After a divorce, the first thing that may pop into your mind is, “I want my wife back.” But how do you get your wife back? What kind of things will you have to do to get her to like you again? What mistakes will you have to avoid? I’m sure that you’ve asked yourself these questions some time after the papers were signed, but as of now, there’s no point in beating yourself up over the situation. It’s already happened and dwelling on it will not bring your wife back to you.
That is not to say that you should ignore the lessons of the past though. There are certainly a lot of things that we can learn from our past mistakes, but you also have to accept that your old relationship is gone, and the only way you can get your wife back is to start from scratch.
This is certainly easier said than done. How can you start from scratch if your wife already knows your flaws, habits or way of thinking? The answer is that you cannot. You already know too much about her just as she knows too much about you. For example, if you are thinking “I want my wife back,” chances are your ex knows what you’re thinking. So there’s really no point in pretending that you have a completely clean slate.
Instead, try to think of it as starting over. When you and your ex first met each other, you held certain assumptions and preconceptions about each other, or to put it another way, you didn’t know each other at all – only impressions. There is something innocent in not really knowing someone. However, if you are trying to rekindle a burned out relationship, you also need to realize that the innocence is gone. So you have to work with something else to get your relationship back on its two feet. For most relationships, this can either be commitment, mutual trust, let’s go back to the ‘good old days’ mentality or even sex.
There’s no simple answer to it really. You will have to look at your relationship and figure out what is its strongest foundations. Once you have done that, you will have an easier time figuring out what you will have to work with.
The first step in starting your relationship anew requires the old patterns of dating. That is to say you need to go back to when you first dated your wife. It doesn’t mean that you should recreate the whole thing, just work with what you know works. After all, she married you, so you were obviously doing something right at that time. At this point though, you should focus more on getting her to leave the past behind, which is another way of saying, “Can you ever forgive me?”
Now that you have your foot on the door, it’s time take things a bit slow. Remember that even though she may have forgiven you and plenty of time has passed ever since the breakup, she hasn’t forgotten about the past’s mistakes anymore than you have. Now isn’t the time for a relapse to old habits. In fact, you shouldn’t even have the old habits otherwise all your talk of how much you’ve changed will be a lie, and lies have a way of coming out in the open in relationships.
Another thing to remember when trying to fix your relationship is to not be selfish. You can say “I want my wife back” as much as you want, but if you aren’t thinking about what your wife wants then you are effectively being selfish. And being selfish in your motives for getting your wife back can backfire on you in the long run. So try to remember your wife. It’s important that when you try to get your girl to like you again, you are doing so for the right reasons.
It takes a lot of work patching up a broken relationship – not to mention a lot of patience and a little faith in the strength of your bond. Nonetheless, these things are only to be expected and you have to get used to the idea that you’re not going to fix anything unless you’re ready to make lasting changes.
