Dear Bel,

We have been married a long time, with two grown-up children. Tom worked as a lorry driver then a taxi driver, spending a good deal of time away. I got used to being independent and practically bringing up the children single-handedly.

To be fair, when Tom was at home he was a good husband and father.

When our kids left home, we moved to another area because a son by Tom’s first marriage came on the scene and we didn’t get on. Tom didn’t want to move but said that if we did, there had to be ‘something in it’ for him.

So he took up golf and goes to the club at least three times a week. We are together one day a week (shopping) and most Saturdays. That leaves two ‘free’ days for house maintenance and perhaps a day out.

My marriage has gone stale. This retirement was for him – not for us. It seems I didn’t really know him until we moved. He will occasionally help in the house and has bought me presents. But presents aren’t everything.

My old friends are where we used to live and our children are far away. I’ve tried talking to him but it usually results in an argument. We don’t share a bedroom and there’s little companionship. I feel I’m being punished for my attitude to his son. I have much to be thankful for but there should be more to my life than having meals ready and tackling housework on a Monday.

Rosemary

Bel replies: Your letter will resonate with many married women. Most couples tend to become stale, whatever spark that once flared between them extinguished by washing- up water and tears.

My marriage has gone stale. This retirement was for him – not for us. It seems I didn’t really know him until we moved, writes Rosemary to Bel

I don’t want to sound cynical, but in Anglo-Saxon literature we find a poem called The Wife’s Lament, and great works – such as War And Peace and Middlemarch to name but two – have at their core truths about marriage.

Time’s passage can bring disappointment and sadness, but it’s still worth considering what can be done.

So let’s look at two sentences in your letter: ‘This retirement was for him – not for us’ and ‘I feel I’m being punished for my attitude to his son’.

In between those lines lies a suggestion of misunderstanding and resentment.

The house move was entirely for you, because you didn’t get on with your stepson – so much so that you were prepared to uproot to get away from him. That’s serious – when your husband didn’t want to move.

So if the retirement was ‘for him’ (it’s not clear what exactly that means) the house move was for you. You say you ‘didn’t really know him until we moved’, but you must have asked yourself whether your extreme hostility towards his son had everything to do with that.

It seems there’s probably a deeper story there, which you’re glossing over. You left family and friends, for what? No hated stepson but a set of golf clubs instead.

I totally sympathise with your longing for ‘more’. At the same time, you express thanks for all the good in your life.

So now you must capitalise on that positivity to change the rest.

For a start, when you try to talk to Tom be sure you don’t start any sentence with an accusatory ‘You’ (as in, ‘You never seem to understand…’) but always use ‘I’ or ‘We’ (as in, ‘I get a bit tired, Tom…’ or, ‘We deserve a change – so let’s….’). This helps turn complains into suggestions.

Tom found his golfing life, so it’s vital that you find something else as well. You need to get out of the house and meet people. What about volunteering? Don’t say you don’t have time because you do.

Is there a local WI group? It’s a marvellous organisation which can change women’s lives and I strongly recommend it. Might you put up a notice at the golf club suggesting a tea for ‘golf widows’? There might be welcome smiles.

You have to create the life you want and take Tom along with you. Next week, leave that Monday housework and go get your hair done.

Is my fear of becoming a dad ordinary nerves or a wake-up call?

Dear Bel,

My girlfriend would probably laugh if she knew I was writing this letter to you.

We’ve been together nearly nine years. We met when we were students and bought a house outside Leeds five years ago. We’ve both got decent jobs, can just about afford a holiday each year if nothing breaks down, and our families all get on. We’ve got a good life.

Lately, though, everyone seems to have decided it’s time for the next step. Every family get-together ends with someone asking when we’re going to have a baby and even the lads at work have started saying that I’ll be the next one pushing a pram round the park.

I always thought I’d look forward to it. I’ve never been one of those blokes who says kids aren’t for him. My older sister has two daughters and I love spending time with them. When I see my mate’s little boy running across the park shouting ‘Daddy!’, I crack a soppy smile.

So why do I feel sick every time someone asks when it’s our turn?

We’re fine, don’t row – we’re too good at getting on with life. We both work hard, come home tired, eat in front of the telly and start the whole routine again the next day.

Weekends disappear in supermarket trips, cutting the grass, visiting family and friends. But somewhere along the way we’ve stopped being excited to see each other. I don’t even know when it happened.

A few weeks ago, we were walking through a shopping centre and she stopped outside a baby shop. She pointed at a pushchair and started talking about how we’d need a bigger car. She looked happy.

When I left her with a friend and got back to my van, I just sat staring through the windscreen for ten minutes.

The truth is, I don’t know whether I’m frightened of becoming a dad or frightened our rut will get deeper. Is she the right person?

Every family get-together ends with someone asking when we’re going to have a baby and even the lads at work have started, writes Darren to Bel Mooney

That sounds mean because she’s done absolutely nothing wrong. She’s kind, loyal and would make a brilliant mum. The problem must be me.

We’re comfortable – but once you’ve got a child, there isn’t an easy way back if you’ve ignored your doubts.

She deserves honesty and not to have nine years of her life turned upside down because I’ve suddenly started questioning everything about our life.

Are these ordinary nerves before a huge life change, or the sort of doubts people regret ignoring years later?

Darren

Bel replies: I’m not sure I would attach the adjective ‘ordinary’ to any heartfelt human emotions. Even if the dictionary tells us the word means ‘Not different or unexpected in any way; usual’, I reckon even common human feelings are experienced uniquely, often with devastating consequences for the person who lies awake at night, wondering what to do.

This echoes the famous opening line from Leo Tolstoy’s 1878 novel Anna Karenina: ‘All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.’

Would it surprise you to learn that I approached my own first pregnancy with fear and gloom?

At 26, I didn’t want my hedonistic freedom to disappear, as I knew it must. Two sisters-in-law had had babies, so I felt stuck on some conveyor-belt to tedious respectability.

Then… I fell in love with the mewling bundle and never looked back. Pushchairs and nappies became fascinating in a way I could never have predicted. Yes, it was tiring – but above all thrilling.

I share that story to reassure you that countless men and women alike have shared your fears. So please don’t say ‘the problem must be me’, because it’s not you. You feel perfectly normal human trepidation at the thought of change. Getting cold feet is a part of the human condition. But your way of dealing with it will be special to you and your love.

Seriously, Darren, does anybody expect to be ‘excited’ at the thought of seeing their partner after nine years? I suggest that if one of you went away for a fortnight, the reunion would be marvellous – check the closing sequence of the movie Love Actually. It would be exhausting to be excited by every normal day. And I warn you, when bored married people start affairs, it’s the excitement that draws – then consumes – them. Not to be advised.

Read today’s other letter from ‘Rosemary’ (below) and make a vow not to get into even more of a rut than the one you describe. You’re still in your 30s, for heaven’s sake! This is the time when you should be having fun as well as working and running a home.

Try to remember a time when you were both stupidly frivolous and surprise her by trying to revisit it. Maybe skip one family get-together and do something romantic instead. Re-learn how to talk to each other.

Tell you what – one unusual, exciting thing to do would be sneak off to the Register Office with two besties and tie the knot. That would surprise everybody, wouldn’t it?

Next time your two mothers go on about babies, ask them if they’ll be ready to help with childcare. Say it with a big grin that puts you in charge. Because you are in charge. You’ve created a good life with a good woman, but we all change – and I hope that, in your own time, a sweet baby will be the icing on your cake.

And finally...

The peace of accepting ‘it is what it is’

These days many people write self-help books, full of homespun wisdom.

They often express the blindingly obvious in sweet and sonorous words – so much sagacity swilling about the shelves and the internet you’d think we’d all be as shrewd as King Solomon by now.

There’s nothing wrong with it – I’m all for anything helpful, which is why I write this column.

Still, you can become tired of faux-wise cliches.

My daughter and my husband often use a popular one: ‘It is what it is.’ That verbal shrug says you have to accept what you can’t change.

Is it sad passivity or muscular realism? Take your pick.

But I found myself rather irritated by what I identified as easy, modern, laconic cool.

Wrong! I’ve discovered the phraseology isn’t modern at all. In my book on the history of embroidery (The Subversive Stitch, by Rozsika Parker), I learn that the 14th-century English king Edward III used as a motto, ‘Sy hyt be as hyt hys’.

At a famous jousting tournament held in Dunstable in 1342, he wore the phrase embroidered with pearls and jewels on his finery, and he even slept with the words glittering at him from his green and gold bed hangings.

You can probably read the Middle English phrase as: ‘So it be as it is.’ In other words, accept things as they are.

What’s more, the idea is even older than the Middle Ages. About 2,200 years ago the concept of Tathata emerged as a formal Buddhist philosophy. Loosely translated, it means ’thusness’ or ‘suchness’.

Recalling expressions like, ‘such is life’ (usually said with a deep sigh) and ‘there you go’ (helpless shrug), you get the idea.

When it’s truly impossible to change things, what choice is there?

Christian prayers end with ‘amen’ – meaning ‘so be it’.