When people are not in love, they tend to choose non intimate emotional needs. In order to fall back in love, though, you need to be meeting the top 4 intimate emotional needs 20-25 hours per week. And it is real important to be honest with him about his weight. If his weight bothers you, it should be brought up.

I would start scheduling about 4 DATES out of the house. 4 dates of 4 hours each. The most effective, high quality UA time is out of the house away from the drudge when you are at your best.

Can you get out of town for some romantic weekends?

Focus on these emotional needs:

conversation
affection
recreational companionship
sexual fulfillment

[/quote} And it is real important to be honest with him about his weight. If his weight bothers you, it should be brought up.


Can you get out of town for some romantic weekends? [/quote]

On my ENQ under physical attractiveness, I said, "I wish your tummy was smaller and I miss your muscles." I asked him last night, if there is anything on the list that seemed too much. He said no.

Childcare is a real issue. Our oldest is almost 15. That seems too young to stay home alone with two other sibs for a weekend. She babysits though for 4 or 5 hours at a time.

I need some perspective. Part of H's complaint is that he lost his wife, that I'm a mom. I lost my husband and the kids lost their dad. He told me last night, he doesn't identify as husband or dad. He sees himself as a room-mate that covers the expenses.

We need alone husband/wife time. Neither of us dispute that. But, it seems really strange to leave our kids alone for 20+ hours a week. For their ages 14, 10 and 8 is that ok?

It's not only okay, it is vital! You are doing a good thing for them by taking time to be a couple. We routinely leave our 15yo in charge of his 10, 8, and 7yo siblings.

Not only is it good for giving them a stable family by keeping mom and dad in love and together, but it teaches them lessons on independence and self-reliance that children need.

Tit-for-tat... Again.

He didn't say or think you lost your husband and the kids lost their dad, you said that as a defensive reaction to him saying he feels like he lost his wife.

Not saying it's not true, bit your thought processes are loaded with disrespectful judgments, and you continually align things as you + the kids VERSUS him.

Why? Because that is how YOU have chosen to live. How has that worked for you? Well, for one, you have a husband who feels like a walking talking meal ticket.

This weekend we had several, long conversations about my ENQ. His needs, my needs. How we will implement MB. Last night, he said, "I feel like I lost my wife when we had kids. You are just a mom." I asked him, "Do you identify with the role of husband or dad?" He said, "Neither. I feel like a room-mate, that gets sex once a week, fusses at the kids and pays the bills."

Did we DJ one another? He said, "I lost my wife to the kids, and as terrible as it sounds, I resented them for it." This is him talking, not me.

And if he's just bringing the cash and the only intimate need I supply is sex. What does that make me?

Do you realize that he doesn't meet my needs either. None of the 4 intimate needs, for years. That's why I sought out MB. Neither of us want to live like this anymore.

He aligns him versus me and the kids. I have begged him for years to join us. He separated from us. That is a fact, that we both agree on. It's not a DJ.

HHH, why do you jump on her posts? She said that HE SAID he didn't identify as husband or dad. Enough already, be helpful. FWIW, Tenacious One, my H said something very similar, and I was desperately trying to get him to take me out on dates. He said that married couples don't 'date', RC is spent with friends, and the kids were MY JOB since he made the money, then complained that he was 'just a paycheck.' Uh, ya think??? What else could you be if that's all you're willing to do???

So I empathize. Get on the dating, your H seems willing. Pry those sweet babies from your breast (figuratively, you haven't said anything about continuing to breastfeed, lol) and go be a woman with your man. This can turn around.

I'll tell (both of) you why this is DJ behavior; because your husband told you how HE felt, and you made it about YOU.

"What does that make me?"

Have the children and household been the priority for you in your marriage? The very title of this thread tells me yes, they have been.

The tricky thing is, you don't have to speak these things to your husband, because your beliefs about his feelings as he tells you dictate your actions and attitude towards him.

He says "I feel you abandoned me for the children."

STOP. Right there. Do not pass "But, but, but... You abandoned us, too!"

Stop implementing disrespectful judgments as a tool to place blame.

I'm not going to help you fix and/or blame your husband. Sorry, not how this program works. I want to help YOU model what the program offers to your husband so he will hopefully come on board. That means learning to keep your side of the street clean, not finding a way to place blame.

HHH, I haven't asked anyone to fix or blame my H. We are accepting responsibility for the choices that contributed to the decline of our marriage. Although, this is "my thread" it isn't all about me. It is about us. I can't fix this marriage by myself. I should be able to tell you something my H said or did, without it being used against me. I am not in control of his actions or feelings anymore than he is in control of mine. You are not privy to every detail. I shared a small portion of our conversation with you. If he can say, "You haven't been much of a wife to me," surely he can say to himself, "Well, I haven't been much of a husband or dad either." We see that as progress. Isn't that MB is about, what are YOU doing and what are YOU going to do to change it. You got a glimpse of the work H is doing.

H is on board with MB. But, neither of us have been meeting all 4 of the major needs. When I left the workforce to come home we, consciously or unconsciously, stepped into classic roles. The kids and home are mine; bread-winning is his. We made choices that led to our marriage being the way it is.

Most recently, after introducing MB to him, we made a little progress. But, things stalled out. We weren't meeting each other's needs and spending enough time together. We have scheduled almost 20 hours over the next 7 days. The forum and website have been amazingly helpful. I like that MB and it's posters are "in your face". Holding couples accountable. We would have never considered dating 20+ hours. We had no idea our marriage was in such bad shape. No one talks about this stuff openly. I think MB will work for us. Thank you!!

This would be the right direction. The number one thing that can help a marriage is successfully following the Policy of Undivided Attention.

Yeah, "in your face" is how it feels at first. Trust me, I got my share - and it was about the same thing; Disrespectful Judgements. Given time, I also noticed that Disrespectful Judgments took units out of my wife's account, and it was happening due to MY OWN thinking, not her words or actions.

You again gave an example of how easy it is to DJ; you tried to attribute his thoughts based on your feelings and beliefs. No, he absolutely does NOT have to say to himself what you think he should "surely" say.

And, if he doesn't? So what! Does it make him a bad man? Hell no! If you don't think or say what he expects you to think or say, does that make you a bad wife/woman/mother? Hell no!

Here's what makes us "bad;"

Refusing to meet our spouse's emotional needs.
Failing to express how our spouse can best meet our needs.
Refusing to eliminate Love Busters.
Failing to communicate with our spouse about the Love Busters they unleash on us.

We not only have to BUILD those Love Bank balances, we must PROTECT them.

HHH, I wish you would read a little more closely. She attributed his words to his mouth.

Not her head.

She is also an adult, and has been explaining herself graciously. Let's not muck it up.

The emphasized portion here; his words? He made this statement himself, without cueing or provocation?

Also, a few pages back you were explaining a conversation in which you aked your H why he thought you felt a certain way, and in that instance you got an answer you were agreeable to. That is a risk.

Had he not given an agreeable answer, the result would have a DJ.

What he believes about the way you feel about is irrelevant. The simple answer as to why you didn't feel like meeting his needs is because you were in withdrawal due to a lack of need meeting (self-imposed and imposed by him) and Love Busters draining your Love Bank balance below the romantic threshold.

The same goes for his refusal to meet your needs.

UA time is priority 1, avoiding Love Busters is priority 2, and meeting non intimate needs is priority 3 - everything else comes after that.

The point I am trying to make, is all this navel gazing about who did what and what is who's fault is nothing but a chain of Love Busting behavior that is digging a hole.

Put. Down. The. Shovel.

Thank you for the more helpful tone in your last post. I appreciate it. I think I understand what happened. When I said this in my post, (If he can say, "You haven't been much of a wife to me," surely he can say to himself, "Well, I haven't been much of a husband or dad either." ), I should have said surely he can say this of himself; not to himself. My bad!

For clarification, he made this statement himself, without cueing or provocation. In the context of him explaining that my role (according to him) was primarily that of mom, not wife. He said, "I feel like I lost my wife, you are just a mom now." My question to him was, "What role do you identify with, husband or dad?" He could have answered this question any number of ways. But, he said out loud, "Neither. I feel like a room-mate, who gets sex once a week, fusses at the kids, and pays the bills." I asked him last night, if I had blamed him or DJ'd him during this exchange? He said, "No, you asked a question, I answered it."

I will admit I DJ my husband. We have our safe word that we use when we LB. He tells me when I LB him. We are much more aware now. And I agree that the fault finding should be over. But, honestly without it (in the beginning), we would still be in the status quo. Our independent behavior, enabling, "just keep the peace" attitude for almost 15 years is what kept us apart. After beating each other senseless with those shovels, we are here. Bruised and battered, but together.

The "tone" of my posts usually has to do with brevity, as I post more often from my phone while I'm at work than I do from home. I have not the patience to flower up my language on a little touch screen keyboard... and auto-correct/predictive text is a little zany.

If I am curt, it is because I don't believe in cheer leading people on spouse bashing, or blowing sunshine up their hoo-ha when they have some exhibited thought patterns and behaviors which are glaring examples of LB behaviors.

I picked that up from fellow posters, and I thank them for direct honesty, not pulling punches, and not letting defensiveness stop honesty.

Now, here is the other post I was referring to;


You were fishing here. Fishing for a fight. You asked a question to which you already had one single "right" answer for. Luckily, in this instance, he got it right.

He shouldn't do this to you, nor you to him. It's a setup to run such lines of questioning.

Here are different versions of this statement;

"Why do YOU think I feel this way?"

"How do YOU think I should feel?"


It's argument bait. His opinion on your feelings is irrelevant. It is the actions that count. If his opinion when you ask one of these argument-baiting questions isn't your predetermined answer, then the only possible result is an exchange of Disrespectful Judgments; whatever he says that doesn't fit the answer he couldn't possibly know without weeks of study on the texts of Nostromdamus, or you thinking he's an idiot/jerk because he didn't read your mind.

Don't do that any more. Quit setting him and yourself up with these leading questions.

A couple of questions.

I've read everything here and read many threads. Sometimes I'm left with the impression, meet your spouses needs. Period. Then, I read the POJA. Don't do anything you are not enthusiastic about, don't meet your spouses needs at your expense. Is it a question of will? Can you clarify this for me?

Also, have you ever denied your kids doing something because it would interfere with UA with your spouse?

He said, "I feel like I lost my wife, you are just a mom now."
You could say: "What can we do about that?"

His complaints are telling you there is a problem (yes there are many problems, but this is one you can do something about.)

Ask him "What would it feel like to you for me to feel like a wife to you?"
"How would an ideal week be like if you felt I was like a wife? Just brainstorm what would happen each day."
Then take his feedback and say "Okay, if we were to have SF everyday, we would need to be in bed by 10:00 so we would have time. I think we could do that is you put Junior to bed while I make the kids lunch. Also if you took out the garbage while i watched the kid's homework we would have more time. Do you think we could try that? I want you to feel like I am your wife again."

So instead of out and out saying "and you have to be a husband and dad", you are letting him know the things he has to be doing so you can be doing what he would like.

I think the idea is that to have a good marriage, you have to be open to the idea of meeting your spouses's need otherwise there is sort of no point. But you shouldn't have to meet that need at your expense. How can it be agreeable to meet that need?

Let's say you are talking about SF. Yes, you should try to meet your spouse's need for SF. But that doesn't mean that the wife has to do everything. If the man, for example, has a higher desire, then he should make it effortless for the wife to meet his need. So he should be affectionate, have some conversation with her earlier in the day, and maybe help get the kids to bed so she has time and energy to meet his need. He may need to initiate. He should engage in foreplay to help get her arroused. Perhaps he should snuggle with her afterward.

What? Why does he have to do all that work? Because he has the higher need. But if the wife has a need for conversation, then maybe she needs to come up with some conversation topics. And have the kids doing their homework so they have a quiet time to talk. And make sure she isn't watching TV so they won't be distracted. She needs to make it effortless for him.