No Porn Marriage

Erin Smalley: The pain and shame of pornography is very real. Healing is a process, it's a journey. But with God's help, a good Christian counselor, and a good community of friends, you and your spouse and your marriage can be restored.

Dr. Greg Smalley: Welcome to another episode of No Porn Marriage. I'm Dr. Greg Smalley, joined by my wife, Erin, and together we run the marriage department at Focus on the Family. Erin, you used the word process, because certainly healing is a journey, it's a process. I imagine for many people, they try to rush through that. How can they really do that in a way that works for them and their marriage?

Erin Smalley: It's first and foremost to recognize that your healing process is going to be different for each of you. I think of a specific couple that I've worked with and he was the one who was seeking pornography and she was not. Upon hearing that, he was so set free from confessing this and releasing this hidden burden that he'd been carrying.

She was just hearing about it for the first time and her process seemed to her to have taken a lot longer, but really she's just catching up. It's different for each of you. So first and foremost, as you walk through this healing process, deal with you first. There's no more excuses, there's no more hiding. It's accepting 100% responsibility for the choices you've made. This is your one opportunity to be 100% honest. You only get one chance at that. As you are 100% honest, even if you don't give all the details the first time around, it's important to let your spouse know this is what I've been doing and I accept ownership of that.

Dr. Greg Smalley: I think one of the things that you said is worth repeating is that you're right. So for that person who has been struggling with pornography, this is something they've been dealing with for years, maybe months, weeks. They've been ready to confess. They've probably prepared their heart. They've spent time with the Lord, maybe asked some friends, what do I do? And now they're about to share this with a spouse who is now learning about this for the very first time. I think oftentimes people can be confused and surprised at the level of reaction from their spouse upon hearing this news. So I think that's a great point that remember, you're used to this information. This might be the first time your spouse has heard this.

Erin Smalley: Absolutely. And it's shocking. And there's grief that will transpire. So there's two different people who are going to be grieving at two different rates and having two different experiences and that's okay. That's why it's so important to surround yourself, both of you, with people who are going to support you in your grieving, in your healing, but also in your marriage.

Dr. Greg Smalley: I know for me, Erin, that what was important is as I've shared my story about struggling with pornography and how we've dealt with that. I had to understand though what the triggers were for me. And for me, when I was tired, exhausted, that really left me vulnerable to being tempted by something maybe that I saw as an advertisement or whatever. But I just know for me that level of exhaustion became something that I had to really, really watch out for because I was used to doing something unrighteous to deal with that. I know for me then the righteous way of coping with the exhaustion was wanting to talk about it, wanting to learn. I can go out and exercise, that tends to make me feel better, or maybe sit down together and watch a movie. There were things that I began to learn and to do to cope with the exhaustion in more of a righteous way.

Erin Smalley: Often I will actually have a client write out a list of what are those alternatives. Instead of seeking the pornography or something that is sin, trying to get these righteous needs met in an unrighteous way, what are alternatives to that? If you do that prior to when you're triggered, then you have an option of something else to do. I know for me one thing that helped me to feel so safe was to know that you had other people in your life that you could go to. That it wasn't just me. It's just so important that you surround yourself, both individuals, both spouses surround themselves with people who they can be honest with, vulnerable with. I know there's groups that churches run for pornography recovery and it's important to have that group of support. As the spouse hearing about this, it led me to feel even more safe.

Dr. Greg Smalley: Because I think what you're saying is that your spouse should not be your accountability partner. Absolutely not. And I think that's the temptation because upon hearing about my news, I'm sure there was some pressure to go what do I need to do to make sure that he's not turning to pornography? And I think we learned the hard way to go, you know what, that's really not your role because you can't win at that.

Erin Smalley: Yeah, it absolutely won't work because then what ends up happening is you step into that role of micromanaging the other person and it's not your job. Your spouse is an adult and is 100% responsible for the choices they make. Now, I can absolutely come alongside and support and encourage, but your choices are not mine. They're not mine to own. They're not my responsibility to go before the Lord. I can go before the Lord with my stuff and my sin. Because believe me, that was your sin, but I had my own. My own sin. It didn't happen to be in the realm of pornography, but what about overspending or shopping or gossiping? I'm confessing everything now. I'm writing this down. To your point, it's so important how we walk this journey. Right now, we're going to hear part of a conversation that Dr. Greg and I had with author Jamie Ivey. She does such a good job of sharing her story and about the difference that confessing her sin to a friend made.

Erin Smalley: So what advice do you have for that person who has someone come to them? What advice do you have for them? What's helpful to say? What's helpful or what's not helpful to say? What do you tell people?

Jamie Ivey: I can give you a personal example of I think I'll use this example until the day I die and it gets me a little teary-eyed every time because one of my sons, it didn't have to do with pornography, but it was a different type of issue that we wouldn't want them involved in. We found out that he was doing this on his phone. It was some kind of where you sing back and forth to each other. Do y'all know this app? We don't have them anymore. But you make music videos and then send them back and forth to each other, which is great with your friends.

The problem with it is that you can also connect with strangers, which is the hard thing with social media and raising kids. Whole other podcast. You can connect with strangers. And so I found on my son's tablet that he had been connecting with strangers and making these videos. And some of them were inappropriate. No pornography, but just inappropriate images for a 10-year-old boy. I found these and I came to him and I said, "What were you thinking? Why would you do this?"

And I'll never forget, it makes me sad because look at me, I get so emotional about this four years ago. But I'll never forget my husband later was like, "Jamie, you cannot do that because he's not going to confess next time. Because what he just got from his mom is shame. What's wrong with you? There's something wrong with you. You messed up. You're bad. You're dirty."

And I mean, that was probably five years ago and it still affects me because I realize that there's truth in that. There's truth in the way that I reacted in that moment really made my son feel. And you know what, he had done something wrong, but it made him feel shameful. It made him feel dirty. It made him feel less than. And so I've spent the last five years, let me tell you, that hasn't happened in my house again because thankfully I listened to my husband with his guidance and the Lord.

And also remembering what it felt like for me when I confessed. In the book when I talk about pornography, it was me having a moment of seeking out pornography in my home, married, mother to four. I was teaching at my church the next day. No one is immune. Yeah. No one is immune. But it was I went to my friend the next day immediately. I knew I could not keep that a secret. And praise be to God, I did not actually ever get to a pornographic site, but I searched my tail off trying to because we've got all the computer things. So I was like, what words can I put in that aren't going to flag the system?

But I knew that I was seeking out that. And I went to my friend, I knew I had to confess. I could not not confess. And so I went to my friend, Annie, and I confessed that Sunday morning. I said, "I need you," and I went into a room and I told her everything. And her response is what is the response. She looked at me and she said, "It's okay. God still loves you. Like there's grace for that. You're forgiven. Repentance leads to forgiveness. Like it's okay." She was pointing me to the truth that Jesus forgave me and that He loves me and He can still use me and I'm still a good wife and a good mom and all those things.

And so that confession is so important. And now we're building in our home, besides that mistake that I talk about all the time, we want to build in our home a safe place for our kids to confess. Because when you talk about pornography, I mean the stats, I don't believe kids are going to grow up and not be exposed to it. They're going to see it. It's not an if, it's a when. And so we parent knowing our kids are going to be exposed to pornography. And I think that is a mistake that some parents can make. Like oh, we do my kids won't ever look at that, my kids won't see that. They will. And so how do we allow a safe place for our kids to confess? And it's just what my friend Annie did. You look at them, they confess and you say, "Okay, we're going to work through this. There's nothing wrong with you."

Dr. Greg Smalley: I like how Jamie is talking about creating this safe place because pornography, it weighs us down. It made me think of Psalms 32:3-5. It says, "When I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groanings all day long. For day and night Your hand was heavy upon me; my strength was sapped as in the heat of the summer." That verse does such a great job to describe this heaviness when we carry sin of any kind, but especially sexual sin. The scripture does such a great job of describing what that experience is like.

Erin Smalley: You think about the guilt and the shame. I mean that physically weighs you down. It eats you alive. You think about the anxiety, the stress, the depressions. I remember my father, a guy named Gary Smalley, used to say that you bury every emotion alive.

Dr. Greg Smalley: That sounded just like him, how he said it.

Erin Smalley: You do bury every emotion alive. And so as you are in that process of hiding and carrying that shame and guilt around, it weighs you down. And one of the deepest human longings within our heart is to be known, to be loved and cherished. Well, how can you be known if you're hiding? If you're isolated off with this secret? And so there's something so powerful about coming into the light and being known, in being seen. Granted, more than likely you never thought that you could be in this place, carrying this darkness around with you. You never intended for it to go like this. But there's something so powerful about stepping out. That isolation is removed. And really, from the depths of your soul, you're finally known.

Dr. Greg Smalley: Yeah, it creates freedom. When we confess, there's a peace. I remember for me when I finally was able to share what I was struggling with with you, that there was a peace. In Philippians 4:7 it says, "And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." And there was a way in which not only did I feel more at peace, but I felt this protection from God. As I confessed to Him, as I confessed to you, there was a way in which that I knew that He was helping to protect my mind and my heart. And that's the power of confessing.

Erin Smalley: Absolutely the power of confessing. But recognize as you're starting to feel better by confessing and beginning the healing process, your spouse is hearing about this for the first time and it's shocking. So know that more than likely your spouse is going to have a huge emotional reaction to this just like I did. Granted, I had to pull it together for the seminar, but important to just recognize there's going to be fallout from the confession, but know that this is the beginning of the healing process. And what an opportunity there is that lies ahead.

Dr. Greg Smalley: We don't want to paint some rosy picture. I mean this is painful and this could get ugly and that's okay. If you surround yourself with the right help, friends, counselors, you can grow, you both can grow and your marriage will be even stronger. Well, that's really what Jonathan Daugherty of Be Broken Ministries was talking about. So let's go back to a conversation that he had with Focus President Jim Daly. I love that Jonathan really dives into how to walk through this healing process. He also describes how confession is the first step to recovery but it shouldn't stop there.

Jim Daly: Jonathan, give us some context though from that evening when you told your wife and she curled up in a ball. How long after that did she decide to leave and separate from you?

Jonathan Daugherty: Yeah, it was less than a week. A week later. So that's why I always tell people, you know, confession is a great place to open the door, but if you don't actually start taking action toward doing right behaviors and toward getting yourself healing, then it's going to be a very short period of time till you just back into your old patterns.

Jim Daly: Right, and I really appreciate and I want to reiterate the caution that you gave to people if they're going to disclose in that way. You've come to that point where you cannot keep it, which is a good thing. But there's ways to do that that will be more helpful in the short and long run. Looking back on that, how would you have done it so that it would have been maybe better for your wife?

Jonathan Daugherty: Well, considering the degree and the depths to which I went in my own personal addictive behavior, there was a lot to unpack because it wasn't quote-unquote "just pornography." I mean there was a lot of other things that were part of that. And so therefore when I needed to disclose, it's not necessarily the same exact kind of process that let's say a guy who, you know, listen, he's struggling with pornography. He's viewing it every now and then. He hasn't crossed what we call the flesh barrier and he's needing to disclose. We're both needing to disclose, but the depth to which our behaviors are going to wound another individual are at different places. They're still wounding there. A guy who's got to confess to his wife that he's been looking at porn is going to wound his wife with that information.

A guy like me who went beyond that is going to wound his wife. I always recommend that it is so important for that man to go see a counselor. Because that's an environment where he can start to unpack all the pieces, start to kind of get a, if I can put it this way, a strategy for recovery that can then invite his wife into that place and then it's, there's no clean way to do this. So I want the listener to know that it's not like you can somehow get a magic formula that if you confess just the right way, your wife is going to be happy and there's everything's going to be fine. It's a messy process no matter what. But I do think inviting a counselor into that space to start helping you pull it all apart and put the pieces in an order that then is more effective can be highly beneficial.

Jim Daly: We talked earlier about how that recovery from sexual addiction, it can be a long process and people need to understand that too. You don't wave that magic wand after confessing and then all of a sudden everything is good. It's a process. I would think your wife, one of the things that she may have expressed to you is this breaking of trust, which is so core to human relationship. How did she begin to open the door to trusting you again?

Jonathan Daugherty: Well, we were separated for nine months and I started my recovery not with any expectation that our relationship would be reconciled. Because she said she didn't want to see me or speak to me ever again. And hey, up to that point she'd never lied to me before. So I'm thinking she's gone, you know, I'm never going to see her again. So my motivation for actually engaging recovery was realizing I have to live with me the rest of my life. And I didn't necessarily like the me that I was living with.

So then nine months later, when God performs this miracle that my wife and I realize that He's been doing things in both of us. He's been healing her, He's been taking me through this recovery and realizing we're becoming new people, we reconciled and then we both realized, okay, we need help and because I had been a lousy husband before, so I needed help to know how to begin engaging this process. So to answer your question about trust, it was really kind of a two-step process, meaning the first fundamental step for her even considering reconciliation was whether she was going to choose to forgive me. And that is something that only she can be involved in. Meaning forgiveness is very much a one-way street. Had I continued to just be a self-centered jerk, she could have still forgiven me because that's out of her own heart and out of her own healing and whatever she decides to give in terms of forgiveness.

Trust, however, is a two-way street. And so when we got back together, she had offered me this incredible gift of forgiveness. But now I had to go on a journey of rebuilding trust. And what that looked like was simply, and this is going to encompass a whole lot, but really what it boils down to is pursue becoming a man of integrity. A man of wholeness, a man of honesty. The idea of integrity means there's wholeness throughout. So there's not compartments over here that say, hey, I've kind of got my porn compartment over here, I've got my me compartment over here. It's saying, no, I'm whole throughout and letting her really see that. And then over time, it took about five years before she was willing to say, "I trust you completely." And you know what, it was worth every minute of it to be able to regain that back. It was hard work, but it was beneficial not only for me to just learn what it means to become a man of integrity, it was instrumental in whether or not she would be able to trust me again.

Jim Daly: How did she rely upon the Lord in this process? I mean, I know obviously for you it was there, you were building your relationship with the Lord, becoming that man of integrity. What was she looking for in her relationship with the Lord?

Jonathan Daugherty: You know, God is so good in the sense that He knows His children and He knows exactly what they need. She went through a season where she just wrestled so much with God because she said, "You know God, You are sovereign. You could have prevented this. Why did You let me go through this?" And she just suffered with that question and struggled with it. And He just was so incredibly comforting to her through that time. Allowing her to grieve, allowing her to cry, bringing people around her that were able to speak into her life words of comfort and of healing.

And then God took her kind of on a turn that really when she tells it, I'm like, ooh, that almost sounds a little cruel. Because when God started, that was probably about seven months of our separation that God was just taking her through a journey of healing. Then He started turning her attention to forgiveness. And the way He did that was He said, "You know, I have been your God. I've been in your life since you were five years old." She trusted Christ at five years old. And He said, "How many times have you betrayed Me and I've forgiven you?" And she was able to look back over her own life and realize that was what God was inviting her to do with me. Now, I know for some listeners out there, that will sound like whoa, wait a second, time out. This guy was a jerk. I mean, he was looking at pornography, he's being selfish, he was having affairs, he was, you know, how on earth could a loving God, you know, put that kind of mirror in front of this woman's face? Well, that's why I say it was seven months before He put that mirror in front of her face. So there was a process in which He's saying, hey, just get it all out. Grieve, cry, yell, be angry, and I want you to know that I'm here to help you process all of that, and then we'll get to that point of forgiveness.

Dr. Greg Smalley: Well, Jonathan is so right that forgiveness is a long process. And I know Erin, for me, that there was a part of just the reality that even forgiving myself that I had to give up, that this could be different, that this could be wiped clean. That this was a part of our story now. And I think that's an important part because sometimes people confuse forgiveness and they think it's about letting your spouse off the hook for whatever those poor choices were, or maybe it's forgetting about the past or forgetting the pain. But really forgiveness is about setting yourself free so that you both can move on, in which sets up for personal healing and growth as well as restoring your marriage.

Erin Smalley: Absolutely, and there's something so powerful about that. But I think one of the most misunderstood things within our culture and especially within the Christian culture is forgiveness. So I love what you said about what it's not because it's not dismissing this as it never happened. It happened. And it had an impact on your spouse and it has an impact on you. So it's recognizing that it is a journey that you're entering into of really forgiving your spouse, but you can't do that until your heart has grieved. I loved how Jonathan said that, that it took seven months for his wife to get there. And that's okay. Just giving yourself the grace to heal in the amount of time that you need.

Dr. Greg Smalley: Erin, as you work with couples as a counselor, what are some of the reasons why maybe someone can't find that place of forgiving their spouse?

Erin Smalley: Yeah. What I have seen consistently is that someone will continue to bring up their feelings, the issue, until they know that their spouse has fully understands the impact this has had on them. Not only understands it, but validates it. And that's a gift that the user or the offender can give to their spouse. That I hear you, I see your pain, I see you, and I know that this hurt you so much and it makes sense to me why this impacted you and hurt you. And ultimately, the spouse has then the decision to forgive. And ultimately, the choice to forgive will impact not only the marriage, but the individual who is forgiving. Because it has a great impact on you. Your anxiety's going to decrease, your stress level's going to decrease, your blood pressure's going to go down, your heart is going to reopen. And that's key. That again is my job. My heart is my job. And so it's a gift that you're giving, but you're also giving it to yourself.

Dr. Greg Smalley: Yeah, you're setting yourself free. I know for me that as I've watched people struggle with forgiving a spouse, I think a lot of times that comes down to the fear that if I forgive you, that you will forget how badly you hurt me. If I forgive you, then I'm kind of setting you free to hurt me again. And that's why I know that you've talked about this before, but the people that you work with, I know a big part of what you're teaching them is as an individual, here's how do you really learn to deal with that level of pain. Because if my expectation is that as my spouse that you're going to take care of my pain, that you're going to keep from hurting me, it doesn't work that way. That as an individual, we have to really learn how do I begin to care for my own heart? How do I walk through this level of pain? Because I've watched that when the individual starts to feel confident that I know how to care for my own heart, I know how to deal with this type of pain, there's a confidence there that they don't have to hold on to the unforgiveness. Forgiveness happens when I feel like even though I don't want to be hurt like this, I now know what to do if you ever hurt me again. Which is why we keep saying for both people in the marriage, get counseling. Learn how to deal with taking great care of yourself.

Erin Smalley: Yeah, absolutely. And surround yourself with friends who are going to support you in your healing journey, but also fight for your marriage. In those moments when you're weak and you want to give up because it's hard, it's hard, you've been hurt and yet you're putting yourself back in that vulnerable place of he could hurt me again, she could hurt me again. Surround yourself with godly friends who are going to direct you to God, but then also direct you back towards your marriage.

Dr. Greg Smalley: Yeah. Focus on the Family wants to help fight for your marriage as well. And we have trained counselors who will guide you through how to confess, how to deal with issues like forgiveness. Our number is 1-800-A-FAMILY. So that's 1-800-A-FAMILY. And be sure to stop by FocusOnTheFamily.com/npm, as in No Porn Marriage. You'll find an amazing six-part video series called Discovering God's Freedom from Pornography. Nick and Michelle Stumbo talk with Jim Daly about some of the underlying issues that lead to a pornography problem and how to find the right kind of help. Again, that's available at FocusOnTheFamily.com/npm. Well, next time, we'll be discussing more on how to rebuild trust in a marriage. I'm Dr. Greg Smalley.

Erin Smalley: And I'm Erin Smalley. Thanks for joining us for the No Porn Marriage Podcast.