Does this sound familiar?
It's as if it happened overnight - and you never saw it coming. If your spouse has seemingly become a different person overnight and is now acting in a way that is the OPPOSITE of the man or woman you once knew...you need to watch this video to understand what's going on with your spouse....
After all, you're no longer dealing with a "normal" man or woman anymore - you're dealing with a "Chaos Kid".
So what can you do? Can it really be over after all these years? Watch this video to understand what's going on with your spouse, then scroll down below to find out what you can do about it.
If you’re married to someone who has seemingly become a different person overnight, you are married to what I call a “Chaos Kid”. This is a man or a woman whose upbringing was traumatic, neglectful or chaotic. There are different degrees of neglect that create a Chaos Kid but the bottom line is this – conventional marriage advice will NOT work for a Chaos Kid.
A Chaos Kid is angry about their childhood and that childhood anger is now directed at you.
It doesn’t matter how good or bad you’ve been as a husband or wife, if s/he was married to someone else, it would be the same story.
(These apply to both men and women, but in this case, we’ll focus on a Chaos Kid woman.)
In this hostile environment, you must become you at your best to avoid pushing your spouse further away. Gifts, cards, kind words, notes and affection will only push a Chaos Kid further away from you and add fuel to the fire.
You need to remember two things if you want to weather this storm. Your spouse has nothing to give; s/he can only take during this time. That’s exactly what a mid life crisis is. A midlife crisis can last on average anywhere from 1 to 3 years so if you’re fully committed and you really do want this man or woman in your life, you need a clear focus.
(Your anger adds fuel to your Chaos Kids’ fire. If s/he has nothing to fight against, there will be no resistance and the chaos will slowly decrease over time.)
(This means, don’t initiate anything, let your spouse make the first move.)
Virtually every spouse I’ve talked to over the past 16 years has tried to convince their spouse not to leave through the following methods:
1) Begging and pleading
2) Getting family members to do the convincing
3) Urging or even threatening their leaving spouse to get marriage help.
The sad fact is, none of this urgency works. Why? It's because there is an emotional set of steps that your spouse has steadily been traveling down.
As he or she moves down that path, you are unaware it's happening or at best, you simply deny that it's all that serious. Since over 80% of divorces are filed by women, this is mostly a man phenomenon. Men are the last to wake up and when they do, their wives say the phrase "too little too late."
The answer? I’ll some it up in two words – Be CALM. In order to prevent pushing your spouse further and further away from you each day, your attitude must be based on being and staying calm.
Calm means no tension, no pressure, and no anxiety. Just focus on being a calm person. Why? The reason so many marriages go from bad to worse, (in sometimes a matter of weeks) is because of the high level of TENSION in both spouses.
It's that tense energy that acts like two high powered fans blowing directly at one another. But if you just turn one fan off, the other will have little to push against. That's how it works in a tense marriage. Someone has to eliminate the tension first, and that someone has to be YOU, as the staying spouse.
So when I say focus on being calm, I mean relaxed, careful, thoughtful, low pressure, gentle, pleasant and friendly. It's how you might have behaved when you first met your spouse on the very first date. You had no expectations, you made no demands.
You may not want to admit this but your leaving spouse is full of negative emotions that he or she cannot control. This makes him or her highly volatile.
Even a slight hint of a critical comment can quickly escalate into an explosive argument that becomes the straw that broke the camel’s back – and then before you know it, your spouse is “emotionally checked out” – sometimes for good. So what this means is that you need to AVOID criticizing, condemning or complaining about your spouse at all costs.
Now I know what you’re thinking. You’re saying to yourself, “Don’t be critical of your spouse…yeah right, easier said than done. That’s nearly impossible.”
In fact, when I work with couples through my Environment Changer program, I give them the exact same advice that I’m giving you today. And when I get to the part about not being critical, nearly every student immediately reacts with "But Larry, how can I stay calm when my husband/my wife is tearing my family apart?"
If you believe that staying calm and avoiding criticism is impossible, what you're saying is that you can't control your negative feelings. But why should you be the one to do that? – Another common question. It's because you're not emotionally dead yet. Your leaving spouse has no desire to control their negative feelings so that leaves you to save your family.
Look, controlling your negative feelings is no small feat, and I’m speaking from experience here. I spent 27 years in a miserable marriage but in the 28th year, I discovered the secret of eliminating my negative feelings in and as a result, I was able to completely transform my marriage. Today my wife and I are happily married over 36 years.
If you want to understand how it's possible to get your emotions under control so you can end the up and down rollercoaster of drama that has taken over your life, watch this video to understand the foundation of how this works.
If you want to
Watch the 1 hour presentation I created on what you need to do to make all this a reality:
Here is the presentation for MEN
Here is the presentation for WOMEN
To a less stressful and more fulfilling marriage,
Larry Bilotta
Founder, Environment Changer Program