Rhyll Anne Croshaw, with the SA Lifeline foundation, shares her insights about the surrender process.
Why do we need the surrender process? Rhyll says that the rewards of surrendering to God are peace. For those of us who struggle with betrayal trauma, peace is like water to our souls.
Rhyll shares her 3 step surrender process and adds some extra details that I find particularly helpful. The basics to the 3 steps of surrender are:
1- Knees.
2- Phone.
3- Box.
Surrendering to God is a key component of 12 step recovery work. Rhyll’s insights are helpful for newcomers and those more experienced in 12 step recovery work.
NOTES:
To attend a gender specific SA Lifeline 12 step meeting for betrayal trauma and/ or sex addiction, please visit https://salifeline.org/ .
Ashlynn Mitchell discusses how to be the buffalo on this week’s episode. Because Ashlynn has been open with her recent experiences of heartache and thriving, I wanted to learn more. I am grateful that Ashlynn generously shares her experiences regarding healing from her recent divorce. We discuss how to be the buffalo…
Physically
Emotionally
& Spiritually
I’ve implemented some things from Ashlynn’s interview that have helped in my own healing. I am hopeful that they will help in yours as well.
Ashlynn is a podcast host for This Is Ashlynn, The Betrayed the Addicted and the Expert, is a co-creator of the program Beyond Enough, runs betrayal trauma groups and is a health and fitness coach.
Addiction & mental illness often go hand in hand. Sometimes it’s hard to see that there is an underlying issue. This last year, my eyes have been forced wide open and I am sharing more of our story here.
Very special thanks goes to my husband who decided to let me be more open about our story. This leaves him vulnerable, as he struggles with both sex addiction and mental illness. Thankfully, because we are now aware of the connection, our resources have expanded and we are finding healing.
By sharing our story, we hope that others can know that they aren’t alone, gain awareness and perhaps get much needed help.
Working Through Strong Emotions is something that everyone has to deal with at times. For those of us who deal with betrayal trauma due to the sex addiction of a loved one we often times have an added struggle.
Emotions! When betrayal trauma hits, emotions can be all over the place.
“traumatized people chronically feel unsafe inside their bodies: The past us alive in the form of gnawing interior discomfort. Their bodies are constantly bombarded by visceral warning signs, and, in an attempt to control these processes, they often become expert at ignoring their gut feelings and in numbing awareness of what is played out inside. They learn to hid from their selves.” Besel Van Der Kolk
As we can see with soldiers, how we deal with emotions can easily and understandably swing too far one way or the other. It’s like a pendulum. We can go too far one way and too far another. The hope is that we can learn to be more centered.
Emotions aren’t bad or good, they just are.
From the website Thought Catalog, this quote is by Anna Gragert “When I started going to therapy, it was pointed out to me that I label my emotions as either “positive” or “negative.” In response to positive emotions, I push myself to stay on the train of happiness. As for negative emotions, I tend to push them away and feel as if I caused my own demise. Obviously, this is not healthy, but I feel that a lot of us tend to do this. We do not want to deal with painful emotions, which is why we throw ourselves into our work or paste a fake smile upon our faces.” (Thought Catalog post written by Anna Gragert)
Toxic Positivity
Have you ever had someone tell you, when you are in the middle of severe emotional distress, things in an effort to help that go something like this,
“You can choose happiness right now!”
“It’s alright, you just need to keep going.”
“You need to focus on positive things.”
“Just be positive.”
“You’re so lucky that _________ didn’t happen to you.”
And more. Might I suggest boundaries with those who have yet learned to “mourn with those who mourn and comfort those who stand in need of comfort.” That’s from Mosiah 18: 8- 10. (Take what you like and leave the rest.)
In case it’s validating for anyone, I’ll link a Hope Works Video: titled Mourn With Those That Mourn to see healthy ways of addressing someone going through hard things.
Another valuable resource might be Episode 4 of the Betrayal Trauma SOS Podcast titled: Why Your Story Matters and How To Safely Share it.
Likewise though, we can also apply toxic positivity to ourselves. We might expect that we should be to a certain point in our healing, or we might think that we should not feel something in particular. It’s easy to undervalue the impact of our experience and/ or what we think the effects of betrayal trauma should be.
Can I suggest that we take out the “I should’s” and seek for acceptance of what is. This is brave to face.
Honoring Emotions
Emotions need to be honored. In this episode I discuss a personal story of how I had no tears after our formal disclosure and how honoring anger was key to my healing. (Listen for the full story.)
My 5 Basics For Handling STRONG Emotions are:
In regards to honoring emotions vs. indulging in emotions: Dr. Jonice Webb quote “Honoring an emotion involves sitting with it, accepting it and trying to understand it. For some emotions, going through the process of honoring it is enough to make it tolerable.”
Dr. Webb then goes on to talk about some people being stuck at this point and talks about moving towards action.
To hear more details, please listen to the entire episode. Let’s heal together. XO Jeni
Episode 16: How To Help a Loved One With a Sex Addiction
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How To Help a Loved One With a Sex Addiction
We can’t “fix” our loved ones, but there are things that we can do. A few topics that we will discuss in this Betrayal Trauma SOS podcast episode are:
1- Learning About Sex Addiction
2- Keeping things shame free
3- Setting Boundaries
4- Strengthening Intuition
“Intuition is not a single way of knowing – it’s our ability to hold space for uncertainty and our willingness to trust the many ways we’ve developed knowledge and insight, including instinct, experience, faith and reason.” Brene Brown
Episode 15: Raising Porn Addiction Resistant Children
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Have you wondered how to teach children about pornography? Me too friend. This week’s podcast episode is all about raising porn addiction resistant children/
This episode stems from a question from last week’s Q & A: “Hi Jeni! I have a question for you: how do you raise sex addiction resistant children? I think about having kids and I worry about them suffering from the same demons that my husband does. I worry about them picking up not safe emotional habits.”
I want to say thank you so much for this beautiful question. I have many of the same concerns and am actively looking for ways to help my 6 children with these very things. Basically, I’m in the trenches with you.
What does porn do to children’s brains?
Neurosurgeon Donald Hilton says this: “Our brain cells change with learning. Addictive learning sculpts the brain in a very damaging way and we can become very set in certain behaviors and tastes.
When there is a reward like pornography, that’s a specially powerful printing process. The brain doesn’t forget that. A 12- year-old who sees hardcore porn is going to say ‘Wow that was amazing’.
Sometimes children may be frightened, but the fascination overcomes the fright eventually.
One thing our brain wants is novelty, change. It wants a different face, a different body shape. Boys, and increasingly girls, are struggling with porn. They literally surf for hours looking for the perfect clip to masturbate to.
There is a lot of scientific evidence that sex can, and in particular Internet porn, be addictive. It’s like a blackjack game, it’s a different set of cards every time.”
The thing is, it’s not IF children will see porn, it’s WHEN.
In a talk titled “A Sin Resistant Generation” by Joy D. Jones, she talks about a critical understanding when she says, “We must understand our—and their—divine identity and purpose before we can help our children see who they are and why they are here. We must help them know without question that they are sons and daughters of a loving Heavenly Father and that He has divine expectations of them.”
We discuss Rat Park in today’s episode as well. We talk about the ROOT of addiction, which is lack of connection.
How do we make it safe for children to share their feelings in our home so that they can ultimately connect in healthy ways with others.
This week we also discuss the skill of making feelings safe. In regards to this, we discuss the following quote from Katy Willis, “When I finally learned that each one of us has the right to feel and that we can validate the other person without also having to validate the drama, the distortions, the story… it has completely changed the way I approach others.”
Something else that we can’t miss in this process is how do we talk to our children about sex and sexuality? Of course this is incredibly personal per family but I’ll share what we are working on.
We’ll additionally talk about:
Talking about sex in age appropriate ways
Taking shame OUT when talking about sex to children
How to talk about sex frequently
When Talking About Pornography, here’s a few things that we teach our children:
1- Name it (That’s pornography)
2- Crash (Turn off any devices, close a magazine, etc.)
3- Tell (Talk to a trusted adult- like a parent)
4- Recognize that no matter how it made you feel, you aren’t bad. Take the shame out.
What To Do When Your Child Tells You That They’ve Seen Porn
If one of my children comes and tells me that they have seen porn,
Know that there are many levels of porn use and it doesn’t mean that they are addiction. Of course, it doesn’t mean that there’s not addiction. Staying curious is critical.
The pattern for my response looks like this:
1- Validate them as a person- bravery- Thank them for trusting me with such hard information.
2- Normalize emotions and desires (not actions.)
3- Teach correct principles when needed without shame.
4- Determine what support they need and follow through
Facing denial to live in truth is critical for anyone, but especially those of us who have a loved one that struggles with addiction. Let’s learn why it’s an important element to address when healing from betrayal.
Denial. What is it and why do we need to be aware of it? This podcast episode uses a parable from Deiter F. Uchtdorf about blind men feeling and describing different parts of an elephant. One feels the trunk and says that it must be snake-like, while another feels a leg and thinks it’s more like a tree.
Denial is like that. It’s easy to have blinders on and only describe small parts of the big picture. We end up painting a false picture to ourselves and others.
We can’t fix what we can’t see. Shedding denial is a critical part of the healing process from betrayal trauma and other heartaches as well.
My goal has become to live in truth. However unappealing it may seem, living in truth helps me to have a clear picture so that I can make adjustments in my life.
For those of us who are suffering from trauma, living in truth is crucial because, as is talked about in The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel Van Der Kolk, it is important for us to integrate what has happened to us.
Episode 9: How To Shine Your Light So That Others Can See
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Do you want to learn to communicate more effectively, and don’t know where to begin.
All who are seeking to learn communication skills will likely find things of worth in today’s episode. While this Betrayal Trauma SOS podcast episode is geared towards helping those who are struggling with betrayal trauma learn better ways to communicate, most things can be applied to many different scenarios.
Sometimes we have a message to convey that is very important to us, but it’s as if we hit a wall when we try to communicate it.
Have you ever felt highly elevated when faced with a hard conversation? I know that I sure have. Hard things are going on with our bodies, and this can happen to anyone.
The basis of this episode stems from a talk given by Bonnie H. Cordon in the April 2020 General Conference for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
She talked about a time when her family hosted an apostle named Elder L. Tom Perry when she was 10 years old. Late that night her mother asked if she had fed the chickens, and her cute response was that maybe the chickens should fast that night. She didn’t want to leave the company of the apostle. Of course that wasn’t acceptable, but Elder Perry had heard the exchange and offered to accompany her, along with his son to feed the chickens.
She ran ahead and after jumping over the irrigation ditch that she was use to encountering. Elder Perry hadn’t been able to follow her light. He stepped right into the irrigation ditch.
She says, “I was shining my light but not in a way that would help Elder Perry. Now, knowing that he needed my light to safely navigate the path, I focused the flashlight just ahead of his steps and we were able to return home with confidence.”
I am learning that I can do my best to show up to hard conversations and can navigate them better when I employ communication skills. I’m still a work in progress, and what I share today is from my own experiences and studies to improve my own communication skills.
These 8 communication tools are what I am personally working on. More detail is provided in the podcast. Let’s learn to communicate:
Understanding what we hope to accomplish with our conversation. When we are crystal clear with what we are hoping to accomplish, we can better stay on track in our conversations.
Organizing thoughts goes a long way. When I take the time to organize my thinking before holding conversations, they tend to go much better.
Knowing I am of worth and that the other person is also of worth. It is not humility to be less or more than what we were created to be. It’s important to know that in God’s eyes we are on equal ground. No matter our station, we are all important. Internalizing this concept helps us to value not just our own thoughts, but those of others as well.
Learning to be aware of our emotional state and use tools to stay grounded. Whether we are highly elevated due to stress or trauma, becoming grounded can be a wonderful tool for being able to gain emotional stability and be able to re-engage in conversation from a more neutral place.
Consider your emotional safety and the emotional safety of those you are communicating with.
Consider that their response is about them. Of course, this takes practice and is easier said than done. It’s ok to be a work in progress.
Consider boundaries in conversations. I’m planning a boundaries episode soon, so stay tuned for that.
8. Taking drama out of communication. The goal is to stay out of drama as best as possible. This is likely a lifelong pursuit and the more I dig, the more evidence I find regarding my role in drama. It’s often very subtle and difficult to see. The better I get at not engaging in drama, the healthier my relationships become.
This week’s meditation will be on the Betrayal Trauma SOS Youtube page later this week. I want to give a shout out to my friends who helped me make this week’s meditation regarding letting our light shine, something that I love. Special thanks to Arianna Rees, who is a therapist trained life coach and is the host of the With Real Intent Podcast, and Katy Willis, who has many qualifications in regards to meditation and yoga plus a multitude of other things, a genuine thank you.
As I better learn to communicate,I have found many blessing. I would love to hear if any part of this week’s Betrayal Trauma SOS episode has been beneficial in your life.
Episode 8: Intuition- You Were Right and You Knew It
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Intuition. You know that time that you knew that something was off? You were right and your body knew it.
*This episode is appropriate for anyone with a loved one who struggles with addiction. This includes alcoholism, drug abuse, gambling addiction and more.
Let’s explore together about what intuition is and how to cultivate it.
When I first began recovery from sexual betrayal, I would only make boundaries based on what I could prove. I have a dear recovery friend who taught me that betrayal trauma recovery becomes richer when we can make boundaries based on our gut instinct, or intuition. She was right and learning to do that drastically changed my life.
The trick is that when addiction, sex addiction, porn addiction, etc is involved, we likely don’t have all of the facts. That’s where intuition comes in.
While boundaries help protect us, when we are better in tune with our gut, we can make better boundaries. In fact, we can get to the point where we make boundaries that aren’t based on what we see or hear for the most part. We can make them based on gut instinct.
In this podcast, we will discuss 5 principles to strengthen gut intuition.
How Faith Is Helpful With Intuition
Learning To Be Still
Checkout It Out With Prayer
Learning To Hear What Your Body Says
Gaining knowledge
Next week we are talking about finding your voice and how to use it so that it is heard. I hope you’ll join me. If this episode has been helpful for you, then I hope you will consider subscribing, leaving 5 stars or consider sharing it with someone who might benefit. Betrayal trauma sos can be found on facebook, instagram and at betrayal trauma sos.com. Let’s heal together.
