I Can’t Do This Anymore

So, in the middle of that season, we decided to take this date night, or date afternoon lunch, and Kerry picked me up at the hospital. But I got into the car and looked at him and he said, you said 1215. And that was 10 minutes ago. Immediately, I jumped into this.

Oh, well, yeah, it was actually, I was triggered right away. And finally, through the tears, I just yanked the ring off my finger and threw it at his feet and said, there, you have it. I don't want it anymore. Welcome to Family Life Today, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I'm Ann Wilson.

And I'm Dave Wilson and you can find us at familylifetoday.com or on our Family Life app. This is Family Life Today. A lot of our listeners have heard, probably ad nauseum, our 10-year anniversary story when you said, I've lost my feelings for you.

And I had obviously no idea. And part of the reason I bring that up is, you know, we realize we're not the only couple that's gone through that kind of struggle. I mean, many, many marriage, almost every marriage at some point gets to a point where they have, they need help. And they're at a crisis point. Yeah. And one of the greatest things is we can offer help. Family Life is known for the weekends to remember that have been sort of on hold during COVID. We are back.

It's exciting, actually. Yeah. And you can sign up this fall to go to a Weekend to Remember. And if you sign up right now, it's half price. That's a deal.

That's a great deal. Your marriage will not be the same at the end of that weekend. We can help you. We've been speaking at the Weekend to Remember for over 30 years, and I'm telling you the stories that we have heard.

They bring tears to my eyes because marriages have hope once again, because good marriages become even greater. And I'm telling you, all of us need a little refresher, especially after COVID. We need this. Yeah. So I'm telling you right now, go to familylife.com or you can call FL Today, Family Life Today, and sign up for a Weekend to Remember.

It's going to change your life. We thought we're the most broken, messed up, especially pastor. You're in the pastorate at the time, starting this church. And we really were broken. And I told you, like, I have nothing left. Like, I'm done.

I've got nothing. And then we heard another story. Yeah. Then a book comes out by Tony Newhoff called Before You Split. And, you know, it's interesting. I didn't know Tony as well as I knew her husband, Carrie Newhoff. And many of our listeners will recognize Carrie's name as a podcaster, author, pastor. I mean, there's so many things I could say about Carrie.

But you know what? Today's not about Carrie. Today is about Tony.

She's the author of this book. And first of all, you guys, welcome to Family Life Today. Thanks. We're thrilled to join you.

Yeah. Great to be with you guys. I consider you friends, you know, even though you're all the way up in the north and Canada. But man, oh man, you know, for years Carrie's known about our church, Kensington, and I've known about Carrie and watched what he had done. But I didn't know a lot about your marriage until, Tony, you wrote this book Before You Split. Find what you really want for the future of your marriage. And as Anne and I started opening this up and reading it, we were like, oh my goodness, your story is so similar in terms of the struggle that you experienced in the first 10, 15 years of your marriage as well.

It mirrored ours in a huge way. Tony, you're a family law mediator and a former divorce attorney and co-host of the Smart Family podcast. So I stopped right there and think, wait, you're a former divorce attorney, so you've heard a lot of stories. You know, we thought ours was isolated and we're going to hear your story in a minute, but that's really interesting for me reading your book coming from your background. Have you heard a lot of stories? Oh, so many heartbreaking, heart-wrenching stories. Unfortunately, the stories I heard didn't end up the way Carrie's and mine did and yours did, thankfully.

You know, we were able to go from that bad to really this great and by the grace of God, I believe. But yes, I've heard so many stories and so many pitfalls that are very common in marriage. And when they're happening to you, you think that, you know, you're in a very small minority. The reality is there's lots of common pitfalls that people face. And as you've written about, you know, there are ways to get through some of those pitfalls.

Well, take us back to I think it was year 15. And it's interesting that it had something took place in a car as well. Basically, tell us your story. Our listeners probably don't know. We want to hear the good and the bad and the ugly and all the good. It was ugly. Well, Carrie and I were in the middle of this season that was rocky. We were having a lot of problems getting through various issues. But I think one of the fundamental underlying problems was that we had different styles of resolving conflict. Our communication was so broken that we just kept, you know, circling around and around in this vicious cycle of conflict. But we couldn't seem to move through it. And our date nights had become more like fight nights.

So, this one week we decided, okay, let's try to shake things up and we'll go for a date at lunch rather than Friday evening. Okay. So, give us a little background of what was going on in your lives at that time. You have two sons. Were they born at that time?

Yes. So, our sons were in middle school. Carrie was leading the local church. I was working at a local hospital on the leadership team. So, we had a full life.

The kids were involved in activities. I was heavily involved in church as well. Our church was growing really fast. So, there was a lot of pressure. I didn't know how to keep up.

We were the fastest growing church in our denomination, one of the largest in our denomination in the country. So, it was just a lot of pressure at work. And then, you know, for us, just to give you the prequel to the story I'm sure you're going to tell, Tone, there was no affair, there was no, like, it wasn't like, oh, something horrible had happened. It was a slide over a decade and a bit from getting along great, being in love, to just drifting apart, more conflict, and just sort of this pervasive pall over our relationship. So, it wasn't like there was this cataclysmic event that happened that ruined everything.

No, there wasn't. It was just a drift into a really unhappy relationship. Yeah, I would say very conflicted. Lots of arguments. And the problem is when you've had problems with conflict and it goes on over time and you don't have those issues resolved or the communication issues resolved, then hurt gets layered on top of hurt, on top of offense.

It's like there is a wall being built. So, Carrie and I were in the midst of that season and not at the point where we had started to double down and gain some insight into what was going on. But we were trying our best. I mean, I think that we both really wanted our relationship to work. We were both so frustrated and hurt and there was this frustration, anger that would simmer under the surface and then the smallest thing could cause it to erupt again.

So, in the middle of that season, we decided to take this date night, or date afternoon lunch, and Carrie picked me up at the hospital. But I got into the car and looked at him and he said, you said 1215, and that was 10 minutes ago. Not the first time that happened, I may say, but I don't think that's a very good excuse. I immediately became defensive. I started out on time. Somebody stopped me in the hall.

It was a risk issue connected with a project that I was already involved in and they needed my opinion. And so, they couldn't wait for a couple of hours for me to come back for lunch. But the issue was once I sat down and saw the look on Carrie's face, then immediately I jumped into this, oh, this, well, yeah, it was actually, I was triggered right away. And so, it took me, in no time, I was already in tears and the explanation wasn't going to work. And I was silent and zoned out and Carrie was saying, well, what about our lunch?

What's happened to that? Are we still going? And finally, through the tears, I just yanked the ring off my finger and threw it at his feet and said, there, you have it.

I don't want it anymore. Wow. And we were one more layer of stuck. So, let me ask you, here you are, like you're in the car.

Tony, was it typical? You said you kind of shut down a little bit. And is that what happened typically in your relationship if a conflict would arise? Yeah, that was a pattern for me that when I reached the point of those big, you know, frustrated or triggered emotions, then I would typically, came to learn, dissociate. So, I would just go off into my own world. It was like I was, there was a veil between me and the world. We now understand that that was a defense mechanism that evolved out of my childhood experiences, but then it was this muddy picture of, you know, I'm just trying to keep the peace.

I don't want to go any further with what's happening here. Well, the way I would experience it, and there's always what you think is going on, then how the other person experienced, I would experience you as very angry and then very shut down. So, you would get very frustrated, very angry at me, hence, you know, ripping the ring off your finger and whipping it on the floor.

And then that was it. The wall would go up. And I would tend to be my Enneagram type, if anyone pays any attention to that. I'm an eight, so I will fight hot. I will go for it. I will drive a truck through it. And I'll be like, we need to get to the bottom of this now. And you would just be completely shut down at that point.

And like you said, triggered. And somebody once said it this way that I fight hot and Tony fights cold. So I would be like, no, we're going to go.

We're going to get this. You know, we're both lawyers by background. I loved the courtroom. You preferred a more conciliatory environment. So I don't mind. Like, I can smell the jugular. Let's go there. That's my personality. So I'm like, let's get to the bottom of this right now. Let's hash it out. And you're like, you would just Stonewall me. Carrie, here you are in the car.

Tony takes off her ring, throws it on the floor. What do you do with that? Yeah, I don't know. You have a better memory of that than me. I think it shocked me. I mean, OK, you want to know how guys think? You know what I thought? I thought, do you know how much I sacrificed for that ring? Do you know how much that cost me? Do you know how much that cost me?

Now, is that a guy thing? OK, come to my rescue here. I just exposed myself on national radio. I'm seeing cha-ching, cha-ching. I've spent money on that.

I sacrificed. OK, that is messed up. You guys aren't saying like that.

Like, do you know how much it's going to cost me to replace that? I'm thinking this is the death of a marriage and our kids. And you guys are thinking of the money. Carrie, you said that you sort of slid. You know, your marriage was sliding over a period of years. Did you realize where you were? It was a wake up call for me. It's like, you know, we used to live on a major street in Toronto. Now we're in the country.

The loudest thing is the birds. But we used to live on a major street in Toronto. And eventually you tune out the traffic. You just don't hear it anymore. Right. And people who live near a freeway would have that experience.

And so we didn't hear it when we were students living in Toronto. Now, if I did that, I would I would hear it immediately. And I think there was so much noise in our relationship that conflict was normal, that disagreement was normal, that resentment and contempt where they just became normalized.

And there would be outbursts on a semi regular basis. Like Tony would be frustrated because it wasn't just her that was late for me. I would tend to show up if it was a family event on time, but work would keep me late. I'll be home at four thirty. Sorry. This thing ran late. I'll be home at six. Apologize.

Just feed the kids dinner. I'll grab it after like that happened way too often in my life at that time. So I think it just yeah, it was like a wake up call. It was a defining moment. But it felt like one more thing I didn't know how to deal with. It's like, great. Now we're being dramatic about it.

Now what do I do? And Tony, what were you feeling at that point when you took off that ring? Were you thinking I'm done?

Really? Yeah, it was one of the questions in my mind. Certainly it was, you know, I had to grapple with that question of is this what the end looks like? And it was very confusing to be in that place.

I think many people can identify with this confusion. If you've ever reached the place of really being disillusioned in your marriage or ambivalent, it feels like damage control, no matter what direction you turn in. You know, if I stay, then am I just signing up for a lifetime of this kind of misery?

But if I go, then we have to deal with all the consequences of splitting, especially if you have kids. So it's very confusing. I stayed stuck in that place for quite a long time. I would say it probably at that moment, thinking back to it, felt like one more tactic, one more way to get my attention, grind me down rather than even expressing your deep frustration.

I think I felt paralyzed by it. I didn't know how to respond. I've never been married before, other than to you.

And no one had ever thrown a ring down. Like, you know, it's like, I don't know. It's not like I've done this eight times. I don't know how to deal with this. I think our conflict resolution styles were so very different.

It's not a black and white picture. You know, I would actually engage in conflict, but there was something about what was happening with Carrie and I that was just particularly hurtful and became triggering, became very difficult to manage. So when we reached that impasse, I'll say, it seemed to me that there was no way to have the conversations we needed to have.

I felt Carrie was being overly aggressive and not listening. And so for me, it became more and more normal and regular for me to just tune it out. And tuning it out was me just going into my own zone. And I would say at that point, you know, marriage is the deepest love, the deepest joy. It's also the deepest pain I think you can feel. And it was probably also the deepest frustration. I could solve problems at work.

I didn't know how to solve this at home. Yeah. And Tony, did you have any sense? Because I know in our situation, Ann has said that she felt guilty approaching me about our marriage because I was working for God. I was in ministry. And it's like, she's feeling like my energy and my passion and my heart is given to the ministry and the people I don't even really know.

And I'm pulling away from her. And she said, man, it was hard to complain because I'm asking you to make me more important than your work with God. Did you ever experience that as a wife to a pastor?

That's an interesting question. I would say that I didn't experience guilt as much as I had the, I would say, maybe cognitive dissonance of, you know, we are leading this church. You know, and our church gives people hope and the love of Christ. And yet, here we are struggling so deeply. I felt like there was a disconnect as far as integrity goes. And I think that prompted some really soul searching conversations with us. You know, I would say, I remember saying, I can't live a sham of a marriage.

Like, I can't portray this image to people and yet live a different reality on the inside. And I think if anything that caused us and me to double down on just getting into counseling and figuring out, you know, what in the world can we do to make, you know, our intentions and the lived reality of our marriage line up. So what did you do? I mean, obviously the rings on the floorboard. That's where we sort of left you.

And I know Carrie didn't pick it up and throw it back and say, well, there you go. You did something. Something happened to turn this thing. What was the next step? Yeah, I did go to individual counseling. And at first I have to confess that my counseling approach was to, you know, explain and pour it all out, let the counselor know what was going on.

But basically I was looking for support. I think I was looking to the counselor more as a cheerleader as opposed to someone to expose my blind spots. But as things got worse, and I think, you know, definitely after this episode we had in the car, I realized that I needed to approach counseling from a more humble perspective. I think the value of humility went up for me because it was a matter of survival. I had to figure out what I was bringing to this mess and really double down on doing some work. One of the things that interrupted that process was I kind of, maybe around that time a little bit after, went through a season of burnout. And it got so bad for me. And it wasn't just the marriage.

It was a decade of running too hard, too fast in a rapidly growing church, not being able to keep up, not having the strategies. And, you know, I was doing some pretty intense counseling at that time. Like I knew our marriage needed work. I knew that I needed work.

And what that did was that was kind of a circuit breaker. I think you got quite depressed around that same time, Tony did. And I burned out. So that was three months in the ditch, got up every day, kept my job, but it was just brutal.

And I think what that did is it brought us both to a place, like I said, a circuit breaker, where I realized, okay, this is where all of that leads. I need a new normal. I need to figure out how to be healthier emotionally, spiritually, relationally. And, you know, spiritually, like I was a Christian. I love Jesus. I'm reading my Bible every day. I'm praying every day.

We're praying through this. So it's not like, oh, yeah, I was a closet atheist. No, I mean, your faith was very sincere.

My faith was very sincere. But we were at this relational impasse and kind of at a life moment where everything just kind of fell apart. And then for me, it was a process of probably three to five years of reconstructing my life on a much healthier foundation, which we can get into.

But but I think it was the circuit breaker burnout that really helped break the pattern for me. And when you're that exhausted, that tired, that broken, everything just kind of stops. It's almost like ending up in a emotional body cast.

You know what I mean? Like, I've never been in a body cast. All I ever did was break a thumb.

But like that was disruptive enough. I can't imagine being in a body cast for like three months. But it felt like I was in this emotional body cast for a few months.

And so all of life kind of stopped. And then looking on the other side to get healthier, we started to rebuild our marriage slowly but surely. As I was reading your book, I could see that you guys talked about being in a cycle. Your arguments would kind of go in the same cycle. We experienced the same thing where we'd have a fight. We'd blow up. We'd have a fight and I would leave the room. That's what we experienced because I hated counseling.

It's Tony's game. She leaves the room. And I would chase Dave and follow him. She didn't chase me. She yelled. She said one time, she said, get back here and fight me like a man, you big chicken. She said that.

Well, just the most supportive words. Okay. Well, I got to ask you, what would you fight about?

What would you argue about? Well, you're like top two or three. Hey, Kerry, Kerry, Kerry, this is our interview. What are you doing here? No, that's okay. I interview people for a living, Dave.

So, you know, we'll give you ours if you give us yours. Ours was really time. I felt like Dave was giving his best to everyone else. And when he walked in the door, he was exhausted. He was more passive because he was he was just burnt out, basically.

And I'll add this. I think what you said earlier, Kerry, I experienced I didn't know what to do in the home. Yeah, I knew what to do as a pastor, as a leader. Not saying I did it great, but I knew what to do. People thought I was good there.

I'd come home. And first of all, I didn't really know what a dad, husband, Christian leader looked like in the home. And my wife kept saying I was bad at it. Apparently, this isn't going very well. Yeah. So I'm bad at it.

Okay, I'll go over there where I'm good, you know. And so that was a big part of our fight. What were yours? I'd say time. I think we clashed over, my natural orientation is to focus on people over tasks. So I would be trying to attend to whatever the kids needed. And if the dishes had to sit on the counter and the kitchen had to wait, that was fine because I knew I would do it before I went to bed, but it didn't have to be done right now. But so we had this clash over- No, it has to be done right now.

That is the answer to the question is it needs to be done right now. And it's interesting because this is tied into leadership. I mean, that's where I spend all of my time. But like, you're kind of used to, I was the senior leader, like you say things, they get done, right? Rightly or wrongly, that's what happens. And I come home and sometimes we have a very neat house, so I'm not complaining, but I would say it looks like a bomb went off in here.

Like what happened? Like there's toys everywhere and the food's all over the place. And, you know, I try to contain the chaos at work and then I come home and there's chaos at home. I'm like, I can't have any more chaos in my life. I'm more task.

Like in the Mary Martha story, that's the one where I'm like, no, Jesus, Martha, you were too hard on her. Like she, like who's gonna, who's gonna pay the bills? Who's gonna cook the meals?

Like who's gonna clean up? Like, come on, you need this stuff done. And I know Jesus was right. I get that. But that's one where I'm probably a little bit OCD, like I've never been diagnosed, but like if things are not in order, I do not feel in order. Now I've learned how to manage that a lot better and we've, it's not really a tension point in our relationship anymore, but it was for years. And so there was that and then money, you know, I was a pastor, we left law. So it wasn't like there was a whole lot of money sitting around and so we couldn't, couldn't agree on priorities.

So I would say that was it. It was that I spent too much time at work and true, I'm a recovering workaholic. I didn't know what to do at home. I think that's a really great articulation, Dave and Sabbath. Oh my goodness. I'm still okay.

So this is years later. I'm still working on Sabbath. This idea of being still, I don't know how to be still. And the problem with the work I do is I could work any time. Like it's my mind, right?

That's what I do. I could be writing a talk. I could be finishing a book.

I could be preparing for a podcast guest by reading their book like it never. So I didn't have any hobbies at the time. And then being a parent, I love my sons. I have the privilege of working with one and we have a great relationship with our grown sons. But like, you know, kids are a lot of work. And when you show up and you're tired at the end of the day and they just want to play outside and the house is a mess. I would be like at seven thirty time to put the kids to bed and you'd be like, oh, they just need one more story. And I'd be like, I need one more something. I don't know.

But that would drive me crazy. We also had different perspectives on discipline, for example, with the problems we already just described in getting through our conflict. It all just seemed to be a mess. Yeah, I was strict and you were lenient. You guys just have very different personalities.

You have different gifts you're bringing in. And we're like that, too. There's certain things that you just rub each other wrong and then you start judging one another, thinking if you would just change this, I would be much more happy.

And so we were kind of in that same cycle. But you know what's beautiful that you wrote in the book that I think can get missed and you broke your book into three parts. And the first part, I love the title, is I Can't Do This Anymore, which I'm guessing is almost a quote, you know, like in that moment when you're throwing the ring. And I think every couple, I hope will listen to that and go, if you're in a place in your marriage, you need to get to that place to say, I can't do this anymore. A crisis point.

Yeah, a crisis point. But here's what a lot of couples do. They say, I'm done and I'm out.

You said, I can't do this anymore. We're going to fix this. We're going to stay together.

We're going to make this work. But I'm not living like this anymore. I'm not faking this charade. I'm not pretending. I won't settle in a sense.

Right. And I hope couples listening will be like, man, if you're there right now, I'm hoping you're going, I can't do this anymore. That doesn't mean I'm leaving you. It means, honey, we've got to take the step, whatever that looks like, to get our marriage to what we dreamed it would be. And it's going to be hard work, but I'm not going anywhere, but I'm not doing this anymore like we have.

And Dave, I would say, too, it's a cry to Jesus, like, Lord, I can't do this anymore. I think he's waiting for us to get to that point of him saying, oh, I've been waiting for you to realize that I'm the one that can take you to new places. We know that, but sometimes we have to figure out how do we bring Jesus into that? So it'll be fun to talk more about how we can do that. I would add the best moment in your marriage.

Yeah. I can't tell you for your marriage, it's your marriage, but it looks like a really bad moment. And it probably was one of the best things that ever happened. Just throwing that ring and saying I'm not going to do this like this anymore. I know there are some of you who can relate to what Tony and Carrie were talking about today. You've been at that frustration point where you've thought, I can't do this anymore.

Maybe you're there right now and you're wondering, what do we do? Is there hope left for our marriage? And that's where Tony's book Before You Split can provide some help. The subtitle is What You Really Want for the Future of Your Marriage.

And I would say to any couple, before you make a decision that is a final decision to end your marriage, make sure you've done everything to fight for it, to try to preserve it. Get a copy of Tony's book. You can go to our website, familylifetoday.com and request your copy. Again, the website is familylifetoday.com.

The book is called Before You Split. Or you can call to order. Our number is 1-800-FL-TODAY. 1-800-358-6329.

That's 1-800-F as in family, L as in life, and then the word TODAY. And let me also add, before you make a final decision, you owe it to yourself to attend together a Weekend to Remember Marriage Getaway. These getaway weekends have been used by God in hundreds of thousands of marriages over the years to bring healing and hope where there was division and strife. And so if that's where you find yourself, again, before you split, come to a Weekend to Remember Marriage Getaway.

We've got about 30 of these events happening this fall in cities all across the country. And if you register this week, you can save 50% off the regular registration fee. And if for any reason the weekend is not what you expected it to be, we'll give you your money back.

There are no questions asked. So register today. And let me just also say, the Weekend to Remember is not just for couples who are frustrated with where their marriage is. If you have a marriage and you would say, it's okay, but you don't want it to be just okay, you want it to be better than okay.

You want it to be all that it's intended to be. Come join us for a Weekend to Remember Marriage Getaway. Again, there's information online about the getaway.

Go to familylifetoday.com. You can register online as well. Or call if you have any questions or if you'd like to register by phone. 1-800-FL-TODAY is the number. And again, if you register this week, you save 50% off the regular registration fee. So let us hear from you.

All right. Tomorrow, Tony and Carrie Newhoff are going to be back with us again. We're going to hear about the steps they began taking when they reached that frustration point in their marriage and thought, I don't know if I want it to go on.

How did they get from where they were to where they are today? We'll hear their story tomorrow. Hope you can be with us for that. On behalf of our hosts, Dave and Ann Wilson, I'm Bob Lapine. We will see you back next time for another edition of Family Life Today. Family Life Today is a production of Family Life, a crew ministry helping you pursue the relationships that matter most.