Reader’s Question

My husband and I have been married for two years and we have a 3 year-old son. Recently, my husband told me that he married me in part because he didn’t want to have another man raise our son. He also told me that another reason was because he wanted to follow the Bible. My husband was not saved when we conceived our son but converted to Christianity after he was born.

My husband and I are wonderful friends and sex between us is awesome. But for the last two years there’s been a lack of affection and love from him, and it really concerns me and makes me feel lonely much of the time. Our son also sees no signs of real affection between us (touching, hugging, kissing, holding hands, etc).

Lately, we have been talking about divorce. Of course the church would frown on this and we ourselves don’t feel good about it. But I wonder if it’s possible that he can make himself love me if he hasn’t felt love for me up to this point. He wants me to give it some time and hope that in time God will put love in his heart. This is taking quite an emotional toll on me and I am not certain about what to do.

Our Clinical Psychologist’s Reply

Unfortunately there is a very long list of wrong reasons for people to marry. People marry out of a sense of pressure from peers who are marrying, out of loneliness or desperation, to get out of a bad family situation, because of a pregnancy, for financial security, or to have a family. And there are many more bad reasons to marry. These days, it’s rare to see people marry for all the right reasons. The main right reasons to marry are a firm desire to share and spend your life with someone you truly love, and to derive the personal growth benefits of a life of commitment to each other and family.

Even though people don’t always marry for the right reason, that doesn’t necessarily mean that their marriages are doomed to failure. Very few of us enter marriage at an advanced stage of personal growth and development. That said, it can be an a distinctly uphill battle trying to build a better relationship that was not initially built on a solid foundation.

You and your husband most likely have some serious soul-searching to do. Doing so with a counselor might be particularly helpful. It’s also often a good idea for each party to work with a separate individual counselor as well as to address relationship concerns conjointly with a trained marital counselor.

You are probably correct in your intuition that merely time and potential guidance from above is likely insufficient to adequately resolve your issues. But your situation is not necessarily hopeless, either. Love rarely comes naturally and always needs to be nurtured. And there is value in commitment in and of itself. Best to flush out all of the necessary issues and work them through before making a decision that will necessarily deeply affect both of you and your child.