Making Your Marriage a Refuge with Special Guest Gary Thomas Ep. 530

[00:00:00] < Intro >

Lindsay: Welcome to The Awesome Marriage Podcast. A place for honest conversations and practical advice on how to build an awesome marriage. I am your podcast producer and co-host Lindsay Few. On the show will be our host, Dr. Kim Kimberling. 

Dr. Kim is a marriage counselor and has been married for over 50 years. His passion is to help you strengthen your most intimate relationship.

Dr. Kim: Welcome to The Awesome Marriage Podcast. Today, author Gary Thomas joins me. Gary has been a previous guest on the podcast, I'm so glad to have him back with us today. 

His newest book, Making Your Marriage a Fortress: Strengthening Your Marriage to Withstand Life’s Storms, it's out this month. So let's go to the studio and begin our talk with Gary Thomas. 

Well, Gary, welcome to today's Awesome Marriage Podcast. It is so good to have you back on the podcast again. Thank you for spending time with us today.

Gary: Well, it's my honor and privilege. Thank you so much.

Dr. Kim: We're excited about the new book that's coming out, Making Your Marriage a Fortress: Strengthening Your Marriage to Withstand Life’s Storms, I love the title, I think it fits us all and, especially, after the couple of years that we have come out of. 

We've had a lot of storms and a lot of storms in marriages. So paint this picture of what marriage can look like when a couple has made it a fortress. I love that analogy.

Gary: The whole point is that this world is not kind to marriages. We have our own sin. James 3:2 says, "We all stumble in many ways." We have the sin of others, they sin against us. We have financial challenges; we have economic challenges. We've just have been through a worldwide pandemic. 

And, so, I was just talking to all of these couples, where just some of the worst things imaginable happened, losing their only son. A severe medical diagnosis for a lifelong disability, you name it. And, and, sometimes, frankly, Dr. Kim, it could be good things. 

I talked to a good friend of yours, Debra Fileta, about her and John when they had the blessing of a baby coming into the house. But as Les Parrot says, "When a new baby is born, a new marriage is born."

Dr. Kim: Yes, absolutely.

Gary: Whether it's good or bad, these pressures come, and the whole point in making your marriage a fortress is; will your marriage be part of the solution or part of the problem?

Dr. Kim: Mm-hmm.

Gary: Because if the problem pulls you apart, then your marriage becomes the biggest issue. Now you're facing the medical challenge alone. You're facing the financial problems alone. You're facing the extra burdens alone. And the whole point is; how can we be together? 

Not just still married but emotionally connected, spiritually growing, supporting each other, so that our marriage is a refuge. It's a fortress rather than something that is, really, our greatest concern, our greatest hurt, our greatest regret.

Dr. Kim: Yes, I think that whole deal of this, "How do we do this? How do we stay connected? How do we keep that? It's such a difficult thing. I think, like we talked about, with the current state of where we've been the last couple of years. But just in the lives that people live and making time for that and learning how much value that is. 

I see in counseling, I've seen couples who have lost a child and things like that, and things that are just devastating to someone. And, really, when you said that, I was thinking, really, only one couple comes to mind that I think. 

I don't think you're ever prepared to lose a child, but their marriage was really in a good place and they went through that together. And that's such a difference because, I think, as you know, many marriages don't make it when a child is lost.

Gary: Yes, well, in fact, and with a couple that I interviewed, it was their only child. They'd had difficulty conceiving. They had a wonderful boy, he died just before his 20th birthday, and it was as devastating as you could imagine. 

One of the first things she did, the morning that she found out her son had died, and she grabbed the lapels of a good friend of hers and said, "Look, I know, I've read the statistics, 70% of couples in this situation won't survive it. We've lost our son, please pray for us so that we don't lose our marriage."

Dr. Kim: Mm-hmm.

Gary: In their case, they came out of it stronger. I don't want to make it sound too simple, because they were really rocked in their relationship, for a while. They mentioned how the second year was harder than the first year. The first year you're numb, you're going through the things, you're trying to survive.

It's the second year when the numbness starts to wear off and you realize, "Okay, it wasn't just one Christmas we're living without our son. It's every Christmas for the rest of our lives we're not going to have our son." 

And when his friends would graduate, or his friends would get hired, or his friends would get married, or his friends would have kids, they'd realize, "It's not just what we lost, it's what we are losing that life has changed going forward."

But their goal was; how do we come out of this closer as a couple because of what we went through? I talked to another couple, a wonderful man serving our country in the military as a chaplain. He goes to some scary places. 

He can work with Special-Ops teams and their goal, again, is the same. "How do we stay connected even when we're thousands of miles and five or six time zones apart? Because just though we don't live in the same place, we're still married. How do I reserve my time? How do I reserve my energy? How do we connect?"

What really held all of these couples together, in the sense of getting through this? Even the couple that faced MS together on the part of the husband was, "Okay, how do we face this together? How do we talk? How do we communicate so that we're not alone?"

Because, ultimately, I think loneliness becomes the biggest problem. I think people would rather have financial challenges if they're going through it hand in hand. They'll face medical challenges if they're going through it hand in hand. It's the prospect when you're lonely, isn't that enticing to most of us.

Dr. Kim: No, not at all. And I think it's really interesting what you said the couple said, about the second year after their son died being the hardest. And I think it's something we have to continue to do, you just can't build your fortress and then coast. I mean, you've got to continue to work on that.

Gary: Yes, one of the things that's fascinating to me, I love traveling in Europe and reading about Europe, and you go back and you see these castles that sometimes took hundreds of years to build. And what's fascinating is that by the time they were built, there's a whole new level of warfare against them. 

I mean, they started to be built with slingshot or something that would go against them, and then 300 years later, warfare had advanced, weapons had advanced. So they're kind of building their fortress for an attack they don't really know that will come. 

Dr. Kim: Yes.

Gary: And I think about this, I work with a lot of premarital couples. I perform weddings and I'm trying to prepare them spiritually because they don't know where the attack will come from. It could be a health diagnosis. Some of them, it could be affluence. 

I'll never forget the businessman who told me, "Gary, my marriage was rocked when I stopped earning hundreds of thousands and started earning millions of dollars a year. Our marriage couldn't survive that." So what you might think is a blessing that ended up being a challenge. 

So we don't know where the attack will come from. From within, without, if it'll be health, financial, spiritual, relational, you name it. The key is that if we sink our roots in the author and finisher of our faith, they, they all came back to that. 

That, ultimately, I think the couple that went through a financial crisis, where they started out poor. 

So they didn't expect to be wealthy and then they ended up earning millions of dollars and losing it all. Starting to climb the way back and then Covid hit and then they have to sell their house, that they raised their kids in. 

But what really helped the wife, and it's just a beautiful story of how she protected her husband's reputation, how she supported him, and encouraged him. Just when he could feel like a failure or less. She said, "What really got me through is I read Psalm 23 and I realized, "The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want."

She goes, "It's easy for me to think ‘I shall not want’ because my husband was a really good business man. He made millions of dollars a year." But now she's like, "No, ultimately, I don't want because the Lord is my shepherd."

The couple that lost their only child, this is one of the most profound things I've heard. She got really serious and I said, "How do you handle this?"

And she goes, "Gary, God didn't just call Garrett" that was the name of their son. "From us, he called Garrett to something." And she said, "Today, as we speak, Garrett Loose is in heaven, perfectly fulfilling God's will for his life, in a perfect, glorified state."

She goes, "My other friends, they have their kids who are alive and they're going through divorces, or substance abuse, or unemployment, or depression, or rebellious children."

She says, "We don't have any of that because, well, I don't know exactly what Garrett is doing. I know he's serving God perfectly and it gives me great joy to think, 'I have a son who's perfectly serving God in glory waiting for me to be reunited.'" For her, the hope of heaven it's not wishful thinking it sustains her and that's where faith becomes real, and faith did become real. 

Then I got a couple with MS, where Darrel said when he was first diagnosed, and he was a big bodybuilder before he had MS and that was his identity, having strength. And, so, when he was given the devastating diagnosis that he had multiple sclerosis. 

That he would soon be in a wheelchair, and then in a scooter, and it just progresses. He said, "My prayer was, 'Heal me, heal me.'" Until God said, "Darrel, I'm going to heal you but not of MS. There are other things in your life I want to address and MS is a tool I can use to address that."

And then the wife, and these things just amaze me the depth of their faith, that's why I'm eager for their stories to get out. The wife said, "Gary, I was always afraid of that." She wanted a strong husband. She wanted the security of a man who could protect her and she realized, "In the end, my fear of MS hurt our family more than MS hurt our family."

Dr. Kim: Wow. 

Gary: And I saw these deep works of God's Spirit that really got to the heart of their faith. These are different people because of what they faced. And it all came back to faith one, and two, all deciding, "Okay, this isn't going to rip us apart, we're going to get closer through this. 

We're going to face this together." And those two things really made the difference. It's what made their marriage a fortress.

Dr. Kim: Wow, that is so powerful. I mean, their stories are just heart wrenching but to see that.  I hear the phrase, "Jesus is enough." And sometimes I think we may hear that and we just don't let it sink in. But with the stories you're telling, He really is. I mean, He was what got them through the things that they're going through, and that He's always there for us.

Gary: He really did. And the key is, and maybe for some of the listeners and viewers, the storms will hit. It's not a threat, it's just the reality of life. If they haven't hit, yet, it's going to come.

  I don't know what form, I don't know what direction, I don't know what aspect it will take on, but they will come. And that's why we want to be spiritually grounded in the Lord before it happens so that our marriage isn't taken out. 

One couple I talked to, the husband had had a sexual addiction, it was awful and horrendous. He was found out, he said he thought it was the worst day of his life. Looking back, he says, "It was the best day of my life." Because he was freed and he got serious, he went to counseling, he was in 12 Step groups, he had accountability.

They took it to the length where he would do lie detector tests on a quarterly basis. So his wife knew what was happening. Just became a stronger person and a stronger man. 18 months after he entered recovery, his daughter was diagnosed with leukemia, life-threatening leukemia. And his wife would spend a lot of time at the hospital with his daughter. So he had to be there for his boys. 

Both the husband and the wife told me, "If he hadn't gotten his addiction under control, we wouldn't have made it." And they talked about the couples who, it was really awkward, they had a kid in the cancer ward and they would have to come in at different times. 

Because they were estranged or they were upset with each other, they weren't facing it together. And the husband told me, "Gary, I couldn't have been there for my wife because an addiction soaks up all of your energy. I couldn't have been there for her. I couldn't have been there for my daughter. I wouldn't have been there for my sons who were watching their sister go through this. Who were having to get by without their mom much of the time because she was at the hospital." 

He was just so thankful that God had allowed him to become exposed so he could repent of the sin, and get his life in order so that he could be strong when the storm hit. And this is my plea of Christians, if you have this, seemingly, little addiction on the side, it might actually be a big one. If you're growing distant in your marriage and, "Maybe it's just not worth the effort or we'll just deal with it someday."

And, so, you grow more and more emotionally distant. If you're kind of getting a little bit lackadaisical about church, or Bible study, or prayer. You can survive if you're entering and living in the climate of Santa Barbara, where it's 70 degrees all the time.

But if the climate changes to Alaska, in winter, or Houston in August, where you have the super-hot or super cold. Will your estrangement, will your addiction, it could be money, it could be food, any number of things, will you be strong enough, then, when it hits? 

And if we know it's going to hit, "I want to get right with the Lord. I want to walk in righteousness. I want to walk in community. I want to have friends that can support us because we'll need them and we want to be there for them. I want to be a part of a church community where we can be fed, and we can participate, and we can be used by God."

It's not rocket science, it's the things we know we should be doing. But the threat of a storm is just, sort of, a wakeup call. 

Dr. Kim: Yes.

Gary: "Okay, you've gotten away with being lackadaisical. Let's get your house in order so that when the storm hits, you can be there for each other. You can be there for your kids. You can be there for your church and you can draw closer to God."

Dr. Kim: Yes, it's like when we're in Santa Barbara, it's easier to be complacent, I think. And, so, why don't couples, and maybe that's it, why don't we put the time and the work in to build those fortresses? What keeps us from doing that?

Gary: Well, I think there are a number of things. Some good and understandable, some not so good. I just spent a week with my son and his wife and their two kids, and I'd forgotten how exhausting it is. 

They don't get much sleep and they were going to a wedding of a friend. So they come back at 11 and their kids are getting them up at six o'clock and we can try to help. Some of it is life is busy and it's not kind to marriage. 

And, so, the couples that addressed that, and I mentioned Debra and John Fileta, were a couple that did that. There was another couple where he was a pastor, during Covid, and busyness took over and whatnot. I would think of Baron and Christina. Baron is in the military and whatnot. What really helped them is they decided to become intentional. 

For Debra and John, it was, "We need Sunday night check-ins." And it's become a mainstay of their marriage, that's inviolable. Where they're going to talk about their relationship. They're going to talk about their life, they're going to talk about their spiritual growth. 

But they found out if they weren't reserving a time for that, they just didn't do it. And Randy and Hannah, the couple that faced the challenges as Covid just changed everything about being a pastor. They have what they call three check-ins. 

They have the weekly check-ins for fun and the relationship. But they found they also needed a weekly check-in for the business meetings, otherwise the date would be taken up by that. So that's the, "Are you paying this bill? What do we have to do on the house and that?" 

Then they had the third one that Randy just called their morning check-ins. Where they just really want to be connected. And, so, every morning, and this would be just five or 10 minutes, "What's going on for your day?"

"What do you have going up today?"

"I want to know what's happening?"

"How can I pray for you?"

"How can I be there?" Now, Randy found out, this is kind of funny, that they only work after his wife has been caffeinated. So he gets her a cup of coffee, he lets her have 10, 15 minutes alone and then they come in and check in and they do that. 

The couple in the military, I thought this was a very insightful thing that Baron learned. When he was out on the road, one time, it was a meeting with other chaplains. And, so, they were going out every evening and it was healthy, wholesome things that they would do. But his wife, Christina, was feeling left out. She was like, "I'm not hearing from you. You're not having time to call or you're too tired?"

And he realized, "Look, if I was at home, I would never go out three nights in a row without my wife. So just because I'm distant from my wife it doesn't mean I'm not married to my wife. It doesn't mean I shouldn't act like a married man. I've got to say no to some of these things on the road so that I can reserve the energy, and time, and focus to be there for my wife."

So the couples that went through this, they were just very intentional. They wanted a close marriage and several of them said the same thing. They said, "You know what, we realized, "We weren't going to get a divorce. This just wasn't going to be us. So we would either be miserable or happy together. Now, why not put in the work to go ahead and feel connected, like we're sharing life together."

The hopeful message behind this, for couples listening and watching, is that you can choose to get reconnected. If you've drifted apart, it doesn't mean you married the wrong person. It means maybe you got a little distracted in your marriage skills. Maybe you got a little behind on your priorities. And, so, you just say, "Okay, well, let's readjust, let's refocus what works for us, not one prescription works for everybody."

But let's just be more intentional and purposeful that regardless of what happens, whether we're adding a child, whether we have a financial crisis, whether I'm having to work two jobs, well, I've got a hospital visit coming up or something. We're going to come out of this closer together and in the end it will actually serve our marriage rather than detract from it."

Dr. Kim: Oh, that's so good and the word intentional is so important, and I think it has to be that way. I was thinking back to when we got married, 52 years ago, I thought, "I had this thing down pretty good." 

My parents had a good marriage and I did think ours would be [Inaudibe 00:19:42]. And then it was, probably, six months into marriage, I thought, "I know nothing about this." And if we were going to make it we had to be intentional. So we had a lot to learn and to go through that.

But I think that what I see in couples that take that step and are intentional to build that, there's that joy that comes with that. There is something in our marriages, that we miss when we don't do that, and our tendency is to look to other places for it. Well, God gave it to us. It goes back to God's first and our spouse second, and we do that, it makes a difference. I mean, that's what being married is all about.

Gary: One of the couples, and I love this because they dispelled the myth about how people say, "Oh, you guys are so lucky."

"You have such a great marriage."

"You found the right person." They said, "It has nothing to do with luck and it has nothing to do with finding the right person. They don't see how hard we work at our marriage." That's a couple that has the three different check-ins.

Dr. Kim: Yes.

Gary: It doesn't work, "Our marriage isn't pleasant if we get lazy on this, if we let other things get into." So they talked about their schedule, "Well, if you commit to this and I commit to that, we know how we're going to feel about each other in August or how we're not going to feel about each other." So we can't do that.

It's so easy for couples on the outside looking in to say, "Well, they just got lucky or they're just, particularly, well-matched." And this couple made it very clear, it's not about being well-matched it's about being intentional. I call it relationally industrious. They're willing to put in the work and they would say without equivocation that it's worth it. 

If you're going to be married, why not have an intimate marriage? Why not have a connected marriage? Why not have a supportive, encouraging marriage? It doesn't happen by accident. It doesn't happen if we neglect our marriage. But the work we put into it, I feel like it's the 401K match, the company will match your investment one-to-one. I feel like with marriage it's 10 to one. 

Yes, it's a little bit of work, but you get back tenfold what you put in. And I say that to guys when they start to escape from their wives with excessive video game watching or whatnot, "Why would I want to give that up?"

I said, "Well, if you could experience what it's like to have a shared passion with your wife to be connected. You would realize this individual pursuit it just doesn't even compare. You're looking at what your wife is asking you to give up. I want you to consider what you'll gain the joy of an intimate connected marriage.

Dr. Kim: Oh, that's so good because our selfishness gets into it, doesn't it? We think our way or what we want's the best, and, yet, yes, if you're going to have a good marriage, you've got to invest in it. I love what you said earlier too, Gary, about and I want to go back to have a do-over. 

Wherever couples that are watching or listening this, that think, "Oh, man, we blew it." But there's always a second chance. There's always a time to come together and say, "Let's start this over and let's do what they were talking about, and let's get a plan to be intentional about our marriage." And it's not too late to do that, is it?

Gary: Never. In fact, we mentioned Debra and John, they mentioned their first child really caused problems in their marriage. There was a lot of distance. They didn't anticipate the challenges, postpartum depression and other issues. And, so, it was the second and third child they said, "Okay, first time didn't work. How do we do it differently?"

Baron talked about his first deployment, where they realized, "Okay, this is how we go." But they didn't plan the reentry and things didn't go well. The kids were all over and whatnot, and there was some frustration, and some hurt, and whatnot. So, "Okay, last deployment didn't go well. How do we make this next deployment a little bit better?" 

So all of these couples, they admit, "Yes, we didn't get it right the first time." But this is what I love about marriage, we have a lifetime covenant. We can make a few mistakes. It's not a race. 

If it's a race, it's a marathon, it's certainly not a sprint, where we can reevaluate, re-engage, and craft a new future. And I think that's God's brilliance in planning marriage to be a lifelong relationship because we need the time to figure things out. We don't know on our own. 

When Debra had postpartum depression, her husband John even though he's an eye surgeon, he's not a psychologist. He doesn't know how to deal with a wife who's facing that, how He can best support her. 

Baron and Christina, they didn't know when they got married that they would spend, ultimately, a couple of years apart, not at once, but in different pieces. So how do we stay intimate? How do we stay faithful even though we're apart so often? 

Another couple, we haven't mentioned yet, David and Terry, what do you do when you find out the wife has had an affair? How do you learn to trust again? How do you deal with those flashbacks or fears of what happened? 

And, yet, they told me, when I interviewed them, that the last year had been the most intimate, satisfying year of their marriage, yet. They were at a point when they thought the marriage was done, and doomed, and finished and now they say it's better than ever. 

So, yes, we can re-engage because we don't do this alone. We have God's comforter; His Holy Spirit is real. You hinted at this before, when couples need God, sometimes, that helps us find Him in a way we never have before. When we think we're strong enough, we'll rely on our own strength. 

All of these couples we're pushed so far past their own strength, their own abilities, their own wisdom, they needed God. And when we're humble before God, God opposes the proud, but He gives grace to the humble. If you want God's grace, be humble before Him, plead for His help, and He is an ever present help in the midst of the storm.

Dr. Kim: Absolutely.

[00:25:47] < Music >

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[00:27:24] < Music >

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[00:28:15] < Music >

Dr. Kim: Let's talk a little bit more about some of the internal stressors that happen in a marriage, and how that weakens a marriage. What are the things that you see and after interviewing people that really, probably, a lot of people are dealing with?

Gary: Well, I think a lot of it comes down from a lack of communicating what those internal stressors are. Let's go back to the couple, David and Terry I talked about, where Terry had an affair. 

She lived with some very unaddressed wounds from her past. Not feeling accepted, needing to depend on others. And, so, when she came into marriage, she found out when they were infatuated, those needs were met. But after they were marriage she lived with this gaping sense of not being worthy, not being worthwhile, not being wanted. 

Her husband faced the stress of, "Oh, my gosh, we have two young children, we need more money." And, so, he found a job that paid really well, but it meant he was gone from Sunday evening to Friday evening. 

And, so, she didn't address these deep wounds she had, those inner stressors in that regard. And living with it without addressing it and being resentful of her husband for being gone. Instead of understanding he was trying to provide for the family, and he was insensitive to her sense of alienation. 

That's why she was open to meeting with a co-worker who liked to talk. Which led her to seek him out just to have another conversation. Which led her to be open to his flirtations, instead of saying, "Hey, stop, that's inappropriate." Which led her to agree to go to a bar with him. Which led her to let him kiss her, which, ultimately, led to them meeting at a hotel. 

And Terry told me, "Gary, there wasn't this overwhelming lust where I saw him and I said, 'Oh, I've got to have him.'" She goes, "There wasn't an infatuation, where I thought I was falling in love with him." I was just living with these unmet needs, a guy was paying me attention, and I just waded into the affair. 

I think overwhelming lust, we have our guard up. An infatuation, we go, "What's going on? I got to be careful." It's those small gradual steps that can lead to so many affairs. So I think it's important to be aware of those internal stressors. 

If I could use a guy, as the same example, for him he never felt connected to his family. Family was never a place of security or intimacy, it was a place of alienation. 

And then worse, he was molested when he was about 11-years old. And, so, he'd lived with a lot of shame and regret, he never dealt with that.

And, so, when he got married he didn't know how to receive love and acceptance from his family and he started acting out in a way that would basically push his wife away. He did what she said she could never forgive: have multiple affairs. And here's, you get this with your educational training and it might be surprising to some. 

But he said, "It's not that my wife wasn't enough, that's not why I had an affair. It's I thought she was the perfect wife. She was the wife of my dreams, so I knew I would lose her. I knew I wasn't worthy of her and, so, I acted in such a way just to get it over with. 

I knew the loss was coming and, so, let me just do that and then I'll face it." And it seems twisted, and it is, but in those cases it was people who limped in the marriage, without dealing with the internal stuff, that makes marriage so difficult. 

And, so, I think part of that is I try to ask myself not when I'm angry, trying to insist my wife do something. "Why am I so angry?"

"Why do I want to stress eat when I face this?"

"Why do I get so flustered if I feel disrespected?"

"Why am I tempted to do this or that or why do I seek to go outside of my..." It's asking myself the why questions to do that work. 

Usually it's just, "You shouldn't need me to do this, or you need to stop doing that, or I wish you would do more." We want to go to our spouse, and there's a place for that. But to really get at those internal stressors, we have to feel like, "What's going on in my heart?"

"What's setting me up to respond this way?" Not giving too much attention to our spouse in the sense of blame, and accusation, and even expectations that can bury them. But what are the motivations that marriage is pointing out, that maybe we've never addressed? And that's where, and I'm kind of getting more to my book, Sacred Marriage's territory. 

But that's where marriage can be such a healing, redemptive invitation to grow in holiness. Because it points out where we're weak, it points out where we're vulnerable, and we can use our marriage then to address some of those childhood hurts and to put our house in order.

Dr. Kim: Absolutely, we mentioned earlier our friend Les Parrot that we both know and one of the things Les says that I love is, "It takes two healthy people to have a healthy marriage." And, so, I think what you're saying is, and I see that too when I do premarital, that you want so badly to help them deal with things that they don't drag into that marriage because I think we all have some of it. 

We've all been wounded, or hurt, or something, previous relationships. And, so, I hope people that are listening and watching this will see that, if there's something that's wrong inside it can be fixed. 

You just got to take the time and be willing to address it and not ignore it because it'll bleed all over your marriage if you don't, very much so. We talked a little bit, obviously, there's all these stories people have gone through difficult things. 

What about the first thing when a tragedy or hardship, a lot of what we're talking about is where they've been. But what is the initial reaction with a couple when a tragedy happens in their life?

Gary: Well, I think a lot of times there's anger. One couple that had financial— well, both couples had financial troubles, that they didn't know what was going on. So when the other spouse found out how bad it was i. e. they were in debt more than they earned in a single year, there was anger. "How could you let this happen?"

With David and Terry, it's, "How could you do this to me? How could you do this to our kids? What will the neighbor think? What does this mean about our marriage?"

Stacy, who was married to the guy with MS, her anger was directed at God. "How could you do this?" I mean, she was just... now, she had to learn to let that anger become lament. It's okay to lament, it's okay to pour out your hurt and your desires to God. But she realized she was turning in anger toward God and that wasn't helping the situation.

Sometimes it's denial, Darrel, who had the MS, as an athlete said, "I can beat this and I'm going to going to beat this." And, so, he started working out more, tearing his body down until the doctor said, "Darrell, you're making things worse. 

Your body can't repair itself when you tear it down like this. If you don't give way to this diagnosis, you're going to be worse off much sooner than you would've been." And, so, he had to come out of denial. 

So I think the thing to remember is that there's no perfect way to respond to this. Of course, there's going to be anger, and hurt, and fear if you get a terrible medical diagnosis. There's going to be trauma if there's betrayal. 

There's going to be anxiety, if suddenly you have to sell your kids' childhood home and you're looking at retirement with a thousand dollars to your name. And what does that mean if we can't keep working, what's going to happen?

It just recognizing that these hits come and we won't respond perfect. But there's this moment where we can regather, "Okay, where do I find my spiritual sustenance?" And then, "How do I bring you closer into it?"

The key is that your spouse may need a different spiritual prescription than you do. We don't all respond to trauma the same way. We don't all respond to fear the same way. 

That Darrel and Stacy, the couple with MS, she's the typical half-glass-empty person and he's the typical half-glass-full person. And she's frustrated with Darrel because he doesn't realize how bad this is. And Darrel's frustrated with Stacy, she doesn't realize how God's going to come through. 

Looking back, they realized they were both right. Darrel didn't realize how bad it was, but Stacy didn't realize how much God would come through. And, so, I would say that's where you move from anger and denial to awe, and worship, and communication with each other. 

Awe and worship of God. "It was a belief that You would be there. Now that we really need You we find out You really are and how fortunate we are going through this, not alone, but with You, our Heavenly Father as our shepherd, as our portion, as our refuge, as our ultimate fortress." 

And then getting to go through this with your spouse and recognizing, "Okay, we responded differently. Maybe we thought the other was the source of the problem, but we realized the biggest problem will be if we come out of this more estranged. How do we reconnect? How do we double down to get to understand and help each other?"

Dr. Kim: Absolutely. So how does a couple find intimacy in the midst of that? Because the things we're talking about, we all deal with things differently. We all have pain at different, I love what you said about lamenting as opposed to anger. 

I've just happened to think there's a book in the Bible called Lamentations, but there's not one called angerntations or whatever that would be. So God gives us some words there in Scripture to help us through that. But what about the intimacy part of that when you're just both really hurting?

Gary: Yes, well, there are certain things that you can do to really understand it. And I leaned somewhat on the work of doctors Archibald Hart and Dr. Sharon May. It's actually a father-daughter combination, they have good things where they talk about the key components of emotional connection. 

Some of those components are understood and can be practiced. Trust is a big thing to rebuild intimacy. You can't be intimate with someone you don't trust, and by intimacy, I'm not just talking about sexual intimacy. 

And trust it's not just about betrayal, it's if you say you're going to pick up the kids at two o'clock from daycare, you pick up the kids at two o'clock. If you say you're going to reserve Friday night for a date night, you reserve Friday night for a date night. It's those little things where I can trust you. 

The reason that's so important is that when the storm hits, if you don't think you can trust your spouse, you're going to try to do their job as well as yours. There'll be no peace, there'll be no sense of teammanship, there'll be fear, "Will he get it done?"

"Is she really going to be there for me?" So trust is so key. Sensitive responsiveness is another one. Those initial interactions when you share what is happening; are you sensitive? And, guys, that, for us, that means not trying to fix it or explain it away, which makes our wives feel like we're diminishing it. 

But really sense, "Oh, of course, you are afraid." Or, "Of course you were hurt." And if we were part of that, "I'm so sorry I did that, I can see why that would make you so angry. I see why that can make you so fearful." Or "I could see why that would make you so suspicious." But there's a sensitivity to our response. We're not just hearing, but we're coming out together and saying, "This is what we have to do."

And then the third is emotional availability; that we're available for our spouses emotionally. We can't be too busy. If we let the world dictate our schedule the world will tear us apart. These couples found out a way, "How do we stay emotionally available?"

For some, it may seem extreme, John, he's an eye surgeon, but he went down to working three days a week and he comes home for lunch. Now that really does, yes, undercut somewhat their financial balance. 

But he says, "We drive older cars." And he goes, "It's worth it. I would much rather have the relationship I have with my wife, on all levels, than have a brand new car, and a bigger house, and a frustrating marriage." So you're making yourself available. It's the couples that made themselves available for the check in. The woman who cheated on her husband recalls a groundbreaking moment for them. 

When they were finally at a hotel, on a business trip, because the husband didn't trust her not to go with them. And he was acting like a detective, he's trying to catch her. "Okay, then you said you went to this, but then you went to that. How could those both be true or whatnot?" She finally looked at him and she said, "David, you've asked me that question a hundred times, but I'll answer it a hundred times. Because I'm so sorry and I want to be here for you." 

David told me something changed, he didn't have any more suspicion, he didn't need to need more because she was being emotionally available. 

She wasn't trying to defend herself, "Well, of course, you're suspicious, I'm so sorry. But I'm making myself available going forward so that we can get through this again. "And, ultimately, I think that's what our spouse wants to know. "I'm here for you."

"I'm not going to leave you."

"We're going to get through this together." 

And if we know we can do it together it just changes everything, and that's what these couples found out.

Dr. Kim: Yes, and I think, for guys, that we get scared when we talk about emotions, but we can learn to be emotionally available. 

We can, and really you hit it, it's really just listening, and being there, and caring, and having some empathy, and we don't have to be afraid to be emotionally available to our wives at all. 

Gary: It wasn't easy for me growing up, I really had to learn. My wife might end up crying about something and inside I'd be saying, "This is really something worth crying about, come on. I mean, serious." And when you feel that way inside you're communicating it. 

I mean, wives are intuitive, they're picking up the non-verbals, they're picking it up from the tone. And, basically, you're saying is, "Oh, man, why are you putting me through this." Instead of, "Honey, I'm so sorry you're having to go through this."

So we've got to get over ourselves. We got to realize that the commitment to marriage is being emotionally available, emotionally there for our spouse to learn, to be curious. Well, can you tell me more? Can you help me understand that? That's what makes them feel emotionally connected to us. And if they're not emotionally connected a lot of bad things come out of that. 

Dr. Kim: Yes, I think, as I learned to do that, too, over time I started reaping the benefits of it. I mean, Nancy felt closer to me, she shared more with me. It was those things that you begin to get the benefits of it and you think, "Okay, God, I can do this with your help. I can be emotionally valuable. I can talk about my emotion, I can be there for my wife." Which is so important. 

Gary: It's something we can choose and there are other things as a husband I just can't do, even though I'd like to. I told you before that we're rebuilding a house, we're renovating the house. We just moved from Houston to Colorado. We got a new house, it's an older house, so we're doing a lot of renovations. 

And my wife holds up two white boards and she says, "Which one do you like best?" I mean, "Is this a trick?" Because they look identical to me, I couldn't see any difference at all. She says, "Well, there are different kinds of white." I really couldn't see the difference. And then the salesman was saying, "Well, of course, the one on the right is a lot warmer." 

And I'm like, "Wait a minute. Colors have shades they don't have temperatures. What do you mean it's warmer?" Look, I wish I could care about kitchen cabinets. I wish I could discern colors that maybe I just have semi-color blind eyes. There are things that we can't be to our spouse, we can all learn to be emotionally available.  

You might not be a handyman. You might not be a poet, you might not be a wordsmith, and whatnot, but you can be curious. You can ask questions. You can put yourself in your spouse's situation. And this is what came up several times, make this situation, not your spouse, an enemy. 

One woman that realized her husband was so busy working. While she resented it because it made him seem emotionally distant. She realized, "Well, the charitable explanation is he's trying to provide for me. He's trying to provide for the kids." 

Now, that doesn't excuse him putting the marriage on hold, but there's this sense where she was entering his world. "I hate the situation. I hate it that you have to work so hard in order for us to pay the bills, I wish it was a different way."

With Christina and Baron, they don't like the separations. But she says, "You know what, somebody has to be there for our country to be safe. I mean, the military is necessary in this day and age. He was going to some really scary places. Those soldiers needed a chaplain." 

So, she could hate the situation; "I wish we didn't live in a world where a military was necessary but, boy, my husband is so good at it." And, so, she feels, for him, that he's not doing it just out of love of adventure or just callousness toward her. It was really trying to see things from his perspective. 

So, when the husband can understand and be emotionally available for the wife. When the wife can understand and be emotionally available for the husband, and each of them can give the most charitable explanation, for maybe their greatest frustration. 

Without fear that, that excuses it, you shouldn't ever ignore your spouse. But the key to reconnecting is first understanding and empathy. Then you can get into the, "Okay, what do we have to do that needs to change?"

Dr. Kim: Yes, absolutely, that's so good. So let's talk about a couple that may not be on the same page. One of them is just fine where the marriage is or maybe they've already kind of checked out, but the other one wants more. What's their first step, Gary?

Gary: Here's where I think we need to be very direct, and courageous, and self-soothing. What I found myself doing, and Dr. Corey Allan has challenged me on this, listening to his works and whatnot. Is it's so often we assume the worst about our spouse so we don't give them a chance to step up and then resent them when they don't. 

We're afraid to say, "Boy, I'd really like this." Or, "I think I need more of this. This would be helpful." We just assume, "Well, they're not going to come through." And then we silently stew and resent. And he talks about getting the negative reply more quickly. Giving them a chance, "Hey, I'd really like to do this on this weekend, do you think we can?" 

Now, maybe your spouse knows that's not going to work, "That doesn't work for me." That's when we learn to self-soothe. And I know that sounds just pathetic to some people, but the reality is, my wife's life doesn't revolve around me. 

I can have legitimate desires, and needs, and whatnot that because of whatever reason, physically, emotionally, her own schedule, her own life, her own call of God on her life, she's not going to be able to meet all of those. And that's where I need to self-soothe, and not expect my spouse to be everything I think I need my spouse to be. 

Because though we're one, we're still two people with God's call on her life, a lot of responsibilities. My wife is also a mother, and she's a grandmother, and she's got her own things going. And, so, I think it's really being open about, "Okay, I'm going to share this frustration. 

It might not happen and, so, if it does, then I've got to learn what to do to take care of myself." Have other healthy friendships. Find out other ways to get the needs met.

Obviously, I think if there's distance in the marriage, I'm not talking about other gender friendships. This is where you build up friendship with your guy friends, if you're a guy. With your women friends, if you're a woman. You find ways to de-stress in other ways and whatnot. 

But you don't make yourself so vulnerable, that if your spouse can't come through for you on one thing that you can't exist. Because, ultimately, that's repelling to a person. Just psychologically, it's not attractive. 

Peter is very clear that if your husband is an unbeliever, the best thing is to set an example. Find joy in God, revel in the beauty of God. Let your husband see what a life of worship does to a person, to their outlook, to their joy, to their peace, and let that invite them in. 

The other thing I would say is but be grateful for what you can have rather than focus on what you can't. I talked to couples, two couples, where they had different libidos. The one the wife had the higher libido, the other couple the husband had the higher libido. 

Where they both found resolution was one realized, "I'm not having sex as often as I'd like." Both the wife and the husband said that, and they're two different couples. "But I realized I need to be thankful for what I do have or I'm going to wreck what I can experience."

And they realized it's all life, what the husband says, "Look, I'd also like to earn $50,000 a year more than I do, but I don't, so that's real life." And, so, it's learning to be grateful for what you can have rather than obsess about what you can't. Because that just leads you to bitterness, and frustration, and estrangement.

Dr. Kim: I agree, and I think, don't you think, sometimes we expect so much from our spouse that they're not even equipped to give us. And I think it's learning to let God meet some needs in our life that only He can meet because He is not going to let us down. 

And, I think, for me, that makes my expectations of Nancy more realistic by doing that, does that make sense?

Gary: Absolutely, true. In an earlier marriage book I talked, A Monk's Marriage, it sounds like a funny title because, of course, monks are celibate. But I talked about these men and women of old that live very joy-filled lives, with great meaning and purpose, who had no spouse because they found that God is amazing. That God is intimate, God is powerful, God is a friend, God is our beloved. 

I said, "What if we, as married people, could join the two together. That we could appreciate what our spouse can bring us, but still, ultimately, look for our fulfillment in God."

Dr. Kim: Mm, so good. 

Gary: Your spouse may not appreciate you, but God appreciates us. Your spouse may not understand you, God does understand you. Your spouse may not hear you, God always hears, God always sees. 

And, so, I thought, "What if we could mix the two worlds where we pursue God like a monk or a nun, and then get the benefits of marriage?" The problem is when we get married, we act like God is just sort of a Sunday edition. And then the rest of the week expect our spouse to be to us what, really and truly, only God can be.

Dr. Kim: Absolutely, and I think when I can do that, it makes such a difference in my life and my marriage. When I see couples that get that it makes such a difference and there's more of a freedom for the spouse. 

Because some spouses are certain personality types, they're going to try to meet all those needs that they can't meet sometimes. And, so, yes, I love that and I think it's such a great place to get to. So one last question for you and Lisa, what are you loving most about your marriage right now?

Gary: Well, I can say we're loving being grandparents. People talk about it and, for us, it's as good as people say it is. Better than we could've imagined and maybe just because we just got to spend five wonderful days taking care of our grandchildren, with my son and his wife. They were here in Colorado for a friend's wedding and, so, we got to step in.

But just the delight. I wrote in Sacred Marriage, but this was years ago when I was still a rather young husband. I didn't understand the truth of it when I said that, "Marriage isn't about being young together, it's about growing old together."

Dr. Kim: Mh-hmm.

Gary: And I'm experiencing that with Lisa, although, I just turned 60 and she goes, "We don't get to call ourselves old until we're 80." So she's not going to accept that language. But it is the reality that there are more aches and pains, things pass, hair is gone, all of that.

But in the end it's about having shared a life with this person and facing these things together. Getting to have the joy of grandkids together. But then being really tired and saying, "Boy, how did we do that when we were parents and we didn't get the break."

And, so, it sounds funny to say, "I'm enjoying growing old with Lisa." I don't want her to hear that because she's going to say, "We're not there, yet." But let me say growing older with Lisa is a part of marriage that I'm treasuring more and more.

Dr. Kim: Oh, that's so good, and you guys have a new adventure living in a new place and all that stuff is exciting too, for sure. 

Gary: God is good.

Dr. Kim: Absolutely, you mentioned a couple of times Sacred Marriage. I think the first time I read that, I can't remember, when did it come out?

Gary: 2000, 22 years ago.

Dr. Kim: That's what I thought. And, so, we're going to talk about making your Making Your Marriage a Fortress: Strengthening Your Marriage to Withstand Life’s Storms, is the new book. But Sacred Marriage was a game changer, for me. I thought it was a great book, a powerful book, and I would recommend that to anyone today.

Gary: Oh, thank you.

Dr. Kim: They can find you at garythomas.com. Any place else that people would find you? Is that the best place? 

Gary: Well, I've moved, for interactions, most to Substack, which is garythomasbooks.substack.com. 

Dr. Kim: Okay. 

Gary: I post weekly columns there and occasional videos, and times for people to interact or ask questions, and that's where I'm hanging out most of these days.

Dr. Kim: Sounds great, Gary, so good to talk to you. So good to see you. Thank you so much for taking time to share your wisdom and just who you are. I love that and thank you for being here.

Gary: That's so kind of you, thank you so much.

Dr. Kim: You bet.

[00:55:50] < Outro >

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