“Why Some Marriages Fail: My Experience Revealed”
“It is not a lack of love, but a lack of friendship that makes unhappy marriages.” — Friedrich Nietzsche.
My marriage, like any other, started on an excellent footing. It began with hope and great expectation, and there were love and friendship. We were two young people taking this marriage journey together. Because we were different in every respect, despite the effort to become united in spirit and flesh, we still saw things from a divergent perspective. That’s not surprising as we had a completely different upbringing and background.
Could it be that the essentials that make a healthy and successful marriage (the strings that bind the package together) were completely missing in my marriage?
I must confess that some of these elements probably were carelessly handled. Was there a lack of communication, patience, humility, forgiveness, time issues, commitment, sexual faithfulness, honesty, and trust? All leading to an inevitable failed marriage? Probably so.
As the husband and breadwinner, I thought I was doing my best to ensure my family didn’t lack anything. But by so doing, I missed spending quality time with my wife, which was a problem in itself. I don’t want to paint myself as a saint because they say it takes two to tango, and the fault should be shared by both parties: for that reason, I should be partly blamed. Maybe I would have handled many situations much better if I had been more mature. Indeed, being ready to be more patient, humble, and able to forgive. Doing so would have solved many problems that later became a thorn in my side.
The breakup was devastating for me, especially with the children at the center of it all. They say when two elephants fight, the grass suffers. My children weren’t the only ones affected by this turmoil because I was also caught in the middle. It caused me to weep in the open and in secret. I missed their warmth and everything else about my children, which caused me to become depressed and created other health problems that I might have for the rest of my life.
No Wonder They Say, Love Kills
Marriage is a natural and sacred institution contracted to last as long as we live. We say, Till Death Do Us Part.
The one-million-dollar question becomes, has this union always worked out for everybody as planned? The answer, without any hesitation, is capital NO. Is there a guide to fixing these varied marriage problems? I hope so because it’s said where there’s a will, there should be a way. Therefore, both sides of the marriage should always plan to put their home in order.
Why Didn’t My Marriage Work?
Well, it was all due to a catalog of missing fundamental building blocks that a great marriage creates. In addition to those mentioned previously, add the lack of maturity, patience, and forgiveness. What about self-ego, undaunting faithfulness, selfishness, and many more from both parties, as the fault of a failed marriage cannot be one-sided.
It needs the maturity of both sides for the marriage to succeed. Every union Begins with great dreams: Love for one another, being faithful to each other, raising healthy and well-matured kids, both mentally, psychologically, and otherwise.
A marriage is like a flower that needs constant watering to grow. The same goes for a relationship; it requires many open discussions to keep it warm and running smoothly. Intrinsic is the need for wisdom, understanding, and all it will take to let it flourish. The more insight and knowledge we apply to the union, the more likely the marriage will survive and mature.
The Consequences of a failed marriage are too devastating; one must strive to tap on whatever resources are available to learn how to keep the marriage afloat. Both parties should decide how to handle issues that affect the children’s welfare and keep the home running smoothly.
Some of these responsibilities should fall more on the husband, but today’s reality is proving this wrong as sometimes doors can first open up for the woman to carry the family’s burden. It’s of utmost importance to maintain constant dialogs to put things in their proper perspective. Doing so will prepare the marriage to weather any storm in rosy and challenging times.
Furthermore, the waters can become choppy in a marriage when it becomes necessary to cooperate and lend a hand to extended family members (husband’s and wife’s siblings). These actions can cause so many setbacks where one part of the family is favored over the other.
It is no wonder that these issues constitute some of the headaches that marriages face (depending on tradition and culture). Some cultures expressly include extended families in the union. As the saying goes: when you’re married into a family, you’re not just married to your wife or husband but to the whole clan.
Just this aspect can produce fruits of discord instead of agreement and love. When that happens, love becomes bitter and downright poisonous in the marriage. It begins to go down a slippery slope producing contrary effects. But when the children are caught in the middle of all this confusion, it becomes even more dangerous for everybody involved, and it could provoke a lot of unwanted problems.
Things get out of hand entirely when the father or the mother enters into a new marriage after their divorce. Children’s issues become more challenging and can escalate when one parent isn’t cooperative. Still, it’s imperative to continue looking for ways by all means despite the rough path to follow.
My marriage has taught me a lifelong lesson with all things being equal. Though I cannot go back and correct the past, I will always make good the lessons learned by investing in the present and hoping for a better and prosperous future.
