After learning of your partner’s sex/p*rn addiction and/or infidelity, have you been experiencing some of these common symptoms of trauma:

• Sleep disturbance
• Nightmares
• Hypervigilance
• Loss of energy
• Loss of interest in things you previously enjoyed
• Crying
• Social Isolation
• Triggers
• Brain Fog
• Loss/Increase of appetite
• All-or-nothing, black-and-white, thinking on the extremes

Sadly, betrayal trauma affects most partners. It’s important to know that being in a trauma state is different than mere suffering. Knowing the difference and applying the best healing measures is imperative to decrease these symptoms and find joy and vitality once again. There are 3 types of traumas:

A – Absence of good things (too little for too long)

B – Bad things that happen (too much too fast)

C – Comparison

Learning of an intimate partner’s sexual betrayal is a B trauma. When we experience a B trauma, the effect of “too much too fast” causes our brain to become overwhelmed and dis-integrated. You may be aware that you are not thinking or processing the way you did before discovery.

Traumatic events are stored in the emotional part of our brains, which makes it hard to access and process them. They’re emotionally charged and seem out of reach of the parts of our brain that controls language, time, and logic. This leaves a traumatized soul feeling as if you’ve lost your abilities – your very self.

So the first element that makes an event traumatic vs. standard suffering is too much to fast. The second is the element of being trapped. This event is out of your control. You are being harmed by something you can’t stop. (It’s worth noting that when a person is physically pinned down/trapped in a harmful situation, their brain will go into a trauma response and become dysregulated. This will cause the entire event to be recorded in the emotional part of the brain, making the memory harder to access, process, and heal.) When we’ve been impacted by an event that is so big and overwhelming that we are left with a traumatized brain, we lose touch with ourselves.

Dear One, is this where you find yourself today? Please know, you are not crazy. You are not alone. One of the most comforting things to me while healing from betrayal trauma is when I learned (via Life Model Works materials) that when Jesus was crucified, he wasn’t traumatized. He suffered. He never lost touch with who he is or his ability to process. He is with you right now. Your problems are not too big for him. He knows exactly how to care for and heal traumatized souls.

Psalm 51:17  "The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit;
a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise."

Psalm 34:18-19  "The LORD is near to the brokenhearted
and saves the crushed in spirit. Many are the afflictions of the righteous,
but the LORD delivers him out of them all."

Contrite means ground up like powder. Is that how your heart feels today? God doesn’t despise that. He is near to you because of it, Dear One.

In future posts we will look at how trauma affects our capacity, how to heal, and some important rules of thumb going forward.