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I often hear from wives who have some issues with whether their husbands are “in love” with them or not. And, if the husbands are, the wives often measure this love by degrees, as compared to how much the wife loves him. I often him comments like “my husband doesn’t love me nearly as much as I love him. I make all of the concessions and advances in the relationship. He never makes any effort or shows me any attention or affection. It’s as if he merely tolerates me. He doesn’t ask me about my day or make any effort to engage with me. It’s like I’m someone who just merely coexists. On a scale of one to ten, I love him on a level that’s an eleven. And he loves me on a level that’s about a one.”
I understand that this is a lonely and frustrating place to be. I experienced this in my own marriage and the way I handled this almost ended that same marriage. Through experience and research, it’s become pretty clear to me that there’s a right way and wrong way to handle this situation. I will discuss this more in the following article.
Score keeping Is Not The Best Idea For A Marriage. The Question Isn’t Which Spouse Loves The Other The Most: The Question Is Do Both Spouse’s Feel Loved?: I understand how depressing it feels when you suspect that you’re the only one who’s really “in love” or trying to keep the marriage afloat. But sometimes, wives focus so much on measuring how much their husband loves them against some imaginary yard stick that has few (if any) implications on real life. This doesn’t really do anything to change or improve their situation.
I often tell wives to give up comparisons and worry instead about whether they’re feeling loved, wanted and valued. Obviously, the answer is most likely to be negative, but at least you’ve shifted your focus from score keeping to something on which you can take concrete action.
It can also be very important to understand that men aren’t as demonstrative as women. So, expecting your husband to be a spouse that compares to you in terms of demonstrating their feelings may not be totally realistic. Very few husbands express their love and affection in the way that wives typically do. This doesn’t mean that they don’t love you enough. It just means that you’ll need to teach him how to express himself and you’ll need to encourage the behaviors that make you feel noticed, understood, and loved.
Some wives tell me that they resent having to do all the work and having to train their husband to do something that he should just automatically do. These points are certainly valid. But, in my experience, it’s better to give a little in exchange for getting what you truly want than to remain angry, frustrated and indignant while you’re not getting your needs met. It’s important to address and fix this before you yourself begin to withdraw. Because when you have to spouses who are on the edge of indifference, this can leave the marriage in real trouble.
When You’re Worried That Your Husband’s Lack Of Affection For You Means He’s Not Invested In The Marriage Or May Eventually Want Out: I often find that the wives who tell me that their husband’s don’t love them enough fall into two camps. The first is a situation where the marriage is probably really OK, but the husband has either gotten into the habit of not showing his affection or needs to relearn that lesson. This scenario is easier to fix.
The second scenario is that the husband’s lack of affection is due to issues within the marriage or with his no longer being invested in it. This is the scenario which you often can not afford to ignore. Because often, his withdrawing from you is a symptom of a much bigger problem. So, attempting to teach a husband to show you the feelings that just aren’t there isn’t likely to work.
Instead, you’ll need to examine why the feelings have left, fix and address the issue, and then reevaluate. This is likely easier said than done. Because in the same way that husband’s aren’t demonstrative, they also often don’t have a firm grip on their feelings and perceptions. They may well know that something is wrong and act upon it. But, unlike us, they don’t lay awake at night exploring and turning over the issue. They’re more reactive. When something is wrong, they withdraw and reshuffle their efforts instead of thinking about their feelings.
They may not even be aware that they are doing this or even understand why they are doing it. And that can be one reason that they insist that nothing is wrong or that you’re imagining things. Since they haven’t pondered what the issue is (or even that it exists) you look like a real nag or complainer when you address the symptom of it. That’s why you’re often much better off just working and acting on your own (especially at first.)
One of the biggest mistakes that I see many wives make is that they harp on a sensitive subject with an already distant and detached husband. So, they’re already on shaky ground and it’s clear he’s resistant, but they think that if they can just get him to “work” on solving the problem, things will get better. The problem with this is that he’s already begun to withdraw. He likely doesn’t want to “work” on the marriage, at least right now. You’ll have to return him to a point of being invested before you can gain any real ground.
Most wives understand this deep down, but they hesitate or rush because they don’t know how to get their husbands to be receptive to them again. The key is often to take inventory of the marriage and see where the husband might not be getting what he wants and then to provide that without needing to have any large or painful discussions about the same.
And, that’s a common place where wives get stuck. I often hear comments like “But how am I supposed to do this? I’m already the one whose providing all of the attention and affection and that’s not working either.” Often the question really isn’t the demonstrative affection (at least on the husband’s end.) The real issue is often the real connection, and the feeling of being truly heard, valued and understood. It’s also important that both parties know that no one is going through the motions, score keeping, nagging, or trying to manipulate the other.
I often tell wives to focus on what they can do very genuinely and convincingly. Husbands know when you’re just putting on a show or trying to overcompensate for what is really the underlying problem. They don’t want more of the same. They don’t want to be manipulated. They often want real change and improvements instead of worrying about how things look on the outside.
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Source by Leslie Cane
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Any complaint that causes your husband to disconnect from your marriage, to distance himself from you, or to consider a separation hurts. There is no scenario where this isn’t painful. But I suspect that it can feel a little more painful when the reason for his distance seems personal.
What I mean by that is that sometimes, a man will be unhappy because of reasons that have to do with him. He may be having a midlife crisis. He may believe that marriage doesn’t suit his ideology. He may be having a personal crisis. I am not saying that these scenarios are not horribly painful. They are. But at least the wife has no reason to blame herself.
And then there are the scenarios where things do feel personal. These are the instances where your husband is blaming the issues in the marriage on the wife. It could be something that she has done or something about her, about her actions, or about her personality that is the supposed problem.
Here’s an example. A husband might tell his wife that being with her is “exhausting.” She might explain: “for the past three months or so, I have been noticing my husband acting distant and weird. I confronted him about it right away, but he denied that there was a problem. Then we were at a family gathering this weekend and it was held outside in 90 degree heat. Like everyone else, I said it was hot and wanted to leave after dinner because I felt sick. My husband got angry at me and said he was tired of dealing with my ‘high maintenance personality.’ As we were leaving, he said that being married to me is ‘exhausting’ and that he may want a separation because he can not stand living his life this way anymore. He says that nothing makes me happy and that I can’t just sit back and roll with the punches of life like a normal person. He says that I am spoiled. He says that he feels like he always has to pick up the slack. I admit that I am not as thick skinned as some when it comes to sitting in the heat all day, but that doesn’t make me a bad person. And he knew that when he married me. I told him that I could try to change and he said that people like me never change and that we are just not compatible. He says that I make him ‘feel tired’ and he doesn’t want to feel that way anymore. Where does that leave me? I don’t want to lose my husband. This really hurts my feelings and feels like a personal attack. But I could forgive it and move on if he would give me the chance. The problem is that he does not seem at all receptive to me right now.”
I understand why you are hurt. These types of issues can feel, and sound, like a criticism. When someone tells you that you are ‘exhausting,’ that phrase makes it seem as if they no longer want to do the work to keep up with you. Of course it hurts.
Understand The Context In Which The Comments Were Made: I think that your husband’s ‘fatigue’ might be due to the fact that the maintenance issue may have bothered him for a while, but he sat silent and said nothing – even when you asked him what was bothering him. So things built up until they exploded. His silence is not your fault. And things may have been easier now if he had addressed the problem much earlier – before he became so angry that he lashed out at you.
Know That Context Doesn’t Mean That It Isn’t Time To Take Action: It’s normal to hope that this will blow over. And it may – for now. But any time a husband is uttering words that indicate he is tired of your marriage or thinks that there is a compatibility issue, you want to pay very close attention and you want to take action right away. I say this not to scare you, but from the concerned place of someone who was in a similar situation. I hoped for the problem to pass over, but I ultimately ending up separated. I think that I possibly could have avoided that fate by taking action at the first sign of trouble.
Moving Forward Quickly: It’s unfortunate that your husband waited so long to share that this issue has been bothering him, but you can’t undo that at this point. What you can do, however, is be careful of what (and who) you are presenting to him moving forward. It doesn’t sound as if he has made definite plans to move out or to pursue a separation, which means that you may have some time to address this.
Sit back and be really honest with yourself. Which of his concerns have some validity? What is he right about? Is this issue something that other friends and family members have expressed? If so, then there is nothing wrong with addressing it. Sometimes, it takes a painful situation to stimulate growth. If you take this and use it to move you forward so that you grow and improve in some way, then at least the pain will have been for something. At least you can use this as a stimulus to improve your marriage.
If you are very honest and you find that his words do not have validity, then you may went to dig a little deeper. Sometimes, a husband will project another problem onto to what is obvious or handy. It may not have been the heat or your personality at all during that family gathering. But the situation might have given your husband an easy explanation. Sometimes, a husband can be frustrated and not quite sure why. That’s one more reason why it’s very important to be extremely observant right now – so that you are taking action on the items that are truly at issue.
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Source by Leslie Cane
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