Bubba   |  Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Tags: Family

RE: Marriage - Toothpaste

Today I am going to discuss something that often gets overlooked in marriages, and I think it’s high time we discussed it here on the blog. What is it?

Toothpaste.

It’s true. This may very well be one of the most important blog posts you ever read (about tothpaste). When Cindy and I started out, we lived in a small apartment with only one bathroom. We learned quickly that sharing was going to be key in such a small space, and we embraced our new adventure with excitement and joy. Except when it came to the tube of toothpaste.

You see, Cindy was (and still is) a middle-squeezer, and I remain a bottom of the tube squeezer. Of course, I didn’t find out about this atrocity until after we were hitched, but I thought it was something I could live with…

I was wrong.

It didn’t take long for her careless middle-squeezing to become like a thorn in my flesh. I couldn’t get over it. You might think that sounds a bit petty, but I assure you, it was a big deal at the time. I mean, was she squeezing the middle of the tube to intentionally get under my skin?

I expressed my concerns with her toothpaste behaviors over and over again, but no amount of begging, pleading or selfless instruction on “how to properly squeeze toothpaste” was getting through to her.

I had married a middle-squeezer, and there was nothing I could do about it.

So, how did I get over it? Did I convert to middle-squeezing? Don’t be ridiculous. You want to know one of the greatest things I have done to protect my marriage over the past 37 years?

I bought Cindy her very own tube of toothpaste. Since then, we haven’t had a single argument about her obvious misuse of the tube. There are other issues we continue to work through and pray about every day, but not toothpaste. No way.

What are some of the “toothpaste tubes” in your relationships? How can you learn from these things and learn to grow together through them?

Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. Ephesians 5: 25-28