When The Person You Marry Begins to Change

 

When the Person You Married Begins to Change

Key Verse:
"And above all these things put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness." — Colossians 3:14

There is a picture many of us carry into marriage without ever realizing it.

We stand across from the person we love, make our vows, and somewhere in the back of our minds we assume that the person standing there is the person we are going to spend the rest of our life loving.

Of course, we know life will change. We know we may move, change jobs, raise children, lose loved ones, grow older, and eventually trade youthful energy for reading glasses and sore knees. But we do not always stop to consider something much more personal:

The person we married is going to change too.

And so are we.

That sounds obvious when we say it out loud, but it can become surprisingly difficult inside a marriage.

The young wife who once seemed carefree may become more cautious after raising children, carrying responsibilities, or walking through loss. The husband who was always ambitious may discover that his priorities have changed after illness, disappointment, or simply getting older. Someone who once wanted a house full of activity may begin craving quiet. Someone who once needed independence may eventually need reassurance. The spouse who seemed confident at thirty may wrestle with uncertainty at fifty.

Sometimes those changes are welcome. Sometimes they are confusing. Sometimes they are painful.

And sometimes we find ourselves wondering, What happened to the person I married?

That question is not always cruel. Sometimes it comes from genuine bewilderment. We remember how our spouse used to think, respond, dream, or behave, and we do not quite know what to do with the person standing in front of us now.

But one of the quiet lessons of a long marriage is learning that faithful love cannot be built entirely around who your spouse used to be.

You have to learn how to love the person they are becoming.

Marriage Was Never Meant to Freeze Us in Time

We sometimes talk about change in marriage as though it is automatically a problem.

It is not.

Some changes are signs of maturity. Some come through hardship. Some happen because God is working in a person's heart. Some are simply the natural result of living several decades in a world that leaves its mark on us.

Scripture describes the Christian life itself as a process of change. Paul wrote that believers are being transformed into the image of Christ "from glory to glory" (2 Corinthians 3:18). God is not interested in leaving us exactly as He found us.

That means a Christian marriage joins together two people who are both still being shaped.

We enter marriage unfinished.

That reality requires humility because it means I cannot expect my wife to remain permanently fixed at the point where I first understood her. She cannot expect that from me either.

When Sheree and I married more than three decades ago, neither one of us could possibly have known everything life would eventually ask of the other. Raising and homeschooling five children changed her. Responsibility changed me. Trials changed us. Victories changed us. Health struggles changed us. Years changed us.

The woman I love today is not exactly the same woman I married.

And that is not an insult to the woman I married, it is simply what happens when someone lives a life.

One of the mistakes we can make in marriage is loving our memory of our spouse more comfortably than we love the person actually sitting across from us.

We remember how things used to be. We remember what they enjoyed, how they responded, what they needed, or what made them happy. Without realizing it, we can keep relating to an older version of them.

Then frustration begins when the old answers no longer work.

Love Has to Keep Paying Attention

Paul's instruction in Colossians 3 is beautifully practical. He tells believers to put on mercy, kindness, humility, meekness, patience, forgiveness—and then says, "above all these things put on charity."

Biblical love is not merely affection we once felt, it is something we continue to put on. That matters when a spouse changes, because loving someone well over many years requires us to keep learning them.

Early in marriage, your spouse may have needed security from you. Later they may need encouragement. At another stage they may need partnership. After illness, grief, disappointment, or exhaustion, they may simply need your presence.

If I insist on loving my wife only in the ways that worked twenty years ago, I may sincerely believe I am loving her while completely missing what she needs today.

That requires something marriage desperately needs but rarely celebrates: curiosity.

Not suspicion - Not interrogation.

Curiosity.

How are you doing now?

What has become harder for you?

What matters to you these days?

What are you carrying that I may not understand?

We tend to ask questions like that while dating because we are trying to learn the person. Then, after years of marriage, we sometimes stop asking because we assume we already know them, but you never finish learning a person.

There are things my wife understands about herself today that she could not have explained to me when we were twenty years younger. The same is true of me. Some lessons only come through experience.

A healthy marriage leaves room for those discoveries.

Not Every Change Is Easy to Accept

There is another side to this conversation that deserves honesty - sometimes the changes we see in our spouse worry us.

A husband may become withdrawn. A wife may become unusually discouraged. Interests disappear. Tempers shorten. Communication changes. Affection becomes harder. Priorities shift in ways the other spouse does not understand.

Loving the person your spouse is becoming does not mean pretending every change is good.

Biblical love is not passive approval.

If something is harmful, sinful, destructive, or seriously affecting the marriage, love may require a difficult conversation. There are situations where wise pastoral counsel, professional help, medical care, or other support may be appropriate.

But even then, there is a difference between addressing a concerning change and resenting someone simply because they are no longer exactly who they were.

We have to be careful not to make nostalgia the standard our spouse can never meet: "You didn't used to be like this."

Sometimes that sentence may identify something important.

Other times it simply means, I liked the version of you I understood better.

That realization can be uncomfortable, but it can also be freeing. Marriage was never a promise that we would remain unchanged. The promise was that we would remain faithful while change happened.

Your Spouse Is Not the Only One Changing

One of the easiest things to miss is that while we are noticing changes in our spouse, they are noticing changes in us.

We often experience our own changes gradually, so they seem reasonable. We know the story behind them:

• We know why we are more tired.
• We know why something bothers us now that never used to.
• We know what disappointment changed our perspective.
• We know why certain dreams became less important and others became more important.

Our spouse sees the difference but does not always know the entire journey that produced it, that should make us gentler. Before asking, Why aren't you who you used to be? it may be worth asking ourselves how much we have changed as well.

A good marriage gives both people permission to grow while continuing to hold tightly to the covenant that joins them. The goal is not to preserve two twenty-five-year-olds forever. The goal is to keep walking together as those two people become fifty, sixty, seventy, and beyond—still learning one another, still choosing one another, and still allowing God to shape them.

Living This Out

There may be no dramatic change needed after reading something like this. For many couples, the most useful beginning is simply paying attention again. Look at your spouse as they are today rather than assuming you already know everything about them.

Maybe ask a question you have not asked in a while - not because something is wrong, because you still want to know them. Listen when they talk about what has become harder, what they enjoy now, what they miss, what they fear, or what they hope for. Resist the temptation to immediately compare their answer to who they used to be.

You may discover that your spouse has been changing quietly beside you and hoping you would notice and while you are doing that, give them the same opportunity to know who you are becoming.

Marriage becomes much healthier when two people can say, in effect, I am still here. I am still yours. But I am growing, learning, struggling, and changing. Please keep getting to know me.

That kind of honesty keeps companionship alive.

A Final Thought

There is something beautiful about looking across the years at the person you married and realizing that you have known several versions of them -

- You knew them before the children.

- You knew them while raising the children.

- You knew them through victories and disappointments.

- You knew them when they were strong.

- You knew them when they needed help.

And if God gives you enough years together, you will meet still more versions of one another. That does not have to threaten a marriage, it can deepen one.

The person you married will change and so will you.

But the covenant gives you a place from which to keep choosing each other while those changes happen. Perhaps one of the quiet privileges of a lifelong marriage is being able to look at someone after decades together and say:

I knew who you were then.

I am learning who you are now.

And I still choose you.

Prayer

Lord, thank You for the person You have given me to walk through life with. Help me not to become so familiar with my spouse that I stop paying attention to who they are becoming.

Give me patience with the changes I do not immediately understand and wisdom when those changes require an honest conversation. Keep me from comparing my spouse unfairly to who they used to be while ignoring the ways I have changed as well.

Teach me to love with kindness, humility, patience, and faithfulness. Help me continue learning my spouse through every season You allow us to share.

And as both of us grow older and continue to change, help us remain close to You and faithful to the covenant we made with one another.

Amen.