Latest / Intimacy After Infidelity | Cut Contact, Rebuild Trust, Shed Shame, Avoid Divorce, Forgiveness for Adultery / 119 | Help! I broke no contact- here’s what to do next

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119 | Help! I broke no contact- here’s what to do next · Intimacy After Infidelity | Cut Contact, Rebuild Trust, Shed Shame, Avoid Divorce, Forgiveness for Adultery

Friend, I get it.
You said you wouldn't, and then you did.
Maybe it was a text.
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Maybe it was a response.
Maybe it was a conversation that lasted a full twenty-four hours and then went quiet again.
And now you're sitting with that familiar cocktail of feelings, the relief, the shame, and the question, "How did I end up here again?" If you're the woman who broke no contact and is wondering what to do next, this episode is for you today, not to lecture you, not to shame you, but for me to just sit with you, to tell you some truth, and to help you figure out your very next right step.
All right, friend, before we go there, I wanna pull back the curtain for just a second because I think this will help you understand what working with me actually looks like and feels like.
When a woman DMs me, and this happens more than you might think, and she says, "Christina, I talked to him again when I said I wouldn't," here's what I don't do.
I do not give her a five-point plan of what to do next.
I don't start with, "Well, here's what you need to do differently next time."
And I don't open the conversation with accountability and the word should.
Here's what I actually do send back to her, something like, "Girl, I am so sorry, and I'm so grateful that you told me.
Are you okay? How are you feeling right now?" Because before we talk about her next steps, I need to know that she's safe emotionally and physically, in all the ways, and I need her to feel me before she can hear me.
And then once she's a little more grounded, then we can look at the situation together with no shame, with total honesty, and with clear, open eyes.
And friend, that's what it's like to work with me, whether it's in a one-on-one capacity or Rooted in Joy.
This is not a content library that you just consume alone.
It's a living, breathing, coaching community where women show up in real time, and when something like this happens, they have somewhere to go and someone who will respond just the way I described.
So if you are looking for some kind of support, would you find me on Instagram, send me a DM, maybe the word ready, or find me on Facebook, find me in the Facebook community, and let's talk about whether Rooted in Joy is your next right step or maybe it's something else.
I would love to just chat with you, pray with you, and hear what season you are in.
Okay.
So let's get into this question of, "Help.
What do I do if I've broken no contact?" And I want to start by saying something with full intention.
I'm doing this on purpose.
Me too.
I broke no contact more times than I can count over the years, and I don't say that to normalize it in the sense that, like, I'm saying it's okay.
I'm not trying to give you an out.
I'm telling you this because I want you to hear that I have been there, and I've learned some lessons on my journey through those years of breaking no contact.
I knew, first of all, what my warning signals were.
Let me tell you, for me personally, it was almost always on a particular day of my monthly cycle.
And believe it or not, it took me many months to realize that pattern.
But for me, it was connected to my monthly cycle, and it was almost always after dark, after nine or 10 PM.
And that tells you everything you need to know.
Me reaching out to this guy was not a rational decision.
It was my nervous system talking, my emotions talking, my longings talking, and for me, my loneliness too.
And early on when this happened, there was a longing for connection.
And then I experienced the disappointment when the conversation didn't meet my expectations because it never did.
It couldn't.
A twenty-four-hour conversation of, "How are you?" over texting, that's not connection.
It's a loop.
It's a cycle.
And I kept hoping that that loop would finally satisfy something, but it was never designed to satisfy.
But here's what I also remember.
The last time I broke no contact, which was quite a while ago, I noticed something different.
I noticed I felt nothing.
Not the pull, not the longing, not the disappointment, just nothing.
And I thought, "I don't actually desire him.
I know that this isn't gonna go anywhere."
And then it died on its own.
What happened was every single day of no contact that I had had before that point, even the days I struggled and I was tempted, each day added one more grain of rice to my healing side of the scale.
One more day of becoming the woman that I wanted to be.
It was one more day of the pull getting a little bit smaller or a little bit weaker.
One day at a time, it builds up consistently day after day.
It builds.
It compounds.
And friend, that's what I want you to experience as well.
So even before we talk strategy, I need you to hear this.
If there's a day that you do contact this person again, you are not starting over.
You are not back at zero.
You are still one day further in your healing than you were yesterday.
This moment, it's just information.
It's just data.
So let's use it to your advantage.
All right, so I have a couple steps for you, a few things that I would love for you to consider when you find yourself in this situation.
Okay, this thing just happened.
What do I do? All right.
Number one, find a safe person to talk to.
Before you do anything else, find a safe person.
Not just someone who says they love you, not just someone who's going to give you a hug and a tub of ice cream and just help you feel better.
What I mean by safe is that they will not bring the shame.
They're willing to listen, and they're willing to tell you the truth because they love Jesus.
This is a rare combination.
Most people in your life will do one of two things.
They'll either validate you in a way that doesn't actually help you grow, or they'll shame you in a way that makes you want to go back underground and into hiding.
And friend, neither of those serves you.
I get it.
Ending the affair can be compared to losing a limb.
It's hard.
And I also want to give you a phrase called disenfranchised grief.
Disenfranchised grief means you do feel grief.
You have something to grieve, just like a funeral, just like a, a breakup.
But disenfranchised means it's not allowed to happen.
It's not socially acceptable.
I remember thinking, "Man, this feels like somebody really important to me died, but nobody's bringing me a casserole.
We're not holding a funeral."
Uh, you definitely can't cry about it with your husband.
You can't post about it on social media.
So it's this kind of grief that doesn't get a name or a ritual or a community of support, unless you're in my community.
And if you intentionally build this space, you can have it.
But again, it's, it's not socially acceptable.
That's why isolation makes this journey so much harder than it has to be.
Friend, you were not designed to carry any of this healing alone.
And the very fact that you are listening to this podcast tells me that you are already reaching for something better.
I'm so proud of you.
So today, before you do anything else, I want you to ask yourself, "Is there one safe person that I can reach out to?" And if the answer is no, friend, I'm raising my hand.
Can I be that person for you? I would be so honored if you sent me a message and just connected with me and said, "Hey, can you be that safe person that I can come to if I'm struggling on any given day?" And yes, my answer is a resounding yes.
All right, so number one, find a safe person.
Number two is just an invitation around the word repentance.
Repentance, you- may be a triggering word depending on what kind of church you grew up in and how people talked about it.
If you heard the word repent and immediately felt a wave of shame wash over you, I wanna reframe th- reframe this for you.
Okay, so in the Bible, the word repent was originally written in Greek, a Greek New Testament, and the word was metanoia.
And friend, repent in the original sense did not mean to grovel on the ground and, "Oh, I'm so sorry.
Oh, I'm so sorry.
Oh, I'm so sorry.
It won't happen again."
That's not what it meant, and it doesn't mean even to punish yourself.
It does not mean to make yourself feel worse until God decides that you've suffered enough.
Repentance has nothing to do with suffering and punishment and all tha- all of that.
Metanoia actually means to change your mind, to change your thoughts, to change your direction, you know, to do a, a 180 and go the opposite direction.
That's it.
So repentance after breaking no contact might just look like, "Hey, I'm gonna be honest with God about what just happened, and maybe I can be honest with this safe person about what just happened.
And then I'm going to choose a different direction, not because I had to earn my way back, but because I am a woman who is becoming who God designed her to be."
And this, turning around, this is what that woman does next.
Repentance is not the end of the story.
All it is is a course correction, and the course corrections are how you get- To where you're going.
All right, step number three, get grounded first.
Okay, so before you make any big decisions, now that you've done some repentance, you've identified a safe person, before you make any other big decisions, please hear me, your nervous system is incredibly dysregulated right now.
I don't mean that as a diagnosis, and I definitely don't mean that as a criticism.
I just mean it as a fact psychologically.
If you have been working really hard at keeping no contact, and suddenly you run into this guy, talk to this guy, whatever it is, your body has just been through something.
Your cortisol levels are elevated.
Your brain is probably in a shame spiral or a justification loop or both at the same time.
This is not the moment for major decisions.
So here's your permission slip to do the most unspiritually sounding thing first.
Go drink some water.
Go step outside.
Literally touch some grass or touch a tree.
You know, like put your bare feet on the ground if at all possible.
Like have your fingers touch a leaf or the bark of the tree.
Go for a walk.
And friend, if it's late at night, just go to sleep.
No decisions have to get made tonight.
Please, all I'm asking of you here is to come back to yourself first.
Your body is the home that you live in, and right now it needs some basic care before it can begin to think clearly.
Trust me, you are not in avoidance right now.
This is wisdom.
If you read the New Testament, even Jesus withdrew to quiet places before he had major moments.
You're allowed to do the same.
No major decisions right away.
Just come back to yourself.
Then step number four, once you're a little more grounded, maybe it's the next day, you've taken some deep breaths, you've been outside for a few minutes, now it's time to look at your no contact plan with some fresh eyes.
This is where I wanna get really practical for a second.
Sometimes the reason we break no contact is that the plan had a hole in it, and that is not a failure.
Please hear me again.
It's not a moral failure, it's information.
And so maybe this specific plan had a little design flaw.
Okay, some questions are worth asking here.
Are you still blocking him on every platform? Are you blocking his number? Are you blocking social media? Are you blocking emails? Whatever it is for you, is that still the plan? Or have you deleted your own social media during this no contact? Uh, was that part of the plan? And let me tell you, deleting your social media account, that was actually part of my no-contact plan for a couple months.
So maybe that's something to consider.
Or if you live in the same town, do you need to drive a different route for a while? Uh, does someone have access to your location for accountability? So I'm not telling you that every person needs to have every part of this plan.
What is it for you? And let's just look at it again and again.
See, see if there is any design flaw that could just get tightened up just one percent.
When I...
I just mentioned this, but when I finally went no contact after the, um, retreat, and I confessed to my husband, yeah, I deleted social media for two months, which at the time felt pretty extreme.
But I not only needed to remove that door because of him, I also just didn't want to trust myself near that door, uh, f-for, for anyone.
I just didn't want to be near that door anymore.
And that wasn't a sign of weakness.
It was knowing myself, and I was designing my success.
I wanted to set myself up for success to say, "Let me have this short period of time of eliminating distractions, refocusing on what's important."
And so for me, yeah, that had to do with my phone and social media, of course, yeah, blocking a phone number.
There, there is an infinite number of options, which is why I can't give you a list of things to do, but it's just worth reevaluating.
What do you need to set yourself up for success? So now at this moment, are you ready to block him again, if that's your plan? If the answer is yes, dear friend, can I invite you to do something that might feel terrifying? Would you even just hit pause on this podcast and go do what you need to do right now? Don't even wait till the end of the episode.
Do it right now.
Or better yet, ask this other safe person, whoever you've thought of, to sit with you while you do it.
That is if your answer is yes, I'm ready to take the step right now.
If the answer is honestly, "I'm not sure," okay, friend, that's important information too because it means that there's something underneath that still needs to be looked at, and that's exactly the kind of thing you do with support.
Again, my inbox is open.
Please send me a message and, and just mention this part of the podcast, "Hey, not sure about going no contact again.
Not sure what is hiding.
Not sure what my resistance is."
Whatever it is, I would love-- I'd be so honored to sit with you and ask you some questions to see what's coming up for you.
Where are you right now, and what is it that you need right now, again, so you can set yourself up for future success? Okay, step number five, last one here, go back to your why.
This was so, so important for me.
When I finally went no contact for real, my why wasn't abstract.
It wasn't just a nice concept.
It was very specific, and it was mine.
I told myself when I went no contact for real, he's gone, I told myself, "I can go.
I have permission to go all in on building," at the time, what was my network marketing business.
That might sound small or crazy to some of you, probably even a little silly, and you know what's interesting is that it wasn't my kids.
It wasn't even my marriage that I anchored to at first.
It was something that felt like mine.
It was a healthy ambition.
It was something safe that I could pour my energy into so that I wasn't looping on thoughts of him.
I knew that if I didn't give my brain something to dive into or, you know, like a, a playground, like I wanted my thoughts to, to be free within a certain space, and if I didn't give my brain that space, I was gonna keep going back to him.
I was going to keep thinking about him, wondering how he was doing, what was going on, had things changed, would we ever be together again, and I didn't want that anymore.
So I, I very clearly told myself, "Christina, you have full permission to go 100% into this.
This can be your focus.
Your energy can go here.
Your time can go here.
You have full permission," and that's what I did.
The other part is that I clung to this verse, Proverbs 35:21, "She is clothed with strength and dignity, and she laughs without fear of the future."
Oh, I wanted to be her.
I cried on my bed one night with my head just hanging down full of shame.
And I remember I literally was crying, and I cried out to God, "I just want my dignity back."
And slowly, one day at a time, I started realizing, well, if I'm a woman of dignity, I can't keep texting him, because every time I do, I'm giving my dignity away again.
And at the beginning, I definitely wasn't laughing.
Where it says she laughs without fear of the future, I didn't have any kind of picture of my future.
But as I began healing, healing my emotions, my soul, my body, and my thoughts, then I started loving myself for the first time.
I started feeling safe with myself, and that allowed me to start laughing again.
Then I was able to dream with God about what was coming next.
Friend, that's what I want for you.
So what is your why? What's the version of you that you're becoming? The one who doesn't need him anymore.
What does she look like? What does she feel like? What does she live like? Write it down.
Friend, put that somewhere that you'll see it at 10:00 PM when it's that specific day of your cycle, because your why has got to be louder than your longing.
Remind yourself of it every single day.
Friend, here's what I know about you.
You are not a woman who wants to stay stuck in this loop.
You wouldn't be listening to this podcast if you were.
I know that you are the woman who broke no contact and immediately felt the weight of it, because you know who you're becoming.
You know that you deserve more.
You know that God has great things planned for your life.
The question of how you actually walk this out consistently, how you regulate your body in those late night moments, how you rewire that longing, how you build this why that actually holds and anchors you, that, friend, is where the coaching comes in.
I would love to help you walk that out.
So here's my invitation to you today.
If you have a safe friend, reach out to her.
Text her right now.
Maybe it's just a simple Thank you so much for being my friend.
Maybe you do need to have a conversation with her.
Hey, can we talk? And that's enough.
And again, if you don't have that person, if you're sitting here thinking, I literally have no one that I could text to say thank you to, friend, the invitation is open to DM me.
Just say, I need to talk, or, hey, thanks.
That's it.
No explanation.
You don't have to have anything figured out.
Just open the door, and together we can see what's your next right step.
Friend, you will not get any shame with me.
You're not gonna get a lecture from me.
I'm just gonna ask how you're feeling, and then we'll see what happens next.
There's no map to this.
There's no way you can have it all figured out.
But what I do know is that each next step becomes clearer after you take the next one.
Can I pray for you? Lord, I pray for courage over the sister listening right now.
I pray for joy that goes deeper than her circumstances, and I pray for a blessing on every step that she takes toward the woman that you created her to be.
In Jesus' name, amen.