Why nothing can prepare you for marriage

I thought I knew what I was getting into when I got married. Little did I know, I had no idea. I had even spent my single years leading up to meeting my husband trying to better myself. Working on my issues, trying to “ready” myself for when I met him. Truth is nothing prepares you for marriage.

Six months before we said I do my mom passed away after her second battle with cancer. Where I was suppose to be preparing for a new chapter in my life and the happiest day of my life I could barely put a sentence together let alone truly smile. With the death of my mom, my world came crashing down. All I could successfully do is stare straight at a wall without a single thought in my head and tears pouring down my face.

While I had this devastation hit at the “worst” time. I do believe there is a silver lining is just about everything that happens to us. In the tragedy I discovered perfection and trying to be “ready” or perfect for a season of life is pretty much impossible. I would have never imagined that I would have to face the darkest days in the midst of what was suppose to be the happiest days of my life. No one prepared me for that. Then again we never imagined she would die. We thought she would get better…She never did.

In our first year of marriage I was faced with my demons, the demons I never knew I had. I had been so focused on other aspects of myself that I thought would help make me a better wife and one day mother. Turns out there were some other deep seeded issues that needed stirring up to see. Issues I needed to address and face head on. At this point I didn’t really have an option. They were staring me in the face. I could ignore them and slip into a depressed state of mind or I could take my husbands hand a start to work on them. The grace he showed me the first year of our marriage is beyond anything I can put into words. Over the last three years he has helped me become less Type A and more relaxed, a little less “cray cray” and a little more patient. Now don’t get me wrong Im no zen mama but I sure have grown since then.

The truth is you can’t prepare for every situation but what you can do is be open, and honest and in that you’ll be able to work through your sh*t no matter how painful.

What about you?

Did you think you were ready for marriage and then face something that made you realize you weren’t?