The Sexually Confident Marriage: With Special Guest Shannon Ethridge
Full Episode Transcript
Brad Aldrich:
Welcome to the Still Becoming One podcast. We are Brad and Kate.
Kate Aldrich:
In our more than 20 years of marriage, we’ve survived both dark times and experienced restoration.
Brad Aldrich:
Now as a licensed marriage counselor and relationship coaches. We help couples to regain hope and joy.
Kate Aldrich:
We invite you to journey with us, as we are Still Becoming One.
Brad Aldrich:
Let’s start the conversation. Well, hello everyone and welcome to Still Becoming One.
Kate Aldrich:
Yeah.
Brad Aldrich:
We are so glad that you are here today and we are thrilled to introduce you to one of our friends friends in ministry that you know, kate. You knew now for a dozen years more than that and we’ve just gotten to know. We’ve been so excited to have Shannon Etheridge on the show with us. She is a million copy bestseller, author of 22 books, including the Passion Principles and the Sexually Confident Wife. She has 30 years of veteran speaking and in conferences and all over. She’s a certified life coach and podcaster as well on her podcast, sexual Confidence, on Tap with Shannon Etheridge and friends. And we are so excited to have you on the show, shannon.
Shannon Ethridge:
Thanks so much for having me guys. Yeah, it feels like we’ve grown up together, doesn’t? It, I know, or that we’re growing old together, or both, all of the above All of the above, I love the name of your podcast.
Kate Aldrich:
So much.
Shannon Ethridge:
Sexual Confidence on Tap. Yes, so much sexual confidence on tap lacking in so many different scenarios. And so, yeah, over the past 30 years it’s been an interesting evolution process.
Kate Aldrich:
I love that and that’s actually we were. We love that principle of yours. We have ever since we’ve known you and would love to kind of broaden that and talk more about that. Today I feel like they’re so. You know you started with the Sexually Confident Wife, which that book was revolutionary for me to read personally, as I was on a journey of healing, discovering lots of different things. But I know that you’ve branched out with your husband and lead the Sexually Confident Couple and it’s just grown so much since you first started it. Tell us a little bit about that journey for you.
Shannon Ethridge:
Absolutely Well. Actually, the Sexually Confident Wife was my 14th book, believe it or not. That’s incredible. It started out with this little book that most people don’t know about called Words of Wisdom for Women at the Well, and it was basically for women with relationship addiction, because I myself had gone through sex and love addiction counseling in my 20s and in my 30s. I just really wanted to encourage women who had a tendency to look for love in all the wrong places.
Shannon Ethridge:
But instead of getting that book published, I mean I had toublish it, which the day was a lot more difficult than it is today.
Shannon Ethridge:
It’s so easy today, but in the process of trying to get that published was when Stephen Arterburn and Fred Stoker, who wrote the Every Man’s Battle series they stumbled upon me through a literary agent that I had sent my Women at the Wall stuff to. So they asked me to write the Every Woman’s Battle series, and I’m so grateful that I did, because that was so. It ran parallel with who I was in that season with wanting to minister to women who were acting out sexually, yeah. The interesting thing, though, is that, over and over throughout that several span of years, there was a total of, I want to say, 10 books in that series. I don’t remember exactly, but it was multiple books and workbooks and all of that, so it was over a several year span of time. I was hearing from women who were acting out and needing help, but more and more I was hearing from husbands who were so frustrated over the fact that their wives seemed so disinterested.
Shannon Ethridge:
And maybe she was interested in somebody else, but more than likely it was just simply she wasn’t interested in sex. She wasn’t interested in closest and connection, touching feeling for play, and he didn’t know what to do to get her engine revving. And he didn’t know what to do to get her engine revving. So I soon realized that I’m only addressing one side of the pendulum swing, the side that acts out. I realized that female sexuality is definitely a pendulum swing. We either swing too far to the left, do things that we never thought we would do, get addicted to porn or interact with somebody in a chat room or have an affair. But there was this other end of the pendulum swing, too far to the right, where women were shutting down, they were losing that feeling and they didn’t know where to find it, and they didn’t even know if they wanted to find it Quite frankly, it was almost like well, I’m done having kids, so why bother?
Shannon Ethridge:
And the reasons behind it were all different and unique. And so that’s when I realized that the sexually confident wife had to be my next book, because it was such a small person. I don’t want to say small percentage, I want to say that probably 30 percent of women have had acting out experiences in their lifetime, which is a significant number, one in three. But I had to look at this other 70% that were going through motions sexually to land their mate or start their marriage or to begin their family but then just that kind of went off the rails with any interest and realizing that women just have not been culturally conditioned to be sexually confident wives beyond having those babies. They just didn’t have a vision for it. So that’s where I feel like I found my sweet spot.
Kate Aldrich:
Yeah, that’s a great. That’s a great the way you worded that was perfect, because I was going to actually ask about that. But I think you’re so right. Like looking at the interpersonal what’s impacted someone in their own lives, but also looking at the culture in the United States, I think it really deeply does impact sexual confidence in women, absolutely Totally.
Shannon Ethridge:
Well, and it’s an interesting vicious cycle, because I’m going to try to paint the picture as best I can, and this is really good practice, because I’m actually going to speak for the Pure Desire conference that they’re having in Portland this week. I’m going to be the token female on the panel discussion. So for you ruminating this conversation in my head, so here it goes. I think that, and first let me just give a disclaimer I’m not blaming women, I’m not shaming women, I’m just, I’m not prescribing, I’m just describing that. This is what I’ve observed.
Shannon Ethridge:
But I feel as if there are so many men who get addicted to pornography because they are not feeling the sexual energy that they crave from their mate, for whatever reason and I’m not justifying it, I’m not condoning it, I’m just simply describing that when he feels a total absence of sexual connection from his wife and feels as if she’s completely disinterested and he has tried jumping through the hoops, washing the dishes, bathing the kids, like he’s done everything he can possibly think of to get her interested and amorous, and he just falls flat, I feel as if pornography is such a strong lure for men who are just wanting to feel that sexual energy coursing through his veins. And so I feel as if that becomes again a vicious cycle of well, if my wife can’t excite me or won’t excite me, then this over here will excite me. Well, then they get more excited about this than this because it’s easier. There’s no rejection in porn, it’s just so easy the click of a mouse and then they lose their ability to actually connect and bond sexually with a real live human. So it becomes an addiction that erodes at the fabric of their marriage, because this is the impact it has on her.
Shannon Ethridge:
What’s wrong with me that I’m not good enough that you have to look at another woman or other people to get sexually aroused. She takes that deeply personal, so now she has just the natural lack of interest that comes from we don’t produce as much testosterone as our counterparts. Now we have a deep wound of. My husband obviously doesn’t find me sexy enough because he’s looking at other people, right, yeah?
Kate Aldrich:
yeah, yeah, we talked. We’ve talked about this a lot and I mean I work with a lot of women in betrayal trauma and that piece comes in no matter. I I wish I could show people what everyone looks like, because it does not matter if they fit sort of the world’s model of beautiful it impacts every woman and I know too, like listening to you say, you know that to have that rejection, which oftentimes brad and I’ve learned in story work models, other rejection they’ve experienced in their family, in their childhood, and so it’s not only just happening now.
Kate Aldrich:
we’re now recreating something that’s happened in the past.
Brad Aldrich:
Right, and we are with the men too right. You just said it.
Kate Aldrich:
But that’s what I meant, actually the men. That’s what I was talking about.
Brad Aldrich:
Okay, I mean, I think it’s on both sides Right Because the porn is there, jumping in, giving them the intimacy that they lacked from their parents, giving them the touch that they lacked from their parents.
Kate Aldrich:
More attention.
Brad Aldrich:
Right, so it was that thing that they ran to back then, and then it’s just easier, right. Right back then, and then it’s just easier.
Kate Aldrich:
right, it’s the lazy person’s way to accomplish a goal, I don’t have to actually have intimacy.
Brad Aldrich:
I’m really just having a release and feel better for a few minutes.
Shannon Ethridge:
I heard it best when I was going through my SLAA years that masturbation and pornography makes you a selfish lover. You’re not thinking about investing in the other person. You’re not thinking about lining up your sexual energies with theirs to create this synergistic whole. You’re not thinking about one flesh. It’s not an act of worship. I mean I can’t declare that across the board. Maybe some people think that it is an act of worship. I mean I can’t declare that across the board. Maybe some people think that it is an act of worship for them. But bottom line is they forget just how amazing that co-created dynamic is because they have settled for the solo act For the solo act.
Brad Aldrich:
So we have had so many couples that we talked to with this exact issue that either porn has entered their marriage or, even if it hasn’t, it’s the effects is there of maybe one person has a higher desire than the other, and so we see that exactly what you’re talking about dynamic, which isn’t that the case in every marriage.
Shannon Ethridge:
It is.
Kate Aldrich:
Show me a marriage where they are both so equally matched with their energy level that there’s no discrepancy, right, it doesn’t happen that way exactly, and we always say with premarital couples, like it’s gonna ebb and flow back and forth, most likely where it’s not always gonna be one person like life throws things at you, changes in life like. Like absolutely, you’re not going to be on the same page sexually, probably very often Right.
Shannon Ethridge:
Well, I think that it’s kind of a beautiful thing that kind of 20s and 30s, men seem to be more interested, more virile, whatever word you want to use. But when a woman hits her 40s and 50s, that is when she hits her sexual stride, if she knows there’s a stride to hit. There’s a lot of women who, just you know, by the time they’re 39 or 40, they have no idea that their bodies and hormones are about to change. And yes, I mean there’s the menopause years where it changes for the negative and they start having all kinds of challenges. But there’s this little window in between I’ve just about got my kids raised and we’re about to have an empty nest and the whole menopause rollercoaster, which is another topic for another day there’s that beautiful window where she actually feels more interest oftentimes than he does.
Shannon Ethridge:
And I think it’s because, intuitively, women know that I’ve got to shore this thing up because my babies aren’t babies anymore and we’re about to look at each other in the eye and go and who are you again when the last one leaves for college. So it’s like she begins to realize what her body is capable of in ways that she never knew before. There are lots of women who don’t even have their first orgasm until that season of life, and when we talk about G-spot orgasms or multiple orgasms, that’s often a midlife discovery that’s not readily available to a woman in her really early seasons of her sexual expression with her mate.
Kate Aldrich:
That’s crazy interesting.
Brad Aldrich:
How do you help couples to discover this? Because what we’re talking about is there’s so many things pulling at this beautiful thing of sexual intimacy, of what can be, of what can be, and I think many couples know, like have this sense of it should be better or it should be. You know this special thing but it’s not.
Shannon Ethridge:
They don’t know how to get there. Yeah.
Brad Aldrich:
How do you, how do you help couples on the journey?
Shannon Ethridge:
Yeah, well, it’s forming a relationship. I mean, I call myself a life and relationship coach not just because I’m dealing with their relationship, it’s also because we are forming a relationship where I’m going to guide them through a process, and it usually is a three to six month process. Sometimes it’s 12 sessions, sometimes it’s 18. Sometimes it’s as few as eight or 10. But the goal is I want to help them look at their look at their sexuality, but in the context of their whole lives. So what I usually start out with is having them do a 20 most pivotal moments exercise. Kate, I believe that I had you do this before your workshop with women at the well is that I want people to create a timeline of their 20 most pivotal moments that really shaped them, and it’s the positive and the negative and they map it out chronologically on a timeline where, by the time they let me see it, it’s literally like an emotional EKG reading of their lives.
Shannon Ethridge:
Through that I can see what their emotional template has been, what their deepest core wounds are, what their biggest rejections were, what their greatest traumas, trials and tragedies were, what their greatest victories were. When I look at each of them individually, then the next step is I have them create one as a couple, because every couple has their own co-created story as well. So when she looks at her childhood baggage and he looks at his, and then you look at how they started their relationship and how it evolved and the walls that they hit, there’s a pattern that surfaces that they can’t see it necessarily at first, because it’s one of those things where you’re just too close to the trees to see the forest. But once I point it out to them that here are your core wounds, this is your attachment style, this is his attachment style, these are his core wounds, and the reason that y’all are clashing or fizzling or whatever the case may be, is because you’re triggering each other like crazy and you’re shutting down that we go into protective mode when we feel attacked or neglected or abandoned or abused or whatever the case may be. So helping couples recognize what the real problem is is really key. And what I often hear from couples is we have read so many books, we have watched so many videos and you know what. You and I all know that we do the best we can writing our books and doing our podcast, of course, know that we do the best we can writing our books and doing our podcasts. Of course, there’s nothing like specific work that’s custom, tailored, sure, to the needs and unique experiences of those individuals. Yeah, so that is.
Shannon Ethridge:
Um, that’s what I started out wanting to do was, um, you know, work directly one-on-one with couples. Most of it is over the telephone, unfortunately, because not everybody can afford to come all the way to Springfield Missouri. But yes, we also do the four-day workshops where sometimes it’s women at the well workshops, where it’s eight to 10 women going through this exact process, looking at her life, and then she’ll often go home and reach back out and say I think we’re ready for couples work now, because I feel as if I put on my big girl pant, but my husband has not done this soul work yet and I don’t know how to walk him through it and we’re we’re getting tripped up because she is basically outgrown him in her awareness of her own sexuality, so he kind of has to play catch up a little bit. Hey, I think it’s great when women can take the lead and say I’m going to look at my life and my sexuality, yeah, and the difference you see in me is going to inspire you to do the same. Pal, it does.
Brad Aldrich:
It does. Yeah, I know we’ve seen that same thing happen, where you know women will start seeing you and eventually their husbands will be like hmm, I better figure this stuff out Right, because I do see the growth happening. I do see that I’m not the bad guy through this coaching, because I think that’s the guy’s script. Is I’m going? To be blamed for everything.
Kate Aldrich:
Right.
Brad Aldrich:
And you know, they start to see, oh wait, there’s actually some movement towards our relationship. That can be healthy and then go all right. What do I need to do to catch up?
Kate Aldrich:
So when I think go ahead sorry. No, go ahead, I was going to say.
Shannon Ethridge:
I think that if he catches the vision that a more sexually confident wife is awaiting the other side of this process, for me, it will motivate him, because so many husbands are like you know, just tell me where to write the check, show me what books are, just tell me what to do and I’ll do it. But they just don’t know what tools are available. They don’t know what books are. Just tell me what to do and I’ll do it. But they just don’t know what tools are available. They don’t know what books to read. They don’t know who to reach out to.
Shannon Ethridge:
And oftentimes it is the woman who will take the lead relationally, because even if a woman doesn’t feel total sexual confidence and maybe it’s because of body image issues, maybe it’s because of past sexual abuse that she has suffered, or maybe she’s been raped, or maybe it’s just she has a lot of negative messages in her head about the whole thing, because maybe she was raised in the purity movement or the church just better. A lot of toxic messages, unintentionally of course, about sexuality. And oftentimes it’s her that will initiate this, because she recognizes that there is, there is something lacking in me, and the way that she describes it best will be I want to want to, I don’t want to, I don’t want to, but I want to want to, right? So I just say you know what We’ll take, let’s work with that. Let’s work with that, because women intuitively know that if they’re not connecting with their husband, he’s not the only one losing out. She’s losing out, yeah, yeah. And she wants to know what am I missing out on?
Kate Aldrich:
Yeah, that’s, it’s so, that’s so good, that’s so real and raw. And I think also women we touched on culture, I think women in the United States. It is more culturally acceptable for them for a variety of reasons.
Kate Aldrich:
That would be another podcast as well to be the initiator of these emotional things and I know for Brad and I as we work with couples. We’re pretty upfront with people Like we will give you some tools, but we also have to look into why these things are happening. So the same thing you’re saying of like the patterns If we don’t and we just do tools, you’re going to be back frustrated at some point because tools break down if we don’t know why we’re actually doing what we’re doing.
Shannon Ethridge:
Well, it’s like going to Home Depot and buying a whole toolbox full of tools, but you have no training. They’re going to sit there and rest Exactly.
Brad Aldrich:
All right. So, shannon, I want to take a minute and ask this for the guys who are watching or listening to this, because I think they’re thinking right now this sounds fantastic. I would love my wife to be sexually confident. I would love us to figure out our sexual confidence. If I go and buy Shannon’s book, am I going to get it thrown at my head right now versus is it going to be helpful? How can men, how can husbands, start this journey?
Shannon Ethridge:
Right? I think that that’s a fantastic question because you’re right. If a husband starts out on the wrong foot with this conversation, she shuts down and takes it as criticism and that’s not productive. I read it first. One man even said I wrapped it in a brown paper wrapper so she would not know what I was reading. I think he wrote much ado about nothing on the outside or something.
Shannon Ethridge:
But he didn’t want to just throw something at her and say here you need to fix yourself. He wanted to understand more about her journey. That’s a great first step, but here’s the thing If the focus is on what’s wrong with her, that’s not going to land well. So my recommendation is actually that he start with my book called the Fantasy Fallacy, exposing the deeper meaning behind our sexual thoughts and fantasies. Because here’s the thing, when you can open up lines of communication about what your sexual thoughts and fantasies are and what they truly represent, and some men have say, oh, I tried that, whoa, was that a wrong thing to do? But she didn’t have the opportunity to understand it through the lens of your life experiences and your trauma. Because how I explain it in the fantasy fallacy is that if we were to make a list of our greatest traumas, trials and tragedies and then made a list of our most unconventional fantasies, the ones that we probably have never told our parents or pastor, or maybe even our partner, if you held those two lists next to each other, they’re mirror images of one another for a valid reason. God wired our brains to compartmentalize pain to make room for pleasure. God wired our brains to compartmentalize pain to make room for pleasure. So if a couple can look at their own thoughts and fantasies through the lens of, we just want to understand each other more fully. And how can we use that information to our advantage to kind of stoke each other’s flame.
Shannon Ethridge:
But a lot of women will come back and say, well, I don’t have any sexual fantasies. That’s, my problem is, I don’t have any sexual fantasies. My response back to them is usually you do. You just have no idea how to tap into an understanding of them. Because of the purity movements impact, I think that women specifically were taught to turn their sexual volume knob down so far to zero, and maybe they turned it up to one or two to get married and have kids, but then they turned it back down. They have no idea what kind of dance they’re missing. They don’t know what their bodies are capable of. They don’t know what their brains are capable of. They don’t understand how fantasy is actually a gift from god to get all of this communicating with one another and get the circuits firing and the lines of communication open in your own mind. So I would say, start with the fantasy fallacy first, if she’s willing, and come at it from a point of humility of I want to work on myself too. Shannon wrote this book for both men and women.
Shannon Ethridge:
Let’s read it together and see what we can each learn about ourselves, see what we can learn about each other. Then maybe a good follow up would be the sexually confident wife, because then you’ve shown her that you’re not pointing the finger at her, expecting her to do all the work to fix herself.
Kate Aldrich:
Right Because it’s an us journey. It’s not right and obviously we’re two independent people. But the other thing I would add to that as Brad and I’ve learned, I would encourage any husband who’s the motivator to actually spend some time understanding your wife’s desires, even outside of the bedroom. The non-sexual desires.
Kate Aldrich:
Because I think, as women, I didn’t grow up in the purity culture, however, there was still very much that kind of culture. I don’t know what you would call culture, however, there was still very much that that kind of culture I don’t know what you would call it in my family. You would probably have a good vibe on it too, honey, but like there was still that good girl culture.
Shannon Ethridge:
The Lady Madonna culture. Yes, that’s exactly right.
Kate Aldrich:
That culture also taught us to not have room and some of my regular personal story as well to not have room for any kind of desire, not just sexual, and, I think, husbands honoring who is my wife and what does she love and she’s obviously on a journey with that, it’s not like she’s figured it all out but encouraging and honoring and delighting in some of those things that aren’t sexual, I believe gives her space to feel safe to explore other desires and until she feels safe emotionally with him and physically through non-sexual touch.
Shannon Ethridge:
The idea of sexual touch just seems so foreign to her. And it’s not because she’s frigid and it’s not because she’s been abused or whatever. This is just. I think this is how God wired women that enter the gas pedal when it comes to physical sexual touch. But women are the brake pedal to make sure that there’s an emotional connection there first, to make sure that you’re a safe partner for me, and thank God that it’s wired that way. You wouldn’t buy a car with two gas pedals and you wouldn’t buy a car with two brake pedals. You need one of each. So we each play a role because without that emotional connection, without that spiritual connection, without that feeling of safety, sex I’m not, I don’t want to say it falls flat, because you know sex is great, but it’s so much richer and deeper when there is a bond that is being fueled like crazy through that sexual expression with one another, absolutely.
Kate Aldrich:
And yeah, I think God had big plans for that emotional part, because we can look at other things in his kingdom that he’s created, that they have the physical side, but that emotional side is what really separates us from other things Absolutely. It’s pretty clear on us.
Shannon Ethridge:
Yeah, yeah, although I love hearing the stories of certain species of animals that bond and mate for life.
Kate Aldrich:
Me too Wolves.
Shannon Ethridge:
You know it’s like, wow, humans can learn from those. Yeah, for sure.
Kate Aldrich:
For sure. Yeah, that’s amazing. What would you say? I was curious. What would you say that you see as one of the biggest hindrances from keeping people moving towards sexual confidence?
Shannon Ethridge:
I think that there is a certain amount.
Shannon Ethridge:
I’m going to say this word and it’s going to ruffle feathers because it’s not a pretty word, but I do think that there’s a certain amount of pride that people feel of they’re not going to admit or confess that they lack sexual confidence because we live in a sex saturated world, like you’d have to be hiding under a rock not to know how sex works, and they’ve probably seen lots of porn where it worked in ways that you know was totally staged, and so most people really don’t have an understanding at all, right, how they lack that sexual confidence.
Shannon Ethridge:
But I think that if you can turn pride into humility and just say something along the lines of well, I feel pretty confident. But if there’s a margin that I could fill, if there’s growth that could take place that I’m unaware of from where I’m standing now, I want to know what that looks like. I want to be the best lover that I can be for my wife or for my husband. If you can come in with that attitude of humility of I just want to see what I can learn and I’m going to do my best to be my absolute best version of myself inside and outside the bedroom. That can help dissipate pride like cotton candy on the tongue.
Brad Aldrich:
Yeah, I love that. Me too, because it says there’s stuff you can do, still right. Like so often we find people just pointing the finger at their spouse and going they’ve got to fix this.
Shannon Ethridge:
Yeah.
Brad Aldrich:
And we’ve seen it both directions.
Shannon Ethridge:
It’s always co-created. Right, it’s always a two-way street. They did not get that in that place because of one person.
Kate Aldrich:
Yeah absolutely, and I think, too, we hear a lot like my needs aren’t being met. I’m curious, since we have you here, shannon, when you hear statements like that, how do you address them? What when?
Shannon Ethridge:
you hear statements like that, what? How do you address them? I’m going to be honest. I think that that phrase my needs aren’t being met At first glance somebody may think, oh, that sounds so selfish, so self-centered. I think that that is incredibly mature and vulnerable for them to make that observation and to put that out there for to be addressed and worked on. And hopefully they will also admit that you know my mates needs may not be getting met either because I’m I’m oblivious as to you know what, you know what I can do for them. That makes want to connect with me.
Shannon Ethridge:
So, when it comes to addressing this particular topic in a healthy way, I would encourage the partner don’t take this personally. They are being incredibly open and honest with you. They’re actually giving you the keys to their kingdom. They’re inviting you in to work on things together and you’ll benefit from it, because who of us doesn’t love feeling as if we know more about how to meet our mate’s needs? It’s what gives us confidence in the relationship. So don’t assume that it’s coming from a place of selfishness. I think that again, it just shows tremendous maturity and insight into themselves. But hopefully they word it in a way that sounds like an invitation rather than a criticism, because you can inspire people to meet your needs. You cannot require them to meet your needs. It does not work that way.
Kate Aldrich:
What would be an example of an invitation? Instead of, what would you tell a husband or a wife?
Shannon Ethridge:
Let’s come up with a particular scenario. What comes to my mind is the whole situation of betrayal. If one partner has been unfaithful, either through pornography or through an actual person online or real time or whatever and that person justifies it by saying well, my needs haven’t been met in a really long time. Okay, well, you didn’t think that you could ask for your needs to be met, or you tried and failed in properly communicating what your needs are. And the way that I explain it is that you know, if a child comes home with a report card with a bad grade, you’re going to tell them you need to do better. And six weeks later, if it’s still a bad grade, maybe you ground them to make them do better. And six weeks later, it’s still a bad grade. Eventually, you’re not going to look at your student anymore because they’ve been doing all that they can. You’re going to look to the teacher of what? Why is this happening? What is not being taught in the classroom? So we have to understand that when our mate says my needs aren’t getting met, ok, well, let me be a student of your needs. You’re the teacher, I’m the student. Teach me. Teach me what I could do better. Teach me what I have failed to do. Teach me what I do well, because we all need to. As a matter of fact, I would say start there. The Oreo cookie approach is really best of tell me what I do well and then tell me where I need to improve, and then tell me again what I do well and what vision you have for the future, because everybody wants to feel as if their mate is working toward a collaborative future together.
Shannon Ethridge:
So many times they come into my coaching office and they are so ready to throw in the towel and they’re using divorce language and separation language and all that kind of stuff. I would say don’t start there. Don’t start there. I’m not gonna say that it sometimes doesn’t end there. Unfortunately, not every marriage can come back from the brink of divorce, but by golly you can certainly try by just being humble and and honest and authentic and not getting in defensive mode and becoming critical of one another and doing the blame game, because it really is a sacred invitation for someone to say I have needs that I I’m feeling empty and raw about and you’re the safest person on the planet that I want to invite to and teach how to meet those needs, because you’re the one I want to be closest to, you’re the one for me. You’re it Like if you can tell it to them. Like that. It’s a compliment, it’s not a criticism.
Kate Aldrich:
I love that, I love that, and, and, as you said, we can’t demand anyone, but we can invite them in.
Shannon Ethridge:
Yes, yes, right, and it may be an evolution process. It may take weeks or months, or maybe years for some people to really open those lines of communication, and that’s why I think that it’s so helpful to work with someone, a third party, who can just kind of help you, navigate and mediate and challenge you in ways that you might not know how otherwise.
Kate Aldrich:
Yeah, that’s really good. I remember, and I think I told you this when I came home from the women at the well, I think one of the statements that has stuck with me the most was and I think you were talking on the subject of emotional needs specifically but you said, like if you actually want, the bravest thing you can do, if you want to get your emotional needs met, is ask for them.
Shannon Ethridge:
Yeah, I have people make a Cliff’s Notes version of their four-day experience by writing the 10 things that they want to remember and number one thing is already filled in for them, because I really want to make sure that they have it in their head yes, the number one way to get your emotional needs met is to be vulnerable and ask for what you need.
Shannon Ethridge:
Yeah, it’s amazing how that works, not just in a marriage relationship with your kids, with friends, with coworkers. Just be vulnerable and ask for what you need, instead of critical and complain that they’re not doing it because they’re not mind readers, they don’t always know.
Brad Aldrich:
Although I will add, Shannon, how often I work with men who have absolutely no idea what their emotional needs are.
Kate Aldrich:
They have no clue what any needs are they have no clue what any any needs are cultivated in this culture right the emotional.
Shannon Ethridge:
Language is a foreign concept, but emotional physical needs like they ignore pretty much.
Brad Aldrich:
Men typically ignore most needs, relational, spiritual other than the sexual need that kind of has that nag to it. That’s the one that they pursue. And then in relationships, when it happens that they’re hearing no a lot, they just go I don’t have any needs, so I just shove them all back in the closet, and this happens over and over.
Shannon Ethridge:
So yeah, and it is so important for all of your listeners who are raising boys understand that this challenge of identifying how they feel, or recognizing their own needs, or recognizing their wife’s emotional language when she’s speaking it to him yeah, this didn’t start after the wedding. This is a pattern that he grew up with. Children are culturally conditioned to either be emotionally intuitive or totally not, and the reasons are, you know, different from one household to the next. But I definitely encourage both not just the moms, but the moms and the dads to have conversations with your kids, not just about what they’re doing or where they’re going or who they’re with or whatever, but how are you feeling? Put a feelings chart on the refrigerator for crying out loud Like. That is one of those helpful household tools to teach kids that, hey, what you’re feeling right now has a name. Let’s go over and look at the feelings chart and let’s identify what you’re feeling.
Shannon Ethridge:
Okay Well, how would you like to feel? Okay Well, what do you need to move from how you’re feeling to how you want to feel Like? Let’s teach them this process.
Shannon Ethridge:
I love Inside Out and Inside Out 2. Those movies are just so great. Take your sons to go see that movie or those movies. It is definitely a language that we have to instill in our sons at an early age for them to really be confident using it as adults. Yeah, I’m so glad you said that.
Kate Aldrich:
I agree 100% and the thing I’ve had to learn as a parent is our kids’ feelings are okay, even if we’re like, oh, that makes me uncomfortable, like your interaction with what they’re feeling. We don’t need to shut it down just because that makes me concerned or that makes me right. Like we have to also understand, as parents, our response to theirs. We don’t need to shut it down just because that makes me concerned or that makes me right. Like we have to also understand, as parents, our response to theirs, because that’s often what’s happening. And then they get shut down or they feel like, oh, I saw mom and dad looking upset, so now I can’t have that emotion, or it’s not safe to have that emotion. And I think, remembering, as parents, the emotion is fine. They can have whatever emotion they’re having, right and make that be safe, absolutely.
Shannon Ethridge:
We need to teach them that our negative emotions primarily sadness, anger and fear those are our wisest teachers. They’re not villains, they’re not culprits, they’re not things to be feared. Teachers, they’re not villains, they’re not culprits, they’re not things to be feared. That’s, that’s our wisest teachers, knocking on the door with a lesson for us, and the faster we receive the lesson, the quicker they’ll go away and dissipate and let us return to happiness and safety and peace. So that is definitely. I think that because so many of us were raised in a household or in the generation where if you were scared about something, it’s stop being a fraidy cat, stop being a scaredy baby. You were belittled. If you were angry, it was you go to your room and don’t you come out until you get a civil tongue in your head. You were not allowed to be angry, especially at an adult, and don’t you come out until you get a civil tongue in your head.
Shannon Ethridge:
You were not allowed to be angry, especially at an adult, and if you were sad, it was stop that crying or I’m going to give you something to cry about we were conditioned as children to repress all those negative emotions.
Shannon Ethridge:
So if we repress our negative emotions, which are our wisest teachers, how are we supposed to learn in life Exactly, teachers, how are we supposed to learn in life Exactly? Absolutely vital to invite those repressed negative emotions up out of the basement, which is often what happens when we do the 20 most pivotal moments exercises. It came with an emotional imprint of these things that have happened in their lifetimes. There were certain feelings, and sometimes they can verbalize that their parents or siblings did a very good job supporting them, like in the death of a family member or something like that. And there are other times where it’s like nobody even had any clue how bad I was hurting. Maybe it’s when their parents divorced, or when they lost their best friend, or when the dog died, or whatever the case is. Yeah, I think it’s those seasons where we don’t ask how they are feeling and teach them language that they can express it with that we go awry and that they just repress those feelings and carry them into adulthood. Yeah, so good.
Kate Aldrich:
Well, I often challenge people too and I think in the church we need this that I actually challenged. There aren’t really any negative emotions. God created all emotions as simply emotions. I like that and he’s experienced all of them. God has.
Kate Aldrich:
And the thing I challenge people because I feel like in the church they need to hear that anger is not bad. What we can do with it can be super hurtful and have lots of repercussions. Even Jesus was angry, exactly, and I always say you know, if my kids were flipping over the table like in my house, I probably wouldn’t be super pleased. Granted, there’s a lot of cultural context, there’s stuff about his family involved in that. But the reality is your anger is not bad, what you’re doing with it right. We need to understand why the anger is. Your anger is not bad, what you’re doing with it right. We need to understand why the anger is there. But that’s so healing for so many people because the church has just said just tamp it down, control it, get over it, and it’s like no, their anger is actually trying to tell them something.
Shannon Ethridge:
And once they learn to look at their childhood through that lens of those emotions that felt negative at the time, I’m never going to think the same terms again. Thank you for that great lesson just now. When they learn that it that it was okay for them to have those feelings, I think that’s when they develop the confidence in their marriage relationship. It’s okay to be afraid, it’s okay to be angry, it’s okay to be sad, it’s okay to have grief. I love being married to a grief therapist, by the way. It’s just so refreshing to be partnered with someone who knows how to connect on that deep emotional level.
Shannon Ethridge:
And so if husbands are really struggling with, how can I get my wife to just be putty in my hands and be that sexually confident wife? I would say you know what? Start with your emotional IQ. I think that’s actually the title of a book. Is it Daniel Goldman or somebody like that?
Kate Aldrich:
Yeah, Emotional intelligence yes, that’s what I was going to say. Emotional intelligence, yeah, and it’s true, and I think you know we enter into grief more than we realize, whether we’re aware of it or not, and it’s something we often talk about with people. That’s a grief process, right? So many things that have happened in our childhood and our lives. It is a grief process and that there’s nothing wrong with you that? You feel grief.
Shannon Ethridge:
That’s part of the human experience the image that comes to my mind. I love showing people two different pictures. One is a light bulb in a room with white walls. The other is a light bulb in a room with white walls. The other is a light bulb in a room with black walls. And which one radiates light more vividly to the human eye? The one in the dark room. The light is juxtaposed best against the darkness, so grief also helps us feel love and connection more deeply. It’s not just a dark place that we go to and we’ll never come out, it’s we feel joy more freely when we allow ourselves to feel the grief when it’s appropriate. I also think that letting ourselves feel it is the only way to heal it. Ignoring it, repressing it all the things that we were taught to do as children I don’t think that that’s ever productive, healthy or beneficial in any way, shape or form.
Kate Aldrich:
Yeah, gosh, that’s so good, we could keep talking forever Shannon.
Brad Aldrich:
this has been so wonderful and helpful. We really appreciate your time and coming on and love what you’re doing, and we would highly recommend couples to check out couples at the well. Um, you know, kate had a wonderful experience at women at the well yeah, phenomenal.
Kate Aldrich:
Definitely check out all of shannon’s resources, both books and what she offers her coaching services. She is just a wealth of knowledge and just such a sweet person. We just thank you so much for who you are and for you growing and who God has made you to be, because that’s what allowed all of this.
Shannon Ethridge:
Can I say two more very quick things? I want to make people aware that when we moved to Springfield Missouri, we established a place, a property that we operate as a VRBO, but our heart is families who are deep in the trenches of grief because they’ve lost someone or because of a divorce or because of whatever trauma may be. It’s a place where you can come and you can work with both Charlie and I. Charlie specializes in grief therapy, as I said, and play therapy with children, and I work with adults, women and couples. So Springfield Missouri put it on your radar If you’re going through a season where you just really need some time set apart to go through the trenches and you need somebody to hold your hand in that process.
Shannon Ethridge:
And also the second thing I wanted to say is I got to have you guys on my podcast with sexual confidence on tap because I’ve known you guys on my podcast with sexual confidence on tap, because I’ve known you guys to be very sexually confident for a very long time. Yeah, you know, lots of people enter into this type of field and they burn out after a year or two or three, and I just love the fact that you guys are still galloping, still going strong, still helping so many people. Yeah, and I can tell that it has had. I can tell that there’s a trickle down effect. I can tell that it blesses you guys in your relationship to be able to help other people in their relationship.
Brad Aldrich:
That’s always been evident to me, yep, god for sure keeps growing us and you know, there are plenty of times I I say this to my clients now like there’s plenty of times that, through something that we’re working on, I will remember, like you know, what I probably need to do that better as a husband right now, right, like there is places where we keep working and growing, no matter what.
Shannon Ethridge:
Yeah, I love the smile on Kate’s face, because what woman doesn’t love hearing her husband say there’s room for me to grow. I want to do better for her yeah, so true, so true. It means you’re worth it?
Kate Aldrich:
yes, totally. Before we run, we always shoot three quick questions at our guests, so and we don’t prep them for it, we just love to know what you think. Off the cuff so so number one what are you doing right now to keep your marriage alive?
Shannon Ethridge:
Well, right now my husband just had surgery, so I’m literally bathing him, making sure that he feels like I am there for him, because his arm he had a shoulder replacement surgery, so just making sure that he feels well, tended to. But if it wasn’t in this season where you know, it’s intense, it’s really intense to care for someone who is immobilized. But we definitely do walks and talks because I feel like there’s something magical about just taking your mate by the hand and even if it’s just a 20 minute walk or 30 minute walk, just to walk and talk at sunset or sunrise or whenever the you know, whatever time of day, yeah, very important.
Kate Aldrich:
I love that. What is number two? What is something that makes you laugh right now, brings you joy?
Shannon Ethridge:
I have a 13 year old niece and to watch her talk to my brother as if he is an alien with three heads, because he’s 62 and all he wants to eat is salads and salmon. Your time is coming, baby girl. I love it. Her name is Journey and I took her to a Journey concert and, oh my gosh, to watch her just jam out to Journey it was so fun.
Kate Aldrich:
I love that. That’s amazing. Okay, third one what is something that you’re doing right now that brings you rest?
Shannon Ethridge:
I got an infrared sauna a couple of years ago for the VRBO. I wanted people to have that, but I realized I need it too. So I’ve been carving out time to just lay in that infrared sauna and sweat like a pig for an hour, because it just gets all the toxins out and it just makes you sweat and like I don’t exercise hard enough to break a sweat, so I feel like that’s that’s good. Does it for you? I like it. That does it for me. Infrared sauna is fantastic.
Kate Aldrich:
I love it okay, putting that on our list, honey, okay that’s so good.
Brad Aldrich:
Well, thank you so much, shannon. We’re just honored to have you on, and that’s all for this week on Still Becoming One Until next time. I’m Brad Aldrich.
Kate Aldrich:
And I’m Kate Aldrich. Be kind and take care of each other.
