April 23, 2025 • 37 mins
In this heartfelt and deeply personal episode, Jay and Stacey open up about a topic that affects so many marriages but often goes unspoken—untreated pain. From childhood trauma to grief and insecurity, they share the raw truth of what it looked like to bring unresolved wounds into their relationship—and how God’s faithfulness, biblical counseling, and a whole lot of prayer helped them find healing and deeper intimacy.
Whether you’re newly married, walking through a rough season, or looking to strengthen your bond, this episode is a must-listen. You’ll hear stories they’ve never shared before, and powerful encouragement on what it means to recognize your baggage, deal with it in love, and let God do a restorative work in your marriage.
Takeaways include:
- How untreated pain can quietly damage your marriage
- Why vulnerability and counseling matter
- The biblical truth that led Stacey from shame to healing
- Why your marriage can get better with time—if you're willing to do the work
Don’t let pain from the past steal the joy of your present. Hit play, lean in, and let this conversation spark healing and hope in your relationship.
If this episode speaks to you, don’t forget to share it with a friend, subscribe, and leave a review—we’d love to hear how God is working in your life.
Grab your spouse's hand, open your heart, and let’s do the work—together.
Listen now and be encouraged to approach grief with hope and grace.
Let’s continue building stronger marriages and families—together.
Whether you're a young family seeking encouragement or simply love uplifting stories of faith and family, this episode offers heartfelt wisdom, humor, and inspiration.
Don’t forget to:
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Podcast Produced by Hi Hello Labs
Website: hihellolabs.com
Whether you’re newly married, walking through a rough season, or looking to strengthen your bond, this episode is a must-listen. You’ll hear stories they’ve never shared before, and powerful encouragement on what it means to recognize your baggage, deal with it in love, and let God do a restorative work in your marriage.
Takeaways include:
- How untreated pain can quietly damage your marriage
- Why vulnerability and counseling matter
- The biblical truth that led Stacey from shame to healing
- Why your marriage can get better with time—if you're willing to do the work
Don’t let pain from the past steal the joy of your present. Hit play, lean in, and let this conversation spark healing and hope in your relationship.
If this episode speaks to you, don’t forget to share it with a friend, subscribe, and leave a review—we’d love to hear how God is working in your life.
Grab your spouse's hand, open your heart, and let’s do the work—together.
Listen now and be encouraged to approach grief with hope and grace.
Let’s continue building stronger marriages and families—together.
Whether you're a young family seeking encouragement or simply love uplifting stories of faith and family, this episode offers heartfelt wisdom, humor, and inspiration.
Don’t forget to:
- Like, subscribe, and leave a comment with future topic suggestions
- Share this episode with friends or anyone facing a tough season
------------------------------------
Podcast Produced by Hi Hello Labs
Website: hihellolabs.com
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
Hey everybody, and welcome back to the Love Like Crazy podcast.
I'm Jay. This is my beautiful wife, Stacy, and we
have so much fun doing these podcasts together as we
want to help you build a stronger marriage, build a
stronger family, and it is great to be able to
spend time with you.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
That's right, And so we just want to give a
big shout out to all of our listeners. Thank you
for following along and subscribing, even on YouTube, and you know,
sharing with others. If there's an episode that you really
like that helps you, you know, share it with someone
else maybe it can help them as well. And so
we appreciate all that you're doing to help us get
(00:59):
the word out about this podcast.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
I just want to say, as we dive off, and
I've been telling you this on a regular basis, your
hair looks really good.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
Oh, thank you?
Speaker 1 (01:07):
Like that?
Speaker 2 (01:07):
Thank you?
Speaker 1 (01:09):
Well that you and I are going to dig into
some stuff today and we kind of wanted to be
kind of organic the direction that we're going to take
this episode, and we're going to talk about untreated pain today.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
Right. Well, you know, a few weeks back, we hosted
a marriage conference at our church, a Love Like Crazy
marriage Conference and the message that we shared in I
believe it's episode forty seven if you want to go
back and listen to it. We talked about the baggage
that we carry or bring into our marriages, you know,
(01:44):
from our upbringing. And so one of the things that
we discussed at the marriage conference in that message was
talking about untreated pain. And so I just wanted us
today to like dig in a little bit deeper on
that and even by using our own personal experiences that
(02:04):
we share a little bit more than we were able
to at the conference.
Speaker 1 (02:08):
Well, when I do PREMI Metal counseling, one of the
illustrations that I always use with couples as they're getting
ready to step into this covenant is I tell them
that one of my responsibilities is to help you deal
with some of the baggage that you're going to bring
into this marriage. It does not matter how great your
expectations might be for a marriage. It does not matter
these pine the sky ideals that you might have, what
(02:30):
your marriage is going to look like. It's going to
be perfect, We love each other, ooh, you know all
that kind of stuff. Everybody brings baggage into a marriage,
into a relationship, And what that baggage looks like is
the opinions, the ideas, the hurts, the disappointments, maybe failed relationships, yea,
the things that have happened to you within your personal
(02:50):
life that are traumatic, maybe rejection that you have faced.
Those things affect you and a lot of times we think, oh,
those are behind me, those are my past. But all
too often we stuff those things down into a quote
unquote unseen suitcase and we carry them with us to
the next relationship, are into our marriage. A lot of
(03:13):
people love to talk about the stats on marriage, and
I say this on a regular basis, that fifty percent
of marriages wind up in divorce court. Right, Well, the
reality is about forty six percent of first time marriages,
fifty two or three percent of second time marriages, sixty
three or four percent of third time marriages wind up
in divorce court. You say, well, why does that number
go up? Because you are accumulating more and more baggage
(03:36):
or untreated pain, and you are taking that into the
next relationship. So the reality is, why don't we just
deal with the things that are in our life and
allow our marriage to be healed and made whole as
we individually are healed and made whole.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
Well, I do think though, first we have to recognize
that we are carrying around this baggage that we have,
maybe some untreated pain, are just some things that we
would rather just stuff down deep inside and not deal
with it. And so I think it has to do
with basically owning your stuff and recognizing it and need
(04:19):
be If help is required outside help, meaning like a
counselor or some pastoral advice or you know, something like that,
then we need to be willing and decide to be
mature enough to step out and ask for that kind
of help.
Speaker 1 (04:38):
Well, I think that one good way to look at
this is when you get sick in your body, what
do you do?
Speaker 2 (04:42):
You go to the doctor, you get help, You get help.
Speaker 1 (04:45):
You step out and get help. I know that I've
got a great doctor that I love to go and
it's kind of funny because oftentimes when I go visiting him,
it is like want to visit a friend more than
a doctor. We sit and we would visit for quite
some time, and you know, by the end of that
he wants to know what is the problem, and I'm
going to tell him, and.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
He's trying to get to the reate of the problem.
Speaker 1 (05:03):
And I'm going to specifically tell him these are the symptoms,
and then he's going to say, well, that is caused
by and he's going to diagnose the issue. Then he's
going to tell me things like eat healthy, exercise, take
this antibiotic, whatever the solution might be to the problem,
because it wants to help heal me and make me better.
(05:24):
Well in our marriages. One of the verses that kind
of pops out at me. I love to quote Proverbs.
Proverbs is one of those books that whenever I was
growing up, my mom was always quoting Proverbs because it's
a book that we look towards for wisdom, and Proverbs
thirteen twelve says that hope deferred makes the heart sick,
but a dream that is fulfilled is a tree of life.
(05:45):
Now I like that, because you know, you go into
your marriage with all these hopes, all these aspirations, all
these dreams, and maybe they don't quite turn out the
way that you thought. Or you think, well, as we're
married longer it's deferred, we get down the road a
little bit, we're gonna our marriage will be happy. Then well,
you got to work on it, and you got to
allow the Holy Spirit to work on you. If you
(06:06):
really want your your your marriage to be happy and healthy,
if you want to live out that dream and for
your marriage truly to be a tree of life to you,
then it starts with allowing God to work on you
and heal you.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
Right. And then too, what we're carrying all of this,
you know, these different things, negative things in our life.
And then once we get married, unfortunately, you know, learning
to to live with someone that you've not lived with before,
or just learning each other's different neosyncrasies. You know, you
(06:43):
it may cause some of this untreated pain or this
baggage to kind of bubble up to the surface. And
you either have you either you're going to deal with it,
either in a negative way or a positive way.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
Well, I know when we got married, I didn't a
whole lot of you know, issues into the marriage. You
didn't perfect.
Speaker 2 (07:04):
All I can say this is not.
Speaker 1 (07:07):
You won the lottery, Okay, I did.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
I mean, I know, I know, I'm extremely blessed. I am,
and we've been married now for almost thirty three years,
and but but we have been through a lot together
and I can definitely say I'm speaking from experience that
when we first got married. I mean, oh goodness, there
(07:31):
was a lot of pain that I had in my life,
some things I had experienced in my upbringing that really
didn't come to the surface until we got married. And
and I mean it came out in a lot of
my emotions. I realized I was really a very angry person.
(07:53):
I had, I'd been, I had stuff to anger because
in my upbringing, I really had never really spoken up
for myself. But then when we got married, I started
speaking up for myself, right, wouldn't you say? Just a
little and just to give you a little bit of background,
you know, we and there may be a lot of
(08:15):
listeners who can identify with this, that maybe there was
some form of abuse in your childhood, whether it be
emotional or verbal, your sexual abuse, you know, physical abuse
as well. I definitely dealt with some of these forms
(08:36):
of abuse when I was younger, and and verbally, I
think I felt very I don't know, put down. It
just kind of destroyed a little bit.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
Of my innocence.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
My innocence, my self image was probably tarnished.
Speaker 1 (08:58):
I would say things to you, talk about how beautiful
you weren't all these and it was just kind of
like it was hitting teflon and flying off of you
wouldn't receive any of it. And I'm like, what is
wrong with you? Why? Why don't you believe these things
about yourself?
Speaker 2 (09:09):
Well, I think I just honestly, I really had the
mindset that I probably wasn't good enough or I wasn't
pretty enough. And I mean if you if you were
to tell me, if we were getting dressed to go
out for a date, and you would say, oh, I
love that outfit. You look really pretty. I could receive
something like that and say, oh, thank you. But for
(09:31):
you to randomly tell me you are so you know,
you are so beautiful. I love you, and I'm sitting
there with you know, no makeup. You know I'm not
looking my best, I'm not feeling my best. That I
would just be like in my mind thinking, no, you crazy,
Yeah no I don't. I don't feel beautiful and I
don't think that I look beautiful. But I do appreciate
(09:54):
all the efforts that you made in those early years
when I really could and receive.
Speaker 1 (10:01):
One of the things that I tell people all the
time is you cannot be loved by your feelings because
your feelings live to you and you just said I
may not feel right, you know, like I am beautiful.
What doesn't matter if you feel it or not. If
I think that or I know that and I speak
that over you, then it's something that you need to
receive and be able to walk in. I know when
we first got married, look, I was twenty years old.
(10:22):
I was yeah, I was very you know, selfish, and
we go into this marriage. We move in together into
this little apartment that I had in Pineville, Louisiana, Tanglewood Terraces,
a little one bedroom apartment upstairs upstairs.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
Do not like upstairs apartments.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
I was just excited because we were going to live together,
build a life together, and we get to have sex now.
So just fired up about that and just go into
this with this excitement. And wow, little did I know
that I had, you know, married somebody who has had
a lot of a lot of pain in her life
that had been untreated. And the next thing, you know,
(11:05):
that starts getting like, I guess the only phrase I
can come up with it it was taken I want
to say, taken out on me, but maybe really what
I'm I was the recipient in that time because you
felt safe with me.
Speaker 2 (11:19):
Right, I was gonna say you were my safe person,
and you were the one that I could that I
was the closest to that I could confide in. And
it just it just kind of this untreated pain that
I had, some of it that I didn't even realize
was there. It started bubbling to the surface, you know,
it would it would manifest in the craziest ways, like
(11:44):
you would come home from work, and maybe it was
just something that you said to me, or maybe it
wasn't even what you said, it was how you said
it to me to say that, yeah, yeah, it was
your talent.
Speaker 1 (11:59):
It was that what you said, it was how you was, how.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
You said, or that you and I noticed that if
you came up behind me and I did like I would,
you would startle me. I would I would just almost
go berserk on you. And a few times, I'm being
I'm being real honest here, I'm being real honest that
these are the things that that did happen. And I
(12:23):
mean it would startle me to such an extent that
I would literally turn around and start swinging as if
I was being attacked and that and that wasn't what
you were doing.
Speaker 1 (12:35):
I'm just coming up to give you a hug, right,
you were.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
Just trying to come and give me a hut, just
like what.
Speaker 1 (12:39):
A husband would do to his wife, walks up behind me, like, Oh,
what's up girl?
Speaker 2 (12:43):
And there were just certain things that that you said,
are did that? You know, it triggered me, is really
what happened, And so I would react. I would react
in a way that I was trying to fend myself,
you know, And and I really didn't understand why I
(13:04):
was doing that and why that it was mainly towards
you until later on, you know, I did. I did
seek out help or you know, discuss these issues with
with someone who could help me recognize that I really
had a lot of pain from my upbringing in the
(13:26):
sense that I was very very close to my mom,
but my dad he was a workaholic and so he
wasn't around all the time, and then when he was around,
you know, we just kind of felt neglect. It was
neglect maybe in the relationship that we really didn't have
(13:52):
a deep relationship. Not not that he did tell us
that he loved us and all that kind of stuff.
He was a great provider, and.
Speaker 1 (14:00):
But he was emotionally disconnected.
Speaker 2 (14:02):
Emotionally disconnected, and you know, there was there was some
emotional and verbal abuse. You know, he had anger and
and so that would come out towards us. And so
I always felt like I was constantly you know, disappointing,
I guess, and so that is what aided in my
(14:23):
low self esteem. You know, I couldn't receive anything positive
that you would try to tell me.
Speaker 1 (14:31):
Well, in all honesty though, because I don't want our
listeners to think that it was all your dad's fault
as well, there was that aspect. But at the same token,
that was back in the day that I didn't really
understand your love language. It was not really speaking you
know what right in a way that you really received right.
Speaker 2 (14:50):
We didn't we didn't have a lot of like premierital counseling.
We didn't you know, go to a marriage conference. We
really didn't even if we had a problem. We didn't
even go sit down with our pastors at the time,
you know, we didn't seek help. It was almost like
it was taboo to talk right, to talk about your
problems are to seek help as as far as like
(15:12):
going to see a counselor where you were labeled like
you well that's for crazy people.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
And let me say this, if you know, we would
get into these disagreements or as you said, or you went,
you would go berserk.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:25):
Some of our response oftentimes is that like, oh my god,
what have you lost your mind? Have you gone crazy?
And then and then on the fire.
Speaker 2 (15:35):
Yeah, I was like, don't tell me I'm crazy. Yeah,
And so it would just end up in a huge fights.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
Little did we know that there were things lying beneath
the surface that, like you said earlier, being triggered and
it was causing these issues in our marriage. Uh, you know,
we went through a period there. I remember whenever I
asked you to marry me, and the pastors of the
church that we were at at that time, we went
and sat down with them, and the the premieral counseling
(16:01):
kind of consisted of something like, so y'all want to
get married, Yeah, y'all love each other? Yeah, all right,
we're gonna pray for you. And that pretty much was it.
And we went through a pastoral change and then we
had our new pastor come in at that time, and
more or less he came into the the I'm gonna
do your wedding. We had him do our wedding. But
there really wasn't, you know, any premarital counseling or anything,
(16:22):
because he in his defense, he thought that that had
already been handled and we didn't say anything. We didn't know.
And so that's one of the reasons why now if
I do a wedding, it's a requirement I will do
premial counseling. We're going to do through four sessions, walk
through and I have had a couple of couples that
have come in that actually did not wind up getting
(16:44):
married because they saw that the differences that they had,
maybe they were not a good match. They were not
that compatible. And that's always a sad thing, you know.
Over the thirty years of ministry, I've seen that happen
a couple of times. But that's why it's so important
for you to go get premarital counseling, as I like
to say, to help unpack some of the baggage. Fold
(17:05):
some socks, put some underwear away, put the toiletries where
they've to deal with some of that baggage before you
get into the marriage. Because the marriages is hard work.
It's an investment. It's something that you're going to work
on and build. So for us stepping into this marriage,
there was no baggage unpacked, and I had no idea
we were stepping into not only that you were dealing
(17:27):
with grief as well, because you lost your mom. I
think of this now and it's like, I was so
stupid because you had just lost your mom two years
before before I met you, right, and four years after
marriage got married. Correct, And this is still fairly fresh
now that I'm getting older, and I'm understand I walk
with families through this as a pastor, I understand just
(17:50):
how fresh this was. And going through your graduation, these
major life markers, graduation, engagement, marriage without your mom there
at your just how difficult that may have been. And
so I've told the story before our honeymoon. We show up,
we get married, We drive to bad Rouge hotel room,
we get there and I'm like wow, yeah, and you
(18:12):
sat on the end of the bed and you started crying,
and I'm like, what, what what did you do wrong? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (18:20):
Already something wrong crying and this is not the wonderful
and wild honeymoon that I had envisioned.
Speaker 1 (18:30):
And I didn't know what to do.
Speaker 2 (18:32):
Remember, everything had just kind of caught up with me.
You know, whenever you planned a wedding and you have
all the festivities and all the excitement and the anticipation,
but yet it can be rather stressful. By the time
we got, you know, to the hotel room and things
kind of settled, and all of a sudden it hit me,
(18:53):
you know. And so I wasn't trying to put a
damper almost it's supposed to be, you know, our honeymoon,
but it was really something that I had to deal
with at the moment.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
Yeah, and now I understand that I understand exactly what
you were in that moment, thinking and feeling right, And
you know, I was not, like I said, twenty years old, immature, selfish.
I was not the probably the most sensitive guy dealing
with that. I was just trying to deal with his
best in new How then we come back from that honeymoon,
we step into this, you know, building a life together,
(19:24):
and you were responding and I didn't never really grow
up seeing by my parents. I'm sure that they disagreed.
I do remember one or two, you know, arguments that
they had, but that you know, I didn't really see
a lot of that growing up. So we step into
this and there's a lot of a lot of strife,
a lot of arguing, and you know, there were things
(19:46):
inside of me that that came out towards you whenever
you got got triggered. And you know, it was just
kind of one of these situations.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
We can laugh about it now. It really wasn't funny
back then.
Speaker 1 (19:57):
It was not funny at all. The makeup was all some.
Speaker 2 (20:00):
But makeup sex.
Speaker 1 (20:03):
You mean, yes, yes, I'm probably getting to write turn
read now, Okay, that's all right. Whenever we preach and
we talk about this kind of stuff together, you love
to embarrass me and make me blush. But yeah, you
know I always tell everybody, you know, you make up
so that you can make out.
Speaker 2 (20:21):
Yes, And we did a lot of Yeah, there's a
lot of arguing. Well, it was the trying to get
to know one another and learn each other's ways, you know,
when you first get married. But then it was just
I don't know, it was really just like this storm
of emotions that just began to circle around me that
(20:46):
I really did not I did not have the tools
to process things, you know, in a healthy weight. Losing
my mom. She had been very sick leading up to
her death, and so that in itself. Being a teenager
caused me to have to grow up really quickly, and
so I felt like I was, you know, I had
(21:07):
to mature in a way that maybe others were able
to enjoy that time of their life, you know, in
a better way. And so, you know, stepping into marriage
that it was a really it was a really it's
a big thing, you know, a big decision that you make,
and so it was it was quite the learning curve, right,
(21:32):
And I say.
Speaker 1 (21:32):
The least, I think a lot of towns whenever we
we hurt, when we go through things, when there's trauma
from past abuse, a lot of towns we just try to,
like you know, slap a smiley face on and particularly
everything's okay. I think we shared this whenever we did
the conference. In Jeremiah six, I think it's verse fourteen.
It talks about Jeremiah says that they dressed the wounds
(21:53):
of the people as though they were not serious piece
piece they say, when there is no peace, and what
that verse is telling us, they're more or less pretending
like everything is okay when it's not okay. And a
lot of times in our marriages and our relationships, we
do that. We pretend like everything's okay. Just put on
a happy face, let's tough our way through this, instead
of getting to the root of the problem. For me,
(22:15):
I talked about going to the doctor earlier. So many
times I will not feel well in my body and
you're like, you need to go to the doctor. I'm like,
I'm not going to the doctor. I'll be okay. And
typically when that happens, if I do want up one
to the doctor's put off quite a few days. I'm okay,
I'm fine, to where I finally just get to the
point where like I don't really have a choice. And
(22:38):
as a result, we do the same thing with our relationships.
All Right, everything's good, right now, everything's fine, So let's
just pretend like everything's okay. Well, then you have this
cycle that you go through and it's like all of
a sudden, you're fussing, you're squabbling, you're arguing. It could
be very toxic. And then when things kind of settle down,
you're like, well, everything's okay now, so let's not rattle
(23:00):
the tiger king. And so you don't ever really get
the help you need. And back when we first got married,
a couple of things were taking place. First of all,
we didn't really have the resources.
Speaker 2 (23:11):
We needed, that's true.
Speaker 1 (23:13):
Uh. And then you know, we were actually volunteer youth
pastors of the church. And you don't want people to
know you're you're walking through this, although our pastor probably
would have said, you know what, that's normal. You're you're
a young gray. A couple of these are things you're
going to work your way through. You certainly didn't go
get professional counseling because in those days that was a
taboo thing. If you did, you were crazy. Uh, And
(23:35):
don't let anybody say that, and.
Speaker 2 (23:36):
Don't say that to me.
Speaker 1 (23:38):
So we were just kind of stuck. Now. Fortunately we
did not throw in the towel.
Speaker 2 (23:43):
Now, and I want a preference. I mean, it's not
like that's all we did was fight, you know. No,
it was just that there were certain times things would happen,
and like I said, things would be said or done
and it would just it would just cause all those
emotions that I had suppressed would just come up to
the surface. And so and I didn't quite know how
(24:05):
to I didn't know how to process those feelings, and
I didn't know why I was feeling that way, and
it wasn't until later on, probably when we you know,
were having our boys and stuff, that I begin to
maybe get some help, some some some counseling, some biblical counseling.
Speaker 1 (24:29):
You started figuring out these things that.
Speaker 2 (24:30):
Are Yeah, I started putting the puzzle right, the puzzle
pieces were kind of coming together at that time where
I was realizing why those certain things would kind of
set me off. And so I did, you know, start
working on on those past pains that that I was
(24:51):
was feeling. So things things did begin to get better.
But that's why I'm like, you have to recognize what
what the problem is. And so for the law longest time,
I really didn't have an understanding of why I was
feeling that way. And then when and I prayed about
it a lot. To be honest, it really was something
that I prayed about because I felt like there was
(25:13):
just these things that were coming in between us being closer,
you know, in our marriage.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Why are you I'm so because we prayed about these
things together a lot, and I would pray something like, Laura,
please help, We're not to be so.
Speaker 2 (25:25):
Crazy, Please help, We're not be so mean to me? Yeah,
you know, And then of course I mean like you said,
it was some of the things were just maturity on
our part. You know, we were young and we just
we just as we matured, then we were able to
work out things in our marriage.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
And I don't want our listeners to think that you
were the only ones who came into this Marri, I
said earlier, like you won the lottery, like you, I
came to the marriage and I'm awesome. And that's by
and large pretty true. No, No, there were issues that
I brought into the marriage as well. Uh, you know,
things that that very opinionated, very stubborn, uh.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
Not extremely patient, No.
Speaker 1 (26:09):
And still still am not. That's something that the Lord
constantly is working on me about. Uh. And so with
that said, we're just trying to make our way through.
But when you couple that in, I mean, by and large,
my mom and dad they had they have a great marriage.
They modeled for me. Uh, in my opinion, you know
what a healthy marriage should look like. But there were
(26:32):
still things inside of me that were the immaturity, the selfishness,
the stubbornness, the just a lot of things that people
bring into life. But then you couple that with somebody
who's coming out of dealing with grief, dealing with trauma,
dealing with things from past abuse, and I'm not equipped
to handle this, and man, it was. It was not
(26:53):
a healthy situation, fortunately, because here's what a lot of
people do when they walk through times like this. They
isolate themselves. They push away from each other. There's a
distance there, and that's exactly what the devil wants. He
wants to drive a wedge there in your marriage, to
cause distance between you. And then, unfortunately, a lot of
times people wind up seeking the arms of somebody else
(27:17):
because there's distance there, and then they eventually might even
wind up in divorce court as a result. Fortunately that
was not the course for us. We went into marriage like,
divorce is not an option, and your parents stayed married
until your mom passed. My parents are still married. They
celebrated fifty years this past December, and we said divorce
(27:40):
is not an option. And we may have disagreed and
argued to have fought a lot, but we still work
those things out and worked our way through those things.
So we come to this place where you decide, hey,
I need to get some help. You start putting the
puzzle pieces together. And we had not allowed this to
cause you know a division between us.
Speaker 2 (28:00):
Yeah, well I do think, you know, because it was
something you know, we were both believers, you know, when
we when we married, we did I did pray and
ask the Lord to show me, you know what the
root cause of some of these issues that I was having.
And I mean God has been faithful to send me
(28:24):
the help and the resources needed. But I do think
it took me being willing to be vulnerable enough and
honest enough to talk to you about the situation, the
things that I was feeling, but then also to go
and seek professional help as well, whether it's taboo or not,
(28:47):
you know. And so I would encourage any anyone all
of our listeners, you know, don't ever be don't ever
feel ashamed to go and seek professional no help for
you know, whatever the situation may be.
Speaker 1 (29:03):
Or let me say this, it's a wonderful thing to
be involved in a good Bible believing, Bible teaching church,
yes that is going to preach the gospel, and in
your involvement in that church, to go sit down with
your pastors. Go sit down with your pastor and his
wife and share what's going on in your life and
(29:23):
get some help there. I know, for us we love
to sit and meet with people. I've heard a lot
of people talk about, well, you know, counseling is not
my favorite thing in the world, But then I have
a lot of friends like for us. We love to
sit down with people and help them navigate the different
things that they're walking through. And we've had ones in
our life who have helped us in that regard as well.
(29:44):
And so I would tell you, get help, don't stay
where you are, don't think that it's normal. You didn't
start realizing. I didn't even know this until you started.
Like you said, the puzzle pieces started coming together. You
sat down and started talking, getting good biblical counsel from someone.
And I remember you coming home and telling me these
(30:05):
are some things that the Lord has revealed to me.
And I was just like, well, that makes a lot
of sense, because that's why you would respond in this way.
Speaker 2 (30:12):
Yeah, So the puzzle pieces started coming together where I'm like, Okay,
I realized, you know that certain things were said and
done in my past that caused me to struggle with
the emotions that I had and to to you know,
respond and react to you the way that I did.
(30:33):
And so so I discovered the route and once I did,
then then I had, you know, the choice to say, Okay,
I'm gonna I'm gonna work on this, I'm gonna deal
with I'm gonna deal with my stuff. And so yeah,
just just by recognizing what had happened in my past,
the different abuse that I had incurred then, and talking
(30:58):
to you about then we were able honestly we could
work on it together. That you could help me, you know,
and we could we could help each other so that
I could get to a place of wholeness. And so
really for me to even be talking about all of
this on this podcast, it's it is it's a huge thing.
(31:20):
Because even though I received a lot of healing, I
didn't want to talk about it, you know, I didn't
want to tell anybody. I still felt a certain level
of shame that that kind of kept me bound for
a long time. But but we were able to, you know,
work on these things because because we were working on
(31:42):
it together. And but then there was also the level
of there's just certain things that I had to deal
with myself, you know, that you couldn't help me with.
That was strictly like the Lord showing me, revealing me
with revealing to me with the biblical count so that
I received, you know, seeing the truth of God's word
(32:05):
you know, applied to my life and spoken over me
because I was believing so many lies of the enemy,
you know, that had had really damaged my self image
and and so reprocessing having a mind shift to see
myself as as the Lord sees me and and what
(32:25):
he has for me. I just really saw God's faithfulness
in the healing process in my life. And so there
was a lot of healing that took place. But once
once my grandmother passed away a couple of years ago,
you know, we mentioned this on a couple of other episodes,
I made a conscious effort to pursue a grief counselor
(32:50):
to help me not only with the loss of my granny,
but it was all the compounding loss that I had
experienced over the years, and that in turn led to
talking through some other things that were traumatic in my life.
And so the Lord has used that to bring about
a healing, a healing, and a wholeness to my life
(33:13):
that I had not experienced before. And so now I
want to tell others, Hey, if you're struggling, seek help,
you know, pray about it. The Lord can can send
you the resources, and if you will determine to work
on these things, then then that healing is there for you.
(33:33):
God's faithful to take care of you well.
Speaker 1 (33:35):
And I think I think back, you know, Paul writes
in Romans chapter twelve. He talks about walking out God's
good and perfect will, and that comes our way by
allowing God to renew our mind, not conforming to the
world standards and allowing him to renew and transform our mind.
And so as you begin to allow the Holy Spirit
to work on you and change you from the inside out,
(33:57):
then our marriage could come to the place where we
I'm not going to say we have bad marriage. We
had a good marriage, but we were just kind of
making our way through these things that we didn't recognize
in reality was untreated pain. Yes, And as you came
to the realization I want God to work on these
things and renew me on the inside, then it's amazing
how you can walk out the will that He has
for your life, for our marriage and for our family.
(34:19):
And now here we are empty nesting and we're able
to kind of share our story with people and maybe
even help people through what they might be facing.
Speaker 2 (34:28):
Yeah, and you know, I think if I had not
dealt with all of that untreated pain, you know, being
at this season as an empty nester, probably would not
be as good, you know, as it is now. If
I had not dealt with those things, you know, because
(34:49):
it was it was a hindrance to us growing closer together,
and that was not God's.
Speaker 1 (34:56):
Best definitely not his will nor his plans right right
to be able to We like to tell people we're
best friends, you know. And I think that after all
these years of marriage, I think every year gets better.
I think a lot of times people think the early
years or the honeymoon years, that's the best. No for us.
Every year, in my opinion, our marriage just gets better
(35:17):
and better and we get closer and closer. And so,
you know, I think it's because we allow God to
help you deal with the things that were there. I
allow God to help deal with the things that were
in my life and brought us the place of a
healthy marriage.
Speaker 2 (35:29):
Right.
Speaker 1 (35:30):
So, well, it's been good, it has. I hope that
this has helped our listeners today. And maybe there's something
you're walking through that you don't quite understand. And I'll
say this again, get help, don't hold that in get help.
Go talk to your pastor seek out a good, godly
biblical counselor who will help you deal with those things
and allow God to help you be healed so that
(35:53):
you can let out His good and pleasing will and
plan for your life.
Speaker 2 (35:56):
Yeah, don't let that untreated pain keep you from drawing
closer to your spouse. Don't allow that to be an
active division between you, but draw closer to each other
and allow the Lord to work in your life.
Speaker 1 (36:11):
Well, thank you for being a part of this podcast today.
This has been a very personal topic for us, something that,
as she said earlier, she hasn't always shared because many
times the enemy would cause her to feel shame about that.
The devil would tell her you don't want to talk
to people about that. And now she's becoming more and
more open about it. And I believe that it is
helping people like you be able to see things within
(36:32):
your life and allow God to bring healing to your
life as well. And so if you've enjoyed this, make
sure you subscribe to our YouTube channel. Just hit that
little click that little button and says subscribe and it'll
let you know. It'll lurt you upcoming podcasts that are
coming up different episodes. Make sure that you like or
leave us a comic, give us a review. We love
to hear from our listeners, and thank you for being
(36:54):
a part of this podcast. And as always, I'm Jay.
Speaker 2 (36:56):
And I'm Stacy and this is love like Crazy. Mold
the
Speaker 1 (37:14):
Load
Hey everybody, and welcome back to the Love Like Crazy podcast.
I'm Jay. This is my beautiful wife, Stacy, and we
have so much fun doing these podcasts together as we
want to help you build a stronger marriage, build a
stronger family, and it is great to be able to
spend time with you.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
That's right, And so we just want to give a
big shout out to all of our listeners. Thank you
for following along and subscribing, even on YouTube, and you know,
sharing with others. If there's an episode that you really
like that helps you, you know, share it with someone
else maybe it can help them as well. And so
we appreciate all that you're doing to help us get
(00:59):
the word out about this podcast.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
I just want to say, as we dive off, and
I've been telling you this on a regular basis, your
hair looks really good.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
Oh, thank you?
Speaker 1 (01:07):
Like that?
Speaker 2 (01:07):
Thank you?
Speaker 1 (01:09):
Well that you and I are going to dig into
some stuff today and we kind of wanted to be
kind of organic the direction that we're going to take
this episode, and we're going to talk about untreated pain today.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
Right. Well, you know, a few weeks back, we hosted
a marriage conference at our church, a Love Like Crazy
marriage Conference and the message that we shared in I
believe it's episode forty seven if you want to go
back and listen to it. We talked about the baggage
that we carry or bring into our marriages, you know,
(01:44):
from our upbringing. And so one of the things that
we discussed at the marriage conference in that message was
talking about untreated pain. And so I just wanted us
today to like dig in a little bit deeper on
that and even by using our own personal experiences that
(02:04):
we share a little bit more than we were able
to at the conference.
Speaker 1 (02:08):
Well, when I do PREMI Metal counseling, one of the
illustrations that I always use with couples as they're getting
ready to step into this covenant is I tell them
that one of my responsibilities is to help you deal
with some of the baggage that you're going to bring
into this marriage. It does not matter how great your
expectations might be for a marriage. It does not matter
these pine the sky ideals that you might have, what
(02:30):
your marriage is going to look like. It's going to
be perfect, We love each other, ooh, you know all
that kind of stuff. Everybody brings baggage into a marriage,
into a relationship, And what that baggage looks like is
the opinions, the ideas, the hurts, the disappointments, maybe failed relationships, yea,
the things that have happened to you within your personal
(02:50):
life that are traumatic, maybe rejection that you have faced.
Those things affect you and a lot of times we think, oh,
those are behind me, those are my past. But all
too often we stuff those things down into a quote
unquote unseen suitcase and we carry them with us to
the next relationship, are into our marriage. A lot of
(03:13):
people love to talk about the stats on marriage, and
I say this on a regular basis, that fifty percent
of marriages wind up in divorce court. Right, Well, the
reality is about forty six percent of first time marriages,
fifty two or three percent of second time marriages, sixty
three or four percent of third time marriages wind up
in divorce court. You say, well, why does that number
go up? Because you are accumulating more and more baggage
(03:36):
or untreated pain, and you are taking that into the
next relationship. So the reality is, why don't we just
deal with the things that are in our life and
allow our marriage to be healed and made whole as
we individually are healed and made whole.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
Well, I do think though, first we have to recognize
that we are carrying around this baggage that we have,
maybe some untreated pain, are just some things that we
would rather just stuff down deep inside and not deal
with it. And so I think it has to do
with basically owning your stuff and recognizing it and need
(04:19):
be If help is required outside help, meaning like a
counselor or some pastoral advice or you know, something like that,
then we need to be willing and decide to be
mature enough to step out and ask for that kind
of help.
Speaker 1 (04:38):
Well, I think that one good way to look at
this is when you get sick in your body, what
do you do?
Speaker 2 (04:42):
You go to the doctor, you get help, You get help.
Speaker 1 (04:45):
You step out and get help. I know that I've
got a great doctor that I love to go and
it's kind of funny because oftentimes when I go visiting him,
it is like want to visit a friend more than
a doctor. We sit and we would visit for quite
some time, and you know, by the end of that
he wants to know what is the problem, and I'm
going to tell him, and.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
He's trying to get to the reate of the problem.
Speaker 1 (05:03):
And I'm going to specifically tell him these are the symptoms,
and then he's going to say, well, that is caused
by and he's going to diagnose the issue. Then he's
going to tell me things like eat healthy, exercise, take
this antibiotic, whatever the solution might be to the problem,
because it wants to help heal me and make me better.
(05:24):
Well in our marriages. One of the verses that kind
of pops out at me. I love to quote Proverbs.
Proverbs is one of those books that whenever I was
growing up, my mom was always quoting Proverbs because it's
a book that we look towards for wisdom, and Proverbs
thirteen twelve says that hope deferred makes the heart sick,
but a dream that is fulfilled is a tree of life.
(05:45):
Now I like that, because you know, you go into
your marriage with all these hopes, all these aspirations, all
these dreams, and maybe they don't quite turn out the
way that you thought. Or you think, well, as we're
married longer it's deferred, we get down the road a
little bit, we're gonna our marriage will be happy. Then well,
you got to work on it, and you got to
allow the Holy Spirit to work on you. If you
(06:06):
really want your your your marriage to be happy and healthy,
if you want to live out that dream and for
your marriage truly to be a tree of life to you,
then it starts with allowing God to work on you
and heal you.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
Right. And then too, what we're carrying all of this,
you know, these different things, negative things in our life.
And then once we get married, unfortunately, you know, learning
to to live with someone that you've not lived with before,
or just learning each other's different neosyncrasies. You know, you
(06:43):
it may cause some of this untreated pain or this
baggage to kind of bubble up to the surface. And
you either have you either you're going to deal with it,
either in a negative way or a positive way.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
Well, I know when we got married, I didn't a
whole lot of you know, issues into the marriage. You
didn't perfect.
Speaker 2 (07:04):
All I can say this is not.
Speaker 1 (07:07):
You won the lottery, Okay, I did.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
I mean, I know, I know, I'm extremely blessed. I am,
and we've been married now for almost thirty three years,
and but but we have been through a lot together
and I can definitely say I'm speaking from experience that
when we first got married. I mean, oh goodness, there
(07:31):
was a lot of pain that I had in my life,
some things I had experienced in my upbringing that really
didn't come to the surface until we got married. And
and I mean it came out in a lot of
my emotions. I realized I was really a very angry person.
(07:53):
I had, I'd been, I had stuff to anger because
in my upbringing, I really had never really spoken up
for myself. But then when we got married, I started
speaking up for myself, right, wouldn't you say? Just a
little and just to give you a little bit of background,
you know, we and there may be a lot of
(08:15):
listeners who can identify with this, that maybe there was
some form of abuse in your childhood, whether it be
emotional or verbal, your sexual abuse, you know, physical abuse
as well. I definitely dealt with some of these forms
(08:36):
of abuse when I was younger, and and verbally, I
think I felt very I don't know, put down. It
just kind of destroyed a little bit.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
Of my innocence.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
My innocence, my self image was probably tarnished.
Speaker 1 (08:58):
I would say things to you, talk about how beautiful
you weren't all these and it was just kind of
like it was hitting teflon and flying off of you
wouldn't receive any of it. And I'm like, what is
wrong with you? Why? Why don't you believe these things
about yourself?
Speaker 2 (09:09):
Well, I think I just honestly, I really had the
mindset that I probably wasn't good enough or I wasn't
pretty enough. And I mean if you if you were
to tell me, if we were getting dressed to go
out for a date, and you would say, oh, I
love that outfit. You look really pretty. I could receive
something like that and say, oh, thank you. But for
(09:31):
you to randomly tell me you are so you know,
you are so beautiful. I love you, and I'm sitting
there with you know, no makeup. You know I'm not
looking my best, I'm not feeling my best. That I
would just be like in my mind thinking, no, you crazy,
Yeah no I don't. I don't feel beautiful and I
don't think that I look beautiful. But I do appreciate
(09:54):
all the efforts that you made in those early years
when I really could and receive.
Speaker 1 (10:01):
One of the things that I tell people all the
time is you cannot be loved by your feelings because
your feelings live to you and you just said I
may not feel right, you know, like I am beautiful.
What doesn't matter if you feel it or not. If
I think that or I know that and I speak
that over you, then it's something that you need to
receive and be able to walk in. I know when
we first got married, look, I was twenty years old.
(10:22):
I was yeah, I was very you know, selfish, and
we go into this marriage. We move in together into
this little apartment that I had in Pineville, Louisiana, Tanglewood Terraces,
a little one bedroom apartment upstairs upstairs.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
Do not like upstairs apartments.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
I was just excited because we were going to live together,
build a life together, and we get to have sex now.
So just fired up about that and just go into
this with this excitement. And wow, little did I know
that I had, you know, married somebody who has had
a lot of a lot of pain in her life
that had been untreated. And the next thing, you know,
(11:05):
that starts getting like, I guess the only phrase I
can come up with it it was taken I want
to say, taken out on me, but maybe really what
I'm I was the recipient in that time because you
felt safe with me.
Speaker 2 (11:19):
Right, I was gonna say you were my safe person,
and you were the one that I could that I
was the closest to that I could confide in. And
it just it just kind of this untreated pain that
I had, some of it that I didn't even realize
was there. It started bubbling to the surface, you know,
it would it would manifest in the craziest ways, like
(11:44):
you would come home from work, and maybe it was
just something that you said to me, or maybe it
wasn't even what you said, it was how you said
it to me to say that, yeah, yeah, it was
your talent.
Speaker 1 (11:59):
It was that what you said, it was how you was, how.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
You said, or that you and I noticed that if
you came up behind me and I did like I would,
you would startle me. I would I would just almost
go berserk on you. And a few times, I'm being
I'm being real honest here, I'm being real honest that
these are the things that that did happen. And I
(12:23):
mean it would startle me to such an extent that
I would literally turn around and start swinging as if
I was being attacked and that and that wasn't what
you were doing.
Speaker 1 (12:35):
I'm just coming up to give you a hug, right,
you were.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
Just trying to come and give me a hut, just
like what.
Speaker 1 (12:39):
A husband would do to his wife, walks up behind me, like, Oh,
what's up girl?
Speaker 2 (12:43):
And there were just certain things that that you said,
are did that? You know, it triggered me, is really
what happened, And so I would react. I would react
in a way that I was trying to fend myself,
you know, And and I really didn't understand why I
(13:04):
was doing that and why that it was mainly towards
you until later on, you know, I did. I did
seek out help or you know, discuss these issues with
with someone who could help me recognize that I really
had a lot of pain from my upbringing in the
(13:26):
sense that I was very very close to my mom,
but my dad he was a workaholic and so he
wasn't around all the time, and then when he was around,
you know, we just kind of felt neglect. It was
neglect maybe in the relationship that we really didn't have
(13:52):
a deep relationship. Not not that he did tell us
that he loved us and all that kind of stuff.
He was a great provider, and.
Speaker 1 (14:00):
But he was emotionally disconnected.
Speaker 2 (14:02):
Emotionally disconnected, and you know, there was there was some
emotional and verbal abuse. You know, he had anger and
and so that would come out towards us. And so
I always felt like I was constantly you know, disappointing,
I guess, and so that is what aided in my
(14:23):
low self esteem. You know, I couldn't receive anything positive
that you would try to tell me.
Speaker 1 (14:31):
Well, in all honesty though, because I don't want our
listeners to think that it was all your dad's fault
as well, there was that aspect. But at the same token,
that was back in the day that I didn't really
understand your love language. It was not really speaking you
know what right in a way that you really received right.
Speaker 2 (14:50):
We didn't we didn't have a lot of like premierital counseling.
We didn't you know, go to a marriage conference. We
really didn't even if we had a problem. We didn't
even go sit down with our pastors at the time,
you know, we didn't seek help. It was almost like
it was taboo to talk right, to talk about your
problems are to seek help as as far as like
(15:12):
going to see a counselor where you were labeled like
you well that's for crazy people.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
And let me say this, if you know, we would
get into these disagreements or as you said, or you went,
you would go berserk.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:25):
Some of our response oftentimes is that like, oh my god,
what have you lost your mind? Have you gone crazy?
And then and then on the fire.
Speaker 2 (15:35):
Yeah, I was like, don't tell me I'm crazy. Yeah,
And so it would just end up in a huge fights.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
Little did we know that there were things lying beneath
the surface that, like you said earlier, being triggered and
it was causing these issues in our marriage. Uh, you know,
we went through a period there. I remember whenever I
asked you to marry me, and the pastors of the
church that we were at at that time, we went
and sat down with them, and the the premieral counseling
(16:01):
kind of consisted of something like, so y'all want to
get married, Yeah, y'all love each other? Yeah, all right,
we're gonna pray for you. And that pretty much was it.
And we went through a pastoral change and then we
had our new pastor come in at that time, and
more or less he came into the the I'm gonna
do your wedding. We had him do our wedding. But
there really wasn't, you know, any premarital counseling or anything,
(16:22):
because he in his defense, he thought that that had
already been handled and we didn't say anything. We didn't know.
And so that's one of the reasons why now if
I do a wedding, it's a requirement I will do
premial counseling. We're going to do through four sessions, walk
through and I have had a couple of couples that
have come in that actually did not wind up getting
(16:44):
married because they saw that the differences that they had,
maybe they were not a good match. They were not
that compatible. And that's always a sad thing, you know.
Over the thirty years of ministry, I've seen that happen
a couple of times. But that's why it's so important
for you to go get premarital counseling, as I like
to say, to help unpack some of the baggage. Fold
(17:05):
some socks, put some underwear away, put the toiletries where
they've to deal with some of that baggage before you
get into the marriage. Because the marriages is hard work.
It's an investment. It's something that you're going to work
on and build. So for us stepping into this marriage,
there was no baggage unpacked, and I had no idea
we were stepping into not only that you were dealing
(17:27):
with grief as well, because you lost your mom. I
think of this now and it's like, I was so
stupid because you had just lost your mom two years
before before I met you, right, and four years after
marriage got married. Correct, And this is still fairly fresh
now that I'm getting older, and I'm understand I walk
with families through this as a pastor, I understand just
(17:50):
how fresh this was. And going through your graduation, these
major life markers, graduation, engagement, marriage without your mom there
at your just how difficult that may have been. And
so I've told the story before our honeymoon. We show up,
we get married, We drive to bad Rouge hotel room,
we get there and I'm like wow, yeah, and you
(18:12):
sat on the end of the bed and you started crying,
and I'm like, what, what what did you do wrong? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (18:20):
Already something wrong crying and this is not the wonderful
and wild honeymoon that I had envisioned.
Speaker 1 (18:30):
And I didn't know what to do.
Speaker 2 (18:32):
Remember, everything had just kind of caught up with me.
You know, whenever you planned a wedding and you have
all the festivities and all the excitement and the anticipation,
but yet it can be rather stressful. By the time
we got, you know, to the hotel room and things
kind of settled, and all of a sudden it hit me,
(18:53):
you know. And so I wasn't trying to put a
damper almost it's supposed to be, you know, our honeymoon,
but it was really something that I had to deal
with at the moment.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
Yeah, and now I understand that I understand exactly what
you were in that moment, thinking and feeling right, And
you know, I was not, like I said, twenty years old, immature, selfish.
I was not the probably the most sensitive guy dealing
with that. I was just trying to deal with his
best in new How then we come back from that honeymoon,
we step into this, you know, building a life together,
(19:24):
and you were responding and I didn't never really grow
up seeing by my parents. I'm sure that they disagreed.
I do remember one or two, you know, arguments that
they had, but that you know, I didn't really see
a lot of that growing up. So we step into
this and there's a lot of a lot of strife,
a lot of arguing, and you know, there were things
(19:46):
inside of me that that came out towards you whenever
you got got triggered. And you know, it was just
kind of one of these situations.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
We can laugh about it now. It really wasn't funny
back then.
Speaker 1 (19:57):
It was not funny at all. The makeup was all some.
Speaker 2 (20:00):
But makeup sex.
Speaker 1 (20:03):
You mean, yes, yes, I'm probably getting to write turn
read now, Okay, that's all right. Whenever we preach and
we talk about this kind of stuff together, you love
to embarrass me and make me blush. But yeah, you
know I always tell everybody, you know, you make up
so that you can make out.
Speaker 2 (20:21):
Yes, And we did a lot of Yeah, there's a
lot of arguing. Well, it was the trying to get
to know one another and learn each other's ways, you know,
when you first get married. But then it was just
I don't know, it was really just like this storm
of emotions that just began to circle around me that
(20:46):
I really did not I did not have the tools
to process things, you know, in a healthy weight. Losing
my mom. She had been very sick leading up to
her death, and so that in itself. Being a teenager
caused me to have to grow up really quickly, and
so I felt like I was, you know, I had
(21:07):
to mature in a way that maybe others were able
to enjoy that time of their life, you know, in
a better way. And so, you know, stepping into marriage
that it was a really it was a really it's
a big thing, you know, a big decision that you make,
and so it was it was quite the learning curve, right,
(21:32):
And I say.
Speaker 1 (21:32):
The least, I think a lot of towns whenever we
we hurt, when we go through things, when there's trauma
from past abuse, a lot of towns we just try to,
like you know, slap a smiley face on and particularly
everything's okay. I think we shared this whenever we did
the conference. In Jeremiah six, I think it's verse fourteen.
It talks about Jeremiah says that they dressed the wounds
(21:53):
of the people as though they were not serious piece
piece they say, when there is no peace, and what
that verse is telling us, they're more or less pretending
like everything is okay when it's not okay. And a
lot of times in our marriages and our relationships, we
do that. We pretend like everything's okay. Just put on
a happy face, let's tough our way through this, instead
of getting to the root of the problem. For me,
(22:15):
I talked about going to the doctor earlier. So many
times I will not feel well in my body and
you're like, you need to go to the doctor. I'm like,
I'm not going to the doctor. I'll be okay. And
typically when that happens, if I do want up one
to the doctor's put off quite a few days. I'm okay,
I'm fine, to where I finally just get to the
point where like I don't really have a choice. And
(22:38):
as a result, we do the same thing with our relationships.
All Right, everything's good, right now, everything's fine, So let's
just pretend like everything's okay. Well, then you have this
cycle that you go through and it's like all of
a sudden, you're fussing, you're squabbling, you're arguing. It could
be very toxic. And then when things kind of settle down,
you're like, well, everything's okay now, so let's not rattle
(23:00):
the tiger king. And so you don't ever really get
the help you need. And back when we first got married,
a couple of things were taking place. First of all,
we didn't really have the resources.
Speaker 2 (23:11):
We needed, that's true.
Speaker 1 (23:13):
Uh. And then you know, we were actually volunteer youth
pastors of the church. And you don't want people to
know you're you're walking through this, although our pastor probably
would have said, you know what, that's normal. You're you're
a young gray. A couple of these are things you're
going to work your way through. You certainly didn't go
get professional counseling because in those days that was a
taboo thing. If you did, you were crazy. Uh, And
(23:35):
don't let anybody say that, and.
Speaker 2 (23:36):
Don't say that to me.
Speaker 1 (23:38):
So we were just kind of stuck. Now. Fortunately we
did not throw in the towel.
Speaker 2 (23:43):
Now, and I want a preference. I mean, it's not
like that's all we did was fight, you know. No,
it was just that there were certain times things would happen,
and like I said, things would be said or done
and it would just it would just cause all those
emotions that I had suppressed would just come up to
the surface. And so and I didn't quite know how
(24:05):
to I didn't know how to process those feelings, and
I didn't know why I was feeling that way, and
it wasn't until later on, probably when we you know,
were having our boys and stuff, that I begin to
maybe get some help, some some some counseling, some biblical counseling.
Speaker 1 (24:29):
You started figuring out these things that.
Speaker 2 (24:30):
Are Yeah, I started putting the puzzle right, the puzzle
pieces were kind of coming together at that time where
I was realizing why those certain things would kind of
set me off. And so I did, you know, start
working on on those past pains that that I was
(24:51):
was feeling. So things things did begin to get better.
But that's why I'm like, you have to recognize what
what the problem is. And so for the law longest time,
I really didn't have an understanding of why I was
feeling that way. And then when and I prayed about
it a lot. To be honest, it really was something
that I prayed about because I felt like there was
(25:13):
just these things that were coming in between us being closer,
you know, in our marriage.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Why are you I'm so because we prayed about these
things together a lot, and I would pray something like, Laura,
please help, We're not to be so.
Speaker 2 (25:25):
Crazy, Please help, We're not be so mean to me? Yeah,
you know, And then of course I mean like you said,
it was some of the things were just maturity on
our part. You know, we were young and we just
we just as we matured, then we were able to
work out things in our marriage.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
And I don't want our listeners to think that you
were the only ones who came into this Marri, I
said earlier, like you won the lottery, like you, I
came to the marriage and I'm awesome. And that's by
and large pretty true. No, No, there were issues that
I brought into the marriage as well. Uh, you know,
things that that very opinionated, very stubborn, uh.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
Not extremely patient, No.
Speaker 1 (26:09):
And still still am not. That's something that the Lord
constantly is working on me about. Uh. And so with
that said, we're just trying to make our way through.
But when you couple that in, I mean, by and large,
my mom and dad they had they have a great marriage.
They modeled for me. Uh, in my opinion, you know
what a healthy marriage should look like. But there were
(26:32):
still things inside of me that were the immaturity, the selfishness,
the stubbornness, the just a lot of things that people
bring into life. But then you couple that with somebody
who's coming out of dealing with grief, dealing with trauma,
dealing with things from past abuse, and I'm not equipped
to handle this, and man, it was. It was not
(26:53):
a healthy situation, fortunately, because here's what a lot of
people do when they walk through times like this. They
isolate themselves. They push away from each other. There's a
distance there, and that's exactly what the devil wants. He
wants to drive a wedge there in your marriage, to
cause distance between you. And then, unfortunately, a lot of
times people wind up seeking the arms of somebody else
(27:17):
because there's distance there, and then they eventually might even
wind up in divorce court as a result. Fortunately that
was not the course for us. We went into marriage like,
divorce is not an option, and your parents stayed married
until your mom passed. My parents are still married. They
celebrated fifty years this past December, and we said divorce
(27:40):
is not an option. And we may have disagreed and
argued to have fought a lot, but we still work
those things out and worked our way through those things.
So we come to this place where you decide, hey,
I need to get some help. You start putting the
puzzle pieces together. And we had not allowed this to
cause you know a division between us.
Speaker 2 (28:00):
Yeah, well I do think, you know, because it was
something you know, we were both believers, you know, when
we when we married, we did I did pray and
ask the Lord to show me, you know what the
root cause of some of these issues that I was having.
And I mean God has been faithful to send me
(28:24):
the help and the resources needed. But I do think
it took me being willing to be vulnerable enough and
honest enough to talk to you about the situation, the
things that I was feeling, but then also to go
and seek professional help as well, whether it's taboo or not,
(28:47):
you know. And so I would encourage any anyone all
of our listeners, you know, don't ever be don't ever
feel ashamed to go and seek professional no help for
you know, whatever the situation may be.
Speaker 1 (29:03):
Or let me say this, it's a wonderful thing to
be involved in a good Bible believing, Bible teaching church,
yes that is going to preach the gospel, and in
your involvement in that church, to go sit down with
your pastors. Go sit down with your pastor and his
wife and share what's going on in your life and
(29:23):
get some help there. I know, for us we love
to sit and meet with people. I've heard a lot
of people talk about, well, you know, counseling is not
my favorite thing in the world, But then I have
a lot of friends like for us. We love to
sit down with people and help them navigate the different
things that they're walking through. And we've had ones in
our life who have helped us in that regard as well.
(29:44):
And so I would tell you, get help, don't stay
where you are, don't think that it's normal. You didn't
start realizing. I didn't even know this until you started.
Like you said, the puzzle pieces started coming together. You
sat down and started talking, getting good biblical counsel from someone.
And I remember you coming home and telling me these
(30:05):
are some things that the Lord has revealed to me.
And I was just like, well, that makes a lot
of sense, because that's why you would respond in this way.
Speaker 2 (30:12):
Yeah, So the puzzle pieces started coming together where I'm like, Okay,
I realized, you know that certain things were said and
done in my past that caused me to struggle with
the emotions that I had and to to you know,
respond and react to you the way that I did.
(30:33):
And so so I discovered the route and once I did,
then then I had, you know, the choice to say, Okay,
I'm gonna I'm gonna work on this, I'm gonna deal
with I'm gonna deal with my stuff. And so yeah,
just just by recognizing what had happened in my past,
the different abuse that I had incurred then, and talking
(30:58):
to you about then we were able honestly we could
work on it together. That you could help me, you know,
and we could we could help each other so that
I could get to a place of wholeness. And so
really for me to even be talking about all of
this on this podcast, it's it is it's a huge thing.
(31:20):
Because even though I received a lot of healing, I
didn't want to talk about it, you know, I didn't
want to tell anybody. I still felt a certain level
of shame that that kind of kept me bound for
a long time. But but we were able to, you know,
work on these things because because we were working on
(31:42):
it together. And but then there was also the level
of there's just certain things that I had to deal
with myself, you know, that you couldn't help me with.
That was strictly like the Lord showing me, revealing me
with revealing to me with the biblical count so that
I received, you know, seeing the truth of God's word
(32:05):
you know, applied to my life and spoken over me
because I was believing so many lies of the enemy,
you know, that had had really damaged my self image
and and so reprocessing having a mind shift to see
myself as as the Lord sees me and and what
(32:25):
he has for me. I just really saw God's faithfulness
in the healing process in my life. And so there
was a lot of healing that took place. But once
once my grandmother passed away a couple of years ago,
you know, we mentioned this on a couple of other episodes,
I made a conscious effort to pursue a grief counselor
(32:50):
to help me not only with the loss of my granny,
but it was all the compounding loss that I had
experienced over the years, and that in turn led to
talking through some other things that were traumatic in my life.
And so the Lord has used that to bring about
a healing, a healing, and a wholeness to my life
(33:13):
that I had not experienced before. And so now I
want to tell others, Hey, if you're struggling, seek help,
you know, pray about it. The Lord can can send
you the resources, and if you will determine to work
on these things, then then that healing is there for you.
(33:33):
God's faithful to take care of you well.
Speaker 1 (33:35):
And I think I think back, you know, Paul writes
in Romans chapter twelve. He talks about walking out God's
good and perfect will, and that comes our way by
allowing God to renew our mind, not conforming to the
world standards and allowing him to renew and transform our mind.
And so as you begin to allow the Holy Spirit
to work on you and change you from the inside out,
(33:57):
then our marriage could come to the place where we
I'm not going to say we have bad marriage. We
had a good marriage, but we were just kind of
making our way through these things that we didn't recognize
in reality was untreated pain. Yes, And as you came
to the realization I want God to work on these
things and renew me on the inside, then it's amazing
how you can walk out the will that He has
for your life, for our marriage and for our family.
(34:19):
And now here we are empty nesting and we're able
to kind of share our story with people and maybe
even help people through what they might be facing.
Speaker 2 (34:28):
Yeah, and you know, I think if I had not
dealt with all of that untreated pain, you know, being
at this season as an empty nester, probably would not
be as good, you know, as it is now. If
I had not dealt with those things, you know, because
(34:49):
it was it was a hindrance to us growing closer together,
and that was not God's.
Speaker 1 (34:56):
Best definitely not his will nor his plans right right
to be able to We like to tell people we're
best friends, you know. And I think that after all
these years of marriage, I think every year gets better.
I think a lot of times people think the early
years or the honeymoon years, that's the best. No for us.
Every year, in my opinion, our marriage just gets better
(35:17):
and better and we get closer and closer. And so,
you know, I think it's because we allow God to
help you deal with the things that were there. I
allow God to help deal with the things that were
in my life and brought us the place of a
healthy marriage.
Speaker 2 (35:29):
Right.
Speaker 1 (35:30):
So, well, it's been good, it has. I hope that
this has helped our listeners today. And maybe there's something
you're walking through that you don't quite understand. And I'll
say this again, get help, don't hold that in get help.
Go talk to your pastor seek out a good, godly
biblical counselor who will help you deal with those things
and allow God to help you be healed so that
(35:53):
you can let out His good and pleasing will and
plan for your life.
Speaker 2 (35:56):
Yeah, don't let that untreated pain keep you from drawing
closer to your spouse. Don't allow that to be an
active division between you, but draw closer to each other
and allow the Lord to work in your life.
Speaker 1 (36:11):
Well, thank you for being a part of this podcast today.
This has been a very personal topic for us, something that,
as she said earlier, she hasn't always shared because many
times the enemy would cause her to feel shame about that.
The devil would tell her you don't want to talk
to people about that. And now she's becoming more and
more open about it. And I believe that it is
helping people like you be able to see things within
(36:32):
your life and allow God to bring healing to your
life as well. And so if you've enjoyed this, make
sure you subscribe to our YouTube channel. Just hit that
little click that little button and says subscribe and it'll
let you know. It'll lurt you upcoming podcasts that are
coming up different episodes. Make sure that you like or
leave us a comic, give us a review. We love
to hear from our listeners, and thank you for being
(36:54):
a part of this podcast. And as always, I'm Jay.
Speaker 2 (36:56):
And I'm Stacy and this is love like Crazy. Mold
the
Speaker 1 (37:14):
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