Sometimes? Who are we kidding. 

 

Guys, Gals… I’ve got news. Marriage is hard, if you didn’t gather that from the title of this blog, it’s killer hard. I’ve got to be honest though, lately, I feel as though so many people forget that in their vows they say, “ For better or for worse.” Which, translated, literally means, when things get better and then when they get worse, you still continue to choose each other, over and over again. It’s a choice. 

Truly. Did you expect “easy peasy lemon squeezy” as my three year old says. Did you expect that joining together two people, two lives and two viewpoints would be simple? Surely not. You know that saying, “the honeymoon stage is over. “ Well, then what? Do you have a plan? Are you going to hang around or are you going to bail when the going gets tough? 

 

I don’t think my husband knows this, nor does he get any credit for it, but I must say, he’s really, really good at being married. He gets it, unlike anyone else I know. He’s told me on more than one occasion in summary:  

 

“Marriage is a lifetime. It’s going to be hard. We’re going to have seasons. I always choose you no matter what. Every single day. I didn’t go into this thinking it was going to be a breeze or that we would be all unicorns and rainbows in love everyday. That’s not marriage. Marriage is hard and that was my expectation. I also know that in the hard times, that’s when you dig in and work. When things get hard, you don’t say “oh it’s not working and give up”, you work on things and that work makes your marriage stronger.  That work, binds you together. It builds a bond that’s unbreakable. It builds a trust within the two of you, and if you have kids, you’re showing them an example that is, truly priceless. “

First off, Expectation- by definition, is a strong belief that something will happen or be the case in the future.

 

My opinion: Let’s just nip those expectations in bud early on y’all. For example: My husband and I know two specific things about each other. I despise housework and he’s not a yard guy. We went ahead and fixed that so those expectations of each other didn’t linger over our heads and those needs were met. We got a lawn company and a housekeeper. Boom. Done. Problem fixed. 

 

Now sure, that may seem simple, and life does get more complicated, but we’ve grown and expanded in our expectations and communication together. We’ve been married for 6.5 years so we’re by no means “experts.” But, we do both have parents who’ve stayed married for 36 and 45 years, so we’ve got great examples of loyalty to lean on. 

 

In our season of life, with little ones. 3 under the age of 5… it’s all about keeping on the same page and understanding team work. Everything about our life is about the “team.” From getting the kids dressed and out the door in the mornings to getting them fed, bathed and in bed at night, we team up. From the very beginning I was open and honest with my husband. I can’t do it all and I need your help, A LOT. If I’m making breakfast and lunches, he’s getting the kids dressed and hair done ( and yes he braids ). If he’s doing dishes from dinner, I’m doing baths and then he grabs jammies and pull ups and we meet back in the living room to get everyone dressed.

That sounds exhausting! In our house, it’s not about who does what. It’s about being selfless. It’s “how can I help US to make everything run smooth.” How can we make it to bed time and then plop down on the couch and put our feet up, and then cheers to another day well done, together. 

 

Sure we get in fights, we disagree, and we have many a times we have to figure out where to go from here. But we do it. We commit. We don’t walk out. We never get in fights and leave. EVER. We don’t believe in that. We also don’t talk about our marriage, outside of our marriage. You’ll never hear me talk negative about my husband, ever. It’s not a thing. We’ve gone to marriage counseling, and that was so great for us. We’ve also done ReEngage through our church and loved that. 

 

To me, our marriage is sacred. It’s special. It’s the most important thing in my world. Our kids thrive on our flow. They love “us” and we strive to make sure we’re showing them how a marriage should be cultivated. We want our kids to grow up knowing that we work at this, and we understand that life throws you curveballs. But, we also know that if you address those expectations, if you address things as they come, you’ll be so much better off. If you don’t let things go- until resentment builds and is so strong there’s nothing left,  you’ll always have a strong foundation to build on.