Program: Family estrangement and infidelity: Esther Perel answers your questions

Sana Qadar: Hey, it's Sana Qadar. This is All in the Mind from ABC Radio National, mailbag edition. And this is also part two of our chat with psychotherapist Esther Perel. Two weeks ago, we had part one of our chat with Esther. And we also asked you, when we confirmed that she was going to come on the show, to send us your questions so we could do a mailbag edition with her. We asked and you delivered. There was a lot of pain that spilled into our inbox. It was quite humbling to read your stories and to know that you trusted us with these questions. So in this episode, we have questions on infidelity, on family estrangement, on global events impacting personal relationships. Esther also talks about how to make amends for past wrongs.

Esther Perel: Without a big mea culpa of what you were going through, because the point is not for them to become empathic toward you. The point is for you to basically be accountable, take responsibility.

Sana Qadar: She also addresses this idea that love, when it's good and real, should feel easy…

Esther Perel: Love is not a permanent state of enthusiasm.

Sana Qadar: So we're going to pick up right where we left off. Here is part two of our chat with Esther Perel.

Sana Qadar: We had an incredible response. A lot of people sent questions through. So I want to put some of their questions to you. And I will start with Leila. Leila writes, hi Esther. They say once a cheat, always a cheat. I spent my 20s in active alcoholism and cheated on almost every partner I had. I am deeply ashamed of my past and the hurt I caused. I wholeheartedly believe I have changed now and have been faithful in my current relationship of almost two years, with no plans of ever cheating again. Is there hope for me to live the rest of my life as an honest person?

Esther Perel: So I spent 10 years, Leila, researching infidelity. I think that it's vast. I wrote an entire book about it, State of Affairs, because it is not a yes, no answer. Do I believe that people can change? Yes. I wouldn't be doing this work if I didn't think that there is a possibility for people to change, to grow and to become different. I think what will be interesting for you is maybe slightly less questions about can I become honest, but more turning your shame into responsibility. If you live it as shame, then you feel like there is a part inside of you that is rotten, that is dirty, that is dishonest, that is deceitful, that is duplicitous, that is all those things that you used to be, that can lie easily, etc. I think maybe somebody or some people you could actually write to and basically just say, I owe you an apology.

Sana Qadar: Former partners.

Esther Perel: Yes, former partners. I owe you an apology without a big mea culpa of what you were going through, because the point is not for them to become empathic toward you. The point is for you to basically make amends, be accountable, take responsibility, which I think is one of the most important cleansing projects that we can have when we feel that something inside of us is living that we worry is contaminated. That's the point I was trying to make. So it's for you, where there are relationships of people that when you think, who did I hurt? Who may be walking around thinking of me as they're trying to create a new relationship with someone else, wondering if they're going to be cheated on time and again. That's the reality of what the legacy that you leave in other people's hearts. Start with that. If you begin to notice and then ask yourself, is it how much was it all related to the drinking? How much is this the model that you saw? You know, where did you learn that you needed to, you know, be on top, be the one who leaves first before anybody can ever leave you, etc, etc. And look at the vulnerabilities that you bring to love. But do I think you are not imprisoned into who you used to be? No, I don't think that that's who we necessarily are. I also think that cheating is a very complex word. What exactly did you do? And what exactly do you think that your dishonesty rests upon? And how are the, what are the other ways that you can at times be dishonest? So, you know, we use words. And in the question, these words make a lot of sense to the person who is asking it. And everybody who hears it gives it their meaning. So it's such a loaded word to begin with. But I think the bigger question is more, can I have been a certain way 10 years ago and be different today? And what lives inside of me? And what do I do with the remnants of parts of me that I carry with shame? And that's when I say one of the most liberating things one can do is turn shame into responsibility.

Sana Qadar: We had a couple of questions about strained family relationships.

Esther Perel: Oh, yes.

Sana Qadar: Iona asks, my father is dying of cancer. We were very close when I was little, but our relationship became strained when I was a teenager. He can be intentionally cutting and hurtful. I love him deeply, but I don't feel emotionally safe being close to him. How do you show up meaningfully for a person at the end of their life when the relationship feels so strained? And how do you grieve someone you love when you don't feel close to them?

Esther Perel: It's a beautiful question. Those are the questions when I think I should not do short interviews like this. That's part of why I'm a therapist, so that I can sit with these questions and really go into the depth of it. But it's nice to do both. If you are not very close to a person, what you grieve sometimes is not their loss, but it's the loss of the closeness you may have wanted or the loss that you once hoped you could have. Sometimes a death is liberating. I think that that is a taboo that sometimes we don't dare to utter, but that is true too. Sometimes a death comes with the grief of what it never became. The potential that never unfolded, the healing that never took place, the amend that never happened, the apology that was never said, the forgiveness that was never granted. If you want to go see your father, you're not going to go because of the relationship. You're going to go because to him. You may go more in terms of the relationship with yourself. I want to have had the opportunity to say goodbye, or I want to have the opportunity of sitting next to this person, my dad, and talk to him in my head. I have no illusion that if I say things to him like that, he will be any different. But I want to have the opportunity of sitting next to him, looking at him, and telling him in my own inner voice those things that need to be off my chest. So that's a form of goodbye too. Sometimes people go and you are surprised. The person who is dying is having a process too, and they too may suddenly realize, I have only one opportunity left to tell you I wish I had done it better. I wish I had been different. And you don't have to say, I forgive you. You can just simply say, I'm glad you think this way. You don't have to put a nice bow. But what is interesting is you only have the chance now. If you care to do it with the person present. If you say, I'll do this by myself later on when it comes up, then that's a different story. That's what I say to people is, for yourself, if you don't want to leave later wondering, I should have, I could have, why didn't I, then just go. But don't go for a resolution. Go so that you don't have to tell yourself later, I wish I had.

Sana Qadar: I may have set you up with asking that question in a short format, but that's a beautiful and very helpful answer, I think. Someone I'll call Danielle asks, how do you maintain a relationship with a sibling who has cut you off or should you? My sister and I were best friends growing up. I thought she was the one person in the world that I could always count on. When I was about 30 and she was 27, she started distancing herself from me. One day when I really pressed her for answers, she said she didn't want to be close to family anymore. And I knew that meant me. It's been nine years now. And even as I write this, I cry. It's like grief, except no one has died. She's living overseas now and we're barely in touch. And while I have moved on and my life is mostly happy now, whenever I remember the loss, I still feel so sad.

Esther Perel: I feel it on my skin as you write it, you know, as Danielle writes it. Because even though the person is alive, that the relationship is dead or feels dead. And that is grief. You can't force her. I mean, you can reach out to your sister. You may already have, but she seems to have been determined. Family cutoff between siblings, between parents and children, it's major. In the United States, we say that there is one in three Americans today are cut off from a family member or estranged. That's the new term.

Sana Qadar: One in three is massive.

Esther Perel: Yes, it's massive. It's really, really massive. And that has to do with people's expectations. You see, when relationships, I'm going to go back to the thing I said to you earlier, and also to this woman who is asking this beautiful question. When relationships were rooted in duty and obligation, it wasn't about how you feel. You had all kinds of bad relationships with family members. They just continued. So was marriage. It was a one-time enterprise, and you did it once, and you were stuck for life. And if you didn't like it, you could hope for an early death of your partner, but you were in it. Now that we have a model that is not about tight knots, but about loose threads, it is rooted in feelings. And the primary feeling it is rooted in is authenticity, to be true to myself. And in order to be true to myself, I will forego the relationships with people that historically were non-negotiable. Now, does that mean they were not cut-offs before? No. Brothers have not spoken to each other for 50 years forever. And in every society, traditional cultures, collectively and family-oriented society, as well as more individualistic society. So it's more the parent-child. It was okay for parents to cut off a child, to disown a child. It had a term. But there was no child that necessarily made a statement about disowning or estranging themselves from their parents, even though they may have gone and traveled for 10 years. So they did it without necessarily naming it and making a statement about it. You have pretty much this woman now, I'm seeing. What is her name?

Sana Qadar: We have called her Danielle.

Esther Perel: I have built a new life. I have people who matter to me a great deal. I know I have a lot to offer. When I think about my sister, it aches. It's a dark place. It's a loss. And it brings up sadness each time. And it will. And sometimes it doesn't for months. And then you see a movie or you read a story, and it suddenly brings this sharp ache back into your body. And that is going to potentially be your story. Maybe one day you'll write a letter again. Maybe one day she will write something to you, and there's not much you can do. You need two people. And then you can ask, why did it happen and why me? And why did I become lumped in with the other members of the family? And what did I do? Or why did she feel that she needed to cut off from me in order to be able to be her own person? And hasn't she become her own person, and doesn't that allow us? You lose nothing by reaching out once a year, twice a year, or whenever you want. You get an answer, you will know something. You don't get an answer, you will know something too.

Sana Qadar: But otherwise it's a sadness you have to learn to live with. It's a hole you live with. All right. This next question touches on sexual assault. So a little content warning there. Michael asks, I've reached a point where I've realized that I am attracted to quote-unquote bad men. I had a difficult childhood characterized by violent homophobic bullying at school, and a psychologically abusive and alcoholic father at home. Last year I entered a relationship with a man who I thought was like my dad on a good day. But unfortunately, as things progressed, he was worse than my dad on a bad day. He raped me at least three times. I finally gained the courage to leave permanently about six months in. Now I find myself disinterested when I meet good guys. How can I resolve this? I want to find good men attractive, but I worry my scar tissue is in the way.

Esther Perel: Well, first of all, Michael, you are extremely astute in your description. You are quite self-aware of what happens to you. For me, the place where I stop in your description is I met a guy who was like my dad on a good day. So you can discern. The discerning is not between good guys, bad guys. The discerning is about what draws you in. What is it that you pursue, you know, like a moth to a flame that you find is irresistible? Why the dullness of kindness? What is it about you that think that you deserve the mistreatment? The kindness is valuing you, is connected to your sense of self-worth. The mistreatment is connected to if I am treated this way, if my dad trashed me, if I was raped, if I was violated. And the power here is that you're talking men to men too, which is often not spoken about nearly enough. And kindness sometimes is viewed with suspicion. And therefore, it doesn't have traction. And therefore, it doesn't have erotic charge. And this is not something that I can give you an answer for just like that on a podcast. The main thing I will say to you, Michael, is this. It's not about the guys and the men and the father even. It's about what you experience inside of you and how you view yourself. When you will view yourself as deserving in a way that your dad never taught you you could, you will allow a kind hand to touch you and you will not feel dissociated. Because that's when you talk about dullness. You won't feel this kind of frozen body dissociated that says whoever you're touching is not me. You will actually welcome it and you may even invite it. And I hope that for you.

Sana Qadar: You are listening to All in the Mind from ABC Radio National. I'm Sana Qadar. This is part two of our chat with psychotherapist and host of the podcast, Where Should We Begin, Esther Perel. If you want to listen to the first part of our discussion, just scroll back in your podcast feed. And the episode part one was titled Esther Perel on love in the age of AI. Today, though, for part two, we're putting some of your audience questions to Esther and getting advice on some of the problems you're facing. And just a note on this next question, it was written and asked before the war in Iran broke out. So presumably what the substance of this question is asking will apply to a whole lot more people now. Lindsay asks, what can I do to maintain intimacy and keep the lines of connection open when world events impact a relationship so personally? For context, my husband is Palestinian while I am white Australian. We have been married for 15 years and have two children. His family is all over there and they feel like a noose is tightening. I struggle with this knowledge, so I can't imagine how this feels for him. While I try and support him and talk to him, it feels like he is in an unreachable place. He doesn't acknowledge his trauma, despite traumatic events, and there is a wall that keeps building between us. He won't even admit it's there. And as the news gets more bleak, I'm worried this wall will never go away. His friend is Jewish Israeli, also with an Australian wife, and she says similar things. A white friend married to a Latino man in the U.S. feels the same in her marriage, too. So I imagine my question isn't just mine alone.

Esther Perel: When you are in a relationship with someone who carries trauma, individual trauma or in this instance collective trauma, political trauma, and you make a very good point of giving other examples to say it is not specifically because of his background. It is this divide that is created between people who at this moment are living a whole reality that their partner has no sense about. A reality of dread, a reality of fear, a reality of rage, a reality of loss, a reality of a bond between this individual and their community, their people, their group. That divide, when bad things happen, becomes more intensified. So you're saying he belongs to this other world, there is a wall that comes up, I can't enter there, and he is not even acknowledging it. Imagine that you really say to him, you are experiencing something that I have no idea about. But I can offer you something, hopefully, that is also important for you. That will actually maybe even help you cope with all the things that are happening to your family, to your people, any of the people. It's an interesting point made about how his friend is Jewish-Israeli or about how the American friend is married to a Latino. So the idea is here, how do we live with cultural, political, racial differences inside intimate relationships? That is the broader question. And of course, one of the questions that I always ask is, what is the story of origin? What drew you to this person? Each of you chose each other. What was that choice about? And how can that choice be validated today? Or is there a feeling that a certain gap is being created that, you know, this is about your fear. You have a sense that a gap is being created and that you're kind of maybe even losing him a little bit. Because you don't belong to the same story, but you don't have to belong to the same story. Refugees marry locals. Immigrants marry people from a place. People who come from horrible backgrounds marry people who had good families. People who are in situations of war marry people who have never known war. That is, what can I offer him? And what do I do with the parts of him that I may not be able to relate to and to understand? And is it okay for him to have more connection and identification with other people who belong to the same part of the world than to me? So talk to him about your fear. Don't talk to him necessarily about his trauma or his people or the war. More, do I have anything to offer you at this moment, given that you're going through something in which I am not a participant? That would be my opening question.

Sana Qadar: And you know very well about collective trauma from your own family background as the daughter of Holocaust survivors. Have you seen similar sort of dynamics play out in your own circles?

Esther Perel: Yes, but I also need to add to that that my husband, Jack Saul, is a psychologist who has worked for 30 years in collective trauma. And moral injuries of war and collective resilience. So this is very much a subject I have lived personally. I think that that idea, there's something very beautiful in what this woman is describing, but the issue is not his war. The issue is sometimes it feels, you know, what do I have to offer given the magnitude of the crisis that her husband is experiencing? And you have to ask yourself, this person chose me. And when it comes in the context of a relationship, so did I know Holocaust survivors who married non-survivors? Yes, I think they are hidden children who were hidden for years, you know, during the war, who then married somebody who had no idea about the war. Yes, and I believe that people who experience this often find more solidarity with other people who are experiencing similar things. Even if it's not the same war, even if it's not the same massacre, even if it's not the same, but it is people who have experienced similar events in their lives. And they go to those groups, solidarity groups, groups of people who have experienced similar experiences in life, support groups, 12-step groups, you name it, are set up without the partner. You go to a 12-step group, the partner isn't there because it's other people who are struggling with the same thing. That identification is extremely important. And the partners have to really be able to say, I'm so glad you have other people to talk to. What else can I offer you? So don't try to enter that place specifically. You have other reasons for why you are in their life.

Sana Qadar: A couple of very quick questions to close with. Someone we're calling Julia asks, people say love in a healthy relationship should feel easy. In your opinion, what should it feel like?

Esther Perel: Love is not a permanent state of enthusiasm. It's a verb and you have to conjugate it in all tenses. And it's active. So this notion that love should be easy. No, it isn't. It just isn't. It's very challenging to deal with an other. To really accept the otherness of a person who may have completely different perceptions, views, ideas, experience, feelings about the same situation as you. And to hold on to your reality without disconnecting from them. And to relate to their reality without disconnecting from you. That is one of the great challenges of modern love, the way we want to experience it. It should feel alive. It should feel dynamic. It should feel that one day, sometimes you think, I cannot spend another minute with this person. What the hell am I doing here? I gotta get out of here. So that's normal. And the next minute you're thinking, I can't think my life without you. What was I thinking? And that back and forth is actually normal. It's not always that extreme, but it has to feel alive. And it has to be able to encapsulate a contradiction and a cornucopia of emotions. If it's all the time the same thing, it's kind of bland. So that's what I consider. There's something fierce about it.

Sana Qadar: Okay, I like that. Shades of grey and all sorts of colours, not just black and white. For sure. Okay, this final question comes from Instagram. This person asks, I'm 24. I have never had a relationship. Will my first love still feel as special as if I was 18?

Esther Perel: Absolutely, if not more so. You will have lived longer. You will have fantasized about it. But the only risk you run is if you want to experience that which you have imagined. Experience that which is in front of you. It may be completely different from what you imagined or way more intense than what you imagined. But don't try to create a concordance between what you've concocted in your head and then what's in front of you. But no, I think a first love is a first love. That power, that surrender, that obsessiveness, that feeling that you're being understood and met and seen like nobody ever has. That sense that you are aligned with another person like that, eye to eye. All of these things. That sensation when the person touches your hand or puts their hand on your shoulder or that first kiss. All of it. It is beautiful. And so it's later. It's later for many, many people today in the West.

Sana Qadar: Yeah, yeah. And that question just felt sweet to me as well because she's only 24 and that's still so young. Esther Perel, thank you so much for being on All in the Mind. It's been a pleasure to talk to you.

Esther Perel: Same for me.

Sana Qadar: That is Esther Perel, psychotherapist and host of the podcast Where Should We Begin? Thanks to producer Rose Kerr, senior producer James Bullen and sound engineer Roi Huberman. I am Sana Qadar. I host and present All in the Mind and I want to say a huge thank you to all of you who sent us your questions. Sorry we couldn't get to all of them. There's always a time limitation, but I hope you found something in these answers that can help you in your own life. Now, just before I go, I'll let you know that next week we are doing an episode about the experience of being a carer in Australia. There are about three million carers in Australia. And Casey Beros became one for her father when he received his terminal cancer diagnosis.

Casey Beros: I can't tell you how many times we were told it's weeks now, and then he'd live months beyond that. You know, I think the first time that I, that I heard it's probably weeks now was like December, January, and he didn't die until the following November. So, you know, when I think when you're in the position of being somebody's primary carer, maybe it's for your partner or for a parent or whatever, when you hear they've got weeks, you go, okay, these are gonna be some of the roughest weeks of my life and, and evidently theirs. But I can, I can do anything for a few weeks. And so you are probably, especially if you are in that sandwich generation, have small children, aging parents, you're probably already white knuckling through. And then when it goes on for months and then more months, and then more months, you are so exhausted. But so grateful that they're still here. It is the strangest feeling.

Sana Qadar: That is next week's show. Until then, take care and I'll catch you next time.