Hope For Wives Pam Blizzard, Lyschel Burket, Bonny Burns

With your co-hostesses: Pam Blizzard from RecoveredPeace.com
Lyschel Burket from HopeRedefined.org
Bonny Burns from StrongWives.com
Help Us Help Others Listen now: Lyschel and Pam had other obligations, so I, Bonny will be speaking with a special guest today –  Dr. Barb Steffens!
Barb is the retired founder of the association of partners of sex addicts trauma specialists, or APSATS. APSATS was a response to her empirically supported work that betrayed partners are traumatized by the discovery of their spouses problematic sexual behavior and should be supported through the lens of trauma, not co-dependence. Barb now focuses on helping better equip religious leaders to care for marriages that are struggling through the discovery of problematic sexual behavior.
Today, our topic is “How Religious Leaders Can Serve Betrayed Couples Well.”
We Will be Discussing: What is institutional trauma or institutional betrayal? What are some things that religious leaders could do to minimize spiritual trauma when they are working with a marriage that has deceptive sexuality? What are some obstacles that keep religious leaders from following up with a couple where the wife has newly discovered sexually problematic behavior? What are some resources that religious leaders could tap into to learn more? What hope can we leave our listeners? Resources mentioned in this show: “Your Sexually Addicted Spouse: How Partners Can Cope and Heal,” by Dr. Barb Steffens and Marsha Means.
Why did God let this Happen? Assessing the Spiritual Impacts of Sexual Addiction on Intimate Female Partners: A Qualitative Investigation
Betrayal Trauma Religious Leader Training Information (July, 2024, dates)
“The Healing Church: What Churches Get Wrong about Pornography and How to Fix It,” By Sam Black.
“Suffering and the Heart of God: How Trauma Destroys and Christ Restores,” by Dr. Diane Langberg.
Coming November, 2024 – “When the Church Harms God’s People: Becoming Faith Communities That Resist Abuse, Pursue Truth, and Care for the Wounded,” by Dr. Diane Langberg.

With your co-hostesses: Pam Blizzard from RecoveredPeace.com
Lyschel Burket from HopeRedefined.org
Bonny Burns from StrongWives.com
Help Us Help Others Listen now: We are continuing to tenderly discussing sexual abuse in marriage and today we are moving into the intense end of the spectrum and will be talking about marital rape.
 
So, again, we invite you to check in with yourself. Are you in a grounded enough place to listen to this conversation? If you are not, please come back another time and listen. If you choose to stay, please take some grounding breaths and hold yourself in compassion and love, knowing Jesus is sitting with you right now.
In our last episode we talked about your right to give consent to sexual engagement in marriage. Marriage does not nullify your right to say yes or no to having sex with your husband.
It was only 31 years ago that marital rape became illegal in all 50 states. And today, in 2024, 9 states still have legal loopholes that allow rapist husbands to receive as little as probation as a punishment for this heinous crime. These states are Idaho, Nevada, California, Oklahoma, Mississippi, South Carolina, Virginia, Ohio, and Michigan (https://www.newsweek.com/spousal-rape-loophole-map-1892924 ) . I’m talking about the US because that is where we are based. Worldwide, 150 countries have criminalized marital rape and 48 countries it is not criminalized and 6 it is unclear. So, women around the world are still fighting against archaic laws that harken back to when women were considered property. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marital_rape_laws_by_country )
We Will be Discussing: When does sexual coercion cross the line into marital rape? What would you say to the woman listening who has experienced marital rape? How does Jesus see women, especially those who are abused? What hope can we leave our listeners? Scripture references: Luke 1:38

With your co-hostesses: Pam Blizzard from RecoveredPeace.com
Lyschel Burket from HopeRedefined.org
Bonny Burns from StrongWives.com
Help Us Help Others Listen now: The next two episodes we are tenderly discussing topics around sexual abuse in marriage. So, we invite you to assess whether you are in a grounded enough state to listen to this conversation. If you are not, please come back another time and listen. If you choose to stay, please take some grounding breaths and hold yourself in compassion and love, knowing Jesus is sitting with you right now.
 
It’s hard to consider that sexual abuse can happen in marriage, and yet it does. It is one of the most confusing and distressing things a wife can process. It is a double betrayal.Sexual abuse is not uncommon in marriages where the spouse with problematic sexual behavior has not embraced the reality of their damaging behaviors. Sexual abuse can fall on a spectrum from objectification and light coercion on one end to marital rape on the other end.
 
Today, we are discussing consent and sexual coercion.
 
According to The Law Insider website, sexual coercion is defined as the use of unreasonable pressure in an effort to compel another individual to initiate or continue sexual activity against the individual’s will. Sexual coercion wrongfully impairs the other individual’s freedom of will (like using threats, making them pay afterwards with pouting behavior or abandonment for a time, drugs and alcohol to inhibit them from refusing) or impairs their ability to choose whether to engage in sexual activity (an example of this is having sex with someone who is asleep or is so sick or unhealthy and cannot stop what is happening, this to me, borderlines on rape, but that’s for our next episode).
We Will be Discussing: What is consent? What are some faulty messages women have received about her right to say no to sex in marriage? (faulty messages from church and culture) So thinking back to the faulty message, how have these faulty messages enabled sexual coercion in marriage? What is the truth for a woman who has been coerced? What grace can she give herself? What hope can we leave our listeners? Resources mentioned in this show: How Not to be an A** by Andrew J. Bauman
The Sexually Healthy Man by Andrew J. Bauman
Practicing Full Consent – blog post by Andrew J. Bauman
Authentic Intimacy ministry with Dr. Juli Slattery
Rethinking Sexuality by Dr. Juli Slattery
Sexual Clarity for Christian Women – class led by Bonny Logsdon Burns (Strong Wives)

 
Scripture references: 1 Corinthians 7:4-5

With your co-hostesses: Pam Blizzard from RecoveredPeace.com
Lyschel Burket from HopeRedefined.org
Bonny Burns from StrongWives.com

Help Us Help Others Listen now:
We often work with women who experience a lack of understanding from their husbands on what it takes to heal from sexual betrayal trauma. So, today, we are discussing, “When the husband is frustrated with her slow healing process.” 
We Will be Discussing: Let’s revisit the definition and experience of betrayal trauma. What are the definitions and how betrayal trauma impacts a woman’s functioning? How long, typically, does a woman take to heal from betrayal trauma? What is important for a husband to know when he experiences frustration due to her healing process? (Can address him trying to control her recovery here.) What hope can we leave our listeners? Resources mentioned in this show: Adding Attunement to Empathy (APSATS radio)
What is EMDR to help memories fade?
How Betrayal Trauma Manifests Itself with Dr. Kevin Skinner

 
Scripture references: 2 Timothy 1:6-7
Jeremiah 29:11-14

With your co-hostesses: Pam Blizzard from RecoveredPeace.com
Lyschel Burket from HopeRedefined.org
Bonny Burns from StrongWives.com
Help Us Help Others Listen now: If you’ve been with us from the beginning, or have binged us up until this point, you’ll know that we have purposely laid out content to follow a trajectory from first discovery, through safety and stability, grief and mourning, and at some point we will move through post-traumatic growth.
The past episode and this one deal with coupleship recovery and lands in the space of when you feel safe enough, especially if your husband has jumped into recovery with a full commitment. We know that some husbands take a longer time to come out of denial to embrace recovery and some never get there.
Today, Pam and I are talking about 3 more keys to coupleship recovery.
We Will be Discussing: What is coupleship recovery? When can a couple start recovery? What importance does friendship have in recovery? What other couple resources are out there? What hope can we leave our listeners? Resources mentioned in this show: Learn Empathy: Help Your Betrayed Wife Heal by Marsha Means
Help Her Heal by Carol J. Sheets and Allan J. Katz
Help Them Heal by Carol J. Sheets
Daring Ventures’ Couples Centered Recovery
7 Principles for Making Marriage Work by the Gottmans (NOT betrayal focused, general audience)
Podcast – Helping Couples Heal (secular, great content)
Podcast – Human Intimacy Podcast with Dr. Kevin Skinner
Podcast – From Crisis to Connection with Geoff & Jody Steurers
Hold Me Tight: Seven Conversations for a Lifetime of Love by Dr. Sue Johnson
Build True Intimacy by Matthew and Joanna Raabsmith and Dan Drake

 
Scripture references: Malachi 4:2
Proverbs 27:17

With your co-hostesses: Pam Blizzard from RecoveredPeace.com
Lyschel Burket from HopeRedefined.org
Bonny Burns from StrongWives.com
Help Us Help Others
Listen now: Pam and Bonny discuss 3 Keys to Coupleship Recovery – Safety/stability, Prioritizing the Relationship, and Radical Honesty.
We Will be Discussing: What would you like couples to know about safety and stability?
What does it mean to prioritize the relationship?
What’s the definition of Radical Honesty and how does it play out?
What hope can we leave our listeners?
Resources: Radical Honesty with Dr. Jake Porter (youtube video)
Scripture references: 2 Corinthians 5:17, "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!"