Transcript:
Brad: Let me just give you a little recap. Five types of negative cycles--I only want to focus on three of these. One is a complex cycle that usually involves someone who's survived some of trauma. And then the other cycle is when one person gets burned out, usually the one that has been pushing for things gets burned out.
And so, I'll explain that in a second. The three most basic types are the pursuer-distancer cycle--distancing is commonly known as withdrawing and so this is the most common cycle where you have a demanding spouse interacting with a withdrawing or distancing partner. And that pattern, the distancing or stonewalling position is shut down, non-responsive spouse.
And when they experience that, it's often a feeling of panic or aggression or anger where the pursuer says I'm going to make you respond to me. That's what the pursuer really want, is they want to get a response and sometimes when they don't get it, they force it. They want closeness and to feel important and needed.
Morgan: Yeah and that's the underlying feeling that pursuers really wanting, they want to be close, but it comes out as maybe nagging or demanding, but they're truly ultimately underneath wanting to know that their spouse cares about them.
Brad: Yeah, they're trying to maintain contact with their spouse. And so, when they don't have that, that's when they become the most...
Morgan: Demanding?
Brad: Yeah, you could---demanding, maybe even feeling insecure or when they feel distressed, that's when they need their spouse the most.
Morgan: And that's a natural response to being...
Brad: Yeah, that's a natural response. You need somebody very important to you. So you have a person who is pursuing and many times they forcefully try to get what they want. And then you have someone who is more of a withdrawer; they are more of a distancer, they naturally withdraw, naturally distance themselves, they naturally...
Morgan: Shutdown.
Brad: Shutdown. That's typically, it will be a male who is the withdrawer, not always and it's a female that's more the pursuer. That's what you see. Then you also see the second type that's common where the withdrawer feels like they have their back against the wall and they'll start fighting the pursuer. They feel like they're being pushed, so they're going to push back.
And that's not their normal cycle but that's what happens, is you have an attack-attack situation where they fight each other. And then you have a withdraw-withdraw situation where both people are--maybe they started out as a pursue-withdraw cycle.
One person is wanting and pursuing and needing and the other is kind of more withdrawn and naturally gets defensive. That cycle goes on for some time and then the person who is the pursuer starts to get burned out and they start kind of care less and they start to give up.
Morgan: Kind of getting tired of the cycle.
Brad: Yeah, they start getting tired. And when you have a withdraw-withdraw situation, the key thing to understand is that both people are hesitant to engage emotionally with each other.
And in the face of conflict, both will further withdraw and that might look like their basic pattern, but really there's a pursue-withdraw pattern that underlies it.
Occasionally, you know people are withdraw-withdraw from each other because they don't like arguing or fighting. They genuinely don't like conflict but generally, couples are in that situation because their marriage could be on its last leg in that kind of situation.
Morgan: Hmm, they're getting tired and...
Brad: Yeah, they're getting tired. You know we talked about the other two cycles; the fourth and fifth cycles.
There is the complex cycle, there is anxiety and avoidance. It's complicated because they are trying to quite honestly connect, but sometimes when you are a trauma survivor and you've experienced a lot of hurt, it makes it very difficult and it makes it very difficult for the person who is the non-traumatized spouse to understand what's going on, what's really needed.
And so that becomes complicated and just because it's complicated doesn't mean that you can't work through it. I mean you can, you just have to get the right help. And then there is the reactive pursue-withdraw cycle. This is where you have the person who is a pursuer and they give up; they're past the withdraw-withdraw stage.
And then they move on to this next cycle, is the pursuer just finally gets burned out and gives up completely. And then you see the original withdrawer become the pursuer to try to save their marriage. And so we see a lot of men and women who try to save their marriage, but...
Morgan: They were the withdrawer originally.
Brad: Yeah.
Morgan: They're like oh my gosh, they've stopped pursuing me, what's going on?
Brad: Yeah and so that's what happens. It's easier to make sense out of pursuing. If people can understand that better, why they are getting blamed or why they blame, criticize, demand.
They can understand their behavior better, but they don't many times understand the behavior of a distancer. And they think is something wrong with them, they just come to these unfortunate conclusions.
And some of the wrong conclusions they come to could be something is wrong with them; maybe they have a disorder, you know something is wrong with them.
Morgan: Because they are shutdown.
Brad: Because they shutdown. They don't open up emotionally. And they can also come to a wrong conclusion about themselves; I'm a bad guy, I'm some sort of monster, I must be this horrible person because you don't want to open up with me.
Morgan: And I'm demanding, I must be just very pushy and horrible.
Brad: Yeah and so it really becomes unfortunate. And so part of getting familiar with withdrawing is really understanding that in times of relationship distress, the person who withdraws, they look for ways to exit that distress. And so they develop these self protective coping responses that include a number of strategies to turn off the alarms.
They feel this distress and so they're looking for ways to turn off that distress. And so some of those alarms that they feel could be anger, fear, shame and again, they experience that when they feel distressed. So if an argument heats up, the more withdrawing partner is more likely to move away from the conflict or in some way try to shutdown the emotions happening in the moment.
Morgan: Because it's very uncomfortable...
Brad: Yeah, it's very uncomfortable. And so what they do is and in their mind it makes perfect sense, they're going to move away from that conflict and in some way, they're going to try to shut down those emotions happening in the moment.
Morgan: So if you are using withdrawing as a way of coping, your approach to distress tends to be more independent and self reliant and you tend to turn away from your partner in times of distress and prefer to manage your emotions on your own.
Brad: Yeah, yeah that happens.
Morgan: Not a lot of communicating going on.
Brad: Yeah and then these are people who like to be self reliant, they don't like opening up emotionally and so you see that a lot Morgan. Part of what withdrawal involves is cognitive and emotional distance. And so what you see is withdrawing partner, they respond to emotional situations with logic and reason. They'll try to you know, let's fix this problem, solve this.
Morgan: And that's what cognitive essentially means, is going up into your head and trying to decide logically and reasonably what to do next.
Brad: There is not a lot of emotion there. And so it's assumed that being more rational or even neutral is necessary to solve problems. So these withdrawing partners, they try to remain emotionally detached from a distressing situation.
Morgan: And I think that's done a lot because people feel like emotions are unpredictable, emotions are--if they show their emotions, they're being vulnerable and weak, yes.
Brad: Yeah, it's a sign of weakness, typically we see that in males more often, but you're also going to see it individuals who have a job where they can't get emotionally involved; someone who works in an emergency room, someone who has to think quick on their feet and can't get their emotions involved in their job.
Morgan: They are not always able to process it emotionally. They have to stay logical because their life and the person's life depends on it.
Brad: Yeah and you know that suits them fine with their job, it's going to help them do a fantastic job with their work, but it may make it harder for them to be vulnerable in their marriage because they're going to be wearing two hats; at work 8 hours a day, they've got this hat on of don't carry your emotions in here, you got to think on your feet, don't get involved. And then at home, it's be emotionally involved--connect and care. And so it can be challenging for them.
Morgan: I believe it.
Brad: And so there's different signs of emotional or cognitive* withdrawal and they really include four things and it's a strict reliance on logic, there's a distrust of emotion, there's a strict emphasis on being objective and focus on facts and the facts only, nothing else.
Morgan: Yeah because emotion is...
Brad: Subjective.
Morgan: Right and it's dangerous, it gets you in trouble. It can't be trusted because I might fly off the handle and then where does that leave us in another argument. I can imagine that a lot of people think about that as they're deciding to be less emotional and more cognitive right.
Brad: Yeah, that happens.
Morgan: So the process of withdrawing involves suppressing emotional thoughts and experiences. Partners who withdraw, they tend to dampen and muffle their emotional responses particularly in times of distress which would be maybe an argument.
The process of shutting down other people's naturally occurring emotional responses can be quite demanding as well. It takes a toll on you both physically and emotionally when you are trying to shut that down.
Brad: And we haven't talked about this before, but we have emotions for a reason. Nature has given us emotions and emotions are useful guides into acting quick and making decisions. And so when we shut out part of something that nature has given us, God has given us, when we shut that out, it really…
Morgan: Makes this...
Brad: There is a side effect to it.
Morgan: Yeah, yeah.
Brad: And what's interesting Morgan is that there is research that has been done that links strategies for avoiding emotional distress with negative, physical and psychological effects. And so those strategies don't necessarily lead to resolution of the problems. So as a result, the ongoing distress may increase negative feelings towards the relationship including more hostility and greater likelihood of emotional detachment.
Morgan: So you can't always think logically about everything and solve every problem with the reason. Emotion takes a special place in deciding your romantic relationship and things like that. So you've got to use that emotion, it's there for a reason.
Brad: Yeah emotions – well it's hard to be connected emotionally to someone when you don't allow yourself to feel any emotions. It's hard to be vulnerable when you don't even let yourself...
Morgan: Open up.
Brad: ...open up. Take the risk of being vulnerable. And so, that's typically what people withdraw, they do. They rely on this emotion or non-emotion, being so caught in their head with logic and objectivity and they don't trust emotion and it makes it really hard to connect it*.
Morgan: Partners who withdraw, they often rely on thought suppression as a primary means of creating emotional distance. So they are suppressing their thoughts so that they don't have to engage emotionally. And this can be an effective strategy in the short-term, but over time, the suppressing of emotion can have a rebound effect.
Withdrawing partner may become overwhelmed and respond with an outburst of anger or hostility when he or she is no longer able to dampen those intensifying emotions. That's why you see your spouse get angry instead of sad. The effects of emotional suppression may also show up in other ways including impulsive actions or binging behavior
Brad: Yeah, yeah, they bottle it up and then it comes out. They bottle up all their anger, they don't release any of it and then they just explode with it. And I can happen with withdrawers.
Morgan: Absolutely.
Brad: And one of the key things to understand about withdrawers is when withdrawers turn inward and they shut down emotionally, they become less aware of their own needs and the impact of they are having on their spouse. And so they are not really in touch with their emotions. And so honestly, in many ways they are out of touch with what they need and what their spouse needs.
Morgan: And so the partner says why don't you talk to me and they are like well, I don't know, I don't know why I am not talking to you. I don't understand what I need. It's very hard for them to ask for it.
Brad: Yeah, it's very hard. And so managing emotions by withdrawing, that suppresses both negative and positive emotions.
Morgan: So they can't feel joy or sadness.
Brad: No, they kind of feel numb in some ways so they can, not everybody, but they can feel numb. So as a result, the withdrawing partner, they have less emotion to work within their relationships. So they are keeping their emotions at a distance that reduces the resources they need to not only communicate, but also be connected at a romantic level.
Morgan: Ah, so emotion is a resource that helps you to communicate and helps you to connect with your spouse.
Brad: Yeah. And the withdrawing partner, they may be able to manage their emotions in the moment, but over time, they become less and less in touch with what matters most in their relationship and that's trust and closeness.
Morgan: And that vulnerability that you talked about, taking the risk of opening up so that you can trust and feel close emotionally to your spouse.
Brad: Yeah, they're just not good with emotion and so because they're not good with their emotions and they are not aware of what they are feeling, naturally they are going to distance themselves and withdraw. They don't understand it, it's confusing to them sometimes. So naturally, they're going to withdraw.
Morgan: So there's basically, there is a logic of withdraw. Partners who withdraw are often trying to keep the peace of a relationship by deactivating distress which emotion is distressful to them through emotional and physical distance is what they use to deactivate that distress. Common responses may involve giving in or going along with their partner's complaints just to reduce the likelihood of a fight. So it's withdraw in a different way.
Brad: Yeah, well there – and you do see that Morgan. You see people who just give in, they agree because they don't want to have a fight.
Morgan: Yeah, you see that. And so other forms of withdrawal involve moving away from negative emotions through silence, logic or even physical distance. So though the actions of the withdrawing partner may seem uncaring or indifferent, withdraw is ironically a coping response intended to minimize conflict and restore peace and well-being to the relationship.
Brad: Yeah Morgan, I'm really glad you said that because that's really key with how pursuers see the withdrawer. They see them as someone who is uncaring or indifferent. And really, they're just like you said, they're trying to minimize conflict or trying to bring peace, restore well-being to their marriage and relationship...
Morgan: Balance.
Brad: Yeah, they're trying to do that. They distance, they withdraw because they care, not because they don't care. And many times pursuers, they think if they cared about me, they wouldn't leave me, they wouldn't withdraw. When I get upset, they would stay with me and try to work this out. But in their mind, they don't understand that, that's too much emotion for them. And so they just…
Morgan: Disconnect.
Brad: They disconnect and it can become challenging. Morgan you brought up some good things about that. Some of the things that withdrawers may be thinking inside, they think to themselves things like this, if I could just calm down, I could come closer. So inside, they have an emotional storm brewing.
They got things going on they don't understand so they distance because they are not really feeling calm. And so if they could just calm down their reason, I could come closer. If I can work out what I'm feeling, then I can move towards you.
Morgan: Or even if their spouse could calm down, if their spouse, pursuer would calm down...
Brad: Yes and no, depends on the situation.
Morgan: Okay.
Brad: Not even the couple, but more the situation they are in.
Morgan: Yeah, that makes sense.
Brad: Another thing they may be thinking inside with they withdraw is, I feel like I'm a failure as a partner. And that's something that's really because pursuer, sometimes they feel like they are a failure.
And so, I feel like I'm a failure as a partner, so naturally they are going to withdraw when they feel like they are a failure. I'm a big letdown to you, naturally they are going to do that. And then here's the other thing they sometimes say, even when I take a step towards you, it's never enough. I hear that a lot. And I'm always failing in your eyes, what I do is never good enough.
I'm always failing in their eyes, when I do move towards them, it's never enough. You know they experience situations where they feel like I never get it right, I'm not what they want, I have no feelings and sometimes they feel like I'd rather be left alone than feel this much pain.
And they are hurting and that's what pursuers don't realize is this person is in pain, they are hurting, the pursuer just sees them as they don't care about me, they are indifferent to me. And that causes the pursuer to continue to push forward more.
Morgan: Until they get tired.
Brad: Well until they get burned out and they give up. And that can take a long time for that to happen, but it's very frustrating.
Morgan: I think it's interesting you said I have no feelings because they don't know what they are feeling. They can't reason or recognize or understand you know why are they getting angry, what's making them so confused. And they do have feelings, they just don't know what they are and they can't seem to navigate through the emotional web, so it looks like they have no feelings.
Brad: Yeah and Morgan to go along with that, partners who withdraw, many times they've gotten the message to dismiss or avoid their emotions. Part of where they come up with this dismissing or avoiding their emotions, sometimes that can come from parents who or even teachers or a coach, he told them to toughen up for be a man, don't share these kinds of things or don't cry – that kind of thing.
Morgan: Put your big girl pants on, I've heard that.
Brad: Yeah and so they are telling you not to feel. Those kinds of things are indirect* ways of saying don't show your feelings. This person may withdraw not only when their partners are critical and angry but also when their partners seek to confide in them about intimacy.
And so that's interesting. It's not only when you're angry with me, they are withdrawing whenever their partner or the pursuer comes to them for closeness and intimacy. And so they feel anxious, they feel afraid. So that may be because they haven't learned how to navigate through their emotional world because they've been taught to suppress their emotions.
Morgan: They are afraid to address their emotions or feelings in the first place, not just fear or anxiety. That's interesting, yeah.
Brad: Hopefully this is helping some pursuers out there who don't understand their spouse and what's going on with them. Sometimes there's feelings of inadequacy or feeling like I'm not measuring up or if I let you in, you're not going to like me, maybe even a little bit of shame, that kind of thing.
But Morgan listen, what's important is the cost of withdrawing is significant. Withdrawing partners, they often feel criticized, they feel unworthy and honestly, they may even be aware of these withdrawing tendencies and maybe even they are criticized because of these protests.
The pursuer gets angry and they protest, but really there is probably a strong sense of shame that could be there, there can be, not necessarily always, but there can be. So there is loneliness that can resolve from keeping a distance in intimate relationships. And that leaves the withdrawing partner feeling alone and ineffective and that just increases their feelings of I'm not enough, I'm not good enough, I'm failing in their eyes.
Morgan: Yeah, so the emotional causes of distress are not addressed by withdrawing, they are only managed when the pain is still present and active.
Brad: Yeah, that's a good way to put it. It's a perfect way to put it. We have a few moments left, I want to go over the common actions of withdraw. There are signs of withdrawal that are often physical; you can spot withdrawal in a person's body posture even. Almost like an ostrich burying their head in the ground.
Morgan: Or a turtle.
Brad: Yeah or a turtle going into its shell. They pull into themselves to hide from the intensity of the moment. And so some of the behaviors that people recognize, you may have seen, is people not listening, not responding, avoiding eye contact, crossing their legs, folding their arms especially while avoiding eye contact, turning the body away, exiting the room and even exiting a location – just getting up and leaving. And any combination of those signals can send a message to the pursuer, leave me alone, I'm not available for you, I need some space, now is not the time.
And one of the things that can happen is partners can also withdraw when the conversation switches to discussions that involve vulnerable emotions such as discussions about intimacy in the relationship, not necessarily just about sex, but about emotional closeness. And because they're not really good at their own emotions, sometimes leads to sort out what they are feeling and thinking.
Morgan: So the key is understanding that partners withdraw when they feel emotional distress, emotionally overwhelmed or simply emotionally unprepared for what's coming next. And it's not that they don't care typically, is that they are afraid of the unknown. And so, it comes across as I need space, now is not the time, don't talk to me, leave me alone. But surely, they are trying to...
Brad: Sort it out.
Morgan: Sort it out, yeah.
Brad: And that's part of the negative cycle and something that we didn't talk about at the beginning of the show that's worth repeating briefly is negative cycles are these rigid patterns of interaction. It's almost like when you get caught in a negative cycle, it could be disagreeing or fighting, it's like you know what your spouse is going to say before they say it. And so the way you get out of that is really focusing on the underlying emotions that are there.
Morgan: How do we go from fighting and arguing or even from being quite withdrawn and walking on eggshells with each other, to really bonding, connecting, sharing our hearts with each other so that an emotional bond develops?
Brad: That's a really great question and that's a very common question. And Morgan actually that's an area that a lot of couples get stuck in, in recovering from an affair. They get caught in negative cycles. Couples can go from fighting and arguing and at times being really distant and in a sense emotionally cold even in the midst of fighting and that's a different type of negative cycle.
I may be giving our listeners a response to that that they haven't heard before which is exciting for me to be discussing this, but it's also very revolutionary in a way. This is an area that psychology is moving towards. It's based on effective, affective neuroscience and that's really understanding our emotions.
And I'm going to get into a little bit of that later, but really we begin to de-escalate and get out of these negative cycles by sharing our primary emotion, our core emotion. And I'm going to try my best as we go along to explain all this because this may get a little technical. You may be asking what is primary emotion.
Primary emotion is core emotion, it is emotion that is experienced by all humans. Primary emotion is also felt somewhere in the body when it's experienced. Sometimes it's experienced as a sinking feeling in your stomach or heat in your hands and other times it's a tightness in your chest. We've all had those moments.
Primary emotions are the most vulnerable emotions and they are the toughest for us to share, but when we do share them, they bring out the most change in our relationships. And so here's a list of common primary emotions. It's really only six, but I'm going to go over the basic six, I'm going to add kind of one just to help description, make it easier.
Morgan: Explain it.
Brad: Yeah, to explain it. So here's a list of common primary emotions. There is sadness/despair, fear, anxiety, hurt and there's anger and rage, shame, disgust, joy and elation, excitement, surprise and curiosity. There are both positive and negative primary emotions.
These feelings are considered primary because they are the first emotions we feel in response to situations. Negative primary emotions tend to make us feel bad about ourselves such as when we are hurt or sad or we are shameful or disgusted.
Positive primary emotion usually leads us to feeling good about ourselves such as when we experience joy and surprise. And so when couples relationship is in distress, the negative primary emotion is usually unspoken.
We are not very good in sharing in our shame with ourselves after an affair or how embarrassed we feel or disgusted we feel that we've been betrayed. We are typically not very good at that. Sometimes if we do, we share in a way that can be unproductive or unhealthy.
So those emotions can go largely unnoticed. We are really afraid, we don't really share our fear many times.
Morgan: And it's important to share those feelings so that your spouse believes and feels that you care for them and that you are important to them.
Brad: Yeah, yeah and that's a great point Morgan because they begin to see you differently. Sometimes long-held beliefs are changed when that happens...
Morgan: And we'll talk more about that I'm sure.
Brad: Yeah. So in a couple's relationship is in distress, the negative primary emotions are very hard to speak, very hard to acknowledge...
Morgan: Maybe hard to understand even.
Brad: Yeah and that's a very good point because when we get into a negative cycle, these emotions have action tendencies to them. So when we are sad, we kind of become irritable, we become moody. Our spouse doesn't typically see us as sad. Sometimes when we are angry and our core emotion, those primary feelings that we have is sadness. We share that, that can be an impactful piece of change in how we talk about the affair, how we recover from the affair.
Morgan: And how your spouse relates to you basically.
Brad: Yeah exactly and that's a very good point. So these emotions can quickly go unnoticed or very largely be unnoticed. It's important that we start to notice these primary emotions. For example, if you suddenly realize that you forgot to do something that's very important, you may get kind of a sick feeling to your stomach. This sick feeling is your body's experience of primary emotion and we've all had that.
Morgan: Oh yeah, definitely.
Brad: I remember being in high school, if I was tardy, I just knew what the teacher was going to say and how embarrassed I would feel or sitting in – I was a horrible geometry student, was great at algebra, but geometry I just didn't get. And I just felt really dumb sitting in geometry class and I could feel just the embarrassment and the shame of not being very good at that.
And the teacher that I had was very condescending, he was – just his personality made it very hard to ask for help in that kind of situation. So it was hard to acknowledge that primary emotion and get help and that's what we do when we have these negative primary emotions, we hide from them.
Morgan: It's very uncomfortable. And we're going to discuss how to begin to get out of these negative cycles we experience after an affair and how to really tap into that primary emotion and understand it. So a large part of this has to do with our emotions like you said.
Emotions inform how we are to respond our mate after an affair. Emotions set the stage for whether we will have a negative pattern or relatively positive pattern. Emotions have action tendencies like you said.
They prompt us to give our mates certain responses. For example, when we feel shame, we tend to hide and withdraw, when we feel anger we tend to assert ourselves or attack or when we are afraid, we tend to avoid are try to escape.
Brad: Yeah, that's a good way to put that Morgan. The action tendencies, these emotions do have action tendencies that causes to give our mates and our spouse certain responses. Just to kind of remind you, there is action tendencies here, so in an affair, if someone is quiet and withdrawn, that may not necessarily mean they don't care or love you, it may simply mean they are deeply ashamed and they feel unworthy of you.
Morgan: And they don't know what to do.
Brad: And they don't know what to do, they feel very helpless. Those are very negative primary emotions and they feel horrible about themselves. Then there is also anger. Anger can be a primary emotion if it's meant to enforce boundaries, saying I've been violated.
That can be a primary emotion that needs to be shared. Anger, it can be an unproductive expression of when it's more reactive anger, like defensiveness. That kind of anger, maybe even criticalness can be an unhealthy anger. But if it's an anger of I'm really wounded and I'm really hurt, that can be a healthy expression of anger.
Morgan: There needs to be distance because I need to make sure that I'm okay and so I'm going to be a little angry.
Brad: Yeah or we are angry because someone we love has been hurt. That can be an experience of primary anger, that's important to know.
Morgan: So like you had said, hearing your spouse's primary emotion can change how you see them and that's important because they are opening up.
Brad: Yeah and Morgan exactly, hearing our spouse's primary emotion does change how we see them. Often many long-held perceptions and beliefs can be altered and it can create pathways for new responses towards each other. That's worth repeating. Hearing our spouse's primary emotion can change how we see them. Often many long-held perceptions and beliefs can be altered and it can create new pathways for new responses towards each other.
Morgan: And I would say that's the pinnacle of what we are saying. That's the thing we're trying to express as you are working out of the negative cycles. Expressing that primary emotion is going to change the way you see each other and break you out of that negative cycle...
Brad: Exactly.
Morgan: ...to start the healing process.
Brad: Exactly. Because honestly, we're just taught not to share our emotions. It's a sign of maturity not to be emotional. It's something that as little kids, we are told and we tell our little kids often times as a society, you know quit crying, I'll give you something to cry about. That's something I've heard people say to their kids. You know and I remember I was told that before by a sibling. What do you do with that? You learn to bottle up your feelings and emotions.
Morgan: Even that it is not okay to be honest about how you feel and that's just not healthy.
Brad: Yeah, so these long-held beliefs and perceptions, they can be altered, they can be changed, allowing new pathways for responses towards each other.
Morgan: And for relating to each other.
Brad: Yeah because these negative cycles, we get caught into as we talked about before, rigid patterns of interaction. We get stuck into acting the same way. It's like we are on this track and we can't get off. And so sharing this primary emotion breaks that track up and it allows a new track to develop, a positive track of interacting and relating to each other.
And so that occurs when you hear someone's primary emotion. Let me give you an example, one wife I worked with, she was able to come to a place where she truly saw her husband as someone who was a wonderful man. And she was able to see him as a wonderful man and that took some work because it was only months before that she saw him as someone who was evil. That was her little words, "he's evil" after he had disclosed that he had nine affairs.
Morgan: Oh wow.
Brad: And some of these dated back to when they were dating. But she saw his primary emotion, she saw his remorse, his shame, his hurt for her, how he felt devastated for her and his resolve to be someone she could really trust again. And she knew that the man that did this wasn't the man that's here today.
This is a man that really felt horrible about what happened and seeing that primary emotion like – and we've talked about that before when we talked about forgiveness and letting that person in.
That may be worth refreshing yourself and going back and listening to that. Now after an affair has been made known, both spouses who are dealing with an affair will be feeling a lot of different feelings. Those feelings and the action tendencies that go with them will cause the couple to get stuck in that circular pattern of negativity, that negative cycle, that eventually causes them to feel lost and hopeless. That's what happens when we get stuck, is we begin to feel lost and hopeless.
And those negative feelings that are there, they have action tendencies that cause us to want to protect ourselves and protect our spouse, protect the marriage. And many times, we're doing things because we don't want to lose our partner, we don't want to lose our spouse and that's something that quite honestly, when someone's – hate to say it like this, but sometimes when people who had an affair, one of the reasons they are unwilling to discuss it, is they've realized they don't want to lose their spouse anymore.
They had a chance to be with somebody else, they realize the grass isn't greener and now they don't want to do anymore to screw it up and they don't want to talk too much because they don't want to push their spouse over the fence. They wonder how much is too much and they are really trying to protect themselves from losing their spouse because they've realized they don't want to lose them.
Morgan: Yeah and it's actually counterproductive.
Brad: They feel like it could be counterproductive to talk about it, that's how they see it.
Morgan: Yeah, I really like this point here that you are making. Because they are relating to each other in a new way, in a way that doesn't make either person in this scenario, either partner closed off or you know when they are open, they are now sharing their emotions.
Brad: Yeah, they are not feeling...
Morgan: There is a safety there and security which is so true.
Brad: Yeah, you are exactly right. Yeah, you're exactly right. Like I was talking about earlier, hearing your spouse's primary emotion has changed how you see them. Even long-held perceptions and beliefs about them, it's altered and it creates new pathways and new responses. So we are getting out of that negative cycle.
You are communicating, you are sharing – what you are sharing that is different is, there is primary emotions – those are the core emotions, but there is other types of emotions and that's secondary emotions. And those secondary emotions tend to be things, it tends to be how we express those emotions.
Morgan: Those primary emotions.
Brad: Those primary emotions when we have a filter on them. And for example, that could be we are really hurting and we're really maybe sad inside and somebody asks us what's wrong and we say nothing, but it's clear to everybody in the office or to our family that something is wrong.
Morgan: That you are maybe angry instead of…
Brad: Yeah, you are short tempered, you are angry. That's kind of common response. You're defensive, you're irritable, you are moody and that can happen when we are afraid. Those tend to be off putting emotions. They tend to push people away from us, but when we talk from a heartfelt place about our primary emotion and share our sadness, fear, shame, hurt – that tends to attract our spouse towards us.
Morgan: And I think it is worth noting that whenever you understand the primary emotion and you can start to see your spouse as expressing that primary emotion and you recognize what's happening to allow those primary emotions to be available and to not swipe at them or that safety and security we had mentioned earlier.
Safety and security, you need to feel like you can be safe to share those primary emotions right Brad? And so when you recognize that from your spouse, allowing them to express that so that there's safety there, so that they would continue, so you can both continue to express those primary emotions and create a safe environment so that you can begin to heal and connect on a different level. Wouldn't you say?
Brad: Yeah, I would say that's accurate. I want to give our listeners an example of how you can relate in a way that makes your spouse feel safe and secure. Bill and Janet, they are struggling with his affair. Whenever Bill goes out to play golf, she feels like she isn't a priority to him. She doesn't say anything until he gets back and then unloads on him saying in a nasty, critical tone,
"You don't care about me, why would you leave me here by myself while you go have fun?" Those responses to feel inadequate, to help his wife feel better, he got her permission to spend a few hours on the golf course and even made plans to have a romantic evening with her the night before.
As Bill is feeling inadequate, he gives Janet the impression he doesn't care. Now his action tendency when he feels inadequate is to become silent and withdrawn. He is quietly criticizing himself for letting her down. She doesn't say that he is feeling disappointed in himself and feels like a failure for causing her to feel uncared for them because she doesn't know what he is feeling about her and where she stands with him.
She sinks further in her despair and sadness. She is showing him this sadness by being accusatory and not by really being vulnerable with him and discussing her fears with him. This is kind of an example of a negative cycle. She is holding this in, becoming accusatory.
What they could have done is, Janet could have instead of having a nasty, critical tone, she could have said, "Bill, I'm really scared. This scares me, I just need a lot of reassurance right now.
I'm really hurting and I feel like I need you to be here because I don't know really how much you care about me. I know we went on a date last night. I know you got my permission, but I'm still very anxious and still feeling very vulnerable."
And if she had come at Bill differently, Bill may have had a different response or he could have been more supportive and he wouldn't have sunk into his own shame and his own sadness and his own despair.
Morgan: And likewise, I mean he could have told her that...
Brad: Sure, they both could have done things differently. And if she did come at him in a critical tone, he could've said, "You know I really feel ashamed of myself. I really feel – hearing what you are saying right now, really hurts me and I feel like I'm really failing you."
Morgan: Yeah, I hurt that you hurt.
Brad: Yeah and they both could have done things differently that would help them out. And really what separates those two scenarios or those two different examples I gave, is in the scenario I just gave about where they are talking heart-to-heart, they are talking from a place of vulnerability and a place that comes from their primary emotions. Sharing that primary emotion empowers a partner to bring new understanding to why they may act a certain way.
Morgan: Yeah and sometimes that may take a little time to understand for yourself. And so you might have to in the beginning, you might have to take a little time just to think through what are you feeling, what is going on for you because it's not natural, I mean nobody – most of the time, nobody is taught how to do this. It's totally counter cultural in a lot of ways. So you may not know right away, you might have to take a few minutes just to think through what's really happening for you and for your spouse.
Brad: Yeah exactly, exactly. And Morgan, we are almost at the end of our time today. I just want to finish this.
Morgan: Okay.
Brad: Sharing primary emotion empowers us to process the experience and the underlying emotions that may be outside of our perception or of our awareness of ourselves and even our spouses. And so for example, for Janet to focus on the sadness she feels when she withdraws, she realizes she is becoming moody and irritable which serves only to push Bill away.
And so sometimes getting in touch with our emotions helps us become aware of maybe even decisions or choices we need to make. And I'll give our listeners an example. My father's been sick recently and he was going to stay with us.
So we quickly made the decision we need to get him – we need to fix up our spare bedroom and get him furniture because he's going to be with us maybe awhile. Well, we went out and spent a large amount of money, way more than we needed to and when we got home after buying it all, it wouldn't be delivered until – maybe until three or four days later. Morgan, you may have felt this way too.
Morgan: I did.
Brad: We both just felt kind of sick to our stomach because it was an impulse purchase, a large impulse purchase. And we're thinking the best – okay we needed to help take care of my dad, he's sick and so we really had noble intentions. And I knew it was an impulse purchase, it wasn't something we planned on, but it was such a large purchase and expense that we later canceled the order which was very humbling. I knew the sales guy...
Morgan: We felt so bad.
Brad: I felt horrible, but we did the right thing.
Morgan: And we needed to heed that feeling, that was the real thing.
Brad: Yeah and you are exactly right. We needed to listen to that because we were making a wrong decision, a wrong choice.
Morgan: But had we both kept it inside and didn't talk about it or just ignored it, then we would have both been worse off. It would have been a bad, bad decision.
Brad: And let me tell you, I was thinking my dad was going to stay with us for a few weeks, he ended up staying with us one night. And so it pays to pay attention to our primary emotion.
Morgan: Definitely, definitely. What I love about this is by knowing and understanding and realizing what is primary emotion, what is the secondary mode, being able to recognize that in ourselves and in our spouse as well, will help us to break out of this, even just recognizing or understanding or knowing the differences between the two – oh you are irritable, well I kind of know you, there's got to be something under there.
Brad: Yeah, there has got to be more and sometimes we need to say, okay there is more here. Sometimes we just can't take it at face value. And we're going to keep talking about this because this is very important.
Morgan: And it helps us to be empathetic with our spouse too. It helps us to, okay I know there's got to be something under there, so I'll just wait patiently while you work it out and if you want to work it out with me, let's do that, I'm here. I'm open and you are welcome to share as you are ready.
Brad: Yeah, exactly, exactly. And we'll keep talking about this. Thank you for listening today.
Morgan: Have a wonderful week guys.
This is Brad Robinson again, thank you for listening.
Many people have asked me about working with me and Morgan personally or a member of my team who is thoroughly trained in affair recovery.
So let me take a few moments and tell you about working with us, so that you can determine if this is right for you at this stage in your life and relationship.
I've personally helped hundreds (now thousands) of couples work through an affair and I've helped even more through audio programs.
I've spent hundreds of hours studying, researching and applying my discoveries to the couples I've worked with. Many of the couples I've worked with were recovering from not just one affair, but multiple affairs.
Some of my past clients have been individuals who literally walked in on their partner in the act of the affair or worked through an affair shortly after marriage, even when it's involved the injured partner's own sibling.
And of course, I've helped countless couples who have experienced an affair while they were dating. Those couples in those terrible situations were able to successfully deal with the pain, rebuild trust and reconnect emotionally again.
And in each of those situations, each couple worked through it faster than they thought they could have.
Over the last few years, I've painstakingly put together an intensive program for motivated couples such as yourself. This program is for couples who are motivated but have too much to do in too little time.
They often feel overwhelmed with their personal and work responsibilities, but simultaneously they want to continue to work through the broken trust and regain emotional closeness.
Many of the people who take our intensive program like yourself have already tried counseling or online courses. They want to see and have better than what they've already got. They want to get their lives back in the balance and be able to spend more time.
They want to get their lives back in the balance and be able to spend more time in their personal lives discussing things other than their trust issues and relationship. They want to get back to normal, so they can spend more time with the kids and leisure activities. This intensive program helps you achieve all those goals.
My intensive program is organized around three key concepts and they are:
1) negative cycles,
2) healing the trauma and
3) strengthening your bond.
In negative cycles, you will not only learn how to recognize them, but you will be able to stop negative cycles in their tracks. You'll be able to keep them from overpowering your relationship. You will also learn exactly how they are holding you back from the relationship you could only dream of with your partner and how they keep you stuck in the pattern of fighting or avoidance.
And I will help you share your primary emotion with each other and you will be able to do it all faster than you are able to do it today.
The second concept is healing trauma. You will be able to work past the pain, the heartache and be able to see each other differently again. You'll begin to regain control of your mind and not let the obsessive, intrusive thoughts of the affair overpower your mind. You'll begin to see the one who hurt you as the one who is there to help you heal.
Eventually, after our intensive program, you'll get to the point where the pain of the affairs but a distant memory. You'll accomplish vastly more in less time.
You'll have more time connecting, feeling close to each other and less time fighting with each other.
The third concept is strengthening your bond. From our intensive program, you get the very most out of your relationship.
You'll strengthen your bond to make your relationship affair proof. Your relationship will get better and better and the closeness you are experiencing will make the present state of your relationship seem like only a bad dream, not the crisis it is.
You'll be freeing your time so that you can be doing those things that you love and have the intimacy you are both longing for.
Over the brief intensive program, you'll work with me, Morgan or a member of our team who has extensive training in affair recovery here in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
You'll get out of the rut your relationship has been in for the longest time and begin to experience progress you've only hoped and prayed for in your hidden journey.
Many of our couples have experienced dramatic results that didn't require endless hours and weekly therapy. In fact, over the course of a few days, they experienced results that had taken other couples four, five and sometimes six months to achieve outside of our intensive program.
The cumulative effect of a few short days with me will include pre-work that you will complete before coming to the intensive. The results are incredible. You'll start to feel in control of your life within a few short days. The cumulative effect of our time together is really quite amazing.
Within a few weeks, the negative cycles and your bond will only continue to increase after you've completed our intensive. Your relationship with your children will improve, your health gets better and your stress levels decline and the entire quality of your life will improve.
Old arguments you've always had, you'll find that you are able to work through those in a way you wouldn't believe. The entire quality of your life improves wonderfully.
The intensive counseling program is both powerful and practical. It is proven to work and has helped couples with virtually some of the worst case scenarios you could ever imagine.
This intensive program will require you to be in charge of your own travel and lodging. The way it works is simple, you will spend 2 to 4 days with me or Morgan or a member of our team and we will work with you through the entire affair recovery process. We will start in the morning and finish in the afternoon with enough time to enjoy the emerging new closeness that's spreading between you in the evenings. This is the best investment you can make yourself.
