Hello – I am new to this forum, and feel very confused. I first met my wife in 1997, on the Internet. We were both 35 at the time. I had just ended a two year relationship that was very emotionally intense, but also quite volatile. I dated no one for 3 months before meeting my current wife. When we first met in person, I found her to be an attractive, average sized woman, with a good stable job, her own home, and fairly average in most ways. But I did not “fall in love.” She was a good companion, but there was never a “spark” or a sense of passion. She was a good friend. We dated for over a year, but she wanted more. She had never been married (was married briefly in the mid-80’s), and really wanted this. I did not feel “in love”, but wasn’t sure if this was a requirement for marriage. I did care about her and wanted her to be happy, just no real passion. I talked with friends, and they said that “falling in love” was just a physical sensation, that true love would take time and effort on both of our parts, and would occur over time. I also reviewed my past relationship history, and it was easy to see that, in every relationship where I had felt in love I always eventually was very hurt by the actions of these women. Because of all of this, I agreed to marry my girlfriend.
In less than a year, I regretted this decision. First of all, all of the activities we had done together while dating, which generally revolved around my interests, she decided she didn’t like doing, so she stopped. She had no apparent interests other than watching television, which I personally don’t much like. Secondly, within the first year of our marriage, she gained over 100 pounds, and I no longer had any attraction to her. I didn’t want to touch her, and felt uncomfortable when she touched me. Finally, her personality changed. She became very moody, resentful, negative, and defensive. She isolated herself completely, and the only activities we shared tended to be eating out, or visiting her family.
I became more and more detached and continued to live my active life, doing everything by myself. I begged her, pleaded with her, cajoled her, and finally began ignoring her. Finally, after three years, I decided I couldn’t continue to live this way. I told her that I was considering a divorce. Meanwhile, one of the people I was confiding in was a very attractive coworker, who was also going through a divorce. Needless to say, we “fell in love’, and in Feb. 2002, I told my wife I wanted a divorce. She soon found out about the other woman and was beside herself with hurt and anger. She began to desperately lose weight and read self help books. But it was too late. I had found my “soul mate.” My hurt wife quickly obtained a divorce in 6 weeks, and moved out. Within 3 weeks, my new “soul mate” decided to reconcile with her husband. I was devastated.
My ex and I were still friends throughout this ordeal, as we had joint custody of our cats (no children). Two months after our divorce was final, we began slowly dating. She had lost quite a bit of weight, and was taking some interest in doing things. We continued to date over the next year; she continued to lose weight, eventually becoming quite slim and very attractive. I still loved her, but still didn’t feel that passion or spark or whatever it is. But I did like who she was becoming, and convinced myself that, maybe I had always loved her, but due to her weight gain and personality change, not to mention allowing myself to be lured by another woman, we had never done the work of true love. In May of 2003, we re-married, with my parents as our witnesses.
In less than a year, she began gaining weight very rapidly, and, much more quick this time, began shutting herself out of my life, and returning to her old ways. We have now been married a 2nd time for 3 years, and I am as miserable as I was in 2001. Our marriage is exactly the same as it was then, and she weighs as much or more. I feel nothing but pity and resentment for her, and just want to run away. She keeps saying that, if I loved her, I would accept her, but if that is true, then I don’t love her because I don’t accept this. I have been careful to not allow other women too deeply into my life, and there is no one that I am drawn to…yet. I am afraid that if I met someone attractive who convinced me that she wanted to share a life, I would be powerless to resist. I just feel alone and depressed. I feel like I have something to offer someone, but have no partner to share it with. I recently went to a music festival (I am an amateur musician) alone, and felt so cheated the whole weekend, because it was so wonderful, and I had no one to share it with. I have told my wife these feelings, and she is very upset, and says she is going to lose the weight and start living (she called Overeaters Anonymous this morning – I am a strong advocate of 12 Step groups, belong to one myself), but I really don’t know if I trust that, or have the energy to go through this a third time.
Okay, here are my questions? If you have never felt love for a person, can it be achieved through working together, communication and counseling? Or should I give it up after 9 years and two separate attempts. Is it possible that her weight gain and subsequent personality problems could have gotten in the way of us meeting each other’s needs, or is this just a cop out on my part? I know that I love my wife but I love music also. I have never felt in love with her. Can this be developed? Am I wrong to feel the way that I do (I feel very guilty much of the time for my feelings towards her)? I tend to be a very intensely emotional person, and want to be able to communicate with the woman in my life on this level, which is pretty much impossible with my wife. I am mostly content in all other areas of my life, and feel cheated and imprisoned by my marriage. To leave the marriage would be very financially disastrous, but I can’t live the rest of my life like this, and it is pretty apparent to me that she is pretty miserable also.
Whew – that was long. There is probably a lot left out, but this will do for now. Can someone please help me?
