Marriage.
Is. Hard.
I. Love. Being. Married.
Marriage. Is. Hard.
Great
accomplishments require lots and lots of hard work. A great marriage IS a great
accomplishment- thus it requires lots of hard work. And I don’t just mean work, like making time
for dates and overlooking your hubby’s quirks that drive you insane or figuring
out how to share housework so one person isn’t feeling overworked and or
underappreciated. I mean HARD work. Hard like finding again your identity as an
individual and as a couple when a defining factor has drastically changed. Hard
like realizing some of your goals that you had hoped for as a couple just are
not going to happen, and beyond realizing that, accepting that without blame or
anger, and then discovering other goals you can share. Hard like wanting to
yell out at church that “ Hey, we’re not contagious! If you associate with both
me AND my husband doesn’t mean your spouse will lose his religion! Give it a
try- invite my WHOLE family over” and “Please stop feeling sorry for me!”
My sweet
husband and I have been married for 23 years.
Long enough to experience some HARD work. I have dwelt on a lot of that hard work that
came from him going from being an active Mormon ( or member of the Church of
Jesus Christ of Latter- Day Saints) to being an Atheist. But to be honest- we
had our difficulties before then, because you know what? LIFE is HARD. LIFE IS WONDERFUL, BUT LIFE IS HARD.
Anyhow, the
change from Richard being an active Mormon, as I am, to absolutely not being
one provided the avenue for us to tackle some really hard work. Which we have, and truthfully after about 10
years we continue to tackle this hard work. I am still trying to find my own
personal identity as well as our couple identity because things that had
clearly defined us before no longer exist.
And only recently am I recognizing the need to define us differently-
because I’m kind of tired of feeling like “poor me”, because you know
what? “Poor me” isn’t accurate and it
makes you feel like crap getting stuck in that mind frame. Lucky, blessed me-
now that’s accurate. Why lucky me?
Because I have a husband willing to work through the HARD stuff too,
because you know what? This has been
hard on him to. When he decided our religion
no longer worked for him, he had hoped that I would come to believe differently
as well, but didn’t. I’m not going into details about how things were hard for
him, that is his story, but they were hard.
And we worked and we worked and we worked. And as we hammered away
trying to create an amazing relationship, yes sometimes one of our hearts got
bruised. But the work continued. The bruises healed. We both try to support
each other in our individuality. He is
constant and kind. I hope he can say the
same about me. Sharing a religion may make some things easier, but no longer
will I think it is what defines a good marriage. I have seen plenty of same faith marriages
with abuse, criticism and infidelity. And
in our marriage I’ve seen compassion, friendship, respect, understanding and
love. Why would I accept a “poor me”
attitude about that! So I’m done with
that, and if you’ve ever felt sorry for me because of the change in Richard’s
religion, I’m letting you know now- please don’t, instead just realize that
yep, amazing accomplishments take lots of HARD work, and team Ashead is just
going to keep on working hard!
