Sometimes we become alarmed when our spouse has gotten fat, or when (s)he doesn’t groom himself/herself like (s)he used to. We may feel that we have been had- like we were tricked into marrying a certain person, and then once we said “I do”, the spell wore off and (s)he turned back into a slob. Not fair. We didn’t sign up for this, etc. It’s even worse when we see him/her engaging in unhealthy habits we know are contributing to the bodily decline we see developing right in front of our eyes. We are tempted to rail at our spouse and get him/her to see how awful (s)he has become, and to commit to going to the gym, stop eating pizza, or whatever. But this rarely solves the problem, and often starts to poison the rest of our relationship. What do we do?
Well, the first thing to do is to realize that you weren’t duped. Bodies do things. I have never yet seen an 84 year old who looks like a 24 year old, no matter how much (s)he exercises, how many vitamins (s)he takes, or how much raw food (s)he eats. All of our bodies are basically in a state of decline. We are all dying every day. Yuck. But it’s true. However, as long as we are still alive, we are supposed to take care of our physical selves. I don’t mean that we should all despair, and just stop doing what we know is healthy. But I do hope to show you that as worthwhile as healthy habits are, they are not going to turn back the clock to the picture you have in your mind of what your spouse should look like.
Secondly, we may be projecting our own fear of decline onto our spouse. We don’t like the idea of not being in complete control of our bodies and our lives. We want to believe that if we are just committed enough, we can achieve our desired outcome. We don’t want to end up old, fat, sick and unloved. We want to be young and healthy and vigorous and sexy, with thick glossy hair and white teeth forever. Let us all accept the futility of this desire. Ain’t gonna happen. We can still have a life full of love and beauty and peace. But we must let go of this perfectionism. We must learn to love our spouses and ourselves- warts and all.
And last but not least, sometimes it’s nice to enjoy some pizza and ice cream together, even if you are not perfect yet! Sometimes it’s nice to sleep in and skip the gym, even if you are still ten pounds overweight. Sometimes, we need to allow our spouses (and ourselves!) to be human.
