.....until it's too late.....how unrealistic weddings are when compared with the rest of life.

"The greatest conspiracy in modern history is not Watergate or the shooting of JFK; it's something far more ingrained and insidious in the way it distorts the truth. The conspiracy is marriage. It's not that I don't respect the institution and the belief I've cherished since childhood of what such a union could be. One heartbreaking and publicly failed marriage later, I actually revere marriage more at age 34 than I did as a blushing bride of 26.
The problem is that when a young woman announces her engagement, everyone is quick to roll out the matrimonial red carpet by throwing showers and obsessing over wedding day plans. This helps a bride prepare for the reality of marriage about as much as nine months of baby showers and nursery decorating prepare a gestating woman for the awesome task of raising a child: not at all.
Perhaps we are all guilty of holding on too tightly to our own Cinderella stories, thinking that the glass slipper of the perfect marriage will conform to us uniquely. Engagement, like pregnancy, is a fleeting and hopeful time, and those who have gone before hesitate to disrupt this dream with a dose of reality. So we carry a young woman toward the threshold of her new identity as wife and mother and abruptly drop her off at the curb, peeling out on two wheels with a honk and a wave and a wish for good luck."

That is a quote from an article written by Kristin Armstrong, of the formerly married to Lance Armstrong fame. I read it in a magazine about four years ago and found those opening paragraphs profound. Reading them again several days ago, I found them haunting.

My husband and I have attended several weddings since our own; one as recently as this past weekend. And though I have looked forward to each one with excitement and anticipation afterwards I just can't seem to shake this sense of confusion (to put in mildly) and depression (to put it accurately.)

Is it because while watching another starry-eyed couple embark on their journey of joy down the aisle towards matrimony I am reminded of how long ago my own fateful walk now seems? Or am I, as a seasoned wife, only too aware of just exactly what awaits that starry-eyed couple once they are pronounced legally joined for life?

I think the answer lies in Kristen's article. I think we in modern America do a very poor, if not disservice-able, job of ushering a man and a woman into their marriage. We start them off with a lavish, excessive show of.....of what, really? Materialism? A keeping up with the Joneses mentality? An unprecedented opportunity to go into debt? And it's as if we are collectively saying that elaborate hand calligraphy-ed wedding programs and the releasing of doves have something at all to do with the nitty gritty of making a marriage last.
We shower them with well wishes and gifts and words of praise. And then as soon as the limo has vanished from view, have very little input into any of the subsequent experiences they will undertake as a couple. We buy into, at the very least, and encourage, at the very most, the dangerous notion that married life at all resembles the 'fairy tale in all it's glorious trappings' beginning that the modern day wedding has become.

But don't brides and grooms deserve that day? Don't they deserve to have the world revolve around them for a little bit? Don't they deserve all the attention and devotion and fairy tale experiences? Actually, I think they do. But they need to understand, it is truly only for one day.

I was reminded of how truly 'one day' it all is last summer when I was the Matron of Honor in my best friend's wedding. I couldn't have been more honored, let me tell you. But I also couldn't have been more slapped upside the head by the stark, stark, let me say it again STARK, differences that exist between the bride and every one else in attendance.

I was, at the time, a relatively new mom. Nursing, I might add, about every hour. Or so it seemed. In between all my wedding duties I had to try and find time to locate a discreet place, undress to my waist (because that's the only way the dress allowed my daughter access to dinner) and try not to squirt milk all over beautiful expensive silk duponi fabric as I fed my child. And after removing said, no longer screaming, child, re-inserting industrial sized breast pads and re-dressing, it was back to the "party" for me. (Can you sense my enthusiasm? Can you?)

On top of all that I was still so hormonal and lacking in sleep that I took out all my stress and frustration on my husband. He and I did a lovely re-enactment of the Cold War that whole evening. In surroundings and amidst an occasion that are both meant to epotomize the very essence of love and romance and eternal devotion we hardly exchanged glances at all; let along longing, sentimental ones. When everything was said and done I was tired, hungry, (it's not just the bride and groom that don't get a chance to eat at their wedding) lonely and sad. We drove home to the joint and competing sounds of a monsoon-like rain storm pelting our windshield and our daughter screaming; because she had been passed around more than the appetizer trays that day and she just wanted to be held by me.

Depressing? Yes. Realistic to the rest of life? I'm afraid so.

Fast forward to this past weekend and this wedding. I thought I was more prepared. My daughter is older now; 15 months. I was glad I didn't have to deal with all the infant at a wedding issues. But I also knew toddler at a wedding issues were sure to be no picnic. It was my husband in the wedding party this time. He had to dress up. I, wisely I thought, chose to wear pants (it was an outdoor wedding) and a simple, easily removable top (we are still nursing) and indeed elected that my whole outfit come from a second hand shop so it could be discarded should any disasters ensue.

But I was still startled by the reality. While every one without young children and most of the men in attendance, including my husband, were able to devote their attention to the bride and groom, I and the other moms tried to quiet rambuncious kids. We bounced. We walked. We chased. We picked crying bundles up off the gravel and washed away the tell tale blood trails. We sunlotion-ed our offspring until they were able to slip right out of our desperate strangleholds. We sprayed them with enough mosquito spray to wear a new hole in the ozone. We fed them snacks so they could last until the dinner was served and then we fed them cake in ridiculous quantities. And finally we put then into car seats, sticky and dirty and crabby, and drove them home well past bedtime.

In the midst of all this 'celebrating', when I found myself separated from the other moms and changing a poopy diaper, in the middle of the vows, in some air conditioned closet, I was forced to look back at the woman I was at my own wedding, all love struck and glowing and naive and wonder.......what the heck happened?

And then it came to me: Life. Life happened. Messy, inconvenient, hard as can be, thankless, endless, monotonous life.

And I understood why we usher brides into all this without even a brief warning whisper of what is to come. Because who in their right mind would sign on for it otherwise.

And then I thought of God's much used analogy of Christ as a bridegroom and the church as His bride. And it suddenly made sense to me on a whole other level. Christ's return will be glorious and elaborate and decadent and like a fairy tale. We will be transported from tired and worn out, just plain trying to get by, existence and changed into the breathtakingly pure and beloved apple of God's eye. It will be like the most amazing of love stories. But with one huge difference. It will be real. And it will be forever.

....the real changes that parenthood brings. Of course you think you've got them all down before the baby comes. You've gone over them numerous times in your head. You've maybe even verbally hashed and re-hashed them over with you spouse, trying desperately to make sure he understands just what you two will be giving up so you don't have to listen to him complain about it later. And yet, somehow, despite everything you truly, ignorantly, perhaps even blissfully, have no stinkin' clue.

In the sheer mind numbing intensity of the early weeks (or as I like to call them: boot camp) you do begin to rapidly experience a few of the changes you foresaw. Yes, there is very little sleep. Yes, there is a lot of emotion. Yes, it's now a good day when you have time to shower AND pee without a several hour intermission. But those are only little changes. The seem like the destructive explosion of some bomb, that blew your life apart, in the moment, true. Yet in the grand scheme of things they are little. For you see, they are temporary. Your child eventually sleeps. The crying for no real reason fades. You have the time to go about your bathroom obligations at a normal humane pace (though you might have a spectator.)

The real changes, the ones you never saw coming (perhaps because you were so focused on the temporary ones) are profound and life altering. They are how you, as a person, now view life.

Once upon a time the world wide panic over some new strain of flu wouldn't really have bothered me. Now I hear the part about it being a particular threat to the very young and my heart is gripped with fear. Once upon a time I thought being in pain or being sick myself was pretty terrible. Now I know it doesn't hold a candle to watching your child in pain or sick. Once upon a time to look into the face of any child rightly seemed like looking at a stranger. Now no matter the age or the race I can't help but see my own daughter. Once upon a time I felt like a whole person. Now I know I'm not. And I never will be again.

Those are the real changes. Those are the reasons my seasoned mother-in-law would look at me with a knowing smile and indulgent tilt of her head every time I talked at length about some temporary little hiccup of an inconvenience and not say anything. Because she knew. (Nine times over.) And she knew eventually I would too.

Don't get me wrong, I did miss sleep and am so grateful to have it back. My husband and I do mourn the loss of spontaneous weekend getaways. And we both often wonder what we really did with all our free time before our daughter came along. (Actually forget before she came along! Who remembers that far back? I want to know what we did with all our free time before she was walking.) But now we understand. We may fantasize about going back to our former life every now and then but we never could. Because we aren't those people anymore. And even if we could be, if it meant life without our daughter.......we wouldn't want it.