Updated January 20, 2026

Are your boundaries backfiring or fizzling out? Today, I will clarify how and when to use healthy relationship boundaries so you can stop the damage while keeping your marriage strong.

Walking on eggshells and feeling resentful

If things get bad enough in marriage, we can feel like we are walking on eggshells. We can become resentful and carry that resentment throughout the day, robbing us of any feelings of joy, and making a chore of loving our spouse. It shouldn’t be that way, and it doesn’t have to be.

The importance of matching in marriage

In marriages where people are very well matched, relating seems almost effortless. Of course, everyone has their moods, and it is better to get a little distance at those times. But in marriages where there is significant mismatch, a little distance isn’t going to be enough.

The area of mismatch would be like sand in the gears of the relationship. At first, everything still works alright, but as time goes by, that little bit of sand will wear away at love and connection. Eventually, the emotional connection will be completely gone.

If that is happening in your marriage, what is needed are steps to take care of those differences and restore your marriage to maximum love and full connection potential.

The three steps for restoring your marriage

There are three major steps for restoring marriages in which a spouse has mismatching, damaging behavior. With few exceptions, they need to be done in order.

The relationship restoring steps are:

1. Stopping our own damage (overcoming neediness),
2. Building a closer connection (validation and being desirable).
3. Stopping our spouse’s damage (boundaries).

Before we go further, you need to know one important exception to taking these steps in order:

Because safety is a prerequisite for relationship building, boundaries for keeping people safe have to come before other steps. If you are being physically abused, get help and prevent your spouse’s ability to continue to be abusive as a first step. Visit thehotline.org for guidance.

Hopefully, that’s not your situation. In which case, you can take a gentler and more gradual approach. Many people don’t do well with boundaries because they start with them in a poorly connected relationship.

Boundaries work best in an otherwise good relationship. If that’s not your situation, and you are not being abused, then start with step one. You will get a lot of improvement with very little conflict, if any.

Step 1: Stop your own damage

Remove from your interactions everything that makes your relationship unnecessarily unpleasant for your spouse. Abrasive language, selfishness, criticism, and sometimes just talking too darn much can make interacting with us unpleasant. Realize that whatever a friend or acquaintance would not like about you, your spouse won’t like about you either. I’m sure you would agree that the same is true about your spouse’s behavior toward you.

Self-assessment for step one

The thing to ask yourself is, “Is there anything about the way I treat my spouse that is very reasonable for him or her not to like?” It takes humility to honestly ask yourself that, and it takes discipline to change. God will be happy to help if you include Him in the process. My book, Overcome Neediness and Get the Love You Want, has helped many people to make such changes, too.

When you have thoroughly removed all those prickly parts of yourself that make your spouse rightly uncomfortable, it will make it easier for your spouse to live with you. You will get along better, but your spouse won’t necessarily desire you more. For that, you have to make sure you are being a desirable spouse.

Why do you need to work on yourself?

Right now, you might be wondering why you need to change if your spouse is the one who has all the bad behavior. It’s because the more your spouse likes you, the more effective your boundaries will be when you get to that step. Without that, your boundaries may just be the straw that broke the camel’s back and drive your spouse away.

On the other hand, if your relationship is already good, then skip to step three. Otherwise, do the building first.

Step 2: Building a closer emotional connection

We need to go another step to be more desirable to our spouse. That means that we become:

• Interesting for our spouse to talk to,
• pleasant to do things with,
• we make our spouse feel interesting, capable, and valued. and
• we make our spouse feel loved.

Didn’t you do that when you were first dating your spouse? And look how well it worked! He or she wanted to keep you and you only for the rest of his or her life. You must have done pretty darn well.

It’s hard to imagine any relationship working where value-adding elements are not present. If you don’t have the skills for pleasant talking or enjoyable interaction, then you can learn. You may have never learned them, but they are not hard to learn. I have a social skills quiz on my website that you can use to check your skill level.

Don’t unrealistically believe that being nice will fix everything

Supposing that you have taken care of the really rough spots in your character and interact with your spouse in an enjoyable way, that is no guarantee that you will get as good as you give. That’s only going to happen in a well-matched marriage, which is maintained with daily one-on-one time, weekly dates, and enjoyable sex.

If you were there, you wouldn’t be here, so let’s get to step three.

Step 3: Ending your spouse’s damaging behavior

Despite all of your self-improvement, your spouse may still have some unacceptable behaviors. You’ve got to do something different than just be nice, or you will soon become resentful, and those bad behaviors will come out again. That eventually would make you stop caring and stop trying.

Using boundaries rather than rules

Instead of stopping your nice behavior or getting negative, this is the proper time for boundaries.

To be clear, I’m not talking about rules–boundaries are not rules. People can break your rules. You will never fix your marriage by making rules. Boundaries are the actions you take or don’t take in order to prevent harm, end harm, and create the conditions for a better relationship. Your spouse can’t break or violate your boundaries because they are completely under your control.

Example boundaries in relationships are:

• Refusing to argue, no matter what.
• Not having sex with your spouse if he or she won’t spend quality time with you.
• Walking away immediately if your spouse is verbally abusive.
• Going out with friends even if your spouse does not want you to.
• Refusing to live with your spouse if he or she has an untreated addiction.

Notice that in each case, the boundary is not something you tell your spouse he or she can’t do. That would be a rule that could be easily defied. Each boundary is an action or inaction that is under your control.

If I have a boundary that I will walk away from you whenever you shout at me, whether you shout or not is still your choice. I can’t stop you. But I can walk away. It will make you upset, but you are not likely to continue to shout at me if our relationship is otherwise good.

You will feel better about using boundaries when you keep these characteristics of boundaries in mind:

• They allow your spouse the freedom to choose his or her behavior.
• They are used to protect you, your spouse, and/or your relationship.
• They are part of the duty of being a loving spouse.

Your spouse will feel like your boundaries are ultimatums or punishment, which indeed they are, so don’t debate it. Don’t get hung up on words.

When to let your spouse know about your boundary

Boundaries can be as simple as ending conversations every time you are interrupted. There is no need to discuss the boundary, though a little warning ahead of time is helpful if your spouse would not realize why you were ending the conversation.

Choose a quiet moment when things are going well and say something like,

“John, I really look forward to talking to you, but I have a bad habit of letting you interrupt me, so I get resentful. I’m going to work on that by ending the conversation whenever you interrupt. I just wanted to give you a heads up about that.”

Own the problem

The more you own the problem, the more powerful you will become. The more you blame, the more you will feel like a victim. I don’t help my clients blame their spouses. Instead, I help them to take responsibility for doing something about the relationship. You stop being a victim the moment you realize that you can do something about the problem.

It is not necessary to even mention what you will do if your action is appropriate and obvious. If your spouse shouts at you and you walk away as soon as he or she does, likely that boundary will be understood. If you do that consistently, your spouse will come to expect it and thus learn to self-monitor.

Don’t warn once the behavior occurs

If you warn your spouse that you are about to use a boundary, your spouse will not self-monitor, and your boundary won’t create a better habit for your spouse.

Never say, “If you continue to interrupt, I will end this conversation,” or “If you continue to shout, I will end this conversation.” If you say things like that, your spouse will continue to do the behavior until you give the warning. When you have a boundary, simply use it at the first instance of the behavior you are targeting.

If you let your spouse shout at you for a while or interrupt you for a while or you only sometimes end the conversation, it’s an altogether different thing. It’s you teaching your spouse that it’s okay to sometimes shout at you. The result is that sometimes he or she will. People do what we teach them they can do. Kids, spouses, employers, friends, or whoever–they all learn what they can and can’t do with us.

Use your boundary everywhere

It also won’t do to drop your boundaries in public or at family gatherings. If you do, your spouse will learn that it is acceptable to do damaging things when in those situations. This means you need to care more about improving your marriage than what other people might think if you walk out of a restaurant, call a taxi to ride home on your own, or whatever you need to do.

If you are around emotionally healthy people, they will actually respect your calm, controlled response to being treated badly.

To be effective, boundaries:

• Need to be stated in advance if they will be misunderstood.
• Need to be applied immediately at the first instance of the target behavior.
• Need to happen every time the target behavior occurs.
• Need to happen regardless of where you are.

Your spouse will get upset, and that’s okay

Whenever you used boundaries with your spouse, he or she will get upset. There is no way to give someone a consequence that they don’t like and have them appreciate it. On the contrary, they won’t like it at all. Probably they will be angry. When that happens, we must let them be angry, though not abusive.

Some people never use boundaries because they don’t like making their spouse upset. And, some people are afraid if they make their spouse upset with boundaries that they will be rejected.

Do you know who actually does NOT get rejected? The emotionally connected and loving spouse who has no tolerance for being mistreated. He or she gets both love and respect. People who fear rejection and allow their spouse or kids to do damaging things are the ones who get disrespect and rejection.

God’s boundaries are an expression of His love for us in that they are for our protection as well as to help us have a close relationship with Him. This is what the Bible means when it says that God disciplines those He loves (Hebrews 12:6).

Logical boundaries are the best boundaries

Boundaries are best when they fit the behavior. For example, walking away from verbal abuse, not responding to nasty messages, refusing to wash clothes unless they are put in the hamper, putting left out materials in a bag and in the closet if they are not put away, refusing to have sex if your spouse isn’t spending time with you otherwise, not riding in the car with your spouse if your spouse drives aggressively, while impaired, or treats you badly in the car. Separation or filing for divorce are appropriate boundaries for affairs and abuse. These boundaries will make sense to others even if your spouse doesn’t think so.

Be careful not to overuse boundaries

No matter how well matched you and your spouse are, your spouse is always going to do some things that you don’t like. Even if you were married to someone identical to you, there would still be some things you would not like about your spouse. Some differences we just have to tolerate. Even so, you can use some skills to make the differences easier to tolerate.

How can you live with disliked differences?

• Recognize you also have faults, even if not the same ones.
• Recognize that any spouse would do things you don’t like.
• Accept that the behavior is not going to change.
• Be careful not to spend too much time with your spouse (familiarity breeds contempt).
• Have your own friends and activities.
• Thank God every day for good aspects of your spouse.
• Consider if you lost your spouse today, whether those things you don’t like would really be all that important.
• Love your spouse and interact around the parts that you do like.

Anyone who can’t live with differences can’t live with anyone.

Getting help can make boundaries much easier

Boundaries, when used correctly, in an otherwise good relationship, are very effective. Unused, problems are perpetuated till all love fizzles out. Getting coaching can help you to avoid the pitfalls and help you with the practicalities of using boundaries to revive love and respect.

Sign up for my Difficult Partner Coaching Package, and I will help you to custom design and implement the right boundaries for your marriage.

The most loving thing you can do is to help your spouse to have a better relationship with you.

FAQ

Why do boundaries sometimes make my marriage worse instead of better?

Although boundaries do create temporary upset, they won’t destabilize an otherwise good marriage. This is why connection is built before using boundaries, except for cases of abuse or other severe behavior.

Should I use boundaries even if my relationship is already on edge?

Yes, but not at first. You will need to work on relationship building before addressing your spouse’s damaging behaviors. Used too early, boundaries can become the final straw instead of a corrective step.

How do I know if I’m using boundaries correctly or just pulling away?

Healthy boundaries are specific actions taken calmly, immediately, and consistently in response to a behavior. Pulling away is emotional protection without creating change.

When is coaching helpful with boundaries?

Coaching helps when boundaries feel confusing, emotionally hard to enforce, or when you’re unsure whether you’re using them too early, too often, or in ways that quietly damage connection instead of restoring respect.

Resources for further study:

Ryder RG, Bartle S. Boundaries as distance regulators in personal relationships. Fam Process. 1991 Dec;30(4):393-406. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/1724219/