Why I'm Glad I Married my High School Sweetheart

Brian and I met in High School. It doesn't feel like it was that many years ago, but we've been together for almost seven years. I will never forget the first time I saw him. School had just started and we had an English class together. I sat in the front. He sat in the back. Our eyes met over the top of the Harry Potter novel his nose was buried in and it was friendship at first sight. Yes, friendship.

At first I didn't think we had a ton in common, except our shared love of reading. I remember that most of my friends didn't like him and didn't understand why we suddenly started hanging out all the time. The same went for his friends. But somewhere over a year of endless phone calls, countless video-games, numerous late night movies and several shared books, we fell in love. And our friends...well, they dealt with it. It didn't really matter what they thought because, by the time we actually started dating, Brian was my best friend.

We dated two years before college separated us for a short time. The separation was only in distance and it strengthened our friendship and our growing relationship. Brian moved to my college town after a year of long-distance-dating. And after three more years of hectic college classes, crappy college student jobs, and two cats, a few tears and a lot of laughs later...we happily said our "I do's" at the beautiful age of 21.

There are about five years between when we starting dating in High School and when we got married in college. And those five years mean the world to me and I believe those five years are what have made our marriage so strong. Why?

Brian and I grew up together, and to this day we are both still growing as individuals. We have each changed drastically since the start of our relationship--our goals are different now, our beliefs, our priorities. But we have supported each other through each of these changes, adjusted our relationship when it needed it, and fallen in love time and time again with the people that we are each becoming.

And along the way, Brian has helped me to remember the person I want to be and who I am in my heart. This is the foundation of our marriage, because it was the foundation of our relationship before. I know that I will change over the course of our life together, but I also know that Brian will love me through all of those changes, even if it is difficult sometimes. And when I forget who I am or I'm feeling lost, Brian will remind me. Always, I will do the same for him.