The three year test drive

When my husband and I met, we'd both been through our share of relationships and heartbreak. I had a daughter who was three years old at the time from a previous marriage. He was still healing from the break up of a nearly four year relationship which ended months prior to our meeting. We had both learned from personal experience, as well as observing friends, that there seems to be a "make it or break it" point in most relationships around the three year mark. He had come to call it, and I have since adopted the term, the "three year test drive."

I have since developed a theory with regard to this phenomenon. The following things are general examples of things I personally have seen, heard, or experienced. They do not apply to every relationship, nor is it an all-encompassing list.

New relationship, year one: You've met someone new! Your heart goes pitter-pat. This person is all that and a bag of chips, the whole enchilada, everything you've ever wanted in a mate, and some things you didn't even realize you were looking for. Sure, they have their quirks, but it's endearing. You're falling in love. You want to spend every available waking minute with this person to find out everything you possibly can about them. It's bliss. And finally you come to that all important benchmark, your First Anniversary. You celebrate, and life goes on.

Same relationship, year two: You've entered the comfort zone. You've now spent four seasons with this person. You've probably met at least part of each other's families, spent a holiday or two together, seen them at their best, and maybe helped them through a rough patch. You're starting to notice little things here and there, that you may have overlooked at first, but everyone has their faults, nobody is perfect, and you can live with the occasional idiosyncracy. You are also letting your guard down and becoming more relaxed around this person. You probably don't clean your house obsessively before they come over. You may have revealed some of your less than wonderful habits - leaving the cap off the toothpaste, leaving the light on in the kitchen, leaving your socks on the floor, sleeping with the television on. But people can change. These are things each of you can live with... for now. After all, you've been with each other for two years. Relationships take work.

Year three: You've let your guard down. You pass gas in front of each other. You're honest enough to let each other know how you really feel about their best friend/mom/brother/child(ren). You've found you disagree on some aspect of politics or religion. Or you don't disagree on anything, and conversation has become routine. You want kids, they don't, or vice versa. They've always dreamed of a traditional church wedding with 200 guests, you're not even sure about marriage. Or you've already gotten married or moved in together and now you find you've asked them to not leave that light on or turn off the television for the 300th time and here you are turning it off again. They've asked you to pick up your socks and put your plate in the dishwasher for the 300th time and you still don't understand why it's such a big deal. One of you is always fashionably late, the other is always 15 minutes early. You come to realize there's only so much you can live with.

Basically, at this point, you decide one of two things. That you love this person in spite of all their faults, and they feel the same way about you, and you know you will spend the rest of your lives together not out of obligation, but because you can't imagine anyone taking their place. Or, you can't stand the idea of another Christmas with this person's family and they've already started staying later at work or spending another night a week at the bar. Make it or break it.

We made it. We are better than ever. Almost ten years later, and after five years of marriage, I thank God.