Transcription
There are few experiences more lonely than being in a bad marriage. It's like sitting next to a time bomb, where the clock is ticking, but you don't know when it's going to go off. You can feel the anticipation that something is about to happen, but it could happen at any time, without warning, and suddenly your entire life gets blown up.
Today, I'm going to go through 15 different clues, signs that your marriage is about to fail. We're also going to talk about the situations when these clues are more likely to appear. I think the more you know about what's going on in your life and what you can anticipate, the better you're going to be able to plan for it. There's nothing worse than being that poor, unexpected, unexpecting sap who just gets slammed with divorce papers out of the blue and wondering what the hell happened. Yeah, you do not want to be that guy, so let's talk about it.
So, there are some key times in your marriage when you're more likely to experience some of these experiences, these incidents. Um, anytime there's some stress—and we'll get into that—like when children come into the marriage, or there's financial stress, or I don't know, just living together stress; that can definitely initiate some of these incidents that are going to be clues that your marriage is failing. Um, opportunities—which seems like an unlikely scenario—but when an opportunity comes along where maybe she's making more money, or she has a new job, or you have a new job, starting a business, something along those lines, is going to disrupt your daily rhythm and may perhaps create opportunities for one or the other of you to excel at a time, but maybe the other one isn't excelling; that can create an occurrence or a time for these things to happen. And then, um, then finally, after your children grow up. So when the children grow up and they're either on the way out the house, or they've already left the house, that's the other time. So these are disruptors that cause these incidents that are indications that your marriage is about to fail to kind of happen almost automatically. So you've got to keep your eyes open around these times, and there are things you can do to kind of prevent these occurrences by seeing the occasion when it comes up; you know, when the opportunity shows up for someone to make more money, or get a better job, or start a business, or something along those lines, that's an opportunity for marriages to falter, so you need to kind of put your radar on and really keep an eye out.
When a baby comes into the world, when you're bringing a new life into the world, frequently women stress out to the max. First of all, there's sleep deprivation, which creates a ton of stress. Secondly, there's a lot of social pressure on her to be a good mom, and whatever that means to anybody at any given time is anybody's guess. And so women, for whatever reason, think that if they don't meet this standard, this mythical standard of what a good mom is, then it's your fault. Um, and then finally, when your children grow up and leave, it creates—it opens a window for either of you to leave the marriage because now you feel like you're no longer responsible for these children, and if you want to get out, now's the time to get out. So if you know these things can happen at these times, you know, just kind of put your radar on, and if you want to save your marriage, you need to take steps to do that. You need to start opening up the communication; you need to start, you know, doing what you can to save it. But quite honestly, most of the time, by the time these occurrences start happening, uh, you'll see what I mean; the marriage is already—it's already—already out the door; it's already a problem to begin with.
The first indication that you're going to get that there is some problem in your marriage is you're going to hear the words—and these are the classics—these three words are going to change your life more than any other three words: "I'm not happy." When you hear that, that is the enormous red flag, and I'm not so sure that you can do anything about it, quite honestly. Because if you're hearing those words from your wife, she is implying that it's your fault that she's not happy, and if that's the case, you've married the wrong woman. Now you might be able to talk her through it; you might be able to talk sense into her and help her understand about internal locus of control, that she's responsible for her own happiness and that you can't do anything about it. And if she's not happy, she should get therapy or take some anti-anxiety drugs or something. But women tend to not be happy because they have a very high level of neurosis compared to men; women have a very low tolerance for stress. Um, and so when things in a relationship get a little bit stressful, as they frequently do, or they get boring, as they frequently do, women's neurosis kicks in, and there is this tendency to focus on the negative. Um, I think that as human beings we have been like pre-programmed to see negativity, and so we have this negative bias in our lives, and women with their neurosis are doubly focused on the negative. And then, in addition to that, we have this confirmation bias, so they immediately see the negative; they have a thought about it, like "it's got to be that asshole's fault that I'm not happy," and then they find evidence to back it up: "Oh, look at him sitting on the couch; oh, look at him, he didn't take the trash out today; oh, he's not doing this; he's not doing that." One thing leads to another, and she has convinced herself that you are the problem, and there is very little that you can do. By the time she comes out and says, you know, "something, I'm not happy," and really what I'm saying is "I'm not happy and it's your fault and you need to do something to change," but unfortunately, no matter what you do—and I'm telling you this from really firsthand, profound, lifelong experience—there is nothing you can do to make her happy, and I have tried everything; I have tried everything, and it's impossible. So just FYI, if she comes at you with "I'm not happy," that's your first sign that things are about to come to an end.
So, as I mentioned with the "I'm not happy," there comes criticism and judgment. So when she decides that she's not happy and she's deciding that it's your fault, you're going to get some criticism and some judgment. So if you have a hobby or something that you enjoy doing with your free time, you're going to get some criticism for not doing whatever she thinks you should be doing with your free time to make her happy, and you're going to be judged for prioritizing that thing in your life over her, or whatever it is that she thinks you should be doing. That's the second sign, so just watch out for it, because it's going to come as soon as you hear the "I'm not happy"; you're going to get the criticism and the judgment, I promise you. And then the third thing you're going to hear is "it's your fault; you're the reason why I'm not happy; you're the reason why our marriage isn't working; you're the reason why we're not financially doing better; you—it's your fault that this has happened; it's your fault that that's happened." This is just the way they think. First of all, I don't know why it is, but it does seem to be almost a meme; it's so true: women have a very difficult time accepting responsibility for their own experience, and I don't know why that is. It seems so easy for most men to just say, "Yeah, I messed up, now here I am, living in my own whatever, we get through it." Women just don't seem to have that ability, and I have no idea why that is, but you're definitely going to get blamed for this, so just prepare yourself.
The next stage in this little drama is going to be "we need to talk." "We need to talk about our relationship," which really means "I need to tell you what you're doing wrong, and you need to tell me what you're going to do to fix it." That's what "we need to talk" means; that's just the code for "we need to talk," so just expect that. If you start hearing her saying "we need to have a conversation about our relationship" or something like that, then yeah, that's what's going to happen. Then the next thing that comes along is "we need counseling; we need some therapy," that means "I need someone else to tell you what you need to do to make me happy." I swear to God, I know this sounds ridiculous and funny, but I swear to God that's exactly what it is: it's just "I'm going to hire somebody, usually a woman therapist, and I'm going to sit there; I'm going to tell this therapist how what a you are, and then she's going to tell you what a you are, and then we're both going to tell you what you need to do to change to make her happy." This is just—I don't know how this happens; I don't know how this—I don't how insurance companies pay for this crap; I mean, it's just insane, but that's what she's expecting. Now every once in a while you'll get a good therapist who will turn around and say, "No, I'm sorry, honey, you're—you're wrong, and he's right, and you need to fix yourself." Now if that happens—now you've hit the—you've hit the button here; the bomb's going off—because now she's going to think that um you're just a really good communicator and you convinced that therapist and you lied to her and you told her things that weren't true and you—you two ganged up on me. I had this happen several times in therapy, where we hired some—we did the—we went to therapy like three or four times, and all the therapists came to the same conclusion that she needed to fix herself, and she just hated that. So it got to the point toward the end of our relationship, she did not want to go see another therapist because she felt like my ability to communicate was undermining her telling her side of the story, and I don't think that's what it was; I think it was just that her side of the story didn't make sense to anybody, and three different therapists basically said that to her. But that was not a reason for her to turn inward and think, "What can I do to change this situation?" She still continued to point her finger at me all the way up to the very last minute. So therapy probably isn't going to work, just FYI. If she says "I need to go to therapy" or "we need to go to therapy," it's not going to work. And now, if she goes to therapy, you might see some benefits, but the chances are it's not going to work.
So all those things together kind of fall into phase one. The next phase is you're going to start being excluded from her life. So she's going to go visit her mother or her family or whatever, and you're not going to be invited. Now you probably don't want to go anyway, so it's an easy one for you to kind of opt out of, but this—this is going to happen repeatedly, where she's going to go see her family; you're not invited; she might even take the kids. Now initially you think, "Oh, this is great; I got a free weekend; I'm on my own," but this is just the precursor to her telling you that you got to go, so just prepare yourself; this is a red flag; this is the next stage in this drama unfolding on your behalf. She's going to start hanging out with friends a lot more, away from the house, and again, since she's not there bitching at you, whining and complaining about whatever, you're thinking, "Okay, well at least she's happy, so I don't need to worry about making her happy." Again, even if I'm left with the kids, it's much better than having her sitting around here, you know, moping and being sad and grumpy all the time. So yeah, let her go hang out with her friends, but—but again, this is just another sign; she's on her way out, or you are on your way out, I guess, and she's just getting there reinforcement; she's talking to them, and they're telling her how good she is and how she shouldn't be putting up with this stuff and—and how "you go, girl; you go, girl." That's what she—that's what she's going to hear from them. Yeah, they all want to sabotage her; she doesn't know it; she thinks they're being supportive, but they're all thinking, "This idiot; she's going to be divorced; she's going to be sad; she's single; she's going to be middle-aged; nobody's ever going to want to date her again." And they're all thinking, "Ah—" I mean, I don't think they overtly think that, but I think they covertly do; I think they covertly are undermining their friends because women are just competitive that way, and seeing another woman go down kind of makes them all feel a little bit better about themselves, 'cause they all have this low self-esteem problem, but I'm being a little too general there, but you know what I mean. So yeah, she's going to be spending a lot of time with her friends. Then, um, separate vacations; that's the next one. Yeah, you're going to be given the opportunity to take your own vacations, and you're going to think, "Ah, this is great; I can go hang out with my friends; we can go do this; we can—you go fishing; we can go on a hunting trip," whatever it is, but at the end of the day, it's just her getting you out of her life so she can go take her own vacation. Now this is an opportunity for her to have a relationship without you, so you just need to prep yourself for that because that's probably what's happening. So once the separate vacations happen, it's just a matter of time before you're looking at separate bedrooms, so just prepare yourself. If she gives you some excuse about just needing some privacy and thinking that'll help with the relationship, yeah, it's not; she's done with you, and—and the next thing you're going to hear—and this is sort of like the nail in the coffin—is "I don't want to have sex anymore." So the affection is going to dry up, and you may have already noticed this; you may be getting less hugs and kisses, less, you know, greetings and—and goodbye kisses, that sort of thing. Um, yeah, but then the sex kind of dries up, and that really is the death nail; that's when you really know that this thing is over. Now you guys can go ahead and pretend that you're just hanging in there and you're going to work it out and all that stuff, but it's very unlikely that's going to happen; in fact, I would just about guarantee that it's just a matter of time before she gets enough encouragement from all of her friends and family to finally tell you that she doesn't want to be married to you anymore and that this relationship is done. So just—just kind of brace yourself, 'cause that's—that's the next thing that's going to happen.
So if you start seeing, um, you know, if there's been a job change or a career change and she starts spending a lot more time at work, um, that's a—that's a sign that she obviously doesn't want to be with you, but it may also be a sign that she's having an affair. Um, if you start seeing encrypted—encryption apps on her phone, like Snapchat and—I can't remember what they are, but there's a whole bunch of them where you can send encrypted text messages and delete them really quickly—WhatsApp, that kind of thing—you—that's an indication that she may have something else going on on the side. And—and she seems particularly happy and cheery all of a sudden, just out of the blue, for no good reason, after being really down on you and down on the marriage, and now she's suddenly happy and enthused; there's probably another man in her life. Just—just know it; just know that that's the case, um, and—and just brace yourself; just prepare—you know, start talking to a lawyer; start getting some advice; talk to your friends; talk to your family; start making arrangements because you're probably going to need a place to stay on short notice, and you're—you're going to have to move out, and it may not come with a lot of opportunity for you to make choices, so you better make those arrangements ahead of time. If she says she has a separate account, or you find out that she has a separate account where she's just stashing away money—I remember my ex-wife did that, and she said, "Well, I'm just doing that just in case of an emergency," and I was like, "Well, what kind of emergency would you have that I wouldn't have? I mean, that seems really odd." She says, "Well, I just need to feel like I have some control and power over money in my life," 'cause she was always, you know, infrequently working, and the money she made was not nearly enough to support her or anyone for that matter. But um, yeah, a separate account where she's stashing away cash, that's definitely a red flag. And then if you start noticing money missing mysteriously from your accounts, or charges that you can't explain, things that just don't seem to make sense, um, that's a huge—huge flag. Like you see a big withdrawal from the savings account, anything like that; that means it's imminent; that means you're about to get the word. Um, I would set some kind of an indication, like on your bank accounts, that if any withdrawal over say like $5,000 or something like that, that you—are notified, that you get some of a text message or something like that; a lot of banks will do that for you. That way, in the event that she's starting to pull her stunt, um, you have indication that it's happening and you can start making arrangements. In fact, it might make a lot of sense if you start seeing these indicators popping up that you create an account just in your name, separate from her, at a separate bank, um, and start stashing away money for yourself, because it's not uncommon for women just to clear out all the bank accounts and then tell you to leave, like, "Now what are you going to do? Like what the—you don't even have any money to get a hotel room." Yeah, so—um, yeah, just be really, really careful because often times women will go for the jug; they will not be screwing around, because you got to remember she's been talking to her family and her friends and everybody else; she's been reading the internet; she's been, you know, listening to all these TikTokers telling about how evil their husbands are and like that, and—um, she's going to go for it all, you know. So—so just prepare yourself; do not allow these indications to accumulate without you taking action to prepare for it and to—to protect yourself from what's about to happen, because there's nothing worse than—um, getting the word that you're done, that your relationship is over, that your services are no longer required, and then when you go to check in at a hotel or rent a car or something, you know, on your own, you find out that all your credit cards are canceled and you don't have any money. Yeah, that's how homelessness happens, so you got to protect yourself.
I think that men are really good at embracing the—embracing the suck, you know, so life just frequently sucks for men, and maybe from thousands of generations of life sucking, we just have a genetic ability to manage that. And so when things start to suck, we just go into "okay, life sucks" mode, and we just deal with it; we just manage. Women, for whatever reason, do not have that gene. When life starts to get boring, or it starts to suck, or things start going badly, or it's just more stressful—all of which happens in life all the time to all people; I don't care how rich or good-looking or smart you are, life is going to suck at some point—so everyone is going to be subject to a woman feeling the pressure of a difficult experience in life, and that woman is inevitably going to point her finger at her partner. Now if you're her partner, you need to prepare that the next step—this is just like the first step—toward her deciding that she's got to do something, take action to improve her life, and that means improve her life without you, because obviously you're the problem. You know, when you see people like, um, you know, Bill Gates and—um—Brad Pitt and—you know—the Amazon guy, you know, I mean, you…
Got rich, good-looking people who are unable to maintain a relationship with a woman, even under the best of circumstances. Okay, so what are your odds of making this work out if you start seeing these early indications? There's a really good chance that you are on your last legs in your marriage.
Um, you know, ironically, the best thing that you can do when you realize that your marriage is about to end is just confront it straight up. Say, "Hey, I see things aren't going well. I get a sense that you're not happy, that maybe you want to get a divorce. You know, if that's the case, let's get a divorce mediator in here so that we can maintain some harmony in our family and our relationship, rather than having two high-paid lawyers go at each other and create this acrimony between us that's going to divide our family for generations."
You know, try to find someone that can mediate this situation and help you get through it with the least amount of, um, you know, pain: financial pain, emotional pain, um, pain for your family, and all that stuff. Rather than just waiting for that uh inevitable um notice that she's going to give you, because as things build up, trust me, it gets worse and worse and worse. The longer you wait, the worse it gets. It's not like this is just going to solve itself.
So anyway, that's all I got for you today, guys. I hope you've enjoyed the video. Um, if you have, you know, please like and subscribe. Share this video with men that you know are going through some difficulty. And um, I'll see you in the next video, but until then, stay healthy, and if you can, stay single.