Leslie Cane Articles

By: Leslie Cane: If you’re lucky, you had a honeymoon period in the beginning of your marriage.  What do I mean by this?  Your marriage started off with a blissful bang where you were both so happy, you may have annoyed and inspired envy in others.  Some people will tell you that the first two years of marriage are the hardest, but from the correspondence that I get (and from my own experience) I think that for many couples, this just isn’t true. Many couples find things more difficult after they have been married for a while. And many notice a very marked difference in their spouse’s happiness and satisfaction level of their marriage after some years have passed.

Someone might explain it in a way similar to this: “when my husband and I first got married, people used to describe him as beaming.  Both his mother and sister told me that they had never seen my husband so happy.  He never tried to hide his feelings from me or others.  He would tell anyone who would listen just how happy I’d made him.  This always made me feel good – as if I’d created something special.  Today, that happy man no longer exists.  He’s sullen and cold.  He’s very critical of the marriage he used to describe as the very best thing in his life.  He’s detached from our family.  And he compares our marriage to the second marriages of his friends.  These friends are married to much younger women and of course they tell my husband that the sex is great and non-stop. I doubt that these claims are even true, but if they are, it’s unfair to compare.  These women don’t have children to worry about.  They have household help.  Their only job is to make their husband happy and to look good.  I do not have this luxury, but my husband seems to expect me to act like them.  Because of these unfair comparisons, he’s now unhappy with our marriage.  He thinks that we don’t have a good marriage anymore.  My friends say that he is just going through a phase and that he will soon see the reality of these May – December marriages.  They say that I am worrying too much about this.  Are they right?  Should I be concerned?”

Why I Think That You SHOULD Be Concerned: I wish I could tell you that you can relax and should not be concerned.  But I can’t honestly tell you this.  Because I tried not to be concerned when my own husband began to show obvious signs of unhappiness.  I too figured it was just a phase and that we would be fine once this thing ran its course.

But I could not have been more wrong.  And we ended up separated because I just sat by and I watched it happen.  So I may be over-analyzing this, but I don’t think that there’s any such thing as being overly cautious when it comes to your marriage.

In my view, it’s better to give your marriage too much attention than not enough.  If you take action and your husband was just going through a phase, then what is the harm?  You’ve given the person you love the most your attention and you have strengthened your marriage.  Those are both very good things that are never a waste of time or energy.

But if you ignore the problem and hope for the best, then it may grow into a much bigger problem that is harder to adequately address.  It is much easier to do maintenance on your marriage and to stop problems before they start than it is to save your marriage once your husband decides that he is truly unhappy in that same marriage.

Taking An Honest Look At Why He’s Unhappy: I know that it can be hard to proceed when you are trying to address your husband’s issues instead of your own. But I would start by asking myself if his complaints have any validity at all.  Sometimes, you can look at them and see a sliver of truth in the complaints.  When I got really honest with myself during my own separation, this was almost always the case.

For example, you are absolutely right that it is unfair for your husband to compare your marriage to his friends’ marriages.  He’s not comparing apples to apples and his friends may not be showing him the true reality of their marriages.  And, even if they were being absolutely truthful, marriages change with time. Revisit those same marriages in 10 years and I guarantee you that they will not look the same.

That said, could he possibly be right that the physical side of your marriage has changed and not for the better?  Do you give this part of your marriage enough attention so that you are both fulfilled? Frankly, I could not have truthfully answered yes to this question right before my own separation.  I did not want to see reality because I felt defensive and attacked, but my husband had some valid points.

It is better to be honest with yourself and put your attention where it is appropriate than to get defensive while nothing changes.  And while I think that it’s perfectly normal for things to change over the course of a marriage, there should always be the connection and that sense of desire and commitment.

Yes, it’s hard to have sex and affection in the way that you did when your marriage was new simply because you have so many other obligations now.  Once kids and careers demand more of your attention, there is only so much of you to go around.  Still, people in good, solid marriages find a way to make that marriage a strong priority so that everyone feels that their needs have at least attempted to be met.

You may feel that you are trying to do this, but if your husband is complaining or showing signs of unhappiness, ask yourself how and where you can be more effective. This is not a knock on you.  And this is not a situation where you should be doing all of the work.  But sometimes, small changes in where you’re putting your attention and placing your priorities makes a huge difference.  And it is so much easier to make these shifts than to try to save your marriage if you are separated.

I wish I had listened to my own advice.  It was very difficult to save my marriage after my unhappy husband moved out.  I would have been much better off paying attention from the start.  You can read more about how I turned things around on my blog at http://isavedmymarriage.com

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