The Affair That Saved Us: Episode 3 - Choosing to Stay

Some moments don't announce themselves. They just happen, and afterward, nothing is quite the same.

In this episode, Arly and Amber take you inside one of those moments during a retreat.

Amber walked in nearly certain of divorce. Arly walked in already accepting that outcome.

What happened next changed everything. This episode is about the difference between a man who is sorry and a man who finally sees you, and what it looks like to hold love and devastation at the same time without demanding that the contradiction resolve.

The Affair That Saved Us is hosted by Amber and Arly . They’re a real couple sharing a real story. This podcast is not a substitute for professional therapy or counseling. If you or someone you love is navigating infidelity, we encourage you to seek support from a qualified professional.

Whatever your piece of this looks like, you're not as alone in it as it feels.

Have a question, a story, or something you want us to talk about? We want to hear from you. info@theaffairthatsavedus.com

If you're ready to work with Arly one-on-one, scheduling is available at arlysmart.com

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

So when they brought us back together, um walking in, I immediately noticed, okay, the room has changed. The circle was still there, but now there's two chairs in the middle of it facing each other. And all of us women kind of looked at each other at the same time and thought, oh no.

SPEAKER_00 0:18

And I knew that what was about to happen was a test of the exact thing I had always run from my entire life.

SPEAKER_01 0:32

Welcome to the Affair That Saved Us podcast. In this episode, Arlie and Amber share their unique perspectives in what may have been the turning point on their journey of healing. If you're in the middle of the wreckage of infidelity right now, what you're about to hear may bring some things up. That's okay. You're in the right place.

SPEAKER_02 1:21

It was 40 things that the affair had cost me, and you had written them down, and now you had to say them one at a time to my face in front of all of these people.

SPEAKER_03 1:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:32

And I was 90% sure the marriage was over. So I wasn't there to save it. I mean, I was there to clear my conscience so that when I left, I knew I had tried everything. Yeah. But so there I am. I have a you know big wad fistful Kleenex in my lap. They're completely soaked through, useless, but I just kept holding them. And somewhere in that list, and I I couldn't tell you which number, but your voice changed, and I looked up. And I realized in that moment, you got it. You actually got it. And I'd never seen you like this before, but you were weeping.

SPEAKER_03 2:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 2:16

Having to stop and and catch your breath weeping before you could even go on to the next thing in your list. And it wasn't like the weeping of a man who got caught. I it felt like a true brokenness, like the whole of it was centered on me and what your choices had actually cost me. And I feel like that's the difference that I want to start with today. Because there's a difference between a man who is sorry and a man who finally sees you. Because like one is about him and the other is about me. And in that moment, that one, that didn't end my marriage. And it's actually the reason I'm still in it. So let me back up and tell you where we actually were because it matters. So this wasn't a counselor's office. Um, it was a weekend getaway, it wasn't a weekend getaway to reconnect. Um, definitely wasn't luxurious or relaxing. Uh, we were at something called EMS Weekend, which stands for emergency marital seminar uh through a fair recovery, and just the word emergency should tell you the whole thing. You don't end up at one of these because your marriage needs a tune-up. You're there because it's on fire and you basically have no other options. So it's in a small group setting, a handful of couples you've never met who are all extremely successful, influential, wonderful people that it's shocking that you're that they're going through the same thing like you would never guess it. And we're all carrying the exact same wound, and we're sitting in a circle doing the hardest work of all of our lives in front of each other. And to be honest, about where I was when I was walking in, I had done the math and the math said to leave. So 90% of me had already left. Um, but I don't want you to hear that as me phoning it in because it was the opposite. I I went so that I would never have to wonder. I have this philosophy about life where anytime I'm trying to figure out what decision I make, one of the things I think through is where, you know, what would I how could I have the least possible regret? And so I was I was going there, so I would never have to wonder what would have happened if we would have gone. Um so I was going to walk away from the marriage, but I just wanted to make sure I hadn't left a single thing on the table before. And just to clarify, I that's not, I wasn't showing up hopeful. I that I was just full of resolve. So that's the tension underneath everything that I'm about to tell you. So that's who I was walking in, 90% gone, not from giving up, but from being just that close to being certain. And then the weekend started to do its work on me uh before we ever got to these chairs. And at one point that weekend, they split us up. I remember they sent the betrayed uh partners to one room and then the other unfaithful to another room. And no context, no idea what was happening. We just, you know, knew for the next two hours or something we were each going to be doing their our own sessions. And so for the next few hours, I sat in a room full of women who had been through exactly what I had been through. Like we were strangers, but oddly didn't feel like strangers anymore. They knew exactly the specific kind of pain I was carrying, and I knew what they were carrying, and I didn't have that before. Um, and for the first time since I found out, I felt less alone. I used to tell people when you're going through this, if it especially initially, you feel like everyone lives on planet Earth, but you live on planet my husband cheated, right? Like there's you're not even having the same human experience as those around you. So you just feel very alone. But you know, during all this, we had no idea what you guys were doing, what the other group was doing, like absolutely none. They gave us no context, no clues, none of that. So while I was in the room feeling less alone, um, apparently you were in a room writing a list of 40 things, but I I didn't know that yet. So when they brought us back together, um walking in, I immediately noticed, okay, the room has changed. The circle was still there, but now there's two chairs in the middle of it facing each other. And all of us women kind of looked at each other at the same time and thought, oh no, like what in the world is getting ready to happen. But it began, and one couple at a time got into those two chairs. And um, I'm telling you, I don't know how else to describe what we witnessed was, but it was holy. It was a hundred percent not comfortable. It was the most uncomfortable thing ever I've witnessed, but I would describe it as holy. I've always said, like, I would never take a picture of it, you would never record it. Um something you would just need to honor. And that was something that was supposed to stay just between the people in that room that had witnessed it. Um and I say that because what I was watching over and over was grown man weep. I mean, weep, weep in front of a room full of strangers and not run from their pain, not shut it down, not deflect, not do the thing that every thing in a man tells him to do. And they just stayed with it. Um, I was just, it was just amazing to watch them have the fortitude to stay in the pain that they had caused and keep looking at it. I'd never seen anything like it. And what I didn't know yet was I was about to watch you do the same thing.

SPEAKER_00 7:58

Yeah. Yeah, while you were in that room, as you described it, feeling less alone, you know, there were 25 of us unfaithful in a completely different part of the uh, you know, the campus working silently alone. Uh they'd given this, uh they'd given us this activity uh and a brief description of of what we were to do. And uh the task wasn't just to, you know, name what the affair had cost your mate. Um we had to go deeper than that. Like we couldn't just say that, you know, hey, my affair cost you sleep. Um we had to be able to identify like what loss of sleep looks like, you know, such as insomnia. Uh I observed you with insomnia for the first time in our entire marriage. Um you know, another example to be, you know, not just that you may have lost, you know, peace of mind, um, but it was that you lost peace of mind because you were having nightmares. You communicated intrusive thoughts, and I could just observe like your inability to function normally throughout the day. And I I had I had to name what I had taken from you and then sit in what that kind of what that actually meant for your life. And as I wrote, I kept having to stop because I thought, you know, the depth of what I had done was that I had broken your heart. And that turned out to be barely scratching the surface. What I was looking at was a complete rupture that ran through every part of your sense of self. Every few items in my heart would start to palpitate. I'd have to stop, I'd have to breathe, and then I can move on to writing the next cost. And once you truly understand what you're doing in that room, like there's you start to gain a little bit of momentum because it can feel overwhelming at first. You're talking to 25 people who were already emotionally inept, and now you have to try to figure out the emotions uh from a broken heart. So once you gain momentum, you feel like you could probably write a thousand of them. And I mean, let's face it, we've probably identified at least that many at this point. And from time to time, they still surface. What I didn't know, and what nobody told us yet, was that I was going to have to read every single one of them out loud, and that I was going to have to read them to your face in that circle. And when they told us that, my first thought was, oh shit.

SPEAKER_02 10:46

And then it was us. And this is the part I've never been able to explain on my own. Um, because I can only tell you what it was like from my chair. You were three feet away, living the exact same minutes from the other side. So we'll each take our turn doing this part. Um so we sat down in those two chairs, knees almost touching. And before you started, they gave us the rule. We had to keep eye contact. You could uh not just read the list and get through it. After every single one, you had to stop and and look me directly in the eyes. So that's how it went. And you'd read one, you'd stop, look at me, read the next one, stop, look at me 40 times. And here's what it undid in me. You read things that were costs that I hadn't even let myself name yet. Um, losses that I hadn't admitted were losses. I couldn't tell you, oddly, um, the exact, you know, wording of any of them, but every single one of them was true. And you had seen the damage more completely than I had. So I came into that room 90% gone, and the man across from me understood what he had done to me better than I think I understood it myself. And you were weeping. I had never in my life seen you that way. Because there's a difference between, you know, being emotional and there's weeping. And you were having to stop to catch your breath. And I saw brokenness that was entirely about me. And I sat there with that stupid soap-through water Phoenix in my lap, holding your eyes through every single one, watching you stay in it the way I'd watch those other men stay in it. And somewhere in those 40 things, um that wall that I had built started to give.

SPEAKER_00 13:13

From from my chair, those same minutes were the most exposed I think I have ever been. I was terrified. I mean, I I wasn't necessarily terrified of the room. The room kind of vanished. I I didn't see people, I didn't see the therapist, I had no peripheral. Uh this was just between you and me. And I knew that what was about to happen was a test of the exact thing I had always run from my entire life. And that is whether I could sit in the discomfort of my own emotions, known and unknown at the time, and not flinch, not run. Whether I could look you in the eye every single time and let you see that I understood. I I had something to prove to you, and I don't know, maybe prove something to myself as well. I watched you cry as I read, I cried as I read. I had to stop more than once just to catch my own breath. Uh my my voice was shaking, my hands were sweaty and trembling, but I but I stayed. And what I understand now looking back is what that afternoon really was. It was like this kind of you you described it as holy, and I think that's the best word for it. Because I think for those of us who were unfaithful in that room, it was a holy undoing of my ego. This was not a performance, you know, to convince you to stay.

SPEAKER_02 15:10

Yeah, and and I need to be honest about deciding to s about what deciding to stay actually was, because it it didn't feel like the end of it. It wasn't like the end of this exercise. I was like, okay, I'm gonna stay.

SPEAKER_03 15:24

Right.

SPEAKER_02 15:25

It was a process that I felt safe beginning, you know, choosing to say there's something here worth possibly salvaging. I feel like we we can continue to do some hard work.

unknown 15:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:45

So the drive home uh was seven hours, about seven hours. And for the first time in a long time, I remember I actually felt connected to you again. And somewhere on that drive, we decided we were gonna move back in together and get everything and give it everything we had. Um, and I'm not gonna pretend that that was easy or that it was easy after that because it obviously it was very difficult. Yeah. But something was different now, and we had learned a new way to talk to each other, and you had learned to sit with me in my pain instead of running from it. And that honestly, that turned out to be everything.

SPEAKER_00 16:22

Yeah, yeah, I agree. I I remember leaving. I I remember that this is an probably a silly detail. Um, but I hold I hold it close. I remember that we were holding hands in the car. And at the time, you know, that felt like hope. Like in my veins. I I felt hope. Um, but you know, I I want to be careful about what I mean by that, because I I had already surrendered the outcome before we ever sat down in those chairs. I I had already resolved to make amends with your parents, with my parents, and to allow whatever future you and I chose, I was going to accept it. If you chose to divorce me, I mean you'd have every right. I had made, I had made my peace with that. I could build a life and you could build your life. And whatever that looked like, I would honor you any way I could, even from a distance. So when you brought back moving in, I I didn't like jump at it, you know. I wasn't like, oh, sweet, the it worked. Uh I'm I've been asked to come back home. Uh I remember asking you if that's really what you wanted. Like in your heart of hearts, is this the right decision for you? Because I think at the time I I needed that to be your ask, not mine. I it needed to be not based on a sense of relief for me, the answer. Uh, and definitely not on the momentum that we gained over the weekend. It had to be your ask. And when you said yes, you would think that I would have been elated. But I'm being honest, it wasn't euphoria. It was gratitude. I definitely humility. Um, but there was a very clear aware awareness that I had no margin for error. These are the thoughts that are running through my head when you're saying, let's do this. This it, you know, it's not like this welcome home party. Like it was more like an invitation to show up and get ready to do the work. And what I mean, I was grateful for that opportunity. And I knew exactly what it was going to cost me.

SPEAKER_02 18:47

Yeah, and I remember it took me, it took time for me to understand what really happened sitting in those chairs. The release, you know, the part where I realized that if this wasn't about me, I didn't have to carry it. That didn't come while I was sitting in the chair. Um, it came slowly as I did um my work and as I healed my own heart, as I figured out what I actually valued, and I started to see myself as someone who was strong and dare I say, brave, you know, and and somewhere in there I started to be grateful for it, for this whole awful mess, and which I know sounds insane to say out loud. A lot of people look at me like I've absolutely lost my mind, especially if they're in the early days. But but what I tell people is this all the time you you just got initiated into a club you never wanted to join, and it's called the Betrayed Club. Congratulations, right? Nobody volunteers for it, but the club hands you a key, and that key unlocks a new way of seeing yourself, other people, and the world. And here's what it taught me: two things that look like opposites can actually be true at the same time. So you can love me and you hurt me. Yeah, all of it at once, and it's true. Yeah, and I had to learn to hold the paradox, and holding that paradox, it turns out, is the secret to a lot of joy. And I didn't have any language for that for a long time. It was just something my own life had taught me the hard way. And dang, I wish there was a different way to get to that understanding and and clarity, but it is what it is. But but I later found out um with Richard Rohr, who ended up being a massive, you know, spiritual advisor for me. Don't know him personally, but um read all of his books and listened to him. He writes about wisdom in this way that we have to learn to live with paradox. And more than that, we have to even learn to love it, or we will never be wise or forgiving or possess any patience that good relationships take. And that really stopped me because it named the thing that the Betrayed Club had handed me without my permission. And Roar points out to you know, all the faith, all the places faith already asks us to hold two things at once, like like Jesus is human and divine, that something can be killed and still be alive. You know, he says reality itself is paradoxical, that there's nothing on this earth that isn't a mixture all at once of good and bad, of the thing that heals you and the thing that hurts you. And even as I think about like parent being a parent is very paradoxical. Like you could never love this human being more than life itself, but at some times you are so done with this little person, right? And so as I read Roar's teachings, um I began to understand it. That like that's my marriage. That's the whole thing. You loved me and you hurt me. And none of it cancels the rest out. Right. And I used to think healing meant that picking one of those to be the true one and only one. And it doesn't. Healing was learning for me, was learning to hold all of them at the same time. And more importantly, that I had to stop demanding that the contradiction resolve.

unknown 22:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:32

And Roar would say, he has a saying that, you know, an untarnished mirror takes in the whole picture, the darkness and the light together. And that's what I finally learned to do. And that's the closest thing to peace that I know.

SPEAKER_00 22:46

Yeah. Yeah. I I think you and I both land on paradox. And I I don't think it's any, you know, that's not a coincidence. I think it's the only place like our story can honestly end. Like what I've come to understand about that particular afternoon is that it showed me that I was capable, that I could sit with this like unquantifiable discomfort. I could look at this person that I love most in the world, the same person that I hurt most in the world. And I could stay, not perform, but actually stay, sit in your pain and my discomfort. And the paradox I live with now is I I will forever hold a knowledge that I am capable of causing the most devastating heartbreak immanageable to the person I love the most. And that I'm also capable of the deepest empathy. I'm capable of the deepest amends. I am capable of becoming the best version of myself for that same person. Those two things don't cancel each other out, like you said earlier. They they don't resolve. I used to think that healing would mean that eventually one of them would win out, that I could, you know, I could stop being the man uh who did this and just be the man I am now. But that's just not how it works. Both of them are true. And I have to hold that tension for the rest of my life. And somewhere in learning to hold that and stopping the fight to make that contradiction go away, the real work began.

SPEAKER_02 24:38

Yeah, I am so grateful that we were both able, you know, to get to that place.

SPEAKER_00 24:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:46

So to those who are listening, just a reminder that whatever your piece of this looks like, you're not as alone in it as it can feel.

SPEAKER_01 25:02

If something in today's episode stirred something in you, we'd love to hear from you. You can find us at the affair that saved us.com. Leave us a question or a comment there. And if you're ready to take a next step, Arlie works directly with couples and individuals navigating infidelity recovery. You can reach him at arlie at arlysmart.com to schedule a session.