Growthtrac Community

[camanda]

Hello everyone. I'm new to the Growthtrac community and wanted to introduce myself. I've read the articles on the site for a long while but have not joined until now.

My husband and I have a great marriage now, but it was not always so. My husband and I can only thank some close friends for really pushing us through the bad times and giving us the strength to keep going. Most couples that have been married for 20+ years say will tell you that they had some really, really bad times (sometimes for many years). They will then tell you that they made the choice to stay together, made changes in their lives and that their best times in their life happened after these bad times. There is light at the end of the tunnel.

This is exactly what happened to us. We married right out of college, moved and jumped right into married life. The first few years were great, but then things started to cool off. We both began working more and started spending less and less time together. There was a lot of fighting, some bad behavior, more yelling (mainly by my husband), a growing pile of angry and hurt feelings, and let’s not forget depression about just about everything. After a few years of going to what turned out to be a horrible therapist (said she was a marriage counselor even though we later found out that she was divorced and only had training in individual grief counseling), I moved out and decided to get a divorce. This came as a shock to most of our friends and family. Most of our friends said that they either didn’t want to give advice either way or that it was probably for the best.

Salvation came from my sister-n-law and two friends that wouldn’t let us accept divorce and wouldn’t let us give up. After a lot of talking, reading, a number of sessions with a new counselor and my husband becoming the man that I knew he really was, I moved back in with my husband and finally I took divorce off the table. This difficult choice to stay married completely changed both of us, brought me out of my depression and set us on the road to where we are today. We still have our fights, but we can both honestly say that we have never been happier in our lives, and I consider myself blessed more each day. I still thank my sister-n-law and our friends every time I see them. They opened up to us about the problems that they had gone through, made me look past my pain, forgive myself and encouraged us to make the decision to stay married.

I hope that sharing my story helps you and that I can continue to learn and grow from Growthtrac and other places. A number of people and I also help with a group on Facebook called I Support Your Marriage that encourages people to stand for the marriages of their friends and family.

[rdsmith3]

Welcome. That is a great testimony. It sounds like God was really at work in your marriage.

[SAM]

Welcome, thank you for sharing that amazing story.

Glad to have you be a participant rather than an observer. You have a great story of hope.