The Rational Basis® of Happiness Podcast

Transcript

The Selfish Path to Romance. Download chapter one for free at DrKenner.com and @amazon.com

Robert, you're having difficulty with your wife?
Yes, ma'am, yeah. What's going on?

Well, I was telling the gentleman before my first wife I was married to for 46 years before she passed away to cancer. Okay, I waited a few years and I remarried again. I married a registered nurse that is retired, and November of just last year we moved?well, we moved up to Oregon from California in 2002, but November of last year she wanted to move back to California with her grandchildren.

Okay?

And I said, Well, what do you want more, them or me? She said, ?Well, it's a different kind of love, and let's move back to California.? Well, I have a home on a quarter acre of land on the corner. It's got a swimming pool. We don't pay any sales tax here in Oregon, have a license plate that's good for the rest of my life for nothing.

Yeah.

And anyway, last year she went to California, basically saying, tough, I'm gone.

Yeah.

She's still not back today. She will not come back. And now she's talking about separating, you know, and I am retired military, so I also have the VA, and I was talking to a Betsy Davis, who is an MS, PMHNP, APRN, BC?

I lost you, but that's okay.

Yeah. Anyway, she had me on Cymbalta, and then?

I wanted?Robert, I want to sidestep the medication because I'm a psychologist. That's not my field of expertise. Okay? So basically she had you on medication to deal with what?depression?

Depression.

So when did the depression set in?

Well, I guess it's been the last couple of months since my wife?my wife will not come back.

Okay, so what you're facing is a major conflict. There are times when two top values in your life conflict, and it's a no-win choice, meaning she loves the grandkids. She wants to be with them, and Oregon is too far away for her to make maybe a day trip or make it?it's not easy for her to get back and forth. So she wants to be with them and watch them grow up, I'm guessing, right?

I would say so, yes.

And it's not that she might love you less, it's that that is a top value in her life. And the problems happen when you have two top values that are mutually exclusive, and this particular one because you are passionate about where you live?meaning you guys chose to move to Oregon. You must love something about Oregon. You love?

Oh, no, nothing. Nothing's holding me in Oregon.

You said you have a home with a swimming pool, and the taxes are not an issue, and you've got a license plate. So what's holding you in Oregon?

Well, I have two daughters who live up north?well, far north of me in Oregon.

But do you get to see them a lot?

I don't see them hardly at all. I'm almost 80 years old, and they're 52 and?

Why don't you see your daughters?

They're married. Then, you know, we just don't communicate with my sisters in California.

So you're used to having some cut-offs, meaning potentially very close?

I love to cuddle and hug and anyway?

Cuddle and hug your daughters?

No, as far as my daughters, we haven't been together for so long because I was in the Navy for 20 years and they were in different states.

Right? So one of the tolls of serving your country many times is you really sacrifice on the home front. It's really sad.

But my problem is, is now I'm figuring for some reason, I want to?I quit taking my medication.

Yeah.

Last week and a half.

Okay. You should let your doctor know that.

I feel like I want to just go out and kill myself, get rid of myself.

Okay. There is a book at my website, Choosing to Live, and it helps you reconnect with what's important to you?not necessarily to your wife, not necessarily to your kids?but what is important to you, Robert. And killing yourself is never a solution. It's the end of all solutions.

True.

So I realize this?wonderful. So tell me what will keep you alive. What action can you take that will give you some hope? Genuine hope.

Well, this might sound absurd, but I would like to get, say, one of these government free grants. I could get rid of this house. I could go back and stay with her down there.

Is she open to that? Is she open to you going back to California?

She won't respond to that. I email her all the time.

Okay, so you can't beat yourself up for the fact that she won't respond. It's not?she needs to give you feedback, but you can't force her to give you that. So you want to always make a contingency plan. I recognize I can't force another person's mind, and if they don't want to communicate with me, it's very painful, but don't beat yourself up about it.

I don't want to beat myself up about it. I want to figure out what's a backup plan for me.

Maybe to connect more with your kids if you want to try that, but I would get some therapy help. You're seeing a therapist now?not just for medication?but you're seeing someone to talk to?

Yes.

Okay. And is that helping you?

No.

Okay, then I would recommend going to a website. Do you have a paper and pencil? Academy of CT. It's all one word, Robert, Academy CT. AcademyofCT.org, O-R-G, and you want to get yourself a cognitive therapist in your neck of the woods.

What type of a therapist?

Cognitive. C-O-G-N-I-T-I-V-E. AcademyofCT.org. You can go to my website, and I have a link there also, DrKenner.com. But you want to get yourself help ASAP. You want to value yourself. You want to cuddle yourself, Robert, right, and give yourself what you're longing for. You can't force somebody else's mind. So you do want to make backup plans, but work with a therapist, and you can also get that book Choosing to Live.

And that's by?more years to go, you see?

Okay, well, you want to have whatever years you have left?the same with me?as good as you can make them. Listen, thank you so much for your call. If you want to hold on, I'll talk to you. I'll talk to you during the break. And here?s a little more from Dr. Kenner.

Do you know what an obsession is?

Oh sure, it's like when a guy looks up girls? dresses.

Well, yeah, that's one kind of obsession. But an obsession means that you get so wrapped up in one thing that you forget all the other important things in your life.

And how many of us have done that? We've gotten so wrapped up in one thing in our lives, and we forget other important things in our lives. Not unimportant things, not things that should be second in line or third in line, but we forget maybe our family, maybe our kids, maybe our relationship with a spouse?if we get too involved in work. Or we could go the other direction. You get too involved with your kids and too involved in your relationship, and you totally ignore work, and you're running your life into the ground. You can't do that. You need to figure out what are your top priorities, and how do you prioritize.

That drop was from a darling movie, Kidco?K-I-D-C-O. You may not be able to get it anymore, but it was a movie about kids running a company. And I won't tell you?it?s a funny, funny movie. They actually?well, I will tell you?they actually sold manure. So there's a tease for you.

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Here?s an excerpt from The Selfish Path to Romance by clinical psychologist Dr. Ellen Kenner:

Your potential partner's sense of life reflects his or her deepest values, and it is important that you try to identify those values consciously. Some view life as an exciting adventure and, using their best judgment, look for values to pursue that give their lives meaning. Others view life as a frightening burden and fear that achieving great values is hopeless. Some have no personal values and live only for others. You will want to know if your partner's philosophy matches your own and whether that philosophy is a healthy one?pro-happiness, pro-long-range achievement. In the real world, people's professed philosophy and values may not be their real ones and may even be in conflict with the values that govern their daily choices and actions.

You can download chapter one for free at DrKenner.com, and you can buy the book at Amazon.com.