The 8th Stage of Marriage | By: Jeanette Martinek
- greatmarriages
- Jun 6, 2014
- 2 min read
Walking down the hallway of the Great Marriages Office, one is immediately inundated with professional photos. These are beautiful couples: couples hugging, couples kissing, couples floating through rose petals, couples glossy and dewy eyed. These couples are framed and displayed gleefully and innocently entering the First Stage of Marriage. However, inadvertently missing are photos of the other stages of marriage. ( See The 7 Stages of Marriage , Harrar and DeMaria, 2007, part of The Great Marriage’s Library.) No one wants to frame the day the couple realized that the honeymoon was over, the day the couple had an argument that shook the marriage like an earthquake down to its foundation, the day a partner was laid off or received a devastating medical diagnosis. Yet, those days and pictures are secretly framed and displayed in the hearts and minds of each spouse. It is easy to tell who has a secret scrapbook when attending a wedding. Those guests wipe away tears in their eyes and gulp hard as vows are stated and rings are exchanged.
This blog is about that secret scrapbook, yours and mine. It is the wall on which to post and frame not only the pictures of which there will be few if any, but also the stories that will probably never make a Hallmark card or a Harlequin Romance Series. They are real and they are the kind of love that can’t be pitched with a slogan by an advertising agency ‘cause nobody would buy it, unglamorous, unmentionable but also unforgettable. These are the stories that answer the question, “Why would anybody get married?” In fact, let’s start there. Post an answer to that question. Feel free to share your thoughts, pictures or stories as well.
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