For better or for worse

August 8, 2008

I got married four years ago today to Michael Wayne Franco Jr., the most charismatic, good-hearted, enthusiastic, strong, hard-working, joyful man I know. He protects me and encourages me, he loves me for my heart, and he makes me a better person without even trying.

He also makes me laugh. 🙂

I was 22 years old when I got married…so young and yet so ready. Michael was 26. Looking back, I think I was as prepared for marriage as a 22-year-old can be. I had read my books, listened to my talks, done perfect charts for our NFP class, and made my poor fiance discuss over and over Things You Should Talk About Before You Get Married.

Who can really prepare for this vocation though?

Sure, you can talk about how you’re going to resolve conflict, and what your goals will be, and how you will approach money and children and employment. You can read books and listen to talks on the necessity of unselfishness and self-gift in marriage. But when it comes down to living it out, to doing the dishes every night, to starting a family, to living with each other’s little faults, to deciding what to cut out of the budget during lean times, we all have to learn as we go.

It’s funny how the “for worse” times in my marriage have always drawn me closer to Michael and closer to God.

Take yesterday, for example. [Gross Story Alert, by the way. I gave you fair warning.:)]

Michael and the kids and I came down with a terrible stomach bug on Monday while driving home to Houston from Baton Rouge. The kids had been sick for a couple of days, and we had thought they were “better,” but they both threw up everything in their systems in our van during the trip, twice each. {Thank the Lord for washable car seats and leather seats!}

I personally threw up eight times total both in grocery bags in the van and when we stopped to be sick on the side of the road, which was frequently. It rained almost our entire way home. Michael and I quickly started to take turns driving our puke-smelling van, stopping every few exits toward the end of the trip. After one particularly “productive stop,” in which we both threw up outside the van in the rain for 10 minutes, I got back in the van and started crying and laughing at the same time. Everything was just so awful! Then Michael started crying and laughing too. We had 2 hours left to drive (without puke stops), and we felt so sick and the situation was so dramatically awful…

We held hands, and loved each other incredibly powerfully in that moment.

Later, when we were about 45 minutes from home, I got in the driver’s seat to give my shaking husband a break, drove three miles, and promptly pulled over to be sick in a parking lot. The kids were both covered in sick and I realized I was simply at the end of my strength.

Michael drove us home himself for those last 45 minutes. I have almost never loved that man more. Except for when we got home and I curled up in a ball on the living room floor and he stumbled in with our luggage and helped give the kids a bath and put them in their beds. Or when we laid on the living room floor together after the kids were in bed, sipping Gatorade, and we prayed a prayer of thanksgiving together, did some more laugh-crying because we were so sick, then fell asleep right then and there, holding hands.

God could have blessed us with not being sick at all, with no torrential rain. He certainly has many, many times before. But He didn’t this time. Yesterday, maybe His blessing came in a little “for worse” experience.

He knows that we all need that “for worse” part in marriage. It’s easy to start focusing on our unhappiness with those annoying little faults in our spouse when we don’t have anything in our lives that demands we be a team.

A few pictures from our wedding, just for “old” times’ sake. 🙂