15 Common Marriage Problems Couples Deal With & How to Fix Them

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Every marriage, no matter how strong, will face challenges. It’s not a sign of failure, but a natural part of merging two lives, personalities, and sets of expectations. 

The key to a thriving relationship isn’t the absence of problems, but how you deal with them together. 

Understanding the most frequent struggles can help you feel less alone and more equipped to address issues before they erode your connection. 

This guide explores the 15 common marriage problems that nearly every couple encounters, offering insight into their root causes and practical strategies for moving forward as a team.

Recognizing that you are not alone in these struggles is the first step toward transforming them from sources of conflict into opportunities for deeper intimacy and partnership.

The 15 Common Marriage Problems

Navigating marital challenges requires a clear understanding of what you’re up against. Each of these problems represents a common stress point where love and daily reality collide. 

By identifying them clearly, you can move from a place of frustration and blame to one of targeted problem-solving. 

Remember, the presence of these issues is normal; it’s your response to them that will define the future health and happiness of your partnership. 

Let’s explore each challenge in depth, examining not just what they look like on the surface, but the underlying emotional dynamics that fuel them.

1. Lack of Commitment

At the core of many marital issues couples face is a fundamental erosion of commitment. This isn’t just about contemplating divorce; it’s demonstrated through emotional absenteeism, broken promises, and a lack of consistent effort to prioritize the relationship.

When one or both partners stop investing in the “us,” the foundation begins to crumble. Commitment manifests in daily choices: choosing to turn toward your partner rather than away, investing time in shared dreams, and honoring vows through action, not just memory.

This issue is profoundly serious. Lack of commitment is cited as the reason for divorce in 75 percent of cases, making it the most frequently reported issue among divorcing couples.

This statistic reveals that while other problems may trigger conflict, it’s the underlying withdrawal of commitment that ultimately severs the bond.

Signs

Making unilateral decisions that affect the family without consultation, consistently prioritizing hobbies, friends, or work over couple time, refusing to engage in problem-solving discussions, speaking about your spouse or marriage with contempt to others, fantasizing regularly about life without your partner.

What to do

• Begin by having a courageous, non-accusatory conversation about what commitment looks and feels like to each of you. 
• Revisit your shared history and the “why” behind your marriage. 
• Rebuild trust not through grand gestures, but through small, consistent actions: being fully present during conversations, following through on promises (no matter how small), and consciously choosing your relationship each day. 
• Consider renewing or explicitly discussing your vows to reaffirm your shared path forward.

2. Communication Problems in Marriage

Communication problems in marriage top nearly every list of relational challenges. 

This includes more than just fighting; it includes 

• Chronic misunderstandings
• Stonewalling (the emotional shutdown and refusal to engage)
• Harsh criticism
• Expressions of contempt (eye-rolling, sarcasm, name-calling) 
• Loneliness of not feeling heard

When couples cannot safely express needs or receive feedback without defensiveness, every other problem becomes magnified and unsolvable. 

Research confirms its critical impact: communication problems are cited as a major reason for divorce in 70 percent of cases, according to a study published by the NCBI. This breakdown creates an environment where resentment flourishes and emotional connection starves.

Signs

Conversations that quickly escalate into arguments, feeling like you must censor yourself to keep the peace, the frequent use of “you always” or “you never” statements, one partner consistently shutting down and walking away, a pattern of talking at each other rather than with each other.

What to do

• Invest in rebuilding your communication framework. 
• Master the “soft startup”; beginning difficult conversations gently, without blame (“I’ve been feeling worried about our budget lately” vs. “You’re wasting all our money”). 
• Adopt “I feel” statements to own your experience (“I feel hurt when plans change at the last minute”) instead of accusatory “you” statements (“You’re so flaky”). 
• Practice reflective listening: after your partner speaks, paraphrase what you heard before responding, ensuring understanding (“So, what I’m hearing is that you felt dismissed when I was on my phone. Is that right?”). 
• Schedule regular, low-stakes check-in conversations to practice these skills when you’re not already in conflict.
• Enroll in a “Couple Communication Course”.

3. Financial Stress & Money Conflicts

Financial stress marriage conflicts are rarely just about dollars and cents. Money represents security, freedom, personal values, and power within a relationship. 

Conflicts ignite from deeply rooted differences: a spender versus a saver mentality, secret debts or spending (financial infidelity), resentment over income disparities or employment status, or the overwhelming anxiety of living paycheck-to-paycheck. 

One partner may view money strictly as a tool for future security, while the other sees it as a means for present enjoyment and experience, leading to constant tension over budgets, purchases, and financial priorities.

Signs

Repeated arguments about specific purchases or spending categories, hiding receipts or bank statements, resentment over who contributes more financially, drastically different risk tolerances for investments, feeling controlled or scrutinized over every dollar spent.

What to do

• Demystify and depersonalize money talks. 
• Schedule a monthly, calm “financial date” with a set agenda; this isn’t the time for ambushes.
• Create full transparency: share all accounts, debts, and credit scores. 
• Build a budget together that includes categories for shared goals (savings, bills), individual “no-guilt” discretionary spending, and debt repayment. 
• Focus on becoming a financial team by setting shared short-term and long-term goals (a vacation, a house, retirement). 
• If necessary, a meeting with a financial planner can provide neutral, expert guidance.

4. Lack of Intimacy (Physical & Emotional)

A lack of intimacy in marriage is a deeply painful issue. It involves not just a decline in sexual frequency, but an erosion of emotional closeness, affectionate non-sexual touch, vulnerable sharing, and playful connection. 

This issue can stem from many sources: unresolved resentment that builds a wall between you, mismatched libidos or sexual desires, the physical and emotional toll of stress or health issues, or simply falling into a busy, platonic roommate routine where you stop seeing each other as romantic partners.

Intimacy is the unique glue of a romantic partnership; it’s the space where you feel most known and accepted. Without it, couples can feel profound loneliness even while sharing a home.

Signs

Kissing and hugging become rare or perfunctory, sexual encounters are infrequent and feel like a chore, you no longer share your inner fears, hopes, or silly thoughts, you feel more like business partners co-managing a household than lovers, there’s a palpable physical and emotional distance.

What to do

• Address the emotional bridge before trying to rebuild the physical one. 
• Start with non-sexual, affectionate touch without expectation; a 20-second hug, holding hands on a walk, a back rub. 
• Schedule quality, distraction-free time to talk about things other than logistics. 
• Communicate openly about desires and barriers without pressure or blame, using “I” language (“I miss feeling close to you” vs. “You never want to have sex”). 
• Consider reading a book on intimacy together or seeking a sex therapist if the disconnect is deeply entrenched.

5. Jealousy and Trust Issues

Jealousy and trust issues can poison a marriage’s basic sense of safety and security.

This may stem from a major betrayal like infidelity, but it can also arise from personal insecurities, inappropriate emotional or physical boundaries with friends/coworkers, secretive behavior (like hidden social media interactions), or a history of broken promises. 

While a flicker of jealousy can be normal, it becomes destructive when it manifests as controlling behaviors, constant accusatory questioning, and a pervasive lack of trust that creates a prison of suspicion for both partners, eroding freedom and goodwill.

Signs

Requiring constant check-ins on whereabouts, secretly checking phones or emails, accusations of flirting or inappropriate behavior with little evidence, isolating a partner from friends of the opposite sex (or any friends), needing access to all passwords and accounts, interpreting innocent interactions as threats.

What to do

Rebuilding trust is a slow, consistent process. 

• The partner whose actions triggered the insecurity must practice radical, voluntary transparency; offering information before being asked, being where they say they will be, and being open about communications. 
• The hurt partner must work on managing anxiety responses and clearly articulate what they need to feel safe, without resorting to punitive control. 
• Together, establish clear, agreed-upon boundaries regarding interactions with others (e.g., “We don’t have private late-night texting with exes”). 
• Professional counseling is often essential, especially after infidelity.

6. Parenting Disagreements

Parenting disagreements couples experience are almost inevitable, as you are blending two different family cultures, values, and personal histories. 

Conflicts arise over fundamental discipline styles (authoritative vs. permissive), division of childcare labor and the exhausting “mental load,” differing values on education, religion, or screen time, and how to allocate limited family resources. 

When not managed unitedly, children can become unwitting pawns in a marital power struggle, leading to confusion for them and deepening resentment between you. 

The stress after having children is a well-documented pressure point for marriages.

Signs

Arguing about parenting in front of the kids, one partner undermining the other’s rules or discipline, resentment over who does the “night shift,” school drop-offs, or planning activities, feeling like you’re parenting alone, disagreeing on major decisions like schooling or healthcare.

What to do

• Commit to presenting a united front to your children, even if you disagree privately. 
• Have regular “parenting meetings” outside of heated moments to discuss philosophies, rules, and schedules. 
• Divide duties explicitly and fairly; don’t assume. 
• Acknowledge the immense weight of the “mental load” (remembering appointments, buying clothes, planning meals) and share it actively. 
• Prioritize your partnership; a strong marital foundation is the best gift you can give your children.

7. Household Responsibilities Conflict

The household responsibilities conflict is a modern classic, fueled by shifting gender roles and busy dual-career households. It’s the daily grind of chores, errands, and maintenance, but the real battle is often over the perception of fairness and appreciation. 

The core issue is frequently the unequal “mental load”; the invisible, cognitive labor of planning, organizing, anticipating needs, and managing the home ecosystem. 

When one partner (still disproportionately women) feels like the household project manager and the other a part-time, task-only assistant, deep resentment builds over who does the dishes, remembers to buy toothpaste, or notices the toilet paper is low.

Signs

The phrase “you should have asked” creates instant rage, nagging feels constant, one partner feels like a parent scolding a child, exhaustion from being the “rememberer,” scorekeeping of who did what last.

What to do

• Make the invisible work visible. Sit down and list every single task required to run your home, from changing air filters to planning birthday parties. 
• Divide tasks fairly, considering preference, skill, and bandwidth; ownership means being responsible for the task from start to finish, including the mental planning. 
• Implement a system (a shared app, a whiteboard) to track responsibilities. Have regular, calm check-ins on the balance, not in the heat of the moment when resentment is high.

8. Emotional Disconnection

Emotional disconnection marriage is the slow, silent drift. You may live together and function as a unit, but you live parallel lives. 

Conversations become purely transactional (logistics about kids, bills, and schedules) but you stop sharing your inner worlds: your hopes, fears, insecurities, and silly daydreams. 

This happens gradually and insidiously as careers, parenting, and the sheer busyness of adult life consume your energy. You stop making your emotional bond a priority, assuming it will maintain itself. 

You may still love each other deeply but no longer feel in love or truly known, leading to a profound sense of loneliness within the marriage.

Signs

Your most meaningful conversations are with friends, not your spouse. You feel a pang of envy seeing connected couples. You don’t know your partner’s current stressors or joys at work. Physical affection is absent. You feel like roommates or co-CEOs of a family business.

What to do

• Reconnection requires intentional, consistent effort. Implement a daily ritual of emotional check-ins, like sharing the “rose and thorn” of your day. 
• Practice active curiosity; ask open-ended questions about your partner’s thoughts and feelings and listen without immediately relating it back to yourself. 
• Create tech-free zones (e.g., the dinner table, the first 30 minutes after coming home) to ensure you are truly present. 
• Schedule regular “state of the union” conversations to discuss the relationship itself, not just its logistics.

9. Boredom in Marriage

Boredom in marriage stems from predictability and a severe lack of novelty. While stability and routine provide safety, the human brain is wired to seek new experiences. 

When every weekend, conversation, and vacation follows the exact same comfortable script, passion and excitement can fade. 

The adrenaline of early romance is replaced by the calm of familiarity, which, without conscious effort, can tip into monotony. 

You might care for each other deeply but miss the spark of adventure, surprise, and discovery that characterized your early relationship, wondering, “Is this all there is?”

Signs

Feeling “stuck in a rut,” dreading the predictable weekend routine, lack of excitement about planning your future together, feeling more animated with friends than with your spouse, sexual routine feels obligatory and unexciting.

What to do

• Proactively inject novelty and shared adventure. Try new activities together that involve learning or mild adrenaline: a cooking class, hiking a new trail, traveling to an unfamiliar place. 
• Break small routines: take a different route on your walk, try a new restaurant cuisine, listen to a new genre of music together. 
• Reintroduce play and flirtation. Be silly, surprise them with a note, or recreate an early date. Novelty reignites the reward centers in the brain associated with your partner.

10. Family Interference or External Pressure

Family interference in marriage occurs when external relationships (most commonly in-laws, but sometimes friends or adult children) overstep healthy boundaries, creating painful loyalty conflicts for a partner. 

This can include unsolicited advice on parenting, criticisms of your spouse, financial entanglements, or attempts to dictate holiday traditions. 

Cultural, religious, or community expectations can also place significant pressure on a couple to conform to certain roles or lifestyles that may not fit them. 

The core conflict becomes “me vs. your family,” forcing a partner to choose between their spouse and their family of origin.

Signs

Feeling tense or arguing before and after family visits, a partner consistently siding with their family over their spouse, family members making derogatory comments about your spouse that go unchallenged, dreading holidays, feeling like your marriage is constantly being judged.

What to do

• Solidify your identity as a new, primary family unit. As a united team, establish clear, respectful boundaries. 
• The partner whose family is overstepping must be the primary one to communicate and enforce these boundaries with kindness and firmness (“Mom, we appreciate your input, but this is our decision to make as parents.”). 
• Present a unified front always. 
• Protect your couple time and make your own traditions.
• Counseling can be invaluable to deal with complex family dynamics.

11. Unresolved Conflicts That Keep Returning

All couples have some unresolved conflicts spouses can’t fully solve; these are “perpetual problems” based on fundamental personality differences or core needs (e.g., one needs more order, the other thrives in creative chaos). 

The marriage killer isn’t the problem itself, but the toxic, repetitive cycle of how you fight about it. 

When managed with criticism, contempt, defensiveness, and stonewalling (Gottman’s “Four Horsemen”), these issues become radioactive landmines that explode with the same destructive pattern every few months, creating a sense of hopelessness.

Signs

Having the exact same argument about money, chores, or time with near-identical scripts, feeling a sense of dread when the topic arises, bringing up past failed arguments as ammunition, believing your partner will never change on this issue.

What to do

• Shift your goal from solving the unsolvable to understanding and managing it with grace.
• Learn to discuss the issue with a softened startup and listen to understand the dream or fear behind your partner’s position.
• Accept that this is a fundamental difference. Then, focus on compromise and humor: “Okay, I’m the neat freak and you’re the free spirit. How can we make our home work for both of us?” The dialogue becomes the success, not the resolution.

12. Past Trauma Affecting the Marriage

The impact of past trauma on marriage is often misunderstood. Unhealed wounds from childhood adversity, past abusive relationships, military service, or significant loss don’t disappear when you say “I do.” 

They live in the nervous system and manifest in the marriage as heightened reactions (triggers), deep-seated trust issues, emotional numbness or volatility, difficulty with vulnerability and intimacy, or patterns of self-sabotage when things are going well. 

A partner’s trauma responses can be misinterpreted by their spouse as personal rejection, coldness, or overreaction, when in fact they are automatic survival mechanisms.

Signs

Extreme reactions to seemingly minor triggers (a raised voice, a certain tone, a specific topic), difficulty relaxing and feeling safe, avoiding conflict at all costs or escalating it instantly, dissociation or “shutting down” during stress, hypervigilance about a partner’s mood or whereabouts.

What to do

• The partner with trauma history should seek individual therapy with a clinician trained in trauma modalities (like EMDR or Somatic Experiencing). 
• Healing must occur within the individual first. The other partner should educate themselves on trauma responses to cultivate patience and respond with support instead of frustration (e.g., “I see you’re upset. I’m here. You’re safe.”). 
• Couples therapy with a trauma-informed therapist can then help rebuild a sense of safety within the relationship.

13. Lack of Quality Time Together

In the relentless busyness of modern life, lack of quality time together is a silent, slow-acting poison for marriages. It’s not just about quantity, but about the quality of undivided, intentional connection. 

When your limited time is consumed by work deadlines, children’s activities, household management, and the dopamine drip of screens, your relationship is relegated to the leftover scraps of time and energy. 

You cannot maintain a deep emotional bond, cultivate inside jokes, or foster intimacy without regular, focused interaction that says, “You are my priority.”

Signs

Feeling like ships passing in the night, date nights are a distant memory or constantly canceled, you’re physically together but both scrolling on phones, conversations are only about task delegation, you can’t remember the last time you laughed together or had a deep talk.

What to do

• Treat couple time as a non-negotiable appointment. Schedule a weekly “date night,” even if it’s at home after the kids are in bed (board games, a special dessert, talking). 
• Implement tech-free zones; no phones at the dinner table or in the bedroom. 
• Find small moments of connection: a 6-minute chat when you first get home, a goodbye kiss that lasts 7 seconds. The key is presence, not perfection.

14. Balancing Independence and Togetherness

A healthy, sustainable marriage requires a delicate, ongoing dance of balancing independence and togetherness. 

Some couples struggle with losing their individual identities, hobbies, and friendships in the “we,” leading to resentment and a lack of personal fulfillment. 

Others struggle with excessive autonomy; living such separate lives that they feel more like detached business partners than a connected couple, leading to loneliness. 

Finding the harmonious rhythm between “me” and “we” is an ongoing negotiation, especially for partners with inherently different social batteries or needs for solitude.

Signs

Resentment when a partner spends time on their own hobbies, having no individual friends or interests, feeling smothered or like you’ve lost yourself, living largely separate schedules, not knowing details of your partner’s daily life.

What to do

• Normalize and encourage “separateness” as a healthy nutrient for “togetherness.” 
• Communicate your needs openly without guilt: “I love our time together, and I also need some solo time on Saturday to recharge.” 
• Actively support each other’s individual friendships and passions. 
• Then, consciously create meaningful rituals of connection to reunite and share your individual experiences, making the “we” time richer because you both have something to bring to it.

15. Changing Goals, Values, or Priorities

People are meant to grow and evolve, but sometimes they grow in different directions. This profound challenge involves changing goals, values, or priorities over the decades of a marriage. 

The person you married at 25 may have fundamentally different dreams at 45. 

One partner may experience a spiritual awakening, desire a radical career change, decide they no longer want children (or want more), or wish to relocate across the country, while the other does not. 

The shared vision you built your marriage upon may fracture, leaving you wondering if you’re still compatible.

Signs

Feeling like you don’t truly know or recognize your spouse anymore, arguing about future plans with no middle ground, resentment over dreams sacrificed earlier in the marriage, a sense that you’re living two separate lives headed for different destinations.

What to do

• Engage in regular, open-hearted “dream sessions.” 
• Practice radical empathy; strive to understand the “why” and the deep need behind your partner’s changing desire, even if you don’t share it. 
• Explore if there are creative compromises that honor both sets of values (e.g., a geographic move that satisfies one’s adventure need and the other’s career need). This may require professional help to navigate. 

The goal is to see if you can co-create a new, shared vision that accommodates both people’s growth, or to recognize with honesty if your paths have diverged too far.

How Couples Can Overcome These Marriage Problems

While this list of common marriage problems may seem daunting, the pathway through them is built not on luck, but on consistent, intentional effort and a shift in perspective.

 The most resilient couples view their relationship not as a static contract, but as a living, breathing entity that requires ongoing care, adjustment, and nourishment. They understand that love is a verb. 

Key strategies include prioritizing open, respectful communication using the tools outlined above, scheduling regular emotional and logistical check-ins before crises erupt, seeking professional counseling as a form of proactive maintenance and skill-building (not a last resort for the “broken”), and fiercely protecting quality time, play, and intimacy from the encroachment of daily life.

Perhaps the most crucial mindset shift is moving from an adversarial stance (“you are the problem”) to a collaborative one (“this is our problem to solve together”). This “we versus the problem” attitude transforms conflict. Remember, you are on the same team. 

By normalizing these struggles, educating yourselves, and committing to daily acts of connection and repair, you can transform these common obstacles into the very experiences that forge a deeper, more resilient, and more fulfilling partnership. 

Your marriage’s strength is measured not by the absence of storms, but by the sturdiness of the boat you build together to weather them.

FAQs

Conclusion

Facing these common marriage problems is not an indication that your relationship is broken or failing; it is undeniable proof that it is human, dynamic, and alive. 

Every single couple, without exception, navigates some combination of these challenges across their lifetime together. 

The health, longevity, and happiness of your marriage are defined not by the absence of conflict, but by your shared commitment to navigating it with understanding, grace, empathy, and proactive repair. 

By normalizing these universal struggles, moving away from shame and blame, and courageously educating yourselves on their roots and remedies, you possess the power to transform obstacles into opportunities for deeper connection, understanding, and partnership.

Your marriage is a living journey of constant growth, adaptation, and rediscovery. Nurture it with the same intention you would a cherished garden; with daily care, patience through the seasons, and the wisdom to seek help when needed. 

It can, and will, grow stronger, more beautiful, and more resilient through every challenge you face together. The choice to engage in that work, side-by-side, is the very essence of a lasting love.