Save Your Marriage Central logo
FastNav:
Help for Marriages in Crisis
Marriage Fidelity Day
Online Discussion Forum

Penny,

My wife left me in September. She said she did not love me anymore and will not even try to work on our marriage. She is working on a divorce.  No one had a clue she even had a problem with our marriage.  She is saying she has not loved me for 4 years and we have a 3 year old child. 

Some of her reasons are I did not give her the love she needed, she never felt like she is number one with me, she never got to do her own thing (we have been together since we were teenagers we are now 30).  I have been in counseling since she left trying to work on these problems and she has done nothing and keeps saying she will not go back to that life and that I will go back to my old ways.  She is telling me that there is no one else. 

Please help.
L

Hi L,
Well the first question that comes to mind and that must be asked is: Even though she says there is no one else, is there anyone else that she could be seeing or that you suspect might be in the picture? If there is it certainly does not mean that we can't take steps to save the marriage, but it does change somewhat the approach we use.

The things that your wife is telling you about her unhappiness in the marriage are very common complaints that women have. She is saying that her emotional needs within the marriage were not being met, and that she lost her feelings of love for you.

It's also extremely common for women to be wary of offers to change, or of statements that change has already occurred. A typical pattern for marriages where the wife eventually leaves is that she will tell me she complained in the past, and that there were half hearted attempts by her husband to make changes, and that those changes were not permanent. It begins what I call the Yo-Yo syndrome, where her feelings about you and the marriage go up and down. Eventually they bottom out as she becomes more and more wary of becoming vulnerable and then hurt again.

Now, all that might sound like doom and gloom. But! There is hope. Good intentions are fabulous, but if you have ever tried to lose weight, stop smoking, or made any other New Year's Resolution you know that good intentions don't really carry you all that far. In coaching, we take those good intentions and we back them up with a concrete focused plan. One might think of it as a business plan with action items and accountability... for the marriage.

Most of my work is done with husbands such as you whose wives have left the marriage either emotionally or in actuality. Together we create a strategy to entice her to come out from behind those emotional walls. With some work we can show her that real change is possible, and that you can be the husband she's always wanted.

We begin that by looking closely at her complaints and doing what we can to make changes. Since she is not living at home with you, that is a little more difficult but not impossible. If you can get her to spend some time with you doing some things that she would enjoy you can begin to show her that you willingness to change is real.

Conversation will play a big part in that. One of the things I do is to work with men to increase their conversational skills. Women feel connected through talking and through sharing their thoughts, feelings and experiences about the world around them. When a man makes the time to be fully engaged in a conversation with a woman it creates a powerful dynamic for attraction.

When you have engaged her interest through conversation you can continue to demonstrate you care by little affectionate gestures. I suggest beginning with emails and calls, friendly, not sentimental, building on the things you are sharing in conversation.

Your marriage can certainly be saved. It takes real effort on your part, but the payoff is immeasurable.

All the best,
Penny R. Tupy

Coachville logoiac logo
Website design and
development by
Rachel Hirsch