I Didn't Really Love You When I Married You

Dear Tom,

After twenty-five years of marriage I want to write you a letter of thanks. But, I don’t know what to thank you for. Because, how do you begin to thank someone for what you are? For the fact that you can love?

I think there is a very important thing about the people in our lives that truly matter – that truly made a difference in our life: they didn’t do one thing, or even two or three. A couple of things don’t make us into who we are. These people that mattered were there, shaping us, with everything that they conveyed through words or actions, for weeks, months and years and that’s why we are this something that we don’t know how to thank them for.

So, how do I start the list of the millions of things you did every, single day since we met that cracked every, single one of my walls? How do I explain to you how the years with your kindness in my life have lifted me up from a defensive, overcompensating girl trying to prove her worth to herself, to someone who isn’t afraid to reach for the stars? How do I summarize how twenty-five years of your thoughtful nature led me to become a better human being than I started out as?

I can’t. I don’t know how. There’s just too much.

What I can tell you is that you are the reason I understand what love is, and frankly, it scares the hell out of me.

I thought I loved you the first time I told you so. I definitely thought I loved you the day we got married, but, this year I realized I had lied to you. That wasn’t love. Not yet. That was a smarter, deeper part of me knowing I could love you and voicing that potential.

This year, I was ill. You know that there were moments when I wasn’t sure I would make it through. That terrified me. Not because I’m afraid of death – I mean, I am. We all are. Those who say they aren’t are full of it. But no. That wasn’t it. I was terrified of the hurt you would feel if I gave up and left you now. I didn’t want you to be a single dad to a special needs person while trying to work to pay the mortgage all on your own. I didn’t want you to try and make it through all of this alone. There are so many things that we started together and that still need the two of us and I couldn’t bear to leave it all to you. One day we will all pass on, but to leave you now didn’t feel scary for me. It felt selfish. I realized that when I go, I want it to be at a time when you’ll be good without me. Whether I am here or not, I want you to have a life full of joy. It doesn't actually matter if it's with me. It just matters that it's good for you.

That was the moment I realized my last wall had cracked. You had somehow managed to break them all and make it all the way into my heart in a way that no one ever had.

There was a moment when it was really bad, and the only thing I could think of was that I needed you there, holding my hand, if I do pass on. And maybe it’s stupid but I wasn’t terrified of death itself at that moment. I was terrified of dying and moving on to a life in which you didn’t exist. It didn’t matter what wonders would await me in whatever afterlife I entered. The thought that in whatever next life there is, I might not remember you and the things you did for me, and were for me, was unbearable. I wanted to hold you in my last moments so that somehow, the memory of you would go with me. Because it doesn’t matter if I lose you someday and somehow. Yes, that will hurt, but I can handle it. But, the pain of not remembering you is unbearable. Because you are me now. So, how can I know myself, if I don’t know you? How can I understand myself if I forget how I became me?

It terrifies me most that I have come to feel this kind of fear for another human being. I realized that this is love, and you have taught me to feel it. And it is scary as all hell and I thank you for it.