The Learning Curve

It's funny how Steve was always the one people sought out for marriage counseling, and now here I am, a widow, giving relationship advice to a couple of different people. Life is unbelievable!! It has had me more intentionally thinking about why our relationship worked so well and why it was so good. There is no ONE reason to put my finger on, I know that on the surface it didn't look like a marriage built to last, in the beginning.

I was 18 marrying a 26 yr old man, who had been married and divorced with full custody of two children. I know my parents had to be biting their tongues so hard they were bleeding. Steve had some issues to work through as a result of his previous marriage and looking back on it at times I know it was a mixture of immaturity and God that I didn't walk away.

The first 2 years were not near as beautiful as the last 16 were. 

One thing I knew about him though was he had a heart for God, even as much of a mess as he was at the time, he had a real relationship with God. He wasn't preachy to me or anyone; he wasn't one of those run you over to pray with you kind of guys, but his heart spoke volumes. I feel like I should insert here that I had absolutely NO idea he would end up being a minister; that might have sent me running scared, just kidding- kinda.

Anyway, I was young and even though I was probably "mature for my age," I was immature and he had so much more experience at life than I did so I guess I found it easy to trust him. I think that was the first brick in the foundation of us - Trust. We had been friends before, so it wasn't like I had just started dating some random stranger and had to figure out if he was trustworthy.

I trusted him to take us where we needed to go and he didn't abuse that trust. If he didn't know what to do we discussed it or he talked it over with someone he trusted. I remember one time I didn't trust that he was doing the right thing, it was a huge major life decision that was going to create a lot of stress for our family. I was so upset I started having panic attacks. He just kept telling me that this was the right thing to do and I didn't see it. It took about a year, but I finally saw it. It was definitely the right thing to do.

I see how hard it is for people to trust their significant others and it makes me so much more grateful for what I had. It was work on both our parts, I had to be able to let go and trust him and he had to be a man I could trust and somehow we just did. I grew up a lot and learned a lot about myself (a lot of things that needed to change) and so did he, but after learning everything we learned it was the most awesome love story ever, it just needed to last another 50 years.