Married 18 months, we are already in counselling, what would you do if....

[pieceofpietuesday]

no dc. will this get better? he says he's not in love with me, but still loves me. we argue all the time. rarely have sex.

i want it to work - my family are christian as am i and i dont want to end the marriage for that reason, but i am aware we cant go on like this. he says he wants to work at it too hence counselling (it was my suggestion).

ive suspected him of an affair, he says no. i believe him but obviously have doubts now and then to have to ask. truth be told i dont think his heart is in it.

not sure how it got to this stage. we were happy before we got married but he now says he had doubts even before then because things were stressful leading up to it and to be fair things did shift a bit, we weren't really 'us' - it was just all wedding wedding wedding.

we do have nice times, but it is all they are - we dont chat properly and laugh, i dont particularly look forward to seeing him. he works a lot, never really seems in a rush to come home ever. that said, we both feel embarrassed about the situation, which is why we have tried counselling. i do still love him, but it doesnt change all the above.

any stories of recovery? would you stay or go?

we were together 3 years before wedding, but a year of that was all wedding planning when it started feeling different (for him)

Sounds to me like you rushed into this and neither of you were actually ready for marriage.
You knew things were iffy during the wedding planning stage but you chose not to discuss/deal with it - why?

If you keep putting religion before everything else it's no wonder your life is messed up.

he says he's not in love with me
There's your answer as to whether your marriage 'has a chance'.
Are you seriously going to 'beg' him to fall back in love with you?

It sounds to me like neither of you were actually 'in love' with each other, you were in the 'honeymoon' phase of the relationship.
The real test of whether you're actually 'in love' comes after that - and you've both just realised that you're not.

Why the rush in getting engaged and married so quickly?
Or was that due to 'religion' as well?

Is he a Christian too? Is the counselling being done by relate or by a Christian counsellor ?
I imagine you've got some church type folks giving you their opinions
Often they will promote 'marriage at any cost' ( been there with a violent man- I should have put up with it apparently)
But this is wrong They're wrong to pressure you or him to stay Don't let anyone talk you into pregnancy either
This is your one life It's too short to be unhappy

To me, it sounds like your marriage is really struggling but that you don't have any major stresses on it. I think your marriage will only go down hill once you have children. They put tremendous stress on a relationship. Or if you had a serious long term illness, or one of your parents died or something.

In order for a marriage to work long term, it has be to be able to handle really difficult things. Yours is having trouble with nothing going on at all.

Does he even care if it works?

We had counselling in our first year of marriage and it made us stronger although I was horribly ashamed at first and thought we should still be in honeymoon period. If you want to be together it will help you understand each other and find a way forward. If you/he genuinely wants out then give it a good shot but don’t waste your life wishing it was different or that you had made different choices.

It took us much more than 4 sessions so see how you go.

Good luck and there’s no shame in divorce so don’t beat yourself up if you take that path xx

OhHolyJesus - can i ask what sort of problems you were going through?

i have overheard DH on a night out telling someone my laugh makes him cringe and he finds the way i talk irritating. that sort of stuff just feels like he dislikes me generally.

its just shit

Stop wasting your time , move on and find someone who does love and appreciate you , you only get one life don’t waste it in an unhappy marriage

thanks floral

Why are you torturing yourself? You realise it's over and are just prolonging the inevitable. Things are not working, you admit that. The dear Lord did not put you on earth to take part in a lesson of endurance and misery. Your time on earth should be filled with love and happiness.

Move on and let him do the same.

Good advice from Lunde.

OP your last post about him talking about you shows he doesn’t live or respect you. You deserve more. Please end your marriage

i have overheard DH on a night out telling someone my laugh makes him cringe and he finds the way i talk irritating

Oh my, just divorce him. This is beyond him not feeling like he's IN love with you. He's mean and nasty and talks about you behind your back.

I know you are religious and feel pressured to stay in your marriage. In the bible (I forget where) it says that husbands should love their wives, even as Christ loved the church and gave up his life for it.

Your husband isn't doing that, not even close.

Your laugh makes him cringe and he is irritated by they way you speak? They are the sort of reasons I'd not see someone after a 3rd date (because, let's face it, we all find some people irritating!), i certainly wouldn't find myself marrying them!

In the 4 and a half years you've been together, the first 2 years were good and you got engaged. The 3rd year was planning the wedding, when things already started oing wrong and he had doubts. Then 18 months of marriage have been poor - emotional distance, he's not in love with you, no sex and he finds even the most basic things about you irritating. This short relationship has been faltering for more than half of it's lifespan.

And you are going to force yourself to spend the rest of your lives together because of your religious beliefs?

I'm pretty sure, if you could ask him, that God wouldn't want you to waste your one precous life with a man who doesn't love you, and doesn't make you happy, for his sake. Those are rules people made. Not God.

We weren’t having sex or really spending time together. I became resentful over the housework as he was working fewer hours and more at home at the time. We argued a lot.

It came to a head when we were house hunting, Pre kids, and he was rejecting all the options I worked hard to find for us. He said he couldn’t do it anymore and we were on the verge of a split. The counselling we had taught us both so much but we wanted to stay together and we have a little boy now and we’re tired but happy!

He still irritates me but neither his laugh or the way he talks makes me cringe. I’m not sure he sounds like he can tolerate you let alone love you.

You could see a therapist alone to establish your own feelings before having any joint therapy. I wouldn’t embark on doing it together unless you feel you really want to save the marriage. It’s a lot of time and money to invest and you might be better off investing just in yourself.

Have you spoken to him about therapy? Do you want to be with him for him not because you don’t want to divorce?

Either way you are brave - sticking is hard and splitting is hard but your ultimate happiness will be worth it.

he says he wants to make it work, it's just not a good relationship. it is NOTHING like it was before we married. so far from that.
i have had mental health problems to be fair and i have been off work, so it has been tough. but he says he is not 'in love' but loves me. it just feels different and i dont know how we go back from it really. maybe counselling will help, first session was terrible..

The therapy itself I found really tough and painful. Old wounds reopened and it was a battle at times but so worth it, really learnt so much. That was our situation though.

I can understand how he can love you but not be in love - being in love is romance and you adore each other, marriage is real life. IMO.

I’d say give the therapy a good chance and see. You’re own mental health and being off work could contribute to feeling low generally but wouldn’t be the sole reason for splitting up, I say this as you wouldn’t be to blame. There is no failure in trying and deciding it’s not the right choice anymore, to me that is more bravery.

He loves you. You love him. You could learn a lot and save your marriage or you could learn a lot and leave and find happiness later on.

But for me, God and my family’s wishes had nothing to do with it

Good luck

thank you for replying! how long were you together before problems arose? when i look back we only really had 2 years of good times, all pre marriage

It sounds as though you have got married very quickly and didn't know each other well enough. If you were just in a relationship with him and not married, I suspect you would both end the relationship and move on.

It sounds like you want to desperately cling on to the idea that you can go to counselling and 'save' things.

He has told other people your laugh makes him cringe and you talking irritates him. It really doesn't sound like he has any respect for you.
Only you can decide how you put up with being treated but I really wouldn't want to spend time in counselling to be with someone who said those things about me to others.

Ontop of this

• you rarely have sex
• argue all the time
• suspect him of cheating (even if it's not true, his behaviour has caused you to worry about this)
• he's told you he isn't in love with you
• you don't look forward to seeing him
• you don't laugh together
• you don't chat properly
• he doesn't rush home to you
• he had doubts before the marriage but failed to discuss it with you

It seems like two people who simply shouldn't have got married.

I wonder why you think you love him, when you don't look forward to seeing him? Do you simply mean you don't want any harm to come to him?

Far from simply falling out of love with you, he's become very disrespectful. When you overheard him talking about you, that should have been the trigger that made you leave him.

Honestly, OP, you have one life. Your husband doesn't love you and frankly, you don't love him. Your parents don't have to live with it; you do. Tell him it's over and tell your parents that if they want to live with him, they can, but that you can't do it any more.

OP i’m making an assumption that you’re still fairly young if you’ve only been married 18 mths? You usually know in your heart of hearts when it’s over. IMO to be in counselling after 18 mths of marriage is alarming.

So please don’t hang around and let years go by if you do infact wish to meet someone new and start a family. I have 2 very close friends that were married with no DC from 25-27 and 30-34; they divorced and met new partners. Now both happily married still with (teenage) children.