If you’re wondering how long the betrayal trauma process takes to heal, here’s what you need to know.
Betrayal trauma is what women experience before and after they discover their husband’s infidelity. And it’s not just from the discovery of his lies. It’s also caused by years of invisible emotional and psychological abuse. To find out if you’ve experienced emotional abuse (even without knowing it), take our free emotional abuse test.
Anne: It is my honor and delight to have Barb Steffens here today. Welcome, Barb.
Barbara: Thanks for having me. I really appreciate the opportunity.
Anne: I’m so honored to have you here today. Partners have difficulty finding appropriate support and help for themselves. Why do you think it’s so difficult to find appropriate support?
Barbara: First, there’s not a lot of knowledge about abuse in general. In a counseling program, when I look at the course offerings, there’s very little that’s even being taught to therapists who are getting trained about the impact on the family.
There’s not a lot of public education on the topic. And it still tends to be one of those things that people don’t understand, and so they don’t want to talk about it. So there’s just very, very little information out there. I think the general, let’s say therapist or counselor, maybe they have some awareness of addiction. But they don’t make the leap to trauma process for the wife.
Sometimes people think they know enough because they read one book or something. And so then they start saying, yes, I can help this population, and end up not being helpful and sometimes hurtful. But I think it’s a lack of information, certainly a lack of training.
Anne: I’ve been talking to my mom about this, and it seems like I’m fighting two fronts. Society in general and their misunderstanding of the issue, and then also the church. Both populations misunderstand it. The religious community sees it a certain way, and they think you should heal in a certain way. That, at least for me, was not helpful at all. And then society in general accepts pornography or they don’t understand the trauma process.
Barbara: I’m glad you brought up faith community. Because I, too, have found they don’t talk about it. They’re afraid to talk about it, or when they do, they lack adequate information. And especially when the wife goes for assistance, they can get crazy kind of advice that can be hurtful too.
Like, just be more sexual. Of course, when your husband looks at pornography, you must not be doing something you’re supposed to do. So those kinds of things don’t help at all. Trying to get into faith communities to educate them on this is extremely difficult. I think they have a lot of fear, they don’t want to talk about it. I think we also know that leadership in faith communities is struggling with this.
Anne: Plus the fact that it’s betrayal trauma in a relationship, and with the trauma process model, we identify as actual true victims.
Barbara: Right.
Anne: Not that we don’t have choices, or not that we can’t be empowered. But I think for a faith community, they don’t want to admit that his behavior has left a trail of destruction.
Anne: You know, they’d rather have it be, well, this is my part. And your part is, you ask me too many questions or don’t make dinner. Or one of my coaches said her religious community told her she needed to win him over with her godly demeanor. So that type of stuff is re- traumatizing to women.
Barbara: Yeah. And you’re describing the distorted thoughts and beliefs of someone who’s engaging in compulsive sexual behavior. Those responses from faith communities sound like so much of the distorted thinking. It’s somebody else’s fault. It’s not that bad. No one needs to know. No one is hurt. They minimize, rationalize, and blame shift. And so unfortunately, many places do the same level of harm that the person does who is betraying their spouse. They use the same tactics.
Anne: Absolutely, my church leader abused me. This happens when churches don’t believe abuse victims. That is more traumatizing to me than the actual betrayal. Because I went to someone for help, and they re-abused me. I say abuse by proxy, because he believed all the things my ex was saying, yeah. So describe treatment induced trauma. We’ve just talked about it.
Barbara: Treatment induced trauma is when the spouse goes to someone that they expect that someone can help me. And then in that trauma process, they find themselves feeling harmed. And sometimes the harm in that setting can feel worse than the original betrayal, because you go feeling betrayed. You need to tell someone, get some assistance. And then when they don’t believe you and you are blamed. Or it is minimized, it just adds to the level of trauma.
Barbara: I compare it to a child who’s sexually abused. They have the courage to speak up and tell someone and when that person doesn’t believe them or tells them they must have imagined things. Or they shouldn’t talk like that, then that person pulls away and is even more hurt. Not being believed is worse than the actual abuse. When you are’t heard, seen, believed, or valued. It really intensifies the betrayal trauma.
So it’s institutional betrayal. Again, this expectation that this place or this person I’m going to is there for me. Then when they turn against me, they add more harm and trauma, so that’s what it is. I can tell you, I hear it all the time.
I get emails, letters, phone calls from women from all over the United States and many other countries, and they’re all describing that similar experience. Experience of taking the risk to go and tell someone, and then not heard or harmed in the process. And it really angers me, because by now, there’s enough information out here that I would think people would know what not to do, but it still occurs.
Anne: One of the things I see is that the addict is so good at lying and manipulating. Others believe them over the victim repeatedly. And how do you get away from that if someone’s lying about you and someone is manipulating the support that you’re trying to get? It’s really difficult to want to get help, to be willing to get help, to actually make the effort to get help and then be harmed further.
Barbara: Yeah, and a lot of times the first person the spouse visits is either their clergy, who’s going to look at it as a marriage issue, or a couple’s counselor. Who’s going to view it through the lens of a marriage issue, and it’s not a marriage issue. A lot of times people try to treat it as a couple’s issue, and it’s not. And I think, again, that’s where many partners are just as you’ve described. Harmed, not understood, or abused within the session, and the therapist doesn’t catch it.
Therapists are trained to recognize physical abuse. But they don’t have much awareness of emotional abuse, verbal abuse, especially psychological abuse and manipulation. And so again, they’re going to see that as a communication issue, rather than a power issue, a control issue or an abuse issue.
Many times people think the only trauma process is the discovery of the secrets, and that’s horrific, that’s traumatic. But what’s missed in many help settings is that ongoing emotional abuse has occurred. It’s already done tons of damage and harm to the victim.
Anne: And then sometimes the continued abuse for husbands who are addicted who are “in recovery.”
Barbara: Yes, right, they may have stopped behaviors, the acting out behaviors, but they haven’t started to practice healthy relational behaviors.
Anne: Or in some cases, I don’t know if they’ve stopped acting out sexually at all.
Barbara: When partners, let’s say it’s six months to a year after discovery, and partners are still not getting “better” in their view. I’m doing that in quotation marks. You can’t see me doing that, but the partners aren’t getting better.
Barbara: Most often it’s because either there’s ongoing sexual acting out that has not yet been uncovered, he’s lying, which is ongoing chronic emotional abuse, manipulation, psychological abuse, and gaslighting, just the things you were describing. So how is a partner supposed to start to heal when the traumatizing has not stopped?
Anne: Exactly.
Barbara: And so we pathologize the partner for not getting well, rather than she doesn’t feel safe. And to me, that is a huge place where treatment induced trauma process occurs, where the partner is blamed for her not getting better when she is abused.
Anne: I see that time and time again. And it’s so distressing to me because the women in these situations are feeling guilty. They’re feeling terrible. They can’t figure out why they don’t feel good when the behaviors they’re describing to me and their husbands sound terrible. And I’m thinking, your therapist isn’t picking this up.
Barbara: They’re not addressing the abusive behaviors that go along with the chronic viewing of pornography or the other types of sexual acting out that can happen with this type of addiction.
They’re looking at the acting out behaviors alone, not looking at how it impacts the character, and getting in the way of that individual caring about empathy for the people they’re harming. So they can talk about how to control their behavior, so they’re not using pornography, but they’re not addressing how this has impacted your wife. One of the saddest impacts is that it gets in the way of spouses, partners and help for themselves.
Barbara: Who wants to get help and be told that you’re part of the problem, that there’s something wrong in you, or this wouldn’t have happened to you. And then if they don’t agree, they pull away and say, well, I can’t trust telling this to anybody, because all I’m doing is getting blamed for it. And so they pull away and don’t seek help again.
So to me, that’s the greatest damage, because we know that people who don’t get help, who are traumatized. Or who are in chronically unsafe, abusive relationships can develop longer-term chronic mental health issues. So it just adds to the level of distress for the spouse. So for me, that’s the greatest impact. But also there’s that secondary trauma that the partner experiences.
So they are not only working through the betrayal trauma process in their relationship. But they also work through the betrayal trauma they experienced at the hand of a clergy member, therapist or other health provider, a physician. Many people will go to a physician to talk about what’s going on, and try to get say medication or something. And the physician can do harmful things.
It’s the extra trauma that doesn’t need to be there, that shame that comes when a partner is blamed for what happens to them. Partners experience that anyway. That’s also our first response. You know, what’s wrong with me that this happened? How did I not know? What did I do or not do that?
That my husband is acting this way. But then when a care provider shames them or blames them, that just heaps more shame on the partner.
Anne: Yeah, and it’s an extended form of the abuse.
Barbara: Yeah. There’s a lot of gaslighting that happens to partners and it’s not all within the relationship.
Anne: Exactly.
Barbara: Partners are getting wiser now that there are more resources available to them, like what you are doing. This is phenomenal that you are offering this kind of information for spouses. So getting educated, ask what kind of model do you use? Do you believe all partners are codependent? You want a therapist or coach aware of what you need. And that’s their primary focus is on getting to know you and identifying how they can help you and allow you to be active in the process.
Unfortunately, I hear a lot of times partners go to get help, and there’s not much room for individual needs. Unfortunately, a lot of therapists say, well, I treat. blah, blah, blah, well, no, you shouldn’t have to train your treatment provider, if there’s prior treatment or some kind of treatment induced trauma process that they experienced, like, from their faith community. Processing that, talking about it, working on ways to find healing for that.
Talk that through with someone, so that you know what all your options are, and then do what fits for you.
Anne: For me, being stuck in that, wanting to pick it, not that I would literally want to do that, but phase. This is an institutional problem that I see within my church, and it needs to change. I don’t know how to change it. I don’t even know where to start. Last night, I spent a lot of time actually just praying.
Anne: What do you want me to do, God? I don’t know how to even overcome this. I don’t even know if that’s healthy for me to worry about the institution as a whole or feel like the weight of that is on my shoulders. But because I talked to so many women about it, I think someone has to do something. And maybe that is me. I don’t know. It’s just such a difficult thing.
Barbara: It really is. Short of picketing, I don’t know if picketing would be helpful, but the services you provide your podcasts, through the coaching you provide, are making a difference. That’s bringing about change. You know, and in large part because of the services you provide, spouses and partners have been educated. They have found support, they are connected with other women who believe similar things, and is changing the institution.
Because they are speaking up. So there are many things that we can do. It’s up to the individual to decide what makes sense for them, and what’s safe for them to do. Because this is risky stuff.
Anne: It’s not something I necessarily like to do, but it needs to be done. And I appreciate everything you personally have done.
Barbara: Well, I have experienced it as a call on my life that whenever I have the opportunity to talk to someone about partners, spouses of sex addicts, and what they need. So whatever opportunity I have to verbalize how extreme this need is for ethical and appropriate care for partners. I’m going to do it.
Anne: Thank you, thank you. I’ll be the collective voice of thanks. Thank you.
Barbara: And I’m not alone in doing it.
Anne: It’s an amazing community.
Barbara: Yeah.
Anne: We’re trying to provide it for women where they are and when they need it. Because so many women are so busy with their children or their work schedules. That just one more thing, in addition to all the trauma, is very difficult. Which may be a reason why women don’t get help. It’s because they’re so overwhelmed with everything.
Barbara: Oh, absolutely, absolutely, I am always amazed when in the throes of crisis. Somehow or other find their way to think clearly enough to get help. Knowing that they can have additional support just by going online. I love that.
Anne: Shouting out into the void of the universe. We are here, you are supported, you can come. It doesn’t matter where you live. You can find us, and we are here for you.
Barbara: Yes. I want to say to the partners listening to this, that I’m so proud of you for doing what it takes to get support. And information that you’re seeking out. Because that takes risk, especially if you’ve already read things or heard things that didn’t make sense to you or hurt you. And if you are still seeking, you are courageous and amazing.
So I want you to know that. I’m grateful for these types of podcasts. Thanks so much for the work Betrayal Trauma Recovery is doing, because it’s so shaming, so scary to think about telling someone. There’s nothing more isolating, so taking a risk to listen to a podcast takes courage. So I want to thank you for that. And I want to commend you for that.
Anne: Dr. Steffens, thank you so much for being here.
