Marriage between two good people can or can’t work

I recently told my husband that I want a divorce. They were some things that occurred where I felt extremely disrespected and when I tried to communicate with him multiple times, got marriage counseling, yet he still didn’t understand. I talked to my parents, got advice from Islamic scholars, and after thinking about it for a while, I made my decision that I don’t see a future in this marriage for me. However, he isn’t accepting it.

We’ve had some discussions since then and he understands the seriousness of the issue now. He has taken accountability and I see how sorry he is and willing to change. He’s genuinely a good person and has a lot of traits that many people say and in my experience, men don’t have anymore (ex: genuinely hardworking, treats my parents like his own, respectful to everyone around him, not controlling, isn’t stingy with money, would be a good father, doesn’t favor his mother over me). He loves me very deeply and is willing to do whatever it takes to make this marriage work.

But the problem is I have no feelings for him or this marriage anymore, and I’m not sure I ever had them in the first place. This was an arranged marriage, but I did talk to him several times before and I was not forced. I did try in this marriage. Even though I had no feelings for him which everyone told me was normal, love and attraction take time to develop after marriage. After our nikah, I talked to him almost everyday trying to build a friendship rather than focusing on if I felt “love”. When he’d visit we spent the entire day together. I tried to think as positively as I could and only focus on his good traits.

But after everything happened, something changed in me. I don’t want to go into detail becz they’re deeply personal, but the way some of our boundaries we broken affected me more deeply that I initially thought. It changed the way I view physical intimacy with him, and consequently our compatibility as husband and wife.

A female scholar spoke to me about how this is a major problem among Muslim couples. Unfortunately, a lot of men, and sometimes women, don’t realize how their behavior or words can affect how their spouse views them, which affects intimacy. A lot of people (generally men unfortunately) don’t understand that emotionally safety is important for the other person to want that physical intimacy.

My husband has stopped the behavior and says he understands now which I believe. I just wish he understood me before when I communicated it with him. It’s just that I feel more at peace since telling him my decision. Which makes me question is it because I made the right decision or just the thought of leaving seems “easier” than staying and fighting?

The guilt I feel is almost crippling. He’s all alone in this country and has no support system here besides me and my family. His parents, my in-laws, are devastated and apparently they said they wish they were here to comfort me before I made this decision (they don’t speak English so we can’t communicate). And ofc there’s always fear of the future the “what if I get married again and something worse happens” bcz the grass isn’t always greener on the other side. He’s even told me that no one will ever love me as much as he does and that if I leave, he made a promise he won’t ever marry again. Seeing how devastated he is and how much he loves me makes me wonder whether, with enough time, I could eventually love him back.

However, even if he may not understand it, staying in a marriage where I don’t feel anything and he’s completely devoted is unfair to him. But he can’t and isn’t able to accept this is happening and has been begging for another chance since telling him. He says he now understands the issue, which I believe his sincerity, and that it’s okay that I don’t have feelings for him that will take time to develop. He says you can’t divorce someone over one mistake (which he had a point). I’ve also thought that if I made a mistake in the future, which ofc no one is perfect, and I begged for another chance this much I’d want that person to believe me. Elders around me also say a lack of feelings isn’t really a reason for divorce, and he’s taken accountability for his actions.

If I give another chance, and god forbid something happens again in the future, it’ll just be more painful for him that I leave again. Not saying I’m choosing to leave at every mistake, but when it comes to my respect and dignity I’ll always choose that first. Maybe this is too westernized of me but I believe that it’s better to be single and happy than in a relationship and unhappy.

The elders in my family say that woman take time to develop feelings and to just focus on his good traits and the good life he’ll provide for me. And instead of focusing on feelings so much, just focus on trying to become his friend first which was honestly what I was trying to do before. They said it’ll probably be even more hard for me to develop feelings for him just cuz of how traumatized I feel after what went down, but they’ve talked to him and he understands it’ll take months for things to go back to normal. He just loves me too much to let me go.

I’m at the point where I’ve decided I have to give this another try. We’re only a few months into our marriage, no one divorces this early on, and arranged marriages can take time to develop. I just didn’t expect it to be this emotionally exhausting. He’s begging for another chance so much, and when a person has finally taken accountability for that mistake you’re divorcing over, I can’t really divorce him over it now. I also think of the future and the men I talked to before this, how rare genuinely good men are. I see that he’s so in love with me it makes me think if he loves me this much that I eventually will also reciprocate that seeing how good he is to me.

So ig the point of this discussion is:

How do people in arranged marriages actually fall in love?
How do you distinguish between “I don’t love this person yet” and “I don’t love this person and never will”?
Can two objectively good people have a successful marriage if one person doesn’t feel romantic feelings at the beginning?

And if someone hurts you in a way that fundamentally changes how you see them, but genuinely takes accountability and changes afterward, is it possible to rebuild the attraction and emotional connection that was lost?

I realize I sound incredibly confused, because I am.

This whole situation makes me wonder how people in arranged marriages fall in love in the first place. Or people in relationships with someone of different cultural background.

I know for people who also read my previous post see me as immature and I might get a ton of hate for posting this. But instead of telling me how immature and dumb I am, I’m truly just seeking honest feedback and advice. I realize how bad i may seem that I married a guy I have no feelings for, but I was told by everyone around me that this was normal and they develop after Walima and marriage life really begin. It’s just exhausting being in a one sided relationship and I feel so bad for him. I don’t know what to think anymore