We Are All Young In Love

Although I may be young, I'm living in the adult world. A new fish to the big pond, so to say. And through all the time I've spent observing and watching those my age, a few decades older and even half a century older, I've come to a conclusion. We are all the same in certain ways. I've seen couples that have been married for 50 years have the same arguments that my husband and I have. I've seen women get angry over the same things, whether they're 18 or 78. I've seen men get frustrated with their spouses for the same reasons they did when they were young. Some things, we never truly grow out of.

I was 17 and a half when I married my husband.

I got a lot of comments like this -
"You don't know what you're doing, you're rushing into this and you two won't make it a year."
"You're too young to know what real love is."
"You are going to regret getting married and missing out on so many things."
"Just try to consider this your 'practice marriage."
"It's pretty messed up that you're 17 and married."
"Is that legal?"

I knew I loved Patrick. I don't know why or how, but somehow I just knew. We have now been happily married for a little over 2 years. Of course we have had trials, hardships, arguments... But as far as I've seen, doesn't everyone? Patrick went out to sea for a month about a month and a half after we got married, came home for 2 weeks and then deployed for about 8 months. 2 months after he returned, we celebrated our first anniversary. A lot of people said we had only done well for that long because he was gone for so much of it.

Although he was gone, it was a constant aching in my heart. I was living in an apartment in Virginia ALONE, at age 17. I had no family, not many friends and I didn't know the area very well. I spent a large majority of my time trying to find friends, laying on the couch with my dog watching Netflix and crying... It was the hardest period of time in my life. There were fights while he was overseas. There were phone calls where we hardly said a few sentences to each other because we were upset about something. There was drama - people passing rumors. Deployment was very hard. A lot of people asked me, "Why don't you just break up and go home if you're so lonely? Go back to your family and friends, go back to school and start working?"

But I wouldn't. I was determined to stay strong on the homefront, to work through any difficult times and to persevere when things were rough. I wasn't going to give up on my marriage. It wasn't because I didn't believe in divorce or I was scared to do it. I didn't want to and I knew that when Patrick came home, life was going to be perfect again and I wasn't going to let any amount of time apart take that away from me. This was the man I wanted to have babies with, own a home with, travel with, make memories with. He was my best friend and my favorite person in the world.

Whether you're 16 or 100, we are all niave. We all say stupid things in arguments, we all get upset over silly things, we all have rough times. The key is to decide what is worth it to you. If at age 16 getting married to your significant other is important to you and you've met someone who you believe is worth it, and they feel the same way back, go for it! We all have the ability to work towards things we know are worth it in our hearts. I've seen women in the middle of their lives get married on a whim, or get married after meeting someone a few months previous and end up very, very happy. The older you are, the more time you spend in the real world. You see the way the world works, find a groove that you live well within, trial and error until you find the correct paths, however... When it comes to love and what is in our hearts, there is no age to say what is and is not true.

My husband has been one of the biggest blessings in my life. If I would have given up on us because times were hard, I would be an entirely different person with an entirely different life. I like who I am and the life I live. I like who I am because I made these choices. I persued things I found to be important enough. We both worked together through the past few years to continue living a beautiful life.

After an argument, when things have cooled down, both of us always regret any harsh words used, any hurt feelings or even arguing in the first place. It is human nature to argue. Once you live with the same person for long enough, the gates open with the ability to be audibly mad at them, argue with them, etc. For example, living at home with your parents. I don't know about everyone else, but I've fought with my parents millions of times. Once you are close enough with someone who you're sharing your everyday life with, fighting is normal. It doesn't mean you're in a crappy marriage, you're unhappy or you shouldn't be together. That is, unless your fighting has become physical... Which in my opinion, is NEVER okay.

I've been rambling quite a bit, but moral of the story is...

We are all young in love.

Patrick, here's my quote for you.
"I seem to have loved you in numberless forms, numberless times, in life after life, in age after age forever."
- Rabindranath Tagore




(photos above from top to bottom are - wedding day, celebrating our "honeymoon" around our first anniversary, our second anniversary and finally, Evelyn starring down Patrick's beverage on our dinner date for our 2nd anniversary)