So do you think he may not be marriage material? A really MB marriage where you live as one?

Do you not agree with Dr. H's assessment?

Not completely, no. I know he didn't just marry me for the benefits of staying here. I know there's love.

I believe it would be a difficult path for us to create a good marriage, but I know we can both do it. I also know now he has a lower tolerance for emotional stress than a lot of other people, but that doesn't mean we cannot learn to manage such stress.

I still believe in us making it as a couple. I regret DEEPLY telling him to go. I should have let myself cool down after my talk on the radio show with the Harleys. I know a lot of people for whom dealing with a marriage such as mine is a fairly removed subject is very easy to generalize and say most people in my H's shoes would take advantage of the other person. And, although that can happen, it's not usually the case. And I know it is not our case. There's too much history here... he could have just as easily gotten the benefit without creating a home here with me. I offered that because I know how to separate these things. He knew he could have gone about it the easy way. There has been no need for him to fake a marriage, love, or commitment. That has all been real.

SD

Hi SadnDepressed,

I have been following your thread, and heard you on air with Dr. Harley.

Have you read Dr. Harley's basic concepts? If yes, do you completely agree with His concepts for how to build and maintain romantic love? You seem to feel Dr. Harley did not really understand your situation, and told Dr. Harley that you also felt the people who have advised you here don't really get it either, and everyone is getting to hung up on the legal reasons for the marriage.

It seems to me that you feel your marriage is quite unique. I do not mean that in a judgemental way, I came to MB initially skeptical about this program, and also feeling my own situation was quite unique, and basically decided to pick the parts of the program I agreed with, and would implement. That was a complete disaster in my marriage.

It is 100% possible that your H was INDEED completely in love with you and committed to the marriage 10 months ago. The problem is he is NOT now. How do I know? I know because he would not be behaving the way that he is now if he was. This does not mean he has zero feelings for you, but people that are IN LOVE don't separate, or leave the spouse behind to go out of the country.

I could have possibly left my H for a long period of time while we were in withdrawal and not in love, but would not ever do so now for ANY reason. My H had to go out of town for 3 days several months ago and I couldn't wait to see him.

It is VERY unusual that he would be willing to go away and leave you for 2 months. I question his commitment to you in general. My kids are older, and would get along fine here with my H, and I could leave them for an extended period, but would NEVER be willing to do that for any reason, period! I have went 10 years without seeing my family and still could never do that or have any desire to do so period. My life and family come first over anyone else. Why is this the case in your situation?

The only explanation is that he is not currently in love with you or very committed to you relationship. The only way to save this marriage is to build or rebuild romantic love.

I also heard Dr Harley's wise words on your situation and agree 100% with tisme but he said something more didn't he? He told you to file for divorce and see if that brought your H back into working on the marriage. He said that you would know pretty quickly if he was faking it to preserve the marriage until the end of the two year probationary period.

I know you do not want to file for divorce because it means telling him you married him for love but your relationship stands no chance without honesty.

How will you feel if, as soon as his greencard becomes permanent, he divorces you leaving you with a 10 year financial liability for him. Oh and a new girlfriend too. That is what will happen if you continue your present course of action.

How do I do that... this is what i want to know.

Living well... he knows I married him for love. Is not like i was dishonest about that. He married me for love, too. Yes, there's the papers situation which was ultimately what the whole marrying thing was about at the beginning, but things changed as the relationship progressed. We were not dishonest about those changes to each other at any point.

If I divorce him, he will sign the papers and stay in his country. Forcing him into an agreement will accomplish absolutely nothing. If anything is to be salvaged, he needs to come back to the marriage willingly. I know this because I have known this person for almost a decade.

Based on this knowledge I can assure you, as well, if the marriage cannot be saved and we go our separate ways, we will divorce at the end of the two years. Girlfriend or no girlfriend I'm still going to feel like [censored], but he will not screw me with alimony or any of that crap. He is an honest man.

SD

Plan Hope has yet to save a single marriage.



Did you read what you signed? You took financial liability for him for 10 years. This has NOTHING to do with alimony, it is the INS. So if he is knocked down and goes into the emergency room without medical insurance or asks for any form of welfare, they come after you to be reimbursed. Are you aware of that?

Yes I am aware... and I know he won't do that. He'll take responsibility for his expenses if it comes to that. If not, well that's a risk I'm willing to take.

Now, this is not about plan hope. I know if I file, he'll just sign the papers and stay in his country. How is that going to help me save my marriage?

Any other ideas i can implement?

SD

S&D, you deserve so much better than this. You sound like a bright, articulate woman who can attract a man who would love and care for her. It hurts my heart to hear that your H does not like talking to you. It is so obvious he does not love you. There are many men out there who would love to talk to you.

Please divorce this man and follow Dr Harley's advice. Stop allowing him to use you like this and free yourself up to date other men so you can find someone who truly cares for you.

I guess you're all given up on trying to help me rebuild love in my marriage. You will help people who have been out of the marriage for months, but somehow you've all decided my marriage is not worth your time and effort. Fair enough.

ML, I appreciate your words, and I know there is some truth to what you're saying.... I'm just not ready to call it quits here yet. I haven't given it my best.

Thank you for your interest throughout this time... I'm guess I'm now on my own as to repairing my marriage and restoring love.

SD

There is something you can always do: Pray.
Take your cares to the Holy Cross and lay them there.

Do you know how to rebuild the love in a marriage with someone who refuses to participate? Because I sure don't. You are asking us to help you achieve the impossible from my perspective. I think you have to look at this realistically and just accept that you can't force someone into a marriage.

I would love to help you if I saw a way, but I don't. Sorry.

Sad, I would strongly encourage you to follow Dr. Harley's exact advice for your situation. This advice stands the best chance of restoring the love in your marriage.

What does Dr. Harley advise a woman to do in a situation where her husband has been approached to participate in rebuilding the love in the marriage and he has refused? I would study this program until I understood what his advice is for that situation, and then I would do that.

If you will take the initiative to learn what Dr. Harley advises for such a situation and do it, I guarantee you we will support you in that.

Hi Sad&Depressed,

I heard you on the radio this week & have read a bit of your thread. I know you want to save your marriage and build love back into it, and this is admirable.

My H was reluctant, too. In fact, he became so abusive I told him to leave. That's the moment he decided to work on our marriage: when he saw he had lost me. I'm sorry that's what it took, but that's the way it worked for us. We are now working together and building a better marriage.

Sometimes Dr. Harley recommends a separation partly to 'wake up' the reluctant spouse. If you do file for divorce, your H may suddenly realize all the goodness he's about to lose, and he may decide that he doesn't want to lose you! If he walks away, then you'll know there was no hope anyway...he wasn't willing to have a great marriage with you, and no amount of your trying would change this.

Have you heard the saying, "We never know the worth of water until the well is dry?" Filing for divorce doesn't mean it's all over: it means the well is dry and he gets to decide how much he wants that water.

...Just my thoughts. I'm sorry you are in this difficult situation.

~ Z

Sad, I don't know how much you've read about the electric personality here. I hear what you're saying that your H doesn't respond to things like most folks would, that he acts in a much more extreme way. Like instead of realizing what he stands to lose, like Z's H did, just using it as fuel for the withdrawal that already makes sense to him. The thing is, is that what you want for the rest of your life? An extraordinarily difficult man that you can only reach by jumping through hoops, well past the point you have any enthusiasm for that? What about when life's real troubles hit, and all this guy knows how to do is bail? You deserve more, Sad.

When I told my then-H that I wanted him to leave, like it describes in When to Call it Quits, he said something like the only way to get him out would be to divorce him. Like you, I knew what an extraordinarily hard shell he had, and I knew he wasn't bluffing, so I cut my losses and filed. After the divorce, he said he wanted to reconcile, but unlike Elaine's H, in the newsletter, he wasn't willing to get the outside help I had let him know about, or find anything on his own to address the real issues in our marriage. Good to know. I didn't need to waste more years on someone who would only stand up for his family when it's easy and convenient.

If you look around at the folks who have turned their marriages around, like cwmi, markos, and the gang, they didn't do it through half measures only when it was most convenient. It took consistent outside help.

Z, how about an update on your thread?

Hi NED, I haven't heard about electric personality here or anywhere else.

We saw each other by chance Sat night at the supermarket. Had a short conversation and arranged to have a coffee the following day. He picked me up, we had a nice time out for coffee, then he came upstairs to spend some time with the animals (dog especially, she's not doing too good) when he dropped me off.

Later that night he used an excuse to swing by again. We visited a while over another coffee, then he used the "it's raining" excuse to stay a while longer. We watched an episode of a TV show we both enjoy while the rain stopped. He was affectionate, and sad... at one point i think he may have teared up behind me. He suggested we meet for another coffee soon, but I haven't heard from him since (it's only been 2 days, but it feels like an eternity). During the time we spent together on Sunday, not one word about "us" was mentioned. Just pleasant conversation about other stuff.

I do not contact him... if he feels pressured, he'll just pull away even more. He's still providing financial support. I have been in contact with one of his friends in whom he confides. This person is supportive of our marriage. H has been commenting about how he was surprised I'm doing "well", and I'm not totally broken and run over with the depression. His friend says he is angry because he feels i kicked him out our home, but despite the anger he feels dim hope of reconciling. He has mentioned he's going to give it until he comes back to see if I can get out of the pit of depression before he makes a decision whether things are salvageable, but he doesn't want to risk his emotional well-being by enduring life with a depressed partner who is unwilling to treat the illness (at least in his view).

His friend suggests I let him come to me.. not to pursue him. To be warm and affectionate when he seeks me out... to try to be the person he fell in love with before all our issues, but to not rush into talking about fixing our situation, as he is not yet receptive. I feel i have found an ally in his friend and I'm very grateful for that.

Despite all this, I realize I cannot just wait here for him. I know what caused us to be in this situation now. I can see all the details in our path to the bottom of the pit. Yes, I do have responsibility in this mess, and yes I wasn't patient, cooperative and receptive to his trying to help. I sat down in my depression and blamed him.. don't get me wrong, he does have a lot to do with my being depressed... i'm not exonerating him, but I also realized I could have handled things differently. However, i will gain nothing if I come out of the depression by the time he comes back, and he's still unwilling or unable to see he also had a hand in getting us where we are right now. This part I do not know how deal with... how do I split myself between fixing me while I hope of reconciling, but at the same time preparing myself to face the definite end of the marriage should he continue to put all the blame exclusively on me?

SD

I have yet to find the part in MB where you are to assign blame. The beauty of MB is that you spend far more time determining what you each should be doing and little to no time spent on what you did in the past.

So waiting for him to have some epiphany about what you feel he did wrong may actually be counter productive to rebuilding your marriage.

In a nutshell, the program is meet needs, avoid love busters and protect the marriage. There isn't a dredge up the past and assign blame portion of the MB plan.

No, I'm not talking about him taking blame... in a nutshell this is what i see happened:

He is very guarded with his feelings... doesn't handle strong emotions well (positive or negative). He puts up a wall. I expected that as the relationship developed and he felt more at ease, his defenses would begin to drop. They did, but I failed to see the progress and kept trying to find out where he was in the process. He became increasingly defensive, and shut me out. I felt lonely and abandoned and became increasingly more depressed. I entered counseling and it made things worse for me (as it usually does in the beginning), he was further put off by so many strong emotions I was displaying and became more emotionally distant. Rinse and repeat.

It became so much, I was hell bent on making him see how he had shut me out and that I was trying to reach out to him. This drove him nuts... sounded to him as nagging. We finally had pretty bad AO's, he felt the only way to stop this madness was to leave. I told him I would have none of it... if he left, we were done. Enter the session with Dr Harley. Nothing much happened, finally I felt it was up to me to say what he couldn't and asked what he wanted... He said he wanted us to work, but he had lost faith in the possibility of it happening and expressed he felt the best thing was for us to go our separate ways. I told him to leave. I've regretted that conversation ever since.

He's now living about 3 blocks from here. Took most of his stuff out of our home. He insists he loves me, but sees no hope for us. He tells his friend he's going to see what happens when he comes back from his country.

I guess the "epiphany" i wish he would have is to see how his shutting me out made me feel. He seems to still think the major hurdle to us being able to fix our marriage is my depression, which it very well could be! But what happens if while he's away I begin to get back to normal... heck even if I achieve it. Then he comes back and seeing that I'm no longer in the depths of despair wants to reconcile and come back home, only to begin shutting me out again? That's basically what I see I'm up against now...

SD

Cross that bridge when you get to it.

Seriously. I'm not saying keep your head in the sand. But your focus seems very external. You make passing references to your contribution, but go back with laser like focus on what you think he is doing wrong.

Who would want to be part of that?

MB teaches that we are to complain, as long as it's done properly. But what one is not to do is to be critical. For example, if you come across as critical as to his emotional openness, what is his incentive to be more open? More criticism will not create more openness.

I like to term what Dr Harley teaches as attacking problems, not people. Complaining is attacking the problem. I.E. we don't talk enough. I would like to talk more. Those are complaints. Criticisms are phrased as, "You are not open" "he is not emotional" or whatever.

It's subtle, but important. I see a lot of criticism in your writing which may come across as attacking him.

In no way am I suggesting he has it all right. What I'm suggesting is that to accomplish your goals, you have to ensure that you are complaining, but not being critical. If I understand, complaints are good and necessary for a healthy relationship, but criticism will destroy romantic love.

Showing my work: http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi8111_quit.html

In this series of letters on the topic of when to call it quits, Dr Harley describes in a letter L.R. the progression.

First one complains. If that doesn't work, they move to criticism, which Dr Harley describes as follows


What follows is emotional withdrawal, separate lives, and little or no romantic love between the spouses.

So complain, but don't criticize. Work on your side of the street. If depression is a problem, then address it. It does little good to focus on how he may or may not respond when you have work to do on your side of the ledger.