Official Blog For Author Fred Stoeker

Question:  My husband and I have been married for twenty-two years. I have known of his sexual addiction the entire time. For the past ten years we have been in recovery both for his addiction and my co-dependency associated with it, along with years of counseling and group therapy. This January I was faced with his major relapse, and his behaviors escalated greatly from where they had been. I am struggling to figure out how to get through these latest betrayals. I would like to stay in my marriage, but I really need some help. None of the women around me have experience in anything similar to this, and I feel alone in my pain.  Where can couples learn how to forgive, and where can I be given encouragement, direction, and skills necessary to mend and heal their marriage. Do you have any suggestions?
 
Answer: Yes, I do have some suggestions. First of all, I would recommend my wife Brenda’s second book, called The Healing Choice, co-written with Susan Allen. I would then highly recommend Susan Allen’s guidebook, The Healing Choice Guidebook, an outstanding resources for healing.  You can get them on my website.
          In these books, Susan will introduce you to Avenue Resource, her organization. ( www.avenueresource.com ) I would suggest that you become part of one of her “telephone small groups,” so you can talk regularly to those that do have an understanding of what you are going through, and that definitely have facilitators that can guide you to healing and wholeness. You can also contact Susan through email at SusanAllen@AvenueResource.com

I just had to write you another note.  I wrote you the first time about twenty-one months ago after I suffered my last relapse and you gave me some great advice and wisdom. At the time, you suggested that I read Every Man’s Marriage, and by now, I am reading it again for the third time. Let me give you a brief summary of what’s been happening.

When I read first Every Man’s Marriage, it dramatically changed the way I looked at marriage. Learning to be my wife Megan’s bondservant was a revolutionary idea, and it really rung true in my heart!  Megan and I went through a fifty-two-day sexual celibacy fast at that time, and she also got your wife’s books Every Heart Restored and The Healing Choice. That second book introduced us to Avenue Resource, who you also recommended to me for some small group help (www.avenueresource.com).  I contacted its founder, Clay Allen, and he responded to me with encouragement similar to yours.  I joined one of the telephone conference-call accountability groups and have been faithful to that for over a year and a half. The regular, transparent intimacy I’m sharing with these other men on the phone has really helped me in the battle.  Megan also joined a ladies phone group with Avenue for about six months, which connected her with other women living in similar pain, and it helped her heal emotionally more quickly.

We have certainly had our bumps in the road and we’ve had to work through a lot of issues, but I can honestly say that our marriage is ABSOLUTELY the best it has ever been.  We have shared our testimony with many long-time friends, with my sons and with some of our younger friends in our church small group.  I have been co-facilitating another phone group with Avenue and I’m pumped to try to assist other men toward freedom. As a couple, we have also begun one-on-one mentoring with another young couple from our church, at their request.

As I’m reading Every Man’s Marriage again, I’ve been struck by a feeling that you’re one of my best friends.  I can’t thank you enough for how you’ve ministered to Megan and me, and I thank my Heavenly Daddy for you often!

          Question: Hi, I have been reading Every Heart Restored and it has really been changing my heart and perspective on my relationship with my fiance. We are supposed to get married in the fall and he recently confessed to me that he has cheated on me and has an addiction to porn. Naturally, I was devastated at first, but realized that we have two options. We can either let the devil continue to ruin this and end our relationship, or we can fight to reestablish our foundation in Christ and to see where God takes our relationship. This isn’t unforgiveable for me and I know it will take time to trust him again, but is it silly of us to pursue this relationship or am I just setting myself up for an unhappy married life? He is repentant and genuinely sorry, but this has been going on for quite some time (without my knowing, but not while we have been engaged). Is it wrong for me to question whether or not he can change and lead our relationship? Thank you for listening and thank you.
for writing this book, it has really helped me to understand my fiance and that if we continue in this relationship that there is hope for a Godly marriage.
          Answer: As you know from my book Every Heart Restored, it is not foolish to think he can change as long as there are clear evidences that he is trying to change, beyond the tears and repentance. Tears and repentance are not enough. Is he reading the “purity trilogy” for young men?  (Every Young Man’s Battle, Tactics, and Hero?)  If he isn’t reading those AND putting the biblical principles from those books into practice, I don’t think he will be changing enough for me to advise marrying him. Reading isn’t enough. He must be putting the principles into practice if he’s to break the addiction.

          Next, is he being fully accountable and fully open about what he did? Is he making excuses, or taking full responsibility and putting defenses into place that will defend his sexuality and his integrity in the future? You have to see these changes now, before marriage. If you don’t see the changes now, before marriage, you cannot be sure he will change after marriage. Like many guys, he may believe that marriage will finally take the issue away. It will not. He will have to fight this at some point, and win. If I were you, I would make sure he is truly fighting it before the wedding takes place. Most women tend to think that their boyfriend’s sin will go away once he is getting regular sex in marriage. This is not the case. It can’t be the case, because a lack of sex isn’t really the issue when it comes to sexual sin. The issue is the addiction and the dependencies that lie beneath the sin, and he’ll drag those right into marriage with him. Regular sex with a wife won’t stop the sexual sin.

          I would recommend that you read both Tactics and Hero as well as Every Heart Restored. That can give you some real help in terms of understanding the issues behind his sin, and in teaching you how to come alongside and help him with his purity even before marriage. Another help would be the book The Healing Choice and the workbook The Healing Choice Guidebook, by Susan Allen (you can get them on my website). These will help you understand how to think about the healing process and to know whether he is really fighting this. But the most important ones for you to read would be Tactics and Hero.

          Let me know if you have more questions. He doesn’t have to be completely perfect before marriage, but he needs to have changed dramatically and begun fighting this with a passion, for his reasons and for the sake of his own connection with God, not simply for the sake of his connection with you. You’ll be able to tell the difference by the way he engages the battle.

Fred Stoeker

The fact that I picked up Brenda’s book The Healing Choice was such an accident. My little boy was becoming fussy, and ready to leave the store when the words on the cover jumped out at me, “how to move beyond betrayal,” and without reading the back or flipping through the pages as I would normally do I bought it. When I began to read and discovered what the subject matter was I thought, “This isn’t for me.” But I continued to read and found such healing and encouragement. It was if Brenda was speaking directly to my pain and situation, though the circumstances are so different. I began to pour over scripture…incorporating them into my prayer life and reading Psalm 139.  I have drawn closer to Him. It’s amazing how God has led and encouraged me. Now my apartment is covered in bright blue file cards with various prayers and scriptures. Some days are harder than others, but I have that inner peace Brenda spoke of and it’s amazing.