Those married between 10 and 15 years, How has your feelings changed about your spouse?

I have been married 12 years. I am 34 she is 33. Three kids. Our relationship has definitely suffered over the past few years. We do not fight much, we do not agree on much, and really we do not talk all that much anymore. I work she stays at home and from 5:30pm to 11pm our worlds cross but certainly do not join. Our relationship has become more of a business agreement centered around raising kids than a personal relationship between two adults. Each of us have the obligatory things we do for each other to keep the peace and the illusion that things have not changed. We do not dislike each other or wish harm or bad things for each other; it is more like there is just a huge void of emotion there. Sex is ok, our money situation is ok, I guess everything is ok. I daydream/fantasy about a relationship where things are new and that 鈥渂uzz鈥?you get by just being around someone. I AM NOT THINKING OF CHEATING just missing that filling. Any thought or advice?

been together 10 yrs, married for 3, 3 kids. life pretty much like yours. hoping as the kids get older more indepent we will conect more. i stay home and by the end of the day emotionally i'm drained and don't have much left to give, physically i'm exdhausted not much to giver. mentally exhausted not much to give. enjoy the good days, be a good friend to your wife, never cheat, remember things could be worse. pray for a wonderful happy renewed realationship with your wife as these years pass, keep comunication open.
good luck.

that's normal, maybe you and your wife should try and spend some quality time together. go out for a meal or something.

I would suggest that you try to spark up your romance again. There are many ways of doing this. Find yourself a sitter and take her out on a romantic date to a nice resturaunt. Maybe you could just send her flowers or leave her a nice love note someplace you know that she will find it. Maybe try talking about this issue with her, communication is very important in a relationship. I went through the same thing that you are going through, only I was the wife....Little gestures go a very long way. Tell her that after so many years together, she is still the most beautiful woman that you have ever known, or just give her a big kiss for no reason at all. I hope this helps.

Take her on a honeymoon and remember the days when you started as a couple... Both of you should rekindle those moments and repeat them to eachother so that you can remember what brought you two together. Buy her a gift certificate at a trendy beauty salon for a makeover so that she can have a change of image and also feel sexy again. What did you two do together when you met (besides sex)? Do those same things. What did she do that made you fall in love with her? Ask her to do those same things...

Good luck and peace to both of you. I hope you can work things out.

17 years married and happy married...2 kids and my wife also home,your problem (probably)is that your wife is at home...just imagine your self staying home all day..is boring.Just try to get your wife out and let her choose where to go..maybe this will help, try also to ask your wife what she love to do in your free time..I wish you a good luck and god bless you..(sorry my English)

i know exactly what you are saying and you are saying it very well. i commend you for saying you are not thinking of cheating. because thats usually the 1st thought in a persons mind when they feel this way. the only advise i have is to hang in there and hope that things change. circumstances change all the time. And if after a 40 or so year marriage it didnt ever change back to the "buzz" feeling you had before, at least you had the opportunity to grow old with a good friend.

You have gotten to a point where your relationship is a routine rather than a marriage and both of you are taking each other for granted. Odds are she feels the same way that you do. You need to find a way to add a little spice/excitement to your relationship (and it doesn't have to be sexual). Children tend to make life routine. My suggestion is that the two of you need to find time to spend together (without children) on a regular basis. Use the time to rekindle the relationship. Get to know each other again.

You need to talk to her. You need to first start with YOURSELF. I'm sure you can list what she does or doesn't do, but what do YOU DO to make the relationship better?

Take her on a date.

Join a club or such together.

Find a hobby you can do together...photography...dancing....refi... furniture...go yard saleing....but something you do NOT do with the kids.

Make HER a priority. I bet she's at the bottom of the list.

Put as much effort into your relationship as you do your job and kids.

Read books from the library on restarting that relationship.

Spend time ALONE together. Flirt with her! Buy her flowers or chocolate. Every day start by coming up with one thing YOU are going to do to make your realtionship better that same day. Touch her. Hug her. Compliment her. Things like that.

Pray about it. Prayer works miracles!

Listen, I think that most marriages go through this phase. Either you work through it and do something to fix the problem or you will end up divorced, or just miserable for the rest of your life. I have a similar problem now. But I try to remember what made me fall for my husband in the first place. I know that people change over time, and situations differ from when you first met, but the love is there underneath everything else. If you want to be with this special person for the rest of your life you need to make some small changes, and get out of the rut. Make a reservation for an extremely nice restaurant, one you would never go to because the prices are a bit to high. Surprise her with Roses one afternoon, and tell her you have a surprise planned for that evening. Take her to do something even if its only rollerskating, then dinner. Tell her, you know that things have not been that exciting, but you truly love her and you want your lives to be fulfilling and have some excitement. Then tell her you how much you want to spend the rest of your lives together. She will really respond to this!! Then keep up doing little spontaneous things, like get her a book she has been wanting, or naughty lingerie with a promise for a fun evening. She will realize that she has been missing the fun also and she will start to reciprocate. I mean it does'nt hurt to try, if it still is dull, and things dont change at least you gave it a shot. You can also see a marraige councelor and get some ideas on how to make your time together more fulfilling!! Good luck, I hope you get your spark back.

You need to reconnect to each other. Sounds like the love is still there but lost in the matters of the world. Find time to get to know each other again. Find a babysitter and make dates with each other. If you can afford it go to a movie or dinner or even a walk in a park. Just somewhere to be alone with each other. You both need to become more attuned to the others happenings of the day. Ask how was your day, and then earnestly listen and take true interest. This has to be a two way street, you both need to just talk to each other. This is the advice from someone who has been married for 33 years and very much still in love with each other. We raised two children and at times had to just put the world away for a while and focus only on each other. Good Luck and remember to always say each day I Love You and mean it.

I'm not married but have been around those like you have had or having problems
it seems like you have got stuck in a rut and you live together but just don't seem happy at all if you imagining and daydreaming then things def need some attention if you still love each other its time to wake up and talk to each other have some counseling or spice things up in the bedroom there loads you can do like pretending you have met for the first time have that first date again ,get a babysitter and go out make time for each other
there's also kinky underwear well you no what i mean
if this is a relationship worth saving then talk to her
if your both not happy and can't work it out then you both should not stay in a loveless relationship not even for the kids as you will hurt them in the long run

I think this is completely normal. You hear ppl talk about the "7 year itch" but we had problems around 12 years. We are at 15 now....I know exactly what you are saying. We got married at 21 and have 3 boys. We were just kind of hanging in there, as it sounds like you guys are, then we went on a few day vacation with no kids and bam we kind of re-discovered each other. It was not like we just met but we realized all the things we like about each other are still there, we just got too busy to look. I would suggest that you guys go out on a weekly date nite and if possible go for a long weekend (somewhere nearby even a hotel in your town), just get away from it all and see what happens. I know this sounds like lame advice you get from anywhere but it worked for us. We were kind of forced to go on our "little kid free vacation", we would have never gone on our own (we wouldn't have wanted to be alone together that long...what would we talk about! LOL!). Anyway try it, it can't hurt! Good Luck, I hope you guys find your way back.

My advice is to tell your wife what you just told us, word for word. As a wife dying to hear stuff like that from her hubby I say take her out on a date and tell her what you are feeling.

Do something! Don't just think about how things are, make things better. Surprise her with roses at 5:30 tonight. Spend some quality time together! Go to dinner occassionally just the two of you. Talk to her about it and come up with a plan together to draw closer to each other. As for your daydreams, she's probably having them too. Stop them before it is too late by doing things to improve the relationship you already have. Continuing to live in a fantasy world will only make things worse because your wife can't live up to the perfect person you have created in your mind and you can't live up to the one that's probably in hers either.

Dh and I have been married for 18 years. There have been some rocky times, but I have to say that now, I love and respect him more than I ever have. Neither of us is anywhere near the perfect spouse, but I am his beloved and he is mine. BTW: We have 4 children and are expecting another in October. Relationships do not have to suffer because we have children.
Good Luck and God Bless!
P~

Added: I read one of the answers said "flirt with her". Dh and I flirt and tease (the fun kind of teasing) each other a lot. Also when he calls, I answer the phone hey sweetie instead of hello. Funny, how it softens his voice. Just reaching for her hand or putting your arm around her can make all the difference in the world and will soften her to you. It doesn't take a lot of effort to improve your relationship if you think about all the little things you can do. It is important that you talk to her about this though. If you just suddenly start bringing flowers and such she may get suspicious. Besides you need to know how she feels too. Oh and I would like to commend you on trying to make things better instead of sitting back and waiting for them to get bad enough for a divorce.

I have been married 14 years and my husband and I also struggle with this. It is so hard to put forth the effort sometimes. It seems whenever one of us is trying the other one is not. I just tell myself that anyone married a long time (longer than us) and are happy, had to go through these times too. You have to try and get your communication back, it is hard. We have been working on this and it is not easy. He feels like a paycheck and I feel like a daycare with no time off ever!! I do not regret being a SAHM and I love my kids more than life itself. You just have to want it back again and talk to her and find out what she wants from you. I feel I am insignificant to him, and feel he is consumed with his job, obvioulsy I know it pays our bills, but there is a lot going on here he is missing because he cannot see past it. He is a good father, we just have to get back on the same page.

I do not think you get back that "buzz" feeling and chances are she daydreams of it too. But you can get a better feeling of two people working together for your family and hopefully because you love one another and want to be together.

I am a product of a divoriced family and told him things have to be a lot worse than mediocre to justify putting our kids through that, and we decided to try and get back on track, it just takes a lot of work and putting the other person first again, instead of being hung up onwhat you are upset about.

We seem to communicate best through email, I guess because the other cannot yell, and we do not fight or discuss these things in front of the kids and its not like we are going to get a baby sitter so we can fight LOL

You have to be honest and tell her what you feel and ready to really listen to what she has to say, it just takes one person to give in and start trying again. Good luck!!

Oh and another thing I have been working on, is just accepting him for who he is instead of waitng for or expecting change, loving him for his good traits and accepting the not so good and he is trying to do the same where I am concerned. Focus your energy on the good, and accept the bad, you will feel a lot better.