Perfect Marriages Exist
So I Have Been Told
I feel like people look at our marriage and think that it is perfect. If you are a friend with me on social media, you might look at our marriage and think that it is perfect, but that is far from the truth. My husband supports me in all of my crazy ideas, and I manage everything in life like a pro. At least, that is what I tell myself. Joking aside, we do have a pretty great life- 18 years married, 3 kids, a beautiful home on 43 acres, and a camper that we love to travel in as a family. There are some things that make our marriage not perfect, but we strive to overcome those imperfections and fight through the temptation of divorce that is so present in today’s society.
Here is where I admit that most of the issues that happen in our marriage are because I am a “stuffer”. I get angry/frustrated at things; I stuff the anger/frustration down. I typically repeat this process for a few months until the tension is hard for either of us to bear. He doesn’t know why I am angry, and I am angry that he doesn’t know why I am angry. This all leads to one big cluster of emotions that we eventually have to deal with. In reality, I typically make the issue far bigger than it is by stuffing the anger/frustration down instead of just talking about it in the beginning.
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I don’t know why I do this, nor do I have time to go to therapy to figure it out. I know that mental health is important, and I know that I could probably prioritize better. Just the thought of adding one more thing to my calendar gives me so much anxiety that is makes it not worth it for me.
Luckily, he loves me enough to deal with the stuffing and walking on eggshells. Sometimes, like this past Sunday, it turns into an all out screaming match until we both get things off of our chest. Then we talk about our true feelings of what the root of the problem is, cry it out together, and find our way back to each other again. This is probably not the healthiest way to fix the issues that we come across through the years, but it has worked for us up to this point.
Things aren’t always like this. When we have regular date nights and he does things that speak to my love language, I don’t stuff things down. I don’t let things fester and build to a breaking point. I suppose this sounds like I am putting the responsibility on him. I know that his actions should not determine my actions, but they do play a role in things. It is what it is. We have had some really good years, and we have had some really rough years. Either way, we strive to work through the years together and not become a divorce statistic.
So, do perfect marriages exist? Maybe. While I don’t think our marriage will ever hit that perfect rating, there is no one else I would rather share my life with, laugh with, cry with, or dance with.
Rebecca Leong discusses three things that make a great date night, in this article, that I find to be true.
