I included this blog in the personal insights category because it is not directly tied to parenting. In fact, I intentionally sought to separate marriage advice from parenting insights in my book. In my book I state that “as a parenting story, it is not my intent to write about being a good husband; however, you cannot neatly separate when writing about being head of household.” Although that “however” is significant, I hold to the beginning of that phrase in this blog as well. To be clear, I do not claim to be a marriage expert in any fashion. As such, I am merely passing along my thoughts and views gained from nearly 25 years of what I would consider a “good marriage.”
Like any marriage that spans over two decades, the road was not always smooth, and if a husband with similar longevity says it was then I would stop listening, give him “side eye” and walk away. The dynamic between a maturing man, a maturing woman, and the interplay between the two is not an equation for perpetual agreement and consensus. And when you add in children – I won’t even get into those variables and what impact they have on the husband-wife dynamic. But I will say, the introduction of the “little ones” amplifies things – so if things ain’t that good before you have kids, I pray resolution of those issues get addressed sooner than later.
I lead in with that because despite me not claiming expertise, I absolutely have views. And I would measure my marriage, the entire 24+ years, against any other couple (with kids) and feel confident I could hold my own (in a good way). And as those who have been reading my blogs understand, I reflect on a lot of things and capture many of them to share. Primarily for my children, but also for others who have interest.
The “advice” I offer is packaged fairly simply, but I am not doing justice if I don’t “unpack it”. However, since I try to keep these posts relatively short, I will unpack my below advice in a subsequent post as I may get long when I breakdown each of my “dos”, “don’ts” and “truths.”
So, accept this as the introduction, and below are the core principles I give whenever I am talking to a newly married couple who asks for my advice (or I simply decide to give unsolicited advice because they may not feel comfortable asking, but need to know 😊).
