A Newlywed Truth

  Some things we've learned along the way...

Something funny happens once you've been married for over a year and you attend other friends weddings. People who don't know will ask, "so when did you guys get married?" When we respond, two summers ago, we get, "oh so you've been married for a while," and I'm never exactly sure how to respond. Yes, technically when compared to the couple we're celebrating that very day, yes we have been married for a while. When I think of a year and a half and compare it to, forever, well then it's actually not that long at all. Despite this confusion, I am sure of two things, a) we're still considered newlyweds, and b)we've evolved quite a bit in our short amount of time living happily ever after.

1. Food

In the beginning, I felt the need to make all of our meals. I'm not sure where this came from because I live my life far from the "Susie Homemaker" mentality. Regardless, I did feel I had to be the designated cook. This fall however, Mike moved to a different school and is now home by 3:30 in the afternoon. When we compared this to the 6:30ish time in which I get home each day, we realized it made much more sense to make Mike the cook. Mike gladly took on this role under one condition, I had to choose what we were having and make sure the ingredients were ready to go. This was certainly a compromise I was happy to accept. Therefore, I am now the grocery person and I get to plan the meals out each week and Mike is the chef. Although I know this will continue to evolve throughout our lives, for right now, it's working like clock work. 

2. Money

This has been the hardest thing by far for us. In the beginning, Mike and I would sit down together once a week to take a look at bills to be paid, move money into savings, and discuss spending cash for the week. I had bills I was in charge of paying and Mike had bills he as in charge of paying and sometimes, we payed bills without telling one another which lead to minor chaos. Personally, this totally stressed me out. I felt like we were constantly talking about money and our system was far from efficient. 

It was about the time where our conversations turned into arguments that I got a call from my retirement fund guy (yes, that's what I call him) who said he felt there was a better opportunity for my retirement funds and he wanted to meet with me. I agreed and also talked with him about setting up a fund for Mike because I knew he hadn't started one yet. Funnily enough, when I spoke with Mike about our options it was his turn to become flustered. This was when my genius idea came to fruition. Our day to day money situation was something Mike handled easily but stressed me out completely, but our long term investments was the complete opposite. Naturally, Mike became our day-today account executive and I became our long term goals executive (we don't actually call each other this but it sounds appropriate as I write this). It's been about 6 months and can't believe we didn't think to do this sooner. We no longer argue or even talk about money because we trust each other has their end of the deal under control. 

As we transitioned into our new roles we were both sort of shocked at how smooth everything worked. I'm a much better planner than Mike and I spend most of my time thinking about how the choices we make now will impact our long term future. Mike is our day-to-day thinker. He doesn't spend too much time thinking about the future because it's so uncertain, he'd rather spend time thinking in the now because it's easier to manage (although, when it comes to decision making we're opposite; I make decisions very quickly because I hate stewing over things, but Mike takes his time... it's weird but each of these components makes us a surprisingly great pair in most situations). We've known these things about each other for a long time so why we didn't think of this system earlier is beyond me. I think we wanted to do everything together so we knew we were a "team", but it turns out working as a team doesn't always mean working side by side. We are a much better team now than we were before because we're each working within our own strengths.

I realize Mike and I still have many things to learn about being married. I do, however, find excitement in the fact that, after 7 1/2 years of being together we continue to evolve and continue to discover strengths within ourselves and, in turn, about each other.