When a Man Withdraws

Join me in welcoming Karissa Strovas to Adding Zest today...

We have all watched our husband’s heart break at one time or another. But men are strong and they don’t always have the words to express the way they feel - even when we would really like them to try. They don’t always have the freedom to express what they are feeling or thinking especially if they don’t feel like their wife will respond well. I am beginning to see that I’ve wasted far too much time not responding well.

A few years ago, as my husbands’ job (as a pastor) was getting increasingly difficult. With leadership changes and responsibility getting shifted around, he slowly quit sharing his heart with me. He felt stuck there because of our growing family and the beginning of our declining job market. He felt deeply the need to continue providing for our family. At the time I was too wounded by his shutting me out to realize what was taking place. I took it all personally and eventually quit trying to engage him. I spewed angry words, was physically distant and emotionally detached because…so was he.

Through counseling and miracles that only God could have orchestrated, we are still married. One piece I am just beginning to see is that when he stepped back because he was really struggling, I stepped back too-especially in the realm of physical connection. Then one step became five and suddenly we were on a slippery slope headed to a broken marriage.

If, in his pain and struggle, I had resolved not to take everything personally and instead I had continued to step forward to him – I do not believe we would have ended up where we did.

I am no veteran of marriage, 11 years in this May. But I am learning a great deal along the way and one key thing I see is that when I see struggle and heartache in the one I love, I need to pursue him in his pain. If I choose to leave him alone, to disengage and let him drift – it will have far reaching ramifications. Though I may like to think it was his fault, I will in fact have made a choice and be partly responsible for it.

It is one of the hardest and most unnatural things to do. To offer my physical self to my husband when I don’t feel like he cares is to be tremendously vulnerable. And it can be taken advantage of for sure. But when you know, as I do, that you are married to a good-hearted man who deep down is truly for you and loves you, it can have an amazing influence on the course of your union.

This January my husband encountered a new and deepest pain. He was the first one to find his father drowned in a small lake while on a hunting trip. There truly are no words for this kind of tragic loss and heartache. It is a wound that will never fully heal. We are still picking up the pieces and trying to understand. Again through this process, I have had a choice to make. Only this time I can see it more clearly. When he is discouraged and sad and asking God some seriously hard questions, he may not be fun to be around. My response however, is still my responsibility.

Just last week I lit candles in our room, went to deliberate effort to let him know I was available to him. He got upset by something quite small I had said and before he even made it into our room, I had blown out the candles, covered my face with a pillow and gone to sleep. My feelings were hurt and it was hard. Something similar took place another night that week. God gently reminded me of everything I shared above. I saw the choice before me and when he came home early from work Friday, I took still another step toward him and he was tenderly receptive to my gift.

What is shared in the bedroom will not heal or mend his heart. What his heart is feeling, I truly cannot understand. But as we walk this path of grief, God is showing me so clearly how important it is for me to still engage and still say yes to love. It is one of the ways we will make it to the other side of this season.

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Karissa Strovas...
I am a Jesus-loving, homeschooling mother of four spirited young children and wife to one incredible husband. After ten years in ministry and eleven years of marriage, my husband and I are in the midst of a new journey. He is now working outside the church while we are a part of a new church plant in our area. We have encountered some pretty overwhelming challenges in our barely 30 years of age. I am learning daily to live out God’s radical promise in Romans 8:28 “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” I have watched this verse in action and am still in awe of God’s ability to use every single thread of my life for His good.
Karissa blogs at Table for Six