Aahh the Newlywed stage. Have people ever told you, “Your first year will be the hardest!” When Asa and I got engaged, it was mind blowing just how many outright negative comments we received. The one common thread everyone said we would fight over, was money. They also said that we would be having sex, all the time. Guess right, they were WRONG.
Whenever we have friends in our life get married we alway ask them these questions:
-What is the best part about being married?
-What is the one thing you can’t believe nobody told you about?
-What is the hardest part about being married?
About 99% of the time we get these answers: “The best part is learning to do life together, making our home, nesting essentially. The part nobody warned us about is how fiercely independent we’ve been for so many years and how hard that would be to shake off as we become dependent on each other. And the hardest part is sex. Expectations were weird, physically it’s not what we expected… and not to say it’s “bad”, (though sometimes it is) it’s certainly not the movies either.
Truthfully this is the reality for so many newlyweds, regardless we’ve found of age or how long they’ve been together. Of course unpacking and arranging furniture is fun. Cuddling with your spouse, having morning coffee, sneaking into each others’ shower are all just awesome fun things. It’s LIFE. This is why we chose to get married, to do life with each other.
The trouble comes that we seem to not realize that sharing our life, really means SHARING OUR LIVES. We share finances and we share time. We share spaces and objects. Learning that I have to communicate my schedule, my desires for OUR money, and being upfront about my expectations is challenging. Somehow though we forget in the engagement stage of the relationship that we are independent people agreeing to intertwine everything in life.
And then yes, there is sex. Your predisposed notion is PROBABLY: “It’s going to be magical, it’s going to be often, and I’m going to be really good at it.” But the truth is, unless you are both quite versed in sex prior to your wedding night, (we weren’t), its going to be awkward. It might even be hard. Yes, it will definitely be fun. But you don’t necessarily think about prior to the marriage, that you will have to find a way to be as sexy as you can, and care as little as possible about the outcome. That’s difficult, right? Things just aren’t the movies, where everything has perfect candle lit angles, and its all extremely satisfying. But you know what it is? It is intimate, it is fun, it does feel good, and it will get better. Practice makes perfect. Stick with it slugger.
We recently saw this quote that resonated well:
“The devil will do anything to get you in bed before your marriage and everything after your wedding night to keep you out of it.”
Believe it or not, this is 1000% TRUE.
Our first year of marriage, we didn’t stress about money. We were poor. Plain and simple! We budgeted extremely well and looked forward to our Thursday night cheap Chinese takeout and Grey’s Anatomy. We didn’t overspend or even want to spend. We had each other, and we lived in the heart of the city of Old Louisville. We had our dogs, our love, and Chinese…what more could we ask for?
But the truth is, as the years went on, we quickly discovered that we didn’t have it all together. Our love, as strong as it was, wasn’t solely butterflies and roses. We struggled finding the time to pursue one another, to learn what the other needed: physically, emotionally, spiritually, and intimately. The newly wed stage is magical for all the right reasons, but it’s just a phase. What we hope and pray you are creating is a healthy foundation of LOVE for all of the phases still yet to come. Each phase is beautifully tough. No phase is perfect, but ALL phases you get to face together.
Love,
