First off, I love my wife very much. She is the most important person in my life, and I make certain that she is aware of how much I adore her. We have been together for 16 years and married for 11 of them. We have two beautiful children who we both love dearly.

With our job situation being as it is, we have not been able to devote time to each other, and our marriage, and have focused solely on the needs of our children. It has been this way for nearly a year.

She just told me that she does not know if she is still in love with me, and trying to "will herself to do it" is not working. I certainly do not want her to will herself to do anything that she is not happy doing. I have made arrangements to change my work schedule so we are able to spend considerably more time together.

My problem lies in the area of how to proceed. I want to give her space to work through her thoughts and emotions, but still be there for her. I try to speak with her to find out what it is that she does not feel like she is getting emotionally so that I can focus my attention on those areas. I am concerned that she is not really interested in trying, because she seems closed off. I don't doubt that she still has feelings for me, she shows me this in her actions. I am going to be re-focusing my attention on getting to know her again, but don't want her to think that I am only doing it because our marriage is in trouble. That is not my motivation. Like I said, I absolutely adore her. My thought is that it took time for things to get to where they are, and it will take time for them to return to the way they were.

We have both gone to our EAP's, her to find out what is making her feel this way, and me to see what changes I might need to make and how to cope.

Any help and advice would be much appreciated.

Welcome, BG,

Have you read all the articles on this website? The Basic Concepts, The Love Bank, Love Busters (LBs) and Emotional Needs (ENs)?

This should be of help to you immediately. You've already identified one of the problems, the amount of time, re-prioritized (sounds like to me) to make that time, be emotionally, mentally and physically available...to target her needs, there are EN questionnaires you can fill out on yourself and on her, if she doesn't want to, to help identify what she was missing most and to fill them.

I believe the LB questionnaires are the best...only you each have to fill out one for the other...

You both are already in IC (what I read as your acronym for EAP and didn't know)...and you are awake, aware and committed...

And you've found your way here.

How awesome! Take heart...you're already doing and knowing a lot...keep it going...get His Needs, Her Needs by Dr. Harley...Fall in Love, Stay in Love...you're not alone.

LA

Ditto what she said. My wife and I are in similar situation, but having read the books mentioned, I now have a plan, more than I ever did before. I have read quite a number of books on marriage - Dr Phil, Hendrix Harville, John Gottman. All had a unique perspective and talked around the same things. But only when I found this site and read HNHN and LBs did everything click in my head.

I now am making an effort to meet her needs of inimate conversation on a daily basis, and she is being more open. Do I have the marriage I want yet - not by a long shot. I need to spend more time, and work on eliminating my LBs. I know that things will get better when I do.

Good luck!

Good advice from everyone. Also look at **edit** which has some great information. I knew I had to change my approach to my spouse, because I was so defensive and so was he....so I had just a couple of coaching sessions from the coaches at that site and was able to get some great results. We all could use some help at times like this. Good luck!

Thanks for the advice from all. My wife insists that there is nothing that I have done wrong. I have identified several areas for improvement. She says that she is confused and can't figure out why she feels the way she does. Both of our councelors have suggested by hormone imbalance, but I can't convince her to have this checked. This might explain her lack of understanding. Maybe I'm grasping, but I would hate to see her end a great marriage and a great family because of this.

Thanks again.

Is there someone else in the picture? That "I love you but I'm not in love with you" statement is a symptom of a WS...

HI bgtg,

Sorry to see you bounce around, but please post this in the GENERAL QUESTIONS section of the Message Board. It gets tons more traffic, you will get more resonses.

Also, change title to something like WIFE IN WITHDRAWL... since that is what you are dealing with. You'll get more specific resonses.

That said, you need to read up on Plan A, EN's, LB's and the 180. Go to the articles section of this site. You want to focus meeting her top 3 EN's, ELIMINATE your LB's and throw a little 180 in, for sanity's sake.

Start the new thread, I'll follow you. Hang in there - Dru

Dear BG,

Sounds like you are doing excellent work towards healing your marriage. What comes to mind is that maybe, just maybe, you could incorporate some time each day to become the most wonderful you you can imagine. Possibly, the more you love yourself (and of course share your excitement and enthusiasm), the more she will find you irresistable...

Maybe plan a "great day" for just you and the kids. Ask your wife when she needs some time alone. Maybe you could take care of the kids at that time. Then go out and have the funnest time possible. Plan the next "great day." If your wife wants time alone, OK, but eventually, she'll want to come along. She'll have a blast too. She'll see you for the wonderful father and friend that you are.

Maybe take an exercise class right after work, before dinner, three times a week. Pick the kind of exercise that realy makes you happy. Is it a flag football club? Is it yoga? Is it something else? It's just some time so your wife can sort things out and you can get some exercise in.

In a few short weeks, you'll look and feel better. You'll be more attractive.

Maybe it's possible for you to forget about your concern for her not trying and simply relax and focus on enjoying and loving and improving yourself. Likely, your marriage will follow suit and flourish.

Wishing you the very best, possibly my musings might help or spark an idea that might help...

D--

I didn't even bother to read through all of what your post had to say. What did Harley's opinions have to suggest on the issues you address. Honestly, I'm sick of couples trying to find an easy way out. There isn't one. If you havent already stopped and took the time to learn what he had to say then stop and look again. You might learn something.