When You Feel Very Alone in your Marriage
In the Christian wife/Mommy blogosphere, a lot of patterns are evident. Many of us who write give very similar advice. Rely on God. Focus on being the best wife you can be, not on changing your husband. Care for your marriage & kids first. Create a nice home. These things are all true, and I hope that people can come here for some encouragement in doing the most important job in the world!
I think most of you who do come here come to get help around the edges. In general, things are going well, but they could always use some tweaking! Most of my posts, I think, are written with these types of readers in mind. You have a family you’re committed to, and you’re trying to work the kinks out. You love your husband, even if he does have faults (which you can obviously name).
Sometimes, though, people live in a much more desperate situation. I was talking to a friend who finally ended a very dysfunctional marriage last year. She said that sometimes she would read my blog and feel so sad, because it didn’t matter how much she did what I said, nothing every changed. The typical answers and typical advice weren’t cutting it.
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Married, but alone
A lot of women out there feel very alone in their marriages, and if you’re in a marriage where you have found your soul mate, try to put yourself in these women’s shoes for a moment. Here’s a comment that was left yesterday:
I still can’t get myself to accept things. My husband does not have a physically demanding job. The past 4-5 months especially have been easy. He is admittedly not doing anything at work.
I cook, I clean. I care for the kids when they’re sick, no matter what time of day or if he’s off work. I run our special needs child to his three-days-a-week appointments. One of those days my other son has an appointment at the same place so of course he goes as well. Sick or not, I take care of the kids. I had the flu two years ago and the first day I was sick he dealt with the kids, but after that? He was pissed that I was still laying around and not doing anything so he got to slamming our bedroom door when he’d go out, not shushing the kids if/when they got loud, etc. That’s one of many times where he’s been less than considerate.
Of course if he has a headache and stuffy nose he’s swearing he has a migraine and he take several different types of medication and sleeps for 10-11 hours straight, yelling if the kids are getting loud.
We’re supposed to move and our house is nowhere near ready to put on the market. It should have been on by now but while he had 3 months to lay the new flooring in our house, he didn’t finish. One room still needs to be done. I, on the other hand, have all of the daily issues on top of painting every room in the house, getting the outside painted, repainting our kitchen cabinets, painting the cabinets in the hall and bathrooms, redoing the tile in our hall bath, rebuilding our master bath shower that he gutted two years ago and never finished, tiling both bathroom floors, de-cluttering and organizing so that the movers know what is storage and what goes.. I don’t have the money to hire those jobs out so I have to do it.
He occasionally mows the yard, and when our kids start a sport he’s gung-ho in the beginning but by the second week in he’s sighing and rolling his eyes when I ask if he’s taking one of our boys to practice. Inevitably they’ll have at least one practice or game per week that coincides with the other’s practice or game, and I count myself fortunate if they’re in the same park or building. Many times they aren’t and because he’s oh-so-worn out and has computer games to play, I’m running like a headless chicken. Throw in an active toddler and I’m busy, worn out, worn down, and just plain beat.
Yes, I’m bitter and resentful, not to mention completely jealous of women who have husbands who help out even when the husband has a busy work schedule.
Don’t suggest I have a talk with him because I have. Many, many times. And many times he’s sworn he’ll change and help out. The only reason I’m still with him is because when I left him a few years ago I couldn’t get a job anywhere and began having anxiety attacks. Not to mention lack of support from family and being made to feel like we’d worn out our welcome and I needed to quit being a child and just go back to my husband. So here I sit.
I can feel this woman’s pain. Can you? Honestly, what would you do if you were married to a man who did not care for your kids, played computer games all day, and didn’t lift a finger to help you? Now, admittedly, we’re only getting this woman’s side of the story, but I have talked to women who are living something very similar. It happens. Very frequently.
So what would you say to her? I’m going to take a stab at it now, but I invite you to answer in the comments, too. Perhaps we’ll have different approaches to it, but hopefully we can offer something that would be helpful.
First, let me say that To Love, Honor and Vacuum was written exactly for women going through this. In fact, I based the book on two women I was close to who were experiencing virtually exactly the same thing. So I know from whence I speak.
And let me tell you what I told them. You cannot change him; you can only change yourself. But you have a lot of power within you to change. God is there to help you create a godly home, where everyone respects each other and grows closer to Him. That is what He wants. Your job is to ask God to show you how to build respect and godliness within your home.
Part of that job may be to stop enabling others to act in an unChristlike manner. It sounds like you do all the housework, and he does very little. That means that you do a lot for him. You don’t have to keep doing this. You could sit down and tell him that you are exhausted, and some things are going to have to come off of your plate. Offer him alternatives. But show him that some of these things will directly affect him. (Laundry, for instance, or making the kinds of meals he likes. If you can live on sandwiches & cereal, it’s a lot easier to make, and it’s still nutritious!). Then take some of that time that you save and use it to do your devotions, to have a bath, to knit, to relax, to do what you need to do to rejuvenate. Don’t do it to punish him; do it to create a new dynamic so that you can keep going.
If you’re busy running the children everywhere, and he won’t help, ask him what it would take for him to start driving a child to soccer. Ask him if this is possible. Don’t ask him when you’re angry; ask him because you simply want help. If he can’t give it, you’re no worse off than you are now. But ask him what is keeping him from doing it? Is he not getting enough sleep?
Or take it from a different perspective. Ask him what are the most important goals he has in life. Share with him yours. Write them on your fridge. Now ask how he’s meeting them. If he wants to be a good father, then ask him how you can help him engage with the kids during the week. Does he want to take soccer? Bath time? Bedtime? If he doesn’t, and he’d just like to play computer games, then ask him how he’d like the kids to think of him. Does he want them to remember him always being on the computer, or does he want them to remember him cheering them at games?
But if he just won’t, you have a decision to make. Can you keep living like this? If you were a single parent, you could not do it all. You could not run a house and keep the kids in all kinds of activities and hold down a job. You couldn’t. You would get help, or you would cut things out.
So if your husband won’t help, you basically are acting as a single parent. What will you cut out? Even if your husband has abdicated responsibility for the family, you can’t. And you can’t abdicate your responsibility to your marriage, either. I would suggest getting the kids out of activities as much as possible and making your schedule as easy as possible, so that you don’t burn out and you can keep going.
Finally, make family fun. Cut down as much as you can so you can get enough rest and sleep. And then use that energy to make your home fun. Play games. Go for walks. Laugh a lot. When family is fun, he’s more likely to want to be involved. When it’s all chores, he won’t. And the more unhappy you are, and the more you nag him, the more he will retreat.
Some people are just plain selfish. He very well could be one of these. Your job is to find peace and fulfillment in God, and then find ways to transfer that peace and fulfillment to the rest of those in your family. Don’t always resent. Don’t let yourself get bitter. Change your family life so that you do have more energy and things do get done.
Oh, and about the house: stop it. Don’t move. Stay there. Don’t put it on the market. So you lose money. I know that’s tough. But if you are always stepping in and doing everything, he never will step up to the plate. Talk about what’s reasonable for both of you to do, and then you do your part. If he doesn’t do his, then you can’t sell the house. Don’t nag him about it. Simply do your part. Whether or not he does his is up to him. And if he starts to suffer financially for it, then maybe that will inspire a burst of energy. Right now, he’s probably waiting for you to come through, like you always have in the past. Don’t enable irresponsibility.
One other thing about how to act biblically in marriage: there are two sides to the Proverbs 31 woman. First, yes, she did a ton and cared for her family well. But second, she had help, as someone pointed out in the comments yesterday. She had servant girls, but she also had a husband who was engaged in the family business, too. He was in the public square, transacting business, where he praised her. Yes, we’re to be the Proverbs 31 woman, but it’s difficult to do all of this without at least some help. If you don’t have that help, I think you need to readjust what’s expected of you so you don’t burn out.
God designed marriage to be a genuine partnership. Sometimes it isn’t. Sometimes it’s very lopsided. Now if your spouse isn’t much of a partner, that doesn’t absolve you of the responsibility to live up to your partnership. We’re to care for our homes and our kids and our husbands regardless. But that doesn’t mean it’s easy, and it doesn’t mean that we should do everything for those who persist in laziness, enabling very un Christ like behavior.
So that’s what I’ve got to say. What about the rest of you? Any thoughts on how to help her? Am I being too easy? Too harsh? What do you think?
This blog was originally posted on tolovehonorandvacuum.blogspot.com . Used with permission.
Tags: alone, Family, help, marriage, relationships, sex resources, sexual desire, Shelia Wray Gregoire, spouse
10 Responses to “When You Feel Very Alone in your Marriage”
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Hi Lonely Husband, I am so sorry that no one has responded to your comment earlier.
I think you have identified one of the weaknesses of Gary Chapman’s model in the 5 Love Languages: that is, the source of our love is from the love that we receive from other people. There is nothing wrong with a desire to–as Gary Chapman describes it–fill up the love tank of others with a language that communicates love to them, but when we begin to look at the ‘low level of love in our love tank’ it becomes an excuse to stop loving. It puts us in the role of victim and justifies the breakdown of relationships.
I think the Bible shows us that God has a much more effective model of love; in fact, He Himself is the definition of what love is. Jesus said it best when He said, “the greatest love is shown when people lay down their lives for their friends” (John 15:13). Jesus showed that kind of love again and again in His life here on Earth. He laid aside His rightful place in Heaven as the Son of God and became a person like one of us so that He could show us God’s love. He gave away the opportunity to be accepted and liked by the people around Him by telling them what they wanted to hear. Instead He spoke the hard truth. The ultimate expression of that love came when He allowed Himself to be arrested, tried, convicted and executed falsely in order to take on Himself the punishment that we deserved for our rebellion against God. The Bible says, “God made Him, who knew no sin [Jesus] to become sin so that we could become the righteousness of God.” (2Corinthians 5:21)
If we want to truly love our spouses, our children, our family, our friends, our neighbours, we need to follow Jesus example and love in a way that is self-sacrificing. That is true love! That is the kind of love that we dream about and tell stories about. It is the knight in shining armour that risks his life to face the dragon and rescue the fair maiden. It is the marine who rushes back into the warzone to rescue fallen comrades. It is the father that starves himself in order to make sure his children have enough to eat. And even though we all know it when we see it and idealize it, we find it so hard to live it out ourselves.
I know that I can’t love like that! I am far too selfish and want my needs met before I am ready to love someone else. That is why I need Jesus in my life: I take to heart when the Bible says, “We love because God loved us first.” (1John 4:19). I am able to sacrificially love my wife, my kids, my family, etc. because Jesus directs my thoughts, attitudes, words and actions.
I don’t know what kind of a relationship you have with Jesus but I would encourage you to look to Him to be your source of love for your wife. Your love won’t wane and wax in response to her loving you but as you look to Jesus as the source for your love you will consistently serve her needs and find in that the fulfillment of loving the way that God created you to love. And you will be amazed at how that changes the way other people love you (not that you will need that kind of reaction to motivate your love).
Does that make any sense at all? I know I have already been rambling, but would you like to find out more about Jesus as the source of your love?
To lonely husband: I am in same boat but it’s my husband who doesn’t want me a part of his life outside the home or emotionally. Hardest time of my life is when we get kinda close and then he closes me off again. My sadness is so deep I physically ache. I really wish God would take me home.
I tried the 5 love languages thing. The only problem is that my wife will only do things that speak to her love language. She knows mine but doesn’t care and refuses to do anything about it.
My love language is quality time. She doesn’t want to spend any time with me. We have no relationship. She has been very clear that the only thing she will do to show she loves me is work around the house. Absolutely no interaction between us of any kind.
So, I do believe the 5 Love Languages is good, but only if both partners will act on what they learn from it.
I am so alone in my marriage it is painful. I wanted to spend my life with my wife but I can only be an outside observer to her life. It is so frustrating.
Dear Khalil, Your situation seems to be one of gradually growing apart from each other. When your mate & you do not love each other, it is up to one of you to stimulate the other to new reasons for falling in love again. Maybe you need to take your wife on a date or evening out, as you did before marriage. Is there an activity you can enjoy together? A book that has helped me & my wife is “The 5 Love Languages” in which Gary Chapman says that we have different ways of wanting to feel loved. Find out what pleases her, learn that language, and you will both be blessed. The 5 major languages are: quality time, words of affirmation, gifts, acts of service, and physical touch. The 4th edition is out now. Look for it, both read it, and both know that you are loved! I wish we’d have had that book 20 years ago, but God helped us weather the storms of misunderstanding, and now we love each other more than ever. I’m praying that you & your wife will again find one-another, that the Holy Spirit will lead you to give each other another opportunity to communicate. Peace & Joy, Alfred.
If we lose our love we will not be able to understand each other, then problems will start between us and day by day more problems will face us untill we found our self that we cann’t stay with each other. The important thing in our life is to keep our love life all the time.
Dear Truthfulnes,
Don’t men do the same thing? I believe that it is human nature to be attracted to someone’s physical appearance first and then you grow to love the person and who they are. That is an incredible bias statement and it sounds like from your words that you have been hurt. If you would like a free and confidential mentor, just click on the link http://powertochange.com/experience/talk-to-a-mentor/.
Sincerely,
Leah
The problem is that many women choose their husbands based on superficial criteria. Stop using appearance and race as criteria and focus instead on the person’s character.
Thank you for that article. My husband used to be similar, but someting changed inside him. We (family) are his number 1 priority in life now, our marriage is more like a patnership. When he was more set in his selfish ways, nagging never got us anywhere but being truthful in communication worked much better. I remember we once had a talk about his responsibility as the stronger male to protect and look after the well being of his family. Standing up truthfully and speaking out explaining “Honey Im exhausted and need your help” Praising hin when he does things. he know does the laundry, vaccuming, cooks dinner. Yes he know realizes that I have more energy left for lovemaking, when he helps out.
We have more of a partnership/family approach lets do this together everybody pitches in. We all have our jobs we do. If one of the kids compLains, WE SAY “you belong to this family too and this is your job. thank you honey”
The most important thing in life is to LOVE AND BE LOVED. Familys are so important and God wants to bless yours.
I know what this is like, not to this extent, but none the less I know. I think the nail was hit on the head when it was said “you cannot change him; you can only change yourself”. If you continuously focus on the fact that you are doing everything and he is doing nothing. Constantly giving yourself all of the credit for things getting done in the house(sincerely, no offense), nothing will get better. You are saying that you are basically with him because you couldn’t find a job so I am assuming that he takes care of all of the financial responsibilities, which is huge considering the economy we are living in.
That is one positive thing you can began to focus on because that is one responsibility that you don’t have to do. Now, does that make it okay for him to not partake in any family activities and responsibilities???? Absolutely not! But, you are hoping GOD will change him, but who is changing you???
When I was dealing with my husband on similar issues, I would get soooo upset and wonder why I was doing everything and GOD wasn’t dealing with him. GOD never responded to me about what my husband should be doing. HE always dealt with my heart. My heart toward my husband HAD to CHANGE in order for me to see change in my marriage. It is not GOD’s desire to see marriages end, but prosper. Look to yourself for the answer. Change Your heart. The WORD of GOD is powerful and life giving piercing through the deepest parts of our souls. And the WORD says, “Wives, likewise, respect your husbands, that even if some do not obey the word, they, without a word, may be won by the conduct of their wives, when they observe your chaste conduct accompanied by fear(of GOD) 1 Peter 3:1,2. This is truth! A changed heart speaks loudly and clearly and is often the most effective way to influence a family member. Difficult? Yes, but here is where you have to pick up your cross and follow CHRIST. Put your faith to the test. Your GOD will move in your favor!
I was married to and divorced a man who – this is the nicest way I can say it – avoided gainful employment for most of our married life. So I was the breadwinner. He had the same attitude about housework. So I had to bring home the bacon, cook it, serve it, and clean up afterwards. At times when we could afford it, I would hire a cleaning person. The best way I know of how to live with a selfish mate and keep your sanity is learn to say no. No, your kid doesn’t have to be in every sport or go to every event. No, you don’t have to be the class mom just because you’re the only stay-at-home mom. No. I think also we get confused about being a godly wife and a doormat. I think one of the problems that wives who don’t work have is that they feel they are powerless, that they have to do everything because, after all, “you don’t work, you just stay home all day.” They kind of get bulldozed by their husbands. Trust me, my husband didn’t do diddly squat for days on end and had no problem with it and I didn’t divorce him for many years. Divorce is expensive. You don’t have to make a big deal about it, just quietly stop doing a few things. If nobody notices, great. If someone complains, say, “I’m sorry. I just can’t do it all. If you want me to do THIS, you need to do THAT.” And stick to your guns. I didn’t do the dishes for a whole week one time. Finally, I came home and he had done them. All of them. My heart is with every woman who has a husband like that, but if I look back on my marriage, part of the fault was mine because I let some of it happen instead of taking a stand early on.