Marriage

You know, most people tell you that marriage is a giant thing. That it's a huge decision. That you should think about it. A lot of others tell you that you should have a degree and your life completely set up before you even consider marriage. That if you marry when you're under 25 then you're wasting away your life and dooming it to misery. Well...... someone isn't happy in their marriage. 

Thing is, no one tells you exactly what it entails! Why? Because it's what you make it. You won't end up the same way their uncle's nephew's cousin's friend's lawyer's bartender did. You will end up however you choose to. Yeah, it's not a direct choice because it's more of a mixture of consequences, but not all consequences are bad. 

A lot of people told me I was being stupid for getting married at 19 to a 22 year old with no college degree. People even brought up that no amount of "love" would be able to deal with his Aspergers. That I wasn't strong enough to deal with his disability. I fell in love with him because of who he is, and that includes everything about him. Yes, it was really hard finishing high school and planning a wedding during my spare time instead of "living the life" like most of the other seniors at school. Did I want to live that life though? Not really. 

Right now, my marriage entails waking up at 4:30am, helping my husband get ready for work, doing some early morning chores like putting on a wash of clothes and emptying the dishwasher before going back to bed. Then I wake up at 9am and have second breakfast because I'm a tall hobbit   take a shower, and pick up around our room, baby's room, and bathroom. Put the clothes in the dryer or hang them up to dry, put them away, rest a bit and blog, and then just wait for the love of my life to come home. 

We take a small nap together, and then talk and do finances or take care of things we need to do. Plan for the future, both long term and short term. Hang out at the mall because we're young enough to do that~ (just joking around, old couples should totally go clubbing and stuff.) 

Anyway, the reason I just told you about all that is because that's the average day for US. Not YOU. You might have a different schedule, have the husband as the one who stays at home, or both of you might work, or work from home. There is no set way marriage goes. There is no perfect marriage schedule to follow, or perfect whatever to go by. As long as you are both being smart about finances, being clean and keeping up with your home, and talking and communicating well, then you should be fine. The most important thing is that you both love each other truly, and let that love show. I clean up after David, picking up his dirty socks, his plate from the table after he finishes eating, and the trash he leaves behind him randomly. Does it bug me? Not really. I wish our trash cans weren't invisible to him, but meh~ 

In return, he helps me fold clothes, put things away I wouldn't be able to put away otherwise, comes with me to the doctor as boring as he finds it, and has been taking great care of me throughout our first pregnancy. He does a lot of other stuff, but if I write it all down he might realize how awesome he is and then his ego won't fit in the room. Two super awesome people together, it's lucky we haven't cause some sort of explosion in the universe yet.

The point I'm attempting, and failing, to get across is that yes, you should think about marriage very carefully but not in terms of "Am I too young?", "Is this the right time?", "What will people think?". Think more along the lines of:

-"How will I feel being with them constantly?"

-"Will I mind sharing a shower even though they hog the water?"

-"Do I love them enough to excuse anything they do to annoy me?"

Questions like those. Random things you don't really think about. Raising a child with them. Growing old together. Going through so very many ups and downs that you'd go crazy if you weren't holding on to your partner tightly. This isn't really something telling you what to do and certainly not how to do it, but this is some friendly advice from a young wife that just made it through their first year and knows she doesn't know everything.