Marriage Builders
Posted By: jen654 Have never been in love with my husband. - 02/14/11 09:12 PM

I have never been in love with my husband. We never should have gotten married. Does this program address that anywhere? I haven't been able to find it, if it does can someone please direct me to that information. I wonder what Dr. Harley says about saving a marriage to someone you've never loved. Thank you.
How old are you both?

How long have you been married?

Do you have any children?

WHY did you get married?
There are two reasons you don't feel in love with your husband:
1) He is not meeting your emotional needs
2) You are interested in someone else

Did you husband ever meet your needs?
Originally Posted by jen654
I have never been in love with my husband. We never should have gotten married. Does this program address that anywhere? I haven't been able to find it, if it does can someone please direct me to that information. I wonder what Dr. Harley says about saving a marriage to someone you've never loved. Thank you.
you never been in love with your husband...so was your marriage "arranged"? was it a one night stand and u become pregnant and it was a shot gun wedding?

you were never in love when you were dating him? your heart never fluttered when the phone rang or when he looked into your eyes?

i find that hard to believe...

i just think you've fallen out of love...became busy in your lives and lost that connection...
Who are you in love with or interested in?
Originally Posted by jen654
I have never been in love with my husband. We never should have gotten married. Does this program address that anywhere? I haven't been able to find it, if it does can someone please direct me to that information. I wonder what Dr. Harley says about saving a marriage to someone you've never loved. Thank you.


Dr. Harley has addressed this, though I don't believe he has anything written on this site addressing that topic. A few months ago I asked this question on his radio program. Can he help a couple who has NEVER been in love to fall in love.

His response was that YES he can! He told the story of a couple he knew who had been living together for several years because, financially, it worked out for them. They'd never loved each other. Eventually they decided they wanted to try to love each other. He taught them to fall in love. He said it took them about 3 months to get to where they wanted to be.

The program works because it identifies the steps that ALREADY occur when a couple 'naturally' falls in love.

A couple in love typically does 4 things:

They make each other happy.
They avoid hurting each other.
They spend time together.
They are honest with one another.

Thus, if you do these 4 things, though you have never loved your husband, you can LEARN to fall in love.

So what is the next step?

1. Plan to spend 20 hours a week TOGETHER doing things together. This will not work unless you can devote 20 hours a week to one another initially. So sit down and plan your time. If you have trouble coming up with the time, tell us your schedules, and we can see if we can help you work it out.

What do you do during that time?

2. Meet each other's intimate emotional needs. These are needs that must exclusively be met by your spouse, and they are heavy hitters, so the more you can incorporate them into your Undivided Attention time together, the better. These are: Affection, Conversation, Recreational Companionship, and Sexual Fulfillment.

Now in order to do this you want to be as effective as possible. Complete the Emotional Needs Questionnaire linked in the Basic Concepts. Each of you fill out the forms and let each other know what you're most important needs are and HOW you want them met. Make an effort to meet the intimate ones I listed above during your UA time, and try to consistently hit each other's top 3 emotional needs whenever you can.

You cannot argue Emotional Needs. They just are. Both of you work to meet them as best as you can. Over time you will get better at it.

3. Meeting Emotional Needs is useless if you are hurting one another. Thus, once you finish the Emotional Needs questionnaire, look at the Love Busters Questionnaire. Work to eliminate ALL hurtful behaviors.

If you can do this, you WILL get to where you want to be. It will be difficult at first because you will be learning and training yourselves to new habits and behaviors. It will be uncomfortable and frightening for a while. It will ebb and flow. There will be good days and bad days, there will be progress and regression, but over time you will get the hang of it.

I'd suggest getting the books His Needs, Her Needs and Love Busters as they really lay out how to meet needs and avoid hurting one another.

So - the 4 things you need to do:

Spend time together.
Meet each other's needs.
Avoid hurting each other.
Be honest about your feelings, thoughts, desires, and needs - create an atmosphere where you each feel safe being honest.

Yes, this program can help you and your husband fall in love, even if you've never been there before.

ETA: NONE of this will work if you have a new point of comparison. And by that I mean, you will never be able to fall in love with your husband if you're currently in love, or have feelings for someone else. If there IS someone else you are thinking of in a romantic way, end all contact with him, immediately.
Originally Posted by Tawandabelle
Who are you in love with or interested in?

Ditto, almost every time I hear that statement, that's the logical follow up question.

But let's assume the best. If you don't love your husband and never have, then leave. Take nothing but the clothes you have. Don't try to take any marital assets, nor any children.

After all, if you promised to love your husband, and by your admission, you never did, you entered the marriage by lying. Your husband should not suffer any loss, financially or as a parent just because you could not be truthful when you took your vows.

So if you want to do the right thing, make sure you take nothing but your half of any marital debt, and your clothes when you tell him you never loved him, and have been living a lie all these years.
J, I don't know your story, age, or how long you've been married, but about two weeks ago I made pretty much the same statement you did and I've been married 23 years. I wanted to walk away and did not think that I ever really loved my husband. Today was the first day in a long, long time that I decided I want to work towards saving my marriage instead of getting a divorce.

I'm still not ready to talk to him about it, but thats ok because I need to work on myself and do some healing, gain some understanding, and figure out how to do this. If nothing else, I think I will be a better person in the end.

If you want to make your marriage work, then read the articles, they will help if you choose to save your marriage, or for any future relationships you may have if you chose not to. The posts can help too. I started reading His Needs/Her Needs and am 44 pages in.

Pick who you choose to confide in outside of here carefully. Try to find someone who will question your choices, not necessarily disagree, but not always agree either.

I read the posts and articles on divorce too. Both making a marriage work and getting a divorce is a lot of work and takes a lot of time and planning.

Good luck and may you find happiness in the choices you make.
Posted By: jen654 Re: Have never been in love with my husband. - 02/15/11 03:17 PM
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Posted By: jen654 Re: Have never been in love with my husband. - 02/16/11 03:46 AM
Thank you all for your input. Thank you Vibrissa.
For your health, and quality of life it is far more beneficial to repair a broken marriage than to divorce.

Do you have children? Well they will be affected. Don't have children? Well, your friends and family can and will be affected by your choice to divorce as well;

http://www.nydailynews.com/lifestyl...n_marriage_may_be_in_jeopardy_resea.html

Not to mention, that you are going to have to go through a withdrawal from your spouse;

http://www.businessweek.com/lifestyle/content/healthday/640951.html

That's right, you're...



Then you will be broke;

http://www.myfoxdc.com/dpps/news/st...fter-break-up-dpgonc-20100707-fc_8518209

You will be confused;

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35836868/ns/health-behavior/

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/03/100308132139.htm

You can, in fact, die of a broken heart;

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A11446-2005Feb9.html

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703615904575053443911673752.html

Or, you can suffer from depression... which depresses your immune system and dramatically increases your risk for cancer;

http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/200312/depression-hurts-the-immune-system

http://abcnews.go.com/Health/DepressionRiskFactors/story?id=4355916

http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/200401/bad-breakups-cause-depression

Or, you can start here;

http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi3000_intro.html

You can learn that love isn't a magical moonbeam, but the response of demonstrating care, and having care demonstrated to you - and that it takes time to build that bond.

As one of the above articles mentions, relationships stimulate the same centers in the brain that addictions do, in the same way addictive substances do. Well, become addicted to your husband!
I like that post HHH smile
I too have never been "in love" with my husband. I have been married to him for 24 years and for 24 years I have been trying to figure out how to get out of the marriage without hurting him. It was not an arranged marriage; I was not pregnant; I had no self esteem and thought that he was my only hope to be married and have children. I know better now. My children are grown and in college. I have asked for a divorce but he is devastated. I hate seeing the hurt in his eyes. I once was in love with someone else, so I know I am capable of being in love. How do I end this and convince my husband that it is best to let me go?
Originally Posted by Wouldyoucouldyou
I too have never been "in love" with my husband. I have been married to him for 24 years and for 24 years I have been trying to figure out how to get out of the marriage without hurting him. It was not an arranged marriage; I was not pregnant; I had no self esteem and thought that he was my only hope to be married and have children. I know better now. My children are grown and in college. I have asked for a divorce but he is devastated. I hate seeing the hurt in his eyes. I once was in love with someone else, so I know I am capable of being in love. How do I end this and convince my husband that it is best to let me go?

You don't need his permission to go anywhere, however, you can fall in love with your husband if you follow this program. That would be the ideal outcome since he is the father of your children, wouldn't you agree?

Who were you in love with and WHEN were you in love with him? Can you be more specific?
Posted By: markos Re: Have never been in love with my husband. - 06/24/13 06:22 PM
Originally Posted by Wouldyoucouldyou
How do I end this and convince my husband that it is best to let me go?

Weird. You don't have to convince him of anything. If you want a divorce just file for divorce. You can get one even if he doesn't think it's best.

Of course, a better course of action for you and your children would be to follow the program here to fall in love with your husband. People do it every day, even with people they have never been in love with. Do it with some guy at work and you'll have an affair. Do it with your husband, and you'll live happily ever after.

My guess is that you really don't want to leave the marriage because it provides you some benefits, so you are making an excuse to yourself that you need to "convince" your husband to "let you go." That way you can stick around and tell yourself that you want out but you can't get out.

It would be far better to take the benefits you've got in your marriage and ADD all the benefits of romantic love.
Posted By: didi768 Re: Have never been in love with my husband. - 07/02/13 12:15 AM
I too married too quick and still do not love my spouse. Married 18 yrs, have two boys 18, 15. I too was terrified of being an old maid and really wanted babies. He loves me a lot but there just are no feelings towards him whatsoever. In fact, I cringe when he even touches me. I find it hard to be nice because he is all over me all the time. I don't know what to do but we cannot afford to divorce. We would if we could.
I hate hearing that love is a decision when I see couples everywhere holding hands. I never got the butterflies either and wish I had.
Posted By: Prisca Re: Have never been in love with my husband. - 07/02/13 12:30 AM
didi, it is entirely possible to fall in love with your husband, even if you have never loved him. The problems you describe are not unusual at all. How would you feel about starting your own thread, and we can talk about it?
Posted By: MrAlias Re: Have never been in love with my husband. - 07/02/13 12:35 PM
Edited: I noticed didi started her own thread.
I am the husband of a spouse that has told me that she has never loved me the way she thinks she should.We have been married 20 years and have children. I have never read a full circle positive outcome from doing the things Vibrissa said. Does anyone know of a site or forumn that has success stories to share?
Posted By: MrAlias Re: Have never been in love with my husband. - 08/26/13 05:50 PM
Want 2 understand,

Welcome to MB.

We�d like to hear more about your situation. Please start your own Topic and you will get direct answers to any and all of your questions.

There are thousands of full circle positive outcomes from those that have followed the principles taught here on Dr Harley�s website. I suggest you take some time to educate yourself on what we here will guide a poster through. This forum and its posters are dedicated to teaching Dr. Harley�s plan.

Start with the good Dr�s Basic Concepts .
Posted By: MrAlias Re: Have never been in love with my husband. - 08/26/13 05:55 PM
Here is a link to a post that shows some posted success stories.

Scroll down a bit to find them ...

Success Stories.

Trust me when I say that is just a very small sampling of those that have been helped by MB.
Jen654, I just have to chime in here and say that I totally understand how you feel. I, too, don't think I've ever truly been "in love" with my husband. From the get go, I think I liked/loved him, but I'm positive that he never met my needs enough to make me fall in love with him. On the other hand, I DID meet his, so he fell in love with me. And like these other women on this thread, I lacked the self esteem to think I could ever find something better and it seemed good enough at the time. I wanted children and a family more than anything (apparently even more than being "in love"!)

So I think it is VERY possible that many, many women feel this way. We want to have children, our biological clocks are ticking, and we "settle" for someone we have very good feelings about, but aren't "in love" with.

Now that I know about MB, I realize that most likely ALL of these cases are cases where the husband just wasn't required to learn to meet the woman's emotional needs. Whether that is because we had sex with him too soon, making him feel like he was doing a better job than he was, or something else. It is now not surprising to me that many, many, many women feel this way. We want to marry and have kids, and we women KNOW that men need sex, but do men realize that women NEED affection and conversation just as much as they need sex? Likely not. Our culture isn't set up that way and when a woman leaves a man because he never filled her need for conversation or affection, she is looked at with scorn. But when a man leaves a woman because she refused him sex all these years, EVERYONE understands. So if we go ahead in the relationship and give to our husband's and meet their needs, then they don't HAVE TO learn to meet ours. They think everything is fine. We marry and think it will get better...that they'll take BETTER care of us once we're married, but we've essentially accepted their lack of meeting our needs, and still given them their #1 which is sex. So they just keep doing whatever they are doing that ISN'T making us fall in love. I actually think it's a sad story that happens ALL THE TIME. I actually think our society has set men up to fail by not teaching them about what will actually make a woman feel loved.

It sucks, but I TOTALLY get what you are saying about feeling in love before. I, too, had been in love before my husband and had that heart pitter-patter feeling. Unfortunately for me, and my heart, he didn't feel the same way about me, and the relationship didn't work out. But for me, I feel like that was the one that got away. And now I know why! He made massive LB deposits, naturally, and I fell head over heels in love with him. However, he didn't want marriage and kids and my husband did. So I chose to continue with my husband even though I've never had that pitter-patter feeling with him. I don't feel like I "lied" to my husband, he could have easily found out how "in love" with him I was, had he asked or paid attention. But he did neither because how HE was feeling was all he cared about. He never actually seemed to want to know how in love with him I was. He never, ever asked. He assumed that if I slept with him, I was in love, and that's as far as it ever went for him.

So right now I'm pretty much in the same situation with you, not in love with my husband. And unfortunately he's not on board with doing ANYTHING at all to make me fall in love with him, and thinks I should just love him as he is. frown It's a tough place to be, so I get it. I do think if your husband was motivated to actually meet your needs though, that everything could be turned around. My dilemma with getting him to become motivated is that why should he? He's done the same thing all along since the start of your relationship, so getting him to see the necessity of the change is going to be hard. Not impossible, but hard. I wish you luck!
Originally Posted by lonely4years
My dilemma with getting him to become motivated is that why should he? He's done the same thing all along since the start of your relationship, so getting him to see the necessity of the change is going to be hard. Not impossible, but hard. I wish you luck!


Right now, this is the situation your husband is faced with:

If I do nothing extra, I still get to keep my wife and the situation which makes me happy.

or

If I do more for my wife I get to keep my wife and the situation which keeps me happy.

Which is obviously not much motivation for him to do more. If I said you could eat at my cafe for �10 or eat there for free, you would obviously choose the free option. You wouln't make the extra effort to pay me �10 just because I said I would prefer it.

You are the one responsbile for outlining what you will put up and what treatment you require in order to stay married.

Letting your husband believe that you will stay married in return for NO care on his part is nuts. You won't get a caring marriage that way any more than my cafe would turn a profit giving away free meals.

Dr Harley would recommend someone in your position to start Plan A and then Plan B.

In Plan A you meet all his needs, not expecting him to meet your needs back any time soon. But you regularly remind him that eventually you will want your needs met too. This is kind of like a 'trial offer'. To stay with the cafe metaphor, I would show you how good my food is for a set period, and get you used to having it, my trial period would get you hooked on the food I offer. But I would remind you that when the offer is up, you will need to pay your share.

Plan B is a controlled separation. Without warning you disappear and refuse to communicate directly with your spouse. You leave him with a love letter informing him that you would love to come back and shower upon him all the attention that he has gotten used to. But before you will agree to come back, you need him to commit to meeting your needs too.

It's not a divorce, it's a loving way of letting them know you won't stay in a loveless marriage. A separation where you state you are longing to return - but to the right conditions.

It's risky - as are all separations. But all you risk losing is a loveless marraige.
Originally Posted by jen654
I have never been in love with my husband. We never should have gotten married.

One of the top 10 Wayward Spouse sayings.

VERY hard to believe and usually means you are trying to justify your bad behavior.
Posted By: ETW Re: Have never been in love with my husband. - 09/16/13 11:26 AM
**edit**
Posted By: MrAlias Re: Have never been in love with my husband. - 09/16/13 12:20 PM
ETW, Really? That doesn't sound like MB advice.

Quote
**EDIT**

Dr Harley would say it can. We fall in love with people that meet our needs and avoid doing things that annoy/hurt us.

Also FYI I�m quite certain Jen654 is long gone. Her original post on this thread was over 2.5 years ago.
You write this as if it is your husband's fault. Look at it from his perspective. You have trained him that that what he was doing was good enough. You agreed to marry him. You had sex with him and so forth. That sends the message that he was meeting your needs.

Now you want to blame him for not meeting your needs after sending the message that he was meeting your needs.

Why should he believe you?

I am not saying he was meeting your needs. I am saying it will be difficult for you to deliver a credible message after years of conditioning provided by your behaviors that indicated he was meeting your needs.

I don't think society gives men a pass. After all, women choose divorce two to three times more often than men, yet there is still this misconception that men are the ones abandoning their familes and are afraid of commitment.

Even our pastor, when he learned of my ex-wife's affair asked me what I did to force her to have an affair.

So there is plenty of blame the victim when it comes to men who are divorced by their wives.

We hear that men are clueless. I wonder how much of that is because we are told one thing, while our wives are feeling a totally different thing. Somehow, it is our fault we trusted our wives and took them at their word when they said they were in love with us, and wanted to spend the rest of our lives together, when really they are simply thinking we are simply the best option.

It is difficult to have a clue when we are not given total honesty


Originally Posted by lonely4years
Jen654, I just have to chime in here and say that I totally understand how you feel. I, too, don't think I've ever truly been "in love" with my husband. From the get go, I think I liked/loved him, but I'm positive that he never met my needs enough to make me fall in love with him. On the other hand, I DID meet his, so he fell in love with me. And like these other women on this thread, I lacked the self esteem to think I could ever find something better and it seemed good enough at the time. I wanted children and a family more than anything (apparently even more than being "in love"!)

So I think it is VERY possible that many, many women feel this way. We want to have children, our biological clocks are ticking, and we "settle" for someone we have very good feelings about, but aren't "in love" with.

Now that I know about MB, I realize that most likely ALL of these cases are cases where the husband just wasn't required to learn to meet the woman's emotional needs. Whether that is because we had sex with him too soon, making him feel like he was doing a better job than he was, or something else. It is now not surprising to me that many, many, many women feel this way. We want to marry and have kids, and we women KNOW that men need sex, but do men realize that women NEED affection and conversation just as much as they need sex? Likely not. Our culture isn't set up that way and when a woman leaves a man because he never filled her need for conversation or affection, she is looked at with scorn. But when a man leaves a woman because she refused him sex all these years, EVERYONE understands. So if we go ahead in the relationship and give to our husband's and meet their needs, then they don't HAVE TO learn to meet ours. They think everything is fine. We marry and think it will get better...that they'll take BETTER care of us once we're married, but we've essentially accepted their lack of meeting our needs, and still given them their #1 which is sex. So they just keep doing whatever they are doing that ISN'T making us fall in love. I actually think it's a sad story that happens ALL THE TIME. I actually think our society has set men up to fail by not teaching them about what will actually make a woman feel loved.

It sucks, but I TOTALLY get what you are saying about feeling in love before. I, too, had been in love before my husband and had that heart pitter-patter feeling. Unfortunately for me, and my heart, he didn't feel the same way about me, and the relationship didn't work out. But for me, I feel like that was the one that got away. And now I know why! He made massive LB deposits, naturally, and I fell head over heels in love with him. However, he didn't want marriage and kids and my husband did. So I chose to continue with my husband even though I've never had that pitter-patter feeling with him. I don't feel like I "lied" to my husband, he could have easily found out how "in love" with him I was, had he asked or paid attention. But he did neither because how HE was feeling was all he cared about. He never actually seemed to want to know how in love with him I was. He never, ever asked. He assumed that if I slept with him, I was in love, and that's as far as it ever went for him.

So right now I'm pretty much in the same situation with you, not in love with my husband. And unfortunately he's not on board with doing ANYTHING at all to make me fall in love with him, and thinks I should just love him as he is. frown It's a tough place to be, so I get it. I do think if your husband was motivated to actually meet your needs though, that everything could be turned around. My dilemma with getting him to become motivated is that why should he? He's done the same thing all along since the start of your relationship, so getting him to see the necessity of the change is going to be hard. Not impossible, but hard. I wish you luck!
Good points.. I will say this I think part of it is what society and/or the church has trained us to do. I was taught that to be a good Christian wife I should do whatever I can to make him happy. That to love like Christ means ignoring your own needs and fulfilling the needs of your spouse. You think there is something wrong with you for being unhappy.. And so yes, then you train your husband that what he has been doing is good enough. Why would he want to change and this is my problem, how can he believe you when you tell him you are happy or not happy when you lied for so long that you were....


After 25 years it just isn't worth the effort... So now I give all of Dr. Harley's books to every single newlywed that I know. I tell them to be radically honest and put these principals into practice. It is too late for me, but not for them.
Originally Posted by Enlightened_Ex
You write this as if it is your husband's fault. Look at it from his perspective. You have trained him that that what he was doing was good enough. You agreed to marry him. You had sex with him and so forth. That sends the message that he was meeting your needs.

Now you want to blame him for not meeting your needs after sending the message that he was meeting your needs.

Why should he believe you?

I am not saying he was meeting your needs. I am saying it will be difficult for you to deliver a credible message after years of conditioning provided by your behaviors that indicated he was meeting your needs.

We hear that men are clueless. I wonder how much of that is because we are told one thing, while our wives are feeling a totally different thing. Somehow, it is our fault we trusted our wives and took them at their word when they said they were in love with us, and wanted to spend the rest of our lives together, when really they are simply thinking we are simply the best option.

It is difficult to have a clue when we are not given total honesty
Posted By: markos Re: Have never been in love with my husband. - 09/16/13 05:07 PM
Originally Posted by tiredwife45
After 25 years it just isn't worth the effort... So now I give all of Dr. Harley's books to every single newlywed that I know. I tell them to be radically honest and put these principals into practice. It is too late for me, but not for them.

Of course it is not too late for you, TW. You just aren't willing to follow the advice Dr. Harley gives for wives whose husbands aren't on board. That is very sad to see.

Dr. Harley is very clear that if the husband is simply not on board, no amount of need meeting / love buster fixing on the part of the wife will drag him back. A wife should not spend years trying to deal with that - she will end up in a terrible emotional state, probably with a serious physical toll taken on her immune system as well, and often suicidal.

I've seen enough women end up in that state after blogging for years here on the forum. I'm here to sound the alarm: not only is it not too late for you, but if you continue like this with no change on his part things are going to only get worse. The time to make preparations is NOW while you feel better, not later when you feel worse.
Originally Posted by tiredwife45
After 25 years it just isn't worth the effort... So now I give all of Dr. Harley's books to every single newlywed that I know. I tell them to be radically honest and put these principals into practice. It is too late for me, but not for them.

It is very much worth the effort. We have people here who have been married longer than you who are in completely recovered, passionate marriages. All it takes is willingness. The tools are lying there waiting for you to pick them up.
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