How To Go About Saving A Marriage
”I love you, but I’m not in love with you” are some of the most dreaded words a spouse can hear. Frequently, before we start to think about how to help our marriage be strong and grow, we let it get to this point. Perhaps there are problems in your relationship that you aren’t addressing, or perhaps these words seem to come out of the blue. Infidelity, abuse, boredom or any number of other issues are among the serious things that can go wrong in a marriage. Getting to a happy and healthy state requires that you actively work at saving a marriage.
The first step toward saving a marriage . . .
Highs and lows are a normal part of any marriage. There could be some serious issues, however, if a marriage experiences a long period of lows without any offsetting highs. Only once you uncover the issue, will you be in a position to resolve it. Pinpointing the problem that causes the constant fighting or the pain that one of you is suffering is sometimes pretty simple.You may be fighting over money or maybe you are upset that your spouse doesn’t seem to be interested in you physically anymore. In other cases, the underlying causes for marital issues are not as straight forward. If you have to get counseling to figure out what the problems are, then do it. You will have no success in saving a marriage without a good understanding of your underlying issues.
The second step toward saving a marriage . . .
You will be able to make a realistic effort to resolve them, after you are clear about the causes of the issues in your marriage. You and your partner will need to honestly and calmly discuss developing a plan for improving the situation, for this to happen. Don’t be surprised if this discussion is more challenging than you thought it would be. After you begin tackling them, even the issues that at first appear small can prove to be very complicated. Frequently, the reason for this is that each of you places different levels of significance on the issues in your marriage, and by the time you are at the crisis stage the stress over these conflicts is great. To facilitate the resolution of your marital issues, you both might need to take greater action than simply changing your attitude. For example, you may be confused about what seems to have been a sudden change in your wife’s feelings when she tells you, “I love you, but I’m not in love with you” and has avoided any type of intimacy with you for months. When she tells you that the 50-pound beer gut you have put on has completely cooled her off, are you going to be willing to commit to getting yourself in shape in order to do what it takes for saving a marriage? The problem can also be something like the fact that she feels rejected by you since you haven’t touched her in six months. Maybe she has gained several pounds, or simply isn’t caring for her physical appearance as much as she used to, and you no longer look at her the way you used to. If this is the case, you too need to be gently honest with her. With issues like this that are very personal, it is critical not to take an accusing tone or lay blame on your partner. Be careful to stay away from the word “you” and instead use the word “I” when having a sensitive conversation.
The third step toward saving a marriage . . .
You have to have time to help your marital problems go away, regardless of what they are. You will need patience and perseverance to put solutions in place and then to recover from the damage that has already been done, whether you decide to get professional help or to tackle your marital issues on your own. Always keep in mind that you are working at saving a marriage, not changing your spouse. It is the relationship that needs mending and you will both have to work at it and at finding what you admire most in each other in order to fall in love again.
