5 Marriages (read carefully)

"Bill was once at a party where there was an older couple who seemed to really enjoy each other and have a lively relationship. They had been married over 50 years. Bill got a chance to talk to the woman alone and told her that he was a therapist, studying how people make their marriages last. He had noticed how lively and positive her marriage seemed to be and he wondered what their secret was.

She answered, "I was married to five different men!" Bill was shocked. He said, "Do you mean that you had four other husbands before you found this one?" She said, "No. It just seemed like I did. When I married him, he was a lively, handsome, trim young man with idealistic dreams. Then he changed into a man focused intensely on work and making a living. He was like a different man. I did not love that new man at first but I learned to love him. Just when it seemed I'd gotten used to this one, he changed again. He went through what's called today a 'mid-life crisis', only we didn't know about those in those days. He became disinterested in work, dissatisfied and disillusioned about being the breadwinner and all of that, and I had to learn to love him all over again in that stage. Then he came out of that and settled into his older years. Now he has a wisdom and depth I really appreciate, but look over there. [She pointed to her husband.] That doesn't look like the man I married-this one has saggy skin and a bit of pot belly- but I have learnt to love that man in that saggy body too."

Her story inspires us and we have used it to inspire our couples. Love has a quality of being a choice and choosing to learn to love a person as he or she changes seems to be part of making a long-term marriage lively and caring."

(From Rewriting Love Stories: Brief Marital Therapy)