A Patient's Vow

I am an emotional therapist. One of my clients is entangled with himself regarding vows. As a result, wanting to help himself and based on a snippet of something he heard, he thought that if he had some 'real' vow, it would help him organize himself internally. Therefore, he resolved that the vow he is about to say, he intends to say with full awareness so that it would be a 'real' vow, and then he verbally expressed some formulation of a vow that he does not exactly remember (but he does not know at all the language of 'konam' and the like and the need to express in the language of object prohibition), but something along the lines of: 'I will not enter such-and-such synagogue, and if I do, I will forbid my wife to me.' After some time, he was compelled due to discomfort to enter that synagogue. He is anxious that he might be failing every day by being with his wife, and whether he should separate from her or annul the vow. The issue is that he is very embarrassed to be in the position of annulling the vow, fearing ridicule and mockery. Is there really a concern of a vow here, and if so, what can be done?