I guess I'm like my husband in that I don't like sitting around either. ( Unless it is cuddling with him!!) Plus, I like cycles. I like to be REALLY busy for a couple of months and then have a month to declutter, get organized and recharged and then get busy again. But I've had that time and now I feel restless.

MB doesn't say don't do anything without your spouse. You listed a number of things you could do in small doses, right?

Well... As of the time he left he had 6 surgeries today ( was on call yesterday) and then will have the football game. And then he called me yesterday to tell me that he is having a colonoscopy on Monday.. Turns out he has been bleeding so he called a doc friend of his who thought he should check it out and had an opening. But that means he will be stuck at the house "cleaning out his system" on Sunday and will be out of commission on Monday.. Before this I had made a list of the responsibilities I have next week. I have gotten out of some of them ( not teaching at the co-op, cancelled violin) and could have my oldest drive to some of them instead of me. I made a list of things I would like to accomplish next week as well on the top of which is go on a couple of dates! I guess we'll talk about it tomorrow morning.. It will be interesting to see his reaction when I try to POJA because although he says we do that we only do that for major purchases or decisions. For his weeks off he tends to make his own schedule and expect me to join him. Smile.. Not this time. Poor guy got home after 9 again last night looking/sounding like he is at the end of his rope. He is looking forward to next week...

Ok.. I am starting to freak out about being on the show Monday.. I don't know if I can do it... Hubby would not be happy if he knew.. Just tell me to stay strong and do it.

Stay strong and do it!

Seriously, why are you nervous? Tell yourself that you will be talking to a learned friend who has nothing but the best for your marriage in mind. You will love Dr. H and Joyce.

Thanks.. Just nervous my husband would find out I suppose..

His week off was a disaster.. We woke up to find that the 100 year old grandmother that we take care of ( she's in assisted living) was taken to the er and eventually on to the emergency room... So my inlaws decided to drive up for the day on Sunday. The colonoscopy was Monday and Yeah everything was normal.

So I was all excited about our date Tuesday afternoon. We had thought dinner and a movie but after seeing the plugged in review of Flight decided that wasn't a good option. So I suggested a picnic lunch at a local park. So he spent the morning picking up the medical supplies for his mission trip and we met at the park.... To which we ate lunch and walked around the park. Then he hurried home so he could cut down the tree and get the hay from a neighbors before it got dark.... I got less than an hour.

I don't give up hope. I gave up teaching my class Wednesday morning, but the kids still would be at the co-op or community college so we had the entire morning to ourselves. Right?? WRONG. He had a financial planner call and so the three of us were on the phone looking over our finances and I'm pulling documents we need and such and as soon as that ends a roofer comes that my husband has called since our roof is 20 years old and we need a new one... But then????

Sigh...

Tired, I have to believe that you and your H are fairly affluent. Have the two of you considered hiring out these chores? Your H is a surgeon, for crying out loud! Can you not afford a yard man?

(I already know your answer; it's time for your H to look at having someone do this work. And you're going to need to bring this up to him.)

He wouldn't ever hire anyone. He enjoys doing it. I think it is his recreational activity.. He has fixed our freezer, washer and dryer, dishwasher, refrigerator, etc He wired our shop for electricity, painted several rooms of our house on the inside, designed and created/installed a sprinkler system for our big vegetable garden as well as our orchard. He wants to learn how to make furniture. He wants to make a bike path through our place. He has a spot by the creek in the back of our place where there is a giant pine tree that he wants to clear out a tent pad...

If something is broken, he must fix it. I am not kidding that a couple of weeks ago he noticed at 5 am or so that the sink wasn't working properly and so in his work clothes was under the sink, taking it apart and getting it to run correctly!!!! The vacuum cleaner broke the week that he was on county call for the weekend and I didn't tell him until the next weekend because I knew that if I told him, even if it was 10pm, he would want to get it fixed for me.

We are frugal. We drove our old Honda accord for 20 years. He isn't a typical doctor. When we replace a car or a big appliance we must do several months of research, talk to 4 or 5 experts, then figure out the cheapest way to buy it. I kid you not.. Then he will still question himself about whether or not he made the best decision or the best deal... Sigh... No one ever makes more careful decisions than he does.

His decision making sounds like a frugal, wise man.
The problem is not following the POJA.

You will receive good advice from the radio show.

Thanks HDW!! I agree. I love the fact that he is frugal. I love that he is hard working. I hear all the wives moaning at church about how their husbands just want to sit on the couch and watch football all weekend.

Thanks so much to everyone here for just letting me share. I'm lonely here now that I've dropped my activities so it is nice to talk to someone about this. ( Not that I would have ever shared any of this with anyone I actually know in real life!!)

I'm curious in what direction the conversation will go.. Here was the short version of my question:
Dear Dr. Harley,



Short version of question: Should I worry about UA time when we have a good relationship? He has a different paradigm of what marriage is and should be and feels the family as a whole is more important. He fulfills my EN with the exception of having fun, which he thinks is not really important. He does not have any love busters. He listens to me, shows me affection, is transparent and talks to me A LOT ( in the mornings before he goes to work and after he comes home) and tells me all about his frustrations and successes. He treats me with respect. He feels like spending time with the children together and/or his special times with each of them is more important than time alone with me.



*edit*

Then I gave them about 5 pages of detailed information if they wanted it with this at the end:

As I said, I'm not sure whether to say thank you or not..(just kidding) Help me figure out how to deal with this now that we have two separate ways of looking at marriage: yours of Romantic love ( didin't even realize what I was missing until I reread/read your stuff) or caring love with respect.


Anyway, we'll see if I don't chicken out. Sometimes I want to go throw up I'm so nervous...

So do the rest of you agree with Melody that my husband isn't in love with me?? I'm not sure he would agree with that... Confusing..

TW, when a spouse is IN LOVE, they do not resist spending time with their spouse because their spouse is irresistable. In your case, everything comes before you. Absolutely everything. Romantic love is demonstrated when you are your spouse's FAVORITE leisure activity. You don't have to beg or push someone to spend time with someone with whom they are in love because they find that person irresistible.

The emotional need you cited, domestic support, should not be a top need of someone who is in love, because it is not an intimate emotional need. You don't fill one's LOVE BANK with non intimate emotional needs.

But you don't have to take my word for it. You can sign up for one of the professional services, coaching or the online program, and they will give you a TEST to determine if your spouse is in love with you. There is an actual test in the book Effective Marriage Counseling. They give this test to all of us who signed up for the MB course and we still take it 2x a year.

I don't intend on posting here anymore, though, because I have already spent a lot of time [that I really couldn't even afford] and my ideas were shot down. I don't have much time to spare here as it is. I honestly think you need professional advice from the Harleys in order to move forward.

I wish you the best.

ok, one more and then I have to get going!

The Love Bank

Thanks Melody. I do appreciate your time. I am both nervous and excited about talking to the Harleys tomorrow. I'll mention your suggestions and ask them if they think he isn't in love with me... Joyce told me in the preinterview that she was excited to be talking to a healthy couple, so now I don't know what to think..

I need to go organize the 27 boxes of books I took down from the attic, but I really don't want to... That is why I am here...looking for people to talk to...

I'm sure he would disagree, but actions generally speak louder than words. For someone who loves you, he sure seems to spend a lot of time engaged in activities that don't include you. His actions, to me, appear to be of someone who is avoiding being alone with their spouse. He seems to prefer solitary activities and is handy around the house. On the surface, he seems to be a frugal, hard-working man who contributes to his family by being a Jack of All Trades in the home. This is admirable, but he is doing this at the expense of maintaining an intimate relationship with his wife. THAT should be his priority. Not fixing the fence or re-plumbing the bathroom.

Spending the money to hire someone to take 10 or so hours off his To Do List each week would be money well spent if it freed up his time so the two of you could build your UA time. You've heard the old saying "penny-wise, pound foolish", yes? I believe it applies here.

If Mr. Bliss were half as "frugal" as your husband and spent that much time maintaining the house while I (and our marriage) withered in the shadow of his busy-ness, I would definitely be having a conversation with him. I wouldn't admire him for loving me so much that he spends his weekends doing chores.

I'm looking forward to hearing your call. Looking back on my marriage, we weren't in Love with each other the MB way. But, I don't know I really even knew what it was. So, if you had asked me, I probably would have said yes, I'm in love with my wife. But I also remember making a clear distinction between "in love" and "mature, married couple" kind of love -- it was probably a justifiction for my lack of intense feelings for my wife at the time.

So, I would agree with Ms. Lane. Your husband is not In Love with you, from the looks of it. The good news is that he appears to be in a place where he could very much be in love with you. You have a prescription here. You can turn up the love meter with by following the doctor's orders, and you have an appointment today!

good luck. They are easy to talk to, so you have nothing to be nervous about.

opt

Well, yes, TW. That's the basic problem. Listen to what Dr. Harley says about how people in love act:

http://www.marriagebuilders.com/radio_program/play_segment.cfm?sid=68


Dr. Harley has to move heaven and earth to motivate spouses to spend 15 hours together, because they are not in love. When they are in love, he does not have to do this, because they will move heaven and earth to spend more time with each other, because they are in love and can't get enough of it!

Your husband may think that what he has now is as good as it gets, so he may say he is in love, but if he doesn't act like he can't get enough of you, he's not in love.

tw, the way we can help you is by motivating you to take the steps that make it more likely that you will soon have your HUSBAND to talk to.

Get him on board!

Looking forward to hearing you on the show. I usually catch the rebroadcast.

I survived. I really liked the summary they gave after the show. Joyce hit the nail on the head that I felt bad about complaining when most people would kill for what I have. I guess they will send me the mp3 so he can hear it. I don't think I said anything that he would find objectionable, so I will let him listen and then see if he has an interest in e-mailing them back.

What suggestions did they give you?