Surfacing

We've been married for six and a half months now, and I finally feel like I'm beginning to surface.

I'm surfacing and I'm settling.

I mean, I knew what I was getting myself into. I've seen marriages, I've talked about marriages, I've thought a lot about marriage.

"It's not easy. It's a lot of hard work. It's a lot of compromise. It's exhausting."

"I wouldn't trade it for anything. It's incredible. It's the best thing that's ever happened to me."

It's all true.

It's a thing, that's for sure. And I feel maybe I'm just kind of getting into the groove.

Not that things are EASY, not that life has stopped throwing curveballs and not that I've outgrown my insecurities and sometimes demanding ways.

There are bumps and there are hiccups and there are fights. There's misunderstanding and miscommunication and no communication - and then there's dialogue. There's honesty and there are sometimes tears and we're making progress.

I can look back at those first few weeks and the first few fights and my first few breakdowns, and smile a little. I can recognize when I was being irrationally anxious. I can commend him for hearing my insecurities and working with them. I have been learning to do the same.

You know what the most exciting piece is? I still feel like me.

In some ways, everything is different. But I'm still me. We're a team, but there's space on that team for me to be me.

If there's one thing that's gotten in the way of building intimacy and establishing our new status, it's when I've tried to be other than I am, when I've tried to be less honest, less needy, less demanding, less... Simply less.

But when I show up as Me, with all my mix of strengths and weaknesses, my needs and my gifts, my demands and my graces - things happen. He shows up and there's space for both of us to be and share and give and receive.

I feel a bit like I'm learning to love.

It's been better  and worse and harder and easier than I expected.