Dr Love with Mid-Day: Why does he feel like a stranger?

Illustration/Uday Mohite

How do I tell my partner that I don't like how he's changed over the years? We have been dating since college but, as we get older, he seems to have drifted apart because he's not the person I thought I knew. We still love each other, but the longer we are together, the more I feel as if he is turning into a stranger. I don't know what to say to him because he may not understand where I'm coming from. If I continue feeling this way, we may not be together after a point, which saddens me. How do I stop this from happening without hurting his feelings?
You're not hurting your partner by telling him how you feel. You are doing what anyone in a healthy, loving relationship is meant to do. If you don't like something or would like to address what appears to be a difficult topic, you have to be able to talk about it because that is the only way to evolve in any relationship. If that is difficult, and you feel as if he won't see things from your perspective, your relationship is already unsteady and heading in the wrong direction. Everyone changes, of course, and your partner probably thinks you have since college too. If you don't like what you see though, this distance can turn into something darker that will inevitably tear you both apart. Speak up now if you want to save this. Ignoring something doesn't make a problem go away.

My husband is a workaholic and it's affecting our marriage. How do I get him to stop if he says it's for our benefit as a family?
Benefits for one's family aren't financial alone. If your mental well-being is being compromised, he is responsible for that too and no amount of gaslighting can change how you feel. As his partner, you have the right to call this out and insist on change for the marriage to get to a better place. There is no other option.

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