Within my first year of marriage, I realized that true love isn't like that. After being together for only three months, my husband was deployed. We spent six of the first nine months of our marriage on different continents.
I had just turned 18, had literally gone from my parents house to living with him (much like so many of those princesses). We didn't know what would happen when he got back home, and, I'm not gonna lie, it was hard. But we fought and we struggled and our love for one another persevered. Two years and two more deployments later, it had gotten easier, although never, by any means, "easy."
I had just turned 18, had literally gone from my parents house to living with him (much like so many of those princesses). We didn't know what would happen when he got back home, and, I'm not gonna lie, it was hard. But we fought and we struggled and our love for one another persevered. Two years and two more deployments later, it had gotten easier, although never, by any means, "easy."
He was out of the military and we'd moved back to our home state. Naively, I thought this would be the beginning of that happily ever after. After three years of uncertainty, I though finally things would be simpler for us. But life isn't like that. Money, jobs, kids, family, frustrations, everyday stress; the next 8 years have proved to be just as trying, just as difficult in their own ways.
In the past eleven years, I've come to one conclusion: There is no "happily ever after." At least, not in the way we think. In the movies, Snow White and Prince Charming ride off in their horse to live together in peace and harmony. It looks like nothing will ever come between them.
What we don't hear about is, years later, Charming develops a gambling problem and loses his job and their carriage gets repossessed and the castle is foreclosed on and Snow White goes back to living in squalor, only now she's got three children instead of dwarfs, and Charming has to work 18 hour shifts to make ends meet. We don't see that, years later, Ariel regrets her decision to become part of his world and resents Eric. Or that Aurora goes out with the fairies one night and gets so drunk that she has a one night stand with a knight.
What we don't hear about is, years later, Charming develops a gambling problem and loses his job and their carriage gets repossessed and the castle is foreclosed on and Snow White goes back to living in squalor, only now she's got three children instead of dwarfs, and Charming has to work 18 hour shifts to make ends meet. We don't see that, years later, Ariel regrets her decision to become part of his world and resents Eric. Or that Aurora goes out with the fairies one night and gets so drunk that she has a one night stand with a knight.
But their love is true, so Snow White forgives Charming, embraces their new life of poverty, and even gets a job working alongside him in the fields. Eric and Ariel find a marriage counselor and work through her anger and resentment, they buy a house on the sea, where she can visit her friends and family often. Phillip forgives Aurora, because he's made his mistakes too, and while they have trouble coming to terms with her infidelity, they're committed to making it work, and do.
Because in real life, love isn't "happily ever after." It's joy and anger, pain and disappointment, hurt and forgiveness. True love is going through all the things life throws at you - things that are supposed to tear you apart - and coming out on the other side of it stronger, wiser, and even more determined.
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As the Hubbs and I celebrate our 11th anniversary, I will remember that just because Disney chose not to show us the hard parts, doesn't mean they didn't happen, as they happen to all true loves.
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As the Hubbs and I celebrate our 11th anniversary, I will remember that just because Disney chose not to show us the hard parts, doesn't mean they didn't happen, as they happen to all true loves.
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