Leslie Cane Articles

By: Leslie Cane: Many devastated wives are still reeling from their husband’s hurtful words. Usually, the husband has just admitted that he is no longer in love with his wife. Sometimes, he will insist that, although he loves them, he is careful to make the distinction that he’s not “in love.” This can leave the wife not only hurt beyond description but also quite confused.

Here’s an example: “my husband has been hinting for months that he thinks we need to get a separation or divorce. I had hoped things would get better so I tried not to worry about this too much. But then last night, he told me that he was going to move into an apartment close to his work. I asked him why he was taking things this far and he said ‘I do love you very much, but I’m no longer in love with you.’  Once I regained my composure because I was completely in shock, I asked him how long it had been since he was in love with me. His response was ‘I don’t know. Actually, I can’t remember the last time I felt that I was in love with you.’ I couldn’t even speak I was so crushed. It’s bad enough being told that your husband isn’t in love with you. But to think that the years could have been going by without him feeling love and passion for me, well, it’s almost more than I can bear. And I think it might mean that our marriage is completely dead or beyond repair. It hurts me so much to think that when he looks at me, he’s not feeling love. I still love him so much. Does this mean that there’s no hope for us? Do husbands ever fall in love with their wives again, even if they haven’t been in love for a very long time?” I’ll try to answer these questions in the following article.

Why Husbands Typically Feel That They’ve “Fallen Out Of Love” With Their Wives: I hope that I don’t come off as being insensitive. But it doesn’t stop me in my tracks when I hear a wife confess that her husband is no longer “in love” with her. Admittedly, it stopped me in my tracks and broke my heart when it was my own husband who was uttering these words. But over the years through my blog and through my own experience, I’ve learned that husbands think they’ve fallen out of love with their wives all the time. It’s not even rare for those same husbands to eventually figure out that they were wrong about this all along, or to change their mind when they changed their circumstances or their perceptions.

There are many reasons that a man might think he’s no longer in love with his wife. He may be responding to a stale marriage (that can be reignited relatively easily.) He might be going through a very trying time in his life where he associates his wife with this stress. Or he may be approaching midlife and all that entails so that he may want to “start over” or “make a new start” and he feels that entails shedding his married life. Another possibility is that he may not feel appreciated, valued or heard so his response to your wondering if he is “in love” with you is to retaliate with the assertion that he’s not.  And any reason that your husband may have for his feelings are absolutely valid. But, that doesn’t mean that he can’t and won’t change his mind given the right set of changes or nudges.

Even If Your Husband Hasn’t Been “In Love” With You For Some Time, All Hope Is Not Lost: I know that it is so painful to hear him say that he hasn’t been in love with you for a long time. It makes you wonder what else he might be keeping from you and it makes you wonder if you’re in a situation without hope.

In my opinion and experience, you’re not. I have seen so many marriages turn around even when one spouse absolutely believes that all the love, passion, and chemistry is gone. I’m not going to tell you that it’s an easy or short process. I’m not going to tell you that you’re not going to change at least some of your habits, perceptions, and behaviors because none of this would be true.

However, countless couples find that once they turn their focus back on their marriage and their spouse, and once they open their hearts to some changes that are long overdue, their feelings most definitely can (and often do) change as well.

Here’s something that might make you feel a lot better, but which you may not have considered. Think about your circumstances when you were most “in love.” You were likely in the very early stages of your relationship where you both were your most attentive, complimentary, and reactive. In other words, you made huge efforts to listen and react when your spouse spoke because you were very invested in the relationship and in making your spouse happy. The energy and effort levels were probably higher than they have ever been. They key in bringing back the feelings of being  “in love”  is to bring back some of the attention and effort.

I promise you that if you place your priority on listening to, appreciating, and validating your spouse, you are going to find their attitude and behaviors toward you shifting. And, when this happens in your own marriage, your husband will see you in a new light and he will be more open to feeling all those feelings toward you that he has been pushing down. As he is more receptive to you and he begins to believe that you are sincere and that your marriage actually can change, it is much more likely that his feelings are going to follow suit.

As a matter of fact, it’s not at all rare for me to hear back from some of the wives whose husbands were telling them that he was no longer in love only to hear that he has completely changed his tune and is committed to the marriage and to reconnecting. I know his claims to not be in love with you are upsetting and hurtful. But know that, with the right plan, this can change.

My own husband told me that he wasn’t “in love” with me before we separated.  But today, he tells me that he loves me all the time.  The difference between these two periods in our marriage lies with the time and attention that we invested back into it.  I fully believe that if you change your behaviors, habits, and perceptions, that it is likely that you will fall in love all over again.  If it helps, you can read about how I saved my marriage on my blog at http://isavedmymarriage.com

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