Being married is not all smiles and sunshine, rainbows and sherbet and snuggles. It aint all hot air balloons and angels singing and eyes that go heart shaped when you see each other...
The Boy and I have a dark side...
...Sometimes he pulls the duvet off me and spins round and round until he is in a cocoon, meaning I have to lie cold and shivery until he decides he's had his fun and unwraps himself so I can get in...
... Occasionally, I wait until my hands are icy cold and then put them on his tummy when he's snuggly warm in bed which he hates...
...Very occasionally I will come into the room to see that he has let the dog lie on our bed...or more accurately on MY pillow...
...Sometimes, I pick his clothes up off the floor, knowing full well they are dirty, and put them neatly back in his drawer as a sneaky surprise reminder that clothes don't walk themselves into the wash basket...
...And SOMEtimes, we are BOTH guilty of eating the last piece of chocolate without even checking that the other one doesn't want it...
I told you, there is a VERY dark side to our marriage...
You see, The Boy and I have just had our monthly barney, like a worn out script of the same lines, said in dull monotone voices because "we can't believe we're here again..." We've rehearsed this scene many a time and it seems there's no way to break the cycle.
SO here I was thinking about how cross he made me, and in the way us human folk do when we're annoyed with someone, I was dredging up every little thing that has annoyed me about him lately to really fuel the fire of my rage. Imagine a witch menacingly stirring a pot of green steamy potion while looking into the distance with slitty eyes... That was me about an hour ago.
Until...I had a brainwave.
I decided that for every incident I thought of in which The Boy has annoyed me, or made me cross, I would counterbalance it with a memory of him making me feel loved. Because when do we ever sit and brood over the positive things people do? Usually, we just enjoy the happy moment when it happens, and lock it away in our memories until something specifically reminds us of it, whereby we pull it out, dust it off and smile fondly at it for a small moment. Then back into the brain bank it goes!
We are sometimes more driven and motivated to act upon the negative things that happen in our life than the positive things. SO this is what I decided to do. I wrote a letter to my husband The Boy, thanking him for so many of the positive things he has done for me since we got married a year and a bit ago. Then I decided I could make it an open letter so I could share with you the journey of change I have gone on in the last hour, in the hope you too may feel the sense of victory I feel as I watch the negative thwarted by the positive.
(Please note: This is by no means a declaration of how 'perfect' our marriage is... In fact, I think it's a pretty loud and clear declaration that it aint!! What it is, is a means of showing how to turn a sad squabble around. And believe me, this wasn't an easy journey. I wrote at least 3 drafts of an angry letter before I got to this point!!)
GO LOVE!!!
Dear The Boy,
I picked up a pen an hour ago to tell you all the things you'd done that had made me so mad. But instead of that, here's a list of 'thankyous' for being amazing. Hopefully this will prove more fruitful than my original plan...
Thank you for loving me.
Thank you for crying on our wedding day.
Thank you for the message you secretly wrote on our whiteboard before you left for our wedding, that I found when we returned from our honeymoon. I was well impressed that you had thought ahead to surprise me.
Thank you for making me a cup of tea every morning, even when I'm being a proper princess and refusing to get up.
Thanks for picking up my hints that it was our 6 month anniversary and buying me lilies and chocolate :)
Thank you for reaching out to me when our friend died instead of building a wall.
Thank you for the dime bar you left on my pillow when I'd eaten that entire bag of dime bars and still wanted more...
Thanks for the many snapchat pictures you send me daily...
But at least this day I have beaten anger with love, and I'll never take you for granted.
Love,
Hannan xxx
