Living with a partner

Something recently caused me to think about the challenges involved in sharing my life with a partner. I started dating Cathy in the summer of '94 and she moved into my house about a year later. We got married in spring of '97 and we're still living together, so it obviously worked out. But that doesn't mean there weren't road-bumps.

Before we were together, I didn't sort my laundry by color. When we started doing combined laundry (not that you'd have to), keeping her whites white was important to her, so we set up two hampers and sorted. It seemed silly to me at the time but seems normal now. And my whites were all dingy grey.

She wasn't much of a pet person while I kept fish, cats, and rats. She loved them all, but it took some learning. And I kind of let the cat litter wander farther from the catbox than she liked, so sweeping that up more frequently became a regular chore...no big deal.

One issue that was a little bit more involved is that I was vegetarian and she was omnivore. So we had to come up with "rules" that suited us both. And there was some give and take on both our parts. She kept cold cuts in the fridge and only cooked meat when I was away -- mostly for special occasions with friends. And a couple years later, she gave that up and now just occasionally eats fish at a restaurant. But that was her choice, even if I'm glad. :-)

I liked to periodically move all the furniture around -- just to change up the rooms and she liked to optimize where everything is and then that's where it stays. Except for my office where I'm free, I basically caved on that one.  

I'm an early-bird and she maintains a more normal schedule. My natural sleep cycle puts me in bed from 7:00 PM to 2:00 AM. Her natural sleep time is more like 11:00 PM to 7:00 AM. We could have different schedules while sharing a bed, or different beds, or even rooms. But we wanted to share a bed time. So we go to bed around 8:30 and read to each other, talk about the day, cuddle, etc. Then she stays up reading after I fall asleep and when I wake up at three, I sneak out and let her finish up.

All of these things take a little compromise, but none of them were really too hard because we wanted to make them work. I'm sure there are a million other things that aren't coming to mind, but we must have got through them when they came up.

Have you faced any interesting challenges in living with someone new?

I met my partner in college after coming back from a thanksgiving break and she was seated with my friend group at the time. We were fresh out of college, moved into my childhood home, and I landed a job to support the household while she went and continued her studies.

I want to echo Christopher where finding compromise was the ticket. Not all folks are going to be willing to compromise on everything, but keeping an open mind and trying things can lead to pleasant outcomes.

I wouldn't call myself a slob, but my tolerance for dirt and disfunction was much higher than hers. For example, I'm hit or miss if I made my bed in the morning but she was consistent and never had a wrinkle. If the blankets landed sorta oriented right I would be happy. I don't mind making the bed, but I just never particularly valued the practice.

I have to admit now... its nice getting into a made bed after a long day! I might not get to it every time, and sometimes make the bed together, but I don't mind making the small extra effort to see her happy!

Heck, she agreed to getting chickens if I took care of them and now she is more of a chicken lover than I am!

Folks can be different, but can find common ground especially when you care about each other.

It was oddly easy for my husband and I to move in together when we got married.  The only thing that was hard was learning to share the bed with another, someone else turning over, things like that.  So we practiced that one or two nights a week when he would come up to visit on his days off, so I could get used to it.  It took about eight months of that to get used to it, and that was around when we got married.  And it took a couple more months of doing that every night until I started to really like the snuggling and closeness.

I think today we just have this misguided idea that if we don't like this trait about our significant other, then they can be swapped for another, and we will be happy. But that is not really the case. We really just end up bringing in new differences with the new relationship. Sure they do not seem to matter in the midst of the new found love, but we all have flaws, and soon they will be noted by each.

It is not always easy to remember, but there were commonalities you shared when you first got together, most likely similar hopes, dreams and an envisioned future. When people lose sight of that they often split up. The sad part is, we as humans like to point to someone else and say, "you need to change". It is probably one of the most arrogant things we can say though!

Here is a reverse thought on that... what if WE changed so that we deserved to be loved by our spouse/partner instead?

Here are two ways we can actually accomplish that. Total Honesty. It will absolutely change your life. That does not mean you say things so brutally honest you are a total ass or bitch, but by nixing the white lies, fibs and justifying outright lies, it will transform your relationship. And total honesty can be said in tactful ways.

The other? Understanding opportunity costs. In permiculture it might mean, if you buy this acreage, then if that acreage over there becomes available, you can't buy it because your here. It is the same with a relationship, as a married man, marriage is my opportunity cost in life. Even if I am to meet someone I think might be ideal for me, I have vowed to my wife to be committed to her. So this becomes more of a dual-warning. First, chose wisely before you get into a committed relationship, but if you are in one, to stay committed because it will be better in the long run emotional and financially. As I said before, others may seem appealing, but like your current love, they will have flaws that will grate on you like nails on a chalkboard eventually.

So test me on this!

1. See if total honesty transforms your relationship.
2. Figure your flaws out and figure a way to mitigate them so you deserve to be absolutely loved by the one you are with.
3. Value commitment, either in waiting for the ideal mate to come along, or be committed to the one you committed too.

So I will make a candid admission right from the start that sounds absolutely terrible without the right context—my wife and I don’t really remember exactly when we first met.  And no, we did not know each other from childhood, nor was alcohol involved.  My wife was my little sister’s college roommate.  At some point we met, but it is hard for us to put an exact figure on the date.  And no, this was not love at first sight either.  In fact, my sister tried desperately to play matchmaker between us and each time we just kinda looked at each other with a vaguely disappointing glance and said “no.”  But at my sister’s wedding, I was a groomsman and my wife a bridesmaid.  My (to be) wife walked up behind me when I was sitting bored in the back of the church during rehearsal when she put her hand on my shoulder and said “Hi Eric.”  That was when I fell in love, but I was so struck that I didn’t know what was happening.  We danced the night away at the reception (I don’t dance and my sister by this point was trying to set my wife up with another groomsman so she was pretty shocked!).  Three years later we married and we moved into a brand new house that we bought together.

Generally, living together was extremely easy for us.  And this is notable as our entire courtship hand been long-distance, separated by about 300 miles (Chicago to Carbondale IL is about a 5.5 hour drive and a bit over 300 miles).  So actually living together in the same area code was wonderful!  But it was probably easier for me for the following reasons:

#1. As I did most of the driving, I no longer had to drive the 5.5 hours on Fridays to reach my girlfriend/fiance/wife.

#2. My wife moved to my area of the state where I was already well established and fully familiar with the area and climate.  It took my wife time to get accustomed to Southern Illinois summers and the lack of snow in the winter.

#3. My wife is FAR more tidy than I am and therefore she cleans much more frequently than I do—I just don’t see the mess that she sees.

Aside from those issues, actually living together was extremely easy and even among the most natural things that I/we have ever done.

Eric

I have learned that if something isn't working, and continues with a poor outcome each time, you have to look at what you're doing and change that. Like a tango, there are two. If you want to change an outcome, you have to look at yourself.

The other thing is patience: reining in frustration over small differences allows for the kind of compromises I see in so many positive remarks above. It's nice to see happy couples.

These days so many people have been conditioned to upgrade: a mobile phone every few years once the upgrades aren't supported, or it costs too much to change the broken screen. I've met people who do this with their partners: they seem to always be on the lookout for the next upgrade. I don't know, maybe it's simply approval addiction, but the upgrade attitude doesn't make for couples success.