Making a marriage THRIVE when everything says it never will

With Dirk & Amy Bak

What happens when what you expected for your marriage is nowhere in sight and nothing seems like it’s ever going to get better? Dirk & Amy Bak found themselves in a place they never wanted to be, feeling there was no way out and no solution.

Today, they are happier than they ever imagined and actually expect their marriage to only get better.

How’d they do it? Let them tell you about their journey, and you’ll see how it can be your journey too.

Dirk and Amy’s relationship started out like many. They met in college, were dating by Thanksgiving, and were pretty serious by summer. When Amy decided not to return to school, Dirk wasn’t sure a long distance relationship was going to work. But Amy had something to tell him that changed his mind. “In August, I found out I was pregnant. We decided we’d get married.” Amy remembers telling her parents. “I was scared, but Dirk and I went together. My mom said, ‘Congratulations.’ Dad said, ‘You know you don’t have to get married just because you’re pregnant. Marriage is forever.’ I knew this was a big deal, but it hit me when he said FOREVER. Dirk right off said, ‘Yeah, we’re getting married,’ and that encouraged me that this was the right choice.”

Amy & Dirk’s wedding day November 1989. Amy was just 19 and Dirk was 21.

Forever begins

They tied the knot, moved into an apartment in Alton, and their baby girl Kinsey arrived the following spring. Dirk was still in college in Orange City and worked with his dad and brothers at their family business in Sioux City. Quickly, both Dirk and Amy were having their eyes opened to the differences of their family dynamics.

When they visited Amy’s family it was a nice time where everyone had fun, joked with each other, hung out talking and playing games. Dirk’s house was much different. Dirk said, “At my house, eggnog turned into shots, turned into verbal fights...at minimum.” But life goes on.

Before long they made the move to Sioux City and decided to start going to church. Dirk said, “Amy’s family had grown up in church. When I was a kid, we only went to church when we were going through confirmation. After that we became Creasters - those people who just do church on Christmas and Easter. I thought I was saved. I know now that I wasn’t. Amy and I joined a church and were active helping with the high school youth group each week.”

What seemed to be a marriage leveling out was really just the calm before the storm.

The storm rages

Amy said, “Dirk would stay after work and drink with his family. Time after time I would call and say supper was ready, but he’d just be annoyed. I didn’t understand it. I kept asking him why he kept doing this. Dirk said, ‘You knew this was how I was before we got married!’ I didn’t know. Not really.”

Amy didn’t realize drinking was Dirk’s normal.

Dirk reflected, “The first five-plus years of our marriage I was wrapped up in alcoholism. My dad, my uncle, my grandpa were all alcoholics. A dysfunctional life was normal - drunk fights with your family, having to patch holes in the wall. I thought that’s how it was for everyone.”

Amy would nag Dirk and beg him to change. He would just get mad and avoid any real discussion about his behavior. Things just got worse.

Amy explained, “Dirk was involved in dirt bikes and motocross, and there was always a party afterward, and he just wasn’t coming home.”

Dirk jumped in, “When I got my first OWI and landed in jail, Amy had no idea where I was.”

After their second child Keegan was born they bought an acerage in Merrill, but their problems followed them.

Living on the edge

Dirk was trying but failing. “My second OWI was after a bachelor party. I had told Amy I wasn’t going to get drunk. Something was telling me I needed to stop drinking. Of course, I started drinking. Just before I left the party I switched to drinking Coke, thinking that would solve things. I rolled my truck going around a curve on the way home.

“A guy saw me put it into the ditch on K22. I had to kick my way out of the mangled truck. The guy told me he had called 911 thinking no one could live through that. I thought about running through the cornfields to get to my parents house, but something inside me told me to stay. When I called Amy she said, ‘I’m not surprised.’

“The next day, Amy came with the kids to pick me up from jail. When I came out and she’s there with our kids I felt about two inches high.

“Amy wanted to see the truck, so we went behind our shop where they’d towed it. As we walked back where the truck was, I started to feel more light about it. Guys were joking with me about surviving that, and I felt like it was a badge of honor.

“When Amy saw the crushed car seat she said, ‘What’s it going to take for you to quit drinking? Are you going to have to kill one of our kids?’ Shortly after that we found out that we were expecting our son, Kade.”

Dirk and Amy, summer 1990. For Dirk, motocross and dirt bike events were always a party.

A change is coming

“The consequences rolled out. I had to go to treatment each night. I remember telling the babysitter, ‘I hope they don’t brainwash me.’ Looking back, it was a brain flushing. They say alcoholism is a generational curse. I started to see we were living in this chaos I’d created for my family.

“In the circle of other people that were going through addiction with me, and the brilliance of the therapist being able to ask good questions, I started opening up about the thoughts that were inside. I started putting words to my thoughts and expressing things better.”

Dirk wasn’t the only one who hadn’t been communicating well. Amy admitted, “My communication was nagging him. Who wants to come home to that? Our communication was terrible!”

Dirk said, “I didn’t want conflict or controversy. I figured if we put it off we wouldn’t have to deal with it. Ultimately it just came out sideways later.”

Amy realized she had a lot of issues going on as well. “Even though Dirk’s getting all this help I’m not feeling any different really. I was still very angry. He’s out doing treatment instead of drinking, so I’m still alone with the kids. I started going to Al-Anon.”

Dirk and Amy started some other positive things as well. They needed a new circle of friends. Dirk said, “Your party friends say they’ll always be there for you but, in reality, it’s only when you’re where they are. We started going to the AA meetings together which led to hanging out with them for fun too.”

Amy smiled, “We had so much fun with people, bring the kids, hanging out, playing cards. At first Dirk wondered how you have fun without drinking!”

Dirk adds, “At church (what is now Sunnybrook) we had joined a small group of people our age. I was still drinking when we started. When I got sober I told the group what I was going through. That was really a positive thing.

“Even though we loved our church it was just too much driving – it’d end up being 100 mile days. The kids had a lot of friends in the local churches so we started going to one nearby.”

A work in progress

Things were better in some ways, but Amy was still struggling. “The drinking wasn’t an issue anymore, but our marriage wasn’t good. My dad’s reminder that this was forever was haunting when you know your marriage really sucks.” Remembering the pain, Amy’s eyes well up with tears, “I felt so stuck, and I had so many feelings I didn’t know what to do with. I didn’t want to live like this anymore but, as mad as I was at Dirk, I didn’t want to give up either. You start wondering how you got here.”

Dirk said, “The ladies circling around Amy from AA and Al-Anon suggested Amy go to counseling – in fact one drove her to the first session.”

Amy added, “We didn’t think we could afford it, living check to check, but somehow we made it happen. That counseling helped a lot! Just making that first step was key. I was diagnosed with clinical depression.”

Amy started going to the counselor and then Dirk came in later on. They needed to learn to communicate, and they were learning some tricks to help.

Dirk remembers one tip he used often. “Sometimes Amy needs to speak stuff out loud to be able to process it. I realized that when Amy said something, even if it wasn’t about me, I’d take it personally.”

Amy continued, “The counselor suggested stating, ‘What I’m going to say isn’t about you, it’s just a bad day at work.’ She told Dirk to hold up an imaginary shield to remind him this is to protect him from what I was saying and to not take it personally.”

Dirk said, “I didn’t have to own it. I’d listen, then put the shield down. I started learning that not everything is about me - she just needs to get it off her chest.”

Dirk and Amy's family is complete and growing. November 2005.

Turning the page

After 10 years of working with his family, Dirk sold out of the company and went back to school to be a teacher and a coach.

“In January 2006, I was out of town when the phone rang. My dad had to be life-flighted to the hospital. His cancer was back, and he’d passed out. Some friends prayed over the situation, over my dad and me. I knew my brothers had headed to the hospital, and I can’t tell you why, but I decided to stay and fly out as planned a couple days later.

“We went to church the next day and I heard the story of salvation. It seemed so simple, and I accepted Christ. On the trip back, I slept like a baby. I knew I needed to share the love of Christ with my dad when I got back. I was able to do that a few days later. Everything changed with him after that.

“I started spending time with him after my teaching day. It’s strange you can grow up with a man your whole life and not know him. In the months before he passed away I got to know him for the first time.

“After the funeral, my little brother called later to ask about ‘this salvation thing.’ My little brother received Christ that night.”

While Dirk seemed to keep progressing in new ways, Amy knew they still had major problems. Their communication was improved but far from good. Dirk avoided any discussions that might result in confrontation and struggled to find words to share anything real. When he didn’t want to talk, he was explosive in his delivery - shutting down Amy and her attempts to improve things.

A friend suggested Amy read the book The Power of a Praying Wife. “I didn’t like it! I thought, Why do I want to pray for him when I don’t like him! I went through the motions and did the prayers. I knew I couldn’t change him, but what do I do? I started softening my heart. God says we’re even to pray for our enemies, so certainly I can pray for my husband! I got more real with my prayers.”

Learning to communicate

After Dirk accepted Christ, they realized how spiritually starved they felt. They made the decision to go back to Sunnybrook Church - and now the bypass made it a quick trip.

The church was hosting a marriage retreat, and Amy thought it would be good. Dirk wasn’t so sure. “Amy was saying we’re not okay. I thought how we looked on the outside meant it was good: we got a house, cars, the kids have decent clothes. I finally gave in and we went.” Amy was right. They weren’t okay.

Dirk said, “It was terrible! I swore I’d never do another one.”

Amy agreed. “Our communication was so bad! We’d go through this workbook, and I wanted to talk about it when we were in our room, but I was so fearful, and I’d just cry. Dirk didn’t say anything because he didn’t want conflict.

Dirk got real, “Let’s bear all because I could rage. She would say these things, and I would get so verbally abusive and scream. There’s credence to her fear.

“I said I’d never go again, but a couple of years later they were having another retreat. I felt different and had been opening up about some things. I’d been going to a Men of Valor group at church and that was helping deal with some things head on. Karl Van Cura was one of my mentors who’d been walking me through some stuff. I had been hiding and protecting these pieces in me but they were starting to come out. Communication with Amy had improved a bit, so I thought this marriage retreat would be different. At this point I knew there was nothing I wouldn’t do to help my marriage move forward. And the guys were going to shoot guns together-so that got me!

Their hopes were dashed. Dirk sighed, “The shooting was fun, but our time together was a repeat. It was terrible! There were teaching DVDs as a group and then you go to your room as a couple and unpack it. I was seriously trying but Amy was crying. This was like a scab we just kept ripping off.

“Karl and his wife Laurie were part of the panel, and Karl talked about how we build a wall one brick at a time and you need to take it down one brick at a time. We didn’t know how to do that. Afterward we told Laurie and Karl we needed help.

Dirk laughed, “After we laid it all out, Laurie said to me, ‘You need counseling.’ I was thinking, ‘ME?!’ But I was surrendered to do whatever it took.”

Dirk started going to a Christian counselor, Dr. Rumberger, getting to old stuff that hadn’t been dealt with. “I realized the voice of my wife got pasted to the voice of my father, which started replaying old tapes from my past, triggering old wounds. That was not where Amy was coming from at all. I started recognizing that.”

Amy admitted, “For a time, I was treating him wrong. I realized I needed to stop that. I needed to turn the page and talk different and do things different.

When the past affects the present

Dirk began to realize how his past was affecting his present and his future. “Getting it all out and finally facing it and processing it was huge. I was sexually abused before I was 10 – we dealt with that. I was verbally abused by my father – dealt with that. These were things I was trying to mask or drown with alcohol. We invited the Holy Spirit into what we were doing and that was such a gift.”

Dirk recalls a really pivotal day with the doc. “He left me hanging one day. I’d been sharing about my dad. My dad divorced mom in 1995. He was a man of few words but very rough and gruff, and swore like a sailor. When my dad got cancer, here he was, a mass of a man, and I saw the cancer just eat him up.

As he’s going through this, it was parents night at school for his stepson. My dad was barely able to walk yet he came out to the 50-yard line. He never came to anything like that for me. I told the doc. ‘I don’t want to feel jealous about this but I do.’

“Dr. R asked, ‘Do you believe Jesus is here right now?’ Yes. ‘Do you think he was there then?’ Yes. ‘Do you believe that Jesus is everywhere at all times?’ Yes. ‘Then, in that attitude, what do you think Jesus is saying to you now about what happened then?’

“I listened. I heard my nervous heal rubbing on the carpet, the air conditioner running, and...I didn’t hear anything from God. I started crying. I so desperately wanted to hear what Christ was saying about that.

“Dr. R said, ‘Times up.’

When God speaks

“I went home and sat with a notebook and a pen.” As Dirk reflected on that moment, the emotion returned. Through tears, Dirk explained what happened next. “Christ started talking to me through that moment. He said, ‘I’m holding you right now. I got you. And I want you to know this, that when your dad was being abused as a young boy that I was holding him too. When he was struggling through alcoholism I was holding him. And I gave him you so that he could see what it looks like to be the father that walks out with the son at parents night at a football game.’”

It became clear to Dirk in that moment, “The struggles that I had been through became purposeful. Romans 8:28 says, ‘God uses all things for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.’ So struggling with alcoholism and being able to overcome that was a witness to my father. Being present for my kids was a witness to my father. Working on my marriage with my wife was a witness to my father. God was working it all out for our good!”

The Bak family all grown up aboard a family cruise in 2013.

Taking charge

About this time, Dirk’s mentor Karl had given him a prayer for sexual healing. “Karl knew of my sexual promiscuity before Amy. He said that if we don’t confess the sins in our life, that gives Satan a toe-hold. You have to identify the problems. God was laying all this junk back in front of me, and as I prayed about them I felt lifted from them.”

At a Men of Valor retreat in 2016, Dirk met Raul Sanchez. Dirk hoped Raul would mentor him but figured it was a long shot since Dr. Sanchez’s time is booked. God worked it out and Raul agreed. In fact, he said he’d been praying about someone to mentor.

Things were getting better, and Dirk and Amy were being proactive about their relationship. They started a Dare training, learning how to help others struggling in marriage (based on the Love Dare book and study).

Dirk and Amy started being intentional about spending quality time together. They didn’t want their marriage to be held together solely by the pursuit of kids – they started pursuing each other.

They shared, “As the months go by we’re like a couple of buddies. We’re going to ride bikes, going hiking, going to the movies. Like dating. Things we should have done at the beginning. We went through sobriety and still weren’t feeling it’s how it should be. We almost needed to start over so we could do things right.”

Surviving to thriving

In the years since then, Dirk and Amy have mentored other couples through Sunnybrook’s marriage mentor program. Not wanting to lose sight of their own growth. Dirk shared, “In 2017, we were being marriage mentored again by Karl and Laurie. We wanted more. We wanted to go from good to great.”

Dirk and Amy decided to do the prayer for sexual healing again and agreed they would abstain from sex. The problem was they never set a time to come back together. Dirk said, “The months started stacking up. Finally, I’m on my knees to God crying out to end this. That morning something happened to Amy in our kitchen.”

Amy said, “I was praying, reading my devotions, dwelling on old junk. ‘Lord, why am I feeling like this? I’ve given this up but it feels like I’m still hanging on. I can’t take this anymore, You need to take it!” I heard God say, ‘Get down on your knees.’ I looked around – did I really hear that! Again, ‘Get down on your knees.’ I did it. This feeling came over me. This WHOOSH. I can’t describe it, but I knew he had taken it. I knew he heard me.”

Amy & Dirk, best buddies, snap a selfie while out hiking Sept. 2018.

Dirk got home that evening and everything changed, “We made love several times over the weekend. I wanted to talk about what was happening with us – with God. I started writing down everything that has been going on and asked Amy to do that too. We figured out that our prayers happened the same morning. We realized what God had done.”

Dirk recalled something Raul had asked at a marriage retreat last year (They actually helped with this one), “Dr. Sanchez asked the question, ‘What story are you believing?’ The Holy Spirit directed me back to a time when we were dating, and I remembered telling my mom that I loved Amy and she was the one. God was reminding me that Amy was a gift he had given me. Our story had become ‘She got pregnant, and we had to get married.'"

Amy agreed, “We kind of lost our story of why we first fell in love.”

How YOUR marriage can thrive

Dirk offers the following tips:

1. Admit you need help - if you don’t you’ll never get headed in the right direction.

2. Resolve to do whatever it takes. It will take hard work.

3. Get God at the center: Get in the Bible. Pray. Go to church.

4. Get in a support group. Husband: Get in a men’s group, get honest, confess. (Proverbs 27:17) Wife: Get in a women’s group with the mindset you need to repair, not leave.

5. Seek counsel.

6. Don’t quit - Amy and I have worked through many layers. The work becomes harder, but the reward is worth everything.

Amy gives this encouragement:

“Our marriage, especially the beginning years, were extremely difficult. What I’m finding now is God has created purpose from the ashes of our past. He helped us see the areas where we needed to work as individuals and as a couple. He created a willing heart in us, put the right people in our lives, and gave us a process to become different people. We each became the person the other deserved. We became the gift for each other that God planned us to be. Through it all I never stopped trusting God. If someone reading this is having their heart strings tugged, maybe, just maybe, God is inviting you into a journey. To a place inside where you haven’t visited for a long time. I pray it’s in that place that you can trust, though it may be painful and it seems so dark, God is with you. He wants to be with you, to hold you, to encourage you, and guide you through a process of healing. I pray you never doubt and trust the process. Amen.”

If your marriage isn’t thriving, contact Sunnybrook Church to find out about marriage mentoring. 276-5814