Marriage: Handle With CareSample

 For Christmas, my mom gave my daughter an illustrated version of “The Gift of the Magi.” 

The cover illustration of the husband and wife clinging to one another, after they had each sacrificed their most treasured possession, took my breath away. 

When we returned to Wisconsin after our short trip to visit family in Tennessee, I placed this book on top of our refrigerator. 

I was struggling with homesickness and wanted that picture to be a reminder of the beauty of sacrificial love and of fulfilling Randy’s dream to be in Wisconsin, even if that meant living away from our family.

We were home for two days when I received the call. My husband was being rushed to La Crosse by ambulance because a CAT scan revealed severe pressure on his brain. What I didn’t know then was that in the coming days, he would have an emergency craniotomy to remove a benign tumor, and our lives would be turned upside down. 

Adrenaline pumped like serum as I tossed his clothing and mine into the suitcase I had just unpacked and checked the freezer to see if I had enough milk stored to sustain our four-month-old during our indeterminate stay. 

My husband’s aunt arrived within ten minutes, and she lived ten minutes away. My husband’s cousin stowed my bags in his car as our three-year-old clung to my legs.

Choking back tears, I kissed her gold-brown curls, not knowing if I was going to bring her daddy back home. 

Really, not knowing anything. 

Hours later, I knelt beside my husband’s hospital bed, trying to brace myself for the worst. 

“I’m so glad I married you,” I whispered, and then rose to prepare myself for his surgery that morning.

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Three days later, I brought him home to our daughters—that threshold-crossing moment paling every Technicolor joy. 

I wept as he walked through the house. Later, I wept as I lay beside him. 

“What would’ve you done?” he asked. “We’re not even settled. Everything’s still a mess.”

“I’m stronger than I look,” I said, wiping tears. 

“I would’ve wanted to be buried in Tennessee,” he whispered, crying too. “You would’ve been close to me there.”

I laughed. “I was going to bury you in Wisconsin. On your grandma’s farm. Your happiest place on earth.”

“I knew you’d do that,” he said, touching my hair. 

I clung to him, my husband returned, and remembered the illustrated copy of “The Gift of the Magi” on top of our refrigerator: a reminder that the greatest gift of all is, indeed, sacrificial love. 

Conversation Starter: How have you put your spouse’s needs before your own? How has your spouse put your needs before his/hers?

Getting Started: Find three different ways you can make a “sacrifice” for your spouse: the gift of time (give him/her a break from the kids), an act of service (folding laundry/mowing the yard), and a thoughtful item that he/she really wanted but you didn’t think was necessary.