If You Aren't Feeling Loved By Your Partner Here's How To Try And Fix It
It's not easy being in a relationship where you don't feel loved. You may love your partner but feel something is missing — perhaps they no longer communicate with you (or maybe they never did) or you feel as though they're pushing you away. On the other side of the coin, they could be expressing their love, but you may have a hard time reading those cues and emotions because you're dealing with something internally.
No two relationships are exactly alike, and we all express love in our own ways. If you feel your partner no longer loves you or isn't expressing their love, don't give up right away. It's time to evaluate why there is a change in your relationship, what caused it, and if it can be fixed. Your feelings could stem from something within you that's affecting your partner or vice versa — your partner could be going through a tough time and hasn't figured out the words to tell you, so they're pulling away.
Before you jump to conclusions, let's look at ways to find the courage to talk to your partner. Once you two are able to communicate about the issue, you may be able to repair your relationship.
Figure out exactly why you're not feeling loved
Before you go into conversations about your feelings with your significant other, try to figure out where your feelings stem from. If you feel as if your partner no longer loves you because communication between the two of you suddenly broke down, then you just need to restore your communication with your partner to find out why they shut down. However, there can also be deeper reasons why we stop feeling loved.
If your partner lied to you or cheated on you, this can cause issues with how close you feel. If your partner isn't observing your boundaries, this can lead to feelings of being unloved and disrespected. If they're spending more time with their friends or not including you in the things they're currently passionate about, that, too, can make you feel disconnected and out of place in the relationship.
Once you've analyzed what is making you feel unloved, you can start to come up with a plan to get your relationship back on track. This could look like standing up for your boundaries, opening up the lines of communication by letting them know how alone you've felt, or trying to bring the passion back into the relationship to reignite that spark.
Schedule talk time together
No matter what is leading you to feel unloved, you need to find a way to talk to your partner about it. While your discussion may not go as you hope, it will allow you to express your thoughts and open up about how you're feeling. To help the conversation stay positive, you should schedule the talk at a time when you both can focus on the discussion — you don't want to have to hurry through the conversation because of other plans or be interrupted while you're explaining your feelings.
Before you start throwing out accusations, even if you feel your partner is to blame for how you feel, be sure that what you have to say is worded appropriately. If you come to your partner with "I" statements, such as "I feel like we don't spend enough time together anymore," rather than something like, for example, "You never spend any time with me anymore," the conversation is more likely to go smoothly and not turn into an argument. Once you've explained your feelings, express what you think led to those feelings. Also, don't go in with ultimatums; instead, ask your partner to help you come up with ways to improve your relationship.
Don't take your partner for granted
You can express gratitude to the people in your life in many ways. When it comes to working on a tough situation with your partner, no matter what's going on between you both, it helps to be thankful for the good times and the positive things they've brought to your life. Your first chance to express gratefulness is to thank them for taking the time to sit and talk with you about your feelings. After all, they may think everything is fine in your relationship, so you never want to assume they've been blowing you off.
Another way to practice gratitude for your partner is to write down what you love about them and what makes you feel that they are the one for you. By giving yourself time to count your blessings and be mindful of the good parts of your relationship, you will be better able to see the good in your partner and the areas where they do love you and where, perhaps, you or they need some work. Remember, it takes two to make a relationship work, and while you may be the one broaching the subject of feeling unloved, it's likely they also feel the same.
Treat others how you wish to be treated
When someone tells you to treat others as you'd like to be treated, this concept can change the way you live. By being kind to people, you call more kindness into your life — it's called the Law of Attraction — what you put out, you call back in. If you feel unloved, stop and look at how you've treated your significant other. If you've pulled away, too, your actions could be contributing to the disconnection.
Even when you feel unwanted, put yourself out there and support your partner. Show them that even if they are pulling away, you're still willing to keep reaching out. If they pull away more often, you have even more reason to sit down and talk to them about the situation. Most importantly, you don't want to aggravate the situation by treating them how you feel they're treating you, which is likely to lead to added conflict rather than a resolution.
Practice self-love
While there is a slightly toxic vibe to saying you can't love someone else if you don't love yourself, it is important to be connected with yourself. By loving who you are and feeling confident in your mind and skin, you will find you understand other people better and that you're more open when resolving conflict. Self-love can lead to increased self-esteem. Also, when you love yourself, it may sting just a little less when you're feeling unloved by other people in your life. Why? Because you know your self-worth when you love yourself.
Practicing self-love can include taking time to be alone with your thoughts, completing guided meditations to increase your self-worth, enjoying a day at the spa, or knowing when you're not getting what you deserve and doing something about it. You deserve internal and external love, and when you're struggling with what's coming from outside, put more work into the love you have for yourself on the inside.
Learn your love languages
If you and your partner have different love languages, this could leave you feeling unloved. Luckily, you can hop online to take a test to learn your own love language and have your partner do the same. Once you know what makes both of you tick when it comes to feeling loved and appreciated, you can work on integrating that into your relationship.
Five love languages exist. Some people feel most love when their partner spends quality time with them, while others would rather their partner perform acts of service, such as washing the dishes every day. Then there are people who feel that touch is the most important sign of love, from public displays of affection to snuggling while watching a movie together, while others would rather be told they're loved and cared for (a.k.a. words of affirmation). Lastly, other people see receiving gifts as the ultimate sign of love.
Of course, you and your partner could have multiple love languages, and they won't always be the same. You will need to learn to love them in their preferred language to deepen your bond.
Discover your attachment styles
Another thing that can affect how you and your partner connect is your attachment style. We develop our attachment styles at a very young age, and this all depends on how our primary caregiver treated us when we were little. Those who felt safe as young children are more likely to have a healthier attachment style as an adult than someone who was abandoned or felt unloved by their parents or caregivers.
A secure attachment style can be described by having a safe childhood, which leads to forming healthy bonds as an adult. Someone with an ambivalent, avoidant, or disorganized attachment won't be as secure in their relationships and could struggle at times. Ambivalent or anxious-style people crave love and attention, but they have trust issues that can interfere with their feelings of security. If you're feeling unloved, you may have a partner who is avoidant or dismissive — they're very independent and find it hard to rely on others. Those with a disorganized or disoriented attachment style can seem loving at one time and distant at another.
Consider your romantic time
Intimacy is important, and relationships give both people the opportunity to open up to one another. Intimacy, though, looks different for everyone and every couple. What's most important to know is that intimacy doesn't have to involve touching or sex. It can be about spending time together, talking, or just being present in the same space.
For some, intimacy can look like spicing things up in the bedroom in an attempt to bring back that missing spark. For others, letting go of sexual expectations could be the answer. Bringing the spark back can look like doing something extreme, such as facing your fear of heights together in a hot air balloon, or even investing in kinky toys for the bedroom. Consider what both romance and intimacy look like to you and whether you feel those needs are being fulfilled. If they are not, which is likely if you're not feeling loved, this will give you a direct subject to broach with your partner. Let them know what would help you to feel that rekindled intimacy and romance, and ask them what would make them feel more loved as well. Never assume that you're the only one feeling neglected in your relationship — always ask.
Schedule date nights
Another way to bring the spark back to your relationship is to schedule date nights. It's easy to get busy with life, between work, kids, friends, and hobbies — sometimes a disconnect in a relationship can happen if you're simply not spending enough time together bonding. Date nights, whether spent at home or out, can help rebuild your bond. Doing activities together that you both enjoy can make you feel appreciated and wanted again.
While it may seem odd to go out on dates together when you're already living together or married, there is never a time when dating isn't okay in a relationship. Statistics say that couples who have a regular weekly date night are often happier than those who don't. Date night gives you the chance to experience some of the activities on this list, such as being more intimate with each other and spending more quality time together. When you start having fun together again, you're more likely to begin feeling the love you used to feel from your partner.
Check your past trauma
If you're feeling unloved and struggling to love yourself, consider past trauma — whether it's linked to your attachment style and childhood or to past relationships. Sometimes our baggage affects our ability to feel love from others. Many forms of trauma, from abuse to cultural circumstances, can affect individuals and relationships. If you've experienced a traumatic event, such as a bombing or hate crime, this can affect how you feel about life in general, which, in turn, can affect how you feel in your relationships.
If you've been in abusive relationships in the past, there's a chance this is holding you back in your current partnership. You may feel unloved because you're not getting close enough to your partner. Then again, they could have gone through their own past trauma and have difficulty being intimate or expressing their feelings. This is where being open with each other and communicating your feelings and fears can knock down walls and help you feel safer together. Therapy may also be needed to work through the effects of trauma on you as an individual.
Consider couples therapy
In addition, it may be time for you as a couple to attend therapy together. Unless you're ready to call your relationship quits, therapy may be the best solution to help open up communication and discover why you're not feeling loved and exactly what your partner feels as well. There could be a reason they're pulling away from you, or they may not even realize anything is wrong.
While couples therapy isn't guaranteed to mend your relationship, it will surely open your eyes to what both you and your partner have experienced in your union. The success of your visits with a therapist depends on you and your partner and how open you are, as well as how you implement what you learn. If you find you're just no longer on the same page, it may be time to move on. Your therapist will send you both home with skills meant to help you become more open with each other — they may or may not work, but they definitely won't if you don't try.
Find a support system
If you feel something is off between you and your partner, sometimes friends and family can help, whether with advice or intervention. Having someone to bounce ideas off of can help, especially if you find it tough to talk to your partner about your feelings. What not to do, however, is make your friends and family feel negatively about your significant other. Be sure they know you want this relationship to work and that you're still in love, even if you're not feeling it in return at the moment — if your allies start to dislike your partner, this can cause even more rifts in your relationship.
Sometimes we don't feel loved because one person can't possibly give us everything we need, and this is where it's important to have other close people in our lives. While many of us want our partner to also be our best friend, this isn't always the dynamic, so having friends outside the relationship gives you others to share your passions with. Your significant other may not like the same music you do, or, perhaps, you love thrift shopping and they refuse to join you — there's nothing wrong with sharing these passions instead with friends and family members who do.
Take a break or break up as a last resort
Once you've tried all there is to salvage your relationship and you still don't feel you're getting the love and affection you want and deserve, it could be time to move on. Breaking up is never easy, but sometimes it is necessary. If you're still determined to make the relationship work, you could try taking a break first. Absence may make the heart grow fonder, and you could come back to a more loving partner. However, breaks in relationships don't always lead to happy endings.
If the lines of communication just aren't opening up and therapy hasn't helped, this is a sure sign that your relationship has broken down enough that it probably can't be fixed. Growth is important in relationships, and if yours is stagnant or going in reverse, you deserve to move on and find someone who will love you the way you want and deserve to be loved.