The evolution of a marriage

Ali Middleton Photo

My husband and I just celebrated our 10-year anniversary, so I’ve been thinking a lot about how our relationship has changed over the years.

Ours started out as a happy-go-lucky, smooth-sailing thing of freshly-returned-LDS-missionary-boy-meets-girl bliss. We dated for a year, then continued dating, traveling, and enjoying life as a married couple for three and a half incredible years before we had our first child.

Having that first baby and dealing with some emotions and hard things we had never faced before taught us how important it was to communicate openly with each other. As I got wrapped up (maybe a little too much) in the care of this tiny human that had entered our lives and tried to adjust to the joyful but overwhelming task of being a mother and this baby’s sole source of nourishment, Clay silently worried I maybe didn’t love him quite as much anymore. It breaks my heart to look back on that time and think of how insecure he felt without me even knowing it. But after we survived the first year of parenthood (a.k.a sleep deprivation) and started getting the hang of both being parents and being in a marriage, we grew closer and our communication became more open.

Welcoming baby number two was easier on our relationship because we had been through it before, but this baby gave us a serious run for our money. Cept we didn’t get paid one darn cent. Parents should get paid. At least for the first year. And if anyone says the first year of having a new baby is not freaking hard, I don’t understand you. But maybe you have magical powers or something. Anyway, our boy cried a lot more and slept a LOT less than our first one. And it was tough. But, we were communicating as a couple. We were okay.

Babe number three joined our family just eight months ago, and we were so relieved when she did. I had some complications when I was pregnant with her and we thought we were going to lose her on a few scary occasions, which made for an emotional roller coaster I’d never wish on anyone. But that uncertainty was also an opportunity for Clay and I to rely on each other and grow closer. I feel like our marriage was better than it had ever been, and we were so happy when our angel daughter was safely in our arms.

But here we are again, going through that dreaded year of sleep deprivation and me feeling like a human milk factory. And having three kids is fun, but non-stop. Non-stop entertaining and feeding and breaking up fights and cleaning up messes and caring for sickies and shuffling kids to soccer and school. My oldest is in half-day kindergarten and my active 3-year-old boy who stopped napping a year ago is home with me all day. My baby likes to wake up at 5 a.m. and eat every three hours throughout the day, and by the time the sun goes down and they’re all in bed, we’re both exhausted. It’s tough to have quality time to connect when all we want to do is collapse on our pillows and not think or talk about anything that requires energy.

Going out on dates regularly has become harder to come by. Mostly because I rarely have enough milk stashed up to leave a bottle with a babysitter, so getting the timing just right and finding someone who can wrangle all three of our kids is a challenge.

Having a conversation with each other while our kids are with us? Laughable. We find ourselves talking really quickly in a brave attempt to get out an important thought before one of the kids inevitably asks for a snack, a booger wipe, or cries for our attention. But there are those magical moments when the baby is asleep and the kids play nicely or watch a show, and those moments are cherished.

What I’m getting at here is that dating and feeling in love and having quality time together when you have kids is hard. It doesn’t come as easily as it did when we were first dating or first married. And sometimes it sucks to look back on the time when we had more time, more freedom to just be with each other and focus on us and know we won’t have that again for a very long time.

But then I think of how far we’ve come in our relationship. True, the butterflies of infatuation don’t flutter in quite the same way as they did before. We don’t get to spend our Saturdays sleeping in, taking naps and cuddling together watching a movie, without wondering how many times we’ll be woken up in the night, or what mood someone will be in the next day, or how we’re going to entertain the kids throughout the long hour of church the next morning. But our relationship is so much richer because of these little people in our lives. Our people. The ones we prayed for and sacrificed for and waited for to get here. The ones who taught us to work as a team and try to be on the same page with parenting decisions and to pick up the slack when one of us is just too emotionally and physically exhausted.

So, we’re trying not to wish away these years of being in constant demand by the precious children who call us “Mommy” and “Daddy.” And while it is exhausting to be needed and touched 24/7, we know we’ll miss these days. We’ll miss the time when our daughter constantly wanted to play with us and left us love notes in her makeshift mailboxes. When our son asked to snuggle or show us his latest “trick,” even when we were in the middle of something. When we had a sweet, tiny baby to hold. When all of their needs and solutions lied within our power.

We’ve decided to re-define romantic dates and get creative with finding ways to spend quality time together. A quick lunch date while we’re both working, a morning run around the block, a cuddle sesh and talking time before bed, even when we’re exhausted.

Because even though we love our babies something fierce, we have to remember to love each other too. Because we were first. And what I want more than almost anything for my children is to grow up with parents who are madly in love with each other and who get grossed out every day from catching them kiss.

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In an effort to remind myself of how I fell in love with my husband, I’ll be sharing our love story in my next post. Stay tuned! Or not. But stay tuned! Cause you might like the part about our awkward first kiss.