IslamicAnswers.com: Islamic Advice

Marriage to a Pious Muslim

Assalaamu Aleikum Dear Brothers and Sisters... I pray all are in the best state of health and imaan...

I have thought about joining this site for a long time, but didn't have the courage to do so as i don't like discussing my problems in public.

But with the hope that i may gain something beneficial from my fellow Muslims, i decided to seek help and insha'allaah I pray that I find something in this....  it is long but i apologize in advance,,, please take your time to read through it.....

I am engaged to a man with a relationship of over 3 years. Our relationship before engagement wasn’t the best. We are both young and hard working and we are a student of knowledge, Islamically and academically and we both memorized qura’an at a young age. I know him for the last few years and yet I feel like I don’t him at all.

I was young when he approached me the first time. My life before him was calm; I was trying my best to practice my Deen and to be the best I can. I was and honest sister, never used to lie about anything if I am questioned. I have tried my very best to stay away from what Allah has made unlawful to us. When he approached me and I saw that he was a man that practices the Sunnah, I believed him and trusted him without a doubt in my heart that he’ll not misuse my trust.

I haven’t had a relationship before him so he was my first. I believed he was an honest man. With the little Islamic knowledge that I had, I put it in practice and I never used to lie so I thought this guy with more knowledge will do better than me and fears Allah more than I or so I thought, because knowing Allah and learning his Deen will help one attain the highest of Taqwa as Allah said in the Qur’an.

So a year passed, we had a good relationship but we sometimes used disobey in Allah and followed our desires, he might hated as much as I did the fact that we were disobeying Allah, yet he used to insist in committing the sin even after we repent and made tawba to Allah. So I got to the point where I believed my repentance are not accepted because am still repeating the sin and I believed that this relationship is not meant to be kheyr for me.

We wronged ourselves to an extreme limit but we never committed fahisha. As always, I will be the one to straight things to more Islamic based relationship when things get worse. Sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn’t work but eventually we were engaged.

After one year of our relationship, I figured that he lied about himself and the way he introduced himself to me. He lied about some things that weren’t even important to lie about which makes me believe that he lies often. So our relationship was based on lies, lies about himself, family, friends and school. This weren’t lies that were told once; they were repetitive through all our relationship because sometimes the conversation we have might be about family or friends and he lies about it every time we discuss this.

Not that he didn’t come from a good family but I just to this day don’t understand what the reason was behind those lies. When I figured out this guy is been lying to me for the whole time, my mind set about him changed him. At first, I saw him a religious man, honest and trustworthy man, but figured that I was wrong. He apologized many times but when I asked him why he would lie about these simple things, he never had an answer and says I didn’t think it was a big deal.

He said I only lied to you about those but not about myself and what he said about himself was beyond what a girl would look for in a guy which makes me believe that he  also lied about himself as well. I forgave him for all. After few months I figured another lie that he told me and yet I forgave him. He repeated major lies that he told me to the point that now I don’t trust a word that he says most of the time.

Now that we are engaged, we’re having bigger problems, I am usually an easy hearted person, my heart can be hurt easily yet can forgive easily but it is hard to change my thoughts and what I believe about some things. The reason why it was easy for me to forgive him is because he loves me as he says or so I thought. I see his eyes are full or mercy when I look at him. He seems to be caring even though he barely does anything for me or shows me an act that shows he cares.

When we were getting engaged, he wasn’t ready for it, I believe financially and mentally. We had a relationship of over 3 years when we engaged. I gave him the options of either marrying me if he wants me the way he says or let me go because I didn’t wanted to spend my days and nights in the disobedience of Allah, I had enough knowing that I was disobeying Allah since the beginning of this relationship. So I told him I will not keep this relationship and that am moving on if you don’t ask for my hand.

Before I got to this decision, we planned marriage many times in the past and he cancelled it every time saying that he is not ready financially. He kept making promises that we will marry or sometimes set a date and when the time comes closer he breaks his promises by giving me an excuses and apologizing so he can still keep me. He kept breaking his promises until I finally decided that if he doesn’t marry me, then am moving on. So we decided that since he can’t afford marriage that we get engaged and my family agreed.

Two months after engagement, he said to me, I put a responsibility that I can’t handle on my shoulders and am going crazy thinking about it, I love you and I don’t want to lose you but I also don’t want you to hold on to me when I have nothing to provide for you so what do you think if we cancel the engagement? At this, I was very surprised that this he is telling me to leave after engagement and I have been telling him to leave me alone all the years before our engagement if he doesn’t have anything for me and he couldn’t.

I wouldn’t be able to leave him either because I loved him with a sincere heart despite what he did to me. I thought he couldn’t leave me out of love that he had for me. So when he told me his idea, I told him that I am not worried about money or the fact that he doesn’t have money. It’s not that he doesn’t have a job, he has a part time job that doesn’t cover anything more than his needs as he says but I also know that his income is very low. So I don’t bother asking him the usual things that girls ask their husband just to make life easy for him.

After five month of our engagement, he came to me with the same idea the third time saying he is worried about us but he can’t do anything for us, he said I see that divorce might be a solution for both of us since I don’t have anything to offer you as a wife, I feel ashamed for what I do, I have tried but I can’t change anything about this situation, I think about this days and nights but I can’t find a solution to our problem, I’ll give you the choice, it’s up to you to make this decision, if you decide to stay with me I will be happy to keep you but if you decide to leave me I will let you go….

Hearing these words, I just broke down, this is a man that I loved and chose him out of the rest. He is been telling me how much he loves me and wants to keep me as his wife. He said so much to steal my heart that I will never expect these words from him. I know that when a man loves a woman, he would do anything to get her despite luck of financial. But he is telling me to make the decision of either staying with or leave and he doesn’t care what I choose and that it wouldn’t matter to him if I leave or stayed.

Hearing his words, I can’t describe how I felt, I wasn’t strong enough to take a step. After days, I decided that I will be divorced, because I felt like I was walked upon, that am keeping this guy in something that he has no interest anymore. So I told him my decision that it’s better for me to leave you. By hearing my decision he felt bad and guilty for ruining the little, happiness and comfort we’ve found in each other.

He told his family, they were as surprised as I was and told him that he was wrong in what he did. His family likes me a lot, they apologized to me and he promised that he will never do it again. But it was already too late, I lost the hope I had in this relationship, he promised he will do everything better and get us married very soon.

I feel like he abused my heart, I tried to forgive him this time but I can’t and he’s not doing anything better to show me that he’s working for our marriage plans. He knows how to talk and whenever we talks, he puts his negative words into positive and he knows he can change my mind. He doesn’t treat me like one; he doesn’t show me that he cares as much.

He always makes promises and barely fulfils them he doesn’t like talking with my family and contacted them only twice in the past 9-10 months and his excuse is that he doesn’t want to contact with them or meet them until he improves his situation and I don’t know how that has to do with contacting my family.

Now we are still together and he is keep promising that he will do everything better, but I don’t trust him enough to count on him as a husband. I find it difficult to believe everything he says. He doesn’t accept his mistakes when I confront him. I told him my luck of trust in him but he is not doing anything to show me that I can trust him again. I am very confused as he changes who he is every now and then.

I feel like I don’t know the guy am engaged to. The image I had of him when we first met and the image I have of him now is total opposite. Now that he wants me still and he is promising to change, is it worth giving him a chance? Will I trust him again? Will he fulfill his promises this time? Does he really love me as he say? Then why his actions far from his words? Why is it hard for him to keep his promises for me if he loves me?

What if I give him another chance and he does this to me again when we get married and have a family? Is he worthy of been trusted? Am I hanging on to something that’s not there? I just sometimes cry when I see who I am now and what I became busy thinking about and who I was before I met him. We have sat to discuss our problems together many times, and every time he used to see the same conclusion to our problem which is divorce…

I also met with local Imams but it didn’t do much help..

~ Faith-Hearted