Wife fell out of love

[Sharky and George]

@onedirection

"but now the season has changed and I don’t know what she truly wants, so I’m shooting in the dark"

 

Key word being season.

As Christians we go through seasons all the time.

What if this season has been allowed by God in order to strengthen your relationship with her.

What I mean is that when you are both getting on with each other again, the relationship will be stronger as it is battles (seasons) like this that do that.

What good relationship has no arguements? I am sure there is the perfect quote for that somewhere but I will try and rustle something up lol:

We could not see it then when the battle was intense, but now we are happy again we know that our arguements gave this relationship strength.

[Marilyn C]

Hi onedirection,

 

So glad you have highlighted those words, `seek understanding ,` for that is the key here. Now I am going to be very firm with you, as I know through my own experience, that it is the way to restoration of relationship.

 

Now I commend you for your great patience and acts of kindness towards your wife, and having such a heart to restore you both together again. However....the enemy has tricked you and sent you down the wrong path.

 

Remember the Pharisees? They did everything right except the one thing God desired - a humble heart. You think you have, but by reading your words you have not. Let me illustrate.

 

1.Reaction instead of humbling self.

 

 `Last night while putting my little girls to bed, I leaned in for prayers and my wife interrupted me saying "that's not how we do it". I was so upset, I snarked something back and left the room. `

You reacted to the situation instead of dying to self. It seems that you want YOUR way instead of inquiring how your wife had been doing prayers before.

2.Using God`s word to condemn.

`She said she is following her heart, which of course I retorted the bible warns us not to follow our deceitful heart.`

You reacted and used God`s word to condemn her. God NEVER CONDEMNS US. The phrase `following her heart,` means that she is listening to her feelings. Now God has feelings and Jesus showed us - compassion, care, love, He wept…

Your wife is showing you that she has feelings and that is what you do NOT understand. You need to humble yourself and find out how your words / actions have hurt her.

You think you are coming from a strong point and you are trying very hard to justify yourself and make out that your wife is the wrong one. That is Pharisaical - religious hard hearted.

If you really want to get to your wife`s heart I will show you the way and it is NOT the way you have gone, which is of the devil Himself. Remember Jesus called the Pharisees of their Father the Devil! He has tricked you into going the `I`m right, I do everything for her…. And God`s word backs me up!` Wrong your heart is not humbled. Here is what you need to do if you are serious.

 

 

[Marilyn C]

Steps to restoring relationship.

1.The problem.

For example - the prayers situation. Now keep the discussion on that point as it can easily lead to lots of other situations. One situation at a time - focus.

2.Ask how she felt.

You don`t realize how you come over to her and you need her to tell you.

Eg.  Your wife might say…`I felt put down when you `snarked` and felt you always want your way and not think how we might have done prayers before.`

3.Say you are sorry & ask for forgiveness.

You then need to humble yourself and say - `I am sorry that I made you feel `put down` and that I  disregarded how you had been saying praying with the girls.`

If there is more to say sorry for, then do that. What you are doing is entering into your wife`s feelings that you had no knowledge of and obviously needed her to explain. (as we all do)

4.Pray - ask God for forgiveness.

Then pray to God humbling yourself and repenting for hurting your wife and making her feel `put down,` & her way of praying not valued. Ask for forgiveness, and ask that the Holy Spirit will teach you to be more sensitive to your wife`s feelings.

5.Work with Holy Spirit.

Go about your life with this one lesson in mind, and being prepared to go through the steps quite often as problems emerge. You will get quicker as you practice and healing will come.

 

praying for you both, Marilyn (& Trevor).

 

 

[onedirection]

Yea I get it, but I'm human. I've been batting a .1000 for 2 months and it took one little thing to spark a fight, her getting in-between me and my kids. I actually handled it much better than I would have before. I only made a small comment and went to my room and prayed to get control of my anger and how to confront the situation properly.

Then while discussing the situation the subject matter went from that particular interaction back to the root of our relationship issues, and it spun out of control. I also wasn't trying to condemn her, I just wanted to share something with her that helped me. I never realized the verse existed, and I used it in my own life to unblock my own prayers. She turns around and says "you're telling me I'm going to hell". Like seriously? Am I talking to a 15 year old? I never even said that.

I just feel hopeless because no matter what I do, I get nothing back from my wife. And when we debate things, she cannot be mature about it. She puts words in my mouth I never said, gets super defensive, or just shuts down and puts a blanket over her head. These point to the "four horseman" that cause marriages to end in divorce.

I guess I'll just die to myself and wait for her to walk out on me, since there is nothing I can actively do to help. However, the emotional abandonment at times causes me to have a twitch in one of my muscles, usually near my eyes. If the emotional abuse is causing physical abuse, then perhaps the divorce is warranted, and I need to get away for my own health.

[Marilyn C]

9 hours ago, onedirection said:

Yea I get it, but I'm human. I've been batting a .1000 for 2 months and it took one little thing to spark a fight, her getting in-between me and my kids. I actually handled it much better than I would have before. I only made a small comment and went to my room and prayed to get control of my anger and how to confront the situation properly.

Then while discussing the situation the subject matter went from that particular interaction back to the root of our relationship issues, and it spun out of control. I also wasn't trying to condemn her, I just wanted to share something with her that helped me. I never realized the verse existed, and I used it in my own life to unblock my own prayers. She turns around and says "you're telling me I'm going to hell". Like seriously? Am I talking to a 15 year old? I never even said that.

I just feel hopeless because no matter what I do, I get nothing back from my wife. And when we debate things, she cannot be mature about it. She puts words in my mouth I never said, gets super defensive, or just shuts down and puts a blanket over her head. These point to the "four horseman" that cause marriages to end in divorce.

I guess I'll just die to myself and wait for her to walk out on me, since there is nothing I can actively do to help. However, the emotional abandonment at times causes me to have a twitch in one of my muscles, usually near my eyes. If the emotional abuse is causing physical abuse, then perhaps the divorce is warranted, and I need to get away for my own health.

Hi onedirection,

`I get it BUT....`  That reveals you are being defensive and looking for an excuse. You see the situation from your side and have said your reasons..... HOWEVER you don`t realise how you have come across to your wife. That is the key. Of course the same applies to her coming across to you and she would have reasons why she is defensive and looking for an excuse too.

You are the one seeking help, (praise the Lord) and you need to be the one to CHANGE the way you approach trying to bring healing to each of you. Each needs to HEAR the other person WITHOUT  `but I .....excuse...blame....`

For example...`Hubby and I amid our various sharing of how we come over told me I came over as a `teacher.` (Well I had been a teacher). That was revelation to me and of course I was trying to `teach` my hubby this or that with the right motive, BUT `teaching` him was NOT the way to do it. It was a revelation, and now I really attend to HOW I come over, and am learning to give him more time to express himself and share what he thinks.`

This attitude of `listening to the other`s feelings, etc` is a non judgmental and open environment, not a `I`m ready to defend my position` type of atmosphere.

In my situation I could have stood on my own `righteousness` and been defensive etc and we would be poles apart, BUT I chose to LISTEN to my hubby as to how I came across and today we both continue to ask, `How did that come over to you?` AND ADDRESS any misunderstanding with `Sorry I didn`t mean to come over that way, and hurt you.....` Misunderstanding happen, for we are damaged people in a damaged world, so we need to be gracious, die to self always wanting its own way, and learn to LISTEN to the other person for maybe, YES MAYBE we DON`T know it all, and DON`T know how we come across to others.

regards, Marilyn.

[onedirection]

You are right, it came across as judgemental, which was not my intention. We discussed it last night and we are over it. I never experienced her trying to come between me and my kids before and I wasn't equipped for the situation. I've been having no issues avoiding conflicts or judgement between the two of us individually since we've gone through the several months of counseling, but this one caught me off guard.

Now that we're passed that, I was able to uncover a new truth. I took your advice about seeking "understanding". In fact before you said that, I was having a sequence of thoughts over the course of several days while in deep prayer. Your comment was the final trigger that put it all together for me; the approach I had to take to initiate this conversation.

So I set off onto a journey to understand her and initiated the talk. Apparently she never really loved me, we were still in the honeymoon phase when we got married. She feels we went too fast and said it was a mistake, ouch.

To make matters worse, she has several misconceptions about what the bible says, and of course I cannot correct her because this would be judgemental. I'll have to leave it up to God to lead her.

I guess I'll be hitting the "hope" devotionals hard this week while I pray and wait.

This makes me think of how the bible characterizes the love that Jesus has for children. He loves them so much, but divorce hurts them so much. At one point when I was afraid I would lose custody of my children, I prayed for that anxiety to be relieved, and I felt that the answer was if I stick this out that God will not allow her to take my children from me, because it isn't fair.

[Marilyn C]

Hi onedirection,

Well done to both of you. Good to hear that you heard the Holy Spirit and that we, (Hubby and I) only gave you confirmation of that.

My thoughts concerning `not in love,` can be overcome in time as you both work together to bring up your lovely (I`m sure) girls. You'd do really well to ask her often how she works with the girls so you can support her in that. I`m thinking she has more time with the children than you, so there is a pattern she has established with the girls and it`s good to support her work in the Lord concerning that.

all the best, Marilyn (& Trevor)

[onedirection]

Yes it appears it all comes back to time. The not in love problem is coming from her, I don't have any problem with love. I'm ready to pick this back up at any moment.

Regarding the kiddies I actually spend more time with them now that she has gone back to work because I work from home, so I get to bring them to school, pick them up, plus I tend to be more hands on anyway.

She likes to play with the kids for about an hour and then she's over it. I laid in bed last night with my 4 year old while she screamed in my ear for a solid 30 minutes because of some tantrum she was having. Make no doubt about it, I am what they call a Super Dad.

Unfortunately that isn't enough to turn the old lady on

Back to serving!

[Billiards Ball]

On 7/11/2018 at 1:33 PM, onedirection said:

Hey all first time poster. I've been going to church my whole life, saved at 15, and recently baptized publicly, late 30s.

I've been seeking additional counsel online and stumbled on another website where I received really poor non-christian advice that led me down a path of anger, resentment, and distrust. So I'm coming over here now to reinforce advice that is faith-based. It turns out that all of that advice was bad, and very inaccurate.

Long story short, my wife feels like she lost love for me a couple years ago after we had kids. Maybe it is midlife crisis, post-partum, or us just not working hard enough on the marriage after coming down off the high of the "in love" feeling.

Since May we have been battling this in a variety of ways - fights, counseling, cordial discussions, then back to fighting again. Divorce has been threatened a few times, to the point where we actually discussed the terms of an uncontested divorce.

For the past 6 weeks it has been a loveless, sexless marriage. I feel deserted and hopeless. Some days I have knots in my stomach and can't sleep and it causes me to lose weight. I feel like I don't have the stamina to stick this out.

I pray on it. And at times I am able to regain strength for a period of time, but it subsides again. I'm a very logical, driven person, that does a lot of reading and works really hard to fix things. My wife on the other hand is a retreater. She finds it hard to follow through on reading the counselor assigned books, she shuts down easily, is entirely guided by emotions, and gets into a rut very easily and cannot get out.

I tried being very passive for the last 2-3 weeks, to stop pursuing her so she could relax and feel like she wanted me again. It didn't work. Now I am taking a very active stance and I'm forcing certain exercises on her. For example, we were assigned the 5 languages of love book, and I am making us do all those recommendations of making love deposits.

I also feel like my wife's faith and trust in God is weaker than mine. She is embarrassed to pray with me. She won't see a church counselor, only the therapists at the doctor's office. She doesn't have any friends or family that know how to give good Christian advice. We go to church on Sunday and she says she believes, but she just won't surrender to God. I admit, I am not very good at surrendering either, probably none of us are, but I know I'm much further along in trying to become more christ-like.

I'm not sure what will happen next, but both of us are at the end of our rope, and we are terrified of divorce. Neither of us have abandoned the other person (physically). We need help!

STOP RUSHING. Why are certain problems going to be fixed in 6 weeks?

START COUNSELING. With the right church, because whoever assigned you the 5 love languages is delusional. You need to find some healing prayer warriors and a church with leader/counselors who know what they're doing.

GET HELP. You can get on the phone with me or someone else who is there for you. You sound alone, stuck without helpers in your current church.

[onedirection]

@Billiards Ball

This would have been great advice a couple months ago, let me give you an update

It hasn't been 6 weeks, the fall out began in late may so it has actually been over 3 months. Prior to this, my wife felt she wasn't loving me 3 YEARS ago at about the time we conceived our 2nd child. She kept it to herself obviously. What confuses me is that along the way she has written love letters, made social media posts, and even drew an M <3 W with sidewalk chalk right up until the moment she snapped. Maybe these are character issues, but I can't be the judge.

We have been counseling, but she stopped going to her individual counselor and based on what I've heard, it is clear she has not divulged all of the secrets to how she feels. We're still doing couples counseling, but she refuses to go to one sponsored by the church. If you remember a few posts back, she condemned me for "bible thumping bullsh**". Despite being a christian, she has some old negative baggage because there are religious zealots in her family that have not been very Christ-like towards her. There is a difference between being a christian and being a follower of Christ. This is quite possibly a case of uneven yoke.

I have joined a men's group recently, and while we haven't gone into our individual issues yet, we're working on a plan to bring more disciples to Jesus. This calling has been strengthening and takes some of the focus off of me trying to fix my marriage. I agree I do need to expand my support network, but I also do not want to share my business with the world. I'm hoping to make some good male friend role models around here.