Last year, my husband found himself needing a different truck than his Colorado. The only problem was that his business didn’t have enough cash yet to buy him a truck so we had to personally purchase one for him. Thankfully, we had the cash and we bought a 2008 2500HD GMC Sierra for my husband.
But earlier this year, right after we paid off our house, my husband started really wanting a diesel truck. Granted, a diesel makes way more sense for what my husband does for a living than the GMC did, but diesels are insanely expensive. My husband owns a remodeling company and has a mobile workshop built out in his enclosed trailer as well as a massive dump trailer. Even though the GMC did her job, she didn’t do it as easily as a diesel engine would.
And that my friends, is where the biggest money fight of mine and my husband’s ten years of marriage happened. My husband’s business didn’t have the money to buy him a diesel so he wanted us to again personally purchase one for him. However, this time we didn’t have that much cash to buy him one. We would have to take out a loan for it, which obviously I was completely against.
The Good News
For obvious reasons, I won’t go into too many details about our big blow out fight as it’s really not important, but I will say the good news is that my husband cooled his heels and waited. And in June of this year, he walked into a dealership and swiped his debit card and paid cash for an F250 Super Duty. His patience paid off as he ended up getting the truck for an amazing price and he now has the truck that he truly wants.
Both of the trucks…the GMC is on the left and the F250 is on the right.
The Not so Great News
When my husband and I got into our big fight about me not wanting to go into debt for a truck and him not understanding why I was so against it, it was bad. I’m not going to lie, the argument was intense as neither one of us was going to budge. I’m an Enneagram 8 and heck, I run an entire business helping people live a debt-free life! I mean, my pride wasn’t about to let me go back into debt.
The argument got so heated that we had to stop and go to bed because it was going absolutely nowhere but driving a wedge between us. And so before bed that evening I prayed cried (y’all know what mean??) and boy was it hard as I realized that I was trying so hard to control the outcome of this whole thing that I was literally jeopardizing my marriage.
And so the next morning I had to look Pat in the eyes and say, “I love you. I won’t ever agree to debt, but I also know that I cannot control you nor control what you do. I’m sorry that I’ve been trying to do that and have no doubts that our fight got so out of hand because I refused to let up. I promise you that if you decide to take on debt to purchase a truck, I will still love you and I will not hold it against you.”
The Hardest Part
Friends, there are times that this is the hardest part in marriage – the dying to self. I truly did not want to go into debt to buy a truck. I also understood at the time my husband was getting hit hard by everyone around him telling him how he needed a diesel and it was really starting to mess with him. I also had to realize that my husband is a grown man and gets to make his own choices. Just like I don’t want him controlling me, I cannot control him.
So, I had to let all of that go and just let him do what he was going to do. Thankfully my husband decided to not take out a loan for the truck and instead waited until he had the money to buy one outright. And I truly to my core believe that he only made that decision because I stopped trying to convince him to do it my way.
Related Resources: Crucial Conversations and The 7 Principles for Making Marriage Work (<–this one is seriously the best book I’ve ever read about marriage!)
I truly am married to one amazing guy!
How to Let it Go
If you’re in a hard spot in your marriage right now, I want you to ask yourself this one question, is your spouse your best friend? If so, great and wonderful! Do you tell them everything? Do you listen to them when they tell you stuff? Do you say great things about your spouse when they aren’t around or do you vent about all of their shortcomings?
Here’s why I ask these questions: you have to make sure that you aren’t seeing your spouse as your enemy. And y’all this happens a lot of the time without us realizing it. Heck, that’s what I was doing with my husband! I made him out to be the enemy because he was going to put us back in debt! How dare him! But when in reality, I married an amazing man – and he married someone that brought in tens of thousands of dollars in debt…I can and should totally trust him no matter if he puts us back in debt because he has always proven himself an incredible provider and protector.
Instead, I was failing to see how amazing my man is, I was, in turn, making him out to be my enemy. We’re married – we’re not enemies. We’re not just a team, we’re one. I cannot turn him into my enemy and expect our marriage to happy, healthy, and survive. Therefore, my dear friends, if you find yourself making an enemy out of your spouse, I encourage you to immediately start stating all of the wonderful things you love about your spouse. And then, when you see your spouse do something nice (even something as simple as hanging up the bathroom towel) thank them for it.
What is your best tip for keeping arguments from destroying your marriage?
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