Marriage Myth #3 - continued

Marriage Myth #3 - continued

Twenty-two years ago, I returned to my 25th reunion of my high school graduating class. It just so happened that my daughter, Suzanne, attended it with me. Two of my old girlfriends were at the reunion. Was it ever embarrassing for me to try to explain to Suzanne why I had broken up with one girl for another. She had heard me talk about both of them. After seeing them both, 25 years later, it was quite clear that good old Dad didn't have his head screwed on quite as straight as the family folklore he handed down had implied.

So, perhaps years later, we wake up to the reality that we married a person for the wrong reasons. We can equate that fact with the myth that we, therefore, married the wrong person. Out there somewhere is Mr. Perfect or Ms. Perfect. At the earliest opportunity, we will find that one. In the meantime, let's get rid of this problem character who wasn't right in the first place, who was chosen for some very wrong reasons.

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That is what is happening to the woman who has quite bluntly told her husband of some fifteen years, "You're a nice guy. I like you a whole lot. You're just not successful enough for me. You don't make enough money. I'm going to find someone who can provide the lifestyle I deserve." Don't get shocked. I know a woman who said exactly those words to her husband, and I watched her walk away, leaving the one she called "Mr. Wrong," thinking she had found "Mr. Right." Actually, she was not much more aware of what was attracting her to him than she was to what had attracted her to her first husband. And how my heart broke as I watched those kids, the puzzled expressions on their faces, watching Mommy take off with this new guy. She wants them to call him "Daddy," when they know who their real daddy is.

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And I don't need to reverse the story, talking about men walking off and leaving their wives of many years for newer and younger models. We see plenty of that.

The truth is that we may very well marry for the wrong reasons. The truth is that we may very well do it over again, and even again, in a restless search for the perfect person.

Another sad truth is that our society has now begun to endorse this as a valid way of doing business. Careful studies show that each subsequent endeavor to find the right person only exponentially increases the potential for divorce.

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Little did I realize that these two, who looked so happy on the surface, were caged in a relationship of mutual misery. His success orientation was devouring him. He didn't have the time for intimacy. She, hungry for attention, hungry for caring, began to find solace in that discreetly hidden bottle of wine, from which that equally discreetly hidden glass was kept perpetually filled, and from which she ever-so-discreetly sipped through the long, lonesome hours, day after day, when the kids were at school and the husband at work. Little did I know that this couple was so unhappy.

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What had made her attractive to him made her attractive to other men. The affirmation that she used to get from his compliments about her beauty she began to find from another and yet another. Ultimately, ever so discreetly, she ended up in the arms of another, not his. When he found out, it was over! For, as he saw it, she was the bad person. He was the good person. He demonized her, excusing himself because he had been faithful to her. He wasn't about to go for counsel, and the marriage broke up. For years now, he, having learned the hard way, is scared of commitment and goes from one woman to another. And she from the arms of one man to another. Those of us who thought they were so happy and wished we had all they had going for us, said, "Isn't that too bad." And we found another couple to idealize. We settle in, wishing we could have all the happiness they have, and we will continue to hold them high until something happens to burst our new fantasy bubble.

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The truth is that every married couple has enough problems to break up a marriage if they allow it. Satan would love to get you to throw in the towel. He would love to destroy your marriage by urging you to compare yourself to someone else. Every couple has their moments of happiness and every couple has their moments of pain. The truth is that no one has it all. The truth is that there is a built-in law of compensation. What looks good and attractive has its flip side of pain-producing potential. How much better it is to work with what we have, however limited that may appear, than to dream about having what someone else seems to have, only to discover that they don't really have it.

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Also using scripture from the KJV where noted.

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