It's easy to fall into a rut. Give people a chance to pleasantly surprise you and reaffirm your relationship.

This particular advice is hard for me to enact. It's not that I'm not a positive person and definately not that I don't love my friends and family dearly. But, I've been deeply disappointed in the past. My own mother abandoned me when I was young enough to understand. Ever since, I've been hypersensitive to criticism and rejection. I'm well founded in that area- but I've spent most of my life circumventing that rut. It's worth it once in a while.

The above is a picture is of me and my husband the month we got married in Chicago. It seemed as if we talked in depth and freely more easily as a non married couple. Now with the expectations that marriage puts upon spouses, I think the communication becomes more inhibited. In fact, I was so afraid of this predicament that even before he proposed, I was hoarding resources to help me along the communication struggle. Or is it just complacency?

There was a particular subject of conversation that I avoided like the plague. I was afraid what would happen/change between us if we talked about it.

I was super pleasantly surprised at how it turned out. It gave me the sign that Todd values our relationship. The conversation didn't hurt me the way I envisioned it would.

I woke up today feeling very happy about my family and marriage. And if I take my friend's advice, I'll wake up feeling the same way for the rest of our life together.

I'm blessed.