This is what my five, short years of marriage have taught me

We do not watch movies together anymore, my husband and I, not after I caught him snoring next to me in the middle of what I thought was a very romantic movie.

After munching his popcorns and finishing off his soda, the guy simply slouched on his seat, placed his head on the headrest, and went to sleep.

What especially annoyed me was the fact that he had actually paid for the movie, so the least he could have done was actually watch it, right?

 “Look, I was really tired, it was a long day,” he told me on our way back home.

“I was also tired…I had a long day too…” I retorted.

“I’m sorry, next time I will not sleep,” he assured me.

The next time we watched a movie together was months later, on a Sunday afternoon at home. We were chatting as he flipped through channels.

He finally came across one showing a movie, a particularly violent one I might say, so not my cup of tea. We continued chatting, but after a while, I noticed that I was speaking to myself.

Ladies, when a man answers you in monosyllables, or keeps saying Mmmmm or okay to everything you say, you are talking to yourself.

I realised that he was staring intently at the TV screen, captivated by gory images of shootings and beheadings.

 “Will you make supper and wash the dishes today?” I asked, to ascertain whether he was indeed listening.

“Okay,” he said. Obviously, he had not heard a word of what I had said.

“What’s the movie about? We can watch it together,” I tried again, only that this time round, he did not say anything.

BLOODY MOVIE

It was a bloody movie, not easy on the eyes or the insides. When the battle scene reached the climax, I could no longer take it and left. He did not even notice.

That day, I learned that movies will never unite my husband and I because our tastes are as different as night and day. 

It also taught me that couples need to give each other breathing space, and the right to engage in individual interests.

Some of us, women especially, dump their girlfriends, hobbies, interests, even careers once they get married. They expect that their husband will be all they will ever need. That, I think, is placing an impossible expectation on one person. He may be your husband, but his work is not to make you happy, fulfilled and also keep you occupied.

You must be already happy in yourself and content in who you are, because if you are not, you will become needy, and this will become a problem in your marriage. Who said spouses should do everything together?

You are either a bachelor or a married man:

There is nothing like a married bachelor. You are either in the union heart, body and soul, or you are not.

I will call him Jimmy. He got married to a nice girl, (who should have known better) but he still lives like a bachelor on the prowl. He returns home late at night, drinks alcohol as if he has a target to meet, and often has a girl or two hanging onto his arm. Meanwhile, his lonely young bride is pregnant, but he has no idea where she goes for her prenatal clinic.

When she gives birth, Jimmy drops her and their son home and then immediately leaves to go celebrate with his friends.

His son is seven months old now, but he has never cuddled him, fed him or changed his diaper. He believes it is his wife’s duty to look after their child, while his is just to provide for their material needs.

What Jimmy does not know is that his presence and involvement in his son’s life is much more important than any expensive toy or gadget he will ever buy him. Also, a husband’s attention, respect and love is more valuable to a wife than a nice apartment or sleek car. A child that grows up in a home where the presence and warmth of both parents is in abundance has a better chance of growing up into a confident, responsible and successful adult.

Getting married and having children is a choice, and there are no shortcuts to getting the job done.

Gentlemen, if you are not involved in raising your children, your wife cannot play her role and play yours too, after all, she too must go out and earn a living. This means that your children will be raised by househelps. This makes one sad home.

Your behaviour has a ripple effect

Several years back, one of my uncles earned himself the nickname, ‘malaria’, a name he is still known by today. It was bestowed on him because when he got drunk, he would become delirious and act mad. We enjoyed hanging around him when he was drunk because he told tall tales and very humorous anecdotes. When he was too drunk to talk or walk, he became a nuisance, and only his faithful wife could stand him. In fact, many times, she would be called to pick him from a trench somewhere. Interestingly, she would tell off anyone who made a derogatory remark about her husband.

But she never stopped praying that he would change his ways. I like to think her prayers were finally answered during the recent spirited fight against illegal liquor. Uncle Malaria could no longer get his regular dosage, and since he could not afford the licenced beer, he stopped drinking. During a recent trip upcountry, I could not help noticing that he looked squeaky clean and had put on a bit of weight. Also, his wife looked a decade younger and their children happier.

This taught me that your demons directly affect your spouse and children. The earlier you work on these demons, the better, before they steal your family from you.

Your differences should complement you:

My husband says that I talk a lot. More so during the 9pm news. Or when we go to bed, when all he wants to do is sleep. Hold on, isn’t this the best time for couples to reconnect since there is no interruption? I once asked him.

“No, that is when my battery is on the last bar and I have no energy,” he told me, adding that if I want to talk, I should choose mornings because that is when he feels energised.

And there lies the problem because I am not a morning person. I am at my most fruitful state in the evening, but come morning, my brain is on shut down, and needs the sun and the maddening Nairobi traffic to reactivate.

But these are not our only difference. He is too conscious to time and is into detailed planning when he should just get on with it. On his part, he thinks I am too casual about life and that I trust too easily.

Obviously, our temperaments and personalities are different, but this is okay because this is what makes both of us unique. I cannot change my spouse, and he cannot change me.

If you are keen, you will find that what initially attracted you to your spouse is usually the main source of conflict as time goes by. Before marriage, I liked that my husband kept time for our dates. He still does, but now I am not amused when we are the first to show up at a wedding or house party, only to embarrass the host who, though she said 1pm, expected guests to start trickling in from 1.45pm, not 12.50pm!

 Did you ask how I deal with this? I have accepted that keeping time is important to him, and so I grin and bear with it.

He is male, I am female - that alone is a recipe for disaster

“What first attracted you to your spouse?” I asked during a couples’ forum I hosted recently.

“Her beauty!” Shouted a man from the back of the hall.

PROLONGED,  RELIEVED LAUGHTER

“His height!” a young woman said. I got many other responses until one smart alec raised his hand and asked me the same question.

“The sex,” I calmly replied. As I expected, there was hushed silence, followed by judgemental looks. No one got the joke until I clarified;

“His gender, that is…” there was prolonged, relieved laughter.

There isn’t enough space to expound on the million things that we are happy about or that we fight about simply because your husband thinks like a man while you think like a woman.

Forget the obviously visible biological differences - take our brains for example. I tell him we need a weekend away, without the kids, to rewind and reconnect, and he gets wired up about a whole other matter.

Fine, that is part of the plan for the weekend, but it is not the main plan! Tell that to a man though.

You need one marriage blue print

I am the eldest in my family. First born daughters tend to be independent, head-strong, opinionated and often bossy. I am most of that actually!

I noticed pretty early though that my husband is no push over. We each had our own views about how marriage should run, but pre-marital counselling taught us that we needed one blueprint, not two. We chose the biblical guidelines. For your marriage to succeed, you must base it on something solid.

Had we not made this decision, I am sure that we would not be together today. This does not mean that we do not differ or disagree once in a while, however, when this happens, we have somewhere to turn to for answers.

The script that we drafted together, based on what the bible says about marriage is one of the most valuable possessions we have. Even better, this script gets more relevant each day as we walk along in this journey called marriage.

Couple counselling is not for those in crisis

If you have never, as an individual, gone through counselling, you are walking in ignorant, dangerous bliss. You could blow up any second, or cower at a corner, never getting to explore your talent, because you are battling unfounded fears fed into you when you were two years old. Okay, this is best tackled by a therapist, but I will give it a shot.

A counseller knows that human beings are not perfect, and that situations you went through while growing up might have negatively affect you. Maybe a teacher called you a retard.

Maybe your father told you you were useless. Now take you, all messed up, and you have no idea, and put you together with another messed up ignorant individual and we call you a couple. And you wonder why there is constant drama in marriage!