May 24, 2022 • 41 mins
Starting to have sex again after an affair is often a major stumbling block for couples. Being intimate can trigger intense feelings of shame, anxiety, and sadness for both partners. But becoming more physically and emotionally intimate gives the couple a way to slowly work through these difficult feelings. In addition, by demonstrating patience, empathy, and kindness, the involved partner can play an active role in helping their injured partner heal and contribute to the affair recovery.
In today's episode, I talk with Jennifer Gingras, a Couples Therapist who specializes in helping couples navigate infidelity and survive infidelity. I think you'll really enjoy this episode, it's a great conversation on a fascinating topic. And provides great insight into the affair recovery process.
Here's some more information on my guest Jennifer Gingras.
Jennifer Gingras is passionate about helping couples navigate relationship issues with a special focus on affair recovery and premarital counseling. She also works with individuals struggling with many presenting concerns including depression and anxiety.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:07):
Hi, my name is Jacob Brown and I'm a couple's
therapist in San Francisco.
I wanna welcome you to sex loveand couple's therapy.
We all want to feel loved.
That's a universal desire, butsometimes instead of feeling
loving our relationships, feelconfusing, frustrating, and a
(00:28):
little crazy making the purposeof this podcast is to help you
clear up some of that confusionso that you and your partner can
find ways to make yourrelationship feel closer, more
connected, and more loving.
So stay tuned.
We've got a lot of great stuffto talk about, and now let's go
talk about my three favoritetopics, sex love, and couples
(00:52):
therapy.
So today I wanna welcome myguest, Jennifer Ingris, and I
have to tell you I'm reallyhappy to, to be here with
Jennifer cuz today we get totalk about one of my favorite
topics, which is infidelity.
And I know that sounds odd tosay infidelity is one of my
(01:13):
favorite topics, but as atherapist, it is such a
challenging and interesting andrewarding place to work.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
To help introduce Jennifer, I just wanna tell you
a little bit about her.
She has a private practice inFlorida called CILA therapy.
In addition, she's part of theteam@affairhealing.com a leading
resource for helping couplesrecover from trauma and of
infidelity.
Jennifer specializes in, inhelping couples navigate
relationship issues with aspecial focus on a fair recovery
(01:44):
and premarital counseling.
She received her degree inmarriage and family counseling
at the university of centralFlorida and her strengths.
She feels are her empathy andutilizing a client-centered
approach that focuses onacceptance and understanding
also interesting in her sparetime.
She is a runner, a triathlete,um, athlete, and has completed a
(02:07):
marathon into half Ironmans.
Fantastic, Jennifer, thank youso much and welcome to sex love
and couples therapy.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Well, thank you so much, Jacob, for having me.
I also get strangely excitedabout talking about this topic,
cause I feel the same way that Ireally enjoy helping couples and
individual navigate what isreally a painful time of their
lives, but knowing that I canhelp them in some way.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
Absolutely.
And, and one of the things Ithink that I find fascinating
about working in infidelity isto be a witness to the
resilience of couples.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
Absolutely.
That, that you can come backfrom truly devastating period of
time and actually form this newrelationship that feels so much
better in connecting than maybethat was before and the ashes of
something so painful.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
So true.
And it's interesting in myexperience, one of the hardest
things for couples to understandat the beginning is that
actually the marriage on theother side might be better.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
Yes.
It's hard to see it when you'rein it but our job would
be so depressing would be sodepressing if that was not the
hope that we were holding forthem as we guide them to that
outcome.
If that's what they're desiring.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
Oh yeah.
I think I love the way way yousaid that, that we're holding
that hope for them.
We're holding that idea for them, but I especially wanted to
talk to you today, Jennifer,about the idea of reengaging
sexually after an affair andfair and surprisingly, at least
surprisingly to me, this isn't atopic that's talked about a lot,
(03:42):
but it is a con a real barriersometimes because a couple
there's been an affair andthey've made a lot of steps in,
in kind of coming back together,but then there's that moment.
Well, how do I sleep with him?
Or how do I sleep with her ifthis has happened in the past?
Speaker 2 (04:03):
Yeah.
It's a really tricky thing tonavigate.
Um, I've found that it usuallygoes one or two directions
either.
They reengage sexually veryquickly.
And I think the term for that'shyper bonding or it's nothing,
it feels too overwhelming.
Um, sex is all about connectionand trust and that's been broken
in, in the context of an affair.
(04:24):
So to reengage in that way feelsvery vulnerable to the partner
who had been cheated on.
Speaker 1 (04:31):
Absolutely.
Yeah.
I think that, I think the wayyou framed that really makes a
lot of sense that it's sex isbased on connection and trust.
And how can I trust you ifyou've done this and how can I
have sex with you if I feelstill feel distant from you
after all of this.
Speaker 2 (04:49):
And that's not even mentioning maybe the triggers
that happen while engaging insexual activity, whether that's
before play leading up to oractual intercourse, right.
It can be really tricky tonavigate for both the involved
partner and the inter partner.
What do we do when that happens?
Um, and that can also get in theway of progressing and
reconnecting in that physicalway.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
Yeah.
And, and I'm wondering since youbrought it up, what do you do?
How do you talk to the coupleabout cuz that trigger makes so
much sense?
So you're, you can imagine acouple they're in bed, they're
kind of beginning to movetowards each other sexually.
Maybe it's foreplay, they'rehugging or, but there's an
intention or maybe they'reactually having intercourse and
(05:33):
one or both of the people isimmensely triggered.
You know, how could, why I doingthis with you?
You did this with that otherperson.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
Yep.
And then it's like, Ugh, hardstop.
hard.
Stop hard stop.
Um, so my approach with couplesis to try to actually prepare in
advance.
So don't wait until you're inthe moment to try to navigate
what to do because the emotionsare going to be really high.
Um, that trigger can lead toreally intense feelings of
(06:09):
anxiety and panic.
And so I try to walk a couplethrough when this happens, cuz
it probably will at some point,what are, what, how do you
navigate that together?
So for the injured party todescribe this is what helps me
feel safe.
Here's what I need from you.
If I get triggered in thismoment and a lot of times it's
(06:29):
simply, I need yourunderstanding.
Don't get upset with me.
If we have to stop for somepeople, they need a little bit
of space and time to kind ofcalm down.
Um, and so we have them come.
I have them come up with a planahead of time of what it would
look like when I get triggered.
Here's what I need.
And that gives the, the involvedpartner, the opportunity to feel
(06:52):
like they can help.
Cause oftentimes they, theirshame gets triggered.
I don't know what to do.
I don't know how to fix this.
I know I'm the cause of this.
So they shut down or they becomedefensive, which then just does
not help lead to furtherconnection.
Right?
So giving them that confidenceof, oh, I can do something in
this moment to help them.
(07:13):
I know I caused this, but I canalso help them in the present
moment.
It's helpful for them to havekinda like a game plan,
Speaker 1 (07:20):
Right?
But also this idea that the, um,involved partner can aid in the
healing of the injured partnerthat they're not just toxic.
They're not just causing hurt.
They can actually help.
Speaker 2 (07:34):
That is such a significant piece.
In my experience of if thecouple is doing the work to heal
together, we're not talkingabout individually, we're doing
it together.
Oftentimes that involve partnerfeels like, what am I supposed
to do?
I can't go back in time.
I can't undo it.
But what I try to encourage themor have them look at is that is
(07:54):
true.
But you can absolutely help yourpartner heal from this based on
how you respond based on youremotional availability, your
ability to be vulnerable andconnect and not be defensive or
shut down.
And that gives them theconfidence of saying, oh, this
is hard, but I can do somethingI'm not helpless.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Right.
You know?
And on that topic, I just wannaread something that I got
actually off of.
Um, one of your podcasts, whichI just loved the essential
necessary change.
Is this the involved partner'ssincere passion to take
responsibility for personal andrelationship healing and their
(08:35):
desire to work on the changethat happens from the inside
out.
And I gotta tell you, I thinkthat's beautiful and that is
just so hard to do.
It's unbelievable.
Speaker 2 (08:47):
I did I a hundred percent agree with that
statement?
Uh, nowhere does it say thatthat's an easy process?
Um, and I, I say that in mysessions, I'm not going to sell
you on unicorns and rainbows,but it is hard to do.
But if your desire is to do thereal work, that's, what's going
(09:08):
to be required,
Speaker 1 (09:09):
Right?
Speaker 2 (09:10):
But again, you're not helpless here.
You can do that work if you haveevery intention of being
uncomfortable and beingvulnerable.
And so in the context ofre-engaging sexually, imagine
you have one involved partnerwho responds defensively and
shuts down and completely walksaway from the bedroom, leaving
(09:30):
their partner alone in theirpain.
Again, first is the uninvolvedpartner that says, I understand,
and I'm sorry, and what do youneed?
Cause I'm here.
You want me to hold you.
If you need some time toyourself, come find me in 10
minutes and I'll still be here.
That's a whole difference inwhat that feeling can look like
(09:51):
based on what the involvedpartner is doing.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
In my experience, one of the things that's hardest to
get over is the involved partneris so resistant, scared, and
willing to be an activeparticipant.
So what'll the typicalscenarios.
You know, the injured partnerwill say, oh, you never want to
(10:19):
talk about it.
And the involved partner willsay, oh no, just, just the other
day you brought it up.
And I, and I, and I, and I, andI listened.
And then the other one says,yeah, but you never bring it up.
You never, it's always me.
That has to bring it up.
Yeah.
And getting the involved partnerto see it as part of his or her
(10:42):
job to bring it up, man, thattakes a little work.
Speaker 2 (10:49):
There's a lot of work.
a little, um, there's somuch that gets brought up.
And I think if I can boil itdown, it's a lot of shame gets
kicked up.
And that shame is sooverwhelming, um, that they do,
they get defensive, they shutdown or they say, well, I'll
talk about it.
If you bring it up, like I'mhere.
I'm just not.
And a lot of times what I hearis I don't, if you're in a good
(11:12):
place, I don't wanna upset youby bringing it up.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
Exactly
Speaker 2 (11:16):
Valid.
Right?
Sure.
But what I tell my clients isthere's not a time that your
partner's not thinking about it.
You're not gonna remind them andthey're gonna be like, oh, I
forgot that even happened.
And now I'm again.
And the other part of that, thatI try to encourage is, um, the
more you bring it up, the moreyou initiate conversations, the
(11:39):
more you talk about it, the lessyour partner feels the need to.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
So true.
So the long term goal of themore you do it, the more your
partner knows I'm not alone.
I don't have to carry thisalone.
And then the need for thediscussion actually decreases.
It has the opposite effect ofwhat they think.
Speaker 1 (11:59):
Right?
Speaker 2 (12:01):
And so for them, for them to see it from that
perspective of it's hard rightnow.
But the goal of what you'reactually working for is
decrease, talking about itbecause your, your partner
starts to feel safe with you.
They start to see that they canbe hurt.
They can be angry and thatthey're not doing it alone.
Speaker 1 (12:18):
Right.
You know, it reminds me when youdo grief work, people they'll
say, well, I don't want toremind them.
I don't wanna bring it up.
I don't wanna upset him.
And just what you, you said wasso perfect.
And what I say to my clientsthey're what do you think they
forgot that their husband died.
Speaker 2 (12:38):
how, the way
it works, right?
Speaker 1 (12:41):
Yeah.
Can't think that, oh, you knowmy mind, but dear
Speaker 2 (12:47):
You remind me.
Speaker 1 (12:48):
Yeah.
And that while they think thatthey're protecting the person,
what they're really doing, andit's totally understandable is
they're protecting themselvesbecause it is so upsetting to
bring this up because thatperson's grief is upsetting for
me to hear.
Speaker 2 (13:04):
And it's a reminder of my shame of what I did
decision I made and that's right.
That's where it gets shut down.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
Right.
Right.
So if I bring this up, she'sgonna be, or he's gonna be
unhappy.
I'm gonna remember my shame.
And then we're just both gonnabe sitting in this so much
better just to kind of breezethrough it.
Speaker 2 (13:26):
Let's just move on.
Let's like, let's just move on.
Let's just keep going.
Yeah.
But unfortunately it has theopposite effect, cuz the more
you don't deal with it, the moreyour partner wants to deal with
it.
And then it stays longer.
You're doing this longer by then.
Not just learning how to be alittle bit uncomfortable and
learning how to navigate theshame, trigger and learning how
(13:48):
to navigate talking with yourspouse about what happened.
So that way there can be a truehealing
Speaker 1 (13:53):
For me.
The path to that is to be ableto be in that pain together.
Speaker 2 (13:59):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (14:00):
So that I didn't injure her, I injured us or we
are injured.
Speaker 2 (14:09):
You know, that's a really good way of, of putting
it.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
We're injured and oh, we both hurt.
We're both so injured from this.
Can we just be injured together?
Cuz it's so much better to bewith someone.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
Absolutely.
We can get through most things.
If we have somebody to help usthrough it.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
One of the other things I was thinking about in
terms of re-engaging sexuallyand you talked about the trigger
mm-hmm
Speaker 2 (14:32):
Speaker 1 (14:33):
And I think there are a lot of different triggers that
may come up.
A lot of them are around theshame that the injured party
carries.
I'm not enough
Speaker 2 (14:44):
Mm-hmm
Speaker 1 (14:45):
He or she had to cheat on me cuz I'm not good
enough.
I'm not attractive enough.
I'm not sexual enough.
I'm not, you know, my breastsaren't big enough.
My not big enough, whatever.
I'm not enough.
Yep.
And there's this immediatethought of comparison also,
would you rather be having sexwith him or her?
The, the affair partner, youknow, am I second choice?
(15:08):
Mm-hmm Thechallenge is that these are
feelings that the injured partydoesn't want to share.
Cuz they're so painful andthey're feelings that the
involved partner doesn't want tohear.
Cuz they're so painful.
(15:29):
You know, it's a reallydifficult spot.
Often in my experience, whathappens is people want to know
more and more details about theaffair, but they don't really
want to know the details.
It's so much easier to focus on.
How many times did you text her?
(15:49):
Yep.
When did you meet, how manytimes, what kind of sex did you
have?
And then if they actually gothrough and start talking about
that, it takes them nowhere.
Good.
Speaker 2 (16:00):
No.
Then you're just adding moreopportunity for more and more
triggers cuz every detail, youknow, is potential trigger at
that point.
Um, so you know, we kind ofadvocate for, with, you know,
our work at a fair healing of,you need to know a certain
framework.
You're thinking of looking at apicture, you need to know the
framework of what you're dealingwith, who, how long was there
(16:23):
sexual contact, who you need toget tested?
Um, was there emotions involved?
Is this person a threat to ourfamily?
Cause you know, there's beensome situations, but you don't
need to shade in all the colors right.
Right.
And where we really try tocaution clients is on the sexual
details are really, it's not a,about a protecting.
(16:47):
It's not about protecting theaffair partner and that
relationship it's aboutprotecting you from potential
triggers.
You really don't need to knowevery position, how many times
where it doesn't really helpwith the healing.
And that's the only thing Iusually caution clients on
knowing too much of it.
Doesn't it just, I've never seenit be helpful
Speaker 1 (17:09):
Because what I really see and the way I try to reframe
it is I don't think you reallywant to know all the details.
I think what you're reallyasking is how did this happen?
Speaker 2 (17:20):
Why did this happen?
Speaker 1 (17:22):
Right.
Yes.
And they think that if I knowthe details, well that'll kind
of explain it, but it doesn'twhat they really wanna know is
why did this happen?
How did this happen?
What was going on?
It's not where, like you said,what position?
Where, how many it's, how couldthis happen?
I didn't think this was gonnahappen to us.
Speaker 2 (17:42):
Right.
I mean, and I think to even gotake that further based on what
you were saying earlier, it'swhy did this happen?
I need to understand it.
I need to make sense out of it.
But the other question, maybethat the injured party is caring
is am I enough?
What, what does this say aboutme?
Um, that there was this otherperson that could walk in and
(18:04):
you know, disrupt ourrelationship,
Speaker 1 (18:08):
Right?
What does this say about me?
And that's, and, and it's sohard cuz on one hand, they're
carrying this anger.
Mm-hmm over the,over what happened, but they're
also carrying that, thatquestion.
What does this mean about me?
Which is this kind of theopposite of anger?
Is this kind of, um, shameful?
Am I enough?
Kind of a question and it's sohard for them to carry both.
(18:30):
I am really angry at you forwhat, what you did and do you
want me
Speaker 2 (18:37):
Yeah.
And anger usually wins out.
Cause that feels more powerfuland I control right.
But it's helping to kind of getdown to what the core is of
what, what they're really askingand what they're really needing
their partner to answer for them.
But I also want to say that anaffair is never about the
injured party.
There was always something goingon within the involved partner
(18:59):
and doesn't mean there wasn'tstuff going on in their marriage
cuz there could have absolutelythen, but it's never a sign of
the worth of the injuredpartner.
They are worthy period.
Whether your partner had anaffair or not, they're worthy.
So I always like to that be myframework when I'm working with
the injured partner of, we cantalk through why this happened.
(19:20):
We can look at what washappening in a relationship we
can look at, um, what were theindividual things that
contributed to this?
What were the circumstantialthings that contributed to this?
What are the personality piecesthat contributed to this, but it
was never about your worth.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
Oh, that's such a nice way of framing it.
And uh, and I'm totally gonnasteal that from you.
Speaker 2 (19:40):
Absolutely take it.
If you can give that to peopleand they believe it.
Cause I will, I will die on thathill.
Speaker 1 (19:47):
Right.
No, no, because that's that's sothat's so true.
And that's so hard for people toget because they feel that it's
about them.
Speaker 2 (19:58):
Yeah.
I mean it's an attachment woundand if they already have maybe
some self-worth or self-esteemissues from childhood or even
just growing up, you're justretriggering already.
But a lot of people deal withany anyway, outside of an affair
situation.
So that's where I just wanna, Ijust offer that over and I tell
my clients, I'm gonna say ituntil you're tired of me hearing
(20:19):
it.
It was never about your wordever.
Even if you were a terrible lifeor a terrible husband, there are
things you can improve, but itwas never about your, and so
that is the basis, which we needto have an understanding to move
forward with looking at all theother pieces.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
Yeah, no I, so with you and similarly kind of
culturally, and I think this issomewhat to, to some degree
misogynistic, the culturally wetend to frame adultery about,
well, he wasn't getting enoughat home.
(20:54):
Okay.
That's that's the frame and it'salmost always about the woman
mm-hmm it blamesher and in my experience, it is
never about the sex at home.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
Agreed.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
It's just not,
Speaker 2 (21:09):
It's not, it's not about the sex even.
I don't care if they're havingsex 27 times a day with the
affair partner.
It's not about the sex,
Speaker 1 (21:15):
Right?
Speaker 2 (21:17):
Yeah.
Agreed.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
But that's so hard to get people to believe it gives
kind of a, a way for theinvolved partner to blame.
Speaker 2 (21:27):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (21:29):
And for the, um, injured partner to feel shame
mm-hmm which toexplain it.
Uh, well I wasn't good enough inbed.
That's so much easier sometimesthan the more complex and more
vulnerable feelings that areactually happening that were
making the couple feel distant.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
Yeah.
It's a great way of putting itbecause it'd be so much easier
if it was just about the sex.
Speaker 1 (21:55):
Right.
Speaker 2 (21:55):
We'll just have more sex problem solved.
Speaker 1 (21:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (21:59):
It's way more complex than that.
Right.
And it was never as much as itwasn't about the injured party.
It's also not about the affairpartner,
Speaker 1 (22:09):
Right?
Yeah.
It's not,
Speaker 2 (22:11):
There's something that was going on
Speaker 1 (22:15):
In the marriage,
Speaker 2 (22:15):
In the marriage, in the person who had the affair
that they were not dealing withappropriately that caused them
to look outside the marriage.
Right.
Right.
And so it's much easier to blamethe wife or the husband.
It's much easier to blame theaffair partner.
It's much easier to blameanything and everything else,
(22:37):
but myself.
Speaker 1 (22:38):
Right.
So true.
And I think that that's, that'sreally hard for people to get,
you know?
Um, but it's so hard to kind ofwork out that this was a more
complex issue and that the way Ikind of framed it is that there
(22:58):
were hard conversations in themarriage before the affair that
we weren't able to have.
Speaker 2 (23:06):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (23:08):
You know that there have been difficult
conversations about how we feelabout each other or how we feel
about ourselves or how themarriage is going or anything,
our, our careers or whatever,but because of who we have been
to each other, we haven't reallybeen able to talk about those.
Yes.
I've never seen an affaircouple, a couple.
(23:31):
Who've had an affair in whichthey have been doing a good job
at having difficultconversations.
Speaker 2 (23:41):
Agreed, agreed.
And
Speaker 1 (23:43):
The road forward is learning how to have difficult
conversations
Speaker 2 (23:49):
In the context of dealing with fair healing and
trauma.
And, but yes, that is absolutelywhat is required for that true
healing to take place is youhave to learn how to be
uncomfortable and how to havehard conversations.
Right.
Because unfortunately life mightthrow something else your way,
10 years from now that disrupts,maybe it's something completely
(24:10):
outside the marriage, butdisrupts the relationship.
And if you don't learn how tohave those hard conversations,
well, what happens then?
Speaker 1 (24:17):
Right.
Right.
That's so true.
Yeah.
Cuz things happen.
I mean, somebody dies, somebodyloses a job, you have to move,
you have a kid who's in trouble,a
Speaker 2 (24:28):
Pandemic,
Speaker 1 (24:29):
A pandemic, oh God,
Speaker 2 (24:30):
Speaker 1 (24:32):
Not a pandemic place, but yeah.
It, and how do we do we feelthat we know how to deal with
these things that we can dealwith these things.
And that's, that's a hard thingto learn, but I was one of the
other podcasts you, you did,which I found really interesting
was on repeat affairs.
(24:54):
Which boy talk about achallenge.
You know, when you have repeataffairs, it's really difficult.
Yeah.
To build and rebuild trust, butI've seen people do that.
Seen both parties change, but itreally requires a willingness
to, as you said, beuncomfortable.
Speaker 2 (25:16):
Absolutely.
You're not gonna get too truehealing without it.
You just there's no, there's nodetour.
Speaker 1 (25:23):
Right.
There's no detour, but you know,we all want the detour.
We all want the shortcut.
We want
Speaker 2 (25:28):
The I don't
wanna be uncomfortable either
what I for a living, but I still, I mean, you know,
Speaker 1 (25:36):
I'm happy to sit with your discomfort.
Sure.
Speaker 2 (25:38):
Absolutely.
But not mine.
I mean, my marriage is perfect.
Thank you very much.
Speaker 1 (25:44):
I was wondering, you know, I was saying one of the
things that drew me to this kindof working infidelity, and I
wonder since it's clearly such abig part of your practice, was
there, what kind of ma what isit that draws you or calls to
you about this kind of work?
Speaker 2 (26:00):
So I have a personal history with it, as you know,
that's probably not toosurprising.
Um, and I'm pretty open withthat in my story that my husband
did have an affair, uh, going on12 years now.
And so navigating that andworking through that, I also
have family history ofinfidelity, um, on my father's
side.
And so, um, I think goingthrough that, seeing the damage
(26:24):
it did as a child, seeing whatit did in my own life, you know,
I, I always said when I was inschool, I would never be a
counselor God has a funnyway of saying, okay.
Um, and I think by helpingothers navigate the same hard
thing that I went through, itgives my story a purpose.
(26:46):
It means that what I wentthrough has meaning, and I
didn't go through it fornothing.
And I find that that is veryfulfilling for me as a
practitioner and on a personallevel that it wasn't for any, it
wasn't for nothing.
Like I have a story that canhelp other people and I can use
both my personal story, but alsowhat I've learned as a therapist
(27:08):
and as a counselor of what worksto help individual individuals
and couples navigate a really,really painful time.
Speaker 1 (27:17):
Uh, well, I really want to thank you for sharing
that, cuz I didn't know that,that, that you had that story.
Um, and I really wanna assureyou that I didn't know that.
So I wasn't, this wasn't like alittle for that.
Speaker 2 (27:31):
It's okay.
If I wasn't comfortable sharing,I would've told you that, so,
Speaker 1 (27:38):
And feel free to push back and we can edit it out if
you want.
But now you're 12 years afterthe affair, what's it like for
you to talk about it?
Speaker 2 (27:50):
Most of the time it's like telling somebody else's
story.
Mm.
I remember what happened and Ican remember growing through it,
but there's, we are definitelynot the same people.
We're not the same couple wewere.
And so there's this spacebetween the emotion of what I
felt then and how it impacts menow.
(28:10):
Um, now sometimes there arepeople whose stories are maybe
similar to mine and that can bea little bit of a,
but I've learned how to navigatethat.
And so 99% of the time, it'smore about using it to help
others, as opposed to me goingback to a place that was painful
for me.
So there is kind of aseparation.
(28:30):
Now when I talk about it, itfeels almost like somebody
else's story, cuz I don't feellike we're the same people.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
And so talking about it no longer triggers you, I
guess the way it, it
Speaker 2 (28:41):
I'm sure.
Yeah.
I can talk about it all day longand it's I can go home and be
just fine and not, not like I'mpretending to be fine, but
generally I'm fine.
Speaker 1 (28:49):
That's great.
Yeah.
That's amazing.
You know, and I was wonderingone of the last topics I wanted
to talk to you about, which isone that I, I find so
fascinating and difficult is thequestion of forgiveness.
I did a podcast a few weeks agowith a guy wrote just one of the
Bibles on forgiveness.
And we were talking about howdifficult the idea forgiveness
(29:11):
is.
And I think one of the issues isthat people confuse forgiveness
for thinking it's all right,right.
That if I forgive you, it meansthat what you did was okay or
that if I forgive you, it meansthat I forget about it.
Um, or if I forgive you, itmeans I can't bring it up again.
(29:34):
Right.
I'm wondering how you frame inyour mind, how forgiveness works
for clients when you talk tothem about what, how do you help
them understand what forgivenessmeans?
Speaker 2 (29:47):
So I like to frame it from first.
I like to talk about thedifference between forgiveness
and trust because forgivenessdoes not require anything of
your partner.
Trust requires something of yourpartner.
Mm it's.
The right behavior over aconsistent period of time.
Whereas forgiveness is reallynot for them though.
(30:08):
They benefit from it.
It's really for yourself to letgo of anger, to let go of the
pain from impacting your lifefor moving forward.
Right.
So I like to kind ofdifferentiate when I'm asking
for, when I'm talking to youabout forgiveness, I'm not
talking about trust twodifferent things.
And then I also like to remind,yeah,
Speaker 1 (30:28):
Well, I'm sorry, I'm gonna interrupt you.
Yeah.
For a second Jennifer.
Cause that was a really, reallyimportant statement you made
there.
And I think one in which I'm,I'm gonna admit that sometimes I
get a little confused and I maynot be clear enough with my
clients.
That there's a big differencebetween trust yes and
forgiveness.
I may forgive you, but thatdoesn't mean necessarily that I
trust you.
Speaker 2 (30:49):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (30:51):
Ah, that's so big.
Speaker 2 (30:52):
You can have forgiveness without trust.
Yeah.
You might not have arelationship.
Right.
But you can have forgivenesswithout trust.
I don't know that you cannecessarily have trust without
forgiveness though.
That is debatable.
I don't know yet.
But yeah.
I don't know.
That might be a further thoughtprocess I have to think about,
but it's not the same trustrequires something of your
(31:12):
partner.
Trust is earned over time,whereas forgiveness is given and
it's really more for yourselfthan it is for anybody else.
Speaker 1 (31:22):
Yeah.
And I think that's a really hardidea to communicate or to accept
that I'm forgiving her for mybenefit.
Speaker 2 (31:30):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (31:32):
That this forgiveness is about me.
Mm-hmm not abouther or him.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:37):
Yes.
And then now they benefit fromit.
Don't get me wrong.
Speaker 1 (31:40):
Right.
Speaker 2 (31:41):
Especially in the context of a healed
relationship, but I also letthem know and validate first
forgiveness is a process.
You're not gonna wake up one dayand be like, oh, forgiven them.
Um, you're never going to forgetshort of a brain injury.
You cannot erase the memory.
So forgiveness doesn't mean thatwe're forgetting nor does it
(32:01):
mean, like you said before, itdoesn't mean that I'm saying
it's okay.
It will never be okay whathappened period.
But I can still forgive theperson, the actions that they
did in order for me to move onmy healing.
Because if not, if I hold on tothe anger and the pain and the
bitterness, I'm the one thatsuffers.
(32:23):
Even if I'm not married anymore,they can go on and have a whole
life that they don't care if Iforgive them or not.
I'm the one who's stillsuffering.
Cause that anger is going to getin the way of other
relationships or truly moving onin a healthy way.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
You know, I, I have to admit that this was a
difficult concept for me to getas well.
Um, cuz you know, sometimesyou'll see a news article on and
somebody, somebody did aterrible thing to somebody's
family and that family thenforgives them.
And I would think to myself, howthe hell does that work?
Yeah, I don't get it.
(32:59):
And it was only through doingthis work with in infidelity
that I started to understandthat concept, that I'm forgi.
My forgiveness is about me andfor me and it doesn't mean that
I have forgotten or that it'sokay or that I'm now love them
(33:20):
or anything like that.
Correct.
But I've forgiven them so that Ican move on
Speaker 2 (33:25):
Perfectly said yes.
Yeah
Speaker 1 (33:28):
Boy, that's a heavy lift sometimes.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (33:31):
And I won't pretend that's easy either.
Right?
Cause we don't, I mean you'rejustified in your anger and your
hurt and all of that, but italso, you didn't choose this
happening to you, but you choosehow you are going to move on
from it.
And so if you want to move on ina way that's, that's not
impacting your life forever.
(33:51):
It takes time.
So again, this is not a rushedthing then.
And, and I also, for the peoplewho don't like forgiveness,
cause maybe it sounds tooreligious for them or there's a
con like a religious, spiritualconnotation.
I use the word acceptance.
Right?
Cause I've accepted that thishas happened.
I didn't choose it.
It's not my fault, but it'shappened.
And now I'm going to choose howI moved forward with accepting
(34:13):
that reality.
Speaker 1 (34:14):
And you can accept and you can forgive and you can
still be deeply unhappy andangry.
Yes.
And hurt.
Speaker 2 (34:22):
It does not negate what happened.
It does not mean you forget itnever, ever, ever means.
You're saying it was okay.
Speaker 1 (34:29):
And then last thing I want to talk about is something
that we brought up earlier,which is this idea that what I
call usually marriage 2.0, themarriage after the affair can
actually be better than themarriage.
1.0 mm-hmm, whichlike I said, you know, is really
hard to convince anybody that,to believe that early on, but
(34:53):
I've seen it happen so manytimes that the second marriage
really doesn't look the same asthe, the, the one beforehand
they've they've had to change.
Mm-hmm And I'm justwondering what your, how you
kind of think about that or, orwhat you've seen or what your
thoughts are about this ideathat the second, the, the
(35:15):
marriage actually improvesfollowing the affair.
Speaker 2 (35:18):
Yeah.
And I think it goes back to whatwe were talking about earlier in
regards to learning how to beuncomfortable and have hard
conversations is like you said,I've never seen a couple who,
where there's been an infidelitywhere they had, they had that
ability.
Right.
And so, and a lot of times inthe context where we're not
having hard conversations andmaybe one person's trying to get
(35:41):
that and the other person'sresistant and there's that push
and pull somebody's needs arenot being met.
Yeah.
There's a sense of disconnectsomewhere stemming from
something that's not reallybeing addressed fully.
And so an affair like anemotional near death experience
where it causes you toreevaluate what's important,
(36:02):
what your needs are in, in arelationship.
And so when both partners aregiving attention to not only the
healing, but what does it meanto fix some of the things?
Let me, let me clarify.
We have to feel some infidelityfirst, before we can address the
things that were going on in themarriage.
People try to get it backwards.
It doesn't work.
(36:23):
So once you've moved throughkind of starting to stitch
together that wound and it'sstarting to heal, you can then
address those areas of themarriage that maybe weren't
functioning very well to beginwith.
And so then there's healing forthat.
And then a new kind ofrelationship develops where we
can do hard things together.
We can have hard conversationsand then there's this confidence
(36:43):
of we can get through anything.
Mm-hmm becausewe've already been through one
of the worst things somebody cango through and we navigated and
it was painful and we struggledand there was ups and downs, but
we did it together.
And so I think that's where itall ties in is giving that hope
for that relationship looksdifferent because you have two
people willing to beat eachother's needs, being willing to
(37:04):
ask for that.
Being willing to have hardconversations in a way that
probably wasn't existing beforethe affair happened or the
affair
Speaker 1 (37:11):
That's so good.
Yeah.
No, I think that's exactlyright.
And I love the way you kind ofmap that out to you.
That first you have to gothrough the affair process,
then, then we can look at themarriage and then people kind of
evolve.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:23):
Yes.
Yeah.
We can't, we can't do it theother way around doesn't work.
Speaker 1 (37:26):
We can't do it the other way.
No.
Cause you can't, you can'treestablish that trust until you
work through that.
Correct?
That pain.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:33):
Correct.
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (37:34):
One last thing I'd like to do.
Cause this has been such aninteresting discussion.
We've gone over so manydifferent kind of topics, which
have all been fascinating, butthe original, uh, topic about
re-engaging sexually just incase somebody's, that's really
what they're kind of strugglingwith is listening.
I just wanna go back to thatbriefly and summarize some of
(37:55):
the points that you brought up,which were so important, which
is that, yeah, this is hard.
That's a difficult moment.
And that it's very likely thatat least the beginning that
there'll be some triggers andit'll be difficult.
And that one of the things thatyou do is you kind of set up a
game plan beforehand.
(38:17):
Mm-hmm about how todeal with these triggers and
that these triggers really bringup a lot of shame in both
partners and, and makes it verydifficult for them to connect
Roundup.
But that this actually is anopportunity, especially for the
affair partner to find, to havea purpose, have a function in
(38:37):
helping the other, the, theinjured partner partner heal or
work through that, that shame byjust being there for them.
Speaker 2 (38:47):
Absolutely.
It's it seems like a small thingthat has larger implications is
your ability to sit with me inmy pain, knowing that you caused
it means that I can begin torebuild trust with you because
if you disappear every time I'mhurting or I'm triggered, it's
hard to rebuild trust oremotional safety around that.
(39:08):
And that's where the involvedpartner, they have power.
They have the ability to makethis better based on how they
respond.
And if you don't know how torespond, go to your partner and
ask them what would be helpful,right?
What can I do initiate thatconversation?
Like we talked about, bring upthat conversation and say, I
wanna be proactive here.
This may be a struggle.
And if it's not great, but if itis, how do we navigate that
(39:31):
together?
Yeah.
What do you need from me?
Speaker 1 (39:34):
What do you need from me?
And that this may go on for awhile.
Yes.
Yes.
It may take a while beforesomeone's willing to really go
all the way from kissing toactual intercourse.
Yep.
That may take a while.
Speaker 2 (39:50):
So patience, patience with the process on both parties
would be really, reallyimportant because they may be on
different pacings in thishealing process.
So a more patient, you could bewith each other and not getting
defensive or trying to push yourpace.
So for the involved partner, notto push too much, if before the
(40:11):
injured partner is ready, alsogoes a long way.
Speaker 1 (40:14):
Okay.
Gotta recognize that for theinvolved partner, he or she
wants to push this.
Yes.
Because if, if we can starthaving sex with all, then we're
making progress.
He may not, he must not hate meso much.
So they really wanna havereengage sexually.
Cause that's a way
Speaker 2 (40:30):
It's fun.
Yes.
Right,
Speaker 1 (40:32):
Right, right.
You know, so, oh, maybe we'rethere's light at the end of the
tunnel.
Yep.
No, we gotta go slow.
Speaker 2 (40:38):
Yes.
You go partners pace
Speaker 1 (40:41):
Right at the end partner space.
That's perfect.
Well, Jennifer, I really want tothank you.
This has been such aninteresting and, and I can't
believe 45 minutes went by that.
I know that
Speaker 2 (40:51):
Really fast.
.
Speaker 1 (40:53):
That was such a great conversation.
I wanna thank you for coming andjoining us.
I just wish you well in your, inyour life and in your practice.
Thank you so much for having somuch and thank you for coming
and let me know if there'sanything I can ever do to help
you.
I appreciate
Speaker 2 (41:07):
It.
Thank you so much, Jacob.
Speaker 1 (41:09):
All right.
Take care.
Speaker 2 (41:10):
Bye
Speaker 1 (41:11):
Bye.
Well, that's our episode fortoday.
I hope we found it interestingand useful, but most of all, I'd
like a thank you for listening.
If you have a minute, please hitthe subscribe button and give us
a rating.
And I hope to see you again soonon another episode of sex, love
(41:32):
and couples therapy.
Hi, my name is Jacob Brown and I'm a couple's
therapist in San Francisco.
I wanna welcome you to sex loveand couple's therapy.
We all want to feel loved.
That's a universal desire, butsometimes instead of feeling
loving our relationships, feelconfusing, frustrating, and a
(00:28):
little crazy making the purposeof this podcast is to help you
clear up some of that confusionso that you and your partner can
find ways to make yourrelationship feel closer, more
connected, and more loving.
So stay tuned.
We've got a lot of great stuffto talk about, and now let's go
talk about my three favoritetopics, sex love, and couples
(00:52):
therapy.
So today I wanna welcome myguest, Jennifer Ingris, and I
have to tell you I'm reallyhappy to, to be here with
Jennifer cuz today we get totalk about one of my favorite
topics, which is infidelity.
And I know that sounds odd tosay infidelity is one of my
(01:13):
favorite topics, but as atherapist, it is such a
challenging and interesting andrewarding place to work.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
To help introduce Jennifer, I just wanna tell you
a little bit about her.
She has a private practice inFlorida called CILA therapy.
In addition, she's part of theteam@affairhealing.com a leading
resource for helping couplesrecover from trauma and of
infidelity.
Jennifer specializes in, inhelping couples navigate
relationship issues with aspecial focus on a fair recovery
(01:44):
and premarital counseling.
She received her degree inmarriage and family counseling
at the university of centralFlorida and her strengths.
She feels are her empathy andutilizing a client-centered
approach that focuses onacceptance and understanding
also interesting in her sparetime.
She is a runner, a triathlete,um, athlete, and has completed a
(02:07):
marathon into half Ironmans.
Fantastic, Jennifer, thank youso much and welcome to sex love
and couples therapy.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Well, thank you so much, Jacob, for having me.
I also get strangely excitedabout talking about this topic,
cause I feel the same way that Ireally enjoy helping couples and
individual navigate what isreally a painful time of their
lives, but knowing that I canhelp them in some way.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
Absolutely.
And, and one of the things Ithink that I find fascinating
about working in infidelity isto be a witness to the
resilience of couples.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
Absolutely.
That, that you can come backfrom truly devastating period of
time and actually form this newrelationship that feels so much
better in connecting than maybethat was before and the ashes of
something so painful.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
So true.
And it's interesting in myexperience, one of the hardest
things for couples to understandat the beginning is that
actually the marriage on theother side might be better.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
Yes.
It's hard to see it when you'rein it
be so depressing would be sodepressing if that was not the
hope that we were holding forthem as we guide them to that
outcome.
If that's what they're desiring.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
Oh yeah.
I think I love the way way yousaid that, that we're holding
that hope for them.
We're holding that idea for them, but I especially wanted to
talk to you today, Jennifer,about the idea of reengaging
sexually after an affair andfair and surprisingly, at least
surprisingly to me, this isn't atopic that's talked about a lot,
(03:42):
but it is a con a real barriersometimes because a couple
there's been an affair andthey've made a lot of steps in,
in kind of coming back together,but then there's that moment.
Well, how do I sleep with him?
Or how do I sleep with her ifthis has happened in the past?
Speaker 2 (04:03):
Yeah.
It's a really tricky thing tonavigate.
Um, I've found that it usuallygoes one or two directions
either.
They reengage sexually veryquickly.
And I think the term for that'shyper bonding or it's nothing,
it feels too overwhelming.
Um, sex is all about connectionand trust and that's been broken
in, in the context of an affair.
(04:24):
So to reengage in that way feelsvery vulnerable to the partner
who had been cheated on.
Speaker 1 (04:31):
Absolutely.
Yeah.
I think that, I think the wayyou framed that really makes a
lot of sense that it's sex isbased on connection and trust.
And how can I trust you ifyou've done this and how can I
have sex with you if I feelstill feel distant from you
after all of this.
Speaker 2 (04:49):
And that's not even mentioning maybe the triggers
that happen while engaging insexual activity, whether that's
before play leading up to oractual intercourse, right.
It can be really tricky tonavigate for both the involved
partner and the inter partner.
What do we do when that happens?
Um, and that can also get in theway of progressing and
reconnecting in that physicalway.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
Yeah.
And, and I'm wondering since youbrought it up, what do you do?
How do you talk to the coupleabout cuz that trigger makes so
much sense?
So you're, you can imagine acouple they're in bed, they're
kind of beginning to movetowards each other sexually.
Maybe it's foreplay, they'rehugging or, but there's an
intention or maybe they'reactually having intercourse and
(05:33):
one or both of the people isimmensely triggered.
You know, how could, why I doingthis with you?
You did this with that otherperson.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
Yep.
And then it's like, Ugh, hardstop.
Stop hard stop.
Um, so my approach with couplesis to try to actually prepare in
advance.
So don't wait until you're inthe moment to try to navigate
what to do because the emotionsare going to be really high.
Um, that trigger can lead toreally intense feelings of
(06:09):
anxiety and panic.
And so I try to walk a couplethrough when this happens, cuz
it probably will at some point,what are, what, how do you
navigate that together?
So for the injured party todescribe this is what helps me
feel safe.
Here's what I need from you.
If I get triggered in thismoment and a lot of times it's
(06:29):
simply, I need yourunderstanding.
Don't get upset with me.
If we have to stop for somepeople, they need a little bit
of space and time to kind ofcalm down.
Um, and so we have them come.
I have them come up with a planahead of time of what it would
look like when I get triggered.
Here's what I need.
And that gives the, the involvedpartner, the opportunity to feel
(06:52):
like they can help.
Cause oftentimes they, theirshame gets triggered.
I don't know what to do.
I don't know how to fix this.
I know I'm the cause of this.
So they shut down or they becomedefensive, which then just does
not help lead to furtherconnection.
Right?
So giving them that confidenceof, oh, I can do something in
this moment to help them.
(07:13):
I know I caused this, but I canalso help them in the present
moment.
It's helpful for them to havekinda like a game plan,
Speaker 1 (07:20):
Right?
But also this idea that the, um,involved partner can aid in the
healing of the injured partnerthat they're not just toxic.
They're not just causing hurt.
They can actually help.
Speaker 2 (07:34):
That is such a significant piece.
In my experience of if thecouple is doing the work to heal
together, we're not talkingabout individually, we're doing
it together.
Oftentimes that involve partnerfeels like, what am I supposed
to do?
I can't go back in time.
I can't undo it.
But what I try to encourage themor have them look at is that is
(07:54):
true.
But you can absolutely help yourpartner heal from this based on
how you respond based on youremotional availability, your
ability to be vulnerable andconnect and not be defensive or
shut down.
And that gives them theconfidence of saying, oh, this
is hard, but I can do somethingI'm not helpless.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Right.
You know?
And on that topic, I just wannaread something that I got
actually off of.
Um, one of your podcasts, whichI just loved the essential
necessary change.
Is this the involved partner'ssincere passion to take
responsibility for personal andrelationship healing and their
(08:35):
desire to work on the changethat happens from the inside
out.
And I gotta tell you, I thinkthat's beautiful and that is
just so hard to do.
It's unbelievable.
Speaker 2 (08:47):
I did I a hundred percent agree with that
statement?
Uh, nowhere does it say thatthat's an easy process?
Um, and I, I say that in mysessions, I'm not going to sell
you on unicorns and rainbows,but it is hard to do.
But if your desire is to do thereal work, that's, what's going
(09:08):
to be required,
Speaker 1 (09:09):
Right?
Speaker 2 (09:10):
But again, you're not helpless here.
You can do that work if you haveevery intention of being
uncomfortable and beingvulnerable.
And so in the context ofre-engaging sexually, imagine
you have one involved partnerwho responds defensively and
shuts down and completely walksaway from the bedroom, leaving
(09:30):
their partner alone in theirpain.
Again, first is the uninvolvedpartner that says, I understand,
and I'm sorry, and what do youneed?
Cause I'm here.
You want me to hold you.
If you need some time toyourself, come find me in 10
minutes and I'll still be here.
That's a whole difference inwhat that feeling can look like
(09:51):
based on what the involvedpartner is doing.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
In my experience, one of the things that's hardest to
get over is the involved partneris so resistant, scared, and
willing to be an activeparticipant.
So what'll the typicalscenarios.
You know, the injured partnerwill say, oh, you never want to
(10:19):
talk about it.
And the involved partner willsay, oh no, just, just the other
day you brought it up.
And I, and I, and I, and I, andI listened.
And then the other one says,yeah, but you never bring it up.
You never, it's always me.
That has to bring it up.
Yeah.
And getting the involved partnerto see it as part of his or her
(10:42):
job to bring it up, man, thattakes a little work.
Speaker 2 (10:49):
There's a lot of work.
And I think if I can boil itdown, it's a lot of shame gets
kicked up.
And that shame is sooverwhelming, um, that they do,
they get defensive, they shutdown or they say, well, I'll
talk about it.
If you bring it up, like I'mhere.
I'm just not.
And a lot of times what I hearis I don't, if you're in a good
(11:12):
place, I don't wanna upset youby bringing it up.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
Exactly
Speaker 2 (11:16):
Valid.
Right?
Sure.
But what I tell my clients isthere's not a time that your
partner's not thinking about it.
You're not gonna remind them andthey're gonna be like, oh, I
forgot that even happened.
And now I'm again.
And the other part of that, thatI try to encourage is, um, the
more you bring it up, the moreyou initiate conversations, the
(11:39):
more you talk about it, the lessyour partner feels the need to.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
So true.
So the long term goal of themore you do it, the more your
partner knows I'm not alone.
I don't have to carry thisalone.
And then the need for thediscussion actually decreases.
It has the opposite effect ofwhat they think.
Speaker 1 (11:59):
Right?
Speaker 2 (12:01):
And so for them, for them to see it from that
perspective of it's hard rightnow.
But the goal of what you'reactually working for is
decrease, talking about itbecause your, your partner
starts to feel safe with you.
They start to see that they canbe hurt.
They can be angry and thatthey're not doing it alone.
Speaker 1 (12:18):
Right.
You know, it reminds me when youdo grief work, people they'll
say, well, I don't want toremind them.
I don't wanna bring it up.
I don't wanna upset him.
And just what you, you said wasso perfect.
And what I say to my clientsthey're what do you think they
forgot that their husband died.
Speaker 2 (12:38):
Speaker 1 (12:41):
Yeah.
Can't think that, oh, you knowmy mind, but dear
Speaker 2 (12:47):
You remind me.
Speaker 1 (12:48):
Yeah.
And that while they think thatthey're protecting the person,
what they're really doing, andit's totally understandable is
they're protecting themselvesbecause it is so upsetting to
bring this up because thatperson's grief is upsetting for
me to hear.
Speaker 2 (13:04):
And it's a reminder of my shame of what I did
decision I made and that's right.
That's where it gets shut down.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
Right.
Right.
So if I bring this up, she'sgonna be, or he's gonna be
unhappy.
I'm gonna remember my shame.
And then we're just both gonnabe sitting in this so much
better just to kind of breezethrough it.
Speaker 2 (13:26):
Let's just move on.
Let's like, let's just move on.
Let's just keep going.
Yeah.
But unfortunately it has theopposite effect, cuz the more
you don't deal with it, the moreyour partner wants to deal with
it.
And then it stays longer.
You're doing this longer by then.
Not just learning how to be alittle bit uncomfortable and
learning how to navigate theshame, trigger and learning how
(13:48):
to navigate talking with yourspouse about what happened.
So that way there can be a truehealing
Speaker 1 (13:53):
For me.
The path to that is to be ableto be in that pain together.
Speaker 2 (13:59):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (14:00):
So that I didn't injure her, I injured us or we
are injured.
Speaker 2 (14:09):
You know, that's a really good way of, of putting
it.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
We're injured and oh, we both hurt.
We're both so injured from this.
Can we just be injured together?
Cuz it's so much better to bewith someone.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
Absolutely.
We can get through most things.
If we have somebody to help usthrough it.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
One of the other things I was thinking about in
terms of re-engaging sexuallyand you talked about the trigger
mm-hmm
Speaker 2 (14:32):
Speaker 1 (14:33):
And I think there are a lot of different triggers that
may come up.
A lot of them are around theshame that the injured party
carries.
I'm not enough
Speaker 2 (14:44):
Mm-hmm
Speaker 1 (14:45):
He or she had to cheat on me cuz I'm not good
enough.
I'm not attractive enough.
I'm not sexual enough.
I'm not, you know, my breastsaren't big enough.
My not big enough, whatever.
I'm not enough.
Yep.
And there's this immediatethought of comparison also,
would you rather be having sexwith him or her?
The, the affair partner, youknow, am I second choice?
(15:08):
Mm-hmm
feelings that the injured partydoesn't want to share.
Cuz they're so painful andthey're feelings that the
involved partner doesn't want tohear.
Cuz they're so painful.
(15:29):
You know, it's a reallydifficult spot.
Often in my experience, whathappens is people want to know
more and more details about theaffair, but they don't really
want to know the details.
It's so much easier to focus on.
How many times did you text her?
(15:49):
Yep.
When did you meet, how manytimes, what kind of sex did you
have?
And then if they actually gothrough and start talking about
that, it takes them nowhere.
Good.
Speaker 2 (16:00):
No.
Then you're just adding moreopportunity for more and more
triggers cuz every detail, youknow, is potential trigger at
that point.
Um, so you know, we kind ofadvocate for, with, you know,
our work at a fair healing of,you need to know a certain
framework.
You're thinking of looking at apicture, you need to know the
framework of what you're dealingwith, who, how long was there
(16:23):
sexual contact, who you need toget tested?
Um, was there emotions involved?
Is this person a threat to ourfamily?
Cause you know, there's beensome situations, but you don't
need to shade in all the colors
Right.
And where we really try tocaution clients is on the sexual
details are really, it's not a,about a protecting.
(16:47):
It's not about protecting theaffair partner and that
relationship it's aboutprotecting you from potential
triggers.
You really don't need to knowevery position, how many times
where it doesn't really helpwith the healing.
And that's the only thing Iusually caution clients on
knowing too much of it.
Doesn't it just, I've never seenit be helpful
Speaker 1 (17:09):
Because what I really see and the way I try to reframe
it is I don't think you reallywant to know all the details.
I think what you're reallyasking is how did this happen?
Speaker 2 (17:20):
Why did this happen?
Speaker 1 (17:22):
Right.
Yes.
And they think that if I knowthe details, well that'll kind
of explain it, but it doesn'twhat they really wanna know is
why did this happen?
How did this happen?
What was going on?
It's not where, like you said,what position?
Where, how many it's, how couldthis happen?
I didn't think this was gonnahappen to us.
Speaker 2 (17:42):
Right.
I mean, and I think to even gotake that further based on what
you were saying earlier, it'swhy did this happen?
I need to understand it.
I need to make sense out of it.
But the other question, maybethat the injured party is caring
is am I enough?
What, what does this say aboutme?
Um, that there was this otherperson that could walk in and
(18:04):
you know, disrupt ourrelationship,
Speaker 1 (18:08):
Right?
What does this say about me?
And that's, and, and it's sohard cuz on one hand, they're
carrying this anger.
Mm-hmm
also carrying that, thatquestion.
What does this mean about me?
Which is this kind of theopposite of anger?
Is this kind of, um, shameful?
Am I enough?
Kind of a question and it's sohard for them to carry both.
(18:30):
I am really angry at you forwhat, what you did and do you
want me
Speaker 2 (18:37):
Yeah.
And anger usually wins out.
Cause that feels more powerfuland I control right.
But it's helping to kind of getdown to what the core is of
what, what they're really askingand what they're really needing
their partner to answer for them.
But I also want to say that anaffair is never about the
injured party.
There was always something goingon within the involved partner
(18:59):
and doesn't mean there wasn'tstuff going on in their marriage
cuz there could have absolutelythen, but it's never a sign of
the worth of the injuredpartner.
They are worthy period.
Whether your partner had anaffair or not, they're worthy.
So I always like to that be myframework when I'm working with
the injured partner of, we cantalk through why this happened.
(19:20):
We can look at what washappening in a relationship we
can look at, um, what were theindividual things that
contributed to this?
What were the circumstantialthings that contributed to this?
What are the personality piecesthat contributed to this, but it
was never about your worth.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
Oh, that's such a nice way of framing it.
And uh, and I'm totally gonnasteal that from you.
Speaker 2 (19:40):
Absolutely take it.
If you can give that to peopleand they believe it.
Cause I will, I will die on thathill.
Speaker 1 (19:47):
Right.
No, no, because that's that's sothat's so true.
And that's so hard for people toget because they feel that it's
about them.
Speaker 2 (19:58):
Yeah.
I mean it's an attachment woundand if they already have maybe
some self-worth or self-esteemissues from childhood or even
just growing up, you're justretriggering already.
But a lot of people deal withany anyway, outside of an affair
situation.
So that's where I just wanna, Ijust offer that over and I tell
my clients, I'm gonna say ituntil you're tired of me hearing
(20:19):
it.
It was never about your wordever.
Even if you were a terrible lifeor a terrible husband, there are
things you can improve, but itwas never about your, and so
that is the basis, which we needto have an understanding to move
forward with looking at all theother pieces.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
Yeah, no I, so with you and similarly kind of
culturally, and I think this issomewhat to, to some degree
misogynistic, the culturally wetend to frame adultery about,
well, he wasn't getting enoughat home.
(20:54):
Okay.
That's that's the frame and it'salmost always about the woman
mm-hmm
never about the sex at home.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
Agreed.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
It's just not,
Speaker 2 (21:09):
It's not, it's not about the sex even.
I don't care if they're havingsex 27 times a day with the
affair partner.
It's not about the sex,
Speaker 1 (21:15):
Right?
Speaker 2 (21:17):
Yeah.
Agreed.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
But that's so hard to get people to believe it gives
kind of a, a way for theinvolved partner to blame.
Speaker 2 (21:27):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (21:29):
And for the, um, injured partner to feel shame
mm-hmm
Uh, well I wasn't good enough inbed.
That's so much easier sometimesthan the more complex and more
vulnerable feelings that areactually happening that were
making the couple feel distant.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
Yeah.
It's a great way of putting itbecause it'd be so much easier
if it was just about the sex.
Speaker 1 (21:55):
Right.
Speaker 2 (21:55):
We'll just have more sex problem solved.
Speaker 1 (21:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (21:59):
It's way more complex than that.
Right.
And it was never as much as itwasn't about the injured party.
It's also not about the affairpartner,
Speaker 1 (22:09):
Right?
Yeah.
It's not,
Speaker 2 (22:11):
There's something that was going on
Speaker 1 (22:15):
In the marriage,
Speaker 2 (22:15):
In the marriage, in the person who had the affair
that they were not dealing withappropriately that caused them
to look outside the marriage.
Right.
Right.
And so it's much easier to blamethe wife or the husband.
It's much easier to blame theaffair partner.
It's much easier to blameanything and everything else,
(22:37):
but myself.
Speaker 1 (22:38):
Right.
So true.
And I think that that's, that'sreally hard for people to get,
you know?
Um, but it's so hard to kind ofwork out that this was a more
complex issue and that the way Ikind of framed it is that there
(22:58):
were hard conversations in themarriage before the affair that
we weren't able to have.
Speaker 2 (23:06):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (23:08):
You know that there have been difficult
conversations about how we feelabout each other or how we feel
about ourselves or how themarriage is going or anything,
our, our careers or whatever,but because of who we have been
to each other, we haven't reallybeen able to talk about those.
Yes.
I've never seen an affaircouple, a couple.
(23:31):
Who've had an affair in whichthey have been doing a good job
at having difficultconversations.
Speaker 2 (23:41):
Agreed, agreed.
And
Speaker 1 (23:43):
The road forward is learning how to have difficult
conversations
Speaker 2 (23:49):
In the context of dealing with fair healing and
trauma.
And, but yes, that is absolutelywhat is required for that true
healing to take place is youhave to learn how to be
uncomfortable and how to havehard conversations.
Right.
Because unfortunately life mightthrow something else your way,
10 years from now that disrupts,maybe it's something completely
(24:10):
outside the marriage, butdisrupts the relationship.
And if you don't learn how tohave those hard conversations,
well, what happens then?
Speaker 1 (24:17):
Right.
Right.
That's so true.
Yeah.
Cuz things happen.
I mean, somebody dies, somebodyloses a job, you have to move,
you have a kid who's in trouble,a
Speaker 2 (24:28):
Pandemic,
Speaker 1 (24:29):
A pandemic, oh God,
Speaker 2 (24:30):
Speaker 1 (24:32):
Not a pandemic place, but yeah.
It, and how do we do we feelthat we know how to deal with
these things that we can dealwith these things.
And that's, that's a hard thingto learn, but I was one of the
other podcasts you, you did,which I found really interesting
was on repeat affairs.
(24:54):
Which boy talk about achallenge.
You know, when you have repeataffairs, it's really difficult.
Yeah.
To build and rebuild trust, butI've seen people do that.
Seen both parties change, but itreally requires a willingness
to, as you said, beuncomfortable.
Speaker 2 (25:16):
Absolutely.
You're not gonna get too truehealing without it.
You just there's no, there's nodetour.
Speaker 1 (25:23):
Right.
There's no detour, but you know,we all want the detour.
We all want the shortcut.
We want
Speaker 2 (25:28):
The
what I for a living, but I still, I mean, you know,
Speaker 1 (25:36):
I'm happy to sit with your discomfort.
Sure.
Speaker 2 (25:38):
Absolutely.
But not mine.
I mean, my marriage is perfect.
Thank you very much.
Speaker 1 (25:44):
I was wondering, you know, I was saying one of the
things that drew me to this kindof working infidelity, and I
wonder since it's clearly such abig part of your practice, was
there, what kind of ma what isit that draws you or calls to
you about this kind of work?
Speaker 2 (26:00):
So I have a personal history with it, as you know,
that's probably not toosurprising.
Um, and I'm pretty open withthat in my story that my husband
did have an affair, uh, going on12 years now.
And so navigating that andworking through that, I also
have family history ofinfidelity, um, on my father's
side.
And so, um, I think goingthrough that, seeing the damage
(26:24):
it did as a child, seeing whatit did in my own life, you know,
I, I always said when I was inschool, I would never be a
counselor
Um, and I think by helpingothers navigate the same hard
thing that I went through, itgives my story a purpose.
(26:46):
It means that what I wentthrough has meaning, and I
didn't go through it fornothing.
And I find that that is veryfulfilling for me as a
practitioner and on a personallevel that it wasn't for any, it
wasn't for nothing.
Like I have a story that canhelp other people and I can use
both my personal story, but alsowhat I've learned as a therapist
(27:08):
and as a counselor of what worksto help individual individuals
and couples navigate a really,really painful time.
Speaker 1 (27:17):
Uh, well, I really want to thank you for sharing
that, cuz I didn't know that,that, that you had that story.
Um, and I really wanna assureyou that I didn't know that.
So I wasn't, this wasn't like alittle for that.
Speaker 2 (27:31):
It's okay.
If I wasn't comfortable sharing,I would've told you that, so,
Speaker 1 (27:38):
And feel free to push back and we can edit it out if
you want.
But now you're 12 years afterthe affair, what's it like for
you to talk about it?
Speaker 2 (27:50):
Most of the time it's like telling somebody else's
story.
Mm.
I remember what happened and Ican remember growing through it,
but there's, we are definitelynot the same people.
We're not the same couple wewere.
And so there's this spacebetween the emotion of what I
felt then and how it impacts menow.
(28:10):
Um, now sometimes there arepeople whose stories are maybe
similar to mine and that can bea little bit of a
but I've learned how to navigatethat.
And so 99% of the time, it'smore about using it to help
others, as opposed to me goingback to a place that was painful
for me.
So there is kind of aseparation.
(28:30):
Now when I talk about it, itfeels almost like somebody
else's story, cuz I don't feellike we're the same people.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
And so talking about it no longer triggers you, I
guess the way it, it
Speaker 2 (28:41):
I'm sure.
Yeah.
I can talk about it all day longand it's I can go home and be
just fine and not, not like I'mpretending to be fine, but
generally I'm fine.
Speaker 1 (28:49):
That's great.
Yeah.
That's amazing.
You know, and I was wonderingone of the last topics I wanted
to talk to you about, which isone that I, I find so
fascinating and difficult is thequestion of forgiveness.
I did a podcast a few weeks agowith a guy wrote just one of the
Bibles on forgiveness.
And we were talking about howdifficult the idea forgiveness
(29:11):
is.
And I think one of the issues isthat people confuse forgiveness
for thinking it's all right,right.
That if I forgive you, it meansthat what you did was okay or
that if I forgive you, it meansthat I forget about it.
Um, or if I forgive you, itmeans I can't bring it up again.
(29:34):
Right.
I'm wondering how you frame inyour mind, how forgiveness works
for clients when you talk tothem about what, how do you help
them understand what forgivenessmeans?
Speaker 2 (29:47):
So I like to frame it from first.
I like to talk about thedifference between forgiveness
and trust because forgivenessdoes not require anything of
your partner.
Trust requires something of yourpartner.
Mm it's.
The right behavior over aconsistent period of time.
Whereas forgiveness is reallynot for them though.
(30:08):
They benefit from it.
It's really for yourself to letgo of anger, to let go of the
pain from impacting your lifefor moving forward.
Right.
So I like to kind ofdifferentiate when I'm asking
for, when I'm talking to youabout forgiveness, I'm not
talking about trust twodifferent things.
And then I also like to remind,yeah,
Speaker 1 (30:28):
Well, I'm sorry, I'm gonna interrupt you.
Yeah.
For a second Jennifer.
Cause that was a really, reallyimportant statement you made
there.
And I think one in which I'm,I'm gonna admit that sometimes I
get a little confused and I maynot be clear enough with my
clients.
That there's a big differencebetween trust yes and
forgiveness.
I may forgive you, but thatdoesn't mean necessarily that I
trust you.
Speaker 2 (30:49):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (30:51):
Ah, that's so big.
Speaker 2 (30:52):
You can have forgiveness without trust.
Yeah.
You might not have arelationship.
Right.
But you can have forgivenesswithout trust.
I don't know that you cannecessarily have trust without
forgiveness though.
That is debatable.
I don't know yet.
But yeah.
I don't know.
That might be a further thoughtprocess I have to think about,
but it's not the same trustrequires something of your
(31:12):
partner.
Trust is earned over time,whereas forgiveness is given and
it's really more for yourselfthan it is for anybody else.
Speaker 1 (31:22):
Yeah.
And I think that's a really hardidea to communicate or to accept
that I'm forgiving her for mybenefit.
Speaker 2 (31:30):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (31:32):
That this forgiveness is about me.
Mm-hmm
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:37):
Yes.
And then now they benefit fromit.
Don't get me wrong.
Speaker 1 (31:40):
Right.
Speaker 2 (31:41):
Especially in the context of a healed
relationship, but I also letthem know and validate first
forgiveness is a process.
You're not gonna wake up one dayand be like, oh, forgiven them.
Um, you're never going to forgetshort of a brain injury.
You cannot erase the memory.
So forgiveness doesn't mean thatwe're forgetting nor does it
(32:01):
mean, like you said before, itdoesn't mean that I'm saying
it's okay.
It will never be okay whathappened period.
But I can still forgive theperson, the actions that they
did in order for me to move onmy healing.
Because if not, if I hold on tothe anger and the pain and the
bitterness, I'm the one thatsuffers.
(32:23):
Even if I'm not married anymore,they can go on and have a whole
life that they don't care if Iforgive them or not.
I'm the one who's stillsuffering.
Cause that anger is going to getin the way of other
relationships or truly moving onin a healthy way.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
You know, I, I have to admit that this was a
difficult concept for me to getas well.
Um, cuz you know, sometimesyou'll see a news article on and
somebody, somebody did aterrible thing to somebody's
family and that family thenforgives them.
And I would think to myself, howthe hell does that work?
Yeah, I don't get it.
(32:59):
And it was only through doingthis work with in infidelity
that I started to understandthat concept, that I'm forgi.
My forgiveness is about me andfor me and it doesn't mean that
I have forgotten or that it'sokay or that I'm now love them
(33:20):
or anything like that.
Correct.
But I've forgiven them so that Ican move on
Speaker 2 (33:25):
Perfectly said yes.
Yeah
Speaker 1 (33:28):
Boy, that's a heavy lift sometimes.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (33:31):
And I won't pretend that's easy either.
Right?
Cause we don't, I mean you'rejustified in your anger and your
hurt and all of that, but italso, you didn't choose this
happening to you, but you choosehow you are going to move on
from it.
And so if you want to move on ina way that's, that's not
impacting your life forever.
(33:51):
It takes time.
So again, this is not a rushedthing then.
And, and I also, for the peoplewho don't like forgiveness,
cause maybe it sounds tooreligious for them or there's a
con like a religious, spiritualconnotation.
I use the word acceptance.
Right?
Cause I've accepted that thishas happened.
I didn't choose it.
It's not my fault, but it'shappened.
And now I'm going to choose howI moved forward with accepting
(34:13):
that reality.
Speaker 1 (34:14):
And you can accept and you can forgive and you can
still be deeply unhappy andangry.
Yes.
And hurt.
Speaker 2 (34:22):
It does not negate what happened.
It does not mean you forget itnever, ever, ever means.
You're saying it was okay.
Speaker 1 (34:29):
And then last thing I want to talk about is something
that we brought up earlier,which is this idea that what I
call usually marriage 2.0, themarriage after the affair can
actually be better than themarriage.
1.0 mm-hmm
hard to convince anybody that,to believe that early on, but
(34:53):
I've seen it happen so manytimes that the second marriage
really doesn't look the same asthe, the, the one beforehand
they've they've had to change.
Mm-hmm
kind of think about that or, orwhat you've seen or what your
thoughts are about this ideathat the second, the, the
(35:15):
marriage actually improvesfollowing the affair.
Speaker 2 (35:18):
Yeah.
And I think it goes back to whatwe were talking about earlier in
regards to learning how to beuncomfortable and have hard
conversations is like you said,I've never seen a couple who,
where there's been an infidelitywhere they had, they had that
ability.
Right.
And so, and a lot of times inthe context where we're not
having hard conversations andmaybe one person's trying to get
(35:41):
that and the other person'sresistant and there's that push
and pull somebody's needs arenot being met.
Yeah.
There's a sense of disconnectsomewhere stemming from
something that's not reallybeing addressed fully.
And so an affair like anemotional near death experience
where it causes you toreevaluate what's important,
(36:02):
what your needs are in, in arelationship.
And so when both partners aregiving attention to not only the
healing, but what does it meanto fix some of the things?
Let me, let me clarify.
We have to feel some infidelityfirst, before we can address the
things that were going on in themarriage.
People try to get it backwards.
It doesn't work.
(36:23):
So once you've moved throughkind of starting to stitch
together that wound and it'sstarting to heal, you can then
address those areas of themarriage that maybe weren't
functioning very well to beginwith.
And so then there's healing forthat.
And then a new kind ofrelationship develops where we
can do hard things together.
We can have hard conversationsand then there's this confidence
(36:43):
of we can get through anything.
Mm-hmm
of the worst things somebody cango through and we navigated and
it was painful and we struggledand there was ups and downs, but
we did it together.
And so I think that's where itall ties in is giving that hope
for that relationship looksdifferent because you have two
people willing to beat eachother's needs, being willing to
(37:04):
ask for that.
Being willing to have hardconversations in a way that
probably wasn't existing beforethe affair happened or the
affair
Speaker 1 (37:11):
That's so good.
Yeah.
No, I think that's exactlyright.
And I love the way you kind ofmap that out to you.
That first you have to gothrough the affair process,
then, then we can look at themarriage and then people kind of
evolve.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:23):
Yes.
Yeah.
We can't, we can't do it theother way around doesn't work.
Speaker 1 (37:26):
We can't do it the other way.
No.
Cause you can't, you can'treestablish that trust until you
work through that.
Correct?
That pain.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:33):
Correct.
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (37:34):
One last thing I'd like to do.
Cause this has been such aninteresting discussion.
We've gone over so manydifferent kind of topics, which
have all been fascinating, butthe original, uh, topic about
re-engaging sexually just incase somebody's, that's really
what they're kind of strugglingwith is listening.
I just wanna go back to thatbriefly and summarize some of
(37:55):
the points that you brought up,which were so important, which
is that, yeah, this is hard.
That's a difficult moment.
And that it's very likely thatat least the beginning that
there'll be some triggers andit'll be difficult.
And that one of the things thatyou do is you kind of set up a
game plan beforehand.
(38:17):
Mm-hmm
that these triggers really bringup a lot of shame in both
partners and, and makes it verydifficult for them to connect
Roundup.
But that this actually is anopportunity, especially for the
affair partner to find, to havea purpose, have a function in
(38:37):
helping the other, the, theinjured partner partner heal or
work through that, that shame byjust being there for them.
Speaker 2 (38:47):
Absolutely.
It's it seems like a small thingthat has larger implications is
your ability to sit with me inmy pain, knowing that you caused
it means that I can begin torebuild trust with you because
if you disappear every time I'mhurting or I'm triggered, it's
hard to rebuild trust oremotional safety around that.
(39:08):
And that's where the involvedpartner, they have power.
They have the ability to makethis better based on how they
respond.
And if you don't know how torespond, go to your partner and
ask them what would be helpful,right?
What can I do initiate thatconversation?
Like we talked about, bring upthat conversation and say, I
wanna be proactive here.
This may be a struggle.
And if it's not great, but if itis, how do we navigate that
(39:31):
together?
Yeah.
What do you need from me?
Speaker 1 (39:34):
What do you need from me?
And that this may go on for awhile.
Yes.
Yes.
It may take a while beforesomeone's willing to really go
all the way from kissing toactual intercourse.
Yep.
That may take a while.
Speaker 2 (39:50):
So patience, patience with the process on both parties
would be really, reallyimportant because they may be on
different pacings in thishealing process.
So a more patient, you could bewith each other and not getting
defensive or trying to push yourpace.
So for the involved partner, notto push too much, if before the
(40:11):
injured partner is ready, alsogoes a long way.
Speaker 1 (40:14):
Okay.
Gotta recognize that for theinvolved partner, he or she
wants to push this.
Yes.
Because if, if we can starthaving sex with all, then we're
making progress.
He may not, he must not hate meso much.
So they really wanna havereengage sexually.
Cause that's a way
Speaker 2 (40:30):
It's fun.
Yes.
Right,
Speaker 1 (40:32):
Right, right.
You know, so, oh, maybe we'rethere's light at the end of the
tunnel.
Yep.
No, we gotta go slow.
Speaker 2 (40:38):
Yes.
You go partners pace
Speaker 1 (40:41):
Right at the end partner space.
That's perfect.
Well, Jennifer, I really want tothank you.
This has been such aninteresting and, and I can't
believe 45 minutes went by that.
I know that
Speaker 2 (40:51):
Really fast.
Speaker 1 (40:53):
That was such a great conversation.
I wanna thank you for coming andjoining us.
I just wish you well in your, inyour life and in your practice.
Thank you so much for having somuch and thank you for coming
and let me know if there'sanything I can ever do to help
you.
I appreciate
Speaker 2 (41:07):
It.
Thank you so much, Jacob.
Speaker 1 (41:09):
All right.
Take care.
Speaker 2 (41:10):
Bye
Speaker 1 (41:11):
Bye.
Well, that's our episode fortoday.
I hope we found it interestingand useful, but most of all, I'd
like a thank you for listening.
If you have a minute, please hitthe subscribe button and give us
a rating.
And I hope to see you again soonon another episode of sex, love
(41:32):
and couples therapy.
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