You're right, dear. All relationships need tending and attention, even platonic friendships and work relationships. Our primary relationships/marriages need and deserve our special attention and creativity.

I'm so glad you two are in a better place these days. It gives people hope.

Working on your PM now.

xo

And Yet put it absolutely perfectly. A relationship doesn't get flowered once a year unless it is determined to die.

AY - thank you for everything...

OR - yep, care needs to be given. Hope attention is given. Thanks for your comment.

I read her thing, too, and I thought... she sounds naive. So very "well, I won't let that happen to me" about the whole thing, and like the ladies that get cheated on brought it upon themselves because they simply stopped wanting sex. Hmpf.

What she seems not to know is... the rules change all the time, conflicts and consequences precipitate a whole new playing field, and no matter how much we want to put our feet down hard and say "no! not that way!" It's not really up to us to decide.

I'm not married yet, but, I think marriage might be like a fire... you can light it, tend it, plan for it to serve some purpose (light, warmth, scaring off bears, etc.) but... ultimately, it's not something you can hold in your hands and mold. It takes its own shape. Sometimes it gets out of control, sometimes it's scary, sometimes it's mezmerizingly pretty, and sometimes it nearly dwindles to nothing until you throw another log on there...

I still want marriage; but, I'm under no delusion that I'll be able to carve it into the cute little fantasy ideal I always hoped for as a younger and less-experienced girl. I wish that woman well, and I'm really delighted to hear about the healing process with you, dear.

RB - really well said. Thank you!

Hopefully 'she' will read some of these comments and take heed. (Not that I would have at her age...)

Yeah, that's true, relationships are hard work. But do we really need to marry and have kids, and all that, waht if we didn't. I'm 35 and can't even think of marriage. It's not for me. Back to spanish learning:ganar dinero.

My husband and I view nightly sex as the whipped cream atop "life's waffle cone of shi*."