My Husband Wants to Split Up, But I Don't

I hear this phrase, and several variations of it (i.e. "my husband wants to separate," "my husband wants a divorce," "my husband is going to leave," etc.) quite often. Most wives who approach me with these situations are really wanting to know the answer to a few very different specific questions as follows: What they really want to know is "can I save my marriage by myself or single-handedly?" and "can I get my husband to stay when he doesn't want to?"

From my own experience, the answer to these questions is a resounding yes. I have done this myself in my own marriage even when my husband had already started the divorce process through his attorney. Of course, every marriage, husband, and situation is going to be different. And every answer to these questions will be slightly different as well. There are a lot of factors that can come into play such as why the husband wants to split up, how long the problems have been going on, and how receptive both parties are to making it work.

That being said though, it's entirely possible that, with a bit of work, patience, and effort you can save the marriage when you are the only one who wants to. What this takes though is a deep understanding of your husband and his motivations, and the ability to take calculated teeny tiny steps (with each small victory leading to another until your marriage is back on track.) Once you reach this point, you'll then need to address the problems and issues that were causing all of these talks of splitting up in the first place, but I don't recommend you try to have difficult or deep conversations until the marriage is back on firm ground.

What Your Husband Probably Really Means When He Says He Wants To Split Up Or Separate: Unfortunately, sometimes husbands are not very good at communicating what they really mean. They may give you very vague, non specific statements like, "I'm just not happy," or "I just think its better if we're apart," or "it's not you, it's me." These phrases really don't tell you anything specific or point you to any concrete action you should take. Worse, husbands will sometimes send you terribly mixed signals. One second he may talk about the split, while the next, he's holding and reassuring you, acting affection, or even wanting to be intimate. So, it can be very hard for a wife to completely understand if he really means what he says.

From my own experience and research, I hopefully can decipher this at least a little. Men typically want out because they've lost feelings along the way. But it may surprise you to learn that many times, the feelings they've lost have to do with how the feel about themselves rather than about you. (Yes, the "it's not me, it's you," line is often the truth.) I'll explain. When a man is in love, it's usually because a woman was able to make him feel attractive, worthwhile, interesting, alluring, and worthy. Most times, a woman does this by lavishing a lot of attention, interest, and affection toward him (like when you were first dating.)

Now, of course, later every one has to go back to real life. We eventually have responsibilities to which we must turn our attention. Our jobs, our commitments, our children, our aging parents, and our households all compete with our husbands for our attention. We can't be everything to every one and we hope and trust that our husbands will see and understand our struggle. We think: of course he will know that I love him and give him as much attention as I can manage, right? Well, not exactly.

For the most part, husbands do know that our intentions are good, but this doesn't stop them from still wanting our attention, affection, and admiration. They still need the validation that created all of the positive feelings. They want to feel loved, cherished, and appreciated just like we do. Deep down, they're often pretty disappointed if they feel this isn't happening.

So, a husband's "wanting to split," is often a reaction to their disappointment that these good feelings about himself are now gone and he doesn't know how to get them back. Your job then, is to show him how this can be accomplished.

How To Get The Spark Back And Save The Marriage: So, the obvious thing to do is to return the original positive feelings in your marriage. This seems such a simple task, but there can be challenges. First, you have to be absolutely genuine about this and can not be obvious about it. No one likes to be manipulated and men really hate it. If your husband thinks you're just playing games, he is going to resist you even more and your job will be even harder.

What you need to do is, every chance you get, present yourself in a positive light. You need to show your husband that you can again be the loving, light hearted, happy go lucky woman he first fell in love with and who made him feel so good about himself. I know that this can be a challenge when so many things are going wrong. You may instead want to reason with, debate with, or bombard your husband with messages, emails, etc., but please don't do this. It will only make you appear desperate, out of control, and needy. You want to instead appear even keeled, rational, and in control.

Yes, it may be a challenge, and yes, it will take discipline, but it is the only way to genuinely get the feelings back in a way that won't backfire on you in the end. And, it elicits positive rather than negative feelings.

When Is It Too Late To Save A Marriage?: I may be biased, but I don't think it's ever too late. As long as the relationship wasn't unhealthy and there is at least one person who wants to save it, that's really all that I think is needed.

But, the more your relationship is damaged, the slower you may have to move. Just be patient, as you will get there. If you jump the gun, you're going to push your husband further away.

Likewise, if you take no action and just hope things work out, you're leaving an awful lot to chance.

I have wives who tell me "yes, but my husband is really mad," or "my husband isn't even speaking to me," or "my husband says he hates me." You may be surprised to hear that I often think this is good news. Why? Because these are strong emotions that are indicative of strong feelings. Love and hate are actually quite similar and close together. If your husband didn't still have strong feelings for you, he wouldn't react this strongly. If he didn't care at all, he'd be indifferent instead.

About the Author: My husband said he hated me a couple of times when he wanted a divorce. Thank goodness I didn't let that stop me. I kept right on working on the marriage (by myself, since he wasn't interested at first.) Eventually, (though commitment and lots of effort), I was able to not only save the marriage, but make it stronger. So, it was very much worth the effort. You can read my very personal story of how I stopped the divorce on my blog at http://you-can-save-your-marriage.blogspot.com/

Article Source: EzineArticles.com