she's a wonderful person but...

[Accuray]

Banjopicker,

I actually think your sitch is already in the red zone. Good for you for finding your way here and reading relationship books to try to improve things. I will add "His Needs, Her Needs" to the books you should read. The "Five Love Languages" is awesome, but the 5 might be too high level, "His Needs, Her Needs" is a good follow up because it gets more specific.

Backing off was my way of supporting her.

This is a deadly cycle to get into. You were assuming this was what she wanted, but to her it might have looked like emotional withdrawal. I'm sure you didn't discuss that you were withdrawing to support her, and she probably assumed the worst about it and withdrew herself. It's a chicken and the egg dilemma in terms of who withdrew first, but it's a cycle that feeds itself once it starts.

In my own situation, I also came to feel like "persona non grata" and also decided to make the best of it and "do my own thing" to be happy, supporting W as I could. On the surface it would have looked like a good marriage because we were cordial, worked well together, and generally were a good team. Under the surface, however, she interpreted my withdrawal as a judgement that she was not worthy, and that I wasn't interested in spending time with her. Therefore, when I would approach her she would be snippy and standoffish which reinforced to me that she wanted to be left alone. Over time, that drained her "love tank" to the point that even if I tried to engage she was no longer interested. I fear that you may be at that point now as well, and it's much worse than it looks, because there is a lot of resentment there that she hasn't given voice to and you haven't seen.

As you've figured out, your marriage has now become devoid of intimacy, she's keeping secrets from you with regard to the smoking, she's not making any effort to pursue shared interests, and she is investing her emotional energies elsewhere. There are two scenarios here: (1) either she has accepted the situation for what it is and is satisfied with it, or (2) she is getting her emotional needs met with another man via an emotional or physical affair.

In either case she doesn't have the motivation right now to do anything different with you, and you cannot make her change.. That's going to be a hard thing to come to terms with, because like you I thought "who wouldn't want a better marriage? Who wouldn't be willing to do the work to have more intimacy?" The answer is, she may not be.

So what does that mean? You are now trying to engage with her and "wake up" your marriage at a time when her head is not in the game. If you start pursuing her, arguing with her, pleading with her, you will make your situation a lot worse. If you go to marriage counseling with her and expose all your emotions and fears, you'll make your situation worse, so tread carefully!

I do think you should have a conversation with her that you are not satisfied with your marriage, and that you're willing to do the work to make it better -- but when you have that conversation you need to be prepared to mainly listen and not try to argue or problem-solve in the moment. Just listen, take in what she says. Repeat it back to her the next day to let her know you heard it. Hold back on presenting a list of "what you want" or itemizing what's wrong with your marriage as it stands. Don't present a list of complaints about her. Just tell her you're not satisfied with the level of intimacy in your marriage, you would like more, and you're willing to work on it.

I don't think you have a "next move" until you get her reaction. Be prepared that more than likely she will tell you she's not interested in pursuing that right now. If that's how it goes, it's very important that you be prepared to handle that with dignity. Think about your response in advance, don't make things worse. She's now in the mode of delivering bad news and will deliver even more if you push her. Once she verbalizes it it becomes more real and she believes it more, so it's better to leave it unsaid for now until she's in a better frame of mind.

Then, you'll need to work on you. You'll need to figure out how to fill her love tank without her help. You'll need to figure out how to be the most attractive person you can be. You'll need to figure out how to get happy, and how to get your emotional needs met without her contribution *for now* so that you are someone who is attractive and fun to be with.

That's where it starts.

WRT the smoking, give up on that for now. Just completely ignore it. Continuing to push that point by either saying "it's bad" or "it's fine" will just make things worse. I think it's a stupid thing for her to do, particularly with kids, but her body, her choice, and until you have a larger balance in her love bank, you can't start making withdrawals to address her smoking.

Accuray