Reply to: What I Want in a Woman
(Prelude: Before I even put out "What I Want in a Woman", I texted it to Hannah because I didn't want her to think it was a "shot" at her & Sammy even though I don't think she would even think that. I didn't want to take the chance and lose two of my best friends. Anyways, she said she'd love to write a response to it and I thought it was a great idea!)
Here's the original blog that Hannah's replying to:
October 7, 2017 (And November 11, 2017) ((And January 5, 2018 because I SUCK)).
Dear Tommy,
We all have desires, opinions, wants, and needs. Mine do and will look differently than yours and anyone else’s. And that is okay, because God put different dreams and visions on all of our hearts when he uniquely and individually created us. So through this letter, I intend on telling you how my perspective on getting married young is a different one from yours. (Edit: This has kind of become a two-part message since it has taken me so much time to write it.)
(Insert cheesy, sappy portion. I promise this approach does not override the entire letter, so hold your vomit in). Like most young girls, I painted the picture of my “dream guy” over and over again. Fine-tuning the masterpiece until it was my idea of “perfect.” When I was in therapy at the age of 17, I wrote out a detailed list of who this person was as a part of my homework. The older I got, the more I revised this outline in my head. I still have that little, old piece of paper laying around somewhere. Overtime, as I dated and observed, I began adding more to the personality column of the list, and didn’t focus so much on the physical. (Although my husband is super hot, thanks @God).
Sam is not the overly-bold, super talkative, and socially out-going type of guy, despite those characteristics being some of my major “requirements” at one point. I now realize that one of the reasons I envisioned those traits as being necessary is because they were some of the ones I like about myself. More relevantly, they were the characteristics I saw in the majority of the people close to me throughout my childhood and growing up. Thus, it became my normal. And by normal I mean, “Do what society tells us is normal. Do what is routine. Do what is traditional. Do what is usual. Be weird, but only to a degree. Only just enough. Only the acceptable amount of weird. Push, but don’t push too far. Try, but don’t try too hard. Just, be.”
But God has shown me that only the silly little fool inside of me wanted someone EXACTLY like my family. God knew I needed someone different than me for reasons I will continue to find. So that I could still shine as an individual while he shines as one too. Not standing in his shadow, always in competition. God knew I needed Sam to be a little different, a little less talkative than I. So that I could have space to talk, and room to grow when it came to listening. So that I had to humble myself, show restraint, be patient, and watch my tongue. So that I could love people, but be kept in check. Not only for when I crossed the beautifully disguised lines into gossip territory, but also to put up boundaries to protect myself in so many ways. So that Sam could be the leader of the home like God calls us to do, and I could lay down my desire for constant control (still growing in these areas). I NEEDED someone different than I so that I could be CHALLENED to GROW. Thanks to Jesus for always being and knowing better than I.
Relationships are really hard. One of the best relationships I have is with my older and only sister, Shannon. During these times of reflection, I remember some of the rough patches we had growing up or periods of time in which we hardly communicated. It provides me with a sense of guidance to recall how we could overcome these troubles within our relationship. And outside of that, we as a team were able to overcome so much. And so I think about Sam and how we have lived all these years apart from each other, having our own experiences and our own trials. I think about how much more we're going to experience and go through, but this time it will be together. Before I was married, in the 21 years of friendship I have had with Shannon, she was my number one priority in life. I’m sure she knows that, but she was my “in case of emergency.” Now, I have that in Sam.
My intentions for making this comparison of my sister-ship with Shannon and my relationship with Sam are not to make one feel better than the other. It is not to minimalize Shannon’s importance, and it is not to put unrealistic expectations on Sam. I am not naïve, I know these relationships have major differences, but there are things to learn from the friendship I’ve had in my sister for so long, that I can carry into my friendship with Sam. There is a hope for Sam and I to have years and years of friendship and relationship, because I’ve already been able to achieve this by learning from my sis.
Mentioning this revelation feels appropriate, because there is a real fear in our world of not being able to stay committed to someone for a long period of time. We live in a world where divorce is the social norm and a viable option. To live in the world and not be of the world is a challenge that bleeds into everything we do. If you want to get married young, or at all, the biggest piece of advice I have to offer is do not let divorce be an option. If divorce is an option, divorce will happen. You truly have to look at the decision of marriage as one that you cannot go back on. And to understand everything that goes into that mindset would take an entire letter of its own.
To make this possible, we have to get to the root of ourselves and realize that no matter who we are in relationship with, we always need to be introspective to our own flaws and faults. I think about how I am in relationship with the holy and perfect God and He still chooses every single day to continue to pursue me. He will never stop loving me, He will never stop being patient with me, and He will never stop caring, being kind, generous, faithful, and forgiving towards me. So why should I be allowed to give up on my relationships when I'm the imperfect? What makes me think I ever should, or that I even have the right? He has every right to give up on us, to abandon us, to neglect us, and yet He never will. If I’m vowing to love Sam until death do us part, and I’m vowing to honor God, then I better strive to show the best example of Jesus to Sam that I possibly can. And when I can’t do it, I surrender that inability to God and He takes over for me. It’s the only way this thing can work. Being in a relationship for me is not just an addition to my already okay life. Being married is not the thing that will make my crummy life better. Being married is the second most important thing I can do on earth, right after accepting Christ and dedicating my life to Him. Followed by the third most important thing, which for me will be becoming a mother. (These are my own personal callings, so I expect that for others this will look different and that’s okay).
I remember driving home from Sam's parents' house the summer we were dating and just crying alone the whole hour car ride. Just totally praising God for who He is and what He was doing in my life. Sam and I had just recently discussed and came to the agreement that we were getting serious about wanting to marry each other. Our relationship at that time period was like we were floating on a cloud. And I remember as I was driving down the Pennsylvania Turnpike to my apartment, there were fireworks going off in the sky. Big ones, right in front of me. It was a totally average, sunny summer night and I just took it as a sign from God. I felt like fireworks were going off inside of my chest, just bursting with absolute joy. And then all of a sudden there they were in the sky, as I'm crying to God, I just see fireworks.
But then there are also moments of a different type of explosion, where we are screaming, fighting with one another. Crying, asking ourselves and each other why we are even doing this. Truthfully, I have asked people is this normal? That we fight like this and treat each other this way? Because I have hardly had an example or model of a positive marriage-relationship growing up. The world skews EVERYTHING, so it’s very hard to tell when you’re absolutely insane or just having a bad day anymore. Unfortunately, yes, it's super normal to argue this way. And doesn’t make us bad people who hate each other, it doesn’t make us abusers, and it doesn’t make us hopeless. It’s honest to say we fight. Thankfully, despite it being usual, it doesn't have to be OUR normal. That is truly something I didn’t realize. I thought this was just a part of me, to get angry and react this way. Something Sam would just have to get used to. We get so comfortable with our flaws and our typical way of living, that I didn’t realize if I just worked at it, it could be better. If I could take responsibility for my part in it, we could grow as a unit. If we continue to work against the unhealthy arguing, it could just become healthy arguing... And that’s another thing I never realized, the arguing will never stop because we are two totally different people. So we have to find the healthy ways to do it. And when it comes, it will come as a learning process, a humbling experience, and a time of refinement for us.
Addition: January 5, 2018 8:42 PM
I saw you the other day Tommy, and I told you the reason this has taken me so long to write is because I was making sure it’s truly coming from my heart. And although, that is true, a big part of it is due to the fact that I felt I had to write from a place of happiness in order to speak honestly on what marriage is like at a young age. I was struggling with how to conclude this overdone essay, and I realized it is because I was intentionally omitting some of the most important parts of marriage.
This portion of my letter to you has a bit more of a somber tone than when I wrote last. Previously when I wrote these letters to you, I did when everything with Sam and I was well. When we had been getting along great and having a wonderful time together. When I was able to focus on us solely, and block out the rest. Today Sam and I had a great day, and things have been great between us. But personally, I was hit with some memories and emotions, causing me to have a low point this evening. And I think that is a more honest representation of how marriage goes.
We really idolize things being like the novels and the movies we engulf ourselves in. We have these expectations of our partner being a hero, fulfilling our desires and our needs. Swooping in where others can not, always saving the day. Even if we watch movies of heartbreak, there is always some romantic, whimsical filter washed over the fracture. Where the character finds this sense of identity, independence, or gratuity. But that is not always realistic. I know I can’t provide that constant stream of intuition in our marriage. I will never be the girl from the novels. I have way too much crap that I still need to unpack from my past to be that blameless or endearing. I’m going to come undone sometimes and we’ll probably both question our own and each others sanity every once in a while.
And I guess if I’m being transparent, I feel weird even bringing my emotions and my baggage into this conversation, but that’s marriage, and that’s what this topic is about after all.
Not even two weeks after Sam and I were married, one of my cousins was murdered due to domestic violence. She was only 26 years old. The reason this is important is because this is now a part of our story. It’s hard to wrap my head around being at the highest point of joy, completion, and contentment that I have ever felt in my life, to one of the absolute lowest. I went through weeks of not being able to even look at Sam in the eyes. No fault of his own, I was just so depressed and felt like I could not trust anyone. I have never questioned so much, so quickly. It’s hard to put it into words, so sorry this is not so elegantly written. I guess the only way to describe it is I was filled with complete confusion. I had to ask all over again, “Who are you God?”
But Sam stuck with me through the ugly, even when it came much sooner than we anticipated. I guess it seems selfish to look at this tragedy from the perspective of us, but I have to remember it's part of our life story, too. It helps me to heal to talk about it now that I am able to. When we were in our “honeymoon” phase, I was going to bed without so much as even kissing Sam goodnight. I was a zombie. I walked around like I was haunting the place. I was cold to Sam. Taking out every range of emotion on him in the span of an hour. Or hardly saying anything at all to him for days at a time. Anyone who knows me would see that as concerning.
But that is love. It’s not love that I treated him that way. It’s not love that I was unable to handle my emotions and he accepted that. It is not love that I took everything out on him and he just bucked up and took it. That is not love. It is love that he stuck by me when I felt as if I didn’t even know right from wrong anymore. It is love that he saw the brokenness inside of me, and he picked me up and carried not only me, but my burden when I so selfishly laid it down. I was like a little child again. I tell everyone, nothing brings out the child in you more than fighting with your spouse in the early stages of marriage. But he was devoted to me, and despite all of my hurt and anger, resentment and frustration, he was there. And he wasn’t there perfectly, because this is not a romance novel. But he was there, and he is still here, and he always will be. And it is undeniable that I will never experience a love on earth like this again. He is the only one.
And God knew that. God did that for me, and for us. Everything that happens passes through God’s hands first. And unfortunately, this loss has not been the end of our already heavy struggles. More have come, and more are yet to come. But guess what, he is beside me. And God is within me. Do you know how beautiful that is? It’s unfathomable that God loves us this much to say, “I love you, but wait, there is more. And more. And more.”
Until I write again,
Hannah (Previously Tincha) Merhaut
