The Cycles of a Marriage

I feel bad for the people who aren't married long enough to complete several "cycles". There are seasons to marriage as well as to life. Those that get bored over time and start to search elsewhere for that excitement and newness that they first felt at the beginning of the relationship miss out on the chance to fall back in love with their spouse, usually on a deeper level each time. Robbie and I have been married long enough (9 years in Novemeber!) to have experienced several of these cycles. Yes, there are times when our relationship feels quite "dry" and when we deeply disappoint each other. But because we make the struggle to work through those times, the end result is that we are blessed to experience a new springtime of our marriage. I love to rediscover, despite the flaws and dark spots which sometimes cause me pain, all of the bright spots and beauty in the soul of my husband which drew me to him in the first place. Some of the things I am now discovering about him have only come about since and through our marriage, such as the depth of his love for the kids. Other things are qualities I already knew lay within that I am now seeing come into fruition. I'm looking forward to coming out of this latest cycle and falling even more in love, and rediscovering the immense goodness in my husband's heart.