Do you often wonder if your husband really loves you?
It’s Wednesday, the day when we always talk marriage! And today I’ve got a pep talk for you ladies! Let’s believe the best!
I face a bit of a quandary here on this blog.
I get email after email and comment after comment from women with the most awful stories. They’ve been married for six months and her husband couldn’t care less about her–he only cares about his friends. He thinks she’s ugly. He tries to manipulate her by saying snide things to her kids. For ten years he’s never cared at all if she gets any pleasure out of sex–he wants it all about him.
Now, perhaps this is all true. But if I were to take all of these letters at face value, then it would mean that there’s an epidemic of narcissistic husbands out there who don’t care about their wives at all! And not just that–they actually delight in hurting their wives. And not just that, but they’re also brilliant actors, because none of this behaviour was visible before they were married!
Okay, I’m being tongue in cheek, because there is no doubt that many women are walking through extremely difficult marriages.
But I wonder if what often happens is something far more mundane: our husbands do something or say something that could be interpreted in a variety of ways, and we choose to believe the most negative one.
Virginia George wrote a great post called The Principle of Good Intent recently. I’d encourage you to read the whole thing, but here’s just a start:
It’s easy in the midst of an argument to see the fight as a personal attack on your character. When we feel our character is being attacked, our feelings belittled, or that our efforts are not enough, it’s important to stop and take a breath, and choose what we are going to believe...
There are times when I don’t feel like my husband loves me. It could be because he was rude, or didn’t help me when I asked for it, he snapped at me, or simply didn’t show me love in the way I was looking for it. In those moments I feel unloved.
But in those moments, I have a choice. I can believe that I am unloved, that I am not enough, or I can choose to believe that’s untrue. I can choose to believe his words when he says he loves me, and that he wants what’s best for me.
What happens in a marriage if we consistently choose to believe the worst?
You’re making love and you’re not that into it, but he doesn’t seem to notice. He finishes, and he leaves you hanging. You’re sure it’s because he thinks sex is all about him.
You get angry and hurt. The next day he leaves the house without kissing you. You’re sure it’s a rejection.
He doesn’t call during the day, and you start to wonder if you even matter to him.
When he gets home you avoid him. You put dinner on the table, but just talk to the kids. He picks up his computer after dinner and goes and plays something, avoiding you.
And this gets repeated, for days, and weeks, and years.
Soon the resentment between the two of you is so great that he may start actually doing things out of anger. You start reacting in anger, too. And the cycle gets worse and worse.
But what if your interpretation at the very beginning was wrong?
What if it wasn’t that he didn’t care about you, but he didn’t want to put pressure on you to have an orgasm, because you’ve felt that pressure before? And he wasn’t sure what you really wanted.
And the reason he didn’t kiss you that morning was because he had a meeting scheduled with a co-worker that he really doesn’t like, and he was practicing in his mind what he was going to say.
What if, when he walked in the door that night, he felt deflated after that meeting and really wanted to talk to you about it, but he sensed that you were cold towards him, and so he retreated onto his computer?
Can you see how this type of thing can seriously harm a marriage–when we assume that our husbands truly don’t love us?
Let’s do a reality check!
Next time you feel hurt and angry that your husband doesn’t love you or doesn’t care about you, ask yourself these questions:
- Is my husband the type of person who would not care about my well-being?
- Is my husband the type of person who would deliberately insult me?
- Is my husband the type of person who takes pride in making me feel badly?
If the answers to these questions are yes, then I strongly recommend you read this post on emotionally destructive marriages.
But if the answer is “no”, then tell yourself this, “I must be interpreting this situation wrong,”, and then simply ask him to clarify what he’s saying or what he’s doing!
Do you have a hard time asking for what you want?
If your marriage is in a communication rut, it’s time for some change.
Shaunti Feldhahn, in her book Surprising Secrets of Highly Happy Marriages, found that one of the ingredients in a happy marriage was that both spouses believed the best of the other. When they had the choice to interpret something that either showed their spouse in a good light or a bad light, they chose the good light. And her studies found that the vast majority of spouses, even in only semi-happy marriages, do honestly want the best for their spouses, too, even if we don’t always feel it!
Like Paul wrote in Philippians 4:8, just think about the good things and focus on those first.
I have more on her research about believing the best here.
So believe he means well.
When we believe the worst, it spirals, and often, after a number of years, becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. You have walls of hurt and you honestly stop caring. But usually those walls of hurt were not built because of true meanness. They were built out of misunderstandings.
Believe the best. Stop the misunderstandings. And enjoy a much happier marriage!
Take this one step further–4 questions to ask to make sure you’re not misunderstanding anything!
This is one of the key concepts in my book, 9 Thoughts That Can Change Your Marriage. We can choose how we think about things and what we focus on. If you have trouble with this, or if you’ve found yourself on this highly negative spiral, pick up the book! And if you find that you believe the worst because there honestly are big problems in your marriage, then I also show how to address those, too.
Find 9 Thoughts here.
Do you have trouble believing the best? Let me know in the comments!
Sheila Wray Gregoire has been married for 29 years and happily married for 24! She loves traveling around North America with her hubby in their RV, giving her signature "Girl Talk" about sex and marriage. And she's written 7 books. About sex and marriage. See a theme here? Plus she knits. Even in line at the grocery store.
Believing the best is difficult with a husband who constantly lies. I truly had to answer your 3 questions with “I don’t know”. Where can I go from here?
Hi Kay, I’m so sorry that that’s the story of your marriage! If that’s the case, I’d really recommend you read the post I linked to: 10 Truths for Emotionally Destructive Marriages. There’s a lot more there on how to handle things and what is the godly thing to do to confront your husband and learn how to draw boundaries.
Again, I’m so sorry!
Sheila, this is a great post, and this MUST be said in between all those other issues you address! Thank-you! I have been married nearly 40 years and I feel like we’re finally beginning to understand each other so much better. And we have come to really appreciate each other – yes! In many ways we feel like it’s a fresh start! No kidding! I am so very glad that we have both hung in there all these years!! Please understand, it’s not been a marriage without any of the big problems you’ve already addressed in the past; we have had some very, very rough times. And raised a handful of children among all that. So many misunderstandings! And trying to address all of them with children hanging onto you 24/7 is, yes, impossible! Therefore, we HAVE to learn to do just what you say…get past the hurt, believe that he means well even though it certainly didn’t sound like it to you! and then learn to move on – serving him in love, anyway. Yes, it’s very hard to take those first steps but wow! you feel so much better when you do it! Believe me, it’s those small things that need to be taken care of right away and even if it’s something big it’s best not to explode right away but to approach it later without kids hearing it. I didn’t get much advice from my mom when I got married but she did tell me that I should remember to forgive, forgive and forgive, and when it would seem like I just couldn’t do it again – then deliberately choose to do it again! And I would be blessed! This advice really bugged me in the first many years but the more I did it, the more I realized that it was very pivotal to holding our marriage together. Even my sanity. Of course, all of this was accompanied by prayer, however pitiful that would be sometimes because of the great hurt and I just couldn’t look past it at times. All this to say that it pays to hang in there, keep your ears and eyes open for how you can better address issues next time etc. I didn’t have internet in the first many years of our marriage and hardly any good reading material so this is proof that if you only give of yourself and believe the best of each other you WILL be able to make it another year! Beloved, please all keep trying! Your children will thank you for it! Oh, and another biggie…please don’t withhold sex just because you’ve been very hurt (when he doesn’t seem to notice and still initiates – or not); it so often is the solution to taking the stress out of the thick air between the two of you! And then voila!! the issue seems to becomes easier to resolve. Believe me, it works, and I think that’s one of the many reasons God designed sex, besides the physical rewards. So many complexities but so worth exploring!
Mrs. M, thanks for telling your story! That’s wonderful.
And I really loved this part: ” Oh, and another biggie…please don’t withhold sex just because you’ve been very hurt (when he doesn’t seem to notice and still initiates – or not); it so often is the solution to taking the stress out of the thick air between the two of you! And then voila!! the issue seems to becomes easier to resolve.” Yep!
Another good one. I think it may have been the Eggerichs’ that said usually people marry good willed people. I agree, usually husbands did not get married hoping to be mean, spiteful and miserable.
I think sometimes two good willed people have just so hurt and disappointed each other over the years that then they are bitter and hurt and angry and begin to act in all these bad ways we hear.
If somehow there can be a reset, we they both believe the other is not bad and are willing to instead explain their hurts and disappointments and the other is willing to step into that and not wait and try to only change after the other does or try to measure how equally the other is changing, etc. But just start really addressing the things that are causing bitterness.
But this does require everyone to be able to really forgive and open up again.
So sad. But it was an excellent and needed post.
So true, TBG! I think this is so key: “I think sometimes two good willed people have just so hurt and disappointed each other over the years that then they are bitter and hurt and angry and begin to act in all these bad ways we hear.” Yep. It does become this self-fulfilling prophecy.
Not to go on and on. But, I do have an example of how thinking the best has worked in my marriage.
We had not been married long and were house hunting. My husband is very frugal and he was looking in really really rough areas. He says, oh they are not that bad people just have stereotypes and besides we don’t need anything fancy.
So, we were in such high crime gritty areas and one condo even had barbed wire around it. I was so upset, I just could not think I could adjust to living that kind of lifestyle. I started to panic, I just did not think I could live like that.
So, I could have gotten into an argument about that he was being so cheap he did not care about my feelings or safety. And my husband could have been annoyed that I just wanted to spend all of our money and was being materialistic.
So, instead of arguing with my husband I said that I appreciated how he is so good with our money and how he really took it on himself to financially provide for our family, how he really wanted to make good financial decisions and to ensure that our family was financially secure and that when he died one day I would have sufficient assets.
Then I told him, but I feel really afraid of crime and it make me feel unsafe to live in these areas.
So I assumed the best of his motives – to provide and that he did not understand the degree of risk he was putting me in. So I just explained my perspective of the risks.
Our compromise was that he just wanted to at least be able to look at properties anywhere because he was not convinced all these areas were all that bad. He just asked that I not get upset and have an open mind to look, but if I did feel unsafe or uncomfortable, we absolutely would not consider that property. He just wanted me to be willing to initially look with an open mind.
That’s a great example! Thanks for sharing it. Where did you eventually buy? 🙂
In a nice safe, tree lined, but affordable suburb 🙂
I’ve written about precisely this same topic before. It’s so important not to jump to conclusions or read things into what the other person is saying or doing, and instead to communicate effectively.
When your spouse says or does something that seems hurtful or accusing, the first words out of your mouth should ask for clarification. Don’t jump to conclusions and react. You should immediately assume that you heard wrong or that you are misinterpreting their words or actions and that they didn’t mean what they said the way you took it. Remain calm and ask what they meant by that. If it turns out that they are insulting you, there’s plenty of time to get mad then. But most of the time that isn’t the case. Assume the best and it will save both of you a lot of needless heartache and stress.
http://lindsays-logic.blogspot.com/2013/03/assuming-best.html
Yep! Absolutely! I think the hard part is that in the moment, we don’t realize that we do have a choice. We have to train ourselves that when we’re hurt, we take a step back and ask if perhaps we’re reading more in that is there. But I think so many women don’t realize it IS a choice.
One of the best things I ever learned from my mom (veteran of over 30 years of happy marriage) was to always ask, “Is this true?” Is how I feel at the moment true — an accurate reflection of reality– or is it simply what my emotions are telling me right now? Asking this question has saved me from a lot of difficulty in my own marriage ( 6 years and counting).
I love the quote I saw somewhere else earlier today:
“Never attribute to malice what could equally be attributed to ignorance.”
Ignorance = Not Knowing.
In other words, don’t assume someone’s being mean, when they may just not know all the facts.
Love that! So true, and such great wisdom.
Nice post.
Assuming the best can be so hard when you’re going through tough times with your husband. I really struggled with it during the years when my husband was low testosterone and didn’t want sex. When I was negative, it just made our situation worse.
Assume positive intentions works well in so many relationships, even aside from marriage. But especially important to do with your husband and during the really tough times.
Absolutely! And I think it’s even more important in the tough times because, like you said, we’re more likely to project onto him what we’re feeling.
This is such a great post! Men and women think so differently and that often makes communication difficult. It’s far too easy to fall into the trap of negative assumptions and subsequent resentment.
This post makes me think of Mark Gungor’s A Tale of Two Brains (so funny and helpful!). My husband and I watched it while we were engaged at the suggestion of our premarital counselors. What a difference it has made in our marriage! We still quote it back to each other, especially when we have times that could end up as disagreements, but we both choose to believe the best about each other.
It’s way too easy to jump to negative conclusions (and this is just what satan wants us to do!). It’s definitely more work to give your spouse the benefit of the doubt and to not let the little things get to you, but well worth the effort!
I love that Tale of Two Brains, too!
There is a slightly different alternative (but it still fits with the “think the best” advice).
Like in my case, my husband is not in love with me. (And there were indications before we were married. Mainly, he said he was cold because we weren’t having sex, and once we were married, it would be different. I believed him and hoped for the best.) It took about two years for me to understand why he would marry me if he didn’t love me — and that’s when I realized. He does love me. He relies on me, I am a comfort to him, I am stability to him. But he is not *in* love with me. If I look at our marriage through the lens of a romantic relationship — um, there is a lot wrong. But if I look at it as a friendship or a “family” relationship, it makes a lot more sense.
Part of my thinking the best is assessing what kind of relationship we actually have and adjusting my expectations. Things make a lot more sense and they fit better. I can put the things that are missing — the lack of sex, the lack of time together, the moodiness and distance — in perspective.
I am not saying this for everyone. I think most people who have spouses who are in love with them and just can’t communicate it effectively. But if you’re one of the ones where “in love” just doesn’t make sense with the real-life actions, maybe you can examine the relationship you actually have and then build on that. It helped me, at least.
I am pretty sure I am in this kind of relationship. My husband loved me, yrs, but is NOT “in love” with me and probably never was. I want to spend as much time with him as possible but all he ever has wanted is to watch tv or movies, avoiding true contact with me. Other than that he’s a great husband and father. How did you “build on” the relationship you have? Most suggestions I read tell me to build a life outside of the marriage. I feel like if I do that then there’s no point to bring married and I will eventually leave, probably.
That’s exactly how I feel! If I build a life outside of marriage, how is that any different than just separating? I’m still not living married.
Just to say — I am so not an expert at this. I am still feeling my way. I think part of it is letting go of some expectations (like greeting him with a kiss when he comes home or having frequent sex). I can’t have those things, so I need to not focus on them. The other part is to look at what we do have in common and try to focus on that as far as I can. Like, we both enjoy cooking. Grand romantic, food-related gestures are out, obviously, but so are things like grocery shopping or taking a cooking class — Husband doesn’t want to spend the time with me. But, I can ask him to chop something or make a side dish with me, and we have a few minutes to talk that we wouldn’t ordinarily have.
There are few things that I just need — like, sometimes I just need to talk and have someone listen. I have to go “outside my marriage” for that, but I can just talk to my mom or my best friend. That kind of takes the edge off.
It ain’t perfect, and there are no easy answers. I am just trying to make the best of what I have.
Dear Sheila
For a while now my hubbie and I have been trying to work onthe believing that the other is meaning well but one thing was still bugging me and that was the way that my husbands views and awareness of sexual stuff on TV had changed. But he was saying it had not.
This was driving me nuts, and was really getting me down and making me suspicious of him and making me not want to trust him and it was stopping me thinking the best of him and so on.
We were going around and around in circles with this and so a few days ago I told my husband that I felt we should discuss this matter with our joint therapist. My hubble was reluctant to do so but when we got there he decided to raise the subject
He told the therapist that I accuse him of all sorts, which I do and that what I was saying was not true. I put forward my side of things and the therapist listened. He listened for quit some time and it was very evident that both my hubbie and I had very different versions of what has been going on
Anyway, to cut a long story short our therapist asked us if we thought that my husband might be suffering from disinhibition following his brain hemhorrage
Here is a video that explains some of this. There are many other articles on the Internet if you want to examine this further
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z03_d6a-7xo
What I am wondering is can this actually be true? It would explain why my hubbie has changed. Before his brain hemorrhage we were together for over 20 years and honestly in all that time we had none of this nonsense. And then, following the brain hemorrage my hubbie would watch any kind of balony on TV, yes I am talking about sex here, and he would just not switch it off. If I said anything, he would just look at me as if I was off my head. And honestly the number of rows we have had you cannot even imagine. I got ill, and he just continued to be oblivious
Anyway, as I think you can imagine there is a lot more to this story. But all I can tell you that not for one minute did I ever put any of this down to his brain hemorrhage. Nobody ever told me this can happen with a brain injury.
I also did not notice it straight away, it was quit a long time afterwards, But since I was not looking for it, I guess that is why I missed it
My husband has not shown any other signs of sexual disinhibition. He does not eye women up when we are out not does he try to chat them up or anything. He has not tried to seek out porn or anything like that. It was just the TV, he would watch anything that came on and not respond in the apporpriate manner that he did do before. He has though exhibited other inhibition behaviour, being somewhat impolite and saying inappropriate things to people but nothing sexual and so I just did not tune into this, at all
Sheila, I have been so so sad about all this so sad it made me very ill. I was thinking he was being so exceedingly selfish and honestly this has affected me terribly and made me poorly. But because my husband is such a good man, so kind and considerate in so many ways, I was perplexed as to why he would do this.
Anyway, now that our therapist has mentioned this our sessions with him are going to be to explore this more. It feel crazy, even like an excuse LOL. But Sheila, honestly in our case this could so very much be true. I really cannot believe a guy would be so senstive and appropriate for 20 years and then suddenly turn into somebody so off his head
I want you to know too, that although this has been killing me, I have never been awful back to him. Wanted to be but was not. And over recent months we have been following your advice here and already there has been some improvement. He is the one that got rid of the satalite system. He said DVDs only and he also said dont go off the certification on the back, check them all out on IMDb. And although I said I will teach him how to use the computer, he has said forget it. He said he knows what kind of things can go on on there. He does struggle with it anyway, but I was thinking he could bring up the news etc, but he has said no. And since speaking to the therapist the other day, his whole chatter on the subject is much more in line with what I think he would have said before all this happened
Our therapist said, sometimes, just being aware that this is happening can help folk get back the so called filters they feel they need to behave appropriately around all this junk
Thank you so much for being here!!!!
Love Joanne
Brain injuries are funny things. No-one can really tell what the effect will be. My husbands dad has a massive brain hemorrhage. Apparently it changes his personality quite a bit. Amongst other things, his impulse control has been lowered drastically. I can well believe that your husband just doesn’t respond to stuff on TV.
It’s really easy to just fall into a kind of default, mindless state when watching TV. Some people even say your brain partially shuts off from TV viewing. I know for me internet browsing can have the same effect. I just kind of tune out and 4 hours later I’ve read around 17 Wikipedia articles about jet engines, the Rose Wars, the candidates for the upcoming primaries or half of someone’s blog or something. So keeping him off the internet if he’s having trouble with filtering is probably a wise choice.
Dear Alchemist
Thank you for getting back to me and explaining what has been going on for you and your father-in-law, this is helping me
this really has been going on for a long time and has affected me severely. I really felt my hubbie did not love me in the right way any more, and as crazy as this seems I did not connect this in any way with his brain haemorrhage. I now see that should have been my first thought but when it comes to how we treat each other, I guess I thought that was bound to be OK. Oh I don’t know, I just did not think of this, I am so glad our therapist, you and others are now helping us with this
The other thing too. Now that this has been brought to my hubbies attention, I am pretty much amazed how quickly he is seeing what is going on for him.
I mentioned that he has got rid of the TV system, does not even want to learn how to use the computer, and now he is saying, he wants to learn more of what is being shared here at this site. I will bring it up, but we will read together. This can, I feel bring us closer together. I love him so so much, he is my soul mate, but truly this brain injury thing has been a nightmare for both of us, in so many ways. He was almost gone when it first happened. I am his only carer. My life has been taken over with looking after him. I really was so worried about this disinhibitation, especially when I did not know what was going on. I am so so glad we have our therapist, and you guys here to help
Love Joanne
Dear Sheila
I have made a mistake on that last post, I have put my surname on it. Can you take that off for me,
Really would be appreciated
Joanne
What about when you can’t trust your husband because he has lied and hurt you so many times that you can’t move past the pain. Once he apologizes you try to work it out and you even start counseling but yet the doubts are still there. And one day I blew up, he’s tired of my doubts and am tired of the insecurities. Now am contemplating divorce because it feels like I will never get passes this. I can’t live in doubt, or thinking what is he doing or who is he texting , or is he finally going to cheat on me this time. Am at a crossroads because I love him but I feel that I deserve to live a life doubt free. Do you have an article to my situation?