Last week, in the heat of California, literally, Brendan and I laid in bed and couldn’t fall asleep
And first of all, who ever told me that is doesn’t get “too hot” in California is a LIAR. And has also not lived without AC. Because it is HOT and we are uncomfortable.
But on the bright side we did purchase a portable AC unit and life is much better. Okay back to the story…
Anyways, we were so warm that we couldn’t sleep and so we stayed up talking until we fell asleep.
It was like a fun little impromptu date! But as we got to talking Brendan said something that I had never realized. But it occurred to me that I thought the exact same thing.
Whenever we have deep conversations we talk a lot about the past, how we have changed individually and together as a couple. And over the last almost six years we have done a LOT of changing, both together and separately.
Here is what he said…
“Whenever I think of myself, I also think of you too. It’s like you are apart of me. I don’t think of us as two separate people.”
Okay, first of all that was so incredibly sweet and I was gushing over that.
Second of all, I felt (and feel) the exact same way. I then realized how much of our lives are together. Yes, we live very different lives during the days and he is gone a lot because of Military life, but we think of everything as “one”.
There are many hard things about marriage but I think why it may start off to be hard is because you are two separate people coming together as one.
It’s hard to consider what is yours someone else’s stuff. My money is their money, my possessions are their possessions, my everything is theirs.. So on and so forth.
This does NOT happen overnight. It takes a long time to understand and feel that way.
And I don’t mean things like, “well their sports car (or some expensive item) is mine now that we are married so I can use it the way I want to” Or something of that sort. I do believe there is a level of respect of certain things that are separate in relationships.
But what I am getting at is..
When two truly become one, they are hard to separate.
It is a pretty incredible feeling honestly, and also really hard to explain.
But mostly what I can say is it is a deep love kind of feeling. And I can’t wait for that deep feeling to grow. To keep coming closer together as one.
Sometimes I want to keep things to myself, for myself because I just want something that is only “mine” and not his. And maybe we both have a few, small separate things that are like this. But what I don’t want to happen (to me or to you reading this) is I don’t want us to have everything separate.
To live a lifestyle where I have my money, he has his, I have my stuff, he has his, I have my own separate life apart from his… Because the more things that are kept apart from each other, the more you will grow away from one another.
You might lose out on the deep love you will find for one another. The deep understanding that comes with learning to “become one”, you might lose half of you.
I don’t want to loose half of me. I will try my absolute hardest to keep as one.
So, if you’re ever up at midnight and you and your spouse can’t sleep, maybe have a conversation. It’ll be like an impromptu date.
I hope these words encouraged you today.
As always, thanks for reading,
Ephesians 5:31 (NIV) “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.”
~Erin, The Short Wife
The Short Wife 