work on my marriage

My wife wants to find her self is what i have been told. 0- to 10 10 being the most love ,I was at a 10 and now I am about a 6 what is happening?

right now. Things are blissful, if I might use that word. We obviously have the usual work-too-much, commute-too-much, have-too-little-time issue, but we hold each other in bed at night, there’s a spark in the morning when we leave, a spark in the evening when we come home, and how content I feel with him right now makes everything we went through so worth it.

Still working on communicating better with each other. Other than that our love is, if anything, growing deeper and stronger and maturing into an even more beautiful thing. Sounds corny, but I would like to plant a tree when we buy our first house as a little symbol of our partnership.

Feeling a bit starved of affection at the mo. Need to prod him into giving me more, I’ll do my best to make my needs clear in a non-confrontational way. He did buy me flowers the night I got back from my trip, however, and that was adorable.

It’s going very well these days, I have to say.

Both having jobs, a secure income, a nice house we can call home, and big plans for moving forwards with our life. We just celebrated our first year of marriage.

I think we have travelled a gazillion miles over the past two or three years and it feels great to be where we are now. We don’t argue as much and I for one feel a lot more content in our relationship. It has made a massive difference that life has become easier and things are falling into place after so many months and years of uncertainty. But I also know we deserve credit for sticking together through some very dark days and also just learning to work together a lot better.

I love him with all my heart. When I think back to all those times I felt so anguished and uncertain, and I look at where we are now and how blessed I feel, I can’t help but smile.

about this right now. When we have conflict it often gets blown up horribly and then I begin to wonder if he can meet my basic needs anymore. Should a married person be having those thoughts?

What’s bothering me, so I can brain dump:

1. He doesn’t seem to ever ‘fight’ for me – he seems to adamantly see it as “kissing my ass”. I don’t know if it’s just me, but I need him to fight for me at important moments, show me that he cares and that he is willing to reach out to me and hold me tight.

2. His indifference to my feelings when we have a conflict hurts me so badly.

3. His unrepentant nature hurts really badly, too. His stubborness, his arrogant streak. His lack of humility or regret.

4. He seems to think my need for reassurance is “being needy” instead of a basic valid need. He is rarely the one to initiate bridge building unless it has got really bad and I have become really sad by what’s passed between us.

5. He says sorry about 3 days too late and never when I need to hear it.

6. He doesn’t try very hard at being romantic or affectionate – two of my most important needs.

7. He seems to put himself first nearly all of the time.

The lack of control I feel in our relationship – the lack of control over him, and my happiness, makes me sick with worry at times. I know it contributed, heck, caused my health problems.

Is this just a bad patch or a symptom of a bigger problem that we will never be able to shake off?

...but it’s worth it. These past few weeks have been really hard for me. A couple of years ago, my marriage suffered an indiscretion, and we’ve been a work in progress ever since. I truly believe we both want to be able to pick up and move on, and we have, slowly but surely…but there are still those times that get difficult because, of course, history cannot be erased. I’ve learned that I need to re-prioritize my life if it is to turn into something I truly want. Family, holidays, back yard barbeques, kids, pets, a warm home…that is what I want my life to be, and I’m working towards securing that one day at a time. This week I came terribly close to finding out what it was going to be like being single and alone, and it frightened me to death. I tried to take solace in that it would be a good ‘learning experience’ about myself, but in all honesty, it’s not something I really want to go through.

To stick it out, or to give up?

This weekend was quite frankly horrific. There is nothing else to say.

We argued and argued till we were blue in the face. I don’t know who we are or what we are anymore.

Life is one great f*ing mess right now. We’re not even sure we can make it together anymore. Divorce is a horrible thought and I can’t even allow myself to go there right now. I have nothing left. I quit my job, my friends, my family, and my country. So to erase everything and undo it all would be a major admission of defeat and a major screw up. I have invested everything I have in this relationship. More than I should have invested.

We challenge each other (to say the least). We rub each other up the wrong way. Our personalities grate in certain ways. And life has just pooed on us for the past couple of years in its own inimitable style. What is the real cause of our problems? Us, and lack of compatibility? Or life, and all its stress? How can we separate out each tangled strand?

I feel sick. I have no will to carry on, looking for jobs and wasting my time putting in job application after application. I am tired, truly tired. I know I am worth something but life makes me feel worthless right now. I need help but there is no help.

The mother of my dear friend G. died yesterday. It puts our crappy weekend into perspective. An absolute waste of life. A waste of a relationship. I feel precious time and life slipping away from me but I am trapped, with no job, a temporary work permit, no money, no friends and little support. I can’t go on like this but there is no other way to go right now.

I gave up on him, to be honest. I realised he couldn’t be there for me the way I needed. I also stopped feeling so sorry for myself and starting getting on with stuff instead of sinking into depression. As soon as I stopped looking to him, he started to reach out/come back to me. Maybe this is a reflection of how the male psyche works, or maybe it’s just him.

We had a bit of an argument tonight, but soon made up.

We’ve actually started having relaxed conversations again. About normal stuff. Not us, not our relationship, not bad stuff. I felt like we could have interesting thoughtful exchanges of information again.

I’m still not wearing my ring. I’m not ready to – right now is a time for me and we’ve been so rocky lately than I don’t feel it’s the right time. But little things are coming back and that feels good.

Hope it lasts, but if we get a setback then I’ll deal with it hopefully with renewed strength and wisdom.

The truth hurts.

Tonight we had a long discussion about the state of our relationship. It was difficult. Some truths came to light that I don’t like – I know I need to change some major things that are dragging us down. Apparently these things have been dragging us down for a long time – all of the time we have been living together – and having to face up to this is scary. When we got together we were so bright-eyed and bushy-tailed; completely in love and no troubles at our door. And then, after all that time of waiting to be together properly, we finally made it, we got to the same city and the same country and we made it. And then the real struggles began. He couldn’t find a job. I got homesick and depressed and ill. I hated my job. When he got a job finally it took him 500 miles away. And after another year apart, the only way I was able to be with him was to give up my own job, so now I’m in exactly the same position, except with immigration issues hanging over me to make things more complicated. I feel we have had no peace, no easy ride for any amount of time, and it has battered us (me) down. And this has meant our relationship has been battered down too.

We chose to get married because we love each other deeply, and it was a make-or-break time – either we moved forwards or we had to give up. And now, 6 months on, I am left wondering where we are. We are good together, but we are going through the motions. We are both bored and tired of how life is right now, and waiting for it to get better. I feel our spark has gone. I am more lost than ever, more depressed and more negative about life. And all of this is what he hates. He says he is tired of trying to prop me up and make me believe that things will turn out in the end. I can see his point, but I just feel broken at times. And now I feel like our relationship is broken, and at some level has been for a long time.

We both need to change, to improve. I know what I need to do, but it’s scary making big changes. My fear and negativity has become to some degree my comfort blanket. What if I let it go? By not daring to hope that things will get better, I am not disappointed when they go tits up. Thinking bad thoughts offers a sick sort of protection.

I know what it’s like to live with a depressed and negative person, and it’s not nice. I can understand why he pushes me away. I just want us to be close and happy, deep down content, again.