If you’re staying married after infidelity, it may be helpful to hear the stories of other women who have also chosen this path. If you want to stay married, but you’re also looking for safety, consider The Betrayal Trauma Recovery Living Free Workshop to give you strategies to use to keep yourself emotionally and psychologically safe after his betrayal.

Transcript: Staying Married After Infidelity? What You Need To Know

Anne: We have a member of our community on today. I’m going to call her Linda. She discovered her husband of nearly 17 years had been repeatedly unfaithful to her throughout their marriage. Linda decided to use some of The Living Free Strategies while staying married after infidelity.

The Living Free Workshop is to help women determine the type of character their husband has through strategy. In Linda’s case, she decided to use the strategies and stay with her husband. So Linda, let’s start with your story. How would you have described your marriage before you discovered your husband’s infidelity?

Linda: Before I found out, I would have called our marriage an idyllic marriage. I would have said that we had pretty much a storybook relationship. We were best friends, were each other’s favorite person in the whole world. We’ve always enjoyed spending time together. All of our friends, all of our family, a lot of them look to us as the example for marriage. It seemed, it seemed really great.

The Devastation Of Discovery Day

Anne: What was it like to realize that everything you believed was a lie?

Linda: It was devastating. It shattered my whole world. I’ve described it to people like a puzzle. If our life is a puzzle. And before that day, I felt like my puzzle was all together, all the pieces fit. It was a really pretty puzzle. And that day, when I found that out, it was as if someone took that puzzle and just threw it. The pieces went everywhere, maybe some of them even broke and went under pieces of furniture or something.

And, for the next however many months staying married after infidelity, it was this scramble. This panicky scramble to try and find all those pieces and get them to fit back together. Except now I realized they don’t fit. All this perfect picture that I thought I had, isn’t what I thought it was, and it doesn’t fit together like I thought it did.

Anne: We’ve talked about D-Day on the podcast before, which means Discovery Day. The day you find out that the reality you’re living in is not actual reality, right? It is mind bending. How did you navigate the fog after D-Day?

Navigating The Fog Of Infidelity With Truth

Linda: if I’m honest, I would say the first at least three months, maybe longer than that. After the first D-Day, I didn’t navigate it. I went into this deep, deep, deep fog staying married after infidelity, and I didn’t know which way was up, and I didn’t even try. I call it a zombie phase where you’re dead on your feet. You get up, and go through the motions. And you do the things that need doing.

I have very few memories of that time, and it was almost like I was just a robot or something going through that time. I don’t know. My brain was just off. I really, really struggled with my relationship with God during that time. And didn’t understand how he could let that happen. I had spent my whole life following him, praying for my husband and for our marriage. It felt like God had betrayed me too. I was angry, really angry with him.

I would pray and say terrible things to him. It was an awful time, but he pursued me through that time and was patient with me through my tantrums. After several months, I did eventually start to believe what he says in his word about me, about him. Eventually I got through that fog by believing truth.

Anne: I felt a similar thing during the worst fog, which was a nine month period after my husband’s arrest. I couldn’t feel God at all. In spite of my prayers, in spite of my scripture study, and it was such a difficult time.

Linda: Yeah.

Staying Married After Infidelity? Finding Comfort In Scripture

Anne: And now out of the fog, I can see him during that time when I was staying married after infidelity. And I’m grateful for his patience, because what we went through that fog is a classic trauma response where we are very wounded and can’t process things. He, Is there even if we can’t feel him.

Linda: And he’s so patient that the scripture, especially the Psalms and also Lamentations, helps me be at peace. I think with that time and to recognize that I would even say like God was okay with it. So I think he appreciated that I was coming to him with my raw honesty. I wasn’t holding back and pretending. You know, everything was fine when it wasn’t.

I screamed at him when I wanted to scream at him and was real. I think he wants our authentic selves. He knows we’re broken. He knows we’re ugly. And he just wants us to come to him as we are.

Anne: So either during this time or after this time, talk to me about the aha moments you experienced.

Linda: For me, one of the first and biggest aha moments was when I got to the place where I had to be okay with the idea of my marriage ending. I was a child of divorce, and I had vowed I would never, ever, ever get divorced. And I clung to that. God brought me to a place where I recognized that I had made my marriage an idol. I had put this, I won’t get divorced above God. I had decided almost that if God asked me to leave my marriage, I wouldn’t.

Conflicting Values & God’s Will

Linda: I would rather be staying married after infidelity than do what he asked me to do. So to get to a place where I said, okay, God, I’m going to follow you. I’m going to do what you want. Even if that means being a divorced person, which, you know, is this terrible thing in my mind.

Anne: This is where it gets really tricky. I think for women of faith, because there are these values in conflict. God’s will for us is to be in a safe spiritual situation, staying married after infidelity. It’s not to be in this dangerous situation with someone who’s being duplicitous.

Linda: A passage that struck me really hard recently is that I’m not gonna remember the exact reference, but it’s in Malachi. And it’s the passage where God talks about how he hates divorce. He’s talking to the men of Israel. They’re asking why isn’t he accepting their worship?

And he says, because I saw the vows you made to your wives, and I see that you’re being unfaithful to them. And he says, you know, I hate divorce, but the message behind that is more than I hate divorce. I hate seeing my daughters abused. And he demands their faithfulness. He says, come back and be faithful to your wives.

Anne: The reason why God made commandments was to keep people safe.

Linda: Yes

Anne: If everyone in the world obeyed God’s commandments. If everyone was honest, the exploitation, abuse, and harm done to other people would disappear. I mean, that’s the point of the commandments. When you don’t obey the commandments, it actually harms someone else.

Linda: Yes

Anne: So it’s not just for your own, like, Oh, good. I’m gonna go to heaven.

Linda: It’s for our safety, yeah.

The Power Of Truth

Anne: So I read my scriptures every day. I found boundaries almost on every page while staying married after infidelity, as I did my scripture study in the morning. It was amazing. I’m really grateful for his guidance through the scriptures. And I think it’s sad, because so many women are so traumatized. That picking up their scriptures seems so overwhelming. It seems like there’s no way like, why would I do that? I’m not getting any answers. I’m out of God. God has abandoned me.

I’ve obeyed the commandments. And here I am in this awful situation. He hasn’t kept his promise. That power that can come from the scriptures during this difficult time is sometimes lost.

Linda: Absolutely.

Anne: You mentioned one of your aha moments was that you wanted to cover yourself in truth. What did that look like for you?

Linda: Before I talk about covering myself in truth. That was really terrifying to me, because I was still trying to live in the secrets, staying married after infidelity. And so it was really scary, but because I wanted to find out what the Bible had to say about it. I wanted to find out what the Bible has to say about boundaries. If I wanted to find scripture about telling the truth.

So that became how I covered myself in truth, because I studied and studied, finding all these verses. And then those would be in my head. And so every day for months, just scripture going through my head repeatedly. It had massive effects on our life. I suddenly started seeing lies everywhere.

You know, someone would ask me a question and I’d give my normal. Oh, I’m fine answer. Trying to minimize my pain or pretend like I was okay. That wasn’t truth.

Staying Married After Infidelity: The Truth Shall Set You Free

Linda: I learned through that time of staying married after infidelity. To let everything that came out of my mouth, I mean, as much as possible. Because I’m still human, be saturated in truth and it changed everything.

Anne: And the truth shall set you free.

Linda: Absolutely.

Anne: There’s so much confidence that I gain knowing that this type of sin is wrong. And that I am doing God’s will to set a very firm boundary around it.

Linda: Yes.

Anne: I don’t know if I would have that firm confidence if I didn’t know it was coming straight from God. Especially because my particular church leaders weren’t supportive of what I was doing. Or they couldn’t understand it. And they thought I was not being faithful, it just gave me the confidence. That I needed to stand up to, I would say, just either my church culture or society or people who don’t understand this. And it brought me a lot of peace.

Linda: You know, I had talked earlier about making my marriage an idol. I believe that’s another thing I had made an idol of is the teachings of the church.

Instead of following just scripture, I had allowed man’s interpretation of that, right? To shape me and I became more dedicated to that than the word itself. And like you said, there are so many churches that don’t get it all right. Years and years and years probably centuries of tradition has gotten in the way of what the Bible actually says about it.

Anne: Sexual sin is old, right? It is the deepest sin we have as humans. And it is the most destructive.

Linda: Absolutely.

Getting Support While Staying Married After Infidelity

Anne: Well, I guess aside from murder, it is so deep in our culture, and so ingrained in, “What it means to be a man.” And also “What it means to be a woman.” How we are supposed to interact. All those, we would say roles, not the relationship God wants us to have. And focus on a peaceful, loving relationship. And I think part of that is coming from centuries of sexual sin.

Linda: Yeah

Anne: So you talked about how you started speaking the truth while staying married after infidelity. So that’s one way that you dealt with your anger and feelings toward your husband. Talk about other ways you dealt with it.

Linda: For me, I had been so isolated for so long. This does kind of go along with the truth part of it. I Decided that I was going to kind of come out. I don’t know if that’s the right word, the right way to say it. You know, I wasn’t going to hide anymore.

I told our children about it. They’re preteens through teenagers. So old enough to understand. And our friends, I found others. I found Facebook groups and all kinds to come alongside me, people that I knew in real life and people that I virtually know. I just got help. The Bible talks about as iron sharpens iron being with other believers.

And I think that was important for me while staying married after infidelity. Another way to get through it was just to get support. One of my life verses has become II Corinthians 1:3-4, which says all praise to God, the father of our Lord, Jesus Christ. God is our merciful father and the source of all comfort.

Comfort In Our Troubles Is Healing

Linda: He comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort others. When they are troubled, we can give them the same comfort God has given us. So I found that as I walked in obedience, God just started bringing women into my life. It somehow miraculously was healing for me.

Anne: My experience was similar. I was praying so much after my ex’s arrest, and he was given a 14 month probation with a no contact order from a judge. And I knew I needed a separation while staying married after infidelity. I needed space. And so as I prayed and said, God, should I file for divorce or should I amend the no contact order? Should I allow him to talk to me? I just kept getting this answer to be still, be still. One day I told my mom. Mom, I got an answer.

She was like, you did? That’s awesome. Which one is it? Cause I was only praying about these two things, right? Divorce or amend the no contact order. Those are the only two options. And his answer was to start a podcast. And so I told my mom, I’m supposed to start a podcast and she was like, okay.

Well, I started podcasting. And a few months after that, my husband at the time, he actually filed for divorce. And so I never had to make that decision.

Linda: Isn’t that just like God, I mean, to, to make it so you didn’t have to do it, you know?

Anne: Because I committed to my marriage vows and covenants, and knew I couldn’t break them. I had no desire to do that.

Either A or B, and God says C

Anne: And so I was just waiting on God to let me know what sort of man is he while staying married after infidelity. Not God, what sort of man is my husband, right? Is he a godly man who can make the changes and repent, or is he not? And I found out he wasn’t. I was heartbroken about it.

Linda: Of course, isn’t it so like us to limit ourselves to A and B? I did that so much too, we were going through and we say, Okay, I can do this or I can do this. And I’ve seen as I talk with other women. Well, it’s this or this, and I’m always thinking, or it’s C. You know, there’s a C, there’s a C, D, and E, actually. I feel like that’s a huge part of betrayal trauma, is that we get stuck in A and B. This is, these are my two choices, and there’s almost always, more choices.

Anne: Yeah, and I think God was waiting for me to be at the right place where he could show that other choice.

Linda: Right.

Anne: Now it’s opened up this amazing world for me. And you’ve experienced the same thing, where there are so many women out there who are going through this. And had we not been able to tell the truth, had we not told the truth, we would never have found each other.

There’s so much power in truth, maybe enough power to stop this exploitation epidemic that we call pornography. I don’t know how, I don’t know when, but I have to believe it’s possible.

God Has Power To Do Miracles

Linda: Absolutely. And with the God that we serve, shouldn’t we set crazy goals? I mean, he. He is the creator of heaven and earth. He holds everything together with his power. Why would we limit him to something that wasn’t crazy? You know?

Anne: That’s a good point. It is pretty crazy, and I think about like the parting of the Red Sea, right? I mean, it gets a little intense.

Linda: This is small compared to that.

Anne: Yeah, it seems bigger to me. For some reason, stopping pornography seems harder than parting the Red Sea.

Linda: And also, don’t you think we know that God, you know, created the world? So therefore he’s in control of nature.

Anne: Right.

Linda: So, parting the Red Sea, we’re comfortable with that falling within his realm of influence or whatever. But this this is the hearts of people.

Anne: Because so many women pray and pray, and pray and pray for their husband’s heart to change.

Linda: Right.

Anne: And it’s not happening.

Linda: So earlier I said we had this idyllic marriage, but I knew about the pornography. I didn’t know about the infidelity, but I knew about the pornography long before all this D-Day and all that.

And I prayed, and I prayed and I prayed. And even though I would have said our marriage was idyllic, there were signs that I ignored. I spent many, many, many years, crying out to God for my husband. That he would turn from that. And for a long, long, long time, I felt like there was no answer to my prayers. And it had to get really bad. It got to the point where he was repeatedly unfaithful in really, really horrible, horrible ways.

Emotional Abuse & Establishing Boundaries

Anne: For those of us whose husbands are not showing signs of change, then boundaries are our only option. In my case, I would love him to change. But I lost hope in him, while I have also increased my faith and hope in God. Which has been an interesting journey, letting go of that idol of marriage. Or letting go of that idol of my husband, and putting it in God. And God put me on this path.

I want to talk for just a second about the emotional abuse that pornography users frequently exhibit. So before you discovered about your husband’s addiction, you perceived it as the ideal marriage, with a few red flags that you discounted.

Linda: Right.

Anne: Now when you look back on his behaviors, do they look different now? Like, do they seem a lot worse than they did at the time?

Linda: Oh my goodness, yes. For all those years, he would tell me, I struggled with pornography, but I’ve quit. Every time he got caught, it was, okay, this is it. This is it. And I remember thinking, how will I ever know if it is real? Because it’s just a matter of time before I find it again, you know? Now I look back and see, like you said, abuse.

It was an abusive relationship before, and even though I didn’t feel like it was. I can see the manipulative ways they communicate and the lies. And then all the, I don’t know what the right word is, but the tactics maybe. To deflect from those lies and keep us where they want us. It was downright abusive, everything was not peaceful at all.

Staying Married After Infidelity: The Chaos Of An Abusive Relationship

Linda: Chaos, chaotic, he looked for conspiracies everywhere. It always felt like everyone was out to get him. And there was this, yeah, kind of craziness about him

Anne: I’m so interested in bringing this to light. So many people think their marriages are ideal. And then later, when they look back when they’re in recovery, realize, wow, no. It was an abusive situation. I was the same way I was being abused for seven years.

My husband was arrested for domestic violence. And at the time he was arrested, it took me like a few weeks to realize, wait a minute, he is really abusive. For about three weeks after, I thought, no, this is my wonderful, loving husband. It’s so hard to wrap your head around abuse. That’s one of the things I’m trying to help people understand. The correlations between pornography use and abuse. Because the world just thinks, oh pornography, like it doesn’t hurt anyone or anything.

And if women know when he’s using pornography, there’s always some element of abuse. It might be subtle, but I think it helps us have the confidence to set those boundaries that we need to set to be safe. And if you’re trying to figure out what type of character does my husband have, does he have this exploitative, deceptive character? It’s hard to know how to do that, which is what the Betrayal Trauma Recovery Living Free Workshop is about.

Linda: Right, definitely.

Anne: It helps women who are in that stage where they don’t know what to do. They don’t know where to turn. They don’t want a divorce. Like I didn’t want to, or you didn’t want to, and not all women who go through this get divorced.

Getting On The Path To Safety

Anne: And at Betrayal Trauma Recovery, we believe women can get to safety no matter what their situation is. And The Living Free Workshop helps women do that.

Linda, thank you so much for coming on today.

Linda: Thank you so much. I appreciate you having me, it was awesome. And thank you also for what you do.