Why Simply Surviving An Unhappy Marriage Will Make You Miserable

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April 3, 2019

You don’t have to accept the status quo.

How could your life have changed so dramatically? It wasn’t that long ago you were enjoying dreams of happily ever after. And somehow now, after such a beautiful beginning, you’re wondering about simply surviving an unhappy marriage.

Somewhere between then and now you’ve lost the shared dreams along with the ones that were just yours.

The love that once kept both of you bathed in feel-good hormones that made everything OK and helped you work together to find solutions to every challenge has disappeared. And now you’re unhappy – really, dreadfully unhappy.

What Makes A Marriage Unhappy?

There are so many things that can make marriages unhappy. And just like no two people are exactly alike, the reasons why your marriage is unhappy will be unique to you. Some of the common reasons people say they’re unhappy in their marriage include one or more of the following:

• Infidelity
  
  It doesn’t matter if the infidelity is physical or emotional, it hurts. And it hurts everyone involved – not just the betrayed and the betrayer. It’s the unhealed pain of infidelity that causes unhappiness.
  
  
• Abuse
  
  Abuse in a marriageisn’t only physical. It can be mental, emotional and/or sexual too. And when someone…

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7 Tips For Changing An Unhappy Marriage For The Better

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December 31, 2018

These tips for changing an unhappy marriage will help you begin changing yours.

To begin changing an unhappy marriage is to welcome an avalanche of feelings, questions, disappointments, even fears. The admission is like the last finger sliding from your death-grip on a steep cliff, with nothing below to catch you.

OK, so that’s a bit dramatic. But to the person finally mouthing the words, “I’m in an unhappy marriage,” that scenario may not be too far from the truth. After all, marriages don’t just rocket out of the “happiness atmosphere” and into the black hole of despair overnight. They inch their way along with a little neglect here, some acrimony there, a veneer of denial everywhere….

If you’ve reached the point where denial is no longer an option, you may wonder if changing an unhappy marriage is possible. And if you have come to this conclusion of unhappiness alone, you may feel you are the keeper of a deep, dark secret.

It’s unlikely that one spouse is miserable while the other is basking in bliss. But it’s not unrealistic to expect that the two come to their recognition of an unhappy marriage in different ways, at different times.

The things that accumulate to damage…

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Is An Unhappy Marriage Better Than Divorce?

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February 8, 2019

Here’s how to decide for yourself.

Marriage, like the love that leads to it, rides many waves of change. And not all are fun. So asking, “Is an unhappy marriage better than divorce?” isn’t a yes-or-no query.

The answer, of course, ultimately lies with you and your spouse. But arriving at the answer shouldn’t be an arbitrary, heat-of-the-moment, feelings-only process.

If you’re at a point in your marriage where you’re contemplating “Is an unhappy marriage better than divorce?” we need to talk.

Ironically, talking -- how much, how, when, with what intention -- is often what’s missing in marriages on the threshold of divorce. In one way or another, communication is at the root of most problems.

If you research advice regarding staying in or leaving an unhappy marriage, you will get answers across the spectrum. And the black, white and gray of them all will have just as many shades of suggestions and directives.

A person looking for a reason to leave will find one. A person looking for a reason to stay will find one. The availability of advice and justification for any choice is abundant.

And that’s why it’s so important to consider the source of the information, and especially…

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7 Strategies For Saving An Unhappy Marriage

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November 28, 2018

Saving an unhappy marriage takes tremendous commit & a willingness to work hard on your own issues.

The bliss of “dating/engagement/wedding” is hardly a trustworthy predictor of a marriage’s success post-Honeymoon Phase. Saving an unhappy marriage may not be on a wedding-day radar, but it sometimes becomes the unexpected goal not too far into the marriage.

Anyone who has ever aspired to grow-old-together love has witnessed at least one iconic couple so interwoven at a soul level that the partners are veritably “one.” They speak and move in unison, respond with impeccable timing, and somehow, inexplicably, look alike.

The deeply-entrenched love of elderly couples who have been together almost their entire lives can be so inextricable that the spouses can’t live without one another. Literally. The stories of spouses dying within months, weeks, even hours of one another are so poignantly common that they have their own name: the widowhood effect.

Whether these beacons of hope are grandparents, friends or movie characters, their mastery of commitment gives witnesses pause to consider their “tricks.”

Were they always this happy? Did they ever fall on tough times? Did they ever get bored or angry with one another? And did they ever have to worry about…

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