Relationship advice: from the newlyweds

You might have read the title of this post thinking: they've been married 2 weeks, what good advice can they possible have? Well, I'll tell you. Chris & I dated each other 9 1/2 years before we got married and it hasn't always been as my dad puts it "barbies and targets." We've had to really work to make our relationship what it is. We've been through a lot together: we lasted through the wonderful high school years, deaths and other big events in the family, helping raise a child, and even living in different cities for 2 years of our relationship. And yes, we know we've still got more to come: buying a house, many financial decisions, and of course the toughest strain on any marriage: children. But we are not worried because throughout the past almost 10 years we've relied on one thing: COMMUNICATION.

This is the biggest piece of advice I can give any couple. TALK ABOUT THINGS! This is honestly the thing that has gotten us through all of our problems not only in our relationship but at our jobs, in our families, and in our lives in general. Now this isn't just something that happened instantly for us, we really had to work at it. Men by nature tend to close themselves off in stressful situations. They'd rather throw there hands up and walk out or keep everything bottled inside and speaking from experience I can tell you that it can take a while for that to change, so patience is a virtue here. But women are equally as guilty - they tend to just get frustrated at their man for not talking or start confiding in someone else instead of the person they should be confiding in most. It takes work. It takes lots of talking and lots of listening. But as long as you are willing to work (aka committed to it) then it will come eventually and you'll realize how much easier your relationship is when it does.

The idea for this post stemmed from a conversation my husband and I had last night over dinner. He said something like this "I'm lucky, things are easy with you because we talk about things. I'm glad we talk about things like money and make decisions together." Which got me thinking that really that's the truth. Things are easy because we talk about things. But it hasn't always been like this which makes me appreciate how things are now a lot more.

I've also been watching a lot of cheesy sitcoms on Netflix with so many negative stereotypes of married couples. It kind of made me mad at first because although we've only been married a couple weeks, we've been a part of each others daily life for almost a decade and they've been the best years of my life. I don't really see that changing as long as we openly talk about our feelings. Doesn't it make you mad when you watch a show on TV and want to yell at the screen "JUST TALK TO HER, SHE LOVES YOU!" Find a way to take that into your own lives and do something about it!

You can't always help how or what you feel. But you can help how you act upon those feelings by talking them out. Having a partner in life that you share EVERYTHING with makes life all the more worth while and you'll find yourself a much happier person and couple by openly communicating with each other.