The Truth about Marriage

“I don’t know if I’m ready to think of myself as married” said a girl whom I’d known for maybe ten minutes. She was getting married in a few weeks time and clearly she was getting nervous. So I did what any good wife would do—I told her the truth. Marriage is just another title for your relationship in the present.

Before I got married, I was afraid that marriage would change me and my friendships. Another part of me thought marriage would make me a better person. The truth is, I had already built my own identity long before we took our vows and nothing could change the real me, for better or for worse. Let me explain...

Marriage Fear: My single friends won’t want to hang out with me.
Every marrying woman worries about this. Especially women like me who only know five people who are married. Here’s the reality—your friends don’t care if you are single or not. Really. They will keep talking about sex and how horrible men are, but they will probably stop asking you for dating advice for a while. Then they’ll realize marriage is just another relationship and you can rejoin the “My man is driving me crazy” discussions. If anything makes a single woman happy, it is knowing that no marriage is perfect.

Marriage Hope: I’ll start acting more like a wife.
Everyone has this stereotypical image of a housewife who cooks and cleans and sits on her husband’s slippers to warm them up before he comes home from work. That was never going to be me. But I had these fantasies about waking up together, eating at the dinner table, cooking with my husband and maybe—just maybe—finding some joy in cleaning the house. After all, it was our home. If I had been realistic about all this, I would have realized that I hate cleaning. I still can’t cook and neither can he, and we are perfectly happy not doing it. So remember, it’s your life and you don’t have to live up to some stereotype. Besides, how does a wedding band change your cooking skills?