Meditation on marriage - for the young and in love (or those who remember the days) part #1

So, It's near Valentine's day. It's the year of our 10th anniversary. Many of my friends are getting married, having kids, and even a few are getting divorced. For some reason I am reflecting on defining moments in my marriage and thought I would share with the world.

Defining Moment #1 - We were meant to be together.

So... the summer after Michael and I got married we filled our house with a bunch of random roommates. One was a older lady (well... that is a relative term, as we were 20. She was in her 30s-40s, I think). She had 2 girls that were 9 and 11. She lived 80 miles away and commuted to my college 3 days a week during the regular school year. She signed up for summer school the month that her kids were supposed to spend with their dad. Since summer school was 4 consecutive days a week, she arrange to stay at our house 3 nights a week.

Well, she evidently was not too good with her calendar, because the month that she signed up for summer school was NOT the month her kids were at their dad's so we got 2 MORE roommates, putting the grand total up to 7 people and 1 cat in our 900 sq ft. house. It was cool with us, her daughters were cool.
Something struck me as interesting about their interactions. Every time she mentioned her ex-husband it was in a POSITIVE way. She would tell her girls that their dad loved them. She would talk to him on the phone in a polite way. She never said why they got divorced. She never sighed or rolled her eyes, even. All this was so foreign to every thing that I had experienced with people who I knew who were divorced. However, I know she was also engaged to be re-married - so it was not that she was hoping that they would get back together, either.

One day we were sitting on our front step. I don't even remember what we were talking about, but I said, "I don't know why you got divorced and maybe you don't want me to know because you never mention it..." And she said "I'll tell you. It's not a secret. I'll tell you"

deep breath. (and I remember this conversation almost word for word)

"It's a shame, Michelle. It's really a shame. We can go today and both sit in counseling and say, 'It is a shame, We were meant to be together.' I remember thinking,'If I could curl up inside of him, I would not be close enough'. We were totally and absolutely in love.
But...
we both made mistakes. He was an alcoholic. For 9 years I took care of everything. I did not know anything about alcoholism. I took care of the kids, I paid the bills, I gave him an allowance, that was basically beer money. If it was not enough he knew he could come and ask for more and I would give it to him... and I lived that way for 9 years. Then, I met (her new fiance) and I had an affair. And that is what happened."

(and this part is a little less vivid, but I get the main points)
"Since then he has sobered up, I have learned about alcoholism, we've been through counseling. But, he is remarried and I am engaged and we have moved on with our lives."

I also think I remember her saying that she will never love her new husband as much as she loved him. That your first love is so memorable and special that you just can't match that.

The whole conversation just struck me. There I am, a newlywed. Totally in love with Michael. The divorce rate is skyrocketing, and I want to say... it is just people who made a rash choice and did not know what they were getting into and they were not meant to be together and that is why they are divorced. But, I am sitting in front of someone who is telling me totally DIFFERENT.

No one would blame her for divorcing a guy who was an alcoholic for 9 years.
No one would blame him for divorcing a wife who cheated on him.

But they can sit in counseling and say "what a shame. we were meant to be together" There is something wrong.

And so I made a mental note: don't let this happen to me. Giant obstacles do NOT mean that we cannot make it through. Struggle does not mean that we were not meant to be together. Don't give up too soon. We were meant to be together.

While writing this, I found myself asking, "When was the defining moment is this situation?" and "Would I have recognized it if it were happening to me?" I think it's easy to say, "Don't let this happen to me!" and harder to recognize that it is and what you need to do to fix it. SOMETIMES you can point it out after the fact... sometimes it is all all a blur.