Welcome to Happily Even After Betrayal with Life Coach Jen, the podcast where we don’t sugarcoat betrayal, we transform it. If your heart is shattered, your nervous system is buzzing, and your future feels uncertain, you’re in the right place. Here we rebuild identity, confidence, and peace. One brave episode at a time. Hey friends, welcome to today’s podcast. So we’ve all heard the term our mental load. And so I want to talk about the mental load of betrayal because it’s real. And I think your life doesn’t pause when you’ve experienced betrayal, but your world shatters. And you still have to go about with life. And it’s hard and complicated and challenging. So that’s just what I want to talk about today. I think it would be nice if we could push a pause button and take a break and experience betrayal, but no, we might still have to go get our kids from school after we found a random text on our home computer or an email or a picture or someone calls us and says something to us and says, hey, your spouse is having an affair, and you still have to go to your dentist appointment or who knows, whatever, right? Teach a lesson at church the next day. So it’s complicated and painful. And we still, it’s like you’re bleeding out and you’re still having to go, you know, run around and drive urines and go to the grocery store and cook dinner. I just want you to hold space for yourself and acknowledge, yeah, this is really hard. I think one of the hardest parts of betrayal isn’t just what happened, it’s that your life keeps going, right? You still have to wake up, you still have to get dressed, you have to make lunches, you for those of you that go to work, you still smile at people because you don’t want to tell them what just happened. Your world exploded and no one else knows but you, your spouse, and maybe a few other people. Taking care of your kids while in your insides are just torn up, like giving your kids, reading them a bedtime story. And as you’re just like want to like cry in a pillow and you’re devastated, right? Going to work or teaching or parenting with the knot in your chest, the exhaustion that sleep wouldn’t fix, right? And you can’t even sleep, right? Your brain’s going a million miles per hour. I think the mental load of betrayal is the constant invisible weight of thinking, scanning, managing, and surviving while pretending you’re okay. I did a lot of pretending in my marriage, and it literally almost killed me. But what’s what we do, right? We have to, we love our kids, we have a job to do, we need to go to work, we need to support our family, yet we’re just devastated inside. And sometimes those things are distractions, which can be helpful, but there’s still a lot of pain associated to them. I think we do a lot of managing of our spouse’s emotions and our own, right? We think we don’t want to say anything because we don’t want to upset them. I for sure did this all the time, right? My kids tell me they used to, you know, be upstairs and they could tell by their dad’s footprints on the wood floor if he was in a good mood or a bad mood. And I think that’s just good to know, right? Like what we do, the knots we put ourselves in to try to manage someone’s emotions. And the truth is we can’t manage anyone’s emotions besides ourselves. I think we try to do a lot of protecting our kids from their adult pain. And of course, when they’re younger, right, it isn’t fair. But as they get older, it’s important, I think, for them to know like, wow, this is painful. And it’s okay that my mom is crying or my dad’s crying or really sad. It’s okay. Deciding what to say, who knows what, right? Like it’s like your spouse was like a web of lies and lying to you, and then you become this web of lies. Like, what do I tell this person or that person? And you almost create a fake identity because you don’t want anyone to know the truth. It’s a talent, right? You have to hold this grief and still perform your roles, your duties. I think it’s a huge burden both in your mind and your body. There’s a lot of hypervigilance going on, right? You’re always constantly scanning for threats, constantly looking, especially at the beginning, right? We’re trying to find safety and we want to constantly look at their phone, look at their social media accounts, look at their emails accounts, because we want to feel safe and we’re really struggling feeling safe. And so we’re trying to, you know, our brain is working overtime, trying to keep us safe. The rumination and obsession about the fair. What did they look like? What did they have that I didn’t replaying whatever you saw, replaying the betrayal? And your mind usually makes things so much worse than the truth, right? And you’re trying to seek answers and your spouse isn’t giving them to you, or they are and you’re not dealing with it well. You have no sense of trust. You completely doubt yourself because you’re like, how could this have happened? They were, you know, telling me they love me this morning when they went to work, and your whole world just fell apart at noon, right? You discovered the affair or whatever happened. You feel very emotionally dysregulated, right? You’re you’re have intense mood swings and lots of rage and confusion and numbness, right? It’s very confusing. Like that’s a heavy burden to hold. And a lot of flashbacks and memories and trying to figure out your timeline and figure out their timeline and what was going on with you. It’s just so much, so much heaviness. The mental load is heavy because it’s not just emotional pain, it’s a profound disruption of one’s nervous system and worldview, creating a constant state of alert and emotional turmoil. Remember, this is not weakness. This is your nervous system trying to keep you safe, right? The constant scanning and hypervigilance and confusion and isolation. You’re just trying to find safety. So, what it could feel like physically in your body, a heaviness in your chest. And I think it’s really important to focus. How does this feel in my body? You might have a tight jaw, clenched shoulders, exhaustion that doesn’t match your activity level. Like, I remember, like, I’m like, I haven’t done one thing today, and I feel like I ran a marathon. A lot of brain fog is common. You have a short fuse, or you’re completely numb. So these are things that you could realize, like, okay, yeah, I my mental load is definitely too much right now. Emotionally, you might experience a lot of anger or grief. So really intense emotions. I tell people it’s like you’re on a roller coaster and you don’t know when you’re gonna get off of it. Shame you didn’t earn, right? Like you decide, okay, well, they’re feeling shame, so I’m gonna just hold it for them so that they can heal or whatever, right? I totally held my former spouse’s shame, made it my own instead of his, feeling too much or not enough at the same time. Guilt for being distracted as a parent, right? This is very common. Like, oh, if I didn’t, if I didn’t do so much for my kids, my husband wouldn’t have had to have this affair. And so, right. So then it just layers more burden onto you, more of this pain and this constant pressure that you’ve got to hold it together, right? That’s exhausting, right? You can’t let yourself fall apart because if you fall apart, then everyone’s gonna fall apart and we may never be able to pick the pieces back up again. But that’s just a lie your brain is telling you. And I envision it’s like you’re in a swimming pool with a lot of beach balls, and you’re just trying to like keep them all underwater at the same time. Like how exhausting that is. That’s kind of what I think the mental load of betrayal feels like. Or you have a backpack with a thousand tons of bricks in it, and you’re trying to hike. You’re just walking along a flat path, but you can barely move. That’s what the mental load of betrayal feels like. What it might sound like is I don’t have time to fall apart. I for sure thought this so many times. Like, I don’t have time for this. Like, I’m devastated, and my kids need me, or and I have a birthday party to plan, and I have made plans with our friends to go on a vacation, right? Like, I’ve got to keep it together. I don’t have time for this. My kids need me. I’ll deal with this later. But the problem is sometimes later is forced upon you, or it just prolongs your pain for that much longer. Why can’t I just get over it? So that’s where shame creeps in, right? You just blame yourself. Like, get on with it, move on with it. And just forget about it. Someone sent me an email and it’s like, I’m trying to forgive, but I just can’t forget. And I’m like, you’re never gonna forget. Like, that’s not the way of it. You have to let go of the pain if you want to reconcile, but you’re not gonna forget it, right? Your brain isn’t gonna let it now. It may not be as intense if you’ve healed. I’ll never forget what my spouse did to me and the betrayals, but they’re not gonna be a weight anymore on me. They’re not a mental load anymore. I’m not carrying them with me anymore. But yeah, I’m gonna remember them every now and again. And I might get irritated and like, I can’t believe he did that, but I’m not gonna be holding this heavy burden load. Everyone else seems fine. Why am I not? So you’re judging yourself. That’s going to make your load even heavier. I should be handling this better. I hear this often too. Like, what’s wrong with me? Why can’t I deal with this? Of course you can’t deal with this. Your spouse had an affair and was lying to you. Like you’re supposed to not handle it. It’s okay that you’re not handling it. What does that even mean? This mental noise is exhausting. And most people don’t realize how loud it is because they never hear it, right? They’re just constantly in their head, right? But when you speak it out loud, that’s where your power lies because you’re like, wait a second, me saying that, or you you even listening to this, you might realize, like, okay, yeah, I need to stop that. I need to stop thinking that. It’s not even true. It’s my brain trying to protect me, and it’s a lie, and I need to let it go. So often our trauma and our responsibility collide. I remember I felt like I needed to be more responsible. I was the parent, like I could have fallen apart, right? I was responsible, and that really was challenging for me because I felt like I’m a responsible person. But I needed to fall apart to that, was the most responsible thing for me to do was to fall apart and let go of some of these false beliefs that I had and some of this pain and load I was carrying. Remember, betrayal is trauma. Trauma puts your body into survival mode so it makes sense. And survival mode prioritizes functioning over healing. So we have to be on to ourselves about this. We have to realize, like, oh, this is what is happening and why, and now what can I do about it? The thing is, your brain is supposed to scan for danger. And when betrayal happens, there’s like tons more danger that it feels very important. Your nervous system is on high alert. You’re carrying emotional weight while meeting real life demands. And this is why rest alone doesn’t fix it. You can’t just stay in bed. Like you, people, when you’re feeling depressed, you might stay in bed all day and you still feel exhausted, right? It’s because the rest, that wasn’t the kind of rest you need. You needed rest from the worry, the thinking about it, the rumination. That’s what the rest is. And you can only get that through healing. You’re not failing at healing if you feel stuck and if you feel like this emotional weight you’re carrying. It’s because you’re carrying the trauma while still being responsible for everything else in your life. So just don’t judge yourself for it. Like this is the way of it. This is how we move through our healing. And we have to acknowledge what we’re experiencing in real time as opposed to ignoring it or pretending it’s not happening. So, how we begin to take the load off, right? To take those bricks out of our backpack or to release and let go of some of those balls that are in our swimming pool. We have to name it, right? Don’t call us lazy. You’re not lazy, you’re resting. You’re being instead of doing. It’s not dramatic, right? You’re not being dramatic. You’re being exactly how you’re supposed to act. You’re acting appropriately. And recognize, like, oh wow, this is a huge mental load that I’m carrying it. And the more you can name how you’re feeling what’s going on with you, shame dissipates. Shame uh thrives when we’re hiding, but it gets reduced when we speak it. Speaking the unspeakable is important. And finding safe places to speak that is also very important. Stop asking yourself to heal and perform perfectly, right? There’s not a perfect way to heal and you’re not doing it wrong, right? If you’re not doing it, then you have to realize, like, okay, maybe I do need to start healing, but healing is different for everyone. And it requires intention and not pressure, right? If we put pressure on ourselves, like, okay, we have six weeks to heal and then we’re going to be better, right? Like, that’s not how it works. You may not take as long as someone else, but we’re also not comparing ourselves to other people, right? We have to just do it in our own time, in our own way. We have to create small moments to release the pain. I think giving yourself five minutes to just go sitting alone in your car. I always tell people if you have a lot of anger, just go sit in your car and scream. Like let it out in a safe way. Go in a closet, go in a bathroom, go, you know, write all your feelings, get them out. That’s going to release this load that you feel that you’re carrying. I think writing down whatever your thoughts are, even if they’re terrible. Like I feel like I have certain journals that are like, wow, those are dark. But I needed to get all that darkness out of me in order to move through it, right? It’s better than ruminating and thinking about it inside of our brain, inside of ourselves. So we have to release that. Just realize like one thing, we don’t have to do everything at the same time. We can just be good enough. Be okay with you’re good enough. You really are, right? And recognizing like this load is too heavy. Like I’ve got to let something go. And there was a point in my life my husband had had an affair, and we cut everything out of our life, like literally everything, and just really did very simple things. That was, you know, the beginning of one of several affairs. And, you know, that was a good step, right? Like that showed me, like, yeah, my husband wanted to change and do things differently. And we really, you know, took a lot of extras out of our life. And I think that’s helpful, right? It’s not always practical or possible, but if you can, sometimes less as more as your healing. And people don’t need to know why you stopped, you know, going to the gym every day or whatever. You know, obviously we want to do things like exercise that’s going to help us with our healing, but maybe find going on walks or, you know, you might just have to switch up your what you were doing before to something different can be helpful. I think learning to regulate your nervous system is huge, right? Get in a more calm, centered place. And remember, you can’t think your way out of betrayal or survival mode. You have to feel your way out of it. And so recognizing, like, oh, right now I feel very frozen. Okay, what do I need to do? I need to go on a walk, I need to eat, I need to drink some water. You need to figure out what is good for you that is going to help you move to a different, more regulated place. And lastly, you need to get support. You don’t need to be stronger, you need to be supported. And it’s so important to have the right people on your team, to have the right tools so that you can let go of this weight that you’re carrying, thinking, oh, this is protecting you, right? This hundred-pound bag of bricks that I’m carrying is protecting me from feeling all these emotions, but it’s really hurting you. And it’s not really great game plan, right? It’s not sustainable. You’re gonna eventually like start really affecting your health, your mental health, and your physical health. And just remember, you’re not broken. The weight you’re carrying is real, and you don’t have to carry it alone. Healing doesn’t require your life to fall apart. You can heal and still live and be in your life and still be a productive human. You’re allowed to heal while still living. And you’re allowed to put some of this weight down, right? You must put it down. And you only do that through healing. So if this feels like you’re like, this is me, this is, I feel like I’m carrying this weight all the time, just know you’re doing it because it feels protective, but you can let it go. And it is possible. And you do that through healing, and you do that through acknowledgement of what is going on and why you’re doing it. And it’s totally normal. And you’re not weird, you’re just in a lot of pain right now. And so there is help out there, and I hope you get it. Have a beautiful day, and I will talk to you next week. Thanks for listening. If this episode helped you breathe deeper or see your next step more clearly, share it with someone who needs it. And when you’re ready for real support in your healing, you know where to find me. At lifecoachgen.com. That’s Jen with one N. Your happily even after is possible. And it starts today.
