Wes and I are closing in on our fifth wedding anniversary. Five whole years. Nothing short of a miracle.
It certainly hasn’t gone according to plan.
I blame
Disney. And every romantic comedy ever made. All those stories of near-disaster, misunderstandings,
evil stepmothers and talking woodland creatures have one thing in common. As
soon as the wedding bells are over, so is the story. They all live happily ever after. Don’t ask questions.
That’s what I was brought up on. I devoured it. And, despite
my best efforts to find books about twins who love recycling, or little girls
who play with tigers, Elvie devours it too. There’s nothing she loves more than
a princess. Except perhaps a princess who lives in a cake.
She plays weddings a lot. Talks about the dresses. The flowers.
The dancing. In her mind, it’s the first dance that seals the deal. She’s going
to be a menace at school discos.
The wedding is the goal. The big day. The big dress. The princess
moment.
To be married. To be chosen. Publicly. And loved forever.
Nothing wrong with that.
I’ll be the first to admit that, even as a stony-hearted twentysomething,
I desperately wanted someone to pick me. To love me.
And then he did.
He walked into my life one night at a networking event,
and went home with my phone number and a spring in his step. I hadn’t even realised
he was hitting on me and, slightly embarrassingly, I couldn’t remember his
name. It was Wes.
He’d said he’d call me. And he actually did. We went out for
a lunch date that lasted eight hours, discovered we had half the world in
common, and quickly became inseparable. I was swept off my feet. I’d never
imagined that anybody could love me so well. So completely. Warts and all.
Things got serious very quickly. I moved to be with him. Leaving
behind my London, my life, and the best friends I’d ever known.
That’s when it got messy. I had a deep-rooted fear of
abandonment. He had previous girlfriend-induced commitment issues. It wasn’t
pretty.
We broke up a few times. I cried. A lot. But we never managed
to stay apart.
And then, in the midst of yet another standoff, at the point
where I had deleted his number from my phone so that I couldn’t send him any
more ridiculously over-emotional texts, he snuck into my garden in the middle
of the night to propose via the medium of tealights.
There were flowers. There was a ring. Quite possibly sub-zero
temperatures. It was beautiful. I was taken completely by surprise, and so
stunned that I spent the rest of the night talking about garden gnomes and woke
up wondering if I’d dreamt the whole thing.
If this was a Disney film, or a Richard Curtis comedy, it
would all end there. With a few token shots of the wedding to fill the closing
credits.
It wasn’t a movie. Thank goodness. That was just the beginning.
We had a fairly disastrous honeymoon. It’s much more common
than you think. It turns out that France in December is really cold. Especially
when you have a throat infection. And exhaustion. And barely any hot water.
Thank goodness for Disneyland Paris. It’s hard to be grumpy there.
Mickey Mouse was good respite. I spent most of our first
year of marriage wondering why more people don’t get divorced. I suspect Wes
did too. I went on the pill, and felt as though I had lost my mind. I learnt
the hard way that I’m more selfish than I’d ever imagined. That I don’t
appreciate having to compromise. I sulked. I snarled. I was passive-aggressive.
And eventually Wes started to run out of patience.
We booked a long holiday. To celebrate making it to our first
anniversary. South Africa and India. A month away. It was incredible. Sun,
adventure and cocktails. Just what we needed. By the time we came back I was
pregnant. The next four years were a blur of pregnancy, small babies, toddlers and
post-natal depression. Which brings us to now.
There have been days when we’ve shouted. Or not spoken at
all. Endless snaps, and losses of temper. He’s realised that I don’t notice
when a room needs hoovering. I’ve discovered that he has an unbreakable
resistance to washing up. I’ve figured out that it’s best to feed him before attempting
a serious conversation. He’s learnt not to expect a constructive response to
anything before 7.30 a.m.
There have been days, sometimes weeks on end, when I’ve
wondered if he liked me at all. There have been days when I certainly didn’t like
him. Days when we’ve argued for hours over nothing at all. Or given in too
quickly on the important things. Days when I knew he was going to leave me.
Days when I would have left me. Plenty of those.
And yet, nearly five years on, we’re still here. Still
married. Still celebrating. By the skin of our teeth.
These last few years have been a learning curve. A steep
one. With a few entirely unnecessary tests thrown in for fun. I’m not sure what
grade we’d get. But we’d pass. I know that much.
Not by chance. Or luck. Or magic. Through gritted teeth and
determination. Because of those gut-wrenchingly vulnerable moments in the clear
air of the morning when we’ve turned around and apologised. As a result of
those tiny little tiptoe steps back towards romance in the wake of our most
bitter arguments.
All of those raw, painful, wearing-our-hearts-on-the-outside
moments have got us to today. To a place where we are starting to appreciate
each other again. Really, properly appreciate each other. It’s been a long time
coming.
Recently I had a blip in my recovery process. The endless
crusade against Churchill’s big black dog. Maybe because I’m tired or because
I’ve been trying to do too much too soon. Maybe the wind has changed. Who
knows.
By the time I went to bed on Friday I was starting to
fold in on myself. All I wanted to do, for the entire weekend, was hide.
Wes was amazing. He asked me how I was. I told him I was
curling up at the edges. And he understood. Completely. I couldn’t face the
firework display on Saturday night. So he took the children. And I stayed on
the sofa with a blanket.
Yesterday, he left me in bed when the children got up. When
I surfaced, they were tidying the living room shelves, which have been a jumble
of piled-high clutter since we moved in. Months ago. Because he knew.
He knew that physical chaos makes my mental chaos worse.
He knew that I wouldn’t have the motivation to tidy. He knew that it would lift
my mood. And it did.
He’s the only one who knows me, faults, flaws, hoover
resistance and all. Inside out. And still loves me. He still kisses me, even
after two huge babies turned my stomach into what can only be described as a
saggy map of the London Underground.
He knows which mug to put my ‘I-need-some-comfort’ tea
in. He knows when I need his arm around me to hold me up. He knows how to stand
his ground in a French theme park
queue. And how to give me hope.
Five years in. It hasn’t been plain sailing. It’s bloody
hard work.
But it’s worth it. Absolutely.
Happily ever after would be nice. But I’d rather have this.
I’d rather have Wes.
Prince Charming may be perfect, but I bet he’s dull. And he
doesn’t tidy shelves.
This is an extract from The Honest Mums’ Club by Hannah Oakland, available now in paperback, priced £9.99.
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