19 years. We share the same values, life goals, interests and sense of humor. When I met him at age 18, I was a traumatized twisted up vulnerable little person and he saw something great in me. I still don’t understand it but he really honestly loves me. We both had a lot of growing to do and we grew together.
I used to be so arrogant about it, like we accomplished something, but we had one really bad year that humbled me, and now I don’t know how much credit we can really take.
But we definitely do things that help.
We always treat each other with respect, and when we slip up we apologize, and we don’t avoid problems, we hash them out. We were both raised with terrible relationship models and were just so, so determined to not be like our parents. Every time I want to snap at him I ask myself if I want this to be the pattern in our relationship. Then I do the thing I want to be the pattern. And that’s how I maintain the pattern. And I maintain it when I’m tired, when I’m pissy, when I’m hurt, when I’m overwhelmed. No it’s not perfect. I can get a little yelly sometimes. But I course - correct immediately. Within moments or at the worst, minutes. “I’m sorry I yelled at you, I’m just frustrated about XYZ.” 99% of the time it’s not about either of us, it’s some childhood trauma bullshit. We don’t argue that often because we don’t want to establish an argument pattern. Most of the time it’s just not worth it.
The last thing we argued about was Facebook data mining. I know. We were both so pissed off. But it’s never about that. It’s about how sensitive I am to being patronized and how much he hates it when I refuse to listen to him. And in the argument post-mortem which we always do we get down to this root of how terrified he is about becoming one of those couples that always fights, like his parents.
But really what makes it work is that we just get along so damned well. We want to be with each other, we look forward to decompressing at the end of every day, we talk about everything from how many grapes our son shoved up his nose today to systemic racism in the criminal justice system. That article I read, we’re gonna talk about it. Here’s this podcast I listened to, you should listen and we’ll discuss. What did you think of this TV show you just watched? Hey I’ve got a question it’s totally random but… So much of our relationship is good conversation.