Did You Betray Your Partner? | Recovering From Betrayal Part 1

0:01 Hello and welcome to real men. Feel I'm your host, Andy Grant. I'm a foster coach and healer and you can learn more about me at the Andy grant.com. Real men, feel exists to remind men that they're human beings. And they have the right to express and experience all of their emotions we have conversations that most men are not having, but that all men can benefit from now since men are human, they can make mistakes one aspect of life, where mistakes happen is in our relationships and since so many studies show that the strongest diction of happiness and Longevity is the strength of our relationships. Well, betraying a partner is a significant issue. Google tells me that nearly half of individuals in monogamous relationships admit to having an affair and close to 25 percent of marriages stay together.

0:45 After an incidence of cheating. My guest today, Vanessa Cardenas is a trusted advisor, Pro betrayal and transformation. Vanessa is a highly experienced c-suite Executives. Mentor coach and speaker with a degree in industrial psychology. She is also the founder. Under and CEO of understanding ear LLC, where she empowers individuals and groups to heal from betrayal amplify, their authenticity, and find love, and happiness on their terms, welcome to real men. Feel Vanessa now. Thank you so much, Andy. Mmm, you do such good work. I love the premise of this very much, so because men absolutely need to communicate, and especially, after betrayal, very, very much so.

1:28 So, we've got a lot to talk. Talk about. Can't wait, let's jump in. Yeah so let's do that in. You'll work what constitutes betrayal. That's a very good question and that leads us to a relationship. What exactly is a relationship. So for purposes of today, we're going to talk about men, betraying their spouse and when we're talking generalizations, I'm referring to the wife. I'm referring to a relationship. That is a Long duration of time years, maybe even decades. So I want to make sure that that generalization is there and that the man has cheated.

2:11 Now there are three different kinds of aspects of that that can be physical. That's like penetration. That's exchanging bodily. Fluids kissing hugging, you know, sex anal. Blowjobs anything, you name it, anything physical, a physical other person. Other than your wife. Wife. Yeah, that's cheating. The second is emotional and this is where there's a gray line that a lot of men have a trouble with because they do have female friends, they have female co-workers, but if they're sharing details that they're not sharing with their wife, but they're sharing it with another female and it's kind of sneaky Lee being done and it's texting at night and it's kind of hiding the the Ship with this other person from your wife. Yeah, that's cheating too.

3:06 And then there's cyber cheating and that's a whole new one that has come into play in the last two decades. Actually with the, you know, with the internet. Absolutely only fans exploded during covid lockdown. So did PornHub. Now, you know, again, everybody is different, everybody's relationship is different. So some relationships might Benefit from that type of activity. That spices things up and they watch it together and I get ideas. Everything else that's absolutely fine. There is no judgment on that, but if one party is doing it and the other party doesn't know about it.

3:47 Yeah, that's cheating. So those are the definitions that I play under that. I treat under those three categories. So for today, I just want Make sure that we're focusing on the right type of group is its men who have betrayed their spouses but want to stay together. That's the key if you want to stay together if you're looking to separate and then the glue is really, really tight. And your wife is hanging on for dear life, but you want out. That's a whole different conversation for today's purpose. We're going to talk about, you betrayed. Yeah, did something you want to stay together. Other and she knows about it.

4:34 So, that's key things must be out in the open for healing to happen. Things have to be out in the open, to begin. Correct. Absolutely. And I had not considered cyber cheating, I've done shows on on porn addiction and such. But again, that that never meant cheating in my mind, but I can see if if there's the, the only fans account that you spend all your time and all your money going to this one individual online. Oh yeah, I get like I can I can see that now. It's very, very difficult. And it's challenging because, you know, when you get married, you know, if you got married 30 years ago, you didn't have this conversation about. Hey, you know, if 30 years from now you have an only fans account and you're, you know, communicating with a woman. Yeah, I'm not going to like that. There's going to be a problem with that. So, you know, you know husband's, excuse of. Well, you never said, I couldn't wait a second. When we got married, that wasn't part of the vows, because we didn't even know about that.

5:28 So, we're talking about communication, right? And we're focusing on on men who cheat on their spouse. But any time I talk about this, there's always someone out there that, but, but women do it too. So, absolutely, absolutely. And we're going to talk about that in part 2. Yeah. Shy of part to our men and women equally likely to cheat. And there's some interesting statistics about that very much. So I'm not going to quote them. Exactly. So I'm going to keep them in generalizations when men cheat, okay with another woman. Okay? It's usually about 25% that that other woman both parties. No meaning that the husband cheats with another woman that the wife knows, 25% of the time, okay? Men women on the other hand when they cheat, it's over 50% That they cheat with somebody that they both know, which means men, there are other men in your life that are looking at your wife. So do keep that in mind, is it equal? It's getting there in terms of, you know, women cheating and men cheating.

6:45 It used to be primarily men, but now women are starting to tick up as well, but for the tits to deliver them, for the sake of this conversation, and your audience were just going to talk about out the men who cheated on their spouse, their spouse knows about it and they want to reconcile, they want to stay together so those are the parameters in the guidelines. When you initially began your work, you worked with women exclusively, right? Yes, yes. I worked with women exclusively because I'm a woman, I knew how it felt to be betrayed. And all of my studying went towards how to heal from a woman's perspective.

7:27 But I started to find that a lot of the women that I was working with were suddenly asking me hey can you talk to my husband? Can you explain this to my husband? He's having a hard time understanding. Why? I'm feeling the way I'm feeling. Why can't I just let it go? Why can't I just you know, just accept it and you know you know, move past it and lets, you know, I told you let's go, let's move on. You know, we don't have to talk about it anymore and men want to get as far away from it as possible. Meanwhile. Living in it. The pain, their body has become the coffin for all of this emotion that they're going through in essence. The man has transferred, the pain, the suffering, everything that he was feeling that led him and we'll talk about that in a second, led him to the cheating. He's now, unburdened and he's like a okay. Now I told my wife, you know yes she cried and this and that and bubble but now we're over it and you'll be able to move past what the fuck.

8:25 So a lot of the women that I He's dealing with were saying, hey, you know, could you talk to my husband? Could you talk to my boyfriend? Could you kind of explain this? And I realized that, that was an entire different segments where I could help, men understand what their wives were going through, what they were feeling, why they were feeling it, why they were so irrational about it, and give them a different perspective to look at. And it was very empowering and both and instances because a man was a So to speak to a woman, me, intimate details. But his wife knew he was talking to me in a situation, so it was very, very interesting, very much. So does it matter?

9:10 Why a man cheats like are there some circumstances that that make rebuilding the trust easier than others? No, the short answer of it is no. The long answer is that you know the woman wants to know why why What, you know, specially if they're blindsided, you know, we're going to take the case of me, for example, because I'm my best clients. I know me inside and out. So, I had been married for decades. I met my husband when I was 12, we dated, you know, when we were 14 15, 16 years old. We fell. Madly deeply in love very much. So. Oh my goodness, the world revolve just around the two of us and it was wonderful and then he screwed up and we broke up because we were immature and did.

9:57 Know, any better? And I had all these high expectations and he was like, yeah, okay, I screwed up. I don't know what to say. I don't know what to do you want someone at and blah, blah, blah, and this and that, and he pursued me for eight years, every single year on certain dates and Christmas and my birthday and he would reach out, and he pursued me very, very heavily. I was dating somebody for a quite a long time at the time and we started having Rocky situation and my, you know, my best friend because he was my friend, And swooped in and, you know, saved me and nine weeks later we were married and it was Madly Deeply fully, you know, and we jumped right in.

10:39 Yeah, we had hardships, every every young couple has hardships without a doubt, you know? But eight years later. My son was born. Three years after that. My daughter was born and I had the happy life that I wanted II grew up. You know when I was 16 I was homeless. So I just had Many challenges throughout life. And now here I was, I was married, I was in love, I had two children. I had the house. I had the car had the career. I was set. I was golden, he was golden, you know, and we just enjoyed each other's company and everything was perfect and one day we're walking through Central Park and my husband says, hey, let's sit down for a second and we sit down on a park bench. Like we had always done and he, you know, I'm looking around, you know, I'm into my own little world. World and he says, there's something I need to tell you and I'm like okay you know I turn and look at him and he goes I've met someone.

11:37 What, you know, like my whole world shattered in an instant time, spit up and it's slowed down to a crawl. And one of the things that I had done at that moment in time as I look down at my feet, I don't know what it is about my feet and the ground. And I realized I was wearing a pair of Doc Martin Boots. And I put my feet flat on the ground because they were in front of me. I put them flat on the ground so I could feel the Earth because the whole world Shaking for me and my world fell apart. It just did. And I was completely shattered, completely shattered. I was completely blindsided.

12:18 There were no, at that moment in time there was no indications. There was no, you know, excessive arguing there was no distance there were there was nothing, nothing that I could see. But obviously, there was something going on and I just didn't see it. I had my rose-colored glasses on because I had my perfect life. Hmm. Yeah, so from my perspective I struggled with the biggest question of all. Why? And that was the question that I immediately asked. And that was the hardest question for my husband to answer. And that's usually the hardest question for men to answer and initially you know, because the woman has reacted so strongly, what do men do? They Turtle they go inward.

13:10 They see a side of their wife that they've never seen before. They see a rage like they've never experienced the fact that her skin doesn't turn green and she rips out of her clothing is amazing because that's what he feels like. The rage just comes over and the biggest question always is why and men really struggle to explain. Lane why and there are a variety of reasons. There's lots and lots and lots of reasons. I'm going to give you seven. The first is that the initial intoxication has faded. You remember that? When you first met your wife you saw her across the room or you saw her in band class than my example and you just you connected you you imprinted you you you just felt that lectricity and you were like, oh my God, I cannot be away from this, this woman. And that just intoxication of love and just the whole rest of the planet disappeared, they didn't even exist. And suddenly over time that Fades and some men want to recapture that.

14:19 They want to feel that all over again women do too. It's not exclusive then of course there's the ego and the insecurity you know as men get older their bodies change their hairline changes things change about them and again Society All of these variety of pressures on men. You know, you see the commercials and, you know, you want to grow your hair and you want to get muscles. And you wanted to, you know, they beat down men. Just like they do women, but they beat down men. So the ego, you know, can I get a young woman? You know, is she into me? And then, of course, you have your single, you know, friends who are egging you on as well, you know, so it feeds into your ego.

15:01 The other thing is we unresolved past traumas, this especially happens. Happens right around fatherhood, there is something about having a pregnant wife and realizing, you're going to have a child that's suddenly Sparks something. Whether that's a childhood trauma, remembering a bully sexual assault, sexual abuse something going on in the background that suddenly you like, oh my goodness. I'm going to have to protect this thing from that that which I have not resolved. I buried it. Buried it so deep. And now it's crawling its way up.

15:42 So that comes into play. Then there's also the lack of male Social Circles where you come into play, Andy. It's that not feeling alone. And now, especially for a man who grew up with a single mother with sisters with ants, you know, and didn't have that male figure around them or the brother. The Big Brother of the little brother to take care of or the Teacher that like molded them or the mentor or something. And especially if it ties into that sexual component of a childhood abuse situation. Then it compounds the issue. And then of course there's unrealistic expectations and that's where only fans and, you know, PornHub coming to play all over again.

16:28 You know, if you ask teenagers, okay? And if you can get them to kind of open up to you and get permission from their parents and all that other kind of stuff. But if you can get teenagers to talk about sex, you'll find out some very interesting things. And and some of the interesting things I'll share with you and your audience. But if you ask a young man who has watched pornography, he seems to think that choking out his girlfriend. She likes that and girls not immune to it either. If girls are watching porn and they see this, they think Are supposed to like getting choked out. I can tell you this most women, I've talked to don't like getting choked out.

17:13 Now. Again, what you do in your own bedroom between consenting adults is wonderful and great and I encourage that there's no judgment but if you talk to our younger generation are 16, 17 year-olds where a young man who has not had sex before, but has been watching porn thinks that a girl will like getting choked out and the first sexual He has, he chokes out his girlfriend. Yeah, there's going to be an issue. So, there are these unrealistic expectations that come into play. Especially if you've been watching a lot of porn, you think. Ooh, my wife might like that my wife, my wife might like that. Mmm.

17:53 Got to kind of be really, really careful with that. The other thing is self-sabotage, and now that comes into play, especially if you have a high pressure job or just a pressure to job, you have a new boss who's, you know, Half your age and you got all this stress and all this stuff going on and then suddenly a woman is paying attention to you, whether that's the hairdresser who's Cuttin your hair and you suddenly feel those massaging fingers and she leans over you. And you know, you see her cleavage and this and that you wonder. Hey, hi. How you doing? You know, type of thing so that kind of comes into play as well. And then, of course, there's fear. There's fear of change.

18:35 And then there's fear of, no change. Oh my gosh. This is what my life is going to be like, day in and day out. Yeah, that gets kind of scary. So that's the multitude of reasons why. What's hard for a woman? Is that a woman? Will immediately blame herself? She'll think that there's something wrong with her. I wasn't pretty enough. I wasn't sexy enough, I've gained weight, I've done this, I've done that and some men will feed into that. Well, if you gave me more, I wouldn't have to look elsewhere. Hmm, no, that doesn't fly. It just doesn't fly. If you want more, you have to communicate with your wife, you have to have a conversation. You have to sit her down and have a serious Conversation, most of my clients will agree that they'd rather have a conversation before betrayal.

19:28 Then after betrayal the conversation, and it's a difficult conversation, I'm not saying that it's easy, of course, it's not easy. If it was easy, we would be having them and you and I wouldn't be talking about betrayal, but we need to have that difficult conversation before and say, Hey listen, I'm feeling we go back to men, feel, I'm feeling X y&z. I need a b and c. What do you think? So, any main experience, these any of these Reese's reasons. If he's brave enough and and aware enough he can feel it shared have a difficult conversation. Experiencing, any of these doesn't mean you are destined for betrayal.

20:08 No, no. You're not destined for betrayal but these are the common reasons why it happens. There are a lot more. But you know, for the sake of this conversation will keep it to those seven. Those are the seven most popular ones but they're not exclusive. There are. Lots of reasons. Why betrayal happens. You mentioned women commonly Taking the blame or giving them. So, yeah, been some so does blame or responsibility does, is it up to both parties or judge? The man need to go. This was my fault like, where does that show up in terms of healing, yet? In terms of healing, let's talk about repairing, okay, because you need to repair it first before, you can heal.

20:48 It kind of need to stitch it up and then it starts to heal. So, in terms of repairing, the first thing, the very first thing to do, after you have come clean Okay, whether you've come clean on your own, which is a higher percentage that men come clean on their own or they've been discovered. Okay, coming clean on your own. You have legs to stand on because you can communicate with your wife. I told you I came to you, I want to fix this. I can't fix it alone. I need you to help me fix this. So, the very first thing is, Is to apologize.

21:30 An apology. Does not have the word but in it, it's a full-fledged apology. I screwed up. I fucked up. I did something terrible. I've done something terrible to you, okay? But it wasn't about you, that's the key. It's not about your wife and she needs to hear that over and over and over again like a broken record. Because right, after discovery of betrayal, she hears like the peanuts adults. Wahwah, that's all. She here's why. Because the nasty chick is on her shoulder screaming at her? Yes.

22:14 Seeing at the dent that the death the death you know just nastiness going on. That's within her she's got that you as the mail might be having shame. You might be having guilt you know there's a lot of emotions going on. Within you that you need to articulate. You need to get that out for the woman, right. At that moment, it's going to be really difficult because all she sees is red. All she sees is Rage and then she sees sadness and they flip like that, they go one to the other, to the other, to the other, they swing around. She is on a never-ending roller coaster for quite a while because now that you've told her she will reap Play your entire relationship.

23:00 And if you have a long relationship, that's a really long movie because she's looking for signs, she's looking for touch points as to where she let you down. Don't allow her to do that. This is your responsibility. So, that's Point number two. In terms of actions to take to repair, you have to take a 100% accountability, 100%. Not this. Has 99%. Well, if you had done this, if you hadn't gained weight, if you had, you know, dressed this way, if you hadn't flirted with the waiter, whatever the circumstances in mmm, you did this action. You did it.

23:44 You take 100% of the responsibility of it, then you're going to want to be accountable, you have to be accountable, you have to account for your actions, and you have to be completely Transparent. She needs to feel safe. So if by her feeling safe, she wants trackers on your phone, put trackers on your phone, if you're not doing anything wrong. Now, you have nothing to hide. Give it all to her. No problem. You want to know where I am at every moment and the time, nope, if that makes you feel safe and we can repair this and we can heal from it, and we can move on, no problem. But if you become tight fit, Stood with that phone, she's going to think you're up to something. So in that, you know, no buts in the apology and do whatever it takes to make, make the partner feel safe after the Betrayal. Is there anything else that that men really got to be a way of to not do?

24:45 What are some common mistakes? Common mistakes is that they need? Common mistakes. Are they're impatient? They're impatient? Okay, I told you everything. All right, enough. Stop bringing it up. Stop. Stop rubbing. My nose in it. Like I'm a dog. I get it. I fucked up. Not enough already. No, no, it doesn't work that way. You're gonna be in the doghouse for a while. Okay? You don't have to live there but at the same token, she doesn't need her body to be the coffin for the pain that you have caused. You have caused her pain. When you betray her, you break her, you do. You just break her into a million pieces. And it's not a situation where you can take a dustpan, sweep it all up.

25:32 Poor super glue on it and boof she's back to the way she was. Mmm doesn't work that way. Chris Rock said it best, he's like yeah if you cheat on your wife you do get a new woman even if you stay with her and now it just is you're going to get a new woman. She's never going to be the same because you broke her now. Could she be better? Yes. Yes. There is Beauty on the other side of betrayal. Now while I do, Don't Advocate betrayal. I absolutely don't very much. I want to make sure that that is crystal clear that I do not Advocate betrayal but I will tell you this for myself personally. And for so many of my clients We are better for the experience, we are better for the experience.

26:22 What broke off of us was the shell of all the expectations of everybody else? We were everything to everyone then it completely shattered, we completely shattered but we shattered that she'll and we stepped into our authentic. Self me case in point with me personally. For me, my trauma response to the Betrayal was my hair. I used to have hair down, halfway down my back salt and pepper bangs long stringy. You know, it was my hairstyle, I had it for decades. Why? Because I was comfortable with it, my husband was comfortable with it, and now it just was my kids were comfortable with it.

27:04 Yeah, it was just me and it identified me, well, the first discovery because there's always more than one. I chopped my hair off to my shoulders, big drastic change. I mean, my husband. Noticed it immediately then I shaved off one side. Then I shaved off the other side. Oh, and now again each Discovery. Something different with my hair. Then I died at the brown. And then the last thing was the pink. And why is the last thing? The pink because the Betrayal completely stopped, I had no more new discoveries and this is years ago and now this is me and this is actually me, this is I love who I am. So I am Better for the Betrayal, and that's a hard concept and I share that with my clients kind of right at the beginning. I'm like, you know, I used to say I'm grateful for the Betrayal and people were likely mean you're grateful and I'm like, hmm, maybe I need to rephrase that. I'm better because of the Betrayal. Well, so am I encourage that with with my clients? So back to men and what they can do. So they have to be patient.

28:16 They absolutely have to be patient. And they're going to get it. They just are take it, you know, just take it just realize she's suffering and just hold her, you know, and when she comes at you because she will come at you. I'm sorry. I know I did this. I fucked up. You know, let me hold you, let me hold you while you cry. It's okay. It wasn't about you. It wasn't about you. It's about me and I fucked up and I fucked up and Just keep repeating it. You're going to be a broken record. Absolutely, but she needs to hear it over and over and over again until it sinks in.

28:56 Because right now again her nasty chick voices are just beating her down. Every single person that has ever said, anything mean to her is just in full force, they're just going after her. The other thing you need to do is respect her boundaries. She is going to lay down boundaries she's and those are for her to feel safe. So she tells you you need to sleep on the couch. Ouch, you need to sleep on the couch. She tells you, you need to move out for a little bit, you're going to need to move out for a little bit, but you still need to be 100% transparent. If you want to repair the relationship, just be told just because she told you to leave is not that you are on a break like Rachel and Ross. No no no, not at all. Got to do it if you want to rebuild your relationship with the woman that you fell in love with and you just up yes. You're going to need to do that.

29:50 And then the last thing, the most important thing I cannot stress this enough. This is the by far the most important thing. So after apologizing, and after taking responsibility, and after being 100% transparent, you need to communicate. You need to To use your words. Because when you stop talkin, she feels ghosted. She just does even if you're in her presence, your silence completely freaks her out. You need to talk. You need to continue to talk again. Her nasty chick voices are talking and talking and talking and talking. You need to counterbalance that by communicating by talking. So One of your guests had a great quote, and I would love to quote, quote him, David Richmond. He had said that people are so fearful of saying the wrong thing, why people are going through trauma, and the person going through the trauma is wondering why they're not talking to them.

30:59 That's key. That's absolutely key in betrayal. Your wife needs to hear from you. She just does you need to get all those feelings out. You need to communicate with her so that she knows what you're thinking, what's going on because when you're silent, she's thinking for you and what she's thinking is probably not what you're thinking, she's thinking about you with it, everybody else. If you need to make her number one priority so I can see that this is how our relationship can actually be much better and I'll say post healing as opposed to post betrayal because probably some of the things that adding to a betrayal, are a man, not communicating not feeling, not respecting boundaries, not being patient. Okay, exactly very well said, very well said. So communication is key between the the partners What is your advice when it comes to letting other people know that the Betrayal has happened that you're trying to work through it?

32:04 Is that a family? A bigger family known issue, a community issue, or is it completely private? Really depends on your relationship. I'm going to put it this way. Once you let the toothpaste out of the tube, it's really hard to get it back because everybody's got judgment and yes was right out of the gate, your wife is feeling like she needs to tell the whole world, okay? I don't recommend that to my clients. All of my clients, I tell them to pause to take a moment and pause that is really, really critical because once you Start telling people, as I said, they have judgments and you'll feel those judgments if you're trying to heal, and there's nothing worse than going to a family event, where everybody knows the man, cheated on the woman and it's like, whoa.

32:56 Hold on a second that makes him uncomfortable, because this healing process is joint, it's the two of you. And in my particular case for me we didn't tell anybody our children found out, of course, because they lived with us, they heard Everything that was going on, but that was it just the nucleus, the four of us were the only ones that knew about it. Why I didn't need the Judgment of other people out of the gate. Now, of course everybody knows because of what I do. But, you know, people come up to me. I had no idea. I had no idea. I'm so sorry, you went through that and I'm like, I'm good. I'm actually good. Our marriage is good. You know it. He became a better man and that's usually the result. Especially if a man wants to stay in the relationship and fix it.

33:46 Why? Because he becomes a better man, how does he become a better man? He learns to communicate. He learns to give and receive love in a way that he never got it before and that, that is beautiful. Oh, it's better than that. Intoxicating, feeling that we talked about initially when you first fall in love that, there's that his Torkoal love. There's that love. That will just be with you. Hopefully forever. Yeah, I love that notion and that, yeah, because that is the key. It's the relationship can't get better unless the human beings get better grow transform, become authentic vulnerable. Communicate feel all the things that make make us human and what I find to be some of our most powerful skill sets, but too many men have been told now that's not the case. Is that, that maybe that girl can feel, but you can't now. Yeah, now it's terrible, it's terrible. What we do to men in society, in general now, and that we pigeonhole them into having to be the providers. I'm so grateful that.

34:55 Now, there are so many men that are stay-at-home father's. It's so Noble, I love it because my husband 20 years ago was a stay-at-home dad. Now, when he was at the PTA meetings, with all the women and again, back then, I had no worries. Not at all. He was mine, he was my teddy bear, he was mine, you know and we were we were happy and everything else and you know what not now would I kind of be okay with that it would change? And again what I would do is I would wrinkle my toes and my Doc Martin Boots right now and just ground myself and and look at the situation for what it is. And I remind women to do that all the time that they have to be present in their bodies.

35:41 Because they will, they will get pulled back into the past. And be like own, the what what about this? What about that? And they go down this dark spiral. That is unnecessary because it's only this moment and moving forward. This moment moving forward. What do you tell a man who grew up in that traditional, really close, narrow scope of masculinity and is been always thought? Let It Go, suck it up and expects that from his wife and you know why can't you just get over this and they so they dealing with that. Patience. What can they do Moment by moment to break through that and that resistance in themselves to to open up, I think it's about shifting perspective and I kind of recommend this to a lot of men who become my clients shift, your perspective.

36:29 Put yourself in your wife's shoes and think about your behavior. What you have done, how you were feeling? I want you to feel what your wife It feels. He'll it all the way down to your toes. You don't like how it feels do you. You don't like being muzzled, you don't like that. You have to just get over it. You want to be seeing you want to be heard. Let's go back to that moment in time in your childhood when you were stifled, what did you want to say? Let's hear it. Let's hear it now, you know what? I want.

37:09 That Tonka truck for Christmas. And I'll say it. It's okay. You can say it and now and get it out, allow for that to get out. So if they switch perspective, even just one degree and realize that feeling that comes up for them is what's coming up for their wives. That can help with the healing. Cool. This has been fasting. I just want to let everyone know that you will be returning. Vanessa and do the flip side about this and advice for people that have been betrayed. Yes, yes, because that's an entirely different ballgame. It definitely is and and men feel it very differently than women do.

37:52 So we're we're definitely going to have an interesting conversation about that again from the experience that I have working with male clients as well as my husband, because again, we're we're far removed. Moved from the Betrayal but it's every single day, every single day, he's accountable to me. He's accountable more, so to himself. And that's that's the biggest difference. And and and that that's the most important takeaway that I definitely want everyone to get moving forward. You know, you want to help her heal without a doubt but you want to be a better man for her. But more importantly for yourself and you can And you will be stronger and you will be resistant. And that's the most important thing and you will stand on your own two feet, whether your own two feet happened to be in a pair of Doc, Martin boots or whatever you're wearing, however, you ground yourself, but you stand on your own two feet and you own what you did and then you move past it. And again, what we do in life, echoes in eternity and he's washing seeing it off.

39:04 Because if that is not true, it is not true. Betrayal is not a death sentence and it is not a prison term for years and years and years. No, that's provided that you heal properly. If you just bury it, it's going to come back up. It's going to come back up. So let's process it. Correct, leaving it, surviving it is not healing. It just getting forcing yourself through and stand together. In and being miserable, is not the point working on this. No, not at all, not at all. So, Vanessa, what's the best way for people to learn more about all the things that you're doing?

39:45 All the things that I'm doing? That's such a wonderful, wonderful segue. I love it. I want to close with a couple of things. There are a few books that I do suggest for men out of the doghouse, Robert Weiss, a great book. This is a step-by-step instruction, mine of course is dog-eared and and hi. Lighted, because he is brilliant, we didn't really touch on fear but fear is very, very prevalent. And again, this one is great. The gift of fear, this is wonderful for both you and your wife, very, very important because she has a lot of fear announced she's fearing the breakdown of the relationship, even if you say to her, I want to stay.

40:29 She still fearful. Again, that's part of the safety. Then, of course, Book dealing with the devastation of your partner's betrayal. What to do when your World falls apart? This is wonderful for your wife it's a quick easy read, it'll definitely help her and then you talked about talking to people how do we talk to other people? And this is really important, especially related to your children. If you have children, they're experiencing what you're going on and they do not have the adult brain to process what is happening? And so it's really important that you talk to your kids. Then once you talk to your children, depending on their ages, you know, then you have to talk to your parents and your in-laws because they have grandparents and they're going to talk about it.

41:16 And then that bleeds into schools, you know, you are going to need to talk to your children's teachers. You're going to need to explain. We're having problems at home and it depends on how you want to communicate that. But, you know, we're concerned that it will bleed into school. We want to address that as well. And for a lot of women, especially if there's an affair partner, they want to talk to the other woman. So, I have a wonderful book dealing with the devastation of your partner's betrayal, how to talk to your kids. Your parents, your in-laws ra, friends and others and these will give you conversation starters to kind of get you going. All of that is available on my website, as well.

41:57 All the resources and that is, understanding, ear understanding ear.com. It comes from a Stephen King, quote, absolutely adore. It. It is the most important things are the hardest things to say, not for the want of a teller, but for the want of an understanding ear. So yes, so I have one more thing if I could be so bold, I am definitely curious as to what was most useful for your listeners. So I'm curious between part one and part two what they have to say. So please do. Share that with me. So I'm excited about part two. And then lastly, if I have free consultations going on, but I'm all booked up until September but exclusively for your listeners exclusively for your listeners.

42:50 I've opened up my schedule so they can log on to understanding ear.com in the top left corner. It says betrayed men. If you click on that you'll read a little bit of my history working with betrayed me. Men, half way down the page. There is a nice blue button because your color is blue. I love it. And it is for Real Men feel. And if you click on that button, you will get your exclusive. I have six weeks open for any of your listeners to come and get a 45 minute consultation with me completely free. So make sure you take advantage of that and the last thing I want to leave you with is if you don't make time If you don't make time for your relationship, you'll be forced to make time for your loneliness. Mmm, please remember that?

43:43 Yeah, that's potent. Awesome. Well, thanks so much for your time. All the resources at your I'm sorry you have your expertise but I'm glad you have your expertise if you know what I mean. Yes, yes, I agree with that wholeheartedly. And as I said I'm grateful for it. It it it changed the trajectory of my life in such a profound way and now I get to do what I absolutely love. I get to help spread love to mend it and to have it be so powerful and it just rather than the breakdown the collectiveness. It's just Mmm. It's wonderful. Well, thanks everyone for tuning in today.

44:24 Visit real men feel that or with the be a blog post for this episode. I have links to all the resources, all the books mentioned, all that ways to reach out to Vanessa and whatever you discovering. Real men field, please give us obscure. Tibe, like follow a comment share this, somebody that this would help improve their lives and help make them a better man. You can always reach out to me at real men. Feel at gmail.com, always glad to hear from you. And until next time, be good to yourself.