My wife and I have been married for almost 4 years. When we met, things happened fast. I fell deeply in love with her within a month. We moved in together after 6 months. The next month I proposed to her. We originally set a wedding date for the next year..approximately 10 months later. We ended up going to a justice of the peace 3 months later, and still having the wedding, although a couple of months later than planned, to accomodate family members. This was done more for monetary reasons, because I was in the military, and if you don't know, a married member recieves more pay and entitlements than a single member does. We were financially strapped, and we had already made that commitment to each other anyway, right? Lots of things have happened in our lives over the years, some good, some bad. My wife recently reached a boiling point, and said that we needed a separation for a little while to sort through feelings. It was like a punch in the stomach to me. We have had our problems before, but we always talked about them and worked them out. There are times I have slipped back into the behavior we had discussed, I will admit. But it was another talk. I know I have some major issues that need to be dealt with by me. I am seeking help for those issues. I just want my marriage to survive this. If our marriage fails, it won't be from a lack of trying on my part. We are both seeing a marriage counselor, and I am seeing a counsellor myself. My wife and I have talks every couple of days still. But after reading the columns on living together before marriage, I am now scared witless. Please don't tell me my marriage is doomed, because of statistics. My wife still loves me, she just needs to decide if she is still "in love" with me. We have a date Saturday night, to try and start over the process. Today she admitted to me that she didn't know if we moved to fast into this. There is so much background to cover, I could type here until I fell asleep, but I feel that would be to long. It's probably already to long. If somebody replies to this post, then I will continue. I just want somebody to talk with about these issues. I can't sit around here all the time with only my feelings to keep me company. Thanks for your time<BR>

I think your marriage is only doomed if you let it be. If you read the other stuff from this site, you will have some really useful tools to take advantage of to help save your marriage! Try not to let yourself get depressed and discouraged. Those feelings will just work against you. Try to stay positive.<P>Share the info from this site with your wife and see if you both can agree to work with the principles that are set forth by Dr. Harley. If both of you are committed to making the marriage work, it most likely will.<P>Hang in there and don't give up hope. Even if you did move too quickly into the relationship, it can be saved. I really believe that! Let us know how it goes!<P>Take care and God bless,<BR>Singer

First of all, thank you for your reply. We are both actively trying to make this work. I found this site last night, and sent the link to her email address. Plus printed out the questionnaires for both of us. I did mine last night, and she did hers today. The funny thing is, niether one of us could relate to the Love Busters Questionnaire. There are a few things that are kind of similar, but nothing that is really close to any of those. I posted a message in the infidelity forum earlier to kind of explain part of our problem. Not infidelity between us, but something that happened to me years ago, that I have never quite gotten over completely. One reply I have gotten already, asking why I didn't feel I could trust her. I specifically stated that I trust my wife completely. I just don't have much trust for anyone else. I have also posted two separate poems on this site, if you would care to read those<BR>

Lucas:<P>I read your note in the other forum about the infidelity of your former fiancee. My only advice to you is that you have to avoid letting this mistrust of others get the better of you. I think you just have to actively choose to trust people. It is hard... it is a loss of control. If you trust people, they have a certain amount of control over you, don't they? It will take a decision each time you feel that mistrustfulness rise up within you to quench it and choose to trust. It will be very hard, but I believe it will be very worthwhile, as well. If you never act like you trust your wife (I know you do, but your actions probably make her think that you don't), she will begin to perceive that you are trying to control her and that will not be helpful to the wellbeing of your marriage.<P>It is great that you both are in couselling. I think the bottom line for you both is to make sure that you are working on yourselves and becoming the right person for the other. There is a great book by Josh McDowell called "The Secret of Loving" which talks about being the right person for someone else, not making them into the right person for you. You could probably get it off of Amazon.com or Barnesandnoble.com.<P>I will continue to follow your story and hope that things work out for you and your wife. <P>God bless,<BR>Singer

Thank you, Singer, for your reply and your wishes. As a little bit more of a background, I have never been very good at making friends. My father was in the military as well, so I have moved every 3 years for almost all of my life. I have lived in Virginia Beach for almost 6 years now, and that is the longest I have ever been in one place at a time. My father was a very anti-social person, and still is. I have started to see a lot of my father in my actions lately, after a lot of internal searching. From his anti-socialness to the punishment of children to quiet anger. I hate to even remotely try to blame the way I am on my past though. We are all human beings and we all have free will in order to make the decisions of how we will act. That includes my jealousy as well, too. You are all correct in the observation that I am scared to death of losing my wife. I love her more than anything I have ever loved in my life. But the very actions that I perform trying to prevent that are driving her further away. I have very selfish thoughts, and I am trying to move away from those to make myself a better person for myself and for us. I have a feeling I will be around here for quite awhile. There is no visible end to our separation right now. If you read my poems, can you tell me what you think, especially of the second one. I want to read that one to her on Saturday night. I would really like some feedback on that one. Thanks<BR>

Your poems seem to come from your heart, and that is the most important thing. Be honest with your wife about your feelings, your fears (as long as they won't come across as lovebusters) and your hopes. I really hope the two of you will make it. It seems to me that if that is what you both really want and you are willing to do the hard work, your marriage will succeed. <P>Keep me posted and hang in there!!<P>God bless,<BR>singer