Family

You may be scratching your head after reading the title to this blog post – right?

My husband and I have been together over 10 years now. Those 10 years brought so many ups and downs and I will be truthful… some of the downs led me to wanting to just throw my hands up and be done. I would search my soul and send so many prayers up to the Lord to please intervene. Our biggest challenge came when my husband got the lay-off slip at work. The slip could not have come at a worse time, at least in my opinion. My husband had a heart condition that caused a bad single car accident. He was out of work for three months. After going back to work from medical leave, it only was a week until he received the pink slip. Needless to say, the company has went under and employees all across the US are without a job.

The unemployment brought on a huge depression for my husband. You see, this unemployment is going on the third year as we speak. The first two years of the unemployment was horrible. I cried, I screamed and I just wanted to give up on us altogether. So, what changed things?

After having a conversation with a special person in my life, she made me think about things. My husband was depressed and taking out his bitterness on the one he loved – ME! I needed to quit being angry towards him and wrap him with love. He was bitter, because his wife was being so successful and all he could do is sit back and wallow in pity. We had a heart to heart talk. In the talk, I told him how much he contributes to this family without having a job. Dude… he does our family’s laundry. Is that not huge? He will take the kids to their extracurricular activities and not even complain about being Dad Taxi. Our cars stay in tip top shape, because he washes them every other day. Hey, who am I to complain? At least the cars are always sparkling.

I realized that I was not being the best wife and helping him through the depression. A light bulb moment changed our lives so much. I thank him more for all he does to help the family function better day to day. I tell him I love him. I go up and hug him randomly throughout the day. I will grab his hand as we are walking. I will lay my hand on his leg when we are eating dinner. I call him Mr. Handsome randomly during our conversations. It did not take time to realize, we were becoming best friends once again. The sparkle was in our eyes once again when we would look at each other. We were holding loving conversations instead of seeing who could win a yelling match.

All it took was that special friend to open my eyes, unemployment did not have to kill us – unemployment could bring us closer. So, I can 100% say, I am thankful for his unemployment. I love you best friend!