Discovery Trauma
Around the time I was fresh off my divorce, I told my therapist that I couldn't remember how it made me feel to discover my husband’s first betrayal. When you go through something traumatic, it's essential to check into your body and understand what is happening. What do you feel? Where do you feel it? Doing this prevents dissociation, which may make it more challenging to heal from trauma later in life. It is essential for me to understand my past and how it shaped me. How can it be used for God's purpose? Healing happens when there is a meaning behind it. My relationship with myself is healthier when I am living with purpose.
Betrayal can manifest in various ways, often through discovery or disclosure. Discovery happens when you uncover something on your own. Discovery occurs when you come across new information that alters your reality. Disclosure is when someone tells you new information that changes your reality.
My first discovery happened almost immediately after I was married. I was the typical Christian young woman who desired a man of God who would be her shelter and provider. Unfortunately, I never knew that life. God handed me something different. Much of my marriage was marked by betrayal, and for a long time, that’s all I understood marriage to be. I remember it was an ordinary evening at home, and I was sitting on the sofa watching TV. We lived in a small apartment, and from where I was sitting, I could see my husband on the computer. I don't remember if I saw what he was looking at from that spot, or if I had to get up. I do remember coming up behind him and being completely shocked. I don't remember what happened next.
Discovery continued to be part of my marriage. It was a constant battle to win my husband's heart and loyalty. It broke me. I put a shell around me, and I lived in it for years. I am unsure if this happens for other betrayed partners, but I could not feel anything. If I felt anything, it meant more pain as his shame would come back and attack my value. I longed to be the cherished wife. I wanted him to pursue me. Instead, he followed his flesh. I don't know how many late nights he spent with other women on a screen. I will never know.
Those memories are still seared in my mind. With little effort, I can take myself back to when I would wake up in the night yet again to find his side of the bed empty. My heart banged against my chest. I sat breathless, listening to the familiar buzz in the air of a monitor somewhere in the house. I lay there begging God to protect me from what was about to happen. I slowly sat up in bed, and I sat in complete silence. Then, one foot at a time, I stepped onto the floor. The noise of my heart trying to escape my chest was so loud that I was sure it could be heard through the entire house. I stood up, knowing the steps to take to avoid creaking floors. I walked a line between wanting to find him asleep on the sofa and finding him cheating on me. My brain was racing, and I needed confirmation that I wasn't losing my mind. I made my way out of the bedroom and walked into the grip of betrayal.
Eventually, I developed a pretty severe stress response from waking in the night to find myself alone in bed and seeing him sitting in the glow of a computer screen, enveloped in a world outside of our marriage. Again and again, he chose pornography instead of choosing me. It felt like I was competing with something that should never have been in our marriage to begin with. He rejected not only my body but also all the ways I was supposed to fulfill his life as his wife. I had a lie buried deep inside me that a man would never love me enough to change. If I am being honest, I still carry that lie even after the effort I have put into my emotional health over the past few years. To be clear, this isn't referring to the expectation that someone will change aspects of themselves to be with me. I was asking him to remain faithful to me.
Many women in marriages marked by consistent betrayal have become so accustomed to it that they are unaware that something is amiss. I stuffed it all inside me.
Not long after my divorce, I prayed to process the trauma of discovery. In all the ways that sometimes don't make sense, God gave me an experience. In this instance, an email with news broke me wide open. Information that changed my reality, again. After this experience, I was fearful of checking my email. I learned that my body responded in a powerful way to new information that I wasn't expecting. He found someone new.
As I held my phone, my body started to go numb, and I crumpled to the floor. All the grief rushed back to me in a way my body couldn't handle. All the discoveries involved me walking in on him in front of a screen until this moment. Through this experience, I realized my brain and body didn’t distinguish between him being with pornography or being with another woman; it registered both as betrayal. For me, the impact was the same. I wasn't allowing myself to heal from this trauma for years because it was "just porn." So with this discovery sent to me in an email, I felt the pain of betrayal all over again. The confusing part is that he wasn't even my husband anymore. With some time spent processing this with my therapist, I realized that my mind never had a concrete person to associate with the betrayal. When that changed, my body responded as if all the past betrayals had just become real. Now was my time to heal something I had struggled to understand.
It is important to know that betrayal trauma is a type of PTSD. With that knowledge, I could grab hold of the same tools others would use when managing their PTSD symptoms. The first thing I do is work to ground or anchor myself.
I make contact with a solid surface. It may look like putting my hands against the floor as I sit cross-legged or grabbing onto something like a countertop or door jamb.
I take time to tune into all my senses. I speak aloud what I smell, hear, see, and taste. I describe these things in detail. For example, while sitting on the floor of my closet, I describe the colors and textures of the clothes hanging there. I count my shoes.
I add a drop of essential oils to my hands and breathe deeply. Many essential oils can be very soothing to the nervous system and can even help ground you in seconds.
Breathwork helps bring in much-needed oxygen, allowing my brain to function better. With every breath out, I release negative emotion, and with the next breath in, I bring in positive emotion. For example, on the exhale, I release my feelings of rejection, and on the next inhale, I bring in acceptance. Breathing is a reminder to let out the old and make room for the new.
I wish I could say that I have overcome this reaction to discovery, but I haven't. I am now very intentional about how I come across new information. A little bit at a time, I allow myself a tiny glimpse into the things that still cause those feelings of betrayal to come up. I employ the same tools for this as I do for all trauma recovery. I look for gratitude in the experience. My husband moving on with someone else was so hard, but I quickly saw that now I am truly free to heal. I can no longer go back to the old and must move on with the new.
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