My love + best friend

Before I got married, I used to believe that you could never lose the lovey-dovey feelings you experience in courtship and engagement.  I mean, how could you?  Everything is perfect then, and all you need is each other (I remember telling Dannie that I would live in a cardboard box, as long as it was with him...my, how things have changed now!).  It's not until after you get used to marriage, you start seeing each other's flaws much more clearly, and life becomes mundane.  There is work to do, bills to pay, money problems to worry about, babies to come, and on and on the list goes.  I'm sure it's different for everyone, and the amount of time varies, but bitterness, fighting, and lots of anger is pretty much inevitable, UNLESS you both are practically superhuman and work very hard at keeping the love and romance alive (and even then, there will still be rough spots to weather through).  

I'm serious, it takes hard, hard, hard, hard work to make the choice to keep loving that person, even when the feelings are gone and everything seems wrong.

In the case of me + Dannie, it didn't take very long.  After we got back from our honeymoon, it seemed like we were hit with a ton of problems, not just problems of our own, but things from the outside that then caused some major problems between us.  And then, for the worst, we're both very hard-headed and stubborn, which has led to many a "disagreement" from which neither of us would back down because we were both "right." 

 Of course, despite the many problems, the early days were nevertheless pretty good.  We were still living on a love high, even though it didn't last long.  Now, almost two years later, it's more of a constant effort to keep on loving...because love really is a choice.  The beginning stage, even though we call it love, is really just emotion.  We tell our "true love" that we would do anything for them, but after years of marriage we don't want to do the smallest niceties, or even bigger things, like laying down our selfish desire to be a servant to them.

 True love is the decision to keep on loving, even when the good feelings just aren't there.

It's a learning and sanctifying process.  Two people become one, but it's two very different personalities and behaviors, mindsets, and sometimes worldviews.  It takes a lot of learning on how to be compatible.  Communication is HUGE.  Trust me.  Talk. Talk. And talk some more. Never stop talking!  

I didn't mean to go into such detail like I just did, because what this post was really going to be about was my love for my husband.  Because yeah, I love him, despite all his problems.  I have many too, and he has to deal with them.  But I'm here by his side, and I'm never leaving (no matter what those heated arguments may say to disagree with that statement).  God created marriage to be forever, and I want to spend the rest of my life with my husband.  I want to grow old together, and after 50+ years of marriage be more in love than ever before.  Because by then we will have weathered through the roughest of storms and persevered...and thus truly know the meaning of true love.  I want to remember the good times, not the bad, even if it's simply because the good times outweigh the bad many times over.  God help us, we will persevere through this forever relationship of marriage.

So, just to say it again, I love my husband.  Underneath his [sometimes] hardened exterior, there's a loving, caring, sweet, tender, understanding, and compassionate man.  He goes out every day- rain, shine, snow, cold, or unbearable heat to provide for his family.  I know I could never do what he does, and I'm afraid I don't give him enough credit for what he does do, instead of resenting what he doesn't do.  I love him to the moon and back.  I choose to love him more and more each day.  I love how he makes me feel safe and secure, not only from evil in the world, but from my own insecurities that want to plague and dishearten me.  He is my love, lover, best friend, and confidant.  And I don't ever want us to stray so far from each other that we lose that.

And did I mention that he's rather good looking? *swoon*