When Working on Your Marriage Isn’t Working
Marital problems are mentally taxing. Some marriages fall apart over together differences of opinion, some due to violence, infidelity, or loss of trust. I watched a video this week on social media where a lady left her husband because no matter how many times she asked him to stop, he wouldn’t stop over-tightening jars in the kitchen. (It wasn’t about the jars…)
Today at Alimonialife we’re discussing a bit about being in the trenches of your marriage. When you’re fighting to save it, and maybe wondering why it’s not working, or if you’re wasting your time.
Many marriages are empowered to a new season of growth and positive change when both parties dedicate themselves to improving the relationship. Marriage counseling has a success rate of nearly 70%. But even with considerable work, some marriages are simply not to be saved.
When Your Marriage Is In Trouble
When your marriage is in trouble, you may talk to your spouse about it and try to get on the same page. You may identify what’s wrong with the relationship, where it went wrong, and what obstacles you need to overcome in order for it to work. Once the hard work of saving your marriage starts, many people find that it feels like it isn’t working.
When adding in extra “date nights,” rekindling emotional and physical connection, and working together on conflict resolution all seem to be failing, many couples turn to marriage counseling.
In fact, many couples choose this option later rather than sooner. Perhaps this is because a couple feels marriage counseling, in and of itself, is a failure or a last-ditch effort. They are ashamed to admit it’s come to this. When in reality, marriage counseling isn’t just for doomed relationships. It could help support your marriage and make it more successful. As the old adage goes—when problems arise, nip them in the bud.
Is Couples Therapy Normal?
When you look up “therapy for” on Google Search you get a list of terms based on the most likely searches performed by the most people. The list looks like this:
Therapy for…Black girls
Therapy for…kids
Therapy for…anxiety
Therapy for…teens
Therapy for…kids near me
Therapy for…Black men
Therapy for…autism
Therapy for…ADHD
Therapy for…depression
Therapy for…OCD
Therapy for marriage doesn’t even populate on the list.
These Google Autocomplete or Google Suggest results say a lot about what people are looking for in a therapist. I find it both alarming and sad that marital counseling doesn’t seem to be a priority.
A similar search, simply typing in “couples,” populates Halloween costumes, massage options, and a television series called Couples Therapy. One thinks when I have a car, I take it to the shop to be maintained, right? When my children need help, I go get it for them, right? But how do I fix my marriage? I am afraid to ask for help.
It seems Google itself is telling us that we are alone in our marital strife. The simple act of searching for a couples therapist (as a last-ditch effort to save our partnership) isn’t trending.
Think of all the online therapy commercials you’ve seen lately. They target individual mental wellness, individual happiness, and individual success. While these are valuable learning tools for learning and growing “confidently in the direction of your dreams! Live the life you've imagined“ as Thoreau put it, as a society, perhaps we do not value marriage partnerships as much as we used to. When marriage used to be a contractual agreement for life so that both parties could manage the home, the children, and the finances (among other things), now, it seems modern society views marriage as often temporary, and as a quality-of-life choice. It saddens me that couples therapy would be uncommon or worse; taboo. Just as it saddens you to hide in the sorrow of your failing marriage, feeling alone in your frustration and pain.
In 2024, therapy should be as well-accepted as visiting a specialist for an ear condition, or an orthopedic doctor for lower back pain. After all, the mind is an abstruse construct, at best, and when two people are trying to be of one mind, learning to navigate this shouldn’t be taboo. It should be celebrated as part of the work done to maintain the central most important relationship we’ve chosen to pursue—like the maintenance we’d do on our vehicle, or the Saturday morning cleaning we do to better organize the garage. In my mind, the marital relationship requires regular check-ins, maintenance, and upgrades. In the world of AI-driven predictions, you’d think Google would know this.
Having said all of this—here at Alimonialife, we do not believe your suffering or your suffering marriage are things that need to be endured without support. We share our stories, so you don’t have to be ashamed of yours.
So, to answer the question—Is couples therapy normal?—not only is it normal, but it’s an investment a couple makes to maintain the thing they love; their partnership. Implemented early on, many marriages can make a strong recovery and go on to be successful, rewarding partnerships.
What Kind of Work Makes a Successful Marriage?
First of all, there’s no shame in Googling your concerns.
Working on my marriage
I’m tired of working on my marriage
Marital problems
Couples therapy near me
My marriage needs help
Go ahead and set up weekly dates with your partner. Go ahead and try all the things, including couples therapy, because saving your marriage is important work. And, the earlier you tackle the undercurrents of strife between yourself and your partner, the better. Couples therapy, generally speaking, is overwhelmingly successful when a couple isn’t afraid to implement it early, commits to using it as a tool, and is open to growing together.
Factors of a Successful Marriage
Productive, effective, and considerate:
➡️ Communication
➡️ Conflict Resolution
Consistent, dependable, and mutual:
➡️ Intimacy
➡️ Trust
➡️ Respect
Rewarding exchanges:
➡️ Time together
➡️ Support
➡️ Love & affection
What if Nothing is Working?
I recall sitting on a therapist's couch nearly two decades ago. I can still remember the quietude of that office. Leather couch. Therapist’s chair; the filtered light through generic gray curtains lighting one side of the minister’s face. He rested one cheek on an elbow-propped hand, and at times, his eyes drifted closed as I cried, and cried, and cried.
In these tearful sessions, as I snotted into one tissue after another and recounted the events of the week past, my (now) ex-husband was stoic, quiet, and agreeable. Three things he never was at home. At home, he mentally tortured me, broke things I loved, threatened to hurt me, and sometimes, did. If we revisit the list above, a list which I wish I’d had at the time, ours would have looked like this:
Productive, effective, and considerate:
❌ Communication
❌ Conflict Resolution
Consistent, dependable, and mutual:
❌ Intimacy
❌ Trust
❌ Respect
Rewarding exchanges:
❌ Time together
❌ Support
❌ Love & affection
I learned after about eight long months of therapy, a separation, reconciliation, and another separation, that simply my doing the work wasn’t going to save my marriage. I remember that well-meaning therapist looking at both of us empathetically and asking, “Is this marriage ever going to work?” In my heart I wanted it to. But wanting something doesn’t always make it happen, no matter how many times you fling yourself into it.
A few stressful years later, defeated, I threw up my hands to the marriage. Honestly, it’s the best decision I have ever made for myself. If I have one piece of advice for you it’s this: don’t waste years of your life trying to save a marriage that doesn’t have what it takes to be a good one.
I’m Tired of Working on My Marriage
During those years of fighting to save the chaos of that marriage, to turn it into something good, happy, and if I’m honest, to live out the commitment I felt I’d made to God, I was tired. The kind of tired you can’t sleep away at night or cry away in therapy. I was becoming a person who felt broken, lost, and alone. No one can tell you when it is time to give up on the marital recovery plan and choose divorce. That’s a personal decision that I didn’t make lightly, and neither should you.
Is My Marriage Fixable?
When you have felt all the feels you can take, cried all the tears you can muster, and flung yourself into saving your marriage for so long—it’s hard to just keep going. When you're working on your marriage it can take a long time to see results. Sometimes, it feels like it isn’t working at all, or there are painful setbacks.
All I can say is hang in there. Give the work of saving your marriage a chance. Consult professionals, learn better communication with your partner, and take regular, honest assessments of how things are going. Be proud of what you are doing and how far you’ve come. Don’t be afraid to get some help along the way, with or without your partner.
When Saving Your Marriage Isn’t Working
Only you can determine if your marriage is fixable. I waited several years after that therapist tried to eyeball me in therapy and direct his comments to me—can this ever work? I knew what he meant. I knew he was concerned about my safety. I knew it was time to give up. But I waited another four years. It takes two people in a marriage to make the changes. It takes two people, together, in a lifelong commitment to each other’s welfare. I knew that no matter how hard I tried, I did not have this in my marriage. I finally decided that the only thing I could improve, or change, or save—was myself.
Christina M. Ward