...but I love him. ???

Something I am reading over the years on this board is "...but I love him."  This, after atrocious stories of not communicating, irresponsibility, ignoring, sometimes mean things the writer has written about the person they "love".  I understand this but I no longer say this is true for me.  In these cases, LOVE is not love but NEED and DENIAL....and grasping for hope.  Fantasy thinking.  

I needed my H to be the person I wanted him to be because I didn't know how else to live other than my own vision of how my life should go....that is happy marriage, happy intact family.  I was willing to do the work and sacrifice but he was not.  My willingness to love him in spite of the uncaring activities he was showing actually made him lose respect for me and treat me like I was invisible.

H and I come from different family-ways-of-communicating.  My family is more subtle and empathic and serious.  His is more cussing and confrontation and jokey.  This also led us to our situation of me resenting him and his disinterest in me and marriage. I want more security.  He wants more fun and independence without the constraints of commitment.

So now, when I read anyone saying, "....but I love him" after an atrocious story about the actions of their spouse, I want to tell you, "No, you don't love him.  You are AFRAID to NOT love for many reasons.  Some of the reasons are your own.....fear, lack of support, lack of options, lack of self confidence."  I accidentally wrote "afraud" instead of afraid there at first.  But this is true too. When we tell ourselves and our spouses that we LOVE them.  We are being a fraud.  We are living our own lies (by not accepting the truth) and stuffing those lies down our own throats because we are afraid of the truth. Afraid of retribution. Afraid of our own decisions.  The truth is that we have been harmed and nothing we do is going to change the situation or the relationship while we continue to submit ourselves to the relationship that is not serving us. We need to grow up and take responsibility for our own actions and find our own way of integrity and contentment.

Before you write here, "...but I love him."  Stop and consider getting a counselor for yourself.  It is what I am doing.  Why was I thinking/feeling I HAD to LOVE while being so mistreated?  The realizations are a scary place to go but nothing will change if you keep LOVING someone who does not make you feel like you are LOVED but make you feel invisible and crazy. Nothing will change if you don't accept that when your spouse is not appreciating you, is ignoring you, is not communicating with you, is lying to you, is making you feel crazy.....THIS IS NOT A LOVING RELATIONSHIP.

My nod to those of you who are BOTH trying hard and loving each other.  I am speaking to the many spouses spoken of on this forum whose mates lash out at spouses or who have a spouse is showing they just don't love.  I am not preaching.  I am one of them.