Lessons Learned from 6 Years in a Happy Relationship!

Would you let me tell you a story that I think would be really helpful for you, because it shares the best of what I’ve learned about having a happy relationship, getting through challenges and struggles?

Read my story in this post or watch the original video of day 162 of Happier People Podcast on YouTube!

After six years in a happy relationship, what have I learned?

This story features the Detroit Zoo and me taking my wife’s hand yesterday as the climax of it.

"Jerry, why did you give the very best?"

"You gave the whole thing too early!"

Well, maybe so.

What I hope to share here is my experience in getting through the normal challenges that we have in relationships, because I think the more we share stories like this, the more we each find it easier to get along with each other.

Ultimately, what I found in my life is that it’s not the evils outside I need to worry about because I have the ability to create all my own evil today, out of my own heart, out of intolerance and conflict with each other.

Why don't you go to the zoo?

Yesterday, I went to the Detroit Zoo with my wife and daughter. I’m very grateful to be here and filming a video visiting my family in Michigan. Yesterday, my aunt said, “Why don’t you go to the zoo?” So my wife and I, packed our daughter up who’s just about two years old, I think she’s about 21 months.

It was a beautiful day at the Detroit Zoo yesterday and we took our daughter there. I took the camera there to take some pictures and maybe make a video. I took a couple of pictures and filmed the camels for just a few minutes at which point I managed to lose my camera case the second time I tried to go out and use it.

Honesty is difficult. Why is honesty so difficult? The second time I went out to go and use it, I lost my camera case within a few minutes of walking into Detroit Zoo.

"Jerry, this story sucks."

Maybe it does, maybe it's really good though, maybe the truth is somewhere in between.

That is for me an immediate shame trigger like, "Wow, nice job you lost your case with everything inside." The money is not a big deal to me, but that stuff always gets into principle like, "You lost your brand new $70 Lapel mic. You lost your case, and you lost your $40 backup battery."

As soon as I walked into Detroit Zoo, I lost $100 right there. I thought, "The money is not a big deal, but why does this still piss me off?" I felt like I was hurried, like I was rushed, like my wife and daughter wanted to go off and see the giraffes in the back of the zoo.

Bottom line, I started coming up with a lot of self-pity and my wife does really good with it. She said, "It's okay. I love you. It's no big deal." She was not minimizing it, but at the same time comforting me, so I felt better soon after that and I prayed about it. Now, just that normally, in a lot of days in my life, is enough to set me off for days. I'd be complaining to you about something I lost years earlier.

We got through the rest of the zoo up until we got to see the giraffes. We had a lot of fun with our daughter looking at different birds and animals.

Then, it got to be about 11 a.m., my daughter was sleepy and she decided right then that she wanted to take a nap. We told her that we didn't have anything to take a nap, that we were out at the zoo and we didn't have her blanket that she wanted to take a nap with.

A total breakdown

She just started asking for her blanket and she just lost it. She had a total breakdown screaming and crying, "I want my blanket," thrashing and flooring around. She didn't want to be held, she didn't want to walk around, she just had a total meltdown.

This presented all kinds of opportunities for shame triggers, "Oh my God, what are these other parents going to think, my child's having a tantrum, look how bad I look."

Her tantrum became difficult for all of us then, and my wife did pretty good with it until I didn't start doing very good with it. I wanted to help out.

I want to be useful and sometimes as a screaming child you don't need both parents to try to help, it's too much, I don't know.

However it went down, my wife, daughter and I, ended up all being very uncomfortable as we headed towards the exit. My wife was trying to hurry out to the exit, I needed to go to the bathroom and was building up a bunch of self-pity and resentment for myself like, "Wow, I don't deserve this," and then getting mad at my wife and trying to blame her.

"Well, if she wasn't in such a hurry I wouldn't have lost my camera case, then if she wasn't in such a hurry our daughter wouldn't have got so upset," and then me seeing that the truth is that I was miserable at that moment.

I was just having a really good day a few minutes ago and all of a sudden I was miserable, and that was the truth. It was not my wife's fault and it wouldn't make it better if I tried to drag my wife down and say these things that were in my head.

What I managed to get out was that I said, "I'm feeling just like Madeline is. I'm feeling frustrated. I just want to sit down, cry, scream and I'm feeling the same way she is."

Now, my wife didn't know what to do with that and she said something along the lines of, "Well, you're an adult. You should be able to deal with this and cope with this."

Tools to deal with emotions

Now, yes, I've got tools at 33 years old to deal with emotions, but the emotions are the same as they've always been. The feeling of anger, frustration and self-pity, are the same as they've been my whole life.

I do have tools to deal with them and I'm grateful that I actually used the tools as an adult to try to recover in a way that's healthier, instead of having a screaming argument with my wife in the middle of Detroit Zoo, instead of going crazy and continuing up and up, and just be a lunatic, which is what I've done most of my life.

When my parents would fight, often they would warm-up each other and one of them would storm off, or they'd start yelling, or they'd keep it all together until they got home at which point they'd be screaming, door slamming and anger for days, and arguments being used for years about things like that.

I pray when I honestly see that I'm insane, and that I really want everything to be worse.

I'm grateful for what actually happened yesterday, I started praying, "God help me remember I love my wife. Help me remember to be here, not to miss out on this by being in miserable anger, and also not to make it worse, to just not say that next nasty thing, to not warm-up at one more time."

Thankfully, I needed to go to the bathroom so I said, "I'm going to go to the bathroom and I don't want it to be a big deal," because my wife was trying to hurry out with our daughter, and what I was trying to do to sabotage was drag as much as possible.

I went to the bathroom still all upset, I was praying and thinking. I might have cried a little bit, I don't know. My wife, outward at least, was keeping it pretty well together, but inwardly she was pretty upset as well. Our daughter, by this time, had started to relax and she was like, "Whatever, I'll get my blanket soon." As my wife and I were walking out of the park, I was all upset.

Saving the day!

Now, normally my wife and I are very touchy and feely. We hold hands and give hugs. We're very expressive with our love for each other.

I looked down and I saw my wife's hands swinging empty because our daughter was in the carrier. I'd been holding her hand when we walked in and everything was good, then I held her hand when I lost my camera case and felt bad. Her hands were sitting there swinging and I was in the middle of this mess in my head like, "I can't believe what she did. It's all her fault, blah-blah." I was praying, "Please God, let's have a nice day together and let's not do the same kind of thing I've done so many times."

It seemed like the most insane thing in the world, like you might think it feel insane to jump off a bridge or to ask someone out on a date…

"Can we get some less extreme examples here, Jerry?"

All right, whatever you think feels totally insane, just admit you're wrong in the middle of an argument.

I just reached out my hand and grabbed my wife's hand and it was amazing everything instantly was better.

Now, I took that action in love, I didn't reach out to grab her hand and slow her down, pull her and try to control her, I reached out her hand vulnerable, in love, realizing that if she just threw my hand out of hers and said, "Get out of here," that I would be crushed, that it would hurt. I reached out almost just like that awkward on a first date, maybe reach out trying to hold the person's hand while you're walking in the mall, that kind of vulnerability.

I reached out and I grabbed my wife's hand, and I just said, "Thank God we're here together, I'm really grateful we have this time together as a family." My wife just said all of a sudden, "I'm sorry for being so hard on you and for hurrying out, or whatever."

She said, "I'm sorry," and I said, “I’m sorry too, I made this more difficult, I didn't make this easier, I made this harder, I'm sorry."

After that we had a wonderful day together.

"Jerry that's a great story, I'm going to go tell that to everyone."

To me that is a miracle because I've seen so many days like that, so many normal things like that turn into absolute meltdown and horrible fights. I've had relationships end over starting with just little things like that, and all of a sudden someone's cheated on the other person, or I'm leaving a crazy drunk phone call, "F U, I don't want to see you again." That's how all this stuff starts, it's just little things like that.

I realize that I want to be married to my wife for the rest of my life, and it's important to fix, really completely fix, every single one of those little things immediately or as fast as possible.

It was amazing yesterday and it felt like all those slowdowns in a movie just reaching out to take my wife's hand, it was amazing.

I've learned that from other people, I've learned how to be a loving and grateful person. I've learned how to be vulnerable and to take a risk, a chance from other people.

This is an intimate personal story, of course I'd rather keep it to myself, and yet I realize this might help.

I hope you have a wonderful day today.

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Love,

Jerry Banfield with edits by @gmichelbkk

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