Welcome to Story Hour! Today: Proving Myself To... Myself?

My family is full of exes, halves and steps. My dad's mom: divorced before my dad was ten, remarried and they had my aunt. My cousin: divorced twice. My mom: divorced and remarried. My dad: divorced and remarried, bringing a step and two half brothers into my life. These things happen, kids know when it should. But that doesn't mean its any easier, no matter the age or situation. The worst part about being a "child of divorce" is that your perception of several things is skewed. You think differently about love mainly.You have no concept of forever anymore when you are a C.o.D. The typical response of a child who has just learned of their parents divorce is there is no typical response. The response is dependent of past experiences, the maturity of the child, occasionally the age of the child, and the way the divorce has taken place. My response was different than my brother's response.

My parents' divorce was when I was in my sophomore year. I remember being very angry at my mother, and the situation in general. I was fifteen when that famous April evening, my brother was 11... On a infamous fight a few months before, October to be precise, I remember both of my parents arguing. We weren't in the kitchen with them but the house wasn't all that big so we could hear it all. I remember my mother was attempting to make "breakfast for dinner" she had actually started making pancake batter. But the fight ensued. Next thing I knew my dad was in his bedroom, packing. I went in there and began screaming at him. Telling him he was better than that, and that he couldn't leave. He replied with "Your mom has no where she can go. I do. I'll go to Grandma's." My brother came out, noticed the packing and heard the screaming and then commenced to crying. Then hearing our ruckus my mom came in, saw what he was doing and took off out the door, yelling that she was leaving. He was two steps behind her and jumped into the car with her. The arguing continued in the car in the driveway. At that point I called my aunt. My dad's family had been pretty kept in the dark about the increasingly frequent arguments between my parents. Soon after this phone call, my dad came back in and then we spent the majority of the evening using all the tissues in the house, going through a roll of toilet paper (after using all the tissues) and then going through almost a full twelve pack of Mountain Dew consoling each other. That night my 11-year-old brother and I got the "It's just us now" talk. Note: There are few things worse than seeing that stoic strong person in your life crippled by his and his children's tears. It forever stays in your mind.

Now, you may be wondering why my brother and I had the responses we did. Well in order to understand my anger and his tears you have to know the back story. When my brother was in kindergarten, ice hockey was (and still is) huge in our family and he used the "problem-resolving" techniques players use when he was on the playground at school. He was reprimanded and from that point on (and its pretty much indefinitely) he's kept any and all anger feelings in. Hasn't shown much if any anger in fourteen years. Now for me. When I turned thirteen, like to the day, for some reason in me an emotional light switch flipped on. From thirteen and one day I was crying DAILY. Drove my dad nuts. So from about thirteen and six months until about six years ago I shed VERY few tears.

So when I met my soul mate, it turned out that fate would have him as a C.o.D. His parents' divorce was when he was very young. Two, in fact. Then his parents were both remarried relatively quickly. But we are both pretty skeptical of love, and in fact we're rather untrusting. We've both been hurt and hurt others in our past, but we are head over heels for one another. Don't get me wrong, our pasts scare us. We have abandonment issues, even though in neither case did a parent up and abandon us entirely. But the issues are there. We seem clingy but that's because we're afraid it might happen to us. In the beginning every couple seems happy together. That head over heels. They call it honeymoon stage. The point, usually after the wedding and honeymoon have finished when all the disagreeing begins. All your new spouse's true flaws appear. But when you've been together as long as we have, six years on the wedding day, you learn these flaws relatively quickly. I mean we've lived together for about five years. Maybe five and a half, so I would pick up on things like, random cups left on the back ledge of the couch or on the head board, stacking clothes on top of his dresser, or his other random habits. And he would learn my crazy habits, like having to clean up the house drastically every time we leave for a weekend trip or a vacation. Or one-time-use-then-wash towels and pjs, or my infatuation with coasters. (I mean come on, we have three sets of coasters [a perk of him working at a glass factory] can we use one?!) We know these things. He knows a lot about me and I know a lot about me.

Some people get married too soon. They meet, and within a year are married. How much can you truly learn about a person in that time? I mean even in instances where the person you marry you've known through someone else for a little longer, you don't know much about them except they're a friend of a friend sort of deal. There are some people who have to get married after a short time. Military folk commonly do this because they want their significant other to receive their benefits while they are deployed. And while that's remotely noble, its hard because when you get hitched and then have to leave right away, leaving your spouse to experience this "honeymoon stage" alone. A lot of times, at least from what I've seen, its caused an adulterous spouse. In 41% of divorces, one or both spouses admit to infidelity, either physical or emotional. That makes sense. That is an auto-deal-killer in my opinion, and in Nate's.

So, what am I proving to myself? I'm proving that we will survive. We will stick to our vows of sickness (or craziness) and health, richness (rarity) and poorness, until death do we part. That we'll make it. I mean it works out for some people doesn't it?