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31 Couples Suffering Through Love-Less Marriages Reveal Why They’re Still Together
Standing at the altar, we vow eternal love to our partner, but in reality, these are nothing more than beautiful words. Ultimately, love can fade and run its course, and in some marriage situations, circumstances arise that would actually make Gandalf from "The Lord of the Rings" exclaim, "Run, fools!"
But sometimes they don’t run. They stick it out through toxic relationships, daily conflicts, and cold shoulders, still gritting their teeth and trying to cope. Sometimes, they even pretend nothing terrible has happened, and that love is still there. Well, today we'll try to figure out why this actually happens.
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#1
Not in that situation, but I know several people that are. And the reality is simple; getting divorced doesn’t necessarily lead to the promised land. We (UK) live in a society where cost of living means most of us have to be in a relationship with two earners.
Good luck separating and finding a place to live, keep a car on the road and if there are kids in the picture, working out what that looks like.
We live in a fakely emancipated world.
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#2
I couldn't afford to without pushing myself and my kids (and her) into poverty. As I got older, I started making more money and then could finally afford to divorce properly.
#3
Gauging from my in-laws, they don't really hate each other. They hate how their lives turned out, their daily existence, and that the other person is both a reminder of the opportunities they disregarded while being with them, as well as a reminder of their own failure to create something more than what they have.
There are many threads online where people who remain in toxic or simply uncomfortable relationships share their reasons for doing so. And you know what? Even though money tops the list, it’s not actually the main reason.
A key factor among these reasons is either cultural traditions or simply a fear of social judgment. Sure, it’s not the Middle Ages anymore (though every new year in the 21st century kinda makes me doubt that...), when marriage was meant to last a lifetime, but lots of people still judge those who choose divorce.
Some cultural traditions are pretty ruthless about judging people who’ve gone through divorce, and sometimes folks are even scared to take that step themselves. Because by doing so, they’re basically admitting they made a mistake tying the knot. And honestly, the fear of making a mistake is one of the most common phobias these days.
#4
For years it was because of my depression and untreated ADHD. I was miserable but frozen.
He’s also a hoarder and I let myself fall into those habits and the house is a disaster. I’m working to clean out the worst of the mess (at least the parts I can have some say in) and cut back on my personal belongings, so I can assess the state of the house and have it possibly be sellable. (I owned it before we got married.)
It feels like every time I get to some place I can start doing things, something knocks me back down. (e.g. me getting cancer, my mental health, him losing four jobs in two years and being home all the time, etc.) Sometimes it all seems incredibly overwhelming and I get frozen trying to start. I don’t really have a support network - my family is small and far away, and I don’t have any friends close enough to ask for the help I need. I have a good therapist though.
Ouch. I haven’t said any of this out loud in so long that I’m crying now and I haven’t been able to cry for a while. I’m so miserable and just feel so stuck.
#5
When you have a disabled child, you need four hands on deck. She truly needs us both, so we are forced to make it work. She’s happy and that’s all we want.
#6
I love my kids more than I hate my wife. Our relationship isn't toxic, she actually seems to care for me a bit still, but I just don't feel like I can depend on her for anything and I can't stand talking to her. That's a big deal to me because I always imagined a wife as a best friend who'd help me and who I'd help achieve whatever it is we wanted to do or be. That being said, we don't fight, we're just not close, and after years of marriage counseling I'm certain we're not going to be close.
If I have to endure that to see my kids everyday I will. That might be selfish of me, but they really are just the absolute coolest things I've ever experienced and it kills me to imagine missing any more of them than work already takes away.
In 2023, Pew Research surveyed Americans about why people stay in unhappy marriages. The survey data showed that Americans are more likely to believe that people stay in unhappy marriages too long (55%) than that such couples break up too often (43%). Women were slightly more likely than men to hold this view – 58% versus 52%.
But a survey is more like an observation – a snapshot of facts – than a deep-dive analysis. But this dedicated article, published on Psychology Today, analyzes the reasons. The study's authors identify five main groups of reasons for staying in an unhappy marriage: money, fear, shame and social pressure, children, and hope for the best (sometimes illusory).
Each of these factors plays its part. Even if your unloved spouse isn’t a Rockefeller, divorce still feels like jumping from a stable life into financial uncertainty. Fear plays a role, too – like fear of failing in a new relationship or just being alone. So, isn’t it easier to just stay with the person you hate but are used to?
#7
When you stay stuck up with each other for years and years you will become Co-dependant. All the times me and my ex wife fought and one of us left we'd come right back even knowing well we weren't going to get better, we came back because we've been together for Soo long that being away from them feels wrong even if it was the right thing to do.
#8
Child of this dynamic here.
My mother has told me verbatim: “I’m scared I’ll be alone, and never find happiness without him.” Note that she has never lived alone, and has always had a partner in her adult life. I’m much the same… Generational trauma? Except I don’t hate my partner.
My father is just… Not interested in change. He’s simply content to just be. To live in malcontent. He goes to work, he goes home, and in between they might talk. They tried counseling once, when I was very very young.
Mom describes her relationship with him as having a roommate she’s married to. She’s too scared of being alone to leave. No amount of children or dogs or career changes have made their relationship ‘work’ beyond being an (faulty) outlet for each other. Their ‘love’ is only what they share love for: the children, the pets, the people around them… but not each other.
She has asked me before if she thinks they still love each other and I’m always honest. I say I think they have a deep bond, made with years of parenting and living together; but I don’t feel any love between them.
They’re in a trap of their own making.
#9
My former boss can't stand her husband- he retired early and discovered a taste for alcohol and bickering- but they can't afford to divorce. So they're stuck in the same house, and they're been ignoring each other for over a decade.
We’ve already talked about social stigma and shame, but when it comes to illusions and hoping for the best, that’s just human nature. We're still inclined to believe in the best, even when there's no real reason to believe so. But hey, maybe this fight was the last one, and now everything’s gonna be okay! Sound familiar? Yeah, same here.
But if the marriage has already produced kids, then the last reason comes into play. And perhaps the most influential one. Because parental instincts run deep, as Mel Schwartz, L.C.S.W., points out in his Psychology Today article.
At the same time, often living in a family where the parents have an unhealthy marriage harms children far more than the parents' divorce and all the ensuing consequences. Kids often unconsciously copy their parents’ relationships, so a “bad marriage” can actually be way worse than a “good divorce,” the author says.
#10
My sister is staying for the kid, but she doesn't delude herself it's for the kid's sake, she knows it's because she doesn't want to give up any time with them and miss out on half their life. She only has the one, and won't be having another.
I think eventually they'll break, neither of them is happy and nothing will change. But I can understand why she doesn't want him out of the house. Even if they split time with the kid weekly and live around the corner from each other, she's still gonna miss stuff.
#12
Cultural ramifications could be one reason.
The country my parents were from, it is just something you didn't do. My uncle ended up getting divorced and his father disowned him for it
My parents also really should have divorced** but never did, even after telling them that I wouldn't judge them if they did since no one was happy lol
Edit: fixed the typo 'survived' into 'divorced'.
By the way, Mel Schwartz also points out that sometimes people shift their insecurities and fears onto their kids. In doing so, they effectively shift responsibility onto their offspring, protecting them from blame, both to themselves and to others. Needless to say, that kind of hypocrisy usually doesn’t end well.
Often, parents unconsciously blame their kids for not having the courage to take the final step and for staying in a toxic relationship. They begin to accuse the kids of supposedly "ruining their lives." But in reality, it’s way more complicated than that.
#13
I’m the child of divorced parents, and I’ve seen what actually happens. People talk about divorce like it’s ripping off the band-aid, and you have a difficult situation for a short time.
Not true. Unless you’re very well-off, divorce knocks your kids down a rung on the socioeconomic ladder. Solidly middle class? Well, you’re lower middle class now. Lower middle class before, making it work? Well, maybe you’ll be able to make it work when you’ve got one person’s income paying for your place, and maybe you won’t. For parents who went through a lot (and were lucky enough) to give their kids a sound financial situation with a real future, that’s not something you just throw away. I’m just not putting my kids into the situation I was put into.
Separately, things are (slowly) getting a bit better with my spouse, which is reinforcing what I’ve heard about marriage having some good years and some bad years, with ups and downs and each partner thriving at different times. Maybe storming out when my spouse was at their most stressed wasn’t the smart and mature solution everyone on here would have you believe.
#14
I was one. A consultant gave me a technical name for my problem. it was you feel responsible for the partner who you think needs you to protect her. I can't remember the technical term. I was living with a demon.
#15
My kids aren’t school age yet and I don’t make enough money for child care while I work. I don’t know how I’m going to figure it out. But I am miserable.
Every year in the US, over 1.5 million people get divorced, but stats don’t – and probably never will – know how many folks grit their teeth and stay with someone they’ve long stopped loving for years or even decades.
They might think they’re being heroic or making a sacrifice, but honestly, who really knows? So, what do you, our dear readers, think about all this? Please feel free to share your thoughts in the comments below.
#16
Not me, but my parents. Money and old age keeps a lot of people together who don’t love/like each other.
#18
I grew up on a lower economic rung and for me. Financial security > happiness.
Also I'm married to an adult that never learned to support themselves. In my jurisdiction that means alimony. They have some money but it's all from an inheritance, but that wouldn't soften the financial blow on my end and the money probably won't last very long. I was in the hospital for a week once and the only reason why all the money in their accounts wasn't scammed was because they hadn't/couldn't set up Zelle.
TLDR, fear, sense of responsibility, laziness (in that order).
#19
I hated my toxic spouse at the end, even though I still loved him, but I stayed way longer than I should for two reasons. Extremely high cost-of-living where I live, and fear of leaving him alone with the children. When we were together, I was always there to step in and de-escalate things, and I had to do it several times a week. Even after the divorce, it highly influenced my life because I felt that it was important to move walking distance from my ex so that the kids could run away to my house when they needed to and they've used it on several occasions. Somebody with less economic resources might be in a real bind.
From his perspective, I can't figure out why he stayed with me at all because he obviously hated me and he never even loved me in the first place. But I provided a lot of added value to his life so that was probably nice.
#20
The following explanation is based on a couple I grew up with, not my previous marriage:
He would have taken everything from her including the kids he mistreated, and she would have had to go back to her family in shame (her family loved and things like emotional and verbal harassment were tolerated culturally-women were expected to be submissive and serve their husbands). He was extremely religious and people don’t divorce in his religion. She didn’t have a job or way to support herself and the kids. At a certain point, she was too dependent on him and had no friends other than the ones he approved of (no support system).
And then there were the years of gaslighting, breadcrumbing, and all the other popular terms that essentially indicate toxic behaviors that eroded her self esteem. At a certain point, I asked her why she didn’t leave-we couldn’t have conversations in the house because he was always listening into conversations even on the phone-and she said that it wasn’t that bad and she’d put in this much time so it wasn’t worth the fight. Essentially, she’d given up.
The funniest thing in the world to me is that he asked me one time (just a few years before she was gone) if she hated him. I didn’t know if she hated him, and she wasn’t the type of person to hate anything. So I answered honestly and said no. But I did wonder to myself how you could be with someone for 40 years and not know if they hated you.
#21
Not me, but I've observed a few people in this situation.
A lot of it is financial, especially in recent years. They can't afford to live by themselves or don't have the ability to move in with family. If kids are involved, they have the added financial pressure of them as well. Religion plays a big part in some marriages, too. It's more accepted nowadays, but still a shameful act.
But I think the biggest reason is not wanting the change. Whether it's for the kids, their own well-being, or simply not wanting to "waste" their invested time together, they would rather stick it out in a hated marriage than have to start over. They've built their life around their spouse and originally planned to keep it that way. They don't want to have to redo everything they've already done with a new person who may or may not be "better" than their current spouse. It's scary to go through, so might as well handle their normal and deal with some resentment than go through a lot of unknown. I don't agree with it as it's far more obvious than they realize, but that's just my theory.
#22
Because I don't hate her. I hate her depression. I hate being the one to do all the chores around the house. I hate being the one to have to shoulder the stress of bills. I hate being the only one who cooked and does dishes. But I don't hate her. I love my wife. I love my family. I do everything I can to make them happy and try to do what's right for them. It may put a lot on me, it may eat up all my time and it may annoy me to ko end. But I can't imagine my life being any other way.
#23
A lot of time it's about split finances. Like my mother-in-law kinda hates my father-in-law. But she wouldn't be able to afford To live if she wasn't in a relationship with her husband.
Is same with my aunt. If she could realistically afford to leave my uncle and know he wouldn't be destitute. She probably would.
I don't think my dad is loved either of his wives. I think he married my mom or a green card and was just gonna stick it out. Until things got real bad between them because my mom's a psycho.
And I think he married my stepmom cause he got her pregnant. She is also a psycho, But she is at least a 1000 times more competent than my mom at every basic life skill.
He absolutely stays with her because she handles basically everything for them.
I don't think my stepmother is happy. But that's because she has so much childhood truma going on be kinda hard to think anyone could make her happy.
And my dad rather have her handle everything in his life then find happiness.
#24
Some people just need to rant in a neutral setting which can give a false impression of the relationship.
I love my wife and wouldn’t want to risk changing anything in our relationship, but it annoys me when she doesn’t clear up. Instead of upsetting her over a minor annoyance, I might rant at work to feel better. Work colleagues might think we don’t get on, but actually everything’s great 🤷♂️.
#25
I'm not personally. But I think I understand why some of these people feel this way.
I am a person who loves to live alone. I want to run my house the way I want to. I want to decorate how I want. I want to do things on my schedule. For example I don't want someone else telling me to do the dishes at night when I do them in the morning, or someone deciding that they're doing the laundry when they want to and not letting me do my laundry on my schedule (which is every other week).
I understand I'm like this and I need a partner who is willing to accept this. My perfect situation has my partner and I living in neighboring apartments so we each have our own space.
But some people, particularly people of older generations, aren't allowed to just be like this. They have to fit themselves into a mold, and if you're someone who is like me but you're forcing yourself to be what is considered "normal" then I can see how you'd end up resenting the person you're with.
Especially if it starts to feel like your partner has become another parent.
#26
Sometimes, it isn't practical. I knew divorcing my spouse was not tenable for her or the kids, and I could reasonably predict the bad outcomes.
I was right. Even years of preparing her and trying to make her ready failed. I went so far into preparing her I taught her how to shut water off and left instructions on how to handle water leak and she botched that one.
I have been helping her handle crisis after crisis. I just recently had to drive her around because she lost driving privileges due to another in a long series of accidents.
She was the petitioner in the divorce primarily over parenting disputes and could not manage our adopted son. The first week we split she dumped him at her parents house.
I stepped back in over objections of my attorney who felt I waa setting myself up for child support for a child not biologically mine or hers (nephew).
I wish I was making all or any of it up. It's a train wreck and maybe I am wrong for divorcing her after she tried to rescind the divorce she filed.
#27
Hate is a strong word, but I've been in an unhappy marriage for 20 years. Stuck around for the kids, for our religion, a great number of reasons... but not each other.
We did 6+ months of couples therapy before I finally said I've had enough and asked for a divorce. Now everyone on Earth is questioning the decision, and my wife is acting like I blindsided her when I was upfront about this possibility multiple times throughout our therapy.
Divorce is hard. It's painful enough that I can see why people would stick to the known discomfort of their marriage rather than going through with it.
#28
Because without me, she would be homeless. Not because she can't earn a living, but because she refuses to (she refers to people who work as "peasants", which is hilarious because she's never been wealthy in her life).
Currently in the divorce process. Stopped caring.
#29
Wife would take (kidnap) my daughter to Japan, her birth country, and I would have no way to get my kid back because of the wonderful laws and government of Japan.
Happened a lot to french fathers (I'm from France).
#30
Should have asked me that 5 years ago. I stayed around for the kids, thinking it was for the best. Learned otherwise eventually.
#31
I think some people don’t actually hate their spouses but have a hard time shifting perspectives or learning how to communicate or grow with eachother tbh. Work is required in marriages and some people don’t have the energy nor want to dig deep and make changes to be with someone.
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What do you think ?
Michael Largey 32 minutes ago
When a couple stays together "for the kids", it's often as much as for financial reasons as emotional ones.
Michael Largey 32 minutes ago
When a couple stays together "for the kids", it's often as much as for financial reasons as emotional ones.
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