Everyone Needs Some Space from the Connubial Embrace

Published September 19, 1985. The other day I heard a song on the radio titled “It’s Hard to Say I’m Sorry,” sung by the group Chicago. The song began:

Everybody needs a little time away

I heard her say

From each other

Even lovers need a holiday

Far away from each other

The song reminded me of a conversation I had with a young husband not long ago, who called late one night and got me out of bed. He wanted to talk, so I yawned and agreed to listen. The new groom was upset because his wife of seven months was going home to visit her parents for two weeks.

“How can she stand to be away from me that long?” He asked. The longer he talked, the more I knew why. His wife needed a little time away from the marriage. They were too close, and their lives too enmeshed. A common problem for newlyweds.

I tried to convince the young man that a few days away from each other were not necessarily harmful, and could, in fact, contribute to a better marriage. Everyone, including lovers, need a little time away.

The thought of spending time away from loved ones is not new. The ancient Hebrew family understood the concept as expressed in Ecclesiastes, chapter three where it states there is a season and a time for every purpose . . . “a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing” (verse five). Or, as it indicates in the footnotes, a time to be together and a time to be apart.

In “The Prophet,” Kahlil Gibran made a similar point

But let there be spaces in your togetherness,

And let the winds of the heavens dance between you.

Love one another, but make not a bond of love.

Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls.

Fill each other’s cup, but drink not from one cup.

Give one another of your bread, but eat not from the same loaf.

Sing and dance together and be yours, but let each one of you be alone.

Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music.

Give your hearts, but not into each other’s keeping.

For only the hand of life can contain your hearts.

And stand together yet not too near together:

For the pillars of the temple stand apart,

And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other’s shadow.

Other contemporary writers and observers of martial relationships have also expressed the sentiments sung by Chicago. Dr. James Dobson, noted author and writer on marriage, has recently observed that love in marriage can only thrive on freedom and spontaneity. He then quoted the ancient adage, “If you love someone, let them go. If they return, they’re yours; if they don’t, they never were.”

Dr. M. Scott Peck, in his book “The Road Less Traveled,” has a whole chapter titled “Love Is Separateness.” He likewise writes, “I have come to realize that it is the separateness of the (marriage) partners that enriches the union. Great marriages cannot be constructed by individuals who are terrified by their basic aloneness.”