I loved you first.

Before the passing, two-in-one, hello and goodbyes on busy days. Before the infrequency of date nights out, or general uninterrupted conversation for that matter. I loved you first. 

I loved the way you would create thoughtful gifts or plan out a creative date night just because. I loved holding hands and taking our time doing nothing together at the mall or the park.

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 I loved you first. 

These days, I know you probably feel a little differently, like I do from time to time. Less spontaneity. More responsibility.

I recognize I’m not alone in all of this, but honestly, sometimes it feels like it. This marriage thing, this parenting thing, it takes all I have. I can get caught up quickly in feeling unheard and unseen. It’s SO hard, so much harder than I ever imagined, that I, too, forget you loved me first.

That being said, I don’t want either of us to get stuck in the lie that because our love is different now, that it is worse. Or that it is second to the busyness of life. I still love you first. It’s far from worse.

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We are a team now. A unit. We have seen more than the sappy good times but now have cried together through the absolute worst of times. And even though it looks different, we are a bit more of everything than we were in those days of firsts.

We are more constant. More trusting. More understanding. More enduring. More grace-filled. More Christ-filled. 

Our love is SO much deeper. We are truly intertwined in the best of ways. So, even if every Valentine’s Day or Sweetest Day or whatever other sappy, love holiday, doesn’t look the same as the firsts, I will not let that dilute or define our idea of love. 

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I loved you first, I will continue to love you all of the days in between, and when my final days come, I will love you last, too.