11 Quiet Signs Of A Truly Miserable Marriage
Relationships will have ups and downs, but a few key patterns indicate something is wrong.
PeopleImages.com - Yuri A | Shutterstock Marriages don't always fall apart in loud, messy ways. They can erode at such a slow pace, you don't notice that the ground beneath you is slipping away. Maybe you and your spouse have busy schedules and your only conversations are about who's picking the kids up from school. Maybe there was some betrayal of trust, and you don't feel as connected as you once did.
The quiet signs of a truly miserable marriage might not announce themselves right away. It's important to know what your needs are and how you want to show up for each other as the years pass. Your expectations might change, but love and compassion should be core parts of your relationship.
Here are 11 signs of a truly miserable marriage
1. You have superficial conversations
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Small talk is part of every relationship, but if your conversations only exist on the surface level, that's often a quiet sign of a miserable marriage. Not every text can be a love note with heart-eye emojis, and not every conversation can be a deep dive on your hopes and dreams. Sometimes, you have to talk about who's making dinner.
Yet for every discussion revolving around daily details, you should also talk about how you feel, how your day was, and your hopes for the future you'll share. We can't feel connected without emotional intimacy, and opening up is a crucial part of cultivating that kind of bond.
As researcher Brené Brown wrote in her book "Dare to Lead," true communication means making "a commitment to lean into vulnerability, to stay curious and generous, to stick with the messy middle of problem identification and solving, to take a break and circle back when necessary, to be fearless in owning our parts."
A relationship without emotional intimacy often feels hollow, like it might break apart at any time.
Having a strong emotional connection is what helps couples weather the storms. Talking about the tough stuff, along with other family logistics, will inevitably bring you closer, while ignoring it will only drive you apart.
2. You avoid each other
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When you're in the honeymoon stage, there aren't enough hours in the day to spend with your spouse. It doesn't matter if you're running errands or binge-watching shows on the couch — every moment you're together is full of laughter and that warm, buzzing feeling you get when you're newly in love. As time goes on, you'll likely settle into a comfortable familiarity, but sometimes, that settling means that the spark has fizzled out.
Feeling more like roommates than a couple in love is a sign of a miserable marriage. It might feel like you're co-existing. You spend more time in front of your computer than you do with each other. Your spouse might stay busy by going out with friends or getting really into the gym or some other hobby. You no longer look forward to seeing them at the end of the day, and being together feels like a chore.
There's an inevitable sense of loss when you realize that your lives don't align anymore. Reconnection takes a concerted effort, but it also can't be forced. If your spouse is checked out, it can feel harder to stay together than making your way on your own.
3. You keep score of past mistakes
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Making mistakes is an inevitable part of any relationship. At some point, you're bound to hurt the person you love, but it's the way you manage that pain that makes a difference. Psychologist Jeffrey Bernstein, PhD pointed out that keeping a running tally in your head can be a fleeting, harmless thought exercise, but it can also be a quiet sign of a truly miserable marriage.
As he shared, getting "caught up in toxic levels of scorekeeping" can destroy even stable marriages. Scorekeeping often devolves into passive-aggressive comments or being cruel to each other. You become so focused on what your partner is doing wrong, you stop noticing the ways they are available.
You might make barbed comments about how they never do the dishes, while they complain that you leave your laundry on the bedroom floor. You take subtle jabs at each other, until that becomes your shared language.
"Destructive communication is relationship quicksand," Bernstein explained. "The further you slide into it, the further down you sink... The act of keeping score inhibits your ability to empathize with your partner and threatens to foster resentment in your relationship."
4. You feel emotionally drained
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Being with your partner might not be easy at all times, but they should uplift you more than they drag you down. When you find yourself drained by every interaction, it's a quiet sign you're in a truly miserable marriage.
While being in direct conflict can be exhausting, holding tension inside and repressing your true feelings can be equally as tiring. You might feel like the thread connecting you is frayed, and you're so worried it will snap, you can't think about anything else.
Being emotionally drained makes it hard to experience life in a whole-hearted way. At the end of a day, being with your spouse should bring out the best in you, because you meet each other with compassion, instead of hushed resentment.
5. You don't confide in each other
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The bond you share with your spouse should be rooted in a sense of security. If you find yourself pulling back, because they don't provide a safe place for you to land, it's a quiet sign you're in a miserable marriage. The less you and your spouse share with each other, the greater the distance between you will grow.
As Beach Cities Psychotherapy shared, "It brings relationships meaning and depth, as it is the window that allows us to feel like our partner fully gets us and that we get them." Emotional intimacy is a key part of any healthy, long-term relationship. Emotional intimacy keeps people connected, even when you're revealing hard truths or hidden feelings.
"If you tell your partner how to show up for you and discover that your partner is not willing or capable of the emotional intimacy you crave, the next conversation is whether that's okay with you," they explained. The conversations that follow won't be easy, but they'll help you bring underlying issues into the light and decide how to get your emotional needs met.
6. You nitpick each other's habits
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No one is perfect, even the people we're closest to. Getting annoyed by your spouse's little inconsistencies is part of loving them, but sometimes that annoyance gets so overwhelming, it overshadows their good parts.
Part of being in a partnership means accepting that you can't change someone else's behavior, only your own reaction, yet being harshly attuned to every flaw doesn't actually solve anything.
"An overly critical person will weaponize your shortcomings to attack you and make you feel inferior," therapist Jennifer Twardowski shared. "They reduce a person to their failure without offering a helpful solution or ways to make it better."
Criticism is often a symptom of some other issue. It's easier to take swipes at your spouse for not putting their socks in the hamper than it is to talk about the tender, scary parts of your relationship.
7. You're relieved when your spouse is gone
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It might sound counterintuitive, yet having alone time is an essential part of staying together. According to author Alice Boyes, PhD, "When couples are temporarily apart, both the person who is away and the one left at home can experience growth." And the benefits of that growth include gaining new skills, having more energy, and improving conversations.
Each half of a couple needs to focus on having an independent life. You both need to cultivate your interests outside of the marriage in order for it to work, but there should also be moments of reconnection. If your alone time is accompanied by a major wave of relief, it's a sign you're miserable in your marriage.
You used to dread spending time apart, and now, you dread being together. You make excuses not to see them. Talking to each other feels like a chore, and you count down the minutes until the weekend is over, so you can resume your separate lives. Whenever they work late, you feel like you can finally breathe.
If all you feel is gratitude that your spouse is gone, it might be time to reassess what you're hoping your marriage will bring.
8. Your routines don't match
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A lot can get lost over the course of a marriage, especially when you're parenting together. It might feel like you're juggling too many balls at one time, and keeping them in the air is challenging enough, let alone devoting time to each other. One person has to chauffeur the kids to soccer practice, while the other has to take charge of dentist appointments.
Having opposing schedules makes it hard to feel like you're sharing a life. While some amount of separation over the course of a day is to be expected, existing in your own orbit often indicates that your disconnect goes deeper than you might be willing to admit.
Ultimately, you should feel like you have a shared, overlapping life, and not two lives running parallel to each other.
9. You don't fight anymore
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Not fighting isn't necessarily a sign of a happy, stable marriage. It could also be a sign that both spouses have stopped caring, because they feel truly miserable in their marriage. Experiencing conflict in relationships is more than normal, it's entirely expected.
Take Root Therapy Practice shared that while romantic partnerships can be "a source of great comfort and solace, relationships can just as quickly be a source of conflict and distress."
They further explained, "Believing that we should not have conflict in our relationships is where we set ourselves up to fail. It can be valuable and worthwhile to take a critical look at how we experience conflict in our relationships and if the conflict patterns we find ourselves in have room for improvement."
Going for the jugular when you fight is an overt sign you're in a miserable marriage, yet avoiding conflict completely can be just as damaging.
10. You're jealous of other couples
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When you're in a truly miserable marriage, other people's happiness might feel like a personal affront. You can't stand seeing other couples who seem satisfied by each other, as though their harmony were the direct reason for your misery.
You have a hard time feeling happy that your best friend has a new boyfriend, and you feel jealous when your sister tells you that her husband gives her flowers — not for any special reason, but just because.
Being a witness to other couples' love might make you feel resentful. If watching other couples get along leaves you with an ache in the pit of your stomach, it's often a sign of something much deeper.
11. You feel lonely
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Feeling lonely in a relationship is a particularly painful experience, one that makes you question what you believe. You might wonder why you feel more alone with your partner than without them. You might feel like they don't know the real you, and they don't care to find out.
Therapist Esther Perel described this emotion as "Ambiguous Loss," a field created by Pauline Boss.Perel shared that ambiguous loss is "what we feel when a loved one is physically present, but in all other ways, absent from a relationship."
While emotional distance can't be solved overnight, there are small steps couples can take to bridge the gap between them. "Getting to a new depth of connection means taking a different path to get there," Perel explained. "One of the most powerful ways for people not to feel deeply alone is for them to feel listened to."
Making time to sit together and share your inner world can retether two spouses who have drifted apart. It might not be a comfortable conversation, but sharing what you really feel will bring you to a place of understanding.
Alexandra Blogier, MFA, is a staff writer who covers psychology, social issues, relationships, self-help topics, and human interest stories.