During the first few years of my marriage, I was annoyed whenever my husband started snoring. I sat up, looked at him, and carefully tried to turn him over so that he would stop. This happened only when he was suffering from allergies. Normally he didn’t snore. He just breathed hard.
Now that I’ve been married almost 15 years, I love to hear my husband snoring. It’s relaxing to me. First off, it means that my husband is with me. Sometimes he travels on business, and when he’s gone, I can’t sleep very well because he’s not in bed, and I feel like something is missing. Secondly, my husband has sleep problems (please pray for him; he has had sleep problems for almost 3 years and feels haggard nearly all the time, and I want so desperately for him to sleep). So when I hear my husband snoring, I smile and I’m so happy and peaceful that I fall asleep. I actually like to hear him snore.
During this past winter, I’ve gotten flus and colds, one after another. One night I heard my husband finally start to snore after midnight. I was so happy that I smiled, but then suddenly I felt a tickle in the back of my throat, because I had to cough. I tried so hard not to cough, but I involuntarily let out a cough. My husband stopped storing. I was so disappointed that my cough woke him up…
It’s like this with other aspects in my marriage. The idiosyncracies of my husband have become dear to me. Little things that used to annoy me no longer do. Maybe I’ve just gained perspective on life, on what’s important and what isn’t. Or maybe I’ve let love cover it.
It reminds me of the old movie “Annie,” where the main male character falls in love with a woman, only to tell her that her teeth were crooked. She felt self-conscious for a minute, but then he declared that he loved crooked teeth. He loved her teeth because they were hers. When deficiencies are no longer seen as liabilities, people can feel more restful and secure, knowing that they are accepted for who they are.
