Navigating Relationship Challenges After Marriage: A Doctoral Student's Perspective

Question
I have been married for 2.5 years.  I am a doctoral student in chemistry and am married to a beautiful woman who has never been to college.  Our relationship was fantastic before we married and now because of buying a fixer upper, moving away from home and the stress from my PhD. things have changed.  We have argued about all sorts of things and in the end I am always trying to explain that things will get better.  I apologize for everything and try to make things better by taking on her chores as well.  My wife's new job and the fact she is away from her family is depressing her.  She gets into these moods where I can't reach her.  I get upset because I work so hard and she does so little and sometimes I take it out on her which generates more argueing and more apologizing.  I've even turned to alcohol sometimes to relieve the pressure.  I've just completed my Candidacy exam and now the stress from my schooling has subsided.  I was so thrilled and weeks before I started to change.  I began working out again and feeling good about myself.  I kept reminding her that I loved her and explained to her how happy I was that I could share my success with someone who was there every step of the way.  A day after my exam she said she loved me but was thinking of leaving me.  This felt like a sledgehammer to the stomach and now I think I'm falling into a depression.  I keep remembering our relationship before I started this PhD and I keep blaming myself for all our arguements because I'm the one who brought here into this mess.  I'm so sad because I don't know if I can repair her heart.  All I know is that I must keep my head up and living my life the best I can and if she does leave I must accept it.  It's easy to say but just thinking about it is depressing.  I feel like such a failure.  Am I completely screwed up?  How do I keep living day to day knowing that when I come home the person I love may be just telling me she loves me because she doesn't want to hurt me?  I'm so sad.  It's really hard to stay focused with all of this.  What do I do?

Best Regards,
Justin Bohn

Answer
Hi Justin~

I would strongly urge you to seek some marriage counseling.  This way you can deal with any issues and problems in the marriage.  You and your wife have to work together as a team to get past this rough time.  Marriage is a constant work in progress, and there are many stressors involved in relationships.  It's all about how you communicate and deal with it all.  

At this point all you can really do is try to be as supportive of her as you can.  And to take it one day at a time.  And, no, you're not completely screwed up, perhaps your priorities at the moment are, but you aren't.  I think you mean well, but your wife is just feeling depressed and possibly neglected b/c of your working and getting the degree, etc.  It's not too late to work on these issues though.