It seems like I love: how to understand that the relationship has exhausted itself

2024 Author: James Gerald | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 14:00

He is kind, smart, cute, you have been together for a long time. He knows what flowers you like, and you remember how many lumps of sugar to put in his coffee. People around you think you are the perfect match. But you feel that something is gone from the relationship. Avoiding his touch, you dodge the embrace. His jokes don't seem funny to you. And you mentally begin to convince yourself: “He is kind. He is good. He loves me. Everything is fine,”but every day the relationship is getting colder, and you are becoming more unhappy.

Anna, 23 years old:

- We have been dating for 2 years, one and a half of them have been living together. But something has changed. I myself cannot understand: I seem to love, but I don't seem to. Intellectually, I understand everything perfectly: he loves me very much, takes care of me, fulfills all my whims. But I have been carrying my things in the trunk of my car for three days now. I want to leave. And I can't. What if it goes away? After all, everything was so good.

How to understand whether the relationship has really exhausted itself and it's time to leave or is it just a crisis of one, three and other years of marriage? With these questions, I turned to the family psychologist Ekaterina Vladimirova. And this is what she replied:

- In the West there is such a good habit - to a family psychologist if something breaks in a relationship. The psychologist does not give advice, does not decide anything for you, but he creates an environment in which you yourself make the right decision for yourself. Unfortunately, “kitchen introspection” and “male conversations” are more popular with us.

If you are in doubt - to leave or stay, go back, forward or stand still - just go to a psychologist.

It is difficult to give universal recommendations, each story is unique, each pair is special. But, of course, there are general trends that are characteristic of most relationships.

First of all, this applies to those couples who live together. Wanting to get married and being married are not the same thing. After all, while you are dating, you only spend pleasant hours together - you have fun, go to parties, dates, give each other gifts. When you start living together, everyday difficulties appear, the total budget and the total time, which were so lacking in a relationship before and so much now.

When a crisis in a relationship comes, this may mean that you simply were not ready for the fact that your partner throws the corpses of socks around the apartment, smokes in bed, and gives flowers only on holidays - after all, when you met, everything was different.

And then options are possible. Either you turn around and leave, or you start to understand, talk, explain that the place for socks is a laundry basket, and if you cry, then you want him to come and hug you now. You learn to be together and appreciate each other.

Olga, 28 years old:

- I felt terribly bored and cramped in our relationship - before I led an active lifestyle, talked a lot with friends, was a regular at nightclubs. And now we are like two old people: we spend our evenings at home in front of the TV. It seems to me that we have everything behind us - both love and romance, all that remains is affection for each other, the habit of being together. Probably, this is how it should be after five years of a successful marriage. Girlfriends say that I was lucky with my husband, and I look at them and envy their freedom and adventure. I think the relationship has run its course.

Ekaterina Vladimirova:

- It so happens that people live together for 5 years, and then the "chemistry" disappears, the feeling of novelty disappears, and they just get bored. Indeed, sometimes with the extinction of the initial passion, it becomes clear that you are completely strangers, each of whom has to go his own way. But after all, often behind a layer of resentment and a wall of indifference, a couple can have a lot of warm and sincere feelings, but you can get to them only by talking over all the problems. And here, of course, is a direct path to a specialist in family problems.

Inna, 22 years old:

- For three years we had everything: African passion and Italian scandals. And now - Japanese composure and calmness. I don't want that - I am a person of emotions, and a quiet married life is not for me.

But I cannot directly tell him that I have fallen out of love, I cannot hurt the person who has become so dear to me. Behaving disgusting in the hope that he will leave me first.

Ekaterina Vladimirova:

- If you decide to leave, it is better to leave immediately. You don't need to chop the tail piece by piece, it will only hurt more. Do it right away, and your partner will be grateful to you for it. Do not torture him by forcing him to leave you first. Imagine doing this to you. Never leave anyone by SMS or phone - it hurts a lot. Find the strength to talk in person, explain why you are leaving, this will help him build relationships with others in the future. Support him, he needs it now.

If in doubt, talk to him frankly, explain how you feel, tell him honestly that you are confused, that you do not know what to do next. Give him a chance to speak. Maybe he will say something that will influence your decision. In any case, there are two of you in this relationship, and the decision must be made together.

5 tips for reanimating a relationship

• Spend more time with each other: have sex, travel, share secrets and experiences, thoughts and opinions, not only about dinner or car repair.
• Do what you've never done before - go to a pottery class or climbing wall together, go hiking or go to a football game together. A shared hobby and changing experiences will help you look at your partner from a different perspective.
• Come up with your common chips and words that are incomprehensible to others, create your own legend, make a film about your love - memories of how it all began will awaken your feelings.
• Create a holiday for yourself from scratch: mark the dates of the first kiss, first date, birthday of the cat.
• Do not cling to trifles, do not conceal serious grievances, talk about your feelings - every problem must be spoken out. This is great for refreshing the relationship.

In any case, crises are inevitable, and the sooner you realize this, the easier it will be for you to overcome them. Almost any relationship can be saved, a broken cup can be glued together, and you can step into the same river twice. On one condition - if you both want it.