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When John and I married, it was a dream come true for both of us. After both suffering from failed first marriages, we felt God had given us a second chance. We knew enough not to expect our lives to be perfect, but we certainly didn't expect to be miserable.

Yet just four months into our marriage, our past relationship struggles started popping up, which caused a lot of misunderstandings. It seemed we were arguing daily.

The situation reached a crisis one Saturday while we were driving home from shopping. John had been talking about something and I felt myself tune out.

When John pulled into our driveway and turned off the car, he said, "Karen, I'm trying to talk to you and you haven't heard a word I've said."

I told him I was sorry, then said, "I got distracted, but I heard part of what you said. Please start over. You have my full attention now."

But instead of starting over, John became frustrated and said, "I might as well wander off somewhere and disappear. You probably wouldn't even notice." Then he got out of the car and walked away angrily.

I was stunned and wasn't sure what to do. I felt hurt and angry. And I was tired of arguing constantly.

That Saturday was the last straw. When Karen talks to me, I stop what I'm doing and listen to her. But she doesn't do that for me. Why is it so difficult for her to respect me by listening?

After I got out of the car, I went to our bedroom and sat on the bed, feeling lost and frustrated. The only thing I knew to do was to pray, "God, why is this happening?"

When Karen feels frustrated because of a stressful day at work, she comes home and withdraws—tunes the world out. That hurts me, especially when I want to connect with her.

Sometimes I can speak for several minutes before I realize Karen hasn't heard a word I've said. So when she did it again that Saturday, I felt abandoned and angry.

Karen wanted to work things out with John before their marriage fell apart. She sat in the car and asked God what to do. She felt a clear answer: Talk to John.

Karen went into their bedroom. When John saw her, he apologized for becoming angry. "I explained that some situations with Karen trigger bad memories for me," John says.

"That's when I realized what our problem was," says Karen. "We kept replaying bad mental tapes from our past relationships. We were bringing them into our marriage and they were crushing us. The old tapes represented old hurts that replayed in the present when triggered by certain situations, words, or actions."

Both John and Karen had grown up in alcoholic homes where verbal abuse caused them to feel abandoned. Their previous difficult marriages had only added to their insecurities.

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