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Stephen Hedger

Stephen Hedger

Crisis Marriage Coach | Harley Street London

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“The Marital Death Spiral”

They are in a power struggle mainly due to hidden unmet needs. Both are feeling the other doesn’t care but neither is really wanting the relationship to end, but where they are is a living hell.

They know they are running out of time, their energy is waning, and they are fed up with the cycle of feeling good and it not lasting.

In fact, the feeling good is getting shorter and the feeling bad is getting longer so their only relief is when they are not together and they know it.

The problem with unmet needs is each person will still try to meet those needs, but will do so in a destructive way especially if they don’t feel understood or cared for.

The problem each person isn’t seeing is their partner’s critical needs are very different from their own and this is normal.

So what is critical to one person may not matter at all to the other.

As they try to communicate they will become upset angry frustrated or confused at their partner’s lack of understanding of what to them is obvious.

Both people are usually blind to these core differences and so they blame the other person for not caring and making them feel bad.

One lady told me she felt her husband’s needs were ridiculous, just because his needs were not the same as hers.

With this belief, she would always collapse any relationship she had.

In their mind, they think what they need is what everyone needs “it’s normal”.

This is NOT true of course, but that doesn’t mean what they need is wrong.

The truth is for couples in this space is they are simply very different and so not designed to understand each other at all.

The solution to the problem is to help each person meet their own critical needs so in any given situation the outcome is always a win-win situation.

To achieve this the couple will need sight of each other’s critical needs and what has to happen for them to be fulfilled.

How people are getting this wrong…

  • So one person may feel unloved when the other person feels a loss of security.
  • One person may feel they are going nowhere whilst the other feels there is no fun or passion.
  • One person may feel they don’t matter whilst the other never feels a meaningful connection.

These are three of many dynamics couples create where each of their core needs is different to the other.

Not understanding this will create a disconnect as each person’s critical needs are never met and so they have to meet that need elsewhere.

The perspective will be their partner doesn’t care and this will build resentment.

One couple had a cycle of not seeing each other needs. She craved love and connection and he wanted to feel like he mattered to her.

What she also liked was growth and so every time they spoke she challenged his thinking. In her mind the challenge would help him to grow and to her that was loving.

To him, he felt the challenge was a criticism so he never felt he mattered to her and so he met his need through his frustration at her which made her protect herself from him.

Because he never felt he mattered to her as a result he was never interested in helping her feel loved.

So they entered a crisis.

This misunderstanding can lead them into terrible pain and that can shut down how they both feel.

The question that each person needs to understand is this: Are their partners’ needs normal or are their needs trying to fulfil an emotional distortion?

You see some people become negatively judgemental about normal healthy needs just because they are different from their own.

Other people get stuck in satisfying the needs of others that are driven by past emotional distortions.

What I see a lot of is a combination of very different needs trying to be met, but are being driven by their fears.

This creates a very upsetting and impossibly confusing dynamic for the couple.

This can lead to paralysis as the couple starts to learn no matter what they do they both make it worse.

Many couples are living in the dark with how to understand and meet each other’s needs so the marriage ends up in natural free fall.

Some people will meet their partners’ needs at the cost of their own, but this pleasing model never works.

Other people will have no clue meeting their partner’s needs are important so they enter a dangerous emotional deficit.

My message today is if you don’t meet your partner critical needs they will have to meet them away from the marriage.

In fact, one of the biggest reasons couples don’t survive is because the marriage stops being the place where they meet their needs and so it ends up becoming unimportant to them.

So how can anyone be of value to their partner and keep them invested if how they show up isn’t helping them meet these critical needs.

Every couple sufferers from this problem.

New mums may get their needs met through a child. People in successful careers may get their needs met through their job.

It’s one major factor in why empty nesters struggle so much, they enter crisis when how they met their needs was through the children now they have gone.

People who retire met their needs through their work not their marriage.

Some needs differences do naturally cause more problems than others, but with the right help, most differences can be overcome for those interested to learn.

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Stephen Hedger
Stephen Hedger
About the author:

Harley Street Expert | Founder & Trusted Advisor to High Performers

With two decades of experience helping couples out of crisis, Stephen the founder of The Marriage Breakthrough Program, uses his proven system for rescuing and rebuilding relationships on the edge of divorce. A trusted advisor to CEOs, elite entrepreneurs, and industry leaders globally, his work blends emotional intelligence with strategic clarity. Known for navigating highly complex relationship challenges, Stephen helps individuals and couples find clarity and direction when everything is at stake.

Find out more >>> The Marriage Breakthrough Program
Stephen Hedger
Latest posts by Stephen Hedger (see all)
  • “I feel nothing… and he’s no idea why!” – MiniPost - May 19, 2025
  • 7 Steps For a Successful Marriage Repair Process - May 17, 2025
  • Do You Know Your Values & Why They Are So Important? - May 11, 2025

Related posts:

Why Mastering Conflict is the Most Important Relationship Skill for Keeping Passion Alive “Signs Your Marriage Is In Trouble” “The Two Simple Rules for Building an Unbreakable Relationship” “Sabotaging Their Marriage – Series” From Battlefield to Breakthrough: How to Save Your Marriage Without a Toxic Fight. Impossible Marriage Problems? “First Step to Fixing Any Marriage Problem” “How to Fix Communication Issues in a Marriage”

Category iconDestructive Patterns,  Marriage Coaching

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Recent Posts

  • “I feel nothing… and he’s no idea why!” – MiniPost
  • 7 Steps For a Successful Marriage Repair Process
  • Do You Know Your Values & Why They Are So Important?
  • “Should I Stay or Go?” Why You Shouldn’t Make Big Decisions While You’re Still Suffering
  • Stop & Never: The 30 Patterns That Quietly Destroy Relationships
  • “How to Fix Communication Issues in a Marriage”
  • “First Step to Fixing Any Marriage Problem”
  • Impossible Marriage Problems?
  • “What if I’m not enough?”
  • “Another 5 Years Like This? No Way!”
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I’m not going to ask you how you “feel", pay me to watch you argue, or try to find the person to blame.

I am looking to discover if the couple can become a team, overcome their problems together and create a dynamic that will create a loving and passionate life together.

My approach is to take you from where you are, to where you want to be… fast!

I can not recommend Stephen highly enough – he not only saved our marriage, but has improved my marriage and myself as a person.

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In a short phone conversation, Stephen was able to quickly get to the heart of what the real issue was in our marriage – and why in almost a year of working on our marriage including 10 weeks of marriage counselling through a relationship therapy organisation, we weren’t really making any progress. I found Stephen to be extremely perceptive, as well as empathetic to our situation, while being able to quickly pinpoint the real sticking point in our marriage.
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Dear Stephen
Thank you for your time to listen to my experience in my marriage. You gave me encouragement to speak out to my partner in confidence. You made me realise that sometimes the way we make comments on each other can aggravate the situation and make it worse. Your advice made me feel revived.

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Success Stories

From Battlefield to Breakthrough: How to Save Your Marriage Without a Toxic Fight.

January 31, 2025 By Stephen Hedger

Most people who come to me for help believe their marriage is broken, so their level of hope is not high. Many will have tried to fix the problems without success. These people are unaware that there is a critical mindset shift: if you don’t make it, your chances of success dramatically drop. As you […]

“By changing yourself, you can change a relationship… because I did!”

September 16, 2024 By Stephen Hedger

We were in the process of physical separation, with my husband arranging to move out at the end of the month, and I was getting legal advice on proceeding with the divorce.  On one of those distressed and sleepless nights, I came across Stephen’s website and his blog. I was fascinated. What Stephen has written […]

“There’s no hope in hell – I want a divorce!”

April 22, 2024 By Stephen Hedger

So what do you do when the trust is broken so badly that their relationship ends with them selling their family home and moving into separate homes? Most people would consider this the end, but this gentleman decided something different. He wrote to me to see if I could help. I wanted to encourage his […]

Marriage Crisis from Infidelity & Communication Breakdown

August 21, 2023 By Stephen Hedger

Today’s post is about a professional couple in the UK who decided they wanted to share their experience of their tailormade program that was designed to help them out of their marital challenges. They were in crisis due to communication breakdown and infidelity. They had 12 meetings over five months to learn how to reconnect […]

His Marriage was Over!

June 5, 2023 By Stephen Hedger

This man was in the depths of sadness; his marriage was over, but he didn’t want it to be. They had seen numerous counsellors who had all concluded the marriage was indeed over. He had lost all feelings for his wife. Due to being so stuck for so long, he had started an affair. But […]

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Stephen says when you are in marital crisis it's important to know what to do to make sure your next steps don't make the situation even worse. This short guide written by Stephen is designed to help you take a step back and consider next steps intelligently.


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Recent Posts

  • “I feel nothing… and he’s no idea why!” – MiniPost
  • 7 Steps For a Successful Marriage Repair Process
  • Do You Know Your Values & Why They Are So Important?
  • “Should I Stay or Go?” Why You Shouldn’t Make Big Decisions While You’re Still Suffering
  • Stop & Never: The 30 Patterns That Quietly Destroy Relationships
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