No Such Thing As Relationship Goals

I am the least person I’d expect to write a relationship-related entry, but alas.
There aren’t a lot of married couples I know that are like us. Maybe that’s a good thing, because it’s not for everyone, certainly (our ways — not marriage. Although yeah, it isn’t for everyone too, lelelel). Drew and I have had many, many, many, many, many ups and downs (sometimes it surprises me how we’re still together — but I mean this in the best way), and it’s broken a lot of walls that made us (mostly me) take a bit of time before we’ve adjusted (mostly me), and accepted (mostly me) the type of couple that we are. He was the first one to be THIS self-aware, while I was still living under the standards of Society. It’s not wrong to, especially if it’s something you REALLY want and makes your relationship work, BUT if you wake up one day and you suddenly realize that your principles have changed, then I want you to know :
1.) It is completely fine.
2.) There is nothing wrong with you.
Apart from the fact that we don’t intend to have kids (which I’ve mentioned a couple of times), Drew and I aren’t also the type to celebrate Birthdays, even Anniversaries. Back in College, we would usually spend weekends at a Resort or the Beach to celebrate our Anniversary, but since we married in 2010, we’ve only celebrated once. O N C E. We aren’t big on those things. Some people I know act all aghast when they hear that Drew and I don’t celebrate basically anything. We mostly have a spur of the moment, “let’s-get-shmancy-and-eat-somewhere-nice” days, which I really love. We don’t like crowded places, we don’t like making a big deal out of certain days when it’s something we usually do out of the blue, usually (you know, like Valentines, which we have on ‘normal’ days, lel). Someone once told me “but those things are important!”, and deep down I chuckled and retorted with, “says who?”.
We also aren’t very expressive around our friends and family (I think we smacked on the lips FOR THE FIRST TIME in front of my in-laws when they dropped me off at the Airport last week, lel), and through the years, we stopped being excessively expressive on Social Media. Lately, I find myself declaring my love for him directly (most of the time, all teary-eyed). I prefer it that way now, although there’s nothing wrong with a little sharing here and there sometimes. I mean, the thing is, Drew and I were together since January 2004. Our relationship didn’t start off the conventional way even then. As I said, we were never the type who’d do any form of excessive PDA, so you could imagine how pissed I was when, during a surprise Birthday celebration a few friends threw for me, we were quite ‘forced’ to give each other a kiss on the lips, and my friends ended up posting the photo on Facebook.
Is it a petty thing to get pissed about? Maybe so. But it’s our relationship, our marriage. What is ours, is ours (to be clear though, we could get pretty PDA-ish when we’re out together, we just act differently when in a group. I know we’re not the only ones).
Sometimes I think it’s because we’ve let ourselves “go” and we started to settle into the comftability (yes, this is a made-up word) of our relationship. It is true that there is a dangerous, slippery slope when you’re VERY VERY comfortable with your partner — the routine could bore you, and romance COULD die (which was the case back in 2012, we were 101% sure we were filing for an annulment, and we basically lived together as housemates for about 3 years). In relationships, there is a very thin line between comfort and death. Lately, we learned how to DANCE ON THE FREAKIN’ LINE.
I’m not here to give you a list on how you keep your relationship or marriage strong, because that defies the purpose of this entry. Personally speaking, I am very aware that I pretty much have no rights to do this, but I’m writing this to share OUR story, because I know there are quite a few out there who live like us, or could be on the path to discovering so. It’s not easy, folks. You’re going to make SO MANY mistakes but please know that if you choose to, if you decide to — you will overcome the rut you’re in.
Our marriage almost ended because I kept trying to make us live our lives by Society’s standards (I will always be blaming it on Society, because tell me — WHO ELSE PRESSURES US, REALLY? Who else makes friends and family think we should be parents before our Thirties, among other things?) We had to go through shit (understatement) just to figure out what worked for us, because it may not be true for everyone, but things really did change after marriage. It was up to us to figure those out, sort out what works, and to keep doing that. Most of our dark days was my doing, to be honest. I was the immature one, constantly comparing my own with other people’s marriages. I kept pushing him to the point that it broke him, for wanting us to live up to what people around me “advised” us. A ‘friend’ once told me that I needed a man who could CONTROL me, and that Drew just doesn’t have it in him to do so.
I know. I was shaking my head as I typed that. For starters, we were surrounded by toxic people, who followed the ways of the world, from books published in the 1800s (I was naive to actually think it’s what we needed : advise from sexists/misogynists).
THANK GOD WE BROKE FREE FROM THOSE IMBECILES (by the way — these are the people who believe that Ramsay raping Sansa on their wedding night wasn’t rape because they were married. Yes, we spent time with these people. I would like to apologize to our 2011 – 2016 selves for enduring this … there’s not even a word for those years). But then again, we wouldn’t have figured out the people we DID NOT WANT TO BE if it weren’t for them.
We’re quite content with where we are. We don’t really aspire to be #RelationshipGoals because we are so over that concept (also, there’s no such thing. We all have our own journeys in marriage and our relationships). There are too many filters on Social Media. We like the fact that we barely put out anything when it comes to us because we don’t feel the need to edit, we don’t feel the need to screen, we don’t feel the need to choose what goes out and what stays in. The good, the best, the ugly, the worst — they’re mostly just shared between us (and sometimes, MY closest friends, because I’m the one who likes to vent). OUR goal is for us to be ourselves, and I know we will continue to evolve individually, and as Husband and Wife. We take so much pride of how far we veered away from a type of category of a married couple (according to Society), because we figured it wasn’t meant for us. I mean, why must we constantly prove to others how we’re still together? A post doesn’t solidify anything. A few have shown concern because he wasn’t appearing on my Instagram (to be fair, we’ve been physically apart for nearly two years, living in different continents), but is that really *necessary?
*I may eat my words when we’re physically together again, that’s for sure. Lel.
It’s funny when I used to think how much I wanted to be treated a certain way, or how we needed to do certain things to prove our stand in our marriage (even something as simple as “to each other”), but then the independence that both he and I are currently experiencing taught us a lot about who we really are. We were basically inseparable all throughout college. The only separation we experienced then was when I started working in Jeddah while he took up a second course back home. But we’re married now.
Then again, it’s true when they say that you can’t really make a relationship work if you don’t know who you TRULY are, and when you completely LOVE YOURSELF. You have to fall in love with you first, before falling in love with and for anyone else. This is one of the few truths I believe with my entire being, in the two years I’ve lived by and with myself, and I’m pretty sure Drew feels the same way. We now feel more comfortable and confident expressing ourselves to each other, too. The most basic of things we should have learned when we were starting, we fully embrace now, especially when it comes to communicating. Really, actually communicating. We somehow had to die before we could actually start living. I will always be grateful that God blessed us with this privilege.
THERE IS NOTHING WRONG with wanting to do things traditionally. Drew and I stopped wearing our wedding rings years ago, but we’ve decided to get ourselves new bands when we have the funds and start wearing them again. We might do something nice for our anniversary someday, but the whole point is (and it is worth saying over and over) : do things YOUR WAY. They have to be done wholeheartedly, and for your sake. Not for anyone else’s. At the end of the day, you’re only sharing your bed with each other.
I want you to remember that people outside your relationship mostly don’t know shit about your business (TRUST YOUR GUT. Know when it is right advise, or trash advise). Your relationship is yours. Listen to what you both need, not to what society and tradition made/makes you believe you need. People will always have opinions about how you should live your life, and trust me, most of of the time, THEY ARE WRONG. There are only a handful of people who gave me the hard truth about our situation and how to get past it, and it took awhile before they really got through to me, but it matters to know to WHOM you entrust your marriage’s / relationship’s ordeals to. It’s not for “public consumption”, as I made that mistake many, many times (I can still rant privately though, hrhrhrhrhr). When it comes to our personal relationships, it is always TRIAL and ERROR. You both have to be willing to take those steps, and occasionally miss. You know, like playing Super Mario.
And while we’re at it, may I remind you : A child does not strengthen a marriage. If you’re going to have a child for the sake of making your marriage stronger, please rethink your decision. THERE WERE COUNTLESS OF PEOPLE WHO TOLD US ON THE BRINK OF ANNULMENT, THAT A CHILD WOULD SAVE US. Like it was our child’s responsibility to make us better people. I mean, we were both broken individuals — WHY WOULD YOU BRING A CHILD IN A MESSY SITUATION TO BEGIN WITH? Why would you advise people who aren’t responsible enough to handle their own lives, to bring another to look after? How fucked up is that? While it may have worked out for other people, there is always a chance that it won’t be the same for us. Another human being added into our then unsolvable equation was too much of a risk. I AM SO GLAD WE DID NOT REACH THAT LEVEL OF STUPID to give in to “advise”. Drew would not have been able to go after what his heart truly wanted, I would not have learned to be independent, and we both would not have been able to know ourselves the way we do now. I doubt either one of us are still here if we listened to other people. Put yourselves first. Put your lives as individuals first. It is not selfish to, it is in fact the BEST thing you could do for your relationship, and your lives.
You can be inspired by people, but that’s different from setting them as goals — which is unhealthy, and unrealistic.
Staying married and strengthening what you have is a choice you make and work on achieving every single day. Just do YOU, my friends. There are only two people in a marriage / relationship.
*That is how you survive it.
*Not advise. It is essentially how marriage works.
Loree
ONE OF THE MOST BEAUTIFUL BLOG POSTS YOU’VE EVER WRITTEN. HUHU. Love you for-evs my Abbielove! 😭😘💗
Abbie
I love you, my LoreeBoo!!!! <3 <3 <3 Thank you for reading this!
Catherine Mirondo
I look up to you in so many ways. And this entry is the highlight of my love and respect for you. You were the one who I literally copied from the start. All your ways (uhhmm, maybe the filtered ones) … I still check your socials and blogs from time to time coz you inspire in real life. I still try to find Drew in all your platforms. I’ve wondered why. But I’m equally happy to see you in portraits and friends and glad that you sometimes post updates about how you’ve been. I always wish you well Abbielove. I cry as i type this with unknown reason. Maybe Im just really happy for you. Because lately, I’ve also learned to stop ranting on social media about relationships. I was so prone to that years back and I still cringe whenever I remember how I carelessly post everything back then. But I find myself still being pressured by society a bit these days. I hope I learn to detach one step at a time. I admire how you and Drew kept everything private in a longest time. Im happy to know that you both declare love directly. I am really happy to know this part of you. This inspires me. I LOVE YOU ABBIE. I still wish that someday, I’d get to sit and chat with you and learn about life.
Abbie
I LOVE YOU SO MUCH! You’ve always been so kind to me throughout our Multiply days. Trust me, it wasn’t easy going through all that. But please know that there are so many people struggling, too — and that we will all get past it. There really isn’t a cheat code on how we overcome things because we are individually going through them, but there will be people around you who will give you hope (at least). I’m always here if you want to talk. Your comment means so much to me. Thank you, Cath. Thank you.
P.S. — Society is shit. Don’t EVER EVER let it get to you the way I let it get to me.
Kat
Inspiring ❤️
Always put God in the center of your relationship and everything will follow.
Loveyou
Abbie
Amen. Love youuuu, Kat! <3
Ches
Big Sis… alam mo na. Haha. I went from sad- to happy-crying as I read through this entry. I’m really just so happy for you. And I’m really really glad the sacrifices you both endured are coming to fruition. Prayers for you and Drew, always. ♥️
Abbie
I love you so much my Baby Sis. I really thought I’d seen na the end of us. But God knows how overjoyed I am that we made it. Your prayers are everything and mean everything to us. I love you, I love you!!!! <3
Eya M
Hey abbie and drew love you guys 🙂 i feel you in so many levels.. Marriage is a BIG WORK. And yup like you I stopped comparing mine from others because it is soooo toxic. Anyway, I am happy you guys made it out from that dark hole.. God has a purpose your lives and He love you both so much and of course we do too. 🙂 God bless always. Mwaah!!! :*
Abbie
It’s toxic, unrealistic, and just won’t do either of us any good. I just wish people would find it easier too to just let us be and not give unsolicited “advise” on how to be better married people, lelelelel! Yeah — took us years but thank God we’re out. I know that we’ll be going through rough patches, but I’d like to think we’d be able to figure our way through more responsibly then. God bless, Eyapot!!!! <3 <3 <3
Marriane Budiongan
I needed to hear or read (?) this. I love how this was written Ate. It’s not preachy but you made people aware that it’s okay to do it your way rather than this is what i think you should do. This was so enlightening Ate. I’m 25 and I’ve been with my boyfriend for nearly 8 years. We’ve been together since college and I know deep in my heart he is the person I want to be with. But at the same time, the pressure from both sides of our family to take it to the next level makes me want to run away. I know deep in their hearts they mean very well, but I wish they could see that we’re happy the way we are and that if we want to get married and have kids, we will when we are both ready. There are times when I’m beginning to actually doubt what I want and give in to the pressures. But this, it makes me feel like I’m not alone. (your post Comfortable is not the enemy also brought me so much comfort.) I wish I could stay strong (mentally and emotionally) and not give in to society too. Thank you for this. ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️
Abbie
I am so glad!!! <3 <3 <3 I know what you mean. It's tough to feel like everyone's just waiting for you to take the next step, without realizing that YOUR path looks very different from YOUR viewpoint. It is so important to communicate with your partner all the time just so you're on the same page, and always find it in yourselves to compromise. It's easier said than done but try your best to tune out the rest of the world and just listen to yourself, and him. It'll all happen at the right time! Age really is just a number. Some of us are ready to settle down by 20, some by 30, some way past 30 ... people will always have an opinion, and it is TIRING to have to listen to them, right? Just do you, Marianne!!! I'm so happy this made you feel like you aren't alone. Always put yourself first, and what feels right for you. The rest will fall into place. HUGSSSS!!! <3
Marriane Budiongan
Definitely agree ate. Compromise between us two is the key and not with other people. I’m very blessed to find someone who is always supportive and understanding. I hope you share more insights Ate , of the world.
Abbie
YES, 101% between the only people in the relationship, not anyone else. Oh wow. Bless you, thank you so much <3 <3 <3 I will do my best!!!!
Jan
A child fucking TESTS a marriage/relationship, NOT strengthen it. Why would anyone think to add another human being into a messy relationship. I have so many thoughts but I don’t know which to wriite next. Hahaha! I’m just so happy for you guys. I was so kilig to see you guys in your stories!
Abbie
I HAVE NO IDEA, but most people were telling me that a Child would be the ANSWER to end our problems, and when we were on the brink of annulment. I would often look at them like “are you listening to / hearing yourself?” Glad to know who those people are because it makes it easier for me to know who to avoid. Hehehehe! Thank you so much!!!! <3 <3 <3
Huwantso
Hello Abbie, super nice entry. I kinda want to get married now and not get married at the same time lol. Thanks for sharing this~ See you on Twitter lol
Abbie
OMG THANK YOU NAMAN SA PAGBABASA! Hahaha! Nako, you’re one of my Lodis. You do you, my friend!!! See you on Twitter and hopefully sa personal din, sana maulit muli ‘yung Tambai kita-kita natin, hrhrhrhr.
Huwantso
Omg wow you are welcome thank you for validating me lol. Ito na lang yata ang napupuntahan kong blog from time to time for chismis??? Joke! Oo nga, looking forward to another IRL meeting some day tapos maging awkward in person~
Abbie
HINDI KA KAYA AWKWARD! FAVORITE PERSON KAYA KITA, nabusog ako sa laughs! Hehehehe! Thank you talaga!!! <3
Areezhreda
Hi Abbie! Beautifully written… and I absolutely AGREE. I have always been a follower of your blog and this is the first time that I’ve felt the urge to say/write something. I must say that this entry has touched me (though I’m not married… yet) and has made me proud as a woman. This is exactly what us women should be aspiring to fight for; to love our self first. Relationship/marriage isn’t just a piece of cake. I myself am walking on a path that I know would require me to be braver. There will ALWAYS be those people (society), ready to point. *cheers my dear!
Abbie
Ate Areej!!! Thank you so much for letting me know this, for taking the time to leave me a comment <3 You keep doing you, Ate!!! I'm here to back you up all the way! It's true, relationships talaga aren't easy, and the one you have with yourself is so tricky. It's very important to establish that, above all else.
Js
Hi abbie
I can relate 100%. Benn with my bf since 2005, he doesnt like to celebrate bdays, anniversaries etc. Of course when I was just a poor kid (in my teens) I was all sad about it, coz really ‘everyone else does it’ I thought we were not normal, my bf would give in and celebrate to please me. Eventually I became him, not wanting to do a big deal out of those days, because really everyday should be celebrated 😀 Also I feel uncomfortable “PDA’ing”.
Glad to find someone who’s having the same experience ad me/us.
I find this relationship more relaxing, this is ours and not the society’s making ❤️
Abbie
Beautiful! Proud of you for embracing who you both truly are. It really does take awhile for us to know ourselves, individually and as a couple. I really don’t mind some PDA here and there from time to time, but only if we’re alone in public! Hahaha! Glad to read comments like this, making me feel less alone! <3 It truly is the best when you know you do things in your own terms!!!! Cheers to that!