Two Worlds Collide: Couples Counseling Testimony by Anonymous

This marriage story is about two very different people with very different people who learn to unite as one with the help of couples counseling. If you need help finding couples counseling, it can be as easy as typing into google “couples counseling near me.”

I want to tell my marriage story. I have been married for almost four years now. I dated my husband for a full year and knew him for about a year and a half before we got married.

I always thought that if I dated someone for at least a year, the adjustment of living together wouldn’t be as difficult. Well, I was definitely wrong about that. I look back at our first year of marriage and am so happy we found counseling and learned how to actually communicate with one another.

Counseling is still very taboo to many people. However, it saved my marriage, so I want to do nothing more than promote it to other couples that are struggling.

There were various factors that I can pinpoint that led us to our breaking point. The first, and probably the reason for most of our disagreements simply came from our culturally different backgrounds.

My husband is half Bolivian, and grew up in a very traditional home, where his mom took care of the house, and his dad went to work. Let me clarify, there is nothing wrong with this type of upbringing.

However, I was raised in a very non-traditional home. My mom was the sole provider and caregiver. I started working at the age of twelve and paid for everything I had.

With that, I have always wanted to work. I love my career, and I’ve always wanted to be a mom and career woman. However, my husband thought differently, he wanted me to be what his mom was to him, and that just isn’t who I am.

The second was family. My family lives in Utah, where we currently live, and his family lives in Washington.

He had somewhat of a strained relationship with his parents for a few years, and he is eight years older than me, so he lived the true bachelor life for a time. I was very close with my family and always wanted to make it to every family gathering. He did not like that.

I would get so mad whenever he didn’t want to go to something, and in result, we would waste our whole weekend arguing about it. It took me some time to realize that he had a hard time with this because of his current personal relationship with his family.

I was still in college and living at home when we met, so I was still spending a lot of time with my family and wanted to continue to do so when we got married.

These were constant things we battled each other on, and I mean battled. A little under a year into our marriage I suggested couples counseling.

We were falling out of love and there was absolutely no way I was going to continue a relationship like this, arguing and crying for hours on the weekends was no way to live. I found myself wanting to fight and argue because I felt as though that was the only way we could communicate.

It had to stop. I had to find a couples counseling near me. He agreed that something needed to change, so we started going to counseling together. The counselor taught us how to communicate and walked us through our feelings. It literally changed our lives.

I look back at our first year and see two completely different people. We were both fighting against each other and not fighting for each other.

We are still not perfect, and we still get in disagreements, but it is nothing to the level that it was that first year. We are actually a team now and want each other to succeed.

Marriage is so much work, but also so rewarding. It’s amazing what happens when you are humble enough to admit you are wrong.

I’ve had my fair share of moments where I’ve had to apologize and so has he. Looking back, I’m so proud of both of us and how much we’ve grown together. We now have a sweet baby boy and are excited to keep growing our family, while continuing to better communicate with one another.

This marriage story showed the success that can come when two people work together, with the help of couples counseling. If you need help finding couples counseling, it can be as easy as typing into google “couples counseling near me.”