The Positives of Being Married to a Negative Person

One morning when I was completely exasperated with my husband (and blinded by my own frustration) I thought, Why, oh, why did I marry him?! And the sad thing was that I had no excuse. I dated my husband for FOUR YEARS before we got married, so I knew pretty much all there was to know about him. I knew his faults. We both made full disclosure in those four years and walked into marriage with our eyes wide open.

Our differences were pretty obvious from the beginning. If we hadn’t met on a blind date, we probably would have never met. In fact, after we started dating, both sets of our friends were VERY surprised. I can’t tell you the number of people who said, You’re dating Brett? You? And, of course, his friends asked him the same question. People had a right to be surprised. Here are some of our more obvious differences:

Me – Country
Brett – Heavy Metal

Me – Reading
Brett – TV

Me – Preppy
Brett – Biker

Me – Overachiever
Brett – What’s a nice way to say the opposite?

Me – Urban
Brett – Rural

Me – Large group of acquaintances
Brett – Small group of friends

Me – White Collar
Brett – Blue Collar

Me – Assertive
Brett – Laid Back

Me – Thought theology was BORING
Brett – Thought theology was fascinating


I could list more stuff, but you get the point. So, I knew this going in. The nice thing about having so much NOT in common is that when you find things you both like, it’s a treat. For instance, we both love history, action adventure movies, and science fiction.

I never planned to get married. I wanted to prove to myself and the world that a woman could be a success on her own. I never wanted to be in the inescapable position of having a man support me. And, perhaps a little more painful to admit, I knew that no man would ever want me.

My thoughts going off the college were that I MIGHT get married, but probably in my forties to a man whose wife had died or some such thing where he would want to be with me. I wanted him to be in marketing or advertising, and I especially wanted him to be a funny and smart man of Jewish heritage. That was my tentative plan. But thanks to God’s intervention, I ended up dating a tall, serious, Swede in my first year of college.

Truthfully, the only reason I went out with my husband after our initial blind date was his dogged persistence. He called me all the time and said the nicest things. I had never had a guy treat me like that. NEVER! I wasn’t in love with him at first, but he was so convinced we were meant to be together that I had to a least give him a chance. And I had to admire his perseverance. After a while, I found out what an amazing person he was. He WAS very different from me, but many of those differences were good things that helped me to maintain balance.

Me – Judgmental
Brett – Understanding

Me – Sarcastic
Brett – Sincere

Me – Unforgiving
Brett – Forgiving

I’d go on, but I’m not sounding like such a good catch myself right now. The main difference between us has been that I’m a born optimist (albeit a cynical one) and Brett’s kind and loving but also most definitely a pessimist. I like to joke he’s like the donkey from Winnie the Pooh! So, usually my frustration stems from the very different ways we can view a situation. And, of course, like all married couples, we are normal in our *cough* *cough* discussions of important issues.

One of the things I enjoy about my husband is that, even after six year of marriage and ten years together, he still chases and pursues me in a way that makes me feel beautiful and attractive. And when opposites attract - like we do – there can be sparks! The good kind, too.

I’ve started to think about our union like a battery. A battery needs both a positive and negative end to make anything work. And when we are in sync, even with our different perspectives, our marriage works wonderfully!

So, in the end, my frustration rarely wins out, and I realize I’m really in love and still attracted to my opposite.

Besides, one of the best things about fighting with a big, tall, handsome man is the making up with the big, tall handsome man.

Ooh, la, la!