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From Crisis to Healing: Ron and Nan's Marriage Transformation 0:00 Well and let me caveat that. I think the problem started the day we said I do. I do. Little did we know, we packed all that baggage into the trunk of his car and0:11 just toted it into the marriage, and it really kinda manifested itself. I mean, we'd have those arguments, you know, year 1, year 2, year 3, year it was the0:23 same argument0:24 Yeah.0:25 For 20 years. But compound that with 3 little guys, not little, they were preteen at the time, and it just it was that same rut we were0:36 in. And it just was getting bigger and bigger and bigger. And and, so I met Ron in our house0:46 and It was in the bedroom.0:47 Yeah. We were living in Amarillo, Texas0:48 at the time. Bedroom.0:49 And I had a suitcase. It was empty, and I said, either you or me is gonna pack this, but I I don't wanna do this anymore. Wow. And he was like, woah. Woah. Woah. Woah. And I said I0:59 knew we were having some struggles. Yeah. Didn't know that.1:01 And I said, I can't do this. I can't do all this traveling, all this leaving us, all you know, the boys need you. They're preteen and I'm I'm done with this. So either you go or I go or1:13 you get us some help. And he he dropped to his knees that night. He said, I'll get us some help. And I said, we'll do it right now.1:20 Wow.1:20 Wow.1:21 We started making phone calls.1:22 He did.1:23 He Struck out the first couple of calls.1:25 He did. Yeah.1:25 Yeah. And then I'm sorry. I meant to say yes to you guys. Yeah.1:29 You know? I've never forgiven you.1:31 I could break, you know, never1:32 forgiven you for that night.1:34 No. It was, who we ended up with was, you know, a god thing. And so Mhmm. But it was 1 of Ron's mentors, had a PhD. And1:46 so I I went in with some sass that morning, and I said, you and you.1:53 Pointed to me and1:53 Both of you.1:54 Hargrave.1:55 None of this psychobabble craziness. You're gonna lay in the plane because I don't want 2 against 1.2:03 Yeah.2:03 And doctor Hargrave set some good boundaries.2:06 Yes. Tier yeah. I'm I'm an early childhood education major. I I'm a I teach 5 and 6 year olds.2:12 Yeah.2:12 Ain't nobody got time to be mind bended2:16 by Pure and simple. Right?2:19 All these guys with all these degrees, and I've was feeling intimidated and, you know, this was a mentor of Ron's, and so I knew he was gonna, you know I don't know. I was just I didn't want I wanted to be2:31 heard. And let me just tell you that's what Terry did. And, yeah, I can call him Terry now because he's a friend. But he said, well, by all means, you go first. And he he allowed me to go first and really,2:43 honestly, was 1 of the first people because I had done some counseling. I've got a lot of baggage from Yeah. Childhood, and he he heard me. And, and then he turned around that day, which was2:54 glorious. I was so sassy when I was also stuck in my pain with him because, you know, I wanted Terry to fix him3:01 Mhmm.3:02 So that then he would stop hurting me. Mhmm. And anyway, he said 2 profound things that day. He he looked at Ron and he really nailed him to the wall on his pride,3:15 which was a a beginning of a transformation for Ron. Yeah. But I was sitting there in my pain going, yes. This is awesome. And then I remember he turned to me and he said,3:27 man, all this pain you've shared with me, if you'll allow God to heal that, it it will be the most beautiful thing in your life. And I was like, what?3:39 Yeah. Right.3:41 I really I really just want you to fix it.3:43 It's simple.3:44 You know, I I I yes. I get this pain that I've had, but I've been trying to scrape this off my entire life. I I need you to get him to stop doing what he's doing that triggers me.3:54 That was the beginning of a journey for us Yeah. That it Yeah. Continues to this day. We are still walking out day after day, stuff we learned then and stuff we've learned in between.4:04 And what your listeners need to know is is it started us both on a journey of self discovery for both of us, and then it kinda halted because then 2 years later, we4:16 lost our son, Connor. Mhmm. That's a wrench4:19 and everything.4:20 So through wrench and everything. But I I think about and then Terry was just walking in grief with us, and he did it beautifully. Mhmm. He was just4:32 there for us. But if we hadn't have had that help Mhmm. 2 years prior4:39 Yeah.4:39 I really honestly don't know.4:41 It's the mercy of God Mhmm. The timing of all of that.4:43 Of course, it was a4:44 big crisis and ugly, and we didn't know what to do with it at the time. But, boy, was it4:49 real Yeah.4:49 God's grace for us.4:50 Because what was you as you look back on that that season, as you guys first really started to go after what was really driving all this, what what did that look like for both of you? Because5:02 I like how you're you're you're saying there's, you know, there's topics and there's you know, we argue about the same thing over and over and over again. Mhmm. But we know that under the waterline, as Aaron loves to5:13 say, there there's some deeper stuff. Like, what what did that look like for both of you? If you don't mind me asking.5:19 No. I don't mind asking. Not at all. It's the stuff we lay out in the mindful marriage. It's the pain that drives the coping in our lives. Our coping my coping was, work really hard,5:31 perform in everything that I do because whether that's work or or husbandry stuff or being a father or whatever, just perform, perform, perform, perform. And, basically, I was driving at5:43 an identity. You're trying to figure out who I was and what I was worth in the world. And what's the pain behind that? Well, it took me years to really sort of unpack that well. In fact, I'm I'm I'm sure I'm still5:53 unpacking that. You know? This was in 2007 when this journey started. For us, here we are in 20 25 still unpacking this narrative. For me, it was about, am I enough? And6:05 am am I gonna lose my dad's, affirmation and approval? And all of that just sort of taught me how to cope with being afraid that I wasn't enough, that I6:17 would lose people's approval. So I performed to try to win it, and I excelled at everything I did. So I'm working hard. I'm, gone. And even when I'm home, I'm gone Gone6:28 in his head.6:29 In my head. You know, working, still, designing, whatever, which made me unavailable to her.6:35 Yeah. So what mine is is abandonment. I felt it from the get go. And,6:42 That's her family of origin.6:44 That is my family of origin. Huge baggage is the abandonment bag. So you you tap that into that insecurity and then he's driven to go out and do. Yeah. And Yeah. It6:55 is a7:01 everybody sees. That's what we saw. That's what we argued about. Am I working too much? No. I don't think so. Yes. You are. You're here. No. I am here. What do you mean I'm not here? That that's all coping argument.7:10 Yeah.7:10 But it's the pain underneath7:12 Right.7:13 That's driving all of it. And when she talked about how Terry really took us on a journey of dealing with our own pride, He didn't necessarily call it pride, but that's what it was. That's what we came to to7:24 understand.7:25 What did he call it?7:26 Selfishness or selfishness7:29 or Yeah.7:29 Or whatever. Yeah.7:30 Yeah. And and basically that heart posture that says, no. I'm right about this, Babe, you gotta change, and I have the right to change you. Well No. You're right about this, Ron. You're wrong. Yeah. You know, that7:41 posture7:42 just The Bible calls it vain conceit. Right?7:44 Yes. It is a dead end street.7:46 I think. I think you should tell them what he said to you because it was masterful in how he said it because7:55 Ron think I will tell you.7:57 If Terry would have said it that way, I don't know if you'd have heard it.8:00 Yeah. So Nan pours out for 20 minutes, the very first session. Yeah.8:05 Got a lot of words.8:06 All the pain from me, the past, childhood, boom, just 20 minutes is solid. He looks at her and just does a simple reflective statement, but boy, he hit me with an arrow in the process. And he8:18 looks at her and he says, so what you're telling me, Nan, is the reason Ron threw you under the bus is because God told him to. And immediately, I knew God would never tell me to do that. That would8:30 never be the and and somehow I have made this a God thing that I get to run over my wife and and and cope in this manner with work and whatever.8:41 Wow. And I immediately knew I was wrong, and it was something about me I had to figure out. And that was the beginning of the humbling down.8:49 Wow.8:50 That was it. And, you know, now we know God opposes the proud and so do spouses. And God gives grace to the humble and so do spouses. And that is a fundamental principle that lays behind9:02 I I I'm convinced none of the marriage ed stuff you guys and we do will ever work for anybody. None of the skills, none of that will ever work unless the heart is in a place9:13 of humility. Because if it's in a place of pride, meaning, I'm okay, honey, but you're not, so I have the right to change you right now. That's a prideful posture.9:25 Yeah.9:25 That will only invite opposition from her. That will only it doesn't matter how soft or kind or sweet or if I'm smiling when I say it. It will only invite opposition from her, and we'll never get9:37 anywhere.9:37 Mhmm. Mhmm.9:38 And that has been an an absolute game changer for us. Now we we still had to figure out how to deal with our pain Right. And cope differently.9:46 Right.9:46 Yeah. But it started with the humbling process.9:48 Wow. What was that like for you, Ron, as a marriage and family therapist?9:52 Yeah. I9:53 knew we had issues, and I knew we we were working on them. It's not like we were horrible people and neither 1 of us cared or loved the other person.10:00 Mhmm.10:00 I think we're far more normal than most. In other words, nobody had had an affair. Nobody had done anything that was crazy outrageous, grand betrayal in our marriage. Nothing like that. We were just regular10:12 people doing life, trying to hustle, and cover all the bases. Yeah. But some of our coping, both her side and my side, was definitely harmful to our us ness. And10:24 so that day, when she brought that suitcase threw it down, like, I knew we had had difficulties. We've been working on stuff. We'd gone to different counselors at different points in our life, and we'd grown up a bit.10:36 And but, man, all of a sudden, I realized in a very stark fashion, oh, this is this big for her. I didn't realize it was that big. Yeah. And10:48 yeah.10:49 So At10:49 the time, the boys were 14, 12, and 10.10:53 Okay. Yeah.10:53 So He10:54 was busy.10:55 You know, he started traveling when they were a baby 2 and 4.10:58 0, wow.10:58 Wow. Which that's hard.11:00 Yeah. About a decade of11:01 Yeah. And and writing and doing and, you know, he always tried I mean, on my side, I was always praying for him. We would pray for daddy as he was traveling. Let's pray for the people he's speaking with and, you know,11:12 there was always those good motivations to it. And then for Ron, he was always, available to the boys. And then when they go to bed, he'd he'd go into the basement in his office and start writing. So he was11:24 burning the candle at both ends, but he always was available to the boys and to me. And yet there was that sense of he's in his head about it for weeks and, you know, it11:36 just he could never let it go, let let it down. And and I just could see we've got preteens and teenagers. And at the time, it they needed they11:48 you know, boys need their dad.11:49 Yeah. Mhmm.11:50 You know? And I needed my husband.11:53 Mhmm. Mhmm.11:53 And he was killing it out there. I mean, you know11:56 Yeah. I was.11:57 People were love you you're you've saved our marriage and on and on it goes. And I'm like and I feel like I was getting the scraps. I really did.12:04 Yeah.12:05 But I had this huge abandonment bag because I never had anybody in my corner growing up. I never had anybody. I nobody ever had my back. I always had my back.12:16 So here I am again. Mhmm. And I'm like, why am I not enough? Why is everything else the shiny thing that you're going after?12:25 Because you guys know when when you carry a bag out of childhood, a pain can't. There's a hypersensitivity to anybody and anything that gets anywhere near that pain.12:35 Yeah.12:35 And sometimes you read into it and you feel like that pain is being struck again. Sometimes you are, sometimes it's not. But the point is you're you're not gonna be okay with that happening12:47 again. Mhmm. And so for both of us, yeah, we were definitely Mhmm. In our our copes were hurting our essence.12:54 Yeah.12:55 Yeah. Mhmm. It sounds like it. So I I I love how you're saying that that to to really go deeper, to understand what's really going on requires that13:07 that that humility. At some point, you've gotta go from the pride, fix him, fix her to okay. Maybe I need to take a look at some of what's going on. How do you13:18 coach someone through entering into that that that humble posture? Because it's like second nature, right, for us to to be prideful, to protect, and all that. Well,13:30 let13:31 me just start with, the churchy answer. Right? So a good sermon on Philippians 2, you know, good sermon on Christ as humble, and that's who we're supposed to be. You know, messages on13:42 Ephesians 5 and first Peter 5 5.13:45 Great humility is Thank you.13:47 Is all over scripture.13:48 Yeah. Mhmm.13:49 And what most of us do is understand that and, oh, there's a concept. Yeah. I need to work on humility. That's a good idea. But what we cannot do is access that14:01 in when the chips are down. In other words, when we become dysregulated and pain gets stabbed and we get reactive, then all of a sudden, pride shows up. That's the moment of truth. That's when pride14:12 rears its ugly head and says, no. I'm right, and I have the right to change you.14:17 Right.14:18 And here I go. And I'm gonna use blame, shame, control, and escape in order to fix you. Mhmm. No. That's the point where you have to put on the self control. It's a self14:30 discipline. Self regulation is the big neurological term, but self control is what it is fundamentally. And you have to say, wait. My job is to look in the mirror right now, not to look past the mirror at you.14:42 Mhmm.14:42 I14:42 gotta look in the mirror at me. Yeah. What's going on with me? Why am I getting all riled up? What's this dysregulation about? Oh, yeah. I'm feeling some pain right now. And whose job is it to steward my pain? Well, it's14:53 not Nan's. Mhmm. It's my job. Right. And that concept is really foreign Yeah. In our world today.15:02 Mhmm.15:02 My job to steward my pain?15:04 Yeah.15:05 No. No. No. No. No. I have the entitlement in my pain, and I get to make everybody in the world adjust to me and what I need, meet my needs. That's the mantra that we have. And I hate to say this, but15:17 we in marriage education have been promoting that without realizing. And we've been coaching people to meet their needs. And so now I'm demanding you meet my needs. Well, guess what? That just puts me in a posture of15:29 pride.15:29 Yeah.15:29 I don't have to look at myself. I get to just blame you.15:33 Mhmm.15:33 That gets you nowhere. Right.15:36 So when you when you begin to, you know, look at the log in my own eye, when you're focusing then on on me, my stuff, How do you then in that moment because you're talking15:47 about being dysregulated. So Mhmm. Your your pain has been triggered. Like, I saw like, literally, I hope she would be okay with me sharing this. So I was with our our15:59 youngest daughter. She went down a hill as she was driving and just went a little too fast, got a ticket.16:07 Just a little too fast.16:08 So I was there with her today in court. And so she's standing before the judge, and she was really, really nervous. And she she said, what what is the judge gonna ask me? And I said, probably just, you know,16:20 do you accept the plea deal? How do you plead? You know, just say guilty.16:23 Mhmm.16:23 So the judge asked her, so Annie, do do you understand your rights? And Annie went, guilty. Like, that's all she knew to say because I coached her. And I was like, oh, man. She looked at me like, why is16:35 everybody laughing? And totally though, I could see it very much triggered her. Yeah. It tapped into that pain of of not feeling good enough,16:46 not16:46 measuring up. I I didn't do it right. And so she became upset at the judge, and I'm sitting there praying going, please don't say anything. Just take the judge,16:58 and we'll we'll talk about it later.17:00 So our CEO judge. Yeah.17:02 Yeah. So as you guys as you guys encourage people in those moments so, like, for Annie, she's totally triggered. Yeah. What will you do with all that?17:12 Mhmm. Okay. So this is where doctor Hargrave's 4 steps, are so critical. I mean, that's the crux of this book.17:20 We have time for 1, so pick your very favorite.17:23 No. No. No. We gotta go. We need all 3 of them. Real real quickly.17:27 I was trying to trigger you, but it didn't work. There's a17:29 Didn't work. There there's really a method to this madness. What you're gonna do is you're gonna physically say out loud in this dysregulated moment 4 things. What's my pain? Well, what I'm feeling is, yeah, it's an17:41 inadequacy thing again.17:43 Mhmm.17:43 What do I usually do with this? Well, what I usually do is I blame you, Dan, for me feeling inadequate, and I try to make it about you. Step 3. But what's the truth? Well, the truth is, first of all, let me go vertical.17:55 God loves me. Okay. That's a capital t truth. Let's hold on to that. And he tells me I don't have to be adequate because his grace is covering all of that. So it's actually okay that I'm not that I'm not adequate, and I18:06 don't have to worry about my reputation. All of this is running through my head and out my mouth in front of Nan in a moment of dysregulation. Keep keep that in mind. And lowercase t truth is, wait a18:17 minute. I I've learned Nan can be upset with me and it's not the end of the world. This really doesn't fall. I always acted like it did, but it won't fall. I I can trust her to hang on with me through this. AndShow more In this video 0:00 From Crisis to Healing: Ron and Nan's Marriage Transformation26:55 Stewarding Pain: Insights on Self-Regulation and Co-Regulation37:12 Navigating Petty Squabbles: Listener Stories and Practical Tips42:44 Addressing Toxic Friendships: Boundaries and Protection in Marriage
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