A Broken Romance: Healing in the midst of Marriage.

Re-blogged from Inkslinger Blog. Original Article here:

Deanna's original post on Inkslinger Blog

My spouse is probably more romantic than I am. Honestly. He’s the one bringing home the flowers. He’s the one who remembers our anniversary every year when I can’t keep the date in my head. He’s the one who bought me a pager when we were dating and declared when we send the number 333 to each other that meant “I love you”. It also became our favorite time of the day. At 3:33 PM every day we would try to page each other, just to let each other know we were thinking about one another. We even got married at 3:33PM. Still to this day, fifteen years of marriage, eighteen years of knowing each other later, if I spot 3:33 on the clock I will glance up and see if he’s noticed too. He usually has.

My husband is the one who “gave” me a song when we were dating and used to lip read the words to me when it played. He’s the one who found a more grown-up song when we got older and needed a more mature song. He’s the one who turns the song on when I’m grumpy and comes over and slow-dances with me in the kitchen. It never fails to improve my mood significantly.

He’s the one that hates instituted holiday’s like Valentine’s Day, (Hallmark Holiday, anyone?) because he’s supposed to get me stuff. He rebels and won’t buy me flowers ON Valentines because he’s going to stick it to the man. No one can tell him when to buy his wife flowers. Instead he does it the week before or the week after. In his older age, he usually brings me a box of chocolate on the actual holiday. His resolve is slowly weakening, it seems. I don’t mind.

He’s also the man who used to suffer from a frequent horrible temper. Or maybe I should say, I was the one who suffered. When we married young, he hadn’t learned self-control or coping mechanisms to deal with life. It effected our marriage severely for many years. Within time, we decided we both wanted a better marriage and both of us set our minds to fix the mess we’d made of it.

I was angry. Hurt. After years of struggle, I was done with it. I wanted something better. But first he had to suffer like I had. Chad knew he had messed up. And messed up bad. But he was determined to make it right. For about two whole years I was mean to him. Downright nasty. I wanted him to feel the pain he had caused me for so long. And instead of being mean back, he controlled himself. He took it like a man. And he LOVED ME THROUGH IT. I was mean. He was nice. He continued being nice even though I definitely didn’t deserve it.

I don’t remember who bought the Love Dare book, but somehow it ended up in our home. My husband decided to do the Love Dare challenge on me. He didn’t tell me what he was doing but within the course of the month, I’m pretty sure I figured it out. He was determined to heal our marriage and set things right. I don’t remember details of that month, but I know by the end of it, I was feeling the love. I knew our marriage had a chance.

Eventually when I realized he really had changed, I knew I needed to change too. I had gotten my anger out. I was guilty as well. It wasn’t just him as the bad guy anymore. I was the bad guy too. Now I had to make things right. I had to let God take our marriage and mold it into His marriage. This wasn’t just about us anymore. We were going to put God in the middle and keep Him there from now on.

All that being said, I think the most romantic thing he’s ever done for me is simply let me heal. He knew it wasn’t going to be easy. He knew he would have to die to self-daily. But he knew what needed to be done and did it. That, my friends, is sacrifice. And sacrifice is the most romantic kind of love there is.

With Valentines Day coming up here fast, what is one way you can show your spouse or loved one that they are cherished and adored? Tell us in the comments below.