{"podcast":{"title":"Marriage Therapy Radio","slug":"marriage-therapy-radio-716729","podcast_index_feed_id":716729,"rss_url":"https://rss.art19.com/marriage-therapy-radio","website_url":"https://art19.com/shows/marriage-therapy-radio","image_url":"https://content.production.cdn.art19.com/images/73/05/66/00/73056600-70e5-4ac5-a567-c66dc00415b3/f16716c292d04172eddbd3d55a6bbf82edff468857593764be3ee90b739efcc599e2c074f31cefac2fee7cb5e52330967084efdc2ed8d93e27dc789dbc2f189f.jpeg","author":"MTR","episode_count":432,"summary":"Look... every couple struggles. You fight too much; you're bored; sex is either okay (or rare); maybe you're even considering divorce. OR... maybe your marriage is actually pretty good, but you want to go deeper. In this podcast, straight-talking marriage therapist Zach Brittle tackle the most common complaints virtually every marriage experience. Along the way, they reveal the science behind strong relationships and talk about what's really going on for couples. Topics include conflict, communication, compatibility, money, sex, in-laws, infidelity, time-management, future dreams, and more. If you want relief? A deeper connection? A new way forward...? Then you've got to find out what's REALLY going on in your marriage. That's what this podcast is about. You can learn more about Zach, and his alternatives to traditional therapy at marriagetherapyradio.com .","last_synced_at":"2026-07-07T16:22:53.819472+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/marriage-therapy-radio-716729"},"episode":{"title":"Ep 422 She Thought He Was Just a Jerk: The Hidden Addiction That Nearly Cost Them w/ Matt & Paige","slug":"ep-422-she-thought-he-was-just-a-jerk-the-hidden-addiction-that-nearly-cost-them-w-matt-paige","published_at":"2026-04-28T07:00:00+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/marriage-therapy-radio-716729/ep-422-she-thought-he-was-just-a-jerk-the-hidden-addiction-that-nearly-cost-them-w-matt-paige","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/marriage-therapy-radio-716729","url":"https://marriagetherapyradio.com/2026/04/28/ep-422-she-thought-he-was-just-a-jerk-the-hidden-addiction-that-nearly-cost-them-w-matt-paige/","audio_url":"https://rss.art19.com/episodes/f23ea4ac-6a1c-42c0-870f-2dc9edfa2c36.mp3?rss_browser=BAhJIg90cmFuc2NyaWJyBjoGRVQ%3D--952c5701c84ad333c69d5faa668f8177091704f0","summary":"Zach sits down with Matt and Paige, a married couple from the DFW area who have been together since they were 14 years old, and who now host their own podcast for spouses and partners of people navigating addiction. What sounds like a high school sweetheart story quickly opens into something far more complicated: a decade-long opioid addiction, financial abuse, gaslighting, panic attacks, and a slow, hard-won rebuild that took most of their adult lives. Matt frames their relationship in three chapters: young and naive kids figuring out what love even is, the dark middle years where addiction quietly dismantled the life they were trying to build, and the current chapter where, for the first time in 25 years, they describe themselves as genuinely on equal footing. Paige's side of the story carries the weight of what spouses often carry alone. She didn't know it was addiction for years. She thought he was just treating her badly. And when his recovery finally stabilized, her body held the bill: panic attacks, rage, and a grief that had nowhere to go while things were still dangerous. She eventually came to a kind of peace, but only after Matt began holding real accountability, not just staying sober. The conversation covers the question of when an addict actually earns credit from their partner, the long gap between sobriety and true marital recovery, how they talk to their kids about addiction, and what it means to finally feel known by someone rather than just tolerated. This is a candid, unsentimental look at what it takes to come back from something that breaks most couples apart. Key Takeaways Sobriety and marital recovery are not the same clock. For Matt and Paige, it took nearly a decade after Matt got sober for Paige to feel genuinely safe again. When one partner…","meta_description":"Zach sits down with Matt and Paige, a married couple from the DFW area who have been together since they were 14 years old, and who now host their own pod…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":2735,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/marriage-therapy-radio-716729/episodes/ep-422-she-thought-he-was-just-a-jerk-the-hidden-addiction-that-nearly-cost-them-w-matt-paige/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/marriage-therapy-radio-716729/ep-422-she-thought-he-was-just-a-jerk-the-hidden-addiction-that-nearly-cost-them-w-matt-paige.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}