Bitter-Sweet
THIS SHOULD BE EASY…
They had both been married before but this time, she “figured marriage would be easy.”
Each had been divorced for more than two years when they met at work.
Both were ambitious, confident, and focused on building careers.
And each had a 6-year-old child from a previous marriage: Jamie, a daughter, Abagayle; Kyle, a son, Gage.
“We had so much fun,” Jamie says, recalling how they would all go riding in Kyle’s prized Jeep. With similar backgrounds and values, and kids who really liked one another, what could go wrong? After dating for eight months, Kyle and Jamie agreed that marriage was the next step. Kyle believed that he had simply chosen the wrong spouse the first time around. His mindset was, “Find that right person and things work out happily ever after.”
But less than a year after exchanging vows, happily ever after morphed into an elusive dream. And “so much fun” plummeted into what Jamie described as a miserable failure. What happened to all their starry-eyed hopes?
Although things were not good on the home front, both Jamie and Kyle were flourishing at work. She was getting raises and establishing a strong career. Kyle was thrilled when he was chosen for an elite program but it required a lot of travel, which did not thrill Jamie.
To her, when Kyle was away from the house and didn’t have to deal with the kids, he was on a vacation. She resented Kyle leaving her “to go play,” while she had to not only work, but also take care of three kids and a house. “I didn’t know if he really understood what I dealt with when he was gone every month.”
Kyle sensed her disapproval when he came home from out-of-town trainings or when he left the home on his off hours for some type of outdoor adventure. He was the kind of person who expected his wife to be waiting at the door to give him a big hug and kiss. Instead, he felt like Jamie could care less if he was home.
Day after day, Jamie’s actions reminded Kyle of his ex-wife; his life of adventure was being suffocated. And day after day, Jamie felt more and more taken for granted. In the back of her mind, she knew that divorce was always an option. A sense of impending doom hung over their marriage.
Read the rest of this story on FamilyLife
FIFTY YEARS FAITHFUL
For love is as strong as death.
Song of Solomon 8:6
Only 10 months into their marriage, during an otherwise calm Sunday drive to church one July morning, a young Navy couple’s car was broadsided by a streaking ambulance racing through an intersection. The driver of the car, R. L. Alford, sustained some minor injuries. But his wife, Hilda, was thrown from the vehicle, suffering a massive head injury that left her not only a quadriplegic, but also legally blind and unable to speak.
That was 50 years ago—50 years of communicating with his wife through little more than the nods of her head. Fifty years of pushing her wheelchair or (his preferred way) carrying her in his arms. Fifty years of emptying her urine pan and cleaning up her bowel movements. And in the last few years, even feeding her through a tracheal tube and learning how to insert her catheters.
Along the way, R. L.’s brand of marital loyalty has drawn some unexpected notice. (“Undeserved,” to hear him say it.) When a longtime family friend spearheaded a drive in the mid-’80s to raise funds to build the Alfords a new home, help came from such high-ranking places as Florida governor Bob Martinez, who not only gave them a brand-new refrigerator but also spent a day working at the construction site. President Ronald Reagan sent a check for $500, followed by another for $1,000.
“When R. L. was asked to repeat the vow ‘for better or worse,’” a neighbor said, “he heard it real loud. Medically, it’s a miracle Hilda is still alive. But she’s not alive because of all those doctors. She’s alive because R. L. gave his life to her.”
In September 2006, the Alfords celebrated their golden anniversary. Looking back, R. L. humbly remarked, “Sure, it’s been rough in some ways. But it’s been rewarding.”
Fifty years of being there. May all our promises to each other be that long-lasting.
Courtesy: FamilyLife
COURTED AGAIN
Thirteen years after my husband walked out of our home carrying a plastic bag of his personal effects, he is back asking my forgiveness. I was 39 years old when he left me without an explanation. I heard he moved in with a woman who was already pregnant. He went on to father 3 children with her. A few years ago, he turned up in church at the thanksgiving service I had with my family to celebrate my 50th birthday. A few days after the celebrations, he changed my car as he noticed that I was having trouble with my old jalopy on my birthday. If I thought that was a sign of impending reconciliation, I was wrong. A few months earlier, he had moved in with another woman with whom he later fathered a child.
Yet here he is two years later, begging my forgiveness, courting me like he never did even before we first got married twelve years before he left home. Now he pays me compliments all the time, calls when we are not together, tells me I am more beautiful than when we first got married. He is bringing me chocolates, flowers, asking me out on dates and hinting about a renewal of vows at our upcoming silver wedding anniversary in a few months. A few days ago, he turned up with a brand new SUV for me and he took me to see an about-to-be completed home he is building for us, thanking me for remaining faithful and loyal when he was not. I feel like I am in a dream.
A few years after he left home, as I prayed for the restoration of my marriage, I had a need to forgive him, which I did. Although my instinct is to run him through hoops, make him take an HIV test and submit him to all kinds of torture but the truth is that he could have infected me while we were still living together when he was running around town with several women, some of whom I knew. Who am I to hold on to a grudge, as ill-done by as I might consider myself to be? After all, I myself have been the recipient of much grace and forgiveness. So after my initial hesitation, we became intimate. He called the next day from work to thank me again for forgiving him. According to him, everything has changed for him already. His business has blossomed and he feels like he is ’alive again’. So I have decided that I do not want to play any games. I have prayed too hard and waited too long for this miracle and I just want to continue to trust God as I have done from the beginning and bask in our newly rediscovered love.
PAIN AND DISAPPOINTMENT
Shortly after our wedding, I suffered a serious back injury. I have had several surgeries in the past five years and I have not been able to work. This is not the life we imagined when we fell in love, took our vows and excitedly made plans for our life together. We cannot have the children we so much looked forward to having and I don’t know if my husband can take another 5 years of this. I imagine that there must be times when my husband has thought of leaving me and I could not blame him if he did. I would probably have been long gone, but he is still here and I love him all the more for that – Carly, Durban, South Africa
THE WEDDING GIFT
A week after we got married, I received a belated wedding package: two children from my husband’s baby mama. Within one year of marriage, I had become the mother of three children. It’s been fifteen years and although there were once days when I wanted to pick up my child and scram but I stuck with it. Now both of my step-children are grown and gone off to college and my child is away in boarding school. We are enjoying the empty nest! – Denike, Lagos Nigeria
LEARNING TO LOVE AGAIN
After a mostly blissful marriage of 30 years, my husband had a stroke. For a while, it did not seem like he would make it but he survived. Only just but he is no longer the man I married: he is different in every way possible: physically, mentally and emotionally and I am at a loss of what to do. It must sound like a terrible thing to say but I am struggling to find a connection with this person I am now married to. He is not the same man and although I know he must be unhappy himself, I am very lonely. I keep searching my past for the horrible thing I did to deserve this life of imprisonment but I want to keep my vows of sticking by him through sickness and health, better or worse because I would want him to do the same for me if the tables were turned. – Mamy, Legon Ghana
BETRAYED BY LOVE
I have loved my husband for as long as I can remember. We were childhood sweethearts and our marriage came as no surprise to anyone. When I did not conceive in the first three years of marriage, I thought was a fluke and everything would right itself but it never did. Three years quickly turned to twelve and we still had no children, despite trying everything. Then I got the shock of my life. My husband had fathered a child by his Banker and they contracted a customary marriage. One Sunday morning, he moved out of our home into her apartment. At first, I thought I would kill myself but I learned to live. Then a few months ago, he turned up with his entire family in tow, begging my forgiveness. He found out the child was not actually his and he had been deceived by his lover. He is back home and I play the part of the devoted, forgiving wife but my heart is broken and I cannot forgive what he has done. – Tunmishe, Ilesa Nigeria
