Your husband has a very full life. Most men do. He is likely to juggle a full-time career, his responsibilities as a parent, and his commitment to you. You do the same in your life, but you feel like you’ve always made your husband a priority, even though he hasn’t done the same for you. You are frustrated, disappointed, and maybe even a little confused. You never imagined that your life would end in this place, did you? You feel unappreciated, taken for granted, and unloved. Obviously, this situation has to change. You’re not going to achieve that by making subtle comments about how your best friend’s husband loves and adores her. It also won’t make any difference if you scold your husband in an effort to get him to the top of his priority list. You have to approach this problem in a way that makes your husband realize that you are the most important person in his life. Understanding the direction you need to take to achieve that starts with learning more about why you are acting that way.
On the day you and your husband were married, you promised many things to each other both verbally and silently. For most women, one of the most important and silent vows is to always put each other at the top of life’s priority list. We as women almost always do that with our spouses. We can hesitate a bit when we become mothers, mainly because our fatherly nature kicks in and we focus all our attention on our little ones. However, with men the story tends to be a bit different. Men sometimes let their work or friends take over the billing. If you are a wife who is beginning to notice that change in your husband’s life, it will finally hurt.
Changing your husband’s attitude so that you become the focal point of his life is not as difficult as you think. You’ve probably already tried talking to him about the problem. In most cases, when a husband confronts a wife who says she feels abandoned, he will take a defensive stance and attack. You can say things about how you work so hard for her or how you can never do anything to make her happy. This is to be expected and any woman who has had this conversation with her husband more than once knows that it is a normal reaction, so do not take it personally.
You absolutely must take a more subtle approach. Your husband reacts better to actions than to words. Most men do. They will make a change in themselves if they feel something internally instead of being told something. This is why it can be incredibly helpful if you temporarily stop paying as much attention to your husband as you have been. You should not take the position of pushing him to the bottom of your priority list, but see him as getting other things ahead of him for a time and with a very definite purpose.
The simplest and least significant things are the best. That is, if your husband expects you to have dinner ready when you come home from the office, he should be greeted with a frozen dinner and a note saying he wanted to go see a movie with a girlfriend. Another great way to get your point across is to stop doing so many things around the house. If you neglect your husband’s clothes because you are too busy shopping online for a new handbag, he will feel the pinch of your negligence.
Many women may see this as a game with their spouse, but sometimes the path to a man’s heart is through sports. It is doubtful that your husband made a conscious effort to remove her from his priority list. You are more likely to have let other things take precedence without thinking. By showing him how you feel, you will push him to see that there is a better and more respectful way to be a loving and caring partner.
