What I Wish I Had Known After My Betrayal
If you are reeling after the discovery, this article is for you. Every “discovery” story is different, but the shock and overwhelm are universal. It takes a while for our brains to accept what is happening.
If you have not yet read “Shattered”, please do. You need to know that info first…even before this article. (Link is on the Home Page)
When I first found out, my husband came home late from work to tell me his sexual history that I had no clue about. I had no idea what was going on right under my nose for our first 4 years of marriage, and while we were dating. He was overwhelmed with shame as he opened up to me, but also so relieved to finally tell me. I was in shock. I asked a few questions, but I mostly just listened. I could hardly respond. It didn’t really hurt yet; I was just in shock and overwhelmed with so much to think about. I wasn’t angry yet, just numb. I couldn’t sleep that night; I’m sure I spent many hours staring at the ceiling.
The next day, and the following days and weeks…things started changing for me. My mind was full of questions. He would go to work, while I was home taking care of the kids and trying to function normally. My mind was overwhelmed with questions and reliving the past, trying to sort out what I was real, and what I could hold on to. That next day, when he came home from work, and for many, many days afterward, I bombarded him with what felt like a hundred questions soon after he walked in the door. We would talk and argue long into the night, after the kids were in bed. I was sleeping terribly, and every day my body was full of more and more tension and anxiety as I tried to process everything. The questions continued. His answers often hurt me more, and never seem good enough; either they seemed incomplete, I couldn’t believe him, or I would catch him in more lies. It felt like there were more and more to struggle with as I worked to figure out what was real and what was a lie.
It was crushing to my soul. I felt so foolish. On top of it all, we were wrestling with who we should tell, if anyone. We both had the instinct to hide it all, to keep it hidden and quiet, between the two of us. After all, sexual matters in marriage should stay private…right? That is how everyone seems to live, isn’t that what our parents and grandparents modeled for most of us? Sometimes it is drilled into us to “not hang out our dirty laundry”. You keep shame hidden. After his years of hiding, and my childhood of hiding abuse at home, we both fell into that old familiar pattern.
So, what did I do? I tried to fix things on my own. I “DIY’d” (Do It Yourself) everything else, so that was my instinct here too. I began to brainstorm everything my husband needed to do to heal from his porn addiction, and what we both needed to do to hide everything that was going on and “put on a good face”. The problem is, I didn’t know what I was doing, and our instincts were so unhealthy and wrong. Sex addicts are PROS at hiding their shame and “putting on a good face”...so what we were really doing was enabling his addiction. Sin thrives in darkness; without realizing it, I was doing exactly the opposite of what was needed. For way too long, he kept falling into his familiar patterns, I kept discovering lies, and sunk deeper and deeper into depression and chaos.
Here are some truths you need to accept right now, things I learned the hard way, and that I’ve seen to be true with many other women I’ve worked with over the last 15 years. I know many of these are difficult to accept, so take it slow if you need to, come back to it later when the time is right if needed.
10 Things I wish I knew after my betrayal:
You don’t need all the details from your husband right now to start your healing.
You don’t have to share every “nitty-gritty” personal detail to start getting support.
You need support. You can’t do this on your own. Grow in understanding and journal on your own, but you won’t heal thoroughly by yourself; you need the support and perspective of others to be whole again.
Your husband can’t fix you or heal your pain right now. He is broken and messed up and needs his own healing. You need to let him do his own work and focus on your own healing right now!
You should not share this pain and details of what you are experiencing with just anyone! Not everyone is “safe”, and not everyone can handle this. Friends and family often make things harder; they say dumb things that really hurt, so be cautious and don’t open up to them too much, use wisdom. They love you and may get angry and overwhelmed with it, too; you’ve got enough on your plate, you don’t need to add more to your worries and stress-load. Find counselors and support groups that understand what you are going through and talk to them first. Get some healing before you open up to friends or family, and then you will better know how/if/when to do it safely.
There are great books and videos out there now…I highly encourage you to watch and read some! YouTube is a great place to start. But you need more support and healing than these will provide! They will help validate your pain and offer understanding, but you need a safe place to process it with people who understand what you are going through and can help you gain a new, healthier perspective on many aspects of what you are experiencing.
It is typical for a lot of your past pain and insecurities to feel magnified after the shock of betrayal. Whatever is unhealthy in you comes out. Take it slow, and recognize you can do some growing and healing right now, don’t let all your pain and mess come flying out of you. We all have past pain, acknowledge your hurts and give yourself space to feel them, and to heal.
You only have so much energy, so much capacity; this betrayal will drain you! I wish I had asked for more help with the kids and meals, and found creative ways to give myself breaks and time away, time to heal and process. It’s okay, and you need it. Acknowledge that this is taking a lot out of you and that you need some help. This is an area where you can lean on friends and family-you don’t have to tell them what is going on yet, just tell them you guys are going through some hard stuff, and you need some help, emotional support and breaks. They don’t need to know more; if they push for answers, tell them you will talk to them when you’ve had time to process. Just ask them to please pray for you and love you through this hard season.
Things can feel “black and white”...“all or nothing”...when you are at this stage. You may have the impulse to “stand by your man” (too much) or run away fast while burning bridges behind you. You don’t have to do either right now! Take it slow. If you need space, get some space! If you want him to know you are still committed and want things to work, great! But you don’t have to deny your needs, safety, security and/or healing to do that.
Try to set aside thoughts of him, your anger, your need to manage and fix, your need to know everything…and focus on you instead! Focus on what is going on in your body. What is this doing to you? What is it bringing up for you? Start journaling for sure-you need this mental outlet to decompress and find some clarity. Your mind can get chaotic after betrayals; you need to be able to sort through things in private, so that it doesn’t all explode out of you in public.
When betrayals happen, when any hard things happen in our lives, many of us want to get it over with as quickly as possible. That is understandable! Who wants to “wallow” in pain and drag it out! The problem is that we often react by trying to cope, comfort ourselves, and avoid the pain.
Avoidance and denial of your pain leads to:
Self-medicating, trying to find comfort in ways that add to our problems (drinking, drugs, eating, shopping/spending, gambling, checking out, affairs, workaholism, hedonistic pleasure, sleeping too much, working out excessively…etc.)
Stuffed emotions that explode at bad times
Neglecting responsibilities, shutting/breaking down, crashing
Getting fired or losing friends or activities because you aren’t functioning well
It builds tension in your body and leads to all kinds of health issues.
Lost relationships because you aren’t yourself anymore
Depression, discouragement, hopelessness, despair, dark thinking
Insecurity, self-loathing, lack of value, no purpose
Anger, hate, resentment, bitterness
You will get just the “tip of the iceberg” when you hear my story, or that of most women who have gone through more healing, compared to what we went through in private. I say that because I know the details of what you are going through can be so incredibly confusing and hard, so much worse, or more embarrassing than you will ever want to talk about. Sexual temptations and “fetishes” can be unimaginably weird, dark, and complicated. I say this for a couple of reasons.
Some of you feel you can’t possibly get help because the situation is too bad.
Some of you have more to go through, or don’t know everything yet. There are more lies to be revealed.
Sexual addiction may be part of the problem, and you need to know if that is what you are up against.
I hate to say that, but it may feel validating for you. If that is how you are feeling, please believe me when I say that getting help can minimize your pain. Yes, there may be more lies or hard disclosures ahead, but if you get some support it will give you some clarity and tools, so you don’t crash so hard, not knowing what to do next. Please don’t procrastinate and avoid support! I learned this the hard way, and it is my biggest regret looking back. Why? Because it dragged out my suffering and, in doing so, increased it.
Avoid Extra Pain and Regrets:
You don’t need all the nitty-gritty details of what your husband did, what tempted him, or understanding all his thought processes. For now, accept that he was tempted by evil and gave in to it. You can make yourself crazy trying to understand it more deeply; you get consumed by “the dark of it” because you now fear what your husband is capable of. It feels like if you know all the depths of his “darkness” that it will make you safer, but it is just a sticky trap. Ultimately, temptation is evil, and the depths of evil and depravity are limitless! You will make yourself crazy if you let yourself be consumed by understanding or managing evil, it leads to imagining all kinds of crazy things are possible. It took me a long time to see this, but now I see that many women experience this. You need to protect yourself from evil, run away from it, not towards it. Protect your mind from the “slime” that ruled over your husband during his temptations…you don’t need that. Becoming obsessed with the details won’t help you heal; and it won’t help you trust again, but it can hurt you more and make healing harder. WAY harder.
I regret not being the mom I wanted to be…for YEARS longer than was necessary. I didn’t realize how much I was crashing, I shut down, I lost myself, for years-just getting by and coping the best I could. I was still a caring loving mom, but both my girls and I could have had so much more fun together…and you can’t get that back. God uses it all and I don’t suffer over this anymore, but it is a deep loss. My 3 girls are wonderful adult women now, they still had a happy childhood and we have great relationships, but I sure wish they had different memories of me. I have heard many moms say this. It is not all lost, but it would have been so much better with support.
Ongoing betrayal pain, and stress creates health problems! I had many issues come up, on top of gaining 100 lbs…and I’m still working on reversing that hard consequence. We are holistic beings, and when one part of us crashes, it affects the other. Try to take good care of your body during this-it is under extreme stress! It is common to experience all sorts of health problems after betrayals. It is typical for most bodies to respond to high stress by losing or holding onto weight. Eat good! Sleep! Exercise! It’s hard to do, but it will help you function better through this and not expand your pain and suffering.
You will be grieving a lot as you figure out what was true and what was a lie, and that was not your fault; it’s so unfair and sad. But it is extra sad to look back years later and realize you lost even more of your life, joy, fun, and peace because you didn't get help after the betrayal. That part is in YOUR control, your responsibility, no one can do it for you. Even though you want them to, your husband can’t heal you or do this work for you. For many years, I was not able to enjoy life, and I sure wish I had taken action to help myself sooner-I hope this spurs many of you to find healthy support, so that does not become your story.
Delayed success with my goals and lost motivation. This is sometimes unavoidable, but I know if I had gotten help sooner, it would have shaved years off my depression so that my creativity and ambitions were more likely to develop.
I simply was not the person I could have been, should have been, in many ways for many years. I just let so much of myself go and quit caring.
I got so caught up in my pain and “his stuff” that I lost myself and forgot what I believed. Without meaning to, of course, he was put on a pedestal in my life; all his “sickness and problems,” all my fears, became my obsession. All his betrayal “yuck” took over my life and became my God. It was on a pedestal because it took priority over everything in my mind. It consumed me. I’ve had to repent of this. Don’t let all the pain and problems rule your life.
I know you feel like your life has been taken over by all this right now. And you are right, it has. But it doesn’t have to continue forever! You feel like so much was robbed from you right now, and you’re right, it has been. But you can take it back! You have more choices right now than you may realize. The hard part is that your mind is fuzzy, and it’s hard to make decisions. There are “seasons” of pain you have to go with while processing all this, but don’t let yourself get stuck there. Keep stepping forward, don’t get stuck.
You can’t fix everything and make this
pain and distrust end as fast as you would like…
But you can take action steps now to start healing.
A few very important tips for you:
You don’t have to make any big decisions right now; take it slow. Wait until it feels right, when you know for sure. The big decisions require some healing first; find clarity, peace, and support.
Clarity comes slowly; have grace on yourself. You don’t have to have all the answers right now, and you don’t need all the answers for everything. As you gain clarity and peace of mind and experience more healing, it will become easier to make big decisions; it will become easier to know what you actually need to know and what you don’t, and you will gain more strength to do what is best instead of what you are tempted to do or want.
Set your husband free emotionally. Trying to manage his path to healing and “policing” his every move makes you both crazy. It does you more harm than good. It actually delays his healing, as he becomes so focused on you that he fails to see his own unhealthiness and wants to be a better man himself. It is so hard, but you need to let him crash and burn or find healing on his own, and you need to focus on you. Working on your own healing is going to be hard enough; you can’t manage his mess too. This may be the hardest advice of all, because it is so scary. We have a heightened need to control things right now because our brains want to protect us, keep us from more pain. Yes, you may lose him. But…you don’t want to have your life sucked away from you in a miserable existence with him either! As you focus on healing and setting boundaries, he will have to start growing and changing, too… if he wants to keep you…If he wants a real connection with you. Let him do that work. You focus on YOU getting stronger.
One step at a time.
Focus on today, right now. What one thing can you do in this moment to maintain peace so that you know what next baby step you will take? Every little step you take brings a little more peace and clarity. As you experience a little more clarity, your perspective broadens-you see and understand a little more, and this grows more and more as you keep moving. Your big decisions can wait.
My site and resources are just getting started, but there are other resources out there. I would like to encourage you to watch videos from the Pure Desire Ministry on YouTube. This is the ministry that helped me (and my husband), and I so wish I had found them a decade sooner. Here is their link:
I encourage you to write out your feelings! It is an amazing way to start processing your pain and finding some clarity. Any paper will work, just make sure you destroy it or keep it in a safe place. I am creating guided journals to help women walk through various stages of healing. If you would be interested, please sign up for my free “Shattered” guide, and I can update you as things are published. I encourage you to email me if you want! You need to find a safe person to connect with as you start this healing journey. You can get through this!g forward with healing. This is what you need to focus on:
What ONE little baby step can you do today?
Sometimes that little step is finding peace and rest.
If that is what you need today, take care of yourself, get some rest.
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