Developing Friendships After Infidelity with Jewel Hohman | Ep #81

Andrea:

I’m Andrea Giles, and you’re listening to the Heal from Infidelity podcast,
Episode #81: Developing Friendships After Infidelity with Jewel Hohman.

Andrea:

Hello, and welcome to the Heal from Infidelity podcast, where courageous
women learn not only to heal from their spouses’ betrayal, but to become
the boldest, truest, most decisive and confident versions of themselves
ever. If you know there’s more for you than the life you are currently
living but don’t quite know how to get there, you are in the right place.
Stick around to learn how to create a life that will knock your own socks
off. Is that possible? It is, and I’m here to show you how. I’m your host,
Andrea Giles. Are you ready? Let’s dive in.

Andrea:

Hello, hello everybody. I’m happy to be back with you today and today I
have a special guest, Jewel Hohman is here with me today and Jewel is a
coach that helps people with friendships. Jewel is here to talk with you
today and talk with me today about the significance and importance of
friendship and I love what we’re going to bring to you today, I’m so
excited to bring it to you because I know that for many of my clients, as
they are navigating this huge shift of infidelity, it can feel like such an
identity crisis that many of the relationships change. And so we’re going
to talk today about friendships, the role that friendships can play in
healing and moving forward and building a life that you step into beyond
infidelity.

Andrea:

So before we jump into conversation, Jewel, can you please tell us a little
bit about yourself?

Jewel:

So happy to be here. From the second I met Andrea at our … What would you
call it, conference I guess?

Andrea:

Yep. Yeah.

Jewel:

But I just like adored you and adored your work, it’s so powerful.

Andrea:

Thank you.

Jewel:

So I’m really, really happy to be here.

Andrea:

Thank you.

Jewel:

Yeah. So a little bit about me. I am a friendship and connection coach as
Andrea said, and so I help people feel more secure in their relationships
and their friendships, and specifically learn how to make friends as an
adult. Most people know how to meet people, but they don’t know how to make
friends, especially like the deep, almost like juicy friendships that so
many of us crave.

Andrea:

Beautiful. I love that. That’s so important. Okay, so let’s just dive in.
So as you know, my listeners are working through some kind of breach of
trust in their marriages, right? And sometimes, what happens is it can make
us question all of our relationships. One big dynamic that I have seen and
that I experience myself is that some people that I thought I was close
with kind of disappeared and other people that I wasn’t necessarily super
close to totally showed up. So tell me what you think about that. Why do we
do this? Tell me your thoughts on that. Go ahead.

Jewel:

Yeah. So first and foremost, the trust part, I have this example, and I
don’t have it all the way fleshed out and it might be a little crazy, so
bear with me. But I was thinking about this, and so when we have a breach
of trust, whether that be … Right, like especially in your audience’s
case with infidelity, it kind of reminds me of what happened with Pearl
Harbor. So bear with me. There was an attack on Pearl Harbor and then tons
of Americans started harassing or really bullying or hurting physically
other Asian-Americans, right? And we can look back now and we could be
like, “That makes no sense.” Right? Like those people, those
Asian-Americans, weren’t tied to what happened in Pearl Harbor, that’s so
ridiculous. So what I want to offer for people is just because you do have
this breach of trust, your brain is going to really want to try to keep you
safe and so it’s going to look out for danger. So it might look at all of
the other relationships in your life and be like, “Okay, where can I not
trust this person? Here. Where do they not have my back? Here.” And I want
to offer, it’s almost just as ridiculous as people attacking
Asian-Americans after Pearl Harbor.

Andrea:

I love that.

Jewel:

So that’s what your brain is doing.

Andrea:

Yep. I think that’s a great example and a very timely example with things
that are happening in the world right now. Like it’s easy to just assume
the worst about a lot of people when we have a breach of trust, right? And
to scan out and go, “Well, if I can’t trust this person, then can I trust
these people over here?” Right? So I appreciate you normalizing it, like it
is a normal thing. It’s a normal thing to kind of wonder, “Well, what is
real?” Right? What is real? But I want to hear from you just why you coach
who you do. Like I want to know why friendship is so important that you
have built your career on it.

Jewel:

Yeah.

Andrea:

Go ahead.

Jewel:

Well for me personally, it was something that I thought about often, even
when I was in like a college setting where maybe I was around other people
all the time. I just didn’t feel secure or safe. I often felt really
anxious, I was really over-analyzing myself, and I did one of two things, I
would self-isolate or I would try to compensate and try to be friends with
everybody, and when you’re trying to be friends with everybody, you’re
close to nobody, right?

Andrea:

Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yep.

Jewel:

So I really did this work with like … When I learned how to really manage
my mind, I deepened so many of my friendships and then when I really
learned about what every friendship has, when I really learned about
friendship research, it changed my whole entire life. I created my dream
group of friends, I have this whole new confidence and comfortability being
myself with these people. I trust so much deeper, and so this was something
that I really wanted to share with the world for so many reasons. One
particularly being, you and I were talking about before recording, we often
put so much stock in maybe one basket, particularly maybe our partnership.
And we’re community creatures, right? Like our brain still thrives off of
community and connection, just as it did when we were cave people and we
were in tribes.

Jewel:

So putting all your eggs in one basket and trying to get all your
connections met in one space just doesn’t make any sense. It’s so much
better for our health, for our lifespan, and just for our quality of life
if we are spreading out our connection and having friends.

Andrea:

Beautiful, thank you. This is something I have been thinking about in
regards to … As you know I just had a baby, right? She’s three months
old, and I think it’s so fascinating, when we look at other cultures around
the world, and how as the saying goes it takes a village. It takes a
village, and for many cultures, they have the village. They’re surrounded
with people. They’re surrounded with aunts and uncles and cousins and
grandma and a lot of help. For their little one, support for them, and
unfortunately, we don’t ascribe to that as much here. And I thought, “How
wonderful that would be.” And so I appreciate you making that point because
I think that we have this mentality here that we need to be able to be
really independent and go it alone and strong, resilient, all of these
things. But really, we’re not meant to be alone. We’re meant to have a
community, we’re meant to have several people, not just one person that we
rely on.

Andrea:

So you touched on this a little bit Jewel and you said kind of the thought
of putting all of your eggs in one basket. And that means it can be your
partner, where you are completely dependent on all of your emotional needs
with your partner, and in the case of infidelity, that adds extra strain.
Because there’s been a breach of trust and not only is the romantic
relationship hurt, like all of the pieces, all the pieces are fractured,
are hurt. And sometimes those can be rebuilt with that person, sometimes
not, depending on the situation. But what I find is people feeling so
lonely because if they put everything into that one relationship and not as
much in other relationships, then what? Would you speak to that a little
bit?

Jewel:

Yeah, yeah. So we’re talking about it in terms of like a partnership, but
this is true even for like … I’ve seen some people be like, “That’s my
best friend, and that’s it.”

Andrea:

Yes.

Jewel:

Right? Yeah, so what ends up happening is that when that … Let’s just say
that does go away, then you’re left with like a huge connection gap. You’re
left with that loneliness. So having multiple people to go to is just very,
very helpful, just in that regard. But it’s also super helpful and super
important because one person can’t meet all of your connection needs. It’s
going to be really hard, the time that you really want to feel supported or
the time that you’re ready to have fun if you keep going to one person on
that. Like we all have lives, we all have internal worlds, and that person
might not be ready or available.

Jewel:

So an example of this might be the other day, like I was looking for
support, like I knew I wanted to flesh things out. And I heard one of my
friends said this saying the other day of, “Are you a chewer where you just
think about it or are you a spewer?” I’m a spewer, I got to talk about it.
And so –

Andrea:

I love it.

Jewel:

Yeah. I called one of my what I call my priority friends and when they
didn’t answer, it wasn’t like, “Oh, well if I still want this support, I
have nowhere else to go.” I have other people I can attend to. It takes a
village to raise a baby, but I also think it takes a village to get the
support that you need, to have the fun that you want to have, to make the
memories you want to make. I’ve gotten really into rock climbing recently.
A lot of my friends aren’t into that, and they don’t have to be.

Andrea:

Yep.

Jewel:

Because I can have maybe just a couple that will want to go do that with
me.

Andrea:

Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yep. I love that. I just had a conversation with my
daughter who’s 18 and navigating adult life and friendships with a bunch of
other 18-year-olds who are doing the same thing, and so she’s had some
struggles come up and she said to me something the other day that I thought
was pretty profound. She has a boyfriend and they have a good relationship
but she said, “I don’t want him to be my only friend. I want to have lots
of friends so that if something were to happen here, I have lots of other
people to have fun, for support, for all the things.” And I’m glad that
she’s onto herself with that. Like you got to branch out.

Andrea:

So tell me, as far as infidelity goes, why do you think that people lose
friendships sometimes around infidelity? Can you talk about that?

Jewel:

Yes, yes. So I think multiple things could happen in this situation. I
think losing friends, like you might have a friend who regardless of what
your choice is after the infidelity, regardless of what your choice is for
staying or leaving or whatever it is, you might have a friend who might
disagree with that choice. And sometimes, I think in the world, something
that I see that I just think is a little silly is we get frustrated when
our friends make decisions that we wouldn’t make ourselves. [inaudible
00:12:27] frustrated or I hear this often, like, “I keep giving her advice.
She’s not taking it.” She doesn’t want to take it.

Jewel:

So what I want to offer is, and sometimes, it might … If other people in
your life aren’t happy with your choice, one, you can remind them they
might not know that they have the option to love you anyway. That might not
even have like crossed their mind, like be there for you anyway, even
though they disagree. So what I would say is if you can tell somebody’s
like, “I think you should do this. I don’t think you should do that. Maybe
you should approach it differently.” It’s up to you to get the support that
you want to get so you can literally say, “I appreciate you caring about me
and being invested in what I do, but I’m going to make the decision that I
want to make, and I still want you to be there to support me,” and vice
versa, right?

Andrea:

Beautiful. Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Jewel:

Yeah. So I think that is one thing, that alone could save so many
friendships. Because again, and it’s not that your friends don’t care about
you or are trying to smite you. It’s just they might be way too invested in
your life. Like for me personally, I can think of an example where one of
my longtime friends was making decisions I didn’t agree with and I noticed
myself getting frustrated and I was like, “But why?” Right? It’s because I
want them, this friend to be happy, but I’m crossing over that boundary.
Like what she does is none of my business, my job is to love her.

Andrea:

Yep. And I just want to point out to my listeners that it can go both ways.
Like whether you’re staying or going. Like sometimes people will be really
upset if you decide to stay and go, “Why? He doesn’t deserve it, you
deserve so much better,” and be really judgmental there. And it goes the
other way as well, of people thinking, “Why would you leave? You should
stay. You should make it work.” So really, we see this no matter what you
do. No matter what you decide, you could likely have some friendships that
shift or where you need to have these conversations. And I love what you
said there about just saying, “Hey, I understand that you don’t agree with
me, but I could really just use your support. Can you just be here, be my
friend?” It’s so simple, but so much of the time, we just don’t say it. We
just let people go and then there’s false assumptions probably on either
side, and hurt on either side that’s unnecessary, right?

Jewel:

Right, right. Yeah, one of the most intimate things you can do that we do
with maybe our partnerships like more often, one of the most intimate
things you can do is be willing to talk about the relationships. So it
might really increase your connections with these people if you are willing
to say, “Hey, I see you and this is what I want from you right now.”

Andrea:

Yep. I love it. Thank you. That’s perfect. Okay, I want to ask you a
question. What about if as my clients are navigating infidelity, there are
friendships that are no longer working, that are bringing more … Like
making it truly harder for them, bringing more pain, what do you recommend?

Jewel:

Yeah. I’m going to tie in also like your other question of why friendships
change too. So I think if they are no longer working and like the
friendship is no longer serving you, I would get really, really curious
about why. And try to be objective as possible, because I’m just going to
take a stab in the dark and guess that if you are in this place, like maybe
where you are really hurt and feeling distrustful, your brain again, like
we talked about earlier, might be scanning for how other people again
really aren’t there for you. So I would get really curious about why this
friendship is no longer working for you. So if it’s something like they
didn’t say exactly what you wanted them to say, like that … You know what
I mean, doesn’t mean that this person is like a “bad friend” and you should
not be friends with them anymore. It’s just again, like what we talked
about, like asking for what you need.

Jewel:

So I think that is huge on its own. I will say, and I can really almost
empathize and understand that your brain is in that place where it’s
scanning for danger, scanning for possible mistrust, scanning for how
people aren’t really there for you. And I really want to encourage you to
try to look at how your friends are there for you. As a whole, when you
think about all of your friends, how are they there for you, how are they
supporting you right now? This might sound counterintuitive, like, “Oh,
well I’m just going to become complacent with the friendships that are no
longer serving me,” especially after the infidelity, right?

Andrea:

Yeah.

Jewel:

But what it’s going to do is it’s actually going to make it easier. One
thing that you said Andrea, when you were talking about your story is some
friends disappeared and some friends really stepped up. I want to offer,
like noticing the friends that really stepped up was probably so helpful
for you, and if your mindset was in this place of like people just aren’t
there for me, these friends suck, you might have missed that.

Andrea:

Yes. Right. I love that. Yeah, I think that’s true.

Jewel:

Yeah. So looking for how people are there for you, how people are showing
they care, it’s going to make it easier for you to prioritize those people,
rather than not.

Andrea:

Okay. So if there is a friendship, somebody that has been a friend but who
… Like I’m talking about like crossing boundaries. Like let’s say there’s
somebody that is constantly harshly judging, saying harsh things that are
not helpful, not asked for, that are not helping you, that are not
supporting you. What then?

Jewel:

Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yeah. So then, again, as you’re looking for support
in other places, with this person … So if they are first of all being
really harsh with you, and that’s not something that you want to tolerate
in a friendship, I would offer for you … Sometimes for some people, I
call it like you get to move people down the list in a way. So sometimes,
like let’s say this person goes to like the same church as you and you’re
still going to see them often. Maybe just moving them down the list, and
what I mean by that is like not spending as much time with them, not
investing that much into that friendship anymore, and then just lowering it
down where it’s somebody you just see every so often. Or if you just
straight up don’t want this person in your life anymore, that’s okay. What
I want to offer is you don’t have to demonize that person either. That’s
not going to actually make you feel better in the long run.

Jewel:

So for boundaries as far as that’s concerned, identifying when, like again,
if they’re saying critical things, if they’re really judging you, you get
to uphold that boundary and say like, “This isn’t something that I’m
willing to listen to and partake in, so if you’re going to judge me and
criticize me, I’m going to end the conversation.”

Andrea:

Yep.

Jewel:

Or if you’re in the coffee shop, you can even say like, “I will leave.” So
setting that up, it doesn’t mean that … Like again this person is
terrible either, like whenever somebody does anything, there’s always a
reason, and we don’t have to love the reason, we don’t have to agree with
it, but if they’re judging you, I want you to offer what are they thinking
about themselves, what are they projecting onto you maybe. Because it
really truly is never personal. So yeah, that’s what I’m saying.

Andrea:

Yeah, thank you. Yes, I have talked before, several episodes ago, it’s been
quite a while. I did an episode about changing relationships, just broad
terms how relationships can change and one of the things that I mentioned
is how when I was going through divorce, I did have some relationships
change that were a surprise to me and I think that some of it, I think some
of the reasons why things change when we are dealing with hard stuff is
that it hits too close to home sometimes for people. Where it’s just too
painful for them to be around you, because it reminds them of problems in
their own life, things going on with them, and so they self-preserve and
back off. Just to kind of keep themselves feeling safe. We’re all looking
out for our own safety, right?

Jewel:

Right.

Andrea:

And so it can feel very personal but it’s really them having a fear
response, “Oh my gosh, if this can happen to her, my husband did this
thing. Should I be nervous about this too?” Like they don’t want to think
about it. So they might just disappear, right?

Jewel:

Yeah.

Andrea:

So there’s lots of different ways and reasons why these things shift,
right?

Jewel:

Mm-hmm (affirmative), mm-hmm (affirmative). Absolutely. Absolutely.

Andrea:

Yeah. So okay, a question I want to ask you is I’ve heard it said many
times, I’ve heard people say how much harder it is to develop friendships
the older we become, the older we are. Like we think about elementary kids
and they just play on the playground and then the older we get, the harder
it is to just go sit by somebody and chat with them. What do you think
about that? Do you agree? Disagree? Why?

Jewel:

Yeah. So as far as kindergarten goes and just walking up and making a
friend, so I lived out of my car for a bit and traveled and I was by
myself, so one thing that I would do is talk to strangers. Now all the moms
that are hearing me say that, I also want to say I was very safe, I was
very cautious, right? No need to worry. But yeah, I would talk to
strangers. Because most people do want to connect in the world. Connection
benefits everybody. Like everybody wants to connect, everybody wants to
feel that way. You’re never bothering somebody with offering a connection.
So first and foremost, if you want, I think you can talk to strangers.
That’s fine. I’ve made great friends traveling doing that.

Jewel:

But secondly, yes. Like making friends as an adult, I hear that all the
time that it’s harder. This is the only reason why it seems easier when
we’re younger, and that is because we have so much consistency in a set
container with people. So if you’re going to school, you’re seeing the same
people every day. So yeah, you’re going to get to really know these people,
you’re going to get to feel comfortable around these people, feel safe
around these people, you’re going to make friends by seeing these people
every day. It’s the same thing with like a work friend. You see that person
every single day. That’s how you created that work friend.

Jewel:

So it seems easier when we’re younger, but I also want to offer and remind
everybody, when I was talking about my experience in college, I was around
the same people like every single day. And I still didn’t feel like I had
the close friendships that I wanted. So consistency is a huge part of it
and what you can do is you can create a container for yourself where you
are interacting with people consistently, where one of my friends, every
week, they have like a trivia night and they go and she does that with her
friends. So things like that. You can, even if it’s like a commute on your
way home, like let’s say your commute is one of those 45-minuters, you get
to call your friends and have consistency in connecting with your friends
even during that time, right? It’s about creating that consistent container
for yourself.

Jewel:

So that one will make it easier to have the deeper friendships that you
want and then two, when it comes to really making deep friendships, I think
sometimes some people need to be in a place where they need to meet more
people or when they need to reconnect with people they might have fallen
out of touch with, it’s really easy to do that. Sometimes we don’t, most
people … Everybody who’s listening to this knows somebody, you’re not a
hermit living off the woods I assume, so you know people in y our life
already. Sometimes just think about people that you like or people that
you’ve fallen out of touch with and reconnect with them, [inaudible
00:25:05].

Jewel:

That being said, sometimes we need to do more of that and sometimes people
are also like me and they are like kind of overcompensating or will swing
the over way and start overcompensating. Where they’re like trying to be
friends with everybody. And so for that, I would really say, picking three
to five people that you want to connect with regularly can be so helpful.
Because what that’s going to do, again if we go back to consistency is
you’re going to create more comfort and safety around these people and go
deeper with these certain people.

Andrea:

Yep. I love that. I love that. One thing that I was thinking about when you
were saying that is that I have had the opportunity to live in lots of
different places and have moved around my whole life. And as an adult have
moved around a lot. And I think it’s a misconception to think that we have
to have all of our friends live right in the same community, see them all
the time. My three to five people don’t live here. Like don’t live in the
same state as me. And they’re spread out in the different places that I
have lived and I talk to them all the time. And it’s not always picking up
the phone, it’s often Marco Polo and then sometimes we’ll have an actual
phone call but there’s creative ways to go about maintaining friendships,
right?

Jewel:

Right, yeah. Yeah.

Andrea:

It doesn’t have to be the same … Like the idea that we have when we’re
younger of hanging out and going and going to eat and whatever. There’s
lots of different ways to maintain a friendship.

Jewel:

Right, absolutely. Absolutely, and I want to offer, if someone is thinking
they’re too busy, like you have to go grocery shopping. You have to cook at
some point or if you don’t, but you know what I mean? So on some level,
think of the things that you’re doing and if there are people in your area
that you want to be closer to let’s say, like just pick those things that
you are already doing and just spend that time with somebody else, doing it
together.

Andrea:

I love it. I love that. A natural transition into inviting another person
into your space, right?

Jewel:

Yes.

Andrea:

I love it. Okay, so a question I have for you Jewel is sometimes, we do get
hurt in friendships. Sometimes we do feel a betrayal. I had an experience
in college where I was laying down on the couch and my roommate didn’t know
that I was there. Like she was who I shared my actual room with and she was
talking about me and I thought that we were pretty close and she was
talking about me and not kindly. And it hurt. I remember laying there,
thinking I thought she was my friend. And fortunately, I got over that and
I thought, “Well, all my friends are not like that.” Like I had some trust
in my other friendships. But what if my clients have a situation like that
where there already is some kind of a breach and then they’re dealing with
a breach of infidelity. I’d love for you to speak to the risk involved in
putting ourselves out there to form new relationships and friendships.

Jewel:

Yeah. Yeah. I mean I think the risk involved is often what really scares us
away. But if you think about both of those situations, infidelity or
listening and having your friend say unkind things about you and feeling
betrayed, both of those things hurt and you are okay. And you also knew and
thought, “Okay, not all of my friends are like this.” If we go back to the
Pearl Harbor example I used earlier, not all people in your life are like
that. So if somebody is going through that or they do have a betrayal with
a friend, I mean I think you’re in the best place to use the tools that
Andrea is teaching you and helping you with. Like that can also be really
helpful in a friendship as well.

Jewel:

I think having a betrayal, it goes back to you get to decide, is this
something that I am okay with? Like is this something that I … Or even
like maybe want to be okay with and move past, and if not, then not.

Andrea:

Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yeah.

Jewel:

Right?

Andrea:

Yeah. [inaudible 00:29:40] pick. Right. Yeah. Okay. So I want to ask you
… Tell me when you work with your clients, how do you help them make
friends? What do you recommend? What’s your process?

Jewel:

Yeah. Making friends, meeting people. So again, like I said earlier,
everybody knows people. You’ve had conversations with women or really like
anybody that you’ve really liked and then you’re like, “Oh, that really
never went anywhere.” Or yeah, there were people that you maybe used to
talk to a little bit more, maybe they never became like a super close
friend but you are like, “I really like that person.”

Jewel:

So what I want to offer is so often we think we have to start from scratch
and there’s a place for that. There’s a place for, “Oh, I want to meet new
people.” But what I want to offer is most of us are actually not starting
from scratch. Most of the time we don’t need to meet new people. We just
need to make an effort and be willing to have that risk, right? Be willing
to have future hurt, be willing to be uncomfortable, be willing to be
rejected, but to reconnect with people that we’ve already liked in our
lives.

Jewel:

So for me, one thing that I did when the pandemic hit was I realized when
the pandemic hit that a lot of my friends who are becoming moms were moving
away and I was like, “Oh.” Like I want someone to hang out in person with.
Like you know, so what’s happening? And what I did was I thought about
people that I really liked and really connected with but also people that
reminded me of who I wanted to be in the world.

Andrea:

I love that.

Jewel:

And I did what I just told all of you guys about three to five, and I would
make effort with these three to five people. So when the pandemic hit, it
was just simple FaceTimes and then little tip, when you’re on a FaceTime or
hanging out with somebody, you can just plan the next time to hang out with
them so you don’t have to worry about the logistics. So I would do that and
with three of the girls, I got super close with. Now again three to five
people, I wasn’t attached to who it became, who became part of my world,
but three of those girls are now, now that the pandemic’s been going on for
so long, like two years later, they are my priority, my closest friends. So
I want to offer most people are not starting from scratch first and
foremost. But if you do want to go and meet new people, I think …

Jewel:

Now we hear it all the time, like joining like a club or a group can be
really helpful, but the reason why it’s helpful again is because if you
have a book club and even if it’s like once a month, you are still seeing
those people over and over and over again. So it’s going to be easier to
get to know them, it’s going to be easier to feel comfortable with them,
and so on. So finding something that you’re interested in or like having
… Even again, even if it’s just one day a month for yourself for meeting
new people and bringing new people into your world, that can be so helpful
all on its own.

Andrea:

I love that. I feel inspired, sitting here listening to you because there’s
wonderful people in the community I live in that I have had great
conversations with but it’s not like a consistent hanging out with each
other or consistent on a consistent basis spending time with each other.
But there’s people here that I for sure would love to be closer to. So I
feel inspired and I often have thought I want more friends that live here,
like that I can actually be with in person, and so I think that I have my
work cut out for me. And it doesn’t feel like work, it sounds fun, it
sounds fun to try harder, to build the support around me and my local,
where I live locally. So yeah.

Jewel:

Yeah, and it will take a little bit of effort, a little bit of being
uncomfortable, but I want to offer the return on that investment is so much
bigger than being like, “Oh, well it could be easier just to stay in and
watch Netflix.”

Andrea:

Yes, totally. Yes. Yes. I think that I do tend to go for, “Oh, I’m tired.
It’s been a long day. I’ve worked all day, whatever, kids need me,” to kind
of put those things off, but really, when we check in with what we need, we
do need people. We need people and we need support. We need to laugh. We
need to have people that we can feel safe crying with, all the things,
right?

Jewel:

Right. It’s going to give you so much more energy in the long run.

Andrea:

Yeah. I love that. I love that. It’s a deposit in something that’s going to
yield a really big return. I love it.

Jewel:

Yes, exactly.

Andrea:

All right, well I think to wrap things up today, I just want to ask if
there’s anything else that you would like to offer my listeners about
friendship.

Jewel:

Yeah. I mean I think the thing that I would most like to offer about this
is, especially to the person who is going through infidelity, I guess this
last little piece is that when you’re going to your friends, now this is
… There’s one or two people, there’s an oversharer and there’s an
undersharer. And I want to offer for my undersharers, your friends care
about you, they want to know what’s going on in your inner world, and for
my oversharers, I want to offer that your friends are not your therapists.
So yes, go to your friends and ask for support, ask for spaces to talk, but
one of the best things that we can do for our relationships is to make sure
both people have time to be heard. So making sure that you have time to
share. Like maybe if you are an undersharer and you’re not really talking
about your experience and you want to and your friend is a talker
[inaudible 00:35:55] all the things, make sure you say, “Hey, I really want
to share what’s going on here with you,” and vice versa if you typically
are the oversharer, that’s me, I could talk all day long, like making sure
you also are asking what is going on in your world.

Jewel:

Because what that’s going to do, especially as you are going through what
you’re going through with infidelity, is it’s going to help you also know
other people and like what’s going on in the world and feel … It’s going
to almost like expand your mind from just t he situation that you’re
currently in. So that’s the last thing I would want to [inaudible 00:36:29]
–

Andrea:

Oh, that’s such a good point. I love that. You’re right, because we can get
so all-consumed. All-consumed with what’s going on with us and kind of
forget that, “Oh, other people have stuff going on too,” and when we can
hear from other people what’s going on with them, take the focus off
ourselves for just a minute, it can lift our burden. It can kind of lift it
for a little bit and go, “Oh, I can think about something else,” and come
away feeling lighter, even if it is listening to something that’s difficult
that somebody else is going through.

Andrea:

I think there’s a lot of comfort that comes just in knowing that infidelity
can feel so isolating, it can feel so … I’m the only one, what’s wrong
with me, why … It can be very lonely. And so to hear from other people
their struggles, what they’re going through, can just feel like, “Okay, I’m
not the only one that’s having hard things happen.” Not that we wish hard
things on other people, but to know that we’re not some isolated extreme
thing over here. Like we all have things that we’re going through, and so I
love that. Giving space to ask, to receive, and also having the courage to
share, right?

Jewel:

Yeah.

Andrea:

For those listeners out there who keep it all to yourself, I know who you
are, that don’t want to share, that want to keep it all in, try it. I’m
challenging my listeners to try sharing. Try opening up. And trusting your
little tribe with some of your hard stuff.

Jewel:

Yes. Mm-hmm (affirmative). What a beautiful challenge.

Andrea:

Yes, that’s right. Okay, well thank you so much. I know I feel inspired. I
feel inspired to go try harder to expand my friendships, to deepen my
friendships and I hope you listeners have taken from this things that will
help you to broaden your circle, to support … give yourself the support
that you need, and just friendships make life more fun. They just make it
more fun, right?

Jewel:

Exactly, exactly.

Andrea:

Like getting past all the hard stuff, it’s just fun to have friends to go
get together with, go plan trips with, all the things, right?

Jewel:

Mm-hmm (affirmative). Everything’s better with friends.

Andrea:

It is. It is. Yep, we’re not meant to do this alone. So thank you again so
much for being here, Jewel, and tell me how my clients can find you and
learn more from you.

Jewel:

Thank you so much for having me. I could always talk to you all day long.

Andrea:

You bet.

Jewel:

Yeah, so my clients can … Or my clients, wow. Your clients can reach me
at www.jewelhohman.com, so J-E-W-E-L-H-O-H-M-A-N, and it’s also
@jewel.hohman on Instagram and Facebook, you can find free videos and tips
and things like that over there.

Andrea:

Okay, awesome, and I’ll have that all linked up so that my clients can find
you easily, okay?

Jewel:

Awesome, thank you.

Andrea:

All right. Thank you so much for being here, Jewel.

Jewel:

Thank you so much Andrea. It was such a fun time.

Andrea:

Thank you.

Andrea:

Thank you for listening to the Heal from Infidelity podcast. If you would
like to be kept in the know about upcoming free classes, new podcast
episodes and other ways of working with me, go subscribe to my weekly
email. You can subscribe at andreagiles.com/lies-about-infidelity/. Again,
it’s andreagiles.com/lies-about-infidelity/. I will see you next time.