I recently heard from a wife whose husband had told her that he “has no feelings” for her anymore. They had had marital problems for a while, but had been trying to work them out. The wife herself felt that, at times, things began to improve. Apparently, the husband did not agree because he told the wife that he was now pretty sure that he wanted a separation or a divorce. The wife was stunned at this and she told the husband that even though the marriage had hit a rough patch, she still loved him and she felt he was a foundation they could build on.

The husband responded to this by telling the wife that not only did he no longer love her, but he “had no feelings for her anymore.” This not only surprised the wife, but she, frankly, did not believe it. The day before she had initiated physical contact and shown affection. She wasn’t sure why he would feel the need to lie, but she was beside herself. She said in part, “How can you say you don’t have feelings for me? We’ve been together for a long time and we’ve been through a lot together. How can you just throw that away and pretend you don’t?” He does not care?”

There are many reasons why men sometimes do this. I will discuss more about this matter in the next article.

Sometimes a man says he doesn’t have feelings for you because he knows you’ll point to those feelings as proof that you can work things out:

I didn’t know any of the people in this situation personally, but I had to suspect that the husband was telling the wife this as a way to take the wind out of their sails. In the past, the wife had pointed to her feelings for each other as the main reason for continuing to work on the marriage.

Many husbands in this situation no longer know what to do. They have tried to “work” on the marriage and various other things, but feel like they are at a dead end and are not sure how to start out. So, they will tell you that the feelings are gone so that you no longer have this fact on your side.

What does this mean for you? It means that the feelings may not be gone, but you have a situation where your husband is willing to say anything to make a break in this situation. That is very important information that can mean a lot and be very revealing.

Putting this into perspective to determine where to go from here:

Many women in this situation have no idea where to go with this or how to respond. Basically there are a couple of possibilities. Her husband may be telling him the truth as he knows it, which means that because so much has happened between you, he doesn’t know what to feel or her feelings may have gone numb. Or, he may still have feelings for you, but he’s trying to diminish or deny them because he’s getting tired of the “working it out” process.

Either way, your perceptions of the situation are now part of the problem. Many women will often react by trying to prove to her husband that she still has feelings or by arguing with him about her statement. In my experience, this is not as effective as focusing on problems and trying to fix them. Having more conflict is rarely the answer. Changing your perceptions can sometimes be.

If the “work things out” stance isn’t working for you, consider focusing on something else:

Sometimes it’s not that the husband’s feelings have changed so dramatically. (After all, I rarely think feelings just turn off and on.) So instead of focusing on this point, sometimes it’s better to take the focus off of all that “work” and all of its connotations. Sometimes the smallest steps are in order.

Focusing on interacting with less conflict and drama can sometimes make a big difference. And sometimes, her husband is looking forward to all these fireworks, but when she responds calmly and with purpose, she may suddenly begin to question her perceptions of him in the first place. This is what you want. Yes, you may have a long and gradual climb. But her real goal is not to show or argue with him that he is wrong, but to show him by her behavior and his reactions that she may have acted too quickly.

You need to show him the carefree, calm and loving woman he first fell in love with, rather than the scared and wobbly woman who may have a tendency to be accusatory and argumentative because she is afraid of losing what she has worked so hard for. .

I know this is a very difficult situation. And I know it feels like you could be on the losing end of this. But your reactions from this point on can be very important. Try to take the right path and keep your perspective. In the long run, you can be glad you did.