I Love You! Sometimes I Hate You Too!

Good Morning Covenant Groupies,

Kevin and I were discussing the very thin line between love and hate. Remember growing up how we all had those moments where we may have hated our parents, siblings, friends, cousins etc. anything from a disappointment, failed expectation, sibling rival, jealousy, to unfair treatment seemed to assist in us crossing that line.

How many if us realize that that same line exists in our marriages? If we're honest with our spouses and ourselves, we'd have to admit that our spouses can be the perfect catalysts to crossing that line to. Often, we don't even tell our spouses about these moments out of fear of jeopardizing the love we depend on so much from them and out of the personal acknowledgement that this is even happening; that we could possibly harbor hatred for the one we live, whether momentary or for an extended period of time.

Why, you ask?

Because no one teaches us that hate truly does exist in marriage. We're supposed to live under the guise of pure happiness all the time - especially in Christian marriages! We're not mentored properly as we embark on marriage and so, many of the things that can possibly destroy marriages are things that if we had  been given a heads up, have solutions as well. Divine and practical solutions. 

When I realized that there were these moments with Kevin and I, it totally messed me up. I couldn't believe that things like his walk to his voice bothered me. And then, because I didn't address them it then became a sustain and a hatred. I had to search my soul to figure out why because I knew that I loved him beyond words, but I needed to weed out this awful feeling and discover where was it coming from.

What I realized was that the majority of these moments existed because I had formed issues, expectations, ideals and perceptions about who Kevin was supposed to be for me and any little deviation from that showed a lack of love, disrespect, taking me for granted, selfishness, you name it. All of these and more will gladly walk you through the door of hatred if and when we're not careful.

As well, I realized that these moments ARE going to happen in marriage and when they do I'll need to ask the Lord which ones I share with Kevin for him to address and work on with me and which ones I just leave alone and work on internally. 

Our spouses should never have to pay for, answer for or be manipulated into fixing or addressing issues especially when they have absolutely nothing to do with them!