| girl_w/limp wrote: So the reason for posting all this is: I need some perspective. |
My heart goes out to you since I hear such pain in your words. I hope you don’t hear my words as being “preachy” as I don’t want to be that way … but you are right … you need perspective.
I’ve been married for 26 years and it hasn’t all be fun, let me tell you. But I have learned that love isn’t a feeling .. it’s a choice. (Yeah, I know there’s a book by that title … but it’s still true). You need to change your mind before you can change your heart.
You are married to a man who you believe loves you, and who doesn’t mistreat you. You even believe that God has shown you that you are not “getting an out”, and I would agree. So what do you do? Be miserable forever, hold adultrous thoughts until one day they become actions?
This is hard, but you can purpose in your heart to love your husband. What worked for me was to behave as though I loved him, do the things a loving wife would do, even if the feelings weren’t there. I firmly believed that I had been hurt so badly that no form of love could ever grow back. But I did it, not for him, but in loving obedience to the Lord Jesus Christ. Then, one day, I was surprised to find that the love was there. Trust me, it works even though this sounds crazy. BUT IT IS HARD WORK AND YOU WON’T ALWAYS FEEL LIKE IT. 
You may say, “That’s dishonest!” I would say, it’s obedience to the word of God. We are called upon to praise God, even if we don’t feel like it, right? We do it because he is worthy of our praise. When we do, what happens? We feel like praising, right?
We choose to love our husbands because God has told us to. Instead of looking at what he hasn’t got, trying looking at what he has got. Maximize on those qualities ‘cos trust me, babe, there just ain’t one out there that’s got it all. And neither do we.
I also got counselling to help me through. Maybe it would help to explore the reasons why you can’t love someone who is loving to you? Could there be some blocks from you childhood that you can’t see?
Hang in there, draw your strength from God to do what you know is right in his eyes. What also helped me was that as miserable as I was, I knew I would only be more miserable if I walked away from His plan for my life. Know what I mean?
Cheers
