Episodes

Dr. Wayne Chappelle ("Dr. C") is the psychologist trusted by NBA stars, Olympic gold medalists, and elite Special Operations — and co-author of Heal Your Hurting Mind with Craig Groeschel (#5 NYT Bestseller). In this episode, he brings that clinical wisdom to the men Joshua serves every week: guys who grew up without a dad, or with one who did more damage than good. Dr. C breaks down what father wounds actually do to the brain, why every man has them, and how to move from victim to survivor. ...

Pastor Brandon Petty returns to Dudes Without Dads for a raw, deeply honest conversation about his new book A Journey Through the Wilderness — releasing August 11. Brandon is the lead pastor of Generation Church, a fast-growing congregation in a small farming town north of Nashville, and founder of the Landmark Association, a network of churches committed to pastor and church health. Brandon opens up about the severe sexual and physical abuse he suffered between the ages of 8 and 10, the identi...

This week on Dudes Without Dads, Joshua sits down with Carl Thomas — founder and executive director of Live Free Ministries and CEO of XXXchurch.com — for a straight-talking conversation about the one topic most men will never bring up in the lobby: pornography. Joshua brings the top 5 questions men are actually asking themselves — the ones typed into search bars at 2 a.m. — and Carl answers them with the compassion of a brother who's been there and the clarity of an expert who's spent 20+ year...

This week on Dudes Without Dads, Joshua welcomes James Ludeman — a 36-year-old husband and father of two from St. Petersburg, Florida, now living outside Nashville, Tennessee. James has never met his biological father. He was raised by his grandmother, grew up surrounded by addiction and abandonment, and later found faith in Christ on a missions trip at 15. James opens up about the "why don't they love me?" question that shaped his childhood, the approval addiction and pornography struggle that...

August 2019. A warm Saturday night at a Spokane neighborhood fair. Ron Hauenstein is manning a booth alone when three 15-year-olds walk up. Before Ron can say a word, the girl asks him three questions in a row: "Is this where I come to get a dad?" "What do I have to do to get a dad?" "Will you be my dad?" Her father, she said, was "a druggie with seven kids who doesn't mean anything to him." That's the reality Ron has been staring down for a decade. This week on Dudes Without Dads, Joshua sits ...

What does it take to become the dad you never had — when the dad you did have was present but never really there? Scott Maudsley grew up as the second of four boys in southwest Michigan. His dad was a man of faith. He was in the house. He loved his kids. But when the business failed, bankruptcy hit, and the family moved into a tent on a campground just trying to survive — the emotional distance between Scott and his father only grew. By the time Scott was 18, he had lived in 14 different homes....

This is a Father's Day special unlike anything the Dudes Without Dads podcast has ever released. Joshua Brown flips the script. In this live, unscripted episode, he's not the interviewer — he's the one in the chair. Alongside him is William, his half-brother. Same dad. Different moms. Two men who grew up without a father, found each other through God's providence, and are now walking out reconciliation together. Gary Moritz steps in to steward the conversation — drawing out the pain, the trut...

What do you do when your father gives you the keys to his brand new truck — and four days later takes his own life? Cory was 30 years old, had just celebrated his birthday five days earlier, and had an 8-month-old daughter at home when his father died by suicide on May 15, 2010. In this raw and unforgettable episode, Joshua Brown sits down with his friend Cory for one of the most honest conversations the Dudes Without Dads podcast has ever had. This isn't just a story about loss. It's a story ...

What is a father wound? How do you heal it? And what does the Bible actually say a man is supposed to be? In this episode, Joshua Brown sits down with Robert Lewis — founder of Men's Fraternity, author of the bestselling Raising a Modern Day Knight, and co-founder of BetterMan — for one of the most important conversations in the Dudes Without Dads catalog. Robert has spent four decades in rooms full of men, opening the Bible and helping them figure out who they are. His work has reached over 5...

What happens when broken men try to build healthy marriages? In this powerful episode of Dudes Without Dads, Joshua Brown sits down with pastors, entrepreneurs, former gang members, ministry leaders, and restored husbands for an honest conversation about masculinity, marriage, emotional healing, fatherlessness, pride, insecurity, and spiritual leadership. These men openly discuss the destructive behaviors, emotional immaturity, anger, and identity struggles they carried into marriage — and ho...

Some of the strongest men you'll ever meet didn't grow up strong — they grew up surviving. Danny Spano grew up watching his Marine veteran father — a NASA engineer for Apollo 11 — come home from work in a rage. Locking himself in bedrooms in fear. Getting drop-kicked by the head of the hair. Watching his mother get beaten until he was big enough to step in and take the beatings himself. Visiting her in psychiatric wards after 16 electroshock treatments. Drinking and using drugs by age 11. Tha...

Most men aren't broken because they don't try hard enough — they're worn out trying to prove a worth that was never theirs to earn. In this conversation, Joshua Brown sits down with Eric Manly (founder of The Intentional Dad) to unpack the core lie that quietly wrecks men, marriages, and fatherhood: "My worth is something I have to prove." This isn't another how-to episode. It's an invitation to stop performing and start being fathered — by God first, so you can father your kids from overflow...

When Mark Koch"s father died at 26, he lost his moral compass. Without that anchor, everything spiraled into chaos. As a Hollywood producer, Mark achieved the dream — million-dollar deals, Lost in Space, a film that knocked Titanic out of first place. On the outside: success. On the inside: a double life fueled by cocaine, alcohol, and constant fear of exposure. This episode reveals what happens to a man when he loses his father in his most formative years without anyone to hold him account...

The affair happened. Now what? Five men sat down to answer that question — not with polished answers, but from the wreckage of real decisions that almost cost them everything. This is a roundtable conversation with men who caused betrayal, survived it, and came out the other side with something hard and honest to say about it. Antoine, Curtis, Gabriel, Mike, and Cody talked about what actually goes on inside a man's mind when he is destroying something he loves. They talked about the lie that...

Most men in America are still fatherless on the inside. And most won’t do the one thing that could change it. This is a raw, unfiltered conversation with Brian Doyle (Iron Sharpens Iron) about why men stay stuck—and why showing up to a men’s conference might be the turning point. If you’ve ever wondered: Do I really need a men’s conference? Is this just another church event? Why would I give up a Saturday? This episode answers it straight. Iron Sharpens Iron is NOT a rally. It’s NOT a feel-g...

He made what he thought was a final decision. A vasectomy. Done. Case closed. No more children. But years later — after walking away from his government job, after paying off $84,000 in debt, after starting to build real estate across 13 states — Nick felt something shift. A conviction he could not shake. What if he had closed a door God wanted to keep open? What if his "no" was limiting what God wanted to do in his family? This is not a political episode. This is not a judgment episode. Th...

What does a man do when he has been in charge of his own life and made a complete mess of it? For "Goose," a 20-year Air Force navigator, the answer involved infidelity, depression, and becoming a man he didn't recognize. On January 1st, 2015, he surrendered everything to God — and that moment started a process that eventually led him to build one of the most powerful men's movements in the country. In this episode, Joshua Brown sits down with Goose, founder of Men's Alliance, to talk about w...

What does a boy do with what he discovers when no father is there to explain it? In this raw and honest roundtable, Joshua Brown sits down with five men — Caleb, Gabriel, Antoine, Cody, and Jason — to answer a question most men have never said out loud: where were you the first time you were exposed to pornography, and who did you go to afterward? From the projects to the woods of Tennessee, from late-night HBO to a father's hidden tape — every story is different, but the wound is the same. No g...

Brandon Petty grew up in a home most men would never recover from. Born to a teenage mother who was married six times by the age of 25, Brandon cycled through apartments, motel rooms, and relatives' couches throughout his childhood. He was raised primarily by women while the men in his life rotated in and out — most of them carrying their own unhealed wounds of addiction and abuse. Between the ages of 8 and 11, Brandon was sexually abused by three different people, including a stepfather who wa...

Dustin Lundy grew up faster than any kid should have to. His father — a former stockbroker born in 1934 — was financially brilliant and emotionally absent. His mother had affairs, abandoned the family for drugs, and left behind a household that 13-year-old Dustin quietly began running on his own. By the time his dad was dying of stage four colon cancer, Dustin was the one cleaning, caregiving, and holding things together — while quietly drowning in his own alcoholism and unprocessed trauma. H...

What does it actually mean to be a godly father — especially if you never had one? In this episode, host Joshua sits down with Kris Langham, co-founder of the Through the Word Bible app, to explore what Scripture teaches about godly fatherhood, father wounds, and how God specializes in breaking generational cycles. Kris challenges listeners to find a truly "perfect dad" in the Bible (spoiler: there isn't one), points to God as the only model of perfect fatherhood, and walks through the stunni...

Most men don’t struggle with discipline. They struggle with prayer. In this episode of Dudes Without Dads, Joshua sits down with pastor and church planter Ralph Moore to talk about why prayer feels forced, awkward, or unnecessary for many men — and what it’s quietly costing us in our marriages, leadership, identity, and fatherhood. If you grew up without a father, you probably learned how to survive. But you may have never learned how to pray. This conversation unpacks: Why prayer isn’t beggi...

What happens when a boy grows up believing he has no value? In this episode of Dudes Without Dads, Cliff Branham shares his journey from childhood abuse, anger, and addiction to forgiveness, healing, and becoming the father he never had. Cliff grew up with an abusive and absent father. That pain shaped his identity, led to rebellion, and fueled years of destructive behavior. But through surrender, discipleship, and understanding his identity in Christ, he broke the generational cycle. In this...

Alcoholism doesn’t start with you—but it can end with you. In this episode of Dudes Without Dads, Fred Sebring shares his raw story of growing up without a father, being surrounded by normalized drinking, and realizing later in life that alcohol had quietly become his coping mechanism. What followed was a breaking point—and a decision to end generational alcoholism for the sake of his wife, his kids, and his faith. This conversation is for any man asking: Why do I drink when life gets hard?Is...