The Boy Friend or Snakes ???

[JLC]

I'll chime in here, and maybe be a voice of reason AND experience. I've been around a long time. I've been married a long time. I've had snakes for almost a long time.

I will start with this caveat...my husband came before any snakes or reptiles. When we got married, all I wanted was a kitty cat. We ended up with two. And now we can't have any (due to weird complications with his military career). I love cats SO much. But I can't have them if I stay married to him. And I'll tell you this...I can NOT imagine any life in which I would choose a cat (or any animal) over this husband.

He also really doesn't like the snakes I have. But over the years, through a variety of those sorts of circumstances that change us and grow us...I've discovered the passion I have for reptiles...snakes and tortoises in particular, but really just about anything. I love animals, and I've devoted a tremendous amount of my time, energy and efforts into helping people learn how to take care of them properly. He realizes this is a real passion for me, and the desire to own some of my own is more than just a childish "want". It's taken a LOT of work and effort and COMMUNICATION between the two of us...and COMPROMISE...for us to reach a place in our relationship where I can have a few animals without making his life any more stressful and unpleasant than his very demanding job already makes it. It was WORTH it to me to work on that and build that into our relationship and reach that compromise with him. And it's a still-growing process, and we are ever working on balancing my needs for more critters with his need for a peaceful, quiet, odor-free home. But he's also proud of me. Proud of all I've accomplished here at BP.net, proud of my work at TRR. He even enjoys being the man with the wife who keeps snakes, and doesn't hesitate to share that little tidbit with his peers.

Is it worth the effort to reach this compromise? Hell yes. Because I love and respect myself enough to understand that my own needs should be met...AND I love him beyond measure and want HIS needs to be met as well.

My summation: If you can't love a person deeply and widely enough to be concerned about THEIR needs and hold their needs in equal measure with your own, then maybe they aren't the right person for you. How sad to go through life with a "significant other" that falls below the animals on a scale of priorities. Where things are in YOUR life, only you can know.