Did you miss my post where I said to let her decide that?

Cut the woman completely out of your life. Change jobs if you have to.

Do it anyway.

And don't argue with her about it or discuss it with her.



You are missing something really serious if you want to use Marriage Builders.

When you talk about your wife's feelings, you explain why she is wrong and you are right.

That is profoundly disrespectful to your wife, and disrespect like this will destroy your marriage.

Quit trying to prove to your wife that you are right and she is wrong. About the woman you saw, about the kids, about everything.

Your wife is not wrong, and if you don't start listening to her perspective and accommodating her, you are going to lose her.

Your wife has an unmet emotional need for family commitment. She doesn't know how to express it well and says you "don't care" about the kids. The problem is you aren't meeting this emotional need for her - when you meet it, she will feel that you care about the kids.

Dr. Harley recommends meeting this emotional need by scheduling fifteen hours a week for you and your wife to be together with the kids. If you do this, she will probably stop saying that you don't care about them.

If you keep arguing with her instead, then when she stops complaining that you "don't care," it will probably be the first sign that she is about to leave you.

Do you have the Marriage Builders app? Are you listening to the radio show, daily?

Markos, I will try to answer all your questions.

I do not spend anytime with any other women. (This instance was an inappropriate anomaly) I try to spend all my time with my wife even when I am work. I text her quite frequently unless she is at work also.

The lady and I do not work together anymore. She has been gone from the company I work for for almost two years. I also was reassigned to a different position a year before that that pulled me out of the building I was working in.

I agree that i do try to convince my wife to see things my way. I will work to correct that.

As far as family commitment, I have never missed a sporting event/dance recital/school dance/birthday or anything else important in my kids lives. I go places alone with my kids when my wife is busy, i even take them with me when i go to run errands when my wife does not feel good. I take my daughter shopping when my wife is at work, I go with my son to cool guy stuff like the shooting range.

I believe where she has an issue is her worries for the kids. She worriies our daughter will have sex before she is married and that our son might get into drugs. I try to calm her fears, but I tell her that we can only give our kids instruction and guidance and snoop to verify that they are not putting themselves in a bad position. We can do our best to make sure they have the right friends, but we will not be able to make that decision for them. Sooner or later they will be put into a position where they have to make a decision and that we hope and pray that we have educated them enough to know right from wrong and that they make the right decision. She views this as not caring because i dont sit around and fret over it constantly. And my kids are pretty decent kids that have never got into any trouble. I know this could change at any moment.

As far as the app and radio program. I will start listening to the radio program but i will not download the app. My wife will see that and she gets mad when i read or look at marriage benefiting material.

Well my wife left for work just a few minutes ago. I am working from home today because I am waiting on a furniture delivery for my daughter. My wife did tell me bye when she left.

That all does not necessarily mean you are meeting her need for family commitment.

That was disrespectful of you.

I don't think this is disrespectful because she has said, "I think you don't care because you don't sit and worry about our daughter getting pregnant or our son getting into drugs."

Saying that she sits around and "frets" is disrespectful. Her telling you that you don't care is also disrespectful. I am very hopeful you will read the book we recommended, Lovebusters, because you will be very surprised at how ingrained the love busters are in your marriage. It was certainly an eye opener for me!

If you never do this again and if you make it impossible for this woman to contact you then you have little to worry about on this front. Eventually your wife will make her own decision about it.


Yet you know what is going on in her personal life. Change your contact information so she can't contact you, and let people know you don't want to hear about her. If anyone persists in telling you about her, make it impossible for them to contact you as well.


You totally ignored what I said about Dr. Harley's recommendation for meeting the emotional need for family commitment. None of what you are describing here sounds like that.


"Trying to calm her fears" is you trying to manipulate how she feels! This won't calm her down; it will withdraw from your account in her love bank and make her feel more and more negative toward you.

LET HER FEEL HOW SHE WANTS TO FEEL.

Telling her how things are and "we can only do this" is lecturing and educating her. Again, disrespectful = a withdrawal from your account in her love bank.

What you aren't doing is brainstorming with your wife about how to solve the problem. You believe you have a list of everything that can be done, and you aren't looking for any additional ideas. You are being closed minded, and your wife is not getting what she needs from you: a partner in dealing with the problems in life that are important to her.

Running from school activity to school activity is not going to help your children develop values in life, it's not going to meet your wife's emotional needs, and it's not going to help prevent the problems she is worried about.


Sounds like throwing them to the wolves to me!

What would she like to do about the possibility of your children having premarital sex and/or doing drugs?

Please understand i am reading all of the advice I am given and will do everything in my power to implement changes in my life so that I can be a better husband for my wife.

What do you make of her at least telling me bye this morning. It was just sunday she left the house without telling me where she was going or saying a word to me.

Well my wife is home from work. I didn't realize she was here and when I walked out of our bedroom she scared me to death. She laughed and thought it was funny. Both of my kids were gone to church. My wife fixed herself a glass of wine and went to our bedroom to watch tv.

Okay well go sit down next to her ask if she wants some crackers and cheese to go with the wine.

Go watch TV with her. Be personable but not pushy. Make conversation with her if she will let you. Don't ignore her in favor of the TV.

After my wife had been home for a while (she was in bedroom, I was in living room), she texted me and asked me to take her to get our daughter. She did not want to drive since it was raining and and had a glass of wine.

We went to get my daughter. My wife did not talk to me on the trip. She just played with her phone. I could see she was looking at clothes online.

After we got our daughter, she said she was hungry so i asked her if she wanted something from Panera. She stated that sounded good, but that they are usually out of bread bowls for soup that late at night. I was real close so I said let me check and quickly ran in and got her the last bread bowl to go.

When we got home we were talking to my son (about a situation I need to post later on to see how I can use POJA and not use disrespectful judgements), and my wife was a little combative. She made the comment that I had diarrhea of the mouth.

When we went to bed, she was using her computer to look for a desk chair for my daughter. I brought her open can of soda that she had left in the kitchen. I asked her if she wanted it left in the can, or poured over the cup of ice that she already had. She aggressively stated that i did not have to do anything for her. I stated that I knew i did not have to, but I wanted to.

When i got into bed and we were ready to go to sleep, i noticed that her arm kept grazing mine. She did not make a obvious effort to avoid me as she has been. SHe also rolled over facing me, which she had not done for a week. When she rolled over to her usual sleeping position, her back and rear were completely up against my arm and hand. I rolled over and hugged her and kissed her on the neck and told her goodnight. She did not reciprocate, but I did not feel her cringe as I she had done when I kissed her forehead the last several nights.

Good, continuous little love gestures go a long way.

What is the issue with your son? Review the POJa article then post.

Okay, so you are getting things slightly better, temporarily, despite her hostility.

I wouldn't expect things to get better permanently though until you've started working with her to find solutions to the problems she sees about the children. So don't take focus off of that, go back up and answer the questions we asked and put the suggestions that we made into practice.

Don't ignore stuff that we post to you - answer! Get started brainstorming possible solutions to these problems.

I came up with a list of about five options yesterday and I'm sure you can think of more.

Sorry, I didn't see the question. I will answer it as best I can.

She really has not stated how she would like to prevent our kids from doing said activities. She just worries about it. As far as drugs are concerned, both my kids go to a private school where they are administered bi-monthly drug tests. They both know they will be expelled if they test positive. They have been going to school there for four years. We also constantly talk about the dangers of drugs and even give the example of my uncle that has ruined his life due to substance abuse.

As far as premarital sex, we have talked to both our kids about how we wish we would have saved ourselves for marriage. How special that is. My son is only allowed to date in groups. My daughter will only be allowed to do the same when she starts dating. She is also not allowed to spend the night with friends that have teenage brothers.