This day 19 years ago I married my best friend, no that's not true. 19 years ago I married the man who would become my best friend. Ours was not a Disney fairy tale. Our love story was more like a wrestling match, hard sweaty work. I can in all honesty say that I am deeply in love with my husband... now.
I say that we have been married for 19 years, that is more technically true. Technically we were married on August 21, 1993. The more accurate years of marriage are more complicated. We were married for two years and then we separated. At the time we had a 6 month old son. We reunited 5 years after we had separated. Through those 5 years we were still very much connected. We had Gabe.
We married at 22. We were young and foolish. I knew that I had to get on with my life, and Christopher went along for the ride, afraid to loose me. Like everything else in my life up until that point I was in a big rush to grow up. The best thing that ever happened to me was marrying Christopher Donald Lindsay, and the best thing that ever happened to me was separating from him. It was because I had to be a single mother that I smartened up and became independent. I had gone from living with my parents, to living with a group of kids my own age, to living with Christopher. I had never learned how to live with me.
Although we were separated we still were in constant contact with each other. Many people commented that we were the most civil separated couple that they had ever seen. We loved Gabe more than anything else in the world, and he was a part of both of us. If we were terrible to each other it would only affect Gabe, and if we loved him, and he was our world, why would we do anything that might hurt him? It was that fact that we were kinder to each other when we were separated than we ever where when we were married was what brought us back together in the end.
In the 12 years that we have been back together there were a few times that we almost didn't make it. The ghosts of our former selves would often make reappearances. We weathered the stress of having twins, but only barely. The most devastating nightmare, the death of our Gabe, was what in the end brought us the closest. We clung to each other. We took turns carrying each other in those first most fragile days. After the death of a child most couples divorce, for us we became stronger. We have been happily married for 7 years. I am married to my best friend. When my husband enters a room, I get butterflies in my stomach, like I did when we were first dating. I am deeply in love with my husband... now.
We still have fights, but now we don't go for blood. Now when we fight we try to make the other understand why we are upset, and what we are upset about. We know that there is nothing worse than what we have already come through, everything else is not a storm, but just a light rain.
Although we were separated we still were in constant contact with each other. Many people commented that we were the most civil separated couple that they had ever seen. We loved Gabe more than anything else in the world, and he was a part of both of us. If we were terrible to each other it would only affect Gabe, and if we loved him, and he was our world, why would we do anything that might hurt him? It was that fact that we were kinder to each other when we were separated than we ever where when we were married was what brought us back together in the end.
In the 12 years that we have been back together there were a few times that we almost didn't make it. The ghosts of our former selves would often make reappearances. We weathered the stress of having twins, but only barely. The most devastating nightmare, the death of our Gabe, was what in the end brought us the closest. We clung to each other. We took turns carrying each other in those first most fragile days. After the death of a child most couples divorce, for us we became stronger. We have been happily married for 7 years. I am married to my best friend. When my husband enters a room, I get butterflies in my stomach, like I did when we were first dating. I am deeply in love with my husband... now.
We still have fights, but now we don't go for blood. Now when we fight we try to make the other understand why we are upset, and what we are upset about. We know that there is nothing worse than what we have already come through, everything else is not a storm, but just a light rain.
This is a great blog. Your wedding pic is beautiful.
ReplyDelete