My Marriage

You guys, marriage is hard hard work.  Sometimes its just hard.
Lately everything seems hard and my marriage falls into that category unwillingly.  TB and I have been together 8 years.  That's a big chunk of my lifetime so far.  We've been married 3 1/2 of those years and let me tell you that there is no 'honeymoon phase' over here.  We never got that chance.  I don't think there ever was.  I lost the baby as we were planning the wedding and the medical ramifications immediately hit my body.  I gained A LOT of weight that I had no control over, I got very tired and had pains I didn't understand.  I was grieving when I took my husband's name and so was he.  We were in a spiral of dark circumstances that had nothing to do with our core relationship but effected everything about it.  Years later when I notice that his ring is worn or I lost our marriage certificate (whoops) I think that not a lot has changed.  We have certainly worked hard at the grief and the coming years of pain and doctors but we still have a ton of crap thrown at us each and every day that other people have no clue about.  Some couples married much longer than us have not been through half of what we have been through in our very short marriage.  It has taken a long time and a lot of work to be able to work together against the hard times and not instinctively close up.  Somehow the thing I wasn't ready for about marriage was being completely open to another person.  I have always been honest and up front but it is a WHOLE other monster to be 100% open with another person.  It was hard to let him see me cry, whine and yell when I didn't understand my body or my loss.  It was also hard to see him handle things differently than I do.  I didn't know how to be there for him because I was so unfamiliar with the territory.

I found a really good man though.  He has done a lot for me.  He puts up with a lot too.  The grief I still haven't worked through.  The mounting bills that we have to somehow tackle.  The days when my bi polar disorder sneaks in and makes me irrational.  Crazy family members.  Bad days.  Bad attitudes.  Angry rants.  Ill timed surgeries and trips to the pharmacy.  Law suits with my doctors.  Endless appointments he has to work around -we only have one car.  Through all of those things he still lets me deal with things my own way, no matter what that means for him.  When I am too sad to move he gently lifts me up and makes me smile no matter how late he is for whatever he has to do.  TB works hard to do the little things that sit on my brain and make my anxiety shoot through the roof.  Not once has he ever said no when I have woken him at 3 in the morning to ask if he will rub my throbbing legs.  When I know his day has been long he will still drive to get whatever I am craving for dinner when I JUST CAN'T find the energy to cook dinner even though I promised him.  He sneaks out of bed on the weekends to let me sleep in and closes the door so the cats won't jump on me, I will find him sitting right next to the TV with it so low its not even a whisper so he doesn't wake me up.  He will get out of a perfectly warm bed to make me pancakes and worries that they are 'done right.'  If I fall asleep across the bed he will sleep on the couch because I 'just looked so peaceful.'

TB may have a thousand faults, as we all do, and some days I can see every one of them.  He is bad with money, bad under pressure and so clueless that its hilarious sometimes.  He really really loves me though and when it is important he quietly does whatever he thinks I need.  Stuffed animals dance and he makes bad jokes until I laugh with him.  I really lucked into a good one.  Oh and he has taught me patience and helped me curb many many of my not so nice tendencies.  We are nowhere near perfect apart and definitely not perfect together but we fit.  Sometimes the truth is ugly and boys are gross and life is tough to get through.  I am ultimately a lucky woman to have this man in my corner, even if some days he's the one I'm fighting with.  He lets me be me.  That is more important than doing the dishes.