Building Trust

If you’re a married man who’s messed up by committing sexual sin, and your wife is both aware of and recovering from your actions, then one of your primary goals is to rebuild trust. You’re repentant, and you want her to know it. You’re ready to do what’s necessary to repair the damage done to you, her and the marriage, and you want her confidence again. Great.

To that end, let me point out three mistakes men in your position commonly make, in the interest of you avoiding them and maximizing your consistency and credibility with here. Here, then, are three common errors to watch out for:

Minimizing

Please repeat after me: Sexual sin wounds wives.

Wounds. Not “irritates” or “inconveniences.” It’s a blow to her soul, a betrayal, an insult she never deserved. If you’ve subjected her to all that, the least you can do is recognize it for what it is. When you minimize it, you speak of it as though it’s a minor “my bad”, like leaving the faucet running or forgetting the oven was on. That’s understandable, certainly, because if you’ve had a pattern of secret sexual sin in your life, the sin itself has probably lost its shock value in your eyes. You’ve gotten used to it; you know it’s wrong, but it doesn’t look so bad anymore. But just because you got used to it doesn’t mean she will, nor should she. And if you use phrases like “It’s not that big a deal; lots of guys do it”, or “It didn’t have anything to do with you, so let’s move on”, then you’re telling her you still don’t recognize the severity of your actions. And if you don’t recognize how wrong it was, how’s she to believe you’re taking it seriously enough to abstain from it in the future? Paul said to flee unclean behavior, because it had a specific severity to it, damaging and defiling a man’s very body. (I Corinthians 6:18) We could do with a bit of his indignation these days. So flee the thing itself, and while you’re at it, flee any phrases that would minimize the seriousness of it, because each minimizing statement you make brings your credibility down a few more notches.

Pushing her to get over it.

No man with a shred of decency enjoys seeing his wife hurt. Most of us, in fact, can’t be at peace as long as we know our lady is angry, moody, or wounded by something we’ve done. All of which moves some guys to push their wives to get better, which makes as much sense as breaking someone’s leg, then telling them that seeing them in a cast makes you feel so guilty, so would they please take off the cast and start running , so you’ll feel better? If you’re really repentant, you make no demands. You don’t insist she stop being hurt so you can start feeling comfortable; you don’t require her to relate to you as though nothing’s happened, just so you can act as though nothing’s happened. You allow her to grieve, process her hurt and anger, and heal. Because believe me, one of the best ways to ensure things don’t get better, is to insist that they do.

Subjecting her to the Chinese Water Torture

The practice of dripping small amounts of water onto the forehead over a sustained period of time was known to drive prisoners insane, especially when the victim had no way of knowing when the next drip would come. Likewise, some wives are driven mad by husbands who “drip out” their confessions, stringing them out in small doses, leaving the poor woman wondering when and how the next drip will come. Classic example: A woman discovers her husband using porn, and wants to know how long he’s had the habit. At first he claims it’s not a habit; he just experimented. A week later he admits he’s been doing it for months; days later he cops to a seven-year history of weekly porn use. Drip, drip. Instead of giving her the full picture, he hits her with a partial snapshot, letting her think she knows the whole story. Then the rug gets pulled out from under her, again and again, until she never feels settled, wondering what new revelation is coming. Every wife I‘ve known in this situation agrees that she’d rather hear the whole ugly truth in one gush, than be tortured with confessional drips. So man up and get the whole miserable disclosure out so it can be dealt with once and for all.

Avoid these errors and you save yourself, and your marriage, a lot of unnecessary turmoil. And while you’re at it, never forget the value of humility, teachableness and gentle patience. They’ll get you far in the process as well. If you’ve sinned, there’s a real bleakness to endure and a hope to hang onto as well, so let the healing begin.