Getting married is more or less like starting a career, or trying to get a degree from the university or polytechnic. It is easy to get married, but it is certain that there will be challenges in the marriage and you have to stay in the marriage for the long term and make it a success.
There are definitely going to be misunderstandings, arguments, disagreements, and conflicts in the marriage. It is the way that you handle and composes you in those situations that will prove how willing you are to put effort into making the marriage work. There are going to be hurdles and storms in the marriage, but you have to overcome them. Below are the strategies that you will need to overcome and restore your marriage-
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1. Admit you no longer have control
The first thing to do while restoring a marriage is to admit defeat. You should admit that you are in a storm and you cannot do anything. Acknowledge the fact that you are powerless and you cannot continue fighting your way out. Admit that you cannot manage your marriage problems and issues on your own. This means you have to recognize the ineffectiveness of your attempts to change your and also your spouse’s faults.
You come to the reality that you are fundamentally powerless to control or change your spouse, his or her wrongs, and many other things that happen in your marriage.
Read More: 6 Step Guide For How to Fix & Save a Broken Marriage
2. Re-adjust your expectations
Almost all marriages encounter problems and challenge sooner or later. Some marital problems and challenges can be predicted and avoided while others cannot be foreseen, and must be dealt with and resolved as they arise.
Marital problems and challenges are complex and there are no easy ways out or quick solutions. If the problems have been occurring over a long period of time, the marriage may be at a point of crisis. A marriage in crisis will be very painful to go through, but that does not mean the relationship should end.
Read More: Useful Tips to Repair an Unhappy Relationship
In an unhappy marriage, the root of unhappiness is a lack of unconditional love and acceptance for each other. Unhappiness is caused in a relationship when you cannot accept your spouse for who he or she is. Controlling, demanding and unrealistic expectations from your spouse are just symptoms that cause unhappiness. When we stop seeing marriage as an obligation for our partner to fill our expectations and desires, and we see it as an opportunity to accept our spouse for who he or she is, happiness is guaranteed to be restored. To restore a relationship or a marriage, you have to re-adjust your expectations, desires and wants in the marriage.
3. Focus on changing yourself not your partner
You should know that you can’t change someone else. You can only change yourself. Trying to change your spouse will create tension and grief in your relationship and actually discourage him or her from changing. Even if your spouse did change, he or she wouldn’t feel very happy about the relationship until you made some changes yourself.
Personally, you don’t like to be pressured, fixed, directed, controlled, or manipulated to change. Trying to change your spouse will likely cause him or her to feel grieved, discouraged, anxious, and angry, which will make him or her to back away from you and resist you.
If you want to restore your marriage it is vital that you accept responsibility for your own mistakes, actions, inactions, behaviours in the relationship rather than putting the blame on your spouse and demanding your spouse to change.
4. Demand for support
As it is said earlier, you cannot change or restore your relationship on your own. You will definitely need help from friends, family experts and so on. Accept help from family, friends, your church members, staff, and others for whatever you need to make the marriage work.
You can both decide to go to a marriage therapist to put you through the restoration process. Going to the therapist for help is even more advisable because while at a marriage therapy, you get to learn more about your spouse, you get to know the problems in the relationship and know how to resolve them and most of all absorb wisdom from the therapist.
5. Rebuild trust
Trust is the most important ingredient in a marriage relationship. It takes a very short time to destroy trust someone has for you and a much longer time to rebuild it. Rebuilding trust requires that you consistently monitor your behaviour, being very careful how you treat each other. Rebuilding trust in an unhappy marriage is the major key in restoring a relationship. If you want to restore your marriage you need the key!
6. Meet your spouse’s most important emotional needs
To restore a marriage, you have to give attention to your spouse, treat him or her with respect, show sincere appreciation, ask for his or her approval before making decisions, fulfill his or her sexual needs, show support, assure him or her of comfort and security.
