The Healing Choice

Book: The Healing Choice

Author: Brenda Stoeker and Susan Allen

Summary: In the aftermath of discovering a husband’s battle with pornography or other forms of sexual infidelity, countless wives are left feeling humiliated, betrayed, angry, and desperate. Worse still is the sense of isolation created by the fear of revealing the truth even to trusted friends.

Angie's Take: I try to be direct and authentic every day. I make it a point to share myself with others in a one on one situation when I think it will encourage and uplift someone. It's an important gift of self. But these ladies, go deeply into that area. They delve into a place of pain and anguish that so many feel and are ashamed to talk about. Betrayal. In our culture, the post-Christian one, everyone expects it to roll off you like water. Shake it off as if you are an athlete. Yet down inside, your soul is slowly dying. I love that Brenda and Susan shine a light into that dark aloneness. If you are going through the pain and agony of betrayal (or even are the one who did the betraying) this book will help you find your way out of that cave of hopelessness. Please read it.

Authors Brenda Stoeker and Susan Allen understand all too well the pain inflicted by a spouse’s sexual duplicity, and in this empowering book and companion workbook they lead women out of the closet of shame and into the light of God’s healing. With biblical wisdom and compassion born of experience, they lovingly guide women in moving toward genuine spiritual and emotional restoration, even if their husbands never change.

Drawing on their own stories and those of other women, the authors provide step-by-step counsel in grabbing hold of intimacy with God and the community of women to find the needed support to move beyond devastation and into a restored wholeness. Through these powerful, practical resources, women will be equipped to find healing and to make wise choices for themselves, their children, and their marriage.



Author Bio: Brenda Stoeker is a registered nurse, mother of four, and seasoned marriage teacher with life experience in rebuilding a broken marriage. She and her husband, Fred, are coauthors of Every Marriage Restored, which lays a foundation for the deeper personal needs addressed in The Healing Choice. Brenda and Fred live in Johnston, Iowa.



Susan Allen is a counselor and, with husband Clay, the cofounder of Avenue, a ministry centered on healing and restoration from sexual brokenness. The author of Avenue’s acclaimed curriculum for women’s small groups, she specializes in helping women create and maintain effective healing groups, both in churches and communities across the country. She and Clay live in Danville, CA.