The post Marriage Isn’t Over After Kids. first appeared on Jennifer S. White.

Marriage isn’t as cool as it used to be, and I’m fine with that.

I’m both pro everyone getting married who wants to, and I’m also alright with anyone who thinks it’s not for them.

But this is why I got married:

I wasn’t always the girl who dreamed of the white wedding, the names of her children, or the picket-fence-surrounded house. However, I did meet the love of my life at age 14, and I married him at 25.

I loved him for over 10 years before we chose to walk down the aisle in front of our friends and family. We’d lived together, not only in a few different apartments around our college town, but we also moved across the country. We lived miles away from where we grew up, and miles from anyone else that we loved.

I already knew sacrifice. I already knew commitment. I already knew that love sometimes isn’t enough for two people, and that work, dedication and forgiveness are just as important as having the same sense of humor, or enjoying looking at each other across a candle-lit table in a crowded restaurant.

I already went through the “in sickness and in health” bit, too. In short, our relationship was significant to me before he asked me to marry him, and before I said yes.

I did say “yes,” and we got married, and I took his last name.

I wore a white dress, and I had a traditional wedding, including a wedding party of my favorite people, delicious food, and a dollar dance. On my left hand I wear an engagement ring, a wedding band, and an anniversary one as well.

I married this man that I call my husband, my significant other, my better half, my best friend, my baby daddy, and my lover. I married him because I wanted it to be hard — mentally and emotionally — to walk away.

When life gets rocky, when I resemble more of an exhausted mother-monster than the woman he proposed to 11 years ago, and when everything about being an adult is momentarily overwhelming, I wanted it to be hard as hell to walk away.

To me, marriage is more than an ancient tradition of dowries. I’m married, and I’m a feminist. I’m not religious. I got married because I wanted to love this one man for forever, or for as long as our forever on Earth could be.

Marriage also has practical benefits, and this aspect of a legal union is only a part of why marriage equality has been worth fighting for. More, as someone who does believe in equality, both inside of a marriage, at work and in all aspects of life and humanity, I can’t help but ask myself, rather than throw marriage away as outdated, why can’t we rewrite it to better fit into modern society?

Ironically, it seems that finances might even be the reason that marriage rates are plummeting. My husband and I were just talking about this while cooking last night.

While apathy towards marriage has long been accepted as the reason that fewer Millennials are wanting to get married, there are also a myriad of other considerations, and money is a main one.

A party like I had is expensive. Would I have gotten married without it? Absolutely, but I was extremely fortunate to not have to make that choice, and it would be easy for me, or anyone else in my situation, to say we would still get married without a large formal event.

Still, in my life, being a wife has been something that has always been positive. I’m not claiming to have a perfect marriage, a perfect life, or perfect circumstances, but being married, for instance, has made the legalities of having my children easier not only for me, but especially for my husband as their father. My married status has been convenient for many aspects of daily living, including benefiting from the insurance through my husband’s job. Yet none of these perks are why I got married, and they aren’t why I stay married either.

Divorce serves a place in society, not the least of which is to allow women to leave abusive relationships (just for example), and not getting married has a place, too. There are less tangible benefits to encouraging specifically women to date, have successful careers, and to see the merit in staying single. It’s becoming more and more socially acceptable to avoid marriage, and it’s becoming more commonplace as well.

But I wanted to get married, and I’ve never regretted doing so.

And although I didn’t dream of my wedding as a little girl, I do sometimes now daydream about dancing with him in my wedding gown — and that smile on his face of pure, delirious joy — when I’m feeling stuck in the trenches with dirty diapers and temper tantrums — my own and our kids’ — and I miss that rather naive girl who met him all those years ago.

I’m relieved we had to wade through our hardest years together after we got married, because we couldn’t just break up and move on and grow apart.

I’m thankful for something that others might see as just a piece of paper, but that I see as the best decision I’ve ever made in my life.

The post This Is Why I Got Married. first appeared on Jennifer S. White.

Marriage these days is a much discussed tradition.

There are those who prefer to not partake in it, although this doesn’t necessarily mean not co-existing in a life-long relationship. There are those, too, who have fought for their rights just to get married in the first place. Then there are those, like me.

I never dreamt about my wedding dress, or had the whole thing planned out.

I was never the girl who, at 14, knew what color her bridesmaids would wear; the age I was when I met the man I would date for over 10 years and eventually marry. (Not that there is anything problematic about having these sort of well-laid plans.)

I did always know I wanted to get married. Specifically, I always knew I wanted to marry him.

And yet cross-country moves for graduate school, traveling for work, and children are all typical life experiences that have challenged our union.

Marriage truly is not always easy, even if it is always something I feel fortunate to share with this man I chose.

Recently, our children are the most joyous aspect of our life, but, alternately, we are not one of those couples who only have their kids in common.

We both love to nerdily talk science, to taste hoppy beers, to backpack for days in the middle of nowhere, to make and eat good food, to exercise, to laugh (and, thankfully, we have the same zesty sense of humor). I could go on and on about what we share, besides our children and marriage certificate.

More, we are in love.

Every day, I fall more in love with this man.

He is not a stranger that I love but am not in love with. Rather, he still makes my heart pitter-patter when I see his name come up on my cell phone, as he calls from work; I still look at him and think he’s the most handsome man I’ve ever seen, and then I trace my favorite features of his along the lines of my children’s faces.

I’m grateful for still feeling in love.

This all said, our children are the most joyous things in our lives, but, equally, they’re a daily hurdle for our real-life romance.

So I proposed what I decided to call The Kissing Experiment. It worked.

In less than 24 hours, our romance was so charged, that I felt a giddiness in the pit of my belly equivalent to either our younger years of courtship—when alone time was neither rare or as deeply coveted—or to those periods of our lives when love is sparked and fueled by a special event—like, for us, our wedding day or when we found out we were pregnant with our children.

Love is funny. Everyone wants it, but often we forget that it takes work, especially after kids.

Romance and maintaining a connection with our spouses and staying “in love” are not things that just spontaneously combust. Instead, they’re aspects of life that, much like that cliched fire, stay lit because we’ve stoked it attentively.

The Kissing Experiment was not well thought out, well planned or difficult. The concept was, intentionally, simple.

I’d felt us fighting over those little nothings lately—the types of fights that happen as people potentially grow apart, symbolic of larger concerns because no one honestly cares, for instance, if the wet towel is left lying on the carpet for a few minutes after a shower rather than immediately hung up.

We couldn’t reconnect in the ways that couples more typically maintain that spark—that closeness of impromptu intimacy; the tenderness of weekends in bed; the silliness of lingerie at 2 in the afternoon or random appetizers eaten out—the kinds of things that are not for people with kids under age 5.

I proposed kissing. Not even make-out level kissing. The kind of kissing you can do in front of kids.

Kissing is so intimate a gesture, but it’s so easily thrown to the wayside in between dirty diaper piles and crying dinner companions.

At first our kisses were fast and almost forced.

Then it grew to kissing more passionately in the kitchen while the girls were in the adjoining family room.

It led—in 24 hours—to us covertly giggling together instead of unnecessarily snapping at one another.

Adorably, my daughter’s dolls started pecking each other and saying hi.

This is something she started playing years ago, but I hadn’t realized she’d nearly completely stopped in recent weeks until her dolls started to give quick “Oh, hi’s!” and “muah’s” to one another all over again.

Our love felt deliriously rejuventated—the intended hope of this “experiment.” What was unexpected, however, was the positive effects I’ve already observed in my children.

Kids need to see their parents love each other. Kids need to see the positive parts of when two people do choose to marry and stay married and stay married and stay married. That’s sometimes what we do, in marriages: we stay married when it’s not easy, but we know we still love our partner and that “this too shall pass.” More than this, I want my kids to see what love, regardless of label, looks like.

Love should look like stolen kisses while making dinner.

Love should look like holding hands when walking into the grocery store.

Simultaneously, love should look like fights that we courageously recover from.

Love should be multi-faceted and complex, easy and challenging, special and unique—all the the things that people are too.

The post The Kissing Experiment. first appeared on Jennifer S. White.

Attending to my children’s needs means, sometimes, choosing between their needs and my own.

As a mother, this is often the most difficult place to be.

At night, I want to cuddle into my husband and be there in that space with him completely, but I’m watching one kid on the baby monitor and, equally, am always aware that another, older child is sleeping soundly too. In other words, my kids are always on my mind.

To be fair, I’m the sort of person who has a busy mind. (Actually, the reason I practice yoga is not because it comes easily to me to be mindful and to stay present within my life, but because it doesn’t—so I know I must need the practice.)

My husband, however, has a much easier time of placing his attention on the task at hand, be it parenting when the kids are up and alert or, alternately, paying attention to me in that twilight of the evening, and the only couple hours that we currently have alone in our life.

There’s an active debate these days, over putting your children or your spouse first. Let me declare boldly that I loathe this debate.

Again, as a mother, we are already all too eagerly put into difficult positions, and intricate dance routines of “wearing our own air masks” and, well you know, being good mamas, and now I’m supposed to also have to choose between the man I love and my kids? Let me tell you who will win every time, and it probably won’t, unfortunately, make me popular.

My kids. Spoiler alert—my kids will win every time.

This doesn’t mean that I don’t hold my marriage high up in my heart, or that my husband is any less important to me than the day we said our “I do’s,” but what it does mean is that, in choosing to have children with him, I make them my priority.

If this contemporary notion that our kids will one day thank us for placing them beneath our need for coupledom is true, then my kids will be disappointed.

Because I am consciously choosing to love their dad, but to be as OK as possible with the reality that our evenings out and our passionate make-out sessions and our fill-in-the-blank, single couple needs are temporarily on hold.

My husband told me that he wouldn’t want to be married to anyone who would place him above his children. He values the way that I want to be there for our kids.

While this doesn’t mean that either of us judge parents who have date nights and a handful of babysitters to choose from—and if there is any judgment it’s only slight envy—this does mean that I have accepted that with two children under 5 years old, my “date nights” are often going to involve cranky dining companions and food splatters on my dress.

I took my children to a wedding recently and was surprised when another guest displayed disapproval. Although my kids were fully welcomed, and just as invited by my friend getting married as she was, I, apparently, should have chosen the babysitter option and declined their “kid menu” invite. I did not.

Instead, I relished that my kids were invited. I adored buying my daughters new dresses when I wore one already hanging in my closet. One of my favorite things about my childhood was dancing with my dad at his cousins’ weddings and, these days, I both live nowhere near family and, perhaps more importantly, haven’t been invited to weddings lately where kids are welcomed so readily.

We had a blast. All four of us had a wonderful evening.

My girls were both so well behaved and we even made it beyond my goal, which was to make it to one song on the dance floor before they crashed. The baby might have been asleep on my shoulder, but my husband, my 5-year-old and I all danced our behinds off on the wooden parquet floor before calling it a much later night than is typical.

Would I have loved to slow dance all night with my lover? Absofuckinglutely.

Would I have left my kids home if their grandparents lived closer to watch them? I’ll be honest—maybe.

But I’ll answer one thing with total certainty: that night was memorable for all four of us, and anyone who wasted their breath wondering if my kids wouldn’t behave or would be burdensome to me can go ahead and exhale.

I love being a mom.

Although I experience more frustration and worry and difficulty in this relationship than I ever have before, including my over 21-year relationship with my partner, I experience, too, more love and affection than I thought possible.

There’s nearly no greater feeling in the world than watching my social-butterfly 5-year-old experience her girlish dream of dancing at a lavish party in her chosen-by-her yellow dress—and dancing so little-kid vivaciously that I’m glad I put bicycle shorts on underneath it.

My kids will grow up and they may or may not thank me for putting my relationship with their dad at a very close second to their own upbringing. None of us can properly predict how our kids will view us as they age, although, surely, we can speculate.

So I’m doing what feels right to me—I do what feels right for my husband and myself, because we are parenting these two tiny people together.

What feels right is making sure that both mine and my husband’s separate and together needs are met, while recognizing that my girls only have one childhood, and that this is it—and I want to be there for it.

The post Why I Choose My Kids over My Husband. first appeared on Jennifer S. White.

I took my husband’s last name at the age of 25.

We’d already been together for over a decade, and I’d imagined over and over again what this would feel like.

My maiden name was a glorious one—a much better pen name actually—but it didn’t mesh well with his. At all. (My maiden name is Friend.)

No one told me that it would be hard to say goodbye to my old last name. No one shared with me that a mini death was taking place as I changed everything over legally.

But, despite having a hard time letting go, I would again take his last name in a heartbeat.

I personally think hyphenated names are ideal, although, for me, this didn’t seem a plausible option, given the, frankly, less-than-exciting combination of our two “word” surnames.

Instead, I chose to bury “Friend” and embrace being a “White.”

Yet, in this contemporary moment of feminism—where, thankfully, women who claim to not be one are called out for their absurdity—I’ve never felt more judged for sharing my husband’s last name.

I’m not judged on a daily basis or even by most people, but, specifically as a writer and a feminist, it’s almost like I’m supposed to apologize for my choice. I do not apologize.

I also don’t apologize for staying home with my kids, and I know full well that I work full-time too—just inside my home. I don’t apologize, either, for sharing my last name with my husband and our daughters. Ironically, I could care less if a woman does or doesn’t keep her original last name upon marriage, or if she works outside or inside her home. Instead, I support her ability to choose.

Staying home is not an option for every woman. Another aspect of modern womanhood is the simple reality that many have to work to feed and clothe our children. (My mother worked more than full-time as a teacher.)

What I have difficulty understanding, and even less capability embracing, is how women want to place themselves into separate, opposing camps from one another, instead of unifying and collectively embracing that “woman” encompasses a whole hell of a lot of ground.

Anytime a group, especially a minority group, pits themselves against each other there is only one group that wins, and it’s not “us.”

We should not be concerned over working mom or stay-at-home mom, or married or single or Mrs. White or Ms. Friend—at least not to the deficit of promoting a woman’s right to live within her personal choices.

What should overwhelmingly concern us most is that I don’t expect to be exactly like another person because we’re both women, but, regardless, there’s a shared kindred knowledge of what still needs to be done in order to best lead my own two daughters into a greater space of equality; into a better world.

So take your husband’s last name or leave it—I could care less.

I would, as already professed, take my husband’s last name time and time again because I like sharing my name with him, but don’t for one second falsely think this makes me less independent or less or more of anything. These, like my last name, are only labels that don’t properly contain or display my worth.

The post I Took My Husband’s Last Name and I Would Do It Again. first appeared on Jennifer S. White.

The sky outside the window where I sit sipping white wine and typing looks apathetic.

The outline of the trees is surrounded by a boring shade of white-grey instead of bright blue or a stack of neon as the sun tilts down the Western skyline.

I can imagine the fuchsia and fluorescent orange of the sky as we used to sit on the top of our favorite mountain in New Mexico when we were in college.

We backpacked up with plastic wine glasses that had stems that unscrewed and then folded neatly into teeny tiny little domes, next to two bottles of white wine and a few other things we had decided upon for dinner fare.

I can still feel my pounding heart and heavy legs as we hiked the last switchback to the top—the one that every single time I felt I could not get past.

But I always did—we always did.

My skin would later grow cold and clammy as the salty sweat evaporated; as the sun set lower, and the sky bruised purple and shades of citrus fruit. You would slowly and carefully unpack our dinner and camping gear, and I would act as your sous chef for all of it.

We would rip off hunks of food and talk. You would tell me your dreams. They usually involved something academic, which wasn’t shocking since we sat on that mountaintop primarily because you were getting your first Master’s degree at the school in the valley beneath it.

They also involved things that we would do together; landscapes that we would see; children we would meet—and, even though you knew that you wanted to thrive as a thinker and an athlete, the dream you wanted most was a family, with me.

I’m able to write this now because I have a rare moment alone. You fell asleep putting our oldest child to bed.

I tip-toed in to check on your progress as you read with her, and saw you both on your backs in an eerily similar position, sound asleep. Our youngest daughter was already asleep on my own shoulder after nursing. I decided quickly to close the door upon your supine figures and place the baby gently in her crib. I’m now looking at her on the monitor, where she’s resting in a strangely similar position to the one I hope to be in shortly.

And we got our wish.

We have two beautiful, kind-hearted, wild children. Sometimes, though, I wonder what happened to those two kids who sat on that moonlit mountain peak.

They’re still here—I’m positive of that.

They show up randomly, like when we crack horribly inappropriate jokes and when we kiss covertly as we cube zucchini in the kitchen.

They tickle my heart as I dream, and they still like riding with the moon roof wide open and the music spilling out the windows behind them and onto the hilly, country road.

They still like drinking wine underneath a starlit sky.

We sat on the front porch of our new house last weekend and I was surprised at the view of the stars.

I sat in the white rocking chair, in awe of the constellations for which I had no personal knowledge of a name—I sat in awe of the man who sat next to me, tracing my thumb with his fingertips, telling me about his too muddy bike ride on the trail that he currently rides, and of how much I love him but often cannot easily show.

Love is funny when you have children.

Everyone thinks that their love will be different and I often hope for them that they might be right. More often than not, however, we equally struggle to maintain a connection that exists beyond poopy diapers, car seats and school.

Romance is stolen kisses after bedtime instead of obvious weekend romps. It’s a favorite cut of meat picked up at the grocery store for the grill. It’s a slightly hurried kiss good-bye in between breastfeeding and child school drop-off. It’s work—and it’s worth it.

But sometimes it feels like work and not love.

Sometimes it feels unappreciated.

Yet the thing about marriage is that it does take work. Romance—that’s the easy part. Love—that’s fairly easy too. But loving someone day in and day out, with annoying personal habits and work and kids and life—that’s the kind of thing that can get old, fast.

But it doesn’t get old, with you.

We sat underneath stars on red-colored rocks on a mountaintop in New Mexico. Now we sit underneath these same stars in matching rockers on a porch in the state where we grew up, together.

We used to lie on a blanket in my parents’ front yard gazing up when we were teenagers—our location seems to change, but, somehow, the stars and our own hearts remain constant.

My rapidly typing fingers slow and slow and slow, and I stop writing (because the baby begins to wake—I can see her on the monitor sitting up and whimpering). I leave you to hold onto our daughter as she dreams.

I quickly undress and grab the baby and get into bed to nurse her back to sleep. I notice that the light has completely changed colors outside of the bedroom window, where I lie.

It isn’t apathetic anymore.

It’s not black and dark out yet, but it isn’t really light any longer either.

Instead, it’s ready to close upon one full day while not quite ready to contemplate a new one—that crisp part of the night when it could be easy to pour another glass of wine and stay up talking for several more hours rather than go to bed.

I’m happy to go to bed, but I wish it was with you.

Loving you never gets old. It changes. It evolves. Sometimes it’s more routine and work than romance and love, but that’s part of what I want. Because it’s true that nothing worthwhile comes easily. It’s true that love should feel natural, but it’s even more true that it requires a few trickles of blood—and salty sweat and tears.

I take off my glasses and set them on the nightstand. I roll to my left side and wonder what I’ll dream of.

The sky is now black. I force my eyes to shut; knowing in my heart that the struggles we currently experience are fleeting—just like your thesis and that last sweaty switchback up to where we’d always put our tent.

It dawns on me—on that contemplative space behind my closed eyelids—that the white-grey sky wasn’t boring or apathetic, but quiet and serene.

Love isn’t always fuschia sunsets.

We want to be exposed to the quickly beating hearts, but hop over the tiring switchbacks that make them pump.

The best part of backpacking with you was that our hearts would labor together. Salty sweat would drip down both of our foreheads, and then simultaneously, similarly we would share the space afterward when everything was calm again.

And right now might be pureeing apples for the baby and shuttling another kid to school, and tag-teaming so that we can both get workouts in that day, but I wouldn’t want to live my life with anyone else and I wouldn’t want my life to be any different.

I love you fuschia.

I love you florescent orange, neon blue and shades of purple and grey.

I love you evening luminaries. I love you mornings when the sky decides to dump rain.

And I know that when the stars are covered up with clouds, that they’re still there, shining brightly and beautifully—it’s just that they’re temporarily hidden from our view.

And I’m okay with that—it’s not that I’m apathetic.

I’m just alright with the white-grey, sunset heartbeats in between the neon fuchsia passion.

Photos: Author’s own; Flickr/Simon Greening.

The post A Fuchsia Love Story. first appeared on Jennifer S. White.

I was reading to my daughter in bed last night.

Looking out the window, the green of the trees contrasted the grey sky, seeming ethereal.

The yellow walls were both cheerful and soothing.

I could have stayed there—next to her—forever, if I couldn’t also hear the baby cry, and if it wasn’t my tenth wedding anniversary, with waiting wine and husband.

I turned to see her still, sleeping face, after I realized that I was the only one who listened to the end of the story and, in that instant, I felt my life slipping by—those kinds of moments that you know you’ll (hopefully) think of at age 90 and wonder where the years went so quickly.

After an evening that included celebrating a decade of married love and the two sleeping children that eventually came along with it, and once in my own bed, underneath silky covers, gazing now at a much darker landscape, I didn’t sleep well—I didn’t want to miss anything.

And this morning, the green trees and the grey sky have a similar visual appearance, but my eyes aren’t seeing them the same way.

Today it looks peaceful, but sad too—but I don’t want to be sad.

So I squeeze my kids, and nurse, and play with the baby and my oldest before she has to go to school, and I know that life does go too fast, but I’m thankful for every ounce of it along the way.

I’m grateful for coffee-with-sunrise grey mornings, when the world could be groggy and tired, but instead finds never-ending pools of energy inside the smile lines of four year olds and the crowning awareness of the life that still lies ahead, among grey skies and bewitchingly green trees.

Photos: Flickr/Volcanic Sunrise; Author’s own.

The post A Morning Prayer of Gratitude. first appeared on Jennifer S. White.

Author’s note: this article is a little bit old and I can’t wait to begin dating him again soon.

I spent my day nervously picking out clothes and thinking about how I should do my make-up.

I was going on a date—and not just with anyone—but with him.

I’d been eyeing this guy for awhile, and I was pretty sure that the feeling was mutual—well, I hope it is, because he’s my husband.

Yes, I went on a date with my husband and, yes, it was a big deal.

If you’re a couple that goes out regularly, then congrats, I hope to soon join your ranks. However, my husband and I have been caught up in career changes, babyhood needs and stress—I guess some call it life.

The thing is, it’s difficult to transition from mommyland into adult world—you know, where the big kids play. It’s important to do this, though, because all women need to feel admired, special and, yep, sexy.

So we went out.

And not just to anywhere, but to the fancy schmancy (okay, not really, more trendy yet cozy) wine bar that I’d wanted to take him to for (cough, cough) months.

I seriously did spend my morning feeling more like an excited teenager than the mom of an inquisitive toddler. (Quite literally, I went shopping at my local mall.)

I wanted to wear something fun and sassy—something that represents the woman hidden underneath the food stains and frazzled facial expression. I think I succeeded.

Without further ado, here are five things that I learned from dating my husband.

1. We like each other.

My husband and I have always fought more when we don’t spend enough time together. I’m perfectly aware that not all couples are like this, that some see each other practically minimally and do fantastically well—but I can’t relate, so here’s my story.

I think that people grow apart because they—gasp!—aren’t spending enough time together; doing things like remembering why they became a couple in the first place. Here’s another thing that I suggest to you: if you find yourself frequently fighting with your significant other and having difficulty just generally getting along, then make sure you’re looking in the mirror as much as you’re pointing your finger.

It takes two to tango, and it takes two to fight—and in our case, it takes two people spending some quality time together to have a solidly built relationship on which to base our family.

When we sat down and looked at the menu, we got to talking about our tastes in wine and food as we scoped our options, and our conversation came easily—because I still like him. Good to know.

2. I like looking hot.

Okay, so I told you that I went shopping, but I didn’t tell you that it was for a little sweater cover-up to go with the extremely short skirt and thin, small top he’d surprised me with a couple days before. (I’ve told you before that I’m lucky to have a man with good taste who enjoys treating me.) Of course, I was going to return them. I told him that I’m too old.

“For Godsakes, I have to bend over to strap my daughter into her carseat,” or something like that. He looked affronted and surprised as I stood in front of him in the outfit that he’d so lovingly, and wisely, chosen while I critiqued him, and the clothes. He said they looked great on me.

Needless to say, I kept them, and I rocked them and I loved every second of it—because everyone (and I mean everyone) needs to feel sexy sometimes.

3. Time flies when you’re having fun.

I didn’t bring a purse; I gave my husband my I.D. (because I’m not too old after all) and some chapstick (yep, that’s how I roll) to put into his pocket for me. Anyways, without my phone or a watch I sat there thinking, at one point, admittedly, that our allotted date time would not be necessary. Of course, we’d easily be home by the time that I had told our daughter’s beloved sitter and then it was nearly time to go home, just like that.

There were absolutely times that I missed my little girl, but there was not one moment that I wished I was somewhere else.

We get so caught up in life and in responsibility, especially as young parents, that we forget that we’re supposed to be having fun too. You know, enjoying the journey and the process, and all that, yet it’s true. Don’t forget to add “love and enjoy the partner who I chose to share my life with” to your check list for the day.

4. Conversations change.

Alright, it’s absolutely true that I was admiring my husband in his fitted t-shirt and that time flew like I didn’t think was possible, but the joke that your conversations change after you have kids can’t be denied. I think if you’re able to discuss the size, color and shape of your child’s poo during appetizers, that there’s no pretending that you’ve just met (at least I hope not) and that’s okay. Isn’t that why everyone wants to have a partner anyway? Not to talk about bathrooms or toilets, but to have someone that you’re comfortable with, who knows your routines—who knows you.

So, yeah, conversations change, but that wasn’t a negative discovery for me.

5. We need to do this more often.

We all say this, “Oh, sure, let’s do this again soon!” (Phony laugh, phony laugh.) I know I’m guilty. My husband and I know that we need to escape together more often, and not just for us, but for our daughter too. Children need happy parents. Children need role models in love. Kids need to be shown how to fight, and then how to make up. They need to know that their parents like each other, if they’re growing up in a double household, that is.

As my husband and I got up from our small wooden table at the wine bar, my legs had that suction-cup action happening from my chair because we’d sat and talked for so long (and because I was wearing a super short skirt), and as we walked out the door I clasped my husband’s hand, knowing that we’d be back soon. Because we do need to do this more often.

As it turns out, neither of us could easily end our date—both of us had a hard time realizing that our window of opportunity was seemingly over as soon as it had begun.

There’s no doubt that we couldn’t wait to see our tiny lady’s always smiling face, but we decided to make a quick stop at our favorite healthfood store for some treats for later, or perhaps it was simply to buy ourselves a little time. (I mean, we had skipped dessert.)

When we were finally cruising up the steep hill to our house, my husband looked at me and said that our daughter was going to be royally upset.

“Why?” I asked, flustered and concerned.

“Because we’re already home.”

“You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.”

~ Kahlil Gibran

Photo: we are the world/Flickr.

This article was first published by elephant journal.

The post 5 Things I Learned from Dating My Husband. first appeared on Jennifer S. White.