Having been married only a year and a half, I’ve recently come to the conclusion that marriage isn’t for me.
Now before you start making assumptions, keep reading.
I met my wife in high school when we were 15 years old. We were friends for ten years until…until we decided no longer wanted to be just friends. 🙂 I strongly recommend that best friends fall in love. Good times will be had by all.
Nevertheless, falling in love with my best friend did not prevent me from having certain fears and anxieties about getting married. The nearer Kim and I approached the decision to marry, the more I was filled with a paralyzing fear. Was I ready? Was I making the right choice? Was Kim the right person to marry? Would she make me happy?
Father’s Advice
Then, one fateful night, I shared these thoughts and concerns with my dad.
Perhaps each of us have moments in our lives when it feels like time slows down or the air becomes still and everything around us seems to draw in, marking that moment as one we will never forget.
My dad giving his response to my concerns was such a moment for me. With a knowing smile he said, “Seth, you’re being totally selfish. So I’m going to make this really simple:Â marriage isn’t for you. You don’t marry to make yourself happy, you marry to make someone else happy. More than that, your marriage isn’t for yourself, you’re marrying for a family. Not just for the in-laws and all of that nonsense, but for your future children. Who do you want to help you raise them? Who do you want to influence them? Marriage isn’t for you. It’s not about you. Marriage is about the person you married.”
It was in that very moment that I knew that Kim was the right person to marry. I realized that I wanted to make her happy; to see her smile every day, to make her laugh every day. I wanted to be a part of her family, and my family wanted her to be a part of ours. And thinking back on all the times I had seen her play with my nieces, I knew that she was the one with whom I wanted to build our own family.
My father’s advice was both shocking and revelatory. It went against the grain of today’s “Walmart philosophy”, which is if it doesn’t make you happy, you can take it back and get a new one.
No, a true marriage (and true love) is never about you. It’s about the person you love—their wants, their needs, their hopes, and their dreams. Selfishness demands, “What’s in it for me?”, while Love asks, “What can I give?”
Marriage Isn’t For You
Some time ago, my wife showed me what it means to love selflessly. For many months, my heart had been hardening with a mixture of fear and resentment. Then, after the pressure had built up to where neither of us could stand it, emotions erupted. I was callous. I was selfish.
But instead of matching my selfishness, Kim did something beyond wonderful—she showed an outpouring of love. Laying aside all of the pain and anguish I had caused her, she lovingly took me in her arms and soothed my soul.
I realized that I had forgotten my dad’s advice. While Kim’s side of the marriage had been to love me, my side of the marriage had become all about me. This awful realization brought me to tears, and I promised my wife that I would try to be better.
To all who are reading this article—married, almost married, single, or even the sworn bachelor or bachelorette—I want you to know that marriage isn’t for you. No true relationship of love is for you. Love is about the person you love.
And, paradoxically, the more you truly love that person, the more love you receive. And not just from your significant other, but from their friends and their family and thousands of others you never would have met had your love remained self-centered. Truly, love and marriage isn’t for you. It’s for others.
Beautiful peice, but it is CRAP! Shortly after we were married, my husband turned into a very different man than when we were dating. No problem I thought… I will just love him more. There are several marriage books that also talk about loving them more and they will show it back. However, the more love I showed that man(kind words, loving touches, thoughtful actions, service,time, etc)…the more he ran all over me. He started to treat me worse and worse. It was hell. I felt like a failure. What was so wrong with me that when I gave that man every ounce of love I had to give, he didn’t have anything but nasty words and actions?!?! The truth is, NOTHING at all. He is just selfish and no amount of love will ever be good enough. After many years, I could no longer give him love, as I had nothing left to give. Yep, this is CRAP!
I feel saddened by the amount of pain I am reading out of your lines. In order for the concept to work, your husband would have obviously had to apply this concept as well. It’s very hard to not be selfish when being in a relationship. I hope you can heal soon and find strategies to choose better next time.
This isn’t crap – it’s actually quite relative to marriage and committment. Maybe there should have been a disclaimer stating, “This article doesn’t apply to people who unknowingly married mean abusers.” I’m sorry you had a bad experience with a guy who sounds like a real piece of work. As with anything, the hardest thing is to know when to keep holding on and know when to cut your losses and walk away. From your comments, it sounds like you stayed too long. Hopefully that bad experience didn’t taint your feelings about love too badly, or you could miss out on an amazing relationship in t he future.
Even though our relationship as a married couple is done, we are not divorced. I want one, magically he doesn’t. I think it must be nice to have someone you treat you so nice and to be able to treat them like crap in return. Do you have any advice as to when to stay and when to cut your losses when there are children involved? I love them so very much. Will my love for them be enough to make it through this horrible marriage, whole? Will this marriage break me? Is it better to put them through all the pain that comes from a broken home, and have a whole mother? I don’t know…. I know our Father loves us…..I know he is there… But truely where is his hand in something as difficult as this?
Compassionate reasoning missing. Please reword and remember Thumper.
So sorry to hear that KT. It is not that YOU didn’t love enough, it was that HE didn’t love enough. It is easy to be bitter when this is the situation. I hope you find someone to love YOU back as much as you love THEM.
KT, is just depends on the circumstances, I am sorry your husband was like that to you. My husband I have always treated each other the same while we we’re dating to now married for 4 years. It seems that your husband had a whole personality hiding behind a mask until he wanted to show it when he married you. but that isn’t normal. I love this article, if both parties are more like this then a married will blossom more beautiful each day.
It sounds like what you’re saying, KT, is that the author’s point is correct, but you are adding the “it takes two to tango” clause. Both members of the relationship have to believe it is about the other person, not just one. Your ex is probably still wondering when that special person will come along that can truly make HIM happy. I’ll tell you right now he will never find that person.
You make a very good point. 🙂 Maybe so. While our relationship in a marriage sense is done, we are not divorced, yet. In so many ways I wish we were divorced. He doesn’t want one. I do, but what about my kids. I can’t decide if my love for them is enough to push through this horrible marrige. Am I strong enough to not let this marriage completely break me…so I can still be a great mom? Is it better for them to have a broken home, but me to be whole? I don’t know…….
KT, I agree with the other commenters- this model for marriage only works when both parties are committed. I feel your pain on a personal level- I lived your story myself. 18 years and two kids, and he abandoned us to pursue “happiness” with an old girlfriend.
I don’t regret what I poured into my marriage, because it spilled over onto my kids and made them more secure and confident. I only regret choosing someone who was unable to reciprocate, and wish I’d recognized his narcissistic personality earlier in the relationship. There are several very good books on narcissism and how to recognize it in relationships.
Good luck to you hon, whether you remain single (that’s my choice, at least for now), or pursue a new relationship, with someone who can love you the way you deserve.
Thank you. I am still married as of right now. When did you know you should leave? Really…our marriage is dead. While I am kind and still do nice things for this man, I have a very hard time not having hard feelings toward him. I love my kids so much, and know a divorced would be difficult. However, I would be whole. Is my love for them enough, for me to make it through this horrible marriage unbroken? I don’t know? I want a divorce and he doesn’t. Our marriage counselor refused to meet with us until I have deicded if I want a divorce or if I want to somehow make this work. My mother begs me to get out(she didn’t know about our terrible marriage until recently) and my bishop tells me not to get divorced. Yes my husband has “Strayed” and treated me badly(think terrible words, not letting me leave the house, demanding I take care of him, while I was having a miscarraige) he has never raised a hand. He says unless he is having repeated relationships outside our marriage or is physically abusive divorce isn’t an option. I know the gospel teaching on divorce…. I just don’t know what to make of it all. Any advice is appreciaed..
This is in reply to KT, to which the above comment replied. Sorry, there wasn’t a link to reply to it directly.
KT, you are so precious, and so worthy, you deserve to be happy. Your children deserve to be happy. Your children would much rather be FROM a broken home than IN one. They are not stupid, they know you are miserable. They know their dad is doing wrong to you. I know the Scriptures too, I was raised in a strong religious background as well. I know God hates divorce. But He also takes a very dim view of a man mistreating and mentally abusing his wife.
This is the question that prompted me to leave my marriage after 8 or better years of multiple affairs, depression and disrespect: What are you teaching your children? I haven’t seen you describe if you have sons or daughters, so I’ll address both. In staying in this loveless, abusive, disrespectful marriage, you are teaching your sons that as men, they can get away with this behaviour. That there are no consequences to treating a wife with disdain, hatred and malice. You are teaching a daughter that this is the best they can expect. That they have no other options when they feel that they are unappreciated and devalued by the man in their life. She is learning that as a woman she has no value in a marriage.
In leaving my marriage, I have taught my sons that they are accountable for their actions and behaviour. That if they disrespect and mistreat a valuable person in their life, that the relationship will be broken and they will suffer a very costly loss. I am teaching my daughter that she is worth MORE than to be abused and devalued. That she does NOT have to accept mistreatment and broken promises, that she is WORTH love, respect and great honour, and has every right to demand it.
I know that you will stay until the pain of leaving becomes less than the pain of staying. You will leave when YOU know you have earned your way out. When YOU know with all your heart and soul that there is nothing more you could have done to improve the situation. And I wish you all grace and love and strength until you reach that point.
This is also in response to KT and Andie. KT yes you should leave and your kids will be BETTER OFF for it. Read Andie’s response- I agree with her 100%. Let your mom help you. Sure, marriage is forever, and it sometimes takes some work (I’ve been married >20 years) but it should not be a prison sentence and something that you stick with at all costs- this is costing you (and your kids by the way) too much.
Well thats only because you married an A$$hole
I am replying to one line and one line only, because it is SO important. You said, ‘Is it better to put them through all the pain that comes from a broken home, and have a whole mother?’ This should be an easy answer for most women, but for some reason it’s not. The answer is YES. Your children need their mother and they need her whole. THEY deserve her whole and so do YOU. The reason I feel so strongly about this is because staying in an unhappy marriage killed my mother. Quite literally. She became a depressed and suicidal alcoholic to the point where we could no longer recognize her, physically or mentally. She died in July. She was only 60. As a child growing up in a home where your parents are unhappy and don’t love each other and you witness the destruction of your once joyful and beautiful mother, I would BEG for them to divorce. Your children will be ok if you divorce. YOU will be ok if you divorce. But when your soul dies a little bit each day, nothing good will come. Instead of ‘staying together for the kids’, divorce for the kids. Believe me, they will thank you one day. Because you would have saved their mother. Good luck to you, I wish you nothing but the best.
I so agree with you SBP, my parents have been married for 62 years, 60 of them, if not more have been loveless, filled with bitterness and not conducive to a good relationship with their only child. There was never any joy in our house, I never saw my parents kiss, hold hands, tell each other they loved each other. I didn’t see laughter, I saw negativity. I can barely stand my mother for more than 2 hours at a stretch. Don’t think for one moment that any child doesn’t know what’s going on in your marriage, they do, being a whole person is the key. Don’t stay for your children, leave if that is your best plan for a life that is whole and happy. The only thing your children take away from a broken relationship is how to have a broken relationship. You never get to teach them what happy and loving looks like. It took me years to figure that out. I have been married to a wonderful man for 20 years, we’ve grown up together in many a sense. But he’s had to be very patient with me because I didn’t know what a healthy relationship looked like or felt like so it was hard to have one. Now that I have learned, life is wonderful. My parents trudge on with never a kind word between them and my mother often says she should have divorced him and never had me. Soo sad is a life that has never been whole or happy. She openly admits she doesn’t understand my marriage and why we do so much together. She’s also made an attempt or two to drive a wedge. We’ve gotten wise to that. Good luck to all who are married and unsure, those that are happy should be your model.
Some with un seen mental health issues cannot function ,even in a Love situation. I agree–loving alone do not always work
It is time to divorce that man. He is not treating you right and that is in turn teaching your children how to treat their spouses and how to be treated by their spouses. Staying with him is not benefiting you in anyway. It is better for your children that their mother be whole then for them to live in a house that is lacking in love. There is nothing you can do to change an abusive man and I am disgusted that your bishop is telling you that you have to stay.
rachel you are wrong divorce isnt the answer
KT I understand your story as I too have lived it. I feel your pain. In the loveless relationship that you have right now, you need to do what’s best for you and your kids. You are a daughter of our heavenly father and entrusted with caring and raising your kids and nurturing their sweet spirits. You deserve happiness. You deserve love, and a companion worthy of that love. I know it’s a hard choice to decide whether or not to divorce, and especially when there are kids involved. But, please take a moment to ruminate on the idea that children grow up watching their parents and learning their behavior. Do you want your children to see how their father is treating you and thinking its okay? it’s normal? Do you want your boys to grow up into young men and husbands thinking its okay to be selfish and treat the woman of his children with disdain? Do you want your girls to grow up and think its expected of them to submit to their husbands cruel behavior? Sometimes, though it’s hard, it can be best to leave those who are abusing you. I say ‘abuse’ because I think that it what he is (from reading your replies to others on this thread), an abusing husband who shows no empathy or compassion for your pain, his wife, the mother of his children. I know your bishop says that you shouldn’t leave unless it is physical abuse… now, I don’t want to discredit him, but I just want to remind you that bishops are only human. They are not perfect beings that can relay absolute truth, they are only human and are doing their best. I also, would like to remind you (and maybe your bishop needs reminding also) that there are different types of abuse: physical, emotion, verbal. All of these are lethal to a persons soul and self-wroth and while the physical scars of abuse may heal, remember that the emotional and verbal ones inflicted on you, though you can’t see them on the surface, run deep to the very marrow of who we are.
You can only do so much in a relationship, like another commenter said “it takes two to tango” and both parties need to be willing. I can say, that after leaving my own marriage (very much like yours), that I am now remarried to a man who love, cares, and respects me, and it is a wonderful thing that every one deserves, even you. Take care.
KT I am not married and who knows when I will be but You say you are still with your husband because your children. I can tell you that as a child of a separation its hard to not have a father around or to have your parents together but seeing an unhealthy relationship, that my parents were in, is hard either way. BUT with that being said, I thank God for the day that my parents separated and my Dad left. Does that mean I don’t love him? No. Does that mean I would never forgive him? Absolutely not. I was young when he left and I didn’t understand but as I got older and learned what marriage should be I know that it wasn’t what I saw.
As a mother, you need to think of what is best for the children and guide them in know that their Dad isn’t a bad person and the you don’t love him. I think that the greatest lesson I learned was what Seth has written about. It isn’t about you anymore in the relationship. It is about respect and being selfless, but your right It doesn’t work if its sided.
The bible talks about love in 1 Corinthians 13:1-13 and it mentions that love should not be self seeking but it also should not be dishonorable. In Ephesians 5 God provide instructions of a christian house hold where the woman submits to the husband and the husband loves the wife, BUT it should be in a relationship that is in reverence to Christ and that is lead by the Holy Spirit.
I write this for you more to consider your children and what they are learning from your relationship with your husband. Question if they are learning what being in a true, loving relationship looks like? or are they learning submission without not respect or love? Are they learning that God should be at the center of a healthy relationship? Or that daddy is the center and mommy does whatever he says?
Christian or not, it is not okay for a husband to treat his wife like you have said that your husband has treated you. I have learned from watching others, questioning them and really spending time with people that I know in marriages that it is the husbands job to lead, but he should be doing that through Christ Jesus, and a wife to submit when he is doing so. I have also learned that is takes love that is respectful, honest, patient, and yes…selfless, but two sided.
KT, Wow. That sucks. It sounds like you married a narcissist. Have you ever read The Wizard of Oz and Other Narcissists (http://www.amazon.com/The-Wizard-Other-Narcissists-Relationship-ebook/dp/B004MDLJW4)? I found it incredibly helpful (for, while I managed to marry a wonderful human being, I have had my share of relationships with people who ran all over me and made me feel like a failure as a human) and it might help you with this particular relationship (or at least heal from this particular relationship).
Most importantly: you are not a failure and you cannot make someone else care for you. You are worthy of love and no one has the right to ever tell you or treat otherwise.
KT, I lived through a marriage just like yours. I kept giving and loving him. I hoped that if I loved him enough it would heal his childhood wounds that were causing him to be emotionally abusive to me, but to know avail. It ended in divorce because of his selfishness, not because I selflessly loved him. I’m remarried now to a kind man, and because of what I have lived through I love and appreciate his kinds acts all the more. The key is to have both people giving and caring for each other, not just one.
KT. I way I figured out whether to stay or get out of my marriage was very simple. I had lumps in my breasts at the time and was going through all the tests. While waiting for the results, I asked myself, if it was cancer, would I be happy spending the rest of my life with this man, would I want him nursing me, being with me during my final days?” My answer was a resounding “HELL NO, if I was going to die I did NOT want to be with him at all”. Fortunately, the tests came back clear and I was seperated within 2 weeks. Best decision I made for me. Was it hard on the kids? Sure, but I availed myself the best psychological support for my kids to ensure they made it through with the least amount of damage. I believe it would have been a whole lot worse for the kids if I had have stayed as they see and feel the unhappiness and resentment, and kids do NOT appreciate parents staying together just for their sake. That puts the responsibility on them and that is unfair. Don’t worry what the bishop says, he has never been married and hasn’t got a clue. Your mum knows and adores you and only has your best interests and happiness at heart. You must do what is right for you. Good luck.
Hi KT. I felt the same way as you for a very long time. I was eventually diagnosed by a counselor as clinically depressed. I felt like I was giving and giving and giving, and getting crap back. Lots of crap. Not just from my husband, but from a family member on his side as well. This kind of abusive behavior goes down through the generations, and my family was no exception to this rule either. I suggest reading the book, The Verbally Abusive Relationship, by Patricia Evans. You can even call her and get a personal appointment with her. It costs, but it might we worth your self worth to do so. You might have to just leave anyway, or you guys might be able to heal. This book didn’t end my marriage though, it opened my eyes, and the eyes of my husband. I don’t know how religious you are, but I would also suggest putting your marriage in God’s hands and letting Him do His work. Let Him heal YOU, and then possibly your marriage. And in case you are wondering, the book is not religious at all. I really hope this helps you.
KT sounds like you went down the same path I did by not taking the time to really know the person you married. I realized after the fact that it wasn’t that he changed he just never showed all of who he was. Makes it harder to find out who a person really is but looking back on everything there were in fact signs of who he was, I just didn’t notice. at the time. The saying love is blind is true in a sense. Because sometimes you can love a person so much that you tend to overlook the things you normally wouldn’t agree with. Now when people ask what happen I just say young and temporarily stupid. The only good thing I got from that marriage is too great boys. Who are becoming great men
KT if you truly know in your heart that no matter what you do, your marriage will not improve then it is time to end it. Staying only makes it harder on you and your children. Sometimes when no matter what you do things are not working is just Gods way of telling us He has a different plan for us. My husband was abusive and I stuck it out and tried to make it work but when I saw what it was doing to my kids I finally got my nerve up and left. It was hard for the first few years but my kids and myself are very happy now. I can’t imagine how my kids would be today if I stayed with their father. considering the oldest child still has some issues that steamed from what he saw 13 years ago.
@KT, I’m right there with you..Sorry…I have tried to leave on several occasions, but get so guilty.. My husband was wonderful when I went through cancer treatments that left me a totally different person (mentally and physically)..Now, I have to deal with nasty names..Brain cancer left me broken and depressed.He thinks I can snap out of it. I was able to finish nursing school. It took everything I had to accomplish that. A lot of memory problems. Always studying in my office, library or tutoring center.Having trouble keeping a job b/c I struggle to keep my anger under check. I am easily to anger and depression is overwhelming…I really want and NEED to get further education in order to get the job I want so I can contribute more to our finances. He doesn’t think I should do that right now and I should just stick with the crappy job I have now even though we have the money I received from my late Aunt..