The Two Words That Saved My Marriage . . . Before It Even Began

As a child, there lived in me a strong desire to do well. Follow the rules, get straight A’s on report cards, win medals, excel, achieve. I aimed to please. But as I look back, neither internal motivation nor an inherent drive to succeed compelled me. My motivation? Fear — pure and simple. My fear of disappointing people drove me. This manifested in many ways in my life: never feeling good enough, smart enough, pretty enough, athletic enough, liked enough. The list goes on.

This state of being negatively impacted relationships throughout my childhood and into adulthood. I was never fully myself. I kept up walls and wore many masks trying not to let people see who I really was. Worse, I pretended to be someone I was NOT. I believed my true self was not “enough” for any of them.

When I met my husband, however, something changed. Maybe he naturally drew out the side of me that I wouldn’t let others see. Perhaps I had finally figured out that to be serious about creating a healthy relationship, I needed to say what I thought, be myself, tear down the walls, and rip off the masks. Or maybe the energy it took to act the way I was “supposed to” finally drained me to the point that I just couldn’t do it anymore. I’m sure it was a combination of those things. With him, I was able to be honest and vulnerable and real. And that vulnerability led me one night to share my deepest fear.

“I’m terrified that I will disappoint you,” I told him during a conversation when we shared our hopes and dreams and all the lovely things that people talk about when considering a life together. I couldn’t for one more second continue talking about all the good stuff without sharing the scary stuff. Because, in my experience, the good he saw in me would eventually fade away, and he would be left with a disappointing wife, partner, and friend.

His two-word reply to my deepest, darkest fear changed my life. And, I believe, saved our marriage before it ever began. He said, “You will.” I will. I will disappoint him. Huh. You might think that this would just confirm my beliefs and validate my fears. But his response gave me something totally unexpected: freedom.

Now, before you start labeling him a jerk for saying such a thing, I want to make sure you know how he followed it up.

“You will,” he said. “And I will disappoint you, and we will forgive each other, and we will be just fine.”

The weight that immediately lifted from me was physical, people. The pressure I felt to always make everything good and okay? Gone. If I messed up, if I mis-stepped, if I made a mistake? It would be okay. No one had ever told me that before.

And the best part? That newfound freedom translates to every area of my life. I’m going to disappoint my children at some point. (I probably already have. Four-year-olds have a pretty low threshold for disappointment.) I’m going to make mistakes at work and in nearly every other area of my life. But it’s going to be okay.

I still struggle with “enough.” I struggle to find the balance I need to be what I consider a good wife, good mom, good employee, good daughter, good sister, and good friend. I never feel like I’m doing it all well. But through those two little words, I learned about grace. Others are far more gracious than I ever expected or realized. I’m still learning to be gracious to myself. And I work at it every day.

“You will,” he said.

And I have. I will again. And it will be okay.