Can You Save Your Marriage When Your Husband Doesn't Want To? Why I Know That You Can

I often hear from wives who are desperate to save their marriages but who are unfortunately the only ones who are still invested in doing so. Often, the husband has made it very clear that he's just not interested in saving the marriage.  This can leave the wife in a very lonely and difficult spot.   Of course, she hears what her husband is saying.  She may even understand it.  But her heart is telling her that she can't just surrender her marriage without a fight.  Yet, she often sees the main obstacle quite clearly.  She's on her own.  He isn't going to help her, at least at first.

I often hear comments like "I am desperate to save my marriage but my husband doesn't want to.  Is there any way that I can do this on my own, without my husband's cooperation?"  I believe that there are ways to do this.  But they are often quite gradual and deliberate.  I will discuss this more in the following article.

Saving Your Marriage When Your Husband Doesn't Want To Doesn't Always Mean Immediately Changing His Mind:  Often, wives who are in this situation feel as if their main goal is to convince their husband to join them in the fight to save the marriage as soon as possible.  Often, they hyper focus on this goal and end up making things worse for themselves even if this was not their intention.

Unfortunately, sometimes if you push too hard, you will only make him more determined that working with you is something that he doesn't want to do because his perception of you and the process continues to decline.   So sometimes, you have to back off of this as you main goal and change course a bit.

Because by doing so, you will usually get at least some pause in his resistance and you can then focus on gradually getting to where you want to go as it becomes possible. So you're no longer in the position where you're trying to do the impossible and he's opposing you every step of the way.

Instead of constantly attempting to get him to work with you to save the marriage, you may want to consider changing that definition.  I've seen wives change course to make it clear that although every one knows they'd like to save the marriage, they have to concede that no one can foresee the future.  Plus, they want to show their husband they are respectful of his position and perceptions instead of constantly implying that he's wrong and needs to be corrected.

This generally works much better than trying to strong arm him into doing something which he believes (at least for now) he doesn't want to do.  I've seen much more success when wives break saving the marriage into manageable goals.  The first goal might be to just improve the communications and encounters between you.  It may be to just discuss things without him disagreeing or shutting down.  The next step would be interacting positively and eventually having fun together and so on.

Understanding How Your Husband's Perceptions Stand In The Way Of Your Saving The Marriage:  As you're coming up with a gradual plan, you'll need to evaluate what is really standing in your way.  Obviously, I don't know you or your husband.  I don't know all that much about your marriage.  But because of my articles and my blog, I do interact with people in this same situation quite often.

And, I can tell you that many times, the reluctant partner (usually the husband) isn't convinced that they want to work with you to save the marriage because of a few common reasons.  First, many just believe that the marriage is too far gone to save.  Many times, they believe that everything has been tried and no changes have really "stuck."  They may also believe that it's just going to be too much work that results in failure anyway. 

And, I often hear comments like: "we're two different people now. My wife used to laugh all of the time and really want to spend time with me.  She used to have a sense of adventure.  She used to listen and was my best friend.  But over time, we've both become different people.  I'm not sure I recognize her anymore and maybe the same is true for her.  I don't know.  But what I do know is that I just can't see things changing when they haven't in so long.  And I also can't see myself living like this anymore."

I'm not giving you this example because I'm making the assumption that this is how your husband feels. Only you know that.  I'm trying to show you the perceptions that might be standing in your way.  Because I'm hoping that the light bulb will go on and you'll see what you need to focus on right now.  And it's not changing your husband's mind before he's really ready to do so and before you've both experienced some real change.

What you'll often need to do is to show him that the person who used to be his best friend and bring a smile to his face and a laugh to his lips is still there and available to him.  He needs to see that the two of you can have fun together before he's likely willing to work together.  And, you have to show him that real change can and will take place without it being all that painful or difficult.

Once he begins to gradually see these changes and improvements, then you have a much better chance of him wanting to save the marriage.  But you always have to be careful how you package this request.  Asking a man to "work" on anything will often fall upon deaf ears.  You know what your husband best responds to.  You want to keep this in mind when you make any requests.

But getting him on board isn't necessarily the main goal, at least right now. It truly is beginning to change the perceptions and eventually the behaviors.  Once these things happen, you'll often begin to see much more cooperation, even if you aren't defining it in any particular way.

There was a time when I truly thought my marriage was over because my husband refused to work with me to save it. But, I knew that, at least from my end, it was not yet time to call it quits. Thankfully, even though I had doubts, I decided to try one last thing and approach it from another angle and this eventually worked. You can read a very personal story on my blog at http://isavedmymarriage.com/.