It was a warm summer night and we were headed to the funniest Shakespeare show and a dinner. We couldn’t wait! We don’t have many overnight date nights, so we were thrilled when my parents offered to take the girls for a sleepover. As we were driving to my parents’ to drop off the girls, Luke (my loving husband) said something that hurt me deeply (that I couldn’t express) and our beautiful dinner and a show turned into a full on fight.

It’s actually embarrassing to think of it now, but sitting outside on the restaurant patio with burgers and wings, our conversation began to elevate to higher volumes. Luke recalls people looking over at us wondering what in the world was happening. It wasn’t our greatest moment.

Let’s start off honestly- grief, hardship of any kind, can be a marriage killer. We saw that first hand after our most recent miscarriage. Five months earlier to that dinner fail, we clung together, and I leaned on him for emotional, mental, spiritual, and physical strength. The troubles brought us closer together- until it didn’t.

Our individual healing journeys happened in random ways. It was almost like someone was stretching a rubber band and when I’d go one way, he’d go another. We both began pouring our hearts into our work and projects trying to process the loss of the twins.

Maybe a miscarriage hasn’t been part of your journey, but maybe it’s been a job loss or difficult financial situation. Maybe there’s been a significant health challenge for either you or kids. Growing together is always the goal, but when growing starts to separate a couple, how do they cling together?

Two years after our miscarriage, we’re still figuring it out. Each year the healing gets deeper and feels more complete, but it wasn’t without its tears and fights. The first year of healing was hard and counseling helped (individually). As I look back at our healing journey, I’ve noticed four basic foundations we’ve clung to help and I hope these help you.

Play Together: Do you and your spouse play together? I watch my girls interact with each other and their friends, and playing is integral into their relationships. Using their imaginations, teamwork, exploring ideas, and getting lost in each other’s company creates a safe space for eventual deep heart level conversations. While Luke spent many nights listening to my weeping and trying to understand my pain, those couldn’t be the only memories we had. We got to have a weekend away shortly after the miscarriage, but honestly, I wept the whole time. I finally had the space to let all my feelings to be free. He never said anything, and just held my hand.

Two years later, we got to have another overnight away in NYC going to see one of our favorite artists. Luke found him on a reel and our family has loved Fulton Lee ever since. When Fulton Lee announced a tour stop in NYC, we got tickets and used points to stay over. With one minor hiccup, we had the best time. We love walking around the city and exploring a museum. Food was also incredible (my husband’s love language is food so it was bound to be great). We danced the night away at the concert. We needed the space to just laugh, love, and have fun.

We’ve sought other ways to have fun. Sometimes he joins me on my projects (have you heard the podcast episodes he’s done??). We’re reading more. We love watching All Creatures Great and Small together. We’re superhero movie people. Each year we’ve been adding something new to what we do together (and things that are cost effective and don’t always require a babysitter).

Just as for kids, playing together helps build new memories and puts more deposits into your relationship bank. Grief and troubles deplete whatever reserves you had and there needs to be times of just lightheartedness. Luke is much better at this than I am. He loves to be silly and I have needed his silliness to break my stoicism.

Pray together– I don’t know how to stress the importance of this. For deep intimacy, prayer has got to be the foundation. There is something powerful about connecting with each other through prayer because of the Holy Spirit. He does something in both of us uniting our hearts deeper. Sometimes we’re praising, lamenting, or confessing as we lift our eyes up to the One on the throne. Our minds and spirits are more united because during our time of prayer, we’re able to take our eyes off of our needs and wants and truly be reoriented to the bigger picture.

Ever since the dinner and show disaster, we’ve started praying over our dates. Even in NYC, there was a hiccup that we both joked how we should have “prayed more” over our getaway. I have asked friends to pray over our date nights and it’s incredible to watch the difference in our attitudes. I can sense when the Holy Spirit is helping fight for us to not get sidetracked by lesser things.

Learning how to pray together is very awkward especially if it isn’t something you’ve built the rhythm of in your marriage. We are still figuring it out. Prayer is incredibly vulnerable and depending on where we are in our relationship journey, it can seem fake and forced. If I could encourage you with anything, keep praying at the same time every day no matter what. For us, it’s before bed. It can still be awkward, but the reward of spiritual intimacy is truly bearing great fruit now.

Prayer ties our hearts, souls, and bodies together more intimately and cannot be neglected especially when we’re recovering from dark times.

Serve together– Similar to playing together, serving binds us together in purpose. Some of my closest friendships came from serving with them simply because our hearts beat similarly for the people we cared for. Luke and I met on a mission trip in 2014 and for us, our roots are in caring for others and sharing the hope of the Gospel. We knew that when we got married, we wanted to be a missional minded family.

In 2024, we had the opportunity to go to Ghana to serve Touch a Life an organization that builds into the lives of kids who have been rescued from labor trafficking, living on the streets, or other abusive/neglected situations. Our trip was a year and a half after losing the twins, and it marked a different healing step for us.

We were taken away from our every day to love and care for others who truly had a fire and joy we needed to see. Kids who were given a new life despite circumstances I could never fathom, empowered us to see our sorrow with new eyes. We knew that God could do something with our story.

Build a “Team Smith” Mentality– Good friends of ours refers to themselves as Team Brown. I love it! The couple and the kids together are the team and everything filters through that: chores, goals, meals, leisure activities, serving, etc. When Luke and I are encouraging our girls to clean the basement we will constantly say, “we clean as a team!” We’re in this together through thick and thin.

In our darkest days, Luke (who is an LPC) constantly referred to the Four Horsemen of the Divorce Apocalypse: criticism, contempt, defensiveness, and stonewalling. He’d start listing them off as he saw us stonewalling each other or becoming highly critical instead of staying curious in our conversations. Counseling became important through this time. We each received our own counseling which helped us process our frustrations before coming together.

Using the “Team Smith” and high-fiving each other has truly changed how we approached many hard conversations including budget meetings, family frustrations, calendar conflicts, and even weekly meal ideas. We’ve had to remember that we are a team first and we will either sink or swim- together.

The Team mentality has also reminded us that our decisions not only impact us, but our girls. We don’t want them to become collateral damage to our pride and stubbornness. Part of fighting for Team Smith has gone back to prayer. When we’ve hit a blockade and not sure how to proceed, prayer has always led to our breakthroughs even if it took months to get to.

Looking at your situation, which of these four would be a great starting point for your marriage? Do you need to reconnect through play? Is there something you’d both try that you haven’t done before?

Do you and your spouse pray together? Are you both attending church together and investing in meaningful relationships? Is there a small group you could join? What about finding a Bible study and doing it just the two of you? You’ll never regret building into the spiritual aspects of your relationship.

Have you tried serving together? Is there a local outreach through your church or a passion project you’d want to support? Have you been on a mission trip to be taken away from your every day realities?

Building your “Team ______” mantras will unify your whole family. It does sound awkward as you begin, but anything worth doing is going to be awkward for a little. Watch the ripple effect in not only your spouse, but even with your own kids.

Your story isn’t over. Your marriage isn’t over. Seek help as necessary, and rebuild.