Heart Work After Betrayal | Infidelity, Marriage, Forgiveness, Loneliness, Trust

Episoder

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  50 | Why Reading Your Bible After Betrayal in Your Marriage Can Feel Empty And How This One Ancient Practice Changes Everything 27.07.2026 13min

  Have you opened your Bible after a hard day after the betrayal in your marriage and read the words on the page and couldn’t even really comprehend them?  Do you feel guilty that Scripture does not seem to be landing the way it used to or you even wonder if something is spiritually wrong with you because you cannot seem to receive comfort from the words you know are true? Are you longing for a way to come to God in His word that goes deeper than just reading because you feel desperate for Him to speak to you in your pain? In this Monday Heart Check I am encouraging you to try an ancient practice that has been used by followers of Jesus for over fifteen hundred years and that completely changed the way I came to Scripture in the hardest season of my healing journey. "Lectio Divina” or sacred reading is simply coming to Scripture to encounter God. To listen. To receive. To be transformed by what He wants to say to you personally in this moment. We will read Lamentations 3:22-23 written by Jeremiah in the middle of complete devastation and yet full of some of the most hope-filled words in all of Scripture. As we are reading I will introduce you to the four movements of Lectio Divina: Read - lectio Reflect - meditatio Respond - oratio and Rest - contemplatio. This practice takes a few minutes and I believe it is going to open something in you that is going to prepare your heart for God to speak to you directly and exactly where you are at today.  Great is His Faithfulness!   RESOURCES AND LINKS MENTIONED 📖 Lamentations 3:22-23 "The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. His mercies never come to an end. They are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness." 📖 Lectio Divina: an ancient Christian practice of sacred reading dating back to the early church fathers 💌 Subscribe to receive a weekly Heart Work Love Letter from Julia 🔜 Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal ❓ Have a question or topic idea? Ask Julia here CONNECT WITH JULIA AND NEXT STEPS Contact → hello@juliacarlton.comPodcast → Heart Work After Betrayal on Apple Podcasts Next Steps: Step 1: Sign up to receive weekly encouragement and practical tools straight to your inbox → Subscribe to my weekly Heart Work Love Letter Step 2: Have a question or topic idea? → Ask me a question Step 3: HEART WORK HEALING CIRCLE ***COMING SOON***A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal in their marriage. Get your name on the waitlist, you will be the first to know when the doors open. → Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist   DISCLAIMER: This podcast is for informational and encouragement purposes only and is not a substitute for professional therapy or counseling. If you are in crisis please reach out to a licensed mental health professional.
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  49 | The Way Out of the Emotional Rollercoaster After Infidelity or Betrayal in Your Marriage And Why It Is Not Another Strategy 23.07.2026 15min

  Do you find yourself replaying conversations with your husband trying to figure out what you could have said differently to finally get the response your heart was longing for? Does his bad day become your bad day, his silence your panic, his healing your project and no matter how hard you try to stop this pattern it just keeps showing up? Have you tried every strategy and every technique to get back to peace after a hard moment and found that nothing seems to produce the lasting transformation you are actually longing for? This episode is for the woman who is exhausted from the emotional roller coaster and ready for something more than just another strategy to manage it. In this episode I am naming a very human and very predictable pattern that shows up in every marriage touched by betrayal. When your sense of okayness becomes dependent on another person's choices, behavior, healing, or response, your inner world feels out of control and you find yourself scrambling to gain back control.  The good news is there is a way out. The answer is not to try harder or apply better strategies. The greatest trap in the healing journey is trying to fix yourself or your spouse leaning on self help instead of asking for God's grace to be activated in you. Drawing on Colossians 3:15 "the peace of God as the umpire of your inner world”, this episode offers one simple question followed by a prayer that is the real and lasting way out of this pattern. This episode is practical encouragement to stop seeking more information but instead find true transformation which starts in your own heart first.  RESOURCES AND LINKS MENTIONED 📖 Colossians 3:15 "Let the peace of God rule in your hearts" 🎙️ Episode 48 Monday Heart Check 💌 Subscribe to receive a weekly Heart Work Love Letter from Julia 🔜 Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist — A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal ❓ Have a question or topic idea? Ask Julia here CONNECT WITH JULIA AND NEXT STEPS Contact → hello@juliacarlton.comPodcast → Heart Work After Betrayal on Apple Podcasts Next Steps: Step 1: Sign up to receive weekly encouragement and practical tools straight to your inbox → Subscribe to my weekly Heart Work Love Letter Step 2: Have a question or topic idea? → Ask me a question Step 3: Want more personal support? → HEART WORK HEALING CIRCLE ***COMING SOON***A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal in their marriage. Get your name on the waitlist, you will be the first to know when the doors open. → Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist   DISCLAIMER: This podcast is for informational and encouragement purposes only and is not a substitute for professional therapy or counseling. If you are in crisis please reach out to a licensed mental health professional.
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  48 | Disappointed by Your Husband's Response? Here's What to Do Next as You Navigate Betrayal 20.07.2026 10min

  Are you replaying conversations with your husband, wondering what you should have said differently? Do you feel disappointed when his response leaves you feeling unseen, unheard, or misunderstood? Are you exhausted from trying to find the "right" words, hoping they'll finally change his response? After betrayal, one of the hardest moments isn't always the conversation itself but it mostly is what happens afterward when your husband's response isn't what you hoped for. In this Monday Heart Check, we will practice how to help you stop replaying the conversation release the urge to control someone else's response bring your attention back to the one heart God has entrusted it to your care If you've been carrying disappointment, longing to be understood, or feeling stuck in the cycle of striving, this short episode will help you pause, reconnect with God, and begin guarding your heart with wisdom and peace. Connect with Julia Contact → hello@juliacarlton.comPodcast → Heart Work After Betrayal on Apple Podcasts Next Steps 💌 Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from Julia 🔜 Join the Heart Work Healing Circle ❓ Have a question or topic idea? Ask Julia here  
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  47 | 5 Practical Ways to Rebuild Trust After Marriage Betrayal and Infidelity Without Letting Fear Hold You Back 16.07.2026 29min

  Are you struggling with rebuilding trust after betrayal in your marriage? Do you wish you felt confident again in your own voice? Do you wonder how to reconnect with others again even if you feel like retreating or isolating because of the pain? In this episode I am building on last Thursday's story of the four false beliefs and turning it toward you. Because the renewal of the mind is not the destination. It is the beginning. And what grows from a renewed mind is what I call Leading from the Heart. I am sharing what Leading from the Heart actually is: a heart anchored in God, honest with itself, and clear about its values and needs and five practical everyday ways to begin building it after betrayal: - getting curious instead of judgmental with yourself - saying no to small things - tuning into your body - bringing it all to God - letting yourself be known by safe people This is Part 2 of our rebuilding trust series and it connects directly to Episode 45. If you have not listened to that one yet go back and start there first. RESOURCES AND LINKS MENTIONED 📖 Romans 12:2 "Be transformed by the renewing of your mind" the foundation of Leading from the Heart 📖 Renovation of the Heart by Dallas Willard  📖 Marshall Rosenberg Basic List of Feelings and Needs 🎙️ Episode 44 Monday Heart Check  🎙️ Episode 45 Ready to FInallly Stop Feeling Stuck in Healing From Marriage Betrayal?   -listen to this first! 💌 Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from Julia 🔜 Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist ❓ Have a question or topic idea? Ask Julia her   CONNECT WITH JULIA AND NEXT STEPS Contact → hello@juliacarlton.comPodcast → Heart Work After Betrayal on Apple Podcasts Next Steps: Step 1: Sign up to receive weekly encouragement and practical support → Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from me Step 2: Have a question or topic idea? → Ask me a question Step 3: Want more personal support? →  HEART WORK HEALING CIRCLE ***COMING SOON***A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal. Come find us → Join the Heart Work Healing Circle  
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  46 | Sick of Second Guessing Yourself After Betrayal? Try This One Simple Practice to Start Rebuilding Trust This Week 13.07.2026 11min

  Have you been second guessing yourself constantly after the betrayal doubting what you feel, doubting what you sense, wondering whether your perception of reality can even be trusted anymore? Do you find yourself dismissing your own instincts telling yourself you are being paranoid or oversensitive or dramatic even when something deep inside you knows what it knows? Have you been waiting for one big dramatic moment of clarity that tells you it is okay to trust yourself again and wondering why it has not come? In this Monday Heart Check we are continuing our July series on rebuilding trust and today I want to give you the most important truth about self trust that I wish someone had told me sooner. It does not come back all at once. It comes back in small moments. One small honest step at a time. In this episode I am sharing a simple three step practice called One Small Act of Self Trust so you can begin making deposits into your own self trust account this week. Because rebuilding trust in yourself after betrayal is really just the accumulation of evidence that your heart can be trusted. And you start building that evidence one small moment at a time. RESOURCES AND LINKS MENTIONED 🎙️ Episode 45 | Ready to Finally Stop Feeling Stuck in Healing From Marriage Betrayal? 4 Shifts I Made That Can Get You There 💌 Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from Julia 🔜 Join the Heart Work Healing Circle ❓ Have a question or topic idea? Ask Julia here : CONNECT WITH JULIA AND NEXT STEPS Contact → hello@juliacarlton.comPodcast → Heart Work After Betrayal on Apple Podcasts Next Steps: Step 1: Sign up to receive weekly encouragement and practical support → Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from me Step 2: Have a question or topic idea? → Ask me a question Step 3: HEART WORK HEALING CIRCLE ***COMING SOON***Join the Waitlist for our private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal.  → Join the Heart Work Healing Circle  
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  45 | Ready to Finally Stop Feeling Stuck In Healing From Marriage Betrayal? 4 Shifts I Made That Can Get You There 10.07.2026 25min

  Have you been exhausted from trying to fix your marriage doing everything you can to hold it together and quietly wondering why nothing seems to be working no matter how hard you try? Are you battling the shame of being another Christian couple with infidelity in the story telling yourself this was not supposed to be your testimony and desperately trying to fix it before anyone finds out how broken it actually is? Have you been so focused on him getting fixed, his healing, his recovery, his progress, that you have completely lost sight of what God might be trying to do inside you? This month I am celebrating 25 years of marriage and 5000 podcast downloads and as I reflect on this Sabbath season of rest and gratitude I want to share the moment that changed everything for me. Not when the marriage got fixed. But when I finally stopped trying to fix it and let God renew my mind instead. In this episode I am sharing 4 false beliefs that were keeping me completely stuck after my husband's betrayal and what the renewal of my mind actually looked like for each one. Drawing on Romans 12:2, Dallas Willard's concept of the renovation of the heart, and my own turning point in a support group where I finally saw the pattern I had been living in, this episode is for the woman who is exhausted from fixing outward and ready to let God do something real on the inside. RESOURCES AND LINKS MENTIONED 📖 Romans 12:2 "Do not conform to the pattern of this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind”  📖 Psalm 51:6 "You desire truth in the inward parts" 📖 Renovation of the Heart by Dallas Willard : the renovation and reordering of the heart🎙️ Episode 43 —  💌 Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from Julia 📞 Apply for a 1:1 HEART Reset Coaching Call with Julia 🔜 Join the Heart Work Healing Circle A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal ❓ Have a question or topic idea? Ask Julia here CONNECT WITH JULIA AND NEXT STEPS Contact → hello@juliacarlton.comPodcast → Heart Work After Betrayal on Apple Podcasts Next Steps: Step 1: Sign up to receive weekly encouragement and practical support and be the first to know what's coming! → Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from me Step 2: Have a question for me or a topic you'd love for me to cover on the podcast? → Ask me a question HEART WORK HEALING CIRCLE ***COMING SOON””"A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal in their marriage. Come find us, the link is above.
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  44 | Do This Simple 2 Minute Practice Every Day So You Can Stop Losing Yourself and Start Rebuilding Trust After Betrayal 06.07.2026 13min

  Have you become so focused on your husband after the betrayal that you've stopped paying attention to your own heart? Do you spend more time monitoring everyone else's emotions than noticing your own? What if one small daily practice could help you reconnect with yourself and with God? After betrayal and/or infidelity, it's easy to believe your job is to keep being on the alert. Watching for warning signs. Watching your husband's behavior. Holding the marriage together. Managing everyone's emotions while quietly losing yourself in the process. In this Monday Heart Check, I’m inviting you into a simple two-minute Sabbath practice called The Shift, a gentle way to turn your attention away from managing everyone else and back toward your own heart. Drawing from Dallas Willard's picture of the heart as the command center of our lives, you'll learn why healing begins when you stop asking, "How is he doing?" and start asking, "How am I doing?" This practical exercise will help you: Notice what you're actually feeling instead of staying stuck in survival mode after betrayal. Identify what you need without guilt or shame. Create space to hear God's voice above fear and anxiety. Begin rebuilding trust in yourself one honest check-in at a time. If you've been longing to experience true rest and want to start rebuilding trust and experience true healing instead of constantly carrying everyone else's emotional load, and worrying about the future, this episode is for you.  RESOURCES AND LINKS MENTIONED 📖 Renovation of the Heart by Dallas Willard 💌 Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from Julia 🔜 Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist : A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal. Be the first to know when doors open! ❓ Have a question or topic idea? Ask Julia here CONNECT WITH JULIA AND NEXT STEPS Contact → hello@juliacarlton.comPodcast → Heart Work After Betrayal on Apple Podcasts Next Steps: Step 1: Sign up to receive weekly encouragement and practical support and be the first to know what's coming! → Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from me Step 2: Have a question for me or a topic you'd love for me to cover on the podcast? → Ask me a question Step 3: HEART WORK HEALING CIRCLE ***COMING SOON***A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal in their marriage. Get your name on the waitlist, you will be the first to know when the doors open. → Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist  
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  43 | Healed From Betrayal & Infidelity: What 25 Years of Marriage and Rebuilding Trust Actually Taught Me 03.07.2026 18min

  Do you wonder if healing from infidelity and betrayal is even possible, or if your marriage is just going to survive instead of thrive? Are you still wrestling with whether staying or leaving was the right decision, even years after the betrayal happened? Do you find yourself waiting to celebrate any progress in your marriage until trust feels completely rebuilt? In this episode, I'm celebrating two milestones: 25 years of marriage and 7 months of this podcast by getting honest about what healing from infidelity and betrayal, and rebuilding trust, actually taught me. If you've ever wrestled with lack of trust, felt alone in your healing, or wondered how forgiveness after betrayal really works, this episode walks through the real, unfiltered shifts that took place in me over these 25 years. This is not a formula for how to trust again, but a testimony of what emotional healing and safety can look like when you stop striving for perfection and start rebuilding trust to yourself, to God, and eventually, to your husband. RESOURCES AND LINKS MENTIONED Celebration of Discipline by Richard Foster Renovation of the Heart by Dallas Willard Proverbs 4:23 💌 Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from Julia 🔜 Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist : A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal. Be the first to know when doors open! ❓ Have a question or topic idea? Ask Julia here CONNECT WITH JULIA AND NEXT STEPS Contact → hello@juliacarlton.comPodcast → Heart Work After Betrayal on Apple Podcasts Next Steps: Step 1: Sign up to receive weekly encouragement and practical support and be the first to know what's coming! → Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from me Step 2: Have a question for me or a topic you'd love for me to cover on the podcast? → Ask me a question Step 3: HEART WORK HEALING CIRCLE ***COMING SOON***: A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal in their marriage. Get your name on the waitlist, you will be the first to know when the doors open. → Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist
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  42 | Forgiveness After Marriage Betrayal Is Not What You Think It Is | Continuing Q&A With A Therapist, Part 2 18.06.2026 24min

  Have you been trying to forgive your husband after betrayal and wondering why it never seems to stick, maybe you say the words and mean them in the moment but the anger and the hurt keep coming back? Do you feel confused about what forgiveness actually means? Whether it means reconciling, whether it means pretending it did not happen, whether it means you have to trust him again before you are ready? Are you longing for the kind of freedom that people talk about on the other side of forgiveness but you have no idea how to actually get there? In this episode I am continuing my conversation from last week with a licensed marriage and family therapist and this time we are going straight to the heart of one of the most misunderstood concepts in the entire healing journey after betrayal: Forgiveness. We will discuss the following questions:  What if you would view forgiveness as a shift of focus and responsibility? What if forgiveness is the moment you stop asking back for something that can never be restored and take ownership of the loss yourself? What does real forgiveness actually cost? Why is forgiveness only possible after honest grief? Why is connecting with yourself the essential first step? What does moving forward truly look like? What is the hope here you can cling to?  This is Part 2 of a two part conversation. If you have not listened to Episode 40 yet go back and start there first.  RESOURCES AND LINKS MENTIONED 🎙️Episode 40 - 7 Truths About Grieving After Betrayal —> That is the first part of this conversation, go back and listen to that one first! 💌 Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from Julia 🔜 Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist  A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal. Be the first to know when doors open! ❓ Have a question or topic idea? Ask Julia here  CONNECT WITH JULIA AND NEXT STEPS Contact → hello@juliacarlton.com Podcast → Heart Work After Betrayal on Apple Podcasts Next Steps: Step 1: Sign up to receive weekly encouragement and practical support and be the first to know what's coming! → Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from me Step 2: Have a question for me or a topic you'd love for me to cover on the podcast? → Ask me a question Step 3: HEART WORK HEALING CIRCLE **COMING SOON** A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal in their marriage. Get your name on the waitlist, you will be the first to know when the doors open. → Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist     DISCLAIMER: This podcast is for informational and encouragement purposes only and is not a substitute for professional therapy or counseling. If you are in crisis please reach out to a licensed mental health professional.
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  41 | Why the Gap Between What You Know and What You Feel About Forgiveness After Betrayal Is Actually Holy Ground And How Honesty Before God Changes Everything 15.06.2026 13min

  Does your head tell you that you should forgive because you know that is what God wants while your heart is still carrying anger, fear, and hurt that just will not go away no matter how hard you try? Do you feel guilty for the gap between what you know theologically and where you actually are emotionally like a bad Christian because your feelings have not caught up with your faith yet? Have you been performing okayness before God, maybe you are bringing Him the version of yourself that has it together instead of the real, divided, struggling version that actually needs Him most? In this Monday Heart Check we are standing at a threshold moving from the grief series into the forgiveness conversation. And before Thursday's powerful episode with Rafael I want to give you something that I believe is the missing piece for so many women in this journey: The gap between what you know and what you feel is not failure. It is not a sign that something is wrong with you spiritually. It might actually be the most honest and holy place you have been in a long time. In this episode I am walking you through a guided reflection rooted in Scripture from David's cry for truth in the inward parts in Psalm 51, to Paul's commitment to a clear conscience in Acts 24, to Peter's call to keep a clear conscience even in suffering to help you understand what it actually means to be honest before God right where you are. And how that honesty instead of performance, pretending, or forcing your feelings to match your theology is the very thing that opens the door to real grief and real forgiveness. This is a short, quiet, contemplative episode. Find a still moment. Bring your honest heart. That is all you need.  RESOURCES AND LINKS MENTIONED 📖 Psalm 51:6  "You desire truth in the inward parts"  📖 Acts 24:16  Paul: "I strive always to keep my conscience clear before God and man" 📖 1 Peter 3:16 Peter "keeping a clear conscience" even in the middle of suffering and injustice 📖 1 John 3:20 "if our hearts condemn us God is greater than our hearts and knows everything" 🎙️ Episode 40  💌 Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from Julia 🔜 Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist — A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal. Be the first to know when doors open! ❓ Have a question or topic idea? Ask Julia here CONNECT WITH JULIA AND NEXT STEPS Contact → hello@juliacarlton.comPodcast → Heart Work After Betrayal on Apple Podcasts Next Steps: Step 1: Sign up to receive weekly encouragement and practical support and be the first to know what's coming! → Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from me Step 2: Have a question for me or a topic you'd love for me to cover on the podcast? → Ask me a question Step 3: HEART WORK HEALING CIRCLE **COMING SOON**A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal in their marriage. Get your name on the waitlist, you will be the first to know when the doors open. → Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist        
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  40 | 7 Truths About Grief After Betrayal And What Can Get in the Way | Q&A With a Therapist, Part 1 11.06.2026 30min

  Have you been wondering if you are grieving the wrong way or not grieving enough, or too much, or in the wrong order and quietly judging yourself for how messy and unpredictable your healing has felt? Do you find yourself reaching for busyness, distraction, or anything that keeps the grief at a safe distance and then wondering why you still feel so stuck months or even years later? Have you ever asked yourself how long is this going to take and felt frustrated, ashamed, or hopeless when you could not find a satisfying answer? In this episode I am sitting down with a licensed marriage and family therapist who has been on this show before and together we are having one of the most honest, reframing, and practically helpful conversations about grief after betrayal that I think you will ever hear. We are covering 7 truths about grief after betrayal and what gets in the way of it including why we avoid grief without even realizing it what unprocessed grief actually does to us why the word healthy might be making things harder not easier what functional effective grief actually looks like in real life He also shares a perspective on grief that completely reframes the whole process not as something you endure but as something you actively participate in by identifying what your needs are first and then taking ownership over how to meet those needs. This is Part 1 of a two part conversation. Part 2 drops next Thursday where we continue the conversation and cover the connection between grief and forgiveness.   RESOURCES AND LINKS MENTIONED Grief Series: Episodes 33-39  💌 Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from Julia 🔜 Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal. Be the first to know when doors open! ❓ Have a question or topic idea? Ask Julia here   CONNECT WITH JULIA AND NEXT STEPS Contact → hello@juliacarlton.com Podcast → Heart Work After Betrayal on Apple Podcasts Next Steps: Step 1: Sign up to receive weekly encouragement and practical support and be the first to know what's coming! → Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from me Step 2: Have a question for me or a topic you'd love for me to cover on the podcast? → Ask me a question Step 3: HEART WORK HEALING CIRCLE **COMING SOON** A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal in their marriage. Get your name on the waitlist, you will be the first to know when the doors open. → Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist   DISCLAIMER: This podcast is for informational and encouragement purposes only and is not a substitute for professional therapy or counseling. If you are in crisis please reach out to a licensed mental health professional.  
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  39 | Why Staying Busy After Marriage Betrayal Is Actually Keeping You Stuck, The Number One Thing I Did Instead 08.06.2026 10min

  Are you sick of being ambushed by your emotions, triggered out of nowhere, overwhelmed in the middle of an ordinary moment, and wondering why you still cannot seem to get ahead of the grief? Have you been staying so busy, so distracted, so focused on everyone else that you have barely had a moment to sit alone with what you are actually feeling after the betrayal? Have you ever considered that what looks like coping on the outside might actually be avoidance and that the grief you have been postponing is quietly fueling the triggers that keep catching you off guard? In this Monday Heart Check we are wrapping up our grief series and before Thursday's special guest episode I want to give you one simple practice to prepare your heart for what you are about to hear. In this episode I am sharing a simple three step reflection practice called What Am I Reaching For? I encourage you to see honestly what you have been using to avoid the pain of betrayal and take your first step toward something different. Honesty gets you connected to reality. And nothing disconnected from reality will ever truly work. That is something we will learn more about on Thursday, as I just directly quoted the therapist I will have a conversation with on Thursday. This practice is your first step toward that honesty. RESOURCES AND LINKS MENTIONED 💌 Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from Julia 🔜 Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist — A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal. Be the first to know when doors open! ❓ Have a question or topic idea? Ask Julia here  CONNECT WITH JULIA AND NEXT STEPS Contact → hello@juliacarlton.com Podcast → Heart Work After Betrayal on Apple Podcasts Next Steps: Step 1: Sign up to receive weekly encouragement and practical support and be the first to know what's coming! → Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from me Step 2: Have a question for me or a topic you'd love for me to cover on the podcast? → Ask me a question Step 3: Want more personal support? If you are tired of carrying this alone — together we will work on rebuilding clarity, learning to trust yourself again, and taking your next step with God, yourself, and your marriage. → Apply for a 1:1 Private Clarity Call with me HEART WORK HEALING CIRCLE **COMING SOON** A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal in their marriage. Get your name on the waitlist, you will be the first to know when the doors open. → Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist DISCLAIMER: This podcast is for informational and encouragement purposes only and is not a substitute for professional therapy or counseling. If you are in crisis please reach out to a licensed mental health professional.
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  38 | What Grieving the Loss After Marriage Betrayal Looked Like For Me | The Real Way I Healed And You Can Too 04.06.2026 33min

  Have you been wondering what grieving well after betrayal actually looks like in real life in the daily reality of being a wife and a mother and a woman who is trying to hold everything together while her heart is completely broken? Do you feel like you have been trying to heal but nothing is really moving like you are doing all the right things but there seems a deep disconnect?  Are you longing to hear from someone who has actually walked this road and come out the other side really and truly healed? In this episode I am setting the teaching aside and just talking to you, sharing what grieving the loss after my husband's betrayal actually looked like for me. The beach walks. The prayer journals. The first time I walked into a support group and cried because I finally felt safe. The photo albums I had to put away. The scheduled cry in the car with classical music playing. The raw, searching, honest prayers. Underneath all of those stories I am going to show you the three connections that I believe made healing not just possible but inevitable: connection with yourself, connection with God, and connection with others. This is what I know to be true: the only path through grief after betrayal is moving toward connection when everything in you is screaming to run away from it. RESOURCES AND LINKS MENTIONED 📖 the Psalms 📖 Proverbs 4:23 "You are the keeper of your heart like a vineyard keeper", the throughline of this entire grief series 📖 Renovation of the Heart by Dallas Willard: spiritual formation and the heart as the executive center of the self 🎙️ Episodes 33-37, the “Grief Series”  💌 Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from Julia 🔜 Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist : A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal. Be the first to know when doors open! ❓ Have a question or topic idea? Ask Julia here CONNECT WITH ME AND NEXT STEPS Contact → hello@juliacarlton.com Podcast → Heart Work After Betrayal on Apple Podcasts Next Steps: Step 1: Sign up to receive weekly encouragement and practical support and be the first to know what's coming! → Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from me Step 2: Have a question for me or a topic you'd love for me to cover on the podcast? → Ask me a question Step 3: Want more personal support? If you are tired of carrying this alone, together we will work on rebuilding clarity, learning to trust yourself again, and taking your next step with God, yourself, and your marriage. → Apply for a 1:1 Private Clarity Call with me HEART WORK HEALING CIRCLE  **COMING SOON** A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal in their marriage. Get your name on the waitlist, you will be the first to know when the doors open. → Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist   DISCLAIMER: This podcast is for informational and encouragement purposes only and is not a substitute for professional therapy or counseling. If you are in crisis please reach out to a licensed mental health professional.
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  37 | Why Emotions Still Can Take Over Out of Nowhere - And How One Sacred Space Can Change Your Healing After Betrayal and Broken Trust 01.06.2026 13min

  Do your emotions still take over out of nowhere. maybe in the car, in the middle of a normal conversation, right before you fall asleep and you cannot figure out why you are still feeling this way? Have you been powering through, staying busy, keeping the routines and yet something still feels tender and unresolved underneath all of that functioning? Have you ever wondered if what you are calling exhaustion or numbness or irritability might actually be grief that has simply had nowhere safe to go? "Sometimes what we call being tired is actually grief that has had nowhere to go." In this Monday Heart Check we are continuing our grief series and this week I want to give you one of the most practical and relieving tools in the entire healing journey after betrayal. In this episode I am sharing a simple three step practice for creating a sacred space for your grief, a specific time, a specific place, and a gentle way to tend the vineyard of your heart with God, so that grief stops ambushing you in the moments you least expect it and starts moving through you the way it was always meant to. Because a grief container does not mean grief gets to run your whole life. It means grief is allowed to be here, in its own space, with God, and where it can finally begin to move. Grief showing up again does not mean you failed. It may simply mean another layer is ready to be tended. This episode is for the woman who has been strong for everyone else and has not yet given her own heart somewhere safe to land. RESOURCES AND LINKS MENTIONED 📖 Proverbs 4:23 a picture of the heart as a vineyard and you as its keeper, introduced in Episode 35 and carried throughout this series 🎙️ Episode 33 "You Can't Grieve What You Can't Name: 3 Steps to Begin Grieving the Loss After Marriage Betrayal”  - start here if you are new to the series! 🎙️ Episode 34  "Why Do I Still Feel This Way: Understanding the Grief Nobody Talks About After Marriage Betrayal and Broken Trust" 🎙️ Episode 35  "What Has the Storm of Betrayal and Broken Trust Left Behind in Your Heart? A Simple Practice to Name the Hidden Losses" 🎙️ Episode 36 "Why I Still Can't Forgive: 8 Hidden Layers of Loss After Betrayal and Broken Trust" 💌 Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from Julia 🔜 Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist  A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal. Be the first to know when doors open! ❓ Have a question or topic idea? Ask Julia here CONNECT WITH JULIA AND NEXT STEPS Contact → hello@juliacarlton.com Podcast → Heart Work After Betrayal on Apple Podcasts Next Steps: Step 1: Sign up to receive weekly encouragement and practical support and be the first to know what's coming! → Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from me Step 2: Have a question for me or a topic you'd love for me to cover on the podcast? → Ask me a question Step 3: Want more personal support? If you are tired of carrying this alone, together we will work on rebuilding clarity, learning to trust yourself again, and taking your next step with God, yourself, and your marriage. → Apply for a 1:1 Private Clarity Call with me HEART WORK HEALING CIRCLE *** COMING SOON ***A private healing community for women doing the hard holy work of rebuilding after betrayal in their marriage. Get your name on the waitlist, you will be the first to know when the doors open. → Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist   DISCLAIMER: This podcast is for informational and encouragement purposes only and is not a substitute for professional therapy or counseling. If you are in crisis please reach out to a licensed mental health professional.
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  36 | Why I Still Can't Forgive: 8 Hidden Layers of Loss After Betrayal and Broken Trust 28.05.2026 25min

  Have you been trying to forgive your husband's betrayal, saying the words, praying the prayers and yet the wound keeps reopening and the anger keeps coming back no matter how hard you try? Do you feel stuck in your healing and cannot figure out why?  It feels like you are doing everything right but it still seems you cannot move forward? Are you months or even over longer into this journey and still asking yourself why you cannot find the healing and the peace you so desperately are longing for?  If forgiveness has felt impossible after your husband's betrayal, this episode is going to give you the answer you have been looking for. And it is probably not what you expect. In this episode I am sharing the 8 hidden layers of loss that most women never name after betrayal in their marriage and why carrying these unnamed losses is the most common reason healing stalls and forgiveness feels out of reach. Using the powerful picture of the heart as a vineyard from Proverbs 4:23 we are going to walk the rows together from the most visible surface damage all the way down to the deepest root of all. You will walk away from this episode with clarity of what you are actually grieving and the ability to begin to do the HEART work with intention. This is Episode 2 of our grief series and it builds directly on Episode 34. If you have not listened to that one yet go back and start there first RESOURCES AND LINKS MENTIONED 📖 Proverbs 4:23 - the picture of the heart as a vineyard and you as its keeper 📖 Renovation of the Heart by Dallas Willard, the heart as the executive center of the self 📖 Ambiguous Loss by Pauline Boss introduced in Episode 34, referenced throughout this series 🎙️ Episode 33. You Can’t Grieve What You Can’t Name: 3 Steps to Begin Grieving the Loss After Marriage Betrayal 🎙️ Episode 34: Why Do I Still Feel This Way? Understanding the Grief Nobody Talks About After Marriage Betrayal and Broken Trust.  Listen to this before today’s episode!  🎙️ Episode 35: What Has the Storm of Betrayal and Broken Trust Left Behind in Your Heart? A Simple Practice to Name the Hidden Losses - the Vineyard Inventory practice pairs perfectly with today's episode 💌 Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from Julia 🔜 Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist — A private healing community for women doing the hard, holy work of rebuilding after betrayal. Be the first to know when doors open! ❓ Have a question or topic idea? Ask Julia here CONNECT WITH JULIA AND NEXT STEPS Contact → hello@juliacarlton.com Podcast → Heart Work After Betrayal on Apple Podcasts Next Steps: Step 1: Sign up to receive weekly encouragement and practical support and be the first to know what's coming! → Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from me Step 2: Have a question for me or a topic you'd love for me to cover on the podcast? → Ask me a question Step 3: Want more personal support? If you're tired of carrying this alone, together we'll work on rebuilding clarity, learning to trust yourself again, and taking your next step with God, yourself, and your marriage. → Apply for a 1:1 Private Clarity Call with me HEART WORK HEALING CIRCLE ***COMING SOON*** A private healing community for women doing the hard, holy work of rebuilding after betrayal in their marriage. Get your name on the waitlist, you'll be the first to know when the doors open. → Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist     DISCLAIMER: This podcast is for informational and encouragement purposes only and is not a substitute for professional therapy or counseling. If you are in crisis please reach out to a licensed mental health professional.  
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  35 | What Has the Storm of Betrayal and Broken Trust Left Behind in Your Heart? A Simple Practice to Name the Hidden Losses 25.05.2026 11min

  Have you been carrying a vague but heavy sense that you have lost so much more than just the marriage you thought you had, but you cannot quite put words to all of it? Do you feel like there is damage in your heart you have never fully allowed yourself to see? Are you weeks, months, or even longer into this journey and still feel like something is missing in your healing like you have only been looking at the surface of the loss?   In this Monday Heart Check we are continuing our grief series because now that we understand why betrayal grief goes so deep, we need to start naming what is actually in there. In this episode I am sharing a simple but powerful journaling practice called the "Vineyard Inventory" inspired by Proverbs 4:23 and the picture of the heart as a vineyard you are called to keep and tend so you can begin to walk the rows of your heart and see what the storm of betrayal has actually left behind. Because you cannot tend what you cannot see, and you cannot grieve what you have never allowed yourself to name. RESOURCES & LINKS MENTIONED 📖 Proverbs 4:23 "Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life"  🎙️ Episode 33 Monday Heart Check: "You Can't Grieve What You Can't Name: 3 Steps to Begin Grieving the Loss After Marriage Betrayal”  - start here if you are new to the series! 🎙️ Episode 34 "Why Do I Still Feel This Way: Understanding the Grief Nobody Talks About After Marriage Betrayal and Broken Trust" - listen to this before this one! 💌 Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from Julia 📞 Apply for a 1:1 Private Clarity Call with Julia 🔜 Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist : A private healing community for women doing the hard, holy work of rebuilding after betrayal. Be the first to know when doors open! ❓ Have a question or topic idea? Ask Julia here CONNECT WITH JULIA & NEXT STEPS Contact → hello@juliacarlton.com Podcast → Heart Work After Betrayal on Apple Podcasts Next Steps: Step 1: Sign up to receive weekly encouragement and practical support and be the first to know what's coming! → Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from me Step 2: Have a question for me or a topic you'd love for me to cover on the podcast? → Ask me a question Step 3: Want more personal support? If you're tired of carrying this alone, together we'll work on rebuilding clarity, learning to trust yourself again, and taking your next step with God, yourself, and your marriage. → Apply for a 1:1 Private Clarity Call with me HEART WORK HEALING CIRCLE — COMING SOON A private healing community for women doing the hard, holy work of rebuilding after betrayal in their marriage. Get your name on the waitlist — you'll be the first to know when the doors open. → Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist   DISCLAIMER: This podcast is for informational and encouragement purposes only and is not a substitute for professional therapy or counseling. If you are in crisis please reach out to a licensed mental health professional.  
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  34 | Why Do I Still Feel This Way: Understanding the Grief Nobody Talks About After Marriage Betrayal 21.05.2026 31min

  Are you months or even longer into healing from your husband's betrayal, if that is infidelity or other behaviors that have broken your trust, and you’re still asking yourself why you feel so stuck and whether you will ever actually feel okay again? Do you feel like your emotions are too much, not enough, or that you should be over this by now but no matter what you do you just cannot seem to move forward? Have you ever tried to explain your pain to someone and felt completely unable to find the words, like the wound goes so deep that language cannot even reach it? Betrayal grief is not like any other grief you have ever experienced — and if you have been wondering why it is taking so long, why you still feel so broken, or why you cannot seem to just move forward, this episode is going to give you the clarity and the compassion you have been looking for. In this episode I am explaining why the grief after infidelity and betrayal in marriage wounds at the deepest level of who you are using Dallas Willard's powerful teaching on the heart as the executive center of the self, the surprising and deeply personal way God Himself has grieved betrayal, and the concept of ambiguous loss, so you can finally stop measuring yourself against an impossible timeline and give your grief the space it actually deserves. This is Episode 1 of our grief series and it is the foundation everything else will build on. Whether you are brand new to this journey or you have been carrying it for a long time I pray it brings you much needed clarity and hope.  RESOURCES & LINKS MENTIONED 📖 Renovation of the Heart by Dallas Willard ( the concept of the heart as the executive center of the self and the foundation of spiritual formation) 📖 Hosea, Jeremiah, Ezekiel (scripture passages on God's grief over broken covenant and His faithfulness in the middle of betrayal) 📖 Ambiguous Loss by Pauline Boss (the research behind why betrayal grief is so uniquely complex and why it does not follow a predictable timeline) 🎙️ Episode 33 Monday Heart Check:  33. You Can’t Grieve What You Can’t Name: 3 Steps to Begin Grieving the Loss After Marriage Betrayal - listen to this one first! 🎙️ Coming Monday: Episode 35: Next Heart Check in our grief series 💌 Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from Julia 📞 Apply for a 1:1 Private Clarity Call with Julia 🔜 Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist - A private healing community for women doing the hard, holy work of rebuilding after betrayal. Be the first to know when doors open! ❓ Have a question or topic idea? Ask Julia here CONNECT WITH JULIA & NEXT STEPS Contact → hello@juliacarlton.com Podcast → Follow: Heart Work After Betrayal on Apple Podcasts Next Steps: Step 1: Sign up to receive weekly encouragement and practical support and be the first to know what's coming! → Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from me Step 2: Have a question for me or a topic you'd love for me to cover on the podcast? → Ask me a question Step 3: Want more personal support? If you're tired of carrying this alone, together we'll work on rebuilding clarity, learning to trust yourself again, and taking your next step with God, yourself, and your marriage. → Apply for a 1:1 Private Clarity Call with me HEART WORK HEALING CIRCLE **COMING SOON** - A private healing community for women doing the hard, holy work of rebuilding after betrayal in their marriage. Get your name on the waitlist, you'll be the first to know when the doors open. → Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist DISCLAIMER: This podcast is for informational and encouragement purposes only and is not a substitute for professional therapy or counseling. If you are in crisis please reach out to a licensed mental health professional.
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  33 | You Can’t Grieve What You Can’t Name: 3 Steps to Begin Grieving the Loss After Marriage Betrayal 18.05.2026 12min

  Are you walking through betrayal in your marriage and feeling so overwhelmed you can't even find words for what you're feeling? Do you find yourself numb, disconnected, or wondering why anger keeps rising up out of nowhere and you don't even know where it's coming from? Are you months  or even over a year into this journey and still feel stuck, wondering if something is wrong with you because you're not further along by now? In this Monday Heart Check, we're starting a brand new series on grief after betrayal and we're beginning at the very beginning, no matter where you are in your healing journey. Whether you just found out or you've been carrying this for over a year, this episode meets you exactly where you are. Today I'm sharing one simple, gentle journaling practice called Name It to Begin It , so you can begin to find words for what your heart is carrying and take your very first step toward moving through your grief instead of staying stuck in it.  RESOURCES & LINKS MENTIONED 📖 Renovation of the Heart by Dallas Willard (referenced in this episode and throughout our grief series) 💌 Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from Julia 📞 Apply for a 1:1 Private Clarity Call with Julia 🔜 Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist - A private healing community for women doing the hard, holy work of rebuilding after betrayal. Be the first to know when doors open! ❓ Have a question or topic idea? Ask Julia here CONNECT WITH JULIA & NEXT STEPS Contact → hello@juliacarlton.com Podcast → Heart Work After Betrayal on Apple Podcasts Next Steps: Step 1: Sign up to receive weekly encouragement and practical support and be the first to know what's coming! → Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from me Step 2: Have a question for me or a topic you'd love for me to cover on the podcast? → Ask me a question Step 3: Want more personal support? If you're tired of carrying this alone, together we'll work on rebuilding clarity, learning to trust yourself again, and taking your next step with God, yourself, and your marriage. → Apply for a 1:1 Private Clarity Call with me HEART Work Healing Community - COMING SOON A private community for women doing the hard, holy work of healing after betrayal. Get your name on the waitlist, you'll be the first to know when the doors open. → Join the Heart Work Healing Circle Waitlist     DISCLAIMER: This podcast is for informational and encouragement purposes only and is not a substitute for professional therapy or counseling. If you are in crisis please reach out to a licensed mental health professional.  
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  32 | The Loneliness Nobody Talks About After Infidelity and Broken Trust in Marriage 15.05.2026 22min

  Are you feeling invisible because of broken trust? Do you carry the weight of the betrayal that happened in your marriage completely alone because you don't know who you can trust with the truth? Have you ever sat in church, surrounded by people, and thought, "nobody here knows how alone I really am?" In this episode, I'm diving into one of the most painful and least talked about sides of betrayal, the loneliness. Not ordinary loneliness. The kind that settles in when the person who was supposed to be your safest place becomes the source of your deepest pain. We're going to talk about what this loneliness actually is, where it really comes from, and most importantly what to do with it in a healthy, faith-filled way. Drawing from Dallas Willard's Renovation of the Heart and Marshall Rosenberg's Nonviolent Communication, we'll go beneath the surface of the feeling and into the unmet needs underneath it. If you've been wondering whether what you're feeling is normal, whether God sees you in this, and whether healing is even possible, this episode is for you, Heart Worker. You are not alone. 📖 Renovation of the Heart by Dallas Willard 📖 Nonviolent Communication by Marshall Rosenberg LIst of Feelings & Needs: https://nonviolentcommunication.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/feelings_needs.pdf 🔗 Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from me 🔗 Ask me a question or suggest a topic for the podcast Contact → hello@juliacarlton.com Podcast → Heart Work After Betrayal on Apple Podcasts Next Steps: Step 1: Sign up to receive weekly encouragement and practical support and be the first to know what's coming! → Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from me Step 2: Have a question for me or a topic you'd love for me to cover on the podcast? → Ask me a question Step 3: Want more personal support? If you're tired of carrying this alone, together we'll work on rebuilding clarity, learning to trust yourself again, and taking your next step with God, yourself, and your marriage. → Apply for a 1:1 Private Clarity Call with me
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  31 | When Loneliness Hits After Infidelity, Hold On To These 4 Truths In Psalm 31 11.05.2026 13min

  Feeling deeply lonely after your spouse betrayed you? Wondering how you can feel so alone even when people are around you? Need a gentle way to bring your hurting heart back into God’s presence instead of hiding, numbing, or shutting down? In this short Heart Check episode, we will walk through a gentle meditation on Psalm 31:19–24 for the moments when loneliness hits after betrayal, infidelity, cheating, lying, or hidden behavior. When broken trust shakes your inner world, loneliness can make you feel unseen, unknown, and emotionally alone, even in your own marriage. This episode will help you pause, reconnect with your heart, and bring that ache honestly before God. When loneliness hits, don’t abandon your heart. Instead bring it into the shelter of God’s presence NEXT STEPS: Sign up to receive weekly encouragement and practical support and be the first to know what’s coming!   → Subscribe to receive a weekly love note from me Have a question for me or a topic you’d love for me to cover on the podcast? → Ask me a question Want more personal support? → Apply for a 1:1 Private Clarity Call with me, if you’re tired of carrying this alone. Together, we’ll work on rebuilding clarity, learning to trust yourself again, and taking your next step with God, yourself, and your marriage. Want to get in touch with me?→ hello@juliacarlton.com