Couples From Around The World Share The 'Unromantic' Things That Actually Made Their Relationships Stronger
Couples From Around The World Share The 'Unromantic' Things That Actually Made Their Relationships Stronger
It's dangerous to go alone, so often we find a person and say, "Hey I like you, you like me, let's be together forever." We call it love, and (at least in most cultures) we attach all these romantic notions of what love is and how to experience love.
Then real life shows up and kicks you.
It's at this moment that your love will truly be tested. You will look at this person at their lowest point, covered in bodily fluids and smelling like death, and you will either pick them up, clean them off and nurse them back to health, or you will decide, "You know what, being alone forever may have its perks." But at the end of the day, I like to believe it's worth it every step of the way. Just because love sometimes is "unromantic" doesn't mean you should abandon it.
It just means you hold on for the ride.
40. Unbowed, unbent, unbroken
When we'd been married about 10 years, two little kids, jobs not paying enough to cover daycare and bills, and we're having the sort of fight that these stresses can precipitate. It was a nasty one, we were not holding back with unkind things said to each other...
And then the phone rang. My dad was in the hospital 1,200 miles away. He'd had a stroke, docs were unsure whether he'd live.
The fight stopped and she told me to get in the car and go to the airport, she'd have tickets waiting for me at the counter. She'd call my boss and explain that I was flying across the country. Take how much time I needed, she would take care of the house and the kids and to not worry about anything but taking care of my family.
Dad made it a few years after that, but now I know that no matter how hard life gets, and however much two volatile pig-headed jerks fight and yell, she isn't just on my team, she IS my team. We'll be married 30 years this year. Life happens, and sometimes people aren't perfect, but when the world is against me, that little woman will grab my arm and we'll roar together, and nothing will break us.
39. Not for the faint of heart
I had MRSA and my wound had to be packed with silver nitrate and wound tape to assure it didn't close over before healing.
That meant my relatively new boyfriend was 2x daily putting me in agonizing pain and first pulling blood and pus-soaked packing material out of a hole in my arm, he was then ruthlessly shoving clean materials back in.
I knew then he was the one. We've been happily married over 10 years now.
38. Burgers are life
I was throwing up in front of him for the first time, he was holding my hair back with one hand whilst eating a Big Mac with the other. Zero hesitations.
37. PSA
In the first months of dating during one of our first intimate encounters, my partner stopped to point out a weird hard spot on one of my balls. At the time it was a bit embarrassing but when I got diagnosed with cancer a few weeks later I was really grateful. We’ve been together for 8 years now.
36. Well, that's certainly something you don't see every day
My husband had a thrombosed hemorrhoid that needed an incision. After the procedure, I helped him make sure it was healing properly and shrinking by looking into his butt every day. I needed to make sure there was no infection. If that ain't love I don't know what is.
35. It's not always sunshine and rainbows
I had a severe attack of gastroenteritis. It was coming out of both ends.
So I'm lying in bed and I suddenly have to vomit so I try to run to the bathroom. I fail and proceed to vomit and poop all over the floor. He cleans me, the floor and the bathroom up. Tucks me back into bed with some water, gives me a kiss and strokes my greasy and tangled head till I fall asleep.
Most unromantic scenario ever but he was there to help me get through it despite how gross it was.
When I tried to apologize for him having to do all that he said; "It's fine sweetie. I love you and I know if the roles were reversed you'd do the same."
And I would too.
34. A true dad
I have a now 12-year-old daughter who is not biologically his, however, she calls him Dad now and he always refers to her as his daughter. When she was about 10 he’d been moved in about 6 months we were settling into things as a family. I was working and they were home hanging out and she got her first period. I had briefly had a couple of small discussions -- enough that she knew what was happening. But she was pretty unsure what to do.
So he handed her some toilet paper, told her the basic girl trick of putting it in her underwear and took her to the store. He helped her pick out some pads, detoured to the ice cream, chocolate, chips, and bakery section and picked up junior Advil just in case. They settled in on the sofa he explained the basics of how to use it. Showed her a quick YouTube video. Made up a hot water bottle for her, popped her dirty clothes on to soak. And they snuggled and she talked about it and they Googled answers if he didn’t have them.
I came home to them having a nap on the sofa looking like a slumber party exploded and a happy child. Probably one of the moments I’ve loved him the most.
33. Childbirth is a crazy time
My husband helped me on and off the toilet when I was recovering from having our son. At one point I was able to go on my own but couldn’t quite make it back to bed, so he lifted me off the toilet, pulled my adult diaper up and carried me back to bed. When he tucked me in he told me I make adult diapers look beautiful... it meant more to me than any other time he’d said it.
32. Something changes when you become a father
Our first child was 8 weeks premature because I got preeclampsia and needed an emergency c-section. I was super messed up from all the medication (magnesium sulfate, anesthesia, and oxycodone). When I was finally able to get out of bed and shower, he helped my crying, hormonal, leaking body sit in the shower chair and take a much-needed shower, helped dry me off and put on clean pajamas and those rhino-sized pads for all the goo. Back into my wheelchair, where I promptly threw up everything that had been pumped into me over the 24 hours after my surgery. He turned me around, wheeled me back in, and started over without even a sigh. He loves that story and peacocks around whenever I tell it.
Also, for anyone curious: the baby was 2.5 pounds at birth and spent 5 weeks in NICU. She is now eight, happy and healthy, and I went on to have another baby two years later that was a full term bundle of cuteness with no drama. Now I must go make them both eggs for breakfast because they are 'starving.'
31. Shouldn't of said that
My husband's family lived across the country and used to send us boxes of their almost new, good quality clothes that they no longer wore. The men clothes were great for hubby and sons, but the female clothes were always a bit too small as I had gained a lot of weight since they had seen me last. My husband always felt so bad for me.
Then one time, my hubby lifted up a pair of pants out of the box and said happily, "These will fit you. They're HUGE!"
I still remember the look of horror that passed over his face once he'd realized what he'd said. But I loved the fact that he was happy for me getting a new pair of pants.
30. There's a lot more of this where that came from
We just moved in together in 2015. That summer some weird tummy bug was going around and I got it. We were watching a movie when unexpectedly my stomach just gave one big churn and before I could get up to run to the bathroom, I puked and pooped myself at the same time. My stomach cramps were so unbearable that I could hardly lift my head up, but he carried me in all my mess, helped me to shower, cleaned up my disgusting mess and nursed me back to health. Every time I needed to go to the bathroom, he'd carry me, rub my back, hold out the bucket, etc. I was mortified, but to him it was normal and he knows I'd do the same for him.
29. I'm not sure I'd want soup after that
When I was pregnant I got the stomach flu, I was puking and then I peed all over the floor. Then I had diarrhea so I whipped my (hugely pregnant) body around so fast and managed to get onto the toilet, but puked all over the already peed on floor. He cleaned it all up while I showered. He's the bomb (even though now whenever he's sick he reminds me of the time he scrubbed my pukey pee off the bathroom tile to guilt me into making him homemade tomato soup and pampering him lol).
28. I don't care what the haters said, Spore was a cool game
My now wife got sick a few weeks into our relationship and I was tending to her, at like 3 am her temp got to dangerous levels and I took her to urgent care despite her saying it was ok and to just put ice on these key points of her body (she is an er nurse) and it turns out she had a really bad infection. She doesn't remember that night but she remembers waking up in my bed in the morning with a bottle of really strong antibiotics on the nightstand. When she got better a few days later she went out and bought me a video game (spore) and a thank you card.
27. She sounds like a wonderful person
I grew up with my grandparents because both my parents had to work various jobs simultaneously, so my grandfather was my world. I took care of him during his last 5 years, when he became bedridden. I tried to visit him as often as I could. He lived with an elderly aunt who fed him but needed me to bathe him and, eventually, change his diapers and so on. Early in our relationship, my now wife would come over sometimes. One time I got to his house and found his fridge full and him watching Tv, eating a bowl of ice cream. My wife had gone a few hours before me without telling me. 6 months later I proposed.
26. The world only tries to break you down, so find a partner that will hold you up
When my husband and I first married, I had surgery to remove a tumor from my chest. The surgery site ended up infected, and for about 3 months he would have to stuff the site with gauze so we could allow it to heal from the inside out. It was so disgusting, I could not do it myself because it was so painful. He was always so amazing about changing the dressing around it, and I really think it cemented the whole mentality of us VS the world thinking. We just celebrated our 11 year anniversary, and are going strong.
24. Sometimes you just gotta laugh through it
I was having a panic attack and he was in the bathroom. He called me in there because he could hear me sobbing uncontrollably. I went in (thinking he was brushing his teeth) and the man pulled me down onto his lap while he was pooping and held me while I was sobbing uncontrollably/hyperventilating/laughing the absurdity.
We are now engaged.
Pixabay
23. Now he will always carry a part of you
I donated a kidney to him. Then when his wound wouldn’t close four weeks later, I packed and dressed it twice a day while trying not to make it obvious that the smell was making me gag. You do what you gotta do!
Unfortunately donating a kidney is a treatment and not a cure. We were told the average (living) kidney donation lasts for 15 years. But we also are closely watching The Kidney Project, where they are creating an artificial kidney about the size of a soda can that can be implanted into you. It is going to help so many people!
22. You probably should have scheduled these things for different days
Four months into dating my husband, boyfriend at the time obviously, he had to take me to my colonoscopy. I didn’t have any family in town and it just made sense for him to take me. Afterwards, I laid in his bed while he tried to convince me to pass gas so I wouldn’t be in pain. He started farting to try to make me feel better.
A few hours after resting, I had to go to the obgyn to get my IUD in. So he had to take care of me all day from being sore in my nether regions. To top it off, it was his birthday. It was the single most selfless thing anyone has ever done for me.
21. The cat knew what was up
I partied way too hard, puked all over my then boyfriend's (now husband) restroom and bedroom.
I woke up to fresh clothes. He explained everything that happened after me begging him to tell me. Apparently, I started trying to exorcise demons out of him and just projectile vomited everywhere. He managed to get me to drink some water, bathe me, get me to bed, and then deep clean the room and restroom.
I was so embarrassed after.
The only memory I have of that night is his cat looking at me with concern and judgment.
Photo by Craig Adderley from Pexels
20. Why is this such a theme in these stories
When I was in labor with our third baby, I had to poop. Like soooo bad. The nurses were wanting to check me and make sure the baby wasn’t crowning. I knew it was legitimately just needing to poop, it wasn’t my first rodeo, obviously.
The nurse told me I could go poop on the condition that the husband had to accompany me in case the baby really did try to make an appearance. My poor husband sat in the hospital bathroom with me while I took a dump and held my hand through contractions as I pooped.
I felt closer to him after that than I ever had before. It was an unbelievably intense 15 minutes and I’ve never been so vulnerable in front of him. We look back now and laugh about it.
Married almost 7 years, my potty time didn’t scare him off.
19. Sometimes it's the little things
I recently had a second heart catheterization to check my heart for blockages (thankfully there were none). Unfortunately this time they needed to go through my femoral artery in my groin and I needed to remain on bedrest for about four hours after the procedure. I had not eaten all day in preparation for the surgery, so when I got out I was famished. The nurse brought me hospital dinner, but I could not sit upright to feed myself. My lovely wife of ten years, who has been a solid rock for me through this ordeal, was excited at the opportunity to feed me.
I'm only 32 years old, so being in this predicament and being unable to feed myself was rather humbling. She happily cut my roast beef and potatoes and fed me a bite at a time. You could just tell that she loved being able to serve me in this way. It was not in any way a burden, or a chore, or a nuisance. She didn't take advantage of the situation to make a humiliating "here comes the airplane" joke. She just carefully fed me and saw to my needs.
I know in her heart she had felt rather useless because all my fear and anxiety was pent up inside. She loved having some way to show that she was there for me in a weak and frankly scary moment of my life. She is much better than I deserve and I am so crazy in love with her.
18. Who is cutting onions in here
Nursing my late husband through squamous cell carcinoma and thyroid cancer. Diagnosed end of November, went into hospice (at home) end of February, died March 21st. I took time off work most days just to be with him and feed him and give him his meds. I had to convince him that he wouldn't become addicted to morphine since he was actually in hospice so he finally started taking it every time I offered it.
My mom (an RN and cancer research nurse for 52 years) couldn't believe how much I stepped up and took over my husband's care. He is the love of my life, all I can do for him is make him comfortable so that was my priority. I am going to do everything in my power to make him comfortable through the end. He died at home, but we had been able to say "I love you", "Thank you", and "Good-bye". I miss him every day even four years later.
Photo by Tess Emily Seymour from Pexels
17. Ok but what's the Chevy Chase backstory
I spent a little more than a year randomly sending him emails from a man named "Nolan." He works in customer service and I made the most ridiculous case for him to solve involving a balloon business. Once in a while, during a slow time at my job, good old Nolan would email him. The last message was about Nolan asking the hubs to join him in a doomsday bunker...
I finally decided to tell him the truth on our anniversary, which is on April 1st.
He got me back this Christmas. He anonymously sent me a super low-rent Chevy Chase coloring book. I greatly dislike Chevy Chase, to put it mildly. He enjoyed me plotting revenge against my friends and even egged me on. He finally admitted the truth on New Year's Eve.
I plan to retaliate in the near future.
Pixabay
16. The wonders of American healthcare everyone, we will literally die because it's too expensive to get the pain to go away
My boyfriend made me go to the gynecologist to talk about getting an ablation after watching me struggle from crippling pain and bleeding every month for years. He said not to worry about money or anything else besides solving my problem. Fast forward two months and I got a call from my surgeon. Apparently, I missed the fact that they did a biopsy when they removed my polyps and found uterine cancer.
Had I been stubborn and continued to ignore my miserable periods for years, who knows what could have happened to me. No one expects uterine cancer in someone under 30. He held me while I cried, took me to every appointment, and helped me when I recovered after my hysterectomy. That dude is my rock.
15. Uhhh, I'm not a doctor, but that doesn't sound right
During her first pregnancy, my wife vomited brown, congealed blood every night for her entire second trimester. We went to multiple doctors and took a few trips to the E.R., never got a reason why. The vomiting happened every night after midnight, sometimes continuing sporadically for 8 hours. Don't know why, but it never happened during the daytime.
One night, she thought she was finally doing better, so she went to sleep early and seemed fine. Then suddenly around 1:00 AM, she jolted awake (which instantly woke me) and tried to run to the bathroom to puke, forgetting the puke bucket on her bedside table in her moment of panic. Unfortunately, she slipped and fell on her side (nothing hit her belly) and puked blood all over the carpet. She immediately started sobbing.
That poor woman went through such a rough time.
So I carefully picked her up, took her to the bathroom, held her hair back while she finished throwing up, then cleaned her face and got her some water to rinse her mouth out. I carried her to bed and then got to work cleaning up the carpet.
We were just kids, still in college together. Those three months of misery galvanized our relationship. Nothing serious has ever come between us in the years since.
14. There's no words for this
My boyfriend texted me one day when he was at the gym that he believed his rectum had prolapsed. No idea how, but I started googling what we needed to do about it. I read that if it wasn't serious, you could just push it back in before going to a doctor, instead of heading to the ER.
So what do I do? Put on a pair of gloves, lube my finger up, and kneel in front of him while he's lying on the bed attempting to push part of his rectum back into his anus.
Turns out it was just a giant hemorrhoid when he went to the doctors the next day. But I think that was a moment in our relationship where it was established that we both had complete comfort with each other. If your partner can try and shove part of your rectum up into your ass then nothing is really too disgusting or gross to discuss.
13. The loss of a pet is always rough
About 2 months into my relationship with my husband, my cat that I had adopted a month before had to be put down. She was my very first “on my own” pet and my first cat because my sister was incredibly allergic, so I had to wait until I moved out to get one.
I was incredibly devastated. He was with me every step of the way. He stayed in the room with me while I held my cat and she was put to sleep. He drove me to get food at 3 am by the time the whole ordeal was over. He stayed up with me all night. It was a surreal night, but he helped me feel normal. That’s when I knew he was the one for me.
12. Found the American
He stayed with me through my laryngeal cancer, through the permanent loss of my voice from it, through several surgeries, through several rounds of chemo and radiation, through my other tumors, and through me putting us into a colossal amount of debt from my medical bills.
That last one hurt him at work since it caused his employer to move him to less important projects as he was deemed a security risk with $350,000+ of debt, and his employer has that policy to try to prevent people in loads of debt from having access to secrets they can sell.
11. Remember that time I locked you in a gas chamber? Good times
6 months into a new relationship, he and I took a road trip to go meet my parents. On the way down, we stopped at AJ's Restaurant in Mountain Home, Idaho. He loaded up on their amazing fried chicken. It was pretty good food for the price, and we went back to our KOA full and sleepy after a long day of driving.
It didn't take long for the farts to set in. If you've never smelled or accidentally (or purposely!) breathed in a fart that smells and tastes exactly like the food that's causing them, you won't understand the pain of being stuck in a tiny cabin thick with fried chicken farts. If you have, well, you get it. It was awful. The worst of it was, I had left to brush my teeth in the bathroom across the lot, and when I came back, the room was already gassed to a point that made my eyes well up, and upon lifting the blankets to climb into bed, I was met with a waft of hot, fried chicken butt. I practically fell off the mattress onto the floor gagging and dry heaving, and all he could do was laugh so hard he couldn't control his farts.
We celebrated 10 years together in November.
10. Have you ever danced with the devil in the pale moonlight?
I suffer from depression. So one time I fell back into one of my episodes, and was sitting, crying on our bed. My husband saw me , grabbed my hands, pulled me up to stand, and started slow dancing with me. There was no music, no tv. Just us dancing. He kissed me several times and just kept giving me the biggest grin, I couldn’t help but smile through my tears.
He never dances or likes to dance. So this was a very sweet moment for me.
9. Surely there had to be another option
My then girlfriend and I went to visit my parents about 90 miles from home after eating Christmas dinner at her parents', so we could go to see a play with the whole family the next day.
We got to my parents home ok and started getting ready for bed. Everyone was already asleep when I started feeling ill. I vomited once or twice in the toilet and then started nonstop diarrhea. I sat there feeling like the world was ending while vomiting into a trash can. My girlfriend did her best to take care of me when it hit her too. Luckily I had stopped and so she took her turn evacuating out of both ends. While I waited for the next wave to come.
There was only one toilet we could use.
After taking turns back and forth a couple times we both realized this wasn’t going to end any time soon and there was going to come a time when we would both have to poop at the same time and honestly neither of us had the strength to hold it back for more than the time it took to make it to the toilet from the bed.
I remember looking at her as we both laid in bed wracked in pain while it felt like something was trying to claw its way out of our bodies. I told her if the time came when we both had to go at the same time I would squat next to her in the bathtub and poo there so she could have the toilet. She told me she loved me and we managed to survive the most horrible night I have ever experienced together. We are now married.
8. And would you know it, that's the best thing to come out of DC in probably close to 100 years
My partner and I went on a trip together in 2017 that ended in Washington, DC. On the last day of our vacation, he got food poisoning...but we didn't realize it until after we'd walked the two miles from the train back to the hotel, by which point I was limping on some pretty bad blisters and just wanted to sit down and elevate my feet. He sat down on the bed to rest and fell asleep before even getting his shoes off, and then I noticed that he had a really high fever.
For a little while, I tried to just keep a cold cloth on his face and make him drink water, but his fever got so high that he started to hallucinate and at one point he wasn't sure who I was. The ice machine was broken and the manager of the hotel wouldn't help me, but the security guard offered to keep an eye on our room to make sure that my partner didn't wander off if I wanted to go buy some ice and medicine, so I put my shoes back on and limped down the hill back toward the nearest pharmacy. I recall thinking to myself at that moment, "Man, I must really love this guy. If it was just me I'd just suffer."
Thankfully, I found a little tapas place I hadn't previously noticed on the way there and they were able to give me some ice. When I took my shoes off, my feet were bleeding. I spent all night nursing my partner through the worst case of food poisoning I've ever seen and managed to get us to the airport on time the next day. It was pretty par for the course for that trip (it was our worst vacation ever and we're pretty sure we should just never go back to DC) but at least it's memorable!
7. In sickness and in health
One morning I sat in a cold bathtub crying as my husband chased down and dressed our toddlers. I’d just recently been diagnosed with Rheumatoid Arthritis and I wasn’t used to needing help. So I listened to my husband feed and clothe and load the babies into the car as my bath water got colder. Then he came into the bathroom to say goodbye, and I just hunched over and sobbed because I didn’t want to admit that I couldn’t get out of the tub by myself but I couldn’t bring myself to ask for help.
I sobbed that we were too young to be dealing with this, that he was too young to be having to help his wife out of bathtubs. So my husband held my hand and looked me square in the eyes and told me, “I am lucky to spend the rest of my life helping you out of the bathtub. I’m honored to be the one to hold you while you walk. I’ll be glad to carry you across the house. And I swear I’ll be there for the rest of our lives.”
Sometimes we fight because he tries to help too much and I get resentful and frustrated that I can’t do things on my own. But I always know help is there if I need it. A lot of things suck right now, but I am honestly grateful to have a life partner who really is in this for life.
6. Babies are wonderful, but the lack of sleep is not
Our second son was born right before our seventh wedding anniversary. We had a five-year-old at the time, but you forget, in five years, how hard that initial baby stage is. We were so tired all the time, walking around like zombies. My husband was a new elementary principal at the time, I was teaching preschool.
One night, we walked up to Taco Bell (walking baby always helped when he was fussy). We’re sitting there, eating, trying to relax as much as new baby parents can, with a very precocious five year old chattering away, too, both exhausted, when my husband looked at his watch, looked at me, lifted his Pepsi in the air to “cheers” and said “Happy Anniversary.” We both started cracking up. Neither of us had even realized it was the date.
Our five year old made a big deal out of it, and I’m sure we seemed pathetic to anyone who saw us, but we just smiled at each other and realized this was life, and the fact that we could both laugh about it was a good sign. We celebrated our 27th year together in 2018.
Photo by Daria Shevtsova from Pexels
5. I have a surprisingly similar story
I went on vacation for one year with my family and took a kayak tour of a salt marsh, it was a nice bit of physical activity and I learned a LOT about the ecosystem! The whole time I was thinking about how I couldn’t wait to tell my boyfriend about all the cool stuff I learned about the ecosystem. We saw little crabs!! We saw dolphins!! We got to put swamp mud on our faces and sunburns!! How cool was that!!
A year later, I’m in the same vacation place with my family and boyfriend. No one wants to do the kayak tour with me except him, and honestly, he could’ve done with reading a book on the ecosystem instead of kayaking through it. He’s not a big “outdoorsy,” person and he would rather never be sticky and sweaty. He’s also never kayaked before. But I am SO excited. We can’t book it until our last day of the trip.
That day, it’s pouring rain. They call us and we reschedule it. I had been SO excited and now I was so sad. At the rescheduled time, it’s still storming. We reschedule again. By the third time, it’s still drizzling. We drive over to the launch area and the weather is awful. I'm wearing a special “kayak outfit,” that I was overly excited about. I’m crying about how excited I was for this kayak tour. We head to the parking lot and it’s still drizzling, but the sun is vaguely coming out, meaning that the humidity and mosquitos are really kicking in. I tell him it’s no use and take off my hat.
Rather than admitting that yeah, it probably isn’t going to happen, and also, maybe it’s a good thing that we won’t have to go have a workout in a hot, mosquito-y swamp while the sky keeps threatening to strike us with lightning, he puts my hat back on my head, gets out of the car, walks over to the booth, and argues with the tour guides that if they feel comfortable kayaking in the rain, we’d feel comfortable kayaking in the rain. He convinces these people to take us on a tour of the swamp (that he doesn’t want to go into) and gets into a kayak (that he’s very unsure about) in the rain so that I can learn more about crabs and mud.
He did end up having fun and we did learn a lot! I love him.
4. Poor kid
Our youngest daughter needed surgery on her little finger, at 21 months old. Our middle child had accidentally jammed it in the hinge side of our back door, pretty much taking the whole tip of her finger off. This happened at around 8 am. None of our children had needed surgery before and the whole thing was upsetting. After a long day at the hospital, waiting for surgery (they had a couple of emergencies come in so surgery got pushed back) they told us it was her turn
I told my husband I couldn't take her in. I was upset and worried and didn't want to see them put her to sleep. My husband said he would do it
So we both walked down to the theatre and I gave her a big kiss and a hug and then waited for my husband in the waiting room.
He came out and I asked how it went. He told me all went fine and the doctors had played a game with the mask to get her to wear it etc.
It wasn't until the next day, when we were finally back home, that he told me she had cried and fought the mask. That it was horrible, but he hadn't wanted me to worry because he knew I was already so upset. This isn't the only time that he's been my rock, but one that stands out
We've been together for 19 years
3. You have to be a team to make it through the hard times
When my husband and I first started dating, he had just bought a new car. His first new car. A few weeks in, my car broke down, and he let me borrow his when he went out of town. Literally, an hour after I got this car, I scraped the side into a cement pillar. Just scratched it alllll up. I called him, crying, to tell him what happened. He asked, "are you okay? Yes? Then everything is fine". The car is still scratched up 8 years later.
When he got seriously sick but was too weak to stand. I changed the sheets by kind of rolling him to my side (I'm 5'0" and was 110lbs, he is 6'4" and 280lbs), taking the sheet off his side, rolling him back, taking the sheet off my side, etc. Then sponge bathing him, keeping his temp down, feeding him broth and water. Worst two days ever.
When our son was born, we got some sort of infection. My son was taken to the NICU and I wasn't allowed in, stuck in my own room on an antibiotic IV. The nurses gave me little cups to express colostrum into to feed my son. I could not get it to work for the life of me. I was stressed, hormonal, crying, begging to have my son so he could eat. My husband stepped up and expressed the milk for me. He literally milked me. Then he was the one to feed our son in the NICU when I couldn't. What a guy.
2. What a champion
I first met her in early 2014 off and on, but I didn't really know anything about her until we moved in with each other in September 2014. This was before we were together. Her roommate left on a week notice so she needed someone ASAP. A couple of months after that, I along with my therapists thought it would be really helpful if I got ECT (electroconvulsive therapy) to help with this bipolar thing that's been with me all my life. I should also mention that I had recently ended a 3-year relationship and didn't know anyone outside of my ex's family, and no one there spoke to me anymore.
So anyway, I filled out the paperwork for short term disability at work and got approved, then started ECT a couple of weeks later. If you aren't familiar, every time you go in you need someone else to come to pick you up since there is anesthesia applied. Like I said before, I didn't know anybody so this was a problem. My lovely partner, without any argument or hesitation, managed to find someone to come and pick me up from the hospital three times a week. She kept track of all of my appointments, which was great because ECT really messes with your memory, and worked out the replacement ride situation when people who said they'd pick me up couldn't make it. We were living in a condo owned by her ex at the time, so she even had the luxury of letting me pay way less rent since I was only getting 60% of my salary from disability.
Afterward, she would remind me to take my pain meds and hold me every time I woke up screaming with a splitting headache. Again, we have known each other for 2 months basically at this point. I did that 3x a week for almost 2 months. It took me a whole other year to realize how irrevocably in love with her I was and still am.
We are going on 3.5 years now and are engaged to be married! I could not have asked for a better fiance, partner, or person in my life.
1. And she didn't leave you forever? Keep her
Early on into my now wife's and I relationship we were taking our first shower together, nothing sexual happening, just showering together, and it was probably the 3rd or 4th time we had seen one another completely naked. She's washing my back, then moves down to my ass cheeks.
Before I continue let me set the stage. It's a hot shower, lots of steam, the air is heavy, no exhaust fan in her apartment's bathroom, the door is closed, and obviously, the shower curtain is drawn closed as well.
Anyway, she's crouching and washing my ass cheeks. By accident, I let rip the most foul smelling fart you could imagine. Like rotting eggs and dead animals that have been perpetually rotting without decomposing for a year bad.
There's complete silence afterward. And then the smell hit her, *bad*. She quickly stands up, and sticks her face outside the shower curtain while coughing and saying "I can taste it I can taste it!". I am stunned into silence. What do you say??
She leaves the bathroom, and I stand there alone, breathing in Satan's perfume. I am unsure of what to do. Do I finish up and excuse myself and never speak to her again, or do I apologize and act like it wasn't a big deal? I get out of the shower and walk into her bedroom after deciding that I should apologize. She's on the bed, stark naked, with tears in her eyes and red-faced from laughing so hard.
I realized right then and there that I am probably going to marry this woman. She faced a horrible situation and chose to laugh at it instead of choosing to be mad at me. As for how we are now. Well, far worse things have left her body since that encounter that I like to remind her of and we laugh about it together.
