15 years and counting....

Last week my husband Jake and I celebrated 15 years of marriage! I am still trying to wrap my head around how fast that has went.

Has it always been easy? Absolutely not.

When we got married we were so blinded by love (and lust) that nothing bothered us. We simply had the world at our feet and loved doing everything together.

Like normal, that eventually wore off and our opposite personalities really started to show and we hit a long season of being in a marriage that we could hardly stand one another (I wrote a whole chapter about it in my book From Zero To Four)

But we worked through it and found out what a blessing our opposite attributes really are to one another. And here we are, 15 years later, in what I would say is a very imperfect but thriving marriage.

My advice and what works for us (with 4 kids ranging from 2 to 13 years of age)

1. Date one another- No kids, no friends or family. Just the two of you. - we do this for sure monthly and love it.

2. Stop trying to change one another. You were not meant to be the same person and most likely grew up in different homes. Embrace who each of you were made to be and work on what your strengths are vs picking apart your weaknesses.

3. Talk. Yup sounds easy right? It can be so hard. But to be clear is to be kind. Talk things out. You are each others person. Extend grace over the little things but talk it out when its bigger things. Burying it down doesn't help either of you. Our hardest conversations we have had ended up being the biggest blessing in our marriage.

4. Your kids are not your whole world. Yes, you read that right. Of course we love our kids like crazy but they are not meant for us to keep forever. You can raise them and love them and set that off into the world. But what good is all that work if you forget to love their other parent along the way?

5. Make sure you are living with a spouse and not a bestie... I might make you blush here but your love life matters. Its a way of reconnecting on a level that is important. We schedule that in weekly (yup we are those people LOL) but it works great for us in the season we are in and neither of us are complaining about it.

Do what works for YOU. Marriage is not a one size fits all kind of thing. We are all in different seasons and different stages of life and need to adjust accordingly to all those variables. I highly encourage you to find other mentors in your life that have marriages that you want to align with. Finding other couples that you can have good and healthy conversation with to help you grow better together. They are out there, I promise!

No matter what, I am rooting for you and your marriage! It matters and is a privilege not all get to experience. It is also never to late to find one another again and start growing together vs apart!

Love & Friendship- Megan