The first year of marriage

     I got in engaged right before I left to be a bartender at a lodge located on Prince of Wales Island in Alaska. The Lodge has horrible reception and not the best internet, and I would be there for three months trying to keep my relationship alive while planning a wedding. Now is that scary or what!? While I was in Alaska, I got to flash my wedding band to the customers who would then have a mouthful of negative advice to give to me. I heard everything! People would look at me as if I was about to ruin my life. Close friends and family let me know how hard the first years would be. I remember Clayton and I were a little concerned and as we started our marriage we waited for all the horribleness to start, but it never did. A year went by and it was amazing! We are almost too year number two and have still yet to hit this “marriage wall” of doom. So why is it that some people have very smooth transitions to marriage while others don’t?
A lot of it goes back to the RAM model and how you pick your partner in the first place (see last post’s content for more information on the RAM model). A marriage is a living breathing thing that you have to take care of. So many people get married thinking that a happy marriage just happens if the two people love each other enough. That’s not how it works. Marriage takes a lot of time, nurturing, and thoughtfulness to be successful, just like a baby.
    Clayton and I never had any really hard times, but we did have small struggles. I learned that it was important to him to be included in things, even something small like decorating. When we got married I went right to decorating the house because that is what I saw my mother do and when it hurt his feelings I was very surprised. These adjustments are very normal and on the regular when you begin a marriage. Clayton and I  hardly had any adjustments when we got married, and the ones we did have were small.
    If a couple gets married and has a pile of adjustments they are working through it's going to be very difficult. Especially if those changes are big. For example, I have a close caucasian friend who married an African American. One of the biggest struggles they had was cultural. In his culture, he grew up doing things very differently than she did which made it very hard for them at the beginning of their marriage. As they really treated their marriage as a living breathing thing, they worked out many of their disagreements and have a very successful marriage today.
Another thing to consider is how a couple handles adjustments. Clayton and I handle adjustments very similarly and very well together. A lot of people have a very hard time adjusting to anything let alone another person who they thought would love them enough to “adjust” to them. I remember my friend in the story was always so jealous of how easy it was for my husband and I to adjust to each other when we first were married.
     Here is the bottom line, there is no secret sauce. I have learned that some of the happiest marriages had very hard first years as a couple and some of them went a lot smoother. Whether your first couple of years go very smooth or not, marriage is hard. It’s something you work on every day. Marital happiness is not reliant upon how many adjustments you have as a couple or how well you adjust pursue. Marital happiness is reliant upon the two people in the marriage and how willing they are to work on their marriage. If you have to work a little harder than others that doesn’t mean your marriage is worse than others. Whether your first year of marriage is hard or easy, it will have its highs and its lows during life, and preparing for both is key.