hey everyone welcome back to another episode of the couples healing podcast i’m excited for today because i want to talk all about how to heal a relationship within a difficult marriage or with some very difficult circumstances that you might be faced with because it’s 100% possible for couples to heal even even having to navigate some very tough things and so i want to break down specific scenarios and give you some insight and some tools to be able to move forward and heal your relationship so many couples are looking for a path forward after there has been damage done by pornography addiction after working with hundreds of couples as a therapist i want you to know that there is hope for you hope for your relationship to become stronger to rebuild the trust and the connection and to rid the addiction from your lives permanently and in this podcast i’ll be sharing with you the tools and the strategies that you need to heal both individually and in your relationship my name is sam Tielemans and welcome to the couples healing podcast okay welcome back everybody so today’s episode is born out of an interview that i was on and from another podcast as a guest two amazing women have me on their show
they specialize in working with betrayal trauma specifically and helping people overcome the impact addiction has had in their life i definitely recommend you check it out for those who are interested in additional resources the podcast is called choose to be and it’s hosted by one of my friends her name is ilana and another her friend who had the pleasure to meet her name’s amy and they’re doing such an awesome work and they had me on to talk about the relationship aspect of healing because they’re all the intricacies and the different parts and when do you integrate it and how do you do it so as i was on there they were asking me some great questions and i felt like i didn’t explain myself very well and full transparency i’m like i felt like i was kind of i got too detailed into i got too into the weeds and i did not it felt to me like i just didn’t do a good enough job explaining this and i wanted so much to explain how and why i approach things the way that i do because i want to help people and so i contacted her i’m like hey can we please ever redo and she’s like yeah 100% no problem and we actually so and so we we had a conversation and she told me that she felt like it was fine she thought it was great everything was fine so i think it was just maybe in my own head but what i wanted to do today was i recorded this episode because i wanted to give almost like a it’s like my own little redo because the questions were so good so i wanted to share with you the questions that they asked because there’s some very tricky situations to navigate so if you’re in a difficult relationship or if there’s special or not special but like extenuating circumstances or what if there is abuse what if there is still active acting out what do you how do you approach the relationship in these ways so they ask great questions that i didn’t feel like i did justice to the answer so i’m going to share with you in terms of how to heal in these difficult scenarios what do you do and what does this look like i want to kind of do my redo not to redeem myself because it’s like i don’t need to look a certain way it’s not for me it’s more like i want this i want to get this information across i want to help people doesn’t so much matter like what people think about me and so this gives me a chance to be able to clarify and to speak to you how do you navigate and thread the needle during these very difficult circumstances in many relationships that people are in again the whole episode the whole podcast we talked about on this other podcast is it was all about the relationship work and she says can you do one of the first questions was can you actually do couples work early on in the process and i said absolutely and i explained there’s a huge difference in what it actually means to be doing couples work in addiction is not go on more dates it’s not spend time with one another it’s not be forgiving and just love each other and be more intimate it’s not those things at all and so doing traditional couples work in that sense is doomed to fail because there are so many different pieces and moving parts and intricacies and there are so many there’s a lot to this that if you go to a regular couples therapist their approach might work for a couple that’s not in this kind of distress or in this kind of distress or situation however that advice that that approach does not work and it causes more hurt and damage and so i get why the traditional couples the traditional recovery world might say things like no you can’t do couples work because there’s other there’s new ways to work with couples that that most people in that circle they’re not aware of and so i wanted to explain and clarify that couples work isn’t those things instead when i work with couples in the early early stages of their process of healing one of the first things to do is to understand the causes of the negative interactions that they’re having if there’s bad communication or a lack of connection or a lack of safety. priority number one is to start creating safety. Helping people communicate more effectively, to understand each other in the way that they want to be understood, because there’s so much misunderstanding and hurt, that filters our communication, and then helping them come together and heal and rebuild their relationship emotionally. Again, there’s so much disconnection, there’s so much distance or anger. And we want to avoid these negative interactions and these negative experiences and promote positive interactions. People say that you need to delay couples work for a few reasons in again, this traditional circle, and I want to get into these reasons, but the reality is that most couples are living together. Most people are not separated, right? There are there are a fraction of people who are separated in these moments who are trying to restore their relationship. But the reality is that most people are living together. So if you’re living with your spouse, do you want to have Do you want to have positive interactions sooner with them, or later. And most people that I work with? Well, anybody that I work with really, is they want to have positive interaction sooner, they want to feel safer, sooner, they want to stop fighting sooner, they want to connect with each other sooner. And so the whole goal is to really create the safety and the environment to be able to make that happen. So again, this is my whole stance on this. And again, this is why the podcast that I’m sharing with you guys is so different. I hope it’s been helpful. Again, people who have messaged me say that they’re listening to these episodes, and it makes a lot of sense. And they’re trying to figure out how to come back together, and how to heal, but there’s not a lot of information out there.
So some of the reasons why people say, Well, you have to delay it is number one, they say, Well, what if he is still slipping? What if the addiction is still active? And so my response is, you can absolutely do tremendous work together, even if there are still slips happening. And the reason why that’s the case, is because it’s not the slip. Okay, let me actually take one step back. One of the early episodes that I did on the podcast was with another therapist named Jeff Stewart, the quote that stuck out to me the most out of the whole episode was we were talking about slips and rebuilding trust. And he says, it’s not the crime. It’s the cover up. And when he said that, I thought that is so at 100% true. It’s not the crime, it’s the cover up. It’s not the slip, it’s what do you do after the slip that causes the most damage? It’s how does he handle it. And so even if he’s slipping, I want to share with you two different scenarios, number one is a slip, then he hides it, then it keeps it to himself. And then his wife finds out about it on her own, which she shouldn’t have to do. No wife wants to be a detective and try to uncover and piece clues together and ask the right question in the right way, using the right words, in order for him to be honest, she shouldn’t have to do that. Yet that happens for a lot of a lot of people in, in relationships where there are slips happening. when that’s the case, it damages trust, though, the way that he handles the slip damages trust, significantly more than the slip itself. So that’s one scenario. The other scenario is this is where this is the support that I tried to give couples and help them do this way, which is if there’s a slip, I want to give him the tools that he needs to not only take accountability and acknowledge and be honest with it, I want to give him the support and the direction, to be able to go to her and understand her pain to validate how this affects her. And then be able to say, you know, this is what I learned. This is why as I reflected on why I slipped, this is what led to it. And this is what I’m committed to do in order to make sure this doesn’t keep happening again. So if he responds to a slip in that way, it’s a completely different experience for her and for him and their relationship. And he can actually start to rebuild trust, as he’s sharing in this way. Because it’s demonstrating to her that this is very serious for him that he wants to get this out of his life. He still doesn’t have all the tools in place yet, but he’s committed to getting them. And the more he renews that commitment to her and shares with her his plan and what happened in the first place, and truly does care about and empathize with her pain. She can feel close to him in that moment, or very quickly thereafter, because he’s handling it so differently. So yes, can you do couples work if there are slips 100% and this is the kind of work that I would do with somebody. We wouldn’t glaze over it and say like, Oh, it was just once it’s not that big of a deal. Let’s focus on forgiveness. Right. That’s the that’s not that’s absolutely Wouldn’t that we wouldn’t be going in that direction. But I think many traditional therapists would, which is why it doesn’t work like that. You have to really thread the needle because there are so many intricacies and moving parts, like we said. So that’s number one, how you approach it, if there are slips, so you don’t have to delay it if there are. Second question they asked me was, can you do couples work when there’s abuse in the relationship? And after I said, my answer, I knew I was like, ah, like I didn’t again, I didn’t handle that. Right. So what I said was, I lead with the answer, which is yes, yes, I would, I would still work with somebody where there’s abuse. And right when I said that, she’s like, I’m having a really negative visceral reaction right now that you said that. So now I have to backpedal what feels like backpedaling and explain, and try to help her see things. But once somebody already has a reaction, it’s very difficult to explain things in a way that can quickly calm them down. So what I wish I would have done. And again, I’m sharing this with you.
Number one, I wish I would have asked more questions first, because abuse is such a charged word. And that means something very different to one person than it does to another. And so what I wish I would have done was ask questions and parse that out a little more. Because there’s another person who does a podcast who I’m not a, this, I have a hard time listening to her podcast, because she flippantly and very generously applies this label of abuse to almost anything. And it’s very difficult for me to hear this because, again, it’s such a charged and and and very, like, again, I guess, emotionally charged word. And is there abuse that happens in a relationship? Of course, it’s completely unacceptable. It’s so damaging. But I wish I would have asked more questions to the person who asked me this. regarding how does she see the word abuse? Again, going back to this other podcast, who is it’s very hard for me to listen to, she describes abuse as anything, she’ll describe her husband, the husband, so her relationship ended. And it was an abusive relationship. And she then just labels that to, okay, if the husband loses his temper, he’s being abusive. If he occasionally slips in watching pornography, he’s being abusive, if he like, those are two examples where I’m like, I see it so differently, right? Is it damaging if there are slips? Yes, of course, would I classify that as emotional abuse? I personally would not if there was occasional slips. And he’s working on it, he acknowledges that I wouldn’t use that word to describe that. Not to minimize the damage it does to the wife. But I would just use a different word. It’s just It feels so charged. And again, if you think about your husband, if you say, Well, my husband is an abuser, he gets angry, he loses his temper sometimes. So he’s abusing like he’s an abuser. It’s very difficult to imagine getting close to somebody who you see as an abuser. And please, again, as I’m trying to clarify this, now, I hope that you don’t take this to mean that they’re, you know, that abuse isn’t real, because it’s a 100% is, but I think the label, it’s important to get clear about what does somebody how do you define it? I don’t define losing your temper occasionally with a spouse as abuse. So I wish I would have cleared that up with her first because she might have said, well, abuse is like physical violence, or abuse is a constant demeaning of a spouse. And like, I’m with that I’m with you on that. So I wish I would have gotten clear on her definition. So when I think about, again, it means different things to different people, I would, I would still, I would want to find the right word to describe the situation. And some people might feel that certain words might fit in other situations. But again, I wish I guess the point that I’m trying to make is I wish I would have clarified, and then I would have gone on to describe a story of a client that I worked with to help her understand and see that even when the wife used the word, my the phrase, my husband was abusive, and he was verbally abusive to me, he was very critical. And what was the word that she might have used? Her husband, she said their husband is very abusive, his explosive anger and his demeaning of her was abusive for her. And so yes, in their situation, he was being emotionally abusive. And so as we started doing couples work together, it’s important that everybody recognizes that the reason why somebody becomes abusive is because of a couple of things. Number one, they lack the tools to be able to manage their emotions in healthy way. Because emotion drives are reactions if intense anger if we don’t have an ability to not only mitigate our anger and to moderate and process it in a healthy way, or to be able to control it, then it causes There’s a lot of damage. So abuse as a result of those lack of tools and an inability to manage your emotions in a healthy way. So those are some of the core pieces of it, there might be other things that we can discuss. I don’t want to get lost in a separate tangent, but I wanted to explain that what I would do with somebody. And what we did in this situation is we got to the bottom of K, what is causing this behavior, this explosive anger, these demeaning comments, what is driving that? It’s not just like, hey, so and so you need to stop doing that. What’s wrong with you?
How can you treat your wife like that? I don’t approach it like that, because it’s not helpful. And he already felt like, I don’t want to be doing this, he already felt he already knew that he was doing things that was causing a lot of damage. And he didn’t want to be doing it. So me just coming down on him is not helpful at all. I take a different stance, I get curious about what’s causing this in the first place. Because as soon as we can resolve this, I think about almost like imagine having a sunburn, or Okay, imagine another analogy. I think in these like weird images sometimes. Okay, so let’s stay with me here. So think about, like, if you grab a frying pan, and it’s scalding hot, and is burning your flesh on your hand, what’s typically your reaction is going to be, it’s going to be very, it’s going to be a lot more than I’m going to gently set this pan down, and I’m going to release my grip. So this doesn’t keep hurting me know, it’s like an immediate like, ah, shoot, like, you drop the pan or you throw the pan. It’s like, Ah, that was like, that’s so painful. That’s what happens for us on an emotional level when something gets triggered for us. There’s such a visceral, intense reaction that results in a very escalated exchange or an abusive exchange. Now, again, as I approach things, my goal is to Yes, we have to create safety. But one of the fastest ways to create safety is to understand what just got triggered inside of you. And let’s solve that. Because once that’s solved, and the frying pan cools down, you can pick up the frying pan. Right, it’s not necessarily the trigger. It’s not the trigger. It’s not the exchange. It’s not the it could be anything right. One of the things that he said is one he felt like he was being dismissed, or what’s the word that he used, it was something along the lines of dismissed or just like, cast aside, that would trigger this nerve that would really sting him in a way that he lost his temper. And so yes, we need to create safety, but the most sustainable way to do that is to identify a what is that nerve that got struck? Or was the cord that got stuck inside of you? What was the wound that that landed on, that’s not resolved yet? Let’s solve that. So that the next time somebody demeans you, or dismisses you, or whatever your trigger is, yes, it’s going to be painful still, but it does not activate the same type of response. If somebody comes behind you, and slaps you on the back, and you have a sunburn, you’re going to get you react very differently than if you don’t have a sunburn. So we have to heal the core of what’s going on. And so in these early stages of doing couples work, it’s not that I would create a situation and bring the wife into an unsafe space. What I shared with the person who was interviewing me, I said, safety is number one, that is the priority. And if we cannot create safety, I would never do couples work, I would never do it. Because we have to have a level of safety there to be able to grow in, or rather to be able to make progress and resolve these deeper issues. So safety is the platform on which we can build. And so doing the couples work with somebody in this type of situation, what we did was identify what’s at the core of this, we process through it. And then I gave him new tools to be able to communicate with her in a different way. So right now he’s in a different place. He’s not being abusive, he’s not overreacting. He’s not demeaning his his wife and degrading her. He’s able to communicate with her in a completely different way, which is stemming from the deeper work that he’s done. And so can you work with these situations? Again, my flippant? Yes, that I responded with my very quick. Well, yeah, you can do that. I realized that the reason why I answered that question so quickly, is because after a decade of doing this and seeing so many different couples, and just knowing how to thread the needle, my quick reaction was, yes, we can do that. And I just share with you briefly what we what we did with this couple that I was working with, identify the core, help him process emotions differently. We do want to include her in in the way that he’s able to share with her differently. So we want to include her in the process so he can communicate and open up to her in a vulnerable way and talk about the pain that he feels instead of acting out on his pain. So, again, when I said the answer, yes, we can do that. There are like 100 things in an incident that go through my mind as far as like different scenarios, different situations, what do you do here, I would put this thing in place here, I would respond to him and do this. And I would help her with this, like there’s so in a flash, my mind just kind of processes quickly. This is how you do it. But I didn’t explain any of that. I just simply said yes. So I hope as it were explaining this now,
there is a possible there is a way to be able to do this. Now, again, a caveat is if he does not acknowledge, and is not interested in changing, it doesn’t recognize the impact that is having and doesn’t care, too. That’s a different scenario, I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t address that I wouldn’t be doing couples work in a scenario where the husband is not interested in change and doesn’t acknowledge or recognize or is willing to recognize because sometimes in the beginning, they don’t recognize that they have a hard time. And so if he’s willing to acknowledge instance, and be open to the idea of his impact, then yes, we can work with that. But if he’s closed off, not interested, doesn’t want to change. This is her fault anyways, right? That kind of an attitude will not work. And I would not do any couples work under that circumstance. But there are many, many other people who do recognize who do acknowledge who want to change, who don’t have the tools. So my goal is to help create the safety in the relationship and give him the tools that he needs to stop that behavior because it doesn’t work and it causes damage. And so that that, so that’s my redo in terms of an answer and how you work with that. So I hope that that makes sense. And please know that safety is number one. And I always assess for that safety when I take on a couple, or as I’m working with them in the process. If something ever does come up, where it’s like, oh, we can’t be doing this anymore, then of course, I would change directions. So I hope that makes sense. Okay, the last thing that I want to share quickly is, this goes back to this idea of safety, because that’s probably the number one objection or concern that people have, which is it’s not safe for her to come into session, and have her open up and, and pour out her heart and soul. And then, and then what’s gonna happen, right, it’s like she’s already done that she’s burned out, she’s already been trying, she’s been reaching, we talked a lot about in the podcast here about an emotional connection, she oftentimes has been desperate to connect to their husband. And so it’s not a lack of her caring. It’s not a lack of her trying. So many women that I work with are desperate and are trying and have been trying for years. But it just hasn’t worked. And so the fear is that, well, if you invite her in, and you do more of this emotional work, it’s going to lead to more damage, more hurt, more disappointment, more sense of being a sense of being alone. And it causes more damage. And so the what, what I say to this is, well, yes, that does happen. When couples are trying to do this on their own. It does lead to burnout, it does lead to even more hurt. And it’s very, very painful. And so as I work with people, when they say, well, it’s not safe, I would even separate this out further instead of like, Well, yeah, you can and you just make it safe. This. I would say, I would say let’s separate that a little bit further. And I would say it’s not the Is it the sharing? Is it her sharing that’s not safe? Or is it how he responds to her sharing, that’s not safe. And as I reflect on that, this is again, what I wish I would have shared, my guess is that she would have answered and said, Oh, yeah, it’s not the fact that she shares that makes that that that is unsafe. It’s how he responds to the way that she shares. And I would say yes, that’s exactly right. It’s not her sharing, because we want her to share, we want him to share. That’s the point of doing this work together to help them share in a way that connects them that is safe. That’s one of the points anyways. So it all comes back to how does he take it? How does he respond to that if she’s being vulnerable, and really opens up and lets him in, the lack of safety comes with his response. And so often, many men don’t know how to respond. They don’t know how to open up, they don’t know how to take in what their wife is saying sometimes they take it personally, they misinterpret it, they react in a negative way because it strikes a chord in them. And as a result, they get stuck and things just kind of spiral. And so my focus when I work with people is to help him receive what she’s saying in a different way. Because if he can take in what she’s saying in a different way and understand her and be able to validate and empathize and support and be compassionate towards her. That’s a completely different interaction. Therefore, you’re creating safety in that very moment. Because you’re interacting in a way that’s different than what she’s used to than what he’s used to. And as a result of those exchanges, safety is being created, and he’s getting the tools to know how to be there for her moving Because when I work with couples, my goal is to get them the tools that they need. So they can move forward without me. It’s like I’m trying to work myself out of a job, I want you to get the tools, I want you to understand the process of healing, so that you can take those tools and move forward for the rest of your relationship and apply them to any number of scenarios.
So it’s not that it’s not safe for her to open up, it’s not safe, if he reacts in a negative way. So the goal, if there isn’t safety in the relationship in that way, is to get him those tools to be able to take in that message differently to support her. And then to help him do the very same thing open up in a way that she can understand him. Because again, in addiction, there’s often so much disconnection, there’s so much anger, there’s so much defensiveness, there’s a lot of blame, we’ve got to get underneath all of that stuff, to give them the new tools to avoid those old reactions. But to truly let her in in a deeper and and much more powerful way that connects them both. That helps not only strengthen the relationship. But as we’ve talked about, over the course of this podcast already, secure connection heals trauma, it heals betrayal, it helps to rebuild trust, it’s one of the most, it’s one of the strongest buffers against addiction. And so for me, when I hear people know, delay, couples work until you know, long long down the road, I just think you’re just you’re taking away one of the most powerful resources that you could possibly have to heal, which is a strong connection, which is what we’re all seeking. We are wired, we’re social creatures, and what more important relationship is there then that our significant relationship or our marriage, so if you know how to get the tools to be able to come together in a different way, in a way that’s safe, it not only helps our relationship grow, but it helps us individually grow as people. So I hope that as I’ve explained things that this makes sense, as I’ve had a redo with you guys, as my audience, I hope this makes sense with regard to, there are some very difficult situations that people go through, and I am empathetic for those things, which is all the more reason why I want to support and help guide and give the tools to navigate and thread the needle. during these difficult circumstances, instead of just saying, you know, I’m not even going to I’m not even going to deal with this, I have to hunker down, I have to be alone, I have to wall myself off. I just wanted to invite people to recognize that there is another way to do this under many, many circumstances. So I hope that what we shared today has been helpful. So if it as I would appreciate, if you wouldn’t mind giving me some feedback, you can write a review or rating, it goes such a tremendously long way for us to be able to, for me to be able to get this information out there to more people. And as always, if there’s any questions about future episodes and things that you might want, might want me to cover, you can shoot me an email, and I’d love to hear from you and make sure this is resonating for you guys. So again, I hope this helps and I encourage you to reflect on these things. And if there’s a way to start to build this into your own relationship, I would encourage you to consider that and be able to take that step forward if it feels ready, if you feel like you’re in that spot for that. Okay, thank you guys so much. I look forward to meeting with you again
next week. Take care.
Wait before you go.
I’m offering free access for my podcast listeners to a course I created. So make sure you go to couples healing.org so you can get some tools to start the healing process individually and in your relationship for if you want even more support and you’d like to work with me directly. You can contact me with the info that’s on that website as well. I’m excited for you to make progress on your journey.
