Leslie Cane Articles

By: Leslie Cane: There are people who go through a marital separation or a divorce who will tell you that they never saw it coming.  They will insist that they were generally in a happy marriage where they were able to manage any conflict that presented itself.

Others will admit that even though they never thought that they would end up separated or in jeopardy of losing their marriage, they have to say that they saw the signs of trouble long before the actual separation happened.  And one of the most common things that they will talk about is a withholding of affection.

Someone might explain: “if you had told me three years ago that I would be separated today, I probably would not have believed you.  But if you had told me two months ago, I would have completely believed you because my marriage has deteriorated so much in the last few months. I have noticed that my husband is almost careful not to show me any affection at all.  In the early days of our marriage, he used to almost always have his hands on me.  He would rest his hand at my back.  He would touch my hair.  He would hold my hand. Today, it is as if I have a contagious disease or something. He never touches me or shows me any affection at all.  Sometimes, I will get tired of this and I will crave affection from him.  So I will try to hug him and hold his hand.  And he will literally pull away.  Last week I asked him if he still loved me and although he danced around the topic, he never gave me a straight answer.  It is not as though we’ve gotten in a huge fight or anything.  We have slowly grown apart.  About a year ago, he asked me to lose some weight.  I admit that I have gained an alarming amount of weight and I would like to lose it eventually.  But I haven’t really started working out or dieting because I am juggling a million other things.  Part of me thinks that this might be why he’s withholding affection.  I worry about what this means for our marriage.  I could continue to live this way if I had to.  I would rather just live with it than to end up divorced.  But my fear is that my husband will decide he doesn’t want to be married to me anymore and will leave me.  Because I can already feel him pulling away.  Am I being paranoid?”

Withholding Affection Can Be Serious: I absolutely do not think that you are being paranoid.  I was in a similar situation and I tried to tell myself that I was just seeing things and so I sort of ignored the problem.  This was a big mistake.  I ended up almost divorced and most definitely separated.

So I would never encourage anyone to just ignore a huge problem in your marriage in the hopes that it will go away.  The most effective way to move past this is to admit it and then to address it.  Sure, all marriages cool down at times.  But a spouse that is obviously withholding affection is troubling.

Putting It On The Table: I’d suggest that you need to figure out exactly why your husband is not being affectionate.  You could try asking once more, being careful not to sound accusatory or desperate.  An example would be something like: “please don’t take this the wrong way.  But lately, I have noticed that you don’t want to touch me and that you pull back when I try to touch you.  I do not want you to think that I am blaming or complaining.  I just want to fix any problems because our marriage is the most important thing to me.  Can you share with me why you might be backing away?”

Hopefully, he will be forthcoming.  If he still talks in riddles or once again won’t directly answer you, then you have a couple of choices.  You could ask him to go to counseling to explore the issue.  Because much of the time, when a person gets around to withholding affection, it is the combination of many things that have been at play for a while and a counselor can help you figure out where the resentments and problems really are.

Strategies You Might Try: If he refuses, then you could try different strategies to see if any of them improve the situation. Because you already have some theories as to why he’s pulling away.  And it may not be that your weight is a turnoff.  It might be that you promised him that you were going to try to do something and you did not follow up.  So he feels mislead and let down.

I think just showing him that you’re making a reasonable effort might pay off.  Allow him to see you making healthy choices and doing simple things like walking after dinner.  I know that you are busy.  Everyone is.  But I think that you never go wrong when you make your marriage and yourself a priority.

And you never want your spouse to think that what is important to him is not important to you and vice verse. You’ll need to keep track of your efforts and see which one brings about the best response from him.  When you notice that something is working, continue to do it until you see the affection returning.

Most often, people withhold affection when they believe that you have let them down or not held up your end of the bargain in some way.  If you can figure out where this is true and fix it, then you may well find the affection returning.

It’s crucial that you pay attention when you still have a chance to fix things.  I didn’t. I just hoped that things would get better.  This almost cost me my marriage.  You can read about how I eventually turned things around at http://isavedmymarriage.com

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