I know at some point you are supposed to stop growing taller, but I am discovering more by the day there is indeed no end to learning or growing. Sometimes when I face a challenge and I am frightened and unsure of myself, I feel like jumping back to my childhood. I feel like I am still the same frightened little girl, only in a bigger body.
But then on some days, like today, I can feel the growth and the change in my life and relationships. There are things that make sense to me today that would have been totally laughable even five years ago. I never thought there could be joy in fighting with one’s spouse. For the purposes of this article, please understand that I do not mean physical fighting involving blows, weapons and bodily harm. I mean using one’s words to work through a disagreement.
When I was younger I thought love meant you are always agreeing with the ones you love. On the contrary, I have now found that love means plenty of arguing. Some of it is because you and your spouse are two different people, brought up in different ways, exposed to different cultures and the product of different experiences. It is inevitable that you will think about things differently and that you will try to persuade your partner that your methods are best.
Some of the arguing will be because the ones you love are best placed to call you out on your bullshit. For instance, my husband is great at tackling my procrastination issues head on. I do not always like it, but when the dust settles I always appreciate that it helps me and that it comes from a good place. Sometimes people fight because they are just plain selfish – it has to be their way or nothing. The essence of good fighting is to keep in mind where your partner is coming from. If we are honest with ourselves we will admit that in a lot of our fighting, there is the element of: “I love you and therefore, I want to improve you.”
Hubby and I have developed some basic rules for fighting, and these will probably get refined as we grow together. We have found that we do not even have certain types of arguments anymore, so the rules for those ones have become redundant. For instance, in fights about our respective family members, we now know that when we say ‘my family’, we are referring primarily to Hubby, Myself and the Offspring. The wider relative base is secondary.
The rules, for now, include no fighting in public or in the presence of an unconcerned party. As much as possible, do not go to sleep with unresolved issues. No storming off to ‘cool off’ in a pub till morning – if you wanna be pissed off in private, choose an empty room inside the house. No digging up the past to say: But this is what you ALWAYS do... Things of yesterday stay, as much as possible, in yesterday. The one rule that makes fighting a joy, however, is that no matter how long it takes to solve a problem, we both agree that the problem must be solved. There is no Plan B – or rather, Plan D-ivorce. We are in it until God takes us.
There is a freedom and a peace in knowing that no matter what we are getting all heated about now – money, kids, time – there is nothing that will be big enough to end us. At any one point, one of us may be slightly saner than the other, but there is no doubt that both of us want to be together and we will continue to do everything we possibly can to ensure that it stays that way. We will pray, we will think, we will sacrifice and always actively put each other first.
When I was younger, the idea of saying to someone that no matter what they did or what went on, you’d still be there for them seemed weak. It was not feminist. It was unrealistic. It was giving them a ticket to walk all over you. It was needy and plain stupid. Well, now I know that commitment is powerful, brave, strong and real. And it isn’t something I can convince you of with words – you just have to live it. So before you commence your next argument, just look your partner in the eye and remind them that at the end of the argument, no matter how bloody it gets, you still consciously choose them. Then tell me if you won’t still feel joy even in the midst of the storm.