When the Flame Flickers: Facing Faded Love in Marriage
When the Flame Flickers: Facing Faded Love in Marriage
Unless you only recently got married, it's likely you've experienced this feeling at some point or another in your marriage. You start out with a fiery spark and you expect it to last forever - that feeling where you can't stand to be away from each other for any length of time and when you're together, you can't keep your hands to yourselves. And gradually over time, it slowly begins to fade - quick peck on the cheek as you leave for work, occasionally holding hands while out and about, ships passing in the night, as you hustle and bustle to get things ready for work the next day and for the children, etc. And perhaps even to the level of just feeling like roommates.
In this blog post, we'll touch on what it might mean when love begins to fade and address that it's more common than you think and doesn't have to mean it's the end.
The Shift: From Romance to Routine
- Life Stressors
- This often includes work, children, extended family, finances, and/or household chores and/maintenance
- Emotional Distance or Lack of Quality Time
- As we age and grow in our lives and our careers, it becomes far to easy to have a lack of quality time together. We use excuses such as our children, work, or finances, but it's also usually a lack of intentionality
- And as we get busy with daily life, especially with multiple children in multiple sports or extra-curricular activities, it becomes far too easy to become emotionally distant from each other, usually due to a lack of time alone together.
- Or worse - we begin to confide in other people outside the home, because we spend more time with them at work than we do with our partner
- It's important to be intentional about spending quality time together and not allowing other people or activities to take priority over the relationship.
- Unresolved Conflict or Hurt
- The longer we are together in a relationship, the more likely it is that we've gotten hurt by our partner at one time or another. But if we ignore it and never address it, it remains unresolved and often festers into resentment, which can significantly damage a relationship.
- It's important to address and resolve hurt and conflict as quickly as possible, to minimize the misunderstand and damage and decrease the chances of the love fading.
- Feeling unseen or undervalued
- I can't tell you how many times I've heard couples share this sentiment in counseling with me. The report feeling unheard by their partner or that, if heard, that their partner just doesn't seem to care about their opinion or feelings.
- Some couples feel that they, at the core of who they are, are not valued for who and what they bring to the table, and begin to feel resentful or disconnected, or even unloved, by their partner.
- It's important to recognize you and your partner won't always agree on everything and won't always have the same priorities. But it's also important to communicate how to manage this and develop boundaries around these types of feelings, so they don't become the overarching sentiment of the relationship.
- I can't tell you how many times I've heard couples share this sentiment in counseling with me. The report feeling unheard by their partner or that, if heard, that their partner just doesn't seem to care about their opinion or feelings.
- Some couples feel that they, at the core of who they are, are not valued for who and what they bring to the table, and begin to feel resentful or disconnected, or even unloved, by their partner.
- It's important to recognize you and your partner won't always agree on everything and won't always have the same priorities. But it's also important to communicate how to manage this and develop boundaries around these types of feelings, so they don't become the overarching sentiment of the relationship.
The shift from romance to routine is often a slow fade. You may not know it's happened until afterward. And then you're left wondering how you got there and what to do.
What "Faded Love" Really Looks Like
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Some signs love may be beginning to fade in a marriage & how to fix them early on:
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Lack of physical or emotional intimacy
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- When you first start noticing this, don't dismiss it as temporary! Take action to ramp things back up. Be intention about time together, especially around physical and emotional intimacy. And remember, your most emotionally intimate relationship should be with your partner AT HOME, not your business partner.
- More irritability, less patience
- As yourself when it started and what might have been the cause. When you determine how/when/where it started, you can take steps to address the root concern. It's usually some sort of unresolved conflict or ongoing unmet need that is building up, but being left unaddressed.
- Going through the motions
- Maybe you've gotten bored. Things are the same day after day and you don't see it changing any time soon. Maybe this is not how you imagined your life to be. Talk about it! Mix things up! You and your partner get to make the rules for your own relationship. If it's not to your liking, change it!
- Feeling more like roommates than partners
- Again, marriage takes work. If you're feeling more like roommates, then you've both allowed life and routine to become excuses. Discuss ways to bring the romance back. I encourage couples to talk about how and why they fell in love in the first place or what activities they used to enjoy doing together, and bringing some of those things back into play.
- Fantasizing about life apart
- This is usually caused by longer term, ongoing unhappiness and/or unfulfillment. It's when none of the other bullet points have been addressed and now you're just miserable, dreaming about what life "could" be like. This might be time to get professional help from a counselor, to help you both get things back on track.
Why This Happens (and What It Doesn’t Mean)
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Love fading doesn’t always mean it’s gone for good.
- In fact, that's rarely the case. It just means it needs a "tune up".
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Discuss attachment patterns, communication breakdowns, and life transitions.
- Ongoing communication is key to any relationship and is the one thing that can help ensure longevity.
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The myth of constant passion and how real love requires maintenance.
- Whoever said that love or marriage is always happily ever after, stretched the truth a bit. Love and marriage can be that, but it takes work. As I said, it requires regular "tune ups" just like our cars need to keep running well.
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Difficult seasons are an invitation to grow deeper, not give up.
- All marriages have growing pains. These pains ae normal and allow us the opportunity to grow deeper in our relationships, not give up.
Hope and Healing: Reigniting the Connection
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Practical steps for reconnecting:
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Intentional time together (without distractions)
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Honest, vulnerable communication
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Small daily gestures of love and appreciation
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Couples therapy or marriage coaching
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Rebuilding trust if there’s been hurt
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When to Seek Help
It's important to know the difference between a temporary rough patch and a more deeply rooted issue. If you've already been working at an issue for a while and feel like you've reached an impasse or that you may need a third part to help you work through a stuck point, it's likely that it's not just a "rough patch", but a conflict about more deeply rooted or core issues. This too is a normal part of relationships, especially after the initial "spark" wears off and you begin to see each other's true colors, not what you see through the rose colored glasses.
When you recognize that you aren't very easily able to resolve issues on your own, it may be time to reach out to a marriage therapist or couples counselor for help. And there's no shame in doing that. In fact, it takes courage to admit there's a problem and being willing to do the work to fix it. The sooner you address the problems with a professional, the easier it is to fix them.
Love Grows Through Struggle
Be assured that all couples face some season or seasons of disconnect or discontent. We're all human beings, after all. Never feel like you're alone in the struggle. All couples have have their fair share of difficulties. And it's usually through the struggles that their love is able to grow stronger.
Even if trust has been broken or serious hurt has been caused, love can almost always be rebuilt. And often it can be rebuilt stronger than before. It takes time and effort. Nothing worth having comes easy.
In working with many couples over the years, I continue to encourage people to stay curious about each other, be compassionate and understanding, take time to listen and be empathetic, and always, always remain committed to your partner.
If you'd like to hear the Married & Confused Podcast Episode that also tackles this topic, where my colleague, Claudia Delgado, LCSW, and I discuss this together, please click here.
If you'd like to see any of my previous blog posts, please click here.
I provide online individual and couples counseling throughout California, Tennessee, South Carolina, and Florida.
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