New Life LIVE

Intro Voice: Welcome to the New Life Live podcast. We hope to provide help and hope in your life through God's word, counselors, and psychologists as we answer questions from listeners who call with the challenges of life. Let's go to today's episode.

Brian Perez: Hey everyone, welcome to New Life Live. I'm your host, Brian Perez, and it is time for you to call in to ask the questions that you have about depression, narcissism, anger, or anxiety. There are so many things you can call about at 1-800-229-3000.

Now, we're only going to be in the studio for one hour today, so make sure you call in starting right now. I'm here in the studio with Dr. Alice Benton. She's a clinical psychologist. Joining us online, we've got licensed professional clinical counselor Becky Brown. She's also the president of New Life Ministries. Hello, Becky. What's going on?

Becky Brown: Hello, Brian. Hello, Alice, and hello listeners. I'm so glad to be here today. Let me be the first one to say Happy 250th birthday, America. If you didn't know, this Saturday is going to be a big day in our country as we celebrate—I'm going to give you a new word today—semi-quincentennial. Say that ten times real fast.

That just means that this is the anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. While I cannot say enough about how great this country is, I also know that there are some challenges. But here's what I want to focus on today: independence. The Declaration of Independence and thinking about independence, autonomy, freedom, and self-reliance or God-reliance.

Independence is the state of being free of the control of some other person, country, or entity. Revolutions are all about obtaining independence, and most famously, perhaps, the Revolutionary War here in America, which led to our freedom from Britain. While we're celebrating the semi-quincentennial of the United States of America, it made me think about people who are not free in many different ways.

Number one: spiritually free. There are so many people who have not yet accepted Jesus as their personal Savior or as Lord. I think that is the first step in being spiritually free—recognizing that you have a Savior that can save you from your sins, to give you eternal life, and to show you a path forward in your life. Maybe your independence is to move into a relationship with Jesus.

Number two: emotionally. There are a lot of us who are stuck in old wounds and in trauma. We need a transformation; we need a revolution. But really, many times we need revelation. We need people to walk alongside us and show us the way.

Then mentally, we often get stuck in our thinking. It can be addiction, anxiety, depression, or many of the other things that keep us from experiencing freedom. Recovery, as you've heard us say many times, is for everyone, and it can give us that pathway for freedom in our lives.

In John 8:31, Jesus says to the people who believed in Him, "You are truly my disciples if you remain faithful to my teaching. and you will know the truth and the truth will set you free." Then He goes down to verse 34 and replies, "I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave of sin. A slave is not a permanent member of the family, but a son is part of the family forever. So if the Son sets you free, you are truly free."

As we begin this semi-quincentennial celebration of the United States of America, what freedom are you seeking? Perhaps you feel stuck in the past wounds, or perhaps it's a spiritual freedom that you're looking for. The beginning of the declaration, the preamble, says, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, and among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." New Life's been helping people find that. We can help you. Call us today.

Brian Perez: 1-800-229-3000. To find out more information about New Life or to order any of the resources mentioned on today's program, call 1-800-NEW-LIFE. Now back to New Life Live.

Here we are. 1-800-229-3000 is the number to call us today. We're only going to be in the studio for an hour, so make sure you call soon. Becky, great discussion to start the show off about freedom from the things that keep us down. Wouldn't you say, Alice?

Dr. Alice Benton: Absolutely. It also makes me think, Becky, about all the people that tell us, "But I've been praying for freedom and I still don't have it yet." We know it is a gift God is ready and willing to give us, but He also often requires action of us.

So praying is good and necessary, but often not sufficient. If you aren't feeling that freedom that Becky was describing, have you taken enough action? Have you taken those praying hands and picked up the telephone to get in touch with a therapist or to get into a group so that you have community? God often gives us the freedom through other people and through the recovery process.

Becky Brown: It's funny when you think about it. There's an old saying—it's something Steve Arterburn has said many, many times—He always said, "God is waiting for you to do what you've been waiting for Him to do."

There are action steps that we each need to take a step forward in, and that's why we talk about recovery being for everyone. That is from *Healing Is a Choice*. I just think of so many people who have taken the step, done the work, and the freedom that they do experience. The health of their relationships and of their journey—the thing that so many people think is that all I have to do is this one-and-done kind of thing.

But it is a life-changing experience. It's a transformation for a lifetime, and it's one step at a time. The more we go towards our freedom, the more we learn and the more we can gain more freedom. It's literally the process of healing that takes place.

I want to celebrate something else. I'm not only celebrating the semi-quincentennial of the United States of America—

Brian Perez: Now you're just showing off.

Dr. Alice Benton: I was thinking the same thing.

Becky Brown: I learned a new word. I bet you can't spell it, and don't ask me to either unless I'm looking at the paper. But we're celebrating the match being met. I know our listeners have been hearing us ask for you to participate in the match, and so many of you have. We successfully completed the match.

I just wanted to give God all the glory for that and for you to move towards giving to New Life. It makes a difference. We talk about how your giving makes a difference in the lives of so many people. Literally, we have 40 years of stories—almost 40 years of stories of just life-changing experiences. Sometimes it's because they heard us on the show and then took a step towards their freedom.

Don't think that it's one and done, like we make the match and then we move on. No, the window of opportunity is still open for you to continue to give to what God is doing in New Life. I just want to say thank you, thank you, thank you for your support because you're helping people.

One of the things that I think we forget all the time is that we don't know, this side of heaven, who is being impacted by the work of New Life because they're listening on the radio or a podcast or they see it on YouTube. They're getting true truth and godly counsel, and then they're making decisions that are changing their lives, their families, and their community. So your giving does make a difference in such a huge way that we will never know, but we'll all celebrate together at some point in eternity.

Brian Perez: That's right. You can give online at newlife.com or by calling 1-800-NEW-LIFE. You can also text NLM to 28950. In honor of our semi-quincentennial—did I say it right? Maybe 250 of you can give $250. I don't know, I'm just saying that. But we will take it. That'd be great. Or maybe you can sign up as a monthly donor to our 99 for the One partners. That'd be awesome too. Let's go to the phones now. 1-800-229-3000, beginning with Jenny in Shreveport, Louisiana. She listens on the New Life app. Hey, Jenny, thanks for downloading the app and calling us today.

Jenny: You're welcome. I love all of you so, so much. I feel like I've been through counseling school with you guys. You all have helped me so much with just communicating with people. I hope you can help with this issue. The question is, how can I help my adult children reconcile with each other?

Brian Perez: With each other?

Jenny: Yes. My oldest daughter was married. She lost her husband to bacterial meningitis a few years ago. Now she is engaged again. She's getting married in October. She's a sensitive person. She went through a ton of grief. She's told me the loss of her husband has changed her. She's more self-protective, I guess. She's just careful about who she talks to about what, etcetera.

Then my son, who's younger than her, is married. The person he's married to has communication issues with all of us—everybody in the family. I love her dearly, and I feel like I've been very patient with her, and I'll continue to be so.

Becky Brown: Jenny, can I ask you a question? When you say communication, what does that mean?

Jenny: Well, she comes from a lot of childhood trauma and teenage trauma. I think it's affected the way she deals with people. She will tell them what she thinks. Whatever's on her mind, she'll say it—no filter. She does so much for people. She can be so, so sweet.

But just she doesn't know how to talk with us as a family. She has got some great friends that she doesn't show this side to. But like when my daughter tried to talk to her—this was in January, this was what started everything—she asked her about the shower that my daughter-in-law was going to give for her because she's great at parties. She absolutely exploded. I wasn't there, I'm just getting this secondhand. She said to my daughter, "You are the least important thing on my list right now."

There's a better way to say that, like, "I've got a lot of things going on right now. I'm working, I've got a new baby." But that's the way she phrases things. Another example: one day I did laundry while I was babysitting for them. I took the stuff out of the dryer, folded it. She got so mad at me because I touched her things. I was babysitting at their house. I thought it would be a favor. But that was a big issue. They almost fired me as their babysitter. Families have issues. We can resolve this. You don't have to fire me as the babysitter.

Brian Perez: Now, how long have they been married, the younger son and his wife?

Jenny: Five years. And she's always been like that. He just kind of caves to whatever she wants. That's his issue—he's not going to stand up to her.

Dr. Alice Benton: Jenny, have you, your daughter, or your son ever attempted to address this pattern or these occasions with her directly? If so, how did it go?

Jenny: Well, one time she was sarcastic with me, and I said, "Well, that sounds like sarcastic." She's like, "No, it's just true." It just went from there into an argument because I was very stressed out. We have an adopted daughter, and she was going through a lot at that time. Emotionally, I was not at a good place, and I argued back.

Then I had to end up the next week—I prayed about it—I just said, "I am so sorry that I argued with you. I'm really, really sorry for the words I said." But she is a person she is never going to say sorry.

Becky Brown: Jenny, your question was about them getting along. So are you guys not talking now? Where is it right now?

Jenny: After that happened in January with the "least on the list," my daughter tried to talk to her about it. She kind of put distance between them. Well, the oldest daughter unloaded every hurt that the daughter-in-law had ever done to her, which was a huge mistake.

Then daughter-in-law and son called me. Daughter-in-law was yelling at me saying she didn't want to be a part of the family anymore. I mean yelling and calling the other person a B. You don't want to say that to the mother of a child. But God helped me maintain peace, and I just said, "We love you," blah, blah, blah. We talked for an hour. It wasn't resolved. Another time, like two days later, called and yelled at me again.

Becky Brown: The hard part is that all of this past wounding from everybody—from her, from all of you—and then trying to get a family of adults on the same page is a challenge anyway. But my thinking is it's going to be one step at a time. I would probably not say the your son and daughter-in-law together. Like, what do you need from us? How can we make this right?

Just start to gather what everybody thinks needs to happen. She's been pretty offended, and I'm not making excuses for her reactions. But it's hard to manage adult relationships, and I know that I'm being very vague. But in order to go forward in connection, you've got to find out what everybody wants.

Dr. Alice Benton: That's such a good point, Becky, because, Jenny, if your daughter is not yet ready to reconcile with your daughter-in-law, your motivation and your desire is maybe outweighs her own. So you might find that you're pushing something that your daughter is not yet ready for.

So I think a couple steps you might take: one is to accept how limited your power is here because you have the ability to apologize for your part, which you did so well. You have the ability to pray for your family. I want to caution you against too much fixing because with our adult children, we do have to allow them to make choices that we disagree with, and we can't always fix or influence or force reconciliation before people are ready to.

Accepting your limited power, next, I would ask your daughter if she wants to work on the relationship with your daughter-in-law. Then I'd have you consider talking with a family therapist who could possibly get several of these people in the room or the Zoom room together to begin working on. Do we want better harmony in this family, and what are we each willing and able to do to work towards that? We often need an outsider to be able to help draw out truth in a way that's tolerable and digestible. You all have made good attempts, and yet sometimes it came out with overloaded truth. A family therapist can help you balance out how to share the right amount of truth with sufficient grace so that people can receive it.

Becky Brown: And you know, Alice, I love that because the other part is we've got to recreate safety in this family for everybody. That the daughter-in-law doesn't feel like the alien, that she is seen, heard, understood. But at the same time, the other members of the family—it is a balance. It's tricky. But I do agree with there's got to be an outside source to manage and mediate. I want this for you, Jenny. I want a strong family connection, but it might look a little different than what you expect.

Brian Perez: There's an article at newlife.com that might help you guys. It's called "Bonding and Boundaries: Why You Need Them Both." We'll put a link to that in the show notes if you're watching us online right now. Thank you so much for calling in today to New Life Live, Jenny.

To find out more information about New Life or to order any of the resources mentioned on today's program, call 1-800-NEW-LIFE. Now back to New Life Live.

Let's go back to the phones. Here is Rick in Macon, Georgia. He listens on SiriusXM channel 131. Hey, Rick, thanks for calling in today. How can we help you?

Rick: I appreciate all that you guys do and the help that you provide to so many people as they listen in. I appreciate taking the call. I do full-time ministry, and I do a good bit of counseling and try to help people through situations. I have a limited amount of education—social psychology and then a biblical counseling degree from Liberty.

But I find myself dealing with people—almost an overwhelming majority of people—are on some type of medication for anxiety, depression, things of that type. I often wonder if they're not more dependent on the medication than they are on their faith. So I just was interested in you guys' perspective or approach. I understand medication is good for chemical imbalances, things of that sort. My feeling is that it's a temporary thing to transition people from one spot to another. But when are we trusting medication more than we're trusting the Lord?

Dr. Alice Benton: Rick, will you tell us an example of one of these people that was closest to you and that their over-reliance on medication, under-reliance on faith had a significant impact on you directly?

Rick: Not necessarily specifically on me directly. Obviously, I'm a very empathetic person, so that's probably one of my struggles in counseling—I can find myself getting really connected and close to people quickly.

Not too long ago, I had a gentleman that had entered into ministry, and he had some depression, anxiety issues, and he had been on medication for two or three years for the situation. I just felt as if it was more of a spiritual aspect that he was not completely reliant on the Holy Spirit and the Lord to help him in those situations and growing in his maturity in faith and allowing God's truth to overcome the lies that seem to keep him entangled in the anxiety and depression. Maybe he felt he could get off medication if he would grow more in that direction.

Dr. Alice Benton: You want your people to make use of all the resources, but especially the supernatural resources, and he may not have been doing enough of that spiritual work and you saw it could have benefited him. Just one other question on the personal side: has anybody thought that you should take medication for depression or anxiety, or did you have a family member that you saw over-rely on medication and not do enough work on themselves?

Rick: I have never had anybody indicate I should, and I've never really, to be honest with you, struggled with anxiety or depression. There was a point in time where I did have a fairly close—I would say immediate—family member that used prescription medication, Adderall, things of that sort, and had become, I would say, reliant on it, so to speak. And then I've also had a close family member that has transitioned away from it and been able to remove themselves from it after a number of five or six years.

Becky Brown: Here's the thing, Rick. In counseling, we have to maintain objectivity with the people that we work with. So whenever we sense that we have an opinion, like what you're talking about, that people rely too much on medication, we have to make sure that we're looking at the folks that we're serving or working with individually.

There is new information about medication. We used to think that it was some sort of a chemical imbalance. Now, there is some truth to that, but there's also some more complex issues that go with brain health, neuroscience, and every person has a different pathway. So that's what I want you to be focused on.

The other part is that if somebody's on medication, it doesn't mean that they have failed. Many times there are people that have to use medication for their benefit. I mean, when you think about somebody who's on Adderall, they likely need that for their attention deficit disorder. I mean, that's usually where that is used. But I want to just encourage you to take each situation individually, help people have a process of where they can determine where medication is helpful, not helpful, because I have also seen—and I'm sure Alice has seen this too—where you have clients that are over-medicated, and they're not paying attention to how they're going about in the world and that can be just as detrimental. It is not a black or white issue. It really is complex. But we have to, as people helpers, make sure that we're not creating judgment on a topic that we're able to talk with people individually and help them find the best answers for them.

Dr. Alice Benton: And, Rick, as you serve, I think it is always helpful to lead our clients in broadening their coping skills—spiritually, physically, with how they exercise, with how they eat. It's always good to give them more tools.

Then I'd be really cautious with questioning their medication, and I would rely more on the psychiatric consultations and consulting with the physician. I'd be really careful not to give too strong of an opinion about something that we don't have as much expertise in ourselves.

Brian Perez: Rick, thanks for calling us today. We've got more calls coming up. Rick and Donna in Philadelphia are watching us on YouTube. Hi, guys. Thanks for calling into New Life Live.

Donna: Hi. How are you today? Rick, say hi.

Rick: Hello. I listen all the time, and I got my husband to finally call in for a question that we had. We were talking because my husband—well, I'm going to let my husband explain it.

Guest (Male): We debate a lot about rationalizing versus reasoning or just trying to figure out what happened. I'll give you an example. The example was if a person walked into a store and stole a loaf of bread. Right away, my wife would say—well, if I said, "Wow, that person must have been really hungry to steal a loaf of bread," she would say, "Stop rationalizing why they did it."

But I'm not really trying to give them an excuse for stealing the loaf of bread. I'm just basically trying to figure out why they would go in a store and steal a loaf of bread. Then I'm thinking, "Maybe they must have been really hungry." I don't know, that's the only thing I could come up with. Your mind goes to motivation behind a behavior, but to your wife it can sound like you're defending or excusing a bad behavior or illegal behavior.

Dr. Alice Benton: Does it ever hit closer to home, where Donna perhaps feels hurt by you and she feels like you excuse your behavior away, or she feels like you do that about the kids?

Guest (Male): Well, it's not more or less about in our household. It's just like in general—the world—like why people do things that they do. Like why would a thief break into your home? Then my reasoning behind that is, okay, maybe I left my doors open, or maybe there were no lights around the house for security. Maybe a door was open, maybe I left a window.

Becky Brown: I've got a question for both of you. What kind of conversations do you have with each other about each other, as opposed to what's out there or these ideas? I'm just wondering, do you feel seen and heard by each other? Do you feel like Donna hears what you have to say, not just about this topic, but do you feel that intimacy, that closeness with each other?

Donna: That's a great question because a lot of our arguments are because he has his own perspective on certain things and I have my perspective. But it seems like he can just come up with some kind of rationale why it's excusable. That's exactly the way she looks at it, where I'm coming up with an excuse and I'm not really coming up with an excuse. I'm coming up with a reason. I'm trying to find out the reason.

Becky Brown: But what's happening is the two of you aren't connecting on the communication. In so many couples' lives, we see things from different perspectives—that's just our humanness—and then you get married and then you're going to have millions of conversations. If you are completely missing each other, or you're feeling like you have to defend yourself or make your point, it begins this dance. Alice, we talk about Comfort Circle all the time, and I'm thinking that's what Rick and Donna are going to need some help with. What do you think?

Dr. Alice Benton: I agree. I just had to do the Comfort Circle last night with my husband, and we both need to hear each other out. When we're willing to stick with a structured style of listening where we're not trying to correct each other, we're trying to listen for the sake of understanding, we both feel better after that kind of conversation versus debates can stir up frustration, anxiety, anger between us. Sometimes a good debate is fun—there's nothing wrong with a good debate—but if you two, Rick and Donna, are leaving these rationalizing versus reasoning conversations and you're feeling like it leaves a wedge between the two of you, then there's something deeper to look at.

Whatever that strong uncomfortable emotion is, there is probably a history tied to it. Can you each identify anger, frustration, sadness? What is the one main uncomfortable emotion you feel when this happens?

Donna: For me, it's anger, frustration.

Rick: For me, it's not really anger or frustration. It's just that it's almost like she don't understand what I'm trying to put across. So misunderstood. I'm not angry about it, but it's more misunderstood.

Dr. Alice Benton: I would guess that there is a related history for both of you. Rick, perhaps in your home growing up, maybe the adults weren't good at taking time to really hear you out and understand you. Donna, for you, maybe there was someone in your childhood who did a lot of defending and not a lot of responsibility taking. And you two may have experienced that with each other as well. So this underlying issue that Becky's trying to help you identify—the idea is go below the debate to hear about the anger Donna feels, the misunderstood that Rick feels, and when you have experienced that before in your lives. If you do that in the safety of a Comfort Circle or being led by a couples counselor—and we've got those in our network—you will get to better resolution than just getting to winning the debate or trying to convince each other of rationalizing versus reasoning.

Becky Brown: I love that you guys are calling together. It is so good. There's nothing wrong with a good debate, and healthy relationships can handle a strong debate where you can have a conversation, you may be on different sides of the coin, but you come together on where the connections are. You guys aren't too far away from Washington, D.C., and we're going to be doing our Intimacy in Marriage Intensive in July, and it would be a great place for you to really explore this and to get started on that connection. I'm glad that you're connected, but I don't want the arguing or the debating to be the connection for you guys. I want you to be able to have that strong connection and be able to have healthy discussion.

Dr. Alice Benton: And, Rick, if I frequently heard you giving what you imagine might be the backstory for when people do something that's wrong and you give understanding and mercy because there is always a backstory—you have a skill in doing that. But if I were Donna, I would probably need reassurance from you first that the behavior is wrong, no matter what the understandable backstory is. Stealing the bread is wrong, breaking into the house is wrong. Donna might need to hear that from you that you recognize right from wrong and you have a heart of understanding for people that choose to do wrong.

Guest (Male): That's an excellent answer right there. I appreciate that.

Brian Perez: Rick and Donna, we highly encourage you to show up at the Intimacy in Marriage weekend intensive. It is happening later this month, July 24th, in Washington, D.C., not too far from you guys there in Philadelphia. The early bird rate ends next Friday. You can get more details at newlife.com or by calling us at 1-800-NEW-LIFE. Becky, you're going to be there, so Rick and Donna go to Becky and say hi.

Also, the book *How We Love*, that's available in the newlife.com store. You can find out more about the Comfort Circle in that book. Again, that's at newlife.com or you can call and order over the phone at 1-800-NEW-LIFE. Got a few minutes left. Show's not over yet. We'll take more calls when we come back.

Brian Perez: To find out more information about New Life or to order any of the resources mentioned on today's program, call 1-800-NEW-LIFE. Now back to New Life Live.

New Life is here to guide you through the struggles you're facing, and we provide help in a variety of formats—so much help, so many different formats that you might lose track. Which is why it's a good idea to sign up for the New Life newsletter. You can do that for free at newlife.com. You'll get it in your email once a month. You can also sign up for our daily devotions there too. Back to the phones now. Here is Teresa in Texas watching us on YouTube. Hi there, Teresa. Thanks for calling in today.

Teresa: Hello. My daughter got engaged in January. Her and her fiancé have done counseling with the pastor. They do live in two separate states—one's in Florida and the other's in Texas. But while on a visit, my daughter discovered that he had inappropriate texts with a female.

The way she discovered it, she walked in the bathroom and he was like, "Yeah," and surprised. She just knew it was odd for him to put the phone in—he made excuses about the text. Eventually, she asked to see it; eventually, she saw. As days went on, she looked more, and he handed over the phone. Inappropriate things, and some things were deleted. It's between a mutual friend—he does have a female friend that my daughter, she knows both persons, but it's the lady's friend that was texting inappropriately. I know there's the betrayal trauma and those things, and she—they do want to do continue with counseling outside of the pastor. So I told them I would call so that they could listen to the advice that you guys would have for them.

Becky Brown: We're so sad to hear this, Teresa, because you're trying to build a relationship together. It's very hard to do long-distance relationships because the time that you spend together is a heightened connection that may not be related to reality. It's that excitement to see each other and then the longing in between. It creates this dynamic in relationships that's not what day-to-day life is going to be like.

Then when you have something like this happen—and betrayal trauma is exactly what you're talking about—now your daughter has this question: does she want to still get married? It sounds like they're going to do counseling and all that, but this is a critical decision at this point because if you play it forward maybe just two years into the marriage and this happens again—I'm not saying it's going to, I'm just saying this is where those connections are so important. His own work will be important in his recognizing what this has done. If this is an old friend of his, then there's that dynamic too—like, what role does she play in his life? Does she live where he lives? These are the things that I would want to explore. More than anything, I want your daughter to experience safety in being able to ask questions. This is a pretty big deal. Alice, what would you add?

Dr. Alice Benton: When is the wedding date?

Teresa: In October.

Dr. Alice Benton: And they've already paused that?

Teresa: In her mind, she's like, "What do I do?" I mean, in a sense of she wants to pause it to seek the help. I'm more concerned for her, of course, than the continuation. She's just in shock, I think, more than anything.

Dr. Alice Benton: It takes immense courage to be willing to pause a wedding that is in just a couple months. This is an integrity issue on his part, and she's caught one level of it. It's hardly ever just one level. If it's already the extent of sexual texting with another woman during his engagement months away from his wedding, then sadly I have to imagine there's a history of pornography use, perhaps early sexual behavior in his life. Maybe he's had other integrity issues and infidelity in dating relationships.

All of that has to be considered because this is what happens when there is an integrity issue—it's not a one-time affair usually. So I would advise them to pause the wedding date, to pause the engagement even, and then I would look at what is his reaction to being discovered. What is he doing, what is he willing to do, and how much of it does he initiate? Does he sign up right away for Every Man's Battle? Does he stay in one of the Sustained Victory groups for a year afterwards and get into individual counseling? Does he take a polygraph test combined with a full therapeutic disclosure of his entire sexual history? All under the guidance of one of our counselors who has expertise in sexual integrity issues. We all come to an engagement with sins and ongoing sins. It's not like he's the worst guy, I'm sure he's got a lot of great qualities. But he has been hiding this aspect of his life. Now what is he willing to do about it? Sometimes people are motivated only because they're caught, and he didn't disclose this—it was discovered. There are so many red flags that it is well worth pausing the engagement and seeing what he's willing to do about these things. I have great compassion for him, and we have help for him if he's willing to walk this path. He can become a man of fabulous integrity that could make for a great wedding.

Becky Brown: At the beginning of the show, I was talking about freedom. He's not walking in freedom right now, but neither is your daughter at this point. This is the tip of the iceberg. What we want for them as a couple is when we see a man who's walking in recovery, he's an open book. The question that we usually have women ask is, "What is your experience with pornography?" Not, "Did you have an experience?" or "Is there a possibility?" It's, "What did you do when you saw pornography?" or "When did you—"

That kind of questioning is not to crucify them, literally, but it's really an invitation into their freedom. I want the best for both of them. There is no need to hurry into anything, especially on top of all of this being a long-distance relationship. There's a lot of difficulties that are present in this situation. But there's a way out, there's a way forward.

Teresa: Thank you so much.

Brian Perez: All right, Teresa, thanks for calling in today to New Life Live. Like you said, you're going to share the video clip with them. Yeah, we have all of our episodes—we archive them, we make them available on YouTube and also the newlife.com website and the New Life app. So yeah, send them this video their way.

Dr. Alice Benton: Just to speak to the man in that relationship, as I said, we care about you and we want what's best for you. If you're willing to respond to this with humility, with admission, and if you're willing to work towards the full therapeutic disclosure, there is so much hope for you. So I'm praying for you right now, and I will be honoring your humble response to this issue. We highly encourage you to attend the Every Man's Battle intensive. It is happening next week, July 10th, that weekend, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, in Washington, D.C. Get all the details at newlife.com or call 1-800-NEW-LIFE. God bless you guys. We'll talk to you next time here on New Life Live.

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