Happy 20th

 "It's not when; but who".

My mother told me this on many occasions. 

Lonely Saturday nights.

When I was invited to weddings and didn't have a date. 

My 30th birthday.

It wasn't when you married, but who you married.  (I quoted my Mom at our wedding during my speech. I loved this advice so much)

And it is here, on my upcoming 20th wedding anniversary, (December 2nd. Im a couple days early)  that I realize even more that what (or who) I thought I wanted in my 20's differed from what I wanted when I hit 30. (Really, 32)

And 20 years later...this is who I got.

I married a man who held my hand when we realized we needed to go through infertility treatments. For two years he couldn't stand the thought of needles so he would do the next best thing..  heat up a sock filled with rice in the microwave for me to heal my bruised stomach from all the injections that I had to do. (A trick I learned back in the day)

I married the man who went to work all day, rushed home to eat a quick dinner and feed the cat so that he could spend evenings with me while I was inpatient in the hospital for 6 1/2 weeks, pregnant with our twin boys.   (Let's not forget to mention that often these visits were accompanied by chocolate milkshakes which were my craving at the time)

The man I married cried along side of me when we heard that our son had passed. We helped each other up and let each other sit in silence when we needed to, during the 6 months that our surviving son spent in the NICU.

The man I am lucky enough to call my husband, waited in the hospital from 6AM until 8PM at night while I had my mastectomy. He wouldn't leave my side until he knew I was settled into a room. 

8 years later he shaved my head when I couldn't take my hair falling out anymore and rubbed my back when I couldn't take the nausea from 12 weeks of chemotherapy. 

My father died 3 days before my brother in law's wedding. My husband went to the wedding and rushed back the next morning so he could be by my side for my Dad's funeral. He was by my side when my Mom died of covid this past April. (Literally the only person by my side because of social distancing guidelines.)

20 years has had its ups and downs but it has molded us into the people we are today. 

Don't get me wrong. He isn't a saint.

 He reloads the dishwasher because he doesn't like how it's done. He gets annoyed if the fridge is open longer than 5 seconds. He is worlds most impatient driver and he doesn't always want to order dessert when we are out to dinner (I mean, come on. Who doesn't ALWAYS want dessert?) The man also has never eaten a peanut butter and fluff sandwich in his entire life.

He does, however, gets up every morning to walk the dog, and lets me sleep in on weekends.  I never have to ask him to pick up his crap

 We share a love of traveling, movies, eating out and spending time at the beach. 

He is the calm to my anxiety. He is the quiet to my loud. He is the sanity when I am insane. (Which is often)

On your wedding day, you do not expect that you will be faced with such battles. I certainly didn't expect we would face them so early on in our marriage. 

But we did.

And together we grew stronger as individuals and definitely stronger as a couple. 

I am forever grateful to my Mom's words of wisdom and without a doubt, blessed to have this guy by my side through it all.

So when you stand by your partner, and recite  your vows to each other- make sure the person across from you is the one you can count on to love you even if you're bald, one breasted and could stand to lose 10 (ok 25) lbs. Make sure that person standing across from you is there to make you laugh and smile but also who will really be there for you. Because life can throw you some shit.

Just ask 2020.

Happy 20th to my WHO not WHEN husband.