Show Notes
Couples who change in a real way are sometimes the ones willing to face the genuine possibility of ending their marriage. Not as a threat or a tactic, but as an honest reckoning with what they stand to lose and who they really are. After all, you can't give a meaningful yes to something if there's not a viable or real no.
In this episode, Dr. Finlayson-Fife uses listener questions to guide a discussion about the decision whether to stay in or leave a marriage. She talks about what it looks like to be in a marriage without having truly chosen it, why ambivalence is never a neutral place, how to know when divorce is the right answer, what it means to put your marriage on the line as an act of honesty rather than control, and why desire can't exist where fear or obligation is running the show.
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Intimate Exposures Workshop in Utah Couples' Workshop in Utah (tickets coming soon!) Starting Strong Workshop in Utah
More from Conversations with Dr. Jennifer
Sexual fantasy makes many of us anxious, because it often taps into darker aspects of ourselves we don’t always understand, let alone want to disclose. Hearing our partner’s fantasies can be just as unsettling, especially if we assume that they want us to go along with what they share.
**SAVE $200 on our upcoming workshops and retreats (use code JFF200)** An intimate marriage asks us to let our spouse see all of us, not just the good parts. It takes a willingness to be known and the courage to know our spouse as they actually are. It’s not for the faint of heart, but it’s what’s required to create an honest, soulful connection with our partner.
No one hopes for a marital crisis. But it's not uncommon for couples who emerge from one to look back and see it as the catalyst for a more mature, more alive partnership. Adversity and disappointment pressure us to face what's true, and while that rarely feels good, it's what allows us to become more solid, more knowable, and more capable of real intimacy.
Pornography brings up a lot of feelings on both sides, and most of that charge comes from the meanings we attach to it, not the behavior itself. Much of this tension is the result of a culture that taught many of us to treat sexuality with fear rather than understanding. That fear tends to show up as shame, and shame doesn't make porn use go away, it just makes it harder to face honestly, ultimately fueling more anxiety, rigidity, and compulsivity.
Past trauma doesn't just stay in the past. It can show up in our relationship in unexpected, inconvenient, and disheartening ways. Desire can disappear without warning. Old distress can resurface years after we thought we'd made peace with it. Our instinct is often to judge ourselves for the ways that our past trauma impacts us, but judgment only pushes desire further away. Understanding does the opposite. It gives us something to work with instead of something to fight.