Ep. 7- Amy's Story

Becky and Tiffany sit down with Amy to hear her story. Amy is a married mother of 4 children, including 3 boys and a young baby girl. She loves getting outdoors and being creative in the DIY world. Amy shares that she was raised in a religious family with good parents that believed in God. She was the oldest of 4 siblings and always knew God was there intellectually. She said her relationship with God varied from time to time. Amy also developed a belief that God loved her, but she had to “check boxes” to earn affection from the Lord. She adopted a deep sense of perfectionism—that she would hurt her siblings and those around her if her example was less than ideal, and her worth lay in her accomplishments.

Amy started college at BYU and met her husband her senior year when friends introduced them, and they soon became engaged and married.

As I look back on my journals about when I went to college at BYU, I took on the perfectionist role, became an overachiever.  Being involved in everything was my badge of honor.

Before the wedding, she did not know about his addiction. He asked if she believed in Jesus Christ’s Atonement and ability to make us clean. Amy said yes, and he let her know that he had things in the past, but they were made clean through Christ. So, she accepted and moved on. A year and a half into their marriage, Amy was struggling with her identity as wife and mother. Her focus moved in large part away from God and to her husband. He was suffering with severe depression, and she was struggling to figure out how to fix him and manage his emotions. (Which Amy realizes was impossible, of course.)

During this time, her husband was acting out and struggling again with addiction but hadn’t been able to talk about it. At one time, he was just curled up in a ball and unable to get out of bed for days. Amy prayed to know what to do, and her husband finally said he needed to tell her something but couldn’t. Through a tender mercy, the Spirit told her what the problem was but to wait for him to talk. Through prayer and patience, he finally told her that he struggled with pornography. Amy believes he thought this struggle would be over when they got married, that sex in marriage would “fix it.” But as for so many others, this was not the case. 

Following this, Amy’s husband said he was going back to 12 step meetings through his church and invited her to attend spousal support meetings as well. She eventually accepted the invitation, but it was hard and felt very disconnected for a while. They were living with family and couldn’t talk about their struggles and why they needed babysitting every week to attend meetings. It was a lonely time with extended family, but Amy and her husband both felt the need for support from others that were struggling with similar issues. 

Amy struggled at this time to understand God and what had happened. Based on her understanding of the checklist mindset, she believed that she had done “everything right.” She was doing all of the things that were supposed to bring happiness, so why had God betrayed her and allowed this horrible thing into their lives and marriage? One day, Amy found herself yelling and swearing at God. She felt abandoned and betrayed. She also felt guilty and expected to be reprimanded by God like other father figures she knew. After all, you shouldn’t be angry with God, right?

When Amy realized God was still there after her “fire storm,” the first words she heard were, “Thank you.” She was in disbelief and expressed the question to God about why simply “Thank you?”

God said, “I've known this whole time you've been mad at me, but you haven't been willing to acknowledge it for yourself and feel it for yourself. Now that you’re being honest with me and you're making that choice to come to me in this totally broken state and express that hurt, now I can hear you and we can move forward.”

This experience was powerful for Amy and began some deeper healing for her. She still had big ups and downs. The darkest moments were still to come. Occasionally she would be prompted to ask about her husband about other things she was concerned about.  One day he mentioned that he had stopped watching videos. This was devastating to Amy, as she didn’t realize he had been watching videos. 

Before the full disclosure, each new discovery led to more devastation.  Amy shares that she would find herself laying and crying on the floor again because she found out a new layer of betrayal and the depth of his acting out. In 2016, her husband finally gave a full disclosure about everything, including things he had continued to hide. Both Amy and her husband hurt deeply, but both felt like they wanted to stay in their marriage and keep trying. 

Amy says, “He wasn’t expecting me to stay. He asked why I would stay after everything. I looked at it like:

I know who my husband is without the addiction. I know the goodness that’s in his heart. I know what you’re really like, and, yes, this stinks. It really, really sucks right now. But I have fought hard enough for you that I’m willing to go forward if you’re willing to go forward.”

Amy says she felt she had fought too hard for him to give up now.  With boundaries in place and a commitment to honesty, Amy and her husband worked again to move forward. She also set boundaries for herself and her own behavior so she could heal from her trauma. Over time, trust began to rebuild and slowly they began to heal together. 

Amy shares that she has started to feel empowered and more peaceful since she has started working on her healing and also reaching out to help others. Through 12-Step Groups and counseling, she has found more healing. Amy says therapy has helped as she works through the betrayal trauma and her perceived need to hustle for her worthiness and her feeling that she needs validation through checklists and her actions. She fights to stay close to God and has felt the presence of her Heavenly Parents supporting her when attending events like Heart of a Woman Retreat. Amy shares that 

Jesus Christ wants to go with us into the dark places of our lives and our hearts to be with us, rescue us, and help us find our way back to the light.

Amy’s Recovery Resources:

Jesus Christ

Good music/Christian Music

Heart of a Woman Retreat

Good therapy

SAL 12-Step Spouse Groups

Amy’s Song:

“Come as You Are” by Crowder