Hello,

I'll try not to make this too long but I really need some help/advice. I've been married 13 years, we've been together 20. We have one child, a 6 year old daughter. Wife has not been happy for several years, for me personally I have not been as happy with our relationship since we had a child. We tried counseling about 4 years ago, I don't think I was ready and the counselor was not a good fit. We again tried counseling in December with someone different, only I don't think the counselor was trying to help the marriage, only encourage her to divorce me. He never gave us any tools to help the marriage, only unfruitful discussions and when I met with him one on one he told me to prepare for divorce and to come back and see him if I needed separation counseling.

After that I sat down with the wife for a serious discussion, set out on a plan to try to reconcile and reconnect. The problem is there really was no plan, only general things that she needed. I attempted to change my behavior and while there was some immediate improvement things slowly reverted back to how they were. On Saturday night she told me she "can't do this anymore and wants a divorce".

I spent many hours on the the internet reading marriage and divorce advice, etc. and stumbled upon this site and Dr. Harley which spoke to me. I immediately purchased His Needs, Her Needs parents addition and read it, highlighting portions that I felt specifically applied to us. It's very clear to me that I am not meeting her emotional needs (nor is she meeting mine) and the book gives specific ways in which to correct them. I'm the type of person that needs a detailed plan and I think there is one in the book that would help immensely - scheduling out 15 hours of time for each other each week, dividing household tasks, etc., all in writing. Although devastated by my wife's desire for a divorce, the book gave me hope that there is a way to heal our marriage. I sat down with my wife Sunday night and explained the concepts of the book and stated that I would not fight her on a divorce but requested she first read the book and consider attempting the suggestions before moving forward with separation, which she agreed to (although with some skepticism as "we've tried this before") I also printed 2 copies of the emotional needs questionnaire, took one my self and asked her to do as well, which she agreed.

One of the issues in our marriage is time, my wife works from home with a lot of travel and she works A LOT. She often will work right up to bedtime and on the weekends too. When she travels for conferences it puts her more behind and increases her workload. She is not a quick reader so I'm not sure when she is going to find time to read the book. She also has not yet taken the 15 minutes to complete the emotional needs questionnaire but it's only been a couple of days, she literally worked up until bedtime yesterday. I'm worried she is not going to make time for this.

The other issue is parenting of our daughter, who has an extreme attachment to her mother. When we are both home, mommy has to do everything for her, daddy can't do it or help, and her behavior is quite poor, often acting like a spoiled brat with tantrums and disrespectful behavior. When my wife is away for work my daughters behavior totally changes, she is respectful, obedient, and enjoys spending time with me. As soon as wife returns my daughter is attached to her hip and wants nothing to do with me. As you can imagine this puts a strain on our marriage and makes me feel like a poor father and overwhelms my wife's attention.

I could go on, but my point of my post is I'm hurt that my wife wants a divorce and realize a lot of it is my fault for not meeting her emotional needs. I want another chance but I'm not sure if she is willing to give it. She will also have to change to meet my needs or things will just revert like they have before. Thoughts or advice from those that have been through something similar?

Thank you.

Welcome to MB. How much travel does she do?

Also here is a good thread to read and listen to the radio clips. Beware of Bad Counselors

Hello sadfather, welcome to Marriage Builders. I want to applaud you for the articulate, informative post and for your diligent research of the Marriage Builders program. You have identified the main reason that MB is different from other programs, it has an actual plan. Another point of differentiation is that the objective of the plan is not necessarily to just stay married, but to create romantic love. Unfortunately, you have discovered the hard way that most "counselors" don't have a plan and are little more than divorce facilitators. They are destructive to marriages and many of us and many of us came here after receiving such bad advice.

I want to completely understand the issues in your marriage before I comment. Why has your wife been unhappy "for years?" Were you aware all these years that she was so unhappy? Or did she just tell you this recently? What are her list of complaints and what have you done to resolve them? If she has been unhappy "for years" did you ignore her complaints?

Thanks for the welcome. Not a place I had ever expected to visit unfortunately. To answer the questions:

Her travel varies quite a bit, usually just a few days a month but it has increased a lot this year with multiple 2-5 day trips a month.

She says she is unhappy because she is lonely. She feels like we are roommates instead of partners, I don't help out around the house enough and she has to do it all. I should add that we sleep in separate rooms. My wife has a lot of sleeping issues, has taken various medications for several years. She has troubles getting to sleep, tosses and turns for a long time and once asleep tends to move around excessively. This causes me to not be able to sleep and now I'm exhausted and can't perform at work (I'm a pilot, fatigue is a big deal), so I end up moving to the guest room in the middle of the night and eventually just sleeping in the guest room. We tried sleeping together again at the beginning of the year, some nights were great and others were tough so I eventually ended up back in the guest room.

I was aware that she has been unhappy for years due to the counseling attempts. I have a lot of outside hobbies that take time away. I play golf, race cars, play guitar in a band and record music. These are all time consuming hobbies and I have cut way back on them, I've barely played golf the last 2 years, spend way less time on music and the band has been on a hiatus since January. I did this in an attempt to spend more time with her and the family.

She also needs more help around the house. I've attempted to help more with dishes,childcare, etc. particularly when it was discussed in counseling. I have not been consistent with it though. She has a tendency to be pretty short tempered with me and rude and condescending (not that I don't deserve it at times) after which I tend to shut down and stop the additional help.

While she didn't specifically mention it, I think she needs more affection from me. I've never been a very affectionate person, I tend to hold feelings in and am quiet and reserved. She is outgoing and extroverted. She says she knew this when we got married (she was the one pushing for marriage) but her needs have changed and it's unfair for her to expect me to change (her words). She thinks I'm great person with so much to offer but we are no longer good together.

I really think these issues could be solved with the specific written plans from the book, I just don't know if it's too late at this point. I want her to be happy and don't want to stay married if she can't be but I'm not ready to give up yet, she may be ready to.

ok, thanks. It sounds to me like she has fallen out of love but that is easily turned around with a lifestyle change and this program. Couples who are in love don't get divorced. The biggest issue I see is your lifestyle. At the top of the list is her traveling job. Divorce is epidemic in marriages with traveling jobs because the couple falls out of love. In order to stay in love, one needs to spend every evening and night together and get at least 15 hours of UA time. A couple that has fallen out of love needs to a) spend every night together and 20-25 hours of UA time to fall back in love.

It would take a commitment from her to find a job that is complementary to marriage and to commit to this program. The IDEAL solution for her would be to be in love with the father of her child. Can she be sold on this?

And have you ruled out an affair? It is very, very rare for a woman to leave a marriage and not have someone else lined up.

I would point out that you did a good enough job of meeting her needs that it caused her to fall in love with you. That being said, spouse CAN learn to do a good job of meeting the other spouse's intimate emotional needs. Affection is very important in creating romantic love.

In 2007, my husband and I were moving to another city. My job started earlier than his so I was traveling down on Monday and coming back on Thursday night for a couple of weeks. We were in love at that time but it was so hard on our marriage that we stopped doing this after 2 weeks. He got his office moved to the new city right away and we would travel down together on Monday and stay together in a hotel until our new house was ready and we were moved in. My point is that being apart like you are is hard on GOOD marriages. It is devastating to struggling marriages. I can't emphasize the importance of not being apart over night in the resolution of your marriage.

Did your outside hobbies cause her unhappiness? Did she ask you not to do them? How did you handle it when this came up? Did she sacrifice and make reluctant agreements when you did these things?

Does that mean that you also spend nights away from home?

Thanks for the reply. Even if I can get buy in from her on the program I know it's going to be tough to find the time with her job. She was one of the original members of her company that has grown exponentially over the last several years and she loves her job. She has been very successful and makes great money, although probably not that great if you broke it down hourly for how much she works. I think she may have thrown herself in to work so much to seek some fulfillment that she wasn't getting from me. With the way things are now I don't see any way she would give up her job to work on our marriage, and I wouldn't expect her to as she needs to be self sufficient in the event we separate. Maybe there is an option to cut down on the travel, I can approach that if she's willing to try the program.

Regarding an affair, I asked her in December and again this weekend if there was someone else. She denied it and said she would tell me if there was. During the one on one with our last counselor he also told me she denies an affair and he believes her, with no prompting from me. I suppose something could be going on during the day while I'm at work but I highly doubt it. If anything, there could be something emotional with one of her coworkers. They are scattered throughout the country and some of them are male. Perhaps she confided in one of them about our marriage troubles and got some needed consoling and attention? Two of her coworkers actually had an affair with each other, it got really nasty and one of them ended up getting fired for it. No way to know really unless she tells me.

Maybe she has fallen out of love but she has told me she still loves me without prompting.

If someone is having an affair they won't come out and admit it. I would silently put spyware on her devices to find out if she is having an affair.

That's not at all true.

The spyware stuff seems extreme, not sure I'm comfortable with that. If there is something going on the communication is probably confined to her work computer and her work cell, both of which are owned by her company.

Would an affair change my course of action?

As long as her job comes before your marriage, this will be a huge problem. Anything that comes before your marriage will come between you. [as you are learning] Without resolving the travel issue this won't work. Nothing we tell you to do will overcome this impediment. It is a HUGE issue that causes most of the detachment in your marriage. This is one of the main reasons she has fallen out of love and you are incompatible. This will prevent any hope of recovery.


You WILL separate and you will divorce if this problem is not resolved. If you can't persuade her to either leave the job or stop traveling, you might want to enlist Dr Harley to help you persuade her. You can get free advice by emailing him at mbradio@marriagebuilders.com.


Of course she would deny it if she were having an affair. And no, she would not tell you and she certainly would not tell a "counselor." Most people who have affairs are not going to counseling to solve problems but to gain cover for an affair. This has to be your first step to rule out an affair. Asking her if she is having an affair will get you nowhere. You need to quietly snoop and see what is happening.

An affair would absolutely change the course of action. It would be like us giving you medicine for heart disease when you have cancer. You have a right and a need to know everything she does since it directly affects you. If she is having an affair, this intel would enable you to save your marriage.

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Missed a few posts while typing -

I am a military pilot in the reserves and I am home every night. We live in a small town and many of my wife's friends have moved away and she does not like it here. I switched to part time to actively pursue employment with the major airlines in order to move our family to a better location. Although I haven't had any luck yet the point is once I do I will also be gone a lot and I'm realizing that will not be helpful at all. I was content with staying here until retirement (5 more years) but my wife wasn't so I'm really doing it for the family.

As far as my hobbies taking away from time with her, the biggest one was golf on the weekends. She would occasionally ask me not to play and it would turn in to an argument, that is my fault. She did start playing golf a couple of years ago with one of her friends and we would go out together at times. When it was just us it was great, when we brought our daughter along is was an exercise in frustration and not very enjoyable. Not an issue anymore since I hardly play but perhaps the damage is done.

I'm trying to imagine if I was having an affair and if I would tell my wife. If that was the reason I wanted a divorce I think I would, I find it unusually cruel to ask for the divorce and cite the other party's behavior as the cause when really I had found someone else. I suppose it could be both, the behavior caused them to seek someone else. Either way, that's not how I operate but I see everyone's point, I'll see what I can gather but don't think it will be much.

Appreciate all the advice. If she's willing to move forward it sounds like the biggest issue will be finding the time together and making sure there was no affair.

Just so you know, what you described is the CLASSIC behavior of a person in an affair. CLASSIC. I have seen thousands on this forum, mostly GOOD people, going back 18 years, who used this tactic. It is the rule, rather than the exception. You can't imagine doing that because you are not having an affair and don't understand the mentality. An affair is an addiction and the mentality is very much like that of an alcoholic. The person does things that are out of character.

In order to help you, it is critical that you do some snooping and find out what is going on. It may be nothing, but it is almost always an affair. It may not be, but you have to rule it out.

Quick update - she did start reading the book this evening, got about a quarter of the way through it. I asked her what she thought so far, she said it made her feel like she was a bad parent for wanting a divorce and that we never had any of the main principles of love in our marriage. Not exactly what I wanted to hear. She said she would finish the book though.

I’m unable to convince her that following the plan from the book will make a difference. I understand her skepticism and reluctance after the failed counseling attempts and I certainly can’t guarantee it will fix our marriage either but I’m still trying to be hopeful she’ll give me another chance.

If you could persuade her to try coaching with Dr Harley's son, Steven Harley, you'd stand a very good chance of success. Steve Harley seems to have the knack of persuading reluctant wives to give the MB programme a try. Coaching is done over the telephone with each spouse separately so that there is no arguing during sessions.

Coaching centre

However, continue to find a way to snoop for an affair. Unfaithful spouses can be very successful at pulling the wool over the eyes of counsellors, and persuading counsellors to facilitate their wish for a divorce. Steve Harley won't be conned in that way, but he can't snoop for an affair over the phone. That's your job.