January 13, 2025 • 24 mins
Rebuilding trust after an affair feels like an insurmountable challenge, but it's a journey worth taking if you're ready to heal. How do you mend a relationship that feels shattered? In today's episode of Happily Even After, I, Jen, a trauma-informed certified life coach, guide you through the emotional labyrinth of betrayal. Drawing from my personal journey and Matthias Barker's insightful "five A's" framework—Acquire, Accountability, Acceptance, Acknowledgment, and Amends—we craft a roadmap for healing, both individually and as a couple. This is not just about patching things up; it's about redefining the relationship fabric and nurturing personal growth so that trust can genuinely take root again.
Honesty, transparency, and patience are not just words but the pillars of trust recovery. Whether it's setting boundaries or diving into self-awareness, these steps are not merely strategies but lifelines that can guide you through tumultuous times. We explore the importance of understanding your own emotional state before making life-altering decisions and discuss why self-healing should precede any couple's therapy. From candid personal stories to practical advice, you'll find the tools you need to navigate the aftermath of betrayal. Share this with those who might need a guiding hand and join me on social media for more insights on thriving even after the storm.
Please follow me on instagram and facebook @happilyevenaftercoach and if you want to see what coaching is all about I offer a free 45 min. clarity call via zoom.
Email me: hello@lifecoachjen.com for any comments or questions.
Thanks for listening, please like and review as well as share with your family and friends.
My website is www.lifecoachjen.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
Welcome to my podcast .
Happily, even After.
I'm life coach, jen, I'mpassionate about helping people
recover from betrayal.
I rode the intense emotionalroller coaster and felt stuck
and traumatized for years.
It's the reason I became atrauma-informed certified life
coach who helps people like younavigate their post-betrayal
world.
I have the tools, processes andknowledge to help you not only
(00:32):
heal from the betrayal, butcreate a healthy future.
Today, we begin to help youlive happily even after.
Hey friends, welcome to today'spodcast.
Today I'm going to talk abouthow to rebuild trust after an
affair and also as well as talkabout healing after an affair.
(00:52):
I think so many people this islike my number one question
asked from clients and thestruggle is real and I've
totally struggled with trust andI probably still struggle with
trust and I may always, but Iknow it is possible to trust
(01:14):
again, and the person of courseI want you to learn how to trust
the most is yourself.
So I'm just going to talk aboutthis concept that a guy he's a
psychotherapist on Instagramthat I follow, matthias Barker.
If you're not following him, gofollow him because he has such
great content and I just likehis demeanor, his way of saying
(01:38):
things.
He's a very kind man and I likehis ideas.
So he talks about the five A's,the letter A how do you know if
you can trust someone that hasbetrayed you?
Because often many of us, whenwe discover betrayal, we
(01:59):
consider maybe can we staymarried, like, is it possible to
trust again Most people, eventhough you said years ago,
before you ever got married, ifsomeone ever had an affair, if
my husband ever cheated on me ormy wife, I'm leaving.
But usually that isn't reallythe thing that happens, because
(02:21):
we have kids, we have a life, wehave a home, we have family
members.
We've been.
You know, however long you'vebeen married.
It isn't just an easy I'm goingto leave.
Now, if you're dating andyou're not married, like by all
means, like this is your sign,probably it's time to go.
(02:43):
I'm just going to say but ifyou're married, it's just a lot
a bigger decision to leave.
And so most people want to knowhow will I ever know if I can
trust my spouse again?
And so these five A's, I reallyliked them.
So the first one is do theyacknowledge what they did?
(03:04):
This is paying attention toyour spouse that had the affair.
Are they acknowledging it?
Do they tell you what happened,how the betrayal happened, what
caused them to make this choice?
And the answer is not well, ifyou were skinnier, if you were
(03:25):
nicer to me, if it has anything,if they acknowledge that they
did this but it was becausesomething you did, that is the
wrong answer and that is notgoing to help you rebuild trust.
Or if they blame it on theperson they had the affair with,
well, they were convincing me,they talked me into it, they
seduced me.
Whatever they say, that's notthe answer either, because they
(03:48):
have to take full ownership andacknowledge what they did.
Okay, they have to acknowledgeit, they have to come clean.
You get to decide how muchinformation you want or need to
know in your healing, but this AI think is really important Are
they even acknowledging thatthey did this?
(04:09):
Because many people that haveaffairs they can't even admit
that they did it, and so that'sa problem.
That's not going to help yourebuild trust.
Help you rebuild trust.
(04:30):
Okay, are they going to makeamends?
Okay, do whatever you need toreestablish trust.
Now.
I don't want you to live a lifeof checking your spouse's cell
phone email, becoming adetective.
I've talked to you about thatmany times, but at the beginning
, the initial discovery you'regoing to want to, like, check,
you know, find my iPhone.
(04:51):
Where is he, is he where or isshe?
Are they where they say theyare.
You have to rebuild trust inthat way having access to his
phone or her phone that way,having access to his phone or
her phone.
So it is important to decidetogether what you need to
rebuild trust, because it isgoing to be important to have
(05:13):
transparency and fulltransparency and whatever that
looks like for you, I think, theaffair partner.
That's hard for them becausethey feel shame, which they want
to hide, and they feel, oh,you're invading my privacy.
Well, you gave up the privacywhen you became secret and
(05:35):
started erasing text messagesand started telling another
person that you love them, youwant them or whatever right, and
you were having sex with them.
So if you want to rebuild yourmarriage, you're going to have
to have full transparency andmake amends, and so you guys get
to decide what that looks liketogether.
And it's important to reallypay attention Do their actions
(06:00):
match their words?
It's really easy to tellsomeone what you think they want
to hear and for you as well,right, even the betrayed partner
you need to be honest withyourself, honest with your
spouse.
This is hard for you.
Say it right.
Don't just say, oh, I totallytrust you, like you don't lie
(06:25):
when you don't trust them, right.
So make sure your words andactions match, as well as pay
attention to their words andactions.
Match Acquire is the next one,and this is really is the person
that had the affair.
Are they acquiring newknowledge?
Are they discovering?
Are they going to therapy?
Are they figuring out why theydid this in the first place?
(06:50):
Because there was a reason andit had nothing to do with you?
Are they figuring out ways thatthis won't happen again?
What inside of them was hurting?
What need were they not gettingmet in their own life that they
decided it would be a greatidea to go and bring someone
else into the marriage?
(07:11):
Right?
And so really pay attention.
Are they willing to acquire newknowledge by hiring a coach,
hiring a therapist?
Both reading books, listeningto podcasts?
There's so much great contentout there for people to discover
what happened.
So many of us live on autopilotand we're unconsciously living
(07:32):
our life, and so it's time toget conscious and figure out why
they did this.
That's not your job.
The betrayed partner.
Right, it's the person thatbetrayed you.
That's their job.
They need to figure this out ontheir own, okay, and hopefully
they'll share that with you, butit is important for them in
(07:57):
order for you to trust themagain.
Accountability kind of talkedabout this, but they have to
take full accountability forwhat they did and not blame
anyone else.
This is really hard because ourbrain wants to make it someone
else's fault for doing what theydid, because they see the pain
(08:17):
in their spouse and maybe theirkids, whoever else was affected.
What I have learned frombetrayal?
It doesn't just affect yourspouse.
It could affect your co-workers, your in-laws, your other
family members, could affectyour co-workers, your in-laws,
your other family members.
There's a lot more peopleaffected by a person's betrayal
(08:38):
than them, the affair partnerand the spouse, especially when
it becomes public or it leads todivorce and the reason is
discovered, right, and so notjust the spouse is betrayed, but
the kids feel betrayed.
Maybe some relatives feelbetrayed.
(09:00):
There's a lot of people thatfeel betrayed.
Maybe your neighbors Depends onyou know what your relationship
was.
So that person needs to takefull accountability for what
they did and make amends, whichwe talked about as one of the
A's and then accepted.
And accepted means that youhave accepted what has happened.
(09:26):
Okay, which in my mind is thehardest thing to do, because we
like to argue with reality, welike to pretend that this isn't
really what happened or thisisn't really the ramifications
of what happened.
And how you can learn to acceptis creating boundaries because
(09:49):
you realize, okay, the realityis my spouse had an affair.
I don't want this to everhappen again.
What kind of boundaries do weneed to create in our marriage,
in our life, so we can hopefullyprevent this from happening
again?
And I'm telling you can'thappen again, right, but there
are many people, yes, thishappens in their life, but then
(10:13):
they never.
If you do all these five A's andactually get help and actually
figure out why and heal thosewounds, for whatever reason you
decided you needed to bringsomeone else into your marriage,
into your life, to make youfeel better or to make you feel
more confident, whatever youwere searching for, if that
(10:36):
person can heal this, then youreally can accept the reality of
your situation.
But I think reality, we arguewith reality all the time and it
is a hard concept to sometimes.
Our brain does not like to dealwith reality sometimes, anyway.
(10:56):
So these are the five A's thatMatthias Barker shared, for how
do you know if you can trustsomeone that has betrayed you?
Now, these are the five A'sthat he talks about to heal from
betrayal.
So, as we are building ourtrust, we also have to heal
ourselves.
Right, because it's verypainful lots of wounding, lots
(11:20):
of damage but your job as yourspouse that has betrayed you is
rebuilding their trust and,hopefully, healing on their own
is healing yourself, and I thinka lot of couples make this
mistake and they think that thisis a marital problem.
No, this is not a maritalproblem.
This is an individual issue anduntil they figure out why they
(11:46):
did this in the first place, youcannot go to marriage
counseling.
I think that's the biggestmistake that we make is the
second.
We find out our spouse has anaffair.
We rush into marriagecounseling and I have done this,
so I know it can be verydamaging and it's not helpful.
(12:06):
It actually almost makes itworse, in my opinion.
Almost makes it worse, in myopinion.
I didn't begin healing myselfuntil I started going to
individual therapy and coachingand I was able to realize,
because the thing is when you'rein therapy.
Well, if she wouldn't do this,then I you know it's.
(12:28):
It becomes this blame game and alot of shame, and if you've
been the person that was in anemotional abuse of marriage,
it's really hard to speak yourmind in that situation.
There's not a lot of reallyamazing therapists At least I
haven't found some in a marriagesituation.
(12:49):
They have to really be able tocall someone out.
I mean, there are a lot ofgreat therapists out there, but
there's also a lot of bad ones,and so, unless you landed on the
really great one, I think thisis going to be hard.
And so doing individual firstand then going after you feel
like you've healed enough tothen go work together on your
(13:13):
marriage, I think is mysuggestion for what you need to
do after discovery of an affair,because I think there's just a
lot of wounding that needs to behealed first before you can
come together and actually talkabout even knowing if you want
your marriage to work, and Ijust think a lot of things could
(13:35):
be said in that environmentthat aren't helpful.
Anyway, so the five A's forhealing from betrayal same thing
you have to acknowledge thebetrayal.
It's hard to admit that, like Ihad so much shame and I
(13:55):
actually, early on, when myhusband had had an affair, I
totally forgot about it.
I disassociated with that untillike 20 years later which is so
fascinating to my brain andluckily I wrote in a journal
about it and I didn't rememberanything about it until I read
(14:16):
that journal again.
My brain was protecting mebecause I had babies to raise
and I had little kids.
But acknowledging the betrayaland the problem is not all of us
, but many of us in thatsituation start blaming
ourselves.
We look at ourselves and try tofix us because we think we're
(14:41):
the problem.
And whether you consciously dothat or unconsciously do that,
it can be really damaging toyourself.
And so I just want to remindyou the affair was not about you
.
I don't care what your partneris saying, it had nothing to do
with you.
And so of course, there arethings that no one's perfect, no
(15:05):
marriage is perfect.
There are things maybe youwould like to change.
Like that, that was me.
I mean, I blamed myself formany years but when I realized,
okay, this wasn't my fault, butyeah, there were things that I
wanted to do better and bebetter, that's 100% okay and
valid.
But you're doing them becauseyou want to, not because someone
(15:27):
else is telling you you need tochange those things.
Okay, so acknowledge, allow,allow yourself to feel all your
emotions.
Whether you're angry, sad,depressed, whatever you're
feeling, your emotions are valid.
And having someone tell you youshouldn't feel that way or stop
(15:52):
being sad, or if they'retelling you this, that's not
good.
You get to feel however youwant to feel Now, eventually, if
you truly process thoseemotions because most of us like
to avoid our emotions, we liketo resist our emotions or we
like to react to our emotionsbut really we need to feel them
(16:17):
and sit with them andacknowledge like, wow, I'm
feeling really sad today andwhen you can do that, that is
going to help you heal, becauseyou're going to move the
emotions out of your body.
When you resist or avoid them,they get stuck inside of you and
they can't come out and that'swhy you feel depressed, that's
(16:39):
why you feel anxious.
Your nervous system isscreaming at you to help by
releasing those emotions and youcan get sick and IBS, like a
lot of health issues, come fromyour emotions getting stuck in
your body and it's not going toallow you to heal.
Analyze the situation Now.
(17:01):
I think it's hard to analyzebecause it's not going to allow
you to heal.
Analyze the situation Now.
I think it's hard to analyzebecause it's like when you find
out that your spouse is havingan affair.
It's like shocking to yoursystem.
Okay.
But when you can get a littlebit of healing, you can analyze
and decide, like, what do youwant to do?
(17:21):
And you know there's not aright or wrong decision about
whatever you decide, Like Ithink we put a lot of weight on
is this the right thing to do?
Just go with if you can focuson.
What does your body feel youneed?
Focus on what you need morethan what you think they need,
because then we become graspyand needy.
(17:43):
And so analyze, decide and youcan decide hey, I'm going to try
to work on this for the nextsix months or three months or
whatever you decide.
But just analyze your situation.
You know what are your kids'needs.
What do you feel would be bestfor your financial situation?
Maybe you need to go back toschool to get some education so
(18:07):
you could go get a job.
If you decide like, I want toget divorced, maybe there's some
things I think sometimes wejust rush, we react, of course,
and that's normal.
Of course you reacted.
It's very shocking, but onceyou can pull yourself back a
little bit now analyze thesituation.
What could help you the most toset you up for the best life
(18:30):
possible?
Act on self-care.
This is hard for womenespecially, but I think men too
but make sure you're taking careof yourself women especially,
but I think men too but makesure you're taking care of
yourself, like get dressed oreven if the only thing you can
do is take a shower that day,drink water, eat something
(18:57):
Sometimes it's hard to eat afteryour system has been shocked.
Make sure you're gettingsomething right, resting, and
don't judge yourself in doingthis.
Don't call yourself lazy orwhat's wrong with you.
Nothing's wrong with you.
Your whole entire system inlife has had this huge shock and
of course you feel this way.
But make sure you're doingthings.
If you can go on a walk or calla friend not to tell her what
(19:21):
just happened or tell them, it'snot just to connect with
someone that you know loves youor cares about you.
So really focus on yourself-care, aspire to move
forward with renewed perspective.
I like this one because many ofus, I think, might forget this
(19:42):
part.
But if you can look at yourfuture and create a goal or what
you envision it could look like, because really an affair is a
big awakening in a marriage andit could destroy it or it could
make it the most amazingmarriage ever.
I've seen both happen tocouples.
(20:04):
And even if your marriage doesend, that doesn't mean you have
to like end right, you couldhave this amazing life as a
divorced person.
Like divorce doesn't mean yourlike life is over and you're
miserable the rest of your life.
Like I know for sure.
(20:25):
I had that vision of whatdivorce means.
I was very wrong about that.
Like you can have an amazinglife whether you're divorced or
stay married.
So it's not like you're likechoosing a better option.
Both are going to be hard andboth could be amazing, right,
(20:45):
and so just really reframe and I, like the word, aspire that
you're going to figure this outand you can move forward with
whatever decision you decide tomake.
As you're rebuilding trust, it'simportant to implement healing
on your part, right?
Hopefully, the person yourspouse that betrayed you is
(21:08):
working on them.
Now it's time to work on you.
So I'm going to remind youthose five A's are acknowledge
that the betrayal happened right.
Don't live in pretend land andpretend it didn't.
The betrayal happened right.
Don't live in pretend land andpretend it didn't.
And I know it is hard to admitthat this happened.
I get it.
It's very devastating.
(21:30):
Allow yourself to fill youremotions.
Analyze the situation, decidewhat you want to do, act on your
self-care, make sure you'retaking care of yourself and
aspire to move forward.
So I think trust is 100%necessary.
If you're going to work on yourmarriage and rebuild it, you
(21:53):
have to have trust, and it'sgoing to take time.
Don't think it happens in a dayor a week, or a month or a year
.
It's going to be drop by dropby drop, one honest thing after
one honest thing.
And make sure you're beinghonest too, even if it is hey,
I'm having a really tough daytoday.
(22:14):
I think I need some extra help.
Can I look at your phone?
Can I look at your email?
Don't go sneak and do it.
Let's be honest about it.
Like hey, because we have fulltransparency, and make sure
you're asking for what you needin order to rebuild the trust.
(22:41):
Trust gets rebuilt and at thesame time, you're healing you so
you can make better decisions,because you're not going to make
a good decision when you're inthe fetal position and crying in
your closet.
It's just you're not in a mindspace, a head space, to make a
good decision when your nervoussystem is out of whack and
you're not in your zone, okay.
When you're in fight, flight orfreeze like that's not the time
(23:03):
to make the decision.
So that's why it's reallyimportant for you to heal.
I hope this was helpful.
If you liked this podcast,please share it with your family
and friends and leave me areview and I will talk to you
next week.
If you want to learn how tolive happily even after, sign up
for my email at hello atlifecoachjen with one n dot com.
(23:24):
Follow me on Instagram andFacebook at happily even after
coach.
Let's work together to createyour happily even after.
Welcome to my podcast .
Happily, even After.
I'm life coach, jen, I'mpassionate about helping people
recover from betrayal.
I rode the intense emotionalroller coaster and felt stuck
and traumatized for years.
It's the reason I became atrauma-informed certified life
coach who helps people like younavigate their post-betrayal
world.
I have the tools, processes andknowledge to help you not only
(00:32):
heal from the betrayal, butcreate a healthy future.
Today, we begin to help youlive happily even after.
Hey friends, welcome to today'spodcast.
Today I'm going to talk abouthow to rebuild trust after an
affair and also as well as talkabout healing after an affair.
(00:52):
I think so many people this islike my number one question
asked from clients and thestruggle is real and I've
totally struggled with trust andI probably still struggle with
trust and I may always, but Iknow it is possible to trust
(01:14):
again, and the person of courseI want you to learn how to trust
the most is yourself.
So I'm just going to talk aboutthis concept that a guy he's a
psychotherapist on Instagramthat I follow, matthias Barker.
If you're not following him, gofollow him because he has such
great content and I just likehis demeanor, his way of saying
(01:38):
things.
He's a very kind man and I likehis ideas.
So he talks about the five A's,the letter A how do you know if
you can trust someone that hasbetrayed you?
Because often many of us, whenwe discover betrayal, we
(01:59):
consider maybe can we staymarried, like, is it possible to
trust again Most people, eventhough you said years ago,
before you ever got married, ifsomeone ever had an affair, if
my husband ever cheated on me ormy wife, I'm leaving.
But usually that isn't reallythe thing that happens, because
(02:21):
we have kids, we have a life, wehave a home, we have family
members.
We've been.
You know, however long you'vebeen married.
It isn't just an easy I'm goingto leave.
Now, if you're dating andyou're not married, like by all
means, like this is your sign,probably it's time to go.
(02:43):
I'm just going to say but ifyou're married, it's just a lot
a bigger decision to leave.
And so most people want to knowhow will I ever know if I can
trust my spouse again?
And so these five A's, I reallyliked them.
So the first one is do theyacknowledge what they did?
(03:04):
This is paying attention toyour spouse that had the affair.
Are they acknowledging it?
Do they tell you what happened,how the betrayal happened, what
caused them to make this choice?
And the answer is not well, ifyou were skinnier, if you were
(03:25):
nicer to me, if it has anything,if they acknowledge that they
did this but it was becausesomething you did, that is the
wrong answer and that is notgoing to help you rebuild trust.
Or if they blame it on theperson they had the affair with,
well, they were convincing me,they talked me into it, they
seduced me.
Whatever they say, that's notthe answer either, because they
(03:48):
have to take full ownership andacknowledge what they did.
Okay, they have to acknowledgeit, they have to come clean.
You get to decide how muchinformation you want or need to
know in your healing, but this AI think is really important Are
they even acknowledging thatthey did this?
(04:09):
Because many people that haveaffairs they can't even admit
that they did it, and so that'sa problem.
That's not going to help yourebuild trust.
Help you rebuild trust.
(04:30):
Okay, are they going to makeamends?
Okay, do whatever you need toreestablish trust.
Now.
I don't want you to live a lifeof checking your spouse's cell
phone email, becoming adetective.
I've talked to you about thatmany times, but at the beginning
, the initial discovery you'regoing to want to, like, check,
you know, find my iPhone.
(04:51):
Where is he, is he where or isshe?
Are they where they say theyare.
You have to rebuild trust inthat way having access to his
phone or her phone that way,having access to his phone or
her phone.
So it is important to decidetogether what you need to
rebuild trust, because it isgoing to be important to have
(05:13):
transparency and fulltransparency and whatever that
looks like for you, I think, theaffair partner.
That's hard for them becausethey feel shame, which they want
to hide, and they feel, oh,you're invading my privacy.
Well, you gave up the privacywhen you became secret and
(05:35):
started erasing text messagesand started telling another
person that you love them, youwant them or whatever right, and
you were having sex with them.
So if you want to rebuild yourmarriage, you're going to have
to have full transparency andmake amends, and so you guys get
to decide what that looks liketogether.
And it's important to reallypay attention Do their actions
(06:00):
match their words?
It's really easy to tellsomeone what you think they want
to hear and for you as well,right, even the betrayed partner
you need to be honest withyourself, honest with your
spouse.
This is hard for you.
Say it right.
Don't just say, oh, I totallytrust you, like you don't lie
(06:25):
when you don't trust them, right.
So make sure your words andactions match, as well as pay
attention to their words andactions.
Match Acquire is the next one,and this is really is the person
that had the affair.
Are they acquiring newknowledge?
Are they discovering?
Are they going to therapy?
Are they figuring out why theydid this in the first place?
(06:50):
Because there was a reason andit had nothing to do with you?
Are they figuring out ways thatthis won't happen again?
What inside of them was hurting?
What need were they not gettingmet in their own life that they
decided it would be a greatidea to go and bring someone
else into the marriage?
(07:11):
Right?
And so really pay attention.
Are they willing to acquire newknowledge by hiring a coach,
hiring a therapist?
Both reading books, listeningto podcasts?
There's so much great contentout there for people to discover
what happened.
So many of us live on autopilotand we're unconsciously living
(07:32):
our life, and so it's time toget conscious and figure out why
they did this.
That's not your job.
The betrayed partner.
Right, it's the person thatbetrayed you.
That's their job.
They need to figure this out ontheir own, okay, and hopefully
they'll share that with you, butit is important for them in
(07:57):
order for you to trust themagain.
Accountability kind of talkedabout this, but they have to
take full accountability forwhat they did and not blame
anyone else.
This is really hard because ourbrain wants to make it someone
else's fault for doing what theydid, because they see the pain
(08:17):
in their spouse and maybe theirkids, whoever else was affected.
What I have learned frombetrayal?
It doesn't just affect yourspouse.
It could affect your co-workers, your in-laws, your other
family members, could affectyour co-workers, your in-laws,
your other family members.
There's a lot more peopleaffected by a person's betrayal
(08:38):
than them, the affair partnerand the spouse, especially when
it becomes public or it leads todivorce and the reason is
discovered, right, and so notjust the spouse is betrayed, but
the kids feel betrayed.
Maybe some relatives feelbetrayed.
(09:00):
There's a lot of people thatfeel betrayed.
Maybe your neighbors Depends onyou know what your relationship
was.
So that person needs to takefull accountability for what
they did and make amends, whichwe talked about as one of the
A's and then accepted.
And accepted means that youhave accepted what has happened.
(09:26):
Okay, which in my mind is thehardest thing to do, because we
like to argue with reality, welike to pretend that this isn't
really what happened or thisisn't really the ramifications
of what happened.
And how you can learn to acceptis creating boundaries because
(09:49):
you realize, okay, the realityis my spouse had an affair.
I don't want this to everhappen again.
What kind of boundaries do weneed to create in our marriage,
in our life, so we can hopefullyprevent this from happening
again?
And I'm telling you can'thappen again, right, but there
are many people, yes, thishappens in their life, but then
(10:13):
they never.
If you do all these five A's andactually get help and actually
figure out why and heal thosewounds, for whatever reason you
decided you needed to bringsomeone else into your marriage,
into your life, to make youfeel better or to make you feel
more confident, whatever youwere searching for, if that
(10:36):
person can heal this, then youreally can accept the reality of
your situation.
But I think reality, we arguewith reality all the time and it
is a hard concept to sometimes.
Our brain does not like to dealwith reality sometimes, anyway.
(10:56):
So these are the five A's thatMatthias Barker shared, for how
do you know if you can trustsomeone that has betrayed you?
Now, these are the five A'sthat he talks about to heal from
betrayal.
So, as we are building ourtrust, we also have to heal
ourselves.
Right, because it's verypainful lots of wounding, lots
(11:20):
of damage but your job as yourspouse that has betrayed you is
rebuilding their trust and,hopefully, healing on their own
is healing yourself, and I thinka lot of couples make this
mistake and they think that thisis a marital problem.
No, this is not a maritalproblem.
This is an individual issue anduntil they figure out why they
(11:46):
did this in the first place, youcannot go to marriage
counseling.
I think that's the biggestmistake that we make is the
second.
We find out our spouse has anaffair.
We rush into marriagecounseling and I have done this,
so I know it can be verydamaging and it's not helpful.
(12:06):
It actually almost makes itworse, in my opinion.
Almost makes it worse, in myopinion.
I didn't begin healing myselfuntil I started going to
individual therapy and coachingand I was able to realize,
because the thing is when you'rein therapy.
Well, if she wouldn't do this,then I you know it's.
(12:28):
It becomes this blame game and alot of shame, and if you've
been the person that was in anemotional abuse of marriage,
it's really hard to speak yourmind in that situation.
There's not a lot of reallyamazing therapists At least I
haven't found some in a marriagesituation.
(12:49):
They have to really be able tocall someone out.
I mean, there are a lot ofgreat therapists out there, but
there's also a lot of bad ones,and so, unless you landed on the
really great one, I think thisis going to be hard.
And so doing individual firstand then going after you feel
like you've healed enough tothen go work together on your
(13:13):
marriage, I think is mysuggestion for what you need to
do after discovery of an affair,because I think there's just a
lot of wounding that needs to behealed first before you can
come together and actually talkabout even knowing if you want
your marriage to work, and Ijust think a lot of things could
(13:35):
be said in that environmentthat aren't helpful.
Anyway, so the five A's forhealing from betrayal same thing
you have to acknowledge thebetrayal.
It's hard to admit that, like Ihad so much shame and I
(13:55):
actually, early on, when myhusband had had an affair, I
totally forgot about it.
I disassociated with that untillike 20 years later which is so
fascinating to my brain andluckily I wrote in a journal
about it and I didn't rememberanything about it until I read
(14:16):
that journal again.
My brain was protecting mebecause I had babies to raise
and I had little kids.
But acknowledging the betrayaland the problem is not all of us
, but many of us in thatsituation start blaming
ourselves.
We look at ourselves and try tofix us because we think we're
(14:41):
the problem.
And whether you consciously dothat or unconsciously do that,
it can be really damaging toyourself.
And so I just want to remindyou the affair was not about you
.
I don't care what your partneris saying, it had nothing to do
with you.
And so of course, there arethings that no one's perfect, no
(15:05):
marriage is perfect.
There are things maybe youwould like to change.
Like that, that was me.
I mean, I blamed myself formany years but when I realized,
okay, this wasn't my fault, butyeah, there were things that I
wanted to do better and bebetter, that's 100% okay and
valid.
But you're doing them becauseyou want to, not because someone
(15:27):
else is telling you you need tochange those things.
Okay, so acknowledge, allow,allow yourself to feel all your
emotions.
Whether you're angry, sad,depressed, whatever you're
feeling, your emotions are valid.
And having someone tell you youshouldn't feel that way or stop
(15:52):
being sad, or if they'retelling you this, that's not
good.
You get to feel however youwant to feel Now, eventually, if
you truly process thoseemotions because most of us like
to avoid our emotions, we liketo resist our emotions or we
like to react to our emotionsbut really we need to feel them
(16:17):
and sit with them andacknowledge like, wow, I'm
feeling really sad today andwhen you can do that, that is
going to help you heal, becauseyou're going to move the
emotions out of your body.
When you resist or avoid them,they get stuck inside of you and
they can't come out and that'swhy you feel depressed, that's
(16:39):
why you feel anxious.
Your nervous system isscreaming at you to help by
releasing those emotions and youcan get sick and IBS, like a
lot of health issues, come fromyour emotions getting stuck in
your body and it's not going toallow you to heal.
Analyze the situation Now.
(17:01):
I think it's hard to analyzebecause it's not going to allow
you to heal.
Analyze the situation Now.
I think it's hard to analyzebecause it's like when you find
out that your spouse is havingan affair.
It's like shocking to yoursystem.
Okay.
But when you can get a littlebit of healing, you can analyze
and decide, like, what do youwant to do?
(17:21):
And you know there's not aright or wrong decision about
whatever you decide, Like Ithink we put a lot of weight on
is this the right thing to do?
Just go with if you can focuson.
What does your body feel youneed?
Focus on what you need morethan what you think they need,
because then we become graspyand needy.
(17:43):
And so analyze, decide and youcan decide hey, I'm going to try
to work on this for the nextsix months or three months or
whatever you decide.
But just analyze your situation.
You know what are your kids'needs.
What do you feel would be bestfor your financial situation?
Maybe you need to go back toschool to get some education so
(18:07):
you could go get a job.
If you decide like, I want toget divorced, maybe there's some
things I think sometimes wejust rush, we react, of course,
and that's normal.
Of course you reacted.
It's very shocking, but onceyou can pull yourself back a
little bit now analyze thesituation.
What could help you the most toset you up for the best life
(18:30):
possible?
Act on self-care.
This is hard for womenespecially, but I think men too
but make sure you're taking careof yourself women especially,
but I think men too but makesure you're taking care of
yourself, like get dressed oreven if the only thing you can
do is take a shower that day,drink water, eat something
(18:57):
Sometimes it's hard to eat afteryour system has been shocked.
Make sure you're gettingsomething right, resting, and
don't judge yourself in doingthis.
Don't call yourself lazy orwhat's wrong with you.
Nothing's wrong with you.
Your whole entire system inlife has had this huge shock and
of course you feel this way.
But make sure you're doingthings.
If you can go on a walk or calla friend not to tell her what
(19:21):
just happened or tell them, it'snot just to connect with
someone that you know loves youor cares about you.
So really focus on yourself-care, aspire to move
forward with renewed perspective.
I like this one because many ofus, I think, might forget this
(19:42):
part.
But if you can look at yourfuture and create a goal or what
you envision it could look like, because really an affair is a
big awakening in a marriage andit could destroy it or it could
make it the most amazingmarriage ever.
I've seen both happen tocouples.
(20:04):
And even if your marriage doesend, that doesn't mean you have
to like end right, you couldhave this amazing life as a
divorced person.
Like divorce doesn't mean yourlike life is over and you're
miserable the rest of your life.
Like I know for sure.
(20:25):
I had that vision of whatdivorce means.
I was very wrong about that.
Like you can have an amazinglife whether you're divorced or
stay married.
So it's not like you're likechoosing a better option.
Both are going to be hard andboth could be amazing, right,
(20:45):
and so just really reframe and I, like the word, aspire that
you're going to figure this outand you can move forward with
whatever decision you decide tomake.
As you're rebuilding trust, it'simportant to implement healing
on your part, right?
Hopefully, the person yourspouse that betrayed you is
(21:08):
working on them.
Now it's time to work on you.
So I'm going to remind youthose five A's are acknowledge
that the betrayal happened right.
Don't live in pretend land andpretend it didn't.
The betrayal happened right.
Don't live in pretend land andpretend it didn't.
And I know it is hard to admitthat this happened.
I get it.
It's very devastating.
(21:30):
Allow yourself to fill youremotions.
Analyze the situation, decidewhat you want to do, act on your
self-care, make sure you'retaking care of yourself and
aspire to move forward.
So I think trust is 100%necessary.
If you're going to work on yourmarriage and rebuild it, you
(21:53):
have to have trust, and it'sgoing to take time.
Don't think it happens in a dayor a week, or a month or a year
.
It's going to be drop by dropby drop, one honest thing after
one honest thing.
And make sure you're beinghonest too, even if it is hey,
I'm having a really tough daytoday.
(22:14):
I think I need some extra help.
Can I look at your phone?
Can I look at your email?
Don't go sneak and do it.
Let's be honest about it.
Like hey, because we have fulltransparency, and make sure
you're asking for what you needin order to rebuild the trust.
(22:41):
Trust gets rebuilt and at thesame time, you're healing you so
you can make better decisions,because you're not going to make
a good decision when you're inthe fetal position and crying in
your closet.
It's just you're not in a mindspace, a head space, to make a
good decision when your nervoussystem is out of whack and
you're not in your zone, okay.
When you're in fight, flight orfreeze like that's not the time
(23:03):
to make the decision.
So that's why it's reallyimportant for you to heal.
I hope this was helpful.
If you liked this podcast,please share it with your family
and friends and leave me areview and I will talk to you
next week.
If you want to learn how tolive happily even after, sign up
for my email at hello atlifecoachjen with one n dot com.
(23:24):
Follow me on Instagram andFacebook at happily even after
coach.
Let's work together to createyour happily even after.
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