(Video) How to overcome resentment towards your husband
The desire to overcome resentment is a serious step in restoring your marriage. It can’t be taken lightly and you can’t stay on the fence. You decided to stay with your husband and rebuild your marriage. That is amazing! And God can definitely make your marriage stronger than it was before you experienced the marital trauma. But, you must take a realistic approach to this and I’m always going to be honest with you about the journey.
Check out this video below to discover how to overcome resentment towards your husband.
You must be committed to honoring God through your marriage and doing the work.
It won’t happen overnight and it will not be easy. During this process, you must keep your eyes on God. You are going to deal with a plethora of emotions as you go through the healing process. If you allow your emotions to guide you, you’ll be filing for divorce or spending the rest of your marriage feeling sad, resentful, and lonely. But, that is NOT God’s plan for you.
God wants YOUR marriage to reflect his love for us. His desire is for you to be whole, joyful, and loved the way Christ loves the church. You must trust that God will move mountains and part the ocean in order for you to experience everything he has for you. But, you must be committed to putting in the work needed for you to experience breakthroughs. Even when your husband is not being the man God created him to be. Even when he has gotten on your last nerve. There will be moments when you want to say “I don’t want to be married anymore.”. But, your commitment to God and faith that he is working on your marriage will sustain you.
Get to the root of the resentment.
To overcome resentment in marriage, you have to start at the root. Ask yourself, “When did it start? What happened that caused me to feel this way?” Maybe you feel there are several causes. Grab a notebook and start writing. Think through the timeline of your marriage. It may seem like you resent your spouse for several things, but there is likely one root cause. Remember, resentment builds an emotional wall between you and your spouse. Many issues may have compounded after that wall was built.
The intention isn’t to list all your spouse’s wrongdoings. Like a good detective, you need to gather evidence. The exercise of writing down the wrongs will help you identify the root cause. Once you have identified the root, don’t let the other issues compound it.
Let yourself feel.
Resentment is an intense emotion. If you’re angry, be angry. If you’re sad, be sad. We often bottle up our feelings when we think others don’t care. Bottling up those emotions isn’t healthy or helpful. To overcome resentment, you must process the feelings that come with it. And as you work through this with your husband, you must let those feelings be seen. Let them know how their action, or inaction, makes you feel. Remember to use “I” statements like “I feel hurt” or “I feel neglected.”
Do not allow your pain to limit your ability to see the good in your husband.
Your spouse is your partner, the love of your life. You may not always like him, but you married him because you love him. While resentment can cause us to dwell on the negative, overcoming resentment can only happen if we remember all the good in our marriage. Grab that notebook and write all the good about your spouse and marriage. Write down what you love about them, how they care for you, good memories, and cherished moments.
You’re going through this process of overcoming resentment because you cherish and value your husband. Deep down inside you truly desire to stay with him. Trust God and the process.
Talk to a trained professional.
Your mom, sister, and best friend might not be the best people for you to speak with. They love you and only want the best for you. Watching you suffer or experience any level of pain will most likely make them harbor resentment towards your husband. You need an unbiased professional that can hear the specifics of your situation and give you a clear path toward restoration.
This isn’t about bashing your spouse. You must address your feelings first. Remember you can’t fix your husband. You can only fix yourself.
Of course, you need a strong support system as you find healing. But, you must choose women that are married, love God, are transparent, honest, and truly believe in the power of God in all situations.
Work toward forgiveness.
You must forgive. Society will tell you not to forgive. Make them earn your forgiveness. Make them feel the pain you are feeling.
Let’s just get one thing clear first. You are harming yourself, more than you are harming him by not forgiving him. PERIOD!
Holding on to resentment hurts you. If you want a healthy, happy marriage, don’t let resentment keep you from working toward that.
Don’t let society have you hemmed up in a lie. If you desire to experience healing, forgiveness must be released immediately.
Reconciliation is completely different from forgiveness.
Reconciliation takes time. Rebuilding the relationship, and trust and reigniting passion between you and your husband take time. Creating healthy boundaries that protect you and your marriage is necessary. Having tough conversations about expectations and acceptable behavior is necessary.
But, none of these things should stop you from forgiving your husband. Before he was your husband, he was your brother in Christ. You will not want to forgive him, but, you must. Because God said you must.
There are specific scriptures that speak to your character as a child of the king:
Ephesians 4:32 Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.
Colossians 3:13 Bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.
Matthew 18:21-22 Then Peter came up and said to him, “Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?” Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven times.
Mark 11:25 And whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father also who is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses.”
Luke 17:3-4 Pay attention to yourselves! If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him, and if he sins against you seven times in the day, and turns to you seven times, saying, ‘I repent,’ you must forgive him.”
Romans 12:19 Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.”
Yes, you’ve experienced marital trauma and you are hurting. But, one tough cookie that I have to chew on daily is the fact that Jesus…..WHILE ON THE CROSS…..BEING CRUSIFIED FOR EVERY SIN I HAVE AND WILL COMMIT AGAINST HIM…..cried out to his father, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” Luke 23:34 Not just that. Take a deeper look, he said this while the very people that were choosing to crucify him were in the middle of gambling for his clothes. The audacity! The shame and humiliation he was bearing while on the cross. The rejection Christ endured WHILE asking God to forgive those that chose to execute him.
Jesus didn’t want to offer forgiveness. He didn’t allow some time to pass so that he could get over the pain of what was done to him. He knew his assignment and did it quickly.
You profess to be a child of God. A believer and acceptor of salvation through the death, burial, and resurrection of our king. Remember Luke 23:34 the next time you want to hold unforgiveness towards your husband. Create boundaries, have tough conversations, and hold each other accountable. But, most importantly, walk in love and offer forgiveness the way Christ commands us.
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