Rebuilding Trust With Your Husband
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2. Do whatever you can to show your husband your love through your actions. Let your husband know that you are 100% committed to this marriage and that you will do whatever it takes, no holds barred, to prove that to him. Ask your husband what he would like, what you can do to win back his trust again, and do anything he identifies.
John: This is important, if you balk or hesitate at anything he asks for your cooperation on, you will send an instant unspoken but very strong message that you are still setting boundaries. Doing so leaves your husband with the question as to what is beyond that boundary. It makes him feel that you still have secret corners in your life that you want to hide from him. At this point, you need to forget about personal "space" or privacy or control. Marriage is not about privacy or secrecy or control. It is about sharing your lives and ministering to each other's needs.
3. Be totally accountable to your husband. Let him read your cell phone bills, credit card bills, call you whenever he wants, read your journals etc. etc. You have to realize part of the consequences to lying is giving up your right to privacy for a time, until trust is restored.
John: Better yet, don't wait for him to ask, be proactive. When the bills come, show them to him, when you read your email, tell him about it and even print any that are important or ask him to log in at anytime or feel free to sit with you. When you write journal entries, read them to him. Without him having to ask, make your life an open book. If you act proactively, he will feel you really DO want to be honest.
4. Be willing to answer any questions at all your husband has about the affair. DO NOT ATTEMPT TO LESSEN THE BLOW BY WITHOLDING INFORMATION. Withholding information will destroy any hope of rebuilding trust. The truth always comes out in time ... and then you have to give an account for lying after you promised not to lie anymore. Very rarely can trust be rebuilt when this is the case.
John: I'd say never because once trust is gone, any additional deceptions set you back. It's like building a wall of security. All the actions we've mentioned put bricks back into a wall that has been torn down. Your honesty and actions are the mortar that binds the bricks. One lie, no matter how small causes the wall to tumble down and you must start all over again. As harsh as it sounds, with your lies you've proven you cannot be trusted. You are at zero on the trustworthy scale and have a lot of work to do to rebuild the trust your husband previously gave you. One slip and it just compounds things.
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