Trap #3 Locking Everything Away to Survive Another Day

The False Strength Slowly Tearing You Apart

Chapters in this Guide

1. Man Down - Introduction

2. Why I’m Writing this No-BS Guide to Grief for Men

3. What the Hell is Grief Anyway?

4. How and Why Men Grieve Differently

5. What Grief Looks Like for Men in the Real World

6. The Traps Keeping You Stuck

   1. Shoulding All Over Yourself

   2. Trap #2 - Destroying Yourself by Avoiding the Pain

   3. Trap #3 - Locking Everything Away to Survive Another Day

   4. Trap #4 - Trying to Outwork the Pain

   5. Trap #5 - Playing the Victim

7. From Traps to Tools

8. The Tools

   1. How to Focus on What’s In Your Control

What do all these phrases—breaking down, losing my shit, falling apart, hitting the breaking point, acting like a little bitch—have in common? They all carry shame. They make emotional pain sound pathetic, like feeling it makes you weak.

They treat grief like something to conquer or suppress. They turn you into your own worst enemy, beating yourself up for feeling human.

I’ve heard men, myself included, describe themselves this way countless times. As a matter of fact, I stopped myself from doing this an hour ago. I was feeling some very intense emotions and decided to go to a coffee shop and finish writing this chapter.

As I was about to leave, I almost said, "I’m going to write. I’m fucking spinning out." But I caught myself. Instead, I said, "I’m going to write. I’m dealing with some tough emotions, and my headspace isn’t great."

For most of my life, I believed there were two ways to operate in the world: logical or emotional. Logic solves problems, makes decisions, and gets shit done. Emotions? They’re messy, unpredictable, and tend to make hard situations even worse.

Men are logical. Women are emotional. And by extension, if you're a man and you’re emotional, you’re acting like a woman. What dude wants that? I sure as hell didn’t.

So when I started feeling emotions I hated, my default move was to shove everything into a mental vault. Lock that shit down tight so I could keep it together and get things done.

Most of the time, I didn’t even realize I was doing it. Even when it was hurting the people I loved most.

I remember going for a walk with my daughters a year or two after Cindy died. It was a beautiful fall day, and we were enjoying our new life. Chloe was seven, and Melody was six. Chloe looked up at me and said, “Daddy, is Mommy in heaven?”

My response? “No, she's gone and buried in the ground.”

What a fucked-up thing to say to a little girl who lost her mom. I robbed her of the chance to make sense of her loss in her own way. I barfed my own inability to deal with my emotions all over a kid who didn’t ask to be puked on.

If God granted do-overs, that's one I'd gladly accept.

I said it because it’s what I needed to believe to “move forward.” It was my way of keeping my old hurts locked away so they wouldn’t bleed into my new life. If Cindy was just rotting in the ground, there was nothing left to talk about. No messy conversations about what happens after we die. No sitting in the discomfort of not having answers for my little girl. And no risk of me opening up old wounds I wasn't ready to face.

If I could shut it all down and keep the pain sealed away, I could keep moving. Or at least, that’s what my subconscious operating system told me to believe. Keep everything contained, stay in control, and get the hell on with it.

But that moment wasn’t about holding myself together—it was about shutting Chloe down, too. I wasn’t protecting her from grief. I was protecting myself from hers. And that’s the real cost of the vault—it locks away a hell of a lot more than your pain. It locks you away from the people you love when they need you the most.

I didn’t see it then, but I see it now. Trying to bury everything didn’t only rob me of healing—it robbed me of connection. And those are losses that grief didn’t force on me—I forced them on myself.

Avoiding vs. Suppressing

Avoiding emotions is about numbing yourself—drowning out the noise. You reach for something, anything, that promises a moment of relief. Even if it burns you up in the process, it feels like a way out. But most men who are grieving don’t spend every waking hour drunk or high. We still show up to work, fix things around the house, and keep the wheels turning.

Suppressing is different. It’s what we turn to when we don’t have the option to numb out. And most of the time, we’re not even aware we’re doing it. It’s unconscious programming. It's a survival reflex we’ve picked up over years of being told that emotions make us weak. Instead of locking away only sadness, we seal off the whole damn story. Our thoughts, our memories, the conversations that might open old wounds—it all gets shut down.

We don’t consciously think, “I need to shut this down.” It happens on autopilot. And we don’t just suppress our feelings—we suppress the entire experience.

It feels safe. Solid. Like everything is contained and under control. You tell yourself it’s better to lock it away than to let it spill out and wreck everything. But the more you rely on that internal lock, the tighter it clamps shut—and the harder it becomes to face what’s inside.

It’s like cutting the wires to the fire alarm instead of putting out the fire. The flames are still there, burning through everything inside you.

Anger: The Wrecking Ball Disguised as Strength

Most grieving men don’t set out to destroy their lives. They want relief at any cost. The need an outlet, something to make the helplessness and pain bearable for one more day. But anger? Anger doesn’t just offer relief—it offers power. It turns “I can’t take this” into “I’ll fight through this.”

The fight has a terrible cost. And most of the time, the people closest to you—the ones who’ve already lost enough—are the ones who end up paying the price.

I spoke to a grieving dad yesterday who’s living this nightmare. His daughter took her own life, and the grief hollowed him out. The rage inside him exploded into an assault charge. Then, on his way into court, it happened again—another charge.

He’s already lost the most important thing in his life. His anger nearly cost him everything else.

This isn’t some rare, extreme case. This is what happens when we live in a pressure cooker of suppressed grief. We push the grief down until there’s no room left—then something small turns into an explosion. And in those moments, you’re not a protector. You’re a wrecking ball swinging through the lives of the people you love.

Anger sells you a story that feels true:

• You’re not weak—you’re in control.

• You’re not hurting—you’re handling it.

• You’re not failing—you’re fighting.

But look at the aftermath. Are you building anything? Are you healing? Or are you just breaking down anything that's left standing?

You snap at your wife over something stupid—now there’s silence in the house for days.

You lash out at your kids—now they’re scared to come near you.

You alienate your friends—now there’s no one left to call when it all feels like too much.

Let me tell you what “survival mode” really means:

It means your daughter wonders why you never smile anymore.

It means your wife looks at you like a stranger she doesn’t recognize.

It means you lose precious moments you’ll never get back—birthdays, simple laughs, random hugs—because you’re locked in your own mental cage.

Grief is already a thief—it takes what you love most. Don’t let it take your soul, brother.

The Cost of Survival Mode

Sitting in my basement bawling about my dead daughter is horrible. It’s taken me years to realize there’s only one thing worse: not sitting in my basement bawling about her.

The cost of keeping that grief locked away is so much heavier than the pain of letting it out.

Locking it all away feels like a lifeline because it helps you keep moving when everything inside you wants to fall apart. But don’t kid yourself. It’s a trap. The longer you keep everything locked inside, the more it wears you down from the inside out.

You don’t need to have all the answers right now. You don’t need to fix everything today. But you do need to recognize this coping mechanism for what it is—a survival strategy that’s no longer serving you.

Grief can be brutal. But you’ve made it this far, and that says something. There’s strength in you, even if you can’t feel it yet. The next step isn’t about fixing yourself. It’s about understanding what’s happening beneath the surface. And having the courage to take it head-on.

Think about what you’ve locked away inside. What would it look like if you had the tools to open that door and take back control?

We’re going to get into that. One step at a time.

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YOUR NEXT STEPS: Learn The Most Important Relationship Skill You Were Never Taught

Ever been in a conversation where someone was grieving, upset, or overwhelmed—and you had no idea what to say?

Maybe you tried to cheer them up, offered advice they didn’t want, or just froze, unsure of how to help. And afterward, you couldn’t shake the feeling that you could’ve shown up better.

💡 You’re not alone. Most people struggle with this—not because they don’t care, but because no one ever taught them how.

That’s why I created The LEAD Model Training—so you can stop second-guessing yourself and start being the person people turn to in their hardest moments.

Here’s What You’ll Walk Away With:

✅ A simple, repeatable framework (Label, Explore, Acknowledge, Decide) that works in any emotional conversation.
✅ Confidence in what to say (and what NOT to say) so you never feel awkward or unsure again.
✅ Proven techniques that make people feel deeply heard—without forcing them to open up.
✅ Real-world role-play scenarios so you’re not just learning, you’re practicing.

Most people:
🚫 Jump to fixing before someone is ready.
🚫 Say things that make people shut down without realizing it.
🚫 Avoid tough conversations altogether out of fear of saying the wrong thing.

But the people who get this right? They build deeper relationships, gain unshakable trust, and become the person others turn to when it truly matters.

🔥 If you’re ready to stop feeling helpless in emotional conversations, join the LEAD Model Training today.