(00:00):
Hi, I'm Brad Robinson with Healing Broken Trust. Thank you for joining me today. I want to talk to you about a common scenario that many betrayed spouses and themselves in. They're betrayed, but the unfaithful spouse will not give them any answers. So as somebody who's been betrayed, it feels like, gosh, I don't have many choices. I don't have many options. What can I do to improve my situation? What I want to get into with you today, something that can be kind of triggering what I'm going to talk about. It probably won't sound fair. It probably is not easy to hear. I'm going to be honest with you, at the same time, I want you to like me. I want you to like my YouTube channel. I want you to like the video. I want you to listen to my podcast. But sometimes we also need to hear the truth.
(00:51):
Or at the very least, we need to hear things that don't always feel pleasant. Our capacity to grow in large part is really dependent on our ability to hear things that are uncomfortable. And I want you to heal. I want you to be successful. I believe in you and I believe in your recovery. So if you've been betrayed, obviously it's probably the worst thing that's ever happened to you. It was for me when I was betrayed. My parents' divorce was also one of the worst things that ever happened to me. So if my parents had good help, the kind of help I'm trying to give to you for free, I wish they had made it. I would not be doing this if they had been able to make it. So if you're listening to this, you likely found out about your spouse's infidelity. You want the truth, which is understandable and it's reasonable.
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You should get the truth. You deserve the truth. The problem you're running into is that when you ask questions, you get silence or they change the topic or they say, "I'm not going to talk about that, " or, "We've talked about it enough. Why keep going? This isn't helping you any. Why should I keep going? " That leaves you as the betrayed partner to feel stuck and confused. You may end up thinking about it all day and all night because you don't know what is real. You don't even know who you're really reconciling with. So getting the facts and the story is really important. Because of that, you're not crazy for any of the answers. After betrayal, your brain stops feeling ... You don't feel safe anymore and you're trying to feel safe. Getting the truth helps you understand what happened. Getting the truth helps you make choices about your future.
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And getting the truth, as you know, is a part of your healing. People who've been unfaithful think giving you the truth is only hurting you more and delaying healing. And sometimes the partner who cheated won't talk because they feel deep shame. They may fear that what will happen if I do tell you the truth. They may want to protect their image. They may still want to hide things or they may not want to face the pain they caused. But no matter the reasons, people can't heal if we are healing in the dark. We only heal in the light. We only heal when the light comes in. That's the only way we can really heal. So if you're somebody who has been begging for answers and still not getting those answers, you're not being too needy. You're being the average person who's been betrayed. The average person who's been betrayed wants the truth.
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They need the truth. They expect the truth. In reality, getting the truth to somebody who's been betrayed, who's asking for it is actually kindness. It's actually a form of love. It's a form of reassurance. It's a form of protection. People who've been betrayed know that. They've asked for it. That's why they're asking for it. That's what causes them to feel like hopeful is actually you're actually trying. It actually tells me you're remorseful when I see that kind of effort because I know it's difficult. But for people who've been unfaithful, they see that as, "Holy crap, we're going to fight. We're going to get in an argument. We're going to get into whatever. It's not going to go well. You're going to leave me when you find out everything." You think it's one, but it was more than one. Or it was one affair while I was cheating on you and them at the same time.
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There was more than this. Or it was none of that. It was just like, "We fight all the time. I don't want to go down this. Is it really helping you? " So they struggle to give the full story. You're not being too needy if you're asking for these kinds of things. And if you're asking for these kinds of things, it's okay.
(04:27):
But we run into this problem of I'm asking because I need it. It's reasonable to me. You don't think I need it. So if you're trying to get your spouse, to be honest with you, I want to give you some advice. I want to tell you about some things that I think never work and some things that do work. What I would do if I were you, if I were in this situation again of saying, "Hey, tell me what I need to hear. I need this. " This is what I would tell you. Basically, it's going to be what you would tell your kids if your kids had done something and screwed up and you wanted them to be honest with you. It would basically be putting yourself, treating them how you would want to be treated, the golden rule. That's basically what I would do.
(05:10):
I would tell my spouse, "There's nothing you can tell me that will make me stop loving you or make me want to leave you. I'm not asking questions to punish you. I'm asking so I can understand what happened and what we need to do to heal, because out of this disclosure, it's going to come sometimes some hard truths. Maybe you're going to go need to do some stuff to get you some individual healing that only is going to come to light when you're really radically honest. So if you tell me the truth, I will not punish you for coming clean. I need honesty so we can move forward. And in fact, this honesty is necessary for you too. So I would really emphasize there's nothing that you can do that will cause me to stop loving you or even make me leave you. Now, as somebody who's been betrayed, especially if we're really close to D-Day or there's been a lot of deception, that's a hard thing to reassure somebody with.
(06:05):
I'm not going to leave you, or you can't make me stop loving you. The problem is when those small pieces of truth come out like you've probably already experienced, we get hurt, it's traumatizing.
(06:20):
We definitely don't feel protected. We definitely don't feel chosen. We definitely don't feel loved. So what I'm asking of you and what's so hard about what I'm saying is in a sense, I'm asking you to be the bigger person. And it's not fair. It's not easy. It's not fair. Somebody, the person you've loved more than anybody has destroyed you and I'm asking you to talk to them to the way you would want to be treated. You may already be doing that, but what I know about the average person who strays is that they hate conflict. They don't have a lot of emotional intelligence. They hate conflict and they shut down really easy. So you're dealing with somebody whose natural tendency beyond the affair is to be a turtle. And what I'm asking you to do is something, in some ways, it's really heroic. It's asking you to be somebody like an angel when you feel like anything but because you're hurt, you're wounded.
(07:18):
I'm just trying to encourage you with things that work. However, I would try to be a broken record. So when small pieces of truth come out, I would really try to reassure them. There's nothing you can tell me that will make me stop loving you or make me want to leave you. I'm not asking you this to punish you. I'm just asking you this to help me understand. And then when they share, I would try to give them positive reinforcement. Because what can happen in this is what I've seen from countless couples at this point in my life is that when the truth comes out, usually people feel like they're getting punished for being honest. And what happens when we do that is that we're teaching the other person to hide more. We're teaching the unfaithful spouse that when they share something that's unpleasant, that we're going to lash out, that we're going to not be able to handle it.
(08:10):
We're going to barrage them with future questions. All of that is normal. All of that is what pretty much everybody feels like doing, but it doesn't always work. And that's where people get stuck in this negative cycle around full disclosure. So I would really try to encourage them again on being honest. I would say, thank you for telling me this. Yes, it does hurt. Yes, it's hard. But when you are sharing with me, it makes me trust you more. And when you hide from me, it makes me not trust you. Is this hurtful for you? Is it hard as the betrayed spouse? Absolutely. But when we punish honesty, we're teaching the other person to hide more. And unfortunately, they're already very sensitive people. They look tough. They look really independent. They're not emotional. They're just highly sensitive people. And it's not fair. But if we can put ourselves in their shoes, try to treat them the way we want to be treated in a situation like that.
(09:13):
In a sense, take the higher road, they're going to be more open to sharing with us. We do need to have boundaries. A lot of the information online is saying, "Well, you got to set boundaries with this person. You got to do this. You got to do that. " Those kinds of things. There are boundaries that you can set. There are certain boundaries that you can set though that it can almost signal to somebody who's had an affair that the relationship is doomed, that they can never heal from this. They can never get over this. And some of those boundaries are around, "If you don't tell me this, I'm going to basically, not necessarily walk away, but I'm basically going to be more controlling. I'm basically going to be more manipulative in some ways." And so yes, we need boundaries and some of those boundaries are going to be things around, I need to know how was my health.
(10:03):
Did you contract any sexually transmitted diseases? I need you to get it checked out. I need to know if you're hiding any money. I need to know if you have any secret money accounts. How much money did you give the affair partner? I do need full disclosure. I do need this timeline. I need to know when it started, how long it lasted, what kind of affair it was, when did it actually end? I need those kinds of things. And the amount of detail that people need who've been betrayed really varies from betrayed person to betrayed person. About 70% of betrayed people need to know a great deal.
(10:39):
70% which they need to know everything. 20% need to know a great deal. 10% don't want to know anything. So it's really going to vary from betrayed person to betrayed person on what kind of information is needed, but the best policy of somebody who's been unfaithful is just no more secrets. If somebody who's been betrayed is asking for the truth, they can handle the truth. In my experience, rarely do people leave when they get the truth and honesty that they're after. If they're asking for the truth and they're asking for honesty, they can live with it. We may not think that if we've been unfaithful because we see them maybe cry or get upset or obsess over what they do know and maybe what we're holding back is actually the worst of it. But when we can be honest and share, we're showing them that we're choosing them.
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We're showing them that we're courageous, that we're not a coward. We're fighting their contempt. One of the things that people have who've been betrayed is a lot of contempt. They feel morally superior. They feel like, "I would never do this. How could you do this? What kind of person does this? You're sensing their disgust. You're sensing, gosh, they're repulsed spy me. " That kind of thing. And if we can be honest and share with them, they begin to see us as somebody who has a backbone, as somebody who's being operating with integrity. We're seeing them as they begin to see us as somebody who is, in a sense, courageous, somebody that is honorable. They're seeing us as a person that they married. It's like, "Okay, yeah, this is the person I married. Yeah, you really made a big mistake. Yeah, you really screwed up, but you're owning it.
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You're not hiding. You're not cowering. You're choosing me and you're picking up the pieces again." That's why the honesty is so important. It helps fight off their repulsion, their disgust. It helps them feel chosen again, ironically, but again, when we're being honest, they just see it as ... We see it as somebody who's been faithful, we see it as, "Man, I'm just hurting you. I'm telling you crap that's going to hurt you more," that kind of thing. So we have to be honest, we have to share. We can't have secrets. If we have secrets and we've been unfaithful, the chances of us truly healing are going to be really small. Doesn't mean we're going to divorce necessarily, but to really heal from this, to really leave this in the past where we both want it to be. It's going to be really small because the betrayed spouse is not going to feel chosen.
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They're not going to feel like they're uniquely special. They're not going to feel like really cared for. They're not going to feel like, "Wow, I'm really glad I'm married to you again." They're going to feel like, "You know what? For practical reasons, it's probably best to stay, but they're not going to feel like, wow, you really have made me happy and I'm really glad I'm here." They're probably not going to get to that point without a lot of therapy or a lot of compensation for the dishonesty. And that's the other thing is, is compensating for not giving honesty is actually really hard to do. If people had a legitimate need and we're not giving it to them, it's really hard for them to feel satisfied. And then the second thing is, it's not up to us to decide what's a legitimate need or not. If our spouse is asking for it, it's really up to them to decide what's legitimate and not legitimate.
(14:00):
And we want to show them that we're choosing them and that we're trying to meet those needs. But if we're saying, "No, I can't meet that for you. I can't do that. " We're showing them that we're still choosing ourselves like we were during the affair. We're showing them that we're not any different than how we were acting during the affair. Maybe the behavior's different. I'm not having an affair at this moment, but I'm still choosing myself. The pattern is still the same. As a result, people who've been betrayed struggle to trust. They struggle to feel like, "Okay, things will be different." They just feel that, okay, maybe things will be different for the next couple of years, they'll be on their best behavior because we're going through hell right now, but they're not expecting ... They think maybe it'll happen again. And as a result, trust isn't truly restored.
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So if you've been betrayed and you're trying to encourage your spouse to give you the truth and they're really struggling and you're not getting any answers, you're wanting that truth and you're not getting it, I would follow the suggestions I've already mentioned about you want to really talk to them the way you would want to be talked to. You would want to reassure them the way you would a child, to be honest with you. You would tell them, "There's nothing you can tell me that would make me stop loving you or cause me to leave you. " And then you really would want to focus on the things that you can control. You want to focus on those things in life that you can control. Maybe it's investing time in your children. Maybe it is going to couple's therapy. Maybe it is individual trauma therapy.
(15:36):
Maybe it's finding other outlets in life that you can control. It doesn't mean that you have to divorce, but finding things in life that you can control that cause you to be happy. Instead of giving all your power over to somebody else, it's called an external locus of control where you control my life, my life I am no longer in control of how I feel or what's going on inside of me. It's up to you are now in it. Instead of giving all your control over to the unfaithful spouse, find those things in life that make you feel alive, that make you feel happy. Maybe it's exercising, maybe it's gardening, maybe it's going back to church, maybe it's anything, any number of things, but find those things that make you feel alive and happy and then go do them.
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If you can control what you can control, treat them the way that you want to be treated and help them feel like, okay, I'm not punishing you for being honest. The odds of you getting the truth are actually going to be greater. The other thing that you can do that you can control is something like therapeutic disclosure. It does get heated whenever people are trying to do disclosure on their own. I don't know if I've ever worked with a couple who didn't argue or fight around disclosure. So everything I've told you so far, I believe in, but how easy is it to implement? It's really hard. So therapeutic disclosure is really a useful tool. Sitting in a therapist's office, sometimes for hours at a time, like three hours at a time, maybe an all day session and just going through what happened and even using something like a polygraph afterwards can really help somebody get the full story out because it's a controlled environment, we're not lashing out, we're not arguing.
(17:29):
There's reassurance that, okay, it's going to get out there and we're going to deal with it, but we're not going to fight over it. We're not going to attack each other. Sometimes that helps people get the full story out. If we can kind of set some healthy boundaries like that, like let's do it in a therapeutic office, let's get therapeutic disclosure. If we can have some other boundaries around openness, like not illegal spine, but if I can, like if you can show me your phone, if you can show me deleted that you're not deleting messages or there's no secret accounts, there's no hidden apps. If you can show me that, give me access to information that affects my safety, like devices, accounts, your schedule, that helps me trust you because if there's things that I sense that you're hiding from me, whether it's your phone or other things, I can't trust you.
(18:18):
It's okay to have boundaries around intimacy. Unless I know what's really going on, I don't feel like making love. I don't think I can do that. It's okay to have boundaries around money. I need to know what kind of spending has happened. I need to know what kind of money you spend on the affair partner. I need to know what kind of spending is happening now. I need to know if there's any secret accounts. That's all reasonable stuff to ask for. It's okay to have social boundaries. It's okay to have boundaries around what we share with others, who we confide in. It's okay to have boundaries like that. It's okay to have boundaries at home or maybe we have to sleep in separate rooms. There can be boundaries around not arguing late at night or arguing in front of the kids, obviously, those kinds of things.
(19:10):
But if you can ultimately reassure your spouse that there's nothing you can tell me that I can't handle, and then when they trickle the truth out or stagger it out, or you have these delays where it's not all at once, trickle truth, basically, if you can show them that you can handle it, they're going to be more likely to give it to you. Also, if you're persistent in asking, they're more likely to give it to you. And honestly, if you're able to follow it up with a polygraph, you're more likely to get the truth. What you don't want to get into is a constant revolving door of arguments where it's fighting over this, arguing over this. You want to just rip the bandaid off. And now as somebody who's been betrayed, you know all of that. I'm preaching to the choir, telling you what you already know, but for people who've been unfaithful, if your spouse is asking for no more secrets, the truth and they're willing to reconcile with you, they can handle it.
(20:07):
What they cannot handle is being lied to, being deceived, and feeling like you're not choosing them anymore. If they're asking for it, they can handle it.
(20:18):
I've met at this point in my career, my wife says thousands of people who have been unfaithful and who are seeking to heal and couples seeking to heal after infidelity. I've only had a handful of people who've left after finding out about an affair, only a handful. The majority who left were people who were like, "You're not doing crap to help me heal. You're not being honest. I have to leave. I can't tolerate this anymore. I'm still traumatized. I'm still wounded because you're not helping me. " And you know what? The people who left were usually pretty happy they left because they felt freer. They felt safer. So you really got to be honest. If they're asking for it, give it to them, give it to them in a timeline, write it down, record it, or do it in a therapy office. We have workshops where we talk about the milestones to healing.
(21:09):
One of those is full disclosure. We have a blueprint that you can walk through to facilitate full disclosure. I'd love to see you come to one of our workshops. I'd love to see you visit us at healingbrokentrust.com. You can do this, but it's not easy and you need outside help typically to go through this, but you can do it. And really the healing begins once the betrayed spouse feels safe enough like, "Okay, there's nothing else out there. You've been honest with me. Okay, I feel safe. I feel secure." And honestly, I haven't met anybody who lied about a previous affair and was totally honest about it who went on to have another affair. Pretty much everybody who has multiple affairs, the common thing that each individual has, whether it's a man or a woman or their age, it didn't matter. None of that matters. What matters is were they honest about prior affairs because when we're honest about what we've done, we're really liberating ourselves, we're gaining self-mastery, self-control, we're really walking into the light.
(22:16):
So if we can be honest about what's happened, we're really freeing ourselves from that compulsive behavior we found ourselves in. We're freeing ourselves from that self-destructive behavior we found ourselves in. But if we are still lying to our spouse, in a sense, we're still lying to ourselves. We're saying, "I'm in control. I can handle this. I can minimize the consequences. I can keep you from getting hurt." But when we buy into that kind of lie ourselves as somebody who's been unfaithful, what we're doing is we're really keeping ourselves from really growing. We're really keeping ourselves from gaining self-mastery.
(22:55):
Any AA program, any addiction program, and this goes for people who are not sex addicts, just people who had a normal affair, even if it was a couple of them. The real truth and transformation starts with just reckoning with ourselves, being honest with ourselves, and then being honest with the people around us. If we can't do that, it's going to really be hard to be faithful. And I've met a lot of people who, after an affair, are truly ashamed and truly remorseful and definitely don't want this to happen again. They feel devastated by what they've done. They don't want it to happen again. They hate themselves over what they've done. I've met a lot of people like that, but I've also met a lot of people where that moment of remorse and that moment of making a vow wasn't sustainable because they had to address other underlying vulnerabilities and factors that only being honest brought to the light, but only being honest made them accountable.
(23:56):
And being honest was their first true step in being responsible over what they've done. So remorse in the moment wasn't enough. They had to be honest. So I wanted to leave you guys with some thoughts. Hopefully this has been helpful. I'm sure it's been challenging. I'm sure some of you already wanted to be like, "Gosh, I hate this. I don't like this guy. If this is your first time listening to me, I would encourage you to listen to other things that I've done. I definitely don't judge healing, broken trust and what we do just based on one episode, one piece of content that we're putting out. I believe in you. You can heal. I know it seems horrible and like, Kylie, there's nothing we can do to get better. You can get better, but a lot of times you need help. There is a point where it's like, you know what?
(24:43):
We need a lot of help. We're available. That's what I do. I help people everywhere. I get to meet people from all over the world, help them heal broken trust. You can do it. People who heal are not any different than the people who don't heal. The only thing is, is implementation. They implement the steps to healing. That's why we have workshops. That's why we have a complete program where we help couples and individuals who've been unfaithful and betrayed work through this process of healing. You can do the same thing. The people who heal are not any different than you or special than you. The only thing is, is they implement the steps to healing. That's it. And I'd like to help you. And so please visit us at healingbrokentrust.com. Until then, I'll see you next time. Thank you.
