I never thought we'd grow old together.

Everyone knows how the story goes. Boy meets girl, girl meets boy, they fall in love and spend the rest of their lives as they are, free to enjoy each other as their prime selves, unchanged.

When I met my husband we were both young, practically children. He was a local boy, working as a bartender across the street from the university I attended. I remember he had this affable glow around him, friends with everyone who walked through the door, never let a bad night get him down. I thought it was a ploy to get better tips. Then he talked to me.

It was a slow night. A day or so before spring break, most of my friends had already bailed after their last final. I was one of two people in the bar. He served me a whiskey sour, on the house, and we got to talking. I'd never loved the sound of someone's voice so much. We talked about everything. Our friends, our childhoods, our plans for the future. I wanted to be a doctor, he wanted to take over and possibly expand the family bar. Before we knew it, it was 3am and he was closing up the bar before following me back to my dorm room for the night.

I was supposed to spring break at a beach house owned my roommate's uncle. Instead, I spent the next two weeks in his apartment, more naked than clothed.

Two years later, we were married.

It was a small ceremony, only ten people came. We celebrated by drinking and dancing in the very bar we met in. I'd never been happier.

Those first few years of marriage were mostly bliss. Medical school wasn't easy, he was butting heads with his father at the bar but we had each other. We had our own place and we were completely in love. Neither of us aged a bit.

Things got a little tough when I started my residency. He worked days, I worked days and nights. We did it our best to make time for one another but it wasn't easy. Some days it felt like I was roommates with a ghost that liked to leave sweet post-it notes on the walls. I love you. Have a good day at work. Those nurses are bitches. Seems stupid now but those little notes were all that got me through the day sometimes. And of course, I put in effort too. Stopping by the bar after work even when I was exhausted. Perking myself up for date nights even when my feet were killing me. It was worth it to make him happy. It was hard but we loved each other, you could tell by the lack of wrinkles.

The pregnancy was where things really went awry. I remember the two of us pacing around each other in the apartment, waiting for the timer in the bathroom to ring. I was floored when I saw the plus sign. What kind of a doctor gets pregnant on accident? He couldn't keep the smile off his face though. "Would it really be so bad?" he asked. "Having a little person around this place, with a little of me and a little of you in them?" Then I couldn't keep the smile off my face.

Well at least for a little while. Then he said those eight fatal words...

"When do you think you'll quit your job?"

We had the biggest fight of our entire relationship. Tears shed, accusations thrown, doors slammed (by me). He was insistent. I couldn't be a resident and pregnant mother. It was too much work, too much stress. He was worried that it would be too much for me and the baby. I was worried that he was being a complete asshole, trying to keep me literally barefoot and pregnant in the apartment while all my dreams for the future flew out the window.

I spent two days at my mother's house. She told me not to be stubborn and pigheaded. He begged my forgiveness so I decided to come home. After a long, much calmer talk, he agreed that my working was for the best, someone had to pay off my student loans after all. I suppose you could say I won that fight.

But it was hard to feel that way when later that night, as I ran a comb over my scalp, I noticed one single strand of gray hair.

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