To My Husband On Our Anniversary

They say the first year of marriage is the hardest.  'They' also the 3 most stressful things to go through as a couple are getting married, moving house and having a baby. Throw another house move, a 4 month deployment to the Falklands and a stillborn into the mix and that was what the first year of our marriage consisted of.  I look back over the last few years and I wonder how we did it, how we have fought through everything that's been thrown at us, things that would have completely broken some and at times very nearly did to us. I believe we have something special, that has kept us fighting and kept us together. We have been through so much in such a short time and I am so proud of how us and what we've achieved.

As I walked into the Church on this day 3 years ago, I was completely unprepared for the journey we were about to embark on. I had an idealistic plan of what married life would be like and this was a failure on my part.  You're not perfect, and neither am I, but we work well as a team (most of the time), take the good with the bad, and just get on with the cards we've been dealt.  I am so incredibly proud of you and everything you stand for.  You're exceptionally hard working, you never complain about being tired or having to work long shifts.  You are completely selfless, and after a full 12 hour night shift you'll stay up to help me with the children, to do something as a family or so I can do something for myself.  Your job is hard on all of us at times, especially when you have to go away, but the opportunities it gives us makes it all worth it. We are so lucky to be living abroad and experiencing this incredible lifestyle, we are all thoroughly enjoying it and I know we are going to find it extremely hard to leave. Your job allows us to live a comfortable life, I can be around for Emelia and Oscar and not have to go back to work, and for that I am extremely lucky and grateful.

You would do anything for me and our family, you put up with me and my hormones during pregnancy and reassured me when I was scared, over and over again. You always remain positive when we are faced with uncertainties and never take no for an answer. You support, encourage and always believe in me.

We've been through some dark times, times I never thought we could come back from.  The day we lost Lucas was the worst day of our lives, and I know no one can understand the pain we live with everyday, that it doesn't lessen in time, you just learn to live with it, that every time there is a joyful occasion you wonder what it would have been like with him here as well. We help each other, when we have our 'moments' we find strength to support one another through the pain.  I've never told you how proud I was to walk beside you as you carried him to his grave, I know this was tremendously hard for you and I know what it takes for you to talk about it. We battled through the pain, and fought through the darkness to find light, a light that I believe has come to us in the form of Oscar, he is our second chance, not a replacement, but another chance to have a wonderful son, another chance for Emelia to know what it's like to have a brother, and another chance for us to remember how lucky we are in so, so many ways.

So here we are, 3 years down the line and on a new adventure, there's no one else I'd rather be learning and growing with than you.  I love being your wife, and I love the way you love your family and put us and our needs before anyone else.  I love watching you with our Emelia and Oscar, you are an amazing dad, everything and more than I ever hoped for in a father for my children, they are so lucky to have you.  Our marriage is far from perfect, but it's the imperfections that I love, that make life interesting.  However, surely we've had our share of heartache and now the fun can finally begin?! (PLEASE!!)

Thank you for loving me the way you do, for not strangling me when I know you'd like to and giving me this incredible life.  I am so lucky to call you my husband. You are my strength, you are my happiness.

Happy 3rd Anniversary Brett, here's to the rest of our lives.  I love you, always have, always will. X 

Corinthians 13:4-13  Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful;it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.  Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.  Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known. So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

Photo credit: Ivan Leah