Leslie Cane Articles

By: Leslie Cane: Many wives feel as if they were forced to change for good after their husband left them. Often, they were fully aware that the only way to have any chance of him coming back was to authentically change in order to remove the obstacles that were standing in the way of a happy marriage.

A wife might say: “I believe that my husband left me for multiple reasons. But the biggest reason is that he thinks I am too immature. I am a lot younger than him. At first, I don’t think that this bothered him at all. However as time went on, he began to believe that we didn’t have that much in common because I didn’t take life seriously enough. I think he began to see me as a party girl who only thought about having a good time with my friends while he took on all of the responsibilities. As a result, we fought all the time about money and I would poke fun at him for acting like my father. Looking back now, I see that I was totally out of line, but it wasn’t obvious to me back then. My husband has been gone for about five weeks. Since that time, I have enrolled in college. I have stopped going out all of the time. I have cut back on silly spending. I realize that for us to have a complete life together, then we both have to contribute equally to that life. I called my husband the other night and told him what I had done and how much I felt that I had changed. I could hear the doubt in his voice and then he quickly changed the subject. Clearly, he doesn’t even begin to believe me. Short of bringing the college receipts over to his house, how can I prove to him that I have really and completely changed so that he will want to come back home?”

The wife had made a decent start, but what she didn’t realize was that because she had wavered many times before when her husband complained about her behavior, he naturally had his doubts about how genuine the changes were this time. And like many men who have initiated a separation, he was leery of any promises that were meant as a pretty blatant attempt to get him to come home. The fear, of course, is that once he returns home, the wife will quit college and will go back to her partying ways.

So the wife had to understand that she likely had many doubts to overcome and this was going to take some time. In the meantime though, there were some things that she could do to help her cause. I will share some of them below.

Don’t Keep Dwelling On The Changes. Let Them Show Themselves Naturally:

If you bring up the new you every chance you get, your husband is likely to think that you are only putting on a display for his benefit. You run the risk of looking ingenuine. So know that telling him of what you have done once is enough. If he has questions, he will ask. Resist the urge to keep working your new life into every conversation. He will be much more likely to believe you if he gradually sees the changes for himself.

Make Sure That Any Change You Make Is Something That You Can Maintain:

I don’t want to sound insensitive, but I dialog with many husbands in this situation on my blog. Many of them are just waiting for you to show your true colors. In fact, many of them will even test you to see if they can get you to slip up and resort back to your old ways. (And if you do, you are going to have a very hard time getting him to believe you again.) So you need to make absolutely sure that any change you attempt is going to be something that you can maintain even under pressure and even under temptation. If this wife was going to claim that she would stop partying and head to college, then she needed to make absolutely sure that she was willing to do just that for a lifetime. Because if the husband was so upset about her lifestyle that he was willing to leave her, then he wasn’t going to suddenly find her lifestyle acceptable when she resorted back to it later.

Have Confidence And Give Off The Impression That You Don’t Need To Prove Anything:

Often, when you become frustrated and want to “prove” something, your tone or the air that you give off almost has a sense of desperation to it and this makes people suspicious of your motives and your sincerity. You are much better off displaying confidence. You want to state your case and then give off the impression that he is going to believe you over time because he will see for himself. There is no need to prove anything or to “make” him believe you. Because after he sees you doing exactly what you say, then he will no longer be able to deny it.

Whether this will be enough to lure him back home isn’t for me to determine, but it is most certainly a good start. Any time you can remove an obstacle that is so important to your spouse that it is standing in your way of remaining married, then it is worth doing.

I definitely had to show my husband sincere, lasting change in order for him to come home during our separation.  At first, he didn’t believe me but I just kept acting authentically and I waited him out.  Eventually, we reconciled and we are still very happily married today.  You’re welcome to read the whole story my blog at http://isavedmymarriage.com

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