marriage

When is Enough, Enough?

by Julie Githiri

When financial responsibility is withheld.

When emotional affection is withdrawn.

When there is physical abuse.

When sex becomes coercive rather than consensual.

When you are repeatedly ignored, dismissed or made to feel as though your needs don’t matter.

The red flags can be many, and sometimes they are so subtle that they are difficult to name.

As a psychotherapist, I have learned that relationship distress doesn’t always arrive dramatically. Sometimes it arrives quietly.

It can look like two people living in the same house but living completely separate emotional lives.

It can be lying next to someone at night and feeling profoundly alone.

It can be speaking and knowing you are not being heard.

It can be reaching for affection and repeatedly being met with indifference.

It can be becoming so accustomed to emotional distance that you eventually stop asking for closeness altogether.

And this raises a difficult question:

When is enough, enough?

At the beginning, perhaps love and commitment were firmly on the agenda.

There were plans, promises, shared dreams and an expectation that you were building a life together.

Then, somewhere along the way, something changed.

Perhaps the love faded.

Perhaps respect disappeared quietly, long before either person acknowledged it.

Perhaps responsibility replaced affection. Transparency was replaced by secrecy. Partnership became obligation.

The relationship may still look intact from the outside.

The house is still there.

The family is still there.

The photographs are still on the wall.

But emotionally, something has died.

And what do couples do at this point?

Do we simply “suck it up”?

After all, isn’t that what marriage is sometimes portrayed as?

“This is your lot.”

“Love it or lump it.”

“You made your bed, now lie in it.”

There are countless colloquialisms designed to make endurance sound noble.

And endurance can be noble.

Relationships require compromise. They require forgiveness, patience, difficult conversations and the willingness to stay through seasons that aren’t particularly easy.

But there is a difference between working through difficulty and tolerating harm.

That distinction matters.

When we hear the word abuse, we often imagine something visible: physical violence, shouting, intimidation.

But harm within relationships can be much quieter.

There can be emotional neglect.

There can be persistent criticism, humiliation or dismissal.

There can be financial control.

There can be sexual coercion.

There can be deliberate withdrawal of affection used as punishment.

There can be a partner who is physically present but emotionally absent.

And then there is loneliness.

One of the most painful experiences I encounter in therapeutic work is the stories of loneliness while being married.

There is something uniquely painful about feeling alone while sitting beside the person who is supposed to know you best.

You may have someone to come home to, yet nobody to talk to.

Someone beside you in bed, yet no intimacy.

Someone who knows your routines yet seems no longer interested in knowing you.

Loneliness within a relationship can be particularly confusing because, from the outside, you are not alone.

But emotionally, you are.

And over time, this can change the way a person sees themselves.

They may begin to question whether their needs are reasonable.

They may stop asking for affection.

They may minimise their unhappiness.

They may tell themselves that this is simply what long-term relationships become.

Eventually, they may stop expecting anything at all.

As a psychotherapist, I often become interested in the point at which a person stops asking, “Is this relationship good for me?”

and begins asking only,

“How can I make this relationship work?”

That shift can be significant.

Because sometimes the desire to preserve the relationship becomes so powerful that the person begins disappearing inside it.

They become smaller.

Quieter.

More accommodating.

They learn what not to say.

They learn when not to ask.

They learn how to manage the other person’s moods.

And eventually, they may no longer recognise the person they have become.

That is when endurance can become self-abandonment.

Choosing yourself does not necessarily mean leaving immediately.

Sometimes it begins with acknowledging what is actually happening.

It means naming the behaviour rather than minimising it.

It means allowing yourself to say:

“This isn’t working for me anymore.”

“I am lonely.”

“I don’t feel respected.”

“I don’t feel safe.”

“I don’t want this kind of sexual relationship.”

“I have spent years trying to make this work, and I am no longer willing to lose myself in the process.”

And when there is abuse, particularly physical or sexual violence, choosing yourself may mean prioritising safety and seeking appropriate professional and practical support.

Because abuse is not simply a difficult season in a marriage.

It is not a communication problem that can always be solved by trying harder.

And it should never be romanticised as something a partner simply needs to endure.

This is perhaps the hardest part.

You can still love someone and know that the relationship is no longer healthy for you.

You can remember the person they once were and still acknowledge who they are now.

You can have shared history, children, memories, a home, a community and years of investment and still arrive at the painful realisation that continuing in the same way is costing you too much.

Leaving does not necessarily mean that the love was false.

Sometimes it means that love alone is no longer enough to sustain the relationship.

There may not be one universal moment when everyone knows they have had enough.

For some, it is a single devastating event.

For others, it is the accumulation of hundreds of small moments.

The conversation they stopped having.

The affection they stopped receiving.

The apologies that became meaningless.

The boundaries that were repeatedly crossed.

The nights they felt alone beside someone.

The gradual disappearance of themselves.

And perhaps this is the question we should be asking:

At what point does staying require you to abandon too much of yourself?

Marriage can ask us to compromise.

Love can ask us to grow.

Life can ask us to endure difficult seasons.

But none of these should require us to surrender our dignity, our bodily autonomy, our safety or our sense of self.

Perhaps choosing yourself isn’t selfish.

Perhaps sometimes, it is the most honest decision you can make.

Because enough is enough when the cost of staying becomes the loss of who you are.

Warmly

Jules

Polygamy in Modern-Day Marriages

by Julie Githiri

Interestingly, polygamy has not yet entered my consulting room in any significant way. What I am more likely to encounter are the consequences of relationships that exist outside of marriage, a topic I plan to explore in a future blog.

Historically, the acquisition of an additional wife was often viewed as a sign of affluence, status, and social standing. In many African communities, polygamy was culturally accepted and woven into the fabric of society long before the arrival of Christianity, which introduced a different set of values and expectations around marriage.

The recent Netflix series The Polygamist has reignited conversations around the subject, bringing a traditionally private arrangement into public discourse and inviting viewers to examine their own assumptions and beliefs.

There are, of course, many perspectives from which polygamy can be viewed. A feminist lens may raise questions around equality, autonomy, and power. A religious perspective may challenge or support the practice depending on the faith tradition. A cultural perspective may see it as part of heritage and identity, while a humanistic perspective may focus on individual choice, consent, and wellbeing.

As a psychotherapist, I am less interested in determining whether polygamy is right or wrong and more interested in understanding what human needs it seeks to meet.

Historically, economic necessity may have played a significant role. For some women, becoming part of a polygamous family may have offered security, stability, and access to resources that may otherwise have been unavailable. Today, however, the conversation appears more complex. As society evolves and women increasingly achieve educational and financial independence, the reasons individuals choose polygamous relationships may be less about survival and more about personal values, lifestyle, companionship, family structure, or belonging.

The desire for companionship, attachment, commitment, and family remains as relevant today as it has ever been. For some, the idea of sharing a partner may feel less threatening than the prospect of loneliness or the absence of meaningful connection. Others may find fulfilment in a family structure that offers support, shared responsibilities, and community. While modern relationships often place immense pressure on one partner to fulfil every emotional, practical, financial, and sexual need, polygamous families may distribute some of these demands across a wider network.

Of course, this does not mean the arrangement is without complexity. Questions around jealousy, fairness, power, emotional security, and hierarchy inevitably arise. Does it matter whether you are the first wife, second wife, or third? How are needs negotiated? How is emotional equity maintained? These are not insignificant considerations.

What strikes me is that many of the motivations people may attribute to polygamy are not entirely different from those that underpin monogamous relationships. Whether we choose one partner or several, we are often searching for the same things: to feel loved, to belong, to be chosen, to feel safe, and to know that we matter.

The difference may lie not in the need itself, but in the structure through which that need is expressed.

The modern-day man is also worthy of consideration. What motivates a man to pursue a polygamous relationship structure in a society where monogamy remains the dominant ideal? Is it about status, desire, companionship, legacy, family, or something else entirely? Is he seeking more connection, or is he avoiding the depth and vulnerability that one intimate relationship can demand?

There are no simple answers.

What is clear, however, is that conversations around polygamy often evoke strong emotional responses. Judgement, shame, curiosity, admiration, criticism, and even envy can emerge depending on our own experiences and beliefs about relationships. Perhaps this is why the topic remains so difficult to discuss openly. It asks us to examine not only the choices of others, but our own assumptions about love, commitment, fidelity, and what constitutes a successful relationship.

In the consulting room, I am reminded daily that regardless of how relationships are structured, people are often seeking the same things: love, security, belonging, acceptance, and connection. Whether those needs are pursued through monogamy or polygamy, the emotional questions remain remarkably similar.

Perhaps the conversation is not ultimately about polygamy at all, but about the many ways human beings attempt to meet their need for connection and create meaningful lives with one another.

Warmly

Jules

Grey Divorce- The Late Arrival of Emotional Truth.

by Julie Githiri

The term grey divorce was coined to describe couples, often married for over twenty years, who choose to separate later in life. They have built homes together, raised children, established careers, cultivated friendships, and created entire ecosystems of family and community. Yet somewhere beyond the age of fifty, and increasingly beyond sixty-five, many are arriving at the same conclusion:

“This marriage is no longer working for me.”

For some, this can feel difficult to understand. Surely after forty years of marriage, one stays. One adjusts. One continues.

And yet the reasons people leave later in life are often deeply human. Many reach a stage where they become acutely aware that they have lived more years than they may have remaining. With that awareness comes reflection. Questions around joy, fulfilment, peace, companionship, desire, freedom, and emotional aliveness begin to surface with greater urgency.

There is often a longing for more of something in the years that remain.

More connection.
More happiness.
More selfhood.

But what happens to the partner who is left behind?

For many, their identity, stability, and happiness have become intertwined with the marriage itself. The ending of the relationship can feel like the dismantling of an entire life structure. One person’s liberation can feel like another person’s loss.

Clinically, I increasingly meet clients navigating this very dilemma. Whose feelings matter most? The person leaving? The partner staying? And what of the adult children, who themselves hold emotional investments in the family remaining intact?

This triangulation of feelings is profoundly complex. Every member of the family system is affected by the rupture of what once felt stable and permanent.

Yet in truth, the person whose feelings often matter most is the one making the decision.

What I have observed repeatedly in the clinical space is that when someone finally verbalises their desire to leave, the decision has rarely been impulsive. More often, it has been preceded by months, sometimes years, of internal dialogue. They have wrestled privately with guilt, fear, responsibility, hope, grief, and freedom long before speaking the words aloud.

As a psychotherapist, my role is not to tell someone whether to stay or leave. Rather, it is to explore the “why now?” To understand the emotional landscape surrounding the decision, the links to significant past relationships, familial attachments, internal guilt mechanisms, fears, and desires.

I explore what freedom means to them.
What joy means to them.
What they believe they are losing, and what they hope they may still find.

But the instruction of “do not go” is not within my professional scope. Nor should it be.

How could I impose my personal opinion on a decision someone may have been carrying, silently and painfully, for years?

Sometimes grey divorce is not simply about the ending of a marriage.

Sometimes it is about the late arrival of emotional truth.

Warmly 

 Jules