What I Learned After 1 Year of Marriage

Tracey Jazmin Photography

Can you believe it's July already? Time has flown by so, so quickly! Ricardo and I have been married for just over a year and I've been waiting quite a while to share this post with you.

I've been writing down little tid-bits since about our fifth month of marriage, so I wouldn't forget what to say. Honestly, so many things have run through my mind since then that I haven't always written down, so I hope I do this justice.

I'm so excited to share these thoughts with you, because I think it's important that we hear and learn from others' experiences. More people should write down or share their thoughts after 1, 5, 24, 58 years of marriage! There will always be someone who can benefit.

Enough blab, let's get started!

Hold the Drama

Let's get something out of the way right now. The biggest, most significant thing that I have learned from the first year of marriage is...drumroll please....it's not that bad. 

Are you shocked? Bewildered? Spit your drink? 

When I say everyone, I mean EVERYONE said that the first year of marriage is the worst, it's so hard, you're going to fight all the time and you're going to hate each other. 

Now, for someone who grew up with their parents fighting and who HATES conflict, this was a serious concern. Ricardo and I's relationship up to that point had very minimal arguments, laughter and was full of companionship. Ricardo was my best friend. 

And then we got married. Actually, let me backtrack a little. A week or two before the wedding I remember bawling to him because people had made me SO scared of marriage...especially the first year. I remember tears just streaming down my face and me telling him I didn't want to hate him. I loved him, and I didn't want our relationship to change.

Well, they lied. Or, at least it wasn't the case for us. Ricardo and I spent nearly every waking moment together in our dating relationship, and when we got married and moved in with each other for the first time, I was expecting mass change and disruption in our relationship. Guess what? There wasn't. 

Now don't get me wrong, you never know what it's like to live with someone until you do, but in my experience, the way people talked about the first year of marriage is horrendous compared to what it actually was like. We had so much fun, we had lots of firsts and we made incredible memories. We barely fought, just bickered about little things at times. We adapted...and you will too. 

Getting Over Yourself

Now that I've iterated that the first year of marriage didn't blow Ricardo and I to smithereens, I do want to share what did change.

My mind.

The biggest thing that you will need to adapt to is your mindset about life, more specifically your new one. I remember when we were driving back to our new house after our honeymoon (Bermuda, we love you!). We were literally two streets away when I burst into tears (lol, I see a theme forming, I promise I'm not a crybaby) because I was scared of being a wife. Ricardo was flabbergasted, as most new husbands (and men) are after going on holiday and having a great time. 

You see, this was my first time living without my parents, without school to structure me, without the structure of my household. After the honeymoon, it just hit me that this is my life now and I need to be responsible. I need to grow up and do chores when no one told me to, pay for the things I use and care for another human being as myself. 

As women, these things tend to hit us in these epiphany moments. We are usually far more introspective and recognize the emotional impact of change (hence, the crying). 

The second biggest thing I learned in one year of marriage is that the biggest adaptation you will go through is your mindset. 

Change is scary. Change is unknown. Change is inevitable. 

But you can do it. Understand that it will take a few months to adjust to your life being different, as well as processing the emotions that come with it. Once you get past the fear in your mind, everything else is just routine. Sounds a bit unromantic, but I promise you it's better than being scared of the change itself.

What You See is What You Get

Now,  I can't move on without saying a little something something to my girls who are still in the dating stage of their relationship. 

Girl, honey, sweetie. If you don't pay attention to anything else in this post, listen to me right now.

Your man is not going to be a different man just because you put a ring on it.

I'll say it again for the people in the back:

Yo mans is not gonna be a different mans just because you put a ring on it. 

What you see is what you get. 

How your relationship was before marriage is how it will be after marriage. If you are fighting constantly now, you better believe you will be fighting MORE after you get married. If you don't trust him now, you will not magically trust him just because he said I do. 

Do not marry someone under the guise of them changing or things getting better after marriage. A commitment like this is work and is not without its challenges. Do not be fooled.

Gourmet Meals for One become Cheap Meal for Two

If you know me, you know ya girl likes food. Give me pho, give me pasta, give me all the carbs. I'm here for it. 

You can imagine how this one blew my mind. Going out for a standard/cheap $20 meal instantly becomes $40, more like $50 with tax + tip. I wasn't ready.

I can be kind of stingy with money in the sense that I hate to see it go (don't we all?). Seeing how one little dinky meal could easily cost me $50 just opened my eyes to how expensive taking care of two people is. 

Just yesterday we were out of town and stopped by McDonald's at 11:45PM to grab a quick bite, and two McChicken meals (read: crappy food) cost us over $20. That ain't right!!

Perhaps I'm being a little dramatic, but the point here is that you're going to have to confront your relationship with money. Everything you could ever get besides maybe feminine products is doubled. And things add up quickly. You won't believe how expensive living the life your parents gave you is and a lot of us have to confront the fact that we won't be living like that for a while. That's another hard thing about getting married and moving out for the first time, but I'll leave that thought for another day.

Basically, if you are moving out of your parents home into your marital home, you will not be ready for just how expensive it is. Just accept it. Also prepare to stop ignoring how you spend money and become accountable to it. It's a relationship that must be worked on and cared for, just like your marriage relationship.

You Will Discover You

If you've been reading my blog posts for a while, this thought will not be new to you. I've written a whole blog post about it (What Love Did to Me). You will learn things about yourself that you did not know. Most of them bad. LOL

Ok, ok. I'm being dramatic again, but seriously, it's bad. You will be forced to confront your selfishness, your bad habits, your insecurities and self doubts. If you're reading books and watching videos about self-discovery, I have a surefire solution for you... get married. You'll learn you're not as cute as you thought. (Totally kidding about getting married for self-discovery purposes). 

You are more than just the excuses and rationalizations that you have in your head about your habits. You are those habits. Your spouse WILL point these out to you, or you will see them in yourself based on how strong your partner is in the areas you are weak. 

I've said it before and I'll say it again. I truly believe that God uses marriage to mold us into the better, stronger people that He wants us to be. I can't wait to see what kind of woman I will be once we've been married for 50 years. I'll be pretty great! 

Seriously though, it's pivotal to understand that this first year of marriage is a lot of self-learning and development. What's important is what you do with it. Choose to accept your faults and change them, for yourself but also in an act of love for your spouse. 

Things Will Calm Down

One year of marriage is no time at all. I feel like we've been married forever but at the same time it went by SO quickly. 

The adrenaline that courses through your veins from engagement to wedding day is powerful. So powerful that it probably won't start to chill out until months after marriage. True, you're exhausted, but now you're doing all kinds of things with your husband that are 'firsts' that keep things exciting. Trips, home decor, community/church involvement, whatever it is, you will find that things are different after marriage. Other people respect you and your relationship more, you are free to do as you please and are able to place more boundaries in different areas of your life. 

Things will really start to settle around the 8 month mark. You and hubby have got a routine down, each person knows what they do and when they do it. You have adapted to personality differences (hello introvert/extrovert relationship?!) and overall have synced together as a unit. 

This can be a bit disheartening if you're someone who loves the excitement and the buzz of a new relationship. Or if you're a romantic like me who notices he hasn't randomly caught you into his embrace and told you he's profoundly in love with you in a while (read: husband is not rom-com). 

You've misunderstood me if you're thinking that marriage is dead after the first year. It has simply levelled out just as it should. People who live on adrenaline highs die. So, for those of you who love your space and like to do your own things, don't worry it will become like this again before you know it! 

It is Magical

I could go on an on about the things I've learned in this one year of marriage, but it has honestly and truly been wonderful. Better than I could imagine, greater than I could hope for. 

Ricardo is my heartbeat and my best friend. My favourite laugh and my greatest joy. Marrying him has enhanced my life in so many ways. I have grown and changed into a better person, though I am always a work in progress. 

This one year of marriage has had its financial and emotional challenges that were unrelated to our actual marriage, but we have grown stronger because of them. 

I love being a wife, but more than anything else I love being HIS wife. Marrying the right person is so key and makes all the difference.

What did you learn in your first year of marriage? 

Tell me below or on Instagram!