Do you have unresolved resentments in your marriage? Are you feeling stuck, unable to move forward because of pain from the past? Many couples find themselves carrying a heavy emotional burden and struggling to let go of past hurts. They want to forgive, but they don’t know how. If this sounds familiar, you're not alone.
Think of resentment like bricks in a backpack. Every hurt, every disappointment, every broken promise becomes another brick. Over time, that backpack gets heavier and heavier. You’re carrying it everywhere—into every conversation, every disagreement, every intimate moment. It affects how you see your spouse, how you talk to them, and whether or not you feel safe emotionally.
Maybe you’re carrying a brick from a time your partner deeply hurt you—something they said or did that left a scar. Maybe you’re holding onto a brick from broken trust, like a betrayal or lie. Or perhaps you’re weighed down by years of feeling emotionally neglected, like your needs haven’t mattered. Whatever the bricks are, they can crush your hope and keep you stuck in pain.
I know this because I’ve felt it too. I’ve had seasons in my marriage where resentment built up and forgiveness felt out of reach. But there is a way forward. In this post, I want to share three essential steps that helped me forgive my wife and begin releasing that heavy backpack. I hope they can help you too.
Step One: You Need to Be Heard
The first step toward forgiveness is being heard. You can’t begin to let go of your pain until your partner truly understands what they did that hurt you. That means they need to listen—not defend themselves, not explain it away—but just listen. You need them to summarize what they did and how it affected you.
Hearing and understanding is different from agreeing. It’s about your partner being able to say, “I see now how that hurt you,” and being able to name it without minimizing it.
Next, you need them to own it. This is harder than it sounds. Many people are quick to defend or justify their actions. But forgiveness becomes possible when your partner takes responsibility without excuses. You don’t need them to own everything—just their part in the pain.
Then comes empathy. You need to feel like your partner gets how their behavior impacted you. Empathy doesn’t mean fixing it; it means sitting with you in the pain and saying, “That must have been really hard.” If you don’t feel empathy, it may seem like they don’t care—and it’s nearly impossible to forgive someone who seems indifferent.
Finally, you need a genuine apology. Words matter here. You need your partner to acknowledge the pain they caused and express sincere regret. Without an apology, even if everything else is in place, something may still feel unresolved.
Step Two: You Need to See Change
Forgiveness is not just about what your partner says—it’s about what they do. Words without change won’t rebuild trust. You need to see sustained change over time. This is the proof that their apology was real.
Change doesn’t mean perfection. There will be slips, moments of failure, or times they fall short again. But just like the stock market, the key is the overall trajectory. When you zoom out, you should be able to see consistent growth and effort in the right direction.
If your partner truly wants to repair what was broken, they will make changes to ensure they don’t continue to hurt you the same way. And when you see them taking action to be better—not just saying they want to be better—that becomes the foundation for rebuilding safety and trust.
Step Three: You Must Make Micro-Decisions Toward Trust
Even if your partner says all the right things and makes real change, forgiveness won’t just happen automatically. That’s because we protect ourselves when we’ve been hurt. We put our partner in what I call the unsafe bucket. It’s a form of self-protection: if they’re unsafe, we wall off emotionally so we can’t be hurt again.
Forgiveness requires intentionally moving them out of the unsafe bucket. And you do that by making small, daily decisions to soften, to risk trust again, and to see them through new eyes.
This process is gradual. One kind act at a time, one respectful conversation at a time, one apology followed by action at a time—you start to believe they are becoming safe again. It’s not about blind trust or wishful thinking. It’s about looking at the data. Has your partner earned their way back into the safe bucket?
Ask yourself: Have they changed? Have they owned their mistakes? Are they showing empathy? Are they making sustained effort? If so, then you begin to let the wall down, brick by brick.
When Childhood Wounds Make Forgiveness Harder
This process can be especially difficult if you experienced emotional hurt growing up. Many people who were hurt in childhood developed the habit of putting others in the unsafe bucket quickly—and permanently. If this is you, forgiveness may feel almost impossible, even if your partner is doing everything right.
This was true in my marriage. I grew up learning to protect myself by shutting people out. So even when my wife apologized and changed, I still had her in the unsafe bucket. I had to actively work on re-training my brain and heart to give her another chance.
That meant choosing to believe she was growing, choosing to soften when I wanted to harden, choosing to give her the benefit of the doubt even when it felt risky. Slowly, over time, I was able to move her into the safe bucket—and forgiveness followed.
Forgiveness Is the Byproduct, Not the First Step
Too often, we’re told to just “forgive and move on.” But in marriage, forgiveness is not the first step. It’s the byproduct of safety being rebuilt. It’s what happens after you’ve been heard, after your partner has owned their actions, after empathy and apologies have been offered, and after change has been demonstrated. Then, and only then, can you begin to take the bricks out of the backpack.
Forgiveness is not a single act—it’s a process of healing. And like any healing process, it takes time, effort, and commitment from both partners.
If you’re struggling with resentment in your marriage, don’t give up. You’re not stuck forever. With these three steps—being heard, seeing change, and choosing to trust again—you can begin to put the pain behind you. The backpack can get lighter. Your marriage can get stronger. And you can experience the freedom that comes when forgiveness takes root.
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What else do you think could help forgiveness in marriage?