Leslie Cane Articles

By Leslie Cane: I sometimes hear from people who worry that they are making a mistake to walk away from their marriage. Often, some part of them deep inside of them wonders if they won’t regret their decision later. And yet, when they think about rolling up their sleeves and trying to save their marriage, they have their doubts about that also. This can leave them feelings as if they are in a situation with no real right answer.

I heard from a wife who said something similar to: “my husband and I have been struggling for years. The spark has been gone for a long time. I feel as if life is passing me by sometimes. And I feel like I would be happier if I didn’t live with my husband. I want him my children’s lives. I care about him deeply. But I am not sure that I want to be married to him anymore. It just feels as if he is holding me back. I have tried to do things to improve my marriage but nothing has really taken hold. Sometimes, I will think that I have made the decision to leave. But then when I even think about telling my husband or my children, I lose my nerve.  I worry that I am being selfish. And then I worry that I will end up alone and lonely and will regret leaving a perfectly good and loving man over something that might be fixed. And I worry that I will regret not working harder to save my marriage. But I don’t know what else to do. Will I regret it?”

I couldn’t predict the future and tell the wife if she would regret leaving her marriage. The only people who would truly know the outcome were the two people involved. But I can tell you that regret does sometimes happen, especially when you know that you still have loving feelings toward your spouse and you can still see them as a decent partner and parent. That said, there are often signs that you can look for that may indicate that you might have some regret sometime into the future. There is certainly no way to tell for sure, but some of the signs that I am about to list may be a reason to think about this a little more deeply before you take action.

When You Say It Aloud, It Doesn’t Make You Feel Stronger: A very good therapist once gave me a wonderful bit of advice about how to handle it when you are wrestling with a difficult decision. She said to stand in front of the mirror, look directly into your own eyes, and then state two sides of the issue. In this example, the wife could look in the mirror and say: “I am done trying to save my marriage. I am ready to walk away,” and then take inventory. The idea is to look into your own eyes and feel deeply whatever comes up. If you have a tendency to look away when you say this, or you feel doubt or weakness afterward, then that is an indication that there are issues that keep you from feeling fully confident or right about this.

But if you can walk to the mirror and say: “I know that my marriage is over and it is in my best interest to walk away,” without feeling any tug while looking very confidently in your own eyes, then this is a good indicator that you are pretty clear on this decision and are at peace with it.

Ask Yourself If You Feel Any Longings When You Think Into The Future: Another exercise that I really like is to look into your future without your husband. Close your eyes and clear your mind. When you are ready, think about your life in say, seven years. What does it look like without your husband? Now, imagine you were at an event for one of your children where both you and your spouse attended. How would you feel, especially if your now husband were remarried or with someone else? Would you feel any longing toward him? Would you feel any regret? Or just relief?

I understand that it is very hard to project into the future and that you can’t really know how you might feel until you have actually experienced it. But I am interesting in what you are feeling right now when you experience this scene. Because if you have any hesitations, then that tells me that somewhere deep down, you are still invested in your marriage. And if that is the case, then there is a chance that you may regret it in the future.

Do You Know That You Have Done Everything That You Could? I have some people who visit my blog and who very convincingly tell me that are completely at peace with their decision to save their marriage. They will often remark that they know that they did everything that they possibly could. And, despite this, it just didn’t work. But they are still able to walk away with out regret because they know that they explored all avenues and still weren’t successful. Although they might be sorry that it didn’t work out, there isn’t deep regret because they know that since they did the work necessary before walking away, there isn’t any question that they made the right decision.

If you haven’t yet sought counseling or tried some self help that walked you through several different strategies depending upon your situation, then perhaps it may be worth it to look at some of these options so that at least you will know that you worked very hard before you finally threw in the towel.

So to answer the question posed, I couldn’t predict if this wife was going to regret not trying harder to save her marriage. But she did exhibit many signs which indicated that this was a possibility. She still exhibited some longing and loving feelings toward her husband instead of indifference. And, she knew deep in her heart that they still hadn’t tried some of the options that just might work.

Admittedly, I am a big advocate of saving marriages.  And I often believe that there is always hope.  My husband and I were separated and almost divorced, but I refused to give up on my marriage.  And I don’t feel any regret about that.  This was always the right decision for me.  If it helps, you can read about the steps I took toward reconciliation on my blog at http://isavedmymarriage.com

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