The best thing to do is to get a separation....it's not considered a divorce & it gives you time to get out & for you to be able to allow him to make changes if it's possible.....Yes, God can convict hearts to change...but those hearts have to be open to the change.....& mental abuse is the same as physical abuse in the eyes of God.

People in the church always want to think the best case will happen.....& the best case can happen but you don't have to continue living in the same house waiting for it to happen. If you can separate & give him a reasonable time to prove to you & you give it a lot of time to verify the change is REAL......that way you have the best of both worlds.....you can always get divorced if you find that he really can't change within a reasonable amount of time.

I was in a bad marriage for 33 years (from even before the wedding). I saw the red flags but they were not abuse they were just attitude issues that weren't something that I was willing to tolerate. Had my computer engineering career that I hid out in for most of the time until the aerospace industry collapsed in California......then I felt trapped in the marriage for the next 13 years until my mother died, I sold her home (that I had grown up in) & God opened the door for me to leave...& move 2100 miles away to a place where I didn't know anyone.....but God surrounded me with the most wonderful caring people who have taken me in as family. I found a church family like I have never experienced before....I have a group of women who are also single that I go to another Bible study with & I have more wonderful friends who I do my horse riding with. If God hadn't meant for me to leave, I don't believe he would have surrounded my life with so many wonderful caring people......so I feel like living proof that God may not like divorce (I am have another appointment with my lawyer to hopefully get the divorce finalized soon). We had so many initial financial issues with the IRS, it was impossible initially to get a divorce but now that's over with, divorce is necessary so that he doesn't financially destroy me (which is it's own kind of abuse).

After leaving to start with, I thought there was mental abuse with totally passive aggressive behavior.....but within just the last few months, I have been doing research because I was curious about WHY his behavior was what it was & nothing described the issues 100%....until I researched Asperger's & it has explained 100% all the aggravations that I went through for so long & it described all his behavior that came across as abusive. I think that God provided this information because of the level of anger that had built up over those 33 years. I was actually seeing red by the time I left him & if he had been anywhere close to me when I found out what he had done with the IRS I would have exploded & he definitely would have gotten the fallout....it just felt like total abuse that I was being the recipient of but in reality, he was never capable of having a relationship or communicating with anyone including his wife & when it came to handling anything with finances he was incapable.....& his favorite belief was that if he didn't tell me then it wasn't a lie....but he was constantly lying to me throughout the marriage. I didn't realize at the time that my suicide attempts were not just because of loosing my career, but they were because I felt trapped in the marriage with no way out.....but God provided the way out......& I'm sure that God opens doors to get out of abusive marriages no matter what the abuse.....you just have to be willing to walk through that door & KNOW that it's ok. That door is between you & God, not the members of the church.

Yes it is God who will put the change on your H's heart, but he's the one that has to accept the change & work on it (free will)...if he wants to listen to God then he will change....otherwise, there is NO HOPE for his change.

Pray & God will provide your answer. It took 13 years for me to finally get out & I almost didn't live to get there but I think that was under God's control also even though it wasn't obvious at the time.

Also, the separation was the initial thing that showed me I didn't want to stay married because absence never made my heart grow fonder.....it just let me know that I had NEVER loved him, not just fallen out of love.

The good thing from the separation is that you can finally see the forest for the trees...in other words, you can look logically rather than emotionally at the relationship & you can better determine what you really NEED to do.