4 Things I've Learned From Marriage - Sharing Life's Moments

My husband and I are celebrating 15 years of marriage on May 21st, 2023. I honestly wondered if we were actually going to make it! But I have learned from marriage quite a few things of importance.

It has been an incredibly rocky year for us. We’ve been dealing with many things placed in front of stronger couples who have fallen apart due to them. They say marriages fall apart due to financial issues, lack of quality sex life, health issues, and becoming like roommates with each other.

Lessons Learned From Marriage

Financial Issues Pull a Couple Apart

We’ve made some inferior financial decisions in our life. As a result, we have been running like hamsters chasing our tail ends. In many ways, I feel like all we do is rob Peter to pay Paul every day of our lives. I do not know how it all works out, but it does. It might be by the skin of our teeth, but everything falls into place. But I am tired of living paycheck to paycheck.

We have put our heads together. We’ve decided to do other odd ends again to start putting money back in our pockets again.

He has gone back to doing his woodworking. He’s also working for the family trucking company again. Plus, he’s being creative on other ways to generate income.

Meanwhile, I’m doing small things to generate a small amount of money again each week. I’m using apps that give us money back, and taking advantage of the various ways I can earn Amazon gift cards while I do my everyday tasks online.

While I can’t really stand to cook unless it’s using a quick and easy recipe, I’ve been addicted to watching these cheap meal ideas for families on YouTube. I’ve gathered up a list of affordable meals to make for the family that won’t take me long to make. Hence this will help with my desire to eat out as much.

My youngest son will either learn to eat what we make or he may wither away on us. He’s literally the hardest person to feed in our home! My husband, daughter, and I can eat beans and rice with cornbread several days a week. My daughter and I also love salads and cheap meals too.

If there’s a will there’s a way, and we have decided that at this point we are going to strive to do all we can to keep my husband working for the family trucking company and home with the kids and I. Lord willing he won’t have to go back over the road again as a trucker!

Lack of Quality Sex Life

This is something I never dreamed would ever be an issue for me in my marriage. After all, I’ve always been willing and wanting to have sex with him whenever he wants it.

It’s often not mentioned when you’re young and single, but having kids and animals can be incredibly draining. The responsibility of taking care of them usually falls on the mother, leaving very little energy to devote to her partner.

Often, women are unable to indulge in thoughts or fantasies about their desires with their partner as they are preoccupied with completing tasks before the day ends. In contrast, men have the luxury of spending ample time exploring unrealistic ideas on the internet and fantasizing about the various things they want to do. Believe me, when we hear dramatic ideas, in some cases, it turns into a major turn-off because we know we are not made with enough physical power to fulfill those dreams.

But I have learned that sometimes asking for help from my spouse, will help give me the break I need to gather the energy to be ME again. So, we can have a wonderful time sexually with each other. He missed seeing me make the moves, putting on something sexy for him, and me being full of life and extremely involved.

I missed the overall sense of satisfaction we used to have with each other when we were newlyweds. I can remember when I used to talk about sex in marriage on my old blog as someone who made it three years into marriage, and I would get couples commenting come back to us when you’ve made it ten years. Now I see why they stressed that so much.

Once you’ve been together as long as we have, there is a huge amount of obstacles that seem to be ever so present in your relationship. Sex seems to be the first thing to get knocked to the bottom. Plus, it’s hard to keep it fresh and interesting when you’ve done so much together. But the options are still there, and it’s just a matter of communicating with each other openly and honestly to rekindle the sexual magic within the marriage.

Health Issues

While health issues aren’t something that can be overly controlled, there are some important points to bring up concerning this matter and marriage. I know my husband and I both have good days and bad days. Over the course of the last two years, my good days have become far less. As a result, I haven’t been able to do as much on the homefront or in the bedroom.

So, we’ve had to adjust how our daily routines have been handled. The chore lists for everyone have changed. There have been plenty of days, I’ve barely gotten through my work shift, and I literally collapse on my couch and feel utterly useless.

We’ve had to shower each other with compassion and empathy as we each deal with our own health issues. His are not an everyday occurrence thank goodness, but they are harsh when his flare up.

We just got hit with the news that we are losing our health insurance on June 1st. I have yet to figure out what we are going to do with that situation. I’ll be honest that has struck a huge fear in me because I live on medication daily that keeps me functioning. Without it, I’m basically useless and unable to function worth a dime because the pain is so intense in my body! But I do have faith that God will provide a way to resolve this issue. I don’t know what it is yet, but I do know it will come!!

Becoming Like Roommates

While this hasn’t been as strong of an issue for us since he’s had to provide more attention to me over the past two years, it can still rear its ugly head from time to time. It’s one of the most common issues most marriages deal with.

Life has a way of pulling spouses away from each other all too easily. I was reminded of this fact when I was desperately trying to spend an entire day with my husband over our anniversary weekend. We each got pulled away from each other by our kids, our dogs (who are kids to us by the way!), and our parents.

As I had to go deal with the kids and dogs, I kissed my husband and JOKINGLY stated we have too many kids in our home. He laughed and said, nah…

Just a side note: When we dated each other the first time and before I became the runaway bride, we wanted to have seven kids. Of course, that was when it was all a pipe dream because several doctors had told me I’d never be able to have kids due to my abusive history. But we are blessed with the kids we have, and if you count our fur babies (like we do) we reached over seven kids!

But the point is, it’s so easy to get wrapped up in maintaining the house, working extra hard at work, working on a side hustle, and giving the kids all the attention they truly desire…. that the spouse ends up on the back burner just getting scraps of our attention.

I’ll go to my grave stating that the order of one’s priorities should always be God, the husband, and then the kids. The reason I feel so strongly about this is because I’ve seen first hand both in my own marriages and that of my parents how detrimental it can be to not keep that order. Our kids NEED to see us putting our spouses first so they know what a marriage is supposed to look like.

They need to see your spouse get love, respect, and attention from you. They need to know that it’s okay for parents to be husband and wife FIRST. I’m not saying that if the kids truly need your attention that you ignore them, but oftentimes, kids are the center of attention to the point that the spouse doesn’t even need to be there.

Date nights are extremely important to maintain too. You can enhance your date nights with various things. One idea that caught my attention was using Crated with Love Subscriptions. If you’re like us and trying to keep expenses down, you can take advantage of these frugal date night ideas.

While I still don’t feel I’ve learned all there is about marriage, I do feel that being married for over 15 years has now given me a greater perspective than I had even ten years ago. Marriage is certainly a journey, but it’s one I’m glad I get to take with my husband. He’s certainly not perfect, but he is perfect for me!