I recently received an email from a wife who strongly suspected that her husband no longer loved her. She had tried to discuss this with him many times. But on almost every occasion, she denied that anything was wrong. Sure, she would admit, they had been married for a while and were no longer all over each other like people who had just become lovers. But this did not mean that they no longer loved each other.
The wife was simply not convinced. Not only did her husband no longer show him much affection, but he rarely told her that he loved her and seemed to make many excuses to be away from her and her home. In short, they simply weren’t spending quality time together, her husband was beginning to avoid her, and the wife was feeling extremely lonely within her own marriage.
The wife wanted to know if she was just seeing problems that weren’t there or if there was some way to tell if her husband no longer loved her. While she may not be able to witness her husband’s feelings, see into her heart, or know precisely what she is thinking, there are some signs that the marriage has lost some of the loving feelings. I will discuss more about this matter in the next article.
A husband will usually show his love through actions rather than words: Men are not generally open communicators in the way that women are. While it may seem perfectly natural for us to express our romantic feelings in words, men have a harder time with this. So while her husband may not say “I love you” multiple times a day, he will usually show it by his actions. This can be through small gestures like the touch of an arm, or making you a cup of coffee in the morning, or opening your car door, or even keeping eye contact and giving you a smile that is just for you.
Sure, just about every wive I know would love to hear “I love you” a lot more often, but sometimes if you can see the gestures and actions he provides, you can begin to see that he is, in fact, saying that he still loves you relatively often, it’s just that he says it through the way he acts instead of the words he says.
When you’re not seeing the actions that show your husband still loves you: the avoidance culture: However, with these things being said, I often hear from wives who will respond to the above explanation with something like, “Well, that’s great. I understand that this can be the case in some marriages. But you don’t understand. He doesn’t understand.” shows his love through his actions either. He pretty much just avoids me. There is no eye contact or holding hands or opening the door. There is nothing. It’s like we’re roommates or acquaintances, but nothing more.”
It is absolutely understandable to be worried in this situation. Because even when you’ve been married for a long time, most people who love, care about, and respect their spouse will display these behaviors and actions at least some of the time, since doing so is just a natural reaction and response that flowing. for loving feelings. If you’re not seeing these things, the worst thing you can do is just ignore him, try to convince yourself that you’re imagining things, or take his denials as fact because you want to believe them.
Even if you’re looking at the darker side of things, all marriages can get better at closeness and intimacy. If you overdo it and the two of you are closer as a result, what’s the harm in that? Of course, most husbands will deny that there is a problem because they don’t want to deal with the consequences of this admission. They know very well that you are going to want them to talk about their feelings and take care of them, and many men want to avoid that.
Sometimes the culture of marriage has stagnated and is now one of avoidance. Neither wants to say what has become obvious, so both people just walk away. In this situation there is usually not much fighting, conflict or anger, but not much intimacy, affection or closeness either.
When I have men who visit my blog and admit that they have become a bit distant and lukewarm with their wives, they often go into more detail about how marriage has changed over time. They are usually quite disappointed because their perception is that both spouses take each other for granted and are not having as much fun anymore. Many of them tell me that their wives no longer seem to have time for them and that the marriage has become very stale and repetitive. There is not a lot of light-hearted fun and playful behavior as it used to be in the beginning.
I’m not saying that husbands’ perceptions are correct. I suspect their point of view is meant to paint them as the victim, but they completely believe what they say. And, for our purposes, that’s all that matters. Usually as a result of this disappointment, the husband will begin to withdraw and withhold affection from him. He may not even be aware of this, but usually his thought process is one of disappointment. And this is typically what you’re seeing, even when he tells you that you’re imagining it. Often, if he can begin to change some of the priorities and patterns or habits in the marriage, he will see the mannerisms, actions, and feelings change as well.
Look, it’s usually not that your husband doesn’t love you anymore. They both might well believe this to be true. But usually, it’s that he (or even both of you) have changed their priorities and time allocation. Therefore, it is usually the marriage that is not bearing the fruits that it used to. But neither person in this marriage has changed. Therefore, it is less likely that the core feelings have changed with respect to the other person. However, your interactions with that other person will definitely have changed and this usually causes a distance that is mistaken for “falling out of love.”
So what can you do about it? Well, since her husband is likely to resist, she will often have to take the lead. She can usually start by changing her time allocation and priorities. You can show him the best version of yourself and try to put your focus on the positive. Try to resist asking her any more about her feelings. Instead, focus on showing him the way you’d like him to act toward you by showing him the kind of affection you want yourself.
He is likely to be pleasantly surprised when you focus on him, and as a result, he will gradually follow suit. This can be a gradual process, but usually if you hang in there and give him more of what he wants, you’ll get more of what you want, too.
