Every Man’s Battle Podcast

New Life: Welcome to the Every Man's Battle podcast, brought to you by New Life Ministries. In this podcast, you'll hear honest conversations and encouragement for living a life of sexual integrity. In every episode, licensed marriage and family therapist JJ West and licensed professional counselor Doug Barnes break the silence around sexual integrity struggles that millions of men face but rarely discuss openly. Each episode offers practical strategies and genuine hope to dissolve the shame and isolation that keeps men trapped in destructive cycles. Let's get to today's episode.

JJ West: Hey everybody, welcome back to the Every Man's Battle podcast. Thanks so much for tuning in. We are excited about today's episode. If you're watching online, you can already see that we have a special guest in our studio. We have Eric Thomas, who is one of our facilitators at the Every Man's Battle Intensive.

We're going to get to know Eric a little bit better, and of course, you can see Doug who's joining us via Texas. We're so thrilled, Eric, for you to join us today on what we term as Happy Podcast Day. So we wish each other a Happy Podcast Day and welcome to season three.

The reason why we have Eric in the studio today is we're starting a new mini-series. It's part of season three and it might even stretch into season four, where we want to introduce you, the audience, to several of the men who serve as facilitators at Every Man's Battle so that you can get to know them, get to know their story.

In the same way that Doug and I in season one shared our stories, it really was born out of a conversation that I had with one of our listeners who's also an EMB alum. He reminded us the other day of how helpful it is to hear the stories of other men because there's always something that I connect with in somebody else's story.

It's going to be different. I'm going to connect to something different in Eric's story than I connect to in Doug's story, and it's going to be different than what you might connect to in my story. So it's really important that we hear all these different stories because we go, "Oh yeah, that relates to my story, and I feel seen and heard and I feel like there's a path forward for me toward healing and toward hope." So Eric, thank you for being on with us today.

Eric Thomas: It is my pleasure. Thank you. It's great to be here with both of you.

JJ West: So without further ado, we can't wait to learn more about Eric. I've got a few questions that I'm going to ask. Of course, Doug's going to chime in and ask his questions as we do so. What we hope is that this will be an encouragement to you as you may be feeling like, "Oh gosh, I don't know if there's a way out of my brokenness. I don't know if there's a way toward healing and hope and sanctification."

So let's start with some of the specifics. Eric, how long have you been a facilitator for the Every Man's Battle Intensive, and how did that connection come about? How did you find it?

Eric Thomas: I'm on my third year of being a facilitator at Every Man's Battle. The connection was through my friend Sam Fraser, who is a facilitator. I've been friends with Sam for about 20 years.

JJ West: You've been friends with Sam for 20 years? Wow. Okay, so now I just have to ask the question: how did you and Sam become friends 20 years ago?

Eric Thomas: We had a link from Fuller Seminary. I was studying for my marriage and family therapy license and Sam was an alum. I needed someone to help me out with a few things and to give me some guidance. Sam was able to do that and we stayed friends.

JJ West: So you're a licensed marriage and family therapist. You work in private practice or in a group practice?

Eric Thomas: I work in private practice.

JJ West: You work in private practice and, of course, you get to serve as a facilitator at the Every Man's Battle Intensive, which we are the incredible beneficiaries of. So thank you for serving in that way.

At the Intensive, we share our stories with the guys as an invitation for them to share their stories. So why don't you share with the audience your story? How did sexual integrity weave its way through your story?

Eric Thomas: I can recall probably my first encounter. You can tell by the gray hairs that we're going back to the 70s. Somewhere around '79 or '82, let's just say '82, I started taking particular interest in those magazines that came in those little slips that were around my house.

My parents were both Christian, church-going people. There wasn't a romantic connection with my parents, and I could tell that from an early age. Meaning they slept in separate bedrooms. I'm aware that there are some couples that sleep in separate bedrooms that do have intimacy, but it was very clear that that wasn't the case for my parents.

Ultimately, I shared a bedroom with my dad, who worked nights. It wasn't too long before when he was at work that I would get out of my bed and search the room, and then I found the stash.

JJ West: You found the stash. Okay. And so you were about how old?

Eric Thomas: I was about 12.

JJ West: About 12 years old. You find dad's stash and when you first discovered the stash, when you first found those magazines, what did you feel?

Eric Thomas: Both exhilaration and shame.

JJ West: Exhilaration. What did that feel like as a 12-year-old?

Eric Thomas: It felt like goosebumps. It felt like a shortness of breath. It felt like I had discovered the hidden treasure. I'm holding back the Lord of the Rings "my precious" because I'm trying to stay professional here, but yes.

JJ West: So there was that exhilaration, that excitement, that electricity of finding this hidden treasure. But then there was the shame. At 12, you probably wouldn't have used the word shame, but you felt something. Do you remember what it felt like to feel shame there?

Eric Thomas: It felt like I'm doing something wrong.

JJ West: So even though I have this exhilaration, this desire is awakened in me for something, and by the way, that desire is supposed to be there, as FYI. Sexual desire, God intended it for us. So there's this good thing that's happening, but I feel bad about it. I'm not supposed to be feeling this, I'm not supposed to be experiencing this. I'm doing something wrong, to use your words. Okay. So then at 12 years old, what did you do with those feelings?

Eric Thomas: I just ran with it. I suppressed the bad feelings and let the good feelings roll for a little while.

JJ West: So from 12 until what age would you say was this "I'm just continuing to go with these magazines, with these good feelings that I get from the magazines"?

Eric Thomas: I would say probably about two years because when I was 14, we got a bigger house and then I got a bigger room to share with my brother.

JJ West: So my access to the treasure has been cut off. Okay. Gotcha. In a good way. Okay, so then did it just evaporate? Did it go dormant? Did it find other expressions?

Eric Thomas: I would say that it went partially dormant because I was also an athlete and I was looking to play college football and in the NFL. Our coaches were already telling us to avoid sexual activity because it's going to make you weak, it's going to make you soft.

So there were real conversations about, of course they were said like, "Don't play with yourself. It's going to make you weak," like that. So there was that voice, and I'm very goal-oriented. So I would say for the most part my goals kept me from trying to find them in the house.

But there were times where I would just be walking home from school and the trash would be out in front of someone's house and I could see just what was hanging out was enough to let me know that that was a magazine. So I would open up that trash bin and grab it and then take it to one of my friend's house and we would take a look at it together. Interestingly enough, this is just coming to my awareness, there wasn't any masturbation or anything like that. We were just looking at it and enjoying it, and then I would leave it and go back home.

JJ West: You'd leave it with him. And was that because of that goal orientation, not because of the threat of being found out at home that I'm looking at stuff I'm not supposed to?

Eric Thomas: It was more being goal-oriented. I think that my parents were probably busy enough trying to figure their marriage out than to be worrying about little things like that. And if dad's looking at it, it'd be pretty hard for him to have this stance of, "You shouldn't be looking at my magazine."

JJ West: So how long did that phase, from about 14 when you started to really take your athletic career seriously, how long did that phase of "I just look at it every once in a while if I happen to come across a magazine with a friend, but I don't continue to do so and I don't engage in masturbation, self-stimulation," how long would you say that phase was?

Eric Thomas: I think that the phase of trying to not engage in masturbation was probably maybe a year or two until I got into high school. I started playing high school football and then my football career became real and my goals really seemed attainable.

So then the focus shifted away at that time from trying to avoid pornography and into trying to avoid cheerleaders. So now instead of the magazines, now I'm trying to avoid actual sexual relationships with other people.

JJ West: And I mean, I don't know what it was like in your school, but in my school, the guys who were on the football team, they were the top pick. They were the ones that the cheerleaders actually wanted to be with. So there was opportunity.

Eric Thomas: Absolutely there was opportunity.

JJ West: And did you have the same admonition or scare tactic from the coaches in high school that you had in middle school of "don't let yourself get sucked into a relationship with a cheerleader"?

Eric Thomas: We had some coaches that were speaking that, and then we had other coaches who were actually sleeping with teachers and bragging about it in the locker room. So there was a mixed message there. But at that time I was really locked in and so I paid attention to the people that were giving the message that I wanted to follow, and that was to abstain.

JJ West: I wish I had done that. Me too. But I didn't. I chose a different path. Okay, so you chose to abstain. And did you find that to be an easy path?

Eric Thomas: I found it to be challenging, not because women were just falling all over me. I was 275 pounds, I was an offensive lineman. I was 275 pounds in high school. But I did have a girlfriend who I needed for prom dates and things like that. So I was fairly clear about what I wanted to do and what I didn't want to do, and I'm a very stubborn person. So I was able to make it out of high school still maintaining my abstinence.

JJ West: So then what happened in the next chapter after you got out of high school?

Eric Thomas: I ended up going to community college because I missed a couple of classes. Meaning I didn't do well in those classes. I didn't get straight to the four-year school. So I went to community college with the understanding that after two years playing there I would finish my career at a four-year school with a scholarship.

I started my freshman year and a lot of Pac-10 schools were looking at me. I was still maintaining my abstinence and really kind of taking on the persona of the person like I'm not going to cut my hair, that's my strength. And I'm not going to sleep with girls because that's my strength.

Then before my sophomore year, I grew up in South LA and I still lived there. So before my sophomore year, it was a summer, July 14, 1989. I can tell you the date. I went to get something to eat and the restaurant was robbed and people came in shooting, and I got shot in the back. That's where the story took a turn.

JJ West: So what happened? What was the turn?

Eric Thomas: Basically, I had to learn how to walk again. The doctors told me that I would never play football again, that I would be lucky if I could just walk. When I woke up from surgery, there was a zipper from my chest here all the way down to the bottom of my stomach and other scars on the right side, and a cut on the right side where my lung had collapsed.

So there were a lot of scars on what was once a very beautiful body. And a body that I hadn't brought in my theology from my church. My church was also reinforcing that your body is a temple of God. So I just remember waking up, looking at my body and saying, "What happened to my temple?" And then I immediately felt regret for saving myself, for waiting all this time. Because I just said, "Well, who's going to want me now?" I passed on these sexual experiences but I'm not going to have them because I look like Frankenstein.

JJ West: The temple has been destroyed. Oh wow. Wow. And so now I'm filled with all this regret, maybe resentment, a lot of resentment toward God, because my theology was telling me to save myself for marriage because that's what God wanted me to do. And I'm also taking care of my body, my temple, for my career. And all of that just got snatched away.

As we all know as fellow addicts, resentment is a key driver in our acting out. So talk about that. What did that look like in the coming weeks, months, and years after you woke up in that hospital bed?

Eric Thomas: Well, I immediately started questioning God and challenging God and letting my parents and my pastor know that I was very upset with God and that I was disappointed. Why did I follow all of these rules only to have this thing happen to me?

Because I grew up in South LA and I would say that a significant portion—I grew up right where all those 80s movies are filmed, *Boyz n the Hood*, *Menace II Society*. You could see my house probably in one of those movies. And here's where pride kicks in: I successfully navigated through that, through those temptations and things that were offered to me. I felt like I did everything right.

So I went into victim mode, and while I did work very hard to get back to football shape, I still made a decision, I made a decision that I would like to use my body sexually. And at the same time, I had so much shame around how my body looked.

So I got into pornography and I would say that at that time I felt like I was—the language I would use now is I was self-soothing because there was so much pain and emotional turmoil. And that was it for a while because I was focused on getting back into football.

As my career continued, because I did make it back to football and I did get half a scholarship to a smaller Division 1 college in the Big West conference—not the Pac-10, Big West—this was not the dream, but it's a sampling of the dream. So I'm doing that. I'm more aware of how my body isn't moving how it used to move and I'm more aware of how men that I think would have driven five yards down the field are either defeating me or having me at a standstill.

So again, I'm reinforcing I'm damaged goods. The temple has been destroyed. Does that take me further into that self-soothing addictive behavior to try to self-medicate that feeling? Yes, because what's also happening is that my church community is telling me that I'm blessed and that I am doing more and doing better than most people in my community.

So I'm getting messages that are telling me to be grateful, and those messages don't sit with me. They're not resonating with me and leading to more self-soothing. And I would tell you that there was a lot of hope that I would even still make it to the NFL out of the Big West.

So there's this theology that's still running that even though I'm not treating my body as the temple because I think the temple is destroyed, I still have this hope that I'm going to make it out of the Big West and somehow get discovered and have a great pro career and I'm going to have this testimony and I'm going to minister to people that have experienced trauma and I'm going to get my hope back and things are going to line back up.

My hope is in my ability to fulfill that dream. But with each passing season and I'm not able to drive these guys five or 10 yards down the field, I'm losing more and more hope that that dream is going to be fulfilled. And if that dream's not fulfilled, where is my hope now?

So then I graduate with a degree and begin work and because I did not become an NFL player, slowly I start to accept the fact that I'm not going to be an NFL player. Then I start thinking that I need a wife because I'm still active in my church. I do realize and understand that there still was a blessing on my life because I did get a college degree out of that and I had a good job.

So I'm trying to move forward. There's still trauma symptoms that nightmares and things that haven't gone away from getting shot and things like that. But I'm now ready to try and find a wife. Found one, but I can definitely say now that I was not whole enough to be the husband that I should have been, and that I was not well enough psychologically and maybe even spiritually to accept that maybe her boundaries or her limitations on intimacy wasn't an outright rejection of me based on the fact that my body and everything was scarred up.

I heard every what I would now say at this age probably normal discourse, conversation, limit, boundary that happens in marriages. Those things were all looked at for me through the lens of, "Oh, it's because I'm destroyed. I'm not worthy of having someone who really wants to be intimate with me and connected with me."

JJ West: Was that what caused the relationship to deteriorate?

Eric Thomas: Yes, absolutely. So we're just piling up the disappointments. What's happening to my heart is that my heart is getting more and more like stone than like flesh. I'm hardening my heart more and more so that I don't feel the weight of all these disappointments that are piling up.

For me, when I was doing that, it was, "Okay, so I go to my sexual acting out as the way to feel something and to avoid the disappointment." And I did that. I did that exact thing. And this time I just decided to just go no-holds-barred because I am now a viable adult with a really good job.

And I decide that if I'm going to interact with women, then I need to make sure that I get my needs met. So I find myself involved in quid pro quo relationships that guarantee that if I do this for you, then I get what I want. Before I met you, JJ, I would have said I get what I need. As would I. I would have said that too.

I was consumed with getting my needs met. Everything that I didn't get from high school all the way up through marriage, I've got to make up for lost time. All that energy. So I just go through relationship after relationship after relationship, and I'm using these people.

In my incorrect thinking—and I even knew better at the time—it was just like, "Okay, but what did she get out of that? Oh yeah, she got a trip to a place that she would probably never go to, or she got a bracelet or she got something." And that was how I was justifying in my mind that I wasn't using someone, that it was this for that. And I had that exact language.

So I'm not a monster who's just using women, it's a trade. But eventually, eventually those justifications start to wear thin. My dad passed. My dad never remarried after divorcing my mom. My dad was a lady's man and a sex addict, since we're talking about it clearly.

He passed away and he died alone. God met me. I was up in the Sierras in an RV for a fishing trip. I went up there a little bit too high. I went up in May and I took my dog who was then nine years old, his name was Patch. I'd taken off for a week and rented a camp space, and that first night it snowed.

My dog did not enjoy the snow, and I can remember him not wanting to get out of the RV because it was just too cold for him. That night, after two nights of being there kind of stuck in the RV, not really getting what I want, not doing the fishing, my dog not having a good time, and there was alcohol involved in this also. I can remember looking my dog in the eye and I said, "Patch, you've got to learn to enjoy this snow because this is our vacation. I took off a whole week for us to come up here and go fishing and have a good time."

As I'm saying that, I just started breaking down crying because I really felt like God was like amplifying every word that I said. I said to myself, "I'm going to be like my dad. I took my yearly vacation with my dog because I refuse to let a woman get close enough to me to judge me, reject me, or hurt me."

I'm trying to convince my dog that this is why we're here and he needs to just not be old and cold and get out here and enjoy this fishing trip. God wouldn't leave me alone that night. Those words kept coming back into my head, and then I kept having images and flashbacks of my dad, of my dad's final time. I thought I could soothe that with alcohol, and so I drank more and more, and the more that I drank, the more I kept seeing my dad and I kept seeing my dog and I kept hearing my words.

I just said, "This isn't how I wanted life to go." That was the wake-up call. It woke me up to realizing that if I wanted a happy life, if I wanted to really be the person that God wants me to be, that I've got to essentially get my life together and heal.

Most of my healing, the therapy that I did, was about nightmares from getting shot and the violence and things that I haven't talked about in this podcast because I know we're talking about another subject. So I did a lot of therapy, but there was so much that I didn't get to talk about: sexual integrity or trusting or love or anything like that.

So all of my love I was pouring into my dog, and women were just company. I wasn't taking one on a vacation, not on my vacation, because I would probably only just get rejected and hurt anyway. The dog is safe. A dog is loyal. A dog doesn't care what you look like, what you smell like. They are loyal and want to be with you no matter what.

So when did I come to a place where I said, "Okay, I've got to be serious about my sexual integrity. I've got to do something different"? It was that morning when God allowed me to wake up again. I packed everything up and drove home and came home and just really got on my knees and said, "God, I thank you for the awakening and I thank you for the vision that you came to visit me all the way up in the Eastern Sierras. I heard you, and I heard you say that this isn't the life that you have for me, that you want more for me."

It might sound cliché, but I made some phone calls that day that I got back and said I'm done with the situationship and I need to do things differently. First thing I did was learn how to be with God and with myself and start healing that way.

JJ West: You started the process of connecting with God and with self so that you could then have authentic connection with others. Tell me one thing you've learned along the way that's made a big impact in your recovery.

Eric Thomas: For most of my early life, I was responding to what happened to me. I didn't really understand grace because I was always in recovery mindset: recovering from what this person did to me, what that person did to me, how that person made me feel.

What happened when God met me up in the Eastern Sierras and showed me my present self and possibly my future self if I didn't change, and then when I started my sexual recovery and I became aware of the people that I hurt and the pain that I caused due to my acting out behaviors, I learned what grace is. I was just like, "Wow, God was really patient with me while I went out there and I did those things."

So I'm continually in awe by God's grace and the fact that I get to come and help facilitate Every Man's Battle. I was just like, "Me? Are you kidding? Me? I don't deserve to sit with any men and tell them or help them understand anything. I have been horrible." But I have had to accept God's grace in order to do the work that He's called me to.

JJ West: Wow. And I know we got the tip of the iceberg when it comes to your story, Eric, but can I just say thank you so much for your willingness to be vulnerable. Thank you for letting us into your world a little bit.

Every single one of us can connect to that feeling of being broken. Every single one of us can connect to that feeling of "I'm going to be rejected." It may be for different reasons. For some, it's going to be my body has been broken because of the scars. For some of us, it's going to be "I don't measure up to what other people are looking for." For some of us, it's going to be the "I've been beaten down by others."

There's all kinds of different ways that we've interpreted "I'm broken." But we all have brokenness and it invites us into resentment, it invites us into hiding, it invites us into self-medicating through whatever our escape is.

We have to come to the place, just like Eric, we have to come to a place of recognizing this isn't life, this isn't what God has for me. So if you're out there and you've heard Eric's story and you've connected the dots in your own story and you've said, "I've been living in a place that God doesn't have for me. I am isolating. I am with-drawing from people, but I want to have life," call.

Call 1-800-NEW-LIFE. Go to the website, newlife.com. Sign up for the Every Man's Battle Intensive because that can be your turning point, that can be your wake-up call to say "I'm not going to live this half-life, this shell of a life, this shadow anymore. I'm going to live life to the full the way God designed for me."

So please make that call. Again, I feel like a broken record, but don't forget, use the code EMBPOD in the coupon code and you'll get $100 off the registration fee because we want you to go. We want you to be there. We want you to experience what it looks like to go from not living to living, to go from isolation to community, to go from brokenness to wholeness. We can't do it alone. So guys, together let's keep walking in integrity.

Next time we meet, we are going to talk about what should be included in a check-in call. We're going to give you some examples of what that looks like because we know you're in community, you're doing sustained victory and you need some help, some practical tools for what does a check-in call look like. So join us next time for that, and thank you again for listening.

New Life: Thanks for listening. This podcast is one of many ways we can encourage and help you. If you're looking for more help, visit us at newlife.com or call 1-800-NEW-LIFE. To receive bonus content exclusive to EMB podcast email subscribers, send an email to embpodcast@newlife.com with the words "bonus content" in the subject line. If you have a comment about this podcast, we'd love to hear from you too. Drop us a line at embpodcast@newlife.com. And please remember to review, like, and share the podcast, as it helps others find us. See you next week.