Dr. Foltz is a very intelligent and caring professional. She does her very best to help with whatever issues arise and takes her job seriously. She taught me appropriate boundaries with those closest to me, helped me to resolve family conflicts, and gave me the tools to deal with unnecessary and destructive guilt. With her guidance, I am in a peaceful place in my life. I highly recommend her.
A. H. (professional adult female)
We had just returned from visiting our family in Chicago over Labor Day weekend. We would be celebrating our 9 year wedding anniversary in two days! We talked about our relationship on the car ride home. We discussed honesty and the importance of meeting each other’s needs. It was a good conversation. The best we’d had in a while. In my core I felt like we were headed for new beginnings. I was right.
The next day I read an email that changed our lives. My head was spinning, my body was numb, and my heart was shattered. I had no foundation, no hope, and nothing to believe in…I had just discovered my husband had been cheating. I was done! I had checked out and removed myself from the relationship. How could he? I had a decision to make…Leave or stay? I had no idea what to do. I wanted to make a decision that would not hurt or harm my children, so I decided to stay until I figured out my next steps. In the meantime, my husband started to look for counseling because he knew we needed a third party if this was going to work. He found several, but we both agreed on Dr. Foltz.
I don’t know if it was her delicate candor or her love of Billie Holiday, but after our first session we were hooked. She immediately addressed the third party in our relationship…the one he and I had neglected for so long… the marriage. We had no idea what we were in for, but my husband knew he wanted to stay married to me and I was willing to stay married to him, “but it would have to be different.”
For about a year, we saw Dr. Foltz weekly. In the beginning the sessions were TOUGH! She broke down walls and forced us (in her loving, yet candid way) to take a hard, close look at ourselves. She encouraged us to be truthful about who we were, with ourselves and one another. Her recommendation of the book, Boundaries, by Henry Cloud and John Townsend, helped us see how much control we had over situations and circumstances in our past, present, and future. We learned that it was our responsibility to protect our marriage.
Dr. Foltz also helped us uncover how our past impacted our future. As I mentioned earlier, my husband and I were approaching our 9 year anniversary, but we were high school sweethearts, so there was a lot of history that had to be sorted through. Dr. Foltz helped us discuss and release pains of the past that haunted our marriage. Our discussions with her allowed us to see how these “ghosts” impacted decisions we made, gave us permission to make poor choices, and allowed us to harbor guilt that was destroying us as individuals and our marriage.
I think the most important thing we gained from our sessions with Dr. Foltz was an understanding of love and forgiveness according to Christ. We knew she was a Christian, and every once in a while she would mention Christian beliefs as a basis for her comments. I clearly remember the analogy she gave for “choosing” to love and forgive. She told me at some point I have to stop “trying” to forgive and just choose to forgive, choose to trust, and choose to give my heart back to my husband without holding back. She equated it to sitting on her couch every week. She went on to explain if the couch was not there and I sat and fell; I would continue to check for the couch for a while at first. But, after the couch was there and I could depend on it to be there, I would just choose to sit…or not. But either way it was a choice. She reminded me to depend on Jesus to help me make this hard choice. This was a turning point in our sessions and a moment in which I, and only I, had a decision to make. I knew the choice I made was going to determine the success or failure of our marriage. I chose forgiveness.
A little over a year later, we are not perfect, but we have learned to accept the hard truth about one another. We understand the rewards and consequences of our choices. We both chose to forgive, we chose to open our hearts to love, and we chose to trust. The road to recovery has not been easy. We continue to work hard every day to make our marriage work. Dr. Foltz taught us to communicate and tell one another the hard truth. She reminded us that we will disappoint one another because we are not perfect, but we should set boundaries to protect our marriage.
When I think of all the pain we have caused one another through the years, and the devastation of that dreadful day on September 5, 2011, I am in awe of the miracle of our current relationship. I believe everything happens for a reason and I KNOW Dr. Foltz was put in our path to heal our marriage and help us mend our broken hearts. She is a talented professional who is not afraid to push you to be your best, true self. She truly cares about her clients and believes in true love. I am extremely thankful for the work she did in our lives. We carry it with us always. Thank you Dr. Linda Foltz!
Mr. and Mrs. H (written by Mrs. H) (married couple)