I've Had 100 Conversations with You in My Head
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I just don't feel safe to think that he could expose me in that way. I feel an overwhelming amount of guilt. I would do anything to repair what has happened. What you're about to hear is an unscripted, one-time couples counseling session. It contains mature themes and listener discretion is advised. For the purposes of maintaining confidentiality, names and some identifiable characteristics have been removed.

But their voices and their stories are real. When I meet this couple, it is nine months after the revelation of his infidelities.

They have decided to stay together for the children.

But for the time being, she does not want any physical connection with him. She does not want to resume the romance between them. I decided that I just can't be with him because I don't trust him. What hurts her the most is the betrayal. The sense that she doesn't feel safe with me, that she doesn't know me. I don't blame her.

And at the same time, I sense that a part of why she has come to the session is because she wants to be able to reconnect and re-engage with him.

This is Where Should We Begin with Astaire Perel. You, when you get nervous, you get a twitch here. Yes.

Now I know. I can monitor your nervousness. Now we can't play poker together. No, you twitch in your jaw. And what's yours? Where shall I track your nervousness? I don't think she's that nervous. I don't know. Oh, that's not true. Her breathing gets totally... Yeah. I might just cry. Yeah. I might just bust out and cry. It's totally fine. Yeah. It's totally fine. But I don't want to presume that you are exactly in the place where you were. Right. So...

It's been almost nine months and... It's okay. Sorry. When you get upset, is he allowed to comfort you or he's not allowed to touch you at all? I think he's so afraid of being pushed away that he has a hard time with it. Would you push him away now? I wouldn't. Okay, then you can comfort her. Initially, I was just in shock and for a week...

He was just crying and trying to make sense of everything and getting medical treatment. And nothing made sense. Then we were having just passionate sex. I feel like I was trying so hard to pretend as if it wasn't happening almost. I think we were both trying to not have to face reality. Life was going on and I told him it was really important to me that

We not pull the kids into this mess. I thought it was really important that we figure some stuff out, get help, whatever it is we need to do, whatever we decide to do, not to talk to the kids about major life changes if we don't even know what's going on or make any changes. Good idea. Every time I would see, I remember being, there was a scene in a movie we were watching about a brothel.

I just lost it. I just came apart. This just kept happening and I just kept going through these images of him having sex with other women. I just would turn into a stone. It was just like it wasn't me. I would imagine so many different things in my head.

And it made it very difficult for me. And I said, you know, I think we just need to just cut things off. I really don't want to do this. I don't want to be physical if it's going to just keep ripping me up. And so we haven't had sex since then. But I'm hearing it's not just sex. It's any physical contact. Hands holding like now when he was just holding you back. You feel it?

Yeah. And how does it feel? It feels wonderful. It feels great. But the only physical contact that we have is if I initiate it. Ah, because he... He won't touch me because he's afraid. Normally. Yeah. And he realizes that he might have to ask if it's okay. It's one way we talked about. So I said ask. Right now you wanted to? Yes, I did. But I didn't ask. I'm aware of that. It's something that I'm working on.

There are some days where I really need to have physical contact with her. Of course, both of you do. I want it every day. Both of you do. Don't think that she doesn't miss it. Yeah. I'm afraid, and this is one of the things I'm working on,

What is often the situation for the person who was the transgressor, you know, this guilty party at this point feels that they have no entitlement to ask for anything. So he waits for her sign. He wants a cue. She doesn't want to have to feel responsible for putting out the cue. And it's this very tenuous avoidance dance that these two people are currently engaged in, both protecting themselves.

What I felt originally was this form of rejection. I've always been afraid of rejection. It's one of the things that I'm working on. When you pay, you never get rejected. Correct. Yeah. I thought of that. Of course.

I'm not giving myself a pass here. I'm not saying that, "Oh, you know, it's not my fault." I know what I was doing. Yeah, this is a big, huge obstacle. But I don't want it to stop us. I want me to learn from this, you to learn from this, and start something new. Some new way of communicating. You know, this was the first time that I've ever had any type of counseling. I've learned that men can cry. I've learned that men can be vulnerable.

I've learned a lot of what the influences in my house have caused, the way it shaped me. How did you grow up? I grew up, my father had, I'm pretty sure, has had affairs. My mother suffered a lot. She still suffers. She has a lot of depression. Always has. So as I was a kid, I knew the pain that my father was causing my mother because I was on the front lines of it. I had to...

See it. So I became that perfect child. I was the captain of the baseball team, captain of the swim team, top 10 in my class. I went to a good university, all coming from a very, very poor background and everything and just overachieving, overachieving, overachieving because I could never, I could never let her down. You know his family? Very well. They're almost like my family, like my parents. We're that close. Where are yours?

My mom lives close to us also, and my brother. And your dad? My dad is deceased. He was out of my life for 10 years before. 10 years ago. He was suffering with alcoholism. He was aggressive. He was dangerous. And my mom had to get an order of protection to prevent him from harming her. And then he had to move back.

to our country because he couldn't afford to live here. It was a rough, rough time. And I don't know, just taking on. She would try to take on a lot of everything. She would just find that need to just make sure. In your family or in her family? I think our family too. Both. Needing to take care of everybody. And then when it came to us as a couple, as a romantic partnership,

We would just give each other crumbs at the end of the day. At night, we'd have dinner, take care of all the responsibilities, and then he could finally relax, and that's when he would love to have connection. Put the kids to bed. And be together. Hey, let's... But by that time... But I would just fall asleep. She would just fall asleep, and I would be sitting there for an hour and a half, feeling lonely, feeling rejected in a way, and...

It just started like that and then eventually it grew into, you know, out of seven nights out of the week, we would sleep maybe two, maybe three in bed together because she would be exhausted downstairs and she would just sleep downstairs. And that happened for a few years. So sex became something that, you know, only on the weekends, maybe like a Sunday morning. To me, it was never enough.

Of sex, of closeness, of connection. All of the above. I think all. And you? For you it was enough? Or you just thought, I can't even ask myself what I want because I'm busy attending to everybody. I felt really overwhelmed at times by the amount of time that we had to dedicate to...

everything around us, right? And everyone. And also, I had a hard time asking him for help also. I felt he was working hard and he was doing the best he could. But there were a lot of other things that I needed help with too and had a hard time kind of asking for help. But tell me if I hear this right. You both are central figures in your families. You both took on very early on

all kinds of responsibilities that usually kids shouldn't take. You became the emotional regulator of your family. Your mother probably asks herself some of the same questions you ask yourself today. Do you let him stay because the kids would want him to stay? Or do you tell him you're no good, you should leave? Different context, but same questions. And you become your mother's confidante.

And you basically promise yourself, I will never be like that guy. Yeah. Right? And your whole identity becomes predicated on not being like your dad. Yes.

And you become the overachiever, which is another version of the same thing. And then you sit at home and you say, fuck this. I try so hard. I do everything. Look what I've done. And I sit here all alone and my wife is asleep downstairs. What the hell is this? What the fuck's going on? I had that horrible sense of entitlement. I deserve something. I deserve this. Right.

But you don't say to her, "I miss you." No. And she doesn't say to you, "I need help." No. I had a very hard time shedding that person who is invulnerable, who can take on anything, who can just, you know, grin and bear it. Did your father hit you? Yes. Yes, I was abused. And is that where you learned to grin and bear and say, "I will never show you that you hurt me"? Yes.

It drove me. That's what it did. As in, I'll show you? I'll show you. I'll show you. I'll show you what? That no one can hurt me. I'll never show vulnerability again because vulnerable people get stepped on. And I don't want to be a victim anymore. She's ever seen you like this? Not until recently. Very few times, I would say. It was new to me how real that pain is for you when you...

Talked about being hit by a dad and I thought of you Sort of being thrown into the ring to fight. It was a bunch of kids and there was a kid who was fighting and Instead of coming to help you the grown-ups threw you in there and put bets That was one of my uh, on which kid would one of my earliest memories. I was like eight nine years old and

And, you know, I was in Dominican Republic and we were playing basketball and got a little heated. You didn't really want to fight, but you had to show that you were tough and that like, yeah, I want to fight. But you really, in the back of your mind, you really don't want to fight. You're really hoping that some adult will come and say, no, no, boys, you know, it wasn't my case. In my case, it was, come here.

"Go kick his ass, and I'm gonna put bets on you." So picture this: two eight, nine-year-old boys going at each other in a circle, and the adults were saying, "Come on, go, go, go, kick his ass. No, punch him in the face." That's the kind of environment. That's the kind of-- - Did you get beat up? - Yeah. I got my ass kicked real bad. Never told my parents until I was an adult. - Because your dad said if you get your butt kicked,

If you get your ass kicked, I'll kick your ass on top of that. Because you're supposed to win every time you get into a fight. Yeah, yeah. So what's remarkable about this couple is that their resilience is palpable. She's able to see him and to see what he has gone through beyond the hurt that he has inflicted on her.

And that ability to still see the other person with compassion separately or in addition to the feelings that one has, the hurt that one feels about what that person has just done is a fundamental ingredient for couples who make it.

And then added to that is the ability to still talk about the relationship lovingly, acknowledging its strengths, acknowledging the good elements of the partnership despite the crisis that has just happened, and being able to hold the relationship on its own separately from the effects of the affairs. That's where strength and resilience lies. But it also makes me appreciate so much how you didn't teach your boys this. No. And you...

Together, you let your boys cry, right? We, in our parenting. But a lot of that I got from you. You helped me a lot with that. I always said we were yin and yang. Where I'm very aggressive, very... But a lot of our family and friends and just social circles, a lot of people have that mindset of...

The reason I turned out the way I did and the reason I'm such an upstanding, good human being is because I got my butt kicked when I was a kid. And look at kids today, they have no respect. But I say, you made it. You're a good human being in spite of the fact that you got your butt kicked. Because I don't feel that that's the way. The piece I also want you to hear is that that is one of the reasons why he couldn't come and tell you.

because he learned not to do that. That does not explain it, that doesn't excuse it, but it contextualizes it. And so the conversation unfolds going back and forth between talking about who they are as individuals, talking about the relationship, and talking about the infidelities.

And we also go from the compassion she may feel for him to the raw pain that she still experiences for the selfishness of his acts and for the disregard for her safety. You are listening to Where Should We Begin with Esther Perel. We'll be back in a minute.

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I often think, of course it hurts. But it hurts differently for every person. It's like we all have a unique pain point. And sometimes the pain point is not the obvious thing. It's not what he did. It's where it hit you. It's kind of where did the knife twist? What would it be for you? The part that hurts, I think, for me...

I mean, there are so many, right? It makes me feel like, it just makes me take a big brush and just paint the whole thing with, I don't know this man. And he doesn't have the best. He doesn't care or have my best interest at heart that at the end of the day, he's going to just do what is good for him and screw anybody else. Another thing that hurt is I told him, I said, listen, we're having sex, I'm protected, right?

And I got an infection. And I don't want another one. I don't want HIV. I don't want something else. I want some... That's how you found out? Yeah. I got an infection. I thought I was hallucinating. I couldn't believe it. I teach this stuff. The one lesson that I never taught. Meaning you taught your students, but not your husband? But he had no idea. He was symptomless. I was symptomless. I went in for a checkup and they saw something and they tested it and said, yeah, by the way.

The doctor who delivered both our kids sat there telling me this. And I just couldn't, I just didn't want to believe it. I was like, no, do another test. What are the chances of this being, I mean, I was so out of my mind. Are you relieved that it came out? I've asked you this before. Yes. I mean, it's a strange question, but it's not. It was...

one of the worst possible ways of finding out. But I was relieved in a sense that now I can just start, you know, and really figure out what... But you never told her you were lonely? You never told her you missed her? You never told her come to bed? You never told her I just want to hug you? I did. I did. He did. And then what would happen? I did nothing.

Meaning she gave you an explanation for why it wasn't going to happen? No. I had a hard time sleeping. I never got an explanation. I never got an explanation why five nights out of the week she wouldn't sleep in bed with me. Or... I told you I was stressed out. Right, okay. How did the sofa suddenly replace you? The sofa just kicked my ass. That's what. The sofa kicked my ass. I couldn't compete with the sofa. Do you know what drove me to the sofa? I, uh...

What drove you to the sofa? You know what it really was? What was it? Not being able to open up to you enough. Much of it was driven by complete paralysis of financial fear that we suffered through when we closed the business and took on a mountain of debt. It seemed like such an impossible feat. Why the couch? I understand the fear, but why the couch?

I remember thinking... To spare him? I remember thinking just my energy next to you would prevent you from sleeping and resting, to be able to do your job and work and feed the family and at least keep us, you know, in a home. I just didn't want to put that on you. I remember saying this to you a long time ago. And I remember you saying that... Can you lean on him a second?

Because you don't know what it's like to have difficult thoughts and feelings and lean on him. You don't know how to lean on him, and he doesn't think that if he lets himself be vulnerable, he's not going to be stepped on. So that makes for a difficult situation between the two of you, wouldn't you say? Yes. You have no idea what it's like to face hardships and not be alone. And neither does he.

That's very interesting you say that. I saw it as just another form of rejection, just another thing that is going wrong in my life and how, yeah, now my wife is withdrawing from me. And just my fear of just rejection, I guess, has haunted our relationship for a long time. How? I guess it came from, you know, early on when I was a child, you know, I was kind of chubby, you know, I had a hard time.

and had low self-esteem. So when I met her, I was like, wow, like, I can't believe a person like this is interested in me, you know? And the best way to describe it is that when you're that little fat kid, you're always that little fat kid. So later on,

I did everything I could in my power not to be that little fat kid. So I went to the gym and I got like all like, you know, in good shape and everything. And I really thought that like I had this, I was slave to this notion that, you know, because obviously this is what my father taught me. If you don't want your wife to lose interest in you or go seek it somewhere else, you're

You better make sure you take care of yourself and you look good and you have a six pack and you know, you're like this big strong muscle man and you're desirable and always be desirable to her. And you smell good. And you gotta smell good and you gotta, which is all great. So he actually became a professional bodybuilder. He didn't compete professionally. Once he made it to that point, he stopped. But that's how far that could drive you.

He took dance lessons. I took dance lessons. Without me. Well, I tried to get him. Right. No, wait, hold on. My goal for that. Latin dance? They were at four in the morning. My goal for that, I originally started that with only one thing in mind.

This is going to spark us. This is going to give us something to do. It's hot. It's sexy. I tried. I tried to get her there. And she came a couple of times. But I always had the sense that like, she's like, no, I'm good. That's not for me. And now? I love that he tried. I love that it mattered to him to keep us going, to make our relationship alive and fun. You said that to him?

I have a feeling not. No. Because you see, right now, you're in the betrayal. And you're into the, he went elsewhere. What you've just added is how much he had tried to bring you. Yeah. And how much he invested in that dimension of the relationship. So that he wasn't just doing the hard work. He was also doing the hard play. Yeah. And he was invested in maintaining an erotic energy between the two of you. Yeah. Yeah.

And when you start to get those images, that's the stuff you need to think about. Because she's plagued with images of him with other women, it is important for her to know that she also has a whole repertoire of images of him reaching out to her, of him trying to enliven their relationship, to bring fun, to bring joy, to bring play, to bring dance, to bring sensuality.

And when she tries to connect with him, or when she thinks about connecting with him, it is to that reservoir of memories and images that I encourage her to go. For that matter, that stuff has lasted much longer than his transgressions and his infidelity. The problem I'm having is that I don't trust that his infidelities lasted for only what he said. So I hear you, but I also doubt that. I doubt...

That they haven't been others? That it hadn't happened all along. Because sometimes I'm in that space where I don't believe that he wants to be here. And why? I think that there was a lot of excitement that was there to be had, to experience. And I told him... Do you know that? Yeah. Do you know that from asking him? He said so, and I spoke to him about that. I said, don't tell me that this was torture for you in that way. There had to be something good.

You don't do this for a year and a half if there isn't something good. Don't play the role of this victim saying that, you know, it was all horrible or you feel like you're supposed to say these things. Right. If you still want to be here, that you have to play the victim, that you have to play the hurt one. But it's a mixture of both.

This is an important moment because while she's able to express her compassion for him, she also wants him to stand accountable. And interestingly, when she says to him, I don't believe that's all there was. There was more. She chooses not to ask it as a question and to trust her own sense without needing him to confirm it, which she may not even believe anyway, or to disconfirm it, which she may not believe either. And she chooses this.

For that moment, to put the emphasis not on have there been others, but on am I the one you want to be with? Do you believe that he wants to be with you? I do, because we're here and he's here. No, no, no. I'm asking you on a physical, visceral, sensory level. Do you believe he wants to be with you? I'm scared to believe it. It's been such a...

tough road compared to maybe anything else in our life emotionally that I want to say you could have not been here. So that in itself tells me somehow you still want to be here. I want to be here because I want to be here. Like in my soul. Can you take her face in your hands and just tell her that I want to be here. I want to be here with you. I just don't know how to get back.

I don't know how to get back to that trust that I had for you in some way, you know? I'm so scared. I feel like I'm just blocked, like I shut myself off and I just refuse to let you in and I refuse to believe you, you know? And I'm sure that's painful. I want to be here. You know I do, but... No, she doesn't, so that you can't say, but you just have to say what you need to say. I want to be here. I love you.

You're the one for me. You're the one I keep choosing. But you put my life at risk. I did. I did. I put my life at risk as well. I did. I don't give a fuck about your life if you don't care about your life. Do you know what I'm saying? I understand. I know you were willing to put yourself at risk. I understand. But what about the repercussions of what we do and where we go? It affects so many people. It's not just us. You know, those kids, our families. I risked all of that. No.

I don't want to become this stone, this like just emotionless dead person that I feel anytime I just think of being sexual again. Because I keep thinking, it keeps happening. Do you feel any type of affection for me? Do you feel any type of romance for me?

We were getting ready to go to this thing and we were getting dressed upstairs together. This was just two weeks ago. Do you remember? It's like you were asking me what to wear. We were talking about this. Did you feel how attracted I was to you? I felt it. And I said things to you. The energy was so intense. So what stops you? My own mind. When this will happen again, because it will,

But that's if I even let it. Well, that one you didn't let, it just took you. Yeah. And you sense it. You'll hold her. Just hold her. I did. And she said she pushed me away. After how long? Maybe a minute. And then she pushed me away. She said, I got to get out of here. Then you say, we'll be okay. And you hold her a little less hard and you do nothing else.

You have to stop yourself from going into your rejection. Yes. Because the minute you do that, you just leave me with nothing, no support, no hope. Do you understand that? I understand that. Can you... What you're trying to say is that when I do feel those feelings of rejection, which come often for me, I should just...

push through it. You should be the one who goes dancing. That's the part of you you want to call on. And because if it becomes about why don't you want me, then you're not able to say to her, I want you. I feel that there are certain boundaries that I don't want to cross. There are certain boundaries that I must respect. And I need you in return to be very clear with what they are.

You understand what I'm saying? No. No? Because she doesn't know. Okay. She doesn't know what she wants. And because a part of reconnecting is risk, not trust. Sorry. To wait till you trust in order to reconnect, uh-uh. To take the risk and then to trust because you've reconnected, yes. She will tell you the lines, don't worry.

And she doesn't want so much for you to be respectful of the lines as she wants to feel that you want her. And you're willing to hold me for that moment. I feel like for many months now, one of the things that's been hard was you just so instantly retreating into your pain and those moments. Yes, that's what I've done. I feel like you had all these conversations in your head about what you thought was happening with me.

And we just never talked about it. You never asked. That I agree. There's hundreds of conversations that I've had with you, but I've never had with you. In my own head. But it wasn't you, it was your proxy. So I would say, "What if I go downstairs and pick you up and drag you upstairs like a caveman? What would you do?" And then your proxy would say, "What the hell are you doing? I'm tired. I'm sleepy. Get the fuck out of here. Go back upstairs."

That's what your proxy would say. That's the rejection part of me saying, no, don't try. You were communicating more with yourself than... Right. These are the conversations that happened in my head. If she really wants you, she would be up here. If she really... Look, sex is sex. But the love that I get when I'm being desired, when I'm being desired, when you desire me,

When I look at you and you look at me and you make me feel and you make me feel like you just really want me. That's the rush. That's the goal. That's like my drug. I don't do drugs. That's my drug. Esther, I'm so screwed. I mean, I say that in the sense that to me sex is...

It really is only a piece of so many other ways that my body feels pleasure. Do you know what I'm talking about? Wait one sec. He's talking about him. It doesn't have to apply to you. It's fine. Right. You have your own script. You have your own template. Yeah. He has his, but it's important that you understand his. And if you answer and you instantly take it back on you, you're doing what you just told him that you didn't want him to do when you talk. Right. Yeah.

It's true. You said something? Okay, now let's talk about me. Yeah. If you instantly respond with me, you're not really listening. It's true. We're so self-absorbed.

Welcome to the best of us. Yeah. You understand? What he's telling you is in his feeling desired, he experiences a level of acceptance that he has always struggled with. It is what it is. It doesn't mean he doesn't like the hugging and he doesn't like the holding and the kissing and the... It's just that because all these feelings are so forbidden for him, they all became codified. Right.

in this experience called sex, lovemaking, not just sex. That's the one thing, by the way, that lovemaking piece that he's referring to, that you can't pay for. So when he doesn't get sex, it's not sex he doesn't get. It's everything the sex gives him access to. That said, it won't hurt you if you expand your vocabulary. You need more than one language, as you're doing now. Yes.

Yeah. You can feel close in many ways. That doesn't take anything away. Right. If it's the only gate, then when she's not into it, then you feel like it's that or disconnect. When you go on dates, what do you do that you enjoy? Dinner, drinks, dancing. I love dancing with her. When's the last time you went? She doesn't want to have any dates with me. How do you get that?

- This... - She told me. - This victim piece. - No, she told me. - When did I say? - So what? So what? - Because... - No, no, no, this is like enough. So what? So she told you. - You're right, you're right. She told me, she said, "I don't feel like dancing with you because I can't." - Okay, that's what she told you on Wednesday night. That was like seven months ago, Esther. - Okay, all right, this is enough. - Okay.

Your bruised little ego, I'm sorry, is going to have to... Take a back seat. Yeah. Got it. Yes, sir. Yes, ma'am. No, I'm not a man. It's not just men who give orders. So you're not going to stress on if you're going to have sex or not have sex at this point, but you are going to enjoy each other a little bit more.

And when bad stuff comes up, you tell him and you just say, hold me. Or you just say, can we walk in silence? Or you just say, I'm having unwelcome visitors. And then it will pass. One day, these will become memories. And we will talk about it as a very tough time in our marriage when we had a real crisis and we almost reached the edge. And from there, actually, we realized that

We were unsustainable as we were. Not because that needed to happen, but we managed to use this and draw a few good lessons from it. We don't really learn from everything going right. You only learn from when the worst things happen. Did we need to go through this in order to get those lessons? No, but that's what it took us. And then it becomes integrated into a larger story. It doesn't remain the essence of the story.

I end this session feeling quite hopeful for this couple. I also know that he still has quite a bit of work to do when it comes to his sense of entitlement, which may either come from, I deserve this, or may come from poor me, the two sides of the coin. And I also know that she needs to be able to tell him how afraid she is to open herself up and to trust him again.

Time is very important, but what they do with the time is even more important. Esther Perel is the author of Mating in Captivity, Unlocking Erotic Intelligence, and her new book, The State of Affairs, Rethinking Infidelity. Both are available on Audible. For more episodes of Where Should We Begin, go to audible.com slash Esther. And if you're interested in being a part of the series or to sign up for Esther's newsletter, go to estherperel.com.

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