New Life LIVE

Brian Perez: It is time once again for New Life LIVE. I'm your host, Brian Perez, and if you're tired of toxic relationships, call in for the next two hours for help taking the first step toward safe and healthy relationships. 1-800-229-3000 is our number.

Clinical psychologist Dr. Jill Hubbard is in the studio today, so is licensed marriage and family therapist Chris Williams. So let's get those lines a-ringing. Jill, what's on your mind to start us off?

Jill Hubbard: Well, what's really on my mind is I'm going on vacation in four days. But in terms of here, my daughter and I were having a conversation. She was going away with friends for the weekend, and we were talking about relational dynamics and things that happen between girls and friends and the dyads that form and alliances and all of that.

As I was talking with her about showing up how you want things to be versus how you fear they might be, she said, "Mom, that's confirmation bias." I said, "Okay, yes." So I decided to look up a little bit more about relational confirmation bias.

Our confirmation bias is we're always looking for the thing that we fear. When we do that, we almost help to create it. So what ends up happening is it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. It's that tendency to seek and interpret and focus our information on things we already believe to be true, and especially the things that are negative, the things that we fear.

It's that selective perception, noticing only small annoyances of what someone does instead of the good that they might bring. It's negative filtering, interpreting actions through a negative filter instead of being more objective. Then you get into this negative feedback loop of experiencing negative emotions that reinforce themselves and that shape your perception. It's like, "See, I knew it would turn out this way."

A lot of times, it is from experiences we have had in the past, of course. But then when we project those onto new situations, familiar situations, familiar behavior, we don't recognize that it may have a different meaning. I think I mentioned on another show how 80 to 85% of our thoughts are negative.

Then 6% are repeating thoughts. That doesn't leave a lot for positive thoughts. And then what happens? We have distress, we have low self-esteem, we are constantly focusing on conflict. So what do we do?

Chris Williams: Can I add something? We create algorithms that reinforce it.

Jill Hubbard: Yes, I love that. That's exactly what we do. So we need to, like I said to my daughter, show up how we want things to be. Act as if things are okay, you do belong, people do like you, and lean into what you want things to be instead of what you fear.

When you have those negative thoughts, ask yourself what would be the opposite of that thought. Practice being in the current moment, not in past moments. You just have to manage those emotional triggers.

Chris Williams: Well, and I think that that's so true because whatever we're looking for, we're going to find. Because the evidence is vast one way or the other. And I'm like, I would love it if we had a confirmation bias at least to be positive.

Jill Hubbard: Well, right, exactly. But you know what? My daughter had a better weekend because she did lean into how she wanted it to be.

Chris Williams: There you go. God created us as creators. We can actually help create our own reality.

Brian Perez: It's the last week of our moving sale. Lots of great resources there to stock up on, some for under a dollar. I know because I did a little bit of shopping myself a couple of nights ago. Click the moving sale banner in the newlife.com store.

1-800-229-3000 is the number to call us today on New Life LIVE. We'll be in the studio for two hours, and maybe you've told someone about our show but they're hesitant to call in, so you can call in for them. We had that happen just yesterday, and it actually happens quite often, so we're totally okay with it.

Let's say hello to Dolly in Pittsburgh. Thank you so much for calling in today, Dolly. How can we help you?

Dolly: My husband is a farmer and I have an outside job. It's getting to be too much and I'm finding my family is dysfunctional. What can I do?

Brian Perez: Okay, so you mentioned farmer and outside job. Dolly, if you could say if there is one thing that drives dysfunction, is it your jobs, is it finances? What would it be?

Dolly: Finances and just the responsibility. Whether it's outside home finances or farm finances, I tend to always be left holding the bag.

Brian Perez: Talk to me a little bit more about that. How does that show up in your relationship with your husband?

Dolly: It seems to demean him or discourage him, but at the end of the day, he doesn't want to hold the responsibility for either the farm or the family finances. So I just end up being the point man. I've even investigated getting out of the business, but would that help my relationship? I'm responsible on all ends. Our children are getting to be adults now, and that's where I see the dysfunction especially showing up.

I have been in counseling for a very long time, but we don't talk about the dysfunctional roles and things like that. It's just discouraging as you continue to uphold your commitment to the marriage and to God that it gets worse.

Jill Hubbard: So are you seeing the dysfunction as you have non-traditional roles? Is that what you're referring to?

Dolly: Well, I see it as there's also the unspoken rules of the dysfunctional family. I'm reading through Faith That Hurts, Faith That Heals and When Love Is Not Enough, parenting through tough times, both Stephen Arterburn books. That's where it's very interesting to see it laid out and I'm like, "That is what's going on." Different people, my children, pick up for each other or they end up enabling the system to continue. But it's also your livelihood, your covenantal marriage, your covenantal relationship. How do I stop enabling without blowing the whole thing up? Because some people would walk away from the relationships and their marriage and that's not what I desire to do because I feel a commitment to God. How do you change the dynamics?

Chris Williams: Dolly, I think there's something much deeper going on inside of everyone. What I can say is that fear is running the show and fear is not a good relater and fear does not solve problems very well. Fear creates desperation. So it sounds like there's a lot of desperate energy and typically when we get overwhelmed or stress kind of overtakes us, there's kind of two directions we go.

One is we kind of shut down, our system shuts down. That's what's known as hypo-arousal. Other people ramp up, that's called hyper-arousal. Often I find this in marriages: one person becomes overly responsible, over-functioning, and the other under-functions. Both are driven by unresolved fear and frustration.

My guess, and this is just a guess, but if I had your husband in my office, he wants so badly, probably tied to his sense of self, maybe his sense of identity, to be successful at his work. And the fact that it isn't working, I can only imagine is absolutely devastating for him. And that's why he's holding onto it and shutting down at the same time.

He needs to get into some work to understand and to get into that deeper thing of like maybe there is a core fear message that he's a failure. That's driving all of this behavior.

Dolly: He expresses that.

Chris Williams: It's not until he starts doing some work on that to see that one, he's not a failure. He's never a failure in Christ. I oftentimes work with guys like this all the time and I'm like, "Hey, you're not failing, just some things don't work." It's okay for it to not work and do something else or shift and understand that God's given you capacity for much greater different things than this. But that's all of his work in that, but it's driving the frustration. So I would want you guys to get into some couples work to start uncovering some of the deeper seated fears and frustrations that are driving the current behaviors.

Jill Hubbard: You're spot on. Dolly, I would also like you to think about what are your husband's strengths and is he operating in his strengths or does he keep hitting his head against the wall about things that he's not great at?

Dolly: He is to some degree, like you said. He's very good, very organized, very gung-ho, can get the job done, has everything organized. But when it's not producing the results, he doesn't shift well or isn't good at managing many variables coming at him at one time, which is kind of where he's stuck in farming.

Jill Hubbard: So that's where he gets frustrated and personalizes it and it becomes a shame rather than a business problem.

Dolly: It is. Shame is a big thing.

Jill Hubbard: Right, like this is his failure instead of the business has a problem and the business is not me. It's outside of me. And you, Dolly, you and your husband standing on one side together looking at these problems, how do we tackle these problems versus opposing each other? It's easy to fall into that, whether spoken or not, of you're not doing enough.

And your frustration of his shutdown and you having to over-function and do so much. Sometimes we need to let a few things fall through the cracks and not pick up all the pieces, Dolly, so that it makes an impression of "we do have to do something different."

I think these are times to dig into our faith. Not as some sort of magical "God's going to rescue me out of the sky" sort of thing, but this goes back to what we were talking about earlier in the show as a confirmation bias. I'll share my confession. I was working on this this morning with my own sense of financial scarcity and some things that are coming up.

I realized when I get in financial fear, all I see is financial scarcity. In working in faith, seeing how God has provided all the way through, it starts shifting what I'm looking for and what I'm looking at. Our eyes need to be fixed on something a little bit different. Instead of the fear and the frustration, even though there's problems that need to be addressed, we miss out on what's sometimes hiding in plain sight and that is opportunities and possibilities and new creative endeavors. But it requires a deep internal shift to be able to do.

Chris Williams: It's so easy to get scared. Even the idea of going on vacation. For us, when we're self-employed and have a client-based business, you go on vacation, it's not only the cost of the vacation, it's a double hit. It's the loss of revenue and income for the time you're gone. That was what my journaling was about.

Vacations cost double. So to go on a vacation is overcoming a lot of fear and having to trust, "Okay, Lord, You've taken care of me in the past, You will sustain me." I've prepared. And yeah, so that's a hard one. But it's doable. That's the thing is we've got to hold onto hope, hold onto possibility. You already mentioned that he's organized and a hard worker and I love that and I would really be reinforcing those things with him.

Jill Hubbard: Daily affirmation. Looking out at the American workforce today, if you're organized and a hard worker, you're at a huge advantage. You're a very employable, viable person. Dolly, shift how you even talk about things, whether you realize it or not. Instead of your frustration at him, do affirm him, reinforce what he's good at and what's going wrong is outside of him. Reinforce that in how you talk about things because those small shifts in how you see him will make a difference in his self-esteem.

Chris Williams: And I would get into some couples therapy and start digging out some of those fears and I would really, really encourage you guys to get to the Intimacy in Marriage Workshop. We do have scholarships.

Brian Perez: Yes, the weekend of July 24th in Washington, D.C. A couple months away, but I think it's well worth their time and investment. And we've also got an article on the newlife.com website that we're going to post in the show notes. It's called 10 Tips to Live a Well-Balanced Life. It'll help you with all the stress and everything that's going on.

Thank you for calling today, Dolly. Let's wave to Rebecca in Hartford, Connecticut, watching us on YouTube. Thank you for calling 1-800-229-3000. How can we help you today?

Rebecca: In a nutshell, my question is how do I best support my four-year-old daughter and all of her questions that are coming since my separation from my husband back in December? He had confessed some very concerning things in a marriage counseling session. We decided to have a physical separation to see if we could reconcile.

As of last week, even more concerning and disturbing information was confessed, which now I am feeling very set in going through with divorce. But now my daughter is asking lots of questions. "Where is daddy?" and things like that because she loves him. So I'm just looking for how do I navigate her questions and best support her in this time period?

Jill Hubbard: Rebecca, really good question. I think it is important to address her questions. She's four years old and so we keep things age-appropriate. But the questions she's asking, she's wanting to know. So you don't want to just put her off. You want her to know that you can ask questions about things, we can have a conversation.

Ask her what she thinks is going on. What has she told herself about where daddy is and try to get a sense of what is the story, the narrative that she's creating in her head? And then be truthful without over-explaining. Don't give more details than she's asked and give her answers and see how that sits with her.

"Mommy and daddy are working on some things, and so we're taking a little timeout right now from each other so we can each work on things. But we're both here to take care of you." You always want to reassure. "We are here for you, we're not leaving you." Because at this age, there's a real fear and helplessness of "who's going to take care of me if daddy leaves and who's going to be here?" So "we are both here to take care of you and we are always going to be in your life but sometimes adults, when they're having some things that they need to sort out, they take a timeout. Just like sometimes I give you a timeout."

Rebecca: Our issue right now is that he is not able to see them right now. He's not kind of allowed to see them.

Jill Hubbard: It's like, "Daddy's having some problems and so he's getting some help so that he can come back and be with you." Taking that a step at a time.

Brian Perez: Is there more than one child involved?

Rebecca: I do have an 18-month-old son, so he thankfully is not asking questions yet, but he will soon.

Jill Hubbard: Rebecca, in addition to what I was saying in terms of what to say to her, I think Chris and I were talking at the break.

Chris Williams: A couple things, like why he can't see them, I think is important. Has he posed himself as a danger to them or other children?

Rebecca: The things that were confessed were he definitely has a sexual addiction problem, but the new things that came out could be categorized as predatory in nature, maybe not towards children. The specific things that he confessed were not about children, but the concern with everyone that's involved is that it could get to that point if it's not dealt with.

Chris Williams: I think that that's helpful because there is some hopefulness here. Taking this a day at a time. Right now, dad is dealing with an illness or dealing with some struggles that he has. He needs to take care of them and he's working on that.

Then give room for your daughter's sadness, frustration, and fears. I think as parents, some of our, this would be my temptation because I know I've done this in the past, is that is to correct or try to change the way that they feel. And I think especially at her age, she just needs room to feel the way she feels.

Jill Hubbard: That's why drawing out what she's thinking and feeling first before you offer up explanations is even more important than the explanations. And "how does it make you feel that daddy's not here with you?" and let her know she can share if she's sad, she can share that with you anytime and you want to just sit with her in it. Because bad things happen, we can't stop bad things always from happening, but what we can do is be with our kids in the bad things, just like Jesus is with us in hard times even though He doesn't always stop them. So that sitting with her does so much to contain her and to make her feel safe. So that's more important than the words. What do you think, Rebecca?

Rebecca: That is really helpful. I have been taking an approach of just trying to keep things like matter of fact, like "Daddy can't come home today." And if she's sad, I say, "I know, I know that is sad," trying to comfort her. But sometimes the questions get very pointed like, "Why can't he come home?" and "Where is he?" and "What is he doing?" and I just don't know what's appropriate for her age to explain.

Jill Hubbard: "Hmm, let's think about what is daddy doing right now? I wonder if he's making himself food? Is he?" like kind of create, you know, let her fill in what is daddy doing so she needs to kind of have a mental picture. Maybe he's getting ready for bed just like we are, along with the sadness.

Rebecca: Right. I guess my concern too is like in the future, how do I handle visitation? Because as of this past week, he hasn't seen them at all. But I'm concerned about how I handle what is appropriate with visitation.

Jill Hubbard: Rebecca, you will be getting a lot of input on that depending on the help he gets and how things play out. A lot of times too, there can be a child advocate that is assigned and evaluations done and sometimes it's monitored visits. I actually have been a monitor before of someone for monitored visits.

This goes back to the age-old advice from the recovery community and these are things you take a day at a time, a moment at a time, a circumstance at a time. We can't predict that yet because these threats and these struggles and these hurts tend to globalize and we want to guarantee the future and rewrite the past, but we've got to stay in the present moment and deal with what is sitting in front of us.

And Rebecca, like you are going through this. You are dealing with learning these things about your husband and you have to be the big person, the mommy, for your four-year-old, but there's also that little girl in you that has been betrayed. This is not the man you thought you married. Great that he's confessing, I mean he's getting it off his chest which is good and good that it's out in the open. That is hopeful, but how hard is that to take in and assimilate all of that information? So give yourself space and time to grieve and places to talk it through just like your daughter is. You need that too.

Brian Perez: There's a book in the newlife.com store called How We Love Our Kids, that might be a good resource for you to pick up. We've also got an intensive coming up towards the end of the year called Restore: Healing After Betrayal. You can find out the details about it at newlife.com. Chris, I'm glad you brought up the Life Recovery Groups because a lot of people think that's only for getting over addiction, but everyone can benefit from a Life Recovery Group. If you're dealing with grief, anxiety, or broken relationships, let us connect you with a group that meets online or one that meets near your home or office. It's a safe place to shed the shame and get raw accountability rooted in biblical truth and the shared commitment to end unhealthy behaviors once and for all. These guys won't let you settle either.

Marty in Minnesota, welcome to New Life LIVE and thanks for listening to us on SiriusXM Channel 131. Marty, hello.

Marty: Hi guys. Hey, thanks for taking my call today. I appreciate it. My wife and our youngest daughter's 23 and she just broke up with her boyfriend that they were dating for like two years and they broke up in January. He was having integrity issues and they just were never getting along. So the question is now she wants to go to Australia by herself to build self-confidence, connect more with God and just kind of reiterate herself. My wife and I are like scared to death and we don't want her to go, but she's 23 and I don't know as a father, I don't know how to respond to her going because I really, really don't want her to go because I still think she's hurting and I feel like she's vulnerable.

Jill Hubbard: Well, I can totally understand being the parent of someone early 20s and they often feel like they're invincible and can also have a naivety about the world. And so seeing her in a more vulnerable place, I mean I commend her for wanting to do something to really help herself. I guess I'm wondering why not go with a friend? Because it just always seems like more fun when you know someone. And why so far away?

I think it's okay as parents to share your concern. It's not that you don't trust her, you just have concerns as your parents and the kind of the situation that you're in right now. So I'm wondering is she self-supporting? Does she live at home? What's her plan in Australia?

Marty: She did move back home last year to save for the wedding. She was going to marry this guy. They were but he just couldn't get a hold of it I guess.

Jill Hubbard: Better before. But ouch, she's really hurting. Does she know who she's staying with? What's the plan for Australia?

Marty: No, she's just going to travel to all these different places and stay at hostels.

Chris Williams: I definitely share the concern that if she's in a hurting place, her decision-making could be deeply compromised. As you said, Jill, she's very vulnerable. I think first and foremost is an opportunity and this is an opportunity to open up communication and connection with your daughter. Hopefully she's able to talk with you, tell her what she's hurting, tell her what she's going through and see if she's willing to listen to your concerns.

You may have already expressed what they are, but I think really talking through this because I think what's most important is that you guys are able to express what your concerns are, able to support her emotionally and relationally in and through this thing that she's going through. I think part of it, this may be a little bit of my own upbringing bias because I was 18 and my parents were like, "Go figure it out," and I did. Not in the best ways all the time. But there is sort of like almost this rite of passage.

Jill Hubbard: But a guy is different than a girl. There is a profound difference there. And I will say this: I'm always interested in people being like "I'm going to go find myself" and they usually choose an exotic place. No one chooses Odessa, Texas. If you really want to go find yourself, go to Odessa, Texas. You're going to have to sit with yourself for quite a while.

But with all of that said, obviously it sounds like you can't stop her, but being able to stay connected with her, share your hearts, let her know that you support her in her healing and restoration journey but you have deep concerns about her experiences of just going off to Australia and the vulnerability that that creates. Especially being alone. What are her contingency plans? What if things don't go like she planned? What if she finds herself in a situation where she needs help? Has she thought some of those things through? Because the world is a dangerous place.

Lots of people like traveling by themselves. They do the backpack through Europe or whatever. I've never quite understood that but I do know there is something that feels like they can conquer. Jill, I've got a question for you because I'm wondering about her deeper motivation in this. In coming off this devastating loss in this relationship where it sounded like he was betraying her, is this her attempt at getting power back, getting sort of agency back in her life and is there better options than going to Australia alone?

And I don't know what Australia is like. Europe is friendly and people will take you in. Plus it's so far away. Like you can't even jump on a plane. It's not like Austin, Texas. It's Australia, clear on the other side of the world. Like and I'm wondering too if you could propose before you go to Australia, could we do a short-term trip by yourself just to see what it's like by yourself? Like pick somewhere, a national park or something, and go by yourself and see how you feel before you venture off, just to give us some peace of mind. I'm in my 60s and my mom hounded me every day about getting the travel insurance that I didn't want to pay for. You know what? I got the travel insurance. Giving my mom some peace of mind.

Marty: That helps. Thank you very much. Sorry for the background noise, I'm in my semi.

Chris Williams: No, that's okay. We appreciate your phone call. And I just appreciate fathers of girls. It's so hard but I love the position that they're in and hearing his heart for his daughter and his love for her and concern. It just warms my heart. Dr. Jim Burns's book Doing Life with Your Adult Children is one that you should get from the newlife.com store.

Let's now go to Suzy in Jackson, Mississippi. Suzy's also a 99 for the 1 partner. Thank you Suzy for partnering with us to bring new life to people all over the world. How can we help you today?

Suzy: New Life ministries, you guys are nothing short of a godsend and couldn't have come in my life at a better time. I was diagnosed with depression back in college, but now I've recently found out the correct diagnosis because we've went through several is complex PTSD.

I shared that with my 33-year-old son and his wife and they have a lot of anxiety issues. He's 33, they have a one-year-old and a three-year-old, and they cut me in and out of their life. Something has just happened recently and I know they want to cut me out from the looks I got. But I've told myself I don't want to hurt them. I cut myself out of their life and that's where I'm at and what I'm trying to do. By the grace of God, although my heart breaks, I'll make it.

Chris Williams: Have they given a reason?

Suzy: No, because they don't talk to me. A lot of my family I think because of the mental illness talk about me but not to me. And yeah, it's tough, but I'm hanging on to the anchor that holds the boat.

Chris Williams: Suzy, if your kids were to have a concern, if they were on the phone call today and say "Hey, I'm concerned that Suzy is..." what would that be?

Suzy: I think they would probably say "not safe," "not stable."

Chris Williams: Would that mean stable emotionally, would that be in decision making? What would that be?

Suzy: More than likely all of the above. And they won't talk to me. Even they expect me to know the rules and things, but they don't share with me what their wishes are. I offered the baby a popsicle at my house and he asked for it, they give him popsicles, but I know only certain colors. So I bought popsicles, the kind they bought, only the certain colors and we were walking in to make sure that daddy says it's okay we can have it and I got in trouble because I did not ask the dad first. And he had to tell the son no and the child was crying in disappointment. And so therefore it's my fault because I should have known to ask dad first.

Jill Hubbard: And those are the types of things they object to?

Suzy: Yes, ma'am.

Chris Williams: Suzy, one of the things that I picked up in your pain is that you've experienced abandonment in your past.

Suzy: Yes I have and neglect, abandonment, abuse. Yeah, I've had a hard life, but I'm not a victim and I'm an overcomer.

Chris Williams: I love that and I appreciate that to no end. And yet that abandonment fear and pain still exists inside of you. Reasonably so.

Suzy: Trauma stayed trapped in the body. I've heard that.

Chris Williams: It is, absolutely. And so I want you to be able to continue to, if you can, keep doing that work to extracting the landmine of that pain of abandonment and also to continue to build out your relational world around you outside of your family. Because it sounds like dysfunction is still active in the family. Like they remember you at your worst when you were struggling before making sense of it all and they kind of have kept you in that box.

Suzy: And it's a mental health issue and nobody's comfortable talking about that. So they don't understand, so they just between the hypo and hyper arousal vigilant. I am extending my relationships outside of what my support has been for so long because even those people I see where unfortunately I was talked into having some ECT treatments, electroconvulsive treatments.

I had 10 out of 12 and it's changed me all the way around. I've had to revamp, rewire, re-transform my life and I'm struggling but I'm doing it by the grace of God. But I get so much objection and so much people aren't used to me being verbalized and setting boundaries and letting out some of my anger in healthy ways. And so yes it's scaring them and that's reinforcing the red flags that they're already seeing.

Chris Williams: Every one of us inside of us has a comfort magnet that we're driven towards safety. When we grow up with a lot of pain, abuse, and unresolved trauma, that gets distorted in a lot of different ways. But my point in all of that is that the safer you become in your own body, the safer you become for everyone around you. Now part of that what they're hearing is that you are setting healthy boundaries, you are expressing maybe at times disappointment or your expressing hurt and they're hearing that in a particular way. But also I want you to be able to balance that by expressing appreciation. Because as humans as we hear "Hey, it's good for us to have boundaries around harmful behavior," in families we also need kind of that balance of like "Hey, but I also see that for instance you're doing your best to raise your children well and I really appreciate that."

When you reinforce people's intentions, it awakens that comfort magnet for them and says "Oh this is a safe person. They can tell me hard truths but they can also be very helpful in their encouragement."

Jill Hubbard: Our families are not always the best place to practice. So I think with friends and in groups and things like that, it's a better place to practice kind of newfound behaviors that are healthier. I like that, Chris, what you're saying about expressing that appreciation too. And letting your son know that your goal is, like one that you are working on yourself, that you see your issues, and that you would value hearing from him what it is like being on the receiving end of you. What was it like to be your son? And that your goal is to come alongside them, not to contradict them or cross them in any way in the stage of life they're in. And so you would value input in how you can do that better.

Brian Perez: Suzy, thanks for calling in today to New Life LIVE. There's a book Doing Life with Your Adult Children that could help you. What is keeping you from calling us here on New Life LIVE? Maybe you're not sure how to formulate your question or that your situation isn't as important as everyone else's. If it's hurting you, it's important. It matters. So give us a call at 1-800-229-3000.

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Tell your friends about us too. The old-fashioned way. You can text them, that's not that old-fashioned, but you can call them, write them a letter, send them a singing telegram, that would be fun. But just let them know we're going to be in the studio for another hour. So today would be a great day for them to call in to New Life LIVE. Talk to you next time.