Your wife fell out of love and left, pulled the rug out from under your world and, in your stunned disbelief you can’t, for the life of you, figure what went wrong.
Many men are blinded sided by divorce, slapped in the emotions by a wife who says, “I’m not in love with you anymore.” Most, I’m afraid, fail to look inward and own the role they played in the lack of love now being shown them.
Happy marriages are difficult to maintain and, it is possible for a woman to fall out of love with her husband. It’s difficult for a couple to maintain the level of excitement felt when they first met once they are sharing their lives day in and day out.
Add to the monotony of daily life, marriage stressors and a lack of skills for dealing with the stress and it is possible for a wife to lose those “loving feelings” toward her husband.
Wondering why it happened to you?
Below are 9 Reasons Your Wife Fell Out Of Love With You
1. You Missed the Mark When It Came to Communication
Not only is communication important in maintaining a bond with each other, how you communicate will determine how strong of a bond. The way a couple communicates is as important as the ability to communicate.
Below are 4 negative communication traits that may have killed her love for you.
- Giving her the silent treatment
- When you refuse to talk and discuss problems you slowly destroy the love that is the foundation of a marriage.
- Refusing to communicate is a disrespectful manner of communicating how you are feeling. Did you give her the silent treatment when she pissed you off? If so, all you managed to do was push her away and build a wall that restricted intimacy.
- Being on the defensive
- If you viewed statements made by your wife as accusations, you probably responded in a defensive manner. Being defensive is not communication, it’s a game of who is right and who is wrong. When you start keeping score, love eventually pays the price.
- Being overly critical
- Constantly expressing how you feel about your wife’s negative traits isn’t communication, it is tearing down. Nothing kills feelings of love for a husband quicker than feeling like you can do no right. If your communication style causes your wife to feel worthless and depletes their self-esteem, don’t be surprised when you find the love has died.
- Name calling
- This is a no-brainer! If you tell someone who loves you they are an idiot, stupid, can’t do anything right, that person will eventually fall out of love with you. Name calling is a form of emotional abuse!
2. You Were a Clingy Husband
My 8th grade home economics teacher taught us that once couples marry they “became one.” She was wrong! Couples do not become one and believing so is a death sentence to autonomy and love.
For love to thrive a wife and husband should remain autonomous, fully individualized outside the relationship and marriage.
Wanting your wife to spend all her time with you because you believe it is an expression of how much she loves you is a sign of immaturity in you, not proof that she loves you.
If love is to grow, a husband and wife must continue to bring your own individuality to the relationship.
If you were clingy, insecure, jealous and possessive you weren’t feeding love, you were smothering it. Want to choke the love out of someone quickly, man or woman, keep a tight noose around their neck!
3. Your Marriage had a Bad Beginning
In order for a couple to weather the storms…the ups and downs of marital life, they need a strong, healthy beginning. Below are a few examples of poor relationship foundations. Beginnings that could cause either spouse to eventually lose loving feelings for the other.
- A rush to marriage
- You fell in love and had her standing at the alter two months later. True love takes time to grow, two months, isn’t enough time. If you rushed her toward the altar before she was ready to go there, your marriage was doomed from the beginning.
- Long-term relationships riddled with problems
- We all know that couple. They dated for six years, broke up and got back together on a regular basis and were always in the middle of conflict. If you can’t hold a relationship together before you marry, you aren’t going to be able to after you marry.
4. You Didn’t Meet Her Needs
Forgive me for going all “Venus and Mars” on you but, as individuals, we have needs in romantic relationships. If those needs aren’t met, love dies.
If you were consumed by work, came home late, ate dinner and watched television that means you had very little leftover for her. Was golf or football your weekend go toes? How often did you help her with the laundry, clean the house or do a sink full of dishes? Rarely? I’m sure she felt drained AND unappreciated!
If, as her husband you weren’t tuned into her emotional and physical needs and putting effort into meeting them, she may have gotten to the point of finding someone who would.
And let’s talk about sex! If you expected sex after weekends of football or golf and no effort to help with the kid or around the house, you EXPECTED WAY TOO MUCH from a wife who, more than likely, felt belittled, dismissed and cringed at your touch.
5. You Didn’t Put Enough Effort into Resolving Marital Conflict
Problems are common in all marriages. Both spouses need to have the ability to constructively work through those problems. When a husband avoids finding solutions to marital problems, leaving his wife holding the bag, love eventually dies.
Putting the onus on her to solve problems by refusing counseling or communicating about the problems causes resentment to grow toward you and the relationship.
Unresolved marital conflict, especially when a husband tries to sweep them under the rug, negatively impacts feelings of love her husband has for her.
6. You Stopped Caring About Your Appearance
You let yourself go. You gained 50 pounds and never lost it, you started wearing nothing but sweatpants and just generally became someone no one would find attractive.
Physical attraction between spouses is important. If your wife looks at you and her motor doesn’t start humming love is doomed. Part of being in love with someone is feeling passionate and drawn to their physical appearance.
Just because a woman has said, “I do” doesn’t mean her love will always be there regardless of how you look and how well you take care of yourself.
7. You Rejected Her Sexually
Sex in marriage is important because it brings a couple closer together. If a couple has a great sexual bond they can weather almost any storm. In a sexless marriage, there is no bond, storms are not weathered!
Sex is also an expression of love between two people. Few men understand that women bond with their partner via the act of sex. It’s true! Marital sex, for women, is a way to feel closer to their spouse.
It isn’t just sex for the sake of sex.
For love to continue and grow it’s important that a husband understands and respects his wife’s normal sexual needs. And, at times, give a spouse what they need (within reason) because you care about her needs being met.
Let me add a qualifier here, she isn’t going to be the least bit interested in sex with you if you’re an abusive, lazy, slob, who never lifts a hand around the house. Don’t take what I’ve written here and used it against a wife who has every reason in the world to not desire sex with you.
8. You Were Impossible to Please
It didn’t matter what she did, you were never grateful. She gave you that extra baby and you bitched because it was another girl. She bought you a riding lawnmower for your birthday and you whined because it didn’t have enough horsepower.
Whatever she did, you took her efforts for granted and failed to show appreciation.
9. You Changed After Marrying Her
Before marriage, you were up for anything. You enjoyed going out with her, doing things she was interested in. You were invested in your career, had a full and rewarding life. You were the total package!
After marriage, you turned into a boring, grumpy, uninteresting person who was in bed asleep by 8 in the evening and spent your weekends on Facebook or binge-watching football on the couch. That interesting man she fell in love with became a snooze fest she had no respect for and very little feelings of love toward.
Message From a Reader
Here’s a list from the perspective of a reader who fell out of love with her husband. I’m sure there are many women who can identify with what she has to say. And, I suggest you take it to heart if you’ve still got the opportunity to save your marriage.
- He couldn’t keep his thing in his pants.
- He was lazy and uninvolved when it came to helping around the house.
- He was lazy and uninvolved when it came to helping with our daughters.
- He was obsessed with money and how he was perceived by others.
- He was a bad lover and expected that while he did nothing to help with the kids/house I should want to have sex with him….which became a chore and left me often times feeling sick.
- He is a narc….and blames women for all his failures–something friends warned me about at the start but I was too blind to see.
- He resented any friends I made and after while I stopped making them.
- He resented any time I spent with my family even though I had just spent almost 20 years overseas away from them.
- He snored; I never got a full night’s sleep in 15 years.
- He never wanted to do anything and when asked he would act like he was doing us a great favor.
This is very helpful for a (ex) husband to read. However, it only provides a woman’s perspective on the man’s shortcomings. Do you have a similar story written from the husband’s perspective? Thank you.
Lemme know if you find one anywhere!
Hmmm guess what my wife of 28+ has done almost all of those and as they say “no fix for stupid” .. I’m an ex Navy Chief who fathered two sons and gave her everything .. she never once handed out punishment .. now that I’m retired I can see her for the person she is … your story here is really sad as is your one sided perspective !!
We know there is a large amount of food poisoning, pollution, heavy metal poisoning. Have all these had an effect on the brain, and caused persons to react badly into a legal suit , divorce, or even worse fights and crime?
Reading this article fekt like i had a friend who listened. Most of the signs are what i am feeling right now. But i am not leaving my husband becaise my kids are here. We just had another fight which just about a simple cold water, imagine how shallow, we are Filipinos and here right now in tje phil, you know the climate here, i am a multitasking mom and a teacher whose because of this pandemic i am working from home plus helping kids with their learning modules plus house errands, and yet because there is no cold water during dinner, he made me felt useless, unworthy and lazy. He is thinking that i am lucky because i am at home all the time and while he is to be praised because his work is miles away, i feel like a bitch and i am not functioning efficiently because of this pain i have right now.
When it come s down to it…. They Just want more sex and we want understanding, help, affection before wanting sex
Always about how to make the women happy never how to keep a man happy
So basically .. just be all things at once, if he wants to spend time with her that’s clingy, but if he’s off at the golf course that’s neglectful. If he’s not ‘invested in his career’ that sucks, but if he ‘comes home late’ or is ‘consumed by work’ or doesn’t do the laundry, that means he didn’t meet her needs.
I’m a divorcing guy and my own experience fits with none of the above, but #10 “Be decisive and a leader, wear the trousers”.
That’s what women really want. I repeatedly tried to keep my wife involved as an equal partner in big decisions like where to move to, and she didn’t like it. In the end she admitted she wished I would have just ‘dragged her by the hair’ but by then it was too late, I organized a move but it fell through and she then pretty much checked out of the marriage. She ended up saying I hadn’t made her feel secure, which is basically code for, didn’t lead her. She went off to have an affair with someone that would treat her a lot less well but that clearly presented himself as more of a ‘real man’. It’s a real mistake to think that a woman’s dissatisfaction in marriage must be based on how well she was treated, rather than simply whether she could stay interested in her husband, whether he took the reins basically.
Briefly on a few of these 9 suggestions:
2. Everyone has their own preference. Don’t marry someone with a preference for spending time or being attached that is totally at odds with yours. Don’t judge someone else, like the author of this article does, because they had a secure bond with their parents as a child and want a close romantic marriage and to spend most of the time together. Rather, you should know what they want before you go marrying them, and then wondering why they aren’t happy when you are always out on the lash with your buddies.
4. Both people need to give it 100%. If they collectively find it works for them that he works 50 hours a week, good. If it collectively works for them that he works 35 hours a week, good.
“And let’s talk about sex! If you expected sex” Well yes, if you are a married couple, sex is something you should be intending to do, and if someone does not feel like sex any more they need to address quickly why that is, with maximum self-awareness, before the problem gets out of control — as it does for actually a majority of married couples. Just because people stay married, doesn’t mean they are happily married. “The Sex Diaries” by Bettina Arndt makes for grim reading. That _might_ be because she is taking on too high a load of work, housework, and kids, but in most cases the man is then at his max contribution too, and so just shifting the burden even more to him isn’t going to be much of a solution.
5. Yeah, I do believe in the importance of conflict, but even so, agreeable people can make it in marriage WITHIN REASON. Marital conflicts that are at all significant are only healed through goodwill. Work on the goodwill, instead of focusing on all the problems.
6. “Physical attraction between spouses is important. If your wife looks at you and her motor doesn’t start humming love is doomed.” The fact is, one day you are going to age. Women sooner but it happens to us all. Testosterone declines and with it the chance of weight gain increases. Of course you SHOULD work out because you should make the most of every opportunity to be the best you can for your wife.
However “Just because a woman has said, “I do” doesn’t mean her love will always be there regardless of how you look ” — in that case, obviously, she should just not have said it in the first place. If you don’t mean it, don’t say it.
7. Well, occasionally men are too depressed for sex, and no one should really say yes just to ‘think of England’. This dead bedroom type of sex is not fair to anyone. Other than that and medical conditions though, I have to agree with this one. Husbands that say no to their wives just wilfully are being treacherous as well as pathetic, what are they thinking.
It’s simple ladies ! – Make him a sandwich and be sexy once in awhile- it’s because of the man that you have the roof over your head . I’m sure he’s tired also ( u get up to watch cartoons and get the kids to school ) try sitting in training to get to work on time all the time .
It’s simple men! Help with the children you created once and awhile, or help clean the mess you make. Don’t treat your woman like a live-in nanny/ sex worker and expect her to stick around.
If a man isn’t an active participant in his family or in his marriage, but instead takes the road of abuse don’t ever wonder why she doesn’t want to be intimate with you.
I have autism, so I was a terrible husband. I am looking forward to living a life alone because I don’t want all the work of pleasing a neurotypical and don’t want to live with another autistic. Call me selfish but I’ve been there done that and want to enjoy being left alone!
Remove the alimony clause and then lets see where this list goes in a few years.
seriously? he snored and you have never snored I bet you never broke wind either
He would sneak porn then.when caught tell me he hated me, dull and drink all day and play victim. So crazy makinh
While some of what I read is true and applicable, Marriage is not a one way street, it is diffcult at best. It takes 2 people committed to working together through their problems. A coin has 2 sides and it takes both sides to make a whole coin.
This was far to one sided from one womens perspective, however we all have our own perspectives don’t we? One coment was made about focussing on the solution, not who’s at fault. Both people have weaknesses & faults. I do all the dishes, clean up the dog crap, change the cat box, mowe the lawn, take out the grabage, etc… and she sits and watches TV. WE both work & the kids are married. My wife cooks diner once or twicw a week( she used to cook almost every night). We both have our faults. We are at a cross roads and what we do & how we comunicate with each other will determine the outcome of what happens going forward. In the future, try to give advice in a more balanced approach. Not all men are neanderlaughls. Men have equal needs as well as the women. Marriage is a 2 way street
An evolved man is happy when his lady is happy. With real chemistry, happiness begets happiness. Often, the reason the woman falls out of love with the man is because he, himself, quits loving himself. He just doesn’t care.
Thank you. I was really upset with the way this article was written. I’m glad you chose to take the time to bring way more information into the mix. The only thing I want to add as a wife whos marriage is on the brink of disaster I really think women in general want to have their man take the reigns now and then even if it is just a hey let’s go out to this restaurant for dinner on such n such night. My perspective is different than the next guy. But it is exactly 💯% what you said. If it works for your marriage great. No two marriages are the same.
Oh my goodness. This article is so female-centric it is almost worthless. And laughable. So if a marriage is showing signs of trouble the male has to do all of these things and the female should do … what? And what if the man already does these things? I worked 50 hours a week at a good job so she could – as she wished – stay home with our twins. They were exhausting, so it often come home at lunch and let her take a quick nap while I fed them and change diapers etc. Then after a full work day I took no more than 10 minutes to take a shower and switch gears from professional to father, at which point she went on the back porch to smoke and chat for hours on the phone with her girlfriends. On weekends I – maybe – went to one football game in person per year. When it was football season I would have the game on in the background but I’d be playing with the kids or vacuuming or doing laundry or making beds or doing bills – often many of them at the same time – none of which she did very often. I didn’t get drunk, listened when she wanted to talk, made sure I was emotionally and physically available 99 percent of the time and stayed in the same really great shape I was when we met. I’m manly, not wimpy or whipped, with a great sense of self, self-confidence, intelligence and a great sense of humor. But I never acted “as-if I was all that.” On the contrary I didn’t make too many decisions whether big or small without consulting her or giving her the chance to give input, but she rarely wanted to. I could go on and on, mentioning that I did to the best of my very capable, multi-tasking abilities to do everything on this author’s list including making sure she l/we had a very rewarding sex life without demanding it. I took occasional time for myself as did she. I listened without giving advice. I did at least half the chores without having to be reminded. And I did all of this stuff because I ENJOYED it, LOVED her and strived – no, I WAS – that husband a not-small percentage of women complain that their husbands are not. I never, ever touched her except in the appropriate tender loving manner. I never threatened her. Never got into her personal space in a negative way. I do not have one abusive bone in my body, nor any of those types of words in my vocabulary. So imagine my surprise one night when she thought was I was asleep but I was still awake she whispered in my ear “I don’t love you anymore.” Then came the lengthy email conversations with guys I did not know. Passwords went in her phone and laptop. (I didn’t snoop. She proudly showed me.) She stopped coming home at night leaving me with a pair of 3-year-old twins screaming for their mother. One morning she came home freaking of sex and after a dozen years of marriage a husband absolutely knows what that smells like. Thus, inevitably, the affairs. She would leave for a week at a time to God knows where, but there was a guy waiting for her at the other end of the flight who was not me. And then claims to her friends that I was physically and emotionally abusing her and the kids!!! (NEVER, EVER, NEVER!) After spending several months in denial, that powerful coping mechanism begin to crack one night when I was holding both twins at once as they wanted mommy so bad they were screaming her name, crying, asking me _wjy Daddy?”, once again. They were absolutely crushed, once again. And then I finally realized how absolutely crushed I was, too. And yes, in this final period I introduced dozens of times to talk about and l, when she was willing to converse, made sure I really listened, and honestly processed her complaints and if they had a micron of legitimacy I would ask her how she would like me to change/solve it/whatever and if it was a moral and appropriate request (the one about me needing to being ok with her having sex with other men, or me participating in a threesome with her and whichever “him” it was this week was an example of one of that was not moral or appropriate). I worked hard on it. My longtime weekly therapy sessions focused 100 percent on what I could do to save the marriages. We went to three marriage counselors because she would stop going because he/she “was on my side.” (She picked the counselors.) The last one finally stood up one day after about three months and “guys I’m wasting your money and you are wasting my time” because we just kept going to the same place where she was sure she was justified in her actions – infidelity, theft of cash from our business, child neglect, lying.- and I had problems with those actions on behalf of our children and myself. Listen, I’m in no way saying I didn’t make mistakes in that last year. Most of my mistakes were born out of the aftershocks of being emotionally sucker punched by this rapid decay of our “forever, I do!” marriage. Some of the other mistakes I made were just me being a bonehead. I always apologized, and meant it. I rarely made the same mistake twice. She did not act in kind. When I got an apartment and said I’m moving there and want to take the boys for the time being she said sure. It was months until she wanted them back, for a whole weekend, and no a dime of child support came my way. Ok, so waaah! I’m a divorced guy who had it tough. Not the first, not the last. But this author’s thesis that if a marriage is in trouble then it is the male spouse who must fix his actions and become a better partner is a false narrative, just plain wrong and highly offensive to plenty of men who’ve had experiences just like my own. I hope the author reads this and presents a much more balanced article next time she writes about the issue. And by the way I’m a professional journalist employed by a very large media organization after working for The Associated Press who’s been writing and editing articles for 25 years. If I turned in one as skewed as this author’s piece it would never see publication. Nor should it.
That is a horrible experience you went through. I’m so sorry! She sounds like a narcissist.
I do things for my wife all the time but now it seems and it seems my efforts go unrewarded. Anything she asks I try to do but she still refuses sexual acts and says I don’t help her. I do most of the laundry as in her and mine and our 2 kids. There’s a lot of laundry and she has to pick up the slack sometimes and do a load here or there and occasionally put them away. We made a deal I do laundry she does dishes at the time she did laundry at work. Anymore though it seems she wants to talk to her friends on the phone or go out with them or have her face buried in the TV. If I try to go do anything to have a little of my own time she guilt trips me for not spending time with her and the kids yet when i was there she didn’t want anything to do with me.
#2 and #4 for me. I had bad luck dating, so when we met we were stuck together. Too close I guess. found myself dependent on her. My parents are attached like this. Her parents were distant to say the least. After 35 years she complained of being smothered, wanting space, me being too dependent. I am trying to give her space, like she wanted. Sleep in another side of the house, do all my own clothes, work 2nd job at night.
#4. During COVID we were both cut back during work, we had financial issues, I did not respond quick enough to resolve. I used to get overtime that kept us ahead of our frugal lifestyle. But that ended. She is a control freak so she takes care of the finances. She did not tell me how bad we were financially until the marriage damage was done. I have started a 2nd job, refinanced our house, changed car insurance, doing what I can to reduce debt, and get more income. We dont talk about it anymore, she is very defensive, can be critical. Leader ? I may not have been the best leader, but it is hard when you are married to a control freak. I am trying to show I am better.
So, I am giving her space, less attention, no looking at her, no touching, gone some nights, she just had major surgery so no sex for weeks. Not sure what is going to happen. Hoping for the best, trying to prepare for the worst. Trying to separate emotions from her, distance myself, hate to say this but love her less. (that is a tough one) She seems not to care. We still go out to eat together. So all is not lost,,,I think, or may be fooling myself.
I have been married for 6 years now. My wife resents the fact that I did not spend enough time with our son, and did not help enough.
I apologized, and made a HUGE shift. I have been going strong for 4 months now – spending SO MUCH quality time with the kids and with her. Stopped playing golf.
I turned into a loving, caring, supportive husband and father (which I was before, but let life just happen – now I am living on purpose). I am loving this new me. I am so committed to our family!
She still has not wanted sex for the last 4 months. She says that ANY physical contact makes her feel like “this is not where she wants to be”
I don’t know what to do?????!?!?!?!!?!!?!?
This might just have saved my relationship
Thank you 😊
100% wife who birth for you
a children
Wow, I read your article Cathy. And while I agree with the majority of what you wrote, there is a strong “men are the problem” undertone in your writings. I was looking for a more balanced article. Instead, all I know now is not hire a woman marriage counselor. So thank you for that.
Ying, no yang. Peaches, no cream. Top, no bottom. Interesting but completely one sided. Jon
I try to make wife as happy as possible, asking how she is, when we need to cook I would make help her with it such doing the dishes as assistant as I am terrible cook, evan cooking for her when she feeling down, making sure anything she I would provide it for her. Doing all the housework so she can relax. She still calls me immature, mamas boy and always acting hot and cold with me.