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Old 3rd November 2008, 05:55 AM   #1
zebedee
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separated, needing prayer badly

Hi all,

I'm new to this forum, and would ask for some prayer.

Please pray for my wife and our family. Please pray that the Lord move in my wife's heart to thirst for Him; to put Him first, to seek Him, and to be obedient to His will for her life. I would ask that you also pray that the Lord put the desire in her heart to Love me again, to put the desire in her heart to choose to work on our marriage, and that the Lord would guide her, fill her with hope and love, and teach her to love selflessly as He loves us. I thank you for your prayers.

Now for the background:

I've been married now just over two years to my beloved wife. She is 32, I'm 31. This is my second marriage and her first. We fell in love and married after only 9 months, back in 06; and since then, our marriage has been a rollercoaster ride.

She has a son from a prior relationship, I have a daughter from my prior marriage. Since our marriage, we've been combatting issue after issue, and needless to say, it's greatly impacted the quality of our marriage; hence the current situation. I will say upfront, I've made plenty of mistakes these past couple of years; we both have, and are both responsible for where we're at now...
1) Blending our family has posed a significant challenge, and we've both had a tendency to priorize our children ahead of our marriage. We're both to blame on this, and it has definitely impacted our relationship.
2) My wife is a victim of childhood sexual abuse. She is in counselling for it now, and is making progress. However, she chose to bury this issue for 17 years, and she chose to confront it last year. It's been tearing us up ever since... intimacy issues, both physical and emotional.
3)I'm in the military and have been TDY/ Deployed for a good portion of our marriage. Last year I was gone half the year, and this really impacted our marriage. I'm getting out next year.

I returned from my most recent deployment almost 10 months ago now, and since then, our marriage has done nothing but deteriorate. We suffered from lack of intimacy, lack of making each other a priority over our children, which has in turn affected our trust... the whole 9 yards.

We talked about all of this back in August, and since then, I have been actively trying to make our marriage my top priority; and I have. However, by the end of the september, not much had changed; in fact my wife's attitude had deteriorated even more, to the point to where she wanted a separation.

By all her accounts, she says I've been a very good husband to her, and a good step dad to our son. But she said she felt burnt out, and really just needed some space. She told me she wasn't ready to "quit", but that she wasn't ready to try either.

So I moved out and gave her the space she asked for. Within a short period of time, things rapidly improved. She said that she missed me, she loved me and she wanted to work on things We did some activities together, and really seemed to be enjoying each others company.

Well, the past three weeks, everything seems to be deteriorating and falling apart now. Now she barely wants to see me or talk to me. I called her tonight to confront her and find out exactly "where we're at?"

She told me the cliche "I love you but am not in love with you". She said that the feelings haven't been there for awhile now; that those first few weeks she was trying to "feel" again, to see if her feelings for me would change, but that they hadn't. She told me that she felt we rushed into the marriage; that she really didn't feel she was ready to be married, and that she didn't want to go on feeling like this for the next 50 years. She didn't say she was ready to quit, but she layed on heavy doubt and discouragement.

I've been doing a great deal of reading/ praying this past month. I am a man of God, and know that the Lord's will for me in this situation is to stick it out through faith, obedience and determination. So I'm not asking whether or not I should quit? I'm asking about how I should approach the future? I did tell her tonight, that 3 weeks of effort isn't going to change a year's worth of discouragement, and that this is going to take time. It took us a year to get this way, it will probably take us at least that long to get better; especially while dealing with other issues outside the marriage as well (her past). I also told her that I'm committed to making this marriage work; that I believe in "til death do us part".

In the books I've been reading recently, I've discovered that love is a "choice". That we can "choose" to love; that we can lead our hearts; and that this is predicated by our desire to give, and to love. If we are willing to give of ourselves, and to do loving things (unconditionally) for our spouse, then our heart is bound to follow. I've been doing this now for the past month, and my love for my wife has greatly increased. It's also greatly enhanced my spiritual walk with the Lord. I've told my wife about it, and have been trying to get her to embrace these principles; i.e. that if she's willing to try; to give and love unconditionally; that we can rekindle our love for each other. The key is making the "choice" to do so. I know I can't make her love me, she has to choose to do so. I pray she will.

I could probably go on and on, but I think you get the point. I know a lot of the discouragment she's feeling is related to us not making our marriage enough of a priority throughout our marriage, and a lot is due to her past experiences, and also not truly being ready to be a wife when we got married. With that said, I do believe that just because we rushed into marriage, isn't reason for us to rush out.

Thank you for taking the time to pray for my family God Bless.
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Old 18th November 2008, 07:13 PM   #2
Raymond
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Join Date: Dec 2006
Posts: 6,409
Re: separated, needing prayer badly

I think you are on the right track Zebedee and I believe you will get through this. You are obviously the stronger one spiritually at the moment so God will turn it around through you mostly. You've got your work cut out but I am sure breakthroughs will come as you nurture and love your wife as best as you can.

If you get an opportunity to get some input from a gifted minister or someone else go for it. It is amazing what God shows up when we seek Him.

Raymond
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Old 3rd December 2008, 03:50 AM   #3
Ageing Grace
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Join Date: Nov 2008
Posts: 738
Re: separated, needing prayer badly

Quote:
Originally Posted by zebedee View Post
She told me the cliche "I love you but am not in love with you". She said that the feelings haven't been there for awhile now; that those first few weeks she was trying to "feel" again, to see if her feelings for me would change, but that they hadn't. ... she really didn't feel she was ready to be married.... She didn't say she was ready to quit,

... 3 weeks of effort isn't going to change a year's worth of discouragement ... took us a year to get this way, it will probably take us at least that long to get better ...
zebedee, your story tells of significant courage & commitment from both of you, even if it doesn't always feel that way.

The abuse your wife suffered comes with heavy burdens of secrecy and guilt (not the child's; this is just the way it's presented, and the child has no choice in the matter). The very fact that she felt strong enough to confront it, after your marriage, is a powerful statement of the emotional security she feels with you.

I would like to ask that you offer her patience beyond what you think you can - God will help you here, I hope!

She's entrusted you with her most vulnerable, darkest secret. People only do that when they feel safe: it's a massive compliment, please try and accept it as such. It's not a poisoned chalice; she has faced it, is going to counselling: of course it's hard for you but how much more nasty is the process for her?

For someone who was abused a child like your wife, the whole concept of love is sullied and vague. It's hardly fair to require expressions of 'love', when the word itself comes burdened with guilt. She loves you enough to have entrusted you with her fears. That speaks very well of you: try to live up to the promise you gave

As you live in faith, then pray for tolerance and guidance. They will lead you along this, admittedly difficult, path and onwards to a brilliantly fulfilled future.

With sincere good wishes to you both,
AG
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