Never Seeing Spouse Archives - Marriage Laboratory

April 19, 2017

How to Spend Quality Time With Your Spouse When You’re Rarely Together

If you have limited time together, you need to learn how to make the most of the time you do have together. Here are four ways to do that from couples who have been there.

This month we’re talking all about quality time- why its important and how to make the most of it.

But what about if you hardly ever see your spouse?

How do you spend quality time together when you are rarely together?

There’s no doubt about it, rarely seeing our spouse takes a huge toll on our marriages. Its rough.

But our marriages aren’t doomed through these stages of not being together much. It will take effort, some creativity and plenty of intentionality. But quality time can happen.

In thinking about this problem, I realized that I have already ran a series on this blog called How to Keep Your Marriage Strong When You Never See Your Spouse where four separate couples who rarely saw each other talked about how they strengthened their marriage in spite of crazy work schedules.

I’ve compiled some of their best advice below:

1 Find things to do together while you’re apart.

Andrea, whose husband is in the air force and deployed for 3-6 months out of the year emphasizes the importance of staying unified when you’re not together physically. She says,

“Jonathan and I like to set goals to work towards together. We’ve set goals to exercise, read certain books, study the scriptures, etc. I’ll be honest, it never works out the way we hope (he usually reaches the goals and I usually have really good intentions.) But it’s fun to have something we are both working on…or thinking about working on.

There are lots of sites that let you play games against friends (ranging from checkers to Settlers of Catan.) You have to get creative, but you can still find things to do together.”

I also loved Andrea’s advice to use your time apart to help you be a better spouse.

“Whether you are apart for weeks at a time, or one of you works long hours, think of ways you can improve as a spouse, and work on it! Jonathan and I like to ask each other for ways we can improve. We try to set goals together, so we are still working towards something together, even if we never see each other.”

2 Learn to communicate effectively.

Jessica’s husband is a doctor and their marriage survived those brutal med school/residency/fellowship schedules while having five kids in the mix. She says,

“Communication is really important in our marriage. Especially because my husband will have periods of time when he is rarely home, it has been important to make sure we keep each other up-to-date on each other’s lives. We have always enjoyed discussing everything together: frustrations, hopes, fears, goals, aspirations, etc. The ability to regularly stay connected with each other helps us get through the difficult periods when we don’t have the opportunity to talk as much.

We have definitely had times in our marriage where I felt we were like “ships passing in the night”. There didn’t seem to be a whole lot of strengthening going on – we were just in survival mode. But connecting with each other as much and as often as possible helps provide some buffer during those difficult times.

Several times a week before he left home at 3 AM, he would write a note to the kids and I. We knew he loved us and was thinking of us even if we didn’t get to see him often. It worked — we’re still here! Making sure we make time to talk and communicate has kept us feeling connected and feeling like we’re a team.”

3 Keep an active sex life

Amy, whose husband is a lawyer and has had a demanding workload since law school says,

“Keeping an active sex life is SO hard when you’re busy, but so important. A few of the benefits:

It relieves stress for both of you.
Allows you to connect with one another quicker than just about any other activity.

You may need to get creative with when…and maybe where. When time is limited, creativity is key.

It’s okay to plan ahead! Don’t let the lack of spontaneity ruin a perfectly good opportunity to connect with your spouse. Maybe look at it this way, when you plan ahead, you can be spontaneous in other ways…”

4 If you fail to plan, you plan to fail.

Drew is a doctor AND his wife Katie is a doctor. They went through the craziness of residency schedules times two. Here’s what he advises,

“It’s important to plan ahead so that personal time does not get neglected. My wife and I will sit together and review our calendars on a monthly and weekly basis. We set aside time on the calendar for our date night. These date nights are away from our children, and away from our responsibilities from work.

As the saying goes, if you fail to plan, you plan to fail. If we don’t make an effort to schedule these date nights, they rarely occur by themselves. This becomes even more important when baby sitters may be in short supply.

So there you have it, how to make the most of your time together when time is limited spoken from those who know the trenches of limited time together all too well.

What works for you guys? What do you do to keep your relationship strong when you don’t have much time together?

May 8, 2015June 28, 2016

Making Your Time Together Count When You Both Work Full Time.

By Drew

This post is part four of the series: How To Keep Your Marriage Strong When You Never See Your Spouse.

We know how crazy a medical resident’s schedule can be- often working all night and then all day and then most of the night again. So now imagine BOTH you and your spouse are medical residents at the same time. Yikes. And then add a pregnancy and a baby in there somewhere. If anyone knows how to make a marriage work while never seeing each other it’s Katie and Drew. Sometimes when I’d be trying to get together with Katie she’d say something like, “Oh not Wednesday, that’s the first night in six weeks Drew and I have off together.”

I’m good friends with Katie, but I wanted a husband’s perspective in this series, so I asked him for some tips on how they keep the love alive 🙂 – Celeste

I’m grateful for the opportunity to share a bit about our experience as working spouses. Before we get too far into this, I should admit that I have never written for a blog before. Hopefully you find what I write to be informative and helpful in whatever circumstance you may be.

By way of introduction, and perhaps to add a little insight to our circumstance, my wife and I met while we were both attending medical school. We went on to complete residencies in Internal Medicine and Pediatrics. As you may know already, residency can be very demanding with work hours extending beyond 80 hours a week.

Needless to say, the rigors of medical school and residency have kept us very busy. Early on we were sure to delineate between our study time and our fun time. In other words, our date nights were not spent memorizing anatomy or quizzing on microbiology. I feel that drawing a line between work/study time and our own personal time has been key to the success of our relationship. Such delineation has helped me to keep my focus where it needs to be; either on my work or on my wife, whatever the circumstance may be. And while conversation about the patients I saw that day may be stimulating to me, it may not be for my wife, so I try to keep this to a minimum.

It’s also important to plan ahead so that personal time does not get neglected. My wife and I will sit together and review our calendars on a monthly and weekly basis. We set aside time on the calendar for our date night. These date nights are away from our children, and away from our responsibilities from work. As the saying goes, if you fail to plan, you plan to fail. If we don’t make an effort to schedule these date nights, they rarely occur by themselves. This becomes even more important when baby sitters may be in short supply.

Often, we would go weeks without having a date night, simply because our schedules didn’t line up. Many times, I would be on days and my wife on nights, or vice versa. In such circumstances the quality of the date became much more important that the quantity of dates. There is a lot that has been written about quality time and I don’t claim to be an expert on any level. However, I can say that those dates that revolved around an “experience” are undoubtedly the most memorable.

For example, while we were in medical school I gave my wife a jar full of small pieces of paper with date ideas on them. As I was preparing these date ideas I tried to look for “experiences” in the community around us. Some date ideas included hunting for lightning bugs in the state park, going to a live auction, or attending the theater at the city college. These dates are far more memorable to me then any night spent in a nameless restaurant or in a dark movie theater. Don’t get me wrong, I love eating out and watching movies just as much as anyone else. But when time is short supply, it’s the quality that counts.

In the end, the most important aspect is to be consistent. A happy and healthy marriage requires constant and consistent investment. This becomes even more important after children enter the picture. While family outings are important and fun for all, it is important to dedicate a certain amount of time in the development of your own marriage.

May 7, 2015June 28, 2016

How To Grow Together When You’re Not Together Very Often

By Andrea

This post is part three of the series: How To Keep Your Marriage Strong When You Never See Your Spouse.

I’m so excited for you readers. You are about to read some excellent writing with some even better advice from my good friend Andrea. I grew up with Andrea (I’m trying really hard not to cave into my temptation to post an embarrassing picture of us circa 1999). She’s witty, she’s smart and she’s well-versed in the ways of bonding with a husband who is away a lot. Get excited readers. Get excited. This is gonna be good. – Celeste

The dream: I live in the kind of cute farm town that is featured in Hallmark movies with my husband and umpteen perfectly behaved children. We have goats and horses and chickens and lots of space for the kids to run and play. There’s probably a tire swing somewhere and one of those DIY tree houses you see on Pinterest (that was clearly DIY’ed by a contractor). My husband works hard, but has time to spend with the family in the evenings and weekends. We live near family, and get together often. And as long as I’m dreaming, I’ll dream that I finally figured out how to fix my hair.

The reality: I don’t know how to fix my hair. I married a pilot in the military. We live in the kind of towns that you are grateful for when you are on a road trip and you took a wrong turn and you really have to go to the bathroom and please let there be a town somewhere in the middle of this desolation! (I actually like the towns, but they are a good 2-3 hours to Target, airports, etc.) At best, we are a two day’s drive from family. We have lived on base housing up until now, and they don’t allow goats, horses, chickens, or tree houses. My husband is my best friend, and a fantastic father. He works hard, but his work day frequently lasts 10-14 hours, often at weird times of the day (4 pm to 3 am?) and sometimes travels on weekends. We have lucked out so far and avoided any deployments, but they will begin this year, with him being gone on average 3-6 months a year.

We are currently in limbo, as my husband is at a 4-5 month training. This training came after a move from one town, but before the move to the next, so right now my three sometimes decently-behaved children and I live with my parents, about 15 hours away from my husband. He doesn’t get any leave during this training, and my son is in school, so we just don’t see each other.

Here’s the thing though: we are happy.

If I could give one piece of advice from what I have learned from our experience, and watching all my friends (whose husbands have deployed – a lot) it would be this: You have to be able to find happiness on your own. It cannot depend on another person. I think this is generally good advice for…well, everything. Your happiness can’t depend on other people, situations, things, jobs, etc. I’ll try not to get too Pollyanna-ish on you, but really, you have to decide to find the good in where you are.

I miss my husband. I really do. My kids miss their dad, and it breaks my heart when they ask for him. If I let myself think about it too long, I’ll end up in a pile of snot-covered tissues, eating a bag of chocolate chips, listening to playlists people put together on YouTube called 100 Best Love Songs of All Time.

I really, really miss him. But while there is definitely a time for just being sad, I don’t want to spend my time like that. And he really doesn’t want to talk to that hot mess every time he calls. I know I don’t want to talk to a blubbery fool every time I pick up the phone.

Here are some things that have helped us:

Be intentional about your relationship.

If you aren’t mindful of it every day, the relationship will weaken bit by bit. You have to work a bit harder to find ways to build the relationship, but you got this! Of everything you have in your life, wouldn’t you say your relationship is worth fighting to keep? Yes. The answer is OF COURSE! So think about it. Make a plan for how you are going to work on your relationship.

Use the time apart to help you be a better spouse.

Whether you are apart for weeks at a time, or one of you works long hours, think of ways you can improve as a spouse, and work on it! Jonathan and I like to ask each other for ways we can improve. We try to set goals together, so we are still working towards something together, even if we never see each other.

Don’t wait for “when…” to be happy.

You need to still live your lives, today, now. Not “when we live closer to family…” or “when we live next to a restaurant worth eating at…” or “when I can finally take that luxurious trip to Afghanistan.” Nope. Today. Where you are, with what you have.

My husband was in pilot training in our first year in the military. This means 12 hour days, five days a week, with 2-4 hours of studying a day, and more on the weekend. And if you fail, you could be kicked out of the military. We put off camping and hiking trips, telling ourselves, “Things will be better when he’s done with pilot training.” Guess what? When we were done with pilot training, he became an instructor, and worked 12-14 hour days, five days a week, and this time, he often had to go on trips on the weekends. Also, we had another baby. And then another one. And a foster baby somewhere in there.

We found ourselves wishing we had done more and been more contented “back when…” We learned our lesson in waiting for life to be perfect before enjoying it. Those years of 12-14 hour days were hard. Dang hard. But there was plenty of joy to be found in them. So find ways to put happiness in your life today.

Respect each other’s schedules and routines.

This is especially important if you have kids. I have heard this from several couples, and I totally agree. If you are the one at home, remember that your spouse has responsibilities where he is. Just because he can’t talk RIGHT NOW doesn’t mean he doesn’t care about you. It just means he has a job to do. If you are the spouse away from home, know that you are loved and missed and respected.

I can’t tell you how many times my husband has called, and I just sat down to eat, or my sister had just come over, or the kids are sitting on the dog again, and I have to go. Or he calls to talk to the kids, but I just got them in bed. We still love him. We still want to talk to him. But we have to maintain some order in our lives. Having this understanding helps to maintain respect between the two of us. I know that he values me and my time and goals, and he knows I value those for him as well.

Communicate.

Lots! Phone calls and video chats are great. So, so, so awesome. Do them when you can. They don’t work too well for us. My kids are pretty young, and video chats with them are mostly spent trying to keep them in the room, or keep them from touching the computer/phone. Our most common time to call on the phone is between 4-8 pm. Do you know what the hours of 4-8 pm are like? I’ll tell you. They are crazy! This is the time of day when everyone (including myself) is tired, irritable, and there are usually half a dozen things going on.

I wish I could say that our daily phone calls are magical and wonderful and that chick flicks could be written based on our conversations. But let’s just say that the Andrea that Jonathan gets on the phone during those hours is not the Andrea his dreams are made of. After 8 pm, I’m just tired. And honestly, my kids frequently don’t fall asleep until 10 or 11 anyway, so there is really not a great time we can always plan on to talk.

We have found that texting and letters and emails and social media have helped us a lot in feeling connected to each other. If the kids say something strange and hilarious, I email him. If I am thinking about him, I text him to let him know. Send encouraging notes. Send pictures. Send lists of things you want to tell him about next time you talk. Send everything. For us, multiple short texts and emails go a lot farther than one long letter. (But long letters are awesome too!)

Note: One of the most meaningful things my husband tells me is that I am doing a good job. Can I tell you how much it means to me when he tells me I am a good mother, even after listening to me hollering at the kids or just generally being exasperated? Words of encouragement are sooooo important.

Watch out for feelings of guilt and resentment.

These two sneaky vices are tricky. In one day (let’s be honest, one hour!) I can go from feeling guilty that I get to be the one who stays home and see the kids every day while he has to be away, sleeping in a gloomy dorm, working really hard, to feeling resentful that he gets to have peace and quiet every day and have time to exercise and, and, and… It’s ugly stuff, and there is no room for it in your relationship. Understand that there are pros and cons for both of you, whether you are the one away or at home, and leave it at that.

Recognize that it is HARD to be apart!

Relationships take work when you are together, but when you are apart? Yeesh. Somehow, allowing myself to say “this is HARD!” helps me cope better. Sometimes I tell myself that so-and-so’s husband was deployed for a year and he wasn’t able to make it home for the birth of their baby! I should be able to deal with a measly three months. Or at least he is in the states and I can talk to him… While these statements might be true, they generally don’t actually help me out. They just make me feel guilty. So. Tell yourself that this is hard, but then tell yourself that you can do it.

Find things to do together.

Jonathan and I like to set goals to work towards together. We’ve set goals to exercise, read certain books, study the scriptures, etc. I’ll be honest, it never works out the way we hope (he usually reaches the goals and I usually have really good intentions.) But it’s fun to have something we are both working on…or thinking about working on. There are lots of sites that let you play games against friends (ranging from checkers to Settlers of Catan.) You have to get creative, but you can still find things to do together.

Keep in mind that one conversation does not define your relationship.

Sometimes Jonathan calls me at a time when I am…not at my best. Since we usually talk in the evenings, depending on the day, I get to be quite frazzled from all the crazy of the day. And sometimes I am short with that good man. Or the connection will be bad and we are both short on patience and the conversation ends on a bad note. We have to remind ourselves that usually if we had a conversation like that, we would still have lots more together time to work it out or get over it. When your total interaction time for a day is under 20 minutes, sometimes those little tense moments feel like they are a much bigger deal than they are. It’s alright. Apologize if needed, and move on.

Stay healthy.

Physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. Do what you’ve got to do to be healthy. When Jonathan is gone, I tend to eat like a college freshman boy. Um, I don’t recommend it. Eat right. Get the sleep you need. Make time for yourself to do something you enjoy. Pray. Pray lots and lots. When you aren’t taking care of yourself, you aren’t able to take care of your relationship. So get some rest. Take a class. Exercise. Go out with friends. Swap babysitting so you have a break sometimes. ACCEPT HELP. Hello, if you need help with kids or the house or with just not being alone, and someone offers that, this is no time to be bashful. If you won’t do it for you, do it for your spouse. You know they are praying for you.

There are so many more things I could say about this, but I have a feeling that this is kind of like getting parenting advice: what works for one family won’t work for another. And if you ask me next year, once I’m a couple deployments into this madness, I might have totally different answers! I think the most helpful thing for me has just been to try my darndest to make the best of things. I hope someday he is home more, and that we have goats and chickens (and that I know how to take care of them) but I don’t want to miss out on these years just because they are less than ideal.

May 6, 2015June 28, 2016

Keeping Your Marriage Strong Despite Your Spouse’s Crazy Work Schedule

By Amy

This post is part two of the series: How to Keep Your Marriage Strong When You Never See Your Spouse.

When I became good friends with Amy a few years back, I was so impressed with how she was raising three small children basically alone day in and day out due to Brett’s crazy work schedule. When I’d ask about it, she’d shrug and be like, “no biggie.” I greatly admired her ability to not seem the least bit resentful toward her husband or the situation. Which was vastly different from my own experience of blowing up like Mount St. Helens when Rich would return home an hour late from work.

I’ve always wondered how they managed to keep their marriage strong when they saw each other so rarely. (Although I can’t lie, I did benefit from him working until 10:30pm because that allowed for many late night Gilmore Girl viewing parties with Amy. Thanks for that Brett.) – Celeste

My three years of “single” parenting were strange. Brett, my husband, was not overseas in the military or studying abroad. He was very close to home, just a few minutes away by car. Brett was in law school. That first year while he was at school, I was home with our two beautiful daughters. The second year I was still home with them and pregnant with our son. Then the third year I had three kids to tend to.

This was Brett’s Monday–Saturday schedule from the beginning of law school until the end:

Leave the house at 6:30 am, take the bus to school.
Come home at 6:30 pm for dinner. Eat quickly and play with the kids for 20 minutes, back to school by 7 pm.
Return home around 9:30 or 10 pm.

Sunday was his day off and we would go to church for three hours of that “family” day.
Summers he was essentially gone. One he actually moved a few hours away and we only saw him on the weekends, for a day and a half.
We didn’t go on dates.
We didn’t have daily phone calls and chats. Any traveling that happened during that time was me taking the kids somewhere.
We never had a family vacation.

Now that lovely scene has been set (I didn’t even touch the emotional stress and all the feelings, so many feelings!), how did we survive?

A few tips on surviving a spouse’s busy work schedule:

1. Realize it’s hard for BOTH of you.
Before we started law school, we met up with some friends who were just finishing law school and the husband and wife told Brett and me, “Remember, it’s just as difficult for him to be away, as it is for you to have him gone.” I think I told myself that every day.

2. Know your spouse loves you.
Brett isn’t a romantic. When he tells me he loves me, he expects me to believe it and feel it and KNOW it. I learned to cling to those three words “I love you” with every inch of my soul. They pulled me through some really rough times and brought me such peace.

3. Laugh.
Make sure you laugh together! Ours usually was at the expense of our children because they’re hilarious. The cause doesn’t matter, just laugh together!

4. Keep an active sex life!
This is so hard when you’re busy, but so important. A few notes on this point:

It relieves stress for both of you.
Allows you to connect with one another quicker than just about any other activity.
Get creative with when…and maybe where. When time is limited, creativity is key.
It’s okay to plan ahead! Don’t let the lack of spontaneity ruin a perfectly good opportunity to connect with your spouse. Maybe look at it this way, when you plan ahead, you can be spontaneous in other ways…

5. Be in it together.
Most importantly, we allowed it to become our new normal. It wasn’t our favorite normal but it was ours and we were in it together. We reminded ourselves daily that this isn’t our life, it’s only a season in it.

May 5, 2015June 28, 2016

Six Ways To Strengthen Your Marriage When You Rarely See Your Spouse

By Jessica

This post is part one of the series: How To Keep Your Marriage Strong When You Never See Your Spouse.

First up in our series, we’ve got Jessica. The first thing you need to know about Jessica is that she is superwoman. I’m not sure how any one woman can do so much in a day- homeschooling five kids, volunteering, cooking, cleaning, befriending strangers. Super powers is the only explanation I can come up with. Oh and she’s done all this while her husband Ben has been working crazy hours finishing up his medical residency/med school/MBA. Superwoman. I don’t often pry into people’s marriages, but I was so sure she was able to manage her marriage to that I wanted to ask her how it is done. 🙂 -Celeste

My husband Ben and I have been married for a little over thirteen years. We met and were married while we were undergraduate students at Brigham Young University. We have five wonderful, rascally kids who joined our family all before my husband completed his schooling. Two were born during undergraduate studies, two were born during medical school, and one was born during business school. On average, we have moved every two years, and have rarely lived near family.

Throughout our marriage my husband’s schedule has fluctuated between 40-100 hours a week at school or residency training. Sometimes his schedule has seemed completely manageable, and at other times I’ve been glad to have a couple pictures of him up in the house so we don’t start to wonder what he looks like ;-).

6 ways to strengthen your marriage when you rarely see your spouse

Now to the topic: what has helped strengthen my marriage when I rarely see my spouse? This question has caused me to ponder a lot since Celeste asked me to write about it. I’m not sure that there’s a simple answer. What works for one couple might not work for another. What one person considers “rarely seeing a spouse” might be different for another person. My friend’s husband works from home, so in comparison it seems like my husband is barely ever around. However, I have friends whose husbands are in the military and have 6-18 month deployments. Even when my husband has a 100-hour work week, it’s better than a military deployment!

My hope is that regardless the situation, some of the things that my husband and I have tried to do to strengthen our marriage can be useful ideas for others. Ben and I both come from families in which our parents and multiple grandparents are divorced. Not surprisingly neither of our families was very excited when Ben and I decided to get married. Although they were correct in their assessment that we had no comprehension of the sacrifices and stresses that accompany marriage, I can also say that there is more happiness and joy in marriage than I could have ever imagined. Learning to live and grow with my spouse has been a great adventure.

There have definitely been extremely busy, difficult times when I’ve thought, “I did not sign up for this!” But to be completely honest, that has happened in every aspect of my life: parenthood, health problems, financial issues, etc. Life is just hard – A LOT of the time! And I’ve come to appreciate (on most days 😉 ) that if I can endure and learn from the hard things, then I grow.

I even appreciate the little joys more as I experience hard things. Besides, what’s the alternative? Give up when things get tough? And specifically in the case of marriage, get divorced? I can’t speak for anyone else, but I can say from my own limited experience that divorce didn’t fix anything. The problems my family experienced as a result of my parents’ divorce, and continue to experience 25 years later, are real and difficult.

Ben and I are far from perfect in any of these areas, but here are some of the things that we have tried to do which have worked for us in strengthening our marriage relationship:

1. Include the Lord in Your Relationship

One of the first things we committed to do in our marriage was to always have the Lord be a part of our relationship. Maybe you’ve seen the picture before of a triangle with each spouse at the bottom two vertices and the Lord at the top:

When I remember that I want and need the help of the Lord to have a good marriage, when I try to live in a way that I can have the Spirit in my life to guide me, and when I remember that everything the Lord touches is healed, then my personal life and married life are just better. Who doesn’t want the help of a loving Father in Heaven to soften their heart, teach them how to be better, gently remind them to repent when needed, and help them find joy in the journey of life? Everything’s better when the Lord is a part of it, and that certainly includes marriage!

2. Laugh Together

Humor is an important component of our marriage. Ben and I love to laugh together. I married my husband because he was, and continues to be, my best friend. Along with our endless conversations (which I’ll talk about more in a moment) he always keeps me laughing. Let’s face it, life is just tough! So why not brighten things up with laughter? We’ve experienced some pretty difficult things in marriage – family issues, health problems, unexpected deaths, etc., and sometimes it has just helped us to lighten things up with a little laughter.

3. Learn to Communicate

Communication is really important in our marriage. Especially because my husband will have periods of time when he is rarely home, it has been important to make sure we keep each other up-to-date on each other’s lives. We have always enjoyed discussing everything together: frustrations, hopes, fears, goals, aspirations, etc. The ability to regularly stay connected with each other helps us get through the difficult periods when we don’t have the opportunity to talk as much.

I’ve heard marriage compared to a bank account: you need to constantly be “depositing” good emotions/experiences so that your relationship “account” remains positive. That way when difficult times come and you are making “withdrawals” or aren’t able to be building your relationship as much as you’d like, you have enough positives that you don’t overdraw. We have definitely had times in our marriage where I felt we were like “ships passing in the night”. There didn’t seem to be a whole lot of strengthening going on – we were just in survival mode. But connecting with each other as much and as often as possible helps provide some buffer during those difficult times.

Once we put the kids down at night, it’s “us” time to catch up. If he’s at work or away, then we try to spend at least a little time talking on the phone. During one period of time Ben was working 18-20 hours every day for a three month period. He often wouldn’t be able to call or text during the day. Several times a week before he left home at 3 AM, he would write a note to the kids and I. We knew he loved us and was thinking of us even if we didn’t get to see him often. It worked — we’re still here! Making sure we make time to talk and communicate has kept us feeling connected and feeling like we’re a team.

4. Serve Each Other

Finding ways to serve each other has also strengthened our marriage. My husband is really busy, so I like to try to do as much as I can, especially around the house, to lighten his load. That seems to help him feel less stressed. I know different people have different ways to unwind, and specific ways of nurturing your spouse will vary based on particular circumstances and family dynamics, but find what works for you!

Whatever the service may be, finding ways to show that we are thinking of each other and loving each other has improved our relationship. There has been a small act of service that has yielded large benefits in our marriage. With five little munchkins in our family there are a lot of dishes to do by the end of the day. If Ben is home he drops whatever he is doing to give me a back rub while I’m washing the dishes – I LOVE it! The rate of dish washing slows down dramatically, but my back feels great once I’m done! Our joke is that if things don’t work out in the medical field for him, he could find a job as a masseuse ;-).

5. Physical Touch

That last point serves as a nice segue into something else that has helped strengthen our relationship — physical touch. A hand hold, a hug, a kiss, or just a gentle touch can be so powerful in strengthening a marriage on a day-to-day basis. We are human beings with physical bodies and positive, affirming touch can help us stay connected on both a physical and emotional level. It’s a simple thing, but a hug and a kiss when Ben leaves in the morning and then again to greet him when he comes home has been important to us.

6. Apologize

Lastly, being able to say “sorry” has definitely strengthened our marriage. I came from a family where no one really said “I’m sorry.” If there was a disagreement it was all about who was right and who was wrong. But after Ben and I got married he taught me a better way. When we disagreed there was never a “right” or “wrong,” instead he’d say “I’m sorry your feelings were hurt.” That completely baffled me at first — so what about who was right and who was wrong? I learned from my husband that love can transcend seeking to win battles or arguments, and instead lead us to focus more on our spouse. He first sought to console me and then to work out whatever differences caused the disagreement.

We have definitely had our share of differences in opinion over the past thirteen years. Sometimes they are resolved very quickly, and sometimes we need a little more time to ponder our own feelings and possible solutions. But as we’ve tried to be willing to apologize and be sensitive to each other’s feelings we’ve been able to work through our differences as a team rather than adversaries on different sides of an issue.

This list isn’t meant to be inclusive. There are so many different ways to improve our relationships and marriages. These are just a few of the things that we have found helpful in our marriage. A wise leader in our church once said, “Marriage can be more an exultant ecstasy than the human mind can conceive. This is within the reach of every couple, every person” (Spencer W. Kimball, “Oneness in Marriage,” Ensign, Mar. 1977).

While we have had struggles and difficult times in our marriage, there has been more happiness and joy than I previously thought possible. The opportunity to face the struggles and adventures of life with my best friend by my side has been one of my greatest blessings. My hope is that no matter where we are — on a relationship high, struggling to hold on at a low, or somewhere in between — that we give both our spouse and our marriage the chance to grow and reach their greatest potential. Maybe that means simply tying a knot and holding on at the end of the rope, looking to the future for brighter times, or setting some new goals as a couple. Whatever it is, happiness in married life is possible, within our reach, and oh so worth it!