My wife is one of the best people I know.  And hot.

Still, marriage is one of the hardest things I’ve ever attempted.  It’s that way for everyone.  I’ve never met anyone who’s been married longer than 10 years who hasn’t considered divorce at some point.

There were a few times in the early years of our life together that I thought I had married the wrong person.  There were things about my wife that took me completely by surprise – things that I had a super hard time dealing with.

It’s that way for everyone.  I’ve never met anyone who’s been married longer than 10 years who hasn’t run into something about their spouse that they really don’t like.

The picture of marriage that our culture paints over and over again drives me crazy.  You fall in love with your soul mate and enter eternal bliss where you fall more madly in love each sparkly sun-filled morning.  I’ve never met anyone who’s experienced that.  I have however met a ton of newlyweds, or folks who’ve been married less than a year, who have this vision firmly cemented in their minds.

Bad Relationship?

I’m now almost 20 years into this marriage thing and finally discovered something that I wish hadn’t taken almost 20 years to discover.

What I hate most about my wife has almost nothing to do with my wife.

At multiple points in my before-married life I was mistreated by people close to me.  If you’re an earthling, you’re pre-married life went the same way.  It’s impossible to make it to adulthood without getting hurt – really bad, really frequently.

The majority of us don’t deal with this well, and enter into married life with a mountain of accumulated, unaddressed damage.  And when someone comes along and rubs their finger in it (enter our lovely spouses), we feel pain. Continue reading What Almost 20 Years of Marriage Finally Taught Me About the Worst Parts of Marriage