0:02

Welcome to the delight your marriage podcast. This show where you hear from amazing and inspiring wives sharing their struggles, triumphs, and advice for this journey called marriage. Here’s your host belah Rose.

0:19

Hi, and welcome. Thank you so much for joining today. If this is your first time listening to the delight your marriage podcast, I want you to know that we talk about marriage, intimacy, sex, sexual addiction, sexual brokenness, intimacy, emotional, physical, and spiritual. Those are the areas we really focus in on. If you haven’t gone to delight your marriage.com, I would encourage you to go there, there’s so many resources for you. Let’s see, I guess this is episode 97. So we’ve got 97 other episodes that you’re welcome to check out, you can use the search bar, and there’s a couple of updates there that I’d love for you to check out. Otherwise, today is a program really focused in on women that have had sexual addiction, either in their past or something they’re currently struggling with. And specifically, we’re talking to an amazing, brave woman that really works with women that are struggling in sexual brokenness, and pornography addiction, and Jenny Miller, who just has an amazing story, it’s really incredible. This is the first half of her episode, sorry, of her interview. But I would love for you to just realize that this is something that so many women are dealing with 37% of women are dealing with it. 50% of men 37% of women and it’s growing. And if you don’t, or haven’t struggled with this, I’m sure many of your friends have, and even your daughters and nieces. And I just encourage you to listen with an open heart. And I think the full point, I guess at the end of this whole episode, is really that shame is not the answer to what you’ve gone through the answer is Jesus. And He can give you a lot of hope. Through the words of Jenny, I believe so. So I’ll talk to you on the other side.

2:28

All right, well, thank you so much to let your marriage listener I’m so glad that you’re here. And I’m so excited to have Jenny Miller on the line. Hi, Jenny. Welcome.

2:38

Hi. Thanks for having me.

2:40

Absolutely. I am so excited that you’re here. You know, Jenny, and I got connected. I think I sent a request into well, tell us a little bit about your ministry. And and what you do

2:53

there? Well, I am the director of administration for a ministry and Umbrella ministry called Whole women ministries. And basically what we do is we work with women on a number of issues that they are seeking hope and healing for one of our ministries underneath that umbrella is dirty girls ministries that specifically works with women in the area of sexual brokenness and sexual addiction. Yeah,

3:18

that’s awesome. Well, I’m so excited, like I said, when I happened upon their website, because there’s a lot of my story that really deals with sexual brokenness, and and we’re even going to talk about pornography addiction in the realm of women having that addiction, because we’ve talked a lot about it on the podcast, when it’s men are the ones that are struggling with this, but as most I mean, I think we’re going to talk about it quite a bit. You know, it’s it affects women. I mean, am I wrong? Is it something like one in three, something along those lines? In

3:49

any women? It is, the statistic is actually growing? It’s about 50% for Christian men and women is growing, I think it was 37%. And we know that it’s higher now. So it’s gaining closing that gap in between being equal.

4:04

Wow. And these are these women that are dealing with it now or, or have dealt with it in the past.

4:10

A mixture of both the women that come into our community are actively you know, involved in sexual addiction, pornography addiction, a fit marital affairs, different types that they’re seeking healing from, and then we have women all the way that have been walking through recovery that just want to stay connected to a community. So it’s a wide range.

4:32

Oh, that’s, that’s such important work that you do. That’s amazing. Okay, cool. Well, yeah, obviously, this is a huge, huge issue that’s affecting men, and it’s also affecting women and marriages. So that’s what we’re talking about today. So Jenny, again, you know, this whole podcast is really about inspiring women talking about their stories, digging into what God has done for them. So let’s just start off if you could, you know, you introduced a little bit of your ministry, but if you could introduce Use yourself a bit. And what your day to day life looks like.

5:03

Well, I’m a mom of three amazing kids. So they are 13, eight and four have two older boys and a little girl. And happily married this September, I’m celebrating 15 years married to my husband. Congrats, thank you. My day to day life and I have to laugh a little bit. I’m very, very busy. I run 100 miles an hour, most of the time. My husband Yeah, he works a lot of long hours. So I have worked from home probably over the last decade. As far as myself, I do ministry. I have my own business. And I’m a full time student. I’m actually leaving tomorrow. Oh my gosh, to go graduate with my degree. Thank you. That’s huge.

5:48

And you have time to talk to us. Thank you so much.

5:50

No problem. I’m just packing running around. But um, yeah, our day to day life is packed really full. I’m really busy. I’m getting ready start grad school in the fall so

6:00

amazing. That’s incredible. Well, for any of us that have been out there saying well, it’s just too much. Look, Jenny’s done it. It inspired ladies. That’s amazing. Well, okay, so tell us a little bit about you and your husband’s personalities. What do you guys like?

6:15

Well, um, if I, my our personalities are really different for starters. So my husband, Randy, he’s a really laid back kind of guy. He’s a really hard worker, he loves to work with his hands. He loves being a dad to our three kids. And we did the you know, love language assessment early on in our marriage, which is very helpful, by the way. But we found out that his love language are his words of affirmation, physical touch, quality time. And then me on the other hand, I’m a really emotional person. And when I say emotional, I don’t mean you know, sobbing all the time. And all of that just feeds. I feel things really deeply. So I’m a really empathetic person. And I love people, I love doing things for others, but I do have kind of that type A personality. So I am a left brained, analytically minded person. So I really love organizing and, you know, building systems, and sometimes this drives my husband nuts, because he’s so laid back, but my love language is actually almost solely acts of service. So it’s really interesting.

7:19

Mm hmm. Yep. That’s interesting. Okay, and we heard a little bit about you kind of like to get things done and do a lot is your, your husband, you say is more laid back, he’s more relaxed on these things.

7:33

He is, um, it doesn’t take a lot to entertain him. He just likes just being being around. Whereas I like to have something in my hands. I like to keep busy. I like to be moving. So yeah, that’s different in that regard.

7:48

Yeah, that’s funny. Okay, cool. Well, that that gives good insight on where we’re going next. But to start things off, do you have a scripture or quote that’s meant a lot to over the years that kind of informs this discussion?

8:02

I do I have to, because I can never do what I’m told and just pick one. So Marie’s will take it. The first one is Proverbs 3125. It says she is clothed in dignity and strength. And she laughs without fear of the future. And the other scripture that I love, and it will make more sense as I tell my story, a little bit is in Isaiah 43. Two, it says, when you go through deep waters, I will be with you. When you go through rivers of difficulty, you will not drown. When you walk through the fire of oppression, you will not be burned up, the flames will not consume you. So those two have really been life versus for me over several over the last several years, for sure.

8:44

That is so powerful. I love especially, I actually just did a podcast about confidence. And proverbs 3125 was a big, that was episode 95, if anyone wants to go back and listening to that, but that that it even says in that proverbs 31. It talks about Woman of Valor, there’s that there’s almost like a better translation than a virtuous wife who can find its own to wife of Valor, which is like that strength, dignity, courageous. So that’s powerful to me as well. That’s awesome. Yes, okay. Well, I want to really dive into your story. So if you could share a season of struggle or difficulty in your marriage, and maybe it was, you know, came even way before that, but I’d love to hear your story.

9:28

Okay. Well, it’s difficult to share my story, you know, in its entirety, based on the limited time we had together, but I’ll try to condense it down, you know, so it’s easy to digest and kind of hit the main points, but it does go way further back than my marriage, but just talking about my marriage to begin with, like my husband and I, we we came from different family backgrounds. And that’s really a story on itself. His I would say was really stable, more stable than mine was, even though he did have some issues. I’ll share in just a minute, but my story is really, I’d say a lot more colorful a lot more difficult. My upbringing was more difficult there was, in my past and past relationships, I had a lot of abuse and abandonment, trauma. And I grew up in a really spiritually abusive church environment. So that combination, I would say was kind of deadly. Going before my marriage, I didn’t know my biological father, he was an alcoholic. And when my mom left him, my stepdad adopted me at a really young age actually didn’t even know anything about that until I was about seven or eight years old. When, when they got together, my stepdad was also an alcoholic before we entered into, you know, our church, so our home was really tough as you can imagine, by the time I was a teenager, I was kind of the poster child for insecurity, I was just lacking a lot of the affirmations, I think that a young girl really needs. Yeah, so you can imagine puberty rolls along, I began to get attention from the opposite sex. And I would say it’s, you know, it wasn’t the right kind of attention. In my mind, I thought it was love in some distorted sort of way. And really a sheltered I went to my church had a private Christian school, I went there, it was the same building as the church within, so kind of to say, I lived breathed. That place, I was there every day for school two to three times a week for church, you know, there was a midweek service youth group summer camp. So I was just in this bubble. And I was really, really naive to what was outside of that. So fast forward to graduation, and getting a job and entering college. It really was, me, like entering into a culture I had never been in before people that you know, we’re not believers. And I guess I could say, you know, I started serial dating. And when men or guys would pay attention to me, I just, I made choices sexually, that were really terrible for me. And it just started this spiraling out of control at that point. And I graduated at the age of 17. I my major in college was computer information systems. And this will tell you how old I am, but computers were I didn’t have a computer at home at this time. So the only computers they had was at college they had in the library, they had a whole computer lab and so I had to go there to do my homework I didn’t you know, did split killing time before work and, and school. So I was on the computer a lot found chat rooms, which this totally girl it was in a bubble. And you know, that was a whole new experience for me just chatting with different people, and then you know, chats with men, and then those turn sexual. And I remember, pornography actually happened in the school library, it was in the very back of the library that there was hardly ever anybody in there when I was there. And so it just popped up one day, and it just sparked something. In me. It was excitement, shame, all of that rolled into one. Yep. And that just started a track of of 11 years of being addicted to pornography, that I really kept hidden the entire time, I did not tell a single person because like you said at the beginning, you know, I thought this was only men that high, right? Women don’t have this issue. And so a lot of women, when they are struggling with this, they get to the point where they get married, and they think, Oh, I’ll get married, and this is all gonna be fixed, it’s all going to go away. And that’s what I thought too. I got married in 2001 to my husband and kept this completely hidden. And as you know, the problem continued, it did not get fixed. All the way through, I was pregnant with my second son, when really, I hit rock bottom. And I actually told someone for the first time in that whole 11 year period. And I started walking in recovery with the same ministry that I’m actually with now. And you would have thought, you know that maybe that was the end of the story. And you know that but it really wasn’t. And I thought it was I was starting to do ministry I was starting to speak I wrote my story. It was published in a book. And about two and a half years ago,

14:22

I was diagnosed with breast cancer out of the clear blue. And my husband and I, as you can imagine sexual addiction, you know, ruins the intimacy in your relationship. And so we knew it was a problem. We knew we had to work on it and we started to really make progress right when I was diagnosed. So then comes chemo radiation, a double mastectomy, a full hysterectomy. You know, sends you into full menopause and reconstruction which my issue was because of the radiation the reconstruction kept failing. So I had about 16 surgeries and all that ended with what they call a TRAM flap procedure, it was, for me, it was kind of a last resort. And to make a really long story short, you know, my body was bluffed, broken, it’s deformed. It’s nothing like my former self. And so this kind of set me back, I think, to square one with what we were working on, and we both had a crisis of faith at that point. And I really didn’t even know if our marriage would make it at all. Oh, my gosh, you know, it was a lot of anger, my husband was dealing with just anger of the situation, anger of my addiction and what it had caused, and it just started this cycle of blame, that really started growing worse by the day. You know, fast forward to today, I mean, we’re still a work in progress. It’s a lot of surrender and, and compromise, my husband has gone and gotten help for his anger issues, and it’s just working through kind of the wreckage that my addiction and cancer has caused, and that daily work with a lot of grace, a lot of forgiveness, you know, a lot of space so our family can heal.

16:09

Yeah. Oh, that’s amazing. Yeah, I just feel like there’s, there’s so much here, and it’s so probably easy. I like, you know, what you said, the cycle of blame, you know, I think that’s so easy in our relationships to get in that spot to point fingers. And if you had made different choices, or if you had done this, or all of that, you know, I want to also mention, you know, my story, similar to yours in that, you know, I was super sheltered growing up and, and then stumbled upon pornography when I was doing homework one time in high school, on the computer, and, and yet, it turned into a very secret, shameful addiction for years. I’m not sure how many years but six, maybe seven, something like that a long time of shame. And so I think that, you know, maybe maybe that’s the area to start is like, how you got through this shame. Because I imagine there’s a lot of women that are listening that whether it’s a porn addiction that they have struggled with, or currently are struggling with, or it’s infidelity, or, I mean, there’s so much shame around our sexuality, and choices we’ve made with it. What would you say to that, to talking about that shame.

17:30

I think that shame is the number one tool that the enemy uses, to keep us silent to keep us, you know, shackled up in that. And it’s not just shame of what we’re doing. I mean, every time you know, you have that cycle, where you act out, you look at pornography, and then you have that down depressive time, that you need. To go back to that, again, it’s just a vicious cycle. But that shame, you know, usually stems from a wound before that addiction even happen. And just, it’s an identity issue or an intimacy issue where the shame of who you are either you were, you know, told a lie by someone that you’re not good enough, you’re not worth it, or it’s been an abuse or trauma of abandonment that has just created that wound. And you turn to this as just kind of a false sense of intimacy, really. And it just perpetuates that cycle of shame. And then you’re triggered again, when someone says or does something that reminds you of that wound. And it just, it’s that trap.

18:34

That is really good. That trigger. And I appreciate, you know, your honesty and authenticity. And in talking about, you know, the recovery is not like, once and done like it’s over. And I remember that like even into my marriage, having, you know, to come and you know, teary eyed talk to my husband about what I had done. And that, you know, I guess, you know, as women are making these first steps into maybe recovery, let’s say, what are some guidance that you could give them about the journey ahead in recovery?

19:13

Well, with any kind of trauma and most people come, you know, seeking help for the addiction issues first for you know, I want to stop doing what I’m doing. And I’d say that that is the first place to to look at first before you back up and look at you know, whatever kind of trauma is underlying behind it, because many people don’t know what it is. But if there’s one thing I could say is just to emphasize the word daily, and what I mean by that is there’s one thing I’ve learned is that we only have control over today and what we are think today what we choose to do today, it’s today is the gifts that we’ve been given and what we have control over whatever choices we make attitudes, behaviors that we do today, or what’s going to affect our future. So depending on what your struggle is, it may be be you know what you choose to think on for that moment. And I have to always remind myself to bring myself back to today. And a daily prayer that I started to pray was God, you know, what do you want from me today? What do you want me to do today? What do you want me to say today? Because it’s really a journey, it’s a daily walk, it’s just 1000 times making the decision just to do the very next right thing in front of you. And well, as far as seeking help for any addiction issues or struggles Galatians six, two says, To bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. And I think that’s the number one thing is the surrendering knowing that this is bigger than me, I cannot keep you know, I can’t fix this by myself. I’ve tried and it’s not worked. And that I need to break the silence. Yeah. And our culture, I have to say that we think we’re more connected than ever, you know, we have Facebook, social media, but we’re not connected on a relational level. And I, so I, I guess I equate that to like, think of yourself as like, your own little island. And you’re sending out these little perceptions of who you are, you know, glimpses of what we’re thinking, and we think we’re making these connections. But really, it’s just like the highlight reel, you’re just broadcasting what you want people to see about you. So I’d say that the real connection, you know, is finding safe people and learn what it means to do life together and to talk about those hard things.

21:27

Mm hmm. Yeah, I so appreciate that. It’s interesting. We actually, I interview someone, it’s coming out the week after your interview Jenny about finding safe people. So I’m not going to dive into that. But yeah, there’s there’s a couple books out there that are really helpful. But finding safe people I think is huge, huge, huge, huge. So So yes, so I like that you said the first step is dealing with ending that addiction dealing with the the the actions, the behavior, but the second piece of that is understanding the underlying trauma, the thing that’s triggering the thing that’s wounded, that’s making you go to that, again, that infidelity, the pornography, whatever. The thing is, and we’re talking about pornography for women right now. So let’s, let’s focus on that. Um, so, you know, as a woman, you know, let’s say she finds the safe people starts opening up, connects with your community, whole women ministries.com. That’s the website. Is that right? Yes. Yeah. Connects there, starts opening up with safe people. Now, think thinking about that trauma, why is that important to understand?

22:44

What happens is when you know, whatever that trauma can be, it can be from your childhood, it can be something even recent, but usually it’s an abuse or an abandonment, trauma or something like that. And some people don’t even understand what that is. So once you’re, you know, you having accountability, and you’re starting to look at, we run from intimacy, another word for sexual addiction is intimacy disorder. And so we lose that connection and that ability to be vulnerable and to be intimate with other people. And so part of healing that is learning how to heal in community, and how you know, the very thing that we’re running from, is the very thing that’s going to heal us. And so it’s difficult for a lot of women to number one, say it out loud. And number two, you know, share, but if you can do it in a safe place, where there’s other women that are like you that have walked the journey before you, they know, I would say call you out on your stuff, but we we’d like this easy for us to hide, and that’s our go to hide, and they can say hey, you’re hiding? And you know, I know because I’ve been there and yeah, it’s it’s just we have to heal and community even though it’s difficult at first.

23:56

Oh, that’s so true. And I love that, you know, kind of circling back to the shame idea, right? Because the shame the enemy is telling us no one will understand what you’re going through. This is the worst of the worst. You are, you know, all these lies a myriad of lies. If you know what I’m talking about, you know exactly. Those lies of the enemy. Just you can’t How can you go to church when you’ve just done that smut all night long, or the day before or whatever, or just hours before? I mean, it’s just like horrible, horrible cycle of shame. And, and then you know, it reminds me of that terrible Austin Powers movie of the the fat guy saying I’m, I’m fat because I’m unhappy. I eat because I’m unhappy and I’m happy like, unhappy because I eat and so there’s like, this, like this cycle of like, you get in that mode of like shame and guilt and sadness, and then you want that, you know, release to run away from it that escape and then it’s the cycle that just keeps going and yeah, what do you think about that?

24:57

I have to say that one of the things I hear the most Is that women will say, I’ve gone to my church, I’ve gone, you know, up to the front, and I’ve been prayed for and I’ve asked God, please take this from me. I mean, I was there, I can’t tell you how many years I went and just cried and just said, God, take this for me take this for me. And the next day, I would find that I’m struggling again. But I wasn’t surrendering. I was, I was still hiding, I was still silent. And that shame kept me silent. And it wasn’t until I open my mouth. And I have to say, the weekend I decided to do it. It was out of nowhere, somebody was talking. I can’t tell you what they were talking about. But something on the inside of me was like screaming, say it, just say it, say it. You can’t keep doing this anymore. And I just said it had no idea what would come out of it. It was two women standing there. And the other one looked at me and said, Jenny, I can’t believe you just said that. She’s like, I have struggled to. And I just I felt like a load of two times fell off my shoulders at that moment.

25:59

Yes, yes. Yes, that’s right. That’s right. Yep. Yep. I can remember two instances during this addiction that I shared with the women that I trusted. And the first one was much earlier on in the addiction, she was my best friend. And I told her, and her initial reaction was, she was horrified. And she said, we’ll stop. And that’s what she did. And she was young. I mean, we were in high school or whatever, so that, then I bottled it, I bottled it for a long time until I was on a mission trip. Far away from home, you know, obviously, on this mission trip, there was no access to internet, obviously. So there was just like, kind of a freedom for a while. And I shared with a woman there and she was much more mature and a safe person as we, as you mentioned. And she just held me and was like, you know, me too. I’ve had my sexual struggles. And she shared, you know, the difficulty she’s gone through. And, and we just, it was just this wonderful, like, freedom. And I think that was a real turning point in my being able to, yeah, walk out of walk out recovery, I guess is the way to say it. Yeah. Yeah. And I think you also mentioned that you heal in community. Now, women, it’s hard to talk about this, right? Why is it more difficult for a woman to talk about porn addiction than it is for a man?

27:34

Well, I think the reasons that women and men turn to pornography are different, even though studies are showing that women are becoming more visually stimulated now, just because of the culture that we live in, and how visual everything is, you know, there is still a difference. I used to think that when I would look at pornography, my main concern was, you know, I would question my sexuality, you know, am I, am I a homosexual woman? Am I straightaway? Like, I don’t understand this. I’m not attracted to women. But yet, why do I look at pornography? That is we hear so often. And the reason why, for me, and what this is, what I hear a lot is that it’s not necessarily that I’m attracted to the women. But there’s something about the woman being assertive and being it’s that distorted sense of reality, or does that distorted sense of intimacy, I’m looking at that unhealthy sexual relationship and somehow in a distorted way, I’m, you know, equating that with intimacy and equating that, and then, you know, obviously, the chemicals firing in your brain and the high that you get from doing that is part of it as well. But when I finally understood that, that was the reason why I was turning to that. Wow, that was really eye opening to me. It was almost like I was becoming that woman in a sense. Mm hmm.

28:51

Yeah, yep. Yep. And I, I actually definitely went through growing up like this questioning concern about my own sexuality, if, you know, if, if that’s what’s attractive to me. And I think one thing that’s helped me kind of come to terms with with it is that I think sex is attractive, I think, for pretty for generally everyone that sex is attractive, and you know, your eye, like if you are walking down the street, and you see sexual sex happening there next to you. It just, it turns your attention, you can’t help it, because that’s the way God designed sex. So if you’re witnessing sex, male or female, I think it’s attractive. And I think, you know, I have so much more to say about this. But I think one piece I’ll just leave maybe a Next, another podcast, I’ll talk about it more. But I think it’s just one of those things that like, what we focus on grows. So if we focus our attention on what we appreciate about life, what God has given us our blessings, the good things, if we ask ourselves questions about what is God done for me today, then we’re going to get really good answers. We’re going to Think about all the joys, the blessings, it’s going to grow, our appreciation for life is going to grow. But I’m sure you and I and Jenny, and everyone listening knows people that have so much. And all they can think about all their focuses is their health problems, or their money problems, or their, you know, stress about job or something, and you look at them, and you’re like, you have everything. How can you be so glum and bad? Like in your head? Like, why are you because whatever you focus on is going to grow in your head and in your thoughts life. And I think that’s the way it happens with our sexuality. If you focus on what’s amazing about your spouse, what’s, what’s incredible about his body, what you are find attractive, what are the areas that are just so amazing to you that you’re so grateful that God gave you this amazing human specimen to you why then that focus is going to grow? Because God gives us barriers and boundaries in the Bible. He says this you can do. And so when we see the can do, let’s enjoy it and embrace it in an experience all that it is. And I think the enemy wants to instead move our focus away. I mean, do you have thoughts on that?

31:11

Exactly, there’s one thing that I say often, and that’s if you’re in a boat, you have your compass, you know, guiding your way, and your compass gets one degree off one degree, that the the amount of miles that you’re off course, by the time you get to the end and how much you will miss the mark off one degree, it might not seem like it at first, you know, it might look like you’re pointed in the right direction. But that slight tiny little deviation will end you up in a totally different place. And so that’s what I come back to the daily thing, your course correcting every day, you’re putting that compass back on true center where it’s supposed to be, which is Jesus Christ. And that is a daily effort. It’s, you know, you can’t just do it one day, and then float off for several months and think that you’re okay, it’s a daily walk.

31:59

That is powerful. I just love that I did want to go back to that. Because daily, that’s powerful. So let’s say, let’s think about the wife that is deciding right now, to accept the free blood of Jesus the gift that He’s given you to wash away all of our sin from yesterday, you know, maybe after this podcast, you can say a prayer and get that forgiveness and accept it, receive it and move forward. So now a fresh day? to course correct? How How does the wife do that? How does she practically course correct for the new day, the fresh beginning that she’s been given?

32:39

Is this individually or in her marriage? Or both?

32:43

Yeah, do both, that’d be awesome.

32:46

I would say a wife has to firt. Number one, it has to be individual. First, you can’t pour out of a vessel that’s empty. So to be the wife that you need to be or want to be if you’re empty, or you’re like you say your compass is pointing in a different direction, you’re going to miss the mark in your marriage every time. So it has to start with you first. And I know for me, I had to once I confessed to my husband, I had to say, Hey, I’ve got to get help for me before we can work on us. And so he had to show grace and step back and give me the space to be able to heal the things in me so that I could be a better person. So whatever that looks like for each person, if it’s just, you know, getting back into daily prayer, and I know as women we are the we put ourselves last always, we just do we do we give of ourselves to everyone, and whatever’s left, if there’s anything left will give that you know, maybe to ourselves or maybe to God, you know, but we have it backwards. You know, God has to be forefront and we have to take care of ourselves so that we can be who we need to be to other people. And so it’s what it you know, asking yourself the question, what do I need to do in my life? What needs to change in my life? What do I need to say no to? And no is a complete sentence, I just want to say that, like, that’s a lesson for me. You don’t have to give a reason. You know, it’s okay to work on you for the time that it takes as far as your marriage. There’s just three things I guess I could say. I’ll say them really quickly. It’s not take up too much time but to really make your marriage successful. I think. Number one is for us, it’s communication. I’m so thankful that my husband I are able to communicate because I’ve seen so many couples that can’t communicate and if we lack in the communication skill with our spouses more than likely we’re lacking in our communication with God too. So that’s something that we need to work out. You know, and talk about our feelings, our struggles, our fears, what we’re upset about and listen to the other person and I don’t mean just listen, you know audibly but listen as an understanding what they’re trying to communicate. maybe repeat it back and say, This is what I’m hearing is this what you mean? The second thing I’d say is to just check comparison at the door. We our world is nothing but comparison. And I go back to social media because we all live on it. Pinterest, you know, and it can be the death of us. It’s just, it’s a deadly trap, because so many marriages look like they have it all together. And you’re seeing what they want you to see. No one’s living, you know, in my husband and I’s relationship. And we’ve made the mistake of, you know, letting people speak into our relationship that didn’t understand the road that that we had walked. And so if you’re going to compare yourself to a godly couple, do it in relationship with them and let them share maybe the difficulties they’ve had, you know, chances are, if you knew their story, and the ups and downs where they were, I think you’d be surprised. And I think the third thing, and this can be in your marriage, or personally, as well is try to get rid of the offenses in your life offenses towards other people, we live in an offended culture. And offense is a killer, it creates those roots of bitterness, and they go really deep down into your heart and soul.

36:14

Oh, that is so good. So the first one, and this is specifically about marriage is communication with your spouse. But that also, probably if that’s not if that’s pretty weak, it probably also means your communication with God is weak as well, which I love that insight. The second one is check comparison at the door, which is huge. I totally agree with that. And the last one is get rid of offenses. Yeah, that’s huge. And that is a daily habit. In fact, all of these are habit habits. You know, I’ve been reading a lot of books about habits recently. And then the it’s funny, because there’s a, there’s a book called The Power of Habit. And it basically is saying, one of the biggest things I took out of it was the most important piece of habits of changing is the belief that you can change. That’s the number one most important thing they did all these and this is all secular studies, and research is the belief that you can change. So, you know, this is the last part of this first half of the interview with Jenny, but I just want to encourage, you know, anyone who’s out there struggling with porn addiction, that first step is believing that God can redeem and, and change you completely. And here I am living proof that I don’t even struggle with it not even close. Not anymore at all. Like I’m on the computer working from home, and my job and with dy M and I had, it’s been years since I’ve had that struggle. So I just want to encourage anyone who’s listening that there is absolute freedom in this area, it can absolutely change. And I yeah, I don’t know, if you have any last thoughts on this first half of the interview, Jenny.

37:52

Just everything that you’ve said is wonderful. Um, you know, I would say just as the first step that pray and ask God to reveal who in your life could be a place that you could go to like your safe place to go. If it you know, sometimes, if it’s your church, if there’s people in your church, if it’s a professional outside, if it’s a person that’s walk that road, before God will reveal to you, if you make that a matter of prayers, that’d be a great first step.

38:23

I love so much of what was talked about on this episode. But I think one thing that you and I need to do is decide right now we are going to break the back of shame. Because just as Jenny said, It’s so true that shame is the number one tool that enemy uses to keep us away from what God wants us to do and be. And so whatever that means for you whether you have struggled in sexual addiction, and you need to tell some safe person, or whether you need to log into whole women’s ministries.com and delight your marriage.com/ 97 We’ll have all the links that we talked about today. Whatever it means for you to break the back of shame. I say do that this week. Have a conversation with a co worker about this episode, have a conversation with someone you trust that can discuss this important topic that’s dealing with maybe one four of 1/3 to even, you know, closing in on on on more than that 37% of women are dealing with this. Have a conversation break the back of shame. That’s my homework for you. And really take that step. God bless you. Thank you so much for listening. I love you. I am praying for you. Praying for your heart, your marriage, and there is hope. God bless you and we will talk next Tuesday.

39:44

Thanks for listening. Stop by delight your marriage.com to check out all the show notes as well as many more resources and articles. Until next time, live with love, wisdom impassion