This is going to be a long story so bear with me. Im looking on some perspective on this where I can see what my sisters think about this.
So I am 29M and got married last November to 24M. It was an arranged setup where we got engaged in July 2024 so there was an approximate 15 month engagement period.
So for context, I am from a family where I am the youngest and have a married brother 35M. My wife is the eldest in her family having a younger brother and youngest sister.
The engagement period.
Before the engagement, we met each other just a week or two prior and started talking to each other. Nothing very special but we did talk about priorities and what to expect and I specifically asked her if she was into the marriage or not, because consent matters a lot to me. Her parents wanted to marry her with me from the get go where my parents and I went to her place for the first time and they were the ones pushing for a quick engagement (we do live 5minutes drive away from each other). I took a few days, did istikhara and everything was fine where I kept a little distance from talking and she was very talkative over text (we couldnt meet each other much as my job takes me to far off places as deployment). At that time, she was studying in a well off university (in terms of expenses). She was a little shaky, as you would expect women to be nervous regarding such a big step in their life. However, a month into it her birthday comes and since Im far away I couldnt manage a birthday surprise as per her expectations and my parents aren’t so good with gifts. From her birthday, she started becoming distant and barely talked to me, expressing her disappointment with mine and my families gifts. At the time, I was suffering from a severe infection and was admitted in a hospital at my deployment location.
Her mother had been a very frequent communicator with me where she would text me, call me and tell me about her and her family. Her mother told me how she was disappointed with the gift so I sent her two gifts in the next two weeks through a friend which were quite expensive to make up for it. She then started to be a little better but then asked me for “space”, i.e. not to talk to her for a few days which eventually became a week. Come september, I went on leave to my home and we were fine, we met each other, went on drives and everything seemed fine for a few months as you would expect an engaged couple to be.
So in January 2025, I am deployed to a closer location and the time comes to decide dates for the wedding. We discuss with her father who is a little confused at first but we settle for November 2025. She starts telling me jokingly that we should reconsider, maybe delay for a year or two and what not but for no reason, just that she is confused. Things go to and fro and everything is routine for another few months.
Moving to July/August 2025, wedding dates come nearer and we are starting preparations where I am deployed to another location which is maybe 6 hours away. She again starts jokingly saying that she wants to delay but does not give I reason. I ask her what the issue is but she doesnt tell me, but she is very normal and really attached to me judging by her frequent texts and videocalls which do bother me at that time but we meet up once Im on leave, we go on drive or I visit her home where her family is very forthcoming and really treats me a bit too much.
Pre Wedding Phase
A month** before **the wedding, she starts to become distant and completely stops contact with me. I try to approach her and her parents but they say everythings fine and she is just anxious, and I believe them since every girl would be in this stage. I reassure her, and try to tell her that everything would be fine and its too late to cancel the venue and tickets for her and mine family coming from abroad for the wedding and she reluctantly agrees. As per her parents, she increases her dose of anti-depressants but she remains slightly distant from me throughout. The pre wedding events begin and we both get busy with our side of the families.
Wedding
So when the Mehndi / Nikkah happens, she is very shaky and nervous. I comfort her the best I can and her family surround her, not letting anyone know of her condition. She is very much concerned about her friends coming and doesnt even invite them, or even tell them beforehand that she is getting married!
While signing the nikkah papers, I see that her signature is shaky and her family tells me later on that her brother held her hand to sign it.
She goes to her home, nervous and crying and I comfort her the best I can.
That night, her mother has a vertigo attack and is admitted in hospital and remains there for three weeks.
The day of the Wedding/ Barat, I pick her up from the Salon and she is fine, we go to the photoshoot venue and yet again things are fine aside from the nervousness. Once we go to the wedding venue, her mother barely arrives for half an hour and has to go back to her hospital. But I do notice that she is concerned about her friends being there. We go to the hotel room we had booked (she wanted to spend a few nights at the hotel instead of my house) and her whole family, literally her cousins and aunts come to accompany her and remove the makeup and the dress. This does concern me a bit but considering her mothers situation, it seems fine. No intimacy that night since she is on her period.
The next morning, we wake up and I go to the washroom. Coming out, I see her crying after checking her phone and comfort her and ask her whats wrong. She goes on to tell me that she doesnt want to go with the Walima and Im really taken aback with that. I comfort her, tell her its ok nothing is going to happen and that it would not be fine not having the walima since everything is planned.
I call her father and aunt and take her to her home, visibly shaken myself about whats going on. She reluctantly agrees after a few hours so I take her to the salon with her cousin, then the shoot and then the venue where things go fine without an issue. That night, she tells me that she doesnt want to spend the night with me at the hotel and wants to go home so considering the situation, I say ok and let her be. My family does not have an idea about whats going on as I dont tell them considering what they would think about it.
Post Wedding
She continues to spend her time at her home, with us going out for drive or meet her mother at the hospital for a few hours. And she remains distant.
4 days after the marriage, we have to go on our honeymoon and she asks me if she can take her cousin and sister along for “moral support”. Yet again, I agree to make her comfortable considering the situation.
We go for 3 days together, with her cousin and sister in one room and us in another yet she does spend most of the time with them.
On the second night, I ask her to tell me candidly whats wrong because things are not fine. She tells me that she has “attachment issues” and that she had a previous relationship which didnt turn out well so she needs time. Im visibly taken aback and concerned. So, upon return I go to her father and ask him to meet me. Then I meet both her parents who say that she is just making excuses.
I try to comfort her any way I can and be there for her yet all this time she remains secretive and hides her phone from me (continues to this day).
Then, one day her parents force her to spend the night with me at my home. We spend the night and the next day she tells me to drop her at the hospital. I drop her off and she texts me that she does not want this. Her parents are forcing her to spend time with me and that way everything will backfire. So yet again, I say ok, take your time and relax, Ill be there for you. Things go on the same way where we meet daily for an hour so but no spending the night.
Fast forward to end of december while my wife is away, i open her mothers laptop as she asked me to install a software. Whatsapp is open and i see her texts to her mother complaining “only your choice can be this cheap and dirty” and then a comment on a photo of us together “i wish it was xyz (name of another guy)”. Im visibly taken aback and I confront her and her family where she tells me that this is the same guy she told me about and blah blah. Her parents keep saying that its an excuse and she is not involved or whatever. Still, I dont tell my parents.
Things settle down a bit, I move away and keep telling her to stay with me but she hardly comes for 7 months (only two time, and one time with her cousin and sister). We have our fights where she either wants to visit abroad with her friends, or want something too expensive etc. Even when I come on Eid, I have to fight her to spend time with me. And during this time, intimacy is bare minimum as she is totally uninterested and makes excuses for everytime we are together.
I confront her about her attachment with her past relationship and she gaslights me for being too controlling and manipulative so I eventually stop about it. The fight spirals to almost a seperation and I tell my parents and thats the first time they know about it. But I stop telling them later on so they do not have resentment with her once she does come. I do regularly talk to her parents about concerns but they try to assure me, telling me that they have tried everything, they start praising me for bearing with her and everything and what not.
I send her on an umrah with her friend in February 2026 and thins do seem to get better, then I take her on another umrah with myself in July 2026 but we keep having fights during that as well.
Fast forward to our return, I am now deployed to my home city and live at my place. But still, after almost a year she barely comes to spend time with me and in a month, we only spend a few nights together. She makes time for her cousins and her friends, prioritizing their plans over ours and our fights have become more frequent.
For the past two weeks, I have sat her down and expressed my concerns about her backing off of her commitment/promise to spend time together over excuses and spending more time with her friends and cousins than me, her husband. I feel to have lost connection with my family and friends because I always wanted to spend more time with my wife. I feel like that she only contacts me when she needs something and is still involved with someone( yet i Dont have proof apart from her behaviour). I have been contemplating divorce but I cannot get over the fact that I have to answer to Allah over it and the stigma attached with it.
I recently confronted her father, meeting him alone and expressing my concerns to what he replied that I have two choices, either to trust in Allah to change her heart or end it, its my choice. Yet I feel her parents keep hiding something from me, even though they do tell me a lot of things which the girls parents so not occasionally mention.
I feel isolated, emotionally drained and feel like I am being punished for unknown reasons. I see other couples and I feel sad seeing them together, spending time together without a lot of expenditure and in routine activities where she wants to only do things which take a lot of expenditure.
In her defense, my wife said that she has anxiety and cannot leave her room. She does take medicines since a few years and does not spend a night over at her friends or cousins, only her room. She has improved herself as compared to last year but I feel that the real love is missing. I literally have to beg her to spend time with me.
She works for only a short time which is online teaching and is not completely dependent on me, takes pocket money from me (I still give it to her and handle the expenses once she is with me) and her father as well.