The Young Newlyweds

The week, we are traveling to San Diego to watch two of our dear friends commit to each other in marriage. On the beach! At sunset! It will be beautiful. She is 20 and he is 21. This week I am reminiscing on another young couple that got married at 20 and 21....

Yep, yours truly. When we were engaged and newlyweds, people would ask our ages and we usually got a "why??" from them. Why get married so young? You haven't dated, finished school, you have so much life ahead of you. Why give that all up? Oh, you're "waiting" until you get married. Must be getting married for sex then. You're making life so much harder on yourselves. He must be whipped.

I was 17 when I met Daniel. It was the summer before my senior year of high school, and the summer before his first semester of college. We lived over 400 miles apart, but it worked. We decided that we wanted to make it work, it felt right spiritually, and hopefully God would work everything else out!

I had a friend's mother say to me "you're too young to be talking about marriage. You need to date around more. You need to figure out what you don't like before you settle with someone". I was really offended by this because I didn't know why I needed to find all the things I DIDN'T like, if I had already found something I DID like. Not to mention that the person you marry will still have at least one trait that you don't like. Sorry, but it's true. We also had a comedian call us out at a stand-up club and make vulgar comments about all the things we should be doing besides getting married. We couldn't believe it.

I have never been one to shop around. I clothes shop quickly (in and out!), I bought my car on a whim (and it was a GREAT decision), and I tried on 3 wedding dresses and chose the first. I knew I wanted to be a wife and a mom. I didn't really want a "successful" life by business standards, I just wanted to be a helpmate to someone great and choose to love him everyday. I met Daniel and he was smart, funny, handsome, spiritual and seemed like a good fit. And he rode a motorcycle. That may have helped.

After dating for over 3 years, we got married.

And it was hard. We struggled and we achieved. We fought and we made up. We rented a house with roommates, and we bought our own house (finally!). We had to learn time management and money management. We had to work hard, but it paid off in fun weekend trips. I had to learn how to cook and take care of a home. So did he. We had to learn how to take care of each other.

Getting married young is not easy. In fact, I would debate that it is harder that getting married later in your twenties or thirties. We have quite a few couples that we know who married young and divorced only months or years later. We are now 26 and 27, and we are totally (ok, not TOTALLY) different people than we were when we got married. Things that we hated, we don't hate anymore. For example, I eat bananas now- not often, and I will never say I like them, but I eat them in baked goods. Good enough. Daniel still loves being outdoors and backpacking, but the other night he told me that there is nothing better than being home with us, with the TV on and Pip playing on his back. This is NOT the man I married.

We have had to work twice as hard to grow together and not apart as we've grown up. It has probably caused more heartache, but we committed to each other to never give up. It's hard, but not impossible.

And to make it even better, Daniel has been in my life for most of the major moments. He went to prom with me. My high school graduation. My first road trip without parents. My first "I love you". My first... you know. Our first home. Our first child. He knows every part of my heart and soul, and it had never been tainted before. We have always said to each other "I love growing up with you".

So when you see a young couple who have decided to marry, don't ask 'why', instead encourage them as they make one of the toughest decisions of their lives. Know that it CAN survive with commitment and hard work, and they'll need real friends as they enter marriage. And when they make it through those first tough years, they will tell you how much  it was worth it.