Letters to My hubby (3), prayers answered

For the last exactly 2 years, 2 months, and 2 weeks I have been married to one Bramwel, my husband. We have had a very beautiful story. Marriage indeed works.

I am reminded of 2 blogs I made on 30^th December 2016 and on 28^th February 2017 where I made a prayer to God yet a letter to my future husband who I was not sure about then. Looking back, God answered my prayers, and so I write yet again, this time as a letter to the young couples.

Marriage has been a very beautiful and wonderful story for us. We attribute our success to the following factors.

First, we have been best of friends, sharing every moment, good or bad. I remember while on campus being told you need to let your spouse know even when you crush on someone else. While we have not gotten here, we share our most embarrassing moments. We have been confessing our sins to each other, our weaknesses, daily frustrations at work, etc. Albeit unknowingly, these things have brought us closer. We share when we lied in the day. When we got humiliated in the day, how we feel about our jobs, life stages, our selfishness, etc. We consider it wrong for your friends to know about what is happening in your life more than your spouse does.

We committed never to sleep on an issue. I am the kind that can get hurt and instead of addressing the issue, expect my husband to know that I am hurt and even discern where he went wrong. When he doesn’t, I am prone to remain silent. I have learned to swallow my pride and just before sleeping, letting my husband know that I am hurt by this word or that action (which mostly he has no idea about). Previously, I would build castles in the air about how to go about the conversation, how to snap on it, imagine him respond curtly, and so forth. I learned a principle that it is my marriage that would be destroyed by my silence while giving the devil a foothold in it. Silence in marriage builds resentment, and nothing compensates for the wasted days. Again, do not share your hurt (from a spouse) with anyone else before settling/pointing it to the spouse.

We date each other. A couple must often date each other lest they find they are married to their former spouse, (Bramwel, 2020). On those dates, we talk about ourselves. It is possible to get on a date and discuss bottom-up, 257GSU officers, Mombasa Road traffic, ministry, house help, baby, and so on. Intentionality must be there for a date to be successful. Share your frustrations. Give feedback, positive and negative. Struggles. Ambitions. Desires (let your spouse know what you desire to become, that way they support you better). Prayers. Name them.

We have learned to pick our battles. This is an old fallacy, but so true. I know of friends who mute on each other over a compliment given to a househelp. Fighting over every little thing raises the bar too high for the other person, who knows you have flaws as well.

We have understood each other. My husband likes spending on guests. He would dig deep into the pocket to entertain guests (culture issues I guess, we will discuss this later). On the other hand, I prefer entertaining within the budget. As one lady once put it, he is among those who give/spend then think about the budget. I am the opposite. Having not been a good negotiator (still, story for another day) and I would put him off with nos and so forth. I have learned to say, (like John Piper defines submission in the book, This momentary marriage); I do not think this is a good idea, how about we…then we meet at a place of compromise.

While this may not be the script for happy marriages, these things have worked for us, and we are among the many crusader’s of ‘Marriage works’, depending on what you decide to make it.

May the name of the Lord be praised. Had he not authored our marriage, we wouldn’t be here.

#Let us tell your story.