Welcome to my podcast. Happily, even After. I’m life coach, jen, I’m passionate about helping people recover from betrayal. I rode the intense emotional roller coaster and felt stuck and traumatized for years. It’s the reason I became a trauma-informed certified life coach who helps people like you navigate their post-betrayal world. I have the tools, processes and knowledge to help you not only heal from the betrayal but create a healthy future. Today we begin to help you live happily even after. Hey friends, welcome to today’s podcast.
This week I was talking to a woman and it was interesting, as I was talking to her, that she had such a fear that what if her grandkids found out that their grandpa had had an affair? Right, and I thought about this, and I thought about it in my own life, because so often we put people on these imaginary pedestals and people do it in families all the time they like have the golden child or people you know we just somehow elevate and I don’t know. I think it’s a combo of them putting themselves up on this pedestal as well as we agreeing with it and putting them on the pedestal. So I think it happens both ways. For sure, in my former life, my former spouse for sure was put on a pedestal. My kids called him church dad right, and people in the business world, in his religious world, business world in his religious world, just in our family. He for sure was at the top and you know, I was way down below right and, sadly, like I didn’t, I can see it so clearly now. I did not see it then. But I another 10, I thought of 10 things why it’s hurtful, right, why it’s not a good idea, why we do this, why we put people on pedestals and why it’s unhelpful.
Okay, so the first one that I thought of are how pedestals. First of all, they’re not realistic and they kind of dehumanize people, because when we label someone as perfect or the golden child, we stop seeing them as human, like they don’t make any mistakes, right, and the only person that I believe that was perfect in this life was Christ, and so we all know that we are imperfect human beings. However, somehow we tend to look at some people like they aren’t and or like that they are perfect, and so for that person it’s very harmful, but also for us, because when they fall and they do and they will it becomes it’s very shattering and very disorienting and it doesn’t, I mean for the person that’s up on the pedestal, like, if they make a mistake, their tendency is for sure to hide it and to lie about it and to make sure no one sees it. So it’s just a very unrealistic way to live and to be and it makes us think that they’re somehow better than us, and that’s not even true. So it’s complicated.
Okay, number two when you put perfection on someone, it leaves no room for accountability. Right, people need to be accountable, especially when they’ve had affairs. When betrayal happens, there’s just such a deep resistance for the person that has had the affair to even acknowledge what they did, because they can’t ruin their image. Right, it’s like this bubble they’ve created among themselves and it’s like, well, it can’t be my fault. So guess whose fault it is? It’s yours. And oftentimes I think people are married to someone else, right, like, at least in my marriage, I took that on like, oh yeah, it’s for sure my fault. Like, okay, I’m gonna, I’m gonna work out more, I’m gonna look better, I’m gonna have this surgery. I’m going to work out more, I’m going to look better, I’m going to have this surgery, I’m going to do this right, so that you can, you’ll love me and you won’t want to have an affair. People will defend the image instead of accept the reality, and so this is why it’s very unhelpful.
Number three the fear of falling fuels more lying Kind of talked about this. Like the person on the pedestal, they go to great lengths to protect their image. They hide things, they lie, they manipulate others. Hide things, they lie, they manipulate others because the shame of falling is too great, and so they go to great lengths like I am amazed at what people do to hide their affairs and to manipulate men and women, because it happens both ways to believing that it was their fault or that they’re crazy and they would never do such a thing.
Number four it creates a culture of silence and secrets. I see this so often, which brought me me this is the one that brought me to the woman I was talking to. So in her mind, she would rather create this secret about her husband to her grandkids, so they never find out who their grandpa was. But I think what a beautiful lesson for those grandkids to learn that, hey, my grandpa was really awesome and he made some pretty awful mistakes, but my grandma and grandpa, they got through them, they worked through it, you know like because they did stay married Anyways, but regardless whether they got divorced or not, like we’re human, we make mistakes, because of course you always, like I remember thinking my grandpa was so amazing, right, and I still believe he was an amazing guy and he was born in the Depression, so times were different. So I can’t really compare how I feel about things today versus then.
But yeah, my grandpa was kind of mean to my grandma, he was, I think, said some really like misogynistic things. You know that just how they talked right, Like really not very nice and didn’t treat her great. Did he love her? Absolutely? I think he did. But right, like there was just like back then, very chauvinistic, very men are, do this and you’re clearly you do the work in the home. So times are different, so we can’t judge, but I can. You know I have a lot of more compassion for my grandma, like, wow, she had to put up with a lot of crap from my grandpa and I still love my grandpa and I love my grandma and they were doing the best they could. But having those eyes like that was never talked about in my family. Now, a little bit right, because I’m like, wait, there’s patterns, there’s things we need to talk about. There’s things that are not okay. Maybe they were okay back then, but they are not okay now, and so I think secrets the thing I’ve learned about secrets.
Secrets never stay secret. They eventually come out, whether it’s in a journal or after you die. Right, I’ve met a few people that the affair was discovered after their spouse had died. Devastating If that person thought that they were like preventing pain from their spouse, like I’m just going to hide this until I die. The amount of extra pain that has caused is unimaginable Because not only do they have to grieve their spouse, they have to grieve that their spouse had been lying to them and now they have no one to ask why they did it had been lying to them and now they have no one to ask why they did it. They don’t have that space and so very cruel, very cruel, very selfish, very upsetting. And I think secrets right back in the day, they’re probably easier to hide.
Nowadays, with social media, with, you know, texting and just all the things right, all the videos and all the things, secrets are just getting more complicated. I mean people it’s a lot harder to have an affair. You have now, luckily I mean, thank goodness people made secret apps for those people wanting to hide their affair. But we’re getting smart, right, we can figure these things out, but the iCloud is really prevented a lot of people or people getting caught quicker, I think because it’s like, oh, I had to set up my son’s iPad and I had to use my Apple ID because they didn’t have one, and then I forgot about that three years ago when I bought the iPad. But then all of a sudden, I’m texting someone else and my spouse comes along to put the kid’s iPad or check his iPad and they see unimaginable pictures and texts and all the things, right, devastating, right, devastating. But I think it’s important to know like we need to talk about this. You can teach your kids lessons by not staying silent and by not keeping these secrets.
Number five the pain of betrayal is amplified by the illusion of someone being on this pedestal. Right, it’s not just the affair that hurts, it’s the fact that the person was held up as morally superior. The bigger the pedestal, the harder the fall. This, for sure, is how I felt in my experience, because when people started finding out not your spouse, not your husband, right, he was so amazing, right, like I’m like, yeah, he was and he’s been lying to us all. He’s been living this double life. Right, he was such this person at church, yet he’s off with this other woman and so, just, it was so devastating, like shook my kids to their core because their dad, their dad, was church dad, right, we were taught to you know, be honest and loyal and read our scriptures and go to church every Sunday and do all the things. And you’re telling us what type of friends we should have. If you lie down with dogs, you wake up with fleas, like, make sure you have good friends, and then all their friends are out screwing around too and having affairs. It’s very messy and it’s very disorienting and it’s this lie and it just makes bigger and bigger.
When you’ve put someone on a pedestal, number six, it undermines the healing process. Definitely. It makes healing so much harder because it’s just hard. You’re like wait, how could someone like this do this? It just it makes our brains really hard to connect and people can’t admit what happened, because what will the kids think? What are our parents going to think, what are the neighbors going to think? And so we get stuck in what other people’s opinions are, because we’ve put ourselves up here on this pedestal, and we can’t. We’re so concerned about what other people are going to think about us, I think. Do you fear man more than God? Right, but no, like we should be fearing what God thinks of us. That’s what’s most important, and what you think of you, as opposed to what everyone else is thinking of you, and I think honesty and transparency are key to restoring trust and modeling integrity.
Your kids can handle the truth. They cannot handle a lie and they will know when you are lying to them. They just know it and they might not know it right away, but they will eventually discover that you’ve been lying to them and so, regardless of whether you know I mean I totally covered for my former spouse all the time and honestly, it was the most freeing thing when I didn’t have to do that anymore and I thought I didn’t understand how destructive that was, especially to my children. But luckily, you can always repair, you can always make it better and, especially if your kids are willing to do that, you totally can and they will trust you more. You will build and deepen your relationship because you were vulnerable Number seven kids know more than you think.
I think we have it all wrong. We think we’re hiding all this from our kids. They feel it. If they can’t name it because they’re too young, but they feel it. There’s something off, they sense things. That’s what our nervous system is for it’s to warn us. And our kids are very smart, they know something, they feel something. So I think hiding the truth to protect them just causes more confusion, more emotional harm than the truth ever could. And I know that feels very scary and very counterintuitive, but it is true. I’ve experienced both and I know I can handle the truth way more than I can a lie.
Number eight you don’t have to drag someone through the mud to step off the pedestal. So speaking the truth doesn’t mean you’re shaming them, right, like you don’t have to. I always say when a person has an affair, especially if I’m talking to the betrayed partner like you’re not a bad person, you made bad choices, right, you’re still a good human. You’re a human being that deserves love and healing, but you did make a bad choice and you’re just going to have to figure that out and repair that. So there’s a difference between, I think, being honest and then being vindictive, and I think you can feel the difference right? I hope. If you can’t, then you know that’s something to get coached on.
But you can tell when you’re just trying to be blatantly mean to someone. I mean I’ve been vindictive and I’ve been just. These are the hard facts, people. But you can tell it’s an energy inside you, like if you just want to hurt someone, right, you just say all the mean things you can think of. We’ve all been there especially if you’ve experienced betrayal. You’ve had those moments. But then the healing moment can be wow, I really lost control there. I really didn’t mean any of those really awful things I said to you and you really hurt me and this is really painful and it’s not okay. So just pay attention to that Number nine.
Everyone deserves to be seen fully flaws and all so when you’re put on a pedestal we can’t see these things, but we are human. One of the things I’ve learned from coaching is that I love the saying I’m the world’s okayest mom, and I love that saying because I think I’m a pretty amazing mom and then sometimes I’m not so amazing, so it gives space for both right, and I think having that philosophy in life, like my kids are really awesome, and sometimes they’re not very awesome. They make mistakes, but that’s the humanness of it. We are all human and we do make mistakes and you can still have love for someone and hold them accountable. We see that with our kids all the time, somehow in our marriages, and it’s not our job to be our spouse’s parent and punish them Like we don’t want to punish them. But also, hey, husband or wife, this is a boundary now that I have because you broke my trust and so if you’re going to continue doing that, then this is what I’m going to do. I’m going to sleep in another bed. I’m going to, you know, get divorced, whatever. Whatever your boundary is, I’m going to leave the room. When you start yelling at me and telling me why you, you know, trying to blame me for your affair, I’m going to leave the room and go on a walk. Whatever you decide, right. That’s when a boundary is important, but you can still love them and love yourself at the same time.
The last one, number 10, redefining respect after the fall. So when someone falls off their pedestal which they will, right I just would encourage you just to stop putting people on pedestals. But Anyways, respect doesn’t have to mean reverence, it can mean honesty, boundaries, mutual humanity. You can teach kids to respect someone as they are, not as the image you once wanted to preserve in your. As they’re going back and forth to their mom and dad, it’s like, okay, they’re your dad, we need to respect them. Now. You don’t have to like what they did, or we don’t have to say like, oh, they’re so amazing and like, try to make them more than what they are. Like, yeah, they made a lot of really crappy decisions and mistakes and this is how we ended up is now divorced because of their choices. But it’s still important to respect your parents or whatever you want to teach.
But I think that can be helpful to just not like blatant respect for people to acknowledge, yeah, they really messed up and you can still be nice and humane to them, right? So I think the biggest takeaway that I want you to look at your life and see like who are you when you’re thinking about them. Like do you say this to about one of your kids, like, oh, they’re perfect, they’re a golden child. Just know that is not helpful, that is actually very harmful. And so start switching your language or have a talk with them. Like, hey, I know. Like, I just think you’re such an amazing person. So sometimes I say that. But you know what? We’re human.
You’re going to make mistakes and guess what, when you do, I’m here for you, I love you.
It’s okay if you make a mistake, because the problem is what happens is for those kids they have no one to go to. Who are they going to go to until they’ve made a mistake. So then they’re going to get caught up in lying and a bigger mess than what they did. And I think there’s lots of families out there that really try to live this image like, oh, we’re the perfect family, and I for sure got caught up in this. Like everything’s fine here, right, look at us, front row of church Every Sunday, my kids all in matching clothes, anyways, I fit the image.
But really inside I was broken and devastated and thinking what’s wrong with me? Why would my husband keep lying and having affairs? Like what did I do to deserve this right? Like I was in such victim mode. It makes me nauseated now, but I was and that was the reality of my life. So and then everyone’s like, oh, my gosh, you have the most amazing husband. I wish I had a husband like yours. And I’m like really, do you? But yeah, they did, because that’s all they saw was how awesome he was and how much money he made and how many cool vacations we got to go on, and so it was harmful.
And when he fell, my kids fell with him. He brought the whole family down with him and that was very painful to watch and very painful to experience and now we’re just all pulling ourselves back up and so I know you can just know like it’s not the end of the world. You can get through this, you can figure this out. Just know like it’s not the end of the world. You can get through this, you can figure this out. I hope this was helpful. If you need help in your marriage, relationship, dealing and healing with betrayal, I’d love to help you Reach out and let’s get on a call and I will talk to you next week. Have a beautiful day. If you want to learn how to live happily even after, sign up for my email at hello at lifecoachjenwith1ncom. Follow me on Instagram and Facebook at Happily Even After. Coach, let’s work together to create your happily even after.
