re: Divorce Board Spin-Off: If you have been married, why did you get married?

quote:

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And for the successfully married OTers, what do you feel like has made your marriage last?

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There are three big ones for me & Mrs. Bard:

The first thing is trust. Both you and your partner need to not only be trustworthy but willing to trust one another. Before getting married you have to look objectively at both yourself and your partner to gauge this.

The second is communication. I put this as the second because without trust you are going to have a tough time communicating. This ranges from finances to how you view raising children (if you even want them) to randomly telling the other person you love them. An incredibly important aspect of this is learning how to disagree.

The third is respect. With trust and communication, this one naturally occurs. Without both of the other two, this one is tough to achieve. This becomes especially true when disagreeing. Having that respect for one another is going to help you both from letting your emotions in the moment override your common sense. Another aspect of this is to not take one another for granted by reminding yourself (each of you), in an ongoing manner, the different reasons why you love one another.

If both parties can achieve these three, the rest is more likely to work out on its own.