Latest / Long Haul Marriage Roadcast / Can I Trust You Again? (Part 7 of 10) 10 Things That Can Make or Break Your Marriage

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Can I Trust You Again? (Part 7 of 10) 10 Things That Can Make or Break Your Marriage · Long Haul Marriage Roadcast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Okay, we are rolling.
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: Rolling, rolling, rolling.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: I feel like we were literally just here in these
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: two chairs.
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: We were just rolling? Well, we're rolling again.
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: Time goes so fast, doesn't it?
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: Rolls on, roll tide. How are you doing, baby?
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: I'm good. It's been a full, busy day, and I've
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: loved it.
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: It has been. Boy, talk about busy. How about a weekend?
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: We're recovering from a Friday night rehearsal and a wedding.
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: And I mean, a wedding and then right over to
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: another rehearsal for a wedding I did Saturday. And then
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: Sunday family time. Thank you, Lord. And then Billy Joel
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: tribute Sunday night. Yeah, it was good.
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I had a great weekend.
• 1:06
  Speaker 2: Love, love Billy Joel. And it was a tribute, all right.
• 1:12
  Speaker 2: So yeah, it was fun. A lot of fun, but man,
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: a little tired today.
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: I know.
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: Just getting my second wind.
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: Right here at bed top. Just kidding.
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: So how are you?
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: I'm good.
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: You good? You ready to talk marriage?
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: I am ready.
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: Cool.
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: What else you got? Is it part seven?
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: Oh, since we talked last, we had a great workshop
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: at Justin Coffee Co.
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: Yes, we did. It has been a very full week.
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: We had the best seasons of us. I think it
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: was our favorite workshop so far. It was great.
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: It was great. what, nine couples came?
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: And yeah, there's only limited space. And so we sold
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: out the patio. That was great.
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it was, it felt good. It was full, but
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: not like.
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: The weather cooperated with the stick.
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: It was great.
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: Really enjoyed doing that with you. So let's do it
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: some more. I love that. The content. Yeah.
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: And the, yeah, that one, I said this dog will hunt.
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: We should take that, that content on the road. We may,
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: you'll be seeing more hearing about the seasons of us
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: workshop that we'll do, and we'll probably open it up
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: to more people just to get a little bigger space.
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: Cause that was, it was really a lot of fun,
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: just really good content. It's not, not forever. You know,
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: you're not going to do a couple of nights or
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: a whole full, a full day. It's just a few hours.
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: And yeah, that was great.
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: And it was, I mean, there were some, I think
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: poignant moments, but also so much fun where we're just
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: laughing and, Not taking ourselves too seriously.
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: Lots of good music.
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: Some good couple time, but no embarrassing moments. So yeah,
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: that was great. So we're going to get into it,
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: aren't we?
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: Yeah. We are in episode seven of our 10-week series.
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: 10 Things That'll Make or Break Your Marriage. How are
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: you guys liking this so far? By the way, thank
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: you to our listeners. If you're listening, thank you. All
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: two of you. Both of you. So, no, we broke
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: into some new countries. It's so cool to see that,
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: the geolocation. And these are people who, I mean, according
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: to our RSS host, they actually listen to the entire,
• 3:31
  Speaker 2: it's not just like the three-second click.
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: When I was doing our newsletter, or no, I was
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: doing something in MailerLite the other day and looking at
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: our subscribers to our newsletter, And I've never seen this before,
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: but you can look in one section on the report
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: and it tells where the subscribers are from. And so
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: some of them are from across the pond. I need
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: to go back and look at all of the places,
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: but it's really cool. So I'm guessing that they probably
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: ran across our podcast and then went to our longhaulmarriage.org
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: and became... A long hauler to get our newsletter once
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: a month.
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: Well, a couple of weeks ago, we had a couple
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: over for dinner late in the week. And they live
• 4:21
  Speaker 2: in Denton now. But she's originally from Portugal. And it's funny.
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: So we recommended our podcast to them. And so then
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: the next day, the guy texted me and said, And
• 4:35
  Speaker 2: my wife heard your podcast when she was living in Portugal.
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: Isn't that cool?
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's really cool.
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: That's where she first heard it.
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: That's very cool.
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: So, yeah, Episode 7, we are going to call this
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: one Can I Trust You Again? Mm-hmm. We're going to
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: talk about trust.
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: Sounds pretty heavy.
• 4:53
  Speaker 2: Betrayal and infidelity. It is. I mean, it really is.
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: I mean, I don't really know of any couple that
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: hasn't been through some breach of trust.
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: Mm-hmm.
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: And man, trust can take years to build and seconds
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: to destroy. And then, you know, what happens after it's broken?
• 5:12
  Speaker 2: That's really, can trust be repaired?
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: You know, the interesting thing is so many couples that
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: we meet with a lot of couples who are trying
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: to work through rebuilding after a trust is broken. But
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: we've talked to so many people who... like in the
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: beginning of their dating or their marriage or whatever, they say, man,
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: that's the one thing. If that ever happened, I'm done.
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: I'm done.
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: That's it. I won't put up with that. That's it.
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: We could never work out after that. And I understand that.
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: And then what's interesting, and that's true for some people,
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: that really does happen. They say, you know what? Nope,
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: that was it.
• 5:54
  Speaker 2: It's a tough one.
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: But many, many people who said that at the beginning said,
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: Once it did happen, they find themselves kind of at
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: a crossroads. It's not as easy and cut and dry
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: as they thought that they would just call it quits. Right.
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: They're like, wait a second. There was something here, and
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: I don't want to just throw everything away. So a
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: lot of people that come to us come with that question, like,
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: can we rebuild? Is this even possible? Yeah.
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: Man, I mean, my deal is, and yeah, we've got
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: notes here. We said this could be, I mean, a
• 6:35
  Speaker 2: whole workshop. I mean, we actually have part of our
• 6:37
  Speaker 2: two-day workshop that's built around rebuilding trust. But still, my
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: brain just kind of went like, where do you start?
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: And every time, just now when you're talking, my brain
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: pinged into three or four different areas. Part of it
• 6:51
  Speaker 2: is there's so many nuances and so, so many different
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: kinds of betrayals. And, you know, we've, again, in our
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: own marriage, we've, we've encountered, uh, some of these, um,
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: but there's, you know, infidelity and, and that word, a
• 7:07
  Speaker 2: lot of times people just mean they, they think it
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: just means adultery, but there's, there's infidelity of so many
• 7:14
  Speaker 2: kinds and broken, broken promises, broken covenant, broken, um, kind
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: of a broken dream, a broken like vision for what
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: you thought you were going to have for your entire marriage. Um, there's,
• 7:29
  Speaker 2: you know, lies, there's pornography, uh, secret accounts. We've had
• 7:34
  Speaker 2: people tell us that their husband committed financial adultery, um,
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: you know, hidden spending, uh, on, you know, one or
• 7:43
  Speaker 2: both spouses, uh, there's emotional affairs, um, you know, promises
• 7:50
  Speaker 2: that or broken and people remember those sometimes for years. Um,
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: I remember talking to one couple and she was still
• 7:59
  Speaker 2: just harboring great resentment because she was in the hospital
• 8:03
  Speaker 2: and he had told her he was going to, uh,
• 8:06
  Speaker 2: basically leave early from this hunting trip that he had
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: scheduled and he never came. And, um, and she just,
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: she was still, you know, pretty bitter about that.
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: Um, There's also other things like boundary violations or things that,
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: for instance, people, maybe one of the spouses has been
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: drinking too much or smoking or whatever, and the other
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: spouse says, I don't like that. It's not healthy for you.
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  Speaker 1: And they begin to hide it. And so sometimes we
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: talk to people who that's a broken trust. They're like,
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: if you're drinking before you get home from work or
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: you're smoking and trying to hide it or dipping and trying,
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: whatever it is, what else are you hiding from me?
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: So even that, like that seems maybe minuscule compared to
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: someone who's had a full blown affair, but it really,
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: that's part of what we're talking about today. Anything Where
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: there's broken trust.
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: Dozens of couples that we've talked to. I mean, just dozens.
• 9:24
  Speaker 2: We hear this over and over that the husband has
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: struggled and battled pornography for his entire life. Some haven't
• 9:31
  Speaker 2: battled it. That's part of their life. But the ones
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: who've struggled with it and battled it and wanted to
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: get rid of it, they were exposed at an early age.
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: And so that addiction was strong. And the wife... Whether,
• 9:45
  Speaker 2: you know, he confessed to it or she busted him
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: or whatever, it came out and he's been trying to,
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: you know, get over that. And then she finds out
• 9:53
  Speaker 2: that he was using pornography again. And so many times
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: we hear it again over and over. and over and over, man,
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: if you would have just told me, like if you
• 10:03
  Speaker 2: would have just told me, but she found, you know,
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: if he, if he didn't come to her, didn't confess,
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: he was busted. Then she said, I just, now you're,
• 10:12
  Speaker 2: it was that deception. It was the lie. It was
• 10:14
  Speaker 2: the secret. And she said, now, like you just said,
• 10:17
  Speaker 2: who are you and what else are you lying about?
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: Hmm.
• 10:19
  Speaker 2: And so many times we hear that was the devastating,
• 10:22
  Speaker 2: the more devastating part is you, you're hiding from me. Like,
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: who are you? And you feel like sometimes, especially after
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: an affair, you know, just you're, is my whole marriage
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: a sham? Like what? This started, you know, two years ago.
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: What?
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: You did that 10 years ago. And then they start
• 10:39
  Speaker 2: going over all the scenes in their mind, the vacations
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: they were on or the pictures that they see. And Like, oh, whoa,
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: you were doing this back then? And it just shatters
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: your life. It shatters the trust that you have in
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: that person. And sometimes just, again, the dream you had
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: of your marriage, something's been infiltrated and, quote, adulterated that
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: you just never thought was going to happen. And so, yeah,
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: we understand if you think that is a deal breaker.
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: But for the ones who do want to restore, a
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: lot of times, you know, I think all of us,
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: struggle with what does forgiving mean? And I always say
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: forgiveness is past oriented, but trust is future oriented. So
• 11:21
  Speaker 2: it's like, and some people, they feel like, I can't
• 11:23
  Speaker 2: trust you because you're still doing it. So I could
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: forgive you for the past, but you're still hurting me.
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: And then the question is, well, you said you loved
• 11:33
  Speaker 2: me before. And so now you're sorry, like if the
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: husband or the wife is showing remorse and they want forgiveness, And,
• 11:43
  Speaker 2: but then it's like, so what's going to make it
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: different this time? If you gave in and you did
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: cross a boundary last time, you did break covenant, what
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: is going to stop you? And if you never got
• 11:53
  Speaker 2: to the bottom of it, if you're just like white knuckling, oh,
• 11:56
  Speaker 2: I'm not going to do it. I'm not going to
• 11:57
  Speaker 2: do it. And maybe it's the, I mean, obviously you
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: see the damage and the hurt it's caused in your
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: spouse and in your marriage, in your family, but maybe
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: it's a moral conviction. You know, well, you had a
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: what's going to stop you? And so many times we
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: never get to the bottom of why you reached out
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: of your marriage. What were you seeking? The validation many
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: times that you didn't get from a mother or a father.
• 12:26
  Speaker 2: And I mean, that's just a common one, an easy
• 12:29
  Speaker 2: one to go to. I've seen so many men that
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: never got the validation from a father. And so they
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: reach outside their marriage for validation. And then obviously the
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: blame that the wife can feel or the shame, like,
• 12:42
  Speaker 2: was I not enough? That feeling of I'm not enough
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: or he wants someone else or something else, but it
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: has nothing to do with her. In this case, it's just, man,
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: he's looking for validation and hers was never going to
• 12:55
  Speaker 2: be enough when his identity is that I'm not enough.
• 12:59
  Speaker 2: And so it's that. Is it chronic? Was it a
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: one-time thing? And not to minimize a one-time thing, you know,
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: a one night stand, but was there alcohol involved? So
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: many times on the one night stand, it was alcohol.
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: You put yourself in this vulnerable position. And the recovery
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: from all of these different scenarios is different, but it's still,
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: it's so hard. But so many times people think that
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: forgiveness means an automatic restoration of trust.
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 13:31
  Speaker 2: And nothing could be like, or if I forgive, that
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: means it wasn't that big a deal. Or he's getting
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: off scot-free or she's, you know, I'm just letting them
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: off the hook.
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: And that doesn't even seem appropriate. I've got it like
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: a puppy. I've got to take their nose and rub
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: it in it to try to teach them. And that's,
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: I think there are just so many people that they
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: have a hard time. They feel like that's going to
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: release them. of any guilt. Like I need to just
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: keep showing them over and over and over again, how
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: much that hurt me. And if I just easily kind
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: of forgive, first of all, you're not going to forget.
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: It's going to be with you for a very, maybe forever,
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: but you can forgive and still remember that it happened
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: and you can forgive and that other person is still
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: going to continue to beat them, beat themselves up over
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: and over and over again.
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: Sure. Yeah. I think we feel, you were saying, if
• 14:31
  Speaker 2: I forgive too quickly, I was talking about how forgiveness,
• 14:34
  Speaker 2: some people think that that that's a process. It's not, okay,
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: I forgive you.
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 14:39
  Speaker 2: It's just an ongoing. And sometimes you don't even want
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: to forgive. It's like, and if I do forgive, then
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: they're going to think it's okay. You know, all of that.
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: It's just so hard. You're, you're saying that, Rewind and
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: go back to the shove their nose in it. You're
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: saying that they need to feel more remorse than I
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: think they do or if I.
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: Let them off too easy. I need to make them
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: pay for the amount of hurt that I've felt. I
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: need to just put their face in it over and
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: over and over again so that they may can feel
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: just a tiny bit of what I felt.
• 15:16
  Speaker 2: And it feels justified to do that. And then if
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: they are told in a, let's say a Christian, you
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: go to church and it's all about forgiveness and you've
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: got a pastor talking about how you need to find
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: forgiveness and you're just sitting there thinking, man, I can't
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: do that. I don't even want to do that right now.
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: And so I would say that's very, very normal and
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: we shouldn't feel guilty over that.
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: It takes time.
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: It takes a lot of time and a lot of work.
• 15:41
  Speaker 2: And so maybe we'll just jump in there really quickly
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: about what we've seen with... What forgiveness doesn't mean, it
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: doesn't mean that, again, that spouse, that what they did
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: was okay or that it was in some way appropriate
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: or that it didn't leave a mark, like you said,
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: or it's going to be an automatic, hey, we can
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: just start back where we left off. So that covenant
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: has been broken. And we always say you're choosing whether
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: or not to get into a new covenant with this person. Mm-hmm.
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: And now who is this new person? Can I trust them?
• 16:20
  Speaker 2: Are they just going to do it again? So one
• 16:24
  Speaker 2: of the things as far as infidelity that I'm just
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: going to go here, the disclosure window, there's got to
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: be an initial disclosure window when there has been someone
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: that's been caught or been found out or has been
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: convicted that they need to go confess an affair to
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: their partner. So first you have to have a full
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: disclosure about everything that's happened. And I always say, be,
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: be careful. Maybe not every graphic detail, but man, usually
• 16:56
  Speaker 2: the spouse who's been cheated on wants to know everything.
• 17:00
  Speaker 2: I want to know everything I want to know. But
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: sometimes those details, if you get into that, then those
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: are some images that are hard to get out of
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: your mind. But I would say categorically that the spouse
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: who was the one who cheated, uh, needs to tell
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: everything because many times what happens, you feel bad. So
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: let's say that the spouse who cheated on, uh, I
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: hate to use these terms, but I remember in, in
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: the torn asunder book, the Carter's book, uh, it's a really,
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: actually it's called torn asunder recovering from an extramarital affair
• 17:35
  Speaker 2: by Dave Carter. He uses the, you know, the infidel
• 17:40
  Speaker 2: sometimes he called it, or the, you know, kind of
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: the victim villain language, you know, But the one who's
• 17:46
  Speaker 2: been cheated on and then the cheater.
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: The injured.
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: But many times the cheater, if he feels horrible, and
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: I'll just say he, if it's a guy in this case,
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: he doesn't want to do any more damage. And so
• 18:00
  Speaker 2: the last thing you want to do is tell something
• 18:03
  Speaker 2: that they don't know about. Like, man, I've already been busted.
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: I've been caught. The thing's over. And first of all,
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: you do have to have zero contact with that person.
• 18:12
  Speaker 2: No contact. And I mean, everything needs to be off.
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: No.
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: you know, going back and, or talking to him, or
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: we think we can be around this person. And so
• 18:22
  Speaker 2: zero contact, but in this initial disclosure window, the reason
• 18:26
  Speaker 2: why I say tell everything, even though you think that's
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: going to set you back or now maybe she'll never,
• 18:33
  Speaker 2: ever forgive me. And here's my wife is saying she
• 18:35
  Speaker 2: wants to work it out and we're doing marriage counseling.
• 18:38
  Speaker 2: And again, you feel, you feel like crap, but What
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: happens is many times we start working with a couple
• 18:45
  Speaker 2: and they start making progress. I always say truth is
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: a heat seeking missile and it will come and find you.
• 18:51
  Speaker 2: And so if you've left something out, if you've left
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: something unconfessed, many times this couple will be working for
• 18:58
  Speaker 2: three months, six months, and then all of a sudden, boom,
• 19:01
  Speaker 2: she finds out something new. And then, man, talk about
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: four steps forward and a thousand back. Yeah, you go
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: all the way back and then it becomes so much
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: more like I can't. I can't believe anything you're saying.
• 19:14
  Speaker 2: You're a liar. And so in that initial disclosure window,
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: you tell all, but then at some point you need
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: to get past that because we see couples three and
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: four years later just continuing to grill that spouse and
• 19:29
  Speaker 2: they just can't get over it. And again, hear me,
• 19:33
  Speaker 2: how long does it take to get over it? However
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: long it takes. It can take a long, long time.
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: It is traumatic. It is like a deep, deep wound.
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: I mean, I suffered a betrayal wound. But at some point,
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: you need to trust, okay, that's... has told me everything
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: and we're moving forward. But then the do whatever it takes,
• 19:57
  Speaker 2: I always say however long it takes. If you were
• 19:59
  Speaker 2: the one, there needs to be 100% accountability and whatever
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: your partner needs. So we I feel like it would
• 20:09
  Speaker 2: be exhausting, and no one wants to live with you're
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: tracking your husband 24-7. You want to know exactly where
• 20:16
  Speaker 2: he is, and you're checking in with me. That feels,
• 20:18
  Speaker 2: and so many times that can get old, right? But
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: you need to, like, if you were the one that
• 20:25
  Speaker 2: cheated on your spouse, I'm sorry. You bought the ticket.
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: You're going to see the show. You've got to give
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: her whatever she needs to feel safe. And to feel
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: secure and to feel like she can trust you and
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: she's not just eat up with that anxiety and tortured
• 20:40
  Speaker 2: brain when you're wondering like if he goes on a
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: business trip or man, he hasn't checked in today. I
• 20:45
  Speaker 2: haven't heard from him. So and that's however long it takes.
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: And many times I remember the movie The Loved, sorry,
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: what was it? Facing the Giants. Was that it? It
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: was one of those or wait, Fireproof. Was that it? Anyway,
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: but there was this thing at the end of the
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: movie called the 40-day love dare. Yeah, that might have been.
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: And the 40-day love dare was after you've hurt your spouse,
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: they may hate you, right? And it's like, I'm going
• 21:15
  Speaker 2: to show them, not just talk, but I'm going to
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: show them that I'm going to be there for them.
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: And so I think in the movie, I remember it
• 21:23
  Speaker 2: was like, okay, so he brings her coffee and she
• 21:26
  Speaker 2: just pours it down the drain. And then day two,
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: give her flowers. She cuts them up and throws them away. Whatever.
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: You've got these 40 days. I'm going to show my
• 21:38
  Speaker 2: wife that I'm there for her. She can trust me
• 21:40
  Speaker 2: and that I love her. Well, and you may think, well,
• 21:43
  Speaker 2: he's just doing this because he's in trouble or he's
• 21:45
  Speaker 2: atoning for his sins. Okay. At some point you have
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: to start fresh, right? Well, I always say, just keep
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: doing it. But most guys, let's say he's doing that
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: and she's throwing the coffee down the drain, throwing out
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: the flowers and just like, totally not receiving anything he
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: tries to give her and not just gifts, but like,
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: or do for her.
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: She's just like, got the stiff arm up. Sorry, dude,
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: I don't like you. I hate you. And you've hurt me.
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: And I'm just going to be over here and keep
• 22:14
  Speaker 2: myself safe. Well, many guys would just give up after
• 22:18
  Speaker 2: two weeks, but the 40 day love dare, what that
• 22:20
  Speaker 2: was like, I dare you to love her for 40
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: days consistently in a way where you're getting no reciprocation
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: and but you just keep doing it. And somebody says, well,
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: what happens after 40 days if her heart hasn't opened
• 22:32
  Speaker 2: towards me again? Well, do it another 40 days. We
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: talked in one of our first podcasts about Walter Wingren Jr.
• 22:41
  Speaker 2: when his wife said, you've crushed my spirit. And it
• 22:44
  Speaker 2: took him three years to win her back where she
• 22:47
  Speaker 2: could open her heart up and trust him and want
• 22:51
  Speaker 2: to love him again.
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: And many times we see the cheater- Once they either
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: come clean because they can't live with themselves anymore or
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: they're busted, they have this many times, not every time,
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: many times they have this true awakening. They were kind
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: of sleepwalking, like dead man walking or dead woman walking before.
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: And they kind of got lulled and deceived into this
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: affair again. And so many times what happens is they
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: have had some kind of like awakening and they're like,
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: oh man, my eyes are open. The veil has been lifted.
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: I see you for who you are. Like, I can't
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: believe that I was such an idiot. And they're like
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: ready to re-up and, you know, like pour on the, the,
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: you know, love and the passion and the recommitment. And,
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: and then you have the injured one who's like, whoa, whoa, whoa,
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: wait just a minute. Like I'm, that you are in
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: two completely different places, and that's hard. So the one
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: that's injured, so what it's going to take for trust
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: is truth plus consistency plus transparency plus time.
• 24:07
  Speaker 2: Ooh, the four T's. Say those again.
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: Well, there's a C in there, but trust, consistency, transparency,
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: and time.
• 24:16
  Speaker 2: So three T's. Yeah.
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: That's just going to take time.
• 24:20
  Speaker 2: I'm going to change consistency to tenacity. Okay. So it's
• 24:23
  Speaker 2: four T's. No, no.
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: I like that.
• 24:26
  Speaker 2: So trust.
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: Trust.
• 24:28
  Speaker 2: Truth, consistency, transparency, and time. Yeah.
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: And I think like with the time part of it,
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: I think the, I hate to just keep saying the cheater,
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: but that's how we're going to denote. So the cheater
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: wants to know like, man, I've like, like about how long. Like,
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: what are we talking time-wise? Like, they want to tell me,
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: are we talking months? Are we talking a year? Are
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: we just talking weeks? And the injured cannot give you
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: that answer.
• 24:58
  Speaker 2: That's good.
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: They cannot tell you that. But that's what's so, going
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: back to that 40-day love dare that you talked about, like,
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: all right, do it again. Yeah.
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: And I love that you said, I can't give you
• 25:10
  Speaker 2: that answer. But what I can say, just like with
• 25:13
  Speaker 2: anything else, I mean, you're grieving. You're grieving the loss
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: of something. And there's so many other hurts. But with grief,
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: it's like you can get stuck in these different stages
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: and nobody can tell you how long grief takes. But
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: you have to do the work. You have to be
• 25:28
  Speaker 2: doing something to get in a process to say, I
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: want to rebuild trust. I mean, the question, do you
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: want to? Is this worth it? Is it worth fighting for?
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: So I'm glad you brought this up. Many times we
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: have seen the people who this bomb did blow up
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: and it's so destructive. but it became the catalyst for
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: them to build something brand new with a new foundation
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: that they never had in their old marriage. And they
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: have a new covenant and they have new cornerstone foundations
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: that are part, uh, new boundaries, you know, new ways
• 26:01
  Speaker 2: of talking, new waves of new ways of being intimate and,
• 26:04
  Speaker 2: you know, warding off any kind of would be vulnerabilities
• 26:08
  Speaker 2: before they ever creep up and, and can cause the,
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: the breach of trust in the first place. Uh, One
• 26:16
  Speaker 2: thing you said is you said that there are different
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: places because the guy feels sometimes when he's caught, it's like, oh,
• 26:21
  Speaker 2: it's like, oh, my gosh. So he feels great now
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: because he's not carrying around this. He maybe feels guilt
• 26:27
  Speaker 2: and shame, but he's not carrying the secret. But so
• 26:32
  Speaker 2: I've seen many men go through programs like this one,
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: you know, Rise Up Kings in Argyle, where they they
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: come to this, you know, three day boot camp and
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: they're They're wanting to level up in their faith, finances, fitness,
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: and family. But it's all these things that many of
• 26:49
  Speaker 2: them have hidden. They've had these sins and they've just
• 26:52
  Speaker 2: been living and hiding them, whether it's an affair or
• 26:55
  Speaker 2: pornography or financial adultery or what have you. But so
• 27:00
  Speaker 2: many areas that they are convicted in the company of
• 27:05
  Speaker 2: other men and coaches and going through this process where
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: they want to become new and they know They were
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: just going to take this affair to their grave because
• 27:14
  Speaker 2: that happened a decade ago. Or that happened, man, I
• 27:17
  Speaker 2: cut that off. I felt guilty about it, and I
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: cut it off. Well, they go home. They drop this
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: bomb on their wife. That's something that they've dealt with
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: for all these months or all these years, but the
• 27:29
  Speaker 2: wife is just now dealing with it. So he's down
• 27:32
  Speaker 2: the road miles, and she's at the starting line. And
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: we have to remember that. Because a lot of times,
• 27:40
  Speaker 2: even the man, he's on fire, man. I'm a new
• 27:43
  Speaker 2: man and I've never been this way. And he feels
• 27:45
  Speaker 2: like he's closer to God than he's ever been, but
• 27:48
  Speaker 2: he feels as far away from his spouse as he's
• 27:50
  Speaker 2: ever been. And so that's something that takes a lot
• 27:53
  Speaker 2: of care. And again, it's a process. We highly recommend
• 27:59
  Speaker 2: you working through that with people like us. We love
• 28:02
  Speaker 2: working with couples that say, we don't know if we
• 28:08
  Speaker 2: can or we don't even know if we want to.
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: But when they are willing to try and say, we
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: do want to rebuild trust, man, that's where we come in.
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I would say it's one of the hardest things.
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: It's crushing when we walk through this with a couple.
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: I mean, I think I'm for sure an empath. I
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: think you are. You just don't let it out as much.
• 28:31
  Speaker 2: It's so hard.
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: What it, you know, what it does to, to, to
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: really both of them, but to the one that's been injured, just,
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: they just, it just most of the time has blindsided them.
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: You know what I love? And I'll say this for
• 28:47
  Speaker 2: anybody listening who thinks, man, we're there and we just
• 28:50
  Speaker 2: feel we've just suffered with it. And we just feel
• 28:53
  Speaker 2: like we just can't get over it. And we've tried
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: and we've tried this and we've tried that. What I
• 28:57
  Speaker 2: love is we've seen the transformation and we've had couples
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: that's part of their testimony and they've come out loud.
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: One of them started a support group and, they are willing,
• 29:07
  Speaker 2: you know, some of these spouses, the husband and the
• 29:10
  Speaker 2: wife are willing to sit down with other husbands or
• 29:12
  Speaker 2: other wives who are going through it to tell their
• 29:15
  Speaker 2: story of how, because you can hear us talk all
• 29:18
  Speaker 2: about it, but hearing people who have restored trust through
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: a physical affair or an emotional affair or the financial adultery,
• 29:28
  Speaker 2: whatever the situation, we have couples in almost every one
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: of those who says, Hey, we'll sit down and talk
• 29:35
  Speaker 2: to them and we can connect you with those couples
• 29:37
  Speaker 2: who are willing to do that. And sometimes you just think, well,
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: it was just like after we lost our son, somebody
• 29:43
  Speaker 2: who else lost a child and they see that we're living,
• 29:45
  Speaker 2: just the fact that we're breathing in and out living
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: 10 years later, like, well, if you guys got through it,
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: maybe we can too.
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: Yeah. And I think it really is one of the
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: sweetest things. I mean, it's heartbreaking and Sometimes it is
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: a marriage ender. Sometimes it is. But the many couples
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: that we've gotten and friends of ours, you know, that
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: have walked through this to see that we wouldn't wish
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: this on anybody, but to see that they were willing
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: to stick it out and say, man, I'm going to
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: forgive you. I'm going to choose to forgive you and
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: let's try to move forward. And it does take a
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: long time to rebuild that trust. But then, Once the
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: snowball starts heading in that direction, it's really cool to
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: see just how strong and how beautiful and how rich
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: their marriage could be on the other side of this.
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: We have seen that many times, and that's a sweet
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: kind of redemptive thing to witness.
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: I love that you just used that term that you
• 30:50
  Speaker 2: chose to forgive. So many times people would see, especially
• 30:56
  Speaker 2: in our culture today, it's like all men cheat, all
• 31:00
  Speaker 2: men suck. They're all narcissists. They're all controlling. They're all,
• 31:04
  Speaker 2: you name it. And it's like, see there, told you.
• 31:10
  Speaker 2: Another one bites the dust. Girl, you get out of there.
• 31:13
  Speaker 2: You don't deserve that. No, you don't deserve that. Throw
• 31:16
  Speaker 2: his butt to the curb and get out of there.
• 31:19
  Speaker 2: And so it would feel weak to forgive. So you'll
• 31:22
  Speaker 2: get a lot of messages that that would be a
• 31:24
  Speaker 2: weak thing to do. But what I would say is
• 31:26
  Speaker 2: no one's holding a gun to your head. And so
• 31:29
  Speaker 2: it can be one of the strongest things you've ever
• 31:32
  Speaker 2: done to choose to forgive. Again, I love that you
• 31:36
  Speaker 2: use that term. You're choosing to forgive someone. You don't
• 31:39
  Speaker 2: have to. And it's so, again, wow.
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: I love when you frame it like that, that it seems...
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: Like some people would make it seem like, wow, little weakling,
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: you know, just allowing him to come back.
• 31:53
  Speaker 2: Take him back. You don't think that highly of yourself.
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: It's like, no. It's like that it really, truly is
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: the strongest.
• 31:58
  Speaker 2: I'm choosing a strength. Yeah. And I love that quote,
• 32:03
  Speaker 2: Esther Perel's quote, the Swiss psychologist. She says many of
• 32:07
  Speaker 2: us marry, or most of us, she says, marry three
• 32:10
  Speaker 2: times in a lifetime. Some just choose to do it
• 32:13
  Speaker 2: with the same person. And that's us. Mm-hmm. I mean,
• 32:17
  Speaker 2: how many times that we've had to re-up on our
• 32:19
  Speaker 2: covenant and our commitment to one another after we've been,
• 32:23
  Speaker 2: you know, just thrashed by life and by things that
• 32:27
  Speaker 2: happen and broken trust.
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: So one thing I want you to share that I've
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: heard you share with so many people, but whenever, you know,
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: through our 37 years of marriage, you know, and we
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: thank the Lord can look at each other in the
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: eye and say, thank you that, that's never happened. Thank
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: you for always being loyal and faithful to me. And
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: we can say that to each other. But you have
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: shared before that when you've met with other couples who've
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: walked through this or whatever, something that has solidified in
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: your spirit, I don't ever, like you want to say,
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: I won't ever go down that road. You don't ever
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: want to think that you're Above it, I mean, it
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: can happen to anybody. But what's the picture that has
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: always been running through your mind when you think about? Yeah.
• 33:25
  Speaker 2: So first, thank you for bringing that. So first, I
• 33:28
  Speaker 2: would say we are all tempted in this area. Again,
• 33:33
  Speaker 2: not just, hey, pride comes before a fall. If you
• 33:36
  Speaker 2: think you're above something, you're delusional. Even if you have
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: a moral conviction, I mean, a lot of our audience
• 33:45
  Speaker 2: are Christian or faith-based in some way. They believe in God.
• 33:50
  Speaker 2: They're a practicing Christian. They're following Christ. They believe Christ
• 33:54
  Speaker 2: lives in them. But even with that, you're human. And
• 33:58
  Speaker 2: so you will be tempted. And so many of us
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: feel shame or guilt for being tempted. And so then
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: we don't talk about it. We go the other way.
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: We have this ridiculous, instead of just being honest, like, no,
• 34:09
  Speaker 2: I am tempted in that area. So you have to
• 34:11
  Speaker 2: have tons of accountability. You have to be an open
• 34:14
  Speaker 2: book to God, to your buddies and to your spouse. But, uh,
• 34:20
  Speaker 2: so one of the things is if you're, if you're
• 34:22
  Speaker 2: tempted in that area, don't say, Oh no, I wouldn't
• 34:24
  Speaker 2: be tempted. And, you know, talk about how great you're
• 34:27
  Speaker 2: doing your accountability, accountability partners in your whatever covenant eyes, you,
• 34:32
  Speaker 2: you got to talk about where you're, where you're failing
• 34:35
  Speaker 2: or where you're getting close to a line or you're, inappropriate,
• 34:38
  Speaker 2: you know, your thoughts or your inappropriate text or, hmm,
• 34:42
  Speaker 2: that's not so professional or business. Now that's crossing the
• 34:47
  Speaker 2: personal line with a coworker or whatever. So when you
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: find yourself in those situations, right, you need to tell someone.
• 34:55
  Speaker 2: But for me, it's that it's never just this. Unless
• 34:59
  Speaker 2: there was alcohol involved, honestly, it's usually just not one
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: failed moment. It was a series of crossing small boundaries
• 35:08
  Speaker 2: and it goes further and further and further. Then you
• 35:11
  Speaker 2: get desensitized to those and you just let it stretch
• 35:15
  Speaker 2: a little further and a little further until all of
• 35:17
  Speaker 2: a sudden you're in a situation and you're really thinking,
• 35:20
  Speaker 2: how the hell did I get here? And so the,
• 35:24
  Speaker 2: the many, many times you just, you're in the moment
• 35:27
  Speaker 2: and in the heat of the moment, boom, then it happens.
• 35:31
  Speaker 2: And you're thinking, wow, how in the world did I
• 35:34
  Speaker 2: ever get here? So one thing that I've told guys
• 35:38
  Speaker 2: over and over and over men and women, but especially
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: the buddies who've come to me and said, man, I'm
• 35:44
  Speaker 2: struggling with this. It's the, after the thing has come out, you, you,
• 35:52
  Speaker 2: you picture the end of the road. You don't picture
• 35:54
  Speaker 2: where you are now or in the middle of it.
• 35:57
  Speaker 2: You picture the end. Okay. Because guess what? This won't
• 36:00
  Speaker 2: end well. If you're married, And you think you're going
• 36:03
  Speaker 2: to get away with something or you're toying with something.
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: You think, oh, man, it couldn't. And you're sitting there thinking,
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: I feel guilty or this is wrong. But, man, you're
• 36:12
  Speaker 2: caught up and you're just letting this thing go. So
• 36:17
  Speaker 2: I picture sitting in the living room with you and
• 36:21
  Speaker 2: with my kids and now my grandkids. It would well
• 36:24
  Speaker 2: be you and the kids and having the family meeting.
• 36:28
  Speaker 2: And so the truth has come out. I've been busted.
• 36:33
  Speaker 2: And the kids are saying, you did what, dad? With who?
• 36:38
  Speaker 2: I've just pictured that meeting, that meeting that's inevitably going
• 36:41
  Speaker 2: to happen within a family where everything comes out and
• 36:45
  Speaker 2: they're just devastated. And so if you can think of that,
• 36:48
  Speaker 2: anytime you're flirting around with this, which by the way,
• 36:51
  Speaker 2: you will, like all of us are human. And whenever
• 36:54
  Speaker 2: that thing comes and those, whether it's a fantasy or
• 36:56
  Speaker 2: fleeting thoughts or thoughts that have just kind of gone
• 36:59
  Speaker 2: down the road a little bit, You need to look
• 37:01
  Speaker 2: and think after this thing comes out, which it will,
• 37:05
  Speaker 2: it will not end well. And so just picture that
• 37:08
  Speaker 2: meeting where the people that you love and that love
• 37:11
  Speaker 2: you are looking at you and you're, they're saying you
• 37:14
  Speaker 2: did what dad with who.
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: If that's not a picture of freezing cold water poured
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: over your head.
• 37:21
  Speaker 2: It's just one of the best things you can do.
• 37:23
  Speaker 2: And so, yeah. Uh, so let's talk to Amy real
• 37:27
  Speaker 2: quick before we close today. Um, What are some of the,
• 37:32
  Speaker 2: like people who have not encountered this and they're thinking
• 37:37
  Speaker 2: they may be the ones that like, oh, that'd be
• 37:38
  Speaker 2: it for us. What are some of the boundaries that
• 37:44
  Speaker 2: you think are healthy to have in marriage to where
• 37:47
  Speaker 2: you don't get yourself into these situations? Or what are
• 37:51
  Speaker 2: the things that you think we've put in?
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: I think even having this conversation with your spouse. Like
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: you think, well, why would we even talk about this
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: if this, hasn't come up for us. I think this
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: would be a super healthy conversation just in saying, hey,
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: I just listened to a podcast about this or I
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: had a friend who just walked through this and I
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: want to kind of have a plan or boundaries set
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: before it ever could possibly become a thing. And so
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: even just having an open conversation whatever you bring into
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: the light is like, that's, that's it right there. If
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: just a tiny little seed is left in, in a
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: dark spot, just left in the darkness, um, that's where
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: it can just be, you know, begin to grow and,
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: you know, turn into something. So I think, um, as
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: much as you can just be completely honest with your,
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: with your spouse, uh, even if it's not been a
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: challenge that you've had to go through. Um, so it,
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: I think, of course, with the crazy, you know, phones
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: these days with the, you know, access that we're, you know,
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: we've just got that with us 24-7. That's something that
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: we deal with with a lot of couples that, you know,
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: where that's where inappropriate chatting can come in or texting or.
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: Facebook or Instagram DMs or pornography. I mean, so many
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: things come at the dumb phone. So I think having
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: a boundary with that. No. secrets there, knowing each other's passwords. And,
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: and I don't mean, you know, just grilling them, you.
• 39:37
  Speaker 2: Know, going through their phones, checking, but many times that's
• 39:39
  Speaker 2: what they've had a gut instinct or a gut feeling.
• 39:42
  Speaker 2: And then they go search in and they find something.
• 39:45
  Speaker 2: And then it's like, okay, so I'm supposed to trust
• 39:48
  Speaker 2: But before I was trusting, now I feel like a
• 39:50
  Speaker 2: fool or an idiot. And so it's so hard not
• 39:53
  Speaker 2: to be hypervigilant at first. And that's that we call
• 39:56
  Speaker 2: it the crazy brain or torture brain where you're always
• 39:59
  Speaker 2: worried that something's going to happen again. And so you
• 40:02
  Speaker 2: are constantly still checking the phone. One of the things
• 40:06
  Speaker 2: is being honest with ourself, especially just think about it.
• 40:09
  Speaker 2: If we're morally convicted that that's obviously sinful behavior in
• 40:15
  Speaker 2: a marriage, it's going to It's not godly. It's going
• 40:17
  Speaker 2: to break up a marriage and destroy a marriage and
• 40:20
  Speaker 2: destroy you. So the last thing we want to do
• 40:24
  Speaker 2: is admit that that could be us. And so many
• 40:29
  Speaker 2: times we don't want to even admit that you could
• 40:33
  Speaker 2: be having some kind of thoughts about somebody that... So
• 40:38
  Speaker 2: you're lying to yourself. If somebody dings you, reaches into you,
• 40:42
  Speaker 2: DMs you, or texts you, or comments and says something
• 40:46
  Speaker 2: to you or whatever, and that attention feels good. That
• 40:50
  Speaker 2: would be the first thing. Be honest with yourself. If
• 40:52
  Speaker 2: you're getting attention from someone that's not your spouse, and
• 40:55
  Speaker 2: it's a member of the opposite sex, first admit that
• 40:58
  Speaker 2: kind of felt good. And you may, somebody may be like, oh, no, no, no.
• 41:02
  Speaker 2: But like, we love attention. We love someone to notice.
• 41:06
  Speaker 2: We want to feel good. Somebody listened to us. Somebody
• 41:08
  Speaker 2: said we look pretty. Or They said you're smart or
• 41:11
  Speaker 2: whatever it is, that someone noticed you, somebody paid attention
• 41:15
  Speaker 2: to you. So if you know that, right? So, okay,
• 41:20
  Speaker 2: what are you going to do about it? So some
• 41:23
  Speaker 2: of the checks that, I mean, we've talked a million
• 41:25
  Speaker 2: times and I know people have heard this, but obviously
• 41:29
  Speaker 2: if you have any kind of, if you have a coworker,
• 41:31
  Speaker 2: let's say, and you're starting to talk about personal things
• 41:35
  Speaker 2: with them, not business.
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: Mm-hmm.
• 41:38
  Speaker 2: The first person you thought of when you woke up
• 41:40
  Speaker 2: was not your spouse. You're thinking about texting that person.
• 41:43
  Speaker 2: If you're having to hide, put their name under someone
• 41:46
  Speaker 2: else's name. Right. If you're saying anything to that person
• 41:49
  Speaker 2: that you wouldn't want your spouse to see, like if
• 41:53
  Speaker 2: you're ever emailing or texting anyone and you would not
• 41:57
  Speaker 2: want that text or email. If they couldn't be looking
• 42:00
  Speaker 2: over your shoulder. Over your shoulder, then you shouldn't be
• 42:02
  Speaker 2: sending it. And you may think it will... Well, it
• 42:05
  Speaker 2: wasn't anything inappropriate. It wasn't anything sexual. But were you
• 42:10
  Speaker 2: thinking about them a lot? So a lot of times
• 42:12
  Speaker 2: it's quantity. It's like, wow, you sure are thinking about
• 42:15
  Speaker 2: them a lot during the day, right? And so I
• 42:18
  Speaker 2: just want to normalize that for people. This is the
• 42:21
  Speaker 2: stuff that will take you down. So then the question
• 42:25
  Speaker 2: I want to go back to is, can I trust
• 42:28
  Speaker 2: you again? I mean, so that's, do you believe that someone,
• 42:33
  Speaker 2: once they have reached the trust, Do you think that, A,
• 42:37
  Speaker 2: that person, the cheater, can be trustworthy again? Or is
• 42:41
  Speaker 2: it once a cheater, always a cheater? And then, I mean,
• 42:43
  Speaker 2: I know the answer to that, but I want to
• 42:45
  Speaker 2: hear you kind of talk about that. And then, do
• 42:47
  Speaker 2: you think a woman or a man can truly ever, like,
• 42:52
  Speaker 2: find it in their heart to forgive that person truly? Like,
• 42:55
  Speaker 2: truly forgive them for that? And then, can they really
• 42:59
  Speaker 2: trust that person again?
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: Mm-hmm. I think the answer is yes and yes, or no,
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: I'm sorry. No. And yes, I don't, I don't think
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: once a cheater, always a cheater. I don't, I think, um,
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: you know, for a lot of different, you know, circumstances
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: and things that we've already talked about that, that was,
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: you know, they were human and they fell prey to,
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: you know, deception and, uh, I think that you can
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: have a complete, like if, if you believe that there's
• 43:33
  Speaker 1: grace and forgiveness, then you have to believe that there's
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: grace and forgiveness for that. If you think that that's
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: not just like the one thing that it's going to
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: stop at. And so, no, I do not think once
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: a cheater, always a cheater. And I do believe that
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: forgiveness can be found, that trust can be rebuilt. Now
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: is let's say it's a, a woman who's the injured one.
• 43:59
  Speaker 1: It's not always like that, but let's just say it is.
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: Maybe for the rest of her life, she'll still remember
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: how badly that hurt her, and she could kind of
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: go back to that moment, just like the grief of
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: losing our son. I don't cry every day about it.
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: I'm not panicked that the rest of my kids are
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: going to die someday, you know, this week or whatever,
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: but I, I will always remember what that crushing blow
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: felt like, you know, and.
• 44:35
  Speaker 2: But it's interesting. You go ahead.
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: So it's not that you're going to forget it, but
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: I do, I do think that you can get to
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: a place where you see your, let's say it's your,
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: you know, it's the wife that's the injured and the
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: husband was the cheater. I think you can see your,
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: husband in a whole new light. Like you've never seen
• 44:59
  Speaker 1: him before, but it will take time. Consistency and time.
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: So it is a new man. It's like a new marriage.
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: And so, or a new woman, by the way, yeah,
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: 46% of women, you know, are reporting somewhere in that
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: 46 to 50% that they cheat as, as nowadays. And
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: I mean, you can look all that stuff up, but it's,
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: I love that you brought up the time and there
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: are the consistency in the time. So in, in the
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: Corbin thing for me, we grieved. And if we wouldn't agree,
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: we see people that are still struggling and stuck in that.
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: And maybe you started medicating in yourself into oblivion, right?
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: You didn't get healthy. Uh, that seems like another life
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: ago for me. Not that we haven't, you know, didn't
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: lose our son, but we don't carry that around, uh, uh,
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: it's not as present. I don't think even at a
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: unconscious or subconscious level, I'd be as strong as it
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: was in those early days. There's just no way it, it,
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: and so there's been healing and there's been life, a
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: lot of life. When I, when I say it literally
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: feels like, like who were those young kids that went
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: through that? It changed us.
• 46:11
  Speaker 2: It does change you. And, and so for us, the
• 46:15
  Speaker 2: stuff that we, we learned through the suffering and the,
• 46:19
  Speaker 2: the resurrection and the new life that we have, it's,
• 46:23
  Speaker 2: It wouldn't have come without that. And so I see,
• 46:26
  Speaker 2: as we said before, I see marriages that have been
• 46:28
  Speaker 2: formed into marriages that would have never happened had that
• 46:32
  Speaker 2: not been a catalyst to cause them to do some deep,
• 46:36
  Speaker 2: deep work in themselves and in their partnership. So look
• 46:41
  Speaker 2: at it like on a timeline. When the bomb goes off,
• 46:46
  Speaker 2: you think, that's it, man. We'll never get over this.
• 46:50
  Speaker 2: But let's say you're at a negative 20. that thing
• 46:52
  Speaker 2: went off. And so there's a zero on the timeline
• 46:55
  Speaker 2: right here in the middle, and you're over here at
• 46:57
  Speaker 2: a negative 20. Well, let's just say you go plus
• 47:01
  Speaker 2: five years from a negative 20. So you're at a
• 47:04
  Speaker 2: negative 15, right? And you go another five years, you're
• 47:07
  Speaker 2: still at a negative 10. Well, then all of a sudden,
• 47:10
  Speaker 2: you go to zero, and let's say you're at 40.
• 47:13
  Speaker 2: And so 40 minus 25, what is that? 15, right?
• 47:20
  Speaker 2: So you're at a positive now, kind of a net positive.
• 47:22
  Speaker 2: So sometimes at the, and again, if there's been consistency,
• 47:26
  Speaker 2: if there hasn't been another episode, if you've just had
• 47:30
  Speaker 2: this new life, this new husband, these new behaviors, and
• 47:34
  Speaker 2: you just develop new trust, like I'm living with another
• 47:36
  Speaker 2: human being. What we're saying is that can happen, but
• 47:40
  Speaker 2: it takes time and it's a process.
• 47:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 47:44
  Speaker 2: But it's beautiful when you see people go through. And
• 47:47
  Speaker 2: I believe that's marriage. And it's not just in this. Yes,
• 47:52
  Speaker 2: can you learn to trust another human being? Well, yes,
• 47:57
  Speaker 2: if they are trustworthy. So it's not anything that comes
• 48:03
  Speaker 2: easily or cheap. But yeah, when you choose to do
• 48:07
  Speaker 2: the work of forgiveness, there is a help that can
• 48:11
  Speaker 2: get you there.
• 48:11
  Speaker 1: Mm-hmm.
• 48:13
  Speaker 2: Probably enough of that.
• 48:15
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 48:15
  Speaker 2: There's so much to talk about.
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: I think one challenge I'd like to throw out for
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: this week is for the many people that haven't, they're
• 48:29
  Speaker 1: currently not dealing with betrayal. There's not been a breach
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: of trust in their marriage. Have this conversation. What boundaries
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: do we want our marriage to have before we're ever tested?
• 48:42
  Speaker 2: Mm-hmm.
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: I think a good, healthy conversation would do wonders. So
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: that's one challenge for people who they're not currently dealing
• 48:53
  Speaker 1: with betrayal. That would be a challenge to have that conversation.
• 48:57
  Speaker 1: So what would you say a good challenge would be
• 48:59
  Speaker 1: for someone who is either walking through it right now
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: or like the bomb just went off? And they're trying
• 49:07
  Speaker 1: to find their way through the rubble. Or it was
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: a few years ago.
• 49:12
  Speaker 2: What would be a challenge for them? A challenge would
• 49:14
  Speaker 2: be to go back and to just do a check-in
• 49:18
  Speaker 2: with your heart. Truly. Are you, do you feel like, yeah,
• 49:22
  Speaker 2: I'm doing pretty well and I can trust my spouse
• 49:24
  Speaker 2: and it's not dogging me like it was before. Or
• 49:27
  Speaker 2: are there some residual hurts that you feel like, like
• 49:30
  Speaker 2: we hear that I never felt like he was truly remorseful.
• 49:33
  Speaker 2: I never really felt like he, he knew the depth
• 49:36
  Speaker 2: of the pain and really apologize for, or just felt
• 49:40
  Speaker 2: that hurt and really felt sorry for it. Are there
• 49:44
  Speaker 2: any things that you're still wondering about? Do you have
• 49:46
  Speaker 2: some kind of a gut thing, but you've been told, well,
• 49:49
  Speaker 2: but if I trust him, I can't be checking on that.
• 49:51
  Speaker 2: Maybe go and be vulnerable to say, Hey man, I've got,
• 49:54
  Speaker 2: I've got kind of something in my gut that's bothering me.
• 49:57
  Speaker 2: You know, I feel like this or that and ask
• 50:00
  Speaker 2: your spouse, but as you said, sit down and have
• 50:03
  Speaker 2: a conversation about it. I would say for couples who
• 50:09
  Speaker 2: you said are going through it right now, if you
• 50:12
  Speaker 2: or have been for a year or several months, if
• 50:15
  Speaker 2: you feel stuck, reach out and get help. You'd be
• 50:19
  Speaker 2: surprised at how just someone else kind of finishing your
• 50:22
  Speaker 2: sentences and just normalizing some of the stuff you're going through,
• 50:25
  Speaker 2: but then pulling out some of the Carter material where
• 50:28
  Speaker 2: he walks you through step by step. Here's how you
• 50:31
  Speaker 2: can rebuild trust.
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 50:35
  Speaker 2: We've just had a lot of success with couples. Yeah.
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: And I think a good challenge for, you talked about
• 50:40
  Speaker 1: a challenge for the one who's been injured. So what
• 50:44
  Speaker 1: about for the one that has cheated? I think there's
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: a couple of good things that, a good conversation you
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: can have with yourself. One is the same as the
• 50:56
  Speaker 1: couple who hasn't walked through a betrayal in their marriage.
• 51:01
  Speaker 1: Ask yourself, what boundaries am I putting in place where
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: that's not going to sneak into my marriage again. Um,
• 51:10
  Speaker 1: how are you doing with that? And then number two,
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: how are you doing about forgiving yourself? I got, I
• 51:18
  Speaker 1: think we talked to a lot of people. We, we
• 51:20
  Speaker 1: know people who have cheated and they just for their,
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: even when the wife is, you know, they've worked through
• 51:27
  Speaker 1: it and seem, you know, things seem to be, you know,
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: going well. Uh, they just still, it's really hard for
• 51:35
  Speaker 1: them to forgive themselves.
• 51:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah, they feel ashamed. They kind of walk in shame.
• 51:40
  Speaker 2: And that's not who you are.
• 51:41
  Speaker 1: So how are you doing on that?
• 51:42
  Speaker 2: That's not who you are. When you have been forgiven,
• 51:45
  Speaker 2: you do move forward. I think one of the things
• 51:48
  Speaker 2: that we can all do is when you're tempted towards
• 51:53
  Speaker 2: any kind of sin, towards missing the mark, you're looking
• 51:56
  Speaker 2: for something to fill a void. You're looking for something
• 52:02
  Speaker 2: maybe that's novelty because you're bored. Or you're looking for
• 52:06
  Speaker 2: something with less friction because this is going to take
• 52:09
  Speaker 2: some work. And now it's so easy to have an
• 52:11
  Speaker 2: artificial or a counterfeit. So what is that? It's like,
• 52:15
  Speaker 2: try to get underneath. What's going on under the hood? Like,
• 52:19
  Speaker 2: let the temptation be a symptom, a warning sign to
• 52:25
  Speaker 2: say something requires attention. What is it that I'm feeling
• 52:28
  Speaker 2: that I'm lacking in my life? So why am I
• 52:31
  Speaker 2: even tempted? Am I lonely? Do I feel disconnected? Do
• 52:36
  Speaker 2: I feel not lovable? Do I feel not enough? Because
• 52:40
  Speaker 2: then there's so many people out there that would want
• 52:43
  Speaker 2: to answer that question. Yes, you are enough. Yes, you
• 52:46
  Speaker 2: are something. And so just think about when God answers
• 52:50
  Speaker 2: that question and he tells you you're enough, you don't
• 52:53
  Speaker 2: need to go check the waters outside of your marriage.
• 52:57
  Speaker 1: That's good.
• 52:57
  Speaker 2: Okay. Well, babe.
• 52:59
  Speaker 1: Great conversation.
• 53:00
  Speaker 2: Let's see. I said that there were four T's. Earlier,
• 53:03
  Speaker 2: and you corrected me. So it was truth, transparency, and time.
• 53:09
  Speaker 2: Those were the three Ts, but you said the other
• 53:11
  Speaker 2: one was a... Consistency was a see ya.