Thirteen Years

Today marks thirteen years of marriage for my husband and I. I can definitely look back over the years and see many trials and tribulations as well as joyful moments. It certainly has been a growing experience. We've had our seasons of doubts and our seasons of security. Yet here we are, 13 years after we started this journey, still together, against the odds.

You see we married when I was 19 and 4 months or so pregnant with our oldest. We'd met in September and married the following June. Both of us come from dysfunctional families and both of us helped raise younger siblings. Quite frankly, statistics would've had us done for long ago. Thank God, He, is more powerful than numbers.

I can't say it's been all sunshine and rainbows. I can't say we've always been fully committed. I can say, we are fighters and that, in truth, we do love each other. Not the kind of love that's all tingles and butterflies. I'm talking about love. The kind of love that chooses, works hard, and is willing to grow even when it hurts, when it isn't easy. It is that love that holds us together against all odds. It is the hope that that love brings to each of us, when times are rougher than the most tempestuous seas, that gives us the strength to persevere.

This year has been a stormy one in our marriage, but there is a light at the end of this tunnel, and growth to be had. I thank the Lord, that He has brought people into my life who are not afraid to play devil's advocate, in my husband's favor, instead of just agreeing with me on everything I feel. I thank Him, for bringing people into my life, who speak hope, faith, and revelations into my heart.  

Through these friends, God has been able to show me where my focus should be and the changes I should be concerned with. Letting go of what I can not control and trusting in, Him, to take care of it all. Looking past my feelings to the facts and my role in everything.

I pray that as the next chapter of this love story begins, I will continue to allow God to move within me into this life we share. That I will continue to grow into the wife my husband longs for, the one I long to be. To let the past lay dead where it is, in the graveyard of unchangeable things, as I move into the light of the right here and now and appreciate all that is, in this very moment.