Yes, it's true: If you marry the man you met when you were twelve, you will not be the same person you were back then once you're ten, twenty, or thirty years down the road. Both of you will definitely change as the years go on.
But guess what? That's not always a bad thing.
I met my now-fiancé way back in seventh grade. At the time, I thought of Logan as "that weird kid from Iceland". It wasn't until our junior year of high school that we became close friends, and it took another year before we started dating. And since then, I've learned that he's not weird and he's not actually from Iceland—he just lived there for a few years while his dad was stationed there during his time in the Navy.
We've gone through so many stages of our lives together. We fought our way through middle school, grew into our identities in high school, graduated, and moved to college together. We have known each other during the best and worst times of our lives. We accept our flaws and we celebrate our strengths.
But no, we aren't the same people we were when we started dating and fell in love. We've both changed in so many ways since then, let alone since we met. We've matured. Our political views have changed. Our college majors have switched countless times. We want to go on completely different life paths than we did even just last year.
The wonderful thing about all of those changes is that as each of them has come to pass, and we have changed together. We might be different people than we used to be, but we are closer to each other than we have ever been.
We have found so many things we have in common as we have decided together where we want to move after college, such as iff we want to raise a family and the kind of lifestyle we want to have. I have been thrilled to discover that we're often on the same page, and when we aren't, we can compromise.
Over the years, we have had the wonderful opportunity to start chasing our dreams together. Though those dreams have changed and they don't always align with one another, we have constantly supported each other and worked hard to turn those dreams into realities. No matter what we decide we want in life, I know that we will help each other reach our goals. Last December, we marked a huge item off our bucket list when we traveled to Alaska on our own (and got engaged while we were there).
People always say that if you marry young you're going to change, grow apart, and get divorced. I just don't think that's always the case. I'm not scared of the future, because I'm confident Logan and I are going to continue to grow together.
I know that we are going to be different people in ten years than we are now, but we have proven a thousand times over that we are a couple that can mature together. I'm excited to see how we'll continue to change as the years go by. I'm even more excited that we'll be changing together.
