One of my favorite moments as a therapist is when a new client comes into my office and tells me their story. As I listen, I begin to see in my mind’s eye the way in which this person’s life will change, the freedom they will encounter, how much better their relationships will be and how good they will begin to feel in their own skin if they will enter into the transformation process. I start to glimpse a vision of what is possible for them and it is exciting and hopeful.
The client is usually having a very different experience. They are telling me about the crisis or problem that has brought them to my couch. For them, there is no vision and often very little hope as they are mired down in their troubles and having difficulty finding a way out. For those dealing with betrayal trauma, the shock, pain and anger often overwhelm everything else making any possibility of hope seem doubtful and unlikely.
Yet, what I and many others know is that there is actually an enormous amount of hope available for betrayed partners. Hope for them. Hope for their partner. Hope for their relationship. Sometimes not all three but always at a minimum the first one.
This hope is not just a pie in the sky wish. It is grounded in the fact that there is a process available for healing from betrayal. There are steps and tasks and tools and information all available to guide you from the initial chaos of devastation to a place where you are actually…dare we say it…flourishing.
At PartnerHope, we have created six phases, breaking down the process of healing from betrayal trauma into key steps on the path and providing you with hopes for each stage of the journey as you move through the process. We call this The Authentic Hope Process.
In 2018, we are going to be bringing this process to you through offering a community for you to participate in as you go through the phases along with resources, tools and support to guide you on the journey.
In the meantime, over the coming six weeks, we are going to take a look at each of the six phases that make up the Authentic Hope Process. These phases are: devastation, realization, stabilization, re-imagining, creating and flourishing. Each week we will examine the common experiences and burning questions that betrayed partners experience during each of these key phases. We will begin next week by looking at where it all starts: the devastation phase.