BRP 241024
Learning from Mistakes in Marriage

Samantha: Barbara Rainey says there’s an art to understanding your spouse.

Barbara Rainey: The real issue in all of these differences that we have in marriage. It’s learning, “Why did that affect her that way?” When you do that, that communicates love. It communicates: “I want to know you. I want to understand you.” //
But it’s not just figuring out what the rules are: “Okay, I can’t say that because that was a mistake. I can’t say it;” but it’s moving beyond knowing what works and doesn’t work. It’s not a formula. It’s figuring out: “Who is this person? What’s important to this person?”

Samantha: Welcome to the Barbara Rainey Podcast from Ever Thine Home. We’re dedicated to helping you experience God in your home. Thanks for listening!

You know, college football coach “Bear” Bryant said, “When you make a mistake, there are only three things you should ever do about it:
* admit it,
* learn from it, and
* don't repeat it.”

That advice can be good in marriage, too. But sometimes figuring out your spouse or exactly what mistake to avoid isn’t as straightforward as analyzing a football game.

Dennis and Barbara Rainey are here with Bob Lepine to help us think through some things related to marriage.

A few weeks back, we brought you an episode where the Raineys discussed the first couple of rules in their list of eleven rules about marriage you won’t learn in school. Today they’ll hit two more of those rules.

The Raineys know a little about marriage, partly because they’ve been married since 1972 !

Barbara: Not bad—hard to believe, though.

Dennis: It is hard to believe. We were just a pair of pups starting out a number of years ago.

Bob: Well, and I want to ask you about a number of years ago because you say there are 11 rules about marriage that you won’t learn in school. You talk about the idea that marriage is not about happiness. You talk about marriage giving a man a chance to step up and finish growing up. Then, you also talk about the rookie season of marriage. Did you have a rough rookie season, as a husband?

Dennis: Well, ask the eyewitness. [Laughter] I think every man has a rookie season—

Bob: Yes.

Dennis: —in marriage.

Bob: Yes.

Dennis: I mean I really do.

Bob: Did Dennis have a rough rookie season?

Barbara: I don’t feel like we had a really rough rookie season. I don’t really know why. I think we definitely think we had a rookie season. It was more than one year because I think that rookie season, for us, lasted until we had our first child. Then, that was when things began to change because there was a lot of pressure added to our relationship because of this person—this new person who needed me all the time. He had to divide—he got divided attention from me, all of a sudden.

That was when the real rub started in our relationship; but yes, I mean, he made mistakes. I made mistakes. We didn’t know what we were doing. We’d never done this before, and we both made lots of mistakes in those first two years which is what I would consider our rookie season.

Dennis: Some guys make their rookie mistakes early in the season—

Bob: Right.

Dennis: —in their marriage relationship. I witnessed one, a number of years ago, at a wedding, where the husband, as they were exchanging the cake—you know, how they’ll take—he’ll take a piece of cake in his hand. The bride will take a piece of cake in her hand. They’ll intertwine their arms and feed each other—

Bob: —the piece of cake.

Dennis: The piece of cake, yes.

Barbara: Yes.

Bob: That’s a sweet moment.

Dennis: Yes, it was sweet.

Barbara: It’s very romantic—symbolic; right?

Dennis: Yes. And this rookie took the chocolate cake with the chocolate icing—

Bob: Yes?

Dennis: —and he smeared it all over the bride’s face—

Bob: Kind of a playful move on his part; right?

Dennis: Exactly; and then, all over her shoulders—

Bob: Oh.

Dennis: —and down her arms. And there were those watching, as this rookie mistake occurred. You know, there are places for your rookie mistake to occur—

Bob: Better in private than in public. [Laughter]

Dennis: —especially, within the first hour of your marriage; you know?

Bob: Yes.

Dennis: And there were those who rushed into assist the bride—not the groom. There were some—

Bob: He was on his own.

Dennis: There were some relatives that I saw who took care of the groom. They wanted to take him out back and work him over; but the photographer walked up and began to minister grace—let’s just call it that to the bride who was crying—wiping off the chocolate smeared all over her face and shoulders and everything, and kind of trying to bring things back together. It wasn’t long after that they headed off onto their honeymoon.

I happen to know this couple. I know what the father-in-law did for the groom as they came back from the first part of their honeymoon they went on. There was a giant box—I don’t know—two feet by two feet by almost two-and-a-half feet high—

Bob: Okay.

Dennis: —full of Popples™.

Bob: The stuffing?

Barbara: Styrofoam packing—

Dennis: Styrofoam—

Barbara: —peanuts, yes.

Dennis: —packing.

Bob: What did you call those? Popples?

Dennis: That’s what I called it.

Bob: Okay.

Dennis: That’s a popular term that I use. [Laughter]

Bob: Okay. [Laughter] I just didn’t want anybody to go to Google® and looking up Popple and trying to find out what that is.

Dennis: Well, anyway, this father-in-law had taken the package—and he had wrapped it, in a package, inside the middle of this box. So, the son-in-law had to dig through all of the packing material—Popples—

Bob: Yes, the Popples.

Dennis: —and find the package. Then, he had to get into the package and open it up. There in the center of the package, as he opened it all up, was a fine goblet. It had a note—had a note from the father-in-law—

Bob: Yes.

Dennis: —to the son-in-law.

Bob: Yes.

Dennis: It basically, as I recall the story, read something to the effect, “Your bride/my daughter is like a fine goblet. If you treat her with care and with gentle encouragement and love, she will last a lifetime. [Signed] I love you,”—and the father-in-law’s name, I’m sure he signed it, “Dad” or—

Bob: Whatever, right.

Dennis: —whatever.

Bob: But it didn’t say, “P.S. don’t go smearing no more cake on her ever again.”

Dennis: It didn’t. It didn’t.

Bob: Do you think he got the point?

Dennis: I don’t think it said that, but I think he got the point.

Bob: So, would you look back and say there was a big rookie error?

Dennis: I would have to say if there was a rookie error that I repeated year, after year, after year in our marriage where it again—the principle is it’s okay to have one rookie season; it’s not okay to repeat it—would have to have been around scheduling. And as we had children—just underestimating how fast, how far, how long my wife could run with me.

Bob: Would you agree that this was a rookie mistake?

Barbara: Yes. I would. And I’m not sure that I would have phrased it quite as specifically; but I think that’s a great illustration. I think it was failing to understand how different I was as a woman, and I think it’s true for me, too. I mean, I think it works for both for the woman’s side and the man’s side.

I mean, I’ve never lived with a man before. So, I’m learning about men by living with my husband who is learning about becoming a man. So, that—right there—is room for all kinds of mistakes. And he was learning about living with me, as a woman. He’d never had a sister. He’d never been married before. He didn’t know much about women.

And I think his framework was he expected me to be able to keep up with his pace. He expected me to think like he thought in certain areas. And that just took a long, long time for that understanding to go: “Oh, she really is different. Oh, she really doesn’t see life the way I do. She doesn’t feel the things that I feel. She doesn’t”—whatever. I mean I just think that would be our rookie mistake—was that understanding of our differentness as male and female.

Bob: Let me toss in some rookie mistakes, from our family—just a few that I was guilty of that are right in the same vein—where we just looked at life differently.

In my family, growing up, one of the ways you expressed affection to one another is you teased. You teased and you poked fun at people. That was a way of saying, “I really think you are special.” Okay? That did not—that was not—

Barbara: That didn’t fly with Mary Ann?

Dennis: That didn’t fly?

Bob: That was not on Mary Ann’s frame of reference for how to express affection or receive affection is to be teased at; okay?

Here is another thing—in our family, growing up, we were pretty much out-in-the-open about kind of what was going on in all aspects of life. So, if I came down to the breakfast table, it would not have been unusual for my mom to say, “I don’t know if you know, but you have a pimple on your forehead.” Okay? And I’d go, “Oh, thanks,” right? [Laughter] So, when my wife comes down to the breakfast table, I go, “I don’t know if you know, but there’s a pimple on your”—and she cries. She cries. I thought I was being helpful.

Barbara: Helpful. [Laughter]

Bob: And she cries. These are rookie mistakes you don’t want to repeat over and over again.

Dennis: No, you’ve got to learn from your rookie errors. Then, you’ve got to say: “You know what? It’s okay to have one rookie season; it’s not okay to repeat it.”

Barbara: It’s not only learning from your rookie mistakes—to not repeat them—but it’s also learning: “Why did Mary Ann cry when you said that? What was it about that”—because you were trying to be helpful. So, it’s not really what you said was in and of itself wrong, but it was how she heard it.

Bob: Right.

Barbara: And to me, that’s the real issue in all of these differences that we have in marriage. It’s learning, “Why did that affect her that way?” When you do that, that communicates love. It communicates: “I want to know you. I want to understand you.” And maybe you get to the place, eventually, where that stuff doesn’t bother her anymore; and maybe, you don’t.

But it’s not just figuring out what the rules are: “Okay, I can’t say that because that was a mistake. I can’t say it;” but it’s moving beyond knowing what works and doesn’t work. It’s not a formula. It’s figuring out: “Who is this person? What’s important to this person?”

Bob: Right—getting to the heart of the issue.

Barbara: “Why?”—yes.

Bob: Not just having—

Barbara: Exactly.

Bob: —not having a checklist of do’s and don’ts for marriage—

Barbara: Right.

Bob: —but understanding, “I know how you think so I can begin to think”—

Barbara: So, “Therefore, I don’t want to go there because that’s hurtful.” And I think most young couples walk into it and say, “Okay, tell me the five things I need to do,” because we all approach relationships—we approach life that way. “Tell me the things that will work so that I can do them so that I can avoid pain, so that I can have a happy marriage, or whatever.”

Dennis: And the verse we should have quoted, a bit earlier, is First Peter, Chapter 3, verse 7, where he commands husbands: “Husbands, live with your wives as a fellow heir of the grace of life in an understanding way so that your prayers may not be hindered.”

And the challenge here is to get out of your own self and realize marriage is about two unique people becoming one. That’s what we are commanded to do in Genesis, Chapter 2, verse 24: “The two shall become one.” And you’re not going to become one without thinking of the needs of the other person.

Bob: I’m still learning. There’s one I’m—that’s still fresh for me; okay? And it’s this: “If we’ve talked about something, and I think we’ve concluded—we’ve reached a decision—I really need to verify that she agrees we have reached a conclusion.” [Laughter]

Barbara: Okay, so, we’re laughing because we’ve been there and done that. [Laughter] We still—

Bob: Because—

Barbara: —find that.

Bob: —I’ll be moving ahead with something and Mary Ann will say, “I didn’t realize we had decided this,” and I will say, “Well, I thought we talked about this.”

Barbara: Well, you tell Mary Ann that she and I are thinking on the same page because I’ve said that so many times!

Bob: She will say, “We did talk about this, but I didn’t think we decided.”

Barbara: Decided.

Dennis: In your mind.

Barbara: Talking about and deciding are two different things.

Dennis: No doubt.

Bob: Yes, and talking about it, and talking about it, and talking about it, you still may not have decided; alright? [Laughter]

Barbara: Been there, too.

Dennis: And that’s close to being a rookie mistake. [Laughter]

Bob: Let’s move on to another one of the rules about marriage you are not going to learn in school. This is for engaged couples. This one comes from The Velveteen Rabbit, Barbara. What is this rule?

Barbara: Well, The Velveteen Rabbit is a children’s story. It’s about a little bunny rabbit that is a new gift to a little boy. It lives in the nursery, and it becomes the little boy’s favorite toy.

At the end of the story, the rabbit has been well-loved. The way that we know that the rabbit has been well-loved is because its—all its fur has been loved off, and one of the button eyes is missing; but it’s still—even though it’s not as cute as it was at the beginning—it’s still the little boy’s favorite toy.

So, that is the illustration that backs up Rule 4, which is: “It takes a real man to be satisfied with and love one woman for a lifetime; and conversely, it takes a real woman to be content with and respect one man for a lifetime.”

Bob: Because we look beat-up, after a few years? [Laughter]

Barbara: That is the truth. We do look beat-up after a few years. [Laughter] And you’ve got to be committed to love and be committed to the relationship because there will be—there will be ups and downs and you will lose some of your button eyes. [Laughter]

Dennis: And well, the culture sends these messages: “Trade her in. Get a better one.”

Bob: Yes.

Dennis: “Trade him in. I mean, you can find a guy who can get it. I mean, this guy is really slow about knowing how to care for your needs.” And that’s not what covenant-keeping love looks like for a lifetime. It’s two imperfect people who don’t give up but who are in the process of learning what it means to truly love another imperfect human being.” And that’s what this is getting at here.

And for most engaged couples, this is a process you start when you go through the engagement. You’re going to find out some things where you need to learn how to love and begin to love them in such a way that you cast the fear out of them.

Bob: You have a habit of quoting famous theologians who aren’t famous theologians. I’ll quote Sir Paul McCartney, who is not a famous theologian; but he said: “Will you still need me? Will you still feed me when I’m 64?” And that’s what—we don’t think about being 64—

Barbara: —when we’re standing at the altar.

Bob: Yes. We don’t imagine the 64-year-old versions of ourselves. If we did, we would probably run away in fright. [Laughter] But that’s a part of what we’re pledging to one another: “When I’m 64, or 74, or 84, I’m still there, and I’ll still need you, and I’ll still feed you.

Dennis: Yes. And it’s enrolling in a lifetime school of love. It’s realizing you are never going to graduate. You’re not going to get out of the school until a lifetime’s walk is over—either by the death of one of the two of you—but it’s that you’re going to take the hard lessons that you learn, and you’re going to grow through them, and you’re going to love the other person, and you’re going to realize, “Sometimes, it’s two steps forward and three backwards,” and you just don’t quit.

And someday, you’ll be like we are. You’ll wake up some morning and go, “Can you believe we have been married for four decades?” I mean, that’s a long time to love one another. But I can tell you this—I really wouldn’t want to start over. I mean, there is so—

Barbara: Absolutely not.

Dennis: —there’s so much of life, of the adventure, of shared experiences—that Barbara and I have enjoyed, over our lifetime and creating a family of six kids—five of whom are now married—19 grandkids, as of today—got some more coming, we think, in the future. But that’s the payoff. That’s the great benefit of not quitting in a relationship.

Bob: Thinking about The Velveteen Rabbit, I had a pastor friend who dared me to tell this joke. So, I’m going to take the dare; okay?

He said that a man and his wife were sitting down at the breakfast table, in their 60’s, one day. The husband said to the wife, “Sweetheart, when we were first married”—he said: “We lived in a dumpy, little apartment. We had a beat up old car.” He said, “But it’s alright because I went to bed every night with a 23-year-old babe.” He said, “Today, we’ve got a beautiful home. We’ve got a nice, new car. I’m going to bed with a 60-year-old woman.” He said, “I don’t think you are holding up your part of the bargain.”

To which the wife said: “Sweetheart, you want to go find yourself a 23-year-old babe to go to bed with? I guarantee you—you will be living in a dumpy, old apartment, driving a beat-up old car.” [Laughter]

There is something about—do you think we could get away with that?

Dennis: I don’t know. We’ll see who writes us on that one. [Laughter]

Bob: But there is something about recognizing: “You know what? We’re going the distance together. We’re going to love one another, in spite of the flaws and the imperfections, because that’s the assignment God has given us.”

Barbara: And it’s worth it.

Bob: Yes.

Dennis: It really is worth it. And I have the same friend you have, and I got the same one—I just want our audience to make note that I didn’t take the challenge. [Laughter]

Bob: You didn’t take the bait, and I did.

Dennis: And Bob did. I read that, and I go, “No! I don’t think so.”

Bob: “I don’t think so.”

Dennis: You know, all kidding aside—I really have a passion for helping engaged couples—those contemplating marriage—start their marriage out with as much as is possible.

Now, it’s not totally possible because we are human beings, we have unrealistic expectations. But helping engaged couples start out with the right set of blueprints—so, when these things start coming at them and life starts piling on, they know how to handle it. They can absorb the shocks of life because they have the biblical blueprints to build their marriage and family from.

And life has a way of throwing some tough circumstances at a couple over your lifetime. It’s not going to be love forever, ever, after with some kind of romantic, warm, fuzzy in your heart for a lifetime. You are going to have some challenging days; and when you do, you have to have the right blueprints—the biblical blueprints—that you share together, as a couple, and a commitment to the One who wrote those blueprints, Jesus Christ.

Samantha: That’s wise counsel from Dennis Rainey, his wife Barbara, and their friend Bob Lepine.

Hey, there’s lots more wisdom for your family and home at BarbaraRainey.substack.com. For only $5 a month you can subscribe to Barbara’s Friends and Family and get the inside scoop on projects Barbara’s working on, along with special articles and letters. Be sure to check it out at BarbaraRainey.substack.com.

Thanks for listening today. Be sure to hit like on this podcast, and pass the word on to others who would appreciate it. And we’ll see you next time for the Barbara Rainey Podcast, from Ever Thine Home.