“My spouse doesn’t love me anymore”

All couples have their times of crisis. How can we avoid divorce?

Your spouse has questioned your marriage because their feelings have changed and they no longer know if they still love you. However, you believe that there is no particular problem — you don’t fight much, you have shared passions, and you agree on how to raise your children. Moreover, you believe your sexual and social life is satisfying. So how do you handle this crisis?

Does love only last three years?

This crisis is a relatively frequent occurrence. Indeed, nature seems to have endowed human beings with the tendency to feel “in love” for a short period of time. These are the feelings that so often inhabit us at the beginning of a relationship and allow it to get established. In fact, these feelings of love are not (yet) true love, just the first step that will transform into something deeper. Many couples do not agree on basic personal issues. But to get to the goal — a lasting and joyfully serene union — a common project will be necessary.

Being in love isn’t loving

Boris Cyrulnik, neuropsychiatrist and specialist in human behavior, says that a couple will last if they “have a cathedral to build.” What are your common projects? Are they projects that support you as acouple and push you towards a future together? Maybe you have them personally for the couple, but have you shared them with your spouse? They will become true conjugal projects when they have been measured, sanded, and polished … through dialogue.

Your spouse’s confession that they no longer know if they still love you is no doubt an expression of the fact that they no longer feel, as they did at the beginning, that outburst of body and heart. It is time to move on to a higher speed. Genuine love, the love that can go so far as to give one’s life for another, is built up day by day. With patience. With humility. Lovingly. And with great courage.

Marie-Noël Florant