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He loves me and sometimes he's in love with me. It is heartbreaking to hear this, especially almost 4 years out. I understand real mature love is an action verb and all about commitment but should ppl be in love with their spouses?
For the record. I don't know if I'm in love with him all the time or not.
But, I think ppl who are married should be in love. All the time.
Our MC says healthy couples recreate that in love feeling. Not sure we are capable of this because of our complicated MH situation. today he told me that my affair started the chain reaction of what happened. I told him we need to be very careful about blame. At any rate, it has made for a very tough day...

rachelc,

I was married probably less than a tenth of the time you have been. Yet, I am not "in love" with XH; probably haven't been since around 6 months after we started dating. We are also almost 4 years out.

And yet we plan to be remarried this year.

Maybe I am crazy, but I just feel done with "in love." I dunno.

[This message edited by heartbroken0903 at 6:36 PM, January 4th (Saturday)]

To me the 'in love' feeling is highly over rated.
The yearning for it leads to the 'Dark Side'.

After 32 years of marriage I find contentment, symbiosis, the feeling that somebody on the planet knows me better than I know myself, the joy of having someone who will finish my sentences for me, knowing there is someone who will put their needs second to mine when required, having someone who accepts me for who & what I am despite my shortcomings.

These feelings far outway the fleeting 'butterflies in the stomach, soulmates forever' of 'in love'.

[This message edited by SlowUptake at 1:55 AM, January 6th (Monday)]

Hi, BS here, I don't think you need to be "in love" all the time, especially under these circumstances. I love my husband all the time in that I care for him, I want to be married to him, and sometimes I do have that "in love" feeling, though right now that is more often covered up by a lot of pain from his affair, it is hard to feel "in love" with someone who has hurt you so badly. I honestly believe this to be normal though even without an affair to consider. When I was younger it used to terrify me that I didn't always feel "in love" with my husband, and I wondered sometimes if it meant I shouldn't be with him, but I know now that it is ok to feel this way. It is the difference between mature love and those first stages of "love" when the chemicals are raging. Let me ask you this, was this need to feel "in love" with your husband one of the reasons you may have had an affair? And did you feel that "in love" feeling for you AP? As SlowUptake says

The yearning for it leads to the 'Dark Side'.

You have to be careful not to confuse the two types of love and remember that mature love is not always constant but it is by far the more sustainable of the two. I sometimes think about it in this way: I love my children, I would not give them up for the world, but sometimes the three year old drives me so crazy that I really wish grandma would take him off my hands for at least a week; I love my son certainly, but I am not always "in love" with him. Does that make sense? Any way, I hope this helps. Good luck.

[This message edited by inshockandhurt at 2:39 PM, January 5th (Sunday)]