8 Lessons Learned From 8 Years of Marriage

This week marks my eighth wedding anniversary! I’m constantly amazed at how much has happened over the last eight years. Between us, my husband and I have had eight different jobs, moved six times, been in the Army for five and a half years, been through four pregnancies including a miscarriage, had three children, graduated with two bachelor’s degrees, started a business, launched a blog, created a podcast, and bought and sold a house. That’s not even including all of Michael’s military or religious achievements. And this is just the highlight reel. It doesn’t even begin to cover all the ups and downs, the bumps in the road, the disappointments, the joys, the unexpected blessings, the blessings that were denied, the miracles, or the near misses. Our life together has been a wild ride.

Obviously, eight years isn’t very long compared to a lifetime. But as Michael and I have gone through these early years of our marriage, there are several lessons I’ve learned that help keep our relationship strong and healthy, and which I think can be helpful for any marriage. So, here’s eight lessons learned in eight years of being married.

Before I begin, I want to make it clear that I am not a marriage expert or counselor or anything even close to that. I’m just sharing the things that have helped keep my marriage healthy, happy, strong, and loving for the last eight years and hopefully for a lifetime and eternity still to come. If you are in a relationship that is abusive, neglectful, or unfaithful, these lessons aren’t going to fix what’s going on in your relationship. You’ll need to seek help from a licensed professional or religious leader. I don’t know your circumstances, so I can’t speak to them. But I do know that whatever is going on in your relationships is not a reflection of your worthiness or value. You are important to and loved by God. So don’t settle for a relationship where your partner is mistreating you. If one or both people in a marriage are not willing to actively work to maintain that marriage, you aren’t obligated to stay. Take care of yourself, be safe, and don’t allow anyone to treat you as less than what you are: a child of God

1. Saying “I’m sorry” and “I forgive you” are just as important as saying “I love you.” There’s a famous line from the movie Love Story that goes “love means never having to say you’re sorry.” That is the biggest load of garbage I’ve ever heard. You and your spouse are imperfect people. You’re going to offend one another, usually in spite of your best efforts not to. Sometimes you’ll hurt each other. It’s easy to hold onto those feelings of anger, resentment, or hurt that come when your spouse is insensitive, but holding a grudge is a death sentence for a happy relationship. You have to learn to let go. And the fastest way to do that is to be the first one to apologize. Yep, you should be the one to say “I’m sorry” first, even if your spouse is the one who hurt you! Why? Because when you come to your spouse repentant and sorry instead of combative and angry, the conversation will take a very different and more loving tone.

Forgiveness is a powerful thing. When you open up the opportunity for your spouse to be forgiving, it’s also much easier for them to be apologetic. Apologizing makes you vulnerable, and while vulnerability is an extremely important ingredient in a healthy relationship, it’s probably the hardest one to maintain. Seeing your spouse be vulnerable makes you feel more comfortable being vulnerable yourself. It should also make you feel more connected to each other. That connection is what will lead to healing.

Instead of waiting for your spouse to come and admit to what they did wrong and apologize for it (which may leave you waiting for forever, especially if they don’t know they did something wrong!) try this instead: “I’m sorry I got mad earlier. I felt like _______ when you _______, so I got irritated and lashed out. That wasn’t fair, especially since you weren’t trying to hurt me.” All of the sudden, you’ve gone from being on offense to being humble, loving, and vulnerable. That’s a much better environment for an open discussion!

2. Your spouse wants validation first and solutions second. This may seem like a no brainer, but if you pay attention to the conversations you have with your spouse you may be surprised how often you jump in and try to fix them before validating them. You are your partner’s first and best sounding board. They’ll come to you with their complaints, frustrations, heartaches, dilemmas, ideas, anxieties, and dreams. In your eagerness to help, it’s easy to launch right into solutions. Or maybe your spouse was bouncing an idea off of you, and your first instinct is to provide constructive feedback. That’s not a bad thing! Your spouse probably wants to hear your full thoughts on what they’ve shared. But first and foremost, they want to feel understood. They want to feel justified. They want to feel validated. So, before you say anything else, acknowledge whatever feeling they shared with you first. Then you can play the role of problem solver.

This goes hand in hand with saying you’re sorry. When your spouse comes to you and says, “I feel like _______ when you _______,” it’s tempting to defend yourself, especially if you feel like you never did the thing they’re angry about! But much of relationships is based in perception and not necessarily reality. If your partner perceived that you were cranky and short tempered with them, you need to acknowledge that they felt that way (even if you weren’t cranky and short tempered). This helps your spouse feel safe in their moments of vulnerability. That doesn’t mean you can’t correct them when they’re wrong. It just means you shouldn’t lead with “you’re wrong.” Instead, lead with “I’m sorry I made you feel that way. That wasn’t what I intended.”

3. Your spouse deserves the benefit of your doubt. So, your husband or wife said something insensitive. Your hackles start to rise. You feel defensive and hurt. Your first instinct is to strike back. It can be really hard to reign yourself in at this point, but one of the things that I’ve learned in the last eight years is that far more often than not when my husband says something that offends me it was not intended to be offensive. Almost always, he said something off-hand or without thinking it through. Frequently, he never even realized it could’ve been hurtful. But if I lash out, we’re suddenly in a fight I blame him for, but he never intended to start. It isn’t fair to always be turning your spouse into the bad guy. Marriage isn’t a zero-sum game, where only one of you can come out on top and every argument must be won at any cost. You’re on the same team, and assuming the worst of your teammate will always end badly.

Instead, try to assume the best. Assume there was no offense intended. And if you’re still feeling hurt, seek clarification. You can always say, “I know you probably didn’t mean that to be hurtful, but it felt a little bit hurtful. What were you really trying to say?” It’s okay to step away for a little bit to collect yourself first. Try to remember to doubt your reaction to what they said before you doubt them. They love you, and they don’t want to hurt you. Most hurt feelings in relationships stem from miscommunication and misunderstanding.

4. Don’t get stuck in a love language rut. Americans tend to talk about love languages like they talk about personality tests. We act like once we’ve discovered our love language, we’ve unlocked the secret to never feeling unloved. But that just isn’t nuanced enough for real life. The reality is that you have different love languages as your needs change. When we were newlyweds, I craved quality time and physical touch. As long as I got those things my cup was full. But as time went on and we had one, two, and eventually three kids, it was harder and harder for me to feel like quality time and physical touch satisfied my needs for love. At the end of a long day of caring for clingy little ones the last thing I wanted was to be touched by anyone. And often what I wanted more than anything was quiet time to myself. I knew my husband was trying his best to meet my needs, but I still felt disconnected.

It turns out that the fuller my plate got, the more acts of service felt like a meaningful form of love. Quality time and physical touch haven’t stopped being love languages for me. My needs have just become more and more nuanced and complex over time, and I expect that they’ll continue to change as our kids grow and our life morphs to meet their needs.  

Obviously, it’s important to figure out how your spouse feels and shows love and affection. But don’t assume that one or two love languages is enough. Most people need a mix of all five! You (and your spouse) are not defined by your love languages. You’ll need different things at different times and places. So be sure to communicate openly what you need and how you’re feeling. Your spouse is not a mind reader! Get creative with how you use one another’s love languages, and don’t get stuck in a love language rut.

5. Make your time together feel intentional. This can get complicated once you have kids and your schedules get busier. But a half hour a day to talk without phones or other distractions goes a long way to feeling connected. Michael and I are firm believers in a weekly date night. We almost never go out; small kids make that both expensive and complicated. So instead, we try to make a night-in intentional. My husband tries to actually ask me to go on a date with him every week. We schedule a time and activity and try to throw in something to make it special. That can be a favorite dessert, a new movie, a fun boardgame, or anything the two of us like to connect over. But planning ahead, no matter how simple the plan, makes that time feel important. Waiting until Friday night and then saying, “what would you like to do?” makes date night feel like an afterthought. Whereas a middle of the week text saying, “I’m so excited for takeout and binge-watching our favorite show Friday night! I’ve been looking forward to it all week!” takes something kind of ordinary and makes it special. A little effort goes a long way.

6. Pray with and for each other every day. As a military spouse, there are lots of times when there’s nothing I can do to help my husband, who may be hundreds or thousands of miles away. And during those times there’s usually very little he can do to help me. But there is one thing we can do for each other, no matter how far apart we are or how powerless we may feel to help, and that is to pray for one another. I’ve seen miracles happen in answer to my husband’s prayers for me and vice versa. There are few things that make you feel as connected and in love with your spouse as pleading for them and their needs to God. So even when we’re far from each other, I pray for Michael every day and he prays for me. And when we’re together, we pray together. I strongly believe that has been a crucial ingredient to our having a happy marriage.

7. Be your spouse’s biggest supporter and cheerleader. I am a naturally ambitious person, and my ambition often outweighs both my confidence and my ability. I talk myself out of most of my ideas, but for every scheme that I decide to tackle, Michael is always there to support me. He shoulders more responsibility with the kids and the house to make time for me to pursue my goals. He’ll build things to meet my vision. And he champions me to everyone he interacts with. I try to do the same for him. It’s common and even popular for people to turn to their friends to complain about and bash their spouse, but rarely (if ever) does this help a relationship. Obviously, there are going to be things your spouse does that drive you crazy, and it can be funny and validating to laugh together with your friends about the quirky things your significant others do. But there’s no benefit to badmouthing your partner when you get frustrated. Instead, try to only say positive and uplifting things about each other in public. Share one another’s successes instead of dwelling on your failures. Do everything in your power to be the person your spouse runs to with their ideas, vision, and goals. Validate and support their ambitions. The things they are passionate about won’t detract from you, they’ll only add to a full and beautiful life that you create together.

8. Embrace dependency. Marriage is not two people living separate lives together. Marriage is two lives becoming one life. That doesn’t mean that you should give up your identity or the things that make you unique. But it does mean that to have a successful marriage you have to be heavily dependent on each other. No one can do it all. That is such a fallacy that our society has tried to feed us. It’s just not possible to do and be everything all the time. When you’re married, you act in a partnership to get everything done, and that actually enables you to do so much more than you could have on your own.

As an Army wife, I’m frequently playing the role of single mom. That means I have to do a lot more on my own than I would if Michael were home. But I still can’t do everything. A lot of things fall to the wayside when my husband is gone. Yard maintenance? Forget it. Meal planning? Not going to happen. And because the natural support system of my husband is missing, I have to rely heavily on other sources for help, like my church community, friends, family (if I’m lucky enough to live close to them), and social services available to military families.  It takes all of that to replace the help and support of my husband. You could argue that that is a negative side effect of being dependent on someone else, but I actually think it’s evidence of how great marriage actually is. When you have someone you can rely on at any time and in any circumstance, you’re so much more stable and secure.

You have to be willing to embrace dependency with your spouse. That means letting them help you when things get overwhelming (my husband still struggles with this sometimes). And it means adjusting your priorities to reflect the priorities of you as a couple rather than as individuals. While it may feel like a sacrifice, two is definitely better than one. One of the things that made me fall in love with Michael is how efficiently and naturally we worked together as a team from the very first day. We instinctively tend to find a role for each of us to play, and then work together to solve a problem. He helps me overcome my indecisiveness and I help him analyze things thoroughly. When he’s gone, I miss him so much it hurts, and I often wonder if I can even function properly without him. But that’s a small price to pay for being a part of such a loving and fulfilling partnership.

Phew! That was a long one (even though there are probably dozens more lessons I’ve learned over the last eight years that I didn’t share). What lessons have you learned from marriage? I’d love to hear them!