#105: Criticisms and Comparisons

Hey Guys!

In this episode, we dive into another listener question (or rather, a series of questions) pertaining to him comparing and criticizing her in his addiction (and oftentimes, well after the addiction has stopped). We have a more casual conversation about this, so if you like structure, check out the show notes below for some scaffolding. This is such a GREAT question, and as you will see from our conversation, this is complex, important, and STILL something we both work on.

Question #1 - Can a husband help heal his wife's wounds from years of criticism and comparisons to other women?

The quick answer is unequivocally YES. We return to this in the latter half of the episode.

Question #2 - Why does he compare her to other women, in his immaturity and in his addiction?

Some of the reasons include:

• To shore up his 3I's - (his criticism of her shores up insecurities in him.)

• Faulty standard due to a history of sin around sexual integrity.

• Standards in our culture and our Christian subculture.

• Projecting. (This is similar to shoring up the 3I's.)

For us women, knowing these whys can help us depersonalize comparisons and criticism.

Question #3 - How will this ever work? How will I ever measure up to what he saw?

• We want to encourage women to be themselves and to NOT change themselves to "be" who they think he is "more" attracted to. (That is complete nonsense and crazy-making!)

Question #4 - The listener also asked - OR, is this primarily the wife's work, to see her value aside from her husband's actions and words?

• There is grief for us women that it's not even possible to look like what he consumed. This is a part of our work.

• We also work toward embracing our uniqueness and who we are, not who we are not.

• Finding security (and our value) in the right things.

We then loop back to the first question: can a husband help heal his wife's wounds from years of criticism and comparisons to other women? I ask Jason what he did to help me heal from his comparisons and criticisms. And he shares a lot and talks a lot. Which I am okay with, I'm just letting you guys know what happens - haha!

We end with talking about this real longing for women to feel highly esteemed by him and to be seen as beautiful by him, because of everything she is, not just because of the physical.

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