The turning point in marriage is almost always the same: someone makes a conscious decision to change to value and protect their marriage, or someone makes a conscious decision to forsake those values.
It’s all about attitude.
Keith and I are just finished speaking at a FamilyLife Weekend Getaway in Jasper, Alberta.
For those of you who don’t know the area, it’s nestled in the mountains and dotted with glacier fed lakes (I believe) which have such a high mineral content the water is bright green and little algae grows, so it’s crystal clear. And it tends to be smooth as glass, so it looks like a giant mirror. It’s breathtaking.
We spoke this weekend with Ryan and Jenn Walter–such a great couple who were sharing their stories of putting marriage first even in the midst of a busy NHL career (Ryan played hockey for the Canadiens, the Canucks, and in Washington (what’s that team again?). Keith got a picture of his Stanley Cup ring to show his brothers.
Most of the weekend is taken up by talks, but throughout the talks we have little mini-projects the couples can do together–something to talk about for 3-5 minutes to help them start to “own” the material. And we have bigger projects interspersed between the talks, because we firmly believe that people make changes not because they hear something great, but because they actually start to talk about the material and own it.
So we don’t get a ton of time to speak to the couples individually (and we’re not there to counsel anyway; that wouldn’t be possible in a short weekend). But still, you learn a lot of stories. The couple going through financial hardships, miscarriages, or cancer; there are always some struggling with the aftereffects of infidelity or porn. And then there are those who are just there for a check-up, to make sure everything is on good footing. I love that. I think if more couples went when things were good, then there would be fewer crises!
But in sharing, we always talk about what the turning points in our marriage were. Some of those turning points were big–I share in 9 Thoughts That Can Change Your Marriage that for the first few years of our marriage sex was just plain difficult. It hurt and it was awkward and I didn’t know why he wanted it so much and I felt totally cheated. It was only when my attitude changed, and I realized that if God made sex to be this great, then I had better figure it out, because why would I want to miss out on that? And I stopped blaming Keith and started trying to do what I could.
Related Post: How Thoughts Can Change a Marriage
And some of our turning points weren’t as huge, but were still important. Like when we realized that Keith’s job and my job weren’t working together. He was working in a different city, and we weren’t seeing each other enough, and even though we both loved our jobs, we couldn’t go on like that. So he made the most amazing sacrifice and went part-time so that we could be on the road together. And he works mostly in our home town now. But we kept our eyes on what was most important.
Related Post: Why We Grew Apart
Then, of course, there was the conscious decision to cling to each other after our son died. We had already lost him; we didn’t want to lose each other, too.
We end the weekend showing this video. It really packs an emotional punch, and I think it’s because as we watch it, we realize that’s what we want: to know that we made it; that we’re still together after all of those years; that we have all of these memories together, and we’ve built something beautiful.
And once you know that’s what you’re aiming for, then it’s easier to ask the question: is the road that we’re on now actually going to get us there? Or do we need a turning point?
I was thinking of all of the turning points in my marriage, and I thought today, instead of posting a reader question, I would ask you all one:
What was the big turning point in your marriage? Was there a time that you knew you needed to make a change in order to achieve that oneness that you really wanted?
I know so many of you read this blog, but don’t comment. That’s perfectly okay; I love you being here! But I want to invite people specifically to comment today. It’s often hearing people’s stories that is so encouraging. It’s knowing that other people have walked through this, but they have come out on the other side. Can you share your story today? Let’s encourage each other!
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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.
Our turning point was this year. My husband left , I filed for divorce and God touched my heart. Our 3 daughters and I began to pray for his salvation and I dismissed the divorce. I told him God convicted me and if we were to be divorced he would have to file. My husband was addicted to drug, living with a female also addicted, lost his job (with our family business) and eventually became homeless. We did not hear from him for two agonizing months. What I didn’t know, God was convicting my husband. He moved into a safe home with elderly family friends, he left all drug associates behind, and began to think with a clear head. He reached out to us and has now been home 2 months. I wouldn’t change a thing, because where we are now is amazing. This has been the biggest blessing and absolutely hardest thing in our 20 years of marriage. We have a family to rebuild, and huge financial destruction to climb out of, but God! He is with us and has shown all of us what unconditional love and forgiveness really mean. God is still in the miracle business, my family is a living testimony. Exodus 14:13-14
Oh, wow! What a story! I’m so glad that you’re rebuilding. Prayers for you as you walk forward. I love how you can see blessings and hardships as one and the same.
Thankyou for sharing your amazing story! I’m praying that you see many blessings and much fruitfulness from your choice to remain faithful to your husband, and to God!
The biggest turning point for me was when I accepted that my husband was in our marriage for the long haul. He wasn’t going to get tired of me and leave me. That was amazing to me, that he would love me and value our relationship so much.
Once I realized this I quit pushing him away and really accepted his love. It’s awesome.
I totally get where you’re coming from, Carrie. I had major rejection and trust issues, too. Whenever we would have a minor fight I would blow it up so much bigger because I was sure this meant he was leaving me.
My turning point? It was back in 2009 or 2010. I had heard about some date movie and I googled for reviews on it (turns out to be one I won’t recommend so I won’t give the title). Anyway, that took me to a marriage website where the movie was discussed and a lady there posted a comment about her relationship with her husband. She said things I knew my wife wouldn’t say about us. It woke me up to how far our relationship was from that, and how hungry I was for that kind of relationship. I had been sleepwalking through life for many years putting up with something far less and growing increasingly unhappy but now that I had been woken up and caught a glimpse of what could be, I had to start working towards it. I’m very grateful my wife was willing to work towards that as well.
Wow, that’s so neat how God can use just a little incident to change everything!
my turning point was after 6 years of marriage when I decided to put healthy and extra firm boundaries in place (even separation, even though it broke my heart) when things got veeeery hard and insane and really scary, instead of getting angry and/or being afraid my hubby was going to leave me.
now we are working together and he loves how strong I am (when needed), because he says “I know that even though I’ll be emotionally all over the place you’ll be strong enough not to let me destroy you, and that means I don’t have to be afraid of myself. and I know that I have to work hard to stay together, instead of just yelling and getting what I want, and that’s good because it means I am growing”. it’s been extra hard, it took years, we both made hard choices and had to grow, and sometimes it’s still THAT hard, but we are going so much better after that.
That’s so wonderful! Boundaries are SO important. It really is often only when we enact boundaries that the spouse who has been treating us poorly starts acting appropriately.
Around a year ago, on a Saturday afternoon, my wife and I, we had nice dinner and a bit of wine, and started discussing different things… The talk lasted until 5 in the morning, and we ended up discussing so many things that we never do. Her insecurities, my private thoughts and aspirations and desires, her fears, my ideas… Since then we often have these long-talk evenings, and they have brought us much closer together. It is amazing how you can live with somebody, and not discuss the things that are on your mind, since the days are busy, and the evenings are either tired or busy or both… In any case, this felt like a big turning point for us, towards deepening trust and communication and fun in our relationship.
Oh, that’s amazing! I think emotional vulnerability is one of the big things that’s missing in so many marriages. How neat!
Thank you, Sheila! I think emotional vulnerability is something we have not achieved yet. And that it will require more bonding, trust, communication, etc. But it is indeed our goal now.
My husband and I have only been married about a year and a half but I feel like we’ve gone through a lot in that time. More specifically, the past six months. We moved, my husband graduated from college & started a new job, in law issues, we had a precious baby & shortly after he started harvest hours at work (meaning he was gone 13 hours a day, only getting one day off every two weeks-if he even got a day off). It was hard. There were many frustrations, tears, fears, etc but ultimately what I learned was that life is hard. I should just continue to be thankful that God brought a wonderful man into my life to go through it with. My turning point has been to realize that Satan will use anything he can to tear a marriage apart because he does not want anything to picture Christ & His relationship with His people like a marriage can. My duty as a believer first & a wife second, is to stay close to the Lord & let Him fill me with truths so that I don’t believe Satan’s lies. And remember that even when I feel alone, that God is there, sees me & cares deeply for me. Our marriage is young but I am excited to see where God brings us to & through for the next 50+ years!
That’s wonderful, Christina! Thank you for sharing!
Christina, your story sounds so much like how mine started (except I wasn’t a Christian back then). Those long work hours can be so hard on young families, hard on mum doing all the home and baby stuff, hard on dad who doesn’t see his kids much, and hard on the marriage, because there is so little time to connect! I am praying for you and your family, please make sure that you don’t lose sight of each other, and of the goodness.
I lost sight of the goodness in my husband for a while, and could only see the bad. Which didn’t exactly make it easy for me to be a loving wife! I am also one of those people who takes things personally. It has taken a lot of ‘taking my thoughts captive’ to get me to a point where I can see that when my husband snaps at me angrily because he is physically hurting, or emotionally tired, or something, that it has very little to do with me. And that he needs a gentle answer and extra loving in those moments.
Although I am sure that you are streets ahead of me in that regard! Your faith is an encouragement to me!
I feel I may be at a turning point today, for the worst. I’m done. One person can only carry a marriage so far. I wish he would wake up like the other husbands mentioned above. I know if I leave he won’t change and pursue me and that breaks my heart and has kept me stuck for years. And yes, I have tried everything. Everything. Sorry to be a downer, I just really don’t have anyone else to talk to. How pathetic, huh??
Praying for you and your family Angie! My heart goes out to you.
Angie, I’ve gone through some things recently if you ever need a good listener, I’m available. Not as a professional, maybe just a friend.
Angie, you are right. One person CAN only carry a marriage so far. It sounds like your husband just doesn’t care. I would recommend not just separation, but divorce. You said you’ve tried everything. It sounds like it’s time for you to leave him. Yes, it will be difficult, but God never meant for you to stay stuck in a marriage like that. If you are able to healthwise and financially, I recommend that either you leave or kick him out, whichever works best. I will pray for wisdom on your behalf.
My turning point came this summer when I realized my husband was cheating on me. I found out it was with multiple women. We just had our 21st anniversary. Things hadn’t been good for the last 8 years (he had an emotional affair with my best friend, emotional abuse, drinking problems and habitual lying) but I was trying to keep the marriage together. This was the straw the broke the camels back. I filed for divorce and am moving forward. I realize that no matter how much I want him to make good choices and to follow after God, it’s not up to me. I tried to be a peacemaker (not peacekeeper) over and over again. But ultimately he is free to choose to be who he wants to be.
Now I believe that God is giving me my freedom and a new beginning. This is never the road that I wanted to travel and I’m sad about my marriage ending. But truthfully my husband broke our covenant a long time ago. My story hasn’t ended in a wonderful turnaround, reconciliation and happy ending. But God is being glorified by setting me free not to endure abuse and disrespect any longer. And my children are seeing that it’s not ok to treat someone like that and that there are consequences for your sinful choices.
For us, our turning point is =right now=. Its on going, =right now=. Both as a couple, and at least for me, individually.
We started out really badly. Complete sexless for the first 16 months. Pretty much sexless for the next 21 years, and for the last 3, completely sexless again. This was not my choice – quite frankly, she is a refuser and a gatekeeper. And this really hurt me, and often I used to think that this really was the base cause of all our troubles for 24 years. BUT – (and this is part of my turning point below) – I also was a complete failure as a spiritual leader. I am an awesome servant (MY WIFE tells me this), but servant-leader? Completely blew the second part. Was this affected by my wifes behavior in the sex area? Sure! But guess what? Only I am responsible for how I act. More below.
So, after the last 3 years, we just reached the point where we both had enough. We’re in godly counseling now, with our assistant pastor and his wife, who while not really close friends, are friends of ours. So they know us both well. More importantly, for me, I wanted our counselors to be someone SHE could trust. I already trust them. So if they say “Biblically, You are doing X wrong, it needs to stop”, we know we can trust them to be true about this.
For me, personally, the turning point was after 3 years of no sex, and no affection at all, I couldn’t take it anymore. So I went myself to our leading pastor, and dumped it on him what happened from the beginning. Every detail, didn’t leave anything out. He asked tons of questions. In the end, I was basically told, “What she did – that wasn’t right, and that needs to be addressed, and we will. But – I can see you need to see that your reaction to this was also =just as bad=. You both are feeding this bad, endless cycle. It needs to be broken – and YOU need to start that by fixing YOUR OWN problems.” In other words, yes, the refusing and gatekeeping is bad, and you know, my feeling rejected and abandoned is valid – but my reactions – withdrawing, giving up, being passive, not reaching out – are just as bad, and in fact, =reinforce= her refusing. Eye opening
So, I got together with the assistant pastor, and went thru a biblical personal evaluation. Very eye-opening. Somethings I believe I was completely wrong on. Some only half-right. Like I said, I’ve been blowing it since the beginning, including not “leading” in getting this sexual refusal addresses. We did go to some counseling, but we didn’t stick with it. Thinking that serving/example was leading, and enough – its not.
She started basically did the same with the pastors wife. She is, as I expected, resistant to the area of sex. But, its a work in progress. So we’ve both been going to individual counseling for a bit.
In our first “together” session, I confessed my sin in this, my weaknesses. So, I want to repent, and change this. I’ve been studying like gangbusters, praying constantly. In other words, there is =work= that needs to be done in my life. Easy? Quick? NO. But I am doing it. And we’re slowly starting to work together, like we always should have.
Is there still frustration? Yes. We are still sexless. Right now, I don’t see a hope of that changing anytime soon – like months, maybe even longer. She doesn’t seem to get it that the refusal/gatekeeping is not only sin, but hinders not only me in my desire to change, but in her as well, and in how it affects us as a couple. I’ve struggled with this – I’m very lonely, and the rejection hurts. But I’m learning I can’t change her on this. The pastors wife is working with her, and in our first couples meeting, literally dragged the admission (somewhat) that something isn’t right about our sex life out of her. You can see she is fighting this for some reason (both pastors confirmed this to me). But I have learned – I can’t do anything about that. I =need= to work on only what I can change – and thats me. I have seriously hurt not only our relationship, but her directly – and myself in the process. So, while I struggle with the rejection, and the fact that she doesn’t seem to want to address her issues, I can’t focus on that. If I do, I only hurt myself and her and our marriage.
Like my pastor says: HOPE! Assume good! Pray! Work on myself! God is working – not only in me, but in her, and in US as well. This was always a struggle with me, but I am learning. And its working, and helping.
So, thats were we are. Is it hard? Yeah. In fact, its even harder! As I admit my own faults, correct my own behaviors and thought patterns, ask for forgivness and move towards repentence (Ie, not only saying “sorry” but enacting change to not do those behaviors again), my own desire for her sexually (previously very very reduced due to rejection), my own desire for her own happiness (concerned with only my own), and for our life together has only increased! So its even harder, knowing that that desire for me is not reciprocated (pretty much told so far that “other stuff is more important first, and then maybe we’ll work on sex”). Maybe it never will be – but I have to face that, but I need to face it with the thought that that isn’t whats important – our unity and my feelings (being corrected now!) is.
So, our ship is turning. Maybe oil tanker slow turning, but it is. I try to keep this in mind – it is very very hard. But with God’s help – I hope, inevitable.
So for those of you still waiting for that turning point – or dreading it – don’t! Get some godly counsel. Face your own mistakes. Admit to your own faults, and work to correct them. It can happen.
John,
You are very brave and I commend you on trying so hard to work on YOURSELF first to make a difference in your marriage. I’m a woman but your struggles seem to mirror mine so very much! My husband is the refuser/gatekeeper. There’s all this pushing for wives to stop refusing their husbands but literally nothing that tells husbands to start initiating and following through. Please tell me, do you have ANY advice or insights?
Angie, I don’t know if I can help, being a man, as I can’t understand =why= a man would treat his wife that way. Course I can’t understand the other way either.
Other than what I mentioned is all I can advise: take a close, close look at yourself. See if there is some part of this that comes from you. Like I found out, I had my own blinders on. I realize now that, without myself taking responsibility and doing changes about myself, not much would happen. It just took reaching ‘that point’ to get help. Not saying you haven’t, I just don’t know. Maybe you can get counsel with a trusted friend or pastor and ask if they see something in you that really does need to be addressed – thats what happened with me.
One thing that might help – and just coincidently – our church had a sermon on Sunday about “Confronting with Care”. Its not specifically about sex, but just in general dealing with some kind of issue with someone else, and how to confront it in a godly way. I wish I had heard this 20 years ago – it might have avoided a lot of pain. Course, my wife could’ve applied it to me as well! I also needed to be confronted about a lot of things.
It might take more than just you confronting him alone, though (I feel this is so with my wife – I think she has a hard-heart towards me when it comes to sex – and maybe deservedly so – so having our counselors addressing it instead is helping, I think). I don’t know if you are Jesus-followers, or if you are, how serious your walk is, but it might help to confront him with church leadership – after all, it sounds like you have tried to confront him about it already without result, so the next step would be to confront him about it with the leadership (preferablely a husband-wife team) involved. Maybe that would be enough to jog him into action. Sometime hearing from another man can spur men into change.
Anyways, here’s the link – its not long, and worth the listen. The pastor is very, very good:
http://osbc.org/multimedia-archive/how-to-confront-with-care/
I pray God gives you guidance, patience, and peace as you go thru this.
I love that your church is talking about that! Confronting is so hard to do, but like I said in 9 Thoughts That Can Change Your Marriage, we’re to be PeaceMAKERs, not PeaceKEEPERs. Which means we will confront when something needs to be confronted.
I know that so much of it DOES come from me. Believe me, I can list every. single. fault. I have and probably some I don’t actually have. I don’t have any friends, much less a trusted one to turn to. As for church counsel, I’ve turned my back on church yet again because of the messages that keep coming from it (such as wives nag husbands relentlessly for no reason and men shouldn’t be alone with women because women will lie about sexual assault that didn’t happen). I’ve done MY best to be a good wife and a good person. I am calling a therapist today to set up an appointment for myself. Maybe I’ll ask for the guy, other women don’t seem to understand my need for sexual and physical intimacy that more resembles a man’s needs. This will be the 3rd counselor and 4th counseling attempt. Thank you for listening to me.
Angie–that’s horrible about your church! But maybe you need to just try a different one? I really think an envangelical Lutheran or Wesleyan may be more up your alley, from what I know about you. And I would be very surprised if that was the main message one of those gave!
We’ve tried 3. Baptist, though. They just just seem focused on getting money from you and talking about making sure you accept Jesus. No marriage focus or family help. I don’t need help getting to heaven. I need help right now. Here. Thank you for the suggestions, I am grateful for you and this blog. To have somewhere safe to express myself is so….. I just don’t have the words.
Wow, John, what a story! I think that is so great that you told your pastors that you needed help, and that you took the initiative to get it. So few people actually follow through on that. So great! And I love how your eyes are on yourself. I pray that she does open up not just to what she is doing to you (which is bad enough) but also to the fact that God made her for so much more–to feel passion, to be vulnerable, to have real intimacy. I pray that she gets a vision of what that may look like, and doesn’t see it only as a physical release thing.
Thanks, Sheila. One thing I struggle with – I would love to suggest to her your books, and J’s over at HHH, or maybe Linda Dillows “Passion pursuit”, or something from Juli Slattery. I really think they would help – but I don’t think I can.
Mostly because it does seem, admittedly, kinda self-serving if I did, and I know she won’t take such suggestions from me (suspicion). If it came from me, it probably would seem that way to her. I’ve bought “Sheet Music” in the past and suggested we go thru it, but it was like an automatic “roll eyes, glance thru it, no way”.
And I don’t want to turn her off to such wonderful resources, if the chance came for her to use them!
She won’t actively seek out books like yours that cover this topic from a purely woman’s view. I’ve been trying to figure out how to “nudge” her in that kind of direction – I’ve thought of suggesting it to the wife of the pastor we are working with, but again – self serving? They have given her a book, but its more general, and from the 70s, and is more couple-oriented. I was hoping more of for a “woman-to-woman” type of thing.
Kind of a catch-22 here. I really think they would help, but such suggestions from me are automatically viewed with suspicion, unfortunately (maybe deservedly, too). Its unfortunate how much we all reject the message just because of the messenger, in a lot of things.
John…… NOT self serving. Marriage serving. Ask the wife of your counsel couple her opinion on these books. She may not have seen them herself! Fortune favors the bold.
Angie – I took your advice! I gave a list of Sheila’s books to our counselors, and I told them I’d leave it up to them. I also suggested J’s and some of Linda Dillows books. Here’s to hope!
Good for you!! I sooooo hope things turn around for you and your wife. Good luck!
Well, one step forward, 3 steps back. I used amazon links to send to our pastor and wife saw the amazon history. She made it plainly clear she “doesn’t need any books how to tell me to do anything” and that clearly this is all my fault and that any sexual reconciliation will be years, if at all. She made it clear we are starting over as if we never met. Yet she won’t even do simple things like hold my hand or.greet each other whe n we come home. I left the room and wept. Wept for the damage I had done to our marriage, wept for the state of our marriage, wept for her hard heart.
Here I am, supposing to be thankful, and all I want to do is die.
A big turning point that comes to mind for me is about a year and a half ago. I had a major depressive episode where I attempted to harm myself. My husband did the hardest thing he’s ever done and called 911. There aren’t many low points in life like sitting in the back of an ambulance on your way to be evaluated at the psych ward. But it was a huge lightbulb moment for me. If these professionals thought I was in bad enough shape to take me to the hospital, then my husband was right. I wasn’t okay. I had been in denial for a long time. My husband had suffered, my children had suffered, and I had still stubbornly remained in my denial. I owed my husband a HUGE apology and I needed help. Once the doctor determined that I wasn’t in such immediate danger that I needed to be admitted, I was able to call my husband on the phone. I was terrified. I didn’t know if he would want me to come home. But he was so gracious, so tender, so forgiving. He drove straight to the hospital and brought me home. That was when it really clicked for me how much he loves me. I had always known, but now I KNEW. Even with all my imperfections he adores me. I realized I’d been pushing him away for a long time because I didn’t truly believe he could love me as much as he said he did. But he does. And I needed to let him. We’re never going to be perfect and we’re never going to stop growing and maturing, but we know without a doubt that we are committed to each other and we would rather do this together than apart.
Wow, Melissa, thank you so much for sharing that! That’s so amazing. And I love how your husband really looked out for your best, even when it was hard for him (and for you) and did the right thing. That’s so great! I’m glad you’re doing better now. 🙂
Hi Sheila,
I love your blog and am a daily reader from California 🙂
My husband (25) and I (28) got married almost two years ago. We’ve had small turning points in our marriage that really make an impact for me mentally – – such as, I finally decided that I was going to have authority over dirty dishes. I would be thankful as I cleaned them, thanking God for food to dirty the dishes and warm water to clean them with. Dirty dishes are actually a blessing!
So, we have had little (but big) turning points like that, but one of the major turning points was when I began a Christian (about 4 years into our dating relationship) and got serious about it. After much talk with God, I made the decision to tell Dillon, that until we got married, we were going to stop being intimate and that he no longer was allowed to live in my apartment. It was difficult, especially after living in sin for so long — but after some initial pushback, Dillon came around (God spoke to him, too) and agreed.
That encouraged me further, along with your blog and God’s word, to confront him on porn and movies/TV that were basically porn. After some arguments, learning, and growing on both our parts, our relationship changed for the better. I think we are both better people now, and we have learned so much about trust and forgiveness and love for each other.
We just had a baby boy about two months ago, so I am sure we will have some more turning points in our future, but I have faith that God will help me navigate my way through motherhood and marriage and prove faithful like He already has in so many ways.
Your blog has helped my marriage! Thank you for writing about tough topics!
Katie
Oh, Katie, what a GREAT story! I love that! And I love how God did so much in your life BEFORE you were married, too. And I love seeing dirty dishes as a blessing! So cool.
My husband and I were 10 years into our second marriages. We never could resolve the issues that were important to each of us. We just pointed the finger at each other and argued endlessly. Our home was a constant verbal battleground. We were both too stubborn to admit defeat a second time, but were at the end of our ropes. I heard about the Weekend to Remember marriage retreats (now called Weekend Getaway) on a Christian TV show called Marriage Uncensored. (Keith and Sheila, along with Paul and Eleanor Henderson were the speaker couples at our first retreat.) My husband likes to say that he was dragged there kicking and screaming, however, at the end of that first retreat, HE said that we were going to come to these retreats every two years. We both felt that we were heard by the other at the end of the weekend. We were on the same page. We have kept that commitment to each other and have returned every two years, to keep our marriage strong, through all the seasons of our relationship. Is our marriage perfect? No. But every two years, we get a tune-up! Next November will be our 6th time!
I remember meeting you at that retreat, Susan! Wow, was that 10 years ago? Wow.
The turning point in my marriage is when my husband left us(3 kids & i) about a yr & a half ago. When he left he said that it would be a way for us to “reset” our relationship, but nothing has changed. He rarely calls the kids, he stopped going to church, he watches the kids once a week at our (we bought a new home & then he left) house & he barely speaks to me. Seems he texts me or comes around when he wants to be intimate (sigh, yes, i am still intimate with him b/c its my only way to stay close to him, plus technically we’re STILL married). He doesnt think he’s “good enough” for me & is very down on himself. This state of limbo that i’m in with him is devastating. I feel like i’m slowly dying. I cant imagine my life without him, although i’m pretty much living it. It seems no amount of prayers, reading, worship or seeking God helps.I am still heartbroken & hurting. I want my marriage restored, but i’m so tired of waiting on God to show up (both in my life and his). I’m at the point of not caring what happens either way (together or not together) but SOMETHING needs to happen. I have even started asking God to take away my desire for him (my husband) b/c i cant keep living this way. I cant keep holding out hope only to be continously disappointed. I just want God to answer me & give me wisdom. Why does He continue to let my kids & I suffer? Being the only one fighting for your marriage is exahuasting. I honestly dont know how much longer i can go on.
Cj, just reading your comment, I would recommend divorce. If you are the only one fighting and your husband isn’t interested, the fighting is useless because it’s not going to get you anywhere. Your marriage, as I can see from your comment, is essentially over. If you are able to healthwise and financially, I would suggest that you say “enough is enough” and end it for good. Yeah it will be difficult, but worth it in the long run. Believe me on this.
You are valuable and precious. Please stop sleeping with this man. It isn’t keeping him close to you, and staying close to him is just hurting you.
Is this what you would want for your children’s marriages? If not stop modeling it.
Reading how you both considered a job change to spend more time together was literally JUST an a-ha moment for me. I have read this blog for years and I got me through a serious consideration of leaving my husband.
We are in a good place now however he works in law enforcement with a crazy night days weekends and holiday schedule. Overtime always and leaving me always alone. I have a job in corporate finance that I love, but I don’t see HOW this is going to work long term. We are 30 with no kids so I don’t see a job change for either of us as “necessary” I am practically living a single life with no kids and a sometimes husband- RSVP always just one.
Can I justify a job change for either one of us? I’m lonely and he is exhausted but we both love our jobs and appreciate that we are finally financially comfortable…. I can’t tell if our marriage is suffering….
It was a year and a half ago. I was certain I would be divorcing when my youngest turns 18. Then one day I saw the cover of Gary Thomas’ book, Sacred Marriage-What if God designed marriage to make us holy more than to make us happy? It was very humbling. I call myself a Christian but I was so angry and bitter. It was a life changer. I was honest with God and told Him that I would obey but that I would be kicking and screaming the whole way. He is so good. He has made it so easy. I have no reason to doubt that He is doing a very good thing. I trust him and He has been so incredibly faithful.
My turning point was when I realised that I needed to mature spiritually. I needed to cultivate my relationship with God personally and learn to listen to His voice personally instead of filtering all my decisions and thoughts through my dad. He had a very toxic control over me, and I had to walk away from that and prioritise my relationship with God and my husband. It didn’t go down well with my family, but it was SO worth the grief! My husband and I were just discussing last night how much we have gained in oneness together and spiritual maturity with our Lord over the 9 years since. We have three beautiful children now and although our relationship with my family is strained, every other relationship in our lives is stronger and healthier now. God first, each other second and everything else just falls into place!
I’m a daily reader for about 5 years. I don’t think I’ve ever commented.
Turning points in my marriage…
1. Realizing that God knows me better than my husband ever can or is able to. I have a wonderful marriage and sweet husband, but he’s not God, and he’s not meant to fill that position.
2. I only have the power to change me–not my husband or anyone else for that matter.
That was so powerful because I don’t have to wait around waiting for him to change!
Focus on where I can change and praise and be thankful for the good I do see in him instead of dwelling on what needs to be “fixed.” (That includes how I pray for my husband.) And it’s usually the most glaring faults I find in him are right in my own life as well!
The turning point in our marriage came when my husband, who had grown up in a wonderful Christian home, admitted that he had been molested as a teenager by a neighbor and was exposed into the world of porn, which he was still addicted to. We had been married for 10 years at this point and had a great marriage, but I always felt like there was a wall between us, but more importantly, between him and the Lord.
Through some counseling, me reading TONS of books, and his transparency to help me understand the whole bomb he dropped, we developed an extreme intimacy, and his relationship with the Lord grew by leaps and bounds. I was so sorry that he had carried this pain and shame for so long, and he finally let me and God both in to help him sort it out. I learned SO much about porn and men’s addiction to it too!
He shared our successful testimony with our pastor, and he was invited to the join him during a Sunday morning to share our story to our church family and welcomed other men who were struggling with porn to seek him out for help. That was a few years ago, and we have been able to walk with many couples who never had someone to talk to before. We’re amazed at how common porn/infidelity is BUT how awesome God is to redeem love.
Our marriage is stronger because we had to face the shame but also we talk about it CONSTANTLY as we counsel other couples. I am always learning new things about him as we discuss how to best help another couple. I will be a lifelong student of my husband!
Very rarely does God speak directly to me. But the morning of Sept 9, 2011, He was loud & clear.
After another routine morning…getting my daughter to school & husband to work, I was out on the porch enjoying a quiet cup of coffee. Then, as plain as day I heard, “Kimberly, you need to look at your heart. If changes aren’t made this is where you’ll be in five years.” Remember those old family home movies…before my wide-open eyes, there was a movie of my daughter & I doing regular daily things-going to school, grocery shopping, fixing dinner… Another clip, this time, of my husband, same thing…but in a different place. Then I heard Him again, “This is where you’ll be…divorced, living in seperate states, if you don’t make a change. I chose this man for you, for together you are one. Or, it could be this…”. Another movie played. It was the three of us, together, walking down a beach. The scene morphed, my husband and I, older, holding little ones on our laps, laughing as the scene faded. I heard, “The choice is yours.” Then, I remembered my husband saying right after we got married, “I believe the happiness of a family rests in the mother’s heart. You see, the father works and provides for the family. But the mother makes turns the house into a home.”
I sat there in stunned silence, literally. Then I started thinking about our life. We’d celebrated our 10th anniversary in March. Our daughter was five years-old at the time. I had felt my husband & I drifting apart for most of those five years. Between running our business, taking care of our daughter, and just surviving, we had come to the point where we just existed. We had drifted to the point where we had become more like roommates with occasional benefits than husband and wife.
I was terrified! We had let this happen. I HAD let this happen! I HAD become complacent. I HAD let life control me. I certainly did not like the movie God had shown me. I love my husband, deeply. I prayed,man, did I pray! I prayed that God would change my heart, show me the way. That’s when I found ‘To Love, Honor, and Vacuum”…boy, does Shelia give some awesome advice! She opened my eyes even more. I had not been honoring my husband the way he should have been – was that ever an eye-opener! I had treated him like the bread-winner, provider…not as a husband.
It took about a week for everything to sink in & register. I wrote my husband a letter. I apologized & asked forgiveness. That morning we talked for hours! He made his confession’s too…he had given up, resigned to having a roommate, he had even packed his bags several times over the years. He told me that just the week before (when I was going through MY revelations) he had packed his bags and had even made reservations at a hotel. When he was getting ready to walk out the door, he said, “I just got this overwhelming feeling. As I stood in the doorway way, I felt in my heart, just wait. Don’t go. Give her one more week. If things don’t change by this time next week, then I’ll go. That deadline I had given myself (tears started to roll down his cheeks)…is tomorrow morning.”
That was six years ago…FOREVER stamped in my memories. We’ve had our bumps and bruises and boulders in our path along the way. For the first year, he kept waiting for the “old me” to show up. But, we keep God first in our marriage. Those obstacles are much easier to navigate together then alone.
Wow! What a story! I love that. What a blessing to have that vision, and then to listen to it! That’s wonderful.
The turning point in our marriage was at the Family Life Conference in Jasper this past weekend, although it has been coming to a head over the last few month. We have realized things in our marriage that John Gottman would predict as red flags for divorce. The knowledge we gained has been very helpful, but we have a long way to go. I have built walls because of the hurt from my husband’s criticism and defensiveness. I want to be closer on all levels, but at this point I have a hard time even wanting to be with him. Help!! How do I let go of the hurt, forgive and want to be with him again?
Oh, I’m so glad that the conference helped you like that! That’s amazing.
Honestly, I’d say the biggest thing is just learning how to have fun together again. It’s hard to talk about these bigger things until you bring the tension level down. I’m a big proponent of deciding to do something together, away from a screen, every week. And I’ve got a list of 79 hobbies that you can start right now. Why not read that and brainstorm with him and see if one sounds good? I think the more time we spend together, the more we build into our marriage so that we can start to talk about these hurts and better ways of communicating.
Thanks!! I’ll check it out. Have fun in Erskine tonight 🙂
We have been married for 30 years. The first 5 were wonderful. After children came, things got harder. I didn’t understand that I had replaced him with the children. I come from a family who LOVES children and expected him to be dazzled by them along with me and we would both go along as a family raising our children and enjoying every stage together. He was not into young children and kind of took a back seat. I believe, looking back, that he felt rejected. Time went on and as the children grew he did better. I did my best to encourage our girls to respect their daddy even if he didn’t earn it. I never spoke badly of him and often said positive things about him to our girls. But our marriage was still difficult. Then around 2000, things took a turn for the worse. He made a HUGE financial decision that affected our family. I was in total disagreement. It affected the whole of our lives. Our marriage truly suffered. About 4 years of disagreeing on this financial decision, he stopped talking to me. We did not speak to each other (except for the basics) or be intimate for almost 2 years. We spoke of not much beyond who was going to pick up our daughter from soccer or asking him if he would go to church with us this week (In the beginning he went every week but now it was very sporadic). This silent period was his choice. He said that when we discuss anything further, we just end up in a fight and he didn’t want to fight. I thought “Fine! I know I am right on this issue and I know I am doing right biblically.” So I decided to just go about my business knowing that I was in the right. I decided to always be polite to him and just be self-sufficient. I knew in my heart that I didn’t really NEED him except to pay the bills because I was at home homeschooling our children. I never spoke poorly of him with my girls. They asked why daddy was acting like that and I just said “I don’t know honey. Your daddy is going through something. Lets pray for him.” Our friends noticed too! But, I kept asking God to change him and make him see the truth. I am a pretty confident person emotionally and spiritually. I knew God would fix this. As time dragged on, I got more discouraged. I resigned myself to having an unhappy marriage the rest of my life. Fortunately, both of us decided early in marriage that we would never use the D word (divorce) and I knew he was committed to marriage and would never leave me. After about a year and a half of this, it really started to wear on me. THIS WAS THE TURNING POINT. I generally have my emotions in check and am pretty upbeat. But, when someone would speak about my husband in any context, tears sprang to my eyes. Even the most benign discussions. This TRULY SURPRISED me! I thought I was doing ok. I went to God and He showed me that what I was experiencing was rejection. I couldn’t identify it because I had never really experienced it. He showed me that we are one flesh and that I really DID need my husband. I started to deeply yearn for a closer marriage and began to pray desperately and fasted. Then I discovered his porn use. That was very difficult. I found it on the computer after he had gone to bed. I was up all night praying and searching Christian internet sites to figure out what I should do. In the morning I confronted him. He was ashamed. I told him that I believed that he did not want to use porn and that I thought he felt trapped in it. He said yes. I told him I wanted to help him. He sent me an e-mail later in the day when he was at work. He told me about an e-mail site where he was stashing his porn. He gave me the password. He said if I really wanted to help him then I would go into that site and change the password to something he could never guess. I did so immediately. We still weren’t really talking or being intimate. There was a lot of hurt on both parts. God gave me inspiration to pray out loud for him every morning whether he liked it or not. 🙂 I would lay my hand on him while he was still in bed and pray for his day and for us as a couple. This began to soften him. Not only did it move his heart, it also gave him insight into what was really going on in me. I believe he thought I had animosity that I didn’t have. After two weeks of this he softened. He started to respond to the prayers. We started praying together and being intimate again. I do think the porn use was because we were not intimate. I have asked him periodically if he still struggles. He admitted he does sometimes but he fights it. I check his phone and e-mail regularly but I have not found any signs of it. Perhaps he is hiding it, but his outward attitude is nothing like it was during those two years. He was always grumpy. I think he has stopped completely. It took a few more years for our marriage to get strong. Today it is AMAZING! I have my best friend back. The one that I had in the first 5 year of our marriage. It is even better than the early years. He tells me he loves me, he gives me non-sexual touch throughout the day which makes me feel so loved. He is so much more open verbally than he ever was. He tells me about his day. All of the things I yearned for throughout our marriage. And I didn’t even ask for these things. I just prayed about them thorough the years. They were a long time in coming but God is so faithful and answered my prayers. We are intimate regularly. Sheila your blog has helped ms so much! Things certainly aren’t perfect. We still fight once in a while. We took a HUGE financial hit because of his decision. We had to sell our $450,000 house and buy a $120,000 house in a community and hour away to stay afloat. But that is ok. My security is not in my house or possessions. It is in my God and he restored our marriage!!
My turning point came two years ago. I was at the point where I wanted nothing more than to leave my husband. After eight years of dealing with the side effects of a porn addiction and feeling unbearably lonely and neglected I was just done. I felt cheated out of the good christian marriage I had envisioned when we started out. I felt really stuck though because we come from a conservative culture where divorce and remarriage just doesn’t happen…and to actually take the step to initiate a separation would have been a very big deal.
I found this website and peaceful wife .com at that time and did so much soul searching and praying and long story short ultimately made the decision to stay…mainly because my husband was an excellent father, a much needed support in my own struggles as a mother, and a good provider financially so I could be mostly at home with my children .
I learned a lot from this website and others about appropriate behaviors and boundaries for someones whose partner was addicted to porn or living in sin and I cant thank people like Sheila enough for having these resources available. I also realized the areas where I was in the wrong, where I needed to change and hard as it was to take my focus from his wrongdoing to mine, I did it.
It has not been an easy journey, I have had to die to self beyond what I thought I was capable, I have realized that I need to rely on God to fulfill my needs and trust that he is in control.
Now I see my husband slowly changing, I see him making an effort for me, I see him taking steps to improve our marriage, and I have hope that someday I will look back and it will be worth it. I hope I can truly fall in love with him again someday and trust him again. But for now seeing how happy and well adjusted my children are , and knowing I’ve spared them a lot of pain helps me cope with my own disappointment in some areas of our marriage and gives me motivation to continue working on it to improve it.
Seeing your kids happy and well adjusted is reward indeed. And worth the work.
My father died this summer and I spent a lot of time traveling to be with my mother along with taking care of our baby and working from home it became a ‘season of distance’. I didn’t feel like he was there for me and eventually just didn’t care if I was married anymore. But my sons face lights up when I kiss my husband. I know how important it is that our marriage be strong so I dug in and read almost every one of your articles and started to make some real changes to put our marriage first and communicate better. I’m starting to find the husband I fell in love with again.