For A Marriage In Crisis Stop Trying To Predict The Future
When a marriage begins to fall apart its not that uncommon for at least one of the spouses to start trying to predict the future and start using phrases like “There is just too much damage, how will we ever make it” or a personal favorite of mine “But our situation is unique”. Yes, there is damage and no sorry to break it to you but your situation is not unique.
When we say such things it’s not because we believe them but rather because we are trying to gauge what the future will look like or even if there still is a future with the other person. It’s at moments like these that, unless you are well into getting expert help, I urge you to pause because decisions about the future should not be happening just yet. When we first get the slap in the face that our marriage is in trouble it is very tempting to think of the worst. We, as humans, have a bias towards thinking negatively like this as part of our survival mechanism and it is difficult to turn it off.
The problem with decisions like these is that rarely are they ever proactive and it is way too early to even be entertaining thoughts about what the future will look like. What we may have been so sure about before may not be the case now and vice versa. It’s easy to say to the person we just got married to that “ if you ever cheat on me I won’t hesitate to leave you” but then life begins to happen and suddenly we have a mortgage, a car payment and a couple of kids. Now the decision is not that easy.
If your marriage is in crisis and you are unsure if you should stay or leave I am going to urge you to stop making decisions about events that haven’t happened yet. I don’t have all the answers for you nor will I pretend to and I don’t know how you will overcome the challenges ahead of you. Nobody knows if you will ever be able to forgive them and truely enjoy freedom or if they will do the same for you. I’m sure you can but I don’t even know if you will want to.
What I do know is you need a plan to help you. Not just for now but for then as well. When the time comes to cross those bridges you’ll cross them but for now, I am going to encourage you to slow down, take a few deep and long breaths and just focus on the moment that you find yourself in right now. Focus on the now and make decisions that will help you to start simply moving ahead.
Once you have figured out how to get the help you and your marriage needs then you can begin to start doing the work that is needed to repair what has been broken. Remember regardless of what you may initially think your marriage didn’t break in one day and it won’t be repaired in one day either. If after you have gotten the help you need, and your spouse is not willing to do the work they need to do then perhaps its time to put some space between you and them. But that’s not now and you shouldn’t be looking that far ahead.
If you haven’t searched for help yet then you have some questions ahead of you that need some well thought out answers. Where will you get help? Are you both open to getting help? What will that help look like? If there was an affair are you both open to restoration? Are you aware of what divorce looks like? Can you forgive the other person and still be intimate with them? Are you truly prepared to go through all the stages of divorce when there possibly could be a change?
These are difficult questions that require time to think through and I would answer them before you make any decision about what the future will look like. You just don’t know what you don’t know and that’s ok. How do you know its better to walk away unless you honestly try saving your marriage? How do you know the marriage can be saved? You don’t and you can’t know. Not yet. Not now. If you do know you want to try to find out then I would encourage you to seek expert help. By this, I mean someone that is trained in helping people with similar issues and not a general therapist or member of your church. If you are serious about it, and you should be, then you need to seek out the best help you can find even if it makes you feel uncomfortable.
I would also encourage you to find that help as soon as possible. Not next week when things finally slow down at work but right now start looking for that help. Expert help can be difficult to find and even harder to get in so don’t delay but don’t let that dishearten you either. The expert help may not be a good fit for you as well but don’t give up. Find a different therapist until you find one that clicks with both of you.
When you do find the help you need please take it slow. You and your partner will need time together and alone to work on your issues. Most marriages in trouble will need at least a year of working at it with expert help before you start seeing real progress. You will get frustrated at times because you will have several false starts in reconciling. Slow down and be patient.
My last piece of advice is since you don’t know what you don’t know then don’t quit until you have exhausted every avenue possible and you are truly convinced that there is no hope. Don’t try convincing yourself to move on but rather do the work so the work convinces you to either stay or leave.
