My wife had a patient the other day and since I don’t want to violate any privacy issues, that’s my wife Gwendolyn who works as a paramedic in….. ahh…. Pittsburgh. Yeah, that’s good.
While making conversation she found out that the patient was divorced and had a new girlfriend but a son in another state. My wife happened to mention that she and I are coming up to 38 years together this year and the man commented, “How do you DO that? No one does that anymore.”
She thought about that for awhile and we talked about it this weekend.
I don’t pretend to have all the answers because, trust me, I would have written the book and cashed the check by now if I did.
The one thing we agreed on is honesty. You have to be honest with each other. We’ve gone through career changes, staying at home with the younger children, health challenges and it just helps to be open and honest.
Priscilla went back to school to learn paramedicine at one point. She was honest with me that that was something she really wanted to do.
You might ask, “How does honesty factor into the health challenges?” Well, I couldn’t have gone through it all without her and I’ve told her that. There were also days when I was just a bear because of how things had changed. I made sure to tell her that. I remember saying, “I just need to be miserable today! I’ll get over it.”
I realize that everyone’s situation is different. We were best friends before we got married. We also both have a great sense of humor that has come in handy many, many times.
Do we agree on everything? No, but I think we have learned to compromise. We’ve also learned what is worth fighting over and what is not. Remember that book, “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff?” Yup! Read it, learned it.
We live in such an instant gratification society nowadays that I think some couples don’t take the time to work things out. Or maybe they rush into things before they get to really learn about each other.
I think, (it was a long time ago) we discussed a lot of things before we got married. We didn’t enter into this thinking we could change the others mind about things once we were married.
We both came from very humble backgrounds so we easily agreed on purchases like cars or our house. New furniture was just cool because it all matched.
I think our faith background has also given us a strong foundation. Just speaking for myself, I know there have been plenty of times when I searched for answers. While I wish they would come clearly in a voiceover like Morgan Freeman, I do feel like I’ve been guided.
Again I’ll say that everybody is different and I’m only commenting on my situation but if I was sitting down with that young man (who shall remain nameless since I never did get his name), I would say, “Be honest.” Hopefully you have someone in your life who will be honest with you AND can listen as you’re honest with them. Tell her what’s important to you and why. But also you need to LISTEN to what’s important to her and why.
Then … find a way.
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