Five years ago, we stood up in front of 200 people… God & our grandparents… and said “I Do”. We promised to be together forever, to stick it out in thick & thin. We knew people were betting against us. Heck, some of them had even TOLD us they didn’t think we’d make it. But we plunged ahead and did it anyway,  and we were convinced we’d prove them all wrong.

Five years ago today, we got married.

And not even 10 months later, we sat on the floor and cried and talked very seriously about giving up, because it wasn’t working.

That was reality for us. It wasn’t working. We’d bruised each other deeply, and we stopped trying to make it better. We were roommates, and not even amicable ones. We’d stopped dreaming about a future together, and just got by on our daily routine. We didn’t even have the energy to fight… nothing seemed worth it.

Not even a year after we said “forever”, we both admitted we were probably looking at the end.

So when people ask me about our wedding… about the significance of our 5^th anniversary… it’s a little hard to talk about. Sure, we dressed up and got married and threw a party on April 19^th, 2008. We’d already been together for 4 years, so getting married was the next thing to do. It was time, and we thought we were ready.

But the last weekend of January, in 2009, THAT’S when we made the promises that count.

We sat in that hotel room, and we cried, and we held each other’s hands, and we made some choices that needed to be made. We recommitted to each other… to this promise. We apologized, and asked for forgiveness. I wasn’t wearing a white dress, and nobody was there to see it… but those are the promises I remember most.

If we hadn’t gotten married on April 19th, 2008, we probably wouldn’t have gotten married at all. Without a doubt, that day will always be important to me. But if it weren’t for January 29^th, 2009, we’d be a statistic… a failed marriage. I’m so glad I don’t have to know what my life would look like without you.

My love, on our 5^th anniversary, THANK YOU.

I know I’m hard to live with. I’m hard to keep happy. I’m hard to please. I’m hard to understand. I’m hard to work with. To steal from one of our favorite songs, I am quite simply Hard to Love.

But you do it anyway. You do it loudly and fiercely and loyally and you never ever quit. I don’t deserve you, no matter how often you say it’s the other way around.

Thank you for April 19^th, and thank you for January 29^th. Thank you for forgiving me, and working with me, and believing in us. Thank you for choosing US over the voices of people that said we couldn’t make it. Thank you for 9 years together, for 5 years married, and for a little over four years of truly being IN THIS TOGETHER.

You’re the absolute love of my life, and no matter where this journey takes us, I’m glad it’s together.