Welcome back to the Oxendine Law Podcast. Jared Oxendine and Christine Palmer here. And keep in mind, most divorces don't start with an affair. Most divorces don't start with a screaming match. Most divorces start years before anyone even files paperwork. And so what we're talking about are these subtle warning signs. Less communication, less connection, and less effort. So today we're going to be talking about the hidden warning signs that your marriage may be headed towards divorce. All right, so Christine, number one, and I think this is definitely number one, communication starts to break down. >> Oh, for sure. Yeah. >> Um you're talking less and you're arguing more. >> Yes. >> Right? You're avoiding difficult conversations. You're giving up too easily on conversations. >> Right. I think people sometimes mistake speaking for communication, and there's a huge difference. Um people think, "Well, no, I still talk to him every day. I still talk to him 10 times a day." That's not communicating. Talking is not communicating. Just because you still do a few If you're in a habit of when, you know, I'm driving to work, I call my husband, and we talk on my whole drive to work. Okay, that's not communicating. That's talking. Probably in the beginning that starts with communication. And those are positive conversations. If you find yourself still doing it, but just to go through the motions, um and it's not being productive conversation, remember the absence of communication or the absence of talking isn't what we're looking at. We're looking The absence of communication, the absence of healthy conversation, the absence of productive conversation. So I think a lot of people think about it like, "We talk all the time. There's not a lack of communication. We talk all the time." No, there's still a lack of communication cuz they're just talking. That's all you're doing. It's just talking. It's just talking to talk. Um you talk about mindless stuff and and nonsense just to fill the space. You're not having productive and deep thoughtful conversations. >> And that's what leads you, Christine. We hear this all the time, to living like roommates. How often do we see that? We're living like roommates instead of partners, and that essentially means you're just living under the same roof, sharing expenses. Like Christine said, saying just enough what you have to say to get by, and going through the motions. >> Yeah, just letting the partner know, "Well, we're out of milk." Or, "We need to do this." Or, "Remember your mom invited us over. We're doing" So, you're still communicate or still talking. You're not communicating. Like, that's the difference. And I think a lot of people just believe that because they still talk all the time, we're fine. Like, no. Like, there I don't know that I've ever met a couple that lived in absolute silence for weeks. You know what I mean? Like, you're you're talking, you're not communicating. >> So, that's the first thing I think you you would notice. Healthy communication starts to completely disappear. >> productive conversations. >> So, next I would say the biggest thing would be you start to have an emotional disconnect. So, not only are you talking less, arguing more, uh living like roommates, you're just kind of emotionally disconnected. You don't care anymore >> That's right. >> about the other person, that's right, what happens to them. You don't care about their feelings. The friendship is lost. Uh unfortunately, with that comes a lack of intimacy, you know? No interest in having sexual relations with your spouse. You start living separate social lives. >> Yeah, I think when you start like making decisions without considering them. And it could be something small. It could be that, you know, your mom invited you for dinner on Sunday. You're having it would be to call him and say, "Hey, you know, mom invited us over Sunday. Do you want to go?" You're on the phone with mom and you're like, "Yeah, I'll be there." Like, you don't consult him anymore. It could be as little as that, or even as big as, you know, maybe whether you decide you want to buy a new car. Um this one, you know, you went to the mechanic and they said that's going to be $1,200 for the transmission and this and that. And you're like, "That sounds like too much." So, you start talking to a car dealer. You may not buy it that day, but you decide to go to the dealership. You swing by Ford over there, and you're like, "Let me test drive that Mustang." Um and and you're doing that independently, where normally that would be something that you would communicate and share in. So, it's not like you're doing weird things behind their back. It's just the unilateral independent thought. Like, you really aren't considering their feelings in any regard, whether it's Sunday dinner or buying a new car. >> Yeah, that happens, and then you also see people start to basically live separate lives, right? I mean, you've got people you know, making extra stops on the way home just to avoid getting home. >> Sure. >> Or making lots of extra plans with friends, or going out alone. >> Yeah, they start to volunteer, right? Like, "Oh, I signed up for this opportunity. I can volunteer. I joined a kickball league to and I've, you know, games on Thursdays." Just something to keep your time occupied and not It sometimes I think it's almost subconscious, too. You're like, "I don't like being at home." It's not that Oh, I don't want to be around my spouse. It's just, "Ah, I'm I wish I had something better to do. Something more fun to do. Something better to do with my time." So, you start filling that time. >> And you don't invite them to come. So, so that's that's number two. Number three, I would say, and this is when it kind of gets to the tipping point. So, you've been through number one, communication's breaking down. Number two, you're starting to get this emotional disconnect. Well, at some point, for most people, the pot boils over. >> Yeah. >> And you start to build resentment. And the reason you're building the resentment is cuz you're not happy. >> Correct. >> And they're not happy, either. And so, as soon as you step in the door, you're already mad. You're mad that you're there. You're mad when you saw them. You're mad at what they just did that annoys you. You're mad because they didn't communicate with you about this or communicate with you about that. And so, you start keeping score. >> Mhm. >> And you start hashing up old arguments. And it's not really that the old argument was a big deal. It's just because it's something you can find argue about. >> Right. >> You start to feel unappreciated. How about that? You know, and and you compare, right? You're keeping score. I do this, you know, so you know, >> So so let's say the husband might say, well, I'm you know, I'm so tired. You know, what would you like to eat tonight? It's always me. I'm always the one that has to decide where we're going to eat tonight or if we cook, I'm always the one doing the cooking. And then the wife says, well, would you like to be the one that does the laundry? When's the last time you did any laundry, huh? When's the last time you picked the kids up from school? When's the last time you cleaned the house? You want to trade, right? And so then you have that >> Right. >> You have that keeping score thing going on. And so all these unresolved issues end up becoming permanent issues. >> Right. And I think a lot of the time um what's happening is you are subconsciously mad at yourself for letting yourself get into this situation, for letting yourself stay in the situation, for feeling disrespected by yourself, but it is natural for us to not want to blame ourselves. So you blame the other guy, you know, you just blame them. It's the same thing at work, you know, if you're frustrated, you start to blame, well, if management did this, if they just if they knew how to schedule people better, well, if they would make these changes, if they would give us these tools, if they would upgrade our technology, you know, you always want to blame somebody else for the problems that are happening. That's just natural human nature to look for blame. Um and in a marriage, it's just two of you. So if you're not blaming yourself, you're blaming that other person. And a lot of times I do think that you are pretty mad at yourself for saying like, how did I let us get here? Or even, how did I get myself here to begin with? Like, how did I even start with this person? Like, what what was I thinking 10 years ago? I knew better. You Have you talked people Have you talked to them like, I knew better. >> Mhm. >> I knew I knew better. I My my mom told me don't do it. My dad told me don't do it. My parents begged me not to marry him or her. My friends didn't like it. >> the way, sometimes that mom or dad are sitting with them at the consultation saying, >> Oh, yeah. >> I told you so. >> Like, well, we Jared, I tried to tell him. We've been saving since the day THEY GOT MARRIED. WHAT'S YOUR RETAINER? TRUST ME, we We wait. Yeah. >> >> So let's say you've got this going on in your household. Again, we are here to help you in any way we can. I can't tell you how many times we have people in our office and we can just tell, for whatever reason, regardless of whether or not they we think they should file for divorce, um they're not ready. >> Yeah. >> And so, here's the advice we give. If you're not ready and you see yourself wanting to stay in this situation, for whatever reason, we're not judging, we're representing, right? For whatever reason, you decide you want to try and make this work, here's what you can do. Number one, explore counseling options, all right? Now, that's a two-way street. >> Yeah. >> If you want to do counseling and your spouse doesn't, it's done before it even began. >> That's couples counseling. Do always do individual counseling, no matter what, whether he or she's involved or not, always individual counseling. I I'm almost make it a prerequisite for my clients to be attending some level of counseling to help me through this journey because it's it's just necessary. >> Yeah, and that may be an initial step or it may be a step that you take in concert with couples counseling, depending on what your need is. But eventually, you know, if you're the only one getting the counseling and your spouse is not getting any counseling and they're not working on their issues cuz believe me, there's two parties in this relationship. It takes two to make it work and it makes two to to tear it apart. If you're going to individual counseling, that's great, but if your spouse is not going to counseling, then at some point, that's not working. >> Yeah, and I mean, the idea of couples counseling isn't necessary, it's great, it's wonderful, but I have actually met with people who couples counseling created conflict, but when they both actively engage in individual counseling and learned how to control their own emotions and learned how to communicate better, the the couples counseling but basically worked itself out. They didn't need couples counseling. They each needed to learn their triggers, they each needed to learn how to remain calm in certain situations, and if you better yourself, you're a better partner. And so, I've known plenty of couples that individually better themselves and end up saving their relationship by doing it. I know couples who have tried couples counseling and thought this just breeds more resentment. This is bigger on the keeping score. Like, if you've gone too far into that phase and you start counseling, you walk in the door thinking, "Ha, I can't wait to tell her about this. Oh, I just can't wait to tell our therapist. Can't wait to tell our counselor." Cuz you know in your heart of hearts they're going to side with you. And the other partner's thinking the same thing. Oh, yeah, this is going to be great. Finally, a person who, you know, can tell her she's wrong. Tell her she's crazy. Tell her she's being ridiculous. Tell her she's overreacting. So, you can't wait and you each are telling your side to a person who's like, "Okay, well, how could you have tempered yourself? How could you have tempered yourself?" Like, "Oh, no, no, no, no, that's not what I want. I want you to tell her she's wrong. I want you to tell him he's being too aggressive." So, um if you've gotten to that phase, sometimes individual counseling is way more effective and way more efficient than couples counseling. So, explore all the options. Find out what's best for you and your spouse in your phase that you're in. And usually counselors will be pretty honest with you when it comes to that. They don't want a reputation for having not been able to help people. So, I've had couples counselors send people away and say, "Y'all go fix yourselves and come back to me." I've also had individual people say, "Look, we can work all day, but until he or she gets into counseling or y'all start going to joint counseling, we're not going to make any progress on the marriage. I can make you a better, you know, poor person, more confident person." >> It's great advice. Uh only other things I would add is start working on trying to have honest conversations about what the issues are. Too many people are either embarrassed to talk about what the real issues are, uh worried about hurting the other person's feelings, um or just it doesn't feel comfortable to have those conversations. At this point in your relationship to save the marriage, if there are major issues that are going on, those have to be honestly discussed, regardless of what they are. So, have those honest communications, and then once you've done the counseling, whether individual or couples counseling, once you've had those honest conversations, let's set some expectations. You know, let's set some Let's get on the same page with what we're going to change and how we're going to change it going forward. If you can do all those things, then you've got a chance at saving your marriage and saving your relationship. If you can't, either because you You've got one and it takes two, and the other person's not willing to cooperate, or maybe it's just a bad situation. It's a situation that's just not repairable. That's okay. That's when we would refer you back to our previous podcast, which ironically was the podcast before this one, and that talks about when to be honest with yourself and when to read the writing on the wall and know when it's time to actually file for divorce. So, check out that podcast episode if you missed it, because it ties right in with this episode. Uh we appreciate you checking us out, as always, with offices in Athens and Suwanee. We are here, ready, and able to help guide you through every step of the divorce process. Make sure that you subscribe on any of our major streaming platforms, including YouTube. Just hit that subscribe button, and you will be the first to know about additional episodes. Thanks for joining us. We'll see you next time.