Aftershock - Confronting Your HusbandSample

Staging an Intervention: Key Step #2

You could handle the logistics of an intervention in any number of ways. Decide with your team the best way to proceed. What happens afterward depends entirely on your husband.

The purpose of this intervention is to talk to him in a clear, loving, and respectful way about his destructive behavior. Throughout this meeting, the focus should remain on your husband and the specific steps you’re asking him to take for healing. Don’t let him change the subject by pointing the finger at you or anyone else.

Your immediate goal is for him to agree to the treatment plan. You or the members of your team may already have thought through the details, including scheduling tentative dates with a counseling specialist, lining up childcare, and arranging transportation. If you haven’t nailed down the logistics yet, you can let your husband know that it will be done as soon as possible.

Ideally, the treatment should begin sooner rather than later. Your husband might come up with a dozen reasons treatment isn’t possible, like he doesn’t need help, therapy costs too much, or he can’t get off work this time of year. Don’t be surprised if he consents to treatment in front of everyone and then withdraws his consent later. This is predictable in some ways because one part of him may want to stop his compulsive habit, but another part of him can’t let it go.

To counter his excuses, you and the rest of the team may find it helpful to think in terms of a medical crisis. If your husband were suddenly in a critical accident or diagnosed with a rapidly advancing cancer, then all the peripheral stuff would become secondary, and you would make sure he got the help he needed.

If your husband continues to refuse treatment after the intervention, follow the guidelines in Matthew 18:17: “If he refuses to listen to [others], tell it to the church.” This means bringing the problem before the church leadership, and possibly the congregation. Clearly, this is a radical tactic since it causes the sin to become generally known and brings to bear the influence of the church.

Next, we’ll examine how to respond if his reaction to your confrontation is denial.