Why Emotional Health Matters for Your Marriage: Dave & Ashley Willis

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FamilyLife Today® with Dave and Ann Wilson – Web Version Transcript

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Why Emotional Health Matters for Your Marriage

Guests:Dave and Ashley Willis

From the series:Healthy Intimacy (Day 1 of 3)

Air date:January 13, 2025

Dave Willis: Being mentally healthy—what’s happening in our mind—is one of the

easiest things to hide from our spouse. But if we hide what’s happening in our minds

and hearts from one another, it creates a wedge in the marriage, where God wants

there to be a bridge, where we can share all of it and bear one another’s burdens. And

so the depth of your honesty really determines the depth of your intimacy.

Ann: Welcome to FamilyLife Today, where we want to help you pursue the re-lationships that matter most. I’m Ann Wilson.

Dave: And I’m Dave Wilson. And you can find us at FamilyLifeToday.com. This is

FamilyLife Today.

Dave: So we don’t often talk about 1999 in our marriage.

Ann: Oh, 1999; ooh, yes.

Dave: It was one of the tougher years; why?

Ann: I lost my very best friend to cancer, and it was my sister. She’s my best friend; she led me to Jesus. She died of [emotion in voice]—gosh, I get teary talking about it—she died of lung cancer. My parents had never smoked, and she never did. She was gone within five months, leaving her four sons; and it was really a dark time for us in our lives.

Dave: Yes; I mean, it was dark for you; it was dark for everyone really. And as your husband, I’ve always said—you know this—one of the things I love about Ann Wilson is your StrengthsFinders [assessment]: like number two is positivity.

Ann: Yes.

Dave: If you walk in the kitchen one day, and you’re not positive, I like fall on the floor. [Laughter] I can barely function, which is like I’m so codependent on your positivity; but you went through/our marriage went through 18 months; didn’t it?

Ann: Yes, I was grieving; and I could not conjure up anything. I was just at a dark, dark place, questioning everything; and I felt like I had absolutely nothing to give.

Dave: I can remember the day I heard you laugh in the garage; I was in the kitchen. I think it was two years that I hadn’t heard you laugh/like belly laugh.

We’re bringing that up because when one of the spouses, or both, are really struggling emotionally or mentally, it can really impact a marriage.

Ann: And I think it can lead one or both of you reeling, not knowing where to go, what to do. You’re wondering, “Will our marriage survive this?”

Dave: Yes; so I’m excited because we’ve got two friends in the studio today, Dave and Ashley Willis, who—I didn’t say Dave and Ann Wilson—Dave and Ashley Willis.

Ann: Welcome to FamilyLife Today. [Laughter]

Dave Willis: Thank you!

Ashley: Thank you.

Dave: You’re sitting over there, being so polite. You know you can’t interrupt us, and here you are sitting in the studio. You guys have this amazing ministry that you have committed—has it been two decades or so of your lives?—to helping marriages, like what we just described, thrive in the midst of good times and tough times; right?

Ashley: Yes; I mean, we definitely have walked through some dark times, just like what you described. Yes, it’s our heart to help people navigate these things. Because it’s those times that, even though we are personally going through a hard time, I think we can turn and kind of put it on our spouse and think: “Oh, did I marry the wrong person?” or “Maybe the marriage is the problem. Maybe it’s all their fault after all.”

So we want to help couples—just like you guys are doing—help them see they can get through these hard times and, not only that, that there’s really kind of a strength you find on the other side of that. When you lean into each other, and really give it to God through that hard time, you can really grow stronger through it.

Dave: Tell us a little bit about Dave and Ashley Willis, because you have, for two decades, at least, really impacted marriages. And then, you start this thing—you’ve got to tell me what this means: Naked Marriage—that’s your ministry; that’s your podcast. The book we’re going to dive in today—

Ann: —that’s compelling. [Laughter]

Dave: —is Naked and Healthy. Obviously, you have a title like Naked Marriage; that gets people interested. What’s that all about?

Dave Willis: It does; we’re not part of a nudist colony—[Laughter]—just to clarify. Naked Marriage goes back to God’s original design for marriage. The first picture He gave us of marriage is in Genesis, Chapter 2—He says that that first couple, Adam and Eve—they were naked and unashamed. That nakedness wasn’t just a picture of physical intimacy, even though that’s a beautiful part of it; but it’s a picture of having nothing to hide from each other and being completely vulnerable/completely open. And that’s what God desires for marriage.

We’ve tried to build our own marriage that way through all of God’s principles for what a marriage should be—and just be a safe place, where other couples can talk about it—whether it’s sending us messages online, which was happening long before we ever had a podcast or were doing marriage ministry, full time, the way we are now. We’re just trying to point people back to God’s design in a world that’s gotten really confused about issues around sex and marriage, and what it all means, and what it’s all supposed to look like. God’s perfect plan is still perfect, and we’re just trying to help point people back to that.

Dave: Yes—and it’s one of the things I really appreciate about your ministry—is it’s biblical; I mean, it’s centered on the Word of God. It’s vulnerable—that’s the naked part—naked and unashamed. You’re always helping; you’re literally helping couples.

It’s real interesting—as I picked up your latest book, Naked and Healthy, it really gets into what we started with—the mind and the emotions; how that affects a marriage—the body or the physical, and the spiritual.

Here’s the thing: before we even dive into that—because I really want to talk about where we started today: the emotional part of a marriage—but one of the things that we do; and we got to talk about this now, because there’s a promotion going on right now with FamilyLife. You can go to the Weekend to Remember® marriage getaway half off, and spend Friday night, Saturday, and Sunday morning learning how to build a marriage that God wants you to have. It’s a great weekend.

Ann: It really truly changed our marriage; it changed our life. I feel like it changed our

legacy. And so to get half off is an amazing deal off that registration price.

Dave: Yeah; so I’d say, even right now, go online—go to FamilyLifeToday.com—sign

up; have a great weekend. It’s going to literally change your life.

Alright; so now, talk about the emotional part.

Ann: You have your own personal story of how this played out in your marriage, where this—the mental and emotional part—affected you in your marriage in a negative way.

Ashley: Very much so. Dave and I got married pretty young; I was actually still in college when we got married. Dave graduated from college one weekend; we got married the next weekend. He started working for the college that I was attending. It was just this fairytale for us; and being naïve and being very young, we just thought, “We’ve got this.” We were also both communication majors; and so we thought, “We know how to communicate, and our marriage is just going to be awesome.”

Dave Willis: Yes; “No problem.”

Ashley: Exactly; “No problem.” We get married—and you know, we’re in that honeymoon phase—but very quickly, I just noticed that I’m not quite myself. I’m having trouble sleeping. I had these lingering, plaguing, negative thoughts and fears that I had a really hard time shaking off. And then—

Ann: Ashley, before you go on, tell me about those thoughts and fears. What was going through your head?

Ashley: Oh my goodness! Really, it was like an onslaught of just trying to—I don’t know—I think I went through an identity crisis, really, because we were actually having a little bit of trouble with some family members in the beginning of our marriage. It really threw me for a loop to be honest with you. It was very earth-shattering in my little world. It caused me to have a little bit of a: “Who am I?” because this relationship—that I really had almost just depended on, and defined myself by—was, all of a sudden, just crumbling to the ground. Things weren’t really how I thought they were; it really sent me into a massive depression.

Then I started having—

Dave: This is year one?

Ashley: This is in the first year. It happened within like the first two weeks. It just—I mean, it was like day after day—I mean, the holidays would come; and it would get worse on the holidays. It was just terrible; it went on for several years.

Ann: So let me go to you, Dave. So here you are—you’re newly-married, like, “Oh, this is going to be amazing!”—and here Ashley is in this phase of life/in this depression. Were you thinking, “What just happened?” Like were you doubting, “Who is she?”

Dave Willis: No, no; I never doubted, “Who is she?”; but I was still completely terrified at the situation. I knew who I married; I never had a doubt in my mind at all about that. I was so thankful, and have been every day of our marriage, that she’s my wife; but I just didn’t know how to help. I didn’t know how to get us/how to lead through that. I didn’t know what I was supposed to do; I didn’t know what she was supposed to do.

It became a time in our marriage, where we really had to lean on God like never before. It was a good way to start out in that way, because it forced us to realize the obvious; which is, “We can’t do everything in our own strength. We need the Lord.” That isn’t just something we said; like that is something, in that moment, we had to live. We had to say: “God, help us do this. Show us what to do.” God helped us in a lot of ways through that. It was a slow process. Usually, the healing happens in slow processes; unfortunately. We want it to happen fast, but it’s usually a journey.

Ann: You were saying how many years?

Ashley: It went on for, at least, four years. I can distinctly remember—like you kind of with depression—anybody who is listening to this, when you’re first depressed, you kind of get used to it. You don’t realize that’s what you’re going through, and you kind of chalk it up to sadness; or “I’m just having problems with this one relationship in my life,”—or whatever it is—you call it circumstantial.

But I—looking back, I think it was actually probably even more than four years—but definitely four distinct years, where I would—I mean, I was crying; I would just cry all the time. I literally, just like the commercials you see on TV for antidepressants, I literally felt like this little dark cloud was following me around; and I didn’t want to do the things I once enjoyed. I just felt like a shell of a person.

I remember that’s when the enemy came in and just really played on that. It was like he just tried to mess with me even more and started kind of feeding me these lies—like: “You know what? Dave’s going to leave you. You’re not really the woman he married anymore,” and “Are you really saved? Are you really saved if you are thinking these dark thoughts,” or “…if you’re doubting God?” or “…you’re questioning your marriage?”—or whatever it is—“How dare you even think that”; like, “You should be ashamed.” I just had all those really terrible lies going through my mind.

It got really dark kind of in the midst of that four-year journey, of even thinking, “I don’t know if I even want to live,”—like—“I don’t know if I really want to continue living. If this is living, I don’t want it.”

Ann: And talk about, spiritually, what did you feel? What were you praying in that time?

Ashley: I would pray; I will tell you there’s never been another time in my life where I’ve

cried out to the Lord so much. Actually, my depression—as it often does for a lot of

people—went into anxiety as well. And I would have anxiety attacks at night, where my

heart would be beating out of my chest. I’d be in a cold sweat, and I’d have to run to the

bathroom and physically get ill—because there are physical manifestations for mental

illness—and I would be in the bathroom just crying and literally, out loud, saying, “Lord,

please take this away from me. Please just give me hope”; just crying out. A lot of times,

too—because I’ve heard from a lot of different people who’ve gone through anxiety and

depression—it usually happens at night. It’s usually in those wee hours. I would turn on

Christian television; and I would just be trying to hear from God: “I just need something.”

And every time, He would; God always comes right when you need Him.

But for me, personally, it wasn’t like, “Poof; it’s gone.” It was a journey; it was a gradual

process. I did go to Christian counseling; that was a game-changer for me. My Christian/I actually went to two different ones, because we moved kind of in the middle of my depression. Both of my counselors really kind of helped me to do what the Bible says to do: to take your thoughts captive and to replace them with God’s truth. That was something that I had to learn, because I really felt helpless there for a while. And when I was first going through it, too, I didn’t even tell Dave. I know he knew something was up, because I just wasn’t quite myself.

But when I finally told him, I mean as my spouse, he didn’t judge me. He didn’t say, “You know what? You are right; you are damaged goods. I think I’m going to move on.” He didn’t shame me at all, like, “You’re not supposed to worry.” Guys listening: “The worst thing you can say to a depressed person is: ‘You’re not supposed to worry. Your worry is a sin.’” It just makes us feel worse.

Ann: Or: “You’re depressed, again, today?”

Ashley: Yes; “I thought you were over this.” It’s not that easy; it can become a stronghold in your life. But I also want to say, with that, in those prayers—in those moments when I was crying out to God—I’ve never felt Him so close. I literally felt the verse that says He is close to the brokenhearted. Over time, I could see Him giving me beauty for my ashes—because I did; I felt like ashes—I felt like the beautiful life I thought I was going to live with Dave. At the time, I had small children. Even when I was going through this, I thought, “It’s just burning in flames,”—like—“I’m the one; it’s me. It’s my fault.” I just had to learn that mental illness is no respecter of persons—Christian or not—we can go through this. But God is our healer, and with His help—and if you’re married, please help your spouse; lean into your spouse in this—but with helping each other through this, you can come through it.

I’ve been on the other side of this for years—praise Jesus—I mean, I’ve been free from anxiety and depression for years; and I’m so, so grateful.

Ann: I’m guessing you guys have met people that the spouse hasn’t responded the way Dave responded to you, Ashley.

Ashley: Yes.

Ann: Have you seen a negative toll that it plays out if you don’t respond in a kind, and generous, and grace-giving way?

Dave Willis: Absolutely. I didn’t know what to say during those times—like I didn’t have any/there was nothing magical that I said or did that helped—but I just knew, “I just need to make sure she knows she’s not going to face this alone.” I just reminded her, over and over, that: “I’m here. We’re going to get through this together.” I was not a perfect husband back then; I don’t want to paint this picture that I was this rock, who was doing everything right; because I was like, in my own ways, kind of messed up then. I was struggling; I felt inadequate and insecure, because I didn’t completely know how to help.

I was making some choices, part of which—not to dive too deep into this now—but I had

had a past struggle, before we got married, with pornography. And I fell back into that in

those early years of our marriage. And that put all kinds of strain and confusion

mentally, spiritually, and otherwise on both of us. And certainly, when that came out,

didn’t do anything at all to help Ashley to come out of her depression. I mean, if

anything, it probably made that worse. And so it became another area where in that I

wasn’t helping with the healing. I was actually adding to the wound. And so we had to

come together to really find healing in the Lord and grace and hope in the Lord.

But if you are dealing with depression or anxiety, the way that Ashley was, some of the things she did—that I just commend her for that God really blessed and used—is like, number one, she chose to hold onto God’s promises, even when she was feeling something different. Our culture kind of says: “Your feelings are always right,” “Your feelings are your god,” “Your feelings are your truth, and you just hold onto that.” But she said, “No, my feelings are lying to me right now. My feelings are real—I mean, they’re real; and I’m feeling the weight of the world on my shoulders—but even though I don’t feel it right now, I’m holding onto God’s promises that He’s good; He’s with me; He’s for me; and that I’m going to get through this.” She kept feeding her mind things that reinforced that message.

She was so disciplined in saying, “I’m going to read the Word today, even though I’m not feeling it. I’m going to put God’s Word in my mind through what I’m listening to and what I’m watching. I’m going to surround myself with people who love me and encouraging voices; because I know I’m really vulnerable right now. If I’m listening to the wrong voices, it could have a really negative impact. I’m going to get into counseling.”

And I encouraged her in all those things. But she did the work, and she continued to

walk that path; and God did the rest over time. It wasn’t quick; but over time, that fog

really lifted. And then she used that as part of her testimony and has helped thousands

of people who are feeling the same thing. And we’re in a time right now, just in what our

world’s been through these last couple years, where there’s never been more anxiety,

and depression, and confusion, and uncertainty. Now, more than ever, we need to do

those things that Ashley was doing all those years ago: turn back to the truth of God’s

Word, and to surround ourselves with the right voices; and maybe, detox from all the

negative news out there in the world, and say, “I want to just kind of fast from that for a

while; and I want to feed on God’s Word and surround myself with people who love me.”

Healing can happen; God wants you to live with healing. He’s not given us a spirit of fear; He wants to give you a spirit of a sound mind. If you don’t feel that right now, don’t beat yourself up. Don’t convince yourself that it’s because you’re some kind of terrible sinner. This is just part of being a human being. Sometimes, we deal with brokenness; but God wants to carry you through it.

Dave: Now, did either one of you guys ever feel like or sort of blame your marriage for the problems you were having? I think, often, we can get in a marriage—and you go through something like what Ashley was going through—and you [say], “Well, if I wouldn’t have married you…” or “If I wouldn’t have got married, I’d be in a different place; I’d be okay.” It’s easy to blame the marriage when the marriage isn’t the problem, but did you find yourself ever doing that?

Ashley: I think—I don’t want to speak for you—but I think when we were having all that

trouble with some family members, I’m sure that crossed your mind.

Dave Willis: No; it really didn’t. It really didn’t because one of the few things I knew for

sure is that that I married the right person. And if you’re out there—“I don’t know if I

married the right person,”—“Hey, listen guys, the moment you said, ‘I do,’ they became

the right person. You’ve committed your life to them; God has made you one.”

Dave: But you never struggled with that; she’s going through this thing you didn’t see

coming.

Dave Willis:Man, I struggle with so many things in my life, so many things; but one thing I have not struggled with is saying, like, “Oh man, I wish I would have not married her.” Like I’ve really/honestly, I’ve had all kinds of terrible thoughts, and dumb thoughts, and sinful thoughts; but that thought has never really entered my mind. I’m like, “I know/I know that I’m with the person that I’m meant to be with for my whole life.” I’m so thankful for her; even in our toughest time/in her darkest time, I was so thankful to be her husband. If anything, I just felt more of a sense of urgency to remind her of that; because she didn’t believe that, even though it was true.

You know, our feelings can lie to us; so I just tried to remind her every way I could, like: “I love you so much,” and “I’m so honored to get to be your husband,” and “We’re going to get through this together.” Her mind wouldn’t let her believe it at the time, but it was true; and I kept saying it.

Ashley: Well, I would even say things like, “Hey, I know I’m not keeping my end of the bargain here,”—like—“I’m not really who you married; and I don’t know if I’m ever going to be that woman again, so if you want to leave it’s okay.” I would literally say that; I would say, “It’s okay.” We would have those late nights—

Dave Willis: And I would say, “No!”

Ashley: I was like: “I’m giving you an out,” “I’m giving you an out.”

He just—and it would be [the same with] you guys—“It’s never convenient when

you’re going through struggles in your marriage, or in life for that matter.” He’d have a

full day of work the next day. I was a student, probably a senior in college at this

time, and my classes wouldn’t start until later; but I’d wake him up usually like 2:00/3:00

in the morning, out of desperation. I would try not to, but I was just so desperate. I’d

been toiling for hours over whatever thoughts I had that night that were plaguing me.

He would be in a fog; and I would just say, “I’m feeling so bad, and I got sick

tonight. I feel so bad. You know what? You shouldn’t have to deal with this. I’m a mess;

I’m just a mess. And clearly, I’ve done something wrong—completely wrong

here—you have an out. You have an out; you deserve so much better than me. You

deserve so much better.” And every time, he would say, Ashley, I’m not going

anywhere.”

Ann: That’s a gift.

Ashley: Oh my gosh, yes!

Ann: That’s a true gift—that we can say that to our spouse—when they’re struggling.

I’m thinking, too, of Romans 12:2; and I love that Scripture: “Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed”—how?—“by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is: His good, pleasing and perfect will.” I think—not being conformed to the world but being transformed by the renewing of our minds—when I was going through my grieving of my sister—and I would say that’s probably the time in my life where I was the most depressed; would you say that, Dave?

Dave: Oh yes; yes, definitely.

Ann: But I found myself the same, Ashley—like my mind is reeling of: “What kind of God would take this 44-year-old woman, who has four kids?”—and then I would be asking, like, “What if that happens to me?” Your mind goes crazy, especially at night.

Learning to take those thoughts captive—man, that was hard—because my whole life, I’d just let my mind go. When you think of captivity, you think of a cage; like you’re going to put those thoughts in a cage and not let them run wild. Learning how to do that can take some time. How did you/like what was your discipline? How did you do that?

Ashley: One of the most helpful things to me—I actually read a book—and it’s an old Beth Moore book. It’s called Praying God’s Word. One thing Beth Moore put in that book—but this is something anyone listening could do on their own—is there was like a perforated section with just Scripture. She had a little blurb in there, saying like, “Listen, even Jesus Himself when He was going through his hardest time in the desert and being tempted, He would quote Scripture to the enemy. He would say, ‘No, no, no; this is what God says…’ out loud.” There’s so much power in that. Also, even if you’re not saying out loud—which I highly recommend—even surrounding yourself in those places that you frequent—like your car, your bathroom, your bedside table—putting the words there is powerful. That’s how you can be reminded; because as you start to have that thought, you remember that verse and you’re really meditating on that verse.

I did that; and I still, from time to time, do that. It was just Proverbs 3:5-6—it was probably my verse that I would cling to so much—not trusting in my own understanding. Because at that time, I literally couldn’t trust my own understanding; because my mind was not healthy. It helped me by putting different verses like that—it just really helped bathe/kind of wash my mind with God’s truth—and it renewed it over time.

You know, the things we tend to focus on—actually, this is a Lysa TerKeurst quote that I love—she says, “The mind feasts on what it focuses on.” I wanted to feast on God’s Word; I didn’t want to feast on the lies of the devil. I wanted to feast on His Word/on His truth. Truly, when I was feasting on His Word by just focusing on it, it’s healing. I mean, His Word is healing; and it really, really helped me tremendously. I wouldn’t have been able to get through that time without it.

Dave: I’m just thinking of a listener—maybe a couple is going through what you went through—and I know we’re not sitting here, like you never struggle again.

Ashley: Oh, yes.

Dave: I mean, it isn’t like it was done and over; but you have helped so many. I’m just thinking, “Man, you’ve given us like a prescription.” And again, I know there’s no step one, step two; but getting your eyes off of the problem and onto the Lord, getting them in the Word.

One of the things that really impacted us in that time period [after Ann’s sister’s death] was worship music.

Ann: Yes.

Ashley: Oh yes, yes.

Dave: I remember we would go to church; and often, I would be in the band, playing. I sort of said, “I don’t want to play for a while. I want to be just standing and singing.” We couldn’t sing; we would just weep. I remember I’d look over, and Ann was on her knees, just weeping—could barely get the words out—but being in [His] presence and going vertical was powerful.

Ann: There was something about, when you worship, your heart has to become soft and absorbs. Whereas before, wherever I’d go, I’d shut down my heart; because it hurt too badly. But when music came—and worship music—the intimacy of God’s words tended to just pour into my heart. I would just cry, because the emotion of it. I feel like that’s super healing.

Dave: So as you think back to that season of your marriage, how did that journey

impact your passion to help people have naked marriages?

Ashley: Oh my goodness; it had a great impact on it; because when I was first going

through my depression, I really hid it from Dave because I didn’t want him to see that

part of me. I think I was thinking like, “Well, this is just going to go away quickly. I don’t

want him to even know I’m having these dark thoughts.”

Ann: “You don’t even need to bring it up.”

Ashley: Right; “I don’t even need to bring it up.”

Dave: Let me ask you: “Could you hide it?” “Did you not see it?”

Dave Willis: As a young husband, I was pretty oblivious to a lot of things. I missed a lot

of pretty obvious nonverbal cues, but I knew something was off; but—

Dave: —didn’t know.

Dave Willis: —I didn’t know. I was not equipped to really, really know. And in the book,

where we talk about mental health, I think being mentally healthy—what’s happening in

our mind—is one of the easiest things to hide from our spouse. And so you really need

the naked marriage [in this area], maybe more even than the other areas, because it’s

easy to hide what’s happening in your head—the thoughts, the fears you’re struggling

with—in my case, the sin I was struggling with, these lustful images in my mind. In

Ashley’s case, dealing and wrestling with anxiety, and depression, and fear, and

uncertainty; and feeling like she had to keep that hidden from us.

If we hide what’s happening in our minds and hearts from one another, it closes

us off and creates a wedge in the marriage, where God wants there to be a bridge,

where we can share all of it and bear one another’s burdens. And so you’ve got

whatever it is that you’re facing—whatever it is in your mind that you haven’t really

revealed to your spouse—bring that out. It’s going to bring your intimacy to a whole new

level because the depth of your honesty really determines the depth of your intimacy.

But any form of secrecy cuts us off from healing, and it cuts us off from our spouse. The

enemy’s game is to keep us in isolation—that’s always his game plan—is to keep us

isolated; get us to deal with stuff on our own. God’s plan for healing always happens in

relationship—a relationship with Him, first and foremost—but then, within marriage

especially, it happens within the relationship and being able to confess to each other,

and pray for each other, and bear that burden together. And so when Ashley really

trusted me with her struggle, even though it didn’t instantly bring healing—what it did

is—it instantly started to bring healing in our marriage; because now, we could face it

together. And now, it wasn’t as heavy for her to carry; because I was helping carry it too.

Ashley: It’s so true. And we always say: “In marriage, it’s never his problem or her

problem; it’s always our problem.” I didn’t realize that at the time; but really, even

though I’m the one who’s going through mental illness, it’s still affecting my marriage. It’s

still something that Dave is dealing with, whether I’m telling him or not. It wasn’t right for

me to keep it from him. But also, I think what actually motivated me to tell him was just

out of desperation and needing help. And again, I probably woke him up at 2:00 in the

morning and just kind of told him really what’s going on. I did feel a release. I felt such a

release, and also a relief of: “He’s seeing all of me; and this man still loves me, and he

still wants to be with me. I’m truly naked and unashamed.” Dave—his willingness to

hear me out, and to be there for me, and kind of hang in the corner with me, so to

speak—it really did help me get rid of the shame, because I think shame was a huge

issue for me back in those days. And when you realize that there’s no shame here—that

you just need healing; and you need Jesus; and God wants you to bring it out into the

light—that’s when the healing happens.

Dave: Well, talk to the couple who’s afraid; because bringing something from the dark,

that’s a secret to your spouse, is a scary thing. And a lot of times, we are so afraid we

don’t. But you both—I mean, Davey shared your struggle with porn; you shared your

struggle with mental health—that’s a scary moment to step over that threshold. And yet,

we sit here and go, “Oh, it’s the best thing.” Yet, I know there’s a couple going, “Maybe

for them, but not for us.”

Ann: We’re so afraid we’ll be rejected.

Dave: Yeah; so what would you say to them?

Dave Willis: Well, I’ll say the mistake that I made is that I had to be caught for it to

really come out. And what that did is it created an extra barrier of trust to be rebuilt. I

wish I could go back—and obviously, not have done it at all—but have had the courage

to share it. Once it did come out, then I got real honest real fast. But I just tell folks:

“Listen, the Bible says it and it’s true. What’s done in secret is going to be shouted from

the rooftops. One way or another what you’re hiding is going to come out; it’s just going

to. And so you might as well be the one to take initiative and be the one to bring it out,

because that’s going to help the healing process; that’s going to help trust be rebuilt

faster.”

It’s going to come out one way or the other, and so you be the one to do it. You

trust God to do the rest and actually have that courage and faith to say, “I’m going to

bring this out. I’m going to be the one to say it and bring it out in the open.” Once we

bring something from the darkness out into the light, it instantly has less power over us;

that’s just the way God wires things. I think that she felt some freedom and healing start

to happen the moment that she brought it out in the open.

Ashley: I did. And vulnerability in marriage is key. But I think the reason so many of us

are scared to share things like this in marriage is because we live in a culture that says

you’re crazy if you’re going to be that vulnerable. I remember distinctly one time we’re

having this kind of conversation, explaining the naked marriage, to a single man;

but he had been dating. The look on his face—he looked at us so perplexed—like,

“You’re serious. You’re serious about saying everything: not having any secrets, and not

having any hidden bank accounts, and not having passwords on your devices and

things like that.” And I was like, “Yes, in marriage, in order to have the kind of marriage God wants us to have, you got to put it out on the table.” He kind of paused for a moment; and he said, “I’ve never trusted someone like that in my entire life, and I don’t know if I ever can. That is so scary to me.” I think he used the word, scary. He said, “That scares me to death.”

And my heart kind of sank; because I thought, “That’s just the world we live in.” I think a

lot of it comes from culture telling us that. But I also think it’s because of brokenness. I

think that, a lot of times, we don’t trust our spouse for something that somebody else did

to us. Maybe our spouse didn’t even do it; but it’s like we couldn’t really trust our mom or

our dad, or we couldn’t trust—maybe, you were married before; and your previous

spouse, you couldn’t trust them—but I just want to challenge you: “To trust God and

trust God with it.”

In our case, with Dave’s pornography issue—I was angry; I had my doubts, and I was

disgusted—and I felt all those things, but I knew that God was bigger. I knew that Dave

wasn’t defined by his sin just like he knew I wasn’t defined by my mental illness. And so

that’s when we have to dig deep and pray. And just like you were saying, Ann, earlier—

about God keeping our hearts soft through worship and through prayer—in marriage,

that is so key; because when we are praying together with and for each other, He does

something miraculous, where He really softens our hearts towards each other. We

begin to be less afraid because, honestly, prayer is probably one of the most vulnerable

things you can do with your spouse and the most intimate thing you can do with your

spouse. I would encourage couples to start there if they’re scared.

Dave: We’re Dave and Ann Wilson. We’ve been talking with Dave and Ashley Willis; I

love those guys.

Ann: I love them.

Dave: They are always great to have on. And their book that you need to get—let me

tell you: “Get it today,”—is called Naked & Healthy: Uncover the Lifestyle Your Mind,

Body, Spirit, and Marriage Need. It’s a long title, but the book covers all of that. And you

can get it today; just go to FamilyLifeToday.com to get that book. Or if you want, give us

a call at 800-358-6329. Again, that’s 800-F as in Family, L as in Life, and then the word,

TODAY, to get their book.

But I got to tell you something else. We’ve been talking about being healthy. You want

to get healthy in your marriage?—come to the Weekend to Remember: marriage

getaway that we put on all around the country.

Ann: —and it’s half price. That sale is going on through January 20; so jump in on this

offer because it will help your marriage.

Dave: Half off; you can’t beat it. I’m telling you: “This is the time to do it, because it’s not

going to be on sale forever.” Go to FamilyLifeToday.com, and you can sign up right

there.

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