Three Things I Have Learned in Three Years of Marriage!

Brian and I have been married for three years! It feels like it has flown by, but at the same time I can’t imagine my life without him!

We are still early in our marriage and have so much to learn, but there are a few things I have already learned, and I would like to share them!

First, everybody knows that love is a choice and that a successful marriage requires you to choose to love your spouse at all times. But another huge choice you have to make is to enjoy your spouse! It can be so easy to forget why you fell in love with this person when you’ve been married for a while. Living with and being bound to someone can change how you see them. Having a baby can change how you see someone! Especially if you aren’t getting much sleep! But choosing to enjoy your spouse and who they are, their personality, their quirks, and their less than perfect side, will help your relationship grow. Your spouse will feel loved and accepted and safe. Just like you want to be appreciated for all the parts of you, your spouse does too!

Second, a baby changes your life, but it doesn’t have to change your relationship. Not forever anyway! Yes, you are both now mom and dad and not just husband and wife, but you are still husband and wife. And you were husband and wife first! Put each other first. Make time for each other. Make time for just the two of you. It may not be often, but it should happen from time to time. When Brian and I get the time to reconnect just the two of us, we grow closer and are better able to handle struggles that come up.

Third, God is the only perfect one in our relationship. I think it is really easy to fall into thinking that we will derive all of our happiness and love from our spouse. When we put that on our spouse, we set both of us up for failure. Brian can never take the place of God in my life. He is a great man, but he is not God and he could never be! I can’t expect him to always make me happy, to never mess up, to never have days where he is down. He is accountable to me and I to him, but neither of us is perfect and expecting that isn’t fair to either one of us!

Marriage has been such a wonderful gift. We have ups and downs like all couples and going through new stages of life requires adjustments on our part, but it has been and continues to be such a wonderful journey! Happy third anniversary Brian.

“Above all, keep loving each other earnestly, for love covers a multitude of sins.” (1 Peter 4:8)

“I have found the one whom my soul loves” (song of Solomon 3:4)

“Therefore, a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh” (Genesis 2:24)