Marriage Is Hard

For most women, we started planning our weddings when we were still little girls. And of course, we all thought we would live "Happily Ever After." When you are a little girl you don't have a clue the amount of work it takes to make a marriage work. You just 'know' that you are a Princess and one day you will meet a boy who doesn't have cooties who will be your Prince Charming, and he will be riding a white horse and you'll live in a castle and your life will be like a fairy tale.

Reality...you grow up, still believe in "Happily Ever After", but with a little more perspective that comes with maturity. After a few years of marriage you begin to realize how much work marriage truly is.

I'm not trying to say I have any regrets. I LOVE my husband, and I am glad every day that I am married to him. But it's hard to let go of all those things you thought you would have. All those plans you made in your head that kept slowly changing as you moved from child to teen to womanhood.

I am 37 years old. At this age I always thought I would have my own home, kids, pets. But how it's turned out, I live in a rented condo with my MIL out of necessity. Every single day of my married life has been lived under the same roof as my MIL. What was supposed to be a temporary situation has never changed and it's not looking like it's gonna change any time soon after a year of unemployment for my husband. Our situation just gets worse. I have 1 child, God just didn't have more in His plans for me. That took 6 years to come to terms with, but I have. I understand that if I had young children to care for, I wouldn't be able to serve as effectively as I do at church. It would be difficult or impossible for me to take a huge group of kids to christian camp each summer if I had a little one I would be leaving behind. And pets...my husband is allergic to cats and my MIL is allergic to everything else including real Christmas trees.

I don't come home to my own home. I come home to a rented home filled with things that are mostly not mine, not my style, and doesn't feel like "home" and a MIL who is always here. Pretty much all of my wedding gifts, china, pots & pans, etc. remain packed or in a storage unit. I wanted to wait to use them until we had our own place and I could unpack that china and plan my own dinner parties and come home to my own home where I am the only one to greet my husband at the door. But life doesn't always go as we hope.

I struggle with this daily. I know God has blessed me abundantly in SO many ways. I have a roof over my head, a job, a daughter who is a college student and works and has a relationship with the Lord, a husband who loves me, ministries that I love being part of. These are wonderful things. But I struggle with thinking, "There must be more than this." I have days I just want to run away.

Marriage is hard. But I took my vows seriously. "For better or worse" "Till death parts us". Divorce is not in my vocabulary at all! This is a season where God is stretching and growing me, and that is usually uncomfortable. But I know God is with me, and He is at work in all this, and His timing is perfect, mine not so much. So I need to learn patience, and remember that He is in the drivers seat, not me and trust that his plans are for good.