Should I Tell My Separated Husband I Want To Save My Marriage?
By: Leslie Cane: It’s not uncommon for your feelings, wishes, and outlook to change after you have been separated for a while. Sometimes, you go into the separation thinking that you will feel a certain way or want a certain thing. But time away from your spouse makes you feel differently and encourages you to reevaluate. And sometimes, your wishes change because of this also. But it can be unclear as to whether or not you should share your changing feelings and wishes with your spouse.
A wife might say: “my husband is the one who initiated the separation. But I agreed with it. I didn’t really fight it. Because it was clear that we had to do something. We had gotten to the point where we could just not get along. And there didn’t seem to be any feelings left between us. It just seemed that everything was deteriorating. So it appeared that the logical thing to do was to separate. We didn’t speak at all for weeks after he moved out. Lately we have been talking on the phone. And as that started, my feelings began to change. I have started to entertain the idea that I would like to save my marriage. I miss my husband. I realize that we are being reactive and not proactive. I feel like we should fight to stay together rather than just idly retreating like we are. But I am not sure if I should share my thoughts with my husband. As I said, we talk. But he hasn’t said much to allow me to gage how he is feeling. So I’m afraid that if I tell him what I’m feeling, he might reject me or stop calling. Should I tell him that I want to save my marriage?”
That’s a tough question to answer. I think you have to look at the situation and at the clues you might already have in order to determine if sharing this information with him will make him more likely to cooperate or less likely to play along.
In my own case, if I alluded to how much I loved my husband and how I would do anything to save my marriage, this would cause my husband to back away – almost every time. If I came on too strongly, he would limit his access to me. He would stop calling and stop taking my calls. I believe that this was because my husband didn’t know what he wanted. He hadn’t completely ruled out a reconciliation, but he also hadn’t ruled out separating permanently or divorcing. So every time I told him how I felt, I think he felt pressured and he felt guilty.
Eventually, I noticed that when I would take a wait-and-see attitude where I just enjoyed the time we were sharing without questioning it or analyzing it, things went much better between us.
Make no mistake about it. I did want to save my marriage. Very badly, in fact. But for me, making a big announcement about it made things worse.
However, I have no way of knowing if this is going to be the case with you and in your own marriage. Sometimes, both spouses decide that they want to save their marriage and no one is shy about saying this. In this case, sharing this with your spouse would be the right call because both people are absolutely sure that this is what they want. So, sharing this news would probably bring you closer together.
Gaging How He Might React: I think that much of the time, you can look at your husband’s behavior and how receptive he is toward you at the time to at least speculate as to how he might react if you were to tell him that you want to save your marriage. If you are sure that this will make him happy and that he will be completely onboard, then I don’t see any harm in sharing this.
But, if there is a chance that this might make him pull back or that this might negate the progress that you have made, then I would wait. And if you are not sure what type of reaction he would have, I would still wait and watch. I would wait and see if he will share his feelings first or I would look for clues to give me more information.
I know that this may not be the news you wanted to hear. But I know first hand that things can be really fragile during a separation. Progress must be guarded. It’s important not to do anything to jeopardize the good things that are happening. And if keeping this information private will help to keep him from pulling away when he’s still not sure what he wants, then I don’t see any harm in keeping this to yourself – at least until you are on stronger footing.
Unfortunately, I learned this the hard way. By announcing my plans to get him back, I caused my husband to back away. It took me a lot of time and effort to regain my footing and to pull my husband closer. You can read more on my blog at http://isavedmymarriage.com
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