When it comes to emotional abandonment:
“It’s a complaint I hear regularly from people looking for help for their marriages:
- ‘I feel distant from my spouse.’
- ‘I try to get my husband to open up, but instead he just shuts down.’
- ‘My wife just doesn’t seem interested in me anymore. I feel like we’re a million miles apart.’
- ‘I don’t know if I love him anymore.’
“What we’re talking about here is emotional abandonment. Instead of physically leaving the relationship, your spouse simply checks out emotionally. They stop investing in the marriage, leaving their mate feeling detached and unwanted. To the outside world the situation can still look rosy, but in reality the relationship is dying a slow, quiet death.” (Dr Dave Currie with Glen Hoos)
Emotional abandonment might not even die quite so slowly and quietly, as the spouse who is shut out tries to grapple with what is happening. Sometimes there is a lot of screaming and finger-pointing within the home— which often seems to complicate the situation even further. And yet, what can the abandoned spouse do to turn the relationship back around in the right direction?
Honestly, it’s confusing —even to those who call themselves “experts” in marriage relationships because everyone’s situation is different. What’s especially tragic is that emotional abandonment is something that seems to be happening in epidemic proportions in marriages today, or maybe it’s just that we hear more about this in today’s world… it’s difficult to tell.
But whatever the case, this is something we need to address because of the devastation it is causing on so many levels to individuals within their marriages, families, churches, and society as a whole, as the family unit breaks down and goes in an unhealthy direction.
To give you some type of insight into what may be causing emotional shut downs and what a spouse can do to turn things around in a better direction, we have found several web site articles that we believe will help. Please click onto the links below to read:
• EMOTIONAL ABANDONMENT: When Your Spouse Shuts You Out
• HER HUSBAND WOULDN’T SPEAK TO HER FOR THREE YEARS
• MY HUSBAND IS A MYSTERIOUS ISLAND
EMAIL | SHARE | PRINT
Print This Page (printer-friendly)
and do your online shopping. 
(UNITED STATES) I am in the same situation but I cannot wait for him anymore, I know for sure now that he takes me for granted. I am filing for divorce this time. Good Luck to all of you though. I hope God can help you with your spouses.
(USA) Milenia, I’ve been married 12 years. I have 3 kids 10, 11, and 3 and my husband left me when I was 5 months pregeant for a girl with 4 kids 12, 10, 6 and 3 years of age. I did get him back; I won that fight. Now after 3 years I don’t want him; I’m emotionally unattached. I caught him with her in 2007 and again 5 months ago. These past 5 months I’ve been emotionally distant with him and I know it’s not going to work. He says he loves me but he turns around and cusses me out a few hours later, calling me curse words.
I have not developed nor have I seen us grow and I’m tired too. I want a divorce. I am leaving in December. We can only be friends; my intimacy for him is gone and he knows it. He loves women so he will have no problem bouncing back. I’m tired; it’s over, I decided. No more being tired of mental abuse. Anyone can have him now. He still keeps contact with her, so she may get him, I don’t care.
(SOUTH AFRICA) I love my wife so much, that it feels like my heart wants to explode out of my chest, even now after 22 years of marriage, however, I’ve been working shifts most of our married life, and my wife has, besides being a good mother, spends more time with the kids and other family and friends, etc. we will end up at times alone in our home, then w inevitably end up not speaking to one another.
I so long for the passion (talking, listening and hearing and just holding each others hand…) we once had to return. whenever we talk to each other, it is always about the doings of somebody else. i personally feel and think that we have grown emotionally unattached from one another.
Yes the birthhday and annivessaries are celebrated, to the world everything seems blessed, but I know in my heart that it is not. I don’t have any fears as a BORN-AGAIN CHRISTIAN, my concern that I have is that when my KIDS (3) are grown and married, that we as a couple will not have anything to say to one another…
(JAMAICA) Hi, I am kinda not getting through to your web site, because I think it is biased. I am a married man who is having issues with my wife. I am almost sure I don’t know what the problem is, but when I look here for answers all I can see is what men do. So my big question is… don’t you think women also do these things to us men? I am really looking for some answers, where the female is the problem in the relationship.
(USA) Hi Richard. Yes, it happens quite often that the situation is switched around and it’s the woman who is emotionally distant (for many different reasons). But it’s difficult to find articles where men are addressing this issue. We’ve looked and keep looking because we know there are men out there who are going through what you are experiencing.
Please pray, and apply the “principles”, and read as the Holy Spirit inspires. The situations are similar, the genders are different, but you can turn the advice around when needed. I hope this helps you in your quest for understanding.