The realities of marriage

[caliDreaming]

Hello :)

I got married to my wonderful H less than a year ago. I'm happy, he's fantastic in every way.

Even though I'm happy, I find myself a bit scared really. Nothing to do with us as a couple, but I have just been surrounded by so many people saying 'marriage is so hard', 'the magic will be gone by the time you're in your 30's' (I'm 22) etc etc.

I can see why marriage is hard - it's committing yourself to one person for the rest of your life and all that comes with that. I knew that before I got married.

Just please, help me feel a little less nervous here (I'm even off sex at the moment as I'm just so stressed worried about this stupid shit!). From other women who have been married longer than I - what are the blunt realities of marriage? Is it unrealistic to have a lasting marriage these days? Everywhere I turn, people (friends, acquaintances) seem to be so negative and it's getting me down. They love my H, but just think marriage is a dated ideal. I married him because he was the man I can picture seeing the world with, having children with and I love just coming home to him after a shitty day at work. Naive? What are the realities of marriage for you?

I don't think I would say marriage is hard but that any relationship goes through ups and downs and you do have to work to keep the spark.

I've been with my DH for 12 years, married for 6 and we have 2 DSes. I think our relationship is great, we get on, we have a laugh, we support eachother but it's different to 10 years ago - we now have a family so our priorities and time for eachother has changed. I would say it's better really, there's a strong and solid foundation and we've grown up together.

We try and make sure we get as much time together as possible to remember 'us' as a couple rather than Mummy and Daddy who do the washing, empty the bins and go to work and all the other household chores!

JoandMax - thank you for this. It sounds like you have a very good relationship, which is nice to know :)

"life" can be hard, but I can honestly say I have never found my "marriage" hard

we have been married for 18 years

he enhances my life, and I think I enhance his

if that wasn't the case, we wouldn't still be together

the first flush of romance can get a bit lost when you first have children (if you do) but if are both grown-up, respectful people you accept that and hang on

then it all comes back again

I think you should stop worrying love, and go with the flow

there aren't some magic "things" you can do unilaterally to make it work

just be yourself,,,he married you for that, remember

Firstly, stop worrying before you need to. This early part of a marriage is the happiest time - don't waste it worrying about things that may never happen!

Secondly, marriage is like any other long-term relationship; couples, parent/child, friends. It has ups and downs. The downs in a marriage can come in many forms - relationship difficulties, life difficulties from jobs, family, the stresses that come from having children. It's a hard thing - to share decades of life with one person, and all the changes that come with that, and remain strong.

I'm married 5yrs this year. We have two small kids. The realities of our marriage are that we are generally happy. I think we achieve that in a few small ways: remaining communicative and trying to make couple-time as much as two small kids will allow. We also don't put large stresses on ourselves - we keep expenses low so we don't have to fret about money, we don't pack our schedule with stuff so that we have relaxation time.

Despite that, we have our stresses too. My ILs are currently being hellish, we're trying to raise two small kids while he runs a business and I study. We row and we snipe from time to time. Last night I for pissed off with him for something and went off in a huff to sleep with DS2 in the other bedroom. But in the morning, I apologised and he understood why.

There is no magic formula. You just have to treat your partner with respect and love and keep talking. Always, always talk.

AF, Squitten & peabodyblue - thank you. I don't like talking to my mom about it because I don't want it to become a 'thing', so this is perfect for me. Thank you so much.

Me and DH has discussed this "marriage being hard" business as it's something my Mum has said to us.

We have always maintained that our marriage is the easiest things in our lives, it doesn't take any work, it's just comfortable and lovely.

If yours is the same, please don't feel bad about it!

Married 6 yrs here, 2 small children. I do have phases where the minor irritations get very annoying, to the point where I have thought - do you know, if we were just dating, I would dump you.

But, we are not dating, we do want to be together, but minor things do/can become an issue after several years. I think, not arguing to the death over petty stuff helps. I am happy to agree to disagree on some things, DH not so much He would prefer that I came to agree with him. He just has to put up with me it.

Having small children brings poor sleep - tired people get grumpy and people can get pissed off with who does what/childcare/housework/money/competitive tiredness. Our first baby arrived not long after we got married - we didn't live together until we were married (!! I know!) I still find living with someone the tricky bit sometimes Remember you are in it together.

But overall, I wouldn't swap him.

Thank you for the responses - we lived together for 2 years before we got married so I am well versed in the little annoying niggly things men do that are sometimes infuriating! I try to just breathe through it and pick my battles!

This has made me feel much better. Maybe because I'm the only married one out of all of my friends atm... my life must just seem pretty strange to them.

I'm with AnyFucker on this. I'd rather be with my DH than with anyone else. We are twee two halves of the same coin. Each of us would be lost without the other.

Of course we have disagreements; life has its ups and downs but Im so glad he's there with me going through any particular pile of shit the wind has thrown at us. And I know he feels exactly the same way.

I don't think marriage is hard; it's easier to walk way if you aren't legally tied to someone. The fact that you are married shows commitment to each other.

Every relationship has its ups and downs; you can apply that to school, work, parents, children and partners. Communication is the key to a successful relationship. If you lose that then you're on a rocky road.

I've been married for 3 years, but with DH for 7 years, and I would second the comments made above - sometimes things are better than others, but knowing that I have that other person who will be by my side no matter what life throws at us means we can get through anything (and in the time we've been together there's been some tough times).

I have a quote stuck to the side of my fridge which says 'a successful marriage requires falling in love many times, always with the same person'. I think that is especially true if you marry young - you are both likely to change and grow as people over time, but if you grow together then you're more likely to stay married.

I think life may not be 'hard' necessarily but it throws curve balls. How you deal with them is when you get to see the 'real them' and the 'real you'. That's what tests relationships - finding out that your partner doesn't react the way you expect. Having met a man age 18, lived together for five years and got married age 23 I can look back now and realise that it was a rather artificial, stress-free existence (uni mostly) and neither of us were quite prepared for real life when it hit.

What I would say is don't be too quick to gloss over 'annoying niggly things' in the first flush of love, as they tend to become 'kill you and bury you under the patio irritating things' if left unchecked. Also have good foundations with dull things like management of finances & division of labour since money and being taken for granted are very common reasons for break-ups. Finally, always make sure you share the same vision of the future.

The biggest danger for people getting together very young which you did is that you change as you get older and grow apart. Me and my ex got together at 19 married at 21 and found by 30 we were totally different people. Not saying that will happen to you but it is a danger.

Sometimes you have to accept there will be bad times in life to enjoy the good times. Everything is a risk to a degree.

Hopefully you will be happy forever but don't worry about it.

I've been married 14 years (together but not co-habiting for 3 years before that) and we are still happy. We've been through rough and smooth but the marriage part has never been hard work - it's been far harder dealing with others' expectations of us than each-other's.

I do have to say though that DH and I could still be whole and independent people without each other. We don't "complete" each other, we are two fully functional and well rounded individuals who happen to like living the same life mostly in a parallel way, with frequent meeting in the middle IYSWIM.

If he fucked off with his secretary (or whatever) he knows I would be ok and build a life of my own without him in it. And vice versa.

Maybe what people have to remember about marriage is that you stay together because you both want to today

I think marriage is scary when you think 'we're going to be married for 50 plus years, I wonder if I'll always feel the same' and similar things. Relationships do change but not necessarily to make things more difficult. You need to keep talking and treating each other like a friend so spending time in your own doing something you both enjoy (including sex) and see how it goes.

I got married at 24 btw - DH was 25. 12 years do far.

I have been with DH for 18 years, we got together in our early 20s.

I think there was a moment in 'House' 9th series which summed it up: " Couples that stay together go through the exact same shit that couples that split up go through. They just decide to deal with it, instead of running away"

We have been through a lot together, we have seen the world (lived abroad for over 8 years), had kids, dealt with sickness in the family, all the usual stuff. We have definitely had big crises with every big change: house moves, emigration and babies do test a marriage!

I think an internal determination to make it work, cutting eachother some slack, keeping some interests/own friends/hobbies and a sense of humour are good to have onboard!

azazello - you're right, it's incredibly daunting when you think of it that way. I really need to stop!

Chandon - love House... I think that quote is perfect. We've gone through the death of one of my parents and just general shit luck thus far and it does reassure me that I have someone who is just going to stick with it. (Read some of these threads and it would seem men have an extraordinary capacity to completely change and be assholes)

Life can be hard indeed, but as others have said, marriage itself should not be hard work.

But then again I would not describe my marriage as "magical" either, so I don't worry about the magic disappearing, like you have been warned.
No, don't get me wrong - I love DH very much and think we have a great marriage. But it's ..life, not some unrealistic magical sparkly fairytale or dream, from which you might wake up one morning and say that "oh, wait a minute, this is actually not what it seemed!". Maybe that's the reason your friends seem bitter and disappointed, unrealistic expectations?

For every bad forum story about a man on here there will be a 50 good stories not posted.

Divorce rates are still high though so you just have to work really hard to make sure you don't become one of them!

I've been married 15 years, together for 18.

Life can be tough and throw you some real humdingers to deal with, and it's those humdingers that can affect your marriage.

It's naive to think that your relationship won't change and you won't change; what's important is that you cope with the changes together. Marriage is about commitment and IMO too many people marry today and aren't fully committed so at the first sign of 'trouble' they think "I can't be doing with this" and clear out. (I'm not talking about trouble like domestic abuse, drink and drug abuse etc but just when things aren't all rosy and fluffy like they are in the beginning of a relationship).

DH and I are having counselling at the moment to try and keep our marriage together - I never thought we'd be in this boat but having a child with complex SN, career-enforced separation, close family bereavement, no family support and the general stresses and strains of family life means that we have lost our way with each other. We stopped being husband and wife and just became mum and dad and we're trying to rectify that now but it is hard.

So yes marriage can be hard, but as my wise old Granny said "if you never fall out it means that one of you is always giving in. And you can't have peaks without troughs".

Sidge, I wish you all the best. Love that quote.

I agree with everything above. It's hard in as must as all relationships, jobs everything is hard at times.
You should stop worrying and forget what anyone else thinks - if you both want to make this work forever then you can do that together.

Someone who reads fortunes, a friend of a friend, told me on my wedding day in a very knowing way - oh well there is always divorce. It really annoyed me so much so I thought no way - i'm going to prove you wrong - it makes me try all the harder.

I've been married 11 years by the way and we have 2 DCS 6 and 6 months.
Sometimes are stressful as everyone says but we love each other and still want to be together and that's what matters. It's all about different stages.

Getting married does not make the relationship harder, although perhaps people might try harder to resurrect a troubled marriage because of the difficulties of divorce. But marriage is no harder than any long-term relationship.

I've only been married 7 years but the 'magic' hasn't gone. Of course daily routine leaves little time for romance for just waking up next to her is perfect. I don't want anybody else and neither does she.

Many relationships do end in divorce, but many couples also grow old together happily. Having someone who loves you supporting you through the hard times is incomparable to anything else. As long as there is compromise and you are willing to persevere and you love each other, there is no reason why it shouldn't work out.

You sound like you truly love your dh, which is the best foundation for any marriage.