Love is a Choice....Not a Feeling

A few weeks ago at church, the priest made an interesting statement during his homily. I found it intriguing at the time, but in the weeks that followed my life underwent several dramatic shifts and caused his words to assume an even greater significance and meaning for me.

He said that “Love is a choice, not a decision.”  His point was that love, be it Christ’s love or any other kind, is an act of will…..a conscious choice. It does not sprout up spontaneously; it must be practiced.

Logically speaking, this seems to make sense. But when you are faced with major decisions and challenges in your life concerning those people you think you love, those are the moments of truth where you realize whether your love for them is based purely on emotions or on a resounding choice of devotion.

Just as the sun was beginning to drift lower into the sky on the evening of May 16, my boyfriend of over 8 years got down on one knee and asked me to marry him. He proposed on the field at Carroll College, which is where we first met. Being proposed to is that moment that most girls dream about their whole lives. And even though we have been together for nearly a decade, it was still one of the most shocking moments of my life. I said “yes” almost instantly, but my decision to marry him is one that has taken nearly every single day of our 8 years together to reach.

I am someone who loves quickly and fully. But my loves are often rooted deeply in emotional aspects. You need far more than lovey dovey emotions in order to make a marriage with another person last, however. It wasn’t long into our relationship that I realized I loved him in the emotional sense.  But it took me years to realize that Andy was the best person for me and that we had what it would take to make a marriage last. I had to CHOOSE to love him every single day, through good times and bad, and to do what was necessary to keep our relationship together. I had already made my choice to love him and when he asked me to marry him, the “yes” I responded back with affirmed that choice----not only to marry him, but to love him.

Eight days after Andy proposed, I found myself hunched over in a chair in a hospital room waiting for results to come back from an MRI the doctors ordered for him. He had woke up that morning with double vision and the fear in his face told me something was seriously wrong and he needed medical attention. After what felt like an eternity, the doctor came back in and told us we needed to see a neurologist soon because something was definitely not right. As ashamed as I feel to admit it, my engagement ring felt like a lead weight on my finger in that moment knowing that no matter what would come to pass, I had chosen to love Andy for life and that meant loving him through anything.

Two weeks later, after making countless phone calls to schedule appointments, spending hours sitting in doctor’s offices, and watching Andy endure a second MRI, blood work, and steroid infusions, we had a diagnosis. The doctor’s determined that he had Multiple Sclerosis (MS). It is a chronic illness for which there is not yet a cure. It is a highly manageable illness with newer and more effective treatments being developed constantly. The diagnosis is upsetting but we are positive and are determined to make this a part of our lives rather than letting it define our lives.

It makes me angry that I don’t get to enter into our nuptuals with the same kind of “happily ever after” and blissfully unaware glow that so many people have. But I feel so incredibly fortunate that I get to enter into the sacrament of marriage prepared and aware that love is not a feeling. It is a choice. It’s a choice you have to make every day. Emotions are easy to have. Life altering choices are not so easy. That awareness is how I know our marriage will survive things others won’t and that we’ll find a way to smile at the end of days where others would have nothing but tears.

I was nothing but positive when it was first suggested to us that he might have MS because I knew all the way through to my bones that God had prepared me well for this trial. The burden of this illness falls just as much on me, as Andy’s future spouse, as it does on him. But it’s a challenge I know I can take on. It has taken me most of my life to learn that God does not deliver the hardest battles and the heaviest crosses to bear to those who deserve them. He gives them to those he knows can handle it. It is a blessing from God really to have challenges befall you. It is something to get down on your knees and thank God for. Because it means that He has more faith in you than others.  It means He knows you will rise back up after falling when others would stay knocked down. On more than one occasion in the past few weeks I have turned my eyes skyward and thanked God for all the times life tried to break me because without them, I wouldn’t have the strength to carry out my choice to love Andy through better and worse….in sickness and health.  

So to this and all that life will bring us in the days ahead, we are ready! And we intend on taking it all on side by side and with smiles of hope on our faces.