Finding Your Power After Addiction and Trauma: 2026 SAL 12 Step Conference Keynote w/ Amanda Christensen

Narrator: This is Pathway to Recovery, an SA Lifeline Foundation podcast featuring hosts Tara McCausland, who is the SA Lifeline Executive Director, and Justin B., a sex addict living in long-term recovery. We have conversations with experts and individuals who understand the pathway to healing from sexual addiction and betrayal trauma because we believe that recovering individuals leads to the healing of families.

Tara McCausland: Hello friends. Welcome to the Pathway to Recovery Podcast. I am Tara McCausland, and I'm excited to share with you this keynote presentation with therapist and 12-stepper Amanda Christensen from our SAL 12-Step in-person conference that we held just this past April. This is a really insightful and meaty presentation. That is relevant to both those struggling with sex addiction and trauma. Now, you'll note that she is showing slides as she speaks. So as you're listening, you'll have to pay attention to follow, but I think you'll glean a lot from this presentation.

Now, before we jump in though, a couple of things. First, we are looking for motivated individuals who are eager to share the hope of recovery as an SA Lifeline ambassador. Now, as an ambassador, you'll receive training from us and materials to share the good news that healing from sex addiction and betrayal trauma is possible. So if you're interested, you wanna get involved, volunteer your time and your talents to help spread this news, I'll invite you to check out the link in the show notes to apply.

And also we have a new resource. This is a new digital resource found on salifeline.org. This is a condensed, non-denominational version of our original Understanding Pornography Addiction and Betrayal Trauma manual. This was written specifically for faith leaders, but this info would be helpful and pertinent to anyone looking for a concise resource to better understand the nature and reality of sex addiction, betrayal trauma, and a pathway to healing for both. So if you're interested, you can check it out on salifeline.org in the shop, and it's just $6.99.

So we hope that you'll take advantage of that. And now to our presentation with therapist Amanda Christensen from our SAL 12-Step Conference.

Amanda Christensen: There is so much gratitude for SAL in my life, and I know that we wouldn't— I would not be where I am today without it. And I'd say it was one of the very top things that has helped me personally and helped my marriage. So I'm honored to be here. And, um, I'll never forget the first group that we went to right after discovery. Uh, we went side by side, like he went to the men's group while I was in the women's group at the same time.

And I was pissed to be there. Right. I was like furious and just so anxious about what he was doing over there and if he was gonna be into it, because I, I had already— I already had a belief in group, not for myself, um, but I was hoping it would do something. And he was full of pride and hated anything therapeutic, so I was just convinced that This was probably going terribly. And we walked out and this was like the moment of truth for me.

I was so anxious. And he hugged me and said, I belong here. And that was the start for me of some hope. And then we were devoted for a long time. I'm forever thankful for this structure and we're so lucky to have it. Locally and online. So, um, I want to start with somewhere I went in September. We went on a big trip. Uh, my husband's the youngest of 10 kids, and so we were able to go with all the adults to, like, all his siblings, their spouses, and his parents to a redwood forest in California.

And I'm a nature person, but I totally underestimated how much This would impact me. I was, I was like, I was overwhelmed with how amazing these trees were. And if you look at this, this, you can't really see the labels, but this is just half of a stump. And this first label on the inside, oh, I have a thing. That is the birth of Jesus Christ. And then right here is, uh, the tree fell in 1934. So there's all these markers of historical things, and that blows my mind.

Space, space movies, I can't watch those. They're a little too much for my brain. And time, like, time is so interesting to me. And I just imagine these trees living for thousands of years, seeing so much stuff. Um, But what really caught me the most was the visitor center. So we went to the visitor center after walking through the forest, and I just got stuck on this lady. She was a legend. Um, I wish I could name her.

I was obsessed with her. Anyway, she was this older lady, and I think she had been working there forever. She knew every fact possible about forests, trees, redwoods, sequoias. And I stood there for an hour, like, transfixed, asking question after question. The whole rest of the group had moved on. They were ready to leave. And I was like, just, just obsessed. So what I learned, uh, was about, uh, the light gap. So when one of these, these, the big ones are called the mother trees.

And these trees have been around for millions of years. They're from the Jurassic period. When one of them falls or is cut down or gets burned, and they're fire-resistant mostly, but everything's prepared. There's this ring, there's this mound that goes around it, and when there's stress on the mother tree, all these other little trees pop up, and it's called a fairy ring, which is just a delightful name. And this fairy ring is ready to take over, and they're There becomes a light gap in the canopy.

And so there's now ability for growth, new growth. And what's really cool is most of the trees in this fairy ring are clones to the mother tree, which is very rare. Hardly anything clones itself on its own. So it's literally the same tree that now grows. And then those little fairy ring trees will compete for who's going to kind of get the tallest and take over that mother tree spot. Also, the roots are not very deep for how tall these trees are.

They're over 300 feet tall. They're not very deep, but they go— they spread really wide. So 60 to 100 feet. Wow. But they're all intertwined with each other. So these trees are Massive powerhouses, and they need each other to stand tall and not fall over in storms. So our mother trees have fallen. That's why we're here. That's why we're in this room. Some kind of crisis has happened. And I want us to look for the light gap and grow into it and harness this concept of calm power.

This is from Frank Anderson, who's my favorite therapist in the public. He talks about calm power, which is like just this very steady sense of knowing. It's a groundedness. In 12-step, we would say you're centered. Your higher power is in your center. Yeah. Um, you can be vulnerable and, and strong at the same time. So, in on power, and do you guys know who this is? This is He-Man. I did not know He-Man very well, but he's— I fact-checked this.

Back whenever this was created, they needed a new little action figure character, and, um, Mattel looked at the market research of what kids want, and all the little boys were saying they wanted power. They wanted more power. So they literally created this character to give little boys more power, a more sense of power. And his tagline is literally, I have the power. Wow. So when we are growing up, we're figuring out very young who has the power.

Okay. And there's so much that we learn. If you guys have kids, I have 4 little kids and it's just like input, input, input. They are, they are soaking in so much and randomly they'll regurgitate something that shocks you. Um, but a lot of what they're soaking in is, uh, implicit. So it's, it's not like overtly said, it's just picked up on. Yeah. And power dynamics are very easily picked up on. There's this vulnerability of being a child.

A baby needs milk, a baby needs protection, and that need goes on for quite a long time, especially compared to other animals. Humans are, uh, pretty dependent. So there's this inherent power differential for us, and that's okay. But we're dependent on our caretakers, which is okay as long as our caretakers are providing what we need. A good way to— and I want everybody listening to start thinking about this from their own family. What were the power dynamics in my family and how is that playing out now?

So a good way to think about it is to think about rules in your family. This would be explicit rules that are obvious and said out loud, like, um, you can't date till you're 16, or you can't go to that sleepover until you do your chores. And then there's implicit rules that somehow everyone in the family knows that this is a rule, but no one has said it out loud, and probably no one would say it out loud, and probably if you said it out loud, it would offend the parents.

Okay. So things like, uh, when mom goes and, uh, like holes up in her room for a few hours, you don't go in there. Everybody knows it. The kids know it. Okay. Or, uh, don't show weakness in front of dad because he'll ridicule you. Um, don't talk about the secrets of our family. You got to protect our image. Okay. Okay, so like parents aren't sitting down their kids and telling them that, but the kids figure that out.

Um, and then roles in your family. So think about what roles you played in your family, uh, or others played in your family. Like, um, you're the golden child, or you're the peacemaker, uh, you're the black sheep, you're the dramatic one, um, you're the rebellious one. Yeah. If anything pops in your mind right now, just notice it and, uh, take that into account as you're trying to figure out your, your place in the, in power dynamics.

Okay, to introduce myself, my power growing up was to be adored. Okay, I figured out if I could be adorable or charming cheeky, cute, whatever. I could kind of get what I wanted, um, and I couldn't compete with like— my siblings were super smart, and I'm smart but not like them, like brainy. And, uh, but I could be adorable and kind of underestimated. I'm still underestimated. That's— I wore my shark tooth earrings today so I could take myself seriously.

Okay. And, uh, a good example here is, uh, my dad was like the, the one very anxious about the rules and following the rules, and my mom was a lot more permissive. But every once in a while, my mom would be kind of mad at me, and she'd be trying to get me in trouble, but she wasn't very good at it. And, uh, I just started mooning her. Oh. I just, I just wanted to break the tension and she would laugh and we would move on and it'd be fine.

And that's just kind of how I got out of everything and like manipulated the system. I was also good. I was nothing to worry about, you know? So, um, so I could get what I wanted. My husband, he, like I said, he's the youngest of 10 kids. And he— it was easy for him to kind of disappear. And, uh, and his parents were like as attuned as they probably could be. They were very poor. They had to both be working all the time and had a lot of kids.

And so he kind of learned to tamp down his emotions and, um, pretend that everything was fine. Hmm. Uh, and disguise how he felt. So then we're— fast forward, we're dating, we're engaged, and all of this is kind of on full display. I feel very adored, and, um, and he seems very stable. And he was so impressive. Like, he's always the leader. If you get people together, Ed's gonna be the leader of them. I don't know how.

Um, he was always the responsible one, and so, so he seemed so stable, but he was also totally unaware of his emotional state. So we get married and we do like our whole undergrad together and our master's degrees together, and then I'm a fully licensed therapist after this, specializing in sexual addiction and betrayal trauma, um, but not being affected by that, to my knowledge. And then on December 23rd, 2016, so this is about almost 8 years into marriage, and this is 9 years ago, um, I'm pregnant with our first.

Wow. I opened a text from a prostitute, and that was one of many, many, many prostitutes. And, um, he was finally ready to tell the truth. I had opened up other texts before that. And so, and it had been a long time coming. So he was at a breaking point. He told the truth. Wow. And I lost in an instant everything that I thought I had. And sharing my story is still hard. I— Rill and Steven have shared their story so many times, and I wonder if it's still vulnerable.

It's gotta be, yes. It's so vulnerable, and it's so important that we are able to do that. But, um, I still have so much pain there, even though I've done so much healing. And in— at the same time of feeling immense pain, uh, I have so much hope and respect for the bravery it's taken for me and him to do this. So it's meaningful. Okay. Um, notice how you, how your power, how you learned power, um, how power plays out in your marriage.

Um, 'cause we're hoping to get to this healthy powerlessness. Um, okay. This is some family systems. I'm a marriage and family therapist, so all my training is in family systems, and I think about every case in a family system's way. So, um, everything's connected and we're all impacting each other. I'm not going to go through all of these, but, um, but let's start with this first one, emotionally neglectful. And neglectful is a strong word, I know.

Um, but what, what I'm gonna go with my husband, he's a good guinea pig here. Um, he learned to be invisible, uh, and that he's too much. Yeah. And actually nowadays, that's like his main negative core belief is, I'm too much. And I can see it because he's a lot. And his acting out is a lot. Like, everything he does is extreme. He does it all in kind of an extreme way. And so he learned to tamp down his emotions and feel— and find private ways to feel seen because he just you know, kind of felt like he disappeared.

So they lived— he, his family lived in their car lot for most of his growing up years. Um, you can ask him about it. It's really— he has a lot of funny stories there. But, uh, yeah, they lived in the showroom. Basically, they cut the showroom in half with like a sliding door, and they're, they're literally like in their living room watching TV while people are coming in and looking at cars. So anyway, there was a big junkyard too.

So he found his special places in the junkyard with, um, his pornography, and that was his kind of special thing. And that's where he learned to have his own time and feel kind of special and choose what he wanted to do. Very young. Uh, we've got this strict, rigid system, and this is kind of perfectionistic. A good example here is, um, a teenage boy. He's from a family of— the dad is a surgeon. They're very successful.

Um, it's like all boys in the family, they're just the golden boys. They're all attractive, they're all athletes. Um, all the girls like them. Yeah. He starts acting out with pornography, but he's got to protect the image of the family. And when that's found out, it's just like total disappointment and like trying to make him keep the reputation. And yeah, it's a sad story. And he gets married to like a good girl, like a really good, pure girl, and he feels unworthy the whole time.

And he almost immediately starts acting out with others again. And, but he's going to med school because he has to, because that's what he's got to do, right? And so he's so stuck in keeping up with this perfectionism. And he's just gonna, he's gonna do that as long as he hits some kind of rock bottom, right? Um, we've got the helplessness where victimhood gets connection, the enmeshed or over-controlling. Um, being an individual is very important, and, uh, it's hard for parents to let go, and some parents are more controlling than others.

I supervised a case, um, with a guy who was like 25, and like, he's an adult. Yeah. Um, he had no driver's license because he was not allowed to get a driver's license. His mom had controlled him so much, and he sneaked and got a driver's license, and that was a huge celebration with him and the therapist. But then they spent weeks, many weeks, role-playing picking up the phone and calling mom and telling her that he got his driver's license.

Wow. And, um, and he was terrified. And, and that's an extreme example, but, uh, in that scenario, that's where— add a sexual addiction to that, and he's gonna need to have a whole double life, right? Um, 'cause there's no safety in being yourself. Secrets. Shh. We don't talk about Bruno, okay? Um, and, and most families have secrets. It's— that's not that special, actually. Um, most families have secrets, stuff we don't talk about. And, uh, usually it's to protect, to protect the family or to protect someone else.

And that then gets very twisted for the ones who are acting out because they do tell themselves, I'm protecting— I don't want to hurt her. Right? And that's, that's, it seems logical, um, and it's coming from this young place here. And then the unpredictable or volatile. So, um, these kids are always watching out and they have a really good barometer for, um, intensity. So the second someone walks in the house, they're going to scan. Right. And figure out how that person is feeling and what the energy is, um, which makes them very anxious as adults.

And, uh, a lot of the betrayed is coming from this sometimes. Um, they try to control other people's emotions to manage, uh, like, no blowups, please no blowups. Um, or they just totally check out, like— Yeah. Nah, this family is so dramatic. I'll be over here with my friends, like, doing my own thing because this is crazy. Um, okay. And then we have this wonderful healthy, safe, and secure, which is really hard to maintain. Um, and if you're a parent, I hope I'm not bringing guilt here because we all, uh, dabble in these dynamics.

Yeah. But to feel important and safe and accepted is the goal. Um, and what that looks like, because a lot of times when I'm teaching, like we're trying to unteach a lot of this rigidity here. Um, people are like, what would it even, even look like to get my needs met? I don't even know what my needs are. Yeah. Um, a lot of times, like, all I can think of is I need sex. It's like, that's just top.

And like, I don't know of anything else. Um, so getting your needs met looks like asking for help. Um, my daughter the other day ran into her friend at the store and was so happy. And then we had to leave and she was so sad. And she said, Mom, I'm feeling so sad. And I said, oh, I, I get that. Yeah. And she said, Mom, I think I need a hug. And I gave her a hug.

And I'm— I ask my kids as much as I can, no matter what they're feeling, what do you need? If they fall down, instead of me deciding what they need, you need a Band-Aid, right? And sometimes I could suggest something like, do you need whatever? But I want them to learn how to recognize that. Yeah. They need something, they're not okay. And then what that might be, and then have the confidence to actually say it and have a safe person say, let's try and make that happen.

And I can't always make that happen perfectly, right? But, um, developing that ability to be that in tune with yourself is huge. And many of us did not really get that growing up. Um, then to co-regulate. That's that asking for a hug. Okay, now we're gonna co-regulate. So I'm okay, but she's not okay. So now we're gonna hug and I'll give some of my okayness to her. And then also learning how to self— healthily self-regulate. So I can also teach skills like, hey, when you're mad, this is what it can look like.

This is what you can do. Okay. A lot of us did not grow up with This ability, um, with, with that privilege. So I'm gonna fly through this. I do believe that, and I didn't mention, sometimes, sometimes there's a wonderful family system, but there's like, there's trauma there. There's sexual abuse or other trauma, um, that is also going to prime this future behavior. Yeah. But I really believe that sexual acting out is traumatizing in itself, and I'll talk about why.

Um, and it's re-traumatizing from the wounds that are already there. So a lot of times it's, uh, you're recreating emotional states because they feel familiar, even if they're negative and terrible. So that icky feeling a lot of time afterwards, a lot of times is this. Yeah. residual from your original wounds. Feeling unchosen or dissociated, we're recreating that. Um, and then also sometimes we're trying to flip that, like we're trying to control that somehow. Like, man, I felt so powerless, maybe I could feel powerful in my acting out.

And, uh, Yeah. Maybe I could flip that role and maybe I could be in control this time. Um, some good evidence here is, and this is very updated, 2025 study found that the, the percent of pornography videos with visual aggression, like seeing aggression, um, towards another person was at about 20% in the 2000s and it's now at 60% in the 2020s. Wow. So, and if you've been watching for that whole time, you've gone along with that evolution. Um, and sadly, the pleasure response here is 90% plus.

So that means that the person receiving the aggression is supposedly loving it, which is just messed up, right? It's false. Yeah. Um, but I believe a lot of this is fueled by, um, trying to feel powerful. Okay. Um, we repeat our attachment wounds. Um, I love what being talked about with generational, um, generational trauma. So it just gets passed down. We keep reliving it and we keep repeating it because remember those rigid, those family systems, those are really Hard to change because we take all that stuff and then we put it in our family and then they put it in their family, right?

Um, and we're just reenacting themes of our story. So, so yeah, recreating, repetitious repeating, reenacting. That's what a lot of sexual acting out is. The allure is that, like I said with my husband, I get to choose this. This is maybe one of the only things I get to choose. I get to type in what I want. Mm-hmm. I get to chat with whoever I want. I get to pay whoever I want. And that feels kind of powerful.

Okay? I can change my mood, I can self-regulate, I can dissociate, I can escape. And the cost is huge. Okay? So the— that false sense of power becomes total powerlessness. Yeah. So, uh, again, like, the trauma of, of, um, of being in this spot is that you are holding all these secrets, and holding secrets is also not fun. Um, and the betrayed, we're like, well, stop, right? Stop being secretive. If it's terrible, just stop it. Um, it's not that easy.

It's possible, right? But not being known equals not feeling loved. If people like you, um, like I said, everybody, everybody loves my husband. He's so impressive. Um, but they don't know his secrets. And so it's hard to actually feel that adoration. It's kind of false. Um, and it leaves you feeling very disconnected because you're always hiding parts of yourself. Yeah. There's this fear of rejection and deep shame and unworthiness. And like I said before, there's this distorted meaning of need.

I don't know what my needs are because every time I need something, I just numb it out immediately. So a lot of times when I'm working with men on like their addiction cycle or something, it's so hard to even identify pain and shame because they've just like canceled it out. So— Gotcha. quickly. It's just almost immediate. So a lot of times they're like, I had a fine day. I went to work and I came home. There's nothing to report.

Um, but they're so used to dissociating from anything negative or hard, uh, which means it's really hard for them to identify their needs. The compulsion and the reliance, that's its own, like, cycle. We'll get into that more. And, uh, it ruins sex, ruins sex. So it's emotional regulation versus real intimacy. So there isn't that much connection and you're not actually getting what sex can provide. You're getting something else. Obviously damage to trust in relationships and the family attachment system.

So if you're in a family and, and Stephen and Real have talked about this a lot. Yeah. which I love, the family impact. This is not just, you know, between 2 people. It affects the whole family. So, so here's our little cute little chick. He's our little boy, um, or he's our adult man, okay? He's any age, but he needs help. And I'm saying he 'cause it's easy. This could be she too. He needs help. Um, he needs all this good stuff.

He needs to feel safe. He needs to feel delighted in, and he can't get it because he doesn't know how, or it's just, it's just not in his family system. He's never been taught. Uh, but he remembers that sexual stuff kind of felt like it made this stuff go away. And maybe that could be a solution here. Yeah. So he gets a fix and it feels like something. This feels good. Okay. I kind of feel like I'm flying actually for a moment.

I can rely on this for now. And I'm going to keep relying on this because it's kind of all I have. Ah, now it takes more to feel good. Okay. I kind of need more and more and more and different, different. And I'm too afraid to stop here because it's providing something. It's providing something. Why is this all I think about? And now I can't stop and I can't tell anyone. Okay, because I've dug myself in a deep hole and I'm even more alone.

Okay, there's our cycle of, uh, of false power. Yeah. Feel— feeling powerful and now being powerless. So, um, this is us getting engaged, and it's still a good memory. I have so many good memories. And, um, but this big bonfire— here's my laser. That's foreshadowing, okay? Because everything's about to— everything's about to catch on fire. Anyway, so I say yes. The beginning of relationships are so exciting. Like, they are filled with optimism. It's a drug. It is.

And it's supposed to feel like that, actually, evolutionarily. Um, we're supposed to just deeply bond and be obsessed. And we were. Um, and there's this inherent trust. I'm not marrying you unless I think you're probably gonna protect me, right? Yeah. Um, so this optimism, this trust, then it gets dashed. This is Christmas lights because, uh, on that December 23rd day, we had had a great day actually. We had been like dropping off Christmas presents all the way up to Idaho to his parents' house.

We were going to be at his parents' house for Christmas break. So exciting. And he goes into Walmart. I looked at his phone casually, saw a text, wondered what it was. He came out to the car. I asked him what this was. The whole drive to the house— from Walmart to the house is like 5 minutes, 10 minutes. Yeah, that was a long drive. He was pretty much silent the whole time, and I was interrogating and he was silent, and I knew something's not right.

And so we pull up to the house and I'm looking at the Christmas lights on the house. And then he tells me the truth and he tells me more and more and more and more and more and more and more truth. And I'm just in total disbelief and shock and I'm just dissociating with the view of Christmas lights. So that's forever seared in my memory. And so that's just a good little symbol of— Yeah. Of, um, that terrible day, uh, but a good starting off point.

So here is some of the impact for the betrayed in just in huge categories. We could, we could, um, parcel this all out and it would take a long time. I'm gonna really zone in on this deception trauma because we've got, we've got our sexual acting out trauma, like the trauma of what's been done sexually, which is just gut-wrenching. And for me, like, and especially that weekend, my body felt assaulted. Like, I felt— I can't describe it.

It felt assaulted. And, um, and that's just heavy and hard. And then there's this other category of deception trauma, which is What? What? Um, so knowledge is power, and, uh, if you have knowledge that your partner doesn't have that is hurting them, uh, that is an abuse of power, and it creates this power dynamic that only you know about. So here's the house on fire. Remember the foreshadowing? So we've got this manipulative loop and, uh, this can be, this all can be going on like pre-discovery disclosure or post.

Um, for me, it's been the whole way through. Okay. It has not been breezy since that day in 2016. The one who's betraying is also stuck in this loop and there's a way out, but he is also stuck in this loop. Um, in this very self-protective way. Um, and it becomes a full-time job. It's actually a lot of work to keep all this contained. And once a secret comes out and everything's tumbling out, the panic that I see in couples, um, it's, it's just like utter terror.

And a lot of times the— Yeah. There's different presentations, but a lot of times the betrayer is like, oh my gosh, how do I clean this up? How do I make this end? When is this going to be over? The betrayed is like, when is this? When am I going to know everything? Stop telling me new things, right? Um, it's just, it's pretty traumatic. So maintaining this facade that everything's okay, or even that everything's wonderful. Yeah.

And in my case, that, that was the case. I thought everything was actually great, not just okay. Straight up lying, right? Like, obviously that's manipulation. Manipulation only has its power when the other, when like the, when the recipient, uh, doesn't know it's happening. So if they know it's happening in the moment, then it's, it's not really very powerful. It doesn't really work. Yeah. Um, uh, distraction. That's a big one that I wanna highlight. Distraction through like how, how good you are in the other parts of life, which is still true.

There is good stuff and there is useful, helpful husband, father, uh, provider, whatever stuff. Mm-hmm. Um, But using it as a distraction on purpose, like, what? I'm in medical school. How? Why? Like, look how great I am. Or, I'm such a good dad. What are you talking about? And most of all, these abuse tactics are used by the user on the user as well, which is the real twist. And he usually doesn't even know it. He knows he might be manipulating her.

Mm-hmm. He might be in self-denial there, but, but he doesn't even realize that he's manipulating himself. Um, but honestly, every single one of these, we could go down and talk about how you do that internally. Doubling down. No, no, no, no, that wasn't that bad. Minimizing. Um, yeah, so everybody's trapped here. Okay, so back to the betrayed. Am I going crazy? It feels like that often. And here are some good examples. Another, you can read through those as I talk, but another good example is, and these are simple, but they're plentiful usually.

Family goes on vacation, they're all staying in a hotel, they all have to check out, they all pack up their stuff, they leave as a family, they get out to the car, husband says, oh, I love, I, I forgot my wallet in there. I'll be back. It'll take me a few minutes. So they're all waiting for him in the car. He goes back in, acts out for 20 minutes in the room. Okay, because he's been like holding it off for the whole trip and he hasn't had any alone time.

He's feeling desperate. He thinks this is his chance. He goes in, he acts out, he comes back out. Wife is like, where were you? What the heck? That was 20 minutes. Um, and he makes up a whole story about how he couldn't find his wallet and wallet and he had to go downstairs. He had to talk to the Front desk and they had to look and, um, and the maids had to come in, whatever. It's completely false.

Um, and they go on with their day. She's like, okay. And, and then that comes out in disclosure, right? So that's a good example. She kind of knew like something's off. That's why she asked, what the heck, right? Um, she kind of knew something, but You don't know if you don't have the information. You can't make decisions about your life if you're living in a false reality. Um, I love this quote by Bessel van der Kolk: as long as you keep secrets and suppress information, you are fundamentally at war with yourself.

The critical issue is allowing yourself to know what you know. This applies to both sides. So You're at war with yourself when you're hiding. And allowing yourself to know what you know is what I get to see in the beautiful disclosure process. There's so much not remembering, and that's real. Like, that's a protective part that's saying you don't remember what happened. Yeah. But it's because it's too scary to remember. It's too scary to know what's— what you've done and what the impact is.

And then for the betrayed, again, you can only do so much with the information you have. But if you know something inside, that's important. And allowing yourself to know that is imperative in the healing process. So we wanna kind of take back this power to choose, to choose things about our lives. And there's been such an undermining of trust. So I obviously can't trust my partner. Maybe I can't trust men in general, but I definitely also can't trust myself because I thought— Yeah.

we had a great marriage, or I thought that you really just went in the hotel. Like, I believed you when you said that. And when I opened up other text messages and he said it was spam, I thought, that's gotta be true, right? My husband's not capable of anything else. Um, so being believed cannot be underestimated. The betrayed needs to believe themselves. Um, that actually happened again. Um, like, as I was thinking, how do I introduce myself?

What do I want to say of our story? It's still— I still have this disbelief, like, what? Why am I standing up here talking about this? Really? Um, that happened to us? And then I come back to reality, and it did. And, um, for me, like, at the beginning, I had so much heavy information that was like too much to bear by myself. Like, my body couldn't contain all the stories, and telling them to other people was also too much.

It might be too much in here that I'm saying prostitution, right? And that's my fear. But I know if I was— when I was going through this, I needed to know that other people had been through extreme things. And I needed to be believed. Um, and as the partner who's done the betraying, if you can just believe that the pain is real and it's as big as she's saying it is— it's actually probably bigger than she's saying it is because she's probably protecting you somewhat.

Um, she doesn't want you to crumble in shame. Believe it, okay? It's not fun. To be traumatized. Okay. Very few people, like, love the identity of a victim. It's tempting, for sure, but in the long run, it's not actually fun. So, believe the trauma. There's this questioning of yourself, like, how can I make any decisions about my life now? I don't know how to choose what to eat for breakfast. I don't know how to choose what to do for next Christmas, or, um, who do I talk to?

Who's safe? Who's not? Okay, so, so much questioning. And, um, this reconnection, which we do in group and we can do in therapy, um, reconnecting with this internal knowing. So you come back to earth. Okay. And you connect with your higher power. And nothing else really matters. You still get to make your decisions based on how you feel. And for so long, I lived my life, and many others lived their life like, well, what do you think?

Well, what do you think? Well, what should I do? So many people come to therapy and that's their first question, like, tell me what to do. They're desperate for direction. And then the annoying therapist is like, I— that's not my job. I won't tell you what to do. Okay. Yeah. And it's like so aggravating, right? Therapists are so annoying. Um, okay, yeah, I don't know who I am anymore because I thought I was this, I thought we were this, and now I don't even know.

Connecting with self looks like, again, connecting with your higher power, but getting to know who you are. And actually, in a lot of cases, you didn't really know who you were before. Actually. Um, so a lot of times it's like we're creating this positive self-image for the first time that's been majorly damaged. Um, but it's a new start to kind of figure out who you are, what you like. Okay, this is the really complex part. The person hurting me is the one I love.

This is if you're staying together. Um, this is if you're in the process of deciding, okay? Um, this is if you get divorced and you're looking for a new partner, okay? It's, it's gonna carry on, this betrayal stuff. So it's such a deep attachment injury, um, that of someone you're still attached to. So this was like a humdinger with my therapist when I went to do my own EMDR therapy with like One of the top EMDR ladies.

She's amazing. Um, she was the best of the best. And I told her my story and I was like, so where do we start? And she's like, so, um, like he could be betraying you at any moment still? And I'm like, yeah, for sure. He probably is. Um, I'm telling myself he probably is. I'm probably never safe. Yeah. Um, and we've gone through periods of like, oh, he's been here lying for a year. Oh, now he's been lying for 2 years.

But we bounce a bit back and forth through truth. And she was like, oh man, that's really hard because usually with trauma, um, like we're treating past trauma that's over now, right? So a lot of, like, a lot of the safety and the soothing that you get is by saying it's over now. Yeah. You're not there anymore. Um, that was in the past. You're safe here now. Okay? And so all I'm saying is it's complex. Not that it's impossible, but you do need a therapist who understands that if you're staying with your partner, it's never over, right?

Like, we can't control what our partner is gonna do. And so We actually can't say that we're completely safe now. Um, anyway, and that's, that's the bummer of betrayal trauma. Um, so we need to be able to name what's happened. We need to have clear boundaries and differentiation so that all of our healing is not reliant on the partner. You cannot put all your healing and all your Um, serenity in whatever the partner's doing. They do have an impact for sure.

Um, they can help or hurt, but it can't be all in them. So we're powerless. Can we see this, that everybody's floundering here? Um, no one's admitted it yet because we don't know how to do that. Um, And maybe you've admitted it, but you're back into feeling like you can do this on your own. And the ironic thing is that pornography is a trick. It's false. It's not even real. It's pretend. Um, your affair is pretend.

Your affair is not as real as you think it is, right? Um, and everybody's kind of being fooled and duped here. And we need step 1. But before that, we're gonna fight, okay? Okay. We're gonna get in a big power struggle. And this timeline varies, so, uh, back and forth between trying to scrap for power, um, because we all feel so powerless in this situation. I'm this, uh, majestic lion, obviously, and my husband's the gladiator. And we will go head to head.

And then other times, like, I would be in the corner there crying, and he would be in the other corner feeling shame and anger. Okay? So, um, notice for yourself how you do your power struggle. And, um, in any power struggle, I say exit. I've supervised a lot of therapists now who are, Learning how to do therapy. And they'll come in, they'll talk about a case, and I can pick up on it pretty quick. They're like, ah, this client is like so difficult.

This client just like, he won't do anything I prescribe. Like all the homework I give him, he doesn't do. Um, everything I say, he's like combative, right? Um, and, and like you're in a power struggle. Okay. Who's, who's the most powerful? Who's the most smart in the room? Yeah. Um, it's a challenge. Don't play into it, okay? Don't win or lose the struggle, just exit it, okay? Um, so this is how we struggle with power within ourselves.

Um, the fear is driving, so fear takes over, and that's the driver, and you can't access this calm power. Yeah. If fear is driving, um, we use resentment as a shield. It's his fault. All of this is him, and, um, I don't need to do my work because this is all him. That's a struggle within yourself. You're kind of denying what— whatever is yours. I hate my partner and I love my partner. Letting go of this feels like a death.

Um, so After one of our first, like, we were still in like the first month or 2 of recovery and we were stalwart group goers and, you know, we would process on the way home. And I was always like, you know, what'd you learn at group? Right? And this one day he talked about how, and he had like these really solid men in his group, and they talked about how part of them wished that their— it would be easier if their wife would die than have to do this work.

And like, I, I was so offended, right? Like, oh my gosh, okay, I'm in group talking about this and you're in group talking about how you wish I would die. It wasn't like that, but it felt like that. Okay. Um, But it's a good example of the wrestle, like the absolute wrestle of letting this go. It's, it is wrenching. Okay. And that's that power struggle inside. Um, the shame and, and denying how bad it really is.

So we struggle with our higher power too. I don't need help. I can stop anytime. Um, that doesn't really help anyway. Or my higher power didn't protect me, so why would I trust that? Okay, that was— that's a big one. And then with our partner, so policing to control. Um, and I don't want to shame any of this, okay, because it just happens. Okay.

Tara McCausland: I think it's part—

Amanda Christensen: I think it's part of the process. So like, if you've never policed, congratulations, but Um, we all take our turn. Um, okay, shaming to make them feel small. I'm really good at that. The finger pointing, that's, that's in my back pocket. Um, waiting for the other one to do their work first. That's this power struggle. I'm not moving till you're moving. Okay. Um, gatekeeping versus safety seeking. I could spend a long time on that. Yeah. Or using boundaries as punishment instead of to keep yourself safe.

Um, I'm trying to teach a lesson here, okay? Um, and I want you to hurt. I want you to hurt because I'm hurting and you deserve to hurt, it feels like, right? Um, and then from the other side, there's these manipulation tactics that we talked about— total silence, um, and stonewalling. Anger and moodiness, that's to kind of control the dynamic. I can, I can control how much you confront me if I get angry every time, because you'll be scared, you'll back down, you won't confront me so much, and I can't handle the confronting.

Okay. And then taking the victim role so, um, so that I can then be rescued. Now you're not mad at me because now you're rescuing me because I'm acting pitiful. Yeah. Oh, here's my ironic thesis, you guys. So this was in 2014, and I, again, I had no idea any of this was happening, and I was just loving grad school. And, um, like, I had to pick my thesis topic in 2012 when I first started, and this is what I picked: the relationship between partner perceptions of marital power and sexual satisfaction as mediated by observed hostile interaction.

So it's all written right there. Okay. Um, it's written down. It's many, many pages long. And, uh, yeah. So can you tell there's some kind of power dynamic going on here? I'm being lied to, but I don't know it. Um, something sexual is off and there's a lot of hostility here. Okay. So, um, I just find that— I find it funny now. Um, if you want to know the findings, the more egalitarian the power is, the higher the sexual satisfaction, just so you know.

Okay, so we're here at surrender. Our lives have become unmanageable. All you have to do is admit it. We just have to admit it. It's already unmanageable. You're already powerless. Um, we just have to admit it. And that's, that's the The choice. Like, we get to choose to admit reality, um, to acknowledge the truth and to let it in, and to let in what that actually means. And here's our healing journey. A lot of this needs to happen before anything actually gets moving.

So a lot of times we get the order wrong, like we try to do Uh, step— like, we try to do things way down the line first instead of doing this stuff. So stopping the behavior is necessary and great. We need sobriety. Um, we need to, um, get regulated as the betrayed and not be sucked into what feels safe. Yeah. But you often can't actually even do that unless you get a little deeper. So the 12 steps are literally a map for doing that.

They are a map for going deeper. And use therapy to your advantage there. That's what you're doing. I don't want therapy to be about your sobriety a lot of times. I want my clients working the steps outside of session. Yeah. Going to group, calling their sponsors, doing that to deal with sobriety boundaries, phone stuff. And I'll do it for sure in therapy, but I would much rather spend time on the deeper wounds because that's actually going to get us to a deeper level of healing.

Admit, address this underlying pain, create the internal safety. And then use your calm power. So leaning into truth and choice, this is my last slide. I'm a huge fan of full therapeutic disclosures. If you haven't done one, you need one. Um, you can do that in a longer format, or what I do now is disclosure intensives. I do the longer format too, but what I say yes to right now is disclosure intensives. Um, Which is just quicker.

Not a good fit for everyone, but for some it's a good fit. Regular personal surrender. So this is inside yourself, this is in prayer, this is out loud, this is in your journaling, this is to your sponsor, this is calling someone from group. Okay, surrender can look so many different ways. I belted Celine Dion's I Surrender on the way here. Because I needed that. Okay. Um, steps 1, 4, and 9. These are, these are working steps. Okay. So step 1, we're powerless.

Step 4, I'm gonna actually look at myself and I'm gonna look at all my character weaknesses and I'm going to account for them. And I'm gonna look at how I respond to what's happened to me. And then step 9, like, I'm gonna, I gotta do something about this. I've gotta repair. And that takes insane bravery, regular contact with others, transparency agreements between couples, boundaries and agreements. And all of that is gonna get you closer to this choice, to choosing how you wanna show up.

On this healing journey. And, uh, yeah, just to end, I'm so grateful that I found the light gap. That— it's hard to say, right? But the mother tree fell. Okay, it actually got cut down. Mine got cut down. And if your mother tree has gotten cut down or it's fallen down, look for the light gap. Mm-hmm. And you have a, you have a fairy ring. You have fairies, okay? Clones of you. You're not dead. That's my message.

You're not dead, okay? You haven't died. You're here. And there's amazing tools to move forward. Um, you have to harness your courage and you have to take a step forward and start growing and, um, Just grow and grow. Yeah, I believe in it. So thank you.

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