In the aftermath of sexual betrayal, it’s hard to understand or verbalize exactly what all this means. But you know your life will never be the same. You even wonder if life can be good…. This post is about coming to terms with what’s required to heal your marriage; which, is worth noting, is different than healing as an individual.

As I’ve tried so desperately to make sense out of the insanity that IS sexual addiction, a great aid was The Gottman’s “The Magic” Triangle. They shared it in this video – and the triangle wasn’t even the point of the video…. Seeing how the Gottmans define the anchors of a healthy relationship showed me where ours was weak – dangerously weak. The Gottmans explain how Truth, Commitment, and Calming are what work together to create that magical experience that can indeed carry a couple through a lifetime of caring. If you haven’t already discovered this, addicts struggle greatly with these three elements of relating.

Sexual sin carries with it loads of deception. Transparency is VITAL! “Worthy of Her Trust” by Jason Martinkus does a great job of laying out how the addict earns trust back over time. Losing trust in an intimate partnership is very difficult to recover from because it’s such an important ingredient in the relationship. You must trust a marriage partner much more than any other relationship you have. After betrayal, one of the rules to live by is: Tell your spouse everything!

It’s also crucial for the addict to understand that he must be committed to his partner’s wellbeing in every aspect. He was committed to his well being at her expense. (And the means he was using to “take care of himself” wasn’t ultimately healthy for him either.) Our hearts are crying out wondering if our husbands are willing to take good care of us. We’ve been pretty badly beaten up by his choices, so staying by our side going forward won’t be easy. But if he wants his marriage, he will stay sober, he will make amends, he will help her heal, he will become a healthy, real man.

The calming part of this triangle is key! Whether we call it calming together, co-regulation, mirroring, staying connected, keeping your relational circuits on, or secure attachment, the concept of calming (individually and as a couple) is a key predictor of mental and emotional health…..and marriage health. Our therapist is great at teaching that addicts have struggled with affect regulation (feeling states) for a very long time. The issues that led to such dysregulation in your spouse were entirely out of his control. The means he had at his disposal to stabilize himself as a child is what developed into an addiction in his adulthood. Eddie Capparucci does a great job explaining it here.

Just like if your husband was a diabetic, you didn’t cause it, you can’t control it, and you can’t cure it! Neither of us like the fact that my husband has a foundational “leaky” condition that makes stability and intimate-relating difficult – and that it didn’t fully surface until 20 years in. Sadly, some guys would rather foreclose on the marriage and walk away rather than learn to manage his particular set of weaknesses. The Apostle Paul said “when I am weak, then I am strong.” Having the weaknesses posed by sexual addiction in a marriage isn’t easy, friend. But it is possible to restore “The Magic” if the elements the Gottmans have so brilliantly listed are strengthened and maintained. This requires the addict owning his story and doing the work. “Once an addict, always susceptible” but not always an addict.

Here are a few resources regarding calming (or what I referred to as mirroring):

Restored 2 More: Lies Vs Truth with Dr. Marcus Warner, episode 6

The Place We Find Ourselves, #20 Affect Regulation

Therapist Uncensored, #61 It’s Not Crazy

Yes, life can be good, with some work. It’s a different kind of good than we thought we were moving toward. For partners, it requires coming to terms with the addict’s brokeness and how that changes how you do life. My coming to terms with these particular things has taken 2.5 years of hard work. There are other issues that still need significant healing in our relationship.