What Love Looks Like After 5 Years of Marriage

My husband and I just celebrated our fifth wedding anniversary and our love is so different from the mushy ideals presented in the fairy tales I loved as a girl.

I’m not sure yet how I feel about having my daughter get into princesses, princes, and fairy tales.  The first princess items made their way into our home recently and to be honest, I inwardly groaned when they did.  This is new to me, so the jury’s still out, but I want my daughter to know what love really looks like.   My husband and I just celebrated our fifth wedding anniversary and our love is so different from the mushy ideals presented in the fairy tales I loved as a girl.

My husband compliments me, but he does not complete me.  He fills in so many voids, but does not meet every desire of my heart.  

Instead, love looks like changing sheets–twice–together at 2 am after your son has vomited all over them.  It is the inordinate delight of having someone make and deliver coffee to you as you sit nursing a baby before the sun has come up.  It is someone who lets you put your icy cold feet on them as you are curled together in a C as you fall asleep.  Love is a husband who eats anything you put in front of him and never makes fun of or criticizes you–ever.  

Love is being told you look beautiful when you can’t remember if you brushed your hair, are not wearing make-up and are certainly wearing the same hoody you wore three out of the last seven days. It is praying and seeking community together.  It is catching each other’s eye across the room when your son says something hilarious and you are trying to be serious and not crack a smile.  

It is having a constant in your life after years of being alone.  My mom reminded me of a time many years ago when I had to sign a heap of paperwork at the hospital and I just started crying and said, “THIS is why I want a husband.  So I don’t have to do all of this by myself!”  I had similar feelings when I had to drag all my luggage with me into airport bathrooms, fill up my gas in -15 degree weather, pay bills, figure out my taxes (I gave up, to be honest–thank you, dad…), and viciously guard my possessions when traveling alone in China.  I prayed for someone who would BE with me in life’s transitions.  Someone I wouldn’t have to explain my complex web of relationships and history to.  A constant would be there for holiday meals and wouldn’t send my host rushing to pull up the “extra” chair because I made our numbers odd. 

Love is in the physical intimacy that you share, though I’ve been shocked by how much NOT like the movies it is.  Hollywood conveniently leaves out the humanizing moments of laughter over surprising bodily noises, mishaps, head and teeth bumps and the aspects that just don’t work, in spite of your aspirations towards creativity.  The movies don’t account for the mess of it all (in so many senses).  But love is in those times, too, imperfect as they are, as they give you an opportunity to connect on bad days and good days.  On days when it feels like the world is going to end and you can’t trust politicians or world leaders to keep you protected, there is comfort in the nearness of another human soul and the closest connection two humans can have.  It is a taste of Eden in a world of chaos.  A vulnerable love that sheds your skin of shame.  That leaves you feeling loved because you are accepted and celebrated in your nakedness.

Love looks like understanding and doing what you can to meet each other’s needs, whether that be for  deep conversation, sex, alone time, or just the need to meet a craving for French Fries or a cup of coffee (even if it means driving 10 miles out of the way).  It is knowing that your husband is an introvert and wants to shut down after an evening with people, but that your wife, an extrovert, will want to chatter away for an hour after you get home.  Love tries to understand that you have different thresholds for people that you need to make allowances for as you schedule your time.

These are the moments I actually longed for when I was single–not the sweep-me-off-my-feet, passionate thrill of love, but the togetherness, the commitment, the security of knowing that someone would love me, respect me and serve me even on the rough days.  Love is having a man to share about my day with and offer to cook me omelets when I am exhausted and standing dejectedly in front of the refrigerator at dinner time.   It is being parents, lovers, friends, partners, co-conspirators, and each other’s greatest fans.  

It is a piece of art made up of a thousand moments recorded, which together tell the story of love.

After five years of marriage, this is what love looks like for us.  We are tired, have made personal sacrifices, put passions on the shelf and are still working on communicating well.  So though life is perhaps not being lived perfectly “happily ever after,” I am sometimes made to feel like a princess in disguise.   

What does love look like for you?  I’d love to hear some real life examples in the comments!

Previous Post:  Thursday Thoughts for Writers~Art & the Alabaster Jar 
Next Post:  When You Feel Spiritually Dehydrated…Again {for Velvet Ashes}

Linking up with A Proverbs 31 Wife and Velvet Ashes

My husband and I just celebrated our fifth wedding anniversary and our love is so different from the mushy ideals presented in the fairy tales I loved as a girl.

 

20 Replies to “What Love Looks Like After 5 Years of Marriage”

  1. Thanks for this honest look at love. We're coming up on five years in a couple months and I've been reflecting on how amazing it is it have a true partner in life. This partnership is amplified by parenting too. Whew! Anywho… Congrats on 5 years!

  2. Congrats to you, too! It's not really a long time in the scheme of life, but long enough to know that love is pretty different (better/deeper/richer) than the way it's portrayed in the movies! Thanks for reading!

  3. I've long thought one of the best things about marriage simply having someone to help with the workload of life (like that big pile of paperwork you mentioned!) Not having to tackle everything alone is just plain nice. We recently celebrated our 5th anniversary too–my story is different, as I wasn't really even interested in guys yet when my husband started calling, but the uniqueness of love stories around the world has always been a passion of mine. I don't get it when other people say that romance novels ruin real-life love for them–because real-life love has completely ruined romance novels for me. I love a good love story–but it has to be real.

  4. I love that real-life love has ruined romance novels for you and I totally agree! They just seem so shallow, missing all the highs and lows of true love. I read your five year anniversary post a while back and loved it, too!;-)

  5. Hi, we celebrated our fourth wedding anniversary recently and I could nod my head in agreement through most of the post.. It's funny how long it takes sometimes to realize that it's okay if our husbands compliment us, but they will never complete us! Marriage is temporary after all and we are destined for a greater 'wedding'.

  6. Yes to real life love- and not fairy tale fantasies! Grateful for the years you've been given- here's to many, many more! Keep pressing into True Love, as you love the one you've been given on earth.

  7. So true! And you're right, I think we'll be a lot less frustrated if we realize early on that only Christ can truly complete us. It lets our husbands off the hook, too, when we stop expecting them to fulfill our every need–that's way too much pressure!

  8. So beautiful, so true. Right now for us, love looks like leaning in and believing in each other's callings, making sacrifices for those, and yet dancing with each other and our kids in a rhythm of work and rest and play. So many days we falter, but after 11 years of marriage we are more FOR each other than ever before. Thanks so much for sharing, Leslie. Really enjoying getting to know you through your writing.

  9. I think we're still trying to find that rhythm, but will hopefully get there in the next few years! Thanks for reading and commenting–I'm so thankful for the Velvet Ashes community!

  10. Wow thank you so much for this post. It describes my husband and I completely!! We celebrated our 5 year anniversary today, Feb 16, and I’m up at 4 am in the morning (fell asleep early nursing our now toddler) and just laying her reflecting on our marriage journey these past 5 years. All I can say and feel is how grateful I am to have found him. Looking back at all the silly fights we had the last few years, I am amazed at how I was so blind to the beautiful human and upstanding man he is! We have two beautiful kids and he dotes on them like I’ve never seen a father do. He’s an exemplary dad. I love how he’s always been right there with me, constantly by my side; no matter how intense and ugly our fights got, he never even left my side or threatened to leave. I’m the one who did that, I threatened divorce more times that I can count. I came from a dark place where love didn’t exist, many divorces that my mother went through. Our home was always ‘broken’. So maybe subconsciously I was trying to push him away, make him leave or something. I’m one to hold a grudge after fights but he’s the type to try to break the ice after that long spiteful silence I tend to give when I’m mad at him. Always offering to make me something to eat, making me eggs for breakfast, fried cheese balls or jalapeño poppers that he knows I love, a piece of chocolate, making me lunch and bringing me my plate when I’m stressed out and buried in work, etc. And he cooks! Every weekend, he gets up and cooks a really delicious breakfast for me and our kids, makes dinner as often or more than I do. So many little things he does that any woman should be lucky to have. He pays attention to everything I talk about wanting and makes sure he goes on the hunt to find it and buy it for me. He’s bought me expensive jewelry, bags, shoes, lotions, perfumes etc. all the pretty girly, often expensive things I like. Recently he upgraded me with a beautiful new diamond ring that I am so proud to wear. When I was going through pregnancies, he would never even let me drive to a Dr. appointment by myself. He was always there to hold my hand and make me feel safe. He is constant and present and committed to me. He really is everything I had ever prayed God for in a man, and here I had him all these years and quite often took him for granted. I am just so grateful for him and couldn’t even imagine my life without him. Looking forward to loving and appreciate him better and spending the rest of our lives together.

  11. THIS is beautiful. Thank you so much. This is the love we singles will wait for, knowing that marriage never completes, but that the togetherness, the commitment, the security of an imperfect marriage centered on Christ is worth it!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Subscribe to my monthly-ish newsletter and I’ll send you the first chapter of my book Invited: The Power of Hospitality in an Age of Loneliness for FREE!

Welcome to Scraping Raisins!