Does my spouse really love me?

Wondering if My Husband Still Loves Me asks:

I want to know if my husband really loves me. We have been married for 23 years and he does not show me very much attention any more. We talk about the children, but nothing else. Does he love me?

Dear Wondering About His Love:

You were a beautiful little girl. I see you in a white lace dress, shy with your eyes looking down, dreaming of the future.

You've grown up to be an assertive, confident woman. Your soul is simple, and I mean that in a good way - simple in expressing what's at the heart of you, and what's in your heart.

When you were young, you imagined your future. Remember? Now you are older and you are imagining your future again, and you wonder about the present.

Is your husband's love true? Is he actually in love with you? Are the both of you truly in love and loving with each other?

It's been a long time since you remember, and when you recall and look back at the past, at the times when you recall yourself remembering your future, you think: is this true, real, and right?

Let me tell you a story that's true:

One time, my friend Linda told me that your eyes can only see if they are moving. Your eyes were designed so that they must move in tiny little motions whenever they look at something. If they did not flutter, vibrate, or ripple when they looked, they would not work. When you gaze at another, the other person would slowly become transparent, vanish, and fade as if they no longer existed.

You and your husband are vanishing from each other.

Your eyes do not see him absolutely, and his eyes do not see you fully.

Soon you will be ghosts, and your love will be a love for the ghosts of the past, and you will say to yourself:

"I love you less than yesterday, and even less tomorrow."

I sense your husband feels a similar way, not exactly as you, not as tenderly and perceptive as you, but he cannot see you, or hear you, or feel you as near as he used to.

Your husband loves you.

And you love him, and yes you would love him as a ghost, and yes you will love him when he passes from you.

And today you will open your eyes to see his love for you.

You are energetic, hard-working, and active with your eyes and soul. You will fall asleep and wake up and look at him and you know you will see part of him for the first time, a part of him that you imagined as a child in your white dress, and you will love him for who he is, and this first step you take will walk you closer to knowing how much he loves you.

My friend Linda also told me another wise story:

"My friend was having trouble with her marriage. She was angry at her husband. She went to church during the middle of the day and asked her priest: "How can I get over this white-hot anger?" And he told her: "It's easy to love him when he does everything right, isn't it? Doesn't everyone do that? It's much more work to love him when he does something wrong..."

Before she left her church, she lit a candle, and as the flame burned, the church was instantly filled with a bright light. She was amazed. A fierce rainstorm was raging outside, and the light was lightning that brightened the church at the same time as her candle. And despite what others said, she took it as a sign, and even though my friend decided she wasn't perfect, she decided to be as perfect as she could be, and that night she had a dream."

"What was her dream? I asked.

"She could not remember," Linda said, "but when she opened her eyes the next day, at first she thought she was blind, but it was because everything looked different."