always and forever?

Lately it seems like all around me couples are divorcing or having problems big enough to where they are considering separation and it is just really taking a toll on my mindset of my boyfriend and I's future. Should I ever even want to get married? I can definitely see us being together, and despite the problems we may encounter, we always find a way to work through them together. I can't imagine sharing certain things, acting or being myself with another person the way that I am with Bray. It's cliche but I am myself more than ever because of him. I don't care to act, dress or talk a certain way and I can be my ridiculously goofy, little kid at heart, clumsy, clueless self. Bray loves me no matter how many flaws I feel I have, even how bad of a singer I am. I have more self esteem because of the way he sees me and how he tells me I'm beautiful; it melts my heart every time.

But what if it stopped? If I had to be someone else to keep him happy or even to keep him with me, would I? I'd like to say no, but I honestly am not sure. I have changed things in my life for our relationship, but change myself? I don't think I could. It's a tough situation to think of, but I fear a divorce could be in my future no matter who I'm with. People do change and sometimes it's very difficult to deal with that. Would I be able to live with Bray if he changed gradually? I can't say. I guess it would just depend on what changes were happening.

My parents were divorced and both remarried and recently my mom and my step-dad have had problems to where they were reconsidering their marriage. It was the biggest thing that changed my mind set on relationships. They seemed perfectly fine before, like an ideal couple, and my dad has the traits that I would want to see in a future husband and he is a wonderful man, but my mom no longer saw the wonderful side of him. Luckily my parents have worked through their problems and have been to counselors in order to stay together and it seems to be working out. The same situation has hit a couple that are like second parents to me and they are deciding to divorce. It has just gotten so ugly. They are spiteful towards one another and can't even stand to be in the same room for too long. It's so very sad to see. They have two children who are going to go through this with them and I feel so bad that they do. Being a child of divorced parents, I can tell you first hand that it is a difficult thing. It becomes regular and you deal with it as time passes but it is still hard. You're at a different house every other weekend, holidays are split and you are always the middle man between your two parents. I think that is my biggest fear in marriage besides the feeling of failure if it doesn't work out. I absolutely do not want to get married, have kids quickly after and then when they are older be headed for a divorce. I want a better life than that for my future children and I don't want them to go through what I did, even if I had it better than other kids I know.

I don't ever want to have to deal with this whole hard and horrible process, so should I never get married as a preventative? After all, you really do not know what could happen. I guess I'm playing devils advocate here with myself because I know that's not how I really feel. I do want to get married, I want that huge, fancy, perfect wedding and I want to live happily with that man for the rest of our lives. I want the fairly tale. I know everything isn't perfect, I get that, but if I love someone so much and can commit my time and life to them as a boyfriend and I see myself with him for a long time, then why not get married? Because I'm scared for my future? For my possible future children? No. I don't believe in being too scared to jump and do something. Live for today is my motto now. I will not be too scared to get married when the time comes because I don't know what the future holds. We'll deal with what God and the future have to throw at us. Love is the strongest emotion I know and I believe that when you have love, you can work through almost anything. It definitely isn't going to be easy, but you can't just call uncle and it's over. That's not how life is and that shouldn't be how marriage is either.