In Sickness and For Worse

My husband is home sick today. It seems like he may be coming down with whatever I had last week, poor guy. I've been thinking about him alot lately, as our thirteenth anniversary approaches. About how he really didn't get what he bargained for when he married me. When we said our vows, I was 25, healthy, and making more money than he was, at a profession that I expected to pursue until retirement age, with the sky as the limit on advancement and salary potential. Within a couple of years, I had my accident, and all that changed forever. So, from that, came this:


IN SICKNESS AND FOR WORSE

The bride in the wedding pictures is tall and slender,
Her face accustomed to smiles and laughter and the occasional smirk.
She said her vows in a cloud of happiness, unable to believe
She could really be lucky enough to marry her best friend.

The wife holding the photo album is thirteen years older
Than the beaming bride, but she is ancient in the ways
Of pain and misfortune, and the dashing of dreams,
Her frame stooped and crooked under the weight of her sorrows.

She could never have imagined that, only two years married,
She would meet with near disaster, to be marked forevermore
By disability and despair, or that her beloved husband would be condemned
To live so much in the land of in sickness and for worse...

Every day I wish I could go back to being who I was before the accident. It'll never happen, and nearly eleven years later, I still haven't found a way to accept that. I'm still so busy mourning my old life, that I forget to live the life I have now. I'm working on changing that, but it's slow going...