posted
Mack, that's something that just (hopefully) works itself out with time. Each person has to be willing to give some ground to the other person and you soon find out where each other's absolute sticking points are.
As for the time to yourself, that also is difficult, but can be done. You plan time to do things together as well as time to do things apart, it seems to work out well unless one or the other of you is clingier. Then you have to work something out to be sure each of you is fulfilled.
Tom and I tend to be very clingy, but its so wonderful when we've been someplace different or done different things and we can come back together and have something to share. We fall into that easy telepathic mindset very quickly and are energized when out with other people or after having been apart for a bit just because its so wonderful to talk with each other in that way. Its actually funny to watch ourselves because we play off of each other for response and it really is a gratifying experience.
On a sappier note...Tom bought me a sheepskin today after visiting a lambing at a local farm with CT. They tucked me in for a nap and Tom was still feeling refreshed and so he went out shopping. He just called right now to remind me that he loved me because he knew that I would miss him while he was away.
*is feeling very warm and happy*
Posts: 1777 | Registered: Jan 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote:As in...space in the house. time to yourself. bed space (I can't sleep when I'm hot and another person too close creates body heat o_O)...stuff like that.
Space in the house isn't too tough. Both of you should have a desk, or a favorite chair, or someplace that's known to be "yours." Mine's the computer desk, she has an art center set up where we converted a walk-in closet (of course now we don't have any closet space in our bedroom, but it's worth it).
Time to yourself is trickier, but possible if you ask for it. I let Teres know ahead of time if possible when I'll need a couple hours or more to myself for a project or just plain me-time, but I make sure that I spend as much time as I can with her so she doesn't feel slighted. And she does the same with me, letting me know when she'll need some time and warning me in advance of anything that might cut into either of our schedules. We both handle some of the chores at different times so the other can get a break (the person that cooked doesn't have to clean up, that sort of thing). You just have to find what works for you, but the essence is communication. It works the other way around, too. There are few things more pleasing to hear from your lover than, "I'd really like to spend tomorrow with you. You busy?"
Sharing a bed can be tough. My temperature is fairly constant, just a few degrees more than she's comfortable with, so we separate when it's time to sleep. There's a floor fan aimed at her side of the bed, and we have a common blanket and another for when she wants her feet covered. Now the snoring, that's another story...
[ March 14, 2004, 07:10 PM: Message edited by: Chris Bridges ]
Posts: 7790 | Registered: Aug 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
I have to say sleeping (yes, actually being asleep) is rather difficult. Kwea is very warm and can sleep through the coldest of winter without anything other than a sheet and light blanket. I, on the other hand, am perpetually cold. The best Christmas gift I got (well, alright the 2nd best Christmas gift I ever got..after the engagement ring) was an electric blanket! No joke,Kwea gave it to me a couple hours before he proposed. His family thought that he was nuts to give that to me as a gift when he was going to propose. I loved it! (that and the socks, but that's an altogether different fettish, oops, I mean kettle of fish!) Kwea calls me a "heat leech", and although I protest vehemently, I must agree that I always get closer to him because he is so warm. That is how he gets cold and why he needs the light blanket at all. Needless to say, I love Kwea and the best day of my life was October 18th, 2003. It only gets better from here. Posts: 325 | Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged |
posted
Has anyone here ever had to live apart from their mate for long periods of time? How did that work for you? Is the old saying true? "Absence makes the heart grow fonder?" Or lonelier? Posts: 2064 | Registered: Dec 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
We lived in different countries for our first year of marriage, and much of our courtship was spent cross-continentally as well (although we did spend months together here and there).
The biggest things: 1) Every goodbye got harder and harder, just when I thought it was unbearable. 2) I never, ever have taken him for granted. Posts: 14017 | Registered: May 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
By the way, today marks our 18th wedding anniversary.
And yes, we chose the Ides of March on purpose We wanted to get married on the same day we considered the beginning of our relationship, March 17, but it didn't work out, so this was the next best date.
Posts: 7790 | Registered: Aug 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
One of the best investments we ever made was our extra-long king-size bed. Neither of us likes to sleep snuggled together, but we like to share the bed.
Once, we stayed in a hotel room that had two queen size beds. Naturally we both got into the same bed, but about halfway through the night I snuck over to the other bed. We were just too close together.
Speaking of sharing a language?my wife and I are absolute whizzes at Pictionary. I don't think we've ever lost a game when we've played as a team. Posts: 5957 | Registered: Oct 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
I agree, beatnix. On one hand, we don't have to read it. On the other hand, there's more than a little smugness and competition mixed in with the classy stories.
posted
I like to snuggle at night, but my wife is like a furnace. I can only do it for a while before I can't take it anymore. Posts: 4625 | Registered: Jul 2002
| IP: Logged |
posted
It's just more shades of Bennifer. It also makes the people you're torturing for your own benefit feel, well, tortured for your benefit. Not impressive.
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
We were apart for about 4 weeks waiting for my first baby to be born. And then when I was pregnant the second time my husband thought about moving 700 miles away. But I didn't want to go. So he sort of commuted, and we didn't see each other much. I've taken 4 or 5 vacations without him. But it's mostly because he's sort of married to his work.
I think it did help me take him less for granted. For a while, anyway. Then I did again for a few years. Now I'm back to appreciating him again.
Posts: 11017 | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged |
I certainly don't feel like that. I feel tortured reading about the couples who hate eachother, fight all the time, throw dishes, and can't stand the other's touch much less want to have sex with them.
If you'd rather read them there are far more of those stories floating around.
These ones give me hope that my own future marriage will be equally happy and rewarding.
I can see how you would not like them if you are never planning on getting married yourself, but even then, I don't see how hearing other's happiness can hurt you at all.
And if you are planning on getting married but just haven't found the right person, then I would still take hope from this. You are still in your early to late 20's right? Where I was (New York), and even where I am now (California), you'd still be considered young to be even thinking about marriage. And who knows, you may meet the man of your dreams on hatrack .
But I will delete this if its me being too nosy. I just don't see why this makes you upset. I guess after meeting you I suddenly assume I can ask personal stuff. Correct me if I am wrong ?
[ March 15, 2004, 11:55 AM: Message edited by: Ghost of Xavier ]
Posts: 80 | Registered: Dec 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
kat, that last was spoken tongue in cheek. I should have put a smilie on it. I personally don't mean to torture anyone, especially for my benefit.
That being said...
Why snuggling all night is uncomfortable:
1. Way too warm. 2. We always end up breathing the same oxygen. 3. Anytime either of us budges, we both wake up. And we both tend to toss and turn in our sleep. I absolutely cannot sleep in the same position all night.
Intimacy doesn't have much to do with it. It's a pure practicality issue. Yeah, we cuddle, we exchange backrubs, you know...but getting enough sleep is a serious issue that we do not mess with.
Posts: 5957 | Registered: Oct 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
No Xav, that's fine. You beat me at air hockey and we were collectively puzzled by children's toys. You can officially ask me anything.
It isn't me. I'm not even bothered - it's some sort of protective instinct kicking in, I think. I know it was bothering some other people, but then, just not reading the thread is a good option. Sort of like it's hard for people who are trying to get pregnant or who just lost a child to hear about someone having their baby. Honest happiness is great and understandable, but the smug kind is too much to ask for people to listen to.
I do have to admit that oneupsmanship of any kind sort of annoys me, although I recognize that it's human. For the other current example, see the Nerdity Test thread. But I'm thinking about giving up on this particular fight against human nature.
Added: Xav, you're a doll. And afr, gotcha. I understand.
posted
Christy and I had a long distance relationship for the first year, of course, and then had to recently spend three months apart when I moved up to Madison for my new job and she had to stay behind in Champaign-Urbana to finish selling the house; it was NOT fun, but we managed.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
My husband and I both like to snuggle but then have our 'Okay, need my space' limit. We prefer flinging our limbs across the bed. When we go to sleep we often have one tiny bit touching - a foot or something. That doesn't last long because of the tossing and turning.
I haven't read smugness in here. I read a bunch of happy married people, and I'm glad my little shout of joy started that.
As to me being cool:
*rubs hands together*
My plans of hatrack domination are coming to fruition. Posts: 3495 | Registered: Feb 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
I haven't noticed too much competition or smugness here, just people who are happy and want to share their happiness with others.
When I was getting married, all of my friends were happy for me, but almost all of them had questions or worries about married life, even the ones that were married themselves. I got so sick of hearing all the little jokes and comments that I was relieved to find this thread. I thought I was one of the olny happy married people around! I know that I haven' been married all that long, but for God's sake I waited until I was sure. I was 33 years old, not 18 or 20, and I knew that people change; the trick is to grow together instead of apart.
So I am very happy to hear that we aren't alone, and that there is hope for many more years to come. We waited until we were more certain of who we were to get married, and that makes us more grounded than a younger couple. Not that it can't work out if you are younger, just that you have that much more growing to do individually that it is harder, that's all.
posted
I find this thread intriguing in a way because it basically vindicates to me that aside from religious issues and social acceptability, there is no reason why I should get married, other than for all of the legal perks. Unmarried.org which verbatim found so funny actually is quite useful and has has a lot of suggestions about legal issues for both same sex and opposite sex couples.
I'm in an extremely happy non-married relationship and could say exactly the same things as most of the married folks in this thread are saying without the nightmare hassle of a wedding. (and I have yet to see a wedding where the participants aren't stressed out and miserable while pretending to be happy)
So I just don't see the point, I really don't think being in a secure happy relationship is dependent on actually being married. As said before, there are a lot of miserable marriages out there too.
posted
"I have yet to see a wedding where the participants aren't stressed out and miserable while pretending to be happy...."
Actually, our wedding went fantastically well, with almost no hassle, and we were glad to have it.
Frankly, if the only reason you and Steve aren't getting married is because you're afraid of a large wedding, I think you should just ask some of us Hatrackers to organize one for you.
The big deal about being married isn't that you're somehow magically more attached to your spouse; it's that you've publicly declared that you are now officially attached to your spouse, and have put up legal barriers to make it harder to detach. It's a symbolic step.
If you don't feel that you're interested in that symbolism, and don't particularly care what the rest of society thinks of your relationship, there's no point in the marriage -- but I think you'd probably enjoy it, if you took the leap.
posted
I wasn't stressed out or miserable for my wedding!
A little bit stressed during the planning period, but really not too much. Things worked out really well for us, and it was a pretty easy process. And, the end result was so worth what stress there was, for me, anyway.
But then, I love having my family and friends all together, and it was great to have them there to celebrate with us.
Anyway, I just wanted you to know that not everyone has nightmare wedding experiences.
Posts: 2661 | Registered: Apr 2002
| IP: Logged |
posted
lol, there are other reasons too, but for all of my close friends that have gotten married the above has pretty much held true.
I don't know, as time goes on I'm seeing fewer and fewer reasons to actually get married. Our relationship has already lasted longer than many marriages. Maybe that is why the statistics are the way they are the longer you are together the less you view marriage as necessary, if your relationship is totally secure to begin with.
At this point, all being married would mean is that we'd have to evaluate our health benefits and see if it would be cheaper to put me on his plan (which I doubt because our benefits are really similar) I can already put him on my plan if we want to. I don't think getting married would actually add any more levels of commitment or meaning to our relationship.
On the other hand having hatrackers plan the wedding would remove quite a bit of hassle <grin>. The hassle within my family itself unfortunately can't be resolved easily though. As far as they go, it is easier for them to deal with the "hurt" othat they feel by us being unmarried, than it would be for them to deal with the fact that I actually don't want them anywhere near my wedding should I get married.
posted
I'm glad people actually do have happy weddings. My best friend is getting married in July. I'm the maid of honor, and I'm going to do my best so that she doesn't get stressed out, but the distance between us makes it a lot more difficult.
posted
I was stressed at first, and everything didn't go right - in fact we had food for 300 and only about 60 people showed up. Freak of scheduling, and the phone rang off the hook with regrets.
But, the most important people were there - my family, his family, and our closest friends. Once I started down the aisle, all the stress melted away.
We have such fond memories of our ceremony, we can still bring up things that happened that day and laugh about them.
As for the one-upmanship and the smugness? WTH? I don't see anyone doing that, I see us sharing stories and information about things that make us happy with each other.
It's not as if people are saying "Oh, well that does sound nice, but let me tell you why MY marriage is better than yours." I haven't seen any post that makes me think it was written in that spirit.
Frankly, I think it was a lovely thread with some nice stories that made me smile and feel like I knew my fellow jatraqueros a little better, until you started dragging up this smugness and oneupmanship business, kat.
If you don't want to read stories about people who are happily married, then please stay out of the thread, okay guys? No one was posting to make single people feel bad. Don't turn the tables and try to make the people who posted about how much they love married life feel bad now.
Posts: 14428 | Registered: Aug 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
The most important thing is to make it the wedding you want: give in a little bit to family and friends, but stand your ground on most issues. We had a wedding of about 100 people with fru-fru, but not very expensive petite sandwiches and bbq (chicken?) because Tom's dad wanted something manly. It was a great family gathering. No pressure at all. The planning wasn't even too stressful for me because I like that kind of stuff. Of course there was the few minutes when my flowers were lost, but even that didn't put much of a damper on the day.
The funny thing is that we didn't really expect to feel different either after being married, but in a way we are. Mostly because of the way others treat you when you're married. As far as the personal commitment, we felt that we had already made it to each other, but now were allowing our families to share in our commitment.
Posts: 1777 | Registered: Jan 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
I think this is a beautiful thread. I'll continue in my happy bliss, but I am sorry to those who felt threatened. It was not the intention to be hurtful.
Posts: 1777 | Registered: Jan 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Christy, at least you trust your family to be civil. <grin> I don't, for obvious reasons, of which at least half a dozen are posted here at hatrack.
As far as standing my ground on trivial wedding things, I know exactly what sort of battering I would take, since everyone in my family thinks their ideas are the best and how dare I have an opinion of my own on how it should be. It is exhausting just thinking about it, and I've gone through hell before on much lesser issues.
Steve's family would be totally cool. But I can't in good conscience invite them and leave my family totally out either.
It gives me the vapors if I think about it too much. <grin>
AJ
(but it also bugs me because I can't work out an answer to the problem either. It probably comes down to knowing that I can't change people in my family's behavior, but I wish it were otherwise, and when thinking about wedding scenarios all I can see it doing is bringing out the worst in all of them)
posted
I didn't mean to hijack. The thing is that I can totally identify with most of the "married person" comments, though I don't have anything specifically cutesy to relate at the moment.
I completely believe you, Christy. I think that little bit of sensitivity was all that was needed. It's very good.
I'm serious, though - this doesn't bother me. That's actually why I felt free to say something. It's just in our community...*thinks* it's like all events happen in the same town square, and sometimes it's hard to have a wedding and a funeral share the stage. Like a shoutout to the troops overseas at the beginning of the Oscars, some statements that aknowledge that not all marriages, even of Hatrackers, are as happy as reported in this thread, are very appreciated.
Anyway, this is taking up much more of the thread than I intended. Carry on.
posted
Our wedding day was long and tiring, but very happy. My wife to be and I drove from Orem up to the Salt Lake temple at about 6:30 am on Friday, March 3, 2000, hoping that the traffic wouldn't be too bad. We sat in the temple annex lobby for a while, waiting for friends and family to show up. My good friend Rob and Katie's good friend Lisa arrived a while after we did. We managed to get them to drive together because we were trying to set them up (it didn't work). Katie's family showed up next, and then we went back into the temple to get ready.
Before we could go into the sealing room, we waited together for a while in the temple's Celestial Room, which is a very beautiful place. As I sat next to Katie I thought about how amazing it was to be getting married to her and what an important moment this was in our lives.
Finally we were called into the sealing room, where family members and some close friends were waiting. My family, running behind as usual, had only arrived 5 minutes before. I was glad they had made it. We sat down between our moms in the quiet room. The man performing the ceremony (he was the temple president) began with some good advice on a happy and fulfilling marriage. Then came the marriage ceremony itself, which is simple and beautiful. I will never forget the moment we were pronounced husband and wife.
After the ceremony we took a few minutes to present our rings to each other. That was the first time I had worn mine (although I tried it on for a moment at the jewelry store) and it felt strange and heavy on my finger. I looked at it a lot on our way back down to the changing rooms. I would stare at it every few minutes as I was putting on my tux. I rubbed it with my thumb as sat in the foyer and waited for Katie to arrive in her wedding dress.
We then went outside to the temple grounds where all of our families and friends were waiting. Following was about 2 hours of picture taking, and that was perhaps the most exhausting part of the day. I immediately recognized the difference in how the two events felt. Inside the temple in the sealing room was perfectly calm, simple, and peaceful; outside, taking picture after picture, was pomp and circumstance filled with hustle and bustle. Finally, the photographer finished his 80 exposures and bid us a good day (he really was very nice and helpful). At last, we sat down to our wedding luncheon in the Joseph Smith Memorial Building.
Those were our first few hours being married, and it was still sinking in, I was just getting more and more amazed at the profundity of the event. We could have run off together in my car as soon as the ceremony was complete, and we would have been just as married. But we wanted to share part of the moment with our loved ones.
Finally, we were able to change out of our formal attire. I walked down from the mezzanine to the lobby of the JSMB in slacks and a tie, and stopped for a moment to admire my wife(!) sitting in one of the plush chairs and waiting for me. She was wearing a new dress that she had bought for just this occasion, and looked wonderful. I walked over to her and it was like meeting her for the first time again. My wife!
After that, we were on our own. We said goodbye to family and friends and flew down to Vegas, rented a car, and drove to Mesquite where we would spend our honeymoon. That was the second half of what was a long and eventful day, and full of its own adventures (like getting lost in Vegas). As fun and peaceful as the next week was, however, nothing could compare with that moment in the temple when we were married.
I wrote this partly to describe our wedding day, and partly to get my brain going because I have lots of other writing that I need to get done. I hope you enjoyed it. Posts: 5957 | Registered: Oct 2001
| IP: Logged |
Boon
unregistered
posted
When Matt and I married, there was absolutely NO stress. We actually arranged everything a week in advance. His parents were in attendance and were our witnesses and I carried a simple bouquet. We were married in the annex building of the church by an old friend of the family. Weddings don't have to be stressful...or huge. (My parents couldn't come...for a lot of different reasons.)
IP: Logged |
posted
Anyone who had their wedding luncheon at the Joseph Smith Memorial Building is obviously a snob. Posts: 1652 | Registered: Aug 2003
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Party]](graemlins/party.gif)
![[Frown]](frown.gif)
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
![[Kiss]](graemlins/kiss.gif)
Marlozahn.![[Evil]](graemlins/evil.gif)
![[Confused]](confused.gif)
![[Wink]](wink.gif)
.![[Dont Know]](graemlins/dontknow.gif)
?![[Evil Laugh]](graemlins/evillaugh.gif)
