Lori Foster guest blogged on Michelle Bunofiglio's Romance Buy The Book blog the other day. Lori asked readers what their idea of real romance was. Clearly I had an opinion, and that’s when I realized I had my topic for the week (trust me; I was coming up short on that end). Then Mac posted her topic for the week, and I knew my post was meant to be.

Real Romance - What Is It?

Real romance is different things to different people. Me, I love romance books, I get to vicariously relive that “he loves me, he loves me not” stage of first love. I get to re-experience the sexual tension, the chemistry that occurs when two people who’re first discovering each other in the first throes of “love everlasting.” That fantasy if you will that for a lot of people that eventually fades to become something different. I remember that exciting time. That “falling IN love” feeling as opposed to the "loving someone" feeling. Sometimes I wish my husband and I could have those “falling in love” moments back. However reality bites, and you can’t relive the past, you can only move forward.

We're an Unusual Statistic
My husband and I recently celebrated out 21st wedding anniversary, and this coming Nov 4, we’ll celebrate 25 years since our first date (he was commitment challenged. LOL). In today’s society the two of us are more of a rarity than the norm. On top of that, my siblings have the same track record. There are four kids in my family, and all of us have been married to the same person for 20 plus years (my sis just celebrated 25 yrs, my bro is over 30 yrs). Another phenomenal statistic.

Survival
So what’ the point of this post you’re asking, well, I just wanted to give my definition of what real romance is to me. In the time the DH and I have been together, we’ve survived a lot.

• We’ve lived through my in-laws not liking his choice in wife
• I’ve lost both my parents – both in devastating ways at fairly young ages
• We’ve both lost our grandparents – two of them grandmothers we both idolized.
• We’ve been blessed with two beautiful daughters (spawn of hell we sometimes think until they do something to make us cry with pride)
• We’ve experienced the loss of a child through a miscarriage
• We’ve experienced an almost two year loss of livelihood and the foreclosure of our home until a miracle happened 30 days before.
• We’ve survived arguments about sex, the kids, money, what we’re going to do when, etc.
• We’ve survived car accidents, hospitalizations, bad hair days and bad schools
• We’ve survived Tim “Tool Man” Taylor renovations, where Jill comes in and says, but if you’d done it this way you wouldn’t have that problem.
• We’ve lived through the stress of buying/selling four homes.
• We’re even dealing with a debt load that when compared to the national debt on a graph looks just as huge.

That's not to say that other couples haven't experienced the same things or similar ones, it's just an example of the DH and I have gone through in our time together. Some of these events are enough to drive a lot of people apart and send them into divorce court. For us though, we’ve managed to survive and continue to love each other.

What Really Counts
But the one thing that really counts in all this is that the DH has survived living with me. He’s not gone insane from the stress of it all. He's managed to survive living with a woman who is a know-it-all (although in most cases I really am right and it kills him, just kills him. LOL), demanding, insecure, bipolar, prone to panic attacks when crossing a bridge, an alpha female who protects her young with a snarl that would rival the best lioness and God knows all the other faults I have (and too ashamed to list them).

That’s real romance IMHO. It’s when you can love a person enough to put up with all the harsh things they say. It’s that you can keep on loving that person no matter how angry they make you. It’s waking up beside each other in the morning and having the ability to say, “Honey, I’m sorry, but those onions from last night aren’t mood enhancers.” It’s being able to whine and moan about being too fat, and hearing him say, “Do you hear me complaining?” Which translates to I love you the way you are.

Real romance to me is when I go write because the DH is working the Mr. Mom angle. Real romance is when he acts supportive when I get bad news. He knows I'll simply push him away and say leave me alone because I'm hurting. Yet he keeps coming back like a glutton for punishment. He grabs that stubborn wife and holds on to her no matter how hard she fights until she sobs on his shoulder. Then he says its okay, even when they both know it’s not okay.

Mood Enhancers Aren't the Nitty Gritty
While the romantic notion of roses, candlelight dinners, being swept off my feet is wonderful, those aren’t the things that really define romance, those are mood enhancers. For me, surviving the realities of life with all its pain and joy, yet still waking up in the morning knowing you wouldn’t want anyone else to share the doldrums with is real romance. So, honey if you’re reading this…I’m a lucky woman, and I don’t tell you enough or show you enough how much I love you. Thank you for loving me in spite of me being me.

Monica