Don’t Wait Until You’ve Lost It Before You Cherish It

My first marriage was a mistake. I was way too young and I hadn’t really gotten to know myself well enough. I was extremely self-centered and honestly thought that all the fault were my mate’s. We had a rather turbulent two years and an unnecessarily discordant divorce.

I had become a lot more mature and understanding by the time I married again. This time, we had a much better relationship and family life. But then, my selfish nature turned up again, but in a better disguise. Cindy and I were both very ambitious, but we also wanted to raise children. We had our two children in the first three years of marriage.

Cindy was a very devoted and loving mother. But she also had very strong feelings about fairness. She wasn’t happy about the fact that she was sacrificing a lot more of her time to attend to the unbelievably demanding duties of raising our toddlers. I spent a little time with the family, but I was more concerned about my equally demanding work as a management consultant.

We had several discussions and I half-heartedly tried to spend more time with the family, but I really felt it was Cindy’s duty to spend more time with the kids. Our relationship degenerated until she sued for a divorce. She was granted the custody of the children, which was a secret relief to me. It was ironic that she welcomed the short end of the root (cause) of our marital problems! She however explained that she would rather raise the kids alone than have a partner who wasn’t there for her.

I had a lot of time to really build up my career and made a huge success of it. Five years later, I met a doting, absolutely gorgeous Sarah and we were married shortly afterwards. We soon had three children in quick succession. Sarah was a very homely person and I could afford and actually preferred a full time housewife.

However, Sarah was carefree, dreamy and not very assertive. Our kids have therefore grown rather wild and unruly. It has become a very painful embarrassment to me. I now make a lot of effort to try and teach them some manners. My embarrassment and regret is sharply accentuated anytime I visit my first two kids at Cindy’s place. They are the epitome of poise, tact and confidence. Cindy hadn’t remarried. Like me, she has also made a tremendous success of her career. At the same time, she was able to single-handedly raised two demanding toddlers into fine young gentlemen. What a woman!

So what did I learn from all these?

It is absolutely important to get to know the weaknesses and strengths of my personality before giving any thought to getting married at all.

Several honest, open, no-holds-barred discussions with my mate are an absolute necessity before we venture into the challenging waters of marital life. We need to project into the future and firmly decide to make all necessary sacrifices to build a happy and an enduring home.

Every personality has it’s up and down sides. It is important for couples intending to go into marriage to be aware of this. We are supposed to help each other to enhance our strengths and make up for our weaknesses.

Above all, marriage is not for an immature, selfish and self-centered person. These are not functions of age. It is important to work on these flaws before dreaming of going into marriage – no matter how old you are. Marriage can only be blissful when both partners have decided to do all it would take to build up the other person to the fullness of all their potentials.