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Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

Mind the (emotional) Gap

5 replies

veryjellybelly · 26/11/2010 20:11

Hi,

I posted a few months ago about a crisis in my relationship with DH - have namechanged to preserve anonimity.

We have now been to counselling, and it's really helped to identify what's going on..........which boils down to us drifting apart emotionally due to external pressures (job, family etc).

We both very much want to strengthen our marriage and make it work, and somehow need to re-establish us as a "team" and bridge the emotional gap that has crept up.

I'm planning on a weekly night out so we can talk properly at least once a week - but would really value some suggestions or advice from people who have overcome this issue.

OP posts:
nemofish · 26/11/2010 20:18

What worked for us was snuggling up on the sofa once dd was in bed and talking about how we felt.

rumred · 26/11/2010 20:30

letting each other talk for 3 minutes, or whateveer you agree on, without the other speaking is a a powerful and useful way of communicating better. then it's other person's turn to do same. hard not to jump in but worth it. good luck

tb · 26/11/2010 20:53

Rumred's idea can be helped by having something like a smooth pebble held by the 'talker' that is then passed to the other person when it's their turn.

When you haven't got the pebble, you have to listen.

izquierda · 26/11/2010 21:17

Hello, my DH and I had become very separate over time, he being totally absorbed in his work. I embarked on an emotional affair with a married acquaintance, which was ultimately doomed and with hindsight, that was a good thing.

This led DH and I to have "crisis talks" and to try and find some kind of strategy for "rapprochement".

We are just getting our two DC off our hands so one idea was to try and take time out together when we can. We have been on days out locally, doing a little shopping and browsing in bookshops, having lunch and teas and coffees, which is nice.

We both undertake to look out for events we both might like, so we've been to some literary festival events e.g. Will Self, Peter Hain - so we can have a lively discussion afterwards.

DH has taken some extra days off work just so we can chill a bit around the house, read the papers at leisure, do a few little jobs and relax a little.

We have also agreed, instead of using our usual decorators, to work together to "makeover" our bedroom in the hope that collaborating and co-operating in a household project might be fun?

Which reminds me we have been to see a few comedy shows together and to the theatre in London for a birthday treat for DH.

It is helping, slowly but surely. Simple pleasures, I would say!

I have also booked him in for a facial(!!) as a treat and we plan a day out Xmas shopping together with lunch and wine included.

We did have some ground to make up. I had told him I had been attracted to someone else (nothing really happened, mind) and I think he realised I had been feeling neglected and that he had better pull his socks up.

For my part, I had come very close to being physically unfaithful and I have seen that I was dicing with danger and stood to lose a lot if not everything.

Anyway, just a few random ideas! Hope they might help?

HobnobHeaven · 26/11/2010 21:48

The best advice I ever had was from my ex-DH's vicar, before our wedding. His advice was to spend one hour a week naked together... (cue much sniggering as we were very young when we married).

10 years later, with DH #2, I actually think it's really good advice - and bear in mind Vicar was married for 35 years. It's not about anything sexual, it's designed to be almost primal, and intimate. Curl up and just cuddle, and flesh on flesh contact builds intamacy. It's about stripping everything else away, it's about making time to make an effort, it's about remembering the early days of your relationship, and the rest just sort of comes along with it eventually.

Writing it out sounds ridiculous. But honestly, it simply works.

Hope you work it all out.

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