Customer Reviews

When His Secret Sin Breaks Your Heart: Letters to Hurting Wives

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

As a wife of a porn addict, I didn't know that so many things were tied together... I thought his porn addiction was just one aspect of his life, I didn't know that being financially controlling, emotionally distant and cold, not having intimacy in or out of the bedroom, not socializing.... it was all related! This book helped me to go from feeling isolated and alone to realizing I'm not the only woman who is in this exact same spot! And best of all... there is help and there is hope! AND Kathy Gallagher helps you to stay focus on the Almighty Healer through it all. I highly reccomend this book to anyone hurting and searching for answers.

If you are looking for a book to help with a personal situation in your life or in the life of someone you love that is hurting, this is not the first book I would recommend. Each letter is written with a different situation in mind and it is likely that only a few of the letters she writes will touch your personal situation, especially if your situation involves other forms of abuse. If you are looking for a more professional or pyschological approach, you may want to look elsewhere. However, if you want to have a greater understanding of how the sexual addictions of husbands hurt their wives or to let you know you are not alone, this book will help give you that. Kathy, the author, has experienced a great deal of hurt in her own marriage and identifies well with the various situations. Although I didn't always agree with her advice, I admire Kathy's consistency as she points each woman back to the Lord where all Truth and healing ultimately lies.

Unlike the previous reviewer, this was not a waste of money, and as far as Patrick Carnes is concerned, he has particular limitations, in that he doesn't focus on the spiritual applications. Kathy Gallagher has lived through her own husband's addiction for many years, and yes...she has compiled letters, but this is important, as it is an emotional look at a painful subject.

She provides encouragement by providing practical and biblical answers based on real life testimonies, and she not only sympathizes with the emotional turmoil wives experience, but more importantly, she directs them to their only true source of hope - Jesus Christ.

Read with an open heart and mind, and make up your own mind, not based on a biased and ill-informed perception of faith and the answers it provides. You make the decision!! The book comes highly recommended!!!

The reason for purchasing this book is obviously a heartbreaking one, but I found so much encouragement in its pages. This book really helped me begin to shift my focuss off myself and on to God. The author has been through what you may be going through and what I am facing and truly offers much hope.

I began reading When His Secret Sin Breaks Your Heart in hopes of understanding the effects of sexual sin on the wife of someone who was involved in sexual sin. What I got was many hours of ministering to my heart. I am not the wife of one who struggles, but have been the man struggling with sexual sin. Kathy Gallagher has spent her life ministering to women who have been broken by their husband's sexual sin. She herself has also been through the ups and downs since her husband spent many years involved in sexual sin. She speaks from the position of someone who knows, but more importantly someone who has been healed by the great healer himself, Jesus Christ.
The book is a collection of letters written in response to letters she had received. These letters touched on just about every subject related to sexual sin that I can imagine. Divorce, separation, dealing with suspicion, the importance of gratitude and the roots of homosexuality are among the subjects that she ministers to. I say ministers to because she does not simply relate some data about a specific subject, but she opens her heart and allows the Holy Spirit to speak through her to touch the hearts of her readers. Her writing style is inviting and familiar. It is almost as though she were sitting opposite me in a small sitting room and speaking to me.
At times her letters were loving, understanding and encouraging. At other times they were confronting, direct and honest. She would confront the selfishness that was shown in the letter from Lauren who was trying to justify divorce because of her husband's use of pornography. Rather than agreeing with Lauren, Kathy Gallagher offered that God will use this time of suffering to purify her. The ultimate goal that God has in anything that we experience is to make us more and more like Jesus through the process. This was a major theme throughout the book. The struggles that we are going through will be used by God to make us more like His Son.
Kathy does not use her own experience, but uses scripture and the leading of the Holy Spirit to respond to the writer's questions. In regards to confronting Joyce's husband Kathy sighted Matthew 18:15-17 as a guideline for how to confront him. First go to him alone, then bring one or two as witnesses then tell it to the church. The objective is to bring about an understanding about his sin. Help her husband to come to a point of honesty and repentance. This brings glory to God and brings everyone closer to the Lord. As she says, "Let's hope that your husband will WAKE UP out of the delusion that he can participate in such darkness and still think he's walking with the Lord." Restoration to a right relationship with the Lord should be our primary concern.
I have come away with new insight into the collateral damage that is caused when a man engages in sexual sin. I have also gained more understanding of my own sin. I have also seen the Holy Spirit at work in her writing and in my reading of her letters. I am thankful of the way these letters have ministered to my heart. I would recommend this book to any spouse of someone who is engaging in sexual sin.

This was not the first book I read, nor necessarily recommend . .. Every Heart Restored was the first and still highly recommend. Now being on the other side and seeing True Victory of my husband over Sexual Sin including elicit sex, pornography and masturbation I can relate to much of the advice given to various women. When you want to run, when you ask why is this happening to me, when you feel like policing your husbands every move, when you have sneaking suspicions and you wonder whether to confront them or not, etc. . . this books helps to guide you through some of these processes. It is reassuring to know that you are not the first women, nor unfortunately the last whom has felt this way. The Gallaghers - Steve & Kathy offer solid Biblical truths with their PureLife Ministiry in Kentucky. Yes, there is victory to be had over sexual sin, and Yes your marriage can be restored if both you and your husband Put God First. As an FYI -We are using this book in conjunction with Every Heart Restored in Wives of Sexual Addicts Recovery Class in Metro Detroit Area.

This book is absolutely perfect for what I am going through. I have gained so much insight and have been repeatedly comforted through Kathy Gallagher's words to other women in (unfortunately) similar circumstances. To me, this book is worth it's weight in gold. Thank you for offering it at an affordable price. :-)

When brokenness shatters the lives of people we love it is human nature to want to share the burden--but we often do not know how to help..."When His Secret Sin Breaks Your Heart" is a wonderful way to compassionately and effectively help shoulder the difficult burdens your friend or loved one may be bearing..."and so fulfill the law of Christ" to help carry someone else's crushing load! Pastor John C. Gore

I am glad to see there is help out there for wives whose husbands are starting down the path of healing. Secret sin is very damaging and devestating and to be able to identify with others is like a breath of fresh air. Great book!

This was the perfect book for a dear hurting friend-- she has learned a lot about how to love after being hurt.