Preface: My marriage is wonderful. There is no need to feel concerned or to write me comments about how you hope everything is okay with Josh and I. However, I do always accept prayer: I like my marriage, and I like my husband, and I would like that to last forever...
Marriage is fragile. My parents did a really good job making marriage seem invincible to me when I was a kid. I did not understand divorce or even think it was really all that possible. How things change. Life has jaded me. Now I know the truth.
When Josh and I were talking about getting married, I told him I was not sure how much I believed in the actual act of getting a marriage license and registering our love with the government. Uncle Sam says, "You are married! Happy tax deduction." That seems dumb. It was especially frustrating to me that I could decide to go back to the same office that we got our license and tell them, "Ummm, I'm not so much into this anymore. Mind just expunging this mistake from my life?" Pure craziness. In fact, utter madness!
There is a reason why God made marriage permanent. I'm not saying that I do not understand or empathize with people that have been through the agonizing and life changing experience of divorce. I understand that there are situations and extenuating circumstances that cannot be avoided. This is not what I am talking about, please understand. What I am saying is that I think it is too easy; it is too quick of a fix.
I look at my two and a half year marriage and notice that I have changed. I am now a mom of two, an almost college graduate, and far more grounded than I used to be. These are unavoidable changes; they are the changes that come from growing and aging. Everyone expects life to progress. The only way to avoid progression is death. However, what about the other changes? I have dark circles that rarely go away due to too many sleepless nights. I have larger hips and thighs as well as a strange looking post-baby stomach that I pray will someday go back to normal. I don't look the way I used to one hundred percent. I don't act the way I used to one hundred percent. I certainly don't believe the way I used to one hundred percent. All three of these things seem to be valid reasons to go fill out a form and leave ones family and current life in the dust.
Marriage is fragile, and it does not seem to get the respect that I think it deserves from our media and even from our churches (bold, I know).
I'm sorry for this post, but I've been needing to rant. I am tired. I am haggard. I am at a loss for what to do. How do you crusade for something that is not popular? I am so drained and sad. I wish I could stop time and save what seems to be, in a lot of situations at least, not savable.
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3 comments:
It is good to see that someone else in my age group thinks that divorce is all too often a quick fix. I think - at least a lot of the times - people use divorce as a microwave solution to solve something else in their lives that is really the problem. If that makes any sense at all.
Anyways, I am glad you ranted & I read it and I'm glad you & Josh aren't headed to the county clerk or whatever.
Your thoughts make a lot of sense, and I agree with you too. Getting a marriage license was really weird...I didn't like the feeling of having to get permission from the government for something I didn't feel like they should be involved in at all. And I certainly don't feel like they should be involved in dismantling that same union. The whole system is really bizarre...
As someone who is currently going through the horrible process of divorce, let me say that it is far from easy and it is far from a quick fix. The unimaginable pain and sleepless nights seem endless. Trust me, in many many ways, it would have been much easier to stay married. It literally feels as though someone is slowly tearing you into two pieces. I do understand what you are saying as far as how the world views marriage. Marriage is sacred and beyond precious and it is fragile. Even now, after all I have been through, I do not take marriage lightly and would never enter into it as "till death do us part, or until we get sick of each other". Marriage as the Bible describes it, is a dying relationship and that is a tragedy. It took guts to voice your opinion on this matter, and that should be applauded.
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