Marital separation almost always creates a major crisis, especially for the one who has been left behind. While the one separating has usually planned their exit with legal and financial safeguards in place, the other spouse is usually unprepared. So, what steps should be taken by that spouse to turn their crisis into an opportunity?
The first reaction of the spouse left behind tends to be purely emotional. Anxiety, anger, and depression all mixed into one dreadful reaction. Serious mistakes can be made when we're emotional, so the first step toward resolving the problem should be to avoid doing or saying anything until it's clearly understood. The most basic fact to understand is that separation in marriage is a sign that the separating spouse cannot tolerate the relationship as it exists. Changes need to be made by the spouse left behind.
It's a tough reality for that spouse. Already going through an emotional crisis of biblical proportions, and then to be told that it's their fault, seems to be terribly unfair. Yet, if they want their spouse to return to them, there's no point in blaming the spouse who has escaped.
So, the answer to the question, now what, is usually that the one left behind should take the initiative to discover the problems of the one who separated and make changes that address those problems – if he or she wants the relationship to be restored.
The changes that are required depend on the reasons that the separating spouse finds the relationship intolerable. And in many cases, those reasons are initially unclear to the spouse that's left behind. In this article, I will describe the most common reasons for separating, how they can be discovered, and what can be done about them. To further complicate an already complicated situation, I will advise a path to recovery that is somewhat different for husbands or wives.
The reason for separation that usually jumps to the head of the list in most people's minds is abuse and control. A spouse that is demanding, disrespectful, and angry will create such an unpleasant lifestyle that it makes sense for the abused spouse to run for cover. In my article, My Spouse Just Hit Me. Now What, I advise the abused spouse to get out, and fast. To the abusing spouse, I recommend treatment for anger management while separated.
Another reason that occurs to most people is infidelity on the part of the spouse left behind. The betrayed spouse cannot tolerate the emotional pain of knowing that their spouse has been unfaithful, so they separate. But the unfaithful spouse can also be the one to separate, not because it's too painful living with the betrayed spouse, but simply to make the affair more convenient. These people often separate without the betrayed spouse knowing about the affair. They talk about wanting to clear their heads and needing time to be by themselves. When the spouse left behind in this situation asks us for help in understanding why, I often suggest that it might be due to an affair, and to take steps to discover if there is an affair partner. In almost all cases, I turn out to be right, and suggest that they expose the affair as their first step toward recovery.
But my experience as a marriage counselor has taught me that abuse and control and infidelity are not the primary reasons that most spouses separate. I've found that the #1 reason is for neglect. Quite frankly, it's a much more complicated reason to identify and to address effectively than either abuse and control or infidelity.
Neglect comes in two forms but in most cases both forms come together to convince a spouse to separate. One form of neglect is that a separating spouse doesn't feel included in the decisions that the other spouse is making. Their interests and feelings are being ignored. The other form of neglect is that separating spouse's most important emotional needs are not been met.
But before I address neglect as the major cause for separation, I will first make recommendations to the spouse who has been left behind due to abuse and control, and then for infidelity.
Identifying abuse and control as the primary reason for separating should not be too difficult to do. Has the separating spouse been complaining about being told what to do, being disrespected, and being the target of angry outbursts? If this is the reason, the most effective response to separation is to obtain professional help in learning how to overcome these habits that I call Love Busters. If that help is effective, the spouse who separated should be able to see changes in the way their abusive spouse deals with conflict. When he or she feels that it's safe, they will often return.
My advice as to what constitutes safety is different for men and women. I usually set a higher bar for abusive men than I do for abusive women. My reason for this may sound strange, but in my experience, most men can overcome their abusive and controlling behavior long enough to draw their wives back, without actually having changed their underlying controlling attitudes. But when women overcome their abusive and controlling behavior, I've found that their attitudes usually change as well. They come to believe that they don't have a right to be abusive and controlling.
Most of the abusive men I counsel tend to believe that they have the right to control their wives, and to punish them if they don't obey. They not only feel that they have that right, but they also consider it to be a God-given responsibility. For them to abdicate that responsibility is to go against human nature. Quite frankly, the majority of men have felt that way throughout most of human history, so it should be no surprise that many men still feel that way today.
But in our modern culture, where husbands and wives are equal by law, men no longer have the right to expect their wives to obey them, or to punish them when they disobey. Instead, husbands and wives are expected to have equal control in marriage, and have no right to punish each other. That's the position I've taken throughout my career because I consider it to be the most caring thing to do in a marital relationship. In my experience, and in the experience of the many couples that I've influenced, equality doesn't lead to marital disaster. It leads to a very happy and successful marriage, something they don't have when a husband tries to be abusive and controlling.
When I counsel abusive women, they often have the same basic belief as the men I've just mentioned, but in reverse. They believe that their husbands should obey, and should be punished if they don't. But when they have overcome their abusive and controlling tendencies, even for a relatively short period of time, they tend to change their belief. They no longer feel that they have the right to control their husbands. They can usually see that their abusive and controlling habits have not helped them get what they want: A loving and caring spouse.
So, when I try to help men whose wives have left them, I encourage them to have a heart to heart conversation about the role of husbands and wives in marriage. I want them not only to avoid demands, disrespect, and anger, but also to understand that they have no right or responsibility to dictate what she is to do. They are equals in marriage. When his beliefs and attitudes fit his new thoughtful and respectful habits, it's usually safe for her to move back in with him.
Many abusive and controlling husbands don't think that they are being abusive and controlling. So, to clear up any misunderstanding, if your wife has left you, ask her to complete the Love Busters Questionnaire that is offered free of charge in the questionnaires section of the Marriage Builders® website. If your wife is willing to complete it for you, you will be able to know if control and abuse has been a factor in the separation, and it will also help you understand what you can do to remove the threat to your wife.
Above all, don't try to persuade her that you are not abusive and controlling. Instead, try to understand what it is you do that leads her to that conclusion, and learn to stop doing it.
Another mistake husbands often make is to tell their wives that they are doing the very same thing. It's not a helpful argument. It will only make her think of the childhood response to criticism, "I know you are but what am I?" It will upset her. Is that really what you want to do?
If the spouse left behind is the unfaithful spouse, then my advice to that person is to end the affair, agree to extraordinary precautions to avoid contact, and to follow the program of marital recovery that I recommend in my book Surviving an Affair.
But if the spouse left behind is the betrayed spouse, I usually encourage wives to be a "Plan A" wife (no Love Busters and a willingness to address his complaints) for about 3 weeks. After that, if their unfaithful spouse is unwilling to end the relationship and to follow a program of marital recovery. I recommend "Plan B" which is to have no contact at all until the affair is over and a plan for recovery is agreed to by the other spouse.
I encourage a different path for husbands, however. I encourage them to be a Plan A husband for as long as 2 years if their mental and physical heath hold up. I make this recommendation because I've seen such a huge difference in the physical and emotional effect of infidelity on husbands and wives. Women seem to suffer lasting emotional and autoimmune problems if they stay in contact with an unfaithful husband too long, while men seem to avoid those lasting emotional and physical problems in their effort to restore their marriage.
Whether separated or not, once there is solid evidence for the affair, the betrayed spouse should expose the affair to friends, family, clergy, children, and others. It should be done in person if at all possible, asking for help in saving the marriage, not as a form of punishment. An attorney should be consulted to be sure that the separation is done legally and in a way that does not jeopardize possible child custody.
One of my most widely read articles is, "Why Women Leave Men." In that article, I use a house as an illustration of what women often experience. The rooms in the house represent the roles that their husbands play in life: Career, recreation, family, religion, financial, repair, and . . . marriage. Each room is furnished with what makes him function in that role. His wife wants to be invited into every room, and help make decision as to how the room is to be decorated. But husbands often lock their wives out of certain rooms, not giving them the right to be a partner when they are playing those roles.
In that article, I offer my Policy of Joint Agreement as a way to unlock all of the doors: Never do anything without an enthusiastic agreement between you and your spouse. Regardless of his role in life, before he makes a decision, he is to discuss his choices with his wife and come to an enthusiastic agreement regarding what he does while playing that role. That way, she is invited into every room in his house.
After a couple follows the Policy of Joint Agreement for a while, they will have come to enthusiastic agreements about a host of decisions that don't need further discussion. They can go about their business knowing that their choices have already been agreed to. Very few new agreements are necessary.
But for couples who have just begun following this policy, there will be much to discuss. It's as if they are just now becoming familiar with what's in all of the rooms of the houses of both spouses. They discover many changes that should be made to accommodate each other's reactions.
Many husbands, upon letting their wives into their rooms (I'm being honest. Isn't that enough?), do not address their wives' reactions. Instead, they continue to make decisions that ignore her interests and feelings. They feel that in certain situations, the Policy of Joint Agreement should not apply. What they do with friends and relatives, how they schedule their time, particularly at their place of employment, and how they spend their money should not be subject to discussion.
As she complains about how his decisions are negatively affecting her, he ignores her complaints, hoping that she will eventually adjust to his way of life. But, she doesn't adjust. Instead, she becomes increasingly offended that he feels that her negative reactions are not worth his attention. She feels that he doesn't care about the way she feels.
In my article, How to Deal with a Quarrelsome and Nagging Wife, I describe the three stages of resentment that women tend to experience when their complaints go unheeded. At first, they try to respectfully explain how his decisions are adversely affecting her. When he fails to respond proactively, she raises the volume in stage two, becoming abusive in an effort to help him understand how she feels. When that doesn't work, she seems to go to a point of no return in stage three, where, regardless of his efforts to change, she can't seem to overcome her resentment.
To avoid that tragic outcome, I encourage husbands to pay close attention to their wives' complaints before his failure to respond to them creates deep and lasting resentment in her.
When a husband follows the Policy of Joint Agreement, he understands that regardless of his motives, he should not live his life independently of her. He must understand every reaction she has to his behavior in every role he plays in life, and learn to adjust so that his behavior creates positive instead of negative reactions in her. By asking, how would you feel if I were to do . . . , he is able to identify behavior that accommodates her feelings and can be a part of their lifestyle together, and behavior that should be avoided.
Wives can also keep their husbands from the rooms in their houses. But in most of the cases I've observed, it has been in response to their husbands' failure to invite their wives into their rooms. Instead of complaining, they simply do the same thing that their husbands have been doing, living much of their lives independently of him. Eventually, they become so independent that they don't see any point in being married.
While their husband's independent behavior is the most common reason that women leave men, their unmet emotional needs is a very intertwined factor, and the two can be regarded as almost inseparable. When spouses ignore each other's complaints, the primary motive for meeting each other's emotional needs, romantic love, disappears. Without romantic love, it is much more difficult to be affectionate, converse intimately, enjoy recreational activities together, and to make love.
So, when spouses feel that they have a right to make independent decisions, ignoring the interests and reactions of each other, the time that they would have taken to meet each other's intimate emotional needs suddenly becomes unavailable to them. They fill their schedule with business and activities that do not include each other. And without that time to be together, their intimate emotional needs go unmet.
I offer a questionnaire that is quite helpful in identifying unmet emotional needs. It's the Emotional Needs Questionnaire which is offered free of charge in the questionnaires section of the Marriage Builders® website. Every couple should complete it regularly just to be aware of problems that may need attention.
This questionnaire has two parts. The first part identifies how important each of the 10 emotional needs are to that person. The second part communicates an evaluation of how well the other spouse is meeting each need. If the emotional needs are not being met, the second part also provides direction as to how to meet them. It also prioritizes those needs, showing which ones are the most important to meet.
Another piece if crucial information is found in the Love Busters Questionnaire that I mentioned earlier in the abuse and control section of this article. The questionnaire not only measures the existence of abuse and control, but it also measures independent behavior, which is the most common reason that women leave men. When independent behavior is identified, failure to meet important emotional needs almost always accompanies it.
But when a spouse has separated, chances are, the Love Busters Questionnaire and the Emotional Needs Questionnaire have not ever been completed, and the spouse left behind does not know where to begin to address the problem. So, if the spouse who has left is willing to complete those questionnaires, it would help provide a roadmap to recovery. It would also be an encouragement to the separating spouse that his or her complaints are being taken seriously, and that the one left behind may do what it takes to make the marriage safe and enjoyable.
In review, if your spouse has just left you, you should first avoid saying or doing anything until your emotional reactions are under control and you are able to think clearly. Then, you should take the initiative to discover the problems your spouse is facing with you and make changes that address those problems. Do not try to punish or blame your spouse for leaving you.