Rebuilding trust in marriage

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For those of you who have experienced a betrayal of sorts in your marriage (whether outright physical affair, emotional affair,or spouse kept something hidden from you, etc), how did you get past it? How did you regain the trust in your spouse? How did you keep yourself from thinking he/she was hiding something else from you? How did you keep yourself from making things worse by thinking the worse?
 
Personally, I pray to St. Monica and St. Therese to intercede on my behalf. When thoughts come to mind that are not about God and not productive, I think about their lives and ask for strength like they had. Frequently, I will visualize the Blessed Mother standing before me and meditate on her lovely life and example. God give us many ways to overcome our trials, pray for Him to show you the way.
 
I think the only way to truly regain trust is total transparency. The spouse who betrayed trust basically needs to show you whatever you need so you feel okay. My husband has betrayed my trust, and while we have healed to a degree, we are still getting over it. Basically, nothing is private in our marriage at this point. Phones, computer, online accounts, money, can all be accessed by the other person. If he ever decided to hide something from me, I would certainly think the worst. We are honest about where we are going and what we are doing. I still wonder from time to time if he is hiding something from me. I will simply ask him what’s on my mind. I try to ask without an argumentative or condescending tone. In my case, I believe he is truly repentant, so he answers any questions I ask him without reserve, even when the answer is something I will not be happy about.

I think I heard it on Dr. Phil that “those who have nothing to hide, hide nothing.”
 
Lucky7 said:
For those of you who have experienced a betrayal of sorts in your marriage (whether outright physical affair, emotional affair,or spouse kept something hidden from you, etc), how did you get past it? How did you regain the trust in your spouse? How did you keep yourself from thinking he/she was hiding something else from you? How did you keep yourself from making things worse by thinking the worse?
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I try to forget it. I made the choice at the time not to leave him (he swore he did nothing, but he was out of the country at the time) since our children were small. It hurt our marriage for a long, long time though. I guess I had to make the decision to stop carrying it along with me, to let it go. Otherwise I would have driven myself crazy.

If he ever does anything remotely like that again, though, it’s over. For good.
 
I try to be transparent, to promote healing all the time. However, I had to separate a little to keep my sanity. Which direction did I go, in the separation that is? I went deeper into my faith. I started reading, listening, and watching everything I could that was catholic. Over time, I tuned into what was authentically catholic. Now I am totally into getting both of us into heaven. I do not actively preach or evangelize. However, my faith has become a hobby of sorts and is therapeutic as well.

Anyway, this is how I coped with the betrayal or lack of total giving which I thought marriage was supposed to mean. One think I know for sure. God has a plan and I will cooperate.
 
hannajomar said:
I think the only way to truly regain trust is total transparency. The spouse who betrayed trust basically needs to show you whatever you need so you feel okay. My husband has betrayed my trust, and while we have healed to a degree, we are still getting over it. Basically, nothing is private in our marriage at this point. Phones, computer, online accounts, money, can all be accessed by the other person. If he ever decided to hide something from me, I would certainly think the worst. We are honest about where we are going and what we are doing. I still wonder from time to time if he is hiding something from me. I will simply ask him what’s on my mind. I try to ask without an argumentative or condescending tone. In my case, I believe he is truly repentant, so he answers any questions I ask him without reserve, even when the answer is something I will not be happy about.

I think I heard it on Dr. Phil that “those who have nothing to hide, hide nothing.”
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I guess I am concerned that asking to have access to personal things like his computer may be going overboard. I think it sends the message that I don’t trust him and I worry that it’s taking things too far. If I truly believe him, wanting his passwords to his computer/email accounts etc doesn’t sound like it’s getting me back on the road to trusting. If anything it tempts me to want to check up on him and be nosy. I already do this with cell phone activity and I’m beginning to think that having access to that isn’t life-giving (even though not finding anything bad is a positive thing if that makes sense). I’m not so sure that being allowed to further invade his privacy is the way to go (at least for me in my marriage).
 
Lucky7 said:
I guess I am concerned that asking to have access to personal things like his computer may be going overboard. I think it sends the message that I don’t trust him and I worry that it’s taking things too far. If I truly believe him, wanting his passwords to his computer/email accounts etc doesn’t sound like it’s getting me back on the road to trusting. If anything it tempts me to want to check up on him and be nosy. I already do this with cell phone activity and I’m beginning to think that having access to that isn’t life-giving (even though not finding anything bad is a positive thing if that makes sense). I’m not so sure that being allowed to further invade his privacy is the way to go (at least for me in my marriage).
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We are talk in about trust that has been betrayed, so of course you don’t trust him. That Trust is broken and the onus is on him to fix it. If that requires him sharing all passwords and phones and accounts with you, he should gladly do it. Peter already recently wrote an article about Social Media and infidelity and one of the first rules he recommends couples to follow, in order to not fall into the cheating trap, is precisely this, to share all passwords and accounts. Doesn’t mean you have to log in hourly in everything to see what he is doing but it will make him realize that at ANY POINT you may do that and therefore he should not be in an incriminating situation.

DH and I have shared all passwords and even bank accounts since before we were even married or engaged. When lines we crossed, we would heighten the limits for the other in order to “reset” things there were times when we needed to establish curfews because “some” of us were forgetting to check the time when there was a company event or a friend’s birthday party…we accepted these terms because it was more important to gave things right with one another than to have an extra beer with the CEO,

So, as far as I am concerned, it is perfectly reasonable for you to demand access to whatever it may be that enabled the betrayal in the first place, or that may enable it to happen again. Simply tell him that you can not, for obvious reasons, be at ease without this transperancy in your marriage. And, obviously, be ready to reciprocate because double standards are never healthy in a relationship.

The only thing that perhaps you can be more indulgent with…coming from the outside I don’t know for sure which way I’d go…but, perhaps give him time to “think” about it .I.e, delete, block, remove whatever evidence may be accessible. I don’t think it’d do you any good to find things in his web browser or his email or his messaging history with the details. If you think you can handle it, assume that risk, if you’d rather not know., then make it as of “tomorrow” so that he has time to clean things up. If the Internet wasn’t involved, than this is a non-issue
 
In my situation, the fact that my husband has agreed to be transparent means that I don’t have to pour over his browser history or facebook. If his phone is in arms-reach and mine is far away, I’ll pick his up and use it. If he had a problem with that, I would become suspicious. Since he’s fine with it, I don’t feel the need to read his texts or inspect his phone. If he leaves his facebook open, and I see a woman I don’t know, I ask in conversation who it is. It’s not to be suspicious, just transparent. If it took him too long to answer or something, I might become suspicious.

There’s been a lot of threads about this issue lately. Weather trust has been violated or not, I believe complete transparency is an ideal for any marriage. When one person breaks trust, they must earn it back. I don’t see how a person can prove they are trustworthy without showing it. You’re not the one who needs to practice trusting, your spouse is the one who needs to practice being trustworthy.

Also, it lends itself to the scripture about if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out, etc. Often, transparency itself helps us to do the right thing. So often, violations of trust happen in secret. When we remove that secrecy, we often remove near occasions of sin.
 
1inICXC said:
We are talk in about trust that has been betrayed, so of course you don’t trust him. That Trust is broken and the onus is on him to fix it. If that requires him sharing all passwords and phones and accounts with you, he should gladly do it. Peter already recently wrote an article about Social Media and infidelity and one of the first rules he recommends couples to follow, in order to not fall into the cheating trap, is precisely this, to share all passwords and accounts. Doesn’t mean you have to log in hourly in everything to see what he is doing but it will make him realize that at ANY POINT you may do that and therefore he should not be in an incriminating situation.

DH and I have shared all passwords and even bank accounts since before we were even married or engaged. When lines we crossed, we would heighten the limits for the other in order to “reset” things there were times when we needed to establish curfews because “some” of us were forgetting to check the time when there was a company event or a friend’s birthday party…we accepted these terms because it was more important to gave things right with one another than to have an extra beer with the CEO,

So, as far as I am concerned, it is perfectly reasonable for you to demand access to whatever it may be that enabled the betrayal in the first place, or that may enable it to happen again. Simply tell him that you can not, for obvious reasons, be at ease without this transperancy in your marriage. And, obviously, be ready to reciprocate because double standards are never healthy in a relationship.

The only thing that perhaps you can be more indulgent with…coming from the outside I don’t know for sure which way I’d go…but, perhaps give him time to “think” about it .I.e, delete, block, remove whatever evidence may be accessible. I don’t think it’d do you any good to find things in his web browser or his email or his messaging history with the details. If you think you can handle it, assume that risk, if you’d rather not know., then make it as of “tomorrow” so that he has time to clean things up. If the Internet wasn’t involved, than this is a non-issue
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Eh, I don’t know. My husband is a very private person and always has been. I don’t think just because I am his wife and he made a mistake that I should expect him to fork over every password to every account. The issue involved his cell phone and I have access to those records. He has apologized and promised to never let it happen again. Perhaps if it was an actual affair (or if he screwed up again) I’d feel differently.

The bottom line is that if he was (or any other man) was going to cheat, there are other ways to do it. Just think how affairs happened prior to the internet. I think to some extent such “transparency” is just a bunch of false security. For example, my husband could make calls from work and I’d never know it. All the transparency in the world isn’t going ot change the fact that when there is a will there is a way. I stil think there are better ways to rebuild the trust. Maybe the fact that I feel uncomfortable with doing this means I actually trust him more than I think I do.
 
Lucky7 said:
I guess I am concerned that asking to have access to personal things like his computer may be going overboard. I think it sends the message that I don’t trust him and I worry that it’s taking things too far. If I truly believe him, wanting his passwords to his computer/email accounts etc doesn’t sound like it’s getting me back on the road to trusting. If anything it tempts me to want to check up on him and be nosy. I already do this with cell phone activity and I’m beginning to think that having access to that isn’t life-giving (even though not finding anything bad is a positive thing if that makes sense). I’m not so sure that being allowed to further invade his privacy is the way to go (at least for me in my marriage).
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I think it’s a matter of degree - evidently your husband didn’t have an affair, or violate your trust in some other major way, like watching porn and masturbating or going to strip clubs or paying for sex. Maybe just the spouse’s willingness to BE transparent forever, helps to rejuvenate trust?
 
hannajomar said:
In my situation, the fact that my husband has agreed to be transparent means that I don’t have to pour over his browser history or facebook. If his phone is in arms-reach and mine is far away, I’ll pick his up and use it. If he had a problem with that, I would become suspicious. Since he’s fine with it, I don’t feel the need to read his texts or inspect his phone. If he leaves his facebook open, and I see a woman I don’t know, I ask in conversation who it is. It’s not to be suspicious, just transparent. If it took him too long to answer or something, I might become suspicious.

There’s been a lot of threads about this issue lately. Whether trust has been violated or not, I believe complete transparency is an ideal for any marriage. When one person breaks trust, they must earn it back. I don’t see how a person can prove they are trustworthy without showing it. You’re not the one who needs to practice trusting, your spouse is the one who needs to practice being trustworthy.

Also, it lends itself to the scripture about if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out, etc. Often, transparency itself helps us to do the right thing. So often, violations of trust happen in secret. When we remove that secrecy, we often remove near occasions of sin.
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This sounds so right to me. I agree, this is the ideal for marraige. It cannot always be so, becasue we are human and cannot always live the ideal.

I would not have agreed with that when married to my ex for so many years. I knew him, and did not want to annoy him, and wanted to respect his great need for privacy (which, turns out, he used to his advantage and my disadvantage).

Now with the man I love, whom I hope to marry if the Church grants annulments (we both have solid ground) I can see it will be quite different. As we have talked of how to merge our lives if we are able to, and get into practicalities, he is totally open with everything, volunteering so I don’t have to ask. And I do the same, which is me, anyway, but so refreshing, so comforting, so safe, that he wants to do this, too.

What you describe sounds like how it would be for us. How relaxing it will be to just pick up a handy phone, not have to respect “privacy” [from *what, anyway?]. Or know that all accounts are open to all, etc., and I can look at balance any time I want without causing wrath, upset, etc. That will be something. How it is supposed to be! Yes, I hope, Lord-willing, hannjomar, to have a marriage like what yours sounds to be!

–I just want to add, also the rest of your post: very balanced and true. You are wise!
 
I’m curious. For those who think nothing should be private and there should be full transparency, do you think you have the right to read your spouse’s journal?

I think a balance is needed in this area. A private person doesn’t necessarily mean he/she has terrible secrets he/she is keeping form his/her spouse. Sometimes it’s just about respecting the person (and trust).
 
Lucky7 said:
I’m curious. For those who think nothing should be private and there should be full transparency, do you think you have the right to read your spouse’s journal?
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I definitely agree with you that we need to be balanced, rational, and charitable. We don’t have the right to just be suspicious forever. It’s wrong to read someone’s journal, because you don’t use a journal to be unfaithful to your spouse. I don’t see the purpose in reading it besides just being indulgent or wanting to embarrass them.

Here’s a hypothetical: Suppose your husband’s phone was sitting on a table, and when it rings, you notice that it’s a phone number with no name. He takes the call, but goes to another room. When he returns, you ask him who it was. If something about his body language or answer makes you uncomfortable because of his history of betrayal, I believe you have the right to ask him to look at his call history and texts. If I was in this situation and he didn’t want to show me, claiming his right to privacy, I would have a huge problem.

I also think any snooping or inspecting also needs to be done out in the open and not in secret. In my case, my husband’s betrayal is porn. Before I would ever check an electronic device, I simply ask him, “When was the last time you looked at porn?” And there have been times that he gave me an honest answer that I didn’t want to hear. I would rather hear truth that hurts than be told a lie and be blind. If something about his answer made me uneasy, I would inform him that I am going to check the computer. For me, the thing that hurt the most about the betrayal was being lied to and kept n the dark by my own husband. I just can’t have that again. I’ve actually never checked the computer or anything because, so far, I’ve been satisfied with his answers. He does appear to have turned over a new leaf. I’ve known women who have been betrayed, but have never truly felt they’re husband had sincere repentance. Their husbands treat them as though they have no right whatsoever to question or to be concerned, and that spouses should just trust unconditionally. I believe that sometimes, trust needs to be earned back.

It is definitely unhealthy and wrong to constantly snoop and question without restraint. I’ve seen women use past infidelity to lord it over their spouse for the rest of time and think they have the right to punish him or question and snoop on a whim. They constantly bring it up and just refuse to forgive and try to heal the marriage. I regret if I gave the impression that’s okay, because I don’t believe that. Also, sorry, Lucky7 for highjacking your thread and writing so much. This is actually a bit therapeutic for me.
 
Lucky7 said:
I’m curious. For those who think nothing should be private and there should be full transparency, do you think you have the right to read your spouse’s journal?

I think a balance is needed in this area. A private person doesn’t necessarily mean he/she has terrible secrets he/she is keeping form his/her spouse. Sometimes it’s just about respecting the person (and trust).
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I am not one of those people. I have never told my husband everything that I have ever done or experienced, and the same has been true for him. When I returned to the Church, let’s just say I had a LOT to confess. That confession was done in the presence of a priest, which obviously, my husband is not. The kind of brutal honesty for no purpose that some people seem to advocate creates a lot of unnecessary pain, IMO. Such as, young people telling their boyfriend or girlfriend about every sexual experience they have had, in detail. It’s lurid, and only leads to pain when the person can’t seem to let go of visual images from this inappropriate confession.

Now, that being said, all bets are off when there has been infidelity or the use of porn, betrayal in any other way, etc. I would still not go backwards into the past which has been confessed, unless there was some bearing on the present, such as “I have actually done this before, with a girlfriend 12 years ago, etc.” And, I believe all of these decisions should be made with help from marriage counselors. When there’s been infidelity, I think each partner should have separate counseling as well as a counselor for the 2 of them together, for “the marriage” as an entity. But that can run into a lot of money.

I think people confuse their desire to be clean, i.e. confession with a priest, with the need to be scrupulously honest with their spouse. Confessing to a spouse is not going to absolve you of your sins and may created permanent damage to the relationship.
 
How about a question from the other side? I think my transgressions have been well-chronicled; for about two years I was way deep into pornography and all that goes along with that. No actual women, no chatting, none of that. Videos on the computer are bad enough thank you very much. I was basically self-medicating to deal with major anxieties that stem from my childhood which, surprise, surprise, were the result of my father being an even worse sex addict who went way, way beyond simply viewing pornography.

Anyways, I really am changing as a person. My anxiety is pretty much gone. The passive-aggressive attacks that were driving my wife to the brink of insanity are no more. I attend daily Mass frequently, say the Rosary as often as possible, am in a group for my issues and part of a regular ol’ men’s group at church. The “tone” in my voice that my wife talked about basically cutting into her every time I spoke has disappeared, all thanks to God.

It’s been months. There have been no “slips.” But my wife seems pretty insistent on not fully reconciling. Oh she came back home quickly, says she loves me and we’ve resumed relatively normal lives and in greater peace as well. But every once in awhile she just gets very upset and says things like “I can never love you the same again” and it’s quite clear to me that she’s resisting God’s grace because she’s scared of being vulnerable. She’s always had a very good relationship with the Lord and now it’s quite disrupted.

Bottom line: Is there anything I can do besides continuing to be patient, enduring these outbursts with understanding and softly agreeing that yes, I am responsible for them due to past behavior? Is there anything that will help her dive fully back in? I don’t care if she trusts me fully, I just want her to trust God.
 
The_Bucket said:
It’s been months. There have been no “slips.” But my wife seems pretty insistent on not fully reconciling. Oh she came back home quickly, says she loves me and we’ve resumed relatively normal lives and in greater peace as well. But every once in awhile she just gets very upset and says things like “I can never love you the same again” and it’s quite clear to me that she’s resisting God’s grace because she’s scared of being vulnerable. She’s always had a very good relationship with the Lord and now it’s quite disrupted.

Bottom line: Is there anything I can do besides continuing to be patient, enduring these outbursts with understanding and softly agreeing that yes, I am responsible for them due to past behavior? Is there anything that will help her dive fully back in? I don’t care if she trusts me fully, I just want her to trust God.
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I applaud you for changing your ways and for trying to reconcile with your wife. I think you’re doing what you’re supposed to be doing, enduring her outbursts. Remember that her pain is the consequence of your actions that doesn’t get erased solely through forgiveness. The best you can do is to now be the best husband you can possibly be. It sounds as though you are trying to do that. But true healing will come in her time and not yours.

Just to give you some perspective, you did what you did for two years, and after a few months you seem to have an expectation that she should be emotionally back to where she was before. Imagine she was drunk driving and broke your leg. She can apologize immediately and you can forgive her immediately. But your leg is still broken and it will take a long time to heal. A week later, she can’t tell you that you should be walking already because she apologized. That’s kind of what has happened to her emotionally. Her emotional pain, and her inability to fully trust you right now are the result of your actions, not necessarily the result of her rejecting God’s Grace.

I’m not sure what your basis is for saying she is rejecting God’s Grace. That’s a big charge to make towards someone. Since she’s not God, she can’t forgive you and then just instantly forget about what happened and act as though it didn’t. That doesn’t mean she gets to torture you for the rest of your life, but from what you write, she might just be working through these emotions. Are her outbursts less common as time goes on, or are they the same, or more frequent? I suppose it will take different people different amounts of time to heal and return to normal.
 
I realize that it’s a stiff charge to make, but I only said it because she flat out said that. I was talking with her and she said, quite directly, that she’s scared of fully trusting God because she does not want to make herself vulnerable anymore. She’s afraid of letting go of the past because she does not want to get hurt again. She has a tough time praying and living at peace from day to day. She’s still hanging in there with that. She’s still at Mass and praying and doing everything she’s supposed to do but she’s flat out told me that I damaged her relationship with God. That hurts more than anything else really because I’m putting her salvation at risk.

I’d say that the outbursts happen when she’s tired or anxious about something and really have not changed over time.

Trust me friend I understand that everything’s not going to be great “right away.” Truthfully I think she’s most scared because she saw what happened with my parents and assumes the same thing will happen here. Well to be honest my father never really almost lost his family. My father never had both his pride and shame ripped out the way I did. My father never let go and let God. Despite converting from Judaism to Catholicism, despite mission trips and all sorts of really extreme ways of changing his life, he really never let go at his core. I think somewhere he likes being the “king of lies” as he once described himself. It’s a frightening and disturbing thing for a father to say to his son. I pray constantly that that part of his character is stamped out and quickly. I for one never felt that; I’ve been a more “hate myself” kind of person who thought I was “too good” to have these serious sins and was too ashamed to change because hey, I’m smart, I know the Catechism and now that I’ve failed God will never love me again.

I get that things will be different probably for years and possibly forever. I’m OK with that because there is zero I can do about it. I did what I did. That I soon after starting had no real free will to stop is besides the point. Drug abusers and alcoholics get started somewhere, right? Me too. And there are ramifications to that. I’m just scared to death that I really tore apart her relationship with God and she will never embrace Him the way she needs to.

I doubted there was more I could do and this seems to confirm that. That’s OK. In God’s time, not mine.
 
Lucky7 said:
For those of you who have experienced a betrayal of sorts in your marriage (whether outright physical affair, emotional affair,or spouse kept something hidden from you, etc), how did you get past it? How did you regain the trust in your spouse? How did you keep yourself from thinking he/she was hiding something else from you? How did you keep yourself from making things worse by thinking the worse?
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For me and my wife it’s a work in progress. I feel that communication is the key. One issue we have is that we come from different cultural backgrounds so what makes sense to me as a solution doesn’t make sense to her. I try to practice patience and understanding and encourage her to do the same. As I said, it’s a work in progress…
 
The Bucket: I am really not following why your wife is saying that your actions has hurt her relationship with God. It doesn’t make sense to me. What you do has no bearing on God. Can you give an example of how she says this? And what makes her say it?

I would never say that what my husband does or doesn’t do affects my relationship with God.
 
Lucky7 said:
The Bucket: I am really not following why your wife is saying that your actions has hurt her relationship with God. It doesn’t make sense to me. What you do has no bearing on God. Can you give an example of how she says this? And what makes her say it?

I would never say that what my husband does or doesn’t do affects my relationship with God.
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She trusted God that I was a great guy and that we’d build a beautiful life together. I really damaged that and so now she can’t really make herself vulnerable to God’s love. I understand it quite well because when life events trashed my perspective of God, I withdrew from him and ultimately it led down a dark path.

She says she preferred it when I was mean and passive-aggressive and cut her deeply on an emotional level but didn’t know about my sinful actions as opposed to knowing it but living with a person who has changed dramatically. I mean, she does recognize that I’ve make major changes to my life and am a very different person. It’s just that she preferred not knowing anything and she’s embarrassed for me and for herself.

Like I said, this happens really when she’s tired or frustrated or anxious. Basically when she’s vulnerable she reverts back to this line of attack. Otherwise things are actually much better for everyone involved. But it does disturb me that when she’s feeling scared she retreats into pain instead of retreating into God’s love the way she used to because I did that and it goes nowhere good.
 
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