books. She's done TED Talks. Her— I'm sure her podcast gets bazillions of downloads. She's a very successful woman in the sphere of the relationship world. She makes your boy DSO look like nothing. Um, the podcast episode of hers that I dissected was called "You Want Me to Watch the Kids While You Go Out with Other Men?" To set it up a little bit, her— the, the tone or the, um, the theme of her podcast, which the title is Where Should We Begin, is that Esther sits down and does a therapy session with, I presume, married couples or just committed couples that are together and they have problems. And they come in and hash it out with Esther and they talk all about it. It's pretty good stuff, actually. Um, Esther, I've always thought a great deal of her books, Mating in Captivity, State of Affairs are pretty much must-reads in the relationship sphere. Um, but when I listened to that episode of You Want Me to Watch the Kids While You Go Out with Other Men, myself and other men just left with our blood boiling. It was nuts. It was insane. Just to give you a quick overview, um, a very milquetoast, weak, weak dude is married to a woman who's having this sexual awakening and she decides, by very obvious lack of attraction and respect for the guy, that her only recourse is to go out and bang other dudes. And he's left behind. And one of the lines was, "You want me to watch the kids while you go out with other men?" Well, what was kind of so surprising and heartbreaking to us dudes who like to listen to Esther and her stuff was that Esther's reaction of one was one of kind of an uber, um, progressive mindset of, hey, whatever happens happens, it must be good. And the tone of her and the wife towards the dude was one of, um, hey, she goes out and gets her jollies with other men, she comes back and she's turned on as a result. Isn't that great? You got your wife all turned on again, you should be happy. Yay. And myself and other dudes said We can't think of anything more hurtful, to be quite honest with you. What a galactically huge kick in the nuts. I can't think of anything more emasculating. And I beat up on the dude because he's just not the most masculine dude on the planet. Um, if you go back and listen to it, DSO Reacts, uh, you want me to watch the kids while you go out with other men? Esther Perel, uh, before listening to this one, listen to that one. Well, for those of you that are wondering what happened to that couple I wonder if they're still together. Well, lo and behold, here we go, part 2. Esther brings him in again, and I've already listened to this, just a quick one, one time listening through while driving, so I may not have paid attention completely. But in essence, I can give you the overview is the dumpster fire continues. Holy shit, this is nuts. And, uh, the nuttiness does not stop. If anything, it intensifies in this episode. So let's get to it, shall we?

Here we are again. Many times I end a session and then time passes and I say, what happened to them? Where are they at now? So this is my opening question as I welcome you back.

Do you want to start?

Do you want me to start?

I can say, well, it was, I think what resonated in the moment is the same thing that resonates still for me now. And I just felt really validated because I felt a lot of guilt before associated with struggling with opening up the marriage. Esther says it's okay for me to be feeling what I'm feeling and to go through what I'm going through.

I stand by that.

Jesus, I would certainly hope so. What, what a, um, what an epiphany. The man feels feelings, negative feelings, which he frames as guilt, which is, wow, I feel bad for feeling bad because my wife wants to go have sex with other men. And, uh, Esther, in her therapy ways, says, well, that's Perfectly understandable. Good for her, but Jesus, dude. Um, you know, let me stop here. Let me get this out of the way. This is something that I got a lot of guys emailing me about, and the question was, do you think the guy's gay? Why would they say that? Well, obviously he kind of has an effeminate, um, I don't know, what's the term, lilt to his voice. Um, no, no. So let's be honest, guys, just because you have a somewhat effeminate tone to your voice doesn't necessarily mean you're a homosexual. No, I don't think he's closeted in any way. I think he's just a very effeminate, kind of meek little dude. But let's continue on.

The message that I see a lot in the polyamory community is, is compersion.

Define it as you understand it.

The happiness for your partner's happiness.

In contrast to—

let me better define that. Um, when I find the compersion in their polyamorous world— and it's funny, I don't remember if they fully defined themselves as polyamorous in the first episode. So it sounds like the narrative is kind of going towards, we are officially part of this community of people that go out and get their needs else— met elsewhere. But from the first episode, it was actually her that did so, not them as a couple. Um, be— to be quite honest with you, I'm not sure the guy even has an option. Just because, hey, I'm polyamorous doesn't mean you're going to run out and get some. I think this guy's gonna have a whole hell of a lot of trouble. And her being a woman, she won't. But anyway, compersion is, um, when I feel intense joy, uh, as a result of knowing that my partner is going out and getting it elsewhere. So let's say you're sitting there watching your, your partner getting railed by some dude and she's having an orgasm. That just fills you with all kinds of happiness. That's what that is. Um, some of you listening to that are like, seriously? Yeah, seriously. Anywho, continuing on.

In contrast to, to jealousy and insecurity, and, and the term I see a lot is toxic monogamy, like if you don't have Persian, then you have toxic monogamy.

Can we leave the word toxic out? Meaning there is toxicity and then there is monogamy, and not all monogamy is toxic, and feelings of jealousy are not unusual.

Yes, even good for Esther. Yeah, we don't need to frame it as toxic monogamy. Jesus, people have jealousy and, uh, Don't want to see their spouse getting railed by some dude. Guess what, guys, that's kind of normal. We don't need to label that as toxic.

Even with people who have compersion at times too. And we can use words that have meaning, but we don't need to trap you in some of the limiting meanings that those words at times have.

Mm-hmm.

When people choose monogamy or polyamory or any form of consensual non-monogamy, Today, in our corners of the world, in the West, these are choices, these are relational arrangements. When they become ideologies that justify themselves by discarding and trashing the other side so that it becomes non-monogamy, never works, or monogamy attached with the word toxic, we really lose what is going on in a relationship that is trying to go through a major transition such as this couple. And you say, is my jealousy an expression of what you read is called toxic monogamy?

Yes.

And what is, what does that mean as you read it?

Um, codependency and jealousy and ownership and control, possessiveness. Yeah.

Did you hear the wife there? Ownership. She has framed this very much from the beginning as this going out and getting, getting her back blown out by other men. Excuse me. Is, is an expression of her identity and freedom as a woman that to do otherwise is somebody trying to control her and control her sexuality. So she's had to throw that little thing in there. Doesn't surprise me. Okay.

But I never heard you say, "I'm right." I didn't even hear you say, "I'm justified, I'm legitimate, I deserve, I'm entitled." You just said, "This is how this lands on me." And I think that is quite honest and real.

Mm-hmm.

But you blame yourself real fast.

No?

Yeah.

And where did you learn that?

Hmm.

You look like you have an idea.

This is all you, babe.

I don't know, I guess it just makes sense. It's always made sense that if you do something wrong, then You're at fault. Accountability.

But accountability, responsibility, and blame are not all one and the same.

Did I miss something? What— who did what wrong? Is he saying that the feelings, natural feelings of jealousy, were in fact wrong, therefore he feels guilty about it?

May I put it differently? When you take responsibility and you express guilt, that doesn't translate into shame.

Yeah, I don't know how to recognize a mistake without feeling shame for it.

I understood, and I asked you, where did you learn that? This is a part of your —code.

It is. And I don't remember it ever not being a part of my code. While I theoretically know everyone makes mistakes, when I make a mistake, it feels worse. It seems worse.

Yes, because I don't just say, I did something wrong. I say, what's wrong with me? Yes. And that is something we learn.

Okay, I get there's nothing wrong with what's being said here. I get it. But did I have a stroke or something? Did I miss it? What, um, what's the context here? I made a mistake. It's almost as if, um, you know, if you were listening to this for the first time, you're thinking, oh shit, what'd this guy do? Um, you know, if you were dropped in at this point in the conversation, like, oh, did somebody cheat? Did he get caught with his, uh, Pants around his ankles? What happened here? But I'm— this guy's just going into this long thing, and Esther is trying to probe into where, where do you— where do you have these feelings of guilt? And when you, when you do something bad— I don't know, this is very strange already.

Where should the sleuth detective go?

Do you think it ties back into your peacekeeping, conflict avoidant?

It might. My deepest desire is to maintain peace.

Well, we all saw this coming. He's your stereotypical Mr. Nice Guy. And Mr. Nice Guy is another term for, uh, and by the way, if you haven't read it, go pick up a copy of No More Mr. Nice Guy by our friend Dr. Robert Glover, who was at BroFest, by the way, in Austin, Texas. Um, it's another word for codependency. Um, it's another word for, uh, being, um, being conflict-averse. Uh, you don't want to rock the boat, even if it means, uh, tearing down your own boundaries and doing things that are unhealthy for you. Um, that's fine as long as it doesn't rock the boat. That's a very not very masculine, very unhealthy mindset to be in. Doesn't surprise me at all to hear this guy saying, "That's kind of part of my makeup. That's part of my code." But again, I'm going to keep harping on exactly what the hell does that have to do with anything here, except for if we were to frame this as he allowed his wife to do a lot of things and he never properly protested, or he never properly said, "This hurts me. Please stop." 'If you want to remain my wife, don't do this anymore.' Um, we're well past that phase, so it doesn't have anything to do with that. He is— from what I'm gathering here, again, I guess I missed it— he is framing all of this in terms of, 'I feel jealous and I feel negative feelings towards my wife having sexual intercourse with other men outside of our relationship.

I'm a bad boy.' That's what I'm hearing. And The easiest disruptor of my peace is conflict with someone that I care about, with anyone that I care about.

Did you grow up with conflict?

Yeah, I grew up— It's reaction. That's exactly how he is. Yes. My family was pretty conflict avoidant.

They're conversation avoidant. Conflict is constant, I feel like.

How does a conflict come up if we don't talk about it?

It's your sister feeling like we don't welcome her enough to the house, so she's going to skip the kids' birthday party. It's your mother sending us a letter 10 years after an incident venting about it. But it's like playing whack-a-mole. You know, you guys just want to whack it down.

So she's pointing out that, uh, dude, you came from some pretty toxic females in your life, and, um, they're, um, kind of have a narcissistic bent to them. You know, the mom holding on to that grudge for 10 years, the, the, um, sister cutting them out of their life for whatever reason. Uh, so wife interprets this as, uh, you're— you don't properly in a healthy way, discuss things. Kind of interesting coming from a wife doing what she's doing. But I digress.

Down, and then it goes away for a while. And everyone says there's no conflict here at all. And for someone like me, I come in and I see the conflict. Like, is everybody crazy? Because we clearly have issues. But there's absolutely no path to resolution. But you find peace with that as long as no one's talking about it. That makes me mental.

I make anyone mental just sitting back and watching your man, um, just avoiding conflict and playing Mr. Nice Guy. He's probably one of those two that doesn't stick up for his wife, you know. If his mother were to say something or sister were to say something, he just goes in the other room and lets it go. One of the biggest libido crushers there is for a woman is just to watch your man fold and just be like, ah, just leave me out of it, I don't want to deal with it.

Because he does that with you too.

Oh yeah. Yes. The biggest lesson for us has been— You talk to him. Yeah, you— I remember you'd be having a day where it was— something was weighing on you about the whole thing. And I would look at you and I knew something was wrong. And so I would start getting panicked, like, oh my gosh, OK, what do I do? I don't know how to fix this. I don't know how to make him happy. And so I would ask you how I could help and how I could support, and you—

well, that right there is awful unhealthy on her part. That's a very codependent thing, isn't it? My partner is exhibiting some negative emotion, obviously. I need to fix this or else I'm going to go insane myself. As opposed to, uh, he's just going through something, let him go, he'll be fine. Um, just let him know quickly, like, here for you in case you need to talk about it. Done. But no, she's kind of wigging out now. In her defense though, She probably realizes from years of being with this dude, oh shit, he's about to deal with this negative emotion in a very unhealthy way. Here we go.

He would tell me, and he would— sometimes it was, I need an hour in the hot tub with my laptop and a movie, and I'll figure it out and I'll let you know. And watching him out there while I'm inside going, what do I do? What do I do? Like, I I couldn't rely on all the tips and tricks and, you know, just try to be better and make him happier. I couldn't rely on any of those.

Describe it. Hmm.

I have spent our whole marriage— I mean, for 15 years, the entire time I have felt this burden, this backpack that I've been carrying around and didn't realize, where it was my job as the good wife to make sure my husband was fulfilled. And the difficulty in that is my husband didn't always know what he needed to be fulfilled.

And so, um, a couple things here. So she feels the weight of this man's, uh, neuroticism, or, or, uh, whatever negativity that he's holding on her— on his shoulders, he feels— she feels that he's dumping on her shoulders. So far I'm not picking up on that. So far it's, hey, leave me alone, I'm gonna go soak in the hot tub for a little bit. That sounds kind of healthy to me. Leave me be. And then she's just, you know, staring at him from the other room going, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God. So what she hasn't done thus far has sold me on the fact of, um, her freaking out is warranted. I don't know, maybe I'm missing something here, but he has his issues. Issues, sure, but why does she make them her issue? Is she being far too empathetic to the point of developing her own neuroses?

I took that very personally. I can't be who you need me to be. That phrase, I can't be who you need me to be. Has been a soundtrack for the past 15 years, and I didn't recognize it.

And who you need me to be is?

I had a picture of someone who enjoyed all the same hobbies he does, and I was entertaining to be around, and I was always on and pleasurable and sexy and kept everything together. And it's every old trope. And it was never something he directly communicated to me. But those messages come through in disappointment. So it was almost a passive roundabout way of how I interpreted that message. It would be his disappointment that date nights weren't fun enough. It would be his disappointment that sex wasn't enough.

You're the only one with other partners? Correct.

Okay, let me stop there. So she couldn't muster in herself the energy to be— notice what she was describing was a traditional feminine, not feminist, feminine person. Um, he needs me to be happy and bubbly and sexy and fun. Yeah, um, I covered this in a previous podcast about what can women learn from pornography. Um, again, porn not the best thing in the world, but it's popular for a reason. And one of the reasons is that the women are youthful, not in their appearance and in their actions. And that's not fair to women to say, hey, you didn't need to be like these young women in the porn. But you can take something from that, learn from it, which is you can be an older woman and be more youthful in your action, such as dropping the negativity, such as, you know, dressing a certain way, acting a certain way. Some women, and you're more feminist bent, may hear that and say, "Yeah, right. What is this, the 1950s?" Well, let's just drop the bullshit. That's what's attractive. And that's what this guy— she says he never overtly tells her, "I don't like that you don't act this way," but she can pick up on it that he doesn't like that. Question is, is that true or not? Is she just projecting? Or she just sees his sadness over the fact that, "No, I don't want to have sex. No, I don't want to go do your thing that you want to do." No, I don't want to have fun. In other words, dude, I'm completely detached from you emotionally. You ain't doing it for me. I can't jump on board your little train here. There's nothing I want to do any less than that. So just leave me alone. That's the energy she's given me and probably what he's picked up on. So the two just don't mesh. If we haven't picked up on that already, you know, an episode and a half into My Wife Wants to Bang Other Men, that's kind of the underlying theme here. She doesn't want much to do with him anymore. And, um, kind of dancing around the topic again. I just— we're kind of, um, I, I can sense that she's going into the more feminist direction of— notice she said that this was a very traditional trope of woman trying to keep her man happy, and nothing I do makes him happy. Um, when in fact it's pretty simple. Um, if he were to go and find another woman, which easier said than done with this dude, I'm sorry to say, and he were to find one that he's way more compatible with, he'd get his needs met. And that woman wouldn't be sitting there saying, I can't believe he wants me to be happy and join him on adventures. She'd be like, yeah, I want to join him on adventures. I'm his wife. That's what we do. It's fun. I love the guy. This woman doesn't have that, that energy.

She doesn't have that in her. Currently, he started dating.

I'm gonna let him tell that.

Yes. But I am currently the only one with active relationship. But he—

oh, we're getting into it now. Okay, well, we just jumped right into the whole, uh, having sex with others. So he's dating, but she's currently the only one with active relationships. Uh, to me, that's code for homeboy over here tried and didn't get much of anywhere, but yeah, I'm having sex, I got a conga line of dudes waiting. This is not always 100% of the time what happens, but more often than not, this is what happens. It's just a different world out there in the dating realm. You're a woman, you could be average, below average on the looks. I know that's a subjective thing, but just go with it. And, um, run out there and just have all kinds of sexual partners. Uh, while you're a man who's average, and, uh, the statistics show that the majority of women will look at you and say, eh, not gonna happen. So it's way tougher. This guy, by virtue of the fact you know, based upon what we have been— what we've heard over this episode and the last episode is he doesn't have the tools. Dude just doesn't have it. Hell, I had got email after email of guys saying that he was— he was gay. Um, that tells you everything right there.

He's still primary, so we don't have it set up and we don't have hierarchy. Um, we are nesting partners. We are very heavily entangled. We have a home, we have children, and we build life together.

Well, who saw this coming? Before, the narrative was— the story was, um, hey, it's you and me against the world. We're partners here. I just happen— this is the wife talking— I just happen to need to get my sexual needs met elsewhere. Um, but you and I, I love you no matter what kind of thing. Now you notice the story's kind of softened a bit, hasn't it? No, we're not primaries anymore. I noticed she used that term entangled. I don't know if you guys have heard that before. It was famously uttered by, uh, shit, what's her name? Jada Pinkett Smith, I think is her name. Um, the wife of Will Smith, who admitted on national TV while a tearful, obviously completely emasculated and destroyed Will Smith sat and listened. She talked about her affair with a younger man. Under their roof, and she described it as an entanglement. So this apparently is kind of a buzzword in their little sphere of whatever you want to call this polyamorous cheating women thing. Um, so what a further kick in the nuts, dude. You've been demoted. You are now my domestic partner. Notice she said we nest together. The guy's Provider 101. That's all he is anymore. Sorry, you are the dude that— yeah, you want me to stay home and watch the kids while you go out with other men. The title still stands. That's exactly what he is. Babysitter, probably housekeeper, maybe throws a few bucks into the bank to help out with things. But other than that, what's the purpose? Again, extremely emasculating, extremely insulting, extremely unhealthy. I know some people are going to listen to this and say, no, I've been in an open marriage forever and it works. Whatever, um, more power to you, whatever floats your boat there. But, uh, this scenario is not healthy. I don't care how they try to massage this, it ain't a good thing.

Um, those entanglements come first, but as values, he is not more valuable than another, another person in my life.

Goddamn, she just put it out there on the table, didn't she? He is not more valuable than anybody else in my life. She's literally sitting next to this dude, I assume, in this Ralph Brewer in this, uh, therapy session saying this shit. Wow, that's just completely tone deaf, uh, the empathy thing. While she was exhibiting hyper-empathy earlier with his stress and his, uh, his obvious negativity and things bother him, throw me for a loop, that's gone, that's out the window now. She's like, yep, fucking other dudes, and, um, he ain't even number one anymore. He is nowhere— he doesn't rank above any of the other guys in my life.

Jesus. Wow. But we have history, we have trust, we— he's my best friend, and that friendship is the— is still the most important thing to me.

In, um, in basic, uh, dating vernacular, the dude has been friend-zoned by his own wife. Ouch.

It becomes clear that in the past 2 years, the structure of the relationship has shifted from them as the primary partners to a more lateral model in which they are co-parenting and they have history and shared financial responsibilities, but there are other partners that she has that are on equal level with him. At this point, I'm kind of putting pieces together. Right? So you said, while he doesn't get angry much, much, one of the ways he gets my attention is by actually going disappointed, sad, sullen. And you feel responsible to regulate if he's upset or disappointed Or do you mope? Yes. You mope. Yes. It often goes— there's another word in English. You pout. Yes. You pout.

Oh, yes. Yes.

I'll go alone in a corner and be sad. It comes up for fun a lot. So she gave the example of The date night wasn't good enough. We go out and I didn't have enough fun in my head, so I go home and go do something fun myself to fill the fun tank.

He likes being entertained. He likes having a lot of stimulation and a lot going on. And when it's our date night, when we've said, okay, we're going to do Thursdays or Fridays or whatever the date nights are for that week. It is an immediate source of stress for me because is he going to end up disappointed like every other date night if I don't find the energy reserves to—

And it's more disappointing because you say she has a better time elsewhere, or I can see her be more intentional elsewhere, or she brings more energy to the other person?

It's the activity. So what I think a concrete example might be Okay, Thursday is our date night, and what will happen is let's watch a show in bed.

That's because you prefer that with him.

That's because that is what I prefer with everybody.

Everybody. It is hard to get her out of the house at those date nights.

So she's a boring asshole. She could be a boring asshole if she wants, that's fine, but it's not compatible with this dude. Hey, The dude likes to go out and have fun. What a monster. I mean, is that kind of what we're going with here? Um, this poor schmuck over here likes to have fun and it's exhausting to me. Um, I much prefer to stay at home and do nothing. Okay, is this okay? You're just fundamentally incompatible when it comes to things to do when you have time free. Not a big deal.

It's become ways to prove We still are important. We still are special. We still— what? Care. We're still intentional.

We're still invested. Mm-hmm.

And that proving point has its own fatigue. I have to prove that I am entertaining enough that he wants to spend that time with me.

Because otherwise?

He's not interested.

You've expressed that. You expressed that you feel You feel that my priority is the fun and you're an accessory to the fun.

Mm-hmm. How interesting. She's literally complaining to him and she sounds shaky voice, like this really upsets her. I feel like I always have to be on with you and I feel like I don't live up to your expectations for a fun partner. Um, we're, we're excuse me while I get vulgar here, ma'am. You are running out and having sexual intercourse with other men, and you with a straight face say, I feel like I don't measure up to your, your, your, um, your barometer of what's fun in a partner. You're fucking other dudes again. Did I have a stroke here or something? What am I missing? She quite literally is saying, to hell with you and your feelings. F you. I've lost all respect for you. I'm gonna go out and get my needs met elsewhere. By the way, you in no way, shape, or form rank above these other dudes, so don't even get that in your dumb little head. And when you want to go out and have fun with me and I feel like I don't measure up, it hurts my feelings. What prevents this guy from looking at her and saying, go fuck yourself? Seriously, um, obviously it's his deep-seated low self-esteem. You can just— it's just, uh, this guy is just dripping with low self-esteem, low self-worth. Otherwise she wouldn't even be in this relationship. You'd be calling an attorney 2 days into this. This is nuts.

To which you said, no, it's that I want to— I want to have fun and I want to share it with you.

And why is fun so important? Oh, not that I think it's not, but like fun has a unique importance for you. It does, because it's on the other side of blame and responsibility. Wait, what do you mean? I'll come back to that.

Okay, I'm just—

I said it before in the previous episode, this wife bugs the shit out of me. She's so goddamn annoying. Um, I don't know if you can hear it. I can hear it in my headphones. That just these little gasps and that she has these little like, oh my God moments throughout the conversation, just Jesus, just get over yourself. Just gonna set that up.

If I get to the end of a day and I look at, okay, I worked today and then I got home and then I went to bed, then it feels like I wasted the day. Because I didn't have any fun today. I only have obligations. And what's the point of life if you're not enjoying it? How interesting this is.

I'm going to keep saying that. How interesting. How this relationship is like this— these two are like lab rats, and we're just sitting there as scientists with clipboards watching them going, oh, this is just one thing after the other after the other with these guys. Do you see what they're doing here? Let me put on my, uh, my very masculine hat here and look at this through a man's point of view, um, who's talked to a lot of guys like this dude. What we're saying is, uh, the wife who has told him your frame as a dude is that of Mr. Provider— please don't get it twisted, dude. Anything that veers outside of the frame of Mr. Provider Uh, is a big fat no-no, and I'm gonna shame the shit out of you for it. You want to have fun? You want to go out and do something that doesn't involve responsibility? Um, go fuck yourself, and I'm gonna shame you for it. I'm gonna— even with all this other shit going on in the background with the sex with others, she just brushes that aside. No, no, no, no, he needs to be punished and he needs to be shamed for, um, how dare he try to have fun. I guarantee you, guarantee you, if there's another guy out there that she is— that really pushes her buttons and gets her going, um, he can be Mr. I-just-work-a-part-time-job-and-I-spend-my-day-having-all-kinds-of-fun-and-going-rock-climbing-or-jumping-out-of-airplanes or whatever, and she would just think he's Mr. Dreamboat. But for this guy, that's not his role. He needs to be Mr. Provider, dude. It's a core value for him.

It's a Yes. Yeah.

Tell me more. If you had a whiteboard here and you had the word fun on the top and you had to free associate to the word fun, fun is?

Fun is adventure. Fun is active. Fun is exploring.

It's good.

Let's second layer. Like specific activities or? Either one. Something I discovered just in the last 2 years—

You just told me that fun has an existential meaning for you. Fun is a way of knowing that life wasn't wasted, is what I heard you just say. Yes. Fun is feeling that at the end of the day, there is something for you after you've done everything you should do for others and for the world of adulthood. Yes. Fun is feeling that— keep going.

I'll fill in the blank. Fun is crucial for mental health. Fun is being a human being. Fun is normal. Uh, you can't have fun 24/7. No, but what if you could and you, uh, um, supported yourself and your family and everything else? I have a feeling even if this guy were super wealthy and raking in the bucks and doing so via fun, this wife would probably still jump all over his case. Feeling that—

feeling that you're not a robot that just went to work in the factory and then got shut off at the end of the day. Fun is humaneness.

Would you be comfortable sharing about how that's impacted work for you and your contentment at work?

Yeah, I have a hard time having fun at work.

Or working in a place that is not fun. Mm-hmm. Correct. Because then all I feel is the robot and the oppression.

Correct. Being unable to have a fun workplace makes me feel like a robot or not empowered.

And how much is his personal life with the wife and all the shit show dumpster fire that's going on there, how much of that impacts that? By virtue of the toxic relationship that he's in, how much is of the onus of his mental health is he putting on the, uh, on the job? In other words, a dude that's getting— that has a good fulfilling sexual life and intimacy and romance at home, he's far more apt to just say, you know, walking to work skipping and whistling and saying, hey guys, I'm here. I don't get 1,000% satisfaction out of this job on an existential level, but it's a job and I'm lucky to have it and I enjoy my co-workers. Hey, look at that, 5 o'clock, see you later. As opposed to a guy who's just like, I just got done being shit all over by my wife and she just went on another date with another guy. So basically I feel suicidal as a result. And here I am in this job and somebody says, hey Bob, um, here's a stack of files we need you to process, have fun. And you're just like, just shoot me now. I have a feeling that has something to do with it. And I also have a feeling that Esther and the little lady there aren't going to put two and two together because That's just what they do.

This has been maybe the most difficult part of our marriage in my perspective. I have been the primary earner. I don't love what I do, you know. It's not like, it's not like I go to work with a, with a sense of calling and whatnot, but it didn't matter because it gave me the keys to have a family and have fun and have all this all these things, and he's never felt that way. And this is going to sound really cut and dry. I'm so nervous about hurting you in here.

Oh, dear God, I'm so nervous about hurting you. I wonder if she feels that way while she's getting railed by some— the third dude that week. And if you can sense my anger, yeah, you're right. This just pisses me off to no end. You know, they're just fundamentally incompatible is what it comes down to. This dude needs to live by himself in a small apartment surrounded by action figures and video games. You know the type. Nothing wrong with that. If that makes you happy, God bless you, enjoy. But, um, you're not the run out and, uh, work your ass off to make six figures kind of dude. You're just happy in your own little world doing your little fun stuff. You can call it Peter Pan syndrome, whatever you want to call it. Um, that's him, and she's trying to say to him, uh, that's always bugged me about you, and I lost respect for you as a result. All right, based upon all her past actions and everything else, if I'm him, I just look at her and say, it's your fucking problem.

You understand I'm not judging you for this at all. I just want to just say it. Okay. I have felt like I have funded his fun our entire marriage.

Yeah, she's his mommy. She didn't like it.

I have often said that in a session, people come in with one story and they should leave with another. But equally important is when people come in with one story and a session Love is about something completely different, and it takes a while to get there, but when you hear it, you know it.

I have felt like I have funded his fun our entire marriage.

Interesting that— there's that word again. This woman, I believe, would identify herself as a feminist person. Not putting words in her mouth. I think she may have in the first episode. At least that's what I got from it. The feminist thing would lead you to believe that egalitarianism would be of the utmost importance, that let's toss aside a lot of the old stereotypes, the male-female roles and the polarity and everything else, and just scrap all that, quote, nonsense, and just be a normal, modern, progressive couple. Yet, when the tables turn and it's, I'm supporting this guy and he's having fun while I'm working. Um, there's a lot of men listening to that saying, welcome to my world. I got a stay-at-home mom. She takes care of a couple kids. Well, but she also goes and gets pedicures and has wine dates with her friends and goes to yoga and, um, all kinds of stuff that I fund. That's just kind of an understanding. That's what we do. She's experiencing that firsthand and she said, this really sucks.

Well, again, interesting. Me going into work and keeping the jobs and working in a really misogynistic industry and fighting my way to the top, I felt— there we go— felt tremendous pressure. I am trying to make ends meet because we have a ton of student loan debt. He went to grad school because he said he thought he wanted to do English and be a Professor, and he would be remarkable at that. He didn't enjoy it when he was there, so he dropped out of grad school. We're still paying off those student loans. And then he had a job, and he didn't like that job, so he got another job, didn't like that one. And I was begging him, find the thing that makes you happy, find the sense of purpose, because that's the only way you're going to be happy, and that's the only way I can have life. And the depressive states that he gets in every time he's in a job, he doesn't enjoy. It's really hard to live with. And I've told him, I'm like, it is hard to want to come home when I'm coming home and looking around going, my God, we have this house, we have these kids, we have each other and this life that we're building, and there's so much joy and there's so much to appreciate about it.

And he'll be— she's missing the big picture here though, isn't she? Um, Men do not— most men, I should say, not all, and he may be an exception to this rule— do tend to gravitate more towards, I do want to provide for my family, I do want to be looked at as the guy who is the one who helps keep the roof over our heads and keeps food on the table. That fills me with a sense of satisfaction. But that kind of goes out the window once we have a sense of betrayal or that we're being some kind of, um, uh, pushover schmuck type guy who's being taken advantage of. Naive. Um, if again, if he had a loving, uh, romantic, healthy relationship, I think he would be much more apt to say, all right dude, get your shit together and focus on a career, make something of it. But that foundation is gone. It's not there. And that has colored everything. And so in other words, bluntly, he's— he may be, without verbalizing this, thinking, why should I put all that effort into being Mr. Provider to you, woman? What do I get out of it? That's it right there. What's in it for me? Just the altruistic feeling of being a good provider to— well, then it goes right back to what? To whom? To you, wife? Fuck that noise. Maybe to the kids, but the kids are attached to you, so he probably has resentment towards them too. The resentment towards the whole family unit, that's very uncommon. It's very common in these circumstances, which is why it's not uncommon for men in this guy's position to pull up stakes and get the hell out of Dodge. One of those dads that, you know, the kids later in life say, yeah, my dad just went out for a pack of cigarettes and never came back, kind of thing. Um, because he couldn't take it anymore. That's not uncommon. I don't see this guy doing that, but, um, again, I think it's just the fundamental incompatibility. Uh, it just, it just spiraled and it's just snowballed, and to the point that we have here was just, again, this dumpster fire. This is nuts.

A majority of last year was just me working my ass off. And last year I told him, I said, I'm done. I'm done chasing your happiness. I am done feeling like I am a fraction of a person to try and keep you.

To try and keep him? She pushed him away a while back, didn't she? She basically dumped this guy a while back, but she's hanging on to him for It's interesting, I guess the question would be for what? What's in it for her to stay with him? Let's drop all the romance and let's, 'cause that's, well, the picture, let's drop all the soft mumbo jumbo and just look at it at a very pragmatic level of what's in it for her. And there's the title, you want me to watch the kids. It just comes down to that very domestic, you, Probably if it wasn't for the kids, she'd be long gone, is probably my guess.

We had some pretty big fights. And he quit jobs. I encouraged him to, like, whatever the hell you want to do. You want to quit a good job? You're making decent money. I will figure it out. But for the love of God, find something that you can actually settle into. So package that all together. It's a loaded topic.

I disloaded, and I listened to it with a lot of respect and humility. And the reason I asked you to free associate the word fun is because you're using one word to talk about a lot of things. You know, we started with date night. We started with fun is my vengeance on a life of work and obligations and— responsibilities. And then it became fun is sovereignty, fun is the proof that I made it, fun is anti-oppression, fun is anti-depression. And a lot of things go into that thing called fun, in which work then enters. And if I'm in a job where I don't feel alive, Since I can't leave myself, I leave the job. And I look for the next place that's gonna make me feel alive. Mm-hmm. In which case, on the other side of alive is a feeling of flat, languishing, depressive state. Yeah. And I count on my date night as the evening of the week that's going to kind of give meaning for all the other nights that I have to just kind of slog.

And that is why I will always disappoint him.

Well, you will only disappoint him if you take it on as a mission.

There you go. Exactly. He'll only disappoint you if you're this overly empathetic, neurotic mess who for some reason seems to be so emotionally attached to this man that you have— I shouldn't say emotionally attached— emotionally dependent upon. Um, this man that you have frankly emotionally disconnected from. How strange is that? Emotionally disconnected, romantically disconnected— maybe that's the better term. The erotic level of whatever they once had is long gone, so that level of connection's turned off, that switch is off, the plug is unplugged. Yet there's another plug still in there, which is, um, I don't know, I'm not a psychologist. I don't know if Esther will get into this. Does she have a codependent bent herself. It is, um, it's very odd. Uh, it's a sense of control on her part. That's something that I wrote about recently where somebody wrote to me and said, my wife is very obviously checked out. She's told me so much. She's openly flirting with other men. We haven't had sex in 3 years. Holy shit. Yet if I make any kind of insinuation that we have grown apart and we need to separate, she loses her marbles and starts screaming and crying. It's a method of, um, control on their part. Those, those avoidant women are very controlling, and, um, their brain is split between two areas. I'm, I'm assuming a lot here. I'm trying to act like a know-it-all asshole here, but from what I've seen in this wife's example is her brain is split into two parts. One is, I enjoy the sexual fun, erotic side of being with all these other men, and it gives me a sense of fulfillment. And he, on the other hand, represents the domestic and the stable, probably something that she was lacking as a kid. And I don't want to let that go, even though I shit all over him and treat him like dirt half the time and have zero respect for him. And there's really nothing attractive about the man, even down to the— if we want to really look at it and dig, how interesting— I need him for the domestic provider side, and boy, he really fails at that. Because he's always been Mr. Dreamer, and he's always bounced from thing to thing, and he just seems to enjoy having fun. And otherwise, he's kind of a kid. His energy is that of a kid, and she doesn't want that. She wants an adult provider man who can help make things stable in life. And when she sees this destabilizing, she, she goes off the deep end. She just needs to let that go. I have—

this is actually— you mentioned how this, all the definitions of fun kind of work, enters through his non-monogamy, enters to that same lens. So I don't know if now is a good time to share your part of why you decided you wanted to explore as well.

Oh shit, here we go.

Yeah, about a year ago, after she had been dating for about a year. About a year.

And do you know them, the other partners? Are they in her life or in your joint life? I know one.

It's a serious partner.

I mean, you know about all of them. I know about relationships with them, and I meet whoever wants serious.

Yeah. My fear. My fear of dating. Me dating was, well, if I go have sexual experience with someone, I'm so attached so easily and so value touch so much that I'll leave the family and I'll go on to be with her.

And he flat out told me that. And my response was, well, that scares the shit out of me, but Here comes that word again.

You ready? Well, this is interesting. He recognizes himself that he, uh, he's the type that he, he married the first chick that, you know, he had sex with. This woman, um, that he waited until after marriage, if I remember right, before doing anything. Which, sorry guys, if this offends you, big fucking mistake. Um, so He is saying he recognizes in himself, I get attached really easily, and the first chick that's going to touch me in a romantic way, I'm going to fall head over heels and I'm going to say farewell to our family. And that scares me. How interesting. He still feels this extreme fear and attachment to somebody who has very obviously rejected him, this wife. And, um, I guess, uh, I don't know, I was gonna say kudos to him for pointing out to the wife, like, if some other chick touches me, you know, I'm gonna fall for her and I'm going to leave your ass. And she says, uh, it scares me to death because that's the drama, because the, uh, the stability and everything else, uh, that she depends on for him, um, goes bye-bye. And it scares her. Again, what a shit show this is.

But you've got to know if what your truth is. If you're— if this marriage is not what you are finding that fun and satisfaction with. I want you to be able to be honest with yourself because you deserve to be happy, and I don't want to be the thing that's keeping you from that.

Wow, good for her, dude. If this isn't what you want in this relationship, um, go get it elsewhere. Have at it. I want you to be happy. Now, why would she be so free to say that but then literally 5 seconds before that say, it scares me to death that you may leave She's saying that because, uh, here comes an asshole thing to say, she knows good goddamn well that he's not going anywhere. He has no choice. He is not going to be able to go out into the dating world and snag up a woman. He just will not. Um, I did recently a talk with— did an event with, um, Dr. Psych Mom, where she says that her patients who are in their 40-something-year-old men newly divorced, they go out and they come back and say, holy shit, it's like shooting fish in a barrel finding women. I'm just getting women left and right. This is awesome. I've had more sex than I've had ever in my life. This is amazing. I wish every man knew how easy it is to get women. Well, that's one side of the equation. And yeah, for some it's absolutely the case. That was for me, not to brag, but that was something as a guy who had been with one woman for 20 years, um, I was surprised at. That it was relatively easy. And I'm the first to say I'm not a Mr. Playboy. I'm not the most handsome man in the world. I'm not the most charismatic dude in the world. Um, I do all right, and I was surprised at it. But I'm not this dude either. I, uh, I was mean in the previous episode and I called this guy a turnip because I was trying to think of something as non-sexy as possible, and a turnip is pretty not sexy. Um, yeah, turnips don't go out and get laid. I'm sorry. He's going to put up the dating profile and some woman's going to say he looks, you know, nice enough and they'll get to talking and she'll quickly friend zone him just as his wife did. I think wife here knows that. So by in one breath saying, "It scares me to death you may leave," and in the next breath saying, "Go ahead and go," we all know what she's saying because What she doesn't say, because the next thought in her head is, "We know you ain't going anywhere, dude." Why did you insert yourself?

I have taken that— I mean, that is a chronic issue I have taken on.

Why do you insert yourself? Because we are not talking about fun. It's really what I think is what I'm more and more sensing. I think what we're talking about is more how you deal with a certain— sad, darker side in you. Yes. And fun has become the kind of code word for the anti-dark, the non-dark.

Isn't that everyone's definition of fun? It's the anti— I mean, I, I keep calling out podcasts and articles that I've done, but I recently did one where I talk about, um, don't hang out with losers. And one of the things that is so, um, so common, especially in Western culture in the U.S., is, uh, men who work, uh, you know, 40, 50 hours a week in a job that they absolutely detest. And then Friday comes around and they get shit-faced hammered, and they wake up with a hangover, and they spend Saturday, you know, some kid's soccer game or whatever, and basically sobering up, and then Saturday night rolls around and I'm going out with my buddies, if he's lucky, or just staying at home and gets hammered again. And then Sunday is spent in a hangover, plus they have the dread of, oh shit, I gotta go back to work tomorrow. That's life for a lot of men, a lot of men. Um, so this isn't, uh, so to say fun is an escape, I don't think that this is the dramatic existential thing that we're making it out to be. I listen to this guy's story and go, yeah, you and about the majority of other men that I've ever spoken to, this is kind of the way it is. You live this life in a job that you take on simply because it provides for your family, and it's not the biggest dream in the world. And you're like, yeah, fuck, I gotta go to this job again, but oh well, it is what it is. And you try to latch on to anything in your life that will provide you with a sense of of fun, purpose, joy. That may mean going bowling with your friends, it may mean playing some video games, playing guitar, um, who knows. But, uh, I don't see— I— they haven't sold me on any kind of shame factor going on here. Um, there is the whole thing of maybe he's not fulfilling his obligation and as an adult and he's not contributing to the family. You know, she's working herself to the bone and he's at home playing video games all day. Yeah, he's got a problem. But again, they're just fundamentally incompatible.

You know, I go, I meet another woman, I love the touch. It will ignite in me the longing, the lonely, the empty, the aching for a certain connection. And it's going to make me then want to go there because I'm going to think fun is there. It has zero to do with you for a minute.

Sorry, that's a relief.

I mean, of course he's sick.

I hate this wife. Oh God, she has zero to do with you, so just chill out there, drama queen. Oh, thank you. Good Lord, just shut up for a second. Let them talk about the poor guy and his detestable fun.

Saying it to you you're the wife, etc. But it is not about you. This is actually a truth that he doesn't tell himself often. Mhm. Hot or cold? Hot. Then what happened? Then you found a partner?

Then I decided to date.

Oh boy, now we're getting into the juice.

Here we go. This is actually what we fought about in the airport.

Oh wait, I missed it. So he said, I decided to date. She said, and that's what we got into a fight about in the airport. I'm interested to see if she sees him starting to veer out and become a sexual creature outside of their relationship, if she will attempt to swat that down because Mr. Provider is not supposed to do that. She may lose him.

On their way to the session, they were stuck in the plane on the tarmac for a few hours, and they got into a big fight. So much so that they almost thought of getting off the plane and canceling the session altogether.

You can tell the whole story. Me coming home from the date and how that made you feel.

There was one date that she came home from, and she had what I remember as the first time she spent 2 consecutive nights away. And she came home, and I was really excited to see her. And one of the first things she said was, I wish I had more time with him.

Jesus H. Christ, this poor schmuck. My God, dude, what are you doing? Your wife's gone for 2 nights in a row. Number 1, holy shit, what the hell? She comes home, you're happy to see her. Okay, we'll let that slide. And first thing out of her mouth is, uh, wish I could stay longer with that dude. God, this woman just keeps kicking this poor dude in the nuts.

And I remember feeling let down and feeling hurt. And then I thought, okay, I can go date. I knew that wasn't a good motivation. I knew that wasn't—

I didn't want to— To defend myself on this, there was zero communication or expression of— I don't know that he knew it. I don't think you were being deceitful in any way. But it hurt me deeply in the airport because he said, he said, this— I haven't told you this. This is what I felt.

What? That's the source of their fight? The source of their fight was, um, he, he tells her, hey, a while back, remember when you came home after being gone 2 days, uh, banging that dude? Um, at that point I decided I'm gonna start dating too. And that set her off. Holy shit, this is so unhealthy. Wow, this poor guy. Just, um, the, the term that's often used online, simp. Um, what does that even mean, simp? But, uh, you know, it's one of those, you know what I mean. I don't know the origin of the term. Um, that's what this dude is. He's just a weak, very weak. He doesn't— he has no backbone, no boundaries. He doesn't look out for himself. And, um, no, just awful.

I had no idea that he missed me or was excited to see me or that there was any sense of expectation around.

And you're his wife, you asshole.

You didn't express it because you felt it, but you wanted to see if she felt it too, and you were going to wait for her first. What?

I don't remember. I don't remember why not express excitement.

Hell, I'll raise my hand. I'll tell you why you didn't express it. Because you've been shown throughout this whole polyamorous experiment that your feelings don't amount to shit and you, you need to shut up, provider boy. And any kind of discontent or anything that you may feel— if you listen back to the first interview with these two, um, the wife throughout that episode was just sat back going, oh God, uh, every time he said anything like, I'm hurt and this hurts my feelings, she was like, oh God, zero respect. Um, this wife is extremely toxic. I don't care how we, uh, try to, uh, shift the narrative here. This, uh, this is possibly narcissistic behavior on her part.

Um, the disappointment didn't come out because that's conflict avoidance. That's, that's my go-to.

That was your fight on your way here? That was a fight this week.

Was rewriting of his— the revisionist history.

So I, I was sad that day.

And pert. What? Revisionist history. She's like, you're rewriting history. That's not what happened. Because I think there's a twofold thing of, number one, he's not allowed to have these kind of feelings. And number two, if that upsets you at the time, weakling, what you should have done is bring it up at that time, not bring it up so many months or weeks or years, whatever it is, later. That shows me that you're scared of me. And oh, now I have even less respect for you. Come on, dude, if something bothers you, just tell me. And again, he says, yeah, but I'm conflict avoidant. Why? How funny that he happens to be married to somebody who, anytime he expresses any kind of boundary or any kind of emotion related to, um, you know, very real human emotion that he has in relation to this, this screwed up relationship of theirs, she swatted it immediately and shamed him. So, message received: shut the fuck up. That's why he shut up, because he has a history of conflict avoidance and he married a woman who swats away any kind of sense of boundaries.

And thought, I can go find someone who wants to have fun with me.

But may I just say, so basically, what made you finally come back and say to her, this wasn't at all— like, why now, a year later? It's because—

it's because we were coming here. So you—

he's blaming you. I've been recruited now.

But say more. You meaning?

Well, I knew when we came here today and had to tell our update that we would best be served with the whole story.

What did she think until now? That you got inspired by her and you said me too?

Yes. Once I saw how we could maintain our relationship in non-monogamy.

Okay, this is what bothered the wife. You going out and possibly dating others, it needs to be within the frame that I consider to be good for me. It needs to be— you need to tell me, wow, seeing how happy you are and seeing how we are able to navigate this and remain together, That kind of makes me want to do this too, sweetheart. And she's like, yay, high five. But if he says, it kind of hurt me when you went out and kind of in a fit, I said, yeah, fuck it, I'm gonna go out and start dating too. Oh no, no, no, you don't get to do that. No, no, no, this is on my terms, mister.

Yeah, so that was most of the story, but what pushed you over the edge was not the whole story.

Mm-hmm. And then what happened?

I went to therapy for a couple weeks because— A couple weeks? A couple weeks. I was already in therapy. I continued therapy for a few weeks before deciding to date. I didn't want to go in dating for retaliation. Oh, she hurt my feelings. Now I'm going to date.

But you didn't want to, but that was a piece of it.

That was a piece of it, and I worked with my therapist to find a good reason.

The moment he has a, as an inkling of any kind of, uh, that's kind of a masculine thing, isn't it? The whole, uh, if you're gonna go out and do it, screw it, I guess I will too. Um, as opposed to, I need to find a softer, more feminine, more, uh, egalitarian way of expressing this and It's you and your freedom and everything else. Wife have inspired me. Okay, now you can, little boy.

I want to find someone I don't have to drag out of the house for a date. Mhm. I want to find someone that likes to sing.

So here's the thing. I'm sorry to interrupt you. May I? It's like you want to find someone who wants to have fun that you don't have to drag out of the house. And your wife here is also telling you that if you can be more steady in the responsibility and the work part of your relationship, she will feel less exhausted and will want to have more fun.

Yes. Bullshit. I'm sorry, she's not gonna come around. This guy could make a million dollars a year and own his own corporation, everything else. Okay, that's kind of a stretch. This guy with this personality would not do that. I think he could probably add another zero at the end of his income. That's probably— that's more realistic. And it probably wouldn't make a bit of a difference in his— the foundational stuff of what makes the turnip the turnip. He'll always be the turnip. That's who he is. And she— this is kind of the equivalent of a woman saying, uh, maybe if you wash dishes tonight you'll get lucky. Um, and the man scrubs away the dishes and he stands there, huh? And the wife looks at him, was, oh, Jesus Christ, I forgot Billy's got a soccer thing. I gotta run. Fuck. Um, any man who has done the old chore play, um, will tell you the same thing. It never works. Works. Any man who tries to out-provide and as a means of bringing about a visceral sexual reaction will tell you it never works. Um, the deck is really stacked against him in a big, big way for a variety of reasons. And one of the big reasons is his wife is dipping into the old new relationship energy waters with these new men, and he in no way, shape, or form can compete with that at all, ever. I don't care what great job he gets, how many chores he does. He plays super provider extraordinaire, she comes home and the house is clean from top to bottom, and he goes, check out my big fat paycheck I just got today. She's not going to suddenly want to ride this guy with the same vigor that she does with the other guys. It doesn't work that way. It may relieve her of stress, it may be— there may be a temporary blip in the radar, and he may have, you know, go to bed with a smile on his face a couple of nights, but it will eventually smooth out and eventually go back to ground zero because the fundamental compatibility is not there. So this is horseshit with you.

So it's like she can't be your source of up when she is feeling responsible to not be your source of down.

He is— it is hard, and he knows what this is like, but it's hard to live with someone who is chronically depressed to that degree.

He— hmm. Well, she's, uh, I don't know if he's been diagnosed as chronically depressed, but it's interesting the tables have turned. One way of looking at this is I have a fun-loving, kind of boyish Peter Pan over there ready to go out and and have fun and tackle the world, fun-wise, not necessarily job-wise, while she's just like, "Can we just stay in and watch Netflix?" And she has flipped it to where it's tough being with this depressed dude over here. I think he can turn around and say the same thing about her. He is.

You are. You are a stream of gadgets and toys. It is a stream of stuff. Constantly. When we had no money, we would still get in fights about, "Well, I want this gadget, and I want this thing." And the only way I could make him feel loved was buying him stuff. And so I would. And nothing reciprocated necessarily, but it was genuinely a survival mechanism, it felt like. To keep us going, I gotta get this kid iPad and his gear.

This kid, you hear that? Yeah, he's a little boy. He's got a little boy energy. Not the most attractive thing in the world to a 30, 40-something-year-old woman who's looking for a partner. Um, not as far as a long-term partner is concerned. She probably put up with a short-term sexual partner to be boyish and fun, but not this dude. It's not him. It's not his role. And she just keeps hammering away at that. It's like, if I'm Esther, I would just go, yeah, point taken, we know he's, he's boyish, he's irresponsible. That's who he is.

Here, and he likes this new workout device, and he just bought himself a kayak for— and I don't care. Like, I don't know what the price tag looks like, but if this just goes towards the effort of, fine, you were convinced this is going to be fun, have it. It's not going to do shit.

As the conversation unfolds and it becomes more and more real, it's clear that we're not talking about fun. We're talking about the sense of emptiness and the void that lies right under the surface, and the neglect and the loneliness that he may have felt growing up, the reverberations of being an African American man, and the responsibility that she has felt towards him to lift him up, buying him toys and gadgets, being the primary breadwinner. And it's no surprise that she wants elsewhere as a place of fun for herself, because the fun she's trying to provide for him is a lot of heavy lifting.

And the interesting thing is he's dated, he's met some lovely, lovely ladies. Oh boy. And gone and had fun. He's not with any of them. There's always something inadequate.

So I'm going to let him tell me that. It's his story.

So I've been on dates and dated two women.

Oh boy, here we go.

I've been waiting for this. And both of them dumped me.

Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. Who saw this coming, right? Again, this is a story for a lot of open relationships. She conga line of men. He I got laid once 6 months ago, and I've been dumped by 3 or 4 women. So he's— this is going to be his— this is probably a big thing of what keeps him around. I don't have any options. I tried. I put myself out there. Hey, I'm a quote single guy, polyamorous, whatever they call themselves. Um, what do you think, world? And he somehow managed to nab a couple of women who both said, yeah, I don't think so. That's pretty, uh, pretty big stuff for any dude to handle, especially this dude with everything else going on in his life. I can see him crawling back in his hole and saying, uh, I gave it a shot, I'm done.

So I would not say the reason that I am not currently dating someone is because they're not—

they are— they're in the poly community as well. They're not hoping that Correct.

Oh, see, okay, that makes it even worse. So the women that he connected with were part of this world. They knew full-on the poly thing. So I was thinking maybe, you know, eventually they go, well, your wife and you're what? No, that's kind of a turn-off. But no, they're fully aware. So he could have been just a casual plaything, so to speak, just a little relationship on the side apart from their primary. Um, but even then, no, this ain't gonna cut it. Ouch.

Double ouch. Yeah. No cowgirls. No what? Cowgirls. A monogamous woman who tries to convince a poly man to go monogamous with her. Tries to rope him in?

Yeah. I've been on dates where I—

they have their own vernacular. Cowgirl. That's the first I've heard of, like, cowgirl in other ways, like a sexual position, but not— interesting. A monogamous woman who tries to rope in a guy.

Interesting. Didn't find attraction, and I've been on dates where they didn't find attraction, and I've been in 2 relationships, and I, and I could have a friends with benefits arrangement with a girl who told me she is not ready for a relationship right now. There you go, dude. And I said, that's not enough for me.

You've had some depressive slumps.

Okay, so, um, this is not good. Dude is just not This is what this dude's prescription is. I would love to meet this guy, I really would, although I've been insulting him for, you know, 2 episodes here. He probably has no interest. But I think what the prescription here should be is, dude, we both know this relationship ain't working. Shake the woman's hand and say adiós. Take care of your kids and focus on you. Give the women a rest for a year because you, dude, are going to latch on to the first complete mess that you meet, and you're going to form a relationship, and you're going to be right back here where you started. That's just what happens with all these guys. Take time off, focus on yourself. Therapy, good, keep at it. Um, hang around more men, work on your, quote, masculine energy, join groups like ours, figure out what's going on. And, uh, the women are ancillary to your main mission, which is working on yourself. Once you feel comfortable in that, and once you get to the point where you're like, man, bringing a woman into my life, she's got to be a pretty goddamn good woman, maybe a casual thing for fun, we're two adults, we can handle it, I have needs, she has needs, that's fine. But to get a girlfriend Oof, that's gonna be tough to find because, uh, I got a laundry list of stuff that a woman needs to be to be called my woman and my only woman. That's a tough job to fill. That's when you know you got it and you're ready. This guy is like, um, a woman came up to him and said, how about some just sex? And he's like, oh no, I want more than that. I want a full-blown relationship. That's frankly, it's a fucking turn-off. Especially from a guy like this. Yeah, he had an opportunity there, which kind of surprised me, and he's not interested. Not a good thing, dude. Not a good thing.

It's about dating and how challenging it can be to make meaningful connections.

Mm-hmm. I do get discouraged between dates, or when a date doesn't work out. That is really discouraging.

Um, like job search.

Like a job search. Uh-huh. And it makes me— it makes me question myself.

As it should. Am I— as it should. I'm sorry, that's a mean thing to say, but you're a dude. Dude to dude, here's the reality. You have a product yourself. You put it out in the market. You say, "Yeah, who wants to buy this?" Crickets. Nothing. Somebody came along and said, "Relationship? No, but if you want like a casual thing, I'm here for you." "Nope. It's not what my product is. Sorry." "Dude, nobody's buying your product." "Sorry, there's not. Time to switch it up." This ain't— this is not a woman type of advice show, if you will, where it's like, you go girl, anything and everything you feel is amazing. It's all their fault. 'Not your fault.' No, dude, it's your fault. You're not an attractive man. You don't have what it takes. A man is judged based on what he provides, what he creates. Now, the term 'provide' seems to have the connotation of that domestic side of things, but not necessarily. If you're on the dating market and you're a guy that says, 'Here's what I provide to you, market. My product is fun. My product is, um, low stress, low neuroticism, I'm a cool dude and I'm fun to hang out with, I'm easy on the eyes, I'm interesting, I'm funny, I'm charming. Guess what? Gonna have a lot of buyers. But if I'm a neurotic mess, I have very low self-esteem, um, I tend to fall in love with women immediately, um, I'm not interested in anything casual, I want something serious like now, Sorry, your buyers are going to be next to none, which is what he found out. That's just the reality.

Welcome to the real world. I— so this— am I, am I a good attorney? Am I a handsome man? Am I an attractive man? No, it doesn't seem to be the case. No one thinks so.

Wife's awful quiet there, isn't she? Be a good opportunity for her to go, "I married you. I think you're an amazing man. You got a lot going for you. Get out there, tiger. Here's what I think you should do." As fucked up as that is, that'd be kind of a quasi-healthy thing to say. She ain't saying shit.

What I'm hearing from you is, I don't really trust if I am smart, competent, handsome, and I carry that insecurity, and I need other people, their response will confirm one way or the other. Yes. And what I sense from you is more the ongoing uncertainty and insecurity inside of you, which is why I think that you're going along with the new arrangement is really incredible and difficult. The new arrangement as in him getting— As in the whole non-monogamy thing itself. When we first talked about it, it was this whole, I'm a horse in the stable and I'm one of many. And if I'm one of many, it devalues me. And, you know, these are themes in your relationship that existed way before. Yes, the transition that existed maybe way before you met her. Yes, yes.

You know, yeah, dude's got issues. He always has, which is why he's in a relationship with this woman. It's not a coincidence that he happened to meet a woman like this. That's who men like this attract. Seen it again and again.

Thinking to myself, this man found refuge in what he called fun.

We keep returning to the fucking fun thing. Just keep hammering on this. I don't know, seems weird to me.

I had another free association.

Fun is fair because you need to unpack that one because that one is meaningful and loaded.

Life, life's not fair. You tell your kid, eventually kids get hammered into them, life's not fair. And it's not like I remember a certain thing happening, but when that message finally sunk in that, oh yeah, life really is unfair.

Life is extremely tough and unfair, uh, well, for everybody, but it's even more so for a guy like this. Um, as terrible as to say, uh, an unattractive, low self-esteem, you know, this guy, the Turnip. Your Turnips of the world have a very, very tough time. Your Turnips of the world end up in what they call this incel community, involuntary celibate, where these guys lash out at the world and say, no one understands me, what a great person I am, it's unfair that I don't get the relationships and the sex and everything else that this guy over here seems to get, and this guy over here seems to be a total asshole, total dickbag, and look at me, I'm a much more deep, thoughtful, sensitive person, yet no one rewards me for that, and this sucks, and it's not fair. That's kind of a roundabout way what this guy's saying. It's not fair at work. It's not fair the way I'm treated at work. I'm not rewarded for what I do, and I hate everybody there anyway. I put myself on the dating market, everyone says no thank you. My own wife at home says, 'I'm gonna go have sex with some other dude to see in a couple days,' and when she comes home, she just says, 'Ah, fuck, I wish I could be better, wish I could do better.' The world just keeps beating up on this poor dude. That's what he's saying. And we could take the easy way out and say you have value, you have worth, you, uh, you mean something, you just need to find the right girl. That's what a lot of these guys hear, which is bullshit. Sorry, dude, the world's been hitting you over the head with the same message for years. What you're doing ain't cutting it. Take the right turn. Quit going straight. Here's a detour. Take it. Do something different. Step 1: leave this bitch. Sorry. Language, but seems to be the no-brainer for me.

Because there's a lot of work and there's a lot of monotony and there's just a lot of stuff to log through in life. But the playground is fair. There's rules to tag and everyone follows the rules and everyone runs around and plays and has—

Whereas in life, even when When you play the rules.

Dude, you're not helping your whole creepy vibe with this playground thing.

You missed it.

You might not get what you deserve.

Injustice is still there.

He's not angry as a human being. Cheat in a board game? Oh my goodness. It genuinely bothers him. It's not funny, it's not amusing. No, it's not funny.

No, that's not funny at all.

Because the one place that is meant to be fair is now being trampled. Tell me, what would you free associate if we had another whiteboard and it had the word "life is unfair"?

Sad.

You're giving him your hand because you know it's— this is It's hard for him.

It's sad. It's depressing that that is the way things are.

And this is where you need a more masculine frame and a mentor to say, yes, but not all is lost. It's just life's way of saying what you're doing now ain't it. So come on, let's try something else. But he's surrounded by women. He doesn't have anybody in his life to put the proverbial hand around his shoulder and lead him in in the right direction, so he's just wandering aimlessly. Maydout.

When you do the right thing, the right thing should happen to you. And it's sad that that's not the case.

In what way, shape, or form have you been doing the right thing is the question.

Some people get a leg up and some people get lucky and there's no rhyme or reason to it and it's existential and nihilistic. Can I ask you something?

Mm-hmm. I remember you saying last time we met that you were the first. Yeah, in our family. Mm-hmm. And so you were the first to go to college, to graduate school, right? To have a house, to have a stable, or at least a structure of a marriage, and All those experiences belong to the— if you do everything right, you will be getting what? The American dream.

Do there— so poor dude put himself through school, but it sounds like he got a degree in English. I don't remember, I think she said he didn't finish that. So he put himself for the school, but he didn't finish. I don't, I don't know. Whatever, however you frame this situation, dude. The result is you are not where you want to be. Therefore, that negates everything you just did up to this point. I shouldn't say that's not fair. Um, the combination of whatever you did didn't work. There's probably nuggets of, ah, you should have continued that, or yeah, that was a good thing, dude, why didn't you follow through? Or, um, who knows. But, uh, the combination that he came up with, the mindset that he's in, everything else led him to here. That's it. And he can frame this as some guys are just luckier and some— yeah, luck exists, sure. Um, what's the phrase? Hard work and opportunity together equal luck. That's what I've seen. And I see that again and again and again. Guys work hard, hard, hard, and nothing, nothing, nothing. And eventually an opportunity pops up and boom, and everyone is quick to jump and say, you lucky asshole. He's like, I'm not lucky. Working my tail off for years, that's how I got here. This is loser speak. General terms is what this guy's doing, and I jump on guys for that all the time. It's not fair. Point to that guy. That's loser speak. Winner speak is, hey dude over there, how'd you win? How'd you earn this? How is it that you got this life here? Teach me, would you? Can I hang out with you? Can I learn from you? Can you be my mentor? Can you point me in the right direction to somebody else? That's what winners do. Hurts your ego. You look like a, you know, a dumb schmuck there for a little bit, you know, with your hat in hand saying, please sir, teach me. We all start somewhere. I don't think this guy's ever had that direction. He's never had anybody to point him in the right way. Would love for him to join the fraternity, which by the way, dadstartingover.com/join. Check out the DSO fraternity. Lots of cool benefits which I won't go to go into right now. Quick plug there. Um, But men like this, oh, absolutely need to be around other men, more specifically other successful men. This guy gets together with men, he's going to be probably with a bunch of fellow Peter Pan, go nowhere type guys, which is fine if that's your life. I know some people are in that life and they're perfectly, perfectly content, but it doesn't sound like that's the life that this guy wants, or rather, um, the result of such of said life is not what he's after. He's after the result of somebody else who has a completely different game plan in mind for life. So therefore he needs to emulate the other people's game plan. But that's really tough and that's hard, and then there's a whole lot of, um, uncomfortability and conflict and everything else. So yeah, just keeps going in circles, doesn't he?

The right things, and then the right things happen. Be you. Even in religion, plays into it too, right? Do what God wants you to do, and then God will bless you. Was at least the way we were raised.

Yep.

I did it, and it didn't work.

That's when I began to question myself. Maybe I'm not as smart as I think I am.

Yeah, that law school was the first time I thought I was smart because I got good grades and people told me I was smart. And for 3 years it was, "Oh yeah, you're definitely going to get a job. You're going to have your free pick of a job." And then to have it all not work out in my pick of a job, let alone a fun job, meant system is rigged, meant you don't have the complete picture.

You're missing a piece of the puzzle here, dude. It sounds like if— did I hear him say law degree? Um, I don't know, I didn't understand him there. So he has some kind of degree to the point, or some kind of certification, something where everyone said, um You should have a job waiting on you, and you don't. That's where you go, hmm, something's up here. Something I'm doing is not quite right. I need to talk to somebody, and maybe they can point and say, yeah, your interview skills suck, dude. You're a nervous wreck. You're a neurotic mess. You're not prepared. Look at the way you're dressed. You're coming across as a bit of a creep. I don't know what the case may be with him, but somebody needs to tell him that. That's the masculine presence. That's the no bullshit approach to all of this. Um, he's not getting that, and he hasn't ever.

The system is rigged. Am I competent in anything?

And then you got a job you wanted. This was an interesting development, I think. You applied for a job you wanted. You got the job you wanted.

But you didn't experience the fun you thought you would.

It wasn't as fun as I thought it was gonna be.

And then? And then you quit.

And couldn't keep up with it. Got too checked out.

Could fall asleep at work. Couldn't keep up with it, meaning it was too hard? It was too demanding? Or it was so disappointing that I dissociated? Disassociated. Absolutely.

And my disassociation made me lose the job.

Made me lose the job. So that became the fun date that didn't deliver. Yes. So this fun, what we call fun, is like a A bit of a tyranny on you.

Yeah, I'm gonna stop there because we're just kind of going in circles and there's not much time left here and they're about done. And anywho, again, this guy needs some help, therapy, be around some men. Push the— notice as this conversation went on, the wife was more and more pushed to the side and him brought more up on stage, so to speak, for good reason. Um, this is the— she is who she is and it ain't gonna change, dude. Let her go do her thing. God bless you, wish you all the best, but now you need to focus on you. And you can't do so within the frame of this relationship that you were in with her. It's just too emasculating and it's too unhealthy and just, it's just a shit show of a disaster. Get out of that. Now that you're out of that, you can wipe your, your table clean, so to speak, and you can look at your problems what they really are. This guy's got issues. Can't hold down a job. Who am I? What am I? As soon as I have a feeling, um, very masculine take on it, that when he went to this job, whatever it was, he was probably presented with challenges and stressors that made him say, yuck, this isn't fair, this is tough. They want me to work how many hours? They want this project done by when? This guy told me, hey, you know, shape up or you're out of a job. That was kind of mean of him. In other words, he's a little weak. He needs to toughen up, and he needs to— that's when you, you know, you're at the job in this kind of situation and you go find some kind of mentor and you say, help me out here, I need help, and I'm trying to do my best here, I'm new in this job. But instead, he shut down. This isn't fair. I don't like it. It's not, quote, fun. I'm not getting any personal enjoyment out of this. He probably would have succeeded Um, and so he disassociated, as he puts it, fell asleep at work and just eventually quit. Um, that's a microcosm of his life, isn't it? Um, dude needs help. I feel sorry for him, I really do.

Um, got—

he's got his work cut out for him. And, uh, these kind of things— I think this, this probably— this session with Esther helped in terms of bringing stuff to light. But, uh, everything, um, is painted with this brush of Esther, of this wife and this awfulness that goes along with that. But I just discount that completely and say it's a shit show, she's nuts, just put her aside, done, wife. All right, let's move on to your problems, dude. But that's easy for me to say. I'm not the one in love with this woman. I'm not the one with this giant basket of problems and baggage that he brings to the relationship. Relationship. It's very, very simple for me to say, as I say to a lot of the guys that I coach, dude, I'm thousands of miles away. I'm hearing one side of the story. It seems pretty cut and dry to me, but that's me, and I'm not you. So it's not really fair for me to say this is easy and this is simple. But then again, it is, isn't it? Alright folks, that's it. I'm going to stop it there. Thank you so much for listening. I appreciate this. If you like it, let me know. If you're in the DSO fraternity, let's comment on this in our discussion groups. Fire me an email, dso@dadstartingover.com. It's dso@dadstartingover.com, excuse me. Check out dadstartingover.com website, the DSO fraternity. If anything that this guy is going through is ringing bells with you and you can identify with this guy, empathize with this guy, um, because a lot of his story is similar to yours, for God's sakes get with some men. You need some of that camaraderie in your life and that real brotherhood. I'm a little biased in saying our group's pretty goddamn good for that, the DSO fraternity. Check it out, dadstartingover.com/join. J-O-I-N. The cost is $14.99 a month. It's not going to break the bank. If you want to sign up for the whole year, you save a few bucks there. It's $149. You could basically get a couple months free. And if you really like it and you want to sign up for a lifetime deal, $349 and you're in. You don't have to worry about any more payments. Um, in addition to that, we also get together once a year. We're going to possibly bump that up here in the near future as far as frequency is concerned, but we call it Bro Fest, where we all get together and we learn from each other and we have fun. And the next one we're going to have is going to be in Las Vegas, Nevada. I can't get any more, you know, cooler than that. February 2023. So if you're a DSR fraternity member or not, join us. We would love to have you. All right guys, thank you so much for listening. I appreciate it a great deal, and, uh, you have a good one.